#guess ill see how it does note wise LMAO

[intotheelliwoods]

Sigh, well since you all keep asking nicely....

Next

Check out the #beetle saga tag on my blog for context

[couldeatthatgirlforlunch]

I really loved your scenario of The Justice League AND The Ill reader,Lmao, poor reader they only need a rest.

Anyway, ever since I read the first part I was thinking about the kids, you know, the League Sidekicks, obviously The Reader knows them, due to work (I can really imagine Batman introducing His kids to the Reader to force a bond , And obviously The rest of The League does the same) So I had the headcanon that the reader really likes the children, they talk to them after missions, sometimes they buy them some gifts for their birthdays, they listen to them when they complain about their father figures (Therapist Reader), etc. But at the same time I can imagine The Reader being totally uncomfortable with his parents, so I can't help but think of a scenario in which The Reader is talking to the League kids in a good mood, but the League members walk in. to the room (They obviously saw the Happy Reader, so they want to gain some advantage) And The Reader just turns off, goes into business mode and is curt as always with the league, and when he finishes talking to the league, he goes back to talking to the children and their mood is happy again. Man I would love to see the league's reaction to the obvious reader favoritism

PD:I really love your work, you are amazing

Pd2:If The kids are yandere, ITS UP to you

A Week in Life: Take Your Kid to Work Day

Synopsis: A week in your life where you get a lot of new little friends, even if you know something’s sketchy about it.

Pairing: Yandere!Justice League X Assistant!Gn!Reader; Platonic!Yanderes! Robin (Dick), Superboy (Konner), Miss Martian, Kid Flash (Wally) and Aqualad (Kaldur'ahm)

Tw: A single implication about Hal’s past dub/non con incidente (blink and you miss it); Implied emotional manipulation, I guess? Justice League using kids as a manipulation tactic; A little angst, I think we all hate how Superman treated Conner, so I added that, so technically not a healthy relationship between them here, could be interpreted as Superman manipulating him or Superboy trying too hard to make his bio-dad like him; The kid’s ages are definitely not accurate canon wise, but what is canon anyway? I mixed their personalities and origins from Young Justice (along with their age gap) and for Superboy it was mainly the animated movie Reign of the Supermen; English is not my 1st language.

Word count: 3,3k

Requested? More than once.

Extra notes: Dick is 10, Kaldur'ahm, Conner, Megan and Wally are 13. I wish I knew more about the Wonder Girls to write about one of them, I felt bad for not adding them, but I would’ve felt worse writing for a character I have no idea how to write.

General masterlist | A Day in Life - Series masterlist

— I wasn't aware that there was a Take Your Kid to Work Day on schedule... — You said in a surprised, maybe taken aback, tone, if not a little strangled and sarcastic, even if a little happy. You rubbed your forehead, you knew your hunch was right…

Monday…

You’ve heard the rumors Gotham media was spreading for months now, you even asked Batman if you should prepare the marketing team in case of an emergency, he denied everything.

So why was it that now you were staring at a 10 year old dressed as a traffic light?

— Miss/Mister/Mx (Y/N)... I’m hungry… — Worst of all? The kid was cute.

You smile in a friendly manner.

— Okay, okay. Just give me a second, buddy, I need to talk to your… Dad…?! — You just now realized you didn't know their actual relationship. Batman only told you his name was Robin, that he was his partner, and that he was in the watchtower to observe. You didn't know superheroes accepted 10 year old interns, but whatever. The kid just stared blankly at you, not giving an actual answer to if you got your assumption right.

— Can I go with you? — Robin fiddled with his fingers. So cute. You nodded with a small smile. The kid jumped off his too big chair and ran towards you, surprising you by taking your hand. He had small hands. So cute.

You walked slowly, to accommodate to his height, in the direction of the door to the briefing room, where Batman was talking to John Stewart. This other Green Lantern was a breath of fresh air. The other one (the one who shouldn't be named) was away, working on another district of the universe since that whole… Less-than-consensual situation. You were happy and surprised when the League didn't just brush it off, and even compensated you for it, alongside making him go away. He either agreed to that, or caused the 3rd World War against the Justice League. It was a temporary predicament, but happier nonetheless, since John wasn't obsessed with you, unlike the rest of them, and easy to work with.

You cleared your throat so they would turn to you.

— Does Robin have any restrictions? He said he's hungry so I'm gonna take him to the kitchen. — You said politely. Batman shook his head.

— Just don't give him sugar. He needs to sleep before patrol tonight. — You raised your eyebrows in surprise and nodded your head. Batman looked at the boy. — Behave, chum. — You blinked, Robin nodded solemnly.

As you walked in the direction of the kitchen, the kid showed to be very happy and talkative. You were surprised, considering who his dad was, but it warmed your heart. At least it seemed he wasn't mistreated.

At some point, he let your hand go and started cartwheeling and doing acrobatics all the way there to show off his abilities to you. You gasped and clapped, praising his talent along with other workers from the crew who were passing the hall. You were slightly worried that he would fall and get hurt, but the kid was really confident in what he was doing (but they always are, until they fall).

When you got there, you were impressed that he wasn't even the slightest out of breath.

— Do you have games on your phone? — He asked, sitting down on a table while you rummaged the fridge for some sandwiches or any healthy snack, since you didn't know how his home diet was, but guessing by his build, which was a lot more athletic than kids his age are, he was probably pretty healthy. Son of the Bat.

— Hmm, I have Dress to Impress, Pou and Candy Crush.

— What is Pou? — Your heart panged and you sighed, feeling old.

— When were you born? 2010? — You walked towards him and settled a plate with a sandwich in front of him, before pouring a cup of juice.

— 2014. — Your mouth dropped, speechless. — Wait, so not even Stardew Valley? — You cleared your throat and shook your head, sitting beside him, while he started eating.

— Wait, can I even let you play? Does Batman let you have screen time? — He nodded.

— I have a phone. I just couldn't bring it with me today… He said he would show me around the tower, but he got busy with work… — He deflated a little at the end of the sentence, your heart broke. — Anyway… He told me I could distract myself. I just need your permission. — You bite your lip.

— Okay. How about we go to the recreational room and you can play some videogames while I work from the computer. — Robin nodded eagerly.

— Damn, you can't even play with me? Working sucks. That must be why adults are so boring. — You took a napkin and cleaned some food from his cheek.

— It's not that bad… You can do whatever you want. — He perked up.

— I guess so… — He looked you up and down. You prepared yourself for one of those moments where kids are so blunt that they don't know they could offend someone. — But you're not boring, (Y/N), you're cool. Must be why daddy likes you so much. And he doesn't like no one.

Tuesday…

Wow, what a weird coincidence. Just yesterday Batman brought his kid, and now Martian Manhunter brought his niece.

Miss Martian looked older than Robin, but again, she was a martian, her appearance was shifted to whatever she wanted to look like. All you knew was that she was young and new on Earth.

Right now, she looked very human. She had freckles and auburn hair. The only thing that made her stand out was the green of her skin.

When she presented herself to you, you got startled by her voice in your head, but you and Martian Manhunter softly explained to her that on Earth people didn't communicate through their minds, and it was kinda like an invasion of privacy. Kinda funny hearing him say that, but whatever.

Like Batman the day prior, Martian trusted the girl in your hands. So many coincidences, right?!

— So, honey, how old are you?

— Oh, on my home planet I should be about 39. But converting to Earth years, I’m 13. — She said with a shy but friendly smile, you smiled back.

— You’re pretty young then. How are you settling on Earth? Planning to go to school maybe? — She nodded.

— I just started the school year… I wasn't too sure about that, but my uncle said it would be good to learn human behaviors. — You nodded.

— American school is nice, I recommend you should take part in clubs. And don't feel pressured to make a billion friends. It's better to have one good friend, instead of 10 people you know but can't rely on. — She nodded, biting her lip.

— I already know some of the other sidekicks, I just don't have any civilian friends… I was thinking about joining the cheerleading team. — You gasped, excited.

— Oh, that's really good! I always wanted to join, but was never the sporty type. You’re sweet, I think that already gives you some points. — Her green cheeks got darker.

— You think so?! — Her voice got louder with excitement.

— Of course! Now let me give you some tips about the jocks, honey…

Wednesday…

Today, Flash brought Kid Flash. You haven't met him until now. The sequence of days the older heroes brought in their sidekicks was starting to look weird… But not that weird. Batman said he would give Robin a tour but became unavailable. Manhunter wanted Miss Martian to meet civilian people and have a good role model — you don't know why he decided that that role model should be you, but it made sense, so… —. Flash Said they would spend the day using the lab to experiment some more on Kid Flash’s still recently acquired powers. So. Coincidences, right?

The boy was 13 too, he had messy red hair and green eyes. Flash didn't specify their relationship, but their personalities definitely matched a little. Both a little hyperiperactive and smiley. Although that could be more of a speedster thing, especially the first part.

Like promised, they spent half that day on the lab, occasionally calling you for snack breaks. However, at some point, Flash gave an excuse and left you with the kid.

Huh.

— Sooo, what do you do around here? — Kid Flash asked, spinning around in a chair he found somewhere and rolled to the middle of your office in the blink of an eye. You half-smiled. It was nice not being crowded by those weirdos and being around fresh and youthful people, but it was starting to feel weird.

— I plan schedule appointments, organize team meetings, prepare agendas and itineraries, book meals and travel arrangements, handle record keeping and documentation, and make sure a project stays on budget. — The ginger blinked and stopped spinning.

— Uhh, you went to college for that? — You blinked.

— I did, why? — He chuckled slightly.

— Nothing, it's cool, sounds boring, though. — You nodded.

— What do you want to work with? — He looked to the side, thoughtful for a moment.

— I think I want to be a scientist.

— Oh really?

— Yeah, I like physics, mechanics and a little bit of chemistry. — You smirked.

— Chemistry? Sounds boring. — Kidflash froze for a second, wide-eyed, then relaxed and started laughing loudly. His chuckling prompted you to chuckle alongside him.

He used his feet to push the chair around your table and stopped at your side.

— Hey, can I see how much people get paid here? If I'm gonna be a member of the League one day, might as well optimize time and just work here. — You slapped his hands away when he reached for your computer, he pouted.

— Wouldn't that make it difficult to keep your secret identity hidden?! — Kid Flash stretched his arm, then draped it across your shoulders, you lifted an eyebrow.

— Babe. I'm a superhero. I could change clothes really fast right now and you wouldn't even notice. — You scoffed and lightly pushed him and his chair away.

— A phone booth would be more appropriate for that.

— What's a phone booth?

Thursday…

Superman brought Superboy.

Why the fuck are they doing that, bro?

You didn't even know they were close! Sure, Superboy is Superman and Lex Luthor’s clone, the whole world knew that, and that Superboy took to Superman's side. But they were never seen together, unlike Flash and Kid Flash, or Batman and Robin, for example.

Worst of all? It looked like the mood between them was… Weary. Especially on Superman’s part. Did he not trust Superboy? You could understand that… But look at his puppy sad face!

And not even five minutes later, Superman just flew away, saying something about a hurricane in Texas, AND SUPERBOY STAYED!

The silence was awkward for a few seconds. You thought back to the personality he showed when he was first announced by LexCorp, when Superman was considered dead. He was all over the media (Lex’s marketing team was good) with his charisma and flirty personality. Although he kept the leather jacket, his quietness surprised you.

You cleared your throat.

Superman brought Superboy.

Why the fuck are they doing that, bro?

You didn't even know they were close! Sure, Superboy is Superman and Lex Luthor’s clone, the whole world knew that, and that Superboy took to Superman's side. But they were never seen together, unlike Flash and Kid Flash, or Batman and Robin, for example.

Worst of all? It looked like the mood between them was… Weary. Especially on Superman’s part. Did he not trust Superboy? You could understand that… But look at his puppy sad face!

And not even five minutes later, Superman just flew away, saying something about a hurricane in Texas, AND SUPERBOY STAYED!

The silence was awkward for a few seconds. You thought back to the personality he showed when he was first announced by LexCorp, when Superman was considered dead. He was all over the media (Lex’s marketing team was good) with his charisma and flirty personality. Although he kept the leather jacket, his quietness surprised you.

You cleared your throat.

— So… Are you hungry? Wanna play videogames? — You grimaced slightly. He looked at you again, a little hesitant.

— Uh… I think so? — He blinked. — You guys have videogames here?! — He exclaimed, surprised. You chuckled.

— Oh yeah, for such a serious and stern guy, Batman really invested in the work environment. — You chuckled together, walking towards the recreational area.

You were curious about the earlier weird vibe, but didn't want to prod.

At first, you just let the boy play by himself, just sitting beside him and working while talking, that was until he paused the game between missions and stretched, then looked at you.

— Are you guys involved? — You looked at him with your eyebrows raised.

— You guys…? — He pursed his lips.

— You and Superman. — You grimaced slightly.

— Oh no, he's my boss, and not my type at all. — He nodded, looking pensive.

— He likes you. — You kept a blank expression, waiting for him to continue. — I like you too, so I can imagine why he likes you. — You stared at him, exasperated. He widened his eyes. — Not like that! — He raised his hands to deny. — It's just- I feel comfortable with you. I felt comfortable with some of his friends before, I didn't even know why, but I think it's because half of me is from him. Like I have some things from Lex since I was… Born… — He looked to the ground for a second, pouting lightly. — That's why Superman doesn't like me. — You widened your eyes.

— I'm sure he likes you! — Superboy looked at you like he didn't believe you.

— No, it's okay… He's polite, I guess. And took me in as his family, just not… As his son… More like a brother, or… A cousin… I mean, I can understand, I'm basically a hate baby, created by his biggest enemy to outdo and destroy him… — You shook your head.

You didn't know what to say, since you didn't know how their dynamic was like.

— H-He brought you here to spend time with you, didn't he? He just had an emergency to take care of… — He looked to the ground and then at you again. He didn't have the heart to tell you that's the first time they ever “hung out”, and that his genius brain clocked hours ago that Superman's plan was to create a connection between you both by orchestrating a connection with you and him. He also didn't want to bad mouth Clark. A part of him always would have hope that Superman would want to be closer to him one day.

Superboy looked at the clock and then at you.

— Don't you have a break? I can hear your stomach, I'm hungry too.

Friday…

This madness has to stop now.

— Nice to meet you, Aqualad. — You nodded at the boy with a small smile. You were a little mesmerized by his exotic appearance. He had brown skin, blonde hair in braids (where are his roots?) and blue eyes. His arms were also covered in tattoos that you knew had something to do with his abilities.

— I was showing him around the Watchtower, but now I have a meeting with Wonder Woman, why don't you two hang out for a while? — Aquaman, always the most obnoxious one. Their intentions were 100% clear now.

Aquaman didn't let you say anything else and left the room with said hero. You heard her murmur something about having to find her own apprentice to bring to the watchtower as soon as possible.

You looked at the boy, not knowing what to say.

— Have you ever been to Atlantis? — He surprised you by speaking first, his tone was gentle, if not a little monotonous, but he looked at you with interest.

— Uhhh, no? I’m not that good of a swimmer and I can't breathe underwater. — Aqualad smirked lightly.

— You wouldn't need to worry about breathing, there are multiple ways for humans to do that, from magic to technology. As for swimming… I'm sure we can find some sort of solution for that, also. And I doubt my king would be opposed to the idea of teaching you. — You nodded slowly. So much for subtly.

— … My vitamin D is low enough as it is, I’d rather stay on land, no offense. — The atlantean opened his mouth to speak but you beat him to it. — Aqualad! Do you like the food here? I've always been curious about your culture’s cuisine…

You kept talking for hours, eventually, Aqualad and you ended up in the training room, he offered to show you a little of his control over water bodies, and you, still a little fascinated over the convivence with superheroes, and this being the second time you met someone from Atlantis, accepted eagerly.

— This is just like H2O… — Kauldur’ahm blinked.

— It is water… — The boy confirmed, hesitantly. You laughed.

