#god i could go at length at how good the way the show addresses cultural issues in the early series is and how it exascerbates the big issue

[this-should-do]

rewatching walking dead, amd gnawing at the bars of my cage at how much daryl trys to be a good person so early, like the second his brother is gone for an extended period of time we immediately see him get less mean less aggressive, and watching him get kinder and kinder with slightly more tact in how he treats others and the underlying bigotry leaving his vocabulary so damn fast with how he treat glenn and theodore and how much he wants to help sophia and how he mirrors his life experience with hers and does everything he can to prevent her having the same sad ending to her story, and he only backtracks as he gets upset with himself for failing at doing that, hes a genuinely kind person but its so hard for him to express that kindness gently and he clams up and gets aggressive woth others when he feels like he fucked up becuz thats the way hes learned to be or when his brither comes back in hallucinations or real life and watching daryl mimick his brother amd his attitudes once that bad influence is back just grgrgrgrhrgrgrggrgr

[starshipsofstarlord]

Okay rockstars, settle down

rockstar!bucky barnes x assistant!reader x rockstar!loki laufeyson / masterlist

summary; having previously worked for loki, it causes a heat to burn within bucky’s already accumulated hate towards the musician / warnings; threesome, smut, mxf and mxm sex, mentions of sex with other characters, oral sex (male and female receiving), creampie, unprotected sex, double penetration, degradation, swearing, orgasm denial, cum eating

“Can’t believe you worked for that wanker.” Snarked Bucky as an image of the well known, musically spread, and acoustically acclaimed, Loki Laufeyson was shown on the screen of the dressing room television, as the other artist stretched his clothing bare arms across the back of the couch. “Come here sweet cheeks.”

At his command, you dismissed the paper work for a moment, trailing over and straddling the inked hunk’s chain belted lap, digging your manicured set of nails into his shoulders, as you seated yourself over his crotch. “I’m happy I work for you now Buck, you treat me so good.”

Punctuating your words, you pressed your teeth into your bottom lip, giving it the appearance of being more plump, as you batted your dark eyelashes up at your employer. “I do, don’t I?” He rhetorically asked, skimming his fingers across the length of your arms, before moving them to sloppily cup your jaw, ensuring that you would not look away from his wild and dilated pupils. “Tell me what I do better than the lead singer of the god of mischief.”

At his words, a small yet peaceful contortion of uncomfortableness split a skin grafted line through the centre of your forehead, stating that you had no wish to do so. And thus, as punishment for your self aversive silence, Barnes braced his knuckles into your skin, causing you to keen out, and tap his shoulders in verification for surrender.

In turn, you lowered your hands, dragging the tips of your nails, absentmindedly running them down the expanse of his waxed chest, conveniently passing the silver hoops that were attached to his nipples on the trail to a less dominant ground. “I prefer the way that your songs have a heavier bass and-“

“Uh uh uh, not the music. Think of something that has you, let’s say, screaming, but definitely not in a crowd. Though, we may have to try that one sometime; show the world how hungry you are to assist me.”

“You, James Bucky Barnes,” he loosened his grip to your relief, which lead to you hugging in spite, “are the best fuck I have ever endured. Loki has nothing on you, he deems himself a god of the arts, but he doesn’t see how you paint me so perfectly with your cum, nor how you bend my body to your whim, as though I am a tool in the midst of your creations, useful, but disposable.”

“I like the sound of that doll. Disposable, now that really does you make you sound like my personal cum dump.”

“That’s was certainly interesting to listen to...”that voice had your body jolting in shock, and it appeared that Bucky too was surprised by the presence, though, he steadied his well versed hands on your hips, claiming you to the intimate spot.

“What the fuck are you doing in my dressing room you greasy haired weasel?” Bucky sneered, his nose turning up at the sight alone of his competition in the lyrical world. Loki, he had graced you with his presence, and you had to look away; he admittedly looked good.

His shirt was open chested, leaving you with the memorable impression of all the times that you had left crescent marks upon that particular surface, a few times you had even drawn blood, but that had only fuelled his mission to fuck you into a propeller of urgency.

“Our new album Laufey has just been released, I can confirm my dear, you shoulda stayed around and knelt in our success. The records are certainly going to have more sales than what was it called again? Ah yes, the red star. I could tell it was about this one, so much passion, a sultry tune, that did little to justify what it means to be with her.”

Loki’s hands waved around as he spoke, and you could only picture the past whence he penetrated your with those long and talented fingers of his. He had drawn orgasm after orgasm out of you, resulting you to be nothing more than a withering mess, as he digressed the option to simply stop. There was nothing simple about him, nor the time that he demanded that he shared you with his brother.

That thought alone had you mindlessly grinding upon Bucky’s covered cock, plucking at your lip with the keys of your teeth, though Bucky’s voice brought you back to reality, causing you to pause your movements embarrassingly, venting a clear out of your head to process the situation that was before you. The two were bickering like two teenage girls, and it was quite exhausting to listen to.

“Answer the question trickster, else I’ll have you fed to the infamous black panther, and let’s just say that he is the best bodyguard I have ever hired. So, are you going to speak, or will I have you dragged out of here like a damned serpent with a noose around its neck?” Bucky threatened, gritting his teeth together, his nose straining in frustration, drawing more attention to the small stud on the right side of his nose.

“Looks like she needs me Barnes, perhaps your reputation does not proceed you. But to answer in full, my band have made quite the rise, and I thought it would be... fitting to pay you a visit. Though I had no idea that this wonderful woman would be here, pining on your lap like some feline in heat. I see she’s fucking you now, after all my suspicions are never wrong. Or we’ll, Heimdall’s train of thought always ends up at the right station.”

“Can the pair of you stop, for one goddamn minute!” Your hands obscured a path into your hair, as you glared back and forth between the pair of rival rockstars. “I am here, dammit! Stop talking about me as though I am not here, a part of me wishes that I wasn’t so I didn’t have to listen to your bitching.”

Without any thought, you clambered from your perch on Bucky’s lap, walking towards the raven haired gentleman, pointing your finger in his face as you accused him. “You’ve got your point across, but I’ll tell you something. If you don’t leave, Heimdall will see me putting my foot up your ass.”

“Does she speak to you like this Barnes? I thought she had loosened up in more ways than one when I allowed Thor to stretch her cunt, but it appears that that mouth of hers has gotten a little out of hand also. You should do something about that, or else you’ll lose her to someone else like a did. Who knows, could be Romanoff, heard she has a thing for brats.”

Natasha Romanoff, a diverse woman in her ways and songs. She was the queen of the rock culture, tormenting her workers with her verbal abuse and it would undoubtedly be no different for her assistant. If you were to be under her employment, it was certain that you would not get out alive, nor work for another talented person for the rest of your life. To cross her, was a vow to sign your own death certificate, it was plain stupidity, yet people still hustled with her and her limits, resulting in their chances of ever getting hired for any job, vastly slim to none.

At the lack of defence that Bucky provided you, you felt small, your shoulders slacked as you were tortured with Loki’s cold and silky gaze, more so when the man stood up, pressing his bare chest against your back. You could feel the rings that hung off the buds that adorned his chest coil and dig into your back, shrouding your demeanour substantially.

A part of you wanted nothing more than for Bucky to abuse Loki’s face with his fist, specifically the right, since it was the bearer to a chunky silver ring. It’d leave quite the print, however, the unexpected unravelled as his enquiring tone was aimed not at you, but Loki instead.

“You let your brother fuck her, hmm. Maybe she should learn her manners by being shared, that way her retrospective spattering of bullshit may be contained, to a limit of course.” It was unbelievably, you could not believe that Bucky was conferring with the enemy! And not only that, they were talking about experiences of having you literally become speechless from their unprofessional administrations upon your body. “I’d get T’Challa in here, but I know she’s already fucked him. Can’t quite fire him for it though, because who could ever say no to those pretty eyes, and that mouth, god, it is definitely one of her most persuasive attributes.”

“Bu-“ you didn’t even get to finish imploring his name off your lips, about to defend yourself and your previous actions, though, you were interrupted, starved from the opportunity of coming up with an explanation.

“No.” Loki told you, the roles now reversed as he was the one with his index finger aimed at you. He tapped your nose with it, as he began to pace in the room, his wild locks remaining in their place as he spun, before facing Bucky, a sly tranquility of a truce veining out from the pools of his evergreen orbs. “You don’t speak a word to me y/n, not whilst I’m having a conversation with James here.”

James. It was too far a polite way for him to address your boss. They were all hot and ready to tear out each other’s throats a moment ago, and now here they were, having a silent conversation without your inclusion. It had you reeling your mind as to why, until Bucky gathered your hair in his hand to the side, sliding you y/h/c locks over your shoulder, and finally deemed it acceptable for you to hear his voice.

Though, he still was not directing his tensive words in your direction. “Since you had dealt with this subordinate behaviour from her, perhaps you’d like to join us; help me train her to become more...” His breath fanned your the top of your ear, making your skin crawl by not only his warm and inviting breath, but also the offer that he had supposed to the other man.

“Obedient?” Loki asked in turn of his wispy ended offer of optimism, his leather, sharp tipped boots taking a prominent, heart clenching step towards you. He reached his finger out, grasping a loose strand that had fallen out of Bucky’s grip and before your face, tugging lightly on it, as his lips came dangerously close to your own. “Rules aren’t your forfeit, are they my dear? The best assistant I ever hired, with all those unique ideas floating around in that independent head of yours, but you’ve always been troublesome. I remember the time that you bit my cock that day you had attitude. I reckon Bucky here could do a better job.”

“Then why doesn’t he?” You hissed as said man tugged on his handful of your hair, instantly making you regret your phrase in the moment. To a halting surprise however, Bucky released you, lightly shoving you to cause you to fumble forwards, and away from him.

“Maybe I will.” He dared, earning a nod from Loki, whom seductively began to unzip his loose trousers, as Bucky descended to the ground, his hands running up his rival’s thighs, as the material dropped around Loki’s ankles. It would seem, that he had gone commando, and as Bucky grasped Loki’s shaft, you felt a pull in your chest inherently demanding that you play some part in this fornication.

“Wait.” Your hand shot out, as though you had some force to stop them from continuing with their war path to exact all of their developed spit onto you. “What about me?” You were ss

“Oh no doll, you are not pulling any strings here, if you wanna do something useful, come here and warm my cock, you can watch me blow your old associate.” A slither of a whimper fell from your lips, it wasn’t exactly what you were prying towards, but you sure as hell were not going to refuse the contact that Bucky was obliged to give you.

Thus you wandered towards him, your pinkies curling around one another, as you sashayed to the ground beside him, watching as he paid Loki no mind for a moment, ruthlessly in a desperation fuelled motion, unbuckled his thick belt, and shoved the material of his leather trousers to be held accountable against his lower thighs, just above his tense knees.

He too, as their exteriors supposed, had forgone the extra layer that kept his cock tucked away, though it was exposed as he tugged those tight trousers down, and the sight of both his and Loki’s cocks bobbing in the same vicinity had you close to quivering.

It was somewhat of a dream portrayed in the viscous space of reality, the two men half undressed in then proximity of yourself, it was something that you had always imagined, even before you had left Loki’s side, and opted to work for Bucky, but the idea was definitely short lived. They hated each other, but apparently they were willing to put all their issues aside to prohibit you from freely running your mouth.

Bucky’s cock twitched as he patted his own thigh, ordering you without the aid of his voice to commence it as a servant’s throne, or in your case, a stool for you to rest on as he tended to intimate needs of the man that you had once worked for. Finally, with the decision of better judgement, you allowed your grey jumper dress to slide down your body, leaving you nude, and the aspect of the two men’s unforgiving and locked gazes.

“No underwear, and you wonder why your men have no difficulty in her allowing them to fuck her.” Bucky took ahold of his cock, squeezing his cock with one hand, whilst his other aided you in sitting on his muscular legs, as he lightly growled up at the opposing rockstar.

From the stiff grip that Bucky affirmed around his sceptre, Loki gasped, his pale lips instantly shutting once the sound wantonly abandoned him. The last thing that he wanted was for Bucky to see him in vulnerable poise, though with that said, it’d be rather difficult considering the smutty circumstances.

Bucky took Loki’s long, alabaster prick into his mouth, starting from the primrose tip and descending down, reciprocating the action that you did yourself as you sheathed yourself onto his cock, but instead with his lips. A grunt rendered along Loki’s length as the man bit back a whimper, the vibrations running through his veins like a transpiring pulse of sorcery.

Bucky opted for bobbing his head, as you endured the liberation of his very slightly gyrating movement inside of you. Though, despite him being almost completely still and leaving you full to the brim with his thick length, his balls resting against the partition where he was delved into you, you remained transfixed.

The motion image, recording first hand through your own eyes, of him blowing Loki was sinful, but you were drawn to it. If that made you a sinner, one endorsed by the graphic scene, licking your lips from the sight of Bucky running his studded tongue up the length of Loki, dipping the ball of silver metal into his slit, then so be it.

Your heart raced as you were met with an opportunity. A globe of saliva, strung by the lapping muscle of Bucky’s tongue dropped down; you practically saw its fall in slow motion. It was done before you could register your actions, you had leant forwards, catching the trickle of spit in your mouth, thinking not for a moment as you gulped the subjective liquid down.

Bucky’s pace increased, he gagged lightly as he jolted him further down his throat. Loki hummed, harshly grabbing Bucky’s dark brunette locks, biting his lip as he reimagined your little catch. It had him feeling close, and just as he was about to finish, precum furiously pooling out of his tip, Bucky pulled back, a smirk marking his features.

“You’re not cumming in my mouth, I don’t mind sucking dick, nor swallowing, but I have to practically listen to you jizz over your own talent, and prowl over my girl.” The name he labelled you with had your heart fluttering, but not nearly as much as when he lightly pulled out of you, infuriating you with the lack of any pleasurable esteem. “Don’t you worry babes, you can finish with me inside of you, like always.”

That used to be him, Loki thought with a brewing rage in his chest. Though he instead shrugged out of his dull patterned striped shirt that was already loose on his shoulders. The fabric hit the floor, leaving all of you barren to the subject of nudity.

“Always doesn’t suppose the past Barnes.” Loki stated, referring to all the various times that he had found refuge in your spongey walls, you willingly clenching around him, and pleading for him to hit a deeper spot within you. “And I do not prowl, I don’t need to. The evidence is there between her legs, coiling in juices surrounding her ever so willing folds, that are prepared to endure the harshest of penetrations.”

“What are you trying to do, write a fucking song about this?” Scoffed Bucky, rolling his crystallised orbs at the guts that this man had. If he so much as wanted to, he could stop this passage into a three way all together, but he did not, at least he had yet to. He was enjoying the way that you were squirming to yourself, thinking that he didn’t notice, squeezing the sides of your thighs together in an aroused matrimony.

“A fucking song would’ve the correct term - literally.” Was the affirmed words of Loki, as he shoved Bucky to be sat beside you, tilting his messy brush of crazed hair, his untrustworthy eyes drifting to you. “Who’d you want to fuck you, you fangirling slut?”

It was truthfully a difficult decision. “Both.” You admitted, your bones jumping as Bucky pinched one of your erect nipples, continuing to hold a sturdy clasp of his pads around the sensitive flesh; you couldn’t jut choose one of them. Not when they were both in such close range, bore in nothing more than their birthdays suits, talking about your quivering and diversely accepting cunt.

They knew that you couldn’t possibly refuse one or the other. You were vastly too hungry to be filled like you had never been before, shagged by two of three most well known artists in the industry, earnestly and mindlessly earning yourself a title within the circle of uptight yet simultaneously chill performers.

Perhaps, if Bucky we to ever potentially fire you, there would be another pursuer for your articulating talents on standby, awaiting for the moment that you walked out of his complex door to swoop you up as though they were a predatory falcon, flying off into a stationed sunset, those around seeing you as nothing more than a shadow of the ambient orb, but the one who had employed you finding you to be a sufficing inspiration.

Large hands swallows your hips, firmly controlling their angle as they grasped you in their strong, almost super human hold, lifting you so that you were tentatively tucked in a reverse cowgirl position on Bucky’s lap. It was the third time that you had been this close to him, it would almost be intimate, if your legs weren’t strewn in an open, all revealing splay, so that Loki could see your boss tease his tip around your entrance before sliding you down his length, extracting a strong wail from your churning throat.

Your own hand resented down, applying swirls of pressure down on your clit; it appeared that they were willing you to continue without interruption. Bucky lightly, despite the power that he was promoted to in this position, began to bounce you on his shaft, spewing small mewls out from your agape mouth.

Fisting his cock, Loki approached, Bucky reachin this seen hands down to spread te lips of your pussy, so that the other man was guaranteed a crude glimpse of you being stufffed. Though, you weren’t quite filled enough, for Bucky raised a brow and prompted Loki to allow himself to be pulled closer by your axed and whining aura.

He brushed his tip languidly against your buzzing clit, dragging through your slick and jab i at your delicate fingers before probing at the base of Bucky’s cock, and pushing inside, right along his rival’s length, the pair moaning out in a pleasured union. On the other and, you had tears falling from the crescents of your eyes, the stretch so much that it was a blistering pain to your cunt.

“Don’t go all meek dear, you and i both know this is far from the first instance where you’ve had more than one cock in this nasty, betraying cunt of yours.” Loki taunted, gripping the vulnerable expanse of your throat from behind, his icy glazed skin sending provocative shivers down your spine, making your pussy pulse from the chill that ran through your body.

And then, i a split instant, both cocks began to piston into your walls, as though you were nothing more than a rag doll, meant o be thrown around and handled in a disorderly fashion. They ere ruthless, groaning out symphonies in the cursive air around you, as your walls engulfed their pricks more than snugly.

You felt so wide down there, they were taking a pirating toll on your body stealing every breath that dared wither from your lips, tweezing their nimble fingered around various parts of your body, all in due retrospect or coerce you into fucking them back, making all actions in the mass of bodies a mutual effort.

Loki lowered his head down meeting Bucky for a sloppy, brash kiss. It was clear they were simply doing that part to fulfil a greedy desire in your stomach, but you were not one that minded. It was, like the rest of their frenzy of collaborations, a competitive mess. They nipped harshly at each other’s lips, ravenously all in the meanwhile ploughing your body with their har girths.

“Fuck, that’s hot.” Your tongue dribbled, earning satisfied, lust induced smirks from both parties that were currently penetrating you, making you writhe harder against their lengths a new flow of moisture weeping out from your hole, lubricating their movements further, it encouraging them to do nothing more than continue what they were doing, despite their better judgements.

The truth was, they were rockstars. They had no better judgement, which is why everyone like them needed someone like you. Their thought were clouded with one mission, and for once in their spent lifetimes, it was not to beat the others, at least not to a certain extent anyways. It was their assignment, delivered by their own hands, to bring you to the edge, and that’s physically what they reformed to do.

One of them were groping your nipples, whilst the other confined the same treatment to your ass cheeks. Loki found your Rocky enables of positive feedback to be icicles and they were beautiful, he stared at them, as though they were divine ploys extracted from the mythical kingdom of Jotunheim, their residence in the realm to be the peacemakers of all bountiful creatures, much like himself and Barnes.

A rich euphoric groan exuberated from Bucky as he allowed himself to spoil, but he tutted whence he watched Loki’s features suppose that he was to follow shortly behind. “Not inside of her.” Bucky growled, sufficing Loki to roll his eyes, and pull out, the man behind you furiously replacing your hand, rolling our clit in his grasp until a sinful scream enveloped the air, commencing them all to the fact that you had just came.

Loki found the show to be unfair, and instead, spilled his priceless seed onto the huffing skin of your stomach, you eyes fluttered shut at the warm feeling pooling onto you. You leant back, drawing your neck into a crooked angle as you swiped your tongue wordlessly over the piercing on Bucky’s right nipple, metal providing a relief to the heat that your body was and had been swarmed with. “ Last chance you’re gonna have t taste her sweet cunt.”

“You do certainly have some faith in this one Barnes, but I do doubt that it will be the last instance in which i am todo so.” His silver tongue pried at your cum soaked flesh, drinking up all the essence that you had to offer, onshore the flavour that Bucky had brought to the table, i the form of a succulent drizzling of Snow White cum.

As Loki finishes swabbing his tongue over your cunt, Bucky adoringly kisses you, much sweeter than he has before. It was sort, and almost chaste, but his blue eyes roamed your face, delicately observing the high points of your face, that were covered with a sheen of great force making you as he would put it, glow.

The pair of you weer exhausted, there was still some swollen was to his lips from where he had sucked off Loki. His hands cradled you around your waist, his feet kicking Loki back as you whimpered from opaque sensitivity. “I guess that was you bidding me a dew.” Sneered the trickster, fishing for his clothes, as he spared you a spark filled glare, to which you ignored.

Once he was situated back into his attire, he left the sex scented room,a hollow smirk chapping his lips as he strutted th a purpose out into the hallway, taking a left instead of a right, and creeping into barnes’ studio to see what the man was working on in the midst of his enduring tour/ He was always the trickster, and nothing different was to ever be expected out of him.

“That was good.” You mumbled, rubbing your ode lovingly across the scruff that coated his jaw. His fingers made small circles upon your tummy, humming contently as he remained sheathed inside of you. He had to admit, he preferred it when it was just him, but his lonesome, sheathed within your walls, feeling the small trembles of your walls around him. It was practically heaven, and he would say so if he believed in such a place.

A deliberate knock ruined the moment, as the man entered,he quarrelled with himself where her to casually look in the direction of the pair of you or to avert his sight around, and blankly at the all. “What is it T’Challa?” Grumbled the man inside of you, quirking a thin brow at the timing of his presence.

“Loki; he managed to get into ur data, and he’s leaked a whole bunch of your music.” Of course, Loki would not come here to simply gloat, there was alas something extra up his green sleeve, and now it was revealed.

“Son of a bitch!” Bucky made a move to stand, but instead prohibited a whimper out of you as hi ships jutted angrily tip on instinct. “Get Odin on the phone, we’re going to have a little chat about his slippery hands son!” Barked Bucky, prepared t do anything to bring his greatest threat down, compiling him into the put of hate industry, until he was forgotten about, unable to ever produce new music again.

“Talk to Sif.” You whispered, becoming the image of his assistant once more, even if his cum lathered cock was prevailing within a rut of required stress relief, growing in the conjunction of your wall with his body guard there. “She loathes him, and rightfully so. He got her kicked out and she has dirt on him that nobody else has ever heard. If you want to take I’m down, she is your in.”

The strict tone grammatically supported by your logical information was definitely turning Bucky on again. He could handle you more than fine without Loki’s aid, he was just a means to an end, as it was clearly shown in his priorities.

[badass-at-fandoming]

I'm on a Mithras kick so hoping you can tell me - what is his thing with Kemintiri? Is she his ex or not? How does Roger feel about it if it's an ongoing thing?

@cryptlock hi buddy!!!

Yeah, I've been enjoying your posts! Thank you, haha. I have a copy of The Fall of London, but I haven't cracked it open yet. Heard it's spectacularly queer though. 👀

the tl;dr is Mithras and Kemintiri are ex-spouses, and Kemintiri is low-key waiting around for Mithras to give up his crown/grandeur to bum around the world with her. This means she occasionally shows up in London to ask if he's ready to go yet.

The long version comes from the Victorian Trilogy, specifically The Wounded King. I can email the series to you if you want. Just private message me an address. Summary of their love story under the cut!

Back in 340s BCE, or "in the seventeenth year in the reign of the Emperor Artaxerxes III," as the book describes, Kemintiri rolled up to Mithras' digs in Parsa, capital of the Persian Empire. The Cult of Mithras was in full swing, and members worshiped Mithras as the god of warriors and oaths.

