#guess the 90s anime that inspired the second picture

[evilhasnever]

some japanese style foxyaos

[hakhub]

short fic/ Putting the Pal in Palingenesis

I don’t have a cheeky statement to make with this, only that I wanted to write something cute with my resident Asshole Fav in FGO. I was reading a lot of @writer-and-artist27‘s Passing Days fics and thought it would be cute to write my own take on how the delightful activity of grailing goes. Naturally I asked permission like a good lad :V I might do some others if inspiration strikes.

Hako is my username and I guess now my Mastersona name so here we go! They’re non-binary and Achilles isn’t really written with a specific orientation in mind.

TLDR: Antagonistic “buddies” almost have a moment of genuine depth before resorting to 90s anime comedy tropes no i am not tagging this

content warnings: this is generally just really crass. If you don’t like people swearing like sailors this isn’t worth a read (it isn’t worth a read by default)

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“You called?” Achilles didn’t even bother with a warning knock before striding into his Master’s quarters. Not like an unlocked sliding door was going to give any resistance.

“Yep,” they sat back in their chair, still facing away from the entrance with their hands tucked behind their head. Their back bobbed against the chair they were in, to the beat of what he could only assume was the song they were listening to. It was a posture typically taken when they were in deep thought, “I’ve been meaning to talk with you.”

"No headphones huh? This must be important," the door sealed shut behind him.

“You could say that. Take a seat,” without even turning to face them they pointed to their cot, the only available sitting location that wasn’t the floor or their desk. The rest of their small quarters (beyond the ensuite bathroom) consisted of boxes chock full of supplies ranging from catalysts to their own expansive music collection dating back centuries in genre and scope.

It occurred to him that he had seen his Master’s room one other time if at that. He quickly took in the sights of the posters and scavenged materials they had gathered from all over the world. They didn’t possess many trinkets, nor pictures of friends and family, but instead decorated liberally with images of artists and performers they admired. Interestingly, he noted that none of their posters featured Servants registered to Chaldea’s database.

They still hadn’t moved their head from the monitor, focusing intently on the wavelength display depicting rhythm and pitch for the song humming through their headphones. They weren’t even wearing the headphones over their head- they were perched on their neck- but he could still hear some muffled rock music. His hearing wasn't good enough to pick up exact lyrics, but he could decipher a nice beat that he could tap his fingers to.

The cot underneath of him creaked a little under his weight as the last few seconds of the song concluded. He sat up straighter at the sight of their hand lunging to click a button on their keyboard, instantly shutting off playback.

“To be real, this isn’t that important,” they fumbled with the wireless headphones on their neck, pulling them off and clattering them clumsily on their desk, “but it’s- well shit. It is kind of important actually.”

Achilles put his hands on his knees, “Well? If it’s important, then out with it. I don’t have all night.”

Perhaps being frank with them would get them to the point faster.

They grumbled under their breath, fidgeting with their patterned headband.

His eyebrows rose; he had never seen them act like this before.

There was definitely some kind of weight pushing down on them, to the extent that they were reluctant to even make light of what burdened them. On a normal day their anger bubbled up to the surface and burst, but this time they were stilted and awkward, practically bottling up their feelings right in front of him. They weren't in need of medical attention but his thoughts ran to rare self-doubt; there were more qualified Servants that could deal with their emotions. He was only most valuable as a fighter (and provocateur) after all.

Finally they turned to their head to face him with furrowed brows. He could see the slightest glimmers of apprehension in their dark little eyes.

Seeing them this worried or dare he say nervous was more than a little off-putting suffice to say. He grew accustomed to them as brash and temperamental, possessing a hair-trigger temper and an even quicker verbal lash. In a lot more ways than he cared to admit they were quite similar to him, with a demeanor that exuded sure-footed confidence and attitude. Despite his preconceptions of them however, they were now acting withdrawn and nervous. Their energy made him readjust his sitting position out of an abundance of caution.

"I've been thinking, is all," they started vague, their eyes darting back to the desk, "about...stuff. I wanted to talk to you about it."

Achilles rubbed the back of his neck, coming to a quick decision for what sort of strategy worked best. Maybe they just needed a little icebreaker.

He sucked in a shallow breath and remarked, “oh yeah? Thinking with that whole brain cell you got over there?"

Casually bullying them felt the most natural. Insulting one another had been the basis of their relations from the start, after all. Why, since the moment he arrived- declaring he was the summoning jackpot to his new Master and a gaggle of witnesses- he was accosted viciously by them for not being Odysseus. In reaction to their initial dissatisfaction with him he came forward with a solid, brilliant rebuttal: if they were praying for the strongest Rider, the title belonged to him and not some "dandy in tights". He couldn’t recall the exact words getting exchanged, but he could clearly remember that he’d never heard such colorful language get thrown at him over the course of ten minutes, and that Chiron and Mash had to separate them before it escalated. In any other circumstance he would have left Chaldea altogether; despite better judgement he found himself more than a little amused by his audacious Master choosing to confront him, a Servant that could break them in half (and was also infamously anger-driven in legend), and accosting him for ten minutes straight in a flurry of criticism and crass insults. He ended up finding it so entertaining he stuck around anyway.

“Hmph,” they crossed their arms, trying to play unaffected but showing cracks when straining not to laugh, “you can’t quit being an asshat for two seconds, can you?”

He sneered, “Hey you summoned me. What does that say about you?”

Their mouth twitched again to suppress a smile, “dickhead.”

“Thank you, I do indeed have one.”

“Yeah and I bet it’s tiny. Like one of those little weenies in cans.”

“As if! Not like you got much of anything going on.”

“What, you really looking or something? Pfft, weirdo.”

He rolled his eyes with mock exasperation, “Don't flatter yourself. You’re not my type.”

They were visibly relaxed now, holding their arms looser around their chest, “Yeah I’ll bet you get your type lining up at your door don’t you? Oh wait, you don’t. Because no one ever visits you.”

“How would you know that?” he smirked when his next barbed line came to him, “you check for me often?”

“It’s part of my job to check on you, dumbtit!”

“So you do check for me often!” he started to laugh.

“Oh shut up,” they waved their arm dismissively at him, “dingus.”

“Dingus? Don’t you call me a dingus, you little shit!”

“Fine, how’s assgoblin?!”

“Terrible, and you're a bitchbaby for saying it!”

“Fuckweed!”

“Dipstick!”

“Shitgibbon!”

“Shitheel!”

They gave him a flash of teeth, “Says the guy with the actual shitty heel.”

"Aw come on!”

“You walked right into that. You really like telling on yourself don’t you?”

Achilles shook his head, his smile evident and impossible to truly conceal, “that’s a low blow, Master. You know I’m more dependable than that.”

At last they relented and laughed a little, "yeah, I guess you're right about that,” they mussed with their hair again, sighing once more, "we've uh. We’ve been through a lot, huh?"

His hand trailed the back of his neck and towards the shaved section of his hair. The bristly sensation against his palm helped him reflect on prior battles, often ones near death, "...Yeah. A helluva lot."

His gaze settled back on them again, their small form sitting cross legged in their chair. When they bundled up like that he couldn’t help but note how tiny they were in their oversized jacket. How could someone so frail looking have the responsibility to lead a veritable Servant army into battle? How many people did they have to lose before reaching the point they stood at now? They never gave him the impression that they were battle-hardened in the sense he was, but at the same time, there was a marked despair that hung around them like a shroud.

They rose from their seat, “Anyway. Because you’ve fought hard and all that…I wanted to reward you properly. Call it a show of good faith.”

He rose an eyebrow, "...reward me?”

“I don’t know if that’s the right term, but it is kinda like that,” they shrugged, putting one hand to their desk and leaning gently against it.

He scoffed playfully, “you getting soft on me? Didn’t think you were the type for favoritism. What happened to keeping things professional like you always say?”

That was why they were always so distant with everyone, wasn’t it? They were friendly but never wanted to involve too deeply into the personal lives of everyone around them. Their response was always some derivative of “keeping things professional”, an arbitrary length they could keep others at for reasons they never properly explained.

"This is still keeping it professional, dumbass.”

Their pointed response still hit differently however; it wasn’t like a friendly jab as before. Curiously too, he noted, they didn’t shoot down his earlier notion of favoritism.

They huffed out of frustration again, "Damn it, this isn't how I wanted this to go. Look, I just- you've fought hard. You've been really dependable. I know we fight a lot and talk a whole lotta shit at each other but at the end of the day, you're my best Rider."

He froze.

They sighed, "You...always have been."

Without their precious music playing, there was a remarkable clarity to their mood. Even their slightest movements when changing which foot to lean their weight on clearly communicated a sincere bashfulness he never expected them to have. Every minute action they took directly translated to emotive language. It made a lot more sense now why they always had their tunes wherever they went: it was a buffer that prevented others from seeing them.

It made him reel with thoughts: were they always this awkward and shy?

He regarded them quietly, settling for inaction to wordlessly encourage them to continue.

"So like I said, uh...call it a show of faith," their fingers clasped snug together and then separated pensively before they gathered their resolve. Their next statement arrived with a stronger, more assertive tone, "that I'd...like to see you keep doing your best. And bettering your best. That way we'll keep fighting together side by side, kicking ass and saving the day and all that."

Their affirmative nod was confident and they were seemingly satisfied with their chosen phrasing. They had indeed kept it professional, even if the it hadn’t been elaborated upon yet.

He blinked, “So I get that, but what’s your big show of faith?”

"Promise me one thing."

"What?"

“…Don’t make this any weirder than it has to.”

Before he knew it, there was a holy goddamn grail shoved unceremoniously in front of his face. It was meticulously cared for and polished so well his own bewildered reflection shone right back at him.

What the hell?

They didn’t just hand those things out like candy. If anything he only knew that Chaldea was in possession of several grails from Caster Nero, who had publicly blabbed to everyone on base that she received special treatment from her Master in a “sincere and genuine gesture of encouragement for her to sing loudly and proudly,” which if anything had convinced him that the prestigious honor was actually more about appeasing Nero’s ego.

A grail for him though? The Servant that constantly argued with them? The same Servant that made them so upset their cursing caused food fights, verbal spars, and enough professional disruption there was a running betting pool on how fast he could piss them off on any given week?

While he was adrift in his own stunned silence, they chided him, “dude, you’re making this weird.”

He blinked again, tearing his gaze away from the cup and back up to them, "You wanna Palingenesis me?"

"Yes. What else does it look like?"

"All the way?"

"Do I need to hold all fuckin' five of these in your face to prove it? Yes!"

He stood up at full height, towering over them by an entire foot, still regarding the gleaming golden cup in their grip.

“…You're joking, right?"

Their whole body bolted from relaxed slouch to a straight spine at attention, their eyes switching from placid to furious. Their voice fired with such ferocity he may as well have been hit by a gunshot.

“You want this t’ be a joke?!”

He leaned back on his heels as if pressured to from the sheer combative air they exuded when properly pissed off.

“Do you have any idea how long I had to agonize over this?!” they whacked his chest with the lip of the grail, punctuating each word that followed, “Thanks for proving you’re not even worth my giving a flyin’ fuck about you!”

“Master-“

“No! You don’t get to have a word in this time- no funny little quips you hear me? You’ve pushed me too damn far and for the last fuckin’ time! I hope Chiron kicks you so hard in the dick your Saint Graph feels it!” They were completely dwarfed in height by him and yet still they were pointing at his face as if they could punch him right then and there. It would’ve been funny as hell if he didn’t feel put upon for saying the wrong thing.

“Master, hang on-“ his attempt at interjection was only met with more high flying anger. He wondered where exactly the ratio was between him deserving it for saying something insensitive, or how much the world's most temperamental Master had an even shorter fuse.

“I try to be serious for one damn second and you think it’s a joke-“ they were visibly shaking, best shown in their hands holding the grail. How nervous were they before he had arrived in their room? The golden cup trembled in their grip, their little fingers wound so tight their knuckles went white, “I can’t believe- ugh! You’re such an asshole- you…!”

“Hako!” he hadn’t meant to shout but he was at last loud enough to make them flinch. He sighed, lowering his gaze, his eyes dull amber.

They stopped in their tracks, their arms having fallen limp to their sides, with the grail still clutched tight in hand, “wha-"

“…I’m honored,” he admitted. It was such a simple thing to say but he knew he should have actually come out with the truth sooner. He was always a little protracted that way when it came to anything important, much to his chagrin.

The silence that fell between them lasted only a few seconds even if it felt like ten years. They were staring at the floor in deep thought, considering his words and what their following response would be carefully. He wasn’t doing much better in the directness department either, opting to look at the nearby trash can rather than at his own Master.

“Honored shmonoured. It doesn’t mean anything unless you do something about it,” they were palming at the back of their neck again, “…Sorry I got mad. I've been stewing on this a while, so when you didn't take it seriously I flipped my lid. Sorry."

“…It’s fine. I shouldn’t have thought you were joking.”

Another silence.

Achilles looked away from his distorted reflection in the stainless steel trash can to add, “I didn’t think you thought that highly of me.”

“Yeah well…my respect is earned, remember that. So…don’t go slacking off just ‘cause.”

He chuckled lowly to no one but himself, but the proceeding wiseass comment had come instinctively, “Heh, I kinda like the awkward hero act you’re putting on. It’s a little endearing.”

The lip of the grail clinked against his armor again, gently and only once.

“And you said I was getting soft.”

The mutual chortle that came from them both felt just as coy as it was friendly. They were resourceful enough to conceal their smiles with well placed hands over their mouths.

“You know,” he finally gave them a glance, “I think I get what you mean by a show of faith.”

Their eyes darted up to his face, twirling the stem of the grail between their fingers idly.

“You’re a hell of a taskmaster, but at the end of the day you’re always looking after us Servants. Impartial and a bit of a firecracker, but…fair,” he began, “I thought at first the way you kept throwing me on the frontlines was just to keep me outta your face, or maybe some plot to get rid of me in a roundabout way. That’s not the case though is it? You wanted me to do better."

“I wanted you to do better,” they murmured with a slight scowl, they weren’t quite angry so much as they were annoyed that their following words would have to be said out loud, “because I knew you could.”

Their comment set him off kilter- did the ambient room temperature suddenly rise? Why would it change? No one else was in the vicinity and they weren't standing by the thermostat. Was someone messing with the thermostat via remote? No, definitely not. Then why were his ears burning? He started to feel weirdly exposed despite standing motionless in a private room, even in armor. He took a step backward in the hopes that the gesture would grant some breathing room.

When that predictably didn't work he rubbed the back of his neck, eyeing one of their many posters instead of looking at them directly, “you really believe in me that much, huh? Heh...can't say I know how to feel about that. It's ah...it's...different."

They couldn't even diffuse the unbearable levels of awkwardness with a decent rebuttal. They were only left with mussing their hair in a pitiful attempt to hide the fluster on their face, "w-whatever. Gloat all you want-"

And that was just what he needed.

"What did you say?"

"I said- ...oh, oh shit-” they froze like a deer in headlights, the air completely flipping from one mood to a polar opposite. The change happened so fast they didn’t have the time to withdraw their fatal error, "no wait I take that back!"

From embarrassment and newfound sincerity to the absolute worst thing to ever give Achilles: bragging rights.

He grinned ear to ear, "Oh no Master, that isn't going to happen at all. I think everyone ought to know, like you suggested."

His addressal practically dripped with irony. Whatever bashfulness there was had evaporated.

Their posture flexed like a bamboo stalk, “don’t. You. Dare.”

He took one long step backwards to the door.

“Oh I’m daring alright. All the staff and Servants are gonna be slack-jawed when I tell them you held out your little holy grail in front of me, your- what did you call me again? Your best Rider? Your most dependable Rider?"

Their excess mana was showing itself now, crackles and sparks of electricity gathering in potency as their inevitable temper reached its peak.

“Achilles, I swear I’m gonna personally punt you to the moon if you say another word...!“ despite their vivid threats he had reached the entrance and flipped the panel, flinging the door open, "hey! Don't you fuckin' dare, you Achaean shit!"

“Don’t you know me by now, Master? I like it when you dare me!” he gave them a parting wink and slipped past the entryway, laughing heartily amidst the ensuing chase.

Mash was humming softly to herself, carrying a large stack of text reports to go over in the cafeteria until she heard the unmistakeable yell of Hako.

"GET BACK HERE YOU ACHAEAN FUCKSTICK!"

The sound was so booming and so sudden Mash nearly jumped out of her own skin, flinging her precious reports in all directions. She promptly stooped over to shakily grab some of her fallen papers but yelped again and ducked to the floor when Achilles leapt completely over her head, bolting down the corridor she just came from. Before she could even register her shock from that, Hako whipped past, sending even more of her documents into the air.

“Outta the way Mash!” Hako may as well have ordered them before immediately turning their attention to Achilles, “and quit laughing, you stupid shitheel!"

“Not a chance!” he shot back.

“Rrrrrrrrgggh!”

They were shouting after him so loudly their voice carried all the way through the corridors, each string of cusses and curses echoing carelessly into the wide open. It didn’t matter that he was the fastest Servant in Chaldea, and it didn’t matter that they were comically unfit for chasing down their own Servant, and it didn’t matter that they were either too stupid or stubborn to use a Command Spell. They were still going to chase him down, holy grail in hand, so they could gain the personal satisfaction of clocking him in the face with it (much to the amusement of everyone else).

Mash’s hands didn’t move from the floor until Chiron appeared beside her and started assisting with cleaning up.

“May I?” he offered.

“Is senpai angry again?” she adjusted her glasses, blinking rapidly, “they looked really mad this time.”

“Hmm. They seem to be, yes,” Chiron remarked blithely, barely lifting his gaze from the stack of papers to watch the local Master of Chaldea scream death threats at a former student.

“I wonder why Achilles is running so slowly. He’s the fastest Rider here, isn’t he?”

“He may be, but it is rather irresponsible- even by his standards- to use full speed while indoors,” he neatly stacked Mash’s papers and handed them to her, “After all, you needn’t look further than his face to see his true intent.”

Chiron flicked his finger to point at the end of the hall, where Hako was on their knees and wheezing for air in a corner while Achilles casually propped himself up next to them.

“Eh?” Mash turned her gaze to the commotion, allowing Chiron the perfect opportunity to continue on his merry way.

Achilles had his hands on his hips, hinging forward as if he were being condescending to a child in a playground. His eyes were alight and his beaming, smug grin was impossible to wipe off, “aw are you out of breath already? You gotta put up a better fight than that~”

He had to immediately swivel ninety degrees to avoid getting a holy grail lobbed at his face, “you were pretty close there! I’ll give that one a six outta ten.”

“You stupid, stupid asshole!” they shot back up to their feet and threw another sacred cup, causing him to burst into laughter when it nearly hit him again.

“That’s the spirit!”

Achilles and the grail-lobbing Hako promptly disappeared when they turned another corner, leaving a bewildered Mash and her neatly stacked reports alone but still in earshot. She made a nervous, uneasy mewl when the resounding clang of a metal object collided against nearby furniture. Followed by the resounding clang of a metal object meeting something made of glass.

"Wow you really threw that thing like an axe!" he teased, "you got a pretty good arm, Master."

"Ugh you're just INSUFFERABLE!" Hako screamed back, more clattering following their wake.

Mash nervously glanced down at her documents and readjusted her glasses again amidst more shouting and raucous laughter. She could only pray that the property damage would be minimal.

[bakugouisabitch]

nono, i care about your very specific highschool au. rant about it please.

dgslsjs omg youu 🥺

well if you insist.... ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)

okay, i once had a discord group which i miss sm rip where i shared some ideas from that AU so i’m basically gonna repeat them here now shsjs under the read more 👇

this AU includes both Maliks as siblings (+ Isis and Rishid ofc) and both Bakuras as siblings too. The two Yamis are the elder brothers of the non-Yamis so they also have their own name ofc. 