— No, no, not water. It's a TV show, it's about mermaids. I guess it isn't exactly accurate, but they can control water, just like you! — He nodded, slowly, contemplating. You looked at your watch, noticing your lunch time was due. You looked at him, shyly. — If you're up for it, we could watch it now… — That seemed to make him perk up a little and he nodded quickly.

— I would like to.

Monday…

— I wasn't aware that there was a Take Your Kid to Work Day on schedule... — You said in a surprised, maybe taken aback, tone, if not a little strangled and sarcastic, even if a little happy. You rubbed your forehead, you knew your hunch was right…

There they were, in the meeting room, all seated around the big roundtable, almost double the number of people who usually sit there.

Now, the food order they made, made sense.

You pushed the food cart forward, one for Flash. You came back and pushed another one, this one for Kid Flash, you ruffled his hair. Then, you walked back and pushed the 3rd food cart around the table, delivering each meal for each hero.

— Steak for Green Lantern. One black coffee for Batman. One meat sandwich and chocolate milk for Robin. — You squeezed his cheek. He smiled brightly at you. — Toast for Martian Manhunter and a slice of strawberry cake for Missy Miss Martian. — As you put the plate in front of her, you whispered that you wanted to know how the cheerleading team was going. She nodded happily. — A burger with fries for Aquaman, a smoothie and salad for Aqualad. Oh, did you change your hair? I like it! — You smiled brightly at the boy and his cheeks burned, he nodded. — Ice cream for Wonder Woman. Another burger and fries for Superman and another for Superboy. I see you followed my advice, your style really matches with those piercings. Tell me how you did it later. — You laughed carelessly and went to the door. — Need me for something more? — Your bosses shook their heads, stunned. You left and closed the door.

— Can't believe you guys actually did it… — John shook his head, disappointed at his teammates.

— I knew it would work. — Batman said, sipping from his drink.

— That's why we stole your idea when we knew about it. — Aquaman chuckled.

— I really need to find a sidekick. — Diana huffed.

Batman turned to Robin.

— You did a good job, chum. — Dick chuckled.

— Yeah, I even asked for a sandwich without the crust. Now (Y/N) think I'm the cutest here. — He smirked smugly. Wally scoffed.

— Yeah, right. She totally doesn't think you're an annoying kid. — The duo stared at each other. — I, for example, made them laugh. — The redhead puffed his chest proudly.

— Are you sure it wasn’t a pity laugh?! — Superboy snorted at Robin’s retort.

— Although Robin might be physically more adorable, and Kid Flash, in his words, made them laugh. (Y/N) and I started a TV show together, my king. — Aquaman nodded at his apprentice’s words.

— You did a good job.

— But (Y/N) actually said they wanted to talk to me later! That usually oficializes human’s friendships! — Megan said, softly.

— They said the same to me, the other day. That I could talk to them whenever I wanted… — Superman looked at Superboy, surprised. He felt awkward praising him, so he just nodded his head and looked away. Superboy pouted slightly.

— Because you told them your sob story, now they think you're a loser. — Conner glared at Dick. — Their physical language showed that they loved me, B! I honestly deserve an Oscar after that performance! They're gonna be ours before you suckers know it!

As a screaming match raised inside the room, the adult heroes looked at each other, lost for words, not only had the kids gotten you roped a bazillion times faster then they could ever dream, but also you were so amazing that they were enamored with you too.

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[shinygoku]

very intrigued to see what you think of Henry!!! ^v^ (character ask!)

Another day, another Big Green! (The others are Piccolo and Thunderbird 2 lmao)

First impression

"Green ver of that one big creepy dude" (Look, when I was Babby I saw a Gordon picture somewhere that minorly spooked me lmao)

Impression now

Ahh, Henry! In some ways, very much like Duck! Green, long nose, popular with the fans and I'm here like Yeah he's a good fixture of the series lol

Ok well, maybe I should disclaim that he's not one of my favourites, which is partly as I guess it's a bit hard to nail down his personality.

His, for lack of a better term, Illness Arc is fascinating and oddly Real for a series about machinery. Something's genuinely amiss with him, but the lack of a clear cause (at least, to the other engines, who presumably don't know he was built from stolen, incomplete plans and the logical issues that would arise from that) and his frequent complaints turn the other characters off wanting to hear about it, thinking he's exaggerating. Then the Welsh Coal stopgap is found! Then the very next story he has a horrible crash but it was a blessing in disguise because then he's rebuilt as a Black 5 and his health issues are gone forever! (ain't we envious of machines now?) Until Lazy Writer Disease sets in Meta-wise, but more on that later.

I think it's safe to say that it's Entry Level RWS Knowledge to know Awdry's frustrations with the character, and it is kind of hilarious how much he tried to write him out, and iirc Henry wound up with the most appearances and 'his' book has 5 stories instead of the uniform 4 for some reason. But it seems it takes further Lazy Corporate Mandates to actually write him out in BwBa which really sucks and is doing such an iconic lad horribly dirty.

Pictured: Henry as seen by Awdry/Mattel, who are about to just shove him out of the story with varying degrees of success.

Well yeah, for me I can't really settle on an opinion because he never seems to have anything solid after the Rebuild. He's kind of the nicer one out of the Terrible Trio, but sometimes he's as bitchy and obnoxious as Gordon without prompting. He seems to be pretty unlucky and sometimes his misfortunes are self inflicted, but they don't commit to this bit. He gets his (in)famous forest, much to Awdry's chagrin, but it does offer a nice gentler side to him. He also seems to be the main Fast Freight engine, particularly more Fish shipments, but this doesn't really inform his character. He all too often feels like a Spare, Green Gordon who's less full of himself (but still gets boughts of Envy and inflated self importance, like Tenders for Henry), and that's a shame because this nebulous lack of anything concrete seems to be why Bad TatMR Writing diagnosed him with Need Welsh Coal again for quite a long time (dunno if that only changed when Mattel/Brenner came in or not). But then the US dub makes him sound like w--dy all-n and that's the worst treatment of all! I kind of understand the temptation to make him the resident worrier but HUUURGHGHH NOT LIKE THAT

So yeah, the better characterization of him needs to strike a good balance of him being ...I guess a Gentle Giant, who enjoys nature and maybe is a smidge prone to bouts of feeling jealous. Maybe catches the engine version of colds more than the others because the early morning runs in the freezing air? I dunno, I'm trying to combine several traits that have been in Henry but never seemed to stick. But done properly, I could really get behind a nice, faceted character like that~

Favourite moment

It feels a bit mean to say, but it's due to the strength of the episode itself with the fantastic visuals, godly music and shocking drama (with a nice bonus of Correct Head Codes!) that put Flying Kipper at the top of this list!

Another part of this ep, is the beginning where the Driver is saying "Don't tell Gordon, but if you pull this nicely, the Fat Controller may let you pull the Express!". Like, that really squeezes my heart, because his driver is rooting for him, the prospect of a better regarded job is floating there, and knowing what eventually happens, it's like... oof! But in a good way.

...Also I think that must have been something Awdry added after deciding not to kill him off because having that bit and for it to all go up in flames would have made children and me extremely upset and he would have been buried under letters of complaint from angry mothers of the time.

Idea for a story

Other than the overly simple and grimdark "he was in fact killed that day" type coma inducers, I suppose the Two Henries theory being explored could offer some interesting interactions.

Like, what if the Henry who rolls back into The Big Station is instantly accepted and in fact, liked more than og Henry? What if the other engines instead couldn't fully relax around him? Were his memories perfect? Too Perfect?

And what would happen if OG Henry were later discovered... (and in what condition?) Dun Dun Dun dododo Dun!

The thing is, it is hard to really explore this because it's innately such a dark, heavy concept. I don't enjoy the 'Authoritarian Hellscape" lameass interpretation by normies. I like my silly workcom on the rails with warm fuzzies and funny antics, thank you very much!

Unpopular opinion

Some of his faces (even before the worsening first inflicted by Magic Railroad) are pretty weird looking! Maybe cause his forehead is so huge and smooth, but maybe just the odd mouth shapes. I like the variety, but they aren’t what I’d call cute... I find myself thinking ‘Moon Face’ looking at him [even with the lack of craters lmao] and oops I think I missed the weirdest grin of all, but here’s a small sample anyway

Favourite relationship

Not a favourite, per say, but some of the more friction-ish interactions he has with Thomas or Percy are pretty funny. With Thomas’ immortal flippant disregard to viaduct safety, Percy retorting that engines with Proper Funnels do, in fact, need scarves, something Henry wouldn’t know about, and that Henry somehow manages to dismiss Bill and Ben, a feat Gordon needs to take notes from. Even the Something in the Air exchange with Thomas, which isn’t really stellar writing just has a funny lame argument vibe.

For some nice Wholesome interaction, Bear is hands down the winner! Easy pick maybe, and it makes me wonder if Bear’s complete absence in the TVS is part of the downward spiral because he’d offer a lot more Plotlines.... hmmm...!

Favourite headcanon

Other than the universal fandom acceptance that He Digs Nature, Baby is the notion I’ve seen a few times that his “fear” of the rain, or what it would do to his paint, isn’t actually why he stopped in the tunnel, and it had more to do with his mechanical failure and/or him having something of a nervous breakdown. He does come across as something of an ass if you take the episode at face value, but there having a secret deeper meaning is way more interesting 👀

[stanharu]

beastars episode 24 thoughts!

this post got kinda long i have Many Thoughts on this one

Overall I had fun watching this ep but I could really tell it was rushed and there was so much that got cut, which makes me super sad. our fears about the finale having pacing issues due to all the added scenes & rearranging were confirmed & it rly sucks, but i'll elaborate more on that in a bit.

this week's ep covered the end of chapter 92, chapters 93-97, and included small bits of chapters 98 & 99.

so the ep starts with the ED and the latter part of the tunnel scene with ibuki and louis. i liked the visual effect they used to show that they were in the dark. louis' voice acting was also On Point. for the most part i think this scene was done pretty well but I can tell it's being rushed also. I really wish we got more buildup and narration instead of just jumping straight to ibuki telling louis to shoot him. the way it is in the anime feels less impactful imo.

also im sad we didnt get to see this in the anime

before i move on, i wanna talk a bit about louis and his relationship w/ the shishigumi and ibuki. i feel like in the anime quite a few of the lil moments that really endear you to the shishigumi and also ibuki were either cut or kinda glossed over, which is strange to me considering how much effort and care went into the ED. it's very emotional and good but i feel like maybe anime onlies are missing out only seeing the anime and the MV. but idk.

legosi and riz's fight was quite rushed as well. there's so much narration and dialogue missing from it and that really rubs me the wrong way. It wasn't all bad but compared to the manga I just don't think it's as good. I will say tho that I really liked the sequence w legosi and the moths. I thought it looked really nice and was pretty well done.

also i liked how the backgrounds had some anti-yahya graffiti, its a nice touch imo

it says "high quality horse meat"

I was happy to see legosi do the "tell me more" pose but I'm honestly disappointed that the anime took out the whole exposition about why legosi did it. like i feel like without that it's just legosi being weird when he has a reason for it!!! This is just one example of the anime taking out crucial narration during the fight.

I also think it's kinda weird how they changed how louis shows up at the fight. im not sure how i feel about riz just charging at him like that, but i liked how legosi kicked him before they ran lol.

i dont have much to say about pina's small scene but I did wanna say that during my first watch thru of the ep i was too distracted trying to read the graffiti behind him that i didn't notice him getting his phone out of the dumpster and calling the cops lmao

it says "devour yahya"

and now... here we are... the predation scene.

overall i thought it was pretty well done but, like the rest of the ep, i could tell it was also being kinda rushed. some important beats werent given enough time to really sink in, and there's a few bits of narration taken out of this part as well that i find disappointing :^(

tho i did like how the anime called back to this scene in s1 when legosi mentions utilizing his strength.

also this part where louis is remembering ibuki had me like😭

I also really liked seeing louis cry. I was crying too sjdflskjdflsjkdf. i thought that scene was really good, its prolly my favorite part of the ep tbh. getting to hear the whole predation scene voiced made me kind of a mess lol. i really liked louis' expressions throughout this whole ep too. studio orange used their whole louis expression budget on these last 2 eps lmao.

seeing legosi instantly get all beefed up was great too. he looked a little ridiculous but i kinda loved it lol. he's so huge and poofy. i love him.

big pomeranian

anyway, im also sad they took out louis' line about being reduced to a flashback character lol. instead he tells legosi "be a hero" again which... im not sure about that change. i liked the part with riz thinking back about tem tho. tho imo the way riz realizes he's in the wrong feels pretty sudden. again adding to how rushed the whole ep feels.

before i move on again i just wanna say legosi looks so cute. even all puffed up and covered in blood. how does he do that

baby boy baby. i wanna ruffle his cheek floofs.

i think one of the things im most disappointed about from this whole ep was how the fight got wrapped up. i really like how the cops show up and totally shift the tone in the manga jslkdfjskljdf. im also really sad we didnt get this interaction

tthe anime really took out most of the sillier moments from the finale, which makes me pretty sad to think about. i know the anime and manga have different tones but pls let the boys be silly sometimes!!

the next part where legosi and louis finally establish their friendship was really cute tho ❤️ even tho it was pretty different i enjoyed it a lot.

BABIESSSS 🥺😭❤️❤️

the wrap-up for this arc and this episode gave me whiplash sdjlfkjsdf. it literally speedruns thru legosi's predation conviction, being released, louis & haru's graduation, and legosi deciding he's going to drop out of school. that is SO MUCH AT ONCE. also i was holding out hope that legosi would have his new years call with haru after the fight instead but that didnt happen!! so it just got cut!!! kinda mad about that tbh. legosi and haru having a lil scene at the very end made up for it a lil bit but that's still one of haru's few moments in this arc that's just not included.

we didnt even get the part wher legosi learns he can't marry haru bc of his conviction.

ive been really hoping for a season 3 announcement once this season ended. with all the background allusions to yahya, the added plot point of someone stealing elephant tusks, and sebun and melon's lil cameos in this season, it seemed to me that studio orange was kinda teasing a 3rd season. but now, with the dismissive way the anime ended, and paru's note from earlier today, im less sure about the possibility of a 3rd season. i'd still like to see the rest of the series animated, but i guess we'll just have to wait and see if more anime is announced in the future.

if we do get another season in the future i just hope that we swing back around and actually address the things that got completely glossed over in the last couple minutes of this episode instead of charging forward w/o touching them again.

i really think the finale for this arc should've been two episodes at least. not including the tunnel scene. i think then things wouldn't have felt so rushed. people have been saying this season really would have benefitted from at least 1 extra episode and i cant help but agree. some have even suggested a whole 24 episodes just for this arc, but i think that this arc couldve been done properly with 12 or 13 episodes if there was some better prioritizing on what to include and what to cut.

like i dont mind not getting the parts about legosi's family if they can be addressed somehow in a future season (or if theres no more future anime seasons thats a plot thread that doesnt have to be worried about). i could have lived w/o seeing sheila & peach's chapter animated if it meant more time for the focus of this arc. and was the kangaroo red herring really necessary?

adaptation wise, i dont think this season was as good as the first. i still think it did fairly well, but i know that it could have been much better. ive been excited to watch this season with my friends once the dub releases, but now im wondering if i should just tell them to read the manga instead. sighs idk. perhaps it comes thru better as a bingewatch, or perhaps im being a bit too harsh. idk. at some point ill do a rewatch and see how i feel about the season as a whole, but that wont be for a while.

if you've read this far, thanks for reading my ramblings!! it's been fun to make these posts every week and im gonna miss getting new episodes every week.

[reallyhardy]

regent’s open air theatre LSOH (2018) breakdown

act one. herein, two years later, i try to remember as much as i can about this production with the help of gifs i took from the trailer and shutterstock images. let’s go!

