#godspeed to all those still in the queue

[stilesssolo]

Care to share your Taylor swift ticketmaster war story today? I just waited 2 hours on the west coast for only nosebleeds seat but I will be there God dammit

Omfg what an ORDEAL it was 😭😭😭 I had a gc with 8 people all trying to get tickets (we were attempting to buy for like 18 people total 😅) and every single part was a shitshow but we did get tickets thank god 😂 we’re east coast so we suffered through the 2 hour unofficial queue pause lol. My sister, who has NEVER once bought tickets in her life because I always get them and who literally made a ticketmaster account specifically for this, got in and got tickets in under 20 minutes right before the site broke (like literally cannot even articulate the beginners luck) 😂. We were trying for all 3 nights so one of my friends also got in for Saturday really quickly but then got through when the whole platform self imploded at 10:30 and got error message after error message before it booted her out to the back of the queue. And then my other friend and and I waited an additional hour after it unfroze and got hit with SO many error messages and “your code is wrong” bullshit and overall I think I gained like three stress ulcers and a migraine from this situation BUT enough of us managed to get seats so we’re GOING every night and that’s what’s important 😂😂😂 literally afterwards I felt like I had run a marathon and also fought a literal battle I was so mentally and physically exhausted 😭 I’m so glad you got some though!! Hopefully the west coast delay meant your purchase was less stressful and glitchy than mine 😂

[a-dragons-journal]

Tsaheyluri // Regarding the Bond

(A disclaimer for any fandom folk who stumble across this: I speak here of my own noemata as if they are The One True Canon(TM). This is purely for the sake of ease. I do not in fact believe in The One True Canon(TM); if your headcanons or interpretation of canon differ from mine, please take no offense and godspeed, have fun. I speak here only of my personal alterhumanity, my noemata, my Pandora. You are entitled to your own.)

Tumblr decided to shatter on impact and eat the first version of this, so here we go again.

Anyone who has read my previous writings about my hearthome has some idea of the fact that one of the things that draws my heart to Pandora most is tsaheylu, the Bond, and Eywa, the result thereof. For those unaware: tsaheylu is the Na'vi word for what happens when two Pandoran animals join their mehuru (singular kuru), their neural queues, specialized organs many Pandoran animals have which allow them to make a direct connection between their nervous systems, creating an intimate connection and mind-to-mind communication. The Na'vi famously use tsaheylu to tame and ride several species - the ikran, the pa'li, the ilu, and I'm sure many others - but it's not limited to Na'vi; fa'li are known to make tsaheylu amongst themselves before large herd movements, presumably to coordinate the herd.

I have noticed a discrepancy in how fandom folk tend to talk about tsaheylu versus how I think about it. When I see tsaheylu brought up in fandom, outside of "is this or that kind of bond possible" conversations at least, it's almost always in the context of "I wish I could bond with and fly on an ikran" or similar - that is, focused on the actions tsaheylu allows, rather than on the bond itself.

Perhaps it's just that my longing for flight is taken up by my longing for my own flight in the context of my draconity, but this is... beside the point of tsaheylu, for me. I long for tsaheylu of its own sake - the ability to bond with another being that closely, to Know another creature more intimately than this world allows. That is the point of tsaheylu to me - it's not just a tool to a greater end, it's an act of connection, an act of love.

In all fairness to the fandom: the movie does not do a great job of conveying tsaheylu, and that's no fault of the movie's either, just a side effect of the medium. Tsaheylu is really something that would be better conveyed in a written medium, because it's an internal, perceptive experience - you can't see the effects of tsaheylu from the outside. We get some idea of it from that first scene where Jake makes tsaheylu with a pa'li for the first time, with Neytiri serving to narrate and explain it to us, but it's still... shallow, at least compared to my gut instincts about what it's actually like. And then the rest of the movie it's just kind of a background feature - which is completely understandable, but kind of unfortunate.

Tsaheylu is a bond. It is a merging of two into one - a partnership, a working-together. This, I think, is also a common misunderstanding on fandom and sometimes canon's part, and I understand that this part is entirely my interpretation: the Na'vi do not command or take over the animals they bond with. They partner with them. The pa'li does not do what the Na'vi wants because it has to, it does so because the Na'vi asks respectfully, and because through tsaheylu it gains an understanding of why they are doing these things, why they are important, as the Na'vi understands it. It understands, at least while it can understand the world through Na'vi eyes, that the work they do together that would otherwise be utterly foreign to a "wild" pa'li enables them to care for each other and create a life that is safer and more comfortable for both of them than it would be alone.