For Yami Malik I’d go with Amir cause the name is beautiful and fits him somehow (it means ‘prince’ or ‘chief’). This AU is literally so self-indulgent where I can finally write Amir just how I picture him in my head as the funny himbo he is, who makes some creepy jokes at times but is generally a nice guy and is just constantly stoned sdfgskh

For Yami Bakura i haven’t thought of a name yet 🙃 He’s low key the protag and I still don’t have a name for him 👏 good work, Ziggy 👏 I was thinking about something that makes his initials still be YB so a name with Y actually (Yamato maybe ?) Everyone calls him Bakura/Bakura-kun anway and they mostly call Ryou “the little Bakura”/Bakura-chan (affectionately) since he is the little brother ahsksfsj

In this AU Amir and YB are like really close friends. They are classmates in their last year together and they are known for being trouble makers. But not just like Honda and Jounouchi in the anime - they are worse than that. They have risked being expelled many times and smoke on the school’s rooftops and even hang out with older guys who sell illegal shit and such (it’d be tw for drugs ofc). OH and lots of spray painting on public places 👊 They are really best buds and bonded over same interests and music taste and same hate for the society and family and such. This fanart was a major inspiration to write these two as high school best buddies.

Also, I did a quick redraw of the typical anime boys sleeping in the classroom pose with these two. That’s them:

 (might finish it one day and post it seperately idk my motivation is swinging lately 🤷)

All their “criminal” behaviour ofc stems from a sad background/past because i’m just a sucker for angst and i keep making my boys suffer 😔 i’m sorry. Every guy in this AU has daddy issues or just family issues in general

YB is VERY overprotective over his little brother Ryou (who’s just two years younger than him, and just like Malik, starts his first high school year in Domino High School). He is literally responsible for raising him up because ever since they lost their mother and Amane (Ryou’s twin sister) at a very young age their father fell into a very deep depression and he’s constantly away “for work” and just generally neglects his two remaining sons. YB hates their father because of that so he has taken it as his own responsibility to make sure Ryou is always safe and protected and acts like the parent in their home (where there is usually just the two of them). Also, another self indulgent thing here: YB being an ass with everyone except for being an overprotective good big brother for Ryou 🥺 please! so cute!! (They ride a bike together on their way to school like this fanart)

The Ishtar’s parents are both dead. Their mother died when giving birth to the youngest one (Malik) and their father died under very tragic circumstances (still gotta think how 🤔 it definitely wasn’t Amir tho’) and they used to have a very abusive household thus why Amir HATES their dad. Contrary to Malik, who keeps saying he deserved a second chance and was a good father and wishes he could have made him proud ~ this always makes Amir and Malik fight amongst other things and this is what also bonds Amir and YB so much: the hate for their old man.

It would be a very psychological AU that deals with a lot of issues and shit and traumas the boys have to live with + adding all the typical teenage angst at that age so it’s CHAOS. and I’d also have the perfect soundtrack/playlist for it 💆‍♀️ (it would be set in the 90s)

Ofc it’d be bakumali because I can’t help myself (and maybe also Ryou x Amir as a side pairing 👀)

Since it’s Malik’s first year in domino high school he wants to be recognised as one of the “cool kids” and befriend the older boys from the class. he just hates it that his big brother (Amir) is always there as well. Compared to the Bakuras these two have much more of a turbulent kind of relationship going on as siblings, where they constantly fight and Amir says Malik “ruined” the family whenever their fights get harsher and Malik says father never loved him anyway. Isis and Rishid try to keep the family and the boys under control as young adults but it’s hard 😔

YB visits the Ishtars sometimes to hang out with Amir in his room where they listen to music, smoke weed, and play PS and such and this is when Malik “spies” on YB. he thinks his big brother’s friend looks so cool with his ripped jeans and eyeliner and black nail polish. One night YB and Amir are smoking weed in Amir’s room and playing PS when Malik would use the chance. He’d piss Amir off and tell him it’s his turn to take the trash out on purpose to make him leave his room. Ofc Amir says no but then Malik “threatens” him with “I will tell sister you smoke weed if you don’t take the trash out”. And so Amir leaves (slamming the door behind him like an unruly teenager and saying he’s gonna kill Malik) and leaves a stoned YB alone in his room. And this is when Malik uses the chance to be alone with a very confused and very stoned YB who wonders why Amir’s little brother seems to be so interested in him sdfghjkl and yea this is basically their first encounter.

Malik has basically a kind of obvious “fangirl crush” for YB but the latter is so confused why and what he even sees in him. Because for him there’s nothing “cool” in skipping school and breaking the rules, it’s just the only thing he knows. But for Malik this is the coolest shit he’s ever seen.

this little sketch i made kinda shows my idea for their relationship in this AU better sdfghjk:

Malik befriends Ryou (who is in his same class and school year) out of convenience ofc cause he wants to get closer to YB. Yes Malik is a lil bitch in this AU. And Ryou is like extremely nice and polite, he’s the weird silent kid who doesn’t have a lot of friends and lives in his own world. He falls victim to bullies a lot and YB also keeps that rough facade to make sure no one messes with him. Ryou befriends Malik and tries to answer all of the weird, intimate questions he has of his big brother...

One night I, like, imagined a scenario where Amir and YB are out spray-painting a wall behind the station with some other thugs and Malik and Ryou followed them secretly (it was all Malik’s plan) even if Ryou was totally contrary to the idea. Once they see the guys have drugs and alcohol Ryou wants to leave, but Malik says this is exactly what makes it exciting and joins them without warning. When Amir and YB see Malik they panic, wondering what he is doing here. Amir gets particularly pissed off and wants to just leave. ofc YB tells him he can’t just leave his young brother alone in a place like this with people like that. But Amir ignores him (and this will lead to one of the first big fights between the two best buddies 😔 they will punch each other. I told you it will have a lot of angst)

Anyway at the end Amir leaves and YB is decent enough to bring both Ryou and Malik home but then Malik insits on wanting to crash at their place. So YB is like “i guess??” And they spend the night together at the Bakura’s place :) YB takes the couch and leaves his bed for Malik to sleep in but Malik will have none of that ofc sgksksj

Okay sorry for boring you, I could go on forever with so many scenarios of this AU or like actually sit down and write it... and yea.. that’s it.... just angsty and misunderstood boys in a shitty society with shitty parents trying to find a sense with their lives 🥺

[mechanicalinertia]

STMPD Recommends Bubblegum Crisis Fanfiction - Resources: The Licensed Bubblegum Crisis RPG Books

No. Not my own RPG. That's... in a state of transition. I broke a bunch of stuff in it and will probably need to get back to it someday to fix it. Not high on my priority list.

And no, not the Shadowrun Second Edition Partial Conversion drafted up by Neo No Armor Against Fate's Shawn Hagen. Apparently Shawn maintains that his RPG conversion is better, said he was able to dissect the combat easily on Usenet back in the day. And he might very well be right in terms of mechanics, except, oh, wait, probably not, because it's Shadowrun, amirite folks?

Thank you, thank you, thank you. I'll be here all week.

No, I don't claim to make any defenses for the BGC RPG as an RPG book, and I'll explain what I mean in a bit. I will, however, argue that these sterling little books, published in the two years before R. Talsorian went dormant for nearly two decades (cyberpunk 3.0 notwithstanding), are hands-down the best 'guides' to Crisis 2032 you could ever want. If you're writing fiction in 2032, and maybe you're pressed for ideas, I say give these three books, each shorter than the last, a read...

Which you can do electronically, for free, right here.

This is going to take awhile, isn't it? Well, yeah, we're talking a few hundred pages of small-font text and some really good settei (concept art) serving as the pictures, some of which saw no reproduction outside Japan at all. So, like the multi-part epic rant I've had brewing in my drafts folder for the past half a year, let's break it down into sections. We'll start with

DON'T ACTUALLY PLAY BUBBLEGUM CRISIS: MEGATOKYO 2033 THE ROLEPLAYING GAME: ARU PEE GEE NO DENSETSU

For context, and this is kind of an interesting story: R.Talsorian Games, the primary publisher behind the OGBGCRPG (OG for short) made its fame on two big product lines.

First there was wargame / RPG hybrid Mekton, pioneered by Mike Pondsmith back in the eighties as a mecha fighting game, in the halycon days when most anime watchers got fansubbed tapes from conventions or were watching rebranded Voltronesques on Saturday mornings. Anime fandom as we know it, or even knew it in the nineties, just did not exist, and here's Pondsmith drawing up a whole fucking wargame to do it. The most recent edition circa the nineties was Mekton Zeta, which also had the mecha-building sourcebook Mekton Zeta Plus.

The other was Cyberpunk 2013, released in 1988, which was essentially a street level adaptation of Mekton's mechanics (called 'Interlock' 'cause all the systems could, e-hem, interlock), that got a cool sourcebook or two (including one inspired by cyberpunk classic Hardwired that was written by the novel's author) before getting a second edition in like '89 or '90. That's Cyberpunk 2020 - that's what put R.TAL on the map, that's what I wrote a shitty fanfic crossing with BGC about (It wasn't hard to do), that's what became Cyberpunk 2077, and that's also what became Cyberpunk RED once R.Tal got money from CDPR to make a new edition.

With me so far? I bet you're thinking, Kyle, "gosh and golly gee wilikers so they put their anime system together with their cyberpunk system, because all those parts interlocked just like you said, and they made Bubblegum Crisis!"

And oh, my sweet summer child, how your eyes are shut.

Yeah... So, the OG is actually run on a system called Fuzion, which blends R.Tal's loose network of systems with that of the HERO System, which is... one of those really complicated universal systems that they say can build anything and everything, was designed with a variety of advantages and disadvantages for characters to use to represent their character, and isn't GURPS. No, it was made more for a superhero RPG, I guess?

Anyway, somehow the two companies met, decided to make a joint universal system for all their work going forward, and called it Fuzion. Many other licensed games used it for awhile, people made universal themed supplements for it, but it's not in wide use anymore as far as I know.

Why? Let me see if I can explain by way of picture.

Champions used 3d6. Interlock used a d10. The devs argued and argued and argued over which type the game should be balanced around, then gave the fuck up. Does that fill you with confidence, readers?

So there's this sort of... highly elaborate mishing and mashing of various elements of two very different systems such that neither comes out the better for wear. Here's R.Talsorian's Lifepath, a character-backstory generator where you roll dice to build a character (setting-agnostic, because they were trying to sell a universal system); then here's Champions's Perks and Complications, bought using those same precious campaign points you're using to buy civilian gear (but aren't your players playing as Knight Sabers? Who needs real shit to be marked when you're building hardsuits with separate points entirely?), and complications must be activated x amount of times a session even if it diverts from the fun of playing the game. And so on and so forth. Shit, even crossing Cyberpunk with Mekton doesn't always work, since blocks of damage from Mekton (Kills) scale unsteadily with the more dice-driven combat of CP. Worse still is that the mecha system and the hacking system are off in MZ+ and CP2020 respectively, so if you want to custom-build hardsuits beyond the small pool of tools you're given on the last fucking page of the book, or you want your Nene equivalent to do something useful, nyah-nyah, go buy more books.

And then I'm sure Shawn Hagen has plenty of reasons why the combat doesn't work, but we're not paying attention to him. Whatever. Let's talk about what does work, which is a mix of worldbuilding lore, stuff the R.Tal writers seemed to just sort of come up with, and a great gallery across all three books of Fucking Cool Mecha (especially BGC EX).

LORE IS SERIOUS BUSINESS FOLKS

I mean that earnestly. It's hard to get right, especially when said lore reflects upon the tone of the actual content, the plot, the franchise, whatever. But when telling stories with a licensed game, some degree of lore is, to my mind at least, incredibly mandatory. Maybe not so much for games where the story ought to be made up as one goes along (see RPG's like The Sprawl), but in the case of BGCrisis, an anime which at the time had a pretty loyal fanbase chomping at the bit for answers for their questions about the wider universe the Sabers operated in, R.TAL had to do a mix of cribbing from untranslated material, the B-Club special and all that, and making their own shit up without looking like they'd cribbed from their own work (CP2020) overmuch. The result is very uneven, but charmingly so. I almost want to say it feels more grounded than CP2020 or Shadowrun, but is that just because it's comparatively light on the ground? Perhaps. The mandatory universe timeline is one page, and focuses more on putting years to events that were already canon instead of adding extraneous stuff in.

Likewise with what the politics look like worldwide. We get a few paragraphs about how the U.S. is recovering (not collapsed as in CP2020), Japan is doing pretty good for itself as GENOM's puppet-state, Russia successfully integrated into the EU even if Eastern Europe didn't (See? Wacky shit like that can only be called charming), and China's one big North Korea (which I think is a holdover from the CP2020 Pacific Rim Sourcebook, where Deng was assassinated by Maoist radicals.) We get another dry bit about the idea of a zaibatsu lifted straight from CP2020's Corpbook 1, where Arasaka is discussed... newspapers are now faxed (look it was in BGC OVA 1 what do you want me to tell you)... on and on it goes.

I suppose I like the lore independent of the actual characters because of a few clever predictions. One is using all the cybernetics-gone-bad in AD Police Files to explain why nobody has them in the 2032 OVA, a link I sense wasn't really made concrete until this RPG. It's one of the most interesting interpretations of the source material and of cyberpunk tropes I've seen, you know, where all the splicing and dicing of the body turns out to be a fad and a failure, leaving those who bought into the trend left with butchered and failing bodies - in light of the crypto crash that seems to be dragging the stock market down back into recession / stagflation, that seems pretty classic capitalism.

The other is tied to Before And After, covering the impact of the cheap and now even more ubiquitous Boomers of Crash:

I mean, what can I say? I like predictions of the future that actually consider the effects of hyper-futuristic technology in that sort of way.

That's what a lot of the RPG's lore is at its best, basically working overtime to paper in the gaps left ignored by the series' creators. So we get a nuanced look into how ADAMA is different than similarly-sentient Boomers from the ADPF OVA; we get the Largo = Mason + Boomer Messiah explanation theory that the internet came up with just a year or two prior to the RPG's publishing; we get conspiracy theory proposals about whether or not GENOM undermined the cybernetics market to replace the enhanced with Boomers; we get to see the ADP go from hotshot riot suppression force able to slaughter undesirables en masse to actively disdained by GENOM; a weird consideration of how recognizing Boomer rights could still serve GENOM's agenda... on and on and on. It's such a mishmash of ideas, beautiful because of it.

Obviously no sane RPG player would ever give a rat's ass about any of this, but again, this was a product also marketed towards fans who just wanted a good worldbuilding book. I'm not saying you should take every part of the RPG's world into your own fanfiction, but you can take a great deal of it in and things will hold up.

POWER CREEP? YEAH, I'VE GOT THE POWER, CREEP!

The actual sourcebook sections of the sourcebooks are a) the characters, and b) the mecha. That's it, that's all. Civilian gear is almost an afterthought shoved into the front of the book like it didn't need to be there, cybernetics don't show up until Before and After. For although there is a section in the corebook proposing non-Saber campaigns players can run, they're essentially permutations of the already-existing types from CP2020: Corporates, mercenaries, medias, etc. And why, I ask you, would you run anything else but your own fanmade Saber team in your home city, overgrown and under threat? Shit, RTAL even went out of their way to put a few pages in EX, the last book in the series, highlighting player campaigns with online presences (Geocities, email addresses, etc.) and describing them in brief. Oh, to be a fly on the wall for the play sessions of the guys who did Mega-Gotham...

Anyway, back on topic. Both character pages and mecha pages get a great deal of settei transposed onto these pages, concept art ripped straight from Artmic's design docs and provided, again, more as a nerd resource than anything super useful. This especially comes into play in BGC: EX, where all the concept art and mecha are instead from everything that wasn't animated. Rejected concepts for hardsuits with wheels for feet; Boomer sketches only found in old hobby magazines; scribbles one of the Crash! mecha designers tried to get in that were apparently labeled 'problematic' (I guess he was a toy designer before all this?). I unironically love all this shit, even the beam cannons mounted on a hardsuit right where the boobplates are. Shit, my Discord profile pic is a non-Boomer mecha supposedly used by the JSDF, a 'Battlemover' whose origin I have no idea about, but which looks cool as hell. That's the kind of weirdo fan I am.

My point is that if you need to spice up your fiction, throwing 'new Boomer X' at the Sabers is one thing, giving the Sabers some power-up parts you dreamed up is another, but using the designs Artmic came up with before you did is more galaxy-brained than either. Shit, I should know, it was what Craig Reed did for the fanfics that I continued off of back in the day. And it's the same with these extraneous lore details that some rando RTAL staffer dreamed up a quarter-century ago, because they beg to have an entire fanfic made about any one of them. What happened to Jeena, folks? Inquiring minds want to know.

Anyway, that's it. That's all. Read through these and be a better fan because of it.

[natsunoomoi]

Holy crap. So like with the previous post I was thinking about Fushigi Yuugi again and kind of checking up on what was up with Byakko Senki cuz I haven’t checked on it in awhile and it looks like it’s on hiatus right now and she’s working more on Arata Kangatari, which is cool cuz I thought she finished that, but I guess not and she just took a break to like finish Genbu and do Byakko or something.

But also I was scrolling through her Twitter to find that she is really into this Chinese movie “Legend of Luo Xiaohei” and so I was checking that out cuz so ironic that Japanese mangaka that got her big break writing manga about an ancient China setting is interested in a Chinese movie. So just looking through her Twitter thread and apparently she found out about Luo Xiaohei from watching a CM while watching Modao Zushi. LMAO It’s amazing, but this situation just feels like an ouroboros eating itself because I have a high suspicion that her work on Fushigi Yuugi imported into China back in the 90s was probably a huge influence on Chinese creators and artists to write their own stories about their culture and helped to popularize the xianxia and wuxia novel movements in more modern times. On top of that MXTX said she was inspired by a D. Gray-man fanfic and while she mentioned that title specifically, I think in the periphery Fushigi Yuugi itself and more recently Arata were probably an influence too. Growing up a number of my Chinese friends also said they got into anime overall because of Fushigi Yuugi because it was an anime and work from Japan about their culture and arguably done pretty damn well. 

In terms of the danmei movement as well, I’m pretty sure Fushigi Yuugi was included in what started the movement as the movement was influenced by Japanese BL that came in via Taiwan, and the beginning of Fushigi Yuugi had the whole thing between Nuriko and Hotohori even though that kind of went nowhere, Nuriko dies to everyone’s depression (I have several friends who refuse to watch the rest of the series after Nuriko dies because it’s not the same), and that whole ship goes off a weird deep end with Hotohori marrying a woman that looks like Nuriko. Also, the exact reasons for Nuriko being in the harem and all that. There was a whole lot of shipping in the 90s from Fushigi Yuugi and it was one of the first series that had a male cast that was almost entirely ikemen and I think the actual first reverse harem. A number of shows probably simultaneously popularized the female gaze in mainstream anime, but Fushigi Yuugi was definitely one of them. Like literally one or two years before there was a lot of manly men and guy’s guys kind of anime characters, but beautiful ikemen, no, not really. In 2021, there are some things about the series that are a bit problematic, but it’s influence on the world is pretty significant. It was one of the first shows I’d seen that had any kind of reference to homosexuality or transgender in it and although it’s not necessarily portrayed well, the fact that it was there and that Nuriko was such a beloved character it started a conversation and helped us to get to a time where the topics she represents can be more discussed. I’m actually not even sure what pronouns would be appropriate for Nuriko because of her reasons for what she did and in Japanese the pronoun problem is actually really easy to get around because you just don’t have a subject or speaking in 3rd person is totally normal. But still, without her the minds of thousands or even millions of fans around the world would not have been opened as early to LGBT topics. Her existence, even problematic as it might be, allowed people to consider and love a character of a different sexual orientation or gender identity than their own and just open their minds to just not being a homophobic, biphobic (cuz relationship with Miaka?), or transphobic piece of shit.