THE BEGINNING. i went to see a matinee so it was daytime, but the stage set was all black-and-white very newspaper aesthetic. my sister and i were very close to the front, five rows back:

and here we are, excited for everything to begin. (note my giant tooth earrings. was really hoping they’d catch matt willis’ eye.) soon enough crystal, ronette and chiffon took the stage for the prologue, belted their faces off and got me hype from the first moment. their costumes were kind of punky, street style (my favourite look was on the girl with the green jacket and shiny leggings:)

skid row was great. the grey set really highlighted the colourful costumes, and for this first number the set stayed black-and-white so the only colour were the main characters and urchins, and the ensemble wore black-and-white costumes.

and i remember being so thrilled by the costumes - in this photo seymour is wearing yellow socks but by the time i went to see it they were pink (to match audrey’s hair!) and audrey is wearing fluffy slide slippers in the promo photos but when i saw it she wore a pair of blue open-toe kitten heels.

once the song ended we got to see some character personality: marc antolin as seymour was adorable. he was (for most of the first act at least) very goofy and beamed a lot, he had a very cute smile. his voice was quite high and nasal and silly and i honestly had a really big crush on him. jemima rooper as audrey was equally sweet and adorable - she had a cotton candy pink wig and started off in kind of a sexy-ish outfit, with a sheer off-shoulder top over a bra. her eye makeup was light blue (and the bruise bright purple) and she was really short compared to seymour. mushnik was super tiny and greasy looking.

every interaction seymour and audrey had was just! so cute. at the start where audrey and mushnik discuss orin (the ‘you don’t meet nice boys on skid row’ conversation,) seymour is stood behind them kind of goofing around and he flips his shirt collar up pretending to be orin and acting macho but at the end of the scene audrey goes quiet and carefully fixed his collar back down before she left and it was!!! emotions.

da doo i can’t remember anything about how things looked :( during grow for me it really highlighted how…cute seymour was. he beamed the whole time, and the plant puppet in its baby form was fantastic, (the pod head at the top opened up and had little human teeth lmao) and they used like… household objects painted green for plants. the roses were red toilet brushes:

with red ink on them so when seymour touched the bristles there was visible blood on his finger which was fun. lots of attention to detail in this production.

seymour on the radio i think happened off-stage? so we just hear him being interviewed while we watch mushnik and the urchins listen to the radio together. the choreography during you never know was really fun too, with seymour and the urchins dancing together, seymour did a lot of hip wiggles and kept trying to stop audrey ii from trying to bite at the urchins as he danced. one of the green ping-pong balls fell off the puppet but nobody slipped on it so it was fine. also GOD the voices of the urchins were just so good in this one.

somewhere that’s green is a song that makes me cry most of the times i listen to it or watch any versions of LSOH, but this is the first time i’d seen a version where audrey was also crying. during this number the actress climbed up onto the top of the mushnik’s store prop and she still had the bright purple black-eye makeup on as well as the cast on her arm so she looked so beat down and sad and it was just toward the end of the song at ‘i’m his december bride’ where her singing started to break down and she started crying, and covered her face by the time she got to ‘far from skid row’ with her voice breaking oh my god the tears were flowing VERY much from my eyes.

and as a note the actress did not have this beautiful wig on when i saw it, she wore one with much less volume - it could have been the same wig just styled differently, (tucked under/trimmed to be just sort of...round?) but it was just... so much less cute lmao, you can just about see it here in this cast mirror selfie:

anyway. then it was time for closed for renovation! this one was fun, audrey and seymour i think were just...arranging plants and other things? the ‘mushniks’ shop prop might have expanded a bit? they turned it around?

there were some cute little dancey bits with the three of them together:

then audrey & seymour talk a bit. audrey gives seymour the kind of advice that she also needs to be taking herself -- seymour asks audrey if she’d go shopping with him, and then orin arrives on the scene.

dentist was amazing. i’ve seen a lot of bootlegs of kind of lackluster orin scrivellos but… well, me and my sister decided we were absolutely going to see this production when we found out matt willis was playing the dentist. (we were big busted fans lol) he wore this insane painted leather jacket with this tooth-themed biker gang design (he and his backup dancers all had hell’s teeth on the backs of their jackets) and his dentist coat underneath had the sleeves ripped off to show his tattoos… they gave him white foundation to make him look i guess more ill/joker like? it totally worked. he honestly kinda stole the show and he totally exceeded my expectations (which is saying something because my expectations were that he’d be perfect for the role and that i’d enjoy his performance thoroughly!!!)

then he comes into the shop, comments on the plant, poses around, treats audrey terribly. and not only does he abuse audrey in front of seymour who iirc was watching horrified (as you would) but also poor seymour gets his junk grabbed twice by villains in this production too lmao, orin grabs and squeezes seymour’s junk while he’s yelling at audrey. it’s a theme i guess???

(hell of a promotion image, that one.) then orin and audrey leave and it’s time for mushnik and son. they did a lot of the usual ‘awkward-tango’ choreo and it was just excellent really. there’s nothing i didn’t enjoy about the number, plus mush was quite a short guy but had a real big voice.

you get a good view of all the fun things they used to represent plants here too: cleaning brushes, feather dusters, hairbrushes, a small fishing net, a bubble wand...

so feed me was great because it starts off of course with the plant puppet prop:

but then by the second verse (when it comes to ‘does this look inanimate to you’) they opened up the puppet’s leaves like a mouth and audrey ii in drag queen form emerged (to thunderous applause). [i found a short clip someone got on instagram a while back, you can watch it here!] she was holding a microphone in her hands so when it came to seymour’s responses she held out the mic to his mouth and it was :’) really funny. and seymour gets his junk grabbed again:

because he can’t catch a break. staging wise i think i remember this was very bisexual - it’s important to note that the first wig audrey ii wears strongly resembles the wig that OG audrey wears - and at times during this number audrey ii acts quite flirtatious with seymour and he seems receptive to it and has to visibly shake himself out of it.

audrey comes back for her sweater (iirc it was a VERY jazzy 1990s looking one in aqua green and pink) and seymour and audrey ii make up their minds about what to do with orin.

so seymour heads out - the dentists chair was just a beat-up shopping trolley with various things stuck on (see there’s what looks like a plunger, wrist restraints too lmao) and orin had a bunch of bloodied weapons such as a power drill instead of a dentist drill:

anyway i usually don’t enjoy now(it’s just the gas) as a number when i’ve seen it in bootlegs but again matt willis had tremendous feral energy and he pulled it off. plus the gear was quite retro-futuristic very cool looking:

it was also especially funny just after ‘now’ because after seymour runs off with orin’s body in the trolley he comes back in with it all chopped up and he was pushing dismembered limbs (the arm was even painted with matt willis’ tattoos and nail polish which was a GREAT detail) into the windows of the prop mushnik’s building that audrey ii was inside of, and he even threw up into the audience which was :’) gross but funny. it was yellow. i didn’t see if it splashed anyone.

then... intermission. will continue this in [part 2, which is here!]

[nikkoliferous]

Phase One: Thor

Since I was looking up my past live-blog of the novel and realising how annoying and repetitive reading through it all is because of my having structured it as a bunch of reblogs, I’ve decided to organize it all into one long-ass post instead. In case anyone else wants to read it in the future. Or in case I decide to re-read it. Because I’m hilarious. 😅

SO WITHOUT FURTHER ADO

My Hilarious Yet Wrathful Overview Of Phase One: Thor, Redux

—

If your son who’s to become king requires a babysitter to not screw it all up and also the idea of him being king is stressful enough to put you into a coma, maybe, uh… reconsider doing that? Just a thought.

But you see here why Odin was so deadset on Thor becoming king, despite him being ill-suited for the role. It’s not about what’s best for Asgard; it’s about personal legacy. Thor is Odin’s mini me, and Loki is very much not. There are places within the text where Odin laments Thor “lacking his father’s wisdom” (he’s definitely inherited your humility, though, Odin!), but he hopes for Thor to grow into a “wise king” like himself. Whereas he holds no such illusions (lol, pun) that Loki will ever take after him.

now with tag commentary! #this scene is in the script and both novelizations #(though in reading this novel seems to just be a more complete version of the junior novel? #idk i'm confused because they're supposedly written by different authors but so far the text is identical) #and it drives me insane each time i read it

“Haha, I’m a warmongering piece of shit, isn’t it funny?”

I know, I know. I try to cut Asgard some slack for being such a militaristic culture because social changes happen slowly and when you live for thousands of years per generation, it makes sense that your views on things like war would be regressive. The text says Odin has ruled Asgard for tens of thousands of years (so much for taking Loki’s “give or take 5,000 years” line literally; sure, the Odinsleep would have extended Odin’s lifespan, but by that much? Idk).

Still, fuck Odin. Especially since he’ll eventually try to shame Loki for doing the same thing he’s fucking boasting about here. And on a much smaller scale too.

…is it, though?

I actually think Loki’s relationship with being the centre of attention is really interesting in its complexity and we don’t discuss it enough. I’ve said this before, but he strikes me as the sort of person who craves attention but also wouldn’t really know what to do with it if he had it. He craves it as a result of neglect, because he’s never been shown recognition or validation. This is why he seems to revel in it in Stuttgart, even in (or maybe especially in?) his brainwashed state. But he also frequently comes across as pretty introverted and has horrible self-esteem, so I think on another level, sustained, genuine attention would make him feel kind of uncomfortable. Loki seems to believe that in order to be loved or respected, he has to literally be Thor, though. And Thor has always been the centre of attention, so for Loki, attention is synonymous with respect.

I find Loki’s relationship with wanting attention especially fascinating because I too both crave and fear it. As a borderline, I need it. When no one is paying attention to me, I lose my sense of identity. I feel as though I literally cease to exist. It’s excruciatingly painful. And yet, I have no authentic sense of self; I’m just a chameleon, and the closer people get to me, the more likely it is they’ll see behind my mask. They’ll realise it’s all a show and that I’m actually no one. And then they’ll leave. I can’t help wondering if that’s how Loki feels sometimes too.

Wait, what? You mean goat. His horns are shaped like a goat’s. This is a ram: 

This is a goat:

This is Loki:

Do you see now? They’re like a goat. Not a ram. Not a cow. A GOAT.

This book was written before Ragnarok was a thing, so it may be unfair to connect the two, but it still seems worth noting that it was Thor who reduced Loki to being no more than a trickster to begin with. “You could be more,” my ass. Loki’s problem has never been that he was one-dimensional; it was always that the people in his life, including Thor, refused to see any other dimensions to him. Which makes those words particularly cruel—as if they aren’t cruel enough already, what with the physical torture and all. 

Always happy to have cause to point out that

Loki was on Thor clean-up duty their whole lives; he certainly was not trying to kill Thor.

People like to point to Loki’s attempted genocide of the Jötnar and attempted(-ish? lol) conquest of Earth as proof that he’s some kind of violent maniac. But in a little place I like to call reality, Loki was historically far less aggressive and bloodthirsty than his peers.

Question: why is one conqueror evil and the other is righteously entitled to ruling over the Nine Realms?

Asgardian exceptionalism FTW

I can’t even begin to imagine what would lead you to expect such a thing, Odin. 😂

Uh, ‘cause it is?? And also their planet is MELTING without it??

This is all only within the first two chapters, btw. Lmao

—

—

—

“Looking for answers,” my foot.

YOU WOULD THINK SO, WOULDN’T YOU??

#i mean unless you knew heimdall #he only commits treason on days that end in y

—

—

What’d I say? Thor clean-up dutyyyyy 

Just wanna remind everyone that this 

is why he’s smiling during this scene 

because it makes me laugh every time. 😂 

—

My heart breaks every time I remember that second excerpt because literally ALL OF IT happened to him when he survived falling through the wormhole. My poor boy. 😭

But also of note… Loki gets cold (and also does not like being cold). This interests me because 1) as many are aware, the prevalent headcanon that Loki has a low body temperature irritates me and 2) it possibly(?) lends weight to the theory that he may not be fully Jötun, whether by virtue of his birth or Odin’s spell.

Haha, look at this Feminist Icon™ trying to take credit for his female friend’s accomplishments! Truly inspiring. 

#for some reason the ragnarok lovers have somehow decided that thor is both a feminist and lesbian icon #whatever that means 🤷‍♀️ #and i'm still trying very hard to figure out why #is it literally just because he *says* he respects women or whatever in that dumb rambly conversation with valkyrie?

Ooh… you were so close to getting the point, Volstagg. So close. Take your tongue off Odin’s boot for just a couple minutes longer.

Also, the author just forgot the name of the Casket. How did this book get published? 😂

JUST LOOKING FOR ANSWERS, HUH?

Because fuck Loki, amirite? He, uh… he’s a prince too, you know.

Also… Fandral, you dweeb 😂

…am I reading too much into this, or did Odin just literally forget that Loki exists?

On the other hand, the author also seemed to forget Loki existed for most of this chapter, so who knows. 🤷‍♀️

lmao @ Jane immediately trying to convince herself she’s too rational to be attracted to a stranger 

Honestly, though, big mood. 

Just your periodic reminder that Thor’s sycophantic friends KNEW Loki was right and decided to throw him under the bus anyway. 

Just as I’ve always said: That was it. That was their ENTIRE rationale. That Loki *could* have done it, therefore he must have. Please tell me these people have nothing to do with Asgard’s justice system.

…lol, jk, Asgard has no justice system.

Ok, first of all, no.

Second: thank you, Fandral. You’re a self-absorbed cad, but also evidently Thor’s least stupid friend.

Thirdly, how…? First, it was, “Loki arranged all this because he’s jealous of Thor.” Now they’ve suddenly jumped all the way to, “All of Asgard is in danger.” What exactly does Sif think Loki is planning? He’s gonna, what… assassinate Odin and then sell Asgard to the Jötnar?

—

Please stop hurting me.

Just so there’s no confusion: this one sentence explains everything Loki did for the rest of the movie. It explains how a person who has been historically non-aggressive suddenly transforms into a warmonger. To prove himself a real Asgardian, like his brother and father and grandfather. 

—

…why did Odin fall into the Odinsleep in two completely different scenes in this book? I’m super confused.

Also, we really need to talk about how cruel it is of Marvel to keep forcing Loki to prove his loyalty again and again and again when he’s been doing so almost literally since we met him. And by “we need to talk about it”, I mean I need to tie Kevin Feige and co. to a chair and spend a minimum of five hours lecturing them on how poorly they understand their own fucking character.

Let’s just be clear here: they’re talking about Loki. They’re saying Loki, their LEGITIMATE king, is an enemy of Asgard, based on evidence so paper-thin it’s practically invisible. Just… please, let that sink in. Take a moment to appreciate how utterly fucked up that is. 

I’m sorry (not really), but Thor was so much funnier before Ragnarok.

This scene has always kind of bugged me. If Odin removed Thor’s powers, how come he can still control the weather? Confusing.

So what exactly was Thor’s plan anyway, before he realised he couldn’t lift Mjölnir? He was just gonna call on Heimdall to help him commit treason AGAIN, show up on Asgard against the expressed command of his king, and… Odin would just shrug and be like, “You got me, son! I guess I can’t keep you down. Welcome home!”?

…I mean, I guess that more or less is what happened in the end, but it’s hard to imagine it would have still gone down that way without all the stuff that happened with Loki. Idk.  

#look what i'm saying is... thor is not exactly a thinking person #no one on asgard is a thinking person #except loki but he's crazy now so he's also thinking somewhat poorly lol

Cool, Thor. Now imagine feeling that way for ONE THOUSAND YEARS and develop a little fucking empathy for your brother.

But you won’t.

You’ll brush off his feelings of worthlessness as “imagined slights”. 😒

Nice that somebody knows how the royal line of succession works, I guess… 

That sound you hear? Yeah, that’s just my heart breaking. NBD. 

First, they mislabelled it the Casket of Eternal Winters. Now it’s the Cask of Ancient Winters. Author must have been thirsty when they wrote this. Lol 

Look, not to nitpick, but this is not the recommended procedure when you see a storm that you don’t believe is of supernatural origin coming. I’m just saying. Lol 

Uh… ‘cause he is?? And your pals are committing treason AGAIN, Thor, so it technically is responding to a threat to Asgard. Just FYI.