This is, I think, part of why Jake struggles so much with learning to ride. He's constantly trying to command his mounts - we see it in his first flight with his ikran as well. Even in his Iknimaya -

This line, to me, is a sign that he still does not fully get it. He's still thinking of these animals in terms of possession, of mastery. And, predictably, his first flight almost gets him immediately killed.

Now, we don't... see him figure this out onscreen. But the way he talks to his ikran here, versus how he interacts with him later:

The fond smile, the use of "we," the acknowledgement of Bob's (yes, he canonically named his ikran Bob.) feelings about it, the fact that Bob came back for him unprompted after the destruction of Kelutral despite the potential danger that posed - all of these say to me that they have bonded beyond "guy and animal he considers a servant." Maybe I'm wrong about that, but it's kind of beside the actual point I was getting to here, I've just realized I've done the ADHD thing and derailed.

Back on track! (Can you tell I don't edit these before I post them?)

Anyway. The point is, tsaheylu is... so much more than "control an animal with your mind," or even "talk to an animal with your mind." You become not-two-not-one. You feel each other's bodies, each other's minds; with a little practice, communication can become so instantaneous that you move as one being. It is the deepest kind of tìkusame, of Knowing, that one can have.

And... we don't have it here. It crushes me, sometimes. Not because I'll never be able to fly on an ikran, not because I'll never be able to do something tsaheylu allows, but because I will never have that connection itself, that deepest knowledge of someone and being known in return. That is the importance, the meaning, of tsaheylu.

(A note: For anyone wondering about weird word changes in this, such as kuru -> mehuru, pa'li -> fa'li, etc., it's a function of Na'vi pluralization, which I prefer to keep even when the rest of the sentence is in English because "pa'lis" looks deeply wrong to me. Na'vi has three plural prefixes: me- (2), pxe- (3), and ay- (4+). All of these inflict lenition, meaning if the word they're appended to starts with certain sounds, those sounds get softened: tx -> t, kx -> k, px -> p, t/ts -> s, k -> h, p -> f, and ' gets eliminated entirely. Thus, kuru (one queue) becomes mehuru (two queues), pa'li (one direhorse) becomes (ay)fa'li (4+ direhorses), etc. The ay- prefix can be eliminated in cases such as fa'li where lenition is present, because if a word is lenited with no prefix, it's assumed to be in the general plural ay-; I frequently do this because it's faster (except when the lenition is getting rid of ', because I have trouble hearing the difference between, say, 'angtsìk and angtsìk when spoken), but it's not required.)

[soberyinragingyang]

TL;DR: this fandom is great and I ramble about smitherses characterisation

omg you guys... I put that post in my queue because I wanted to decide on posting it or not later, but then it did 😅 thank you for your responses, I'm happy it struck a cord in that sense. I'll be going through them and probably replying soon.

I usually try not to 'start shit' (which is why I don't tag it, and censor the character names in a way) because I believe everyone is entitled to their own opinions and interpretations of characters. I know I personally bend the 'rules' a bit even looking at the classic seasons for what's probably considered 'in character' or not and I don't want to pretend I know the truth about characters that aren't my own. Part of what makes niche fandom so enjoyable to me is the endless possibilities for personal interpretation!

But I believe our little ingroup of sorts can agree that part of what makes smits enjoyable to us is his adoration of scheming, plotting men with little care for the consequences to others, and the fact that they, in the current seasons, proceeded to then frame his character as 'here's to enjoying the good in each other, while ignoring the bad' (paraphrased) in the Portrait episode was extremely uncomfortable to me, like a pretty big, cartoon slap in the face. It made me realize that a lot of people see this character as something so different from me/us, including the current showrunners.

Which is, you know, okay... I just firmly disagree and sometimes I get a bit too irked for comfort. Honestly, lucky to see I'm not alone in this and get to bother people besides my boyfriend with opinions he can't bring himself to care about much 😂

To be clear with this: I really, really don't want to think of smits as someone who goes along with evil deeds only because he's tasked to. Someone who turns a blind eye to moral corruption for the off chance that things may get better, or worse, that he might get a relationship out of it if he sticks around and suffers through it all long enough. In the current seasons he comes off as so meek and unhappy, and I really can't consider it 'character development' even if I wanted to.