Then also Genbu Kaiden and Uruki’s powers. Yeah.... I mean, also kind of with the earlier discussion, the idea of dual cultivation I don’t recall even being brought up much before in most media, but such ideas were also banned and repressed in China at a certain point. Documentation shows it was more of an ancient practice that suddenly became known about again. The book I was talking about that has it more explicitly written is banned in China has its only original surviving copy in the Japanese National Library as it was one of the books brought to Japan by scholars escaping persecution in China and bringing with them books to escape one of the many episodes of mass book burning. According to my Chinese lit professor who had us read an English translation of that book as a part of our curriculum anyway. Supposedly the translator of said book had to go to Japan to read the original in order to write the translation. There’s apparently a number of ancient Chinese texts like that because book burnings were a thing at different points in Chinese history, so if you are a scholar of Chinese lit if you want a complete picture of your field for some texts you do actually have to come to Japan to do your research. But yeah, that power mentioned in that very book Watase-sensei gave to Soi, and also the story of Fushigi Yuugi takes place in that very library that contains that ancient copy of a banned and would have been lost to the world book. If you’re asking why a “dirty” book would be something a scholar would grab to save, ancient lit scholars do regard it as a rather well-written piece of literature even though the content of it is basically taboo.

But also the Fushigi Yuugi Suzaku Ibun game is a hot mess when it comes to this same issue because if you romance Nuriko you can save her from death and my friend Hikari said she wasn’t sure if she was happy about fucking with the universe like that. (I’m not either.) Nuriko’s death was such a huge impact on the story and everything. Also, notably, most of the Suzaku Shichiseishi died, but Nuriko had the LONGEST tribute. Like Chiriko and Mitsukake’s was like a tag on of a few minutes. Hotohori’s was too even, but it was addressed more in the later manga chapters the publisher pressured her to write and in the OVA series afterward.

Also, like Fushigi Yuugi other than the Neverending Story was one of the original sucked into a book holy shit how do I survive stories. Idk if SVSSS is influenced by it in that way, but it’s fair to draw the parallels because of the similar theme. It’s just canonically Taiitsu Shinjin is not behind the the system in the book and in a number of ways Shen Yuan is more competent than Miaka. Miaka gets a lot of shit though and when I re-watched FY a second time I actually found the gripes people generally have about it make up only a small part of the series. People just talk it up so much that it seems like a huge thing when it’s not. Plus the technical canon is only the original TV series because that’s where Watase wanted to end the story and that is an emotional rollercoaster that makes you cry so good. But like there’s some other kinds of parallels as well like how toward the end and like the last two episodes you hate Nakago up until the exact moment you find out why he’s an absolute asshole, and characters straight up criticizing him about how he’s an asshole the whole damn series just gives the same kind of feels that SY gave criticizing the original throughout SVSSS. Can’t say for sure, but Fushigi Yuugi has a lot of clout in a general sense.

But yeah, Watase-sensei said that she was really surprised by the animation quality of Chinese animation these days and she thought Japanese anime was going down in comparison. Same, yo. Same. But still, her work was probably a huge contributor to the movement that allowed MDZS to exist because her art is damn beautiful, Chinese influenced, and she had one of the first works in Asia to like bring the subject of LGBT issues into the mainstream after years of oppression from mostly Western influence because in pre-modern Asia no one gave a shit before and there’s a significant amount of classical novels that address some form of LGBT issues at least in Japanese lit and like even academic documentation that notes Confucius saying that doing it with a guy was better than with a woman. And the author of the work that probably was very influential to BL back in the 90s watches MDZS. She noted that there wasn’t any in the actual anime, which is true, but I think she helped that series to exist and she watches the anime so it’s kind of exciting.

I hope it influences her to go finish Byakko, but OMG I want her to finish Arata too because I like Arata. I should try to find time to read more of it because the anime is too short and the wiki descriptions of what’s happening are so damn confusing and incomplete.

[hagridkeeperofkeys]

May 2021 posts

IF YOU DO ANY OF THESE POSTS AND THEN  SEE THEY WERE ACTUALLY CLOSED, PLEASE REACH OUT TO YOUR HEAD OF HOUSES  AND THEY MAY STILL BE ABLE TO AWARD YOU THE POINTS! 

24 Hour Elimination Challenge:

Favorite Magical Food (First Vote) - CLOSED

Favorite Magical Food (Second Vote) - CLOSED

Favorite Magical Food (Third Vote) - CLOSED

Favorite Magical Food (Fourth Vote) - CLOSED

Favorite Magical Food (Fifth Vote) - CLOSED

Favorite Magical Food (Sixth Vote) - CLOSED

Favorite Magical Food (Seventh Vote) - CLOSED

Favorite Magical Food (Eighth Vote) - CLOSED

Favorite Magical Food (Ninth Vote) - CLOSED

Favorite Magical Food (Tenth Vote) - CLOSED

Favorite Magical Food (Eleventh Vote) - CLOSED

Favorite Magical Food (Twelfth Vote) - CLOSED

Favorite Magical Food (Thirteenth Vote) - CLOSED

Favorite Magical Food (Fifteenth Vote) - CLOSED

Favorite Magical Food (Sixteenth Vote) - CLOSED

Favorite Magical Food (Seventeenth Vote) - CLOSED

Favorite Magical Food (Final Vote) - CLOSED

MAGIC Bingo:

First Sign Up - CLOSED

First Card - CLOSED

Who Am I? Riddles:

Riddle #1 - CLOSED

Riddle #2 - CLOSED

Riddle #3 - CLOSED

Puzzles:

May The Forth Be With You (300 pieces) - CLOSED

Honeydukes (80 pieces) - CLOSED

Professor Severus Snape (99 pieces) - CLOSED

Cinco De Mayo (99 pieces) - CLOSED

Dementor’s Kiss (100 pieces) - CLOSED

Happy Mother’s Day (49 pieces) - CLOSED

Chocolate Frog (100 pieces) - CLOSED

Harry Potter World (98 pieces) - CLOSED

Start of Term Feast (200 pieces) - CLOSED

Harry and A Light Saber (96 pieces) - CLOSED

HC (99 pieces) - CLOSED

Pumpkin Pastie (99 pieces) - CLOSED

Magical Sweet Treats (60 pieces) - CLOSED

Harry Potter Puzzles (100 pieces) - CLOSED

Professor Sprout (144 pieces) - CLOSED

Hedwig The Owl (60 pieces) - CLOSED

House Tea (100 pieces) - CLOSED

Harry Potter Mothers (100 pieces) - CLOSED

Pomona Sprout Slide Puzzle - CLOSED

Hufflepuff (100 pieces) - CLOSED

Fountain Of Magical Brethren (80 pieces) - CLOSED

Hufflepuff (99 pieces) - CLOSED

First 4 Eliminated (49 pieces) - CLOSED

Feast (60 pieces) - CLOSED

Next 4 Eliminated (49 pieces) - CLOSED

Ollivanders CF Card (77 pieces) - CLOSED

Graduation Cap (36 pieces) - CLOSED

Harry Potter - Prisoner of Azkaban (99 pieces) - CLOSED

Aragog The Acromantula (50 pieces) - CLOSED

Logic Puzzles:

What Is That?! (Food Version) - CLOSED

What Is That?! (Creatures Version) - CLOSED

Cryptogram - CLOSED

Your Eyes Only - CLOSED

What Is That?! (Part 3) - CLOSED

Quizzes:

Do You Belong In Harry Potter or Star Wars - CLOSED

Can You Solve These Harry Potter Logic Puzzles? - CLOSED

Create An Ice Cream And Determine Your House - CLOSED

Hogwarts House Per Food Preferences - CLOSED

Hagrid’s Favorite Beasts Quiz - CLOSED

First Year Feasts And Treats Quiz - CLOSED

Battle of Hogwarts Quiz - CLOSED

Professor Sprout’s Herbology Test - CLOSED

What % Pomona Sprout Are You? - CLOSED

The Ultimate Food Quiz - CLOSED

The ULTIMATE Harry Potter Food Quiz - CLOSED

The Definitive Rubeus Hagrid Quiz - CLOSED

Draco Malfoy Quiz - CLOSED

Can You Identify All 40 of These Minor Harry Potter Characters? - CLOSED

Are You Hermione, Luna, Ginny, Or Pansy? - CLOSED

Creative Writing:

What Would Hermione Do? - CLOSED

Food Care Package - CLOSED

What Weapon Would You Use (if not a wand) - CLOSED

Food Fight - CLOSED

Writing Prompts - CLOSED

Hagrid Sponsors A Dragon - CLOSED

Professor Sprout’s Birthday - CLOSED

Choose A Character To Room With - CLOSED

Create Your Own Food - CLOSED

New Shop Owner Permit - CLOSED

Easy Points:

Food Fight - CLOSED

Use Food Emojis To Describe Your Ideal Day - CLOSED

Who Took Harry’s Treat? - CLOSED

Create Your Own Magical Recipe - CLOSED

What Place Per Your Battery Percent - CLOSED

Love Potion, Imperio, Avada Kedavra (Hufflepuff Edition) - CLOSED

Which Sandwich? - CLOSED

Who Would You Shoot? - CLOSED

Spot The Difference - CLOSED

Battle of Hogwarts Partner and Weapon - CLOSED

How Are You Feeling? - CLOSED

Who’d Cedric Sneak Off With? - CLOSED

Food Ship Name - CLOSED

Hidden Objects (Kitchen) - CLOSED

Love Potion, Imperio, Avada Kedavra (Mother’s Day Edition) - CLOSED

Bring A Food That Starts With Your Name - CLOSED

Picture Game (Find me..) - CLOSED

Predictive Text (My Butterbeer Brings All The...) - CLOSED

Create Your Own Luna Accessory - CLOSED

Pick A Card - CLOSED

Quidditch Team/Own Hype Song - CLOSED

Sign Up For Being Tagged In Posts - CLOSED

What 3 Self Love Things did you do this week? - CLOSED

Who Said What Quote? (Dragons Edition) - CLOSED

What Goodies Do You Buy With $10 - CLOSED

This Or That React - CLOSED

Favorite Moment From Harry Potter And The Sorcerer’s Stone - CLOSED

Harry Potter Meme - CLOSED

What Would Arthur Weasley Google? - CLOSED

What’s Your Hogwarts Houseplant? - CLOSED

Pizza Party - CLOSED

Create Your Own Harry Potter Inspired Drink - CLOSED

Rank the Books - CLOSED

Eid Mubarak - CLOSED

What Conversations Is Susan Bones Remembering? - CLOSED

Harry Potter Attractions and Exhibits - CLOSED

Music To Scenes - CLOSED

Love Potion, Imperio, Avada Kedavra (Magical Creatures Edition) - CLOSED

What’s Your Mood Today? - CLOSED

“My exact reaction...” (Ron) - CLOSED

Food for Characters (Part 1) - CLOSED

Food for Characters (Part 2) - CLOSED

Harry Potter Maze - CLOSED

Sort Your Animal - CLOSED

Guess Character by Emoji - CLOSED

Fifth Picture In Your Reel - CLOSED

Hogwarts Check In - CLOSED

Harry Potter Recipes - CLOSED

What If... - CLOSED

Pair Movies/Books and Food - CLOSED

Collages:

What Food Do You Associate With Each House - CLOSED

Food/Beverage Aesthetic - CLOSED

Famous Hufflepuffs Through The Ages - CLOSED

Favorite HP Collage - CLOSED

International Harry Potter Day - CLOSED

Templates:

Which Dragons Are Real? - CLOSED

This Or That (Food Edition) - CLOSED

Are You Really Your Hogwarts House? (Hufflepuff Edition) - CLOSED

Would You Rather (Bertie Botts Edition) - CLOSED

What Pet Would You Want Hogwarts To Include? - CLOSED

Hogwarts Library Card - CLOSED

Hogwarts/House This Or That - CLOSED

Chocolate Frog Card - CLOSED

This Or That (Ship Pairings) - CLOSED

How Many Traits Do You Have (4 for Each House) - CLOSED

Lessons:

History of Magic (Battle of Hogwarts) - CLOSED

Transfiguration (Gamp’s Law) - CLOSED

Care Of Magical Creatures (dragons) - CLOSED

Flying - CLOSED

Divination (Part 1 - Tesseography) - CLOSED

Divination (Part 2 - Tea Leaves) - CLOSED

Herbology - CLOSED

Defense Against The Dark Arts - CLOSED

Mini Lessons:

Pomona Sprout - CLOSED

Order Of The Phoenix Series:

Part 1 - Brain Room (puzzle) - CLOSED

Part 2 - Death Chamber (word search) - CLOSED

Part 3 - Love Room (quiz) - CLOSED

Part 4 - The Time Chamber (quiz) - CLOSED

Part 5 - The Hall Of Prophecies (Predictive Text) - CLOSED

Collabs:

Part 1 (easy points) - CLOSED

Part 2 (creative writing) - CLOSED

Word Search:

Food! - CLOSED

Sweet Treats - CLOSED

Hogwarts Founders - CLOSED

Hanging With Hufflepuff - CLOSED

Professor Sprout - CLOSED

Harry Potter Films - CLOSED

Memory Match:

Professor Sprout - CLOSED

Fawkes Flow Challenge:

Character To Food - CLOSED

Sphinx Sudoku:

Part 1 (Easy) - CLOSED

Part 2 (Hard) - CLOSED

Astoria’s Associations:

Lumos - CLOSED

Coloring Sheets/Drawing:

Mother’s Day Card - CLOSED

Food Pictures - CLOSED

Harry’s Birthday Cake - CLOSED

Baby Dragons - CLOSED

Head of Herbology - CLOSED

Hermione’s BAG Bingo:

Hermione’s BAG Bingo - CLOSED

Fancasting 90s:

Harry Potter - CLOSED

Hermione Granger - CLOSED

Draco Malfoy - CLOSED

Ginny Weasley - CLOSED

Blaise Zabini - CLOSED

Ronald Weasley - CLOSED

Fred & George Weasley - CLOSED

Theodore Nott - CLOSED

Neville Longbottom - CLOSED

Pansy Parkinson - CLOSED

Cedric Diggory - CLOSED

Luna Lovegood - CLOSED

[kinetic-elaboration]

July 28: Braven, Man What the Hell Happened

Braven, 90s AU ~1000 words, for anonymous

90s/2000s song inspo: #149, Walkin’ on the Sun - Smash Mouth

I didn’t really know what to do with this, so secondary inspiration from the Daria episode “That Was Then, This is Dumb.”

This got longer than intended and so editing was, uh, extra minimal.

Currently taking requests for 90s/2000s inspired fics; send me a pairing and a number between 1 and 217 and I’ll write a scene based on a song from my Nostalgic Childhood Music Playlist

My tag list: @ciewill @dealingdreams @shadowheron2013 @julyrubyrose @wonderland-promises @hanav @rycewritestrash @thelittlefanpire @musicnote902 @stonybnatural @earthgay2052   (lmk if you would like to be added to or deleted from this list)

*

Everybody at the flea market is selling junk. Some of it is one, two generations old, and after twenty minutes of wandering through the aisles, Raven starts to feel like they're on a mission through time, a mission without a goal, a free-floating wandering through the rubbish of the past, searching perhaps for treasure, or just wiling away hours. Summer is reaching its peak, the days long and lazy, the noonday sun high and bright in a cloudless sky. For a while, she and Bellamy walk between the booths together, sometimes holding hands. She's not sure who reached for whose hand first or if she likes this development in things; his hand is sweaty, and she's not used to being tethered to anyone.

They pass by a table selling old jewelry, burnished bronze and gold, that makes Raven think of someone's great-aunt's closet, musty, old gilt-edged boxes covered in dust. Then they stop for a while at a booth selling a miscellany so random, so without categorization, and so old, that she's quite sure someone has died, and this is an unwanted inheritance. She knows something about that.

Later, they separate, for a time. The market is being held in the park and the grass, growing with abandon in the wildness of the season, catches at her ankles, a thick carpet beneath the soles of her sneakers. She finds a little tent selling second-hand books, and ducks in beneath the shade of it. Then sets to searching for a pattern to the makeshift shelves and the milk carton crates of old paperbacks, browned at the edges, eerie in the distorted gray light as it filters through the cloth walls. She's picking her way through a crate of old children's books from the seventies when she feels a light touch at her hip, and almost jumps.

She drops the book she's holding and turns.

Bellamy's hand slips around her waist, half-encircling her. He's wonderfully close in the heat and the dulled light of the sun.

"Kids books, Reyes?" he asks. "Is there something you want to tell me?"

"Funny," she huffs. She leans her hip back against the folding table, carefully, and he steps closer. He's still smirking, that half-smile she knows well because it was an expression he wore all the time, when they first met. Not that long ago. "I was looking to see if they have any of the books my grandmother used to have—" She breaks off, not caring to fully explain, glances down and sees that he's holding a couple records in his other hand, tucked in against his side. "Vinyl, Blake?" She quirks her eyebrows up. "Do you even own a record player?"

"Yeah, actually, I do." He scoffs, and steps back; she breathes a little easier, feels the heat of being so close rising belatedly to her cheeks. She's not embarrassed to be wrong. Somehow, now that he's said it, she isn't surprised. They haven't spent much time at his place, because he has roommates, and at least one of them always seems to be around. But she can picture his room, with its neatly made bed and messy bookshelves, and the record player in the corner, probably on the floor because he has no other place for it, and—

"Let me guess." She falls into step beside him again, slides her hand into his hand again. "You're into sixties rock. You like to lie on the floor and stare at the ceiling and listen to... Led Zeppelin. The Doors. And get high off Monty's stash—"

"That was one time."

The first time they met, sitting in the window seat in his living room with a view of the skyline at dusk, and every small moment grown large, like their fingers touching as he passed her the joint he'd inexpertly rolled, or their knees knocking together, or the smoky taste of his breath when he kissed her, and it felt first-kiss awkward and beautiful all at once.

"But I'm right about the rest of it," she says, and squeezes his hand.

Bellamy neither confirms nor denies, but as they step out into the full sheen of the sun, he squints against the brightness and says, "It just sounds different."

"Sounds like some weird nostalgia," Raven answers. "Do you really think the past was better?"

"I think people cared, more than they care now."

This answer is so vague and so beneath him that Raven almost calls him on it, except he winces, frustrated with himself, and tries again before she can.

"I mean—we're all so complacent now. I am, sometimes. Too often."

His voice drops, and he won't look at her, and Raven wonders if this is some sort of confession. Or something maybe that he's only working out for himself.

"What's that curse?" she says. Softer this time. "May you live in interesting times? Are you sure you're not just—wishing for interesting times?"

"That's the thing!" He glances over to her, and for a moment she sees that his eyes are animated and bright. "These are interesting times. The end of a millennium. But—Yeah, maybe I do wish more people knew we weren't living at the end of history."

His hand is large and warm in hers, palm sweating in the heat. Raven considers this for a long moment: the end of history. The illusion of security. Would she rather drop out of everything, braid flowers in her hair—drum circle in the park, or whatever people did, then, before they got disillusioned, dropped back in, put their old books and records and jewelry in boxes and crates and gave all of the past away to strangers, who are searching without knowing they are searching, with no narrative for searching?

"If this were the end, that would be pretty bleak," she says, at last. And before he can tell her that's not what I mean: "Let's go back to your place. I need to see this record player to believe it."

[idolizerp]

LOADING INFORMATION ON NIGHTMARE’S VOCAL, DANCE ZHAO DAXIA...

IDOL DETAILS

STAGENAME: Xia CURRENT AGE: 19 DEBUT AGE:17 TRAINEE SINCE AGE: 16 COMPANY: Koala.T SECONDARY SKILL: N/A

IDOL PROFILE

NICKNAME(S): nightmare’s babydoll, xixi INSPIRATION: daxia was largely inspired to be an idol by her favorite groups, who she’d began to love after seeing online videos. after winning a small talent contest at her school, she said that it showed her what fame and being loved by fans felt like and that she’d give anything to feel that for the rest of her life. from there on, she began grinding to work towards becoming the sweet and talented idol she is today. SPECIAL TALENTS:

martial arts - she started learning at the six and continued classes off-and-on until receiving her black belt at the age of thirteen.

choreography - after being a dedicated for so long, she’s practiced many years so master several of her favorite group’s choreographies from the last three generations, going as far as to try to mimic their mannerisms.

impressions - often teasing, but she has a special skill for impersonating both her members and other idols she’s fond of.