Despite showing up uninvited, Kemintiri was welcomed in, largely because Mithras was lonely. He hadn't sired any childer, there weren't a lot of Kindred besides him, and the Kindred present were nowhere near his level of experience and power. He was living as an untouchable god. Kemintiri was in a similar situation, and the pair got along like a house on fire. One of the cult members birthed a boy on the night of Kemintiri's arrival, and the couple decided to adopt him. They named him Noushad. He grew up to be a fine, strapping member of the cult, fully believing he was the child of gods. Kemintiri and Mithras planned that, once he matured, he would join their "pantheon." Neither of them had Embraced anyone before, so they were really nervous, and they prepared Noushad best they could.

When Noushad reached the end of his teen years, a woman named Daeva waltzed into town. She was shockingly white-skinned and bore the name of a debased witch demon. Basically, a sexy, bad girl! 😂Noushad converted her to Zoroastrianism and the teachings of the prophet Zoroaster aka Zarathustra, which was the dominant religion of the Persian Empire. She knew about Mithras and the cult, but wasn't a member. Zorastrianism is a real religion, btw! Still practiced today! In VtM land, there's a fucking ANCIENT Lasombra named Zarathustra who named himself after the main prophet and spreads his teachings in the Sabbat all the way into these modern nights.

Anyway, things went fine for a couple years, but Daeva started asking questions. Isn't it kind of weird you only see your parents at night? And they only eat the blood sacrificed by members? At first Noushad is like "how dare you! I never see my dad during the day because he is busy ESCORTING THE SUN. They drink blood because it's the only substance PURE enough for the gods to drink!" But eventually Daeva wears him down...and doubt spreads in the cult...maybe Mithras isn't a god? Maybe he's monster who's tricking us...?

BAM. Mithras wakes up one night and his fucking temple's on fucking fire. He's like wtf, bros. His most devout priests lay slaughtered. Kemintiri is nowhere to be found (dead?!). Mithras tears the palace apart looking for Noushad, only to find out that Noushad is the one leading the rebellion. Noushad yells that Mithras isn't his real dad, and Mithras runs, heartbroken. 😭💔

As Mithras flees, he comes upon Daeva on the road. "You! I will destroy you!" He grabs her by the throat and lifts her in the air, and...Kemintiri drops Obfuscate to reveal herself. Mithras runs.

When I read that, my first reaction was "GURL, why." She had the perfect set-up for her lifestyle, a husband who loved her, and a good son. Later in book, she says, "We are not gods, no matter what we tell ourselves. It is a lesson we can only learn in pain. [...] There is no Godhead. The heart of the universe is empty. [to Mithras] Will you walk through it with me?"

So that's Mithras and Kemintiri's dealio. I don't know what Roger thinks of it. My guess is "babe, your ex-wife is a little bit bananas in pajamas." Mithras and Roger have been around so long that polyamory and polygamy can't be foreign concepts. Even though Zorastrianism doesn't practice polygamy, Mithras must have heard of it before. Roger was born in ~600 CE in Britain, so he would have been raised believing in...Woden, maybe? Woden is suuuuuuper roughly analogous to Odin, and there's some evidence that Norse culture practiced polygamy. Roger marinated in that or Celtic-flavored Christianity. His wiki says he hung around in cemeteries a lot, but "cemetery" is a real nebulous word. Could be fucking around Sutton Hoo or ye olde Catholic tombs. Maybe the Vampire: the Masquerade - Dark Ages books would clarify?

I doubt Roger is one for jealous love. Both men have repeatedly shown the great lengths they will go for each other. Whether it's her Clan compulsion, her Tragic Embrace Backstory Full of Trauma, or some combination thereof, Kemintiri can't let herself be happy. And is full of nihilist nonsense.

Omg, you activated the history nerd within, and this got hella long. Thanks for asking and reading! :D

[ashandboneca]

Racism, abuse, and why I don’t consider myself a part of the ‘community’

I’d like to talk about the event that pushed me away from the idea of a pagan community, and forced me inwards to further develop my own practice - and about the events of the last few years in regards to continued abuses in the pagan community. About 6 years ago, I started to look into the Norse pantheon. I had worked with Thor in the past, and about 6 or 7 prior to that I did an experiment where I worked with the Aesir for a month. At that point in my life, I didn't connect with them. I don't know why I didn't, I partially blame the terrible book I had for guidance, and the fact that the person who initially agreed to guide me flaked out. However, this time around I endeavoured to learn as much as I could from a reputable source, because the last time I had no idea what I was doing. I approached my friend, who is a practicing forn sidr heathen, and they agreed to teach me what they knew. We spent a number of sessions discussing cosmology and theology. I felt confident going forward, armed with book recommendations and a passion to learn further. I wrote a bit about my experiences openly on my previous blog with Odinn. Interactions with him were not sought after, but something that merely happened. When gods or spirits or ancestors come calling, you answer in some way out of respect. I wrote more about my experiences, and different techniques I utilized to connect with him. None of them were specifically Heathen - but I don't soley identify as Heathen, so I figured if that was an issue, Odinn wouldn't have shown up in the first place.

Some time later, my friend had messaged me to let me know they had gotten some hate mail about me via Witchvox (which no longer exists, but used to be a connection board for finding pagans and witches in your area, as well as open groups, etc). I was initially gobsmacked. Why the hell is someone emailing her in regards to something I did? Wouldn't have been more productive to email or message me to resolve whatever issue? I found it who it was. This person was, at that time, a member of a well recognized organization locally who put on events and rituals - an organization whose first mandate is "We hold that each one of us has their own path to follow to truth and spirit." To be honest, I had never really interacted with this person beyond being paid to do so in my former job at a pagan bookshop. We attended a few of the same events, but never really interacted. There was no real beef. I wasn't particularly fond of said person, but I had no real issues with them - so this came sort of out of left field. I sat on it for a bit.  I did not reply to the sender. Instead, I decided to post the initial email on my previous blog. Inevitably, someone is going to disagree with how you practice or what you do, even if you're not doing anything wrong. The  point I think is important to underline is that you do not need to stand for other people trying to tear you down, assert some kind of moral superiority over you, or telling you how and when you should be practicing, unless your practice is appropriative - in which case you should be taking a long, hard look at yourself. As heathenry is an open tradition, I had no concerns. I also think transparency is very important, and when people behave badly they often do so to gain something from it. Whether it is attention, drama, or they feel they are in a safe space to do so due to anonymity.  So, by posting the email (albeit in edited format - I removed all identifying information about said person, because I wanted to focus on the behaviour, not the person), I felt I was addressing something that more people should have been addressing. Afterwards, my friend received a few more emails about how I was 'pissing on their ancestors' and etc. My friend told them, in no uncertain terms, that the emails were unwelcome, the issue was none of their business, and to fuck off. I also got a few emails, a few messages on Witchvox, a few comments, and a lovely comment from a sockpuppet account here on tumblr, as well as finding out my writing was posted to be mocked because I wasn't 'heathen' enough - with screenshots! I did not respond to anything, just kept record of everything in case it was needed. I disagree with the idea of bringing in some third party who is uninvolved to do one's dirty work. If someone has an issue with how someone else is practicing, they need to question whether it's something to address. Bringing in someone uninvolved is both cowardly and childish. They did not ask to be involved, and I'm not sure what involving another person serves to carry a point. Fight your own battles, or say nothing.

There were a few other instances. A series of screencaps of this person’s continued racist, sexist, and abusive behaviour was provided to a few of us. A known leader was accused of racism and verbal abuse by other members of the community with credible evidence. This leader had a pattern of setting up multiple Facebook accounts and when one was found they would set up a new one with a new name. They talked at length about their feelings on immigration, POC in the Heathen community, and interfaith. They advocated violence and celebrated terrorist acts. Some really troubling, disgusting stuff.

We did what we thought was right - we emailed the organization to tell them and offer proof via said screencaps. In the response, we were told, and I am not bullshitting, that this person was a valued member of the community, that they are 'proud' of their heritage (uh, so am I, but I don't run my mouth off about diversity being white genocide), and that we could essentially go pound sand. I quote "own personal outlook on (their) culture and (their) path. (They are) entitled to (their) own practice as much as anyone of us are, and (they) cares deeply for (their) culture.  (They) makes a significant contribution to the Pagan community with (their) efforts through (group). (They are) a hard worker and has accomplished a great many things in (their) time on the board, a commitment that is not to be taken lightly. (They) fulfill (their) duties as a board member admirably."

Do I agree with their hot take on this? No. I think if someone comes to you with an accusation of that kind of wrongdoing, you have a duty to do some manner of preliminary investigation, because if you are in a position where you are teaching people and have authority, those students need to feel safe. You need to determine if the accusations have any truth, and if they are found to be false, feel free to stand behind and assert your belief in the accused. I truly believe the harasser/abuser showed their group the email, and they spun it in some way to discredit us.

Complicity via ignorance is still complicity - it's enough to tarnish an organization's good name. In the working world, business owners have been hung out to dry because of their racist, homophobic, or sexist employee's actions. The whole Kenny Klein situation happened for years because people excused his behaviour and allowed other people to be abused.  We are all finger-wagging and clucking when people try to bring up this behaviour  - don't be starting drama, oh that's just how (name) is, oh that's just rumours. Look, everyone - assholes, creeps, criminals, and predators exist in every faith, every organization. We are so quick to sweep it under the rug, so rushed to prevent judgement, that we always forget that one important fact. While I think it's important not to jump on every bad thing you hear about people, I do think it's important to have an open and frank discussion about proper behaviour while in a position of power. Especially if proof of misdeeds are being offered.

This group, and their lack of action, stood complicit in this person's bad behaviour. If they made the choice to stand behind a racist, bigoted person who spends their time trying to harass people online (I am not the only one, I have been told - there have been multiple people, including some of their own family members), that is their choice. They have made that choice, and they have chosen to accept any repercussions going along with it. They chose to stand behind an abuser.

Sarah Lawless, back in 2018, named a number of known abusers in the wider PNW community. The flack she received for being brave to stand up and call that shit out was disgusting.

Abusers are coddled and protected in pagan communities. They are viewed as elders, as productive members of the community,  as local heroes. While I have been fortunate to encounter very little sexual harassment in the pagan community, I have suffered other abuses and harassment that has shown me that, just like the priests and cardinals in the Vatican, pagans protect and believe only those in their clique. And there are cliques in the community, have no doubt about that.

Sarah pointed out that the ideal community is a fantasy - I agree. Stories I have heard from others about their own experiences in the 'safe and welcoming' pagan community would break your heart. One person I spoke with said 'it's scary to even fathom trying to approach anyone, because it's hard to know who to trust, who might lure you in and take advantange of you'. That is a sad statement, and one I know too well. I have a tendency to keep abuse like this close to the chest because I have been burned by people in the past. There is no spiritual support for people who get abused - no chaplains, no pastoral care, no therapists.

These were people who were putting everything on the line to be heard, and the vitriol and hatred and lies I had seen made my blood boil. This is precisely why people do not come forward. They could put everything on the line - in Sarah's case, the safety of her partner at the time and children - and people will still find a way to claim the survivors are lying. Why? What do the survivors get out of lying about their abuse? What person would come forward, knowing they will be attacked, confronted, slandered, and encounter more abuse, if they weren't telling the truth? Why would any survivor put themselves through that unless there is truth? The most stalwart defenders claim 'they couldn't have done it, I've never seen them do anything to me!' Humans are complicated and complex beings, with many facets and many faces. The face you see may not be the same face others see. The John Doe you know and the John Doe I know may be the same person, but very different relationships. 

It comes down to this: You can't 'believe survivors' if you're supporting abusers.

You can't support survivors if you're sheltering abusers.

You can't help survivors if you're siding with abusers.

You can't call it a safe community if you don't protect it's members.

Standing up for myself and others lost me “friends” who ditched me about the ‘drama’, and my community.  Something needs to change. It is inevitable that change will befall the community, and those denizens had better wise up quickly. There are a lot of young, vulnerable people looking for guidance and safety, and the community better fucking step up and prove they are willing to protect their members, or they have become no better than the Christian groups who continue to enable their abuse. We need willing leaders to push forward to make the community better. We need dedicated, smart, and savvy people to navigate a new and better future for paganism, because it's got a death rattle going on and it needs the kiss of a new life.

Burn the whole of the modern pagan community down. Burn down the groups that perpetuate abuse, that enable abusers, and grow something better and safe from the ashes. Dismantle the sexist, enabling, racist, oversexed community with it's abusive elders, cleanse it with fire, and create a place where people can come together without having to fear predators.

The only I have learned from watching my and other’s experiences is that we shouldn't call out wrongdoing in the community, because I have gotten abuse hurled at me for it and I have seen others who have done the same get more and worse abuse. People get mad, they accuse those who come forward of 'causing drama' or 'rocking the boat'.

That is a terrible lesson. A witch is sovereign unto themselves.

Bitches, this boat is rocking. Grab on, or drown.

This is my own story. I have posted links for further review down below.

Further reading:

Dealing With Toxic People in the Pagan Community

Sarah Lawless’ post about her suffered abuse, via the Wayback Machine

Abuse, the Pagan Community, and Our Commitments

Abuse Within Paganism - a taboo topic?

A Crisis of Faith

Authenticity and Racism in Contempory Paganism

This is not a new issue - via livejournal, 2006

Cultural Appropriation in Neopaganism

[moodyblues93]

Dear LGBTQ Community

I am so incredibly sorry is the only right way to start. This post comes from a lifelong conservative, homeschooled Christian. I never stood on a street corner with a sign that said ugly things about you, and whenever I met someone who was gay (or I suspected they were), I tried very hard to treat them the same as anyone else and not hold them at arm’s length; nevertheless, I made some disparaging remarks within my circle of likeminded people, and I most definitely saw you as being in the wrong. I didn’t hate you- I felt sorry for you, and found myself wistfully thinking how nice it would be if being gay wasn’t a sin, and we could all just get along then…but ultimately I had to shake my head and say, “well, the Bible says it’s a sin, so that’s the end of the debate.”

Having now been out of my (incredibly controlling and right-wing extremist) parents’ house for seven years now, I’ve made a lot of progress in finding what I believe is a proper middle ground for my beliefs and overall worldview. Every New Year’s Day, rather than make a resolution, I have a long talk with the Lord and ask Him to please make me more like Him in the coming year and draw me closer to His heart; I can honestly say that every year this prayer is answered, and I continue to become a more loving and understanding person (though I am far, far from perfect). This year I have become increasingly aware of how ugly a lot of my conservative, supposedly Christian friends behave at their cores, and how so many of the things they claim they’re saying in love sound a lot more akin to hate, pride, and bigotry. By May, I was so disgusted by their words and actions, I came back for a Part 2 to my prayer. I asked God to reveal to me the things in my beliefs that I had accepted as truths that are in fact lies- whether in part or in whole -and vice versa; I asked that He help me be willing to reconsider my stance on any and all issues where I was wrong, and to give me the courage to take the steps necessary to change.

I kid you not: within two weeks of praying that, I was struck out of the blue by a thought I had never dared even entertain in jest in my entire life. Why is being gay a sin? I froze in my tracks and my heart stopped. Having thought this forbidden sentence, my mind raced ahead before I could catch it.

Why should it be a sin?

I understand that the very first couple was a man and a woman, but they HAD to be in order to continue the human race.

If there’s one thing I’ve known from an early age, it’s that God is a God of logic. He has a reason for every commandment/rule, and usually that reason is very self-evident. Adultery is breaking a promise and brings devastating hurt to others and yourself. Stealing is taking something that you have no right to take, and again, you’re harming someone else one way or another. I already know AIDS isn’t the exclusively “gay cancer” televangelists claimed it was in the ‘80s, so I can’t even use that as the reason behind why gay relationships are forbidden.

I stood there in the kitchen, stumped. I could not think of a single actual reason why being gay could be considered a sin, aside from citing “because God said so,” which is not an actual argument; God never lays down arbitrary rules like that, and even the passages about “it is an abomination�� suddenly didn’t make sense to me. Okay, but WHY is it an abomination? Circular reasoning didn’t sound like the God I’ve come to know so well over the years. The notion gnawed at me all day, and I could hardly focus on anything else. I prayed almost continually for the next two days on the matter: I asked that if my heart was deceiving me and I was being sucked into the “liberal Christian” mindset after too long away from the influence of a super strict church, that God would save me from my error and show me the why behind this commandment so I wouldn't stray. I also asked in no uncertain terms that if the church is in fact wrong and being gay is NOT a sin that God would give me peace about the whole matter and help me to find good, thorough resources that could dismantle the arguments I’d been supportive of all these years.

None of this stemmed from a guilty conscience needing to find justification for a beloved family member’s lifestyle, or even my own: as far as I know, everyone in my immediate family is hetero, and I myself am ace. Nor did this come from the desire to be as opposite of my strict parents as possible, to rebel and go nuts now that they no longer control my life. I am a person who always wants to know the why and how behind every rule and process, to understand as much about my surroundings as a human can, and to champion the truth in all things- even when that truth makes me uncomfortable.

I spent copious amount of time over several months researching this subject from multiple viewpoints, devouring articles and lectures, and praying for guidance with every new piece of information I uncovered. By the time I’d finished, I was left with a deep conviction that we have been wrong all this time; the arguments the church has used are based on a mix of mistranslations and cultural practices that are irrelevant to our society today (for anyone who wants to know more on this, I cannot recommend enough Walking The Bridgeless Canyon by Kathy Baldock, and God and the Gay Christian by Matthew Vines, because there isn’t room in this post to explain it all. You need to read both books for the full picture).

I’m sorry for how long this post is, but since you don’t know me, I’m trying to convey to you just how significant it is for someone like me to have come to this conclusion. I’ve been a dyed-in-the-wool conservative Christian my entire life; I literally don’t even remember my conversion because of how young I was when I came to faith. For those who are skeptics concerning if homosexuality and the like is a sin, I hope this has prodded at your conscience and will push you to start looking into this for yourself.

But my main purpose of this post is to address you, the LGBTQ community. One person’s apologies, no matter how sincere, cannot begin to make up for or repair the damage done to you. As I was studying all this, the more horrified I became as it hit me that there are countless souls the church turned away because they were told Jesus wasn’t interested in a relationship with them, and consequently, most of those people likely then didn’t want to have anything to do with a Jesus like that. The thought completely broke my heart for you, and all I want to tell you now is that regardless if someone has said to you that you cannot enter the kingdom of Heaven as long as you are a practicing homosexual/bisexual/etc. or anything else along those lines…PLEASE listen to me instead.

I love you. I accept you as you are and I am not going to ask you to change this aspect of your life. Far more importantly, Jesus loves you as you are and He wants to have a relationship with you. If the only thing that’s ever held you back from looking into Christianity is believing your sexuality won’t be accepted, know that there are churches out there who will gladly welcome you (Google ‘open and affirming church near me’).

I’m making an iron promise to you that I’m going to attend my local rally every June from now on; I’m going to hug you and remind you that it’s okay to be who you are without having to fear eternal damnation for it. I can’t say enough how sorry I am for everything that has been said and done to you, all supposedly in the name of love- a love that has been hideously misunderstood and twisted to fit a human agenda of our own making. Please give God another chance. Let Him show you just what love really and truly is, and I guarantee you will find it’s nothing like what you’ve been told.

I know you don’t know me, and you have no reason to believe me, but please take this as a hopeful sign for the future. If I can come to this conclusion, then surely the rest of the world can’t be far behind me. We will make this a safe and accepting place for you, where contemptuous glances and ugly words are no longer slung across the dividing line, because there will no longer be a line- it will no longer be an Us vs. Them, because there will only be Us. Thank you for your persistence through the decades to not deny who you are, because your endurance will help keep the door open for this and future generations to come to a true understanding.

I hope a lot of people see this. I don't know much about how Tumblr works, I'm hardly ever on here, but I sincerely wish for many people to see this and smile by the time they're finished.

Red and orange, yellow and green, blue and purple, black and white, we are precious in His sight.

[potteresque-ire]

Daenerys Stormborn, First of Her Name

Here’s my first review post on Game of Thrones! Thank you so much for asking about Daenerys, @bixgirl1, @kikibluemay and @oceaxe-ifdawn. She was fascinating and tragic, and I couldn’t really stop talking about her... as in, I ended up writing a 4k+ word essay on her character.

Due to the length, I’ve crossed-posted to AO3 for those who prefer to read it there: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19119595 . As usual, never feel obliged to do anything! Fandom is a happy, carefree place for me :) .

Before I start, I’d like to say this—I’ve never expected GoT to be progressive. Its medieval aesthetics aside, the gratuitous violence and nudity really seal the deal. Therefore, this review is written decidedly without a social justice lens; I shall not argue if the showrunners were feminists, racists, imperialists etc. Also, I haven’t read the books and have read few metas and reviews; so these are my unfiltered thoughts and of course, my personal opinion. I got interested in Game of Thrones because the snippets I knew of it reminded me of ancient Chinese history, which I loved for its twists, its very blurred lines between truths and myths, its cynical record of human nature, clever strategies and bloodshed. Along this vein, I was, and still am, the most interested in how each contender of the Iron Throne got there, and as the theme of the story emerged (“the lies we spin, our fates they weave” is my way of describing it), the things they told for motivation—the lies and truths that, should they win, would become history.

Of all the contenders and their stories, Daenerys’ rise was the most…mythical and uplifting. She was easy to root for, partly because we’re conditioned to root for heroes like her. The last descendant of a dynasty. Orphan. Exiled, abused, went through her personal journey from little better than a slave to become queen. She even birthed dragons and rode them to war. I really enjoyed the part of her story as the Khaleesi. She grew into a queen in every way, and an ideal one, by the time led her small group of followers across the desert. I loved her—she was strong, resilient, intelligent, righteous. And she understood and respected a culture that was supposedly far below her (as her brother Viserys frequently reminded everyone). 

But then came Astapor, then Yunkai, then Meereen. She became a true ruler, without a Khal by her side… 

I started feeling a little uncomfortable. I was puzzled by that. Her cause was emancipation, one I believe was absolutely correct. Her stance was uncompromising. She walked the walk. Every single one of these traits was beyond admirable, and precious among rulers. Nailing 163 slave masters for 163 children might seem brutal, but the world of GoT *was* brutal. 

And yet, something felt...off.

Then I realized: after all the screen time in Meereen, I remained very much ignorant of the place, other than it practiced slavery. Slavery—and the barbaric practices surrounding it, such as the fighting pits—was presented as the only thing that defined her new constituents in her eyes. This could be by design, to show Daenerys’ “style” as a ruler. This can also be a reflection of the showrunners’ perspectives, their disquiet about tackling slavery for a larger audience.  But if I must judge the show by its own merits and ignore the hands behind it, the repeated shots of Daenerys sitting high in the Great Pyramid, she and her advisors donned in their foreign attire, telling the locals who looked nothing like them, over and over again, that they were wrong… 

She looked like a coloniser. My radars were beeping for that reason. I grew up in a colony, a well cared for one (ie, it would’ve fared far worse if it hadn’t been colonised). Colonialism is therefore an integral part of my life, and my views of it are coloured and educated by the experience. Controversial point: far from a general rule, but I recognise that colonizers can do great good. I’m a beneficiary of that myself. However, I’ve also learned that there’s an art to bringing these great goods to the colonised. One lesson: defining these people, especially when they’re foreign to the ruler, with anything that the ruler is seeking to eradicate — a habit, a tradition, a set of beliefs… —is not a recipe for success. It’s a matter of human pride—the pride of, in this case, the people who’d just suffered defeat. The former ruling class needs to feel some respect, which translates to a sense of security, for any transition of power to be smooth. One may say, the slave masters deserved neither pride nor respect nor security; this is very true, but there was a very practical consideration, one that Daenerys acknowledged: the ultimate goal of conquest is to rule. An un-governable colony won’t change for the better, because it won’t remain a colony for long. In Meereen, as in many real-world colonies, colonisers were few and their constituents were many. Revolts would favour the latter, in particular, the former ruling class who often had both financial and geographical advantages. The Sons of Harpy’s revolt did address that, albeit weakly.