So yeah, big kudos to his characterisation in Who Shot Mr.Burns Part 1 where he very clearly drew a line once things weren't enjoyable for him any longer. I see him as a guy who, you know, only acts as a doormat when he feels like it, and genuinely enjoys all of his and burnsie's corporate adventures. Bonus points if he gets into a bit of good old fashioned backstabbing (I miss you, anagonist-to-Homer smits..)

Anyway, I miss these two being friends, I miss how they looked like partners in crime who, generally, enjoyed being around one another. I miss how comfortable they both were in their cartoony boss/lackey dynamic. I get we can't have that back, with that chemistry dwindling since past season 8 (and even past season 3, in a different way), to the point where I don't even want them to be canon anymore... but I really enjoy keeping the spirit alive with all of you.

And to those of you who don't see them as I just described and still ship them, or don't: godspeed!

[howmanyepsofmlseason6areleft]

Friendly reminder+a small thank you!

apparently the (amazing) @buggachat reblogged my may airdates post and now my notifs are blowing up. I literally do not know how to handle it dsjjdfjfd but thanks Kelly! It’s 1:00 am and i’m still freaking out 

But hello to all the new followers! I’m so happy to welcome you aboard as we explore the hell that is miraculous airing and chronological order :> 

Now with the much needed thanks out of the way, on with the reminder!

Mr. Pigeon 72, the fourth episode of season 4, airs in just a few hours! I’m going to be reblogging a post by the lovely @miraculousepisodes​ that has livestream links and a time converter so you know what time it airs in your timezone! I will also be providing the link for it with english subtitles when I wake up tomorrow :)

I also forgot to make a post earlier today that Lies, the 2nd episode of season 4, has aired in english! The link to watch it is here, and I apologize for all the pop up ads! There is this google drive link that has the other season 4 english dubs on there, but lies is unfortunately missing, so it’s either this or to look it up on youtube. 

Anyway, that’s all for now! I’m going to go to sleep, but will of course queue a countdown post as always and keep y’all updated! Love you all and to all those staying up to watch the episode, Godspeed!

(chronological order under cut)

ML SEASON 4 CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER

S4E01- Truth ✔️

S4E02- Lies ✔️

S4E03- Gang of Secrets ✔️

S4E04- Mr. Pigeon 72

S4E05- UNKNOWN

S4E06- Furious Fu ✔️

S4E07- Sole Crusher

S4E08- Queen Banana

S4E09- Gabriel Agreste

S4E10- UNKNOWN

S4E11- Guiltrip ✔️

S4E12- UNKNOWN

S4E13- Optigami

[dustedmagazine]

A year of pissed-off, bummed-out music: Jonathan Shaw’s year in review

Photo of Agrimonia by Victor Sanchez

I’m not making any grandiose claims about the “greatness” or the “best-ness” of any of these records. But they’re the records I kept coming back to, throughout the year — the ones that refused to fall off the queue, that insisted that I listen, closely and attentively.  

The list also gravitates toward the slow and really, really heavy. This year, if a record’s sounds weren’t loud and pissed off or bummed out, it didn’t have much chance of holding my attention. Heavy, pissed and bummed were my affective baselines, as U.S. politics and culture spiraled around an ethical nadir. Music has never been an escape for me. It’s life’s soundtrack. And life has a dire, desperate feel these days. The records respond accordingly.  

Agrimonia’s Awaken is the record I played most often this year, and I played those by YOB and Thou almost as frequently. The others are in no particular order, but I spent a lot of time with all of them.

Agrimonia — Awaken (Southern Lord)

Awaken by Agrimonia

Awaken is a remarkably potent blend of crust’s politico-cultural ethos and metal’s volume and riff worship. The band’s roster combines decades of experience gigging in Gothenburg’s fecund metal and punk scenes, and their confidence and deftness shows. It’s a passionate, exciting record, egregiously underappreciated.  

YOB — Our Raw Heart (Relapse)

Our Raw Heart by YOB

To call this LP “heartfelt” might be a bit too on the nose. Still, Mike Scheidt’s heavyweight bout with near-fatal illness has imbued YOB’s riffing with a nakedly emotional impact. The band still brings the heavy, but they do so with palpable humility and humanity, and that’s a real artistic accomplishment. 

 Thou — Magus (Sacred Bones)

Magus by Thou

An absolute knockout: all the scabrous, desolate noise you could want out of a sludge record, and an outsized load of smarts, too. Thou released a ridiculous amount of new music this year, but this record is the motherfucker. Unrelentingly intense and full of ideas.