Anyways, this is an important point that doesn’t get made often enough. People want to act like Loki illegally usurped the throne somehow, but even without the deleted scene that explicitly shows Frigga passing rulership to him (a scene which is, for some reason, entirely skipped over in this book, but whatever), understand this: Loki could not have controlled the Destroyer unless he was legitimately King of Asgard. The fact that he’s able to do so is irrefutable proof that his rulership is valid.

lmao you little shit

So… here’s my issue with this scene (and with Thor as a character): He always assumes that Loki’s acting out specifically to hurt him. That Loki’s entire life and thought process revolves around Thor. He does it in this scene, he does it in The Avengers… it’s just a chronic thing with Thor. Everything is viewed through the lens of Loki inexplicably hating him.

But that’s… just not accurate. Yes, Loki harbours a lot of jealousy towards Thor. But that’s not what’s happening in this scene. Loki is not trying to kill Thor here because he wants him dead; he’s doing it because Thor (and his friends) are getting in the way of Loki completing his ultimate goal. Loki tried to solve this problem non-violently, by lying about Odin being dead. It’s Thor’s friends who all but forced his hand by going behind his back and trying to bring Thor back to Asgard against Loki’s (and Odin’s!) direct orders.

For all the humility he’s learned in the past few days, this entire speech is still really all about Thor. About assuming that Loki’s doing this for personal reasons, because he holds a grudge against Thor for some unknown reason. This is implicit in his request to “take [my life] and end this.” It never even occurs to him that his friends are traitors to the Crown and Loki, as King of Asgard, is perhaps justified in pursuing them.

It also needs to be acknowledged that Thor’s apology here is hollow, even if it’s ultimately coming from his heart, because he has no idea what he’s apologising for. “Whatever I have done to wrong you” is not an apology. An apology addresses specific hurtful actions taken and commits to not repeating those mistakes in the future. Thor cannot commit to not repeating the hurtful things he’s done, because he doesn’t know what he’s done. Despite his best intentions, what Thor is doing here is actually kind of manipulative. He’s not addressing any substantive issue between the two of them; he’s just trying to talk Loki down. And it ultimately fails not because Loki doesn’t care or because he wants Thor dead, but because it doesn’t actually change anything.

Finally and only semi-relatedly, we should maybe at some point talk about the fact that Loki, who is stated to be a master tactician, has displayed a weird pattern of hardly ever being as lethal as he could be. He freezes Heimdall in place instead of killing him outright; he backhands Thor with the Destroyer instead of incinerating him; he, well… *gestures vaguely at almost the entirety of the first Avengers movie* Anytime the violence is even a little bit personal, he seems to hedge. Odd behaviour for somebody who’s supposedly super evil.

I’m sorry, I know I’ve pointed it out at least a hundred times before, but I just can’t encounter this scene in any form without taking a moment to appreciate how underrated and hilarious it is.

I also genuinely wonder how many Ragnarok stans who have accused me of having no sense of humour, have failed to laugh at moments like this one. Kinda feel like if you need to have the comedy spoonfed to you in the form of ass jokes, maybe you’re the one whose sense of humour is lacking. 🤷‍♀️

Let’s be super clear: this is not what happened. Loki did not betray Odin; he was betrayed by Odin. He did not open Asgard to its enemies; he attempted, misguidedly, to destroy Asgard’s enemies. And he most certainly did not commit suicide out of a sense of guilt.

I’m not saying Loki did nothing wrong, nor am I saying he feels no regret for the lives he has taken. What I’m saying is there’s no indication that he believes he betrayed Odin or Asgard in the process. Which makes perfect sense, because he didn’t. Everything he tried to do was for Odin and Asgard. It was misguided and horrible, yes, but it can hardly be classified as a betrayal.

The insurmountable burden on Loki is not that he did terrible things, but that no matter what he does or how hard he tries, Odin will never look at him with anything but contempt. Consider once more these passages from the very beginning of the book, at Thor’s coronation:

—

Consider that this book goes to great pains to point out that Odin favours Thor because Thor is a warrior like him. And yet even when Loki embraces that, even when he acts more war-like than ever before, Odin rejects him— just as he always has.

There is a reason why this moment is the last time Loki will ever call Odin his father. Because he realises once and for all that, no, nothing he tries will ever be good enough; no, Odin won’t ever look at him with pride. That is Loki’s burden. That is why he lets go.

The epilogue is really just two pages of making me want to vomit. 

There’s your party where Thor and a certain subset of the fandom insist that Loki was mourned. There’s barely an indication here that anyone even perceives his demise as a negative thing.

“[Sif] could see Frigga thought [Loki was dead] as well” also contradicts the tie-in comic for TDW, so I don’t know what the author is on about there. Unlike the majority of Marvel comics, the tie-in comics are canon to the MCU, so it’s a bizarre statement to make.

COULD YOU SMEAR THE DEAD* ABUSE VICTIM A LITTLE HARDER, PLEASE? Fucking hell.

No matter how many times I encounter this scene, in whatever format, I still fail to become desensitized to how disgusting it is. I realise there’s a good chance that whatever version of events Thor has been told was twisted at best; but how you can look at a man whose son has just committed suicide under any circumstances and say there will never be a better father than that guy, is utterly beyond my capacity to understand.

And Odin’s “you’ve already made me proud” line just feels like extra salt in the wound because, again, Loki let go because he realized Odin would never say those words to him. And yet they come so damn easily when it’s Thor.

Fuck this entire family so much. I think I hate them more than Loki does. Sometimes I wonder what he would think about that. How he would react to knowing that not only is he actually loved, but that he’s so loved that people are genuinely furious at the way he’s been mistreated. That there are people who regularly devolve into full-on rants because they just can’t contain how much anger they have towards the people who hurt him. I think he’d have a hard time wrapping his head around that concept, tbh.

Anyways, to end on a not-completely-depressing note, I’m still waiting for someone at Marvel to explain how Loki knew what Thor said in this scene after plummeting into a wormhole. ‘Cause he references this conversation as Fauxdin at the end of TDW. So like… ?? Did he steal Odin’s memories before he erased them? Because that would be… kind of neat, actually. And very clever. Not entirely ethical, of course, but it’s Odin, so fuck ethics.

WELP, THAT’S IT. Thanks for following along with my dumbassery, hope you enjoyed yourselves. Lol

[lightsandlostbells]

Druck season 2, episode 7 reaction

Goddamn, Druck. I’ve been dragging my ass with the rest of the S2 reactions because honestly, the content is pretty rough and rewatching it requires a certain amount of emotional fortitude, lol. 

Anyway, here’s me putting myself through S2 hell so I can catch up to recap S3 hell!

Episode 7

Clip 1 - Interesting choice of entertainment

As I mentioned in the last reaction, I thought we might start with Mia calling off their relationship, as if last night was her way of saying goodbye to Alex, getting in just a little more time together because she did as Kiki asked. But obviously that wasn’t the case, because Mia and Alex are very much still in bed together.

They are sitting up and watching a movie on a laptop. In the movie, a woman kisses another woman. We cut away to Alex and Mia sitting there stiffly, sneaking glances at each other, as we hear the scene get sexy, with zippers unzipped, lots of panting and wet smacking sounds. Both of them clearly getting turned on by this video. Alex shifts and I think he covers his lap a little more, lol. He shifts closer to her and “subtly” puts his hand out for the taking. I love that Mia notices and smirks a little but doesn’t seem to take his hand. 

This whole part of the scene was so weirdly true to life, lmao, if you’ve ever ended up watching a film that was more explicit than expected with someone. I had a friend who ended up watching Y Tu Mamá También on like a first or second date, neither of them knowing what the movie was about, and it was apparently very awkward.

Finally he turns off the film and kisses her. She leans away eventually and starts asking him about the scene - whether he was turned on by her or the scene. He’s like … both? He asks whether Mia watches porn and she says yes.

There was some debate about like … whether it’s in-character for Mia to watch porn or whether it’s hypocritical of her to do so as a feminist, and I don’t want to even get into the larger debate about whether porn can be feminist because holy shit is that a can of worms, but whether or not you think it’s compatible for Mia to watch porn with her being a feminist, people do a lot of stuff that isn’t 100% in line with their ideals. A lot of feminist criticism also opposes makeup and believes it to be a product of patriarchy, but Mia wears lipstick anyway. So just on the level of whether this is consistent with her as a character, i don’t think it’s wildly OOC.

There was also a lot of (understandable) debate about them watching a lesbian sex scene while still dodging a clear answer about Mia’s sexuality, especially right after Kiki made that comment about Mia being bi in the previous night’s clip, which again went unanswered. By the end of the episode they did give us an answer, but watching in real time made it feel more like they were drawing out the answer. I guess I’m wondering just why they chose to do so? Was it to tease the audience, or were they trying to find a way to drop the answer in naturally (because I can think of places where they could have done so earlier), or was there intended to be a reason story-wise that Mia’s a little vague? Is it just because it’s related to her romantic history, and it’s difficult for her to mention? Because she could mention her bisexuality without talking about specific relationships, although it’s true people might ask whether she’d ever been with a girl.

I think the most likely reason is perhaps that the Druck team didn’t expect just how much people wanted from them about Mia’s bisexuality, and they wrote in more scenes mentioning it after they saw fan reaction.

About the video they’re watching - it’s called Wach and it’s apparently by Funk (the channel that does Druck). You can watch it on YouTube although it seemed kind of dreary so I confess I didn’t watch much of it, lol. If it’s really good and I’m missing out, let me know! Anyway, the movie’s about two girlfriends but in the scene Mia and Alex are watching, they’re having a threesome with a guy. Not sure if there’s any bigger significance other than the nod to something else from Funk, and nudging at the topic of Mia’s sexuality, or the sex topic between Mia and Alexander.

He suspects she has a bigger reason for asking and draws a question mark on her forehead. This dude needs to take improv classes already, that’s clearly where his heart lies. Also, I think Mia might be asking why he’s turned on to get his opinion about two women together? I mean, I guess that could be the in-universe explanation why the talk about her sexuality is a little vague is that she wants to see how he’ll react first.

They have a pillow fight and she shoves him out of bed, he runs back into the room and tackles her and they roll around. WATCH THE LAPTOP! Eh, I guess Alex can afford another one.

They’re playful and cute. Things get heated and he slips his hand to crotch level, which makes her shake her head and back off. He asks her what’s allowed. LOW BAR, I know, but at least he doesn’t pressure her to go father than she wants. It’s sad and I don’t want to praise him for showing basic human decency, but William’s comments when Noora didn’t want to sleep with him, saying it was a funny joke and such, or that he’d managed to sleep with her soon anyway, always bothered me, so I’m glad this wasn’t recreated in Alexander.

Mia gives him the finger, and then adds another, which is deeply fucking iconic, and we end as he slides his hand down her pants. Well, damn. A big departure from Noora, not so surprising because Mia has a lot of differences from her (such as drinking alcohol when Noora did not). Part of me is proud of Mia for being upfront about what she wants and setting boundaries for what she doesn’t, the other part is like ohhhhh nooooo, girl. You told Kiki you’d break up with him, you don’t want to go any deeper with him! (...pun intended.)

Clip 2 - Bubble bath

Mia and Alex are taking a bubble bath together, lying at opposite sides. That’s quite intimate. They are doing some types of The Sex at this point even if it is not The Whole Shebang so maybe not surprising, but certainly we’re seeing their physical relationship escalate as a faster pace than Noorhelm. They seem comfortable in there together. Alex says they should stay in there as long as they can. Like, days. Well, if you can tolerate pruning, cold water, and marinating in your own filth for that long, go for it.

Mia offhandedly mentions Alex’s grade retention and he looks tired and not ready to talk about it. That water just got a few degrees colder.

He asks why she’s so cautious, if it’s because of Kiki. Mia lies to him that she talked to Kiki and everything’s cool. MIA, NO. Really???? Not a good idea. You’re not only disrespecting Kiki with what you’re doing now, and lying to your friends, but now you’re lying to Alexander, too. I know that she probably just wants to stay in this bath and in this bubble of Alexander’s apartment where everything’s OK and she gets what she wants and no one is mad and her personal life isn’t messy, but this is not the way to go about it. 

OH SHIT he actually asked about negative experiences and whether that’s why she’s bi. Errrr, is he implying that she likes girls because she’s been burned by men? YIKES. Mia tells him that statement alone is reason enough to only date girls from now on. Okay, so is that confirmation of her bisexuality? (I guess if I have to ask, probably not the clearest it could be.) And she says that she could also ask why he only does one-night stands and moves fast. He says it’s complicated. So basically, despite becoming more intimate, literally lying here naked in this tub together, both of them still have some friction, both aren’t completely opening up to each other. 

She chides him for his so-called hard life, with his nice car and apartment, and he reminds her that this is his sister’s flat, and we finally get an answer of sorts that his sister is in Bali. (By now we know the truth, but when this aired I wrote in my notes: “Super dark theory: the sister is dead and he means they scattered her ashes in Bali or something like that.”)

He talks about it’s hard with his parents and then says he wants to get out of the tub as the water is getting cold, which is one hell of a turnaround from wanting to stay in there for days like a minute ago. Mia says things are difficult with her parents, too, and she’s sorry. That makes him lie back down in the tub. Tension averted for now. They fist-bump. I guess their couple thing is hand gestures? Like Jonas has Hanna’s nose, meanwhile Mia and Alex are just flipping each other the bird and knocking knuckles. I can get into that, they certainly have a lot of options.

Clip 3 - Truth or dare

Mia and Alex step outside and turn off airplane mode on their phones. So they’re really hiding from everyone, huh, not even letting text messages come through. This is shady as hell that Mia’s doing this when she told Kiki otherwise. She’s lucky because this is holiday break, but she can’t camp out in Alexander’s apartment away from the rest of the world forever

Mia told the girls she was ill. DUDE. All of them were worried and checking in on her. I wonder how many of them truly believed her and didn’t have any suspicion of what she was really doing? Kiki in particular seemed to wonder how she was doing, and I’m not sure she totally bought Mia’s excuse. But whether she did or not, that must make Mia feel a ton of guilt. (Though she still doesn’t break up with him...)

I love this shot of Mia and Alex looking so small and uncomfortable once they stepped outside, like it’s overwhelming and harsh to leave their bubble.

They go back inside because it’s cold, or because they don’t want to face the outside world, and Mia is pensive. She spins around the thermos like it’s spin the bottle (and lmao when it lands between them, fixes it to point toward Alex) and says truth or dare. I wonder why she chose that moment to get some truth between them? Because she feels guilty about the lies she told her friends? Because she wants to know this thing she’s lying to them about is worth it, and that means she has to open up?

He says truth. She asks, “Why me?” He says it’s because she knows who he is. Which true, if you assume he means all the way from when she told him off about Kiki back in season 1. She’s been pointing out his flaws all along. And I mean, maybe he has a shit opinion of himself, but she wasn’t wrong about him (at least not entirely) and she didn’t fall for an idealized version of him, Alexander the rich bad boy with the cool car who’s the most wanted guy in school. She saw through that and she saw him at much of his worst, and yet somehow she’s here anyway. And I don’t know if this is exactly what he meant, but she also knows him in the sense that they have some things in common, like dealing with difficult parents, being Christmas orphans, etc.

Mia directs the thermos at herself and says truth. Bold move considering she knows what he’s probably going to ask; she’s really just ready to talk to him about it, and this is maybe an easier way to do so, framing it as a game. Alex takes a moment to think about what to ask and then asks why she’s so cautious. She tells the story of when she was 13 and she had a crush on her friend’s older brother, who was 18. He paid her a lot of compliments and she thought he liked her. He pressured her into sleeping with him, she didn’t want to but did it anyway, and then he never texted her again. Some people are school knew about it. She felt bad about herself and couldn’t talk to anyone.

The age of consent in Germany is 14, making what happened to Mia statutory rape. This adds perhaps even more impact to Mia reporting Bjorn later in the season, because it doesn’t sound like the first guy faced any repercussions for what he did; with Bjorn there is hope that justice will be served.