No, I don’t mean Daenerys should yield on the issue of slavery. Lives were at stake and the emancipation had to be immediate. But then, merely insisting this was the right thing to do and punishing offenders with increasing severity, while reinforcing the segregation between the ruling class and the ruled (Daenerys pretty much sequestered herself in the Great Pyramid), was not a direction to take to render the emancipation permanent. Daenerys had to be out there. She had to make serious effort to find common grounds in the 3-way between herself, the former slaves and former slave owners, especially after she’d removed one of the pillars of Meereen’s sociopolitical structure. It didn't matter that the latter were despicable; she had to find a connection. And being a nation that had stood thousands of years, with its wealth and fine architecture, Meereen had got to have something benign and beautiful that Queen Daenerys could embrace, that she could use as a bridge to endear her to her constituents and at the same time, de-emphasize the role of slavery in defining what Meereen was. Wear their clothes. Visit the temples. Whether she actually believed in their gods didn’t matter. Join their festivities—if she did it enough it would matter much less if she skipped the fighting pits. Go to their Flea’s Bottom equivalent (as Margaery Tyrell did in King’s Landing; she would’ve made a good colonial governor). Talk to their craftsman and ask about their traditional crafts. Never for once did Daenerys consider these strategies. She could’ve used Tyrion as her ambassador—his stature and broken language skills, if utilized correctly, could loosen people’s defense, and the parties he’d attend would give him access to the good wines he craved and the setting for him to establish alliances with small talks. If governing foreign lands is indeed an art form, Daenerys didn’t pursue it in Meereen, even though from her time with the Dothrakis, it seemed unlikely that she was ignorant of its necessity (She did eat a horse heart for her Khal and her unborn child).

Again, assuming that the writers were merely following GRRM’s guideposts on her character arc, I had to contend with these possibilities that inform me about Daenerys the Ruler: 1) somewhere in her journey in Essos, she’d lost her ability to empathize with the cultures under her rule. This seemed unlikely. Or, 2) she no longer felt the need to do it, her power no longer derived from a Khal. Either way, with Westeros also being foreign to Daenerys, I started to wonder the kind of ruler she would end up being … 

… and it looked rather similar to the Daenerys in her final scenes, asserting that her moral compass should make the entire Westeros bent their knees. I started to wonder if the show intended this to be a good or bad thing, or something more nuanced, as it should be. My hopes weren’t high—after all, our own western world still retains much of its colonial sensibilities, which would’ve (rightly) praised Daenerys’ role as a Liberator, but would also (sub)consciously downplay her … colonising tendencies. 

Does it mean I see Daenerys as a bad person, or going mad? Not at all. Conflating character and ability to rule is, IMO, one of the major weaknesses of her ending (more on that later); it was also, perhaps ironically, Daenerys’ own fatal mistake. My question is merely one about her fitness to rule, which is itself a fluid thing. War-time rulers require different skills compared to peace-time rulers, conquerors to defenders. The serious contenders of the Iron Throne each had their own strengths, some better suited for rulership and some better for rulership at different times. Stannis was a strong general but was too easily swayed as a ruler. Daenerys was a conqueror. Jon Snow was a diplomat. 

One thing, however, is true and consistent in the world of GoT: to gain power, being morally righteous is not enough. Ned Stark’s detached head brought this point across all too well. Rulers win the hearts of their people. Not the brains, not the logic that decides what is right or wrong. Humans are inherently passionate about power, whether it’s theirs to own or not.

And this is, perhaps, Daenerys Stormborn’s greatest tragedy. She assumed her strict moral compass, along with her birthright and strong will, would be sufficient to take her to the Iron Throne. Her dragons further misguided her in that regard—punishments by Dracarys lent an extra mythical weight and poetry to her judgments, as if she had a higher power, like God, on her side. When she asked Jon Snow if she was to rule with love or fear, she asked as if the two were a dichotomy, seemingly blind to the fact that she had always treaded the line between the two. Love got her the Unsullied, the talents who came far and wide to advise her; fear got her the Dothrakis, the fragile peace in Essos. 

If you’ve read till here (thank you), you may assume I’d defend Daenerys’ decision to burn King’s Landing, or suggest it was foreshadowed. I’d say this: I find it to be within the realms of possibility, but only given my personal opinion about her rule in Meereen. I don’t see it as a botched coin-flip by the Gods, because nothing in her prior judgment suggested madness. Yes, she’d ignored advice before, but no more than, say, Robert Baratheon or Joffrey (Cersei simply killed those who gave her advice she didn’t like). Daenerys’ decision to march to King’s Landing immediately after the Battle of Winterfell—the last major decision she made before the sacking—might not be wise to some but was logically sound. I’d also venture to say this, perhaps in defence of the show’s writers: I’m also not quite sure if the show intended her decision to be a proof of madness. 

Because I’m not sure if the madness told in this show was real at all. 

Because curiously, while the coin flip had been mentioned several times, the show never offered us any concrete, visual evidence that Daenerys had suffered a loss of reason, which defines madness for us who live on Earth in the 21st century. The destruction of King’s Landing was portrayed at the ground level; we didn’t exactly see Daenerys cackling, or enjoying the carnage. Making a terrible decision does not a mad person make. She was seen to be sure of herself in her final scene with Jon Snow—but why shouldn’t she be, when she’d just emerged victorious and achieved her life’s goal, her revenge? If cockiness had been the mark of madness, half of the characters in the show would’ve been mad. 

Even more curious to me is this: people like Ramsey or Joffrey or Cersei, who’d done seriously mad things in our perspective, were never once described as “mad”. The adjective “Mad” had always been reserved for the Mad King. 

How was the Mad King mad then? This is important, because Daenerys supposedly inherited his madness. But the audience hadn’t been given much information. We know The Mad King killed his dissidents, but that seemed to fall within standard monarch behaviour. We know he and his advisors—including, notably, Varys—were at increasing odds with each other, but put a bunch of power-hungry men with immense power imbalance in the same room and that would happen more likely than not. He killed Ned Stark’s father and brother in a confrontation—so he was vengeful, distrustful, and brutal, yes, just like Joffrey or Cersei, but still, nothing that spoke particularly of madness. He was said to want King’s Landing destroyed, but the act was never realized; we only learned of his intentions via Jaimie. He set up the network of wildfires, which were terrible weapons but also … traditional in the Targaryen dynasty, if wildfires had indeed been invented as replacements of Dracarys. So how mad was actually the Mad King then, compared to his ancestors? Or was he called Mad only because he lost his game of thrones, and history was written by victors? When Varys claimed to be worried about Daenerys’ state—when he hinted at her madness and being a bad coin flip—was he merely repeating the same lies that had been told about her father, with the purpose of setting up a chain reaction that would propel Jon Snow to the Iron Throne, as the same lies had helped justify and cement Robert Baratheon’s reign? Varys might have been trying to feed Daenerys something. A “crazy potion”, maybe?  

Yes, I know. I’m probably reading too much into this. It’s my wishful thinking, perhaps, to not see Daenerys as mad (or the writers writing her as mad) because that would’ve taken away her agency. Because Daenerys’ character arc doesn’t deserve an ending equivalent to death by a falling flowerpot. Because, if her sacking of King’s Landing was meant to be the Shock of Season 8, she must retain her agency. It’s shocking because a good person did it. A good person is good only when she has the agency to make terrible mistakes.

So how am I reading Daenerys’ decision to sack King’s Landing? If I were to ignore all inputs outside the show—I don’t know if the showrunners had commented on anything—this is how I would “bridge the gap”, so to speak; how I’d imagine the thoughts running through Daenery’s mind as the bells rang, behind the few seconds the camera focused on Emilia Clark’s face in the show. I believe the series of tragedies Daenerys had suffered (losing Jorah, Missandei, a dragon son) had only made her more determined to wipe out, as Greyworm told Jon, everyone who’d served Cersei. But while this sounded like a simple task, carrying it out was much more complicated. Cersei’s armies were dispersed all over the city; they could easily remove their armour and feign innocence. Moreover, every resident in King’s Landing could be seen as an accomplice to Cersei’s reign; even the people in Flea’s Bottom, like Gendry, used to make weapons for the Lannisters. Were they to be wiped out as well? If not, where to draw the line? This order nonetheless confirmed Daenerys’ world view that the morally corrupt should perish without mercy, and Cersei was, indeed, corruption defined. Daenerys had seen Cersei’s treachery herself, and the sheer scale of it must be as foreign to her as Westeros itself. Her closest friends and followers, Greyworm and Missandei, didn’t even know how to tell a joke—the smallest, most benign form of treachery. Daenerys knew what treachery was, of course, she’d suffered greatly from it, but treachery in the game of thrones was a different beast and she wasn’t yet equipped to handle it, to make correct assessments of the kind of behaviours it’d instigate—unlike Cersei and Tyrion, who as Lannisters had been breathing it in since birth, or Varys, who’d been both an observer of multiple reigns and a ruthless Kingmaker himself. King’s Landing, the city itself, had also signified little but treachery to Daenerys—her father had been murdered there by someone who’d sworn to protect him; men had been sent from there to murder her since she’d been born. 

While Tyrion had told said that Cersei’s armies were serving only out of fear, Daenerys, who’d only had the most faithful / honest armies, the Unsullies and Dothrakis, probably couldn’t truly appreciate what that meant. She had every cause to be terrified then when the bells rang, especially when they rang so early, without her or her army and allies even close to the Red Keep. Ironically, perhaps, her own moral righteousness became her blind spot; she might have assumed Cersei’s forces had something far more sinister waiting for her—because how could they abandon their duties, their queen so easily?

And if they did abandon their duties and their queen so easily, what would stop them from committing the same treachery when Daenerys becomes queen herself? How could she vet the innocent and the treacherous and if she couldn’t—and she couldn’t, not with one dragon, a small army and no geographical advantage—what could she do? What could she do, when she was Daenerys Stormborn, who would never compromise to treachery?

I can see her feeling cornered. I can see her feeling she was left with one option: take the innocents out with the treachery. Do it like removing a tumour. Cut out a ring of good flesh around the bad. 

The ring of good flesh was King’s Landing.

Plausible? Maybe? That tragically, both the rise and fall of Daenerys Targaryen could be attributed to her moral code? That she didn’t lose this game of thrones because she was evil, but because war and politics have always been amoral and she was a misfit? People in Westeros change allegiance all the time; morals are fluid and carry a price tag. Appropriately then, the man who understood and lived by these rules, whose loyalty could always be bought—Bronn—was also the biggest winner of this game of thrones.

I’d say this though:  a plot point as significant, and as close to the finale as the sacking of King’s Landing, shouldn’t require the audience twisting their minds into pretzels to make it feel plausible, and my brain feels a bit pretzly at a moment. No matter what the writers intended, there remained too many holes for the watchers to fill with their imagination. I’ve read some who said the final season was too rushed; I’m not sure that was the issue. The issue, I think, is that even if given enough screen time, the writers didn’t quite know how to drive the characters without the books’ guidance—an issue that had become apparent by Season 6. The last three seasons felt…derivative, like fanfics of the first four. This isn’t a slight (well, not a big one)—Benioff and Weiss had managed what GRRM hasn’t been able to—but I felt a sense that their visions of the world had evolved to conflict with GRRM’s over the course of the show. Meanwhile, they still needed to hit the goal posts GRRM provided, while they wanted to focus on / believe in something else. The result was the later seasons that felt …schizophrenic at times. GoT had highly implausible moments since Season 1, but the first four seasons sold them because the showrunners believed in them. S8 Ep5&6, meanwhile, offered enough for me to logically agree that the sacking of King’s Landing and Daenerys’ downfall can be canon, but not enough for me to believe emotionally because…I didn’t feel the showrunners believed in them. The events felt written to serve a purpose other than storytelling—maybe to match GRRM’s notes, or satisfy the perceived need to shock; in all cases, I felt the hearts of the writers were somewhere else, somewhere perhaps more spectacular than dissecting the motivations of a fallen queen. The shift towards visual storytelling in the later seasons, perhaps to mitigate the difficulty of writing dialogues for an ensemble of deeply complex and intertwined characters, furthered exposed the incoherence of the show’s focus. While I love the visuals, GoT had its origins as a political show and politics is 99% talk. Similarly, the increased reliance on the actors to convey their characters via facial expressions and body language might work for someone like Brienne, who was taciturn and largely consistent personality wise, but insufficient for characters who used talking as a weapon (Tyrion) or underwent major transformations (Daenerys). 

Anyway, back to Dany. If there was one thing I truly, truly dislike about the close of her story arc, it was the very end, when Jon Snow drove that dagger into her. Painfully cliche aside (I’ll leave Cersei’s baby to another day), it also unfairly cemented Daenery’s highly un-rightful place as the villain of the story, given that Jon Snow, the uncontested Good Human of the show, committed the murder. The show pitted two sympathetic characters against each other just to let one … leech the sympathy out of the other, when neither of their characters deserved the treatment (yes, I found this decision to be as unfair to Jon Snow as it was to Daenerys). As much as I had reservations about Daenery’s ability to govern, I never doubted the heart that Jon stabbed, the desire in it to do good for the people. Yes, I said it isn’t enough, and yes, I believe that too inflexible a moral code forcibly imposed upon others can do great damage, but this is very different from saying that Daenerys Stormborn was a villain. Conflating character and ability is human, but I expected this show to know enough nuance to avoid this mistake. Having the heart, the desire to rule well, is a start. A great and important start. A start seen in few others in the whole series. The early seasons of GoT were particularly strong in depicting characters in the grey but Daenerys, sadly, was robbed of that; she swung violently from white to black.

And what was so disappointing is that it needn’t be that way. Daenerys could have caused the destruction to King’s Landing and still be sympathetic. Queen Cersei was still in the Red Keep, and the Wildfires buried by the Mad King remained all over the city. Innocents die in wars, there’s never an exception to that, even if the wars are waged with the best intentions. I’m no show writer, but this is what I could come up with to spare Daenery’s fate as a villain after a few walking trips around my city, while keeping most major plot points intact. Show writers can do (much) better. 

Just for the fun of it, below is the alternative ending for Daenerys I came up with, and I will end my very, very long thesis here :) . Thank you so, so much for reading! ❤️❤️❤️

===

1) Start of the episode. Qyburn teaching his little birds a nursery rhyme about a Mad King and his Wildfires, and an Evil Queen who will set them all burning. He tells them to sing far and wide. (This is just an excuse to get another song from Ramin Djawadi)

2) Long shots of combustibles being laid in the same tunnels Lancel Lannister crawled through back in Season 6 Ep 10, before the explosion of the Sept of Baelor. That 10-minute sequence was so classic that the audience would likely remember the place. Piles of wood connect the stores of barrels that we know contain the Wildfires. Black tar flows down the sewers of the Red Keep, down the alleys in Flea Bottom, slicking everything, staining the innocents there with (Queen Cersei’s) muck. This sequence can be done entirely through visuals.

3) The Bell rings. Daenerys attacks the Red Keep with Dracarys. The tar and wood catch fire and carry the flames to the Wildfires around the city. As Wildfire is Dracarys’ substitute, the two augments each other and the city soon turns into an Inferno. Daenerys watches, horrified and unable to do a thing. The nursery rhyme becomes a prophecy: as much as a Lannister laid the grounds, the Targaryens are solely responsible for the King’s Landing destruction. Woods and tar are, after all, harmless without fire. And Daenerys Stormborn, who swore to protect and liberate the weak, ends up killing more innocents than Cersei ever had. 

4) Tyrion advises Daenerys that for now, she has no choice but to rule by fear. A reign cannot start with apologies, and what good will it do? So Daenerys gives the same speech to her armies on the steps of the ruined Red Keep, but noticeably distraught.

5) Daenerys must also restrain Drogon. She can’t afford him accidentally setting more fires in the city, while her armies scour every tunnel to make sure all Wildfires have been consumed. So the Breaker of Chains is forced to chain down her son, the symbol of her power.

6) Drogon, being intelligent but still a beast, maims Daenerys badly in his struggle to be free. Jon finds Daenerys, but she’s beyond saving. She tells Jon to keep what he saw secret, and if he can’t—she knows he can’t—to please lie for her, for once, that Drogon did it to avenge for the innocents she killed; that Drogon, and their family name he represents, knows justice above the fire and blood. When honest Jon reacts…honestly, she asks him to ask Tyrion for advice. She struggles to stand, says she wants to try the Iron Throne before she goes. She refuses Jon’s help; she walks, head high, blood trailing like a cape behind her, as she crosses the ruins. She won’t make it. Only her finger will get to touch the Iron Throne, as in her prophecy in the House of the Undying. Jon kneels behind her as she falls on her own knees. She will always be his queen. Drogon carries her away.

7) The waiting period can be a mourning period for all who have perished. Tyrion will still recommend Bran to be their King, as his proposal will be accepted as he remains the Hand. Jon would’ve asked Tyrion about the lying, and the issue can be brought up when “A Song of Ice and Fire” is presented in the small council. King Bran can then offer his wisdom as the Three-Eyed Raven, the Living History. What does he think, when he sees both the truth in history and the lies and prophecies told about it, that propel it? Does he approve of them? Disapprove? This will also wrap up the theme of the show, about the stories that make history, the history that makes us. Ser Davos can ask about the legend of Azor Ahai that cost Stannis Baratheon everything. Is it true? Does it matter? Also, how many swords actually make up the Iron Throne? Thousands, as the legends and Daenarys had believed? No more than two hundred, as Little Finger said in Season One? How many more swords have been buried for these thousands or hundreds?

[springecho]

The Passing Flame Ch. 2:

Rhun kept his usual pace behind his two sisters, as he was usually lost in thought during their morning walks to the Scholar. Classes, Training and feeling far behind the rest was always weighing heavy on his mind. He knew he didn’t have a knack for taking leadership like his parents, nor was he even interested in such. He sighed softly as he looked on towards his siblings. As much as hated when Hyliea bullied him, he very much admired her strength and courage when it came to combat classes.

Her skills where unmatched by many of the other students, even Raubahn had a difficult time defeating Hyliea, boasting about alike her and Harune where in strength and Valor. Railee was very much in the same boat but took more to their mothers’ side of combat. Her strikes where always in range, her casting ahead of the rest. Rhun found it hard to believe he was related to them, and often was the butt of Hylieas’ “adoption” jokes.

“Rhun? Rhun!” Railee flicked his forehead to gain his attentions. “Ow… what was that for?” He rubbed the sore spot on his head. “Seems we have visitors at the council.” She pointed down the long, dirt path that lead towards Ala Mhigo Palace. “I just saw Papa and Mother heading towards the Palace, and a number of guards but not of our own.” She pointed towards the base of the Palace and the stairs leading up to the giant doors.

“What? You think the Scions are gonna go on a super epic mission?” Hyliea exclaimed excitedly. “We’re getting new students, Father told me this morning.” A whisper voice spoke from between the three causing all but Railee to jump. “By the twelve Fae!! Why must you sneak up on us like that?!” Rhun exclaimed while holding his chest.

The young girl looked up at him, her platinum blonde hair pulled into two pigtails with half of her hair falling just below her shoulders. Her eyes where blue and she held a sleeping carbuncle in her arms. “Cause izzy is sleeping, and I do not wish to disturb him.” She stated plainly. Fae had a knack for summoning like her father Alphinuad. She possessed many of the same qualities towards magic like him but didn’t care much for political views and was very critical when it came to being a team healer.

Ryne would talk to her about helping everyone on her team and that the healers job was to look out for her fellow classmates when they ran team drills. Though, it never really quiet set into Faes’ head to be more kind, instead, she would often shoot back that “If they weren’t so reckless they wouldn’t need me all the time,” and would leave her team mates hobbling to the chirurgeons’ office.

“By the way…” Fae looked towards Rhun once more then moved over to stand behind Hyliea. “Duck.”

Rhun tilted his head in confusion until he felt a body slam into him from behind. “YOOOOOO, Whas’up Sparky?” The slightly older boy smiled a toothy grin and ruffled Rhuns hair before getting off of his back. Rhun stood, coughing up dirt and dusting off his clothes. “M’toya! Why do you always have to be- “

“Annoying.”

“Infuriating.”

“A cat.”

All three girls spoke as they looked at M’toya with distaste. “Ah, c’mon. You love me.” He chuckled, then draped an arm around Rhun. “At least you do, right best bud?” He smiled again which earned a small smile from Rhun as well. M’toya was named after Y’shtolas’ late master but revised it to fit into her Miqo’te culture. His hair was medium length in the front, much in a similar manner as his fathers; Urianger but spiked in the back like his mothers. He was a few inches taller than the triplets and a year older as well.

His hair color was the same color as his fathers and his feline ears were much longer than a normal Miqo’tes, due to being half Elezen. “C’mon, if anyone knows the dirt on what’s going on, is Lyam.” M’toya took off running towards the Scholar, making the other four follow out of their own curiosity.

Upon reaching the entrance of the Scholar, M’toya scanned the student body for a certain blonde haired info boy. In a showed corner, the boy in question was leaning against the wall with his arms crossed as if in waiting. M’toya grinned seeing him and quickly, with the rest who caught up, hurried over to Lyam.

“Well if it isn’t fireball and the Elezen Quartet.” Lyam smirked and chuckled at his own joke.

“I wish you’d stop calling us that, we sound like a terrible bard group.” Railee crossed her arms giving him a judgmental stare.

“C’mon princess, I’m only play’n.” Lyam came closer to Railee, putting his arm around her.

“Remove your arm, or risk losing it.” She glared dangerously at the older blonde boy.

“You know, I like when you play-” “-Lyam!” Rhun spoke rather loudly, earning a few raised eyebrows from M’toya and a few of the others. Rhuns cheeks flushed red realizing his outburst, Lyam removed his arm from Railee and came to stand next to Rhun.

“No disrespect, little sun beam.” Lyam ruffled his hair and turned to address the rest of the crew. “Simply put, Starlight came early for us.”

“Meaninnnnnnng?” Hyliea sounded exasperated and on the verge of losing her patients.

“Fenyx, Akelda and Tsuyu.” He stated proudly.

Before Lyam could blink, he was being dragged towards the Auditorium by the others, excitedly and eagerly wanting to meet up with old friends.

 

~Ala Mhigo Place~

Harune bowed in respect to her old comrades from the east and shook hands with the others from Ishguard. It was a pleasant reunion at first, exchanging stories of parenthood, how each of their homeland is doing and normal anxieties about their children attending Ala Mhigan scholar so far from home.

“Ah, Rhun will be happy to see Tsuyu, he is quiet smitten with her.” Alisiea giggled softly and she and Yugiri spoke of their children’s puppy love. “Indeed, Tsuyu speaks fondly of young Rhun, though she isn’t too thrilled at attending the same Scholar as Fenyx.”

Ser Aymeric chuckled as he overheard Yuguri. “Ah yes, Fenix spoke of his distaste at the knowledge of Tsuyu being a classmate of his, but thank the gods Akelda will keep him in check.”

The mention at the young Wyrmblood sparked a question Harune has been withholding for months.

“Has… Has there been no word from Estinien still?” The room grew quiet, Aymeric seemed to be debating on how to answer said question.