NOTABLE FACTS:

she was first found after starring on the show “superstar k”, where she placed 4th.

she once went on a trip to new york city and took a picture with rihanna.

daxia’s a huge fan of western music from the 90’s, and once a week she posts song recommendations for fans to follow and add to their playlist, along with an extended explanation and preferred method of listening.

she is known for her significant weight loss during her time as a trainee to debut, losing around 22 kg in a month. she refuses to say how, for fear others will try it as well.

IDOL GOALS

SHORT-TERM GOALS:

daxia does not hope that nightmare will change their concept, but instead that it will be better received by the public as they keep promoting, she also hopes that as they get more experienced, she will be more natural at fitting in with the dark concept. she wants to also better connect with international fans more, and hopes to be able to travel to china on tour and connect with fans in her native tongue.

LONG-TERM GOALS:

despite the cultural difference, daxia hopes to become a beloved figure of the korean entertainment. while highly ambitious, she hopes that she’ll have a lengthy and successful career and eventually be able to venture into other types such as acting and more variety. she wants to be a long term public figure known for her personality, and eventually be able to earn enough to move her parents to korea.

IDOL IMAGE

[did you see that new girl  they added, daxia? she doesn’t look like the nightmare type at all.]

cute face, devilish grin. daxia’s introduction to nightmare was certainly a shocking one, such childlike features accompanying such an eerie concept. and yet, in a way, it works. the deceitfulness in her smiles is just the soft energy they need. sure, nightmare doesn’t ever catch a break because of their concept, but in a way it’s xia who helps bring the cuteness back that they’re missing.

[i heard she’s the least talented out of the bunch, though. is she just a pretty face?]

upon her debut, she receives almost instant criticism. she’s lacking skills. she shouldn’t have debuted so soon. she barely can speak korean. all in all, everyone seems to view her as a trainee who still needs lots of work. what could she do? it’s not like she doesn’t agree, but daxia had been dying to make it big and nightmare seemed like her only chance. she tries her hardest to work hard, but they don’t seem to get past her swift debut and lackluster skills. the only thing that’s saving her is her charisma, even the anti-fans can’t deny she has an incredible stage presence and personality onscreen.

[yeah, i think so. but she’s a little cute….right?]

so koala.t uses a new method, using her downfalls as their strength. within a month of debut, they stray her away from the dark character it seemed everyone else was playing. instead, they have her play dumb. since they can’t seem to do much with her, they work with her flaws and make them “cute” to the audience. her korean, which is lacking but nevertheless improving, is told to be intentionally worse to play the clueless foreigner card. her voice cracks are made to be a cute mishap, and her lack of coordination can be attributed to her adorable clumsiness. koala.t feels that all her critiques have been swiftly cleaned up, but xia can’t say she feels the same. unable to be completely herself, to be made to be some quirky, relatable little kid for the public’s sake.

[i guess so. she’s sweet, at least. i think she likes what she does.]

but it’s not all bad, in xia’s book. being among the youngest of the bunch means she’s frequently doted on, and gets the privilege of teasing her members without seeming to mean. she’s known as “nightmare’s babydoll”, the sort of sunlight in such a dark concept. her fanservice and frequent streams make her a favorite among those who prefer personality to skill, something she can’t decide on whether she likes or not. whatever her beliefs, her marketing as the cute side, the “dawn”, of a hellish nightmare, has been one that’s put xia out of the darkness.

IDOL HISTORY

begin. from the very first few seconds she left the womb, daxia knew she was special. born a daughter, the only child to parents who for so long had tried to conceive a child. while she wasn’t hardly wealthy enough to be deemed spoiled, daxia always felt confident that there was a place for her in the world. her first steps, first words, first meal, all of it was caught on camera alongside the cheers of proud parents. they cherished her. cherished her so much that they never let her out of their sight. how could they, anyways, when all the bad in the world was so willing to swallow up girls like her? daxia was known to be terribly susceptible to colds, had an extensive list of allergies, and all the likes. even her asthma, which she felt was a minor setback, would result in panic anytime it decided to cause her some trouble. she was a small, cute thing, their bao, or treasure.

both in their mid 30s, they raised her in a disciplined yet loving household. to satisfy their fears, the girl was homeschooled all throughout her schooling years, drilled with lessons in math, english, and more. her friends all lay within her stuffed animals, and when she got older shifted to living souls behind her computer screen. with the bulk of social interaction coming from her parents and penpals, xia soon got bored and resorted to a different form of entertainment. something fresh. something….exciting. kpop. her parents, being extremely traditional, accepted nothing but the chinese ballads they filled the house with. so, in secret, she plugged her headphones in and began to fall a little deeper for the celebrities who seemed so far away. her hobby soon became addiction, and within a few months she could tell anyone who listened an alphabetical list of over a hundred boy and girl groups. you see, it took her away. away from her parents, from wuxi, from china. for once, she felt like she wasn’t trapped within her house but instead apart of something much more. korea, in general, soon gained her interest, and she slowly shifted from interest solely in idols to learning the language and culture. by the time she turned 17, she’d begun learning simple phrases and had her eyes set on the country.

if she was being completely and utterly honest with herself, daxia knew she had no place at home. she had no work skills, no real talents, only a passion and a kind soul. it was only when she stumbled upon an advertisement for a talent competition based in korea that she began taking the idea of a future seriously. a future with her passion, in which she may even be able to share the stage with her idols. daxia, being the ambitious teenager she was, worked her hardest to land a spot. staying up late at dance studios, visiting vocal coaches. her savings account, which had largely been holding funds from her job, was emptied to get her plane ticket there.

those dreams soon came crashing down, when her reign of superstar k quickly ended as she left the show with 4th place. the people had loved her bright spirit and small-town girl feel, but it hadn’t been enough to win a talent-based competition. with low spirits and even lower funds, she’d just begun her travels back home when the company she knew well, koala.t, contacted her in hopes of bringing her into the agency. it was clear she had a lot to improve, but her bright spirit and work ethic gave them a sort of momentum.. sooner than she ever thought possible with the talents she had, she was put into nightmare’s lineup. how was it possible? even daxia knew, with the optimistic lenses she saw the world with, that there was less celebrating than she’d hoped. other trainees had worked far longer, far harder, and had the talent to back it up. what was daxia doing, standing next to such talented girls? the thought haunted her, and the constant criticisms of her surprise debut didn’t make it any easier.

just like that, all daxia’s ideas of what reality was were all ripped from her eyes. she was thrown into the trainee scene faster than she could imagine, as her family watched on with shock. in a country she could barely understand, working to be just like the people she’d always felt were in another universe. the transition was anything but easy, filled with tear-filled nights of frustration and the same, sad homesick feeling whenever she thought of her family back home. she was 16, her parent’s bao, who had always been raised a baby. now, here she was, with the culture shock of her life and struck with the reality of independence and the entertainment industry.

nightmare’s concept hit her like a pound of bricks, as she had to learn concepts such as alluring and sexy. never had she been associated with these words before, but she tried her best to catch up with the rest of her members. the cute, soft daxia was certainly still there. but with such high stakes, she was willing to do whatever it took. she was already let go once, and she’d be damned if she let her only opportunity to be a somebody go through her hands like that again. her hard work seemed to be working against her, though, for every time

everyone swears her charm is in her uniqueness, but daxia wishes everything in her it isn’t true. because it’s all her differences that make her faults, and no matter how out there nightmare might be in concept she hopes they don’t say the same about her, the individual. so she smiles like everyone, tries to speak like everyone, and doesn’t dare complain.

because she’s different, she knows, but will do anything to hide from the spotlight and blend into the background.

[zinecuntroll]

3 decades of Queer Women making Herstory through Music

Written for Pink Washed Zine issue #3

by Raquel Silva aka Raquel Smith-Cave

             I turned 30 this year, more precisely last August and it’s also been 12 years since I had my first girlfriend. When I started thinking about my queerness more seriously back in 2005/2006 I quickly realized how it wasn’t that usual for girls to be fascinated by Linda Perry in boxer shorts and combat boots like I was at 5 years old. My mom says 4 Non Blondes “What’s up” was my favorite song back then and she even bought the CD so I could listen to it on repeat and not just wait for the video to magically appear on the TV. Thanks Ma!

              Through my teenage years I had “Baby Can I Hold You” by Tracy Chapman constantly playing in my head. Mind you, I always have a song in my mind and I burst into singing at the most unexpected times, it’s mostly an unconscious act which can be embarrassing in front of people who don’t know me well. Honestly I  don’t care much, it’s just a part of my nature and if I’m not murmuring or humming some melody it usually means there’s something wrong. So at around 15/16 I remember starting to sing the chorus for “But you can say baby…” out of nowhere in school breaks or while walking home. This happened constantly and exactly why my brain was stuck with this melody was a complete mystery to me. Maybe I heard it in passing or on the radio…? I could never find the answer but I did buy Tracy’s self-titled vinyl this year during Record Store Day and discovered it was released exactly 30 years ago. It’s a precious record, her voice is warm and familiar and her guitar is so soothing to the soul. I think I finally answered my teenage self on all that musical haunting.

             Cássia Eller is a Brazilian artist who made the 90s a really wholesome, magical, golden time for every lesbian in love with husky voices. Her hit song “Malandragem” was part of this series called Malhação but I only found out she was the mystical singer behind that iconic childhood tune years after listening to it on the show. She tragically died in 2001 and even after that she still created major impact in society, when her longtime girlfriend won custody of their son, after battling against Cássia’s father who had never cared about his daughter until money was involved. Cássia was a shy person who became a complete lion on stage. Humble and almost too pure to handle the hype. She just wanted to sing to people and exorcise her demons while making others happy. Which she did and so much more. Her legacy is tremendous, as it still resonates with so many of us today and the world hasn’t really witnessed anyone quite as ingenious as her ever since.

               It’s 2007 and I’m watching a live concert in a Portuguese music festival on TV featuring a wild ass singer with the screaming voice of my wildest grrrl dreams. It’s The Gossip! And Beth Ditto is rolling around the stage, singing her lungs out in front of a pretty chill crowd. I wanted to BE THERE. I probably discovered Gossip’s music through CSS who I was obsessed with at the time or probably from watching The L Word. The truth is: the more intrigued I was by the words of this fat, dyke, goddess the more comfortable I felt about my own identity. I was fat for most of my childhood and got bullied for it on a regular basis, just part of being in an all-girls catholic school life I guess. At 13 someone called me “Fufa” which is basically “Dyke” in Portuguese and it was the most traumatic experience ever. Years later I wish I could have thanked the girl who bullied me out of a closet I wasn’t even aware I was in. I don’t believe I was ever in the closet though. Honestly, falling in love with a girl was just as natural as having crushes on boys. It was just another question I had finally found an answer for. Beth Ditto’s pride in her queerness and blatant attraction to butch people while being a proud femme, fat, dyke made me feel represented in a way I hadn’t seen myself before and ok with my own desires. Ditto!

                The first glance of The L Word I watched I didn’t really enjoyed. The image was dark and the plot seemed so tragic. It was Jenny somewhere in the first season. After one year I finally watched the whole 2 or 3 seasons that were out by then. Tegan and Sara play in one episode and are featured in the soundtrack, which I still go back to sometimes to remember really great tunes. What a blessing to have Tegan and Sara guide you through your first acid trip and “coming out of that closet” am I right Dana? (RIP) My love affair with Canadian people started right there with Tegan’s goofiness and Sara’s witty remarks. By 2007 “The Con” came out and became a staple to the LBGTQ+ community. So much so that the band released a special covers album last year, with many queer artists recreating those magnificent songs. In the records that followed their sound was purposefully re directed to more pop melodies which I couldn’t relate to anymore. They did make good use of their huge platform by launching the Tegan and Sara foundation, which fights for LGBTQ girls and women all over the world with the help of some amazing queer people.

                 The other tiny Canadian who owns my heart is Ellen Page. Ever since Juno, my gaydar was just screaming out loud in every direction possible and I’m so happy that she is now able to be herself freely. Just like Juno, my musical top 3 included Patti Smith and Iggy Pop… but not The Runaways. For me it’s actually Nick Cave. I never gave too much attention to The Runaways, though I knew about Joan Jett and her extremely queer badass persona from being a teenager obsessed with punk rock and riot grrrl herstory. Until Kristen Stewart got cast to play Joan for The Runaways movie and I finally listened to their 70s records. I fell in love with Kristen and Dakota’s version of “Dead End Justice” as well as the original. Gaystew was born to play that part. Just last week I saw Bad Reputation, a documentary about Joan’s life with lots of awesome people speaking about how incredible she is, as both a pioneer for women in rock’n roll and an advocate for human and animal rights. At 60 she’s still rocking the fuck out of leather pants, inspiring kids to start bands, making everyone smitten by her confidence and flipping the finger to the all the hypocritical social definitions of gender, sex and music.

                It’s really difficult to write about Janelle Monáe. Not because I don’t have words but mostly because I have too many. Janelle caught my eye and ears with “Tightrope” where she’s prancing around wearing her uniform, as she proudly used to talk about her suit, an homage to her working class parents and Kansas City upbringing. I saw her live at the end of 2010, at a winter festival, where all my other friends went on to watch Sting’s daughter I Blame Coco and I stood front row waiting for Janelle. It was life changing. She danced, jumped, screamed and even painted something into a blank canvas throughout the whole set. Her band was impeccably orchestrated and the show was extremely cinematic, since many of Janelle’s inspirations are from sci-fi movies. Her music is layered and complex just like her personality. Over the years she has been extremely mysterious, one of the things I appreciated the most about her. This year that changed. After much speculation in the media, she said in an interview she’s pansexual, as someone who has had relationships with men and women, that’s how she identifies more comfortably. Above all she’s an artist with a very specific vision and talent, carving the path for Afrofuturism; to create space for black people but especially queer POC to conquer over the systematic racism, lack of opportunities and prejudice in our society. Her new record “Dirty Computer” is the materialization of that evolution, the most “Janelle” album ever. Covering everything from sexual freedom to political issues while using a pop funky beat. Reminiscing one of her heroes, Prince, who became a friend and mentor before passing away in 2016. And all I want for 2019 is to be in the same room as Janelle and take on another voyage dans la lune with all the other androids.

                 Annie Clark has also played around with the idea of being an alien or a cyborg, especially on her self-titled album from 2014. That’s when I saw her live for the time and I had to give into my friend’s obsession with her music. Last year St. Vincent released “Masseduction”, an almost perfect record, in my opinion. The song with the same title is most definitely an anthem for our generation “I can’t turn off what turns me on…” and after a long relationship with model/actress Cara Delevingne or that summer fling with Kristen Stewart, it was clear, Annie is queer. (Pun so intended) While songs like “New York” or “Los Ageless” can be associated to both of those relationships, Annie’s talent as an exquisite guitar player, fearless innovative sounds and unique live shows, have made her the intergalactic rock Goddess of our queer dreams.

                 Widely inspired by Annie Clark is my next musical Queeroe. Mackenzie Scott aka Torres. There’s something about debut albums that I really love and Torres self-titled LP from 2013 is definitely in my top favorites list. It’s really fucking sad music with raw emotion, as you can hear in “Honey”, “Jealousy and I” or “When Winter’s over”. Her second album “Sprinter” showed a very exciting evolution in her sound but it’s “Three Futures” from 2017 that encapsulates Mackenzie’s desire towards experimenting with her sexuality in a more explicit way. As seen in the video for the first single where she takes on gender roles as both feminine and masculine characters who are living the dreadful “American Dream”. Plus the cover picture for that record is her staring at a semi naked woman on a pole, marking 2017 as very gay year for music.      

                Laura Jane Grace’s voice first made waves through my ears because of the collab Against Me! did with Tegan Quin back in 2007 for the single “Borne On The FM Waves Of The Heart”. The song didn’t stick to me that long and although I had heard Against Me! was my kind of band I never took the time to really listen to them. Until 2014, when “Transgender Dysphoria Blues” was released and it rapidly became one of the most important records of my life. I started watching many interviews with Laura Jane about the struggles of coming out as a trans woman in this fucked up world, specifically while being part of the punk scene, where there’s not much space for anything other than toxic masculinity. I related to Laura’s journey and with every single lyrics on “True trans soul rebel” since it felt like the most authentic punk anthem I had heard in a while. I went to their first ever gig in Portugal in 2015 and screamed as much as I could surrounded by my family of misfits, all wearing black and their heart tattoos on their sleeves. I dug into Against Me! discography but other than the single “I was a teenage anarchist” which I already knew, nothing got me hooked as much as “Transgender Dysphoria Blues” did. Laura Jane’s name is very much appropriate, for her Grace is felt through her screams as much as her written words, something I found fascinating while reading her auto biography: “Tranny: Confessions of Punk Rock's Most Infamous Anarchist Sellout”. I loved every page of it, with original diary pieces, she takes us on a wild precious ride from her childhood and family issues to all the drama in the music industry or the tribulations of managing a band in this time and age. There’s really nothing more punk rock than being yourself and Laura Jane does it with so much effortless coolness and Grace.

            I tried not to listen to Courtney Barnett for months. I had seen the hype around her but didn’t feel quite ready to embark in that journey and my queers did I regret it… She played at Primavera Sound Porto in 2015 and I started listening to her on loop only weeks after that. The heartbreaking part is that I was also at that festival. The good part is that she came back in 2016 to another festival in Lisbon and I was there just for her (and Father John Misty). Which felt like the stars had aligned with my musical desires. She’s unapologetically herself but not in the way that you would say so about Cardi B for example. She’s wickedly smart with her words and unexpectedly brutal with her chords, right before she opens her mouth she looks like the sweetest person you will ever meet and after you are transported to her own island, full of genius puns, sarcastic inputs about daily life or the state of the world. My favorite verse is from “Pedestrian at best” and I almost got it tattooed… “Give me all your money and I’ll make some origami honey”. Which to me roughly translates to: Fuck Capitalism! She’s also very open about her long term relationship with her wife and fellow musician Jen Cloher, making them the ultimate indie rock’s queer power couple.

                 2016 was the darkest year of my life. I stopped listening to music for months, stopped sleeping and my panic attacks would strike me even if I was in the middle of a busy street. It was scary to lose myself in such dark thoughts but then one day I listened to Shura’s song “Too shy” and felt like a little bit of me was alive again. Her debut album “Nothing’s real” came out around that time and her lyrics for the title song were exactly what I felt through my depression. In this song she is writing about her own experience with a panic attack that makes you feel like dying. And they do. “Too Shy” is a beautiful tune about unrequited love because you are simply too fucking shy to ever go for it and ask your crush on a date. Being shy and anxious almost always go hand in hand, as an awkward, quiet, weird introvert myself, discovering Shura’s songs and story gave me hope and made me gather the lost pieces of my own identity, leaving all the pain, shame and constant anxiety behind. Music really is medicine for the soul.

                 Julien Baker also has one of the best debut albums I’ve ever heard. Personally, it’s very special because it marks the beginning of my current relationship, as my girlfriend surprised me with Julien’s “Sprained Ankle” vinyl just weeks after we started dating. That vinyl did not leave my record player for the last months of 2016 and whenever I listen to it now, I am instantly transported to that moment in time. I was finally getting back on my feet and everything was falling into place, Julien’s gigantic voice echoed my natural melancholy, embracing my demons with a new found strength.  I’ve seen her twice, both times a very out of body experience and had the pleasure to let her know how much her music has helped me. We hugged, talked and she even has the zine I make (CuntRoll) in her living room table because she likes it so much. She is someone I could definitely see myself hanging out in my group of friends and that’s what I love the most about this new generation of artists, who aren’t trying to be something they’re not for the sake of money or exposure. They embrace who they are and let the world decide if they wanna take it or leave it. And that’s exactly what we need right now, to accept and embrace people for who they are and the art they make. So we can all to the same in our own lives.