  Candy — Good to Feel (Triple B)

Good To Feel by CANDY

The remarkable hardcore record, Good to Feel finds a way to get to the other side of nihilism by taking it seriously. Careful with this one—it leaves a mark. And the band are among the best live acts in heavy rock right now.

 Efrim Manuel Menuck — Pissing Stars (Constellation)

Pissing Stars by Efrim Manuel Menuck

Menuck is one of the founders of Godspeed You! Black Emperor, and that band’s sonic grandiosity is occasionally registered on this solo LP. But most of the sounds are bleak, angry or emotionally tapped out. It’s pretty harrowing stuff. Menuck attempts to bring the record’s tone around to hope, and the title track almost gets there. Almost.

 The Armed — Only Love (Self released)

ONLY LOVE by The Armed

An impossibly exciting hybrid of hardcore’s provocation, electro’s technical spazz-out and noise rock’s information overload. It’s hard to get a handle on exactly who these Detroit-based pranksters are, and what they intend by presenting the world with these sounds. But the sounds themselves are undeniable.

 Material Support — Terror Prone Nation (Aklasan Records)

Terror Prone Nation by Material Support

The year’s sharpest political punk, Terror Prone Nation couples ideological clarity with memorable melody. Vocalist Jackie commands the songs with a voice that’s clear and compelling. She knows that the words are what matter, but she can shout with the best of them. “Tear it down and start again.” Right on.

 Moloch — A Bad Place (Feast of Tentacles)

A BAD PLACE LP by MOLOCH

At once unendurably ugly and utterly transfixing, this is the sound of the earth ball rolling around the rim of a rusting, crumbling sewer pipe. Depending on how you’re situated, A Bad Place is either the worst record to play when you’re feeling shitty, or the only record to play.

 Screaming Females — All at Once (Don Giovanni)

All At Once by Screaming Females

As on all Screaming Females records, Marissa Paternoster’s guitar-hero antics dominate. But All at Once also demonstrates the range of her gifts as a singer, and the record’s ongoing thematic interest in image (on the Internet, self-image and identity, and in visual arts) makes for a cohesive and stimulating set of inventively written songs. And the solos burn it down.

 Primitive Man / Unearthly Trance — Split LP (Relapse)

Split w/ Unearthly Trance by Primitive Man

This is one of those rare split LPs that feels like a complete record, as both bands explore the relation between doom metal and harsh noise. Primitive Man’s tracks are much more oriented to experimentation with noise, while Unearthly Trance absolutely destroy their side of the record with four songs of soul-shattering metal. Among the heaviest records of the year, by whatever metric you want to use.  

Also, a special shout-out to Philadelphia’s own Moor Mother, who threw down the loudest, smartest and most searing live show I saw this year, among a bunch of loud, smart and searing shows. If you haven’t seen Moor Mother do her thing, stop fucking around and go. Here’s a taste:

Peace.

 Jonathan Shaw

[luisprada]

Directing The Dancing Bartender From Rick Astley’s “Never Gonna Give You Up” Video

Director: So you’re a bartender, and then you hear the music and you dance. Maybe throw in some spins, wipe down the counter a little – whatever feels right. But, like, be happy about it. “Woo dancing! It’s fun!” that kind of thing. Sound good?

Dancer: Uh…

Director: What’s wrong?

Dancer: That’s it? What’s the story here? Why do I go from washing a glass to dancing, and so quickly? Is the song that good? I haven’t heard it yet.

Director: It’s okay. I mean, it’s fun, but when it’s over, it’s like it never happened.

Dancer: So, why am I dancing so much then?

Director: You really need direction for this? Just dance. It’ll be in the video and you’ll get paid. Easy.

Dancer: Mister Director, I am an artist. I speak through dance. It is not just movement. It is an expression of my soul. As such, I cannot physically articulate the complexities of this bartender’s emotions if I don’t know what they are.

Director: Goddamn it.

Dancer: …

Director: Alright, look – you’re a bartender out of options. Your wife is libel to pack and leave you at any second. Every whiskey sour your serve up to some morose local drunk reminds you of the heartbreaks and failures that kept you behind that bar instead of spreading your wings to soar. Sometimes you think if you just had one path out of this life, you’d take it. No questions asked, no idea where you’d land. It’s that bleak. But then, Rick Astley starts performing “Never Gonna Give You Up.”  

At first, you’re intrigued. Is this a black person singing? Sounds like it, but there’s a vague…whiteness to it. It’s almost cool but not quite. Maybe express that with a curious look over to the stage, like you’re not sure if one of your customers is stealing a napkin holder. They’re not. But for a second there, boy, did it look like it.