“Unfortunately no, I was hoping he would show to escort his son to Ala Mhigo but-”

“If that bastard only knew how much Fenyx suffers, I wish he would prioritize his on kin sometimes.” Lucia spat out. She made her point know since the day Estinien entrusted Ser Aymeric and Lucia with the care of his son.

“The boy is indeed suffering, we waited until the last minute to board the airship, though once more, Estinien was nowhere to be seen. The only sign he lives is only due to the month gil installments he sends for Fenyx.” Aymeric stated with a sigh. Estinien always sent gil to compensate for Fenyxs’ care, though Aymeric and Lucia have put all gil aside for Fenyx for when he is of age to be on his own and wishes to do so.

Hien slapped Aymeric on the back, causing the tall Elezen man to fumble forwards. “Enough brooding. The lad will have his friends to keep him from being lonesome and my daughter to spar with too!” The Eastern Lord gave a huge grin.

Harune looked amongst old friends and comrades, ‘some things never change.’ She though as everyone began to take their seat in preparation for the council meeting.

The last to joing the group was Thancred, who escorted both Urianger and Y’shtola to the Palace.

“What a pleasure for the two of you to grace us, and not under explosive circumstances.” Lyse joked as Y’shtola rolled her eyes.

“Yes, my kitten seems to have a knack for explosive experimentation. I have informed the Scholar to inspect his room for any mishaps he may be cooking up.” Y’shtola took her seat along with Urianger.

“I reassure you, we sweep his room every morning he leaves for class.” Lyse affirmed. She then stood to address the room, taking on a much more serious tone.

“With the exception of our missing members due to other obligations, I welcome you all to this meeting. Old friends and comrades, it is good to see our homes and lands restored to what once was. Eorzea celebrates peace amongst each other as well as the prosperity of our eastern brothers and sister who are ruled by a most gracious Lord and Lady.” Lyse took a breath and let out a soft sigh.

“How I wish we could forever speak of peace.” She took her seat at the front of the table, all eyes focused on the Ala Mhigan leader, as she prepared herself for the flurry of questions that would was over here like waves crashing on the shore.

“I have been informed from our Shadow hunters, an Ascian yet lives.”

[headoverjojo]

Here's a story that I written about how she meets gang (Only Bruno to be honest) part 1,she will meet the gang in part 2.

Griselda Eisenhauer meeting the bucci gang part 1 (I accept criticism and I added a certain character besides Bruno)

It was showtime for Griselda Eisenhauer, she often had her nightly concerts at the local theatre in the city of the Naples; it was extremely favoured among the locals who appreciated classical music to visit the local theatre to adore and listen to the glorious music they played at the theatre.

 Bruno often relished the classical music they played there and sometimes he was accompanied by his good friend Fugo. Often, he and Fugo would meet the musicians after the show to praise and admire their performance to indicate that they were great admirers for classical music. Griselda would often be timid with meeting the two and she would often disappear before they arrived. This was due to the reason that she found it unfavourable and awkward to socialise with other people. She felt she would come across as strange and odd, the young women hated this, and she would always avoid meeting new people. She preferred to spend hours to herself playing the violin and piano as she took pleasure in practising her passions. She would often play for many hours and she would bask in being away from other people.

Tonight, it was no exception that it was showtime for Griselda as she made her way to the theatre wearing formal clothing. She was wearing a very long maxi dress with long sleeves and it was covered in beautiful lace. It was so long that she had to hitch up her dress to be able to walk. She was wearing white strapless heals to match and it felt like torture to even walk in, but she decided to bear it for the sake of her job. Her extremely long light blond curls were tied up in an elegant lower ponytail with a white ribbon and she wore pearl earrings to match her light blue eyes. As she walked to the theatre lifting her long dress, a man with long lavender hair wearing a very unusual outfit looked at her feet and licked his lips. She felt extremely creeped out by this man and she felt he was some sexual deviant. She started to walk quicker as she felt her heart beating like a drum as she felt terrified, he would pursue her. Luckily, he just walked away from her and she made it to the theatre.

 She went to her position in the string section of the orchestra and she sat down with the other musicians. The concert started and she played along beautifully of course. Soon the concert was over with the sound of the applause of the captivated audience as the orchestra bowed politely.

They were in the staff room drinking and talking with each other as Griselda turned to leave the theatre as she was paid for her time. But as she went to the door; a funny short man with a comical moustache called to her: “Griselda! Where do you think you are going?”. She froze with fear as she tried to think of what she could have done to lead up to this and she ended up over thinking about it. The man with the moustache who was her boss marched up to her and dragged her by the arm. “There you are! Mr Bucciarati wants to speak with you to compliment your performance himself, please be polite with him as he is not only a regular, but he is a special attendance at the theatre!” he ordered her as he dragged her along. She felt very anxious and scared about what sort of person this Bucciarati man was. She felt she would come across as odd to him as she knew she was a very reserved and timid person as she saw the world differently from other people. “Oh god what if I scare Bucciarati off? What if I scare him off and he never comes back to the theatre? What if I get fired?” she asked herself as she was overthinking the situation.

 She was dragged to the theatre bar as she was led to a young man with a black chin-length bob with neatly timed bangs. He was wearing a white suit pattern with black dots like a Dalmatian dog. His suit seemed to reveal a lot of his chest, on his chest seemed to be a black lace top or a tattoo. Griselda was not sure which one is it as she tried not to stare at his chest.  “Here is Griselda Mr Bucciarati like you requested,” the moustache man told him as he forcibly dragged her to a stool next to him and sat her down. “Thank you, Mr Marino, I appreciate it,” Bruno thanked him politely as he smiled at him as he appreciated Mr Marino going through the trouble of getting her. “No problem Mr Bucciarati,” he said as he walked off. Now she was left alone with him and she felt her heart beating out of pure anxiety as she hoped she would not come across as odd. “Hello Miss Griselda I apologise for the inconvenience of dragging you there by Mr Marino, but I would just like to say that your performance was beautiful and exceptional, I had complimented every musician in the orchestra except you Miss Griselda, you always seem to disappear after the show is over,” he complimented her in a gentle and polite manner as he smiled warmly at her as he wanted her to know how much he took pleasure in hearing her performance. “Thank you ever so much Mr Bucciarati, that really means much to me when someone compliments my performance,” she responded politely smiling at him as well as her strong German accent was present. She felt really happy and flattered that he adored her performance. It really means much to her as it gave her that rare confidence she rarely had, and it made her feel like a valued person. She felt a little less anxious as he seemed to like her.

“Miss Griselda where are you from? I really like your accent,” he asked her with curiosity as he was starting to take interest in her. “I am from Berlin in Germany Mr Bucciarati,” she replied as she was used to people being interested in her heritage. “That is interesting, I usually don’t meet many foreigners in the Naples and it’s a shame as I am really invested in other cultures Miss Griselda,” he said to her as he wanted to get to know about her culture. “What is it like to had lived in Germany Miss Griselda?” he asked her eagerly as he smiled at her. “Well Mr Bucciarati the city of Berlin is huge with a lot of land marks like the Berlin wall which was build in 1961 and it was destroyed in 1991, I actually got to witness it being pulled down and it was such a huge change for me since I was born in East Berlin and so many people tried to escape with some people being killed in attempts to try to get to West Berlin and I remembered back them that people told me that life would be better for me when the wall was destroyed,” she prattled passionately as it was such a important event in her life. She paused awkwardly as she realised, she should have mentioned something that was more normal than the Berlin wall. “I’m sorry Mr Bucciarati, of course there’s other more normal landmarks like the Brandenburg gate of course,” she admitted as she felt guilty for prattling about the Berlin Wall and she felt she was going to scare him off as she knew she could come off too strongly when talking to other people. Bruno looked impressed by her knowledge of the Berlin wall and her experiencing the fall of the wall. “No, no Miss Griselda please tell me more about it your experience with the Berlin wall I am very impressed by this,” he reassured her. “You didn’t do anything wrong,” he told her as he smiled at her as he wanted to let her know that she was an interesting person for living through the Berlin wall. Griselda felt surprised and amazed that he didn’t find her odd. She felt overjoyed that he didn’t find that she came out too strongly with her experience of the wall. “Really Mr Bucciarati?” she asked him with surprise. “Yes, really since you lived through the wall falling apart how old were you back then when it happened Miss Griselda?” he asked her with fascination. “I was nine years old when it happened Mr Bucciarati,” she responded. “So, you were quite young when it happened, right now you must be twenty-one years old correct?” he asked her. “I’m twenty years old Miss Griselda,” he added. “Yes, I am twenty years old,” she agreed with him as she nodded at him.

Bruno felt very interested with her, he wanted to get to know her more as he felt she had a lot of interesting stories to tell from Germany and he wanted to find out what she was like as a person. He felt she was timid and reserved but he found her interesting never less. He decided to invite her for lunch to introduce to his gang. “Miss Griselda would you like to meet me sometime to the local restaurant and meet my friends?” he asked her as he obviously he needed to hide the fact that he was in a criminal organisation and he was the second in command to the boss himself. “If you wish my friends and I can tell you about my culture, we could have a nice long lunch with my friends, only if you want to I am not going to force you Miss Griselda,” he reassured her as he wanted to give her the choice to come. Griselda was greatly astonished and amazed that he asked her for lunch with his friends that she cannot believe it and she felt he was joking. “Are you sure Mr Bucciarati?” she asked him as she didn’t want to fall for that trick. “Yes of course Miss Griselda so I will be seeing you at the restaurant this Sunday at 12:30 noon?” he asked her as he gave her the address to the restaurant on a piece of paper with the time and day. “I hope you are able to make it,” he said to her hopefully as he wanted to get to know. She thought for a while if she wanted to come since she preferred to stay inside and play her violin. “I might be able to come but I will think about it since my schedule is busy Mr Bucciarati, but I will try to come,” she responded as she wanted to think about this before giving a yes or no. “Alright I need to go Miss Griselda so see you on Sunday at 12:30 noon?” he asked her as he got up to leave since it was getting late and he needed to make sure the gang was not getting into any funny business. “Yes, I will see you there if I can make it Mr Bucciarati,” she replied as she got up to leave as well. “See you soon Miss Griselda,” he said hopefully as he hoped she will be able to make it. “See you soon Mr Bucciarati,” she told him as they both left the theatre bar.

 She ran all the way home as it was very late, she took off her high heels since it hurt so much, and she ran barefoot. She rushed past the man with lavender hair and strange clothes. He looked very surprised but extremely pleasured to see her barefoot, but she zoomed past him. She ran to the little house she lived with the older couple known as Luciano and Rosetta Cappelletti. She let herself in with a spare key, she tiptoed as quiet as a mouse to her room as she didn’t want to wake up the older couple since she was their roommate and she wanted to be respectful. She entered her room, changed into a white nightdress, she collapsed on bed and she fell into a deep slumber.

------

It was reeeeaally interesting!! I liked it!! I look forward for more content about Griselda!

[the-passing-flame-ffxiv-fanfic]

The Passing Flame Ch. 2

Rhun kept his usual pace behind his two sisters, as he was usually lost in thought during their morning walks to the Scholar. Classes, Training and feeling far behind the rest was always weighing heavy on his mind. He knew he didn’t have a knack for taking leadership like his parents, nor was he even interested in such. He sighed softly as he looked on towards his siblings. As much as hated when Hyliea bullied him, he very much admired her strength and courage when it came to combat classes.

Her skills where unmatched by many of the other students, even Raubahn had a difficult time defeating Hyliea, boasting about alike her and Harune where in strength and Valor. Railee was very much in the same boat but took more to their mothers’ side of combat. Her strikes where always in range, her casting ahead of the rest. Rhun found it hard to believe he was related to them, and often was the butt of Hylieas’ “adoption” jokes.

“Rhun? Rhun!” Railee flicked his forehead to gain his attentions. “Ow… what was that for?” He rubbed the sore spot on his head. “Seems we have visitors at the council.” She pointed down the long, dirt path that lead towards Ala Mhigo Palace. “I just saw Papa and Mother heading towards the Palace, and a number of guards but not of our own.” She pointed towards the base of the Palace and the stairs leading up to the giant doors.

“What? You think the Scions are gonna go on a super epic mission?” Hyliea exclaimed excitedly. “We’re getting new students, Father told me this morning.” A whisper voice spoke from between the three causing all but Railee to jump. “By the twelve Fae!! Why must you sneak up on us like that?!” Rhun exclaimed while holding his chest.

The young girl looked up at him, her platinum blonde hair pulled into two pigtails with half of her hair falling just below her shoulders. Her eyes where blue and she held a sleeping carbuncle in her arms. “Cause izzy is sleeping, and I do not wish to disturb him.” She stated plainly. Fae had a knack for summoning like her father Alphinuad. She possessed many of the same qualities towards magic like him but didn’t care much for political views and was very critical when it came to being a team healer. Ryne would talk to her about helping everyone on her team and that the healers job was to look out for her fellow classmates when they ran team drills. Though, it never really quiet set into Faes’ head to be more kind, instead, she would often shoot back that “If they weren’t so reckless they wouldn’t need me all the time,” and would leave her team mates hobbling to the chirurgeons’ office.

“By the way…” Fae looked towards Rhun once more then moved over to stand behind Hyliea. “Duck.”

Rhun tilted his head in confusion until he felt a body slam into him from behind. “YOOOOOO, Whas’up Sparky?” The slightly older boy smiled a toothy grin and ruffled Rhuns hair before getting off of his back. Rhun stood, coughing up dirt and dusting off his clothes. “M’toya! Why do you always have to be- “

“Annoying.” “Infuriating.” “A cat.”

All three girls spoke as they looked at M’toya with distaste. “Ah, c’mon. You love me.” He chuckled, then draped an arm around Rhun. “At least you do, right best bud?” He smiled again which earned a small smile from Rhun as well. M’toya was named after Y’shtolas’ late master but revised it to fit into her Miqo’te culture. His hair was medium length in the front, much in a similar manner as his fathers; Urianger but spiked in the back like his mothers. He was a few inches taller than the triplets and a year older as well.

His hair color was the same color as his fathers and his feline ears were much longer than a normal Miqo’tes, due to being half Elezen. “C’mon, if anyone knows the dirt on what’s going on, is Lyam.” M’toya took off running towards the Scholar, making the other four follow out of their own curiosity.

Upon reaching the entrance of the Scholar, M’toya scanned the student body for a certain blonde haired info boy. In a showed corner, the boy in question was leaning against the wall with his arms crossed as if in waiting. M’toya grinned seeing him and quickly, with the rest who caught up, hurried over to Lyam.

“Well if it isn’t fireball and the Elezen Quartet.” Lyam smirked and chuckled at his own joke.

“I wish you’d stop calling us that, we sound like a terrible bard group.” Railee crossed her arms giving him a judgmental stare.

“C’mon princess, I’m only play’n.” Lyam came closer to Railee, putting his arm around her.

“Remove your arm, or risk losing it.” She glared dangerously at the older blonde boy.

“You know, I like when you play-” “-Lyam!” Rhun spoke rather loudly, earning a few raised eyebrows from M’toya and a few of the others. Rhuns cheeks flushed red realizing his outburst, Lyam removed his arm from Railee and came to stand next to Rhun. “No disrespect, little sun beam.” Lyam ruffled his hair and turned to address the rest of the crew. “Simply put, Starlight came early for us.”

“Meaninnnnnnng?” Hyliea sounded exasperated and on the verge of losing her patients.

“Fenyx, Akelda and Tsuyu.” He stated proudly.

Before Lyam could blink, he was being dragged towards the Auditorium by the others, excitedly and eagerly wanting to meet up with old friends.

~Ala Mhigo Place~

Harune bowed in respect to her old comrades from the east and shook hands with the others from Ishguard. It was a pleasant reunion at first, exchanging stories of parenthood, how each of their homeland is doing and normal anxieties about their children attending Ala Mhigan scholar so far from home.

“Ah, Rhun will be happy to see Tsuyu, he is quiet smitten with her.” Alisiea giggled softly and she and Yugiri spoke of their children’s puppy love. “Indeed, Tsuyu speaks fondly of young Rhun, though she isn’t too thrilled at attending the same Scholar as Fenyx.”

Ser Aymeric chuckled as he overheard Yuguri. “Ah yes, Fenix spoke of his distaste at the knowledge of Tsuyu being a classmate of his, but thank the gods Akelda will keep him in check.” The mention at the young Wyrmblood sparked a question Harune has been withholding for months.

“Has… Has there been no word from Estinien still?” The room grew quiet, Aymeric seemed to be debating on how to answer said question. “Unfortunately no, I was hoping he would show to escort his son to Ala Mhigo but-” “If that bastard only knew how much Fenyx suffers, I wish he would prioritize his on kin sometimes.” Lucia spat out. She made her point know since the day Estinien entrusted Ser Aymeric and Lucia with the care of his son.

“The boy is indeed suffering, we waited until the last minute to board the airship, though once more, Estinien was nowhere to be seen. The only sign he lives is only due to the month gil installments he sends for Fenyx.” Aymeric stated with a sigh. Estinien always sent gil to compensate for Fenyxs’ care, though Aymeric and Lucia have put all gil aside for Fenyx for when he is of age to be on his own and wishes to do so.

Hien slapped Aymeric on the back, causing the tall Elezen man to fumble forwards. “Enough brooding. The lad will have his friends to keep him from being lonesome and my daughter to spar with too!” The Eastern Lord gave a huge grin. Harune looked amongst old friends and comrades, ‘some things never change.’ She though as everyone began to take their seat in preparation for the council meeting. The last to joing the group was Thancred, who escorted both Urianger and Y’shtola to the Palace.

“What a pleasure for the two of you to grace us, and not under explosive circumstances.” Lyse joked as Y’shtola rolled her eyes. “Yes, my kitten seems to have a knack for explosive experimentation. I have informed the Scholar to inspect his room for any mishaps he may be cooking up.” Y’shtola took her seat along with Urianger. “I reassure you, we sweep his room every morning he leaves for class.” Lyse affirmed. She then stood to address the room, taking on a much more serious tone.

“With the exception of our missing members due to other obligations, I welcome you all to this meeting. Old friends and comrades, it is good to see our homes and lands restored to what once was. Eorzea celebrates peace amongst each other as well as the prosperity of our eastern brothers and sister who are ruled by a most gracious Lord and Lady.” Lyse took a breath and let out a soft sigh.

“How I wish we could forever speak of peace.” She took her seat at the front of the table, all eyes focused on the Ala Mhigan leader, as she prepared herself for the flurry of questions that would was over here like waves crashing on the shore.

“I have been informed from our Shadow hunters, an Ascian yet lives.”

[blog-oddeyecircle]

Here’s the full story of Griselda meeting the Bucciarati gang.

It was showtime for Griselda Streusel, she often had her nightly concerts at the local theatre in the city of the Naples; it was extremely favoured among the locals who appreciated classical music to visit the local theatre to adore and listen to the glorious music, they played at the theatre.

 Bruno often relished the classical music they played there and sometimes he was accompanied by his good friend Fugo. Often, he and Fugo would meet the musicians after the show to praise and admire their performance to indicate that they were great admirers for classical music. Griselda would often be timid with meeting the two and she would often disappear before they arrived. This was due to the reason that she found it unfavourable and awkward to socialise with other people. She felt she would come across as strange and odd, the young women hated this, and she would always avoid meeting new people. She preferred to spend hours to herself playing the violin and piano as she took pleasure in practising her passions. She would often play for many hours and she would bask in being away from other people.

 Tonight, it was no exception that it was showtime for Griselda as she made her way to the theatre wearing formal clothing. She was wearing a very long maxi dress with long sleeves and it was covered in beautiful lace. It was so long that she had to hitch up her dress to be able to walk. She was wearing white strapless heals to match and it felt like torture to even walk in, but she decided to bear it for the sake of her job. Her extremely long light blond curls were tied up in an elegant lower ponytail with a white ribbon and she wore pearl earrings to match her light blue eyes. As she walked to the theatre lifting her long dress, a man with long lavender hair wearing a very unusual outfit looked at her feet and licked his lips. She felt extremely creeped out by this man and she felt he was some sexual deviant. She started to walk quicker as she felt her heart beating like a drum as she felt terrified, he would pursue her. Luckily, he just walked away from her and she made it to the theatre.

 She went to her position in the string section of the orchestra and she sat down with the other musicians. The concert started and she played along beautifully of course. Soon the concert was over with the sound of the applause of the captivated audience as the orchestra bowed politely.

They were in the staff room drinking and talking with each other as Griselda turned to leave the theatre as she was paid for her time. But as she went to the door; a funny short man with a comical moustache called to her: “Griselda! Where do you think you are going?”. She froze with fear as she tried to think of what she could have done to lead up to this and she ended up overthinking about it. The man with the moustache who was her boss marched up to her and dragged her by the arm. “There you are! Mr Bucciarati wants to speak with you to compliment your performance himself, please be polite with him as he is not only a regular, but he is a special attendance at the theatre!” he ordered her as he dragged her along. She felt very anxious and scared about what sort of person this Bucciarati man was. She felt she would come across as odd to him as she knew she was a very reserved and timid person as she saw the world differently from other people. “Oh god, what if I scare Bucciarati off? What if I scare him off and he never comes back to the theatre? What if I get fired?” she asked herself as she was overthinking the situation.

 She was dragged to the theatre bar as she was led to a young man with a black chin-length bob with neatly timed bangs. He was wearing a white suit pattern with black dots like a Dalmatian dog. His suit seemed to reveal a lot of his chest, on his chest seemed to be a black lace top or a tattoo. Griselda was not sure which one is it as she tried not to stare at his chest.  “Here is Griselda Mr Bucciarati like you requested,” the moustache man told him as he forcibly dragged her to a stool next to him and sat her down. “Thank you, Mr Marino, I appreciate it,” Bruno thanked him politely as he smiled at him as he appreciated Mr Marino going through the trouble of getting her. “No problem Mr Bucciarati,” he said as he walked off. Now she was left alone with him and she felt her heart beating out of pure anxiety as she hoped she would not come across as odd. “Hello Miss Griselda I apologise for the inconvenience of dragging you there, by Mr Marino, but I would just like to say that your performance was beautiful and exceptional, I had complimented every musician in the orchestra except you Miss Griselda, you always seem to disappear after the show is over,” he complimented her in a gentle and polite manner as he smiled warmly at her as he wanted her to know how much he took pleasure in hearing her performance. “Thank you ever so much Mr Bucciarati, that really means much to me when someone compliments my performance,” she responded politely smiling at him as well as her strong German accent was present. She felt really happy and flattered that he adored her performance. It really means much to her as it gave her that rare confidence she rarely had, and it made her feel like a valued person. She felt a little less anxious as he seemed to like her.