I think this explains a lot about why Mia was cautious about Alexander in particular, because he’s the kind of guy who was feeding girls compliments, sleeping with them, and cutting them off. Didn’t Alexander compliment Kiki’s stomach or something? And then of course Mia had a front-row seat to him ghosting Kiki after sleeping with her, and then seeing it all happen again like a slow-motion car crash. I really, really hope this makes him think about what he was doing with girls before Mia. Remember how he tried to justify himself in episode 2 about what he did to Kiki, not making her promises and saying how he couldn’t have torn down her self-image all by himself? Here he sees the long-lasting effects of that behavior on someone. Just think, there are probably Mias out there who will end up telling their stories to someone else, and the guy they’re talking about will be Alexander.

Alex is about to turn the bottle back to himself, but Mia stops it and says she also had a thing with a girl that ended before she came to Germany. No details on why it ended, if it was something really bad or more of a mundane breakup. Since she’s not going into details, I’m assuming whatever happened wasn’t horrible, but I’d still like to know more details about it.

Could they have handled Mia’s sexuality better? Yes, of course. But at this point I was just glad they addressed it directly. It would be nice if they touched on it in the future: we haven’t yet had the build-up of Matteo living in the flat, or being rescued by Hans, but with both Hans and Mia being members of the LGBT community, it would be really nice if they were able to support Matteo, and then we could hear more about Mia’s sexuality, too, like her past relationship, how she realized she was bi, etc.

He says no pressure, they have all the time in the world. THANK GOD. Low bar, I know, but I also still think there’s value in showing men being respectful and not pressuring women into sex? If you consider that the target audience is teen girls, this is a message that they need to be hearing - that they are allowed to set sexual boundaries and that boys have to respect them. And for teenage boys, while Alex has done a lot of messed-up stuff regarding girls, this part can still be used as a model for respecting boundaries and getting consent.

Clip 4 - I bet Hans and Linn ate the soup later

Mia and Alexander are in Mia’s room, ostensibly trying to study but very clearly hot for each other and making this a kind of foreplay. However, they don’t get very far until Hans comes into the room. He asks whether Alexander made “grumpy cat” angry, lmao. I love that nickname for Mia. He flops on the bed as if checking out the view of Alexander. Hans, what about Michi??

UNFORTUNATELY the doorbell rings and Linn opens Mia’s door, saying there’s a girl with soup. We hear Kiki’s voice. UH OH. Damn, Mia didn’t even really have time to like, try to shove Alexander under the bed or anything, did she? 

Alexander says it’s totally OK with him. Um, I bet it is. Would be a great opportunity to be like, hey Kiki, sorry for dumping you on NYE? Although he doesn’t look totally OK with it, though that might just be because Mia is so visibly worried.

Lol, Hans thinks for a moment, clearly recognizing Mia’s distress, and then strips off his robe and throws it over Alexander, and hey, he was the only one doing anything smart in the moment? Maybe not honest, but smart? OK, not smart, but it was ... something. 

Well, Alexander ain’t up for hiding under a robe, he takes it off as Kiki walks in with a big pot. She eyes Alexander and Mia, saying she made soup. She looks stunned at first, but then gets pissed and says it’s one thing for her to fuck up and apologize, but this is the worst. I have to agree, honestly. Mia put the burden on Kiki to tell her what to do, and then she didn’t even respect Kiki’s wishes. And then she lied to everyone. After that whole performance with cooking Kiki a nice dinner to talk about how sorry she was? This makes it seem like Mia just doesn’t give a shit about Kiki’s feelings, her crying and apologizing was an act to make Mia feel better, not Kiki.

I wonder if Kiki was really thinking Mia broke it off, or if she wasn’t suspicious. Like she was definitely suspicious after Sam put it out there a few episodes ago, and some of her moves were kinda calculated toward figuring out the truth. The soup may have been genuine goodwill, but maybe she also wanted to see if Mia was really sick, or if she was hiding something. Kiki did look very shocked when she saw Alexander, but maybe she was telling herself that no, Mia wouldn’t lie, Mia meant what she said, Mia cares about her. So this moment was confirming her worst fears.

Kiki angrily puts down the bowl of soup and I have to give her some credit for not throwing it or dropping it, which is what I was expecting.

Alexander asked her why she lied, and Mia says she doesn’t know. Errr, not a great answer, Mia. I have an idea why she lied. She wanted the moral high ground of “making things right” but didn’t want to actually give anything up. She wanted to ignore or run from the problems instead of dealing with them.

Mia says she can’t do this to Kiki. Alexander is pissed. Honestly, I can’t blame him for that. He has his flaws, too, for sure, and has been a shit to Kiki, but he also asked Mia if things were OK with her and Kiki, and she said they were, and now he’s finding out they weren’t and she’s using that as a reason to break up. I’d feel pretty betrayed. She also gave them a few days where they were extremely open with each other, took their relationship to the next level physically, got vulnerable with each other, and after that, she’s calling it off. When she knew all along that it was a bad idea - like she could have nipped this in the bud at the benefit concert. Instead it’s like she dawdled and made their relationship more intense and meaningful before ending it for a reason that’s been there the whole time, which is so much worse. (For Alexander, a dude who doesn’t get close to people? Even worse.)

Mia has massively fucked up but from a story perspective, I don’t mind it? I mean … that’s good for the protagonist’s growth. I like how messy Mia has been. I think it takes her off the “perfect girl” pedestal. 

Clip 5 - Panic attack

Mia is lying in bed in the dark at 21:00, so you know, she’s called it an early night. I feel you, girl. She reads her texts from earlier, where she and Alex flirted and discussed him coming over to study. How nice things were just hours earlier. No new messages. 

By the way, I can see the tear streaks on her face when she’s in bed, nice detail.

However, after she puts it down and rolls over, her phone lights up. She checks it and Alex is telling her to come over. Typing in all caps so it seems extra urgent.

As she’s running to Alexander, you hear some heavy breathing and rewatching the scene, it definitely sounds masculine, but when I first watched this clip I was so surprised by this development and why Alexander needed Mia that I wasn’t paying super close attention (also not watching with headphones), and I thought it was Mia’s breathing as she’s worried and running out the door. The reveal that this is Alex’s heavy breathing during a panic attack really stunned me. It adds so much tension to the scene as Mia is running to his place, obviously heavy breathing is something that reminds you of dangerous or tense scenarios.

She runs up the stairs to his place and his door is open, the lights are dim. The way the camera follows her is really disorienting, it’s hurried, it’s shaky. The lights make everything eerier - it’s dark and the sign on the wall makes the room pink, it’s not unnatural. Watching Mia run through his apartment trying to find Alex feels like navigating a maze.

Mia calls out for Alexander and eventually finds him in his underwear in a corner, sobbing and hyperventilating. You can see him clearly in the light but there’s still something unfocused about it. Mia grabs a paper bag from the kitchen and has him breathe into it. He’s crying and saying he wasn’t there. Holy shit, this is a panic attack?

Mia holds him as he cries and gasps for breath. He asks her to stay, she says she’s not going anywhere. She makes a joke about it still being 50 euro with breakfast and he manages to laugh.

This pose at the end is definitely giving off Pietà vibes.

The camera goes from extreme closeups as Alex is gasping to pulling back once he lays in Mia’s arms and calms down a bit, once he’s able to breathe and laugh at her joke. Like we’re getting breathing room. The music also goes from really tense to something more gentle once he relaxes in her arms and she says she’ll stay.

Goddamn. So instead of Mia having panic attacks/trauma, it’s Alex??? It was Noora who was panicking in OG, but we’ve switched the roles, Mia is the one to calm down Alexander. 

Props to Druck for showing a dude having a full-blown attack like this, in a very non-glamorous and vulnerable way. Panic attacks in general can be pretty visceral and they’re not pretty, and I think some media shies away from showing male characters in really fragile states like this. And it’s definitely a reversal of a lot of media gender roles to have Mia the fully clothed one who’s “in control” helping out Alex, the half-naked, sobbing and shaking one. And for this not to be portrayed as something weak, but something healing. Also, big props to the actors. Chris Veres didn’t hold back in this scene.

This clip really got to me, especially as someone who has experienced panic attacks. The earlier scene with Kiki discovering Mia and Alexander together had ratcheted up the drama, but this was one of those clips where I couldn’t really do anything else after I watched it for a little while, it had gotten under my skin that much. It’s hard for me to unpack it. Even rewatching it unnerves me, though Mia’s gentleness and compassion, and the ending where she says she’s not going anywhere, make the experience more uplifting. Bravo, Druck. 

I think it helped that it was so surprising too, like we already got a very important clip earlier in the day, and it was the drama we were all expecting, the next step in the Kiki/Mia/Alex situation, but this definitely was not what I was expecting next, both in that it’s a divergence from the original storyline and that I figured the next clip would build on Mia dealing with estrangement from both Kiki and Alex.

Clip 6 - Giddy up

Mia wakes up in bed with Alex the next morning. I like the contrast here from the last scene, just what a difference the daylight can make, feeling so much less threatening, and I like Mia’s reaction, as if she’s taking in all that happened last night. She looks at a Polaroid picture at the side of the bed, of Alex and his sister. The fact that it’s beside the bed tells you how much Alex probably looks at it and misses his sister.

Alex stir and wakes up. Heh, the crinkles of their pillows and sheets are so damn loud? I kinda love it, though, it reminds me of how good it feels to slowly wake up after a good night’s sleep. He tells Mia that he had a dream where he was feeling bad and cried in front of Mia, weird right? Mia agrees. It’s very quiet and they’re whispering. Comforting, talking about it and acknowledging it without having to go into the ugly details right now. And Mia isn’t grilling him over why he was having a panic attack or anything, just being gentle. She strokes the hair behind his ear and kisses him. They kiss softly and it gets a little more intense until Mia reaches for the jar next to Alexander’s bed and grabs a condom. They smile and Mia sits up on him and takes off her shirt. The music helpfully proclaims, “I’m a cowboy” so I mean, we know what position they used. Not surprising Mia would be on top.

I have zero problems with Mia and Alexander having sex sooner than the season finale, as with Noorhelm, although I was kinda like … is this reeeeally the best time to take this step, kids? Not because of Alexander’s panic attack, but more about Kiki walking in on them and finding out, and Mia thinking she can’t do that to Kiki, and what the hell they were going to do. It felt like they had a lot to talk about. But even so, I can definitely see why Mia felt it was the right time to take this step. There was no way Mia was leaving Alexander after last night, and clearly they care about each other a ton. It must have felt not just like waking up in the morning, but that they survived the night. The panic attack made Mia realize the total depth of her feelings, I think, and so I can fully see why it led to increased tenderness and intimacy.

Comparing Mia and Noora, Mia has trust issues and a bad experience with sex like Noora, but William did more stuff that would’ve broken Noora’s trust and made her question her feelings for him before they had sex. Noora and William kissed, then William was cold to her in front of his brother, so Noora was upset, then they made up, then William smashed a bottle over a guy’s head, then Noora was upset at that and questioned whether she could be with William, then before they could get back together, Niko happened. Since they’ve kissed, Mia hasn’t really had so many reasons to be upset with Alexander himself - it’s all about the situation with Kiki putting stress on their relationship. So I can see why the sexual element of their relationship, and the relationship as a whole, escalated much faster; Mia had more time to build up trust with him without that getting interrupted.

Clip 7 - Crew love is true love

Hanna and Mia are in the bathroom and Mia’s been telling Hanna how fast everything has gone in the last few days. It sure did! By the way, Hanna’s looking very pretty.

I like how they went from the cowboy song in the previous clip being a non-diegetic song and transitioned into this one as a diegetic song, with it playing at the Abi party now. That kind of stuff is clever, and it’s smoother than just choppily switching songs between scenes.

Alex is going to therapy now, which I love. I love that we have the Bad Boy Rich Dreamboat character seeking professional help for his trauma, I love that Druck is mentioning therapy rather casually, normalizing it. It’s not something that’s considered shameful or embarrassing, just a potential avenue for help. Mia says she doesn’t think it was his first panic attack, but she doesn’t really know why. (I’d understand if people were ehhhh about Mia telling all this to Hanna if you want, like IDK if Alexander gave her permission to tell people about his panic attack. Mia and Hanna seem to be pretty trustworthy about stuff like Matteo’s sexuality and they’re not trading it as juicy gossip, but I would get it.)

Hanna says Jonas also won’t talk to anyone, not even Matteo. Ohhh no. That boy might need some professional help, too, if he’s that much of a mess.

Hanna’s totally hugging turtleneck guy/not Gereven when they enter the club. Mia looks around and sees Kiki with Carlos. KIKI, TREAT HIM RIGHT. CARLOS, TREAT HER RIGHT. Kiki glares at Mia. 

Carlos gets a drink the same time Mia does and says, “What’s up Judas?” Not gonna lie, that’s mean, but it made me laugh. He does the typical “ugh girl drama BITCH FIGHT” thing, and lmao, I can’t help but think of like Jonas/Toilet Sam tussling in the stairwell in S1. Yes, it’s all girl drama, boy fights just don’t exist, ever!

Carlos is like, it’s none of my business, he doesn’t want to get involved, but he’s getting involved (lmao) and tells her how Kiki was in a very bad state the last few days, and says it would be a good move to smooth everything out. He’s like, good talk, and walks off. Without paying either, lol. Mia pays for him. Well, I guess she has some groveling to do. God, that talk was ridiculous but benevolent of him? He’s looking out for Kiki’s well-being. 

"Two angry birds” aka Sam and Amira (and lmao I love that nickname) come up to Mia. Indeed, they look angry. Mia says she’ll make it up to Kiki. I mean, she should probably apologize to the other girls, too, for lying and putting them all in this awkward position where they’re torn between friends.

Heh, there’s some banter among the girls about Sam being the only one who’s single and when Amira is like helloooo, Sam says she has Allah. Although it’s played more as a joke, this follows the same pattern of people disregarding the Sana character as someone who can have romantic relationships and feelings. She doesn’t count in the conversations about who in their group is alone and who’s not.  

Mia follows Kiki to talk to her. She apologizes and Kiki just looks annoyed. I don’t blame her considering that Mia’s last apology with the dinner turned out to feel hollow, all words but not backed up with actions. Kiki points out she was a hypocrite. I love Mia and I feel sympathy for her, but Kiki is really really not wrong.

Maybe this is obvious, but I’m seriously just realizing how close this situation is to Eva/Jonas/Ingrid in S1 (or Hanna/Jonas/Leonie), even more than Vilde, Noora, and William were to that situation. Mia fucked it up with Kiki to a level Noora didn’t with Vilde. 

Kiki interrupts and tells Mia what’s what - that if she had been honest from the beginning, Kiki wouldn’t have stopped her. But instead, Mia went to her when Kiki was heartbroken and basically made Kiki tell her what to do and give her her blessing. That’s exactly what happened! Mia put the burden on Kiki and basically said her happiness was in Kiki’s hands, like either Kiki had to be the villain and tell Mia to break up with Alex, or put aside her own feelings and be OK with it, even when she was the person who was wronged. Kiki didn’t feel like doing giving her blessing when she felt like shit and had been betrayed by a friend. And she didn’t expect Mia to listen, but Mia should’ve cared about her from the beginning. Kiki calls Mia out on being honest not just with others, but with herself. Kki used to compare herself to Mia, Mia gives all these moral lectures that sound smart and clever, but it’s not about what you say, but what you do. Well, shit. She’s right. And Mia needs to hear this. I’ve said this before, but I think their relationship is really complex this season. Messy, but complex. And this dynamic between them, with Kiki feeling like Mia didn’t really care, or was judging her, goes beyond just Alexander’s involvement. It’s not just fighting because of a boy.

Mia is apologizing and Carlos comes in to ruin the moment and be like “You straightened it out?” Lmao dude, don’t interrupt. He gives them all a shot, which is his attempt to play mediator, I guess, so he’s dumb but he’s trying. Kiki clinks glasses with him, then walks out. When Mia calls after her, Kiki says you still want my blessing? But you need yours. Whoaaaa.