Dancer: Hmm. How’s this?

Director: That’s…good, actually. Didn’t expect you to nail that. Um…so, anyway -- the music. It’s an intoxicating rhythm. It bursts through your emotional wall. You’re amped up. Your problems are still there. But the lingering trauma that’s coiled itself around every synapse, influencing every word and action, is numbed. The pain, it…it doesn’t hurt as much anymore. It can’t, not while Rick Astley’s “Never Gonna Give You Up” is playing. So your neck bobs to the beat, your eyelids shut. You’re not going to need eyes to see where you’re headed – to an awakening.

Dancer: Right. Okay. So, you mean like this…

Director: My God…exactly like that! Astonishing! Sir, your soul radiates through every move.

Dancer: Thank you. I think I can do this. What do I do next?

Director: You’re entranced. You dance, unaware of place, time, and your customer’s growing concern for your mental health. This isn’t a small nod to a beat anymore. Each pulse of your hips is a tug at the chain that binds you to your sorrows. Your shoulders and arms dip and sway in an intrepid battle against a tenacious tide unseen to all but you.

Dancer: Mmph. Mmph. Can I do something with the towel?

Director: Like wha--

Director: Heavens above.

The Director shakes his head in disbelief. The Dancer points to his heart.

Dancer: It comes from here. I’m simply its vessel.

Director: Well, it’s perfect! Rick’s song has woken something inside of you, a sense of possibility you haven’t felt in years, the sudden opening of the door you’ve been pushing against for as long as you can remember. With a toss of a towel and a handspring, you’re breaking free of the bar’s constraints.

Dancer: I love it.

Director: As do I, but what if we harnessed this creative breakthrough and spun it into something even greater? Follow me here: what if we get some shots with you further expressing your newfound lease on life brought on by Rick Astley’s “Never Gonna Give You Up”? It’s just you alone, away from the bar, dancing with abandon, feeling joy for the first time.

The Director becomes crestfallen.

Director: But…no. It’ll never work.

Dancer: But why, Mister Director?

Director: To do something like that, we’d need a feat of dancing unlike any we’ve seen before. A move so spectacular, so daring, no other physical expression could match it. But I’m afraid a move like that would be impossible to pull off, deadly even. I’m not even sure if one exists.

Dancer: I see what you mean.

Director: Oh, damn it all! We were so close! We had lightning in the bottle but could not contain it! Maybe we were never meant to. We tried and we failed. There’s no shame in that. We’ll film what we came up with and then try to live with ourselves knowing what we could’ve accomplished here today if it were even possible to touch what lies beyond mankind’s reach.

Dancer: Mister Director, if I may be so presumptuous, I might have something. It might not be exactly what we need, but like my father always said, “Do what you can with what you have.”

Director: Those are wise words. Your father was a smart man. But wisdom has its limits.

Dancer: Please, Mister Director. Just give me the chance to show you what I can do.

Director: I don’t kn—

Dancer: Please.  

The Director sighs.

Director: Fine. But should anything happen to you, I will disavow all knowledge of this conversation. It was a maneuver you attempted on your own in defiance of my directorial will. Do you understand?  

Dancer: I understand.

Director: Then Godspeed.

Dancer: Thank you. Here we go. On three…two…one…

Dancer: What did you thi--Mister Director, is everything okay?

Tears stream down the Director’s cheeks.

Director: Oh, quite, yes. Come, let’s roll camera – and change the world.

                                                   ******

                                       400 Years Later

The line extended for a quarter of a mile. Some in the queue wore white shirts with rolled sleeves, red suspenders, and loose black slacks; others in a black and white-striped long sleeve with black short-shorts and ankle socks. The ones at the front had been waiting since before dawn to be the first allowed in. With patience and grace, the ones at the back waited hours for their turn. A few thousand more would arrive as the day went on.

They were all there to pay respects to the man and the maneuver that elevated the human race to unprecedented heights of thought, empathy, and courage. They had come to watch the Dancer spring off the chain-link fence again and again in mega-HD clarity as his image projected out of a hologram-emitting cube. The cube itself obscured by a lush bed of flowers, making it look like he’s leaping way from a dreary parking lot fence and into a psychedelic sea. Surrounding the flower bed is hundreds of plain white towels laid there by visitors signifying a pilgrimage that has reached its end.

An inscription atop a pedestal among the flowers reads: “This memorial is dedicated to the Dancer, who, in this very spot, leaped onto a fence and sprang into our hearts. We never gave him up.”