“Miss Griselda where are you from? I really like your accent,” he asked her with curiosity as he was starting to take interest in her. “I am from Berlin in Germany Mr Bucciarati,” she replied as she was used to people being interested in her heritage. “That is interesting, I usually don’t meet many foreigners in the Naples and it’s a shame as I am really invested in other cultures Miss Griselda,” he said to her as he wanted to get to know about her culture. “What is it like to be in Germany Miss Griselda?” he asked her eagerly as he smiled at her. “Well Mr Bucciarati the city of Berlin is huge with a lot of landmarks like the Berlin wall which was built in 1961 and it was destroyed in 1991, I actually got to witness it being pulled down and it was such a huge change for me since I was born in East Berlin and so many people tried to escape with some people being killed in attempts to try to get to West Berlin and I remembered back them that people told me that life would be better for me when the wall was destroyed,” she prattled passionately as it was such an important event in her life. She paused awkwardly as she realised, she should have mentioned something that was more normal than the Berlin wall. “I’m sorry Mr Bucciarati, of course, there are other more normal landmarks like the Brandenburg gate of course,” she admitted as she felt guilty for prattling about the Berlin Wall and she felt she was going to scare him off as she knew she could come off too strongly when talking to other people. Bruno looked impressed by her knowledge of the Berlin wall and her experiencing the fall of the wall. “No, no Miss Griselda please tell me more about it your experience with the Berlin wall I am very impressed by this,” he reassured her. “You didn’t do anything wrong,” he told her as he smiled at her as he wanted to let her know that she was an interesting person for living through the Berlin wall. Griselda felt surprised and amazed that he didn’t find her odd. She felt overjoyed that he didn’t find that she came out too strongly with her experience of the wall. “Really Mr Bucciarati?” she asked him with surprise. “Yes, really since you lived through the wall falling apart how old were you back then when it happened Miss Griselda?” he asked her with fascination. “I was nine years old when it happened Mr Bucciarati,” she responded. “So, you were quite young when it happened, right now you must be twenty-one years old correct?” he asked her. “I’m twenty years old Miss Griselda,” he added. “Yes, I am twenty one years old,” she agreed with him as she nodded at him.

Bruno felt very interested with her, he wanted to get to know her more as he felt she had a lot of interesting stories to tell from Germany and he wanted to find out what she was like as a person. He felt she was timid and reserved but he found her interesting never less. He decided to invite her for lunch to introduce to his gang. “Miss Griselda would you like to meet me some time to the local restaurant and meet my friends?” he asked her as he obviously he needed to hide the fact that he was in a criminal organisation and he was the second in command to the boss himself. “If you wish my friends and I can tell you about my culture, we could have a nice long lunch with my friends, only if you want to I am not going to force you, Miss Griselda,” he reassured her as he wanted to give her the choice to come. Griselda was greatly astonished and amazed that he asked her for lunch with his friends that she cannot believe it and she felt he was joking. “Are you sure Mr Bucciarati?” she asked him as she didn’t want to fall for that trick. “Yes, of course, Miss Griselda so I will be seeing you at the restaurant this Sunday at 12:30 noon?” he asked her as he gave her the address to the restaurant on a piece of paper with the time and day. “I hope you are able to make it,” he said to her hopefully as he wanted to get to know. She thought for a while if she wanted to come since she preferred to stay inside and play her violin. “I might be able to come but I will think about it since my schedule is busy Mr Bucciarati, but I will try to come,” she responded as she wanted to think about this before giving a yes or no. “Alright I need to go Miss Griselda so see you on Sunday at 12:30 noon?” he asked her as he got up to leave since it was getting late and he needed to make sure the gang was not getting into any funny business. “Yes, I will see you there if I can make it Mr Bucciarati,” she replied as she got up to leave as well. “See you soon Miss Griselda,” he said hopefully as he hoped she will be able to make it. “See you soon Mr Bucciarati,” she told him as they both left the theatre bar.

 She ran all the way home as it was very late, she took off her high heels since it hurt so much, and she ran barefoot. She rushed past the man with lavender hair and strange clothes. He looked very surprised but extremely pleasured to see her barefoot, but she zoomed past him. She ran to the little house she lived with the older couple known as Luciano and Rosetta Cappelletti. She let herself in with a spare key, she tiptoed as quiet as a mouse to her room as she didn’t want to wake up the older couple since she was their roommate and she wanted to be respectful. She entered her room, changed into a white nightdress, she collapsed on bed and she fell into a deep slumber.

 It was Sunday, the day she was due to meet Bruno and her gang. She got out of bed at eight and she made her bed. She brushed her teeth and washed her hair and dried it with a hairdryer as it took a long time for her hair to dry up. She brushed her light blond curls with great difficulty. She got dressed into her usual outfit which was a two-piece above the ankle dress which had a plain white dress with thin straps and a lace dress with long and wide sleeves. The second part of the dress had ribbons on the side of the sleeves and around her neck. She put on some light brown laced up shoes with heels and a white flower crown on her head.

She went downstairs to make breakfast for her and the older couple to try to be helpful to them. She made some tea and coffee with some buttered toast for them as she waited for Luciano and Rosetta to come downstairs. Eventually, they made their way slowly and carefully to the kitchen to have breakfast.

Rosetta was a delicate and frail old lady who did not reach up to the mere height of 5’4. Her light grey hair was tied back with curlers which were put on in the night and taken off during the day. She wore a pastel-coloured bathrobe with roses with matching slippers. Her expression was elderly with plenty of wrinkles and her eyes were chestnut brown. She had a light brown walking stick to help her balance properly. Luciano was an elderly man with the great height of 6’1, he was more fit and able than Rosetta as he held her hand as he gently led her to the kitchen. He was wearing a set of blue-striped pyjamas with nothing on his feet, his grey hair was cut short and his face was neatly trimmed.

“Good morning Griselda, did you sleep well dear?” Rosetta asked her as she sat down slowly on her chair. “Yes, I did Miss Rosetta, did you sleep well?” she responded politely as she looked at her. Luciano didn’t say anything as he was a man of few words as he took his coffee and toast to eat it outside. “Yes, I did, it’s lovely that you made breakfast for us since it’s starting to become difficult to even walk since my age is catching up to me so it’s convenient for us to have someone make breakfast for us I appreciate it, Griselda,” she said gratefully as she tucked in her breakfast. “No problem Miss Rosetta, it’s not too much trouble to prepare breakfast for both of you,” she replied happily as she was starting to eat her breakfast. “Are you planning to do anything today?” Rosetta asked her. “The theatre is closed on Sunday, so you have some free time, do you have any plans or are you going to sit in your room all day to play the violin or piano?” she inquired as she wished Griselda would go out more since she was concerned about her as she always seemed to be alone.

“Well…” Griselda started. “I was invited to have lunch with someone named Mr Bucciarati today with his friends after he met me after the show yesterday,” she said as she was not sure if she should come, she would honestly rather spend time in her room.  Rosetta seemed to choke on her tea with surprise. “Mr Bucciarati invited you for lunch?!?” she asked her as she knew Bruno as he was kind and respectful to other people, but he seemed to be only invested in his gang of teens. She couldn’t believe that he asked Griselda out of lunch “Griselda how did you manage to get him to ask you out for lunch with his group?!? Do you know he’s very invested in his group and he usually doesn’t ask civilians out,” she informed her as she continued to sip her tea. “What do you mean civilians Miss Rosetta?” Griselda asked her as she was confused with this sort of sentence. “Civilians? Oh, silly me, my tongue had slipped dear, you really don’t know much about Mr Bucciarati, do you?” she asked her. “It was only a few months since you moved here from Germany so it’s no surprise that you barely know him,” she continued. “What is there something I should know of Mr Bucciarati Miss Rosetta?” Griselda inquired her with curiosity as she wondered what Bucciarati’s secret was. “Nothing Griselda, I advise you go to have lunch with him and his group,” she advised her as she felt that Griselda would not be able to handle the news of Bruno being in a gang since she seemed so prim and delicate to her, she felt she would be heartbroken to find out this news. “It will be good for you as you always seem to be alone, I understand if you need to spend time alone which is perfectly fine and harmless for anyone to do but you should try to form friendships since they are important in anyone’s life, I believe that you should at least try to go to lunch with Mr Bucciarati and his friends, if you dislike it then you don’t have to do it again but it’s good for you to try and step out of your comfort zone even though it’s extremely daunting, so what do you say Griselda?” she asked her in a serious voice as she looked at her as she waited for an answer from her. Griselda thought for a while as she desperately wanted to be alone and be away from other people. But she did want to form some meaningful relationships since she wanted more people to be accepted and loved for herself. She wanted to go despite being terrified of being rejected and hurt. She contemplated for a long and tedious time until she had made her decision. “Miss Rosetta thank you for the advice, I will go to see Mr Bucciarati and his friends for lunch,” she told her as she smiled bravely as she told herself that she would have fun. “WHAT ARE YOU DOING GRISELDA YOU CAN’T GO TO LUNCH WITH MR BUCCIARATI AND HIS FRIENDS, YOU WILL BE REJECTED AND MOCKED BECAUSE WHY WOULD MR BUCCIARATI INVITE SOMEONE LIKE YOU, YOU ARE TRASH!” Her mind screamed with horror. Rosetta smiled as she held her hand. “I’m glad you made your decision I believe you will enjoy yourself and make some friends,” she told her letting her know that she was very proud of her.

It was 12:09 noon as Griselda prepared to leave, she made sure her hair and clothes were neat at least ten times before going. She stepped out of the door when she decided to check her hair and clothes again. She stepped inside to look in the mirror. Rosetta was watching her. “Griselda this is the eleventh time you checked your hair and clothes you look perfectly presentable now go to the restaurant or you will be late,” she urged her as she pushed her out of the door and closed the door. Griselda turned to walk slowly to the restaurant as she felt very anxious. “GRISELDA, GRISELDA LET’S GO HOME PLEASE!” Her mind begged her, but she told herself she would have fun and she was not going home. She walked and walked until she found the restaurant. She felt her heart beating loudly and she was nervously sweating. She wiped the sweat from her forehead and checked the time on the front of the restaurant. It was 12:29 and she felt she needed to wait a minute until it was 12:30 as she felt she would be too early as she waited for it to be 12:30. One minute later, it was 12:30. Bruno was nowhere to be seen and she told herself that it was only 12:30. 12:35, she told herself he was running a bit late. 12:40, she was starting to wonder what happened to him. 12:50, she concluded that a cruel joke was played on her. She felt regretful and crestfallen as her eyes were brimming with tears. She turned to leave the restaurant as she planned to go home and cry to herself. Maybe play some miserable violin music to match her current mood.

Suddenly, a voice called out to her as she was leaving the restaurant. “Miss Griselda, where are you going?” called out Bruno as he walked up to her quickly from the restaurant. Griselda was astonished to discover that he was here, and she turned to face him. “I am so sorry Miss Griselda, I should have told you to go inside the restaurant to get the waiter to take you to me, I am so sorry!” he apologised as he felt so horrible for making her wait and forcing her to think he played a cruel joke on her. She blinked away the tears as she smiled at him, she felt so happy and relieved that he really means it to invite her for lunch. “It’s alright Mr Bucciarati, I should have gone inside the restaurant,” she reassured him as she didn’t want to blame him for keeping her waiting. “I’m happy that you showed up, my friends were really looking forward to meeting you so come on,” he told her smiling at her warmly as he led her inside the restaurant to meet the gang.

They walked into the restaurant and they made their way to the group. Abbacchio, Mista, Narancia, Fugo, Trish and Giorno were sitting at the table as they talked among themselves. Bruno had made sure to specifically tell Giorno to not steal her wallet, Fugo to try to control his temper, Narancia to also control his temper as well. He told them firmly for both Narancia and Fugo to not do their homework when Griselda was around. He told Mista to try to not react so much if he sees anything resembing the number four, he made sure to let Abbacchio know to not serve Griselda his urine as tea despite him telling him it was only once with Giorno. Finally, he told Trish to try not to show off her expensive clothes and products so much as it would make Griselda think the young girl was haughty. He didn’t want to scare Griselda off with his team’s eccentric nature since he wanted him and his team to get to know her.

They arrived at the table the group was in. “Hey guys this is Griselda,” Bruno said introducing her to the group. Instantly Mista, Fugo and Narancia got up to greet the young women. Mista grabbed her hand to shake it as he smiled at her in a friendly manner. “Hey Griselda, you know you are a very pretty woman, Bruno told me a lot about you,” Mista flirted with her as he liked pretty women. Griselda found her face turning extremely red at his compliment as she felt very embarrassed at his flirtatious side of his personality but despite this, she found him to be very friendly. “Hey, her face is turning red, I think she already likes Mista!” Narancia teased her as he shook her hand very vigorously. “Hi Griselda, my name is Narancia and this is Mista!” he said to her in a friendly manner as he was excited to meet her for many reasons. Griselda didn’t say anything to Narancia’s teasing as she let Narancia shake her hand as she felt he was shaking her hand a little too hard, but she found him to be very friendly and energetic. To her, he seemed to still have his childlike nature due to his tenancy to tease her. She felt emotionally overwhelmed by both Mista and Narancia as she felt she couldn’t handle their extremely social nature. “Guys calm down! You guys are overwhelming her!” Fugo yelled at them angrily as he felt furious that Griselda was getting flirted by Mista and Narancia teasing her as he wanted her to feel welcome. He felt anger boiling up inside him as he walked over to deal with Mista and Narancia. But Bruno placed his hand on his shoulder. “Fugo please count to ten and take a deep breath, it’s very caring of you that you understand what Griselda is feeling but please calm down,” Bruno said to him in a calm and gentle tone as Fugo started to count to ten. He took several deep breathes before calming down and he composed himself. “Thank you, Fugo I appreciated it,” Bruno thanked him gratefully as he was relieved that Fugo had calmed down as he can often be very sensitive, and he often struggled to keep his temper together.  Fugo was eventually calm and composed as he went over to greet Griselda. “Hello Griselda my name is Fugo, I think I saw you play several times when Bruno and I attended the concerts at the theatre correct?” he asked her politely as he shook her hand in a gentle manner as he smiled at her gently. “Yes, I think you do see me play at the local theatre,” Griselda replied as she shook his hand as well. “I just want to say that you are a really talented violist,” he complimented her as he really liked seeing her play at the theatre. “Thank you Fugo I really appreciate it,” she responded gratefully as she liked it that he appreciated her music. She found him to be really nice and polite. “Anyway, let’s order our food, I’m sure we are all hungry,” Bruno told them as they all sat down at the table together.

“Griselda this is Trish who is the only girl in the group but now there are two girls in the group,” Mista introduced her to Trish who shook her hand. “How do you do Miss Griselda, I’m Trish,” Trish introduced herself as she continued to shake her hand. “You too Miss Trish,” Griselda responded as she shook her hand politely as well. She found Trish to be a very polite young lady. “Miss Griselda, I really like your hair how did you make it so long and curly?” Trish asked her enviously. “I really like the colour of your hair as well, it’s a really nice shade of light blond and even your eyes are in a pleasant shade of blue,” she continued as she could see her looking really good in some channel clothes. “Thank you, Trish, I do take care of my hair quite well,” Griselda replied delightfully as she took pride in her hair. She took pride in Trish liking her hair and her appearance as she felt blissfully happy. “This is Giorno who can be awesome to be with,” Mista continued to introduce the rest of the group. “How are you Miss Griselda?” Giorno asked her politely as he shook her hand. “I’m doing fine Giorno,” she replied as she found him to be polite as well. “Want to see a trick?” Giorno asked her as he stuffed his ear in his head without waiting for her to answer. “How did you do that?” she asked him with astonishment and surprise as she was amazed at this trick as she examined at the hole in his head to try to study how he managed to perform his trick. “Don’t let his ear trick get to you Griselda,” Mista advised her as it was an extremely confusing trick to understand. “It’s something that very few people can do Griselda and I do it to impress other people since it’s such a complicated trick for other people to comprehend,” Giorno told her in a manner that sounded charismatic and he didn’t sound like he was flourishing this trick as it lead her to believe it was really a trick that few people could perform. She found him charismatic and very excellent at talking to her. “And let me finally introduce you to our man Abbacchio who may be a little imitating, but he will warm up to you soon don’t worry,” Mista reassured her as the introductions were finally done. Abbacchio seemed to glare at her as he didn’t remove his headphones as he listened to his music, he didn’t say anything to her as he continued to frown at her as he was trying to read her like a book since he wanted to know what sort of person she was and what was her relationship with Bruno. “Hello, Mr Abbacchio…” Griselda said to him in a nervous and anxious voice as he continued to glare at her, she found him to be extremely menacing and distrusting of her as she could feel his stares were burning through her soul.

 “So, Griselda Bruno told me about your experience with the Berlin Wall tell me what it was like please,” Fugo suddenly spoke interrupting the awkward silence between her and Abbacchio. “What’s the Berlin wall, Griselda?” Narancia asked her eagerly as he was really interested in this wall. She smiled at both of them as she felt happy that they were interested in the wall as she was born in East Berlin, the part of Germany that used to be in the USSR’s communist regime. “Well Narancia the Berlin wall was a wall that was placed they’re between East and West Germany between 1961 to 1991, I think it was there to split Germany after World war 2 between the Allied countries,” she explained to Narancia patiently. She turned to Fugo. “And Fugo during the time I remember the adults talking about how there were no free elections since it was a communist state, no division of powers and no freedom of movement as so many people wanted to live in West Germany since I heard it was better there,” she told him in a serious voice since she remembered it all too well. Bruno, Trish and Giorno looked interested in her experience in East Berlin as they listened to her politely. Mista and Narancia looked completely confused as they had no knowledge of the Berlin wall or Communism from the USSR. Abbacchio didn’t even care as he had his headphones on. “Fugo what is Communism?” Narancia asked him as he looked confused as he tried to think of a definition of communism. “Yeah Fugo, since you are a smartass you should know,” Mista added as he was never so confused in his life. “Oh god looks like I would have to give both of you a history lesson of the USSR and communism, teaching Narancia is bad enough but I would rather die than teach both of you idiots,” Fugo responded as he knew Mista was almost as stupid as Narancia and one idiot was bad enough. “Come on Fugo I need to know,” Mista begged him desperately as he wanted to be on the same page as Griselda as he felt he needed to be smart to impress her. “Mista you just want to know about Communism so you can impress Griselda, I can see through all of your tricks,” Giorno teased him in a light-hearted manner as he thought about how hilarious it would be for Mista to tell her about communism to impress her since he knew Mista liked women a lot and he would do anything to impress them.

 “He’s just all hair but no brains,” Trish teased him as well. “You two are so mean both you and Trish don’t need to do much to impress others,” Mista said sadly. “Bruno and Abbacchio can impress women with no effort, Bruno managed to ask Griselda for lunch who is a pretty woman from Germany and Abbacchio gets all of the goth girls, I swear I will be single forever and ever,” Mista continued to tell his tragic story of being single. Griselda felt sorry for him and she sympathised with him of wanting to be with somebody. “I’m sorry to hear that Mista don’t worry you will find someone one day,” she responded in a sympathetic tone as she patted his back awkwardly. “Yes, Mista someone will be yours one day,” Bruno told him as he also patted his back. “If you need any advice on women you know who to go to,” Bruno reminded him smiling. “But it would be a long-term project,” Abbacchio suddenly spoke out as he smirked at him. “But Mista if you get a girlfriend then the single trio will be a single duo!” Narancia protested childishly. “You are my bro Mista, if you get a girlfriend then I only have Fugo left!” he complained as despite Fugo being his friend, he could be boring to hang out with. “Narancia for god sakes I said I would not be part of a group where we act like Martyrs because we don’t have a girlfriend,” Fugo sighed feeling irritated, he didn’t see any point of trying to have a girlfriend since he felt his anger issues would just chase away any potential people. “Fugo you may be smart, but you don’t understand the purpose of the single trio,” Mista spoke up as he seemed to recover quickly from his sadness of being single. “Well he recovered from his sadness quite quickly,” Griselda thought to herself as she found herself glancing to Bruno as he smiled at her as she turned her head quickly with embarrassment as she still felt awkward with him. “But the single trio is there for poor saps like us who can’t get a girl which is Narancia, Fugo and me,” Mista explained to him as he placed his hand on his shoulder. “Mista I am not interested in relationships at all, so I don’t care about getting a girl or not,” Fugo responded as he felt that there was no point of him getting into a relationship due to his anger issues. “Everyone says that Fugo but one day when you fall in love you might be interested in entering a relationship,” Bruno spoke up as he knew that his anger could prevent him from building relationships. Fugo didn’t say anything as he continued to eat and drink. Mista put his glass of wine down and he felt his blood froze. He looked horrified as he realised, he drank his fourth glass of wine.  

 “What the hell is this fuckery?” Mista cursed to himself fearfully as he was trembling with fear as he couldn’t comprehend that he just drank his fourth glass of wine. “Mista what’s wrong?” Griselda asked him in a concerned voice as he looked so fearful like he just saw a ghost. “Griselda this is something out of humanity’s control, I just drank my fourth glass of wine,” Mista gulped nervously as he was so terrified. Griselda looked so confused but she patted his back awkwardly to try to console. “Mista this is why you shouldn’t count how many potions you had of any food or drink because you freak out whenever you have your fourth potion,” Fugo told him sighing like the rest of the group were not alarmed by Mista’s discomfort of his discovery of his fourth potion of wine since they were used to his irrational. Bruno put his hand on Griselda’s shoulder to try to reassure her. “Miss Griselda don’t worry about Mista he’s not going through anything alarmingly distressing he just has an irrational fear of the number four and he just had his fourth glass of wine,” he explained to her. “It’s not irrational Bruno!” Mista exclaimed. “Having five potions is fine, having three potions is fine, but if you have four potions something terrible will happen!” he continued. “When I was kid another kid adopted a kitten from a litter of four that was born in my neighbourhood but then the cat scratched his eye right out of his head,” he went on explaining why the number four was a horrible number that brought bad luck. “Of course he beat the cat to dea-“he added before being cut off by Bruno. “Ok Mista we get it now please calm down,” he interrupted Mista as he gave him a warning glare as Mista calmed down by drinking his fifth glass of wine.

A waiter approached Bruno and whispered in his ear. He whispered in Giorno’s ear as well as they both got up from their chairs. “My apologies Miss Griselda Giorno and I need to go take a call, we will be back as soon as the call is over,” Bruno told her as they went to a private place to take the call. Abbacchio seemed to the checking that Bruno and Giorno were gone as he poured her some tea. “So, Miss Griselda let’s have some tea and chat,” he told her smirking at her as it was regular tea, but he was planning to put something in it. “Sugar?” he offered her as he put out a bowl of salt to put in her tea as a new bullying tactic for her. “Well, I...” Griselda started as she seemed very surprised that he was making the effort to speak to her when Bruno and Giorno were gone. “Of course, you would like some sugar in your tea Miss Griselda,” he interrupted her as he put lots of salt in her tea and stirring it for her. “Thank you, Mr Abbacchio,” Griselda responded awkwardly as she looked at him. Fugo knew he put salt in her tea as he felt anger boiling up in him as he realised, he was bullying Griselda, but he didn’t want to start a fight with Abbacchio as he sipped his tea angrily. Mista and Narancia tried to hold back their giggles as they always enjoyed it when Abbacchio played a prank on someone while Trish was too busy reading a magazine to take notice of this. “So, Miss Griselda do tell me, what is your relationship with Bruno?” Abbacchio asked her in a fake friendly tone as he was trying to see what Bruno saw in her and why Bruno seemed to like her. “I don’t know what you are trying to say Mr Abbacchio,” she responded as she felt he was interrogating than asking her an innocent question. “Oh, you know are you in a relationship with Bruno?” he asked her as he sipped his tea and his gaze didn’t break off her gaze. “Like hugging each other, complimenting each other, kissing each other, saying “I love you”, going on dates…” he went on. “Maybe even getting a little frisky and having sex?” he suggested as he stared at her as he was going to get some honest answers out of her one way or another. “No, I am not in a relationship with Bruno we just met a few days ago!” she protested as she started to blush at the thought of dating Bruno and even having sex with him. “We are just friends Mr Abbacchio,” she told him as she tried to convince him she wasn’t dating Bruno. She felt nervous and she felt she was being bullied by him. “How can you even sure? Maybe you are hiding something from us…” he said to her in a suspicious voice as he was not convinced by her answers. He was acting like that because he felt that Bruno gave him a purpose in life and something to live for in his life. He felt paranoid and fearful whenever Bruno entered a relationship with someone as he felt that Bruno was going to leave him forcing him to live on nothing. Griselda was starting to feel antagonised by him as she felt distraught and upset by his bullying. She thought she would be accepted by the group but Abbacchio was clearly rejecting her and was trying to find a strategy to escape this situation.