Carlos and Kiki walk off hand in hand talking about her breasts. Well, I guess it’s nice that they’re appreciated without the surgery. Though obviously it’s about how Kiki feels about her body, not Carlos.

Mia stays behind and has a Moment, I guess she’s thinking about how she needs to go all in with Alexander, get rid of her remaining doubts. Then she goes out to meet her girls, they smile and dance. Finally Kiki smiles at Mia and they dance together. I love their little glance of reconciliation. The girl squad has a group hug. Awww! 

Toilet Sam comes in and greets everyone! He’s talking to Hanna and OF FUCKING COURSE that’s when Jonas and Matteo roll in. Jonas sees Hanna and Sam and legit pulls a Granpa Smpson exit, lmao at Matteo’s exasperated exit after him. Poor Matteo.

Mia and Kiki dance together in the closing moments of the clip, and it’s a fitting ending. Yay, they’re happy again! Truly the next three episodes will only be good times and no more suffering!

Social Media/General Comments:

LMAO, I fucking lost it at all the passive-aggressive Instagram stories that Kiki posted after the dinner from last episode. She tagged only Amira, Hanna, and Sam, not Mia, posting pictures that didn’t include Mia, set to Little Mix’s “Shout Out to my Ex” for that extra bitter flair. Which you know, fits Kiki’s relationship with Alexander, but honestly feels more like Mia is her ex going by the pictures, lol. Then Amira, Hanna, and Sam respond by posting Kiki’s posts WITH Mia, like good lord, the dramaaaaa of it all. I mean, they’re all making a statement, that they’re not ditching Mia, but how must that make Kiki feel? But it’s all so teenage and petty and immature that I love it. 

Jonas flakes on Matteo, saying he needs to study, but it’s more like he’s staying home and getting wasted. Matteo is worried and says they barely see each other anymore. Jeez. This is a total reversal of what we’ll likely see in S3, unless they are BOTH total messes in that season. Then it’ll be up to wise men Carlos and Abdi to step up for their bros. We did see Carlos having some sage advice in this episode, so maybe it’s not such a wild idea?

Matteo and Hanna talk later and Matteo lets Hanna know that Jonas isn’t doing well and that he failed a math test. I don’t think it’s Hanna’s duty to fix Jonas’ problems at all, but it’s nice that Matteo and Hanna are talking together and trying to help Jonas.

The other girls were gossiping about Mia and Alex. Amira figured out that Mia probably wasn’t answering because Mia was at Alexander’s place. Sigh, Mia. How long did you think you could keep your relationship a secret? It always gets out, as you just learned last week!!

Kiki posts a LOT of stuff about fake friends on IG after she discovers Mia and Alex together, and it’s pretty juvenile, but you know, hashtag relatable. And understandable. Super teenage.

I like that Amira reached out to Kiki and said she was there if she needed to talk. Kiki has been a shit to Amira on multiple occasions, but Amira remains a true friend. And I hope Kiki keeps this in mind the next time she wants to say something racist or insensitive (not that she would recognize it as such, probably).

Druck gave out hotline information for teenagers after the panic attack clip, encouraging them to talk to someone, which is great. Again, I love how they’re encouraging teenagers not to go through their problems alone, whether it’s through therapy, hotlines, or talking to trusted friends and family.

Amira talked about religious discrimination on Instagram and how difficult it is to get into public service in Germany when you wear a hijab. She’s mentioned this before, when the girls were meeting with career counselors, and I really hope that we somehow get a S4 despite the girls’ graduation so we can get an Amira season. I would love to see her story talk specifically about her ambitions and how she tries to achieve them despite people constantly telling her she won’t be able to make it as a Muslim hijabi. Just send Amira to Australia and she can have a life-changing backpacking adventure. It would be amazing. (Skam never gave us the Evak + boy squad Morocco trip we deserved, so I am down for Druck providing that awesome travelogue content.)

I am not German so please feel free to correct me or clarify me on cultural and language matters.

If you got this far, thank you for reading!

[lokiarsene]

episodes 12 ~ 14 thoughts.

thoughts on episode 12:

-- ren gently and politely offering to hang out with makoto at an arcade or to take her to karaoke to help her find a way to "close the distance" between them is... very... very sweet. i forgot how much they made ren a genuinely kind young man in this. he's got nerves of steel, of course, but i'm really pleased to rediscover his gentleness.

......... akechi's got a good bf~

-- i also really like that ren points out that makoto's the type to really get into games (or media in general), and she thanks him for allowing her the chance to indulge. that's yet another thing i forgot about ren! he's not only keenly perceptive, but he has a strongly developed intuition for someone so young (he's what, 17 at best?). it's a kind of gentle "wise beyond his years" type of thing.

-- kaneshiro's distortion-transformation into his boss form is uhhhhhhhhhhhhhh gross. not bad gross, just--gross and effective.

-- really tired of makoto and ann's bodies (namely, their asses) being disturbingly detailed when the animation crew fuckin' slacks on things that matter. that's bad gross.

-- awww i really like the baton pass sequence in kaneshiro's fight. it's a nice, exciting way to bring the feel of how it is in game to the anime.

-- makoto getting late night peptalk calls from mona and ren is ;-;7 really sweet. their friendship was my absolute favorite in the game, second only to goro and ren's (i’m a sucker for villain/protag dynamics).

-- makoto whispering, with her back turned to sae (and in another room!), all that she really wants to say to sae was like a little knife twistin' in my heart. it adds to what i said earlier, about their relationship being so strained and muted.

thoughts on episode 13:

-- AKECHI'S BACK

-- AKECHI'S ON THE TV AND WALKIN' INTO LEBLANC'S AT THE SAME TIME. boy knows how to make an entrance.

-- hE ASKS REN TO PLAY CHESS WITH HIM are you kidding me

-- FOR FUCK'S SAKE I LOVE THEM

-- oh my god i love this entire bit of them playing chess. this whole segment, everything about it--their conversation, the way they're framed, how the angles change, where it zooms in and where it pulls back. it almost feels like a dance.

-- the piece goro uses to trap ren's king? that’s the tower piece--also called the rook. which is also the name of a corvid bird.

-- mishima can you stop being so weird. is that even a remote possibility?

-- apparently not, because even mona calls him out on it.

-- mona, ann, and makoto all goin' to hang out is ;___; really fucking cute.

-- gotta love how the coffee shop doubles as a 'ren's friends come in and dump all their anxiety and troubles on the table while having a cup of coffee' zone, too. see also: akechi saying leblanc has a nice atmosphere. it's place where you can speak--and thus breathe--easily and clearly.

-- akechi: HEY, HANG OUT WITH ME ren: *goes along without protest*

-- !! akechi offering a plan that'll serve them both (keeping yusuke safe from kawanabe, and akechi getting the proof he needs that kawanabe is doing shady shit), and the two of them working together is reALLY FUCKING COOL, ATLUS.

THEY WORK TOGETHER LONG AFTER LEBLANC IS CLOSED, COMING UP WITH A FLOW CHART AND NOTES ON HOW TO NAB HIM AND EVERYTHING.

TOO BAD IT'S IN A FUCKIN MONTAGE, ATLUS. ;_;

-- yusuke: "someday i'll use my art to paint over the blackness of the world." ren: "i'll look forward to it."

get u a friend like ren who will support you no matter what your dreams are.

-- AND THEN REN INDIRECTLY HELPS AKECHI GET A BREAK IN THE CASE BY FLAT OUT ASKING KAWANABE IF HE KNOWS ABOUT THE SHADY SHIT lmao. turns out it was some rando jobber.

-- interesting that the two major contrasting emotions in this episode are desire and hope. desire, naturally, would be depicted as something dangerous (buddhism and all), but what is hope but the exact same thing? hoping is just a wish, a desire, for something to come true... i guess the argument would be that desire is an impulse acted on, and thus distorted, but hope is a passive feeling?

thoughts on episode 14:

-- AKECHI AGAIN. and oof, his face in the car when he thinks no one is looking... ouch.

-- i really love the development we're getting with makoto in these episodes. her reflecting on how useless an honor student is if all she does is what she's told was really staggering. she doesn't take any pride in the role that is traditionally showed as something to aspire to--and she's right. what's the use of being on the student council and a representative for the other students if you're not able to actually help them or speak up for them?

and her questioning what's the point of going to a top university if she doesn't even know who she wants to be. now that's a problem i think teenagers anywhere in the world can understand. young adults are asked to set up their futures at an age where people barely know themselves. and so many people change their minds about who they be throughout their 20s and 30s...it’s really unfair. hell, i didn’t get my life in order until my late 20s, though that was mostly due to my illness.

these kind of things make makoto one of the most interesting members of the PT to me, far more than some others that i won't name (because i don't want to be a dick). i really, truly wish that p5's story allowed for a more thorough examination and pulling apart of the traditional ideals in contemporary japanese society that are actually harmful for the people who are forced to uphold them.

but i guess if i want that i gotta go play yakuza.

please play yakuza btw.

-- "sticking to your own sense of justice.. will only lead to self-destruction." i know sae's talking about makoto here, but i'mma side-eye akechi with that remark.

-- REN JUST SHUTTING OFF THE PHONE WHEN MISHIMA TEXTS HIM FJSDKALFDSJKL. yes, please. just keep putting that weirdo on read, ren.

-- "the most important part of your life is how you choose to live it." *lies down on the floor* makoto why are you the best character in all things in all ways forever and always the end.

-- REN STEPPING IN BETWEEN TSUKASA AND MAKOTO FJKADSFJSDKL

"YOU'RE FIGHT'S WITH ME."

*BURIES SELF IN DIRT AND LEAVES* WHY IS HE SO GOOD JDKLS

-- "MALE SCUM GET PUNISHED WITH FISTS." FUCK YEAH THEY DO, MAKOTO

[notailtheories]

NotailsAndMore Tweet Compilation 2

Last Compilation | Next Compilation

This section will contain the tweets that I consider make up Act 2. Because they are not actually from O-1, you could also consider them an intermission... But they still hold important information either way. OwO

This batch of tweets began a little over an hour after the last round stopped... Which isn’t a very long pause. You can most easily tell the difference because this person’s face is “TvT” rather than “=)”, if you’re looking to track these from the Twitter itself... OwO

98 |

I passed out and I wake up to me being logged into this creepy ass notail fact account. Fuck off who did this? TvT

Reply to 8, & 99 |

hate to be a stickler for details but you didn't say a fact just a question tho i *would* like to know some notail facts about my dark past :D

Holy fuck. Look if you know me O-2 sir I just want you to know I did not make this account or tweeped at you, I just woke up to this. Who tweeps shit like this at an O-class? TvT

100, reply, & 102, reply, 108, reply, & 112 |

X-7364 if this was you and some of your shitty experiments I WILL strangle all of your dirty rats. These O classes could order my death for no reason. You even used my actual email to do this. They could figure out who I am! TvT

Your buddy even said "fuck you" to me. Now that guy's got some real claws. >:3 

I am so sorry O-6 sir. I had nothing to do with this but I will still apologize. Please forgive me, I'm ok if you don't forgive my friend and kill him though. TvT

Grovelling ain't pretty, you know. But hey, you ain't done anything, right? Maybe I'll let you go. >:3

You would be most kind if you let me go for words that were not my own. Thank you. TvT

I'll think about it. >:3

Thank you. That is all I ask, and all I am allowed to ask. TvT

Reply to 98, 101, reply, 109, reply, 113, reply, 114, reply, & 115, reply, 118, reply, 119, reply, 120, reply, 122, reply, 124, reply, 125, reply, & 126 |

lol u rly had me worried there sweetie :3 im still curious abt this whole thing if u want 2 help me find out abt it :3

I didn't write any of this! This has to be an X class prank. "Ha Ha, make your friend pass out, make an account with their email and possibly kill them by telling O-6 that you love them. So funny!" TvT

lmao u creeped out like every single o class tho i think thats kinda an achievement u should be proud of urself :3 whoever made this account was saying some really spooky stuff tho do u think it was just creepypasta or what :3

Please don't say I did it. I had nothing to do with this. I wouldn't contact the O classes, much less say such things to them, for they are most favorable to my survival. It was just some shitty prank. Some of the reactions are, strange, but that is no matter to me. TvT

watching u suck up 2 them is rly funny lol but kk babe i guess ill drop it :3 smh i thought this was something cool :3

I rather not relate "something cool" with angering the O classes but I understand. TvT

suckuuuuuuuup :3

I rather live a suck up than die for something I didn't do. TvT

how abt i give u smth else 2 suck on hot stuff :3

Look I don't even have a tweeper and I'm about to abandon this account and never touch it again. So my response to that is "um bye." TvT

i hate 2 see u leave but i love 2 watch u go :3

That's extremely holy and not ok. TvT

i hope ur not as disappointing in bed as ur friends failed arg was on tweeper :3

How could a notail raise so high to grace? TvT

u sure raise some things of mine baby :3

I would block you but I'm not going to be related to this account anymore, and if my friend logs back in I'm ok with him getting fucked over by your words. TvT

id prefer 4 u 2 to get fucked by me :3

Courtship between notails is not ok, but I suppose you know that. Just understand that "no." TvT

lol our society sux anyway i dont think its possible to pollute our gene pool more than its already fucked up babe :3

Ok well society gives me a roof over my head, food, and the time I got bit by a mallon I was experimenting on society fixed my arm before it rotted away. So we'll have to agree to disagree. TvT

lmao :3 the more u talk the more stupid and boring u seem :3

Says the notail who keeps going after clearly making me uncomfortable. But "sigh" I guess that's most people. TvT

ppl are funniest when theyre uncomfortable :3

Typical notail. You fit in just nicely. TvT

Original, 103, reply, & 105 |

@NotailsAndMore is it time for my 13 other facts?