                 “Yeah I’ve got it I’m a man now…” are the verses that got stuck with me for weeks after listening to Christine and The Queens single “iT”. Yes, the capital T is on purpose as it represents testosterone, the hormone used by many Trans AFAB people to start the process of becoming more themselves. This androgynous handsome French creature original name is Heloise and since her worldwide success with her first record “Chaleur Humaine” she has shredded so many stereotypes through her music, her dancing and her style. I hate comparing artists but some people call her “ the French Michael Jackson” for a reason. My chin dropped while watching her cover for Beyonce’s “Sorry” which she transformed into her own song like it’s nobody’s business (please go watch it asap). This year she blessed as with her second LP just called “Chris” inviting the world to be a little bit closer to her. Chris is her nickname and presents us with a new image for Heloise, embracing her masculine vibe more than ever before, with short hair, loose clothing and talking proudly about queer issues in many interviews. The video for the single “5 dollars” is the epitome of gender fucking and the reason why I am even gayer now tbh.  (You should watch that also!) The future is genderqueer.

                 I stayed away from the hype of “Girls like Girls” back in 2015 because I’m mostly suspicious of pop artists using gay stories to go with the trend of pink washing, ie Katy Perry “I kissed a girl” is a fucking jam but also really fucking problematic, coming from a cis het white female who has no idea the struggles of being queer. Hayley Kiyoko is most definitely not one of those artists though, as she has slowly but certainly become the Lesbian Jesus we’ve all been praying for. With “Curious” she let us know there’s a new fucking boss in town and she’s so fucking gay. What a time to be alive, 20gayteen is real and we are here to witness it all. Hayley’s not the greatest singer in the world, but she uses the best of her skills to give voice to all the kids who struggled with feeling alienated because they couldn’t fit in anywhere. She creates videos which are more like short stories, where she not only acts, but also writes and directs with her own team, never compromising her vision to tell the stories she wants to tell. Stories that resonate with so many queer people and we all know how important representation is, especially coming from an authentic source. To have such a person in the mainstream is what Tegan and Sara were thriving for a few years ago but the result wasn’t very genuine, something that doesn’t happen with Hayley’s songs. Her album “Expectations” doesn’t have big hits, other than “Feelings and “Curious” but it’s the debut album of someone with a huge potential and vision to take up the space for ourselves to tell our own stories and no one else.

                Linn Da Quebrada is the musical Goddess of the moment. Eloquent, inspiring, caustic, no one is left indifferent after listening to her. And that's exactly what she wants, to leave us on our tiptoes waiting to be carried away by words of pleasure, empowerment, trans feminism and especially so much self-love. Each verse is a lyrical genius clapback in the face of this transphobic, sexist and racist society. Prejudices that kill so many queer people of color in Brazil every year. Her existence is transforming, rewriting the HERSTORY of the world and of her country, through the re-appropriation of funk, where SHE finally gets to be the protagonist of her own story and that courage surpasses linguistic or cultural barriers. In 2017 she released her first album “Pajubá” after a very successful crowdfunding campaign and also has her own documentary called “Bixa Travesty” which has gathered accolades through many film festivals around the world. The song “Bixa Preta” is a fucking iconic anthem for 20gayteen and for all of my maricones family out in the world fighting everyday for our existence to be respected.

We will NEVER be erased.

[kylorenpunk]

Do them all. Suffer as I did 😂

Bitch I told you this was our friendship. We force each other to answer all the questions. 

1. selfie

Well… I wasn’t dubbed Selfie Queen for nothing… 

This one is interesting bc I have zero makeup on. The most recent ones are too blurry. A lot of my fav selfies are full faces of makeup tho. 

2. what would you name your future kids?

I feel like that’s a decision for both parents but I really like the names Felicity, Isabella and Dimitri. Yes, all of them are names from various franchises I enjoyed throughout the years. Be glad I’m out of my phase where I thought Vladimir was a good name. 

3. do you miss anyone?

I miss all my friends I don’t get to see frequently. Love all of y’all and hope y’all are doing well in life! 

4. what are you looking forward to?

Fucking graduating. Jesus Christ it’s taken me five damn years. 

5. is there anyone who can always make you smile?

From my club it’s Chris, Yara and Josephine. Also my entire friend group from back home. Honestly I love my friends so much. 

6. is it hard for you to get over someone?

I feel like every situation is different so that’s a tough question to answer. 

7. what was your life like last year?

I honestly don’t remember much from December of last year. It was a good time though. 

8. have you ever cried because you were so annoyed?

I’m an emotional bitch. I’ll cry over anything. I cried over fucking Mulan the other day. 

9. who did you last see in person?

My parents and brother. Earlier in the day my club. 

10. are you good at hiding your feelings?

I’m shit at it. My face gives away everything. The other day my professor was going into her inspiration porn narrative and I just gave her a cold dead look the entire time. 

11. are you listening to music right now?

No but I have the Hamilton soundtrack stuck in my head right now since that’s what I was last listening to. If you haven’t heard it I highly suggest it. Man I wanna see it so badly. 

12. what is something you want right now?

Sleep but I’m trying not to throw off my sleep schedule right now and am waiting a bit before going to bed. I only got three hours of sleep last night so that’s fun. 

13. how do you feel right now?

Kinda tired. Relieved that I got two service projects in a row done today. It’s been a long weekend. 

14. when was the last time someone of the opposite sex hugged you?

My friend Sebastian hugged me when I dropped him off. I guess that counts. 

15. personality description

I’m a makeup loving nerd who enjoys sitting in pajamas watching anime and superheros as much as she enjoys swatching EVERY lipstick in Sephora. According to my friends I can’t go 5 seconds without mentioning how old I feel and my love for Dungeons and Dragons. I’m also an asshole. (Wow this sounds like a 12 year old writing this)

16. have you ever wanted to tell someone something but you didn’t?

Yeah tons of times. It’s bitten me in the ass. Oh well live and learn I guess? 

17. opinion on insecurities.

Everyone has them? If they say they don’t then they are lying. Mine is mainly related to my appearance or how I speak. 

18. do you miss how thing were a year ago?

I miss how things were in the beginning of this year. It started off strong then kinda turned into a shit show. 

19. have you ever been to New York?

No but it’s my top thing on my bucket list. My friends and I are highly considering a trip. 

20. what is your favourite song at the moment?

Of all time: Get Low by Lil Jon 

Currently: “Told You So” by Little Mix (If you haven’t heard their new album I highly suggest it if you love girl groups that preach women empowerment) 

21. age and birthday?

22 - June 21st (She’s a Cancer)

22. description of crush.

I don’t have a hardcore crush right now. More like 5 second crushes that are over the second they do something I don’t like. 

Edit: Currently “celebrity?” crush is Nathan Sharp. I am seriously considering dropping $55 to see him at a convention this month. 

23. fear(s)

Heights, something terrible happening to my loved ones, wild snakes, and the usual common anxiety fears 

24. height

Five foot three inches. I’m short. Yes I know it’s not that short but tall people like to put me in the short category anyway. 

25. role model

My mom’s coworker who was my internship supervisor. She has a doctorate’s in what I want to do and is amazing at what she does. The amount of knowledge and experience that women has is incredible. She is also extremely funny and knows how to teach with a sense of humor which I appreciate. 

26. idol(s)

Celebrity idols? I don’t really idolize celebrities bc humans are humans and have flaws. 

27. things i hate

Immaturity, intolerance of differences, demeaning slurs, The Last Jedi, and the new Fantastic Beasts movie 

28. i’ll love you if…

Play with my hair, are kind to my friends and family, share common interests, show an interest in what I have to say, basically respect me and those close to me and we’re good 

29. favourite film(s)

Hairspray, High School Musical, The Greatest Showman, Stardust, The Harry Potter series, Avengers, Guardians of the Galaxy

30. favourite tv show(s)

Jane the Virgin, Naruto (fuck off I hate myself too ok), the first three seasons of Arrow before it turned to shit

31. 3 random facts

I’m not artistically talented but I genuinely enjoy makeup and creating looks

I have a nonverbal brother with autism and he’s my favorite person ever

I completely programmed my brother’s communication device by myself 

32. are your friends mainly girls or guys?

Now my friends are mainly girls but when I lived in Tampa 90% of my friends over there were guys (Hi Mason). I’m going to say that’s bc of us all playing video games in the Delta lounge (RIP Dirty D). But yeah now it’s mainly girls and 80% of my dude friends are gay. 

33. something you want to learn

Sign Language. Ice skating. Hairstyling. Fashion (I’m trying to be better about putting clothes together). Also I’m down to learn more about makeup and techniques 

34. most embarrassing moment

Either farting while doing an air guitar in front of my entire girl scout troop

or signing to my friend that I liked her friend at a party and his brother repeated what I had signed out loud in front of everyone

wait. No. When I F U C K E D  up in front a super hot guy while volunteering and then chose an 18 year old jock as my wingman. 18 year olds are dumbasses. Don’t use them as wingmen. Fuck you Khaled. 

35. favourite subject

In grade school I think it was English or History. It really all depended on the year. 

36. 3 dreams you want to fulfill?

VISIT NEW YORK 

Hike the Smokey Mountains 

Visit Europe 

37. favourite actor/actress

Chris Evans (especially when he is trying to fight orange president on twitter) 

Also Mark Hamill is perfect 

38. favourite comedian(s)

I don’t watch comedians often. I guess the Fluffy guy? 

39. favourite sport(s)

The only time I give a shit about sports is when my university is undefeated or playing my first university in football. Or the soccer world cup if it’s on. However I appreciate the skill it takes to do a sport. 

40. favourite memory

San Antonio. It was my first time traveling without family and it was the greatest time. It was such a cool city 

41. relationship status 

Single - I take my sweet ass time 

42. favourite book(s)

Eragon (No, I haven’t finished the entire series. No, I don’t want spoilers bc I will do it eventually.) 

43. favourite song ever

“Get Low” by Lil Jon 

“Look Through My Eyes” by Phil Collins 

44. age you get mistaken for

Last year I got mistaken twice in a row within an hour for a middle schooler. I was 21 at at that time. During my internship one of the parents asked me if I had any kids. I’m either mistaken as a parent or as a 13-15 year old. There is no in between.  

45. how you found out about your idol

N/A since I don’t have an idol

46. what my last text message says

“lmao it’s alright” to Joey but the previous one is more funny “thankfully no one threw up this time” in regards to my friend’s party last night

47. turn ons

Well I aint about to talk about my sex life so let’s go with personality 

Common interests such as superheros or anime, charismatic, easy to get along with, common goals in life, cares about their loved ones, has passion, and someone I can hold an intellectual conversation with 

48. turn offs

rudeness, immaturity, inattentiveness, bad tempers, superiority complex, not being genuine, judging others, treating people like objects, and general lack of care for others or themselves

49. where i want to be right now

Back in the smokey mountains in a cabin watching movies and anime

50. favourite picture of your idol

N/A 

51. starsign

She’s an emotional Cancer

52. something i’m talented at

Apparently I’m good with kids      Makeup too I guess? 

53. 5 things that make me happy

friends, family, nerdy shit, makeup and Kakashi

54. something thats worrying me at the moment

Some shit happened last night that has me worried for some friends but I’m sure they’ll figure it out 

55. tumblr friends

A shit ton of y’all I know IRL. I won’t tag y’all bc that’s annoying af 

Joey’s my only internet friend @earthschampion (answer my text bitch) 

56. favourite food(s)

pasta, empanadas, crab rangoons, taziki sauce 

57. favourite animal(s)

Meerkats and koala bears

58. description of my best friend

K @burnitstronger: realest damn friend you will ever have. Will tell you how it is and provide never ending love and support. Never understands my dumbass shenanigans but loves me anyway. Love you boo 

J : Will also tell you how it is and forces you to watch Naruto and ruin your damn life. Will happily go with you to eat junk food after class. Will fight anyone who wrongs you and is def still plotting revenge on all my ex’s. Stans Loona

M: Will scream at you in Leo in a frightening but loving way. Has the best damn fashion sense I have ever seen. Is the friend that comes by when I need her to and brings a shit ton of snacks and love (J does this as well).

59. why i joined tumblr

I was bored on fourth of July in 2012 and my friends kept telling me that this website would be fun. Also the avengers “fandom” from back then 

60. ask me anything you want

I would say I’m sorry Mason but I enjoy making all my friends suffer. Make sure to give him a follow bc he’s cool. @masonjar828

[astralgloss]

im a curious meanie so 1-134 muhahaha you get to relive the hell i just went through

etab i haTE U

1: Name

my name is marit lol but please just keep it mar

2: Age

i am 17 but i’ll b 18 in 2 months!!!!

3: 3 Fears

the dark, complete and utter loneliness, and clowns

4: 3 things I love

books, forest fruit tea, the sound of rain

5: 4 turns on

a nice smile that reaches the eyes, a nice smell, having a dog ngl, a soft touch

6: 4 turns off

extreme arrogance, insisting to pay for my meal if i want to pay bc its “what a man should do”, forcing lifestyles on me, not caring about my interests

7: My best friend

she does have tumblr but idk it but hey demi if u ever see this ur the bomb.com

8: Sexual orientation

im bi fam

9: My best first date

my bf and i went to amsterdam to go shopping and he followed me everywhere (even the bookshop even though he hates books) and idk i just love him it was a nice day

10: How tall am I

im 1,65m or 5′4″ but i can and will kick ur ass

11: What do I miss

nothing really??

12: What time was I born

ok so i asked my mom and she said i was born on a tuesday at exactly 12pm but i bet she’s lying

13: Favorite color

yellow!! im basic!!

14: Do I have a crush

well i sure hope so @ boyfriend

15: Favorite quote

to the stars who listen, and the dreams that are answered

16: Favorite place

my bf’s house tbh, specifically his bed

17: Favorite food

pizza, specifically the hot chicken one from ny pizza

18: Do I use sarcasm

nah fam (ofc i do im a little shit)

19: What am I listening to right now

god is a woman by ariana grande

20: First thing I notice in new person

how they look at other people when those people don’t notice it

21: Shoe size

38/39 idk the other size lol sorry 

22: Eye color

its blue but it changes with my mood (oh my god im so sorry im kidding please don’t hate me)

23: Hair color

im a blondie

24: Favorite style of clothing

sth casual but also a bit towards the punkish style, but i also rlly love looking tiny and soft and cute lol

25: Ever done a prank call?

ok so there’s this hotline for kids who have troubles with their parents and families but it was a shit hotline tbh so once i called it up with my friends pretending i was crying and the man on the phone asked me what was wrong so i told him that all my friends had fire type pokemon and i only had grass type pokemon and they kept beating me and i didnt know what to do and then man was so confused it was funny af

27: Meaning behind my URL

idk man i wanted a name that could b easy to remember and i was inspired by ridgeport tbh

28: Favorite movie

the perks of being a wallflower

29: Favorite song

Fav song atm is anything from p!atd's newest album and my fav song of all time is probably train of consequences by megadeth

30: Favorite band

megadeth lol

31: How I feel right now

pretty good but also annoyed bc i have to go to work in half an hour :(

32: Someone I love

my bf

33: My current relationship status

if u guys havent noticed by now im taken

34: My relationship with my parents

p ok

35: Favorite holiday

halloween/christmas

36: Tattoos and piercing i have

I have my ears pierced and thats it lol

37: Tattoos and piercing i want

i rlly want a few bookish related tattoos, like a tiny raven, a little lightning bolt, and the city of velaris and then i also rlly want a sleeve tbh but imma be a teacher and idk if i can :/ about piercings: i rlly want a helix or tragus and maybe get second holes in my hearlobes

38: The reason I joined Tumblr

ok so ive been on tumblr for about 5 years and initially it was bc i was Depressed™ and then about a year ago i found out about simblr and i was hooked

39: Do I and my last ex hate each other?

tbh i dont even talk to him anymore i dont rlly care about him in any way

40: Do I ever get “good morning” or “good night ” texts?

yes bih

41: Have I ever kissed the last person you texted?

hes my bf so yea lol

42: When did I last hold hands?

wednesday

43: How long does it take me to get ready in the morning?

about 45 minutes bc im lazy and i keep getting distracted

44: Have You shaved your legs in the past three days?

nope

45: Where am I right now?

in bed lol

46: If I were drunk & can’t stand, who’s taking care of me?

either my bf or my best friend

47: Do I like my music loud or at a reasonable level?

depends on where i am

48: Do I live with my Mom and Dad?

mom

49: Am I excited for anything?

tbh moving out but thats gonna take a few more years

50: Do I have someone of the opposite sex I can tell everything to?

*insert bf here*

51: How often do I wear a fake smile?

every time im at work lol

52: When was the last time I hugged someone?

wednesday

53: What if the last person I kissed was kissing someone else right in front of me?

lol bye

54: Is there anyone I trust even though I should not?

nope

55: What is something I disliked about today?

the fact that i have to work a day shift instead of an evening shift

56: If I could meet anyone on this earth, who would it be?

my internet friends tbh it’d be cool to meet all the people from my bookish discord or from @booptherat​‘s discord

57: What do I think about most?

what book i should read next

58: What’s my strangest talent?

i can finish a book in about 4 hours

59: Do I have any strange phobias?

not rlly? i hate the whole asmr thing tho ew

60: Do I prefer to be behind the camera or in front of it?

behind lol

61: What was the last lie I told?

i dont remember tbh

62: Do I prefer talking on the phone or video chatting online?

neither lol

63: Do I believe in ghosts? How about aliens?

look im not saying that believing that we’re the only living species in the entire universe is narcissistic, but it is. also dont fuck with ghosts

64: Do I believe in magic?

hell yes

65: Do I believe in luck?

hell yes

66: What’s the weather like right now?

idk probably cloudy and windy

67: What was the last book I’ve read?

fahrenheit 451 by ray bradbury 

68: Do I like the smell of gasoline?

nah not rlly

69: Do I have any nicknames?

i guess mar?

70: What was the worst injury I’ve ever had?

when i was 2 i fell from sth and slammed the corner of my eye onto the corner of a table and i couldve been blind but thank god im not

71: Do I spend money or save it?

both 

72: Can I touch my nose with a tongue?

yup

73: Is there anything pink in 10 feet from me?

post it notes

74: Favorite animal?

doggg

75: What was I doing last night at 12 AM?

reading lol

76: What do I think is Satan’s last name is?

idk man

77: What’s a song that always makes me happy when I hear it?

i gotta feeling by the black eyed peas lol

78: How can you win my heart?

give me a samoyed and a 1000 books

79: What would I want to be written on my tombstone?

“a boss ass bitch”

80: What is my favorite word?

fuck?

81: My top 5 blogs on tumblr

@cubersims​ @imvikai​ @ridgeport​ @cowplant-pizza​ @bloomlet​ @tiptoptab​

82: If the whole world were listening to me right now, what would I say?

spend fiddies, pet kitties, hold tiddies

83: Do I have any relatives in jail?

not that i know of lol

84: I accidentally eat some radioactive vegetables. They were good, and what’s even cooler is that they endow me with the super-power of my choice! What is that power?

the power to choose whatever power i want at any moment

85: What would be a question I’d be afraid to tell the truth on?

“do you like working here?”

86: What is my current desktop picture?

its an august background from @emmastudies​

87: Had sex?

yes

88: Bought condoms?

no

89: Gotten pregnant?

no

90: Failed a class?

yes

91: Kissed a boy?

yup, i’ve been kissing my bf for about 2,5 years now lol

92: Kissed a girl?

yup, i’m living the bisexual dream lol

93: Have I ever kissed somebody in the rain?

yes

94: Had job?

yes, im working at a movie theater right now!!

95: Left the house without my wallet?

tbh all the time now that i can pay with my phone

96: Bullied someone on the internet?

yea i used to but that was when i was 12 and i’d like to say that i’ve grown a lot in the past 5 years

97: Had sex in public?

nope

98: Played on a sports team?

yes

99: Smoked weed?

nope, even though i live like 20 minutes away from amsterdam lol

100: Did drugs?

nope

101: Smoked cigarettes?

nope

102: Drank alcohol?

yupppp, i love me some raspberry cider

103: Am I a vegetarian/vegan?

nope

104: Been overweight?

nope

105: Been underweight?

nope

106: Been to a wedding?

yup

107: Been on the computer for 5 hours straight?

lol all the time tbh

108: Watched TV for 5 hours straight?

yup

109: Been outside my home country?

yup, however never outside of europe tho

110: Gotten my heart broken?

a few times

111: Been to a professional sports game?

yess, i saw the dutch female volleyball team once!