“Miss Griselda is definitely not in love with Bruno, I can tell,” Trish spoke up from her magazine as she turned a page. She decided to try to force Abbacchio to stop bullying her by sticking up for her. She moved chairs to sit next to her so she could comfort her and make her feel less distraught. “She only met him a few days ago and this is the second time she met him, she would need to get to know him properly to fall in love with and if she had a crush on him right now, she would be infatuated by him, not in love with him,” she continued as she looked at him. She squeezed Griselda’s hand to try to console her as she could see she was very distraught in this situation. Trish already admired Griselda since she found her to be kind and intelligent. She never really had a female friend before since she was surrounded by boys in her group. So, it was nice and pleasant for her to have a female friend. She was not going to have Abbacchio antagonise her like that. “So, I guess you are the love expert Trish?” Abbacchio asked her sarcastically. “Yes, I am the love expert actually I go out on at least one date per month, so I know when someone likes me or I like them,” she told him as she crossed her arms. “She goes on so many dates it’s hard to count the number of boys and girls she dated,” Mista commented. “Did she date more boys or girls Fugo?” Narancia asked him as he started to spin a pencil on the table like a top as he was bored. “It’s an equal distribution Narancia, she likes both boys and girls I guess,” Fugo responded as he sipped his tea. Abbacchio looked frustrated and angry that someone else in his team was sticking up for Griselda. He left the restaurant feeling furious. “So, Miss Griselda how many years have you been playing the violin and piano?” Trish asked her as she decided to distract her with another topic. “I have been playing the violin when I was nine years old and the piano when I was ten years old, so I have been playing the violin for about twelve years and the piano when I was eleven years old Miss Trish,” she responded gratefully that Trish stuck up for her as she felt less upset about the incident. “That’s a lot of experience Miss Griselda you must be very talented,” Trish replied sounded impressed by her dedication and experience. “Yes, it’s impressive as you have picked it up when you were a child and usually children are not as dedicated to playing an instrument,” Fugo added as it was impressive that she had a lot of experience.

Bruno and Giorno finally returned back from their call as they whispered to Mista as they had a mission to do. Mista nodded as he got up. “Alright guys we need to go, where’s Abbacchio?” Bruno asked the group. “Abbacchio went home because he was pissed Bruno,” said Narancia. “Why was he angry?” Bruno asked as he felt concerned and worried about Abbacchio. “I don’t know,” Narancia responded. Bruno felt slightly annoyed with Narancia, but he decided to drop it. “Ok guys you guys go home while I accompany Miss Griselda to her home,” Bruno announced to the gang as they got up to leave the restaurant. “So, Miss Griselda, let me accompany you back home,” he told her as they walked out of the restaurant. “Yes of course,” Griselda replied as she nodded at him. “Hey Bruno, can I walk with you to Griselda’s home?” Narancia asked him hopefully as he wanted to spend more time with her. “Can I come to?” Mista asked him as well. “No Mista and Narancia all of you guys go home,” Bruno said to them firmly as he wanted them to go home so they could plan their mission. “Pleeaaseeee Bruno?” Narancia begged him. “Yeah Bruno pleeeaaseeee?” Mista added as both of them tried their best to make the cutest puppy eyes to try to persuade Bruno to let them come with him to accompany Griselda to her home. “No Mista and Narancia, all you say goodbye to Miss Griselda and go home,” he told the group firmly as he was not changing his mind. Mista and Narancia could see it was a lost cause. Both Mista and Narancia shook her hand at the same time. “Goodbye, Griselda I hope I can see you again,” Mista told her as he turned to leave. “Bye Griselda you are awesome!” Narancia said to her as he gave her a fist bump before leaving with Mista. Then the rest of the group said good-by to her. Fugo shook her hand as well. “Goodbye Miss Griselda I hope I can see you again at the concert,” he said to her as he left. Giorno also shook her hand and left. Trish hugged her. “Miss Griselda, I hope I can see you again,” Trish told her hopefully as Griselda felt surprised with the hug, but she wrapped her arms around her. “You too Miss Trish,” she responded as she hugged her back. They all left the restaurant, Bruno and Griselda walked home together.

  “So how was the lunch? did you like my friends Miss Griselda Bruno asked her eagerly as they walked home together as he wanted to know if she had a great time with him and his friends. “Yes, I did thank you Mr Bucciarati, I got along well with your friends,” Griselda replied as she didn’t want to tell him about Abbacchio antagonising her since she preferred to keep her struggles to herself. “That’s good, you know if you wish you can call me Bruno if you like Griselda,” he told her as he didn’t feel that he had to feel formal with her as they were friends. “If you don’t mind Bruno,” she replied as she continued to walk home with him. “So how long have you lived in Naples for?” he asked her. “Well it’s only a couple of months since I had moved here from Berlin,” she said to him. “I hope you don’t mind me asking but why did you move to Naples from Berlin?” he asked her curiously. She froze for a while as she didn’t want to talk about why she left her home country. “I left because I wanted to live in another country that is all,” she lied to him as they arrived at their home. “Goodbye Bruno, thank you for inviting me,” she said quickly as she ran into the house as she was uncomfortable with talking about her reason for leaving her home country. “Oh, ok thank you for coming Griselda,” he found himself saying as he found her reaction strange to his question but he didn’t think about it too much as he walked home.

[alexazbofficial]

EXCLUSIVE Interview With AleXa Of Produce 48 [Future K-Pop Star]

A day before the Delhi show we got to sit down with AleXa at length. Having to give continuous press interviews since morning she did not one bit show anything but cheerfulness on her face. She answered all of my questions with a smile even describing the adversities she had gone through like it was no big deal.

How do i even begin to describe my impression of hers, she is super talented and yet very down to earth. To quote her “I can’t English right now.” So thank god i have the detailed interview below from when i could!

KHigh: Could you please introduce yourself and tell us about your background?

AleXa: My name is AleXa – stage name, i am originally from Tulsa, Oklahoma in the United States and i was born to a Russian-American father and a Korean mother so i am half actually. I have lived my entire life speaking English up until 21 years of my life, only English because my mom was adopted from Seoul when she was 5 so she doesn’t remember the language… couldn’t teach me therefore, there’s that. Umm I’ve basically been singing, dancing and doing stuff on stage my entire life and then Zany Bros found me in 2017… and the rest is history!

KHigh: I did some research on you and found out that you started dancing from a very young age and it shows in your performances, when you dance you own the space and have fun doing it! But how and when did singing come into picture?

AleXa: Let’s see… like you said I’ve been dancing from an young age, i mean i was in my school choir and every thing but i really only started taking singing seriously in high school. Sophomore year of high school is i suppose 10th grade in India, i was accepted into my high school’s show choir and i along with two other sophomore girls, we made it in and for 15 years there had not been sophomores admitted into the choir until my year!

KHigh: So we can say that was your first achievement at singing?

AleXa: Yes! And up until i graduated i stayed in show choir and that gave me more confidence in singing on stage and more performing etc. Then i went to college and started studying musical theater, we did vocal classes and stuff but i never received vocal lessons until i came to South Korea for my training.

KHigh: Did you get to complete your college?

AleXa: I actually dropped out before i graduated because *laughs* Korea.

KHigh: I also heard you are interested in science!

AleXa: Very much so!

KHigh: I saw your video with Grazy Grace and you mentioned about being a mortician and i thought to myself “well that’s scary!”

*we both laugh, her more at ease and me with wonderment.*

KHigh: You were so specific on that so how come?

AleXa: Being a forensic pathologist is something i wanted to do from a very young age but also mortician do autopsies on bodies.

*she continued to answer as if its the most natural choice as a kid*

AleXa: My mother from young age said i should go to medical school because doctors, nurses make a lot of money but i just never like the idea of having someone else’s LIFE in my hand. So how about NO, how about i work with dead people so if anything goes wrong i can not be sued.

*she concludes chuckling*

KHigh: Woah very clever! I could have never thought of it like this, so you weren’t scared of it ever?

AleXa: Oh noooo, once there was an exhibit that came to my hometown called ‘Bodies’, it was donated bodies of prisoners some of them were completely skinned and you could see the veins, organs – some were dissected a certain way you could actually feel it! It was incredible!

KHigh: Is the thought of pursuing college still there?

AleXa: Maybe after debut, if i wanna continue my education, if i have time… i would like to go back to university, but i think more or less after my career is at its finished point then i’d like to go back to college, one little step at a time.

KHigh: I’ve watched and cheered for you on Produce 48, but i’d also like to know your journey towards it, coming to Korea auditioning for entertainment agencies etc?

AleXa: So in 2016 was the first year that this online contest called ‘Rising Legends’ happened with Soompi and JYP, i won  the dance category and the following one with Cube i also won the dance category but that year among the top 3 winners they chose one grand winner with the most overall votes and judges’ decision to go to Korea for originally 5 days and audition for cube in person. I won the grand prize and was given the opportunity but when they called me saying i won they also mentioned  “hey we’re considering filming a TV reality show the week before would you fly out a week early and be part of this” and there was no way i was going to pass that up! So i went to Korea and that’s when i met the Zany Bros crew so i was introduced to my company that way and through that we shot my first single and music video “Strike it up” and during the editing process the Ceo of Zany bros saw and asked about me, and that’s when the idea of me being their first trainee and Zany bros starting an entertainment company was sparked!

KHigh: How did you make the choice of going ahead with ZB as you had not auditioned for any other companies other than ZB label and Cube Entertainment?

AleXa: I remember they (ZB Label) called me in December 2017 to talk about this i had my parents with me we did a Video conference, for the longest time my parents knew i loved doing creative things and they of course supported me in high school but as i had mentioned my mom wanted me to go to medical school so gaining so it took me a long time to gain their full approval for me to go all into something creative with no second choices, when this opportunity arose they were like its about time go for it, there’s nothing for you to lose at this point you can only try and get further. So there was no way i was going to pass it away!

KHigh: How long have you been training? And what is the hardest part of being a trainee?

AleXa: To be really in the trainee system, i think it began more or less in November. We started going in we had everyday training, i started attending a Korean academy to improve my language, i have private training to better my rhythm and then am also taking a K-Pop class to get the basic lines and things down for girl group choreography. So i’d say its been a little over an half year.  Hardest part is probably keeping the mindset of like, It’s okay be at  the level you’re at but you can do better. You need to know you have to do better, no matter how well you’re doing at the moment you think but you need to go above and beyond of what the standard is. That’s probably a very hard thing to keep in mind.

KHigh: You had to learn Korean language from scratch, what do you think helps you best learning the language?

AleXa: I think just constantly speaking it. I’ve learnt to use Korean more and though I’m not even close to fluent but to constantly speak gets my brain to work faster hence even if i make mistakes it’s corrected and i catch on quick. So the more you speak it, it gets more natural. I had the biggest fear of me not wanting to say anything in Korean constantly worried about speaking incorrectly, but not anymore i don’t care even if i have to corrected, good at-least i’ll learn.

KHigh: Tell us about the culture difference you might have experienced when you came to Korea for the first time? Has it settled in or you still feel it from time to time?

AleXa: The US is completely opposite of Asia, i mean India and Korea are very alike. In Korea you have different forms of speech formal-informal even in India, but not in English it’s more about the tone how you address someone. Definitely the language is the biggest culture shock like different addresses for different people etc. and I’m still getting use to it.

KHigh: During the airing of Produce 48 there was specifically one clip of you crying a lot, it quickly became the talk but we never found out what happened there exactly? You also suffered an injury too, right?

AleXa: During Produce my injury did happen but it’s all healed now, in school i did cheerleading and things and injured a lot so it may have been a pre-existing one that had not healed over the years possibly because I’ve been dancing my whole life, i don’t ever rest my knees! And yes the clip, everyone was like so sad but no one knew why haha. I did sustain a knee injury a ligament tear the doctor had suggested i take 2 months off from dancing because if worsened i would require reconstructive surgery on my knee but we had our group battle only a few days after and i was like I’m not going to give up because of my dang knee, so yeah i had to give my all!

Also the team i was in all of them were already known and they had fans in the audience, so there was this moment when we went out there i saw all these signs and not one for me, after the performance when the MC asked me “did you see your fans out there?” and as soon as the translator told me, i just snapped. I mean i didn’t expect going thinking that oh i’ll be famous but yes to see no one for me just kind of broke me at that moment.

*I then went on to assure her how much Indian fans adore her and that she won’t have to feel like this anymore. We sang Drake “Started from the bottom” and also taught her the “Apna time ayega” chant!*

KHigh: You opened the show for IN2IT and might i add did so fabulously, how did this opportunity come about? When you heard the news what was your reaction?

*She begins to answer with a big smile clearly still in awe*

AleXa: If I’m being honest sometimes i don’t even know how exactly this happened either haha… i just remember one day my staff announced it to me that i’ll be opening for IN2IT on their tour and i was like what… hello… okay

*re-enacts her shocked expression, you had to be THERE*

AleXa: We have been working with them for things ahead but this came up and since PRODUCE it’s the first. Let alone abroad! Not a IN2IT concret in Korea but Delhi, Mumbai it’s a lot of responsibility to uphold and make sure to do a good job.

KHigh: Well you did a great job! After your Mumbai stage i can say you nailed it.

AleXa: Thank you!!

KHigh: How has your experience been working with IN2IT?

AleXa: They are really hard working, nice boys. I am guilty i did not watch Boys24 all the way through but i tuned in every now and then i saw the debuting group and their Snapshot era. One of my friends from back home is actually a big IN2IT fan and would always talk to me about them! I did my research before we started practicing, they’re very fun to be around, caring like good older brothers.

KHigh: As you mentioned this was a concert in India. Upon hearing that, what was your impression of India?

AleXa: I knew that Hallyu wave had come here but to what extent, i wasn’t aware… but when i walked on stage at the Korea fest i saw the crowd, all these people it was insane. I was like wow! That’s incredible! The response was wild in the best way, its amazing to see how K-Pop has come to India.

KHigh: After the show you met some fans i remember you mentioned it was your first time experiencing something like it, can you share us more on how you felt?

AleXa: It was the most heartfelt moments I’ve had in a long time, I’ve never really had the opportunity to meet my fans in this kind of way let alone meeting after a show, I’ve never done it before. To walk into a room and see people who are happy to see me… i never felt i’d be here in my life to the level of… minor success i am having at the moment so it was like a dream come true.

KHigh: Can we talk about you going viral with your performance on ‘Bole Chudiya’, how was your experience and how long did the prep take?

AleXa: Keiko (NAMAS-K) found the song and clip for us, Bollywood is so colorful i find it thoroughly entertaining. We learned our parts individually and then we practiced together, for myself it took me about 2 days to make it look good but 2 more full days of practice to perfect it even more.

KHigh: You exude confidence, there’s a certain charm you carry be it on stage or off stage, would you say you’ve naturally always been a confident person or you feel you need to work on it from time to time?

AleXa: Oh man if you were to talk to me 2 years ago, no.

I have not been like this, I’ve struggled with self confidence for so long. Thank you for seeing on stage and thinking i have it… it’s a relief to hear. But i still struggle with confidence now… a lot and i feel that’s a very human thing. I’ve never met any one in my life who’s completely confident all the time. I feel having doubts and worries is what makes us human. Over the years on stage i would say i have gained more confidence because in school and college i didn’t fell confidence in things as their was a lot of favoritism, i felt unwanted but ever since training in Korea, I’ve garnered a lot more confidence and the mindset that i am here to perform for my people and i’ll put the best show possible when I’m on stage!

KHigh: If there was one thing you had to say to all the young girls and women out there looking up to you, what would that be?

AleXa: I think it would be ‘Your voice matters’ because as women we get silenced at times, we feel unimportant, unwanted and invalidated at times but that’s not true! As Beyonce said who runs the world? GIRLS!

I would say don’t  be afraid to be heard if someone’s not listening grab a Megaphone!

KHigh: You know about your YeeHaw Squad?

AleXa: That was literally the first thing i saw when the lights went up a big bright yellow sign that said “Can you be the Yee to my Haw?” And in my brain i was processing like oh no what have i done but also the fact that not only K-Pop has come over here but my dumb little southern colloquialisms have made it here. I felt so good, these girls are awesome. It made me feel a lot more comfortable because it’s something i say and i saw it in the middle of the crowd and felt now i can breath now. A representation of my hometown had taken off so well i felt comfortable and more welcomed! I felt being accepted for all my quirks and weirdness.

KHigh: What kind of music you want to pursue and who are the artists you look upto?

AleXa: I mean sound wise i love the music of the 70s-80s and the Wonder Girls really carried that and even right now Sunmi has an 80s synth going on, so for pop music i’d say that way but if i ever branch out into RnB i definitely want to go in the direction of Heize, her sound is something i really follow. And then, music inspirations in general … Like i mentioned the 70s-80s even up to the 50s, i love David Bowie, Queen yeah I love all these old like soft rock, glam rock bands Twisted Sister, KISS, ACDC, Rolling Stones like i love all these things so those have been really big influences on me creatively.

KHigh: Apart from singing and dancing, are you also interested in song writing, composing or production?

AleXa: Yeah Singing and dancing part aside of being an Idol I’m slowly learning how to compose with my vocal teacher back in Korea, which is awesome ’cause i wanted to pursue it for so long and my teacher is also teaching me to play Piano. I’ve been writing poetry/lyrics for the longest time, i have notebooks filled! As my label is ZB so I’ve always been interested in production and would love to get behind that!

KHigh: Wow! Apart from conquering the world is there any other hidden talent we should know about?

AleXa: Umm, i can fly *does the airplane*

I really don’t know if it’s a talent but i can eat spicy food!

KHigh: I’ll give you that!

KHigh: You put covers regularly, you’re opening shows now, the Pre-debut hype is in the air, every one wants to know how close is your debut?

AleXa: Whenever i’m asked this question i just like to say i know as much as you do, that’s the thing my staff of-course knows how its going to be possibly when its going to be, I’m hoping and praying that with more hard work it can be this year. Hoping and praying!

KHigh: Trust me your fans are ready and hoping it’s this year. I feel it’s the right time you are creating waves as you’ve been so well received and Indian fans love you dearly! Everyone is buzzing about your debut.

AleXa: I’m so grateful for the response i had because i never imagined being here but all in all my debut depends on me and how much i can achieve within the time frame, so really hoping that it’s gonna be soon with more hard work.

KHigh: I’d like to ask you some quick one word answer-questions!

If you had to sum up your journey in produce?

AleXa: Memories.

KHigh: One word for the Mumbai (Kfest & Concert) Experience?

AleXa: Impactful.

KHigh: Describe your trainee life in just a word?

AleXa: Passion.

Khigh: One word for your future self?

AleXa: Integrity.

There’s so much i want to say but i feel my brain isn’t functioning I’m so overwhelmed, to all the fans that have been supporting me since day 1 I’m so grateful for your love and support. I hope that you continue to look after me, thank you! – ALEXA

[softshelltaakos]

what’s up everybody! it’s time for part 2 of my taz graphic novel review.

part one covered (most of) my beef with the writing and storytelling choices. this part is gonna cover character designs!!! you should know going into this that my opinions are not positive. this post is also a lot less analytical in tone than part 1, because art is not my forte.

disclaimer: i love the mcelroys. i truly do. taz has gotten me through some very difficult stuff and i have a tattoo. all this to say i’m not doing this because i hate them or because i like hating things. if you feel the need to message me about how i am overreacting, specifically to green taako, or about how i should just calm down and ignore it, or about how it’s sad that i’m getting so worked up instead of just enjoying the show, i’ve heard it and i don’t care. you will not be taken seriously. save yourself the energy.

there are spoilers for the graphic novel under the cut.

alright. i’m getting the elephant in the room out of the way first because it’s the most important thing to address, and once it’s out of my system i’ll feel better goofing on the rest of the designs. as i mentioned in the disclaimer: Green Taako Is Bad.

[ID: a panel focusing on taako. he’s skinny and minty green with chin-length light blonde hair and a big, pointy nose.]

now, a lot of people have made posts about this before, and i’m not saying anything new about it by any means. i’m also not the most equipped person to talk about why green taako is bad, because i’m a white gentile (i’ve heard conflicting opinions on whether or not green taako is antisemitic, but it feels remiss not to mention that there’s been discussion) and therefore not part of any groups affected by this whole debacle, but in short: when pressed for more diversity, specifically in taako’s case as a pretty large chunk of his arc involves literally inventing a mexican cultural food (fun note: that’s never mentioned in this book,) carey pietsch decided he should be green and the mcelroys were down with it. this is not an issue that cropped up when this design was released; it was something that there was already a ton of discourse surrounding, and it should never have gotten concepts drawn, let alone made it to publish.

this article by natt cuesta has been linked before on the subject, and i think it’s a good, concise explanation of why green taako is bad as well as why aracial characters in general are bad. this is a racist design.

now that we’ve gotten those ethical ramifications out of the way... i’m sorry, but it’s an ugly design, lmao. he looks like a palette-swapped version of pearl from steven universe with less character. the ONLY thing about this design that i like is the prominent lower lashes, if only because they’re the only thing that keeps him from looking entirely generic. because, like, y’all, when has anything about taako been generic?

[ID: a panel focusing on magnus. he’s a muscular fair-skinned man with auburn hair, a bushy beard, and a scar over his left eye.]

generic is a word that’s going to come up a lot over the course of this review, because i genuinely can’t think of a more apt descriptor for pietsch’s designs. it feels like she went with the lowest common denominator of every character’s design, a synthesis of all of the most popular (and most boring) ones, except in instances where that would lend any personality to a character’s design. magnus fits what brief description we’re given in the podcast: auburn hair. beard. big. and i guess that’s all you need?

i understand that by appealing to the most common and basic designs for these characters you’re inviting a lot less ire than you might by going with something more individual, so i get the motivation behind it -- or i would, if her designs hadn’t always been about this dull. but it’s bizarre to me that in a story as unique as the balance campaign, we ended up with the most basic ass Fantasy Hero lookin’ dude in the world as one of our protagonists.

i just really don’t have a lot to say about this. i’m just bored by it.

[ID: a panel of merle. he has medium-dark skin with a smooth white bun and beard.]

merle is simultaneously the design i like most out of the boys and the one that throws me the most, because i feel like he’s the most out on a limb one. which... oof. most merle designs i see give him a floral motif (i guess he has a few petals in his hair, maybe?) and big coke-bottle glasses, and i miss those things with this design, but at least it doesn’t totally feel like pietsch threw every merle she could get her hands on into a blender and poured it out on a page, although honestly, that might have been more satisfying. people do some really fun shit with their merle designs, but again, he’s. generic.

as the cuesta article mentions, with how much of an issue it was to get any of the boys to be poc in the first place and in conjunction with minty up there, this design also feels like tokenism -- an appeasement rather than an honest attempt at diversity or god forbid because the artist actually headcanons merle as a person of color. personally, i wish that she’d gone a step beyond re-coloring his skin and idk given him a natural hairstyle or something. he still feels very much like a recolor to me rather than a character who was designed as a person of color from the beginning.

i feel like he looks more like a cleric than he looks like a merle, which i feel like is pretty contradictory to who merle is.