Look it up yourself? Go read the Cosmosdex or something. I may be a K class but I'm not some fact machine. TvT

The what

Can you not look up basic and common terms? Geez look. http://cosmosdex.com/cosmosdex/ TvT

104, reply, & 107 |

X-7364 just walked in with coffee and called me a sleepy head. Said I passed out after intensely working on typing. Said I wouldn't respond to me when he had a question. He's lying, he knows he went overboard this time. TvT

You may want to improve your security. This could have ended very badly for you. :V

I will do what you recommended O-7 sir as you are most wise as all O classes are. I do have good security, I must have passed out so fast my computer didn't lock so my roommate and coworker decided to fuck with me. TvT

106, reply, 111, reply, & 117 |

I just checked the profile page to see if I could find some evidence of who did this. "i'm not sorry i told the truth when you didn't. no one deserves lies." The hell. If this is over lying about who ate the last pizza I'm going to be pissed. TvT

This went better for you than it could have mate, but I would recommend keeping closer guard over your belongings. Some of the other O-classes seem a bit agitated right now. uvu

Fully understood O-5, who kicks clockworks across the skies. I'll attempt to not pass out at my computer with my roommate around. TvT

The epithets aren't necessary mate. But maybe give your roommate a kick so they don't pull this again for good measure. uvu

I will make sure to give him a kick no matter how much he says he had nothing to do with this. Thank you for the advice O class. TvT

Original, & 110 |

@NotailsAndMore Once you figure out who did this, send me their ID number. Immediately. unu

I....think it's my roommate X-7364, but he's swearing the whole time this was going on I was working and refused to respond. I don't believe him but he sounds so serious about this. TvT

Reply to other party, & 116 |

Is there any way I can convince it to become a solid Yes? c:<

(Note: I won’t record this whole exchange because I don’t think it’s relevant... The context is O-8 is looking for who made this account. That’s all. OwO)

I know this is rude of me, and feel free to confirm this, but will you spare my roommate? He seems so honest in his pleads that he didn't do it.... He's the only one who could have done it, so it's him, but it seems like he regrets it deeply now. TvT

Original, 121, reply, 123, reply, & 127 |

I really am impressed by how many people they managed to unsettle in, what, an hour? uvu

Honestly as an X class he is naturally unsettling but I've never seen him act this badly. I wonder if I really ticked him off with the pizza thing. TvT

I've dealt with much worse than some X class...if it was just that then whatever...what does your friend know....OwO

I wish he would just admit it already. He said a few really odd things on this account and I have no idea where he's getting it from. Just. Fucking admit it X! Why is he being so rude to O classes you guys could KILL or BANISH us. TvT

It feels like something stranger is going on...OwO

It's just a stupid prank. A stupid prank that's now getting us basically evicted cause we can't stay here anymore. Stupid, stupid, prank. TvT

128, & 129 |

Ok this account is done. My roommate likely made this account as a laugh and somehow got the attention of the O classes. I'm sorry this happened even though I had nothing to do with it. I wish I could say my friend was sorry too but he's pissed off. TvT

Logging out, and never logging back in again. Yet again. Sorry for all the problems this account caused. Just unfollow this account. Bye. TvT

[ THIS ACCOUNT IS DEAD | Shitty prank by shitty roommate/friend who refuses to admit it | Will never be logging in ever again ]

Last Compilation | Next Compilation

[neo-shitty]

toffee!

no dont apologise! i didnt check until just then so np :)

mmm yeah it is a bit trippy. hehe ITS TRUE THO. yeah sadly i think ur right, and tag blocking is probably a good idea. sometimes smut written well or not in excess is okay but goddamn when its abt 01 line and thats the whole fic... *silently blocks tags*

hehe i do that all the time lol this conversation is carrying on threads from a month ago :) mmm yeah ur probably right sadly, same. HA HE DIDNT HAVE A CHOICE and now i have someone to talk to abt them, so thats good! I KNOW felix was actually the one who got me into skz with his iconique gods menu line so i guess i have a soft spot for him. i always tell myself my bias is chan but ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ guess im more whipped than id like to admit. mmm yeah that does make sense dw i hope they do that as well. YES king seungmin hIMSELF. GODDAMNIT DONT GET ME STARTED ON MINHO IN GODS MENU I DIDNT EVEN KNOW HE WAS PART OF THE GROUP UNTIL I STARTED GETTING MORE INTO THEM. BITCH (affectionate) THE LINE DISTRIBUTION HAS BEEN UTTER DOG SHIT but *deep breath* its better now so were moving on adn hoping it stays that way. sis same but i may or may not have gone thru a rlly depressed phase and actively sought out the elimination episodes so i could actually force some tears out of my emotionless shell of a heart but what cna you do? lmaoo i feel that irl, binnie deserves more vocal lines. yesss channies accent is rlly prominent then, i think also the way he structures his phrasing? is more english speaking than korean? but yeah i totally get what ur saying. AJKSAL lmao

okay then! im excited for whenever it gets done! (maybe tag me?) ahh the cold shrivelled heart of a dark au writer beats again at the thought of torturing another poor characters very soul (/j) :(( yeah that would suck not being able to see them. ohhh ur on the other hemisphere to me! were just going into spring rn. mmm smth to look forward to! YES you put it into words. they rlly are pretty independent from the company (remember how jyp rejected that other dudes songs after like 3 seconds and then how he was apparently nervous to show the song hed written to chan cos chan was so good at writing hits ahhh sweet revenge) mmmYES we rlly need a mute and remove notifications button for our brains dont we?

YES CORRECT i totally agree. some people jsut dont give it a try, adn assume its bad cos its korean smh racist assholes. yes! im coming up to my 6 month anniv actually! sis sAME, i feel like theyre being tugged into appealing to the western american market and theyre not staying as true to their artistic flair as a group, especially with only writing english songs atm. *sigh* ah well, at least theyre bringing recognition to the kpop world. AHUH dead on, theyre going to be discarded pretty soon and then where will bp be? theyll prob go solo paths which is rlly sad but what can you do when the company is run by a prideful asshole? yg is not going to last much longer in the big four if they keep this up.

hehe you get it. oooh very cool! whos ur ult? (sorry if youve said this before) mmmm yeah good decision, i feel liek thats probably a wise decision. this is my first album release as a kpop stan (not counting mixtape oh) so i think ill get it for sentiments sake. yeah! im excited for the new music! mingi was the one who got me into them, but atm my bias is seonghwa followed by san, wooyoung and ateez but jonghos high notes man *swoon* he, yeah atm ive got jake, jay, nikki, jungwon and sunoo down so just trying to get the rest :) heh, yeah kard i rlly only got into cos of bm, ive seen him like interacting with a lot of idols and he seemed nice so i decided to check out the group. ikr gunshot man *another swoon*

no noe! i didnt know what it was until i got it lol. thx toffee ill try and take that to mind :) yeah lol im on a waiting list thats not going to be free until late september so hopefully i can hold on until then. hope ur okay, that sounds like it sucks, hope you can find someone. maybe ill just take you along on my phone and the therapist can get a two for one patient deal lmaooo. mmm, sorry no i havent mentioned it before, i dont rlly talk abt it much. uhhh basically hypermobility? if you google it, it doesnt seem bad, jsut joint flexibility but ive got the severe end of the stick, leaning towards ehlers danlos syndrome so thats fun. basically it just makes it hard for me to exercise, run, jump, stand or just walk for long periods of time and gives me a lot of joint and muscle pain so... thats fun! but obviously so many other people have it worse than me, so i try not to complain. normally in young people it will improve as they get older, but my doctor said bc its severe in me, its unlikely to get much better. but again, i dont have the worst lot in the bunch, so its all g.

oh its good that its not the bad type of rain, a light sprinkling can be relaxing sometimes. aww thx darl, the concern is appreciated but it went pretty well and i managed not to cough too much on stage or kill myself trying to run around to the other side of the stage in the pouring rain so thats good! oooh tea buddies! my dogs a labradoodle, but shes a bit more of a feral poodle lol not much labrador in her at all, unless its her relentless urge to hunt down every bird that has ever walked this earth smh :((( hopefully they can come back on soon, does uni have dances?

ahhh a mood if i ever heard one. hopefully things will get better for you soon, ik anxiety sucks ass. ooh thats always good! when its sunny here, its always melt ur thongs to the pavement hot so the nicely cool sunny days are a lovely change. hehe impatience is not so good for you, but good for us that get to see ur beautiful theme early. ahh no worries, itll come eventually hopefully. and if not, then just things that make you not anxious are good. it doesnt have to be black or white, sometimes gray is good. mmmmm sames i have midterms this week to catch up on and then two weeks of end of terms so thats fun! i hope u can overcome that a little, heres some channie to be ur motivation https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a8LWyNjzOww. hah! i hear that all the time, he seems to be everywhere. did you see that tiktok of hans slowed back door rap, i stg it sounded EXACTLY like namjoon, it kinda scared me. also teh beginning of another day, sounds so much like joon i swear.

that reminds me! idk ur biases! i feel like this should be smth i should know so please! feel free to elaborate!

ahh im glad, i was worried it is. mmm same, so no hard feelings if either of us misses a day or smth. ill start worrying if weeks/months have gone by, but if its just a little while thats more than fine. ill just picture you studiously completing notes and i wont worry lol

<3 w.a. 🐺

at some point i really think i'm going to start blocking accounts because blocking tags won't be enough. i saw ask tags the other day and it just made me want to bleach my eyeballs.

i could talk about god's menu felix for hours man. the teaser for god's menu that featured his part on the bridge made me look forward to the mv release. you: biases chan, also you: lixiesbabyhands. yes you are more whipped than you think. i can't believe orange haired minho was given NOTHING during that era but they kind of made up for it in the b-sides. i also hope it stays that way. the distribution for this era was pretty fair.

"torturing another poor character's soul" in all honesty, i used to live for this. 2017 me leading up to early 2020 wrote nothing but angst. i have another aussie friend on twt and tbh i'm still really (O.o) about the seasons! jyp should be terrified skz could easily take over that company. heck if skz grow old and start their own company, they'd probably do a great job at running it. PLEASE. i have issues on muting/notifications both mentally and in real life. sometimes, i just wish to disappear.

some people in my country are just disgusting tbh. not only racist but homophobic too. they label kpop as 'gay' and it DISGUSTS me. it's a problematic behavior/mindset people in my country need to fucking get rid of. anyway, HELP ME 6 MONTHS??? and i've been in this shit for like a decade eye. tbh, i’m not fond of kpop groups trying to appeal to the western audience :// it feels like they’re losing their identity in a way. yes recognition but at what cost? yg has my favorite groups but that’s one shitty company when it comes to promoting.

okay my ult! it’s haechan from nct but i consider chan an ult too. like a close second above my whopping list of kpop boys. oh yes! you should get the album just for like a keepsake? remembrance? how did mingi appeal to you? omg did you start getting interested in ateez back when he was still on hiatus? NOT YOU BIASING THE SAME PEOPLE I DID WHEN I FIRST STARTED STANNING. the infamous ateez thot-line. jongho is easily one of the best fourth gen vocalists out here, no one can change my mind :( good luck with memorizing the rest of enhypen! just in time for the comeback too. i hope i’ll get into kard soon but i’m pretty content (and a tad bit overwhelmed) with the amount of groups i stan right now.

please hold on though, feel free to vent here if you like. thanks for the offer tho HAHA but like i’ll try to get checked here too when the cases die down a bit. i’m sorry to hear about your condition though :( please don’t ever overwork yourself to the point that your joints/muscles would ache. it’s completely valid to complain about it tho. i get that you have others in mind but keeping that mindset really doesn’t do you (like you internally) any better? so if you need to, vent your frustrations out and don’t keep it in.

oh my god, about your performance last sunday. was the stage out in the open? glad you didn’t cough too much and did well on your concert. i’m proud of you! i can never understand dogs and poor birds T_T uni doesn’t have dances unfortunately. i think there’s just one party at the end like a graduation ball. what year are you in anyway? if it’s something that you’re fine with sharing. if not, it’s cool.

good luck with your exams! and thanks for the link! AHA what a cutie. i think he does this motivation thing once in a while during his lives and it’s just comforting. yeah joon and han my irl just freaked when we made that discovery. ult crumbs for her. oh god not me forgetting about every biases when you asked. you can ask for my biases in a few groups just list down the one’s you’re interested in knowing. 

i missed yesterday because i was grinding and finishing what if we stay + school work. finally did it today. i’m sure i’ll reply in like a day or two, definitely not a month unless i state otherwise. if i ever decide to abandon this blog, i’ll let you know.

[get-the-treasure]

school log #1

9-5-17

Happy last ‘first day of high school’ I’m finally a senior let’s fuck shit up.

Assembly: i came in and first went to hug taylor cause jahsbfjfaks i havent seen her all summer nd did i tear up? yeah kind of lmao i missed taylor sm what a gem. then i went by like. the squad (for memory reasons: ???? ppl on the side, jade, bean, yadi, eren, rye showed up, dalon showed up, sammy showed up, ashley showed up, might be missing someone?). eren gave me a bitching smoothie (bless ty) nd i think we all just talked like we normally would. its nice to just slip into normal conversation with people wou havent seen in what feels like forever.

Hour 3 (Homegroup): sat in hg for like 2 hours. we got some new freshman of whom i only can name 3 because i missed the others names. nd i also only kno one of the sophomores by name cause i forgot the others. maybe we should talk w maya sometime? ive seen her around a few times and she looks like shes mostly alone? we got our lockers too. sike some middle schoolers took our lockers and now we have to wait until tomorrow to figure out if we can get them b a c k. then i knocked over the smoothie eren gave me nd like a little came out but not much so um thanks god. we filled out this helping sheet thing that were going to be checked on every monday soooo better keep up on work i guess. also there was a lot of talk of grilled cheese up the ass???

Hour 1 (AP Bio): i turned in my poster board and we just went over the same rubric we went over when i signed up for the class smh. doesnt seem like itll be hard tho? sammy might have to drop it if she doesnt do her entire thing over and turn it in tomorrow and even then he might say no. so heres to hoping. also sabastion sat by our table nd honestly w h y do we have to have mutual friends i hate my life.

Hour 2 (ROPE): went over like oNLY the autobiography part of the rope packet tbh. also amy said we should know who our thesis paper advisors are but 1. i didnt even know what the thesis paper was and 2. the day ended and i still have no idea who my thesis advisor is weLL GUESS ILL SUFFER. im worried i wont have a good autobiography and that i wont be able to keep up with rope, but if i just dont goof around (lol) then it shouldnt be a  w  f  u  l. i notice a big student mood is being like ‘i want to die’ when school starts but christ its not rlly that bad? u get a normal ish sleep schedule, its easier to hang out w friends imo, and the work isnt even that hard you just have to pay attention and do it. it kind of bugs me honestly when school breathes and someones like THIS IS THE WORST THING ON EARTH FUCK SCHOOL FUCK ALL THE WORK THIS SUCKS cause its literally not that bad if you just idk. dont goof off all the time. sometimes u can goof off im sure everyone does sometimes. just. do ur work nd dont get so uppity about it. also idk if nyone will even read these but this isnt directed at anyone.

Hour 4 (English 12): our class is huge lmao. sammy and i got seats by jimmy, josselin, and ariel but i think eren wants us to get to class earlier tomorrow so we can sit together w yadi at the back of the room. but we get out of hg when peter lets us out soooo we cant rlly control when he lets us out.

Lunch: there was a lil spider where i sit so i kind of shooed him away so i could sit and i ended up cramping a lot. the worst part abt school imo is the chairs are just as hard as the floor and i have awful pelvis issues so my entire lower half starts to freeze and lock up and it hurts rlly bad getting up or shifting after sitting still for a while, so i fidget a lot and shift positions a lot so i can try and reduce the pain. nyways i played music nd sidney nd alexis sat down by us and theyre really quiet (whenever i would see them in the halls on the way to class and they had a free hour or it was lunch nd id see them they were always quiet then too) and sidney left her chapstick and i hope she remembered to grab it (i told her at the assembly at the end of the day because i forgot to grab it to give back to her). i cant rlly remember what else happened honestly??? thats of noting at least.

Hour 5 (Free): eren and i are probably going to sit in michelles room for this hour since she has chairs and 3 hours in a row on the floor is going to bust my ass so bad. eren started doing work but we ended up just talking and eating and listening to a vine comp.

Hour 6 (Free): sammy came down and we did basically the same as the previous hour but more talking and laughing. i cant remember what we talked about tho?? or nything else?? (edit: we tlaked about fucking and spanx)

Hour 7 (Government): eren sammy nd i had put our stuff down in michelles room early to save our spots (but i bet ill be the only one still at the table tomorrow because they have to go to the front) and then eren nd i left to go to the bathroom then fill sammys water bottle and by the time we came back in michelle was like ‘please arrive on time’ like 1 we were in here first nd 2 the bathroom was packed nd were supposed to go between classes i couldnt piss any faster thanks tho. we got the syllabus and an intro to the class/classroom and thank god jared isnt in this class fuckkkk. also we have to do debates like in front of the class?? no t h a nk you i hate it

Hour 8 (Advanced Drawing/Painting): we just sat around ny amy was like ‘heres what well do’ but ariel sammy nd i basically talked the entire time we all know how art works.

Assembly: a final assembly to wrap everything up with all grades together (since middle nd high had separate assemblies this morning) and i dont kno if we got any important information i think it was just things only 6th graders nd new students need to know cause we hear the same spiel every year. then i guess we all left??? 

After School: my dad picked me up and hell be picking us up every day from now on (unless like smthn comes up u kno its whatever). he didnt say anything on the ride home unlike when he and mom would both pick us up and theyd both ask a lot of questions. i thought he was angry and i ended up being right. he and my mom got into a bad argument she told me later on and now shes changing the locks so he doesnt have a key. its kind of upsetting how she said i should be civil with like whoever my parents may end up dating nd the entire family and whatnot but she (vise versa) cant even be civil with him or the rest of our family so??? nice example you set for your kids, parents. anyways my dad is also apparently switching up stuff he says like what hell pay and what theyll keep asset wise and how theyd cooperate for our sake and now hes changing what he said during court and all this mess and i feel like hes doing it to spite my mom but hes also spiting us in the process because we rely on our mom. ughhhhh this is stupid difficult to deal w id rather just not have to hear this stuff but moms always on the phone talking about anything and everything and were forced to hear. nyways lol

[ivyandink]

1-15

LMAO anon, stealing the glory. i already answered 4, 6, 12 and 13. so i guess i’ll fill in the rest. lol. ill put them under a cut bc i dont wanna clog up yalls dashes ;)

1. How did you learn to edit pictures?

hmmmm. mostly by reading about other peoples processes, watching speed edits, etc. then once i got photoshop, and took my class on it in uni, i started playing around with stuff myself and experimenting. still a WIP lol.