112: Broken a bone?

nope

113: Cut myself?

yes

114: Been to prom?

we dont do prom in the netherlands lol

115: Been in airplane?

yes

116: Fly by helicopter?

nope

117: What concerts have I been to?

k3 (only dutchies and belgians remember this), one direction, megadeth, and ed sheeran

118: Had a crush on someone of the same sex?

yupp

119: Learned another language?

i mean im from the netherlands and im fluent in english thanks to myself

120: Wore make up?

yuppp

121: Lost my virginity before I was 18?

yes

122: Had oral sex?

lol yes

123: Dyed my hair?

nope

124: Voted in a presidential election?

not old enough to vote :(

125: Rode in an ambulance?

nope

126: Had a surgery?

nope

127: Met someone famous?

nope

128: Stalked someone on a social network?

nope

129: Peed outside?

a few times lol

130: Been fishing?

nope

131: Helped with charity?

yep

132: Been rejected by a crush?

a few times

133: Broken a mirror?

lol yes

134: What do I want for birthday?

some books, money, cake, more books, makeup

[attract-mode-collective]

Scorpion Vs. Elon Musk’s Mom: FIGHT

Yes, that is indeed Elon Musk’s mother up there. And no, I do not have a bigger sized version of the pic. Guess we could always ask captain-price-official if one does exist.

Or perhaps make your own? Here’s Elon’s mum by herself (and in higher res)...

And with that, it’s time to see what else I tweeted during the first half of March! So, sticking with fighting games: which Street Fighter character does lighting better? Ryu, via the animated movie (via settei)...

… Or Bison, via the live action flick (via toghomevideo)...

I absolutely love win quotes from rom hacks (via bison2winquote)...

I have a massive backlog of games, yet Tekken 7 just shot straight to the top of the list, thanks to the knowledge that you can accurately recreate Dynamite Headdy characters (via mysterious0bob)...

This Hatsune Miku X Space Channel 5 figure is v. nice (via nendoroidoftheday)...

A friendly reminder to everyone that A. I'm a massive fan of Seaman & B. my birthday is about a month away (via nutastic)...

This scene at the beach with a Figma of Link, from A Link Between Worlds, feels more like Link's Awakening than anything else (via vyntic)...

Toys and models are no longer just for reenacting memorable in-game moments, they can also reproduce famous IRL events that surrounded the games themselves (via 8bitcentral)...

So what's the going rate for ET for the Atari 2600 that was supposedly dug up in for that so-called documentary, Atari: Game Over? Which I recently re-watched and still can't believe people think is real. At any rate, am assuming the autograph from Howard Scott Warshaw gives it some actual value (via it8bit)...

And what's the going rate for Chinese Famiclone karaoke carts, primarily one with Jackie Chan on the label. Am also wondering if it's cuz his songs are included... you are aware of his successful career in music as well, right? (via ulan-bator)...

Been struggling to come up with a zinger for the past 10 minutes, but ain't nuthin gonna beat "Welcome to the Velvet Room y'all!" (via jatayu)...

To be filed under: it's funny cuz it's true (via doctorbutler)...

So the weather has been awful around these parts, lots of rain & snow, which gets in the way of imagining a giant tetromino in the sky (via uvula.jp)...

When playing Super Mario Galaxy 2, please keep in mind that somewhere out there, despite being out of view, is the ghost of Luigi floating through vast stretches of empty space, with zero destination or purpose (via suppermariobroth)...

Speaking of Luigi, and Supper Mario Broth; they’ve taken the adventures he talks about in Paper Mario: The Thousand Year Door and illustrated them in the form of a comic that closely adheres to the style of the game...

Also a friendly reminder of that rift between Mario & Luigi for a few years (they'd eventually make up & resume doing games together, as everyone knows) after Mario discovered his brother being all friendly with the enemy in Super Mario World (via peazy86)...

Yet another obscure Mario factoid: the move he uses to defeat Bowser in Super Mario 64 originates from an old furikake commercial that predates the game by about a decade (via suppermariobroth)...

Yet another random gif of Mario from the 80s, this one from a video guide from Super Mario Bros; I miss the days in which his look was not yet standardized (via suppermariobroth)...

And here we have a completely unlicensed Dr. Mario, unless Nintendo gave him the OK to brush up on his doctoring skills by assuming an alias at a family clinic in Houston TX (via suppermariobroth)...

It's funny how, when it comes to obscure Mario games, everyone brings up Mario Is Missing or Hotel Mario, but what about Super Mario Bros. & Friends: When I Grow Up? (via kazucrash)...

Mario gets his own breakfast cereal.

Luigi? Booze. (via @carolynmichelle)

A question that I posed on MAR10Day (via retrogamerblog)...

It's not Super Mario Bros, but simply…. Bros (via therubberfruit)...

I've never wanted something "bootleg" to be official as much as as this Dark Souls fan art. And if the actual game somehow looked like this, that would be... gladly welcomed (via gamefreaksnz)

Oh God, Nier is amazing and all, but I would SO be down for a yelling & screaming match with Yoko Taro on this point (via @Avisch_)...

Behold my fave Twitter thread in recent memory: "You see, that was taken from Africa, but it belonged to the Keyblade Masters. Imma take it off your hands for ya."

"Nah, It was taken by British soldiers in Africa but it's actually from Gaia. A sword far heavier than any sword has rights to be, yet a true 1st Class will wield it with ease. Don't trip, I'm gonna take it off your hands for you."

"Nah, It was taken by British soldiers in Africa but it's actually from Hyrule. Originally crafted by the goddess Hylia herself. Only a true hero that is pure of heart and strong of body is capable of wielding the sacred blade. Don't trip, I'm gonna take it off your hands for you."

Naturally the star of Home Alone 1 & Home Alone 2 has both a NES Classic and Famicom Mini, like all Hollywood bigwigs (via @SimonParkin)...

While discussing Ready Player One with a colleague, was reminded of the dude who was so inspired by the book that he turned his apartment into an arcade (and then his fiancé broke up with him; via nydailynews.com)...

Recently there was some kind of event at Sega HQ, I think? Details are basically nonexistent due to the language barrier, but far as I can gather, 16 super fans were invited to come by & party (via @SEGA_OFFICIAL)...

... If you check out #セガ公式アカウントオフ会 you'll see numerous pics from the get-together, though the one thing that stands out is the assortment of Sega hardware (via @KK__Cy)...

... MIA, cuz no variants were on display, is my fave alt ver. of the Mega Drive: the Wondermega. But @yu100s took one of his own… with the ugly ass US Sonic 1 NOT FOR RESALE cart inserted, Jesus fucking Christ...

The Sega logo in katakana looks pretty hawt (via @Exciteless)...

... Yet the Sega logo in Arabic which is official, is even hawter (via boingboing.net)...

Please enjoy your daily recommended dosage of an erotic hospital-management sim (via @topherflorence)...

NCSX makes the fidget spinner comparison, though the fidget cube seems a bit more appropriate; behold the fidget game controller...

Toy Fair recently took place, and naturally I took tons of pictures. You can find all of them on my personal Instagram, though a few are worth re-posting here. Like the latest in NECA's line of classic movie characters, as they appeared in video game adaptations...

Though in the case of their take on the Alien vs. Predator arcade game, they even included Capcom's original characters...

Unpainted, pre-production figures from Reflection's upcoming Ghost 'N Goblins line, sporting the oh-so popular Kenner-eqsue retro look...

Pint-sized arcade cabs, available this fall for $400. They’ll come unassembled, though dead simple to put together; the construction of the assembled mini cab was surprisingly sturdy, plus the screen wasn't bad (contrary to the picture that my iPhone's camera paints). Though the controls were shit; no word on whether the parts can be swapped or not...

Was delighted to not not only see Cuphead merch at Toy Fair, but more than just one instance (though this was the only time I was allowed to take a picture)...

Came across a producer of infant goods that had a selection of Super Mario baby bibs...

I asked the rep if this was their first foray into video games and the answer was "Yes." And when asked who's been mostly buying them, was told "Video game collectors, who don't even have children… it's so bizarre!!!"

Sticking with bibs, here's a set that tied to Dragon Quest (via miki800.com)...

... I asked on Twitter what they said and @alexfkraus was kind enough to provide translations, here and here.

Was so inspired by @MinusWorld listing which characters he'd like to see in the next Super Smash Bros that I decided to cite a few of my own:

- Mona from WarioWare - Nester from Nintendo Power’s Howard & Nester comics - Link from that Japanese A Link To The Past commercial - A deck of Hanafuda cards

... BTW, had no idea Ollie also mentioned a Hanafuda; I only saw his initial four, initially! Anyhow, my second round of choices:

- Ashley from Another Code - The "who are you running from?" guy in the Game Boy Camera - Lucas from The Wizard - The 4WD from Stunt Race FX (since Fighters Megamix with the Daytona USA 2 car clearly ain't ever happening)

I alas forgot to include BoxBoy, much like how I got these Uniqlo shirts when they were on sale last year (via minusworld.co.uk)...

Here we have my fave reaction on Tumblr to the Nintendo Direct with the Smash 5 reveal, if only for the punchline (via mendelpalace)...

And here we have my fave reaction on Twitter (via @redford)...

This one is also great because wrestling (via @SteveYurko)...

Speaking of wrestling, remember that time Tazz, while commentating for Smackdown, was also playing a game of Final Fantasy X-2… or so he thought? (via defjamvendetta)

"hey quick question whoever's developing the wwe games now: what the fuck"

"It helps him eat small fish"

"better question: why isn't this an option in every game ever"

"FAIR POINT" (via snoozlebee)

Whereas most publishers in Japan, during the 80s & 90s, had festivals (or carnivals) centered around shmups, Asmik's was based on women's wrestling (via oldgamemags)...

It's not for a video game, though the illustration is by someone who has been involved in a few; it's by Satoshi Yoshioka, of Snatcher and Policenauts fame (via videogamesdensetsu)...

It's not for a video game that actually exists, but is instead a completely fictional instructional manual, one that makes you wish it was real (via tomeccles)...

Just when you think you've seen every ultra, wacky & obscure video game box art there is to see out there (via @CoolBoxArt)...

I have a serious soft sport for the usage of video game imagery among early 80s musicians (via siryl)...

... What the final product looks like BTW/FYI...

A. so there's a VR version of Fruit Ninja, did not know that, & B. if you like watching people play it (for whatever reason), yet wish you could actually see a person swinging a sword and not just some abstract swiping motions… here ya go (via prostheticknowledge)...

Playing games in VR is so 2017… Handling your collection of games in VR? Now THAT is very 2018 (via mendelpalace)...

Lots of friends are playing the new DBZ fighting game, though I'll give it a shot once it hits the arcades and is also in a cab like this (via @Fotosdecomics)...

I absolutely need to get my hands on this S.H. Figuarts Shinya Arino (via tinycartridge)...

Available right now, some Altered Beast, Bare Knuckles, and Rent-a-Hero resin kits (via miki800.com)...

Cursed? More like blessed amirite (via @Pretzel_Pup)...

I know Yoji Shinkawa is best buds with Hideo Kojima, but would he be open to doing another gig at Konami? Cuz him art directing a reboot of Twin Bee would kinda be the best (via @SESKOU)...

There's money on the table with this Metroid X Pepsi mash-up, am confident of this (via ryangilleece)...

Cuz even someone like Samus Aran needs a good stretch every once in a while (via jon-bliss)...

And this third piece of Metroid fan art in a row is very much related to Metroid 3, aka Super Metroid (even though it technically depicts the ending to Metroid 2; via mmillus)...

Awakening indeed (via brookietf)...

For those who have asked, yes, I have seen the hack that connects the Switch to an itty-bitty black & white TV...

Though I'm only really interested in tiny b&w CRT TVs if I can play Duck Hunt on them (via arcade-crusade)...

I not only dig teeny-tiny displays for light gun games, but also for driving games as well (perhaps some of you might remember the following from this)...

Back to tube displays; seeing Zelda on a CRT also reminded me of how Dark Souls look on a CRT, aka CRT Souls or 480i Souls (which again I'm hoping regular readers of the blog remember, especially since the original post has fallen victim to a Tumblr bug)...

"while playing king's field just now i died in the magic cave of fire and when i warped back there were beautiful graphical glitches everywhere" (via mendelpalace)...

Some landscapes, filled with beauty and mystery and terror, are accidental (see: the graphical glitches from before)… whereas others are completely deliberate, as in the case of Atlantia (via obscurevideogames)...

Once again, I REALLY need to figure out a way to play some PC88 games (via obscurevideogames)...

Here we have a semi-common Space Invaders sighting for the time, in an episode of Battle Fever J, one of the earliest Super Sentai shows (via himitsusentaiblog)...

And here we have a rare Game Gear sighting, in old OVA anime, Starship Girl Yamamoto Yohko. Hell, it’s a rare Game Gear in anything sighting; the only other example that comes to mind is Rumble In The Bronx (via @TheOtaking)...

And an equally rare Sonic on the runway sighting (via kotaku.com)...

I normally watch a video in its entirety before making a recommendation. Yet when it came to this overview of Last Bronx's legacy in Japan (and lack thereof in the West), hearing the main theme to Beat Takeshi's Violent Cop near the 3 min mark was all I needed (have since watched the whole thing, and as expected, it's another awesome Kim Justice production)...

And finally, a friend notes: "subzero's right arm is real close to trump's spinal column

just sayin" (via @jbillinson)...

[shakingsphere]

i just like doing these

1. Do you like who you are? no ive never liked myself very much

2. What would people say about you at your funeral? i don’t know probably something about being smart and honest

3. What would you regret not doing in your life? i dont like thinking about my past but many not trying hard enough the first time i tried to od...

4. What’s the wisest thing you have ever heard someone say? idk 

5. What lessons in life did you learn to hard way? it took me a long time to learn when to quit

6. How often do your biggest worries and fears come true? they dont and i take too much lexapro to worry these days

7. If you had one year left to live, what would you try to achieve? i’d probably just travel

8. Do you serve money or does money serve you? i don’t think about money a lot as long as i can buy nic and coffee

9. Are you afraid of being your true self around others? Why? no. i dont thinks there’s a thing as a ‘true self’ just different versions of yourself

10. What are you grateful for? financial stability and being able to go to college 

11. Have you done anything you are proud of lately? nope! 

12. Have you made any recent acts of kindness? i doubt it!

13. If you knew that you would die tomorrow, what questions would you ask yourself? i’d just go to bed no point asking questions

14. If your biggest fears came true, would it matter in five years from now? yes. 

15. How would you describe yourself? depressed. but funny and smart ig

16. Do you take people’s advice? sometimes but i think taking advice is hard because im so bad at giving the full picture

17. Do you get quickly offended? not really, it depends

18. Do you consider yourself to be a likable person? no lol

19. ‘We make a living by what we get, we make a life by what we give’ – What does this mean to you? hard work i dont know

20. Are you enriching the lives of others? i doubt it

21. Are you living a meaningful life? no

22. What makes a meaningful life? contributing something and being happy

23. Would you ever give up your life to save another? depends on the person 

24. How much would you be willing to sacrifice for people in poverty? what do you mean? i’d pay higher taxes and stuff

25. If you could live one day over and over again, what would you choose to do? i wouldn’t want that

26. Do you think you are important and worthy of affection and love? no. 

27. What would make you feel more worthy? What do you believe needs to be different about you? i need to stop being sad

28. What brings you down the most often? boredom 

29. Would you rather work less (and do the things you enjoy) and have less money? yes

30. Where do you find peace? sitting by streams

31. What is the most important quality you look for in another person? sense of humor

32. What is your biggest dream in life? to be successful and respected

33. What is your biggest fear? failure

34. How would the world be different if you had never been born? it literally wouldn’t. my parents wouldn’t have daughters i guess. 

35. What life lessons do you wish you knew 10 years ago? i was a child i needed to learn first. 

36. If you could tell your younger self one thing, what would it be? join the track team

37. If your life was a movie, what would the title be? bedtime

38. If your life was a movie, would you enjoy watching it? depends on the director

39. What does success mean to you? i feel like i already answered this

40. If you could be a different person, who would you be? yes

41. What was the best day of your life? Why? i dont know probably my last real date with my ex...

42. What do you look forward to most in life? being happy one day

43. What bad habits do you want to ditch? i want to start keeping my room clean

44. Who do you look up to and why? my mom, shes just really hard working

45. Do you know your partners love language? i dont have a partner

46. Do the people you love most know how much you love them? im sure they do

47. Are you satisfied with the depth of your relationships? yeah

48. What do you owe yourself? sleep

49. Based on your current day-to-day life, what do you expect to achieve in 5 years from now? a MA!

50. Do you say ‘yes’ too often when you really want to say ‘no’? Why? yes, i dont get offered things very often so sometimes i feel like i have to say yes

51. What did you learn yesterday? i think my childhood friend is hot and we like the same anime lmao

52. What do you like about yourself? im smart

53. Would you consider yourself to be a generous person? yeah

54. Do you really listen when people talk to you? yes ofc

55. What is the number one change you need to make in your life this year? ugh i should probably quite vaping but maybe start working out again

56. How many hours per week do you spend on the internet? too many

57. What are your most common negative thoughts? Are they logical? im literally suicidal 

58. Do you think it’s too late to do certain things in your life? Why? yes because they’re things i would have had to start when i was younger but thats not important anymore.

59. If you could be the most influential person in the world, what would you change? redistribute wealth probably 

60. How much time do you spend with your family and friends? like a few hours a week. im not very social

61. Where do you want to be in 5 years from now? the east coast :)

62. Is your life complicated by unnecessary things? everyones life is

63. How can you simplify your life and focus on the most important things to you? bitch idk

64. What stresses you out? my sister

65. What makes life easier? having stuff i have to do

66. How often do you give without expecting anything in return? occasionally 

67. What is your greatest challenge? mental illness luv

68. What is most important to you in life? Are you giving it the time it deserves? idk idk

69. If you could send a message to the world, what would you say in 30 seconds? i dont have anything to say to the world. maybe redistribute the wealth?

70. What do you most regret never telling someone? that i loved them. 

71. When was the last time you tried something new? sucking balls 

72. Are you afraid to speak your own opinion? no

73. Do you give into others too often and feel resentful because of it? no

74. Are you holding onto something that you need to put behind you? probably

75. How often do you let your fears hold you back? i dont

76. Do the people in your life bring the best out of you? some do some don’t

77. How often do you make excuses? i try not to

78. What is one mistake that you will never do again? dating someone who couldn’t really commit then

79. Which is worse, failing or never giving it a shot? never trying

80. What has grown you the most as a person – your challenges and trials or the comfortable yet enjoyable moments in life? the challenges

81. If you could choose to have no more challenges or obstacles in life, would you? no what a pointless life. 

82. In one word, what is standing between you and your biggest goal? time and hard work!

83. How often do you go to bed feeling angry? i dont

84. Would it be wrong to steal in order to feed a starving child? no 

85. If you paid more attention to the sad things in this world, would you feel more conflicted about it? no

86. If we learn from our failures, then why is it so bad to fail? because its a sucky feeling and its embarassing to want something and not be able to get it

87. What could you pay more attention to in life? my cats

88. Why do we think of others the most when they’re no longer around? sad maybe

89. What does it look like to make the most of your life? idk i’ve never tried. maybe ill start a vlog channel on youtube

90. What have you given up on? eating more than 2x a day

91. How many people do you truly love and what are you doing for them? 4 or 5 and idk not worrying them

92. Do you ask enough questions, or are you happy to settle for what you already know? i think asking questions is a good thing

93. What were you doing when you last lost track of time? tiktok

94. Do you think you would be happy if you never had to work again? i think i would be bored

95. How old would you be if you didn’t know how old you are? a baby

96. If you could ask for one wish, what would it be? to be good at math

97. What inspires you in life? idk art

98. What can you not live without the most? water

99. What do you enjoy doing over and over again? sleeping

100. When did you last laugh so much it hurt? i dont know

101. What is stopping you from living the life you want to live? the actual life i live

[betateens]

5 Recent Games Filled to the Brim With Style

4/27/18

by Edward Green

Gravity Rush 2 (PS4): This sequel to the cult Vita title delivers on just about every level a sequel should, including the visuals. You play as the lovable “gravity shifter,” Kat as she flies around the city on a quest to save the world and rediscover her past. From the moment you start the game, you're greeted to one of the game’s many color rift planes along with the comic inspired cutscenes. French and Belgian comics along with anime inspire aspects of the art style, both in-game and out. The floating islands make the architecture stand out a lot, with plenty of different areas to explore. Buildings you fly past or stand on all feel authentic in how they are constructed, making the world feel more alive besides the NPCs walking about. This makes the game’s online treasure hunts (which are only up until July) a lot of fun as you guess what part of a building someone is using for a hint picture. Among all this, the game has a very cel-shaded look to it like the first game. Couple that with some stellar character designs, excellent use of color, a blissful orchestral soundtrack and being one of the few games to convey the action of falling almost realistically and you have one of the most stylish games from 2017. At the now decreased price of $20, this is not a game to be missed by any PS4 owner. Gravity Rush Remastered is also a must if you want to get into the story as best as possible.