[ID: a cutaway showing griffin, a white man with brown hair and glasses wearing a collared shirt.]

i’ve said before that it feels a little odd to talk about her design of a real person, so i’ll keep this brief, but... you know how every drawing of a basic white dude looks a little bit like griffin mcelroy? you know how that one arthur character looks a little bit like griffin mcelroy? you know how everyone is constantly messaging mysillycomics about how her avatar looks like griffin mcelroy?

how did carey pietsch manage to actively attempt to draw griffin mcelroy and miss the mark? it boggles the mind. he doesn’t not look like griffin, i guess, but he doesn’t look like griffin, either. i don’t know, man

[ID: a generic gerblin. he has yellowy-green skin, slight tusks or fangs, and weird, nubby little horn-type things.]

i hate these gerblins. they are ugly. next

[ID: two images of klaarg/g’nash. he’s a bugbear with brown fur and yellow eyes as well as a mouth full of pointy teeth. in the first image he looks pissed off; in the second he’s starry-eyed and delighted.]

klaarg is probably my favorite design in the book, and that’s just because he looks like a cute dog for most of the time he’s on the page. he’s fluffy and i love klaarg anyway, so like. did not take a lot to reach this mark. especially considering how i feel about most of the other designs lmfao

i do definitely think he keeps up the trend of looking generic, though.

[ID: an image of barry bluejeans. he looks like tom arnold, kind of; he’s square-jawed and white with thick-rimmed glasses. he also has a light brown mullet.]

i hate this. i hate the mullet. i’m sorry, y’all, i really, truly, cannot stand the mullet. i don’t feel like barry has mullet energy. i feel like it’s too powerful a move for him. it wouldn’t be a good move, mind you, but it would be a big one. i don’t know y’all it’s just bad

[ID: an image of killian. she’s a green-skinned orc woman with prominent eyelashes, eyebrows, and tusks, and straight brown hair.]

i can’t have been the only one who was hoping for a badass, visibly muscular, maybe even butch killian design, right? that wasn’t just me being a big old lesbian, that’s a pretty common theme of killian designs? i guess kudos for going out on a limb again, but then, like, take the kudos back for going out on the most boring limb possible again. i could hang with the face if her hair wasn’t so boring, but it’s... it’s so boring

[ID: an image of magic brian. he’s a drow with long white hair and an oblong face and oddly shaped nose.]

for how many of her designs are syntheses of popular ones, i..... don’t understand how this happened. i don’t understand how whimiscal and flamboyant magic brian who’s often drawn as taako-but-a-goth-dark-elf ended up looking like this. he looks like he used to play football and got his nose busted up and peaked in fantasy high school. he looks like the first quarter of a monster factory video where the thing’s just ugly but doesn’t have a personality or any endearing traits yet. he didn’t have to be the goth twink we all know he is but what.......... is this

[ID: an image of gundren rockseeker/bogard. he’s a light-skinned dwarf with dark long hair and a matching beard.]

..........listen i know they’re cousins and distant cousins at that but all of merle’s cousins are light-skinned and, like, not to say that that can’t happen but having them be anywhere near merle’s skin tone would’ve been such an easy way to help bolster the obviously inaccurate idea that this is a work concerned with diverse character designs, or rather to help ppl claim it was being bolstered, and yet

[ID: avi, a fair-skinned man with long dark hair kept up in a ponytail and slight scruff on his face.]

i feel like maybe avi is intended to be east asian so i think at this point that brings the count up to a whole two characters of color. we’re almost done with the book. cool. he’s cute, i guess, but guess what word i’m about to say again (it’s generic)

[ID: a panel of several unnamed cameo characters. from right to left: carey fangbattle, a light blue dragonborn; brad bradson, a green orc man with a long brown ponytail; and presumably lucas miller, a tan human with glasses and dark hair.]

ok. deep breaths.

first off, there’s another panel w these three as well as boyland, who looks fine, but i didn’t grab that one bc it’s harder to make out detail. carey is cute. brad is fine.

i assume the third guy is lucas miller because i’m not entirely sure who else he would be, and... oof! as you may know i can’t stand lucas miller, which has nothing to do with his necromancy or nerdiness and everything to do with the various human rights violations he commits in the small time he’s got focus as well as the fact that he’s got a theoretical redemption arc that’s not actually an arc so much as us being told he’s better now. lucas is an entitled jackass who repeatedly uses other people’s bodies and minds without their consent, from the obvious offense of using the bugbears as brainwashed chore-doers (read: slaves) to the less-oft discussed dragging of noelle and others out of the astral plane into robot bodies, again to do his chores for him. because of this, it has always sat very uncomfortably with me when people make lucas a poc, because everything about him screams Shitty White Nerd Boy to me. it sits extra uncomfortably coming from carey pietsch, given how white all of her other designs are.

it’s a little hard to tell because i took all these pics with my phone camera in my room’s lighting so they’re not super high fidelity or anything, but pietsch’s lucas is noticeably darker than any other character we’ve seen so far save merle. maybe he’s just a white guy with a tan, but all the same, it strikes me as incredibly skeevy to have one of so few characters of color be this fucking guy.

[ID: johann, a black man with an oblong face and textured dark hair.]

johann’s design is fine, although this is a similar face shape to that brian from earlier and i just. i don’t. understand it. it’s not especially interesting, but hey, at least he’s not another generic white guy.

that being said, as i mentioned in part 1 of this review, johann’s role is severely cut in this -- he’s reduced to three panels, when in the show itself he’s the one who escorts the boys to the voidfish’s chamber and inoculates them. as i mentioned in that post i understand that they shifted it some to give lucretia a more prominent entrance, but as i also mentioned in that post, they should have compensated for that. three panels.

johann is not a character with a great deal of screentime as it is, but he’s a character with a major impact. he is the reason story and song happens. his song serves as a direct foil to john’s nihilistic conversion of his own home plane into the hunger. the fact that he’s been reduced to three panels with little to no characterization at this point, especially in conjunction with the fact that he’s one of very few poc, makes me really, really uncomfortable. avi is in more panels in this book than johann is, and while i love avi and as i said i am parsing him as an asian dude, he’s also still light-skinned enough and the style is nondescript enough that there are definitely people who will parse him as white, and also, avi’s role in the story is not as big as johann’s.

it doesn’t sit right with me.

[ID: an image of davenport, a fair-skinned man with a big red mustache and slicked back red hair.]

ginger davenport with a big mustache. groundbreaking.

[ID: an image of lucretia, a slender black woman with short white hair dressed in blue layers.]

and finally, lucretia. now, i’m biased, and it’s hard for me to see a lucretia design i don’t like. i also think that this is, compared to a lot of the others at least, one of the more interesting designs in the book, at least as far as her clothes go. it’s not a long robe that would be hard to move in, and i appreciate that -- it strikes me as a pretty practical outfit while also being ornamental and wizard-y. and she’s pretty, and she’s not whitewashed, and that’s all great. i like her earrings.

all that being said, i feel like it’s not enough. luc’s hair continues a theme with merle’s and johann’s (as well as the preview we’ve seen of angus,) which is that it strikes me as very low-effort on pietsch’s part. it’s short and it’s definitely not straight, but it doesn’t feel to me like it had as much thought put into it as, say, minty green taako’s hair. we could’ve had a lucretia with a big beautiful afro, or long box braids, or so many other natural hairstyles; we got this. it’s not bad, but i do think it’s disappointing. without going looking for it and without being a person who reads a great deal about character design, i’ve seen a fair amount of discussion from black women (artists, writers, and none of the above) about the portrayal of black women as it pertains to their hair. they’re never designed to be as feminine as their white counterparts. their hair is never treated with the same amount of detail or respect as their white counterparts. it’s short, maybe curly if you’re lucky.

i’m gonna circle back quickly to killian’s hair. it’s long and smooth and kept down, despite the fact that killian is an action-oriented women and might not want it to be in her face all the time -- it could have at least been braided or in a bun. it could’ve been short! and that would’ve made sense. and i don’t mean to say that lucretia couldn’t have short hair, but she’s a very elegant woman whose dress is described as intricate. she wears business regalia. she could have any number of hairstyles, from something elaborate to something simple but more out-of-the-box than this, but she doesn’t. i found this on a quick hunt through my ref tag -- it’s a tutorial for drawing black folks with just a small selection of interesting things you can do with afrotextured hair. these resources aren’t hard to find! and i’m doing this for fun -- carey pietsch is a professional artist who was paid for these designs. if she’d put in more than the bare minimum effort, we could’ve had some really interesting shit going on, but she didn’t.

and that’s the core of the issue here. i truly do not feel like pietsch put the same amount of care into the designs for the few characters of color we see as she did into the white ones, and that’s upsetting and emblematic of a larger problem in the work: neither pietsch nor the mcelroys put in very much care at all for the fans of color who spoke up and asked for representation.i know i said i was getting taako out of the way first so the majority of the post could be goof-heavy, but goddamn, y’all, it’s hard to goof about when it’s so blatantly shitty. pietsch’s designs are boring at best and racist at worst, not to mention conspicuously lacking in anyone who is not skinny, muscular, or a dwarf. people have praised this thing so uncritically, including people whose opinions i generally really respect, as if the fact that the mcelroys signing off on green taako made it above reproach.

it didn’t, by the way. there’s no such thing as an unproblematic fav, because everybody fucks something up now and then, but even then, this is a pretty egregious fuck-up! and it was willful!

i’m not saying y’all need to burn your copies of the gn or stop listening to the mcelroys entirely or anything of the sort -- you may remember the disclaimer at the top of the post where i say i really, really love them, and more specifically, i really love taz: balance. but i am BEGGING YOU to think critically about their work. good, good boys can do bad, bad things. white people can produce work that’s racist even if they’re gay women. it’s not mean to critique the boys and it’s not homophobic (or god forbid reverse racist, which is still not a real thing) to critique carey.

¯\_(ツ)_/¯ the real kicker of this whole thing for me is that there’s a small fanart gallery in the back of the book. most of them aren’t labeled with the artist’s handles, just their names, but there are some truly beautiful pieces featuring diverse designs -- galacticjonah and milkychai both have beautiful latino taakos featured! galacticjonah’s is fat, too! but even after the backlash against green taako, even aside from that being the design that people are going to accept as canonical, there are pieces in the gallery of green taako, as if doubling down on it was the right move.

and by the way, yeah, i’ve read griffin’s apology. but i thought we all learned in kindergarten that an apology doesn’t count if you don’t act on it.

[timeagainreviews]

5 Moments when Doctor Who SUCKED

Imagine, if you will for a moment, that you are a brand new Doctor Who fan. You don’t even know to call yourself a Whovian yet. You get on a few facebook groups, see a few YouTube videos and discover, much to your dismay, that Doctor Who is, in fact, ruined now. Woe is you who set path down a trail leading toward mediocrity, and eventually utter devastation. I ask you to picture yourself in this manner because I want you to realise that only a person new to Doctor Who would believe such drivel. Everyone else saying this seems to have rose tinted glasses. The rest of us all know that Doctor Who is a show that sometimes requires forgiveness.

Am I saying Doctor Who is a bad show? Not hardly. Much like pizza, Doctor Who is still pretty good, even when it sucks. I would venture to say that one of the things I love most about Doctor Who is how campy and silly it can be at times. Why is it then that so many people are turning their backs on a show that’s filled their lives with so much joy? I’m really trying to avoid the "because sexism," argument. But I can’t help but feel like if you were to switch the Doctor to a male, nobody would be calling the show "ruined." Furthermore, how do you even ruin something that has gone through so many changes throughout the years? Oh right, it’s the Doctor Who fandom. Where the only language allowed is hyperbolic.

Perhaps these fake geeks are mad because making the Doctor a woman takes away their ability to call her a Mary Sue. Especially when you consider the same character once burst out of a golden birdcage and floated to the ground in a wave of Jesus energy. That might mean they’d have to retroactively apply the title to every incarnation. Could the Doctor ever escape the distinction? Unnaturally talented, charismatic, good at everything he does, brilliantly smart. Or is it that these attributes only belong to men? We can believe Tom Baker’s Doctor is capable of walking into a burning furnace to save K9, but hell no, a woman can’t be the Doctor.

You have to face it, Doctor Who has had some terrible moments. Yet we continue to tune in because we forgive it. We forgive when Doctor Who is bad because of the moments when Doctor Who is wonderful. Which I know is how you would describe an abusive partner, but I’m gonna let it slide for a television series. Especially this series. Because unlike that dickhead who never texts you back, Doctor Who can change. If you don’t believe me, please peruse this list of five instances when Doctor Who was terrible.

1. The John Nathan-Turner era

My God, how could I not start with this? While there is no denying there are some wonderful moments in JNT's Doctor Who, it's easily my least favourite era of Doctor Who. And as much as I personally love Colin Baker, his Doctor got the lion's share of poor scripts and erroneous costume choices. Never has a man more game for a role, been dealt such a bad hand.

Introducing a Doctor that was cowardly, and even violent toward his companion, was seen as a bridge too far. While I understand the desire to try something new with the character, this wasn't the way to go about it. While the show begins to pick up around the end of McCoy's tenure, it's evident that this is more the influence of studio notes and the hard work of script editor Andrew Cartmel. I can't think of anyone less suited for the job of showrunner.

It seems that for a good nine years, Doctor Who had a madman at the helm, and not in that cute Matt Smith way. Dressing in flamboyant Hawaiian shirts, Nathan-Turner brought that same brash sensibility to the program. From Six's garish costume, to question mark lapels, to Mel's entire timeline, it's a big fat mess with him sitting in the middle. Add to all of this, the allegations of him being a predatory creep toward young male fans, and it's a surprise the show ever survived. Oh wait, it didn't.

2. Racism

Ok, maybe I should have started with this. While Doctor Who has taken efforts to address its racist past, it still happened. They drop a racist slur in "The Celestial Toymaker." Even the term "celestial," is used to mean "Chinese," in describing the titular character played by the very white Michael Gough, fully clad in Oriental silks. This tradition follows into "The Talons of Weng-Chiang," when Li H'sen Chang was played by John Bennett.

It's an uncomfortable miracle that they didn't allow Patrick Troughton to play the role of the Second Doctor in brownface. Not to say his era escaped the odd bit of racism. While Toberman in "Tomb of the Cybermen," gets a few heroic moments, he also gets none of the lines. Cast as mute manservant, we learn nothing about the inner workings of a black man who died so that white people may live.

Later, the show used characters like Ace to talk about racism. She shows disgust with a "No Coloureds," sign hanging in the boarding house she's staying in. When the evil Morgaine had her under mind control, it was calling her friend Ling Tai "yellow," and "slant-eyed," that she was able to snap out of it. Real Ace would never say such things. But even with that groundwork laid, the new series still struggles. From the Doctor being weirdly dismissive toward black people, to it taking nearly 50 years for the first black TV companion, Doctor Who is still grappling with its race issues. Yet you all kept watching.

3. Ace gets molested

This one is a bit of a lesser known infraction as it takes place in the books after the show had already been cancelled. Kicking off the Virgin Media "New Adventures," is 1991's "Timewyrm: Genesys," by John Peel. In it, the Doctor and Ace travel to ancient Mesopotamia, where they meet King Gilgamesh. Gilgamesh wastes no time going full blown creep, groping Ace and pawing at her like he was Joe Biden.

The Doctor's reaction to this is to tell Ace to just go with it, and that it's part of the culture. While I agree that, yes, Gilgamesh may not be the sophisticated modern man that hugs a bro and supports equal pay, the Doctor's reaction is some straight up bullshit. If you're going to go there, maybe try saying something with it other than "Women are men's property." This could have been a great opportunity for the Doctor to puff up and use Gilgamesh's own primitive mindset against him. "How dare you touch my woman!" the very tiny Doctor could say to the very tall man. It would have been a funny visual, mixed with the Doctor utilising male privilege in a way that helps his companion.

This is really an objection I have against most of John Peel's work. He writes women in that "she boobed boobily," manner. Much to my dismay, Peel is one of the sole writers of the Dalek books, so any time you want to enjoy a tale involving our enemies from Skaro, you have to also partake in his brand of women. I'm talking women being described as buxom babes with shoulder length blonde hair, voices like baby goddesses, and legs up to their neck. While on the other hand, we get men described as having a hat and probably some other features. I may be embellishing, but seriously, John Peel, your women suck. Yet it still spawned a rather large book series.

4. Minuet in Hell

Doctor Who has never been known to nail accents. Tegan is vaguely Australian. And Peri must have moved around a lot due to the fact that nothing about her American accent sounds like a regional dialect. That doesn't mean that Robert Jezek's Foghorn Leghorn meets the KFC Colonel performance as " Brigham Elisha Dashwood III," is any less painful. But bad accents aside, the biggest demon in this Big Finish audio is one of Doctor Who's oldest enemies- sexism!

While I understand that Charlotte Pollard may be a fan favourite among many Big Finish listeners, her character will forever be tainted for me, and it's all due to this story. In it, Charlotte, or Charley, gets literally human trafficked. They kidnap her, force her to wear lingerie in a very creepy and misguided attempt to add some sexiness to the story and force her to wait on rich businessmen at a casino.

Now, allow me to clarify, it's not the human trafficking that taints her in my eyes. People who get trafficked are victims, obviously. What bothers me is that neither Gary Russell or Alan W Lear thought to give her a single line of dialogue where she protests. She doesn't even complain a little. Sure, the Doctor often gains intel by getting captured, but this is ridiculous. Add this to the weird disjointed story, and "Minuet in Hell," easily serves as one of the lowest points in not just Big Finish history, but Doctor Who as a whole.

5. Sexism

(Image by Billy Darswed)

It makes the most sense that this is the last one on the list. Because let's be honest, it's a huge problem in the fandom. A lot of early Doctor Who audios and books smack of moments when it feels as though the writers never considered the existence of female fans. Women are often utilised as a means to make the Doctor look better, and for the baddies to look scarier. Mind you, it's not always been a pantheon of swooners and screamers. We got the occasional Sarah Jane, Leela, and Ace.

Even the strong women are long-suffering. Liz Shaw (and her real-life actress Caroline John) left the role of companion over sexism. Beginning her time on Doctor Who as UNIT's top scientific advisor, she was demoted to assistant, holding beakers for the male Doctor who stole her job. The Fourth Doctor acted similarly when telling Romana her qualifications had nothing on real life experience. The same excuse has been used for decades to keep educated women out of the workforce. "Come back when you've got some experience, sweetheart."

While Rose Tyler was a refreshingly real character with a family and life of her own, it doesn't mean that she wasn't horribly mismanaged. In "The Stolen Earth," we see a darker, more serious version of her character. The Rose we used to know is now fully devoted toward one mission and one mission only- getting her man back. It's as though her personality disappears and is fully dependent on having the Doctor in her life. She rises to greatness so that she might bask in his once more. Maybe it's romantic, but maybe it's bad writing.

If you were to ask me who my favourite Doctor Who writers are, I'd have to say Robert Holmes is up there, and he wrote "Talons of Weng-Chiang," a serial full of yellowface. I'd also say Russell T Davies, who wrote the aforementioned "Stolen Earth," and also saw it in his wisdom to turn Shirley Henderson's "Ursula," into a blowjob dispensing garden brick. Or even Steven Moffat who believes the Statue of Liberty could sneak around New York, undetected, and that nobody notices his predilection toward dominatrix women in stiletto heels.

In my review for "The Battle of Ranskoor Av Kolos," I quipped that Chris Chibnall had not yet written a truly great episode of Doctor Who. However, since "Resolution," I can no longer say such a thing. I may even go as far as to say it's one of the best Dalek episodes ever. It would seem then that, given enough time, he could become a great showrunner. And it seems that given enough time, any writer, yourself included, could one day write the latest "worst episode ever."

Every new era has had its stumbles. Not every Doctor gets it correct 100% of the time. Capaldi decided he was the kind of Doctor to exit through the window, a trait we never saw again. The Fifth Doctor decided to sleep his way through his first adventure. The Eighth Doctor was "human on his mother's side." And Ten took so long to regenerate that I'm beginning to think it was old age, and not radiation that did him in. If you can look at all of these stupid, stupid moments and still say you love Doctor Who, then maybe, just maybe, you can get over a bit of spotty writing, like you always have. Or is it still the female Doctor thing? Oh...

[thebellwitchblog]

Some Things I Feel the Need to Address in Fandom

Hello there! I’ve been in fandom for a long time and as such have witnessed it evolve into what it is today. I wasn’t around during the times when people feared Anne Rice and her lawyers, but I did pop into the scene soon after when the horror was still fresh in everyone’s minds, and I’ve been around in some capacity ever since. Fandom has always always had problems that needed addressing, and that’s what I intend to do in this post. Yes, there are plenty of posts just like this one floating around Tumblr and other sites where fandom gathers, even in the author’s notes of fanfiction where disclaimers once stood.

All fandoms across the board have the same problems, some more so than others, but the same general themes show up. Of course depending on the canon material there are more problems of certain types than others, but really most problems stem from one thing: People are trying to police how others experience fandom.

What do I mean by this? Well, simply put, select people are trying to decide what is and isn’t acceptable for other people to do in fandom. This goes beyond educating about polite ways to interact with each other and straight into deciding what is or isn’t okay to headcanon or ship.

The major problem with this is that fandom arose from people that were passionate about some creative work or another and wanted to share this passion with others, even if they didn’t agree on certain aspects what bound them together was their shared love for the source material. There have always been ship wars and discourse in the communities, but here within the last few years, particularly here on Tumblr, these have gotten out of hand.

It is perfectly fine to disagree about who should be paired together, to disagree over headcanons and how characters should be remade. It’s okay to disagree, but once disagreements become demonization and a toxic us vs them ideology then fandom becomes a dangerous place. I’ve witnessed all out vicious wars on here over things like shipping a 17 year old with someone in their mid-20s. This isn’t okay.

Fanon is literally anything you want it to be. That’s why it isn’t canon. Fanon is taking the canon and changing it up as much as you would like until it’s perfectly suited for you. Do you ship these two characters? Great now they’re together in your fanon. Do you think this character gives off major ace vibes? Well guess what! They’re ace! In your fanon. Your fanon does not under any circumstances get to invalidate someone else’s. Let me repeat that one more time, but bolded. Your fanon does not, under any circumstances, get to invalidate someone else’s.

So far I’ve talked in really general terms, but now I’m going to address some more specific things I’ve seen. Again, these aren’t about any specific fandom, but specific problems I’ve seen people fighting over in multiple fandoms.

Shipping minors with adults. This is, not gonna lie, a very very iffy area and it comes up a lot. Whether or not this is okay is dependent on the age gap. NOT the age gap in the canon work, but rather the age gap in your fanon. What do I mean by this? Well, let’s say a character in canon is 21 and you’re wanting to draw them with another character that’s maybe 15 in canon. How could this be made remotely okay? Easy! Age up the younger or de-age the older enough that they’re within an acceptable age gap. This sort of stuff has existed in fandom since the dawn of fandom. It’s really nothing new. Note: This is not pedophilia! Pedophilia, by definition, is a chronophilia (sexual attraction to individuals within a specific stage of life), and mental illness, characterized by the sexual attraction to pre-pubescent children, which the DSM-5 includes up to age 13, by adults. Even without changing the ages, a 15 year old being shipped with a 21 year old is not pedophilia. It is Hebephilia or, more likely, Ephebophilia depending on whether the 15 year old is experiencing puberty or just after it and what definition of the two you reference as these have not been formally included as a mental illness as of yet and thus do not have an agreed upon age range, but regardless 14 and 15 year olds do not fall in the range of pedophilia.

Shipping canonically non-het characters in het relationships. This is what we’ve been doing all along with cishet characters this entire time, guys. Literally probably 90% of slash/femslash (oh geez are these terms even used anymore? I think I’m showing my age) is two canonically heterosexual characters being shipped in a pretty gay relationship. Granted this usually happens because there wasn’t a lot of representation, but now that representation is growing it’s to be expected that people are going to do the same with the LGBT characters. This goes right back to what I touched on earlier in this post- let everyone experience fandom like they want. Note: It is not homophobic to ship a non-het character with someone of the opposite gender just like it’s not heterophobic to ship two het characters in a gay relationship. This especially goes for characters that we don’t know their sexuality specifically we just know that they’re non-het.