2. Whats your aesthetic in your opinion?

man, i feel like i don’t have one lol. oh well!

3. Who are your inspirations when it comes to editing?

pretty much everyone i follow :D similar to my inspiration for writing, anytime something catches my eye that someone does, i take note :) 

5. Who is your least favourite character you’ve made?

ooooooh. hm. either steven or peter lol. steven was significantly more useless of a character. i bet like 90% of people don’t even know who he is LOL. i put him in the story for a certain reason, but then never did that plot idea, but he kinda stuck around for a bit lol idk.

7. What causes you to feel uninspired?

being busy. :( or if i run into a road block with my plot. but mostly just not having enough time to work on it. i 100% love my story, and i never just completely DONT want to write it lol.

8. Is there anything you look for when browsing for simblr stories to read?

there is actually a lot i look for LOL. i still follow lots of people who dont do all these things, but if i find one that does, you’re def getting a follow :D i typically look for story-based stuff, with a decent amount of writing thats not too short or too long, decent editing/photos, and anything that’s really different from what i’ve already seen! stories of different genres, etc. :) and i looove really cinematic style posting, as well. 

9. Do you have any storytelling pet peeves?

for myself or others? i hate plot holes, obviously lol. this goes for myself and others. more so for myself tho, tbh. im more forgiving for other people, hah! and relying on cliches. bad character development. 

10. Who are your five favourite characters and why?

Elliot, Clementine, Sonia, Violet and Levi :) they’re MY MAINS

11. What do you do really well (storytelling wise)?

i have been told i write really realistic dialogue, and that i have really good character development! :) i tend to agree with both of those. my stories are very character driven, and i try my best to make them feel super real and believable.

14. Do you have a dark or more light-hearted writing style in your opinion?

i think i tend to darker writing? my writing itself is light i think. but the topics i write about tend to be more emotionally driven. i have some plans to play around with some darker story lines in the future, both with my legacy and area 27, so we’ll see how that one goes.

15. Are there any topics you’d like to write about in the future?

yes so many!!! like so many. i want to do another history challenge one day, bc i always have the best historical plots. or just a historical short story in general. i want to venture more into the pseudo-post-apocalyptic theme with area 27. and i want to touch on more issues in life besides just romantic drama, which is what i have mostly covered so far in my legacy, i p much wanna be old school degrassi??? “it goes there”. lmao.

thanks so much anon :D i loved answering these

[sleeplesssecrets]

today is the fifth anniversary of my miscarriage. my middle school math teacher’s daughter just had a baby today. i dont feel anything. i never truly did unless someone else does. the day it happened i didnt express myself at all and i can’t remember what i was thinking exactly, i can just remember how much pain that was. it was nothing compared to full term labor, but at that time it was the most physical pain i had ever experienced in my life. the top three most insufferable physical pains i have experienced are labor, a miscarriage, and a disease i have i dont talk about because its not that big of a deal but when it happens it’s completely miserable. the worst emotional pain ive ever felt is hard to pin point because ive never really had a terrible thing happen in my life that affected me so bad emotionally. i guess the worst is having poor self image, which is an eh on the emotional pain scale compared to losing a baby to most people. my mom thinks im more sensitive about my miscarriage than i am. im more sensitive to her emotions. anyways im watching a new show i dont like so far and i hate how poorly they portray people. its just not believable. people dont talk to each other in code or fast and witty jokes all the time. people talk over each other and dont know what to say and dont say everything theyre thinking. i dont always have the right words or perfect story or best possible response. yesterday we were out with tanner’s grandparents and his grandma recently lost her mother. she said that losing her mom is a completely different pain than losing anyone else you love. and i awkwardly smiled nicely and watched her eyes swell with tears and didnt know what to say. i didnt want to say im sorry or that i understand or anything i obviously dont really mean. so i didnt say anything. i dont think im a very relatable person so i really dont know what to say. ive been trying really hard lately to be a patient and active listener and it’s paying off. it has it’s downsides but the best part is the more i listen the less i have to share. people love to talk about things and i have always been envious of people who cared about what other people had to say. people who listen and make eye contact and nod their heads and remember what people tell them. i always thought i was the type of person who didnt feel like i have to give up a part of me to be there for other people and it’s not like that. im not giving a single thing up from myself when i hear what other people have to say. not even my time. my time is relatively less important than having a conversation about anything with anyone. anyways i have one empty notebook on my bookshelf and i hate writing in real life for lots of reasons. the biggest one being anything you write is permanent, even if it was with pencil or whatever. you can burn the sheet of paper you wrote something regrettable down on and it doesn’t take away from the fact that you had to write something down and it was so bad you had to destroy it. ive written about a couple of my insecurities on this blog before and i realized how much they mean to me after i made them real by writing about them and posting it. it made them worse maybe. it doesnt help me to talk about things to myself. although i dont write to help myself, i write because i love to type and sheer boredom. nothing on this entire blog but the insecurities ive written about really explore myself. for my one empty notebook, ive been considering writing a couple major things down in it. and just keeping it on the bookshelf. i have had blatant secrets spelled out easy for anyone to see folded up in notes to my friends scattered on my bedroom floor and no one has ever had the mind to pick them up and read them. i could write about my greatest fears in that notebook and seal them away anticlimactically by shutting the book and putting it back where i had it. it’s the same meaningless notebook, same meaningless spot on my shelf, same meaningless arrangement with all the other same meaningless things i keep near it, just with fears and secrets and shadows and bottled up thoughts inside. i can take away from the realness of written out negative thoughts by storing them next to tanner’s unused bible and my high school graduation cd. but i probably wont do that. my next writing project is a google doc called in the case that i die. tanner gave me one condition about my dating life if he dies. and it made me wonder if i had any conditions for if i die. if i have any certain ways i want things to be after my death if it should happen so soon. i dont think i do but i cant know unless i start writing it haha. of all the things i fear, i dont necessarily fear death. ive come to terms with the end of my life. speaking of fear and death, i really miss roller coasters right now for some reason lmao. when i was little i would ride anything my height limit. if it went upside down, sideways, stopped midair, turned the lights off unexpectedly, or jerked you around i was not afraid. im still not, and i think im more of a thrill seeker than i thought i was. i dont say no to anything that feels dangerous but isn’t, like roller coasters. there is the inherent danger of them breaking, but if i die on a roller coaster i die happy. if i get severely injured on one i might think differently but that hasnt happened so im not going to worry about it. anyways. a question a lot of people have been asking me is what im going to do for my honey moon, and tanners parents are offering to gift us a cruise vacation after we get married, but tanner and i were talking about going next year when we have money again haha. i want to really enjoy it and whatever they say about money not bringing true happiness is stupid. having fun and having money overlap. and having fun and having other people’s money is the same thing ha. also, we have loosely planned a pregnancy... idk we havent talked it out details wise, but i want to have another baby before i never have another baby. my grandma had 5 babies like, 10 or 15 years apart i cant remember. and thats amazing and i low-key want that but also really dont. i think ill have one more baby, then start donating my eggs if im eligible. my mom hates that idea which makes me want to do it more. im a fertile but fragile human and i want to share my fertility with people by donating my pretty, smart lil eggs to people who will love them. women are born with all the eggs they ever will have in their entire life, but not all women have viable eggs and not all couples have uteruses at all. i want to extend the fruits of my womb to humanity. anyways im gonna go

[neo-shitty]

toffee!

ah yeah i suppose ur right. yeah i think quarentine has had that sort of effect on a lot of people :( sorry to hear abt ur strict parents, hopefully ur friend will be able to come back soon. small outings (even with family) are still good tho, make sure ur taking care of urself toff.

youre totally right! ah yes thats good advice (/gen) ill try and use that when im in a slump ty. any music suggestions?

lol sames. even some of the stuff abt seungmin, innie etc is a little uncomfortable, like theyre grown ass men for sure, but at the same time, theyre still young, still just over being a teenager in the grand scheme of things. (on that note, i do struggle with worrying that im infantalising them, obviously theyre adults but at the same time, theyre still young. i do treat all fictional characters as my children, but i guess its different when its real people. idk. what do you think?) yeah some stans rlly need to take a chill pill, some are rlly walking the wire between 'ah theyre attractive/that look rlly suits them' and making fucking smut fics abt minors, like... they do not see a problem with that?? yeah tbh i feel like unless theyre 18 they shouldnt be put into the spotlight, weve seen what it does to peoples mental health, but modern day kpop industry is a lot like old hollywood with a lot of popular child actors -_- hopefully the big companies will learn but i agree, its unlikely

suuuuure toff haha. ill go searching for them, but idk if ill be able to find the fluff needle in the angst haystack (jkjk) yeah, fair i groan and complain but you do write angst etc rlly well, so if its what ur comfortable with, then pls continue, it is one of your strong suits, well as you write fluff aside

ah okay good! ill continue to send you essays then

THE ALBUM YES. so ive been looking forward to it for literally months, this is actually my first skz album release as a stay (since the last on was 9 months ago) i was sitting there hitting refresh on my spotify the second 6pm kst came around. (speaking of which, how did you do the release? i couldnt decide whether to watch or listen first but i ended up on listening cos there would be more material) okay: so cheese was super cool, very skz ya know? tho i almost wish theyd made domino the title track, tho obv it was a more experimental track and would have been a bit controversial (much like whistle for bp) i looooved domino and thunderous was absolutely impeccable. all the songs were amazing but standouts were- secrets, secrets which lowkey made me tear up idk why, red lights which almost killed me (it did not have to go that hard, but it did) and OT8 WOLFGANG omgggg i wasnt sure if hyunjin was going to be included in it but i was hoping and, ya know people had said hed be in there, but the further i got in, the less i was sure and then BAM hyunjin started what had been jisung's part and i just sat there grinning for about 5 minutes. surfin was absolutely adorable and gone away almost made me cry AGAIN. star lost was so touching, almost a nod to hyunjins little star? silent cry was relatable beyond anything. SSICK was funny? for some reason I was laughing while it was playing, idk the combination of added cheering and minhos aggressiveness and the totall seriousness they sung it. but i rlly enjoyed it. sorry i love you showcased their vocals like nothing else. the view is THE BOP of 2021, absolutely going to be stuck in my head for the next decade, that hook is genius. what did you think?

also did you watch their grow up performance? with all the stays and ALL THE TEARS? ;n; i feel like this is the end of an era of skz and tbh im kinda happy but also sad. super excited for their promotions but super bummed they wont get to tour. ah well

<3 w.a. 🐺

answer under the cut bc i gave an equally long answer to this already long ask HAJSH

oh yeah, abt quarantine having an effect. my friend and i talked about this earlier actually. i didn't realize the world was moving so fast until the pandemic happened. being in quarantine gave me time to think and i got to know myself more. it's just the sole good thing i got out of the isolation lmao. and abt my strict parents, ironically i got to go out today so i got to hang out with a few of my bestfriends. i had fun but my legs are a bit sore from walking. but they're a different set of friends. i'll get to hang out with the others when my getaway driver comes home in december.

hmm music recommendations for writing? depends on the plot you're writing. care to share what story you're working on and i'll try to rake my brain for a song that might match the vibe. i listen to classical / lo-fi if i don't have song inspo for a fic because lyrics sometimes distract me.

i don't think that's infantilizing tho. for me, it has something to do with my environment and the way i was raised. maybe it's the same the other way around? like this certain age (for the ones above 18 but below 20) is thirst-able for them. idk really. it's just not for me ?n? what i do NOT condone is writing smut for minors??? like get checked : D // i agree with everything with the idols being 18+ before they debut simply because it's for the best for their well-being like. how can young idols decide that this shit is the thing they want to do for life? or at least until their contracts last. idk :// it's unfortunate that it's unlikely to happen.

WELL. i have a list so you won't have to go search for them! in class (minho), in the rain (seungmin), gladius maximus (chan) and you've read five star already. and i just realized that most, if not all, of my upcoming fics are fluffs and i'm fond of all of them :D i used to focus a lot on angst because fluff disgusted the living shit out of me. i think things changed when i wrote champagne problems and hurt myself so bad i wanted to drop angst entirely. i didn't, of course, but i allowed myself to be self-indulgent now.

for the release of the album, i was on twt and watched the vid at 12 views (if i remember correctly, i watched back door at 14 so HASJH) i’m gonna talk by track so it wont be too confusing? bc i wrote this in paragraph format and it just ???? beware im very picky with tracks even if they’re my ults. so no offense if we have opposing opinions and i’m not fond of reading lyrics so these are all music wise.

cheese - oh god i hated cheese at first listen but it grew on me easily. i was singing the yeahyeahyeahyeah bit all day today :D

thunderous - i cant say that it’s my favorite title track. it felt really dry sometimes, both mv and music wise. but at the same time, it’s not that bad. the choreography carried the song tho o.O it’s so fucking cool. but like go live, another track has my heart and it’s

domino - AND YES I AGREE THAT THEY SHOULDVE MADE DOMINO TITLE TRACK UGHHHHH WHAT A WASTED FUCKING OPPORTUNITY. WORDS CANNOT EXPRESS HOW FOND I AM OF THIS SONG. it stands close to the level i love easy.

ssick - was a skip on first listen too because i found the chorus underwhelming but it grew on me? not that much but i can bear listening to it.

the view - it’s something the gen public like, hence its something i dislike. im not fond of songs that are structured like this? it’s not a bad song, just not the type of song i like. but i agree that the hook is very not catchy but it would get stuck in ur head.

sorry, i love you - it’s not as sad as i expected but i actually like it??? i can’t wait to write a fic out of it (1) HAJSHAJ it’s like a 3/5 for me. it’s angsty but chill?

silent cry - i’m pissed at this song bc it hits but sometimes it doesn’t?@?#!? but it’s starting to grow on me but definitely not my fave track.

secret secret - glad i found a secret secret enthusiast because my irls thought it was a skip?$?#@$? it gives me ikon vibes and i’m a huge fan of ikon’s discog so this was a win for me T_T +

STAR LOST - gives me bigbang song vibes and now im very sad :(( in case u didnt know, i’m a hUGE yg fan and 2ne1/bigbang introduced me to kpop so when i heard this track that gave me yg feels i just <3___<3 and it’s one of my favorite tracks anw moving on,

red lights - I WANT TO SKIP THE FIRST TEN SECONDS OF RED LIGHTS EVERY TIME IT PLAYS LIKE IT MAKES ME FEEL AWKWARD KDSJFSK but fine. i’m adding this to props and mayhem’s playlist LMAO it’s more aggressive than sexc tho. more enemies to lovers o. O

surfin’ - this coming right after red lights just wasn’t the best decision arrangement wise because how did we go from ooh sexc to aigh pARTAY. felix saying sheesh T___T it’s such a fun song i want to go to the beach ;n; do you like beaches?

gone away - i have yet to read the lyrics because i’m using this as inspo for a jeongin fic jskjash it’s not the type of ballad i like but it’s so fucking sad to listen to :’ ) the pitch change caught me off guard? still does. it’ll grow on me prolly.

wolfgang - I YELLED WHEN I HEARD HYUNJIN IN WOLFGANG. i didn’t like this song until recently. it gives me the confidence boost i need to pick myself off self-esteem crashes.

and no i haven't watched that performance and i prolly wont because i’ll cry. i’m excited for the promotions too. do you think they’ll still have a repackage?? i cant fucking believe that i just finished waiting for 12am kst for skz teasers and now i have to look forward to 12am for nct 127??@?#? NOT A SINGLE DAY OF REST FOR THIS STAYZEN