Cuphead (PC/ XB1): From the newly formed Studio MDHR comes a game more than a decade in the making purely because of its choice in style. From the backgrounds and attacks to the enemies and effects, Cuphead is a game made to emulate the traditional animation used during the Fleischer Era. Each background is made from watercolor paintings with the characters animated frame by frame with traditional, hand-drawn animation. Such a feat hasn't been done on this level before with a game (though, the game Skullgirls uses a similar technique but not to the same extent). While the game play itself is inspired by old school run-n-gun games, the visuals alone are enough to keep anyone engaged despite the game’s unforgiving difficulty. The meat of the game is its boss fights, which all are full of personality. From how each of them move, you can tell a lot about them without any exposition or drawn out story. At a silky smooth 60 frames per second, the game never feels too off in both style and gameplay. It's one of the few games to truly feel like a playable cartoon due to the level of expertise of pulling off the convincing look of old-school cartoons while also remaining a fun game.

ARMS (Switch): One of the reasons that fighting games is one of my favorite genres of video games is due to them being great showcases of characters and attention to detail in visuals. Nintendo’s extendable arm fighting game is one of the greatest examples, along with just straight up being a joy to play. Each character is designed with the idea of them being able to extend their arms for a sort of boxing match against each other. This leads to some designs including springs, ribbons, snakes, noodles and of course a mummy. The whole cast is colorful and full of life, with their own abilities that make them stand out from one another. Along with a decently sized cast of characters, there is a great amount of arms to choose from when fighting either online or locally. Some arms curve while others fire projectiles or inflict status effects. It all adds levels of customization to play however you choose. In an update added not too long ago, an art gallery section was put into the game that allows you to use coins to purchase all kinds of official drawings for your viewing pleasure. All in all I'd say ARMS is a game that drew me in with its visuals at first and still has me hooked through that and it's unique gameplay.

Persona 5 (PS4/ PS3): Out of every game I’ve played recently, this is one of the few to truly wow me from purely visual flair at just about every turn. Everything from the battle transitions and menus strikes the eyes in a way not too many Japanese RPGs do. In the game, you play the role of the Phantom Thieves who use their “personas” to fight monsters within the hearts of corrupted souls. It’s got a lot of charm from the characters, visuals, music and good ol’ turn based gameplay. The gameplay is presented in an anime style, which you can quickly tell from the traditionally animated opening directed by Sayo Yamamoto (director of Yuri on Ice and Michiko & Hatchin). Like Gravity Rush, the game has a very cel-shady style along with 2D character portraits for dialogue to add an extra touch of personality. Along with that, gameplay itself is very seamless. There’s next to no loading screens outside of when you first boot up the game from a save and between certain segments. Presentation is key in this game, as it lasts around 90 or 100 hours to get through. Battles and just general walking around the city and dungeons is all an excellent eye catch, backing up a story that is sure to keep many engaged. There’s not much else I can say about the game’s visual style other than to just see it in action for yourself.

Nier Automata (PS4/ PC): To end on a more realistic note, there is NieR Automata. While I don’t exactly want to spoil the story, I can say it’s about androids helping to protect a post-apocalyptic Earth. It’s a game that you have to play through multiple times with different kinds of playthroughs that are better to go into blind. NieR Automata presents a more tranquil and peaceful post-apocalypse rather than one full of disdain and chaos. Humanity has broken down, so with that comes cities full of vegetation and robots who roam the wasteland. Music adds to the mood of the several locales within the game, with varying usage of instruments and vocals. From broken down cities to a desert to an abandoned amusement park, there’s scenery to behold all around. It makes the game more appealing when along with new things happening in the plot, you get to explore a new area and just take it in. Despite there not being too much to do in the world outside of side quests and the obligatory main quests, the world of NieR Automata is one that can still manage to keep one hooked through its many endings. Along with pretty environments, the character design is also exciting. Most robot enemies you face in the game are adorable yet menacing when they take you out in only a few hits. Overall, the often muted and bleak NieR Automata is a delight with its style.

[whenitsdarkweilluminate]

Zagreb 1990

Host: Croatia/Yugoslavia Participants: 22 Voting method: 12-point system (juries only) 

Winner: Toto Cutugno - Insieme: 1992 Country: Italy  Language: Italian Points: 149 (59.1% of highest score possible) General Overview: 1990 is the year of European solidarity songs. The Cold War was almost over, the Berlin Wall had fallen, borders were reopening, regimes were toppling, and the European Union's creation was around the corner. This inspired several artists to express optimism for the future. Ironically, the oncoming decade will not be a peaceful one for the host country. Zagreb upholds the progress seen in the recent contests – a roomy flat stage, giant video screens, a computerized scoreboard. The presenters, meanwhile, ditch the recent trend of introducing each entry individually. 1990 also incorporates an animated mascot – the Eurocat! He appears in the intro and the postcards, where he “snaps” a blank-and-white promo picture of each artist. I love the Eurocat! The same 22 countries from 1989 reappear in 1990. Malta wanted to rejoin, but the number of participants had reached its max. This will become a major problem soon. The interval is whatever. It's a video montage of local scenes. Normally, these videos would be shown at the start of the show instead. The opening sequence this year is a montage of people performing different music styles in various locations, ending with the Eurocat on stage lol. The 1990 contest is notorious for the screw-up during Spain's performance. Eurovision uses backing tracks to keep the artists and the orchestra in sync. But there was a malfunction this time. Azúcar Moreno walked onto the stage, and the band and orchestra were silent. The duo then stormed off. The performance was restarted a few moments later. The vote reveal is fairly close. Ireland lead for a while. But around the 3/4 mark, it became tight between Italy / Ireland / France. Ireland gave their 12 points to Italy, but Italy gave 0 points to their two rivals (seems legit). Austria then shorted the gap between Italy and Ireland to one point. The final two countries, Cyprus and Finland, ultimately gave Italy a convincing lead in the end. While France and Ireland tied for second place, which is unusual. As for the song quality, this is the strongest year since 1985.

Spain: Azúcar Moreno - Bandido Despite the audio screw-up, the sisters pull off a great performance. “Bandido” fuses Flamenco with '90s piano house music; including long instrumental sections. These two different genres sound really good together here. And it sounds very fresh in Eurovision for the time. I love the dangerous atmosphere - there's ominous string flares, a Spanish guitar, castanets, and a drum breakdown. Plus the duo's vocal style is compelling. And the pauses before the chorus are a great hook. In the song, they crave a “bandit”, even though he's harmful.  Greece: Christos Callow & Wave - Horis skopo This is just a very forgettable, bland, and nothing entry. It's so uninteresting that I can't think of anything else to say about it. I guess there's a "ti ti ti" bridge. Belgium: Philippe Lafontaine - Macédomienne Philippe dedicates “Macédomienne” to his North Macedonian wife, since he is performing in Yugoslavia. It's a sweet song. And the instrumental's atmosphere is really compelling. It's slow and gentle but in an uneasy way? It gives the image of a nighttime boat ride on a European river. The chorus vocal is romantic too. While the guitar 'da-da's in the verses stick out. And I like how the post-chorus lingers. Turkey: Kayahan - Gözlerinin Hapsindeyim Turkey submits another traditional entry, but with a dark atmosphere. I love how the instrumental keeps moving forward on this uneasy, uncertain journey. The motion stays constant at a comfortable speed. The accordion and the brass responses are great too. And the drifting “Hay la la la la” bit is catchy. Turkey and Belgium are all about the vibes the year. In the song, Kayahan is taken captivate by dangerous temptation.  Netherlands: Maywood - Ik wil alles met je delen Maywood addresses her partner who feels lost, and going through a hard time in life. She wants to share the pain and craziness with them. And she loves them the way they are. This chorus is immensely powerful - like she's pleading to him with all her might. The backing vocalists really elevate it. Luxembourg: Céline Carzo - Quand je te rêve Céline dreams about being with her long distance partner. They eventually meet up in the airport in verse 2. I like the recurring light frosty synth breaks, and when the ending turns frantic. The verse instrumental is nice, but once the guitars/drums arrive to make the chorus fuller, that chorus is just *okay* to me. The "QUAND.. JE.. TE.. REVE" part is kind of annoying. United Kingdom: Emma - Give a Little Love Back to the World Emma spreads an important message of environmentalism - we should replace what we've taken from this planet, or else future generations will have nothing. The song attempts a unifying, anthemic, singalong chorus. But that chorus is so tedious. And there's just something so cheesy and surface-level about this song. Iceland: Stjórnin - Eitt lag enn Iceland's first 4 entries kinda flopped, but they've finally reached top 5! And they do so by copying Denmark's formula of pure cheerfulness. The duo bring bright energy and they look genuinely happy in love. Their little bounces and sideways struts are cute. The chorus is infectiously catchy as well ("EEEEITT LAAAG ENN"). The song has a bouncy, dance-able rhythm, with some little sounds thrown in - horns, slaps, synth raindrops, electric guitars. And the bridge adds a tiny bit of drama. Norway: Ketil Stokkan - Brandenburger Tor Norway celebrates the fall of the Berlin Wall by repeating the words “Brandenburger Tor” (“Brandenburg Gate”) a lot. The Brandenburg Gate is a Berlin landmark associated with German reunification. The song may be repetitive, but that chorus is so catchy. It's this unifying chant that victoriously marches forward. The final chorus is also a victory lap. The verses are earnest by contrast. And the instrumental change in the bridge is effective. The song just has such an optimistic tone for the future. Israel: Rita - Shara Barkhovot Rita's performance takes us on an emotional journey. She even crumbles to her knees at the end. The lyrics describe her thoughts right after walking out on her lover. She has conflicted feelings over it. And the song's depressing tone shows her dark emotions. The instrumental takes a journey as well. From somber piano and rattles, to electric guitars in the chorus, to the second verse taking an interesting direction with the drums and strings. The song steadily builds into the bridge, then recedes at the end.  Denmark: Lonnie Devantier - Hallo Hallo Denmark continues to be cheerful and carefree. In "Hallo Hallo", Lonnie impatiently calls her crush from the phone booth, but she keeps getting the answering machine. The song's tone is so lighthearted that the situation comes across as comical. The staging also includes lively dancers behind Lonnie. The song is kinda basic though. It has an energetic rhythm, the ending of the pre-chorus is hype, and I like the horns, but the chorus is average. Switzerland: Egon Egemann - Musik klingt in die Welt hinaus This would be so boring without the violin parts. Egon's voice is so deep and monotone and expressionless. The verses work because he adds a violin riff after every line; plus there's bubbling synths. The intro and bridge are also violin solos. However, the chorus is very monotone and flat, and literally every line begins with the word “Musik”. In the song, he sings about the power of music.  Germany: Chris Kempers & Daniel Kovac - Frei zu leben This duet ballad has a strong anthemic chorus, but the song is kinda boring. It's about freedom, which I assume is a reference to the Berlin Wall falling. It would be weird if Germany *wasn't* singing about this in 1990. Maybe the approach is too serious for me. France: Joëlle Ursull - White and Black Blues The co-runner-up, and the beginning of France's boundary-pushing era. They will go outside Eurovision's comfort zone for most of the 90s. This one is driven by soft "tribal" drumming, set to an unusual time signature in a circus-y rhythm. With an accordion! The drum breakdown bridge breaks up the monotony. And the song is chill and buoyant. It encourages racial harmony, while Joëlle expresses pride in her African heritage. “White and Black Blues” fits this year's theme of social message songs, and it's not preachy or cheesy or overly serious. Yugoslavia: Tajči - Hajde da ludujemo BOP! This sounds like a current pop song – a bit like the B-52's. The instrumental is so clean and sharp. The orchestra takes a back seat, to let the electric guitars and drums take over. Which really makes it sound modern. Tajči is also a charismatic, confident singer who has fun with it. She lets out a couple "WOW!" screams. And her hand movements match the song perfectly. Oh, and the chorus is insanely catchy. This song has good energy and injects electricity into the arena. The guitarists are fun too. It's a host entry that's better than the song they won with. The lyrics are simple - you don't have to be rich or handsome or strong to impress her! Portugal: Nucha - Há sempre alguém I mostly remember this entry for Nucha's dress (and the backing singers as well) having colourful music notes on it. How camp. The song is catchy ("SEMPRE HA SEMPRE") but kinda basic. It has a very positive vibe though, and Nucha presents it in an inviting, accessible way. Good vocals too. The lyrics encourage looking out for the less fortunate.  Ireland: Liam Reilly - Somewhere in Europe The other runner-up. Ireland submits a polished, professional, adult piano ballad, where Liam misses his European trip he shared with a special girl. And he wishes to meet up again. The lyrics mention a bunch of European cities and landmarks. Which I'm never fond of in ESC songs - it feels like pandering. The chorus melody is REALLY strong though. The orchestra and backing vocals elevate it. Sweden: Edin-Ådahl - Som en vind Ugh, one of my least favourite Swedish entries. It's just a generic, boring boyband ballad. I groan from that "hah-hah-hah" intro. The chorus melody is sooo slow and tedious. And the last chorus is overdone. That one growling vocalist can go too. Verse 2 isn't enough to save it, where the instrumental turns rock-y and the vocals jump out. Italy: Toto Cutugno - Insieme: 1992 (winner review below) Austria: Simone - Keine Mauern mehr Another song about the Berlin Wall. Here, Simone is hopeful for the future. She even makes sure to repeat the title in English. I like the fairytale strings in the intro. While the rest of the song uses 1990 rock production. The verses hold anticipation, and the big singalong chorus is impactful. But the backing vocals are too dominant, the chorus is kinda 'blah', and Simon's stage presence is awkward. I also wish the guitar responses in the chorus weren't so quiet. Cyprus: Haris Anastasiou - Milas poli I was wondering when an S/A/W-style production would reach Eurovision It was a signature sound of the late 80s. “Milas poli” is lyrically silly - Haris complains that his lover “talks too much”. I wish his vocals were better, and his dancing was more confident. He basically dances for the 3 whole minutes. Because the song itself is a carefree bop, and the loud instrumental breaks work well. Finland: Beat - Fri? The last song finishes in last. Finland decides to sing in Swedish this year. The quartet asks if we're truly free, which is an interesting take, since the other message songs from 1990 are so positive. The chorus is catchy with the "whoa oh"s and the call-and-response. But the chorus is also messy. And I don't like the outfits either, or that dorky dance break. I do like the trumpet interjections though. And how the song speeds up at the end. The Winner: Italy finally achieves a second victory; 26 years after their first. One can never discount Italy as a contender – their entries are almost always impactful. That said, Italy was actually apathetic towards Eurovision around this time. They skipped a few contests in the '80s, and they're about to withdraw “permanently” in three years. Well, they did come back for '97, but they're basically absent until 2011. The winner, “Insieme: 1992”, features a choir shouting the words “[TOGETHER!] UNITE, UNITE EUROPE!” several times. The message is pretty blatant. The song celebrates the anticipated start date of the European Single Market (1992). And it praises the idea of a more united Europe. Needless to say, “Insieme: 1992” is very of its time. It's also another winner whose main hook is in English. That loud a cappella intro from the backing grabs you immediately. The first half of the song is pretty restrained, which establishes anticipation for an explosive chorus. But then Toto just shouts in intense vocals for the entire second half. Almost like he's scolding Europe to get their s**t together. The orchestra is relentless too. The arrangement is supposed to be powerful, but it's too aggressive. It's overly intense like Luxembourg 1983 was. Toto just sounds super pissed off. And it contradicts the theme of optimism and unity. I do like the trumpet responses and the “... per voi” pauses though.  Toto's winner's reprisal is noteworthy for two reasons. First, his hair dye dripped onto his shirt while walking from the green room to the stage. And second, he performed in the middle of the audience – a Eurovision first.   Verdict: "D” tier. Honestly this song gets more annoying the more I listen to it. My points go to.... 01. Yugoslavia: Tajči - Hajde da ludujemo 02. Netherlands: Maywood - Ik wil alles met je delen 03. Spain: Azúcar Moreno - Bandido 04. Iceland: Stjórnin - Eitt lag enn 05. Turkey: Kayahan - Gözlerinin Hapsindeyim 06. France: Joëlle Ursull - White and Black Blues 07. Belgium: Philippe Lafontaine - Macédomienne 08. Israel: Rita - Shara Barkhovot 09. Portugal: Nucha - Há sempre alguém 10. Ireland: Liam Reilly - Somewhere in Europe 11. Norway: Ketil Stokkan - Brandenburger Tor 12. Cyprus: Haris Anastasiou - Milas poli 13. Luxembourg: Céline Carzo - Quand je te rêve 14. Denmark: Lonnie Devantier - Hallo Hallo 15. Finland: Beat - Fri? 16. Italy: Toto Cutugno - Insieme: 1992 17. Austria: Simone - Keine Mauern mehr 18. Switzerland: Egon Egemann - Musik klingt in die Welt hinaus 19. Germany: Chris Kempers & Daniel Kovac - Frei zu leben 20. Greece: Christos Callow & Wave - Horis skopo 21. Sweden: Edin-Ådahl - Som en vind 22. United Kingdom: Emma - Give a Little Love Back to the World

[weekendwarriorblog]

The Weekend Warrior Jan. 17, 2020 - WEATHERING WITH YOU, BAD BOYS FOR LIFE, DOLITTLE

Only the second column of the year, and I’m already questioning how long I’m going to keep writing this. In case you haven’t heard, I’m no longer writing for The Beat. I don’t really want to talk about it, but it was generally a horrible experience that I put up with since I needed the work/money. It turns out that someone I thought I knew, someone I respected and considered a friend for almost a quarter of a century, turned out to be a truly awful person. That’s really all I’m going to say... for now. (The Beat decided not to run my final Box Office Preview, so that’s incorporated within, as well.)

The good news is that Makoto Shinkai’s latest animated film, WEATHERING WITH YOU (GKIDS), will hit U.S. theaters this Friday after a few “fan previews” on Weds and Thursday night. If you don’t know the name of that Japanese animation filmmaker then you clearly didn’t see the fantastic sci-fi film Your Name, which was an absolutely enormous hit, grossing $354 million worldwide, most of that in Japan, China and South Korea in 2016. That movie eventually opened in North America in 2017 and made another $5 million, but it’s probably one of my favorite animated films. (Your Name will be playing again at the Metrograph starting February 7 if you haven’t seen it.)

But back to Weathering with You, which is another wonderful film from Makoto-san, this one about a high school senior named Hodaka who runs off to Tokyo and runs into financial problems in the gloomy city (boy, can I relate) until he meets Hina, an optimistic girl who has the ability to stop the rain and clear the clouds, something that they turn into a thriving business. It’s a simpler premise than Your Name for sure, but it’s still steeped in magic and fantasy that really makes it a very special film.

You can get tickets for Weathering with You here.