Feeling like the creators of the source work owe you something. This one isn’t something you see outright stated a lot, but it’s evident in how people act towards animation studios, authors, etc. Whenever something doesn’t go how people want it to in the canon, then people practically riot and threaten the creators- even the voice actors and actors will get hate from fans when they don’t have any, or very minimal, control over where the story goes. Yes, you can get upset over what happens in the canon and get worked up, but when it gets to threats and absolute chaos? Especially when it’s just a rumor? That’s not okay anymore. That’s when it gets toxic. We have headcanons and fanon for a reason. It’s there so that if the canon material goes completely opposite of what you’d like you can still have that perfect ending. That’s a large part of why we have fanworks. 

Other Problematic Ships. Policing ships isn’t always due to age gaps. I’ve witnessed it with canonically abusive characters a lot, for instance. Regardless of why a ship is “problematic” there is no excuse for telling someone they cannot ship it. Not only does this fall back to the whole “Let everyone experience fandom how they want” ideology I’ve brought up on multiple occasions throughout this post, but also they can interpret this ship however they want. People disregard canon a lot in fandom, so why is this any different? More often than not the character isn’t abusive in their fanon no matter what the canon might say. Even if the character is still abusive in the ship, that doesn’t mean they’re not allowed to ship it. I’ve talked to some people where these ships were an honest to god coping mechanism for them after they got out of an abusive relationship. Note: This does not make it okay to romanticize abuse.

These next few points aren’t specific to fandom but instead Tumblr as a whole that are a huge problem in fandom as well.

Echochambers. Tumblr, and social media in general, is notorious for this. People surround themselves with like-minded people and block anyone that even slightly differs from their opinions. Why is this a bad thing? Because when we’re surrounded by the same viewpoints our viewpoint narrows. A lot. And misinformation spreads faster and is harder to get rid of. Not to mention other problems such as nurturing an us vs them ideology. Things get blown out of proportion, people become unable to cope with opposition, and it’s just not a good time for anyone involved.

Callout Culture. Callout posts are so so so common that it is honestly overwhelming. If you’ve been on this site and actively posting for any length of time, you’ve probably been called out by someone for some perceived crime against humanity. Whether or not you actually committed this crime, or if this “crime” is actually worth the backlash, you’re now blacklisted by a varying number of people depending on how many followers the person has. Congratulations! Crimes can be, but are certainly not limited to: - reblogging a post from someone you didn’t know was some vile creature in human clothing (whether they actually are one or not doesn’t matter. What matters is they’re considered one). - you used a term you had no earthly idea was a slur. No slap on the wrist for you, you’re going straight to the gallows. - posting fanart of a ship someone considers problematic (see two prime examples above!) Why is Callout Culture such a problem? It demonizes and turns entire communities against someone for minor mistakes or entirely bogus reasons in the first place. If someone makes a mistake they shouldn’t be blacklisted immediately; they should be informed of why what they did was wrong first and foremost and given the chance to change.

Holding Grudges. Please. I am begging you. Let. People. Grow. If someone says something years ago and then not only apologizes but proves they’ve changed? Let it go and move on. What is the point in insisting that people need to widen their views if you won’t let them live down a mistake they made beforehand? If they change then reward their efforts instead of holding their mistakes over their head. This goes for actors and actresses, directors, producers, people here on Tumblr, etc.

I could keep going and bring up even more problems, but honestly I’m tired. It’s time to wrap this up.  tl;dr stop acting like you own fandom and let people do what they want. Let people ship what they want, headcannon what they want, etc etc etc. Fandom belongs to everyone and canon material belongs to the actual creator, not you. The only thing you own is the stuff that you make. Mind your own business, stay in your lane, and let things go every now and then. You’ll be a lot happier, I promise.

[entamewitchlulu]

Homura’s Flash Reviews [Spring 2018]

It’s the end of another animu season, so it’s time to give some flash reviews for the stuff I ended up finishing this season!

Under the cut for the length + all the gifs lol

Comic Girls

After having storyboard after storyboard rejected, young aspiring manga artist Kaoruko moves to a dorm specifically for young mangaka, where she makes new friends, has fun adventures, and learns a lot about herself and her craft.

I liked this show way more than I expected to; it’s a very moeblob show and especially in the first couple of episodes there’s a lot of anime bullshit.  It IS a gag anime at the start and tends to default to a lot of the same tropes.  Despite this, I found it ridiculously hilarious, and I could relate to a lot of the #ArtistProblems and other things the girls dealt with regularly.  Not to mention, the characters were generally just really fun, cute personalities.  Despite some frustrations with some general character arcs feeling a bit stagnant, there were actually multiple places where I physically cried because despite the gag manga start, it gets pretty emotional later on regarding things like anxiety, artist’s block, and the feeling of stagnation, which was super relatable.  Also....Kaoruko is absolutely a tiny lesbian and I love my tiny lesbian daughter.  Actually I’m pretty sure they’re all lesbians, except for Rukki who is probably bisexual.

overall: 7/10

Cardcaptor Sakura: Clear Card

Following the events of the original Cardcaptors, Sakura wakes up one morning to find that all of her Sakura Cards have turned clear.  Not only that, but there are more, strange new spirits appearing, and she’s been granted a brand new key from a dream.

Okay so....I have made mention of this one from a few other flash reviews since the first cour took place during last season.  And...my opinion has honestly worsened.  This was 22 episodes of obnoxiously boring fluff and little else. Don’t get me wrong: I love fluff. But I watch specific things for fluff. I don’t watch magical girl shows for 95% fluff, I watch them for sparkly, magical girl bullshit, cute costumes, fun magical experiences, and maybe just a little bit of worldbuilding.  Clear Card gave me next to nothing on all fronts.  When it wasn’t trying to be Cardcaptor Sakura: The Cooking Show, it was dragging its feet with 15 minutes of pointless chatter that did nothing to further characters or relationships, leaving them the exact same static characters they were in the original series.  Syaoran’s greatest draw was nearly completely erased once he became just a sedentary background love interest who did little. At least as a rival he pushed Sakura, but here, he just enabled the boring writing that did nothing to push the envelope.  The formula is nearly exactly the same as the last two series and the arc even mentions it.  Characters are unnecessarily cryptic, hiding things from each other, which only drags the story down.  The main plot is barely sprinkled in, magic stuff usually only happens for about 2 minutes towards the end of the mind-bogglingly slow fluff episodes, and the major plot??  Only appears for about five minutes in the final episode, addresses none of the questions we had and only reveals things we had already figured out fifteen episodes ago, gives no conclusion to any of it, and COMPLETELY ERASES THE ONLY CLIMATIC, STORY-FURTHERING SCENE BY USING TIME MAGIC.

And that’s...it, apparently.  I see no indication of a second season.  I assume the manga is still ongoing, but even if it is, this was an absolutely horrendous ending that did nothing to satisfyingly tie up ANY loose ends, further the world or the characters, or really do anything to add to the previous series.  Even the costumes were few and far between and the cards were almost all the same as the last set.  There was no creativity and nothing added here for the fans.  That brings me to my ultimate complaint: who was this show even for?! It can’t still be for kids, because new young fans of the original demographic’s age group would not have any clue what was happening with these characters, and it’s just lore-based enough to confuse any new viewers.  And it can’t be for the original fan group, who are all much older now and want something with just a little more substance. I’m not asking for a gritty cardcaptors show at all. Just something that respects us as adult viewers and gives us a little more to grab onto.  And that was way longer than any flash review has any right to be, so I will cut myself off there.

overall: 4/10

Lostorage conflated WIXOSS

Though they believed it was finally over, former LRIG and Selector Kiyoi knows that the Selector battles will come again, and this time, they will destroy everything--and she is determined to bring the dark loop of suffering to a close once and for all by bringing together all of the greatest Selectors from every generation to take on the new threat.

Boasting the largest cast of any of the previous WIXOSS series and continuing both the story of Lostorage and the first two Selector series, this is absolutely the most ambitious take on the WIXOSS universe thus far: and it does fantastically with it.  There was not a single moment where I was bored; even during slower flashback and exposition parts, I was hooked.  This was one of the best ways to expand and complete the universe, as the ending here finally does feel like a decisive end to the anime franchise (though, so did the end of the Selector anime, so who knows lol).

As always, WIXOSS has some of the most fantastic character designs, relationships, dynamics, and animation among other anime, making it truly stand out.  The card game is more window dressing than actual substance, but that doesn’t matter, because the power of the relationships and the messages that this story is telling are far more powerful and attention grabbing.  The decision to make Kiyoi the protagonist of this series, while also bringing back previous protagonists Ruko and Suzuko, was an incredible decision and really made for a fantastic story.

overall: 9/10

Golden Kamuy

After being discharged from the army after the Japanese-Russo war, Sugimoto is left with the dying wish of his comrade: to make enough money to support his fallen comrade’s wife and son and pay for their medical expenses.  He stumbles across an opportunity when an escaped convict tells him of a hidden trove of Ainu gold that can only be found by collecting the information tattooed onto the bodies of a group of escaped prisoners. With the help of an Ainu girl named Asirpa, whose tribe the gold was stolen from, Sugimoto takes on the mission to track down the prisoners and find the gold.

This show is absolutely fucking incredible.  I don’t think I can even give it proper words.  Like what a goddamn great season for anime this was??  Not only is the show clearly heavily researched, giving us insight into a part of Japanese history and Ainu culture that is rarely if ever discussed in Japanese culture, the story and characters are all so well done.  The animation can be wonky in places, but the expressions, the character banter, and god the soundtrack are all mind-blowingly good.  Unlike Clear Card, when this show decided it wanted to be a cooking show, I was completely on board, because I was learning something new about Ainu culture and also getting to see our heroes be adorkable and hilarious together.  The characters are absolutely where this show shines, and even though it’s a bit bloated at first, characters quickly become recognizeable and easily separated.  The relationship between Sugimoto and Asirpa, especially, is one of the most wholesome and fun friendships I’ve ever witnessed (I’m hoping, tho, that it stays platonic despite some jokes to the contrary lol).  This was only season 1, and season 2 will air in October, and you can bet I will be waiting at the edge of my seat for more of this incredible show.

overall: 9/10

Hinamatsuri

After a strange girl in a metal cocoon drops out of the sky and onto his head, yakuza Nitta finds himself the reluctant father of a needy young girl with psychic powers.  Shenanigans ensue around their strange new family and the dysfunctional adults and children that surround them.

This show was so much fucking better than it had any right to be; from the initial plot summary I was worried it was going to be awful, creepy-ish moe bullshit...but it was NOT.  This was a gag anime of the highest caliber.  The pacing was amazing, the characters were to a one endearing, the animation was BEAUTIFUL, and god...the punchlines...everything was so fucking funny the whole time.

You’ve got pretty much everything here: you’ve got the obnoxiously needy Hina, who is monotone in everything she does, you’ve got the Worst/Best Dad Nitta, you’ve got poor can’t-say-no-to-favors Hitomi, and the Most Pure and Wholesome Anzu.  There’s something to love in every character and every scene, and it’s ridiculous just how amazing this show is.  I can’t put it into words, please just watch it.  Where my other top shows of the season took awhile to grow on me, this one was hitting home runs from episode 1.  Do yourself a favor and watch it.

overall: 9/10

Megalo Box

In a world where boxing is performed with powerful mechanical rigs known as Gear, a nameless boxer known only as Junk Dog is tired of being forced to throw fights in an illegal underground boxing ring to pad the pockets of his gambling organization.  When he crosses paths with the current champion of Megalo Box, he and his crew take a risky gamble to get him into the world’s first international Megalo Box competition so that he can fight the champion again, reinventing himself as Gearless Joe as he steps into the ring without any Gear.

This show took a while to really get onto my Awesome List, mostly because the aesthetic that it’s throwing back to was never really my thing in the first place.  I’m generally not a huge fan of the muted color palettes, the punkish music, or just the idea of boxing in general (a lack of significant female characters also always tends to put me off).  Despite this, however, the show ended up being stunning.  By halfway through, I was incredibly hooked on the high this show wanted me to ride, by the character arcs that were playing off each other, and I was even coming around to the music.  Boxing may not be my thing, but the character story that was told here was an incredible one, and definitely deserves its place among the Best Anime of 2018, which if it doesn’t win something come that time, I’ll be floored and disappointed with everyone.

overall: 9/10

Overall this was an incredibly strong season: I dropped a few things of course, but what I continued were almost all 9/10s.  I’m super pleased with the spring season and I’m looking forward to seeing what’s coming out for summer.

[dailyaudiobible]

9/16/2021 DAB Transcript

Isaiah 22:1-24:23, Galatians 2:17-3:9, Psalm 60:1-12, Proverbs 23:15-16

Today is the 16th day of September, welcome to the Daily Audio Bible. I’m Brian, it’s wonderful to be here with you today, it is a joy and a privilege to come by my place around the Global Campfire together with you as we exhale and release all of the stress and all the stuff that's going on and just allow the Scriptures to speak into our lives. Today, we will move back into the book of Isaiah, as well as the letter to the Galatians. We’re reading from the English Standard Version this week. Isaiah chapters 22 through 24 today.

Commentary:

Okay, super famous passage in the letter to the Galatians today. We probably have all heard it. Most of us probably can quote it. I have been crucified with Christ, it is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me. That is, I mean, that is a statement of a reality, that is a statement of what Paul believes and what we as Christians believe. It's a part of a paragraph though and it gets lifted out of the paragraph a lot. So, let's explore just for a second because what Paul said there, that we are all shaking our heads up and down and going yep, yep, yep I know that verse and yes it is Christ who lives in me. This is an incredibly controversial statement, heretical statement even for Orthodox Hebrew believers. So, bringing just a…one sentence more context helps us a lot. So, I quote “forth through the law I died to the law so that I might live to God. I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me and a life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God who loved me and gave Himself for me.” This is kind of an abbreviated version of things that Paul unpacks more at length in the letter to the Romans. So, Paul is saying that he died to the law, God's law, the Mosaic law. The law that pulled the people together cohesively as Hebrews, the thing people were trying to live up to, or live into in order to be made righteous in some fashion before God, only to know that they couldn't and so they would offer also sacrifices to atone for their sin to become made righteous before God. Paul is undermining that understanding and as was laid out in the book of Romans. Paul's view is that the law revealed a person's inability to obey it. The law revealed a person's failures and their inability to become righteous before God and so the law condemned them because they couldn't live up to it. So, if the law is what makes you righteous before God, then nobody could be righteous before God, because nobody could fulfill the law. But Jesus did and God raised Him from the dead, no longer to die. So, Paul responds by coming to the understanding that we’re to die to the law so that we can actually live for God. The old person that we were bound by sin and unable to achieve any kind of righteousness before God. That person dies, is judged by the law, guilty, dies and is resurrected in Christ who has fulfilled it all. We glory in these realities, we do all that we can to accept and live into these realities, it is Christ in me that animates me. It is Christ in me that restores me to God. It is by grace alone, through faith alone, that this is a reality and I believe it we…we rejoice in these things from the early people though hearing the good news. How would you even get your mind around not having the law when it's all you've ever known, and you've aimed your entire life and your entire culture is aimed in that direction. It's indeed, the good news but it's also existentially disruptive, right, it up-ends a lot of things that have to then be rethought and even thinking those things would feel maybe even sinful. But in this case Paul is writing to a group of people, an established church. The churches in Galatia and saying “hey I never told you all that stuff, I didn't entangle you in all of that stuff. It's these people who are coming in behind me that are causing this disruption and confusion. I came with the message that showed you complete freedom and now you're trying go back and become a slave to this thing that you died to.” And so, I quote Paul “O foolish Galatians who has bewitched you? It was before your eyes, that Jesus Christ was publicly portrayed as crucified. Let me ask you only this” and this is actually where the rubber meets the road on his argument, “did you receive the Spirit by works of the law?” in other words, did the Spirit of the Lord come upon you because you were so righteous by obeying the law, or was it by hearing, and then you had faith, “are you so foolish,” I’m quoting Paul again, “having begun by the Spirit, are you now being perfected by the flesh?” In other words, you receive this by faith. Are you not trying to be perfected by obeying the law, a law that you've not really been familiar with and those of you who have never been able to even come close to achieving and then once again we see Paul do a move that he does a lot which is to go back before Moses and go to the origin story with Abraham and unpack the fact that Abraham was made righteous before God through his faith in what God said, not in his adherence to a law that did not exist? That idea is a profoundly foundational tenet of what Paul teaches. And we can, I mean, this brings us up to speed on what we read today and will continue the journey forward in the letter tomorrow. It’s easy for us to get lost in the theology or the doctrine of it, trying to understand and unpack what this actually means for us. Ultimately, like we were talking about yesterday. Ultimately, what Paul is arguing for is spiritual freedom. The freedom to understand that you have been made righteous before God and so you can have a relationship with God personally, unmediated, directly. A relationship with God who has grafted you into His family. There aren't hoops, there aren't levers, there isn't a law other than the law of love. And so, as believers we should rest in that, we have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer we who live, but Christ who lives within us, through Christ we have been made perfect before God, we have achieved what we could never achieve, through Christ who achieved it for us and gave it to us freely. All we have to do is believe it. This is the good news.

Prayer:

And so, Jesus, we thank You for this good news and it is definitely through this Hebrew centric lens that we read of it and unpack it and understand it. And for many of us, we don't have that background and so thank You for allowing us all of the different context and all of the letters and all of the narratives found in the New Testament that allow us to understand how radical, what a shift in reality, in awareness and in understanding. It’s something that we very easily take for granted because we've only known it a certain way and yet the Scriptures show us the moving forward of the gospel, the good news that has come into our lives and shaped us and changed us irreversibly. So, come Holy Spirit and help us to dive more deeply, drink more freely from this precious gift of salvation. Come, Holy Spirit, in the name of Jesus we ask. Amen.

Announcements:

dailyaudiobible.com that's home base, that’s the website, that’s where we find out what's going on around here. It's the home of the Global Campfire. If you’re using the Daily Audio Bible app then you’re holding it in your hand and you can access all these things from within the app as well. So, check out the Community section, check out the resources that are available in the Daily Audio Bible Shop. In the Community section, you'll find the Prayer Wall. In the Shop, you'll find a number of resources that are, well, there…there of this community, by this community, for this community. It's us and so you can find a number of resources in a number of categories there, so check it out.

If you want to partner with the Daily Audio Bible, thank you, thank you. If what we’re doing by showing up every day together around the Global Campfire and taking the next step forward in the Scriptures and just keeping stepping forward until we reach the conclusion of the year and in the entire Bible. If that matters, if that makes a difference than thank you for your partnership. There is a link on the homepage at dailyaudiobible.com. If you’re using the app, you can press the Give button in the upper right-hand corner or the mailing address is P.O. Box 1996 Springhill, Tennessee 37174.

And as always, if you have a prayer request or encouragement, you can hit the Hotline button that's in the app the little red button up at the top and that'll work wherever you are as long as you're connected to the Internet. Or there are number of telephone numbers that you can dial: in the Americas 877-942-4253, if you are in the UK or Europe 44 2036 088078 is the number and in Australia or that part of the world 61 3 8820 5459 is the number to call.

And that's it for today. I’m Brian and I love you. I'll be waiting for you here tomorrow.

Prayer and Encouragements:

Hi this is Nelly calling in and I want to call in for a few people. First of all I wanted to call in for Susie. She was talking about the situation from Haiti and God I just pray for Your peace to be on that land. I pray that the gains would be dismantled. God, I pray for protection. I pray for Stanley who was killed on his way to work God, for his family. I pray you give them comfort in the name of Jesus. I also want to lift up Stephen John, John from Sudan had to put a restraining order on him God. That must've been such a difficult decision but God, I know you're in the midst of it all and I just pray in the name of Jesus that You would just comfort that family for a complete transformation of the mind of John Stephen. John God, I pray that You would just touch him, that You would minister to him and that You would just be with those who are working with him. I also want to lift up Gary who is struggling with anxiety. God, I've been there. I know what it's like to wake up in the night and thinking about things. God, I pray that you remove that heaviness and that You would replace it with Your comfort and Your peace, in the name of Jesus. God, You are a strong tower and I pray fear would be gone. I pray that You will give him direction. I pray that You would give him endurance and God that You give him rest. We love You, in Jesus’ name. Amen.

Saul, one day was willing to kill his own son, but the next day he was unwilling to kill the heathen king, Agag, even though God demanded it. We must not be two sided. Plants must be tied to a stick as they grow to keep them straight. And likewise, we must remain tied to the Lord for it is only He that can keep us straight as we grow. It is the sail and not the Gail that determines our course. And don’t let comfort overshadow commitment for the tempting without works closely with the trader within to ensure our defeat. The spirit will always cry out for faith, while the soul will always reach for unbelief. What’s in your wallet? BlindTony1016@gmail.com. I like to give a shout out to Victoria Soldier, haven't heard from you lately and also Michelle for LA, know that you are both in my prayer list daily and thought of often, very much loved. And once again, Brain and the Hardin Family, thank you for this wonderful podcast for God's Holy Spirit to flow. Keep it flowing ya’ll. All right, bye bye.

Hi John Alpar, I heard your message about Stephen John and you needing to commit him to the hospital for mental health for bipolar. This is Radiant Rachel; I am praying for you and your family and I just wanted to let you know that you’re not alone. This weekend, this week, my dad is manic and he had to go on medical leave from work and we were scheduling a family meeting. And, you know, concerned, he’s not making proper decisions to be safe driving on the road, things like that. And, God did a miracle for us, He put it on my dad’s heart to want to commit himself to go into the hospital to spread the word of God to those inside the hospital. So, he is there now as well. And, God is working, I know that He is working on Stephen John also. And I just…Lord, we lift up all those who are struggling with mental health and all those who are caring for those with mental health. We pray that You will just guide them, work in their hearts, give them peace, give them rest, give them sleep. And, just use these trials for Your good. Have Your way Lord. In Jesus’ name. Amen.

[singing] Low in the grave He lay, Jesus my savior Waiting the coming day, Jesus my Lord Up from the grave He arose, with a mighty triumph for His foes He arose a victor from the dark domain,  now He lives forever with His saints to claim He arose, He arose, Hallelujah, Christ Arose.

Good morning DAB, God Bless all of you, you're all in my prayers constantly. This is Patrick from Seattle. If you could, I would appreciate your prayers. I have been a police officer in law enforcement for over 32 years. And right now, I am on the precipice of change and the message I keep getting from God is be still and I will fight for you. But as a driven, action-oriented person, that's not easy for me. So, I ask for prayers for guidance and patience and discernment and courage as I try to find out and determine what I'm going to be doing next in my life to support my family and to continue to serve God. So, if you would please join me. Heavenly Father, I thank You so much for allowing me for the last several decades to be able to serve You in the capacity that allows me to support and honor my family and honor my faith, my beliefs and my ethics and now as I'm trying to figure out what I’m gonna do next and where I'm gonna go and where You need me I can't hear what it is that you're telling me if You're speaking at all and I feel like Elisha in the cave waiting for all the storms to pass to hear Your quiet voice. So, I just ask that I can hear Your voice and I ask that You can help me to find a way to continue to serve You and support my family. Please help all those people out there that are in a similar circumstance asking for Your prayers. It’s in Your heavenly, holy name we pray. In the name of Jesus Christ our Savior and our King. Amen.