BAD BOYS FOR LIFE (Sony)

Cast: Will Smith, Martin Lawrence, Alexander Ludwig, Joe Pantoliano, Paola Nuñez, Kate Del Castilo, DJ Khaled Directed By: Adil El Arbi and Bilall Fallah (Black, Gangsta, Image) MPAA Rating: R

Oddly, it took three whole weeks to get our first sequel of 2020 – that is, if you don’t count The Grudge, which actually is a sequel. I guess that would make Bad Boys for Life the first sequel that people actually may want to see, because it reunites Will Smith and Martin Lawrence, the stars of two very popular buddy cop movies a nd two of the biggest stars of the ‘90s.

The first Bad Boys came out in 1995 when both guys were pretty big TV stars, Lawrence on Fox show Martin and Smith from The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air. Oddly, Lawrence already had quite a bit of film success from the “House Party” movies and Eddie Murphy’s Boomerang when he was paired with Smith.When the original Bad Boys opened with $15.5 million and grossed $65.6 million, that was considered pretty good for the time, especially for first-time director Michael Bay. That’s right. Bad Boyswas also Bay’s debut.

Ever since then, things have gotten crazy, especially for Smith, who starred in Roland Emmerich’s blockbuster Independence Day just one year later, the first Men in Black the year after that, and the rest is history. Lawrence went on to a couple big movies of his own, including the copycat Blue Streak, but other than 2000’s Big Momma’s Houseand its sequel six years later, he just didn’t have much draw when he tried other things. 2011’s Big Mommas: Like Father, Like Son made about half what its predecessor made (about $38) million and then Lawrence vanished for a while.

Smith and Lawrence reunited for 2003’s Bad Boys II, again with Bay, who was also a much bigger director by then (and that was even before the “Transformers” movies) and that opened with $46.6 million and grossed $138.5 million domestically, showing how much bigger both stars had become.

That brings us to Bad Boys for Life, the third movie that may or may not have quite the same audience as the last movie. Little-known Belgian directors Adil El Arbi and Bilall Fallah take over from Michael Bay for this threequel, and oddly, it’s Smith’s fourth movie in the past year after the disappointing showing for Ang Lee’s Gemini Man and the animated Spies in Disguise over the holidays. On the other hand, Smith also had a huge hit last summer with Disney’s Aladdin,and that seemed to be enough to appease his fans who had gotten used to him doing one movie a year.

In some ways, Bad Boys for Life might feel a little like Men in Black 3, which Sony Pictures released in the summer of 2012, just nine years after the previous movie’s $190 million. While it didn’t seem like a necessary sequel, the third Men in Blackstill made only a little bit less. Obviously, nine years wasn’t enough to sour anyone on Smith’s character, although that movie also was now eight years ago, and we’re coming off a year of a ton of disappointing sequels.

Oddly, the MLK Jr. weekend has become a prime weekend for buddy cop movies, two of them seemingly inspired by the “Bad Boys” movies, as Ice Cube and Kevin Hart teamed up for Ride Along and its sequel. Both of them opened this weekend, the original six years ago to $48.6 million over the four-day weekend, and its sequel two years later made $41 million over the extended weekend.

That would seem like a pretty good barometer for Bad Boys for Life, if not for the fact that it’s a sequel to a movie that came out 16 years ago with a much hotter blockbuster director. Will audiences who were 18, 19, 20 when Bad Boys 2come out be anywhere near as interested in Smith and Lawrence’s shenanigans now that they’re well into their 30s?

Reportedly, Bad Boys for Life cost $90 million, although it’s doubtful that Sony expects the movie to make all of that money domestically. Bad Boys II made almost the exact same amount overseas than in North America, although the international market has exploded in the 15 years since then.

Reviews will probably hit around the same time that this column goes live or maybe slightly earlier, so it might be hard to tell if there’s a consensus either for or (more likely) against it. (It’s a sequel being released in January. Do you REALLY think that critics are gonna give it a fair shake?)

That just leaves the question of how well Bad Boys for Life might do, considering that Bay isn’t involved and Lawrence hasn’t been in the public eye very much. I think Smith’s ongoing popularity and the number fans of the previous movies should help the movie make close to $40 million over the four-day weekend, give or take. It certainly will offer something new for the key 20-to-40 year old males that already saw 1917.

DOLITTLE (Universal)

Cast: Robert Downey Jr., Ralph Ineson, Michael Sheen, Antonio Banderas, Carmel Laniado, Jim Broadbent, Jessie Buckley with the voices of Emma Thompson, Rami Malek, John Cena, Craig Robinson, Kumail Nanjiani, Octavia Spencer, Ralph Fiennes, Selena Gomez and more Directed By: Stephen Gaghan (Syriana, Gold) MPAA Rating: PG

Next, we have a slightly oddball of a first new family film for the year, as well as Robert Downey Jr’s first non-Marvel movie in a very long time, playing the classic kids book hero Doctor Dolittle, a doctor who can talk to animals. The children’s books by Hugh Lofting originated all the way back in 1920, and it was only eight years later before it was adapted into a silent animated short film. Probably the most famous movie (at least for 30 years) was the 1967 version of the movie starring Rex Harrison, but Eddie Murphy took on the role in 1998 for two hit movies released by 20th Century Fox (so maybe we’ll see them on Disney+ soon?).

Which might make you wonder how Universal got its hands on the property and why the studio isn’t making it a bigger deal about 2020 being the 100thanniversary of the character? Well, kids, it’s something called “public domain,” which allows anyone who wants to make a movie based on the character to do so. In this case, it’s Oscar-nominated filmmaker Stephen Gaghan, best known for his political thriller, Syriana, which got George Clooney his first Oscar. Obviously, a family-friendly fantasy adventure seems like an odd choice, but obviously, this is a real movie.

The story involves Dolittle being called to save Queen Victoria (played by the wonderful Jessie Buckley, star of Wild Rose) who is dying. Dolittle brings along a young lad named Stubbins (Harry Collett from Dunkirk) as well as a slew of animals voiced by a menagerie of actors. We’ll get back to them in a bit.

Obviously, Downey’s presence will probably play a larger part in anyone’s interest in the movie, since I’m not sure Doctor Dolittle has been able to maintain any sort of place in the pantheon of popular children’s book characters among younger readers. (I could be wrong.)  This movie is co-produced by Joe Roth, who helped pave the way for big stars to take on popular fantasy characters, putting Johnny Depp in one of Disney’s bigger pre-Marvel/Lucasfilm hits, Tim Burton’s Alice in Wonderland, James Franco in Sam Raimi’s Oz the Great and Powerful, and Angelina Jolie in Maleficent. Universal (who previously teamed with Roth for Snow White and the Huntsmanin 2012 and its less successful sequel) are hoping that Downey can bring a similar starpower to Dolittleto get people into theaters.

The last time Downey took on a non-Marvel literary character was his eponymous turn as Sherlock Holmes in the movie directed by Guy Ritchie just over ten years ago. That made a half a billion worldwide, and its sequel two years later did similar business. Other than a starring role in Todd Phillips’ Due Date and the passion project The Judge with Robert Duvall, Downey hasn’t done much outside the MCU. But why should he? Apparently, he is getting somewhere around $50 million to make each of those movies, and for most people, that’s early retirement money, especially after wrapping up the role inAvengers: Endgame, the highest-grossing blockbuster of all time (globally). And yet, we’ll supposedly be seeing Downey’s Tony Stark in this year’s Black Widow, probably in flashback, so he’s clearly not putting the rest of his career in the hands of playing Doctor Dolittle.

The rest of the cast might not be as important but the movie does star the popular actor Michael Sheen (Good Omens), Antonio Banderas (who just received his first Oscar nomination earlier this week) and then the voices include a strange mix of British and American actors, includingEmma Thompson, Rami Malek, John Cena, Craig Robinson,Kumail Nanjiani, Octavia Spencer, Ralph Fiennes, Selena Gomez and more. It’s kind of a shame they couldn’t find a role for Kevin Bacon, as it would make that “Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon” game so much easier.

Family movies have generally been tough to predict, especially ones that may or may not interest teen and/or older audiences, which is certainly the case here. Opening Dolittle on a weekend with no school on Monday is a wise move by Universal, as well as doing so in January where there isn’t as much competition for eyes. More than anything, Dolittle will be a very good (and possibly sobering) test on whether Downey is a box office star when not playing Tony Stark… or Sherlock Holmes.

The movie has not caught the attention or interest of the ever-outraged #FilmTwitter, except to make fun of it, but that doesn’t mean younger kids won’t want to see a fun adventure with talking animals, and the latter should help Dolittle make somewhere between $25 and $28 million over the four-day weekend.

This Week’s Box Office Predictions:  

Despite the impressive opening for Sam Mendes’ 1917 last weekend and its ten Oscar nominations, it’s very likely that either Bad Boys for Life or Dolittle (or both) will knock it out of first place this weekend. It definitely could be a close race for second place, depending on how well the latest movies from superstars Will Smith and Robert Downey are received. Expect Greta Gerwig’s Little Women to also get a nice bump from its own Best Picture nomination this weekend.

(Note: All the numbers below are for the four-day holiday weekend.)

Bad Boys for Life (Sony) - $42.5 million N/A (up $4 million)*

1917 (Universal) - $29.5 million -20%

Dolittle (Universal) - $23.5 million N/A (down $3.5 million)*

Jumanji: The Next Level (Sony) - $12 million -15%

Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker (Lucasfilm/Disney) - $9.5 million -38%

Just Mercy (Warner Bros.) - $9 million -7%

Like a Boss (Paramount) - $7.5 -25%

Little Women (Sony) - $6.6 million -15%

Knives Out (Lionsgate) - $4.6 million -18%

Frozen II  (Disney) - $4.5 million -24%

*UPDATE: Okay, my earlier predictions may have been a little unrealistic and it’s pretty clear that Bad Boys for Life, which has gotten decent reviews, will  do significantly better than Dolittle, despite there not being much family competition. I’m adjusting accordingly.

LIMITED RELEASES

Besides Weathering with You, Tim Robbins and Susan Sarandon’s kid (well, he’s 30) Jack Henry Robbins’ movie VHYES (Oscilloscope) will be out in select theaters and presumably VOD sometime soon. It’s a fairly odd movie made up of bits recorded on a VHS camera meant to look like it was recorded off various television stations by a teen, which includes bits of “late night adult television.”  It’s pretty amusing more for appearances by the likes of Kerri Kenney and Thomas Lennon from “Reno 911,” Mark Proksh from “What We Do in the Shadows,” Charlyne Yi and more. It will open in select theaters Friday, including the Alamo Drafthouse in Brooklyn.  It has some funny moments but it’s a little disjointed; I’m sure it would be great in an environment that involves drinking.

Also on the genre side of things is Gille Klabin’s directorial debut The Wave (Epic Pictures), starring Justin Long and Donald Faison, a weird movie in which Long plays an insurance lawyer who goes out on the town with his co-worker (Faison) but then gets dosed with a hallucinogen.  It will open in select cities and On Demand Friday.

Alex (Taxi to the Dark Side) Gibney’s latest doc Citizen K (Greenwich) will open at the Film Forum on Wednesday, this one looking at Mikhail Khodorkovsky, the wealthiest man in Russia who was valued at $15 billion from his Siberian oil before being thrown into jail by Putin. I haven’t seen the movie, but it recently received a nomination from the Writers Guild (WGA).

A couple mostly VOD horror films out on Friday are Pedro C. Alonso’s horror/thriller Feedback (Blue Fox Entertainment), starring Eddie Marsan, Paul Anderson and Ivana Baquero (Pan’s Labyrinth) and Andy Newberry’s The Host (Vertical Entertainment), starring Maryam Hassouni, Mike Beckingham, and Dougie Poynter.

REPERTORY

Before we get to the regular stuff, if you happen to have some free time on Saturday, like the whole day, you should get down to the Anthology Film Archives for Subway Cinema’s latest all-day marathon, “It’s the Nineties, Stupid!” a collection of six rare and probably very weird films from the ‘90s shown on 35mm. These events are always a lot of fun, and there may still be some tickets left if you act quickly.

METROGRAPH (NYC):

Welcome To Metrograph: Reduxcontinues this weekend with Seizun Suzuki’s Branded to Kill (1967) and Edward Yang’s A Brighter Summer Day (1991). I personally haven’t seen either but might give one or more a try.This weekend’s Late Nites at Metrograph is Paul Schrader’s 1985 movie Mishima: A Life in Four Chapters, a movie I’m not really familiar but apparently, it stars Ken Ogata as Japanese artist Yukio Mishima, who committed seppuku. This weekend’s Playtime: Family Matinees is the classic sci-fi film Them!(1954).

ALAMO DRAFTHOUSE BROOKLYN (NYC)

Next Monday’s “Fist City” screening is Wesley Snipe’s Passenger 57 (1992), the “Terror Tuesday” is Adam Wingard’s 2014 movie The Guest, starring Dan Stevens, with Wingard in person for a QnA, and then next week’s “Weird Wednesday,” January 22, is the 1990 film Brain Dead, starring Bills Paxton and Pullman, hosted by YOURS TRULY!! Yes, I’m making my Alamo debut with a movie from the ‘90s I absolutely loved.

THE NEW BEVERLY (L.A.):

Today’s “Afternoon Classics” matinee is John Huston’s The African Queen (1951), while Friday’s “Freaky Fridays” is the 1985 horror film, Silver Bullet. Friday night’s midnight offering is Tarantino’s Django Unchained while Saturday’s midnight movie is Scorsese’s Raging Bull, celebrating its 40th anniversary this year. The weekend “Kiddee Matinee” is Miyazaki’s Kiki’s Delivery Service (1989).

FILM FORUM (NYC):

The West Village theater begins an expansive new series called “Black Women: Trailblazing African American Actresses 1920-2001” on Friday, and it’s fairly self-explanatory except that there are a lot of films that have rarely been seen in recent years, such as Otto Preminger’s 1954 film Carmen Jones, starring Dorothy Dandridge; Vincente Minelli’s 1943 film Cabin in the Sky with Ethel Waters and Lena Horne, and even Pam Grier as Coffy in Jack Hill’s 1973 film. This is going to be a very special series, one unlike anything else that’s been done on the New York rep scene, and I wish I could afford to check some of these movies out. As part of the series, “Film Forum Jr.” will play the 1972 movie Sounder, for which Cicely Tyson received an Oscar nomination.

EGYPTIAN THEATRE (LA):

On Friday, Beyond Fest presents a 35mm print of the 1993 movie Freaked with directors Alex Winter and Tom Stern and most of the cast and many of the crew in attendance. Hosted by my pal, Drew McWeeney! On Saturday, there’s a matinee of Disney’s 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea (1954) and then that night is a double feature of Marlon Brando’s One Eyed Jacks  (1961) and Peter Fonda’s The Hired Hand (1971). Sunday Print Edition is a matinee of 1945’s Hangover Square, then later on Sunday is the first Sean Connery Bond film, Doctor No (1962). Sunday night is a screening of Hitchcock’s Rear Window (1954).

AERO  (LA):

On Weds. night, Greg Proops is presenting the hilarious Barbara Streisand-Ryan O’Neal comedy What’s Up, Doc? (1972) as part of his monthly film club. On Thursday the 16th, the Aero is showing Raging Bull in a matinee as part of its “Films of Marty and Bob,” then Friday is the 15thannual Focus on Female Directors, a mix of older and newer movies including the recently nominated short, Kitbull. Saturday begins “A Tribute to Noah Baumbach” with a double feature on Saturday night of Frances Haand Mistress America, his two collaborations with Greta Gerwig. Sunday is a double feature of his earlier films The Squid and the Whale and Kicking and Screaming. Tuesday’s offering in “The Films of Marty and Bob” is the classic King of Comedy, one of my favorite collaborations between the duo.

QUAD CINEMA (NYC):

On Friday, the Quad begins the series “Origin Stories: Bertrand Bonello’s Footnotes to Zombi Child” aka Bonello’s new movie, which opens next Friday. This series will include lots of genre films  that influenced the film,including Carpenter’s The Serpent and the Rainbow, De Palma’s Carrie, The Exorcist: Extended Director’s Cut, I Walked with a Zombie and the Aussie classic, Picnic at Hanging Rock (also a director’s cut).

MOMA  (NYC):

This week’s Modern Matinees: Jack Lemmonare Billy Wilder’s Oscar-winning The Apartment (1960) with Shirley MacLaine, the 1955 film Mister Roberts Thursday, and Costa-Gravas’ 1982 film Missing on Friday. Also, the International Teen Cinema series Show Me Love continues through Sunday. (You can click on the link to see what’s playing.) Another series, To Save and Project, the 17thMOMA International Festival of Film Preservation will run through the weekend and next week with some interesting choices like Roger Corman’s The Masque of the Red Death (1964) and Mystery of the Wax Museum from 1933.

FILM AT LINCOLN CENTER (NYC):

Although most of the screens here will be taken up by the 2020 New York Jewish Film Festival (see below), but FilmLinc is also getting a head start on its annual “Film Comment Selects”  with the New York premiere of Jeffrey Peixoto’s Over the Rainbow and a 35mm screening of Darren Aronofksy’s controversial 2017 film mother!, starring Jennifer Lawrence. Okay, neither are that old but still sort of repertory.

IFC CENTER (NYC)

“The Films of Studio Ghibli” ends on Thursday, so it might be your last chance to see many of these films theatrically before they move to HBO Max later this year. Otherwise, it’s most of the same movies screening at midnight: David Lynch’s Eraserhead and Mulholland Drive, as well as James Cameron’s The Terminator. Ah! Looks like the IFC Center added its new winter repertory series after I wrote this week’s column.  Weekend Classics: Luis Buñuel will screen the filmmaker’s 1972 film The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoise, The Terminator (1984) is screening as part of Waverly Midnights: Hindsight is 2020s, and  Late Night Favorites: Winter 2020 is Kubrick’s The Shining (1980) but ALSO Prince’s 1984 classic, Purple Rain. 

MUSEUM OF THE MOVING IMAGE (NYC):

As part of the exhibition “Envisioning 2001: Stanley Kubrick’s Space Odysey,” MOMI will have a screening of Stanley Kubrick’s film on Saturday afternoon with actor Dan Richter appearing in person. (For $25, you can get access to the exhibition after the screening.)

ROXY CINEMA (NYC)

The love for Nicolas Cage continues as the Roxy will screen Brian De Palma’s Snake Eyes (1998) on Wednesday and Saturday, and Joel Schumacher’s 1999 film 8mm on Thursday.

LANDMARK THEATRES NUART  (LA):

This Friday’s midnight offering is Pink Floyd’s The Wall (1982) by filmmaker Alan Parker.

FILM FESTIVALS

Going back to Film at Lincoln Center’s 29thAnnual New York Jewish Film Festival – which I oddly have NEVER attended  (mainly since I don’t have an outlet to write about it) – it begins on Wednesday with the New York premiere of the doc Picture of his Life, about underwater photographer Amos Nachoum.  It will run through the end of the month, closing on Jan. 28 with the New York premiere of Dror Zahavi’s Crescendo about a world-famous conductor, and the Centerpiece selection is Marceline Loridan-Ivens’ 2003 film The Birch Tree Meadow. I’m not really sure why I haven’t gotten to more of the films in this festival, but it’s mainly because it offers so much, and I never know what’s good or bad and what’s worth my time, which is kind of a shame.

STREAMING AND CABLE

Okay, it’s a little funny that media mogul Tyler Perry is making his transition to Netflix with a film called TYLER PERRY’S A FALL FROM GRACE on Friday, and unlike most of Perry’s movies, I was invited to a press screening, which I sadly couldn’t make since I have to see Bad Boys for Life. It’s about a young woman named Grace (Crystal Fox) who confesses to killing her husband so her lawyer needs to learn the truth.

I also haven’t been able to watch the Viola Davis-McKenna Grace dramedy Troop Zero from filmmakers named “Bert & Bertie” but it will premiere on Amazon Prime this Friday. It also stars Oscar-winner Allison Janney and Jim Gaffigan, but it takes place in 1977 Georgia where a young girl (Grace) dreams of going to space by being recorded on NASA’s Golden Record.

Next week, we get The Gentlemen (STXfilms), the latest ensemble crime movie from Guy Ritchie, which I’m really excited about, and the horror/thriller The Turning (Universal). Again, I’m not really sure if I’m going to be writing anything more after this.