#haha nothing of relevance here folks

[cewyll]

hii! i found your blog by accident and i'm mesmerized. i used to play rp on twitter and i really wanted to start doing the same here but idk where to start. could you please give me some tips?

oh hey, thank you so much for reaching out! :D i'll admit i'm not as active on this blog as on others, but it makes me happy to have reached you nonetheless. <3

i'd be delighted to give you some tips to start out! it's definitely a process that feels a bit alien at first, but over time you get a feel for it. :>

i am soooo sorry in advance, this is going to be super long — you picked a wordy bitch to ask 😂 but i'll try to format this in a way that's easier to read!

take your time to go through stuff & no need to read or absorb it all right away. feel free to keep this post bookmarked to look back on whenever you need it as well.

💖 welcome to raine's stupidly-long guide to starting tumblr rp! 💖 qualification: i've had this blog for 11 years. fml disclaimer: still all just from my perspective, i'm just one gal with opinions hehe

start out by making a new blog for your character. (i wouldn't recommend starting out with a sideblog personally, since you can't send asks from them). choose a url that feels relevant. i'm always a fan of the ol "smush two words together that sound nice" technique — ie, my other blogs are huntershowl and icarusplunged — which never seems to fully go out of style. really you can do whatever feels right to you :)

the most important part of setting up an rp blog is creating a rules page and, if you're writing an OC, an about page. the rules set up your boundaries, your wants and don't wants, anything you want someone to know before they follow you. the about page should give new partners everything they need to know about your character — personality, appearance, setting/lore, any backstory you want to display publicly.

feel free to look around at different rpers' rules pages and use them as inspiration! as long as nothing is copypasted and everything is your own original content, which brings me to etiquette.

etiquette!

'tis largely an Unspoken Thing in the rpc (rp community), and breaching it can def make people feel uncomfortable (even though that's something that Should be in rules pages, most of us forget haha). here are the things i can think of off the top of my head:

the way to reach out to new people is simply to follow them. that's all you gotta do! if they don't follow back, don't push, just unfollow them after a few weeks and move on. it's almost never personal!

in that vein, if someone's blog is private/selective/mutuals-only, wait to interact until they follow back.

once they do, it's up to you how you want to move forward — usually i'll wait until they post some sort of interaction call for you to like. a starter call, a plotting call, orrrr if they reblog an ask meme (which is like a list of sentence prompts! you can choose one from the list and send it as an ask, which they can use as an rp starter.) you can also just IM them though :)

don't reblog non-rp content (ask memes, quotes/imagery, etc) directly from another rp blog, it clogs up their notifications! just reblog from the original post instead.

don't interact with other people's threads (liking or reblogging, but feel free to read them and talk about them ooc!), and only respond to a starter if it's labeled as open — otherwise it was probably written for another rper specifically.

try not to prod people too hard if they haven't responded in a while. some folks are okay with being reminded about a forgotten thread a few weeks after replies stall out.

always tag nsft (not safe for tumblr, the other acronym gets flagged/hidden) and very upsetting content — gore, SA or abuse mentions, etc. i've seen some people starting to use "dead dove do not eat" as a catch-all for super dark content, but honestly that phrase gives me the heebiest of jeebies so i prefer to go with individual tags

general platformless rp etiquette rules apply: don't steal other people's content, don't assume or control the other character's actions/thoughts/etc.

be kind to each other, most of all. communicate when you have a problem with someone, rather than making a vague/callout post about them. that being said, i'm a proponent of the block button — blocking people is okay! it's not a big deal. this is a hobby space and no one is entitled to you. advocate for yourself!!

okay that was a long section, whew! lil break. take a sip of water. have a snack mayhaps.

now: RP STRUCTURE (the fun part)

we don't really do "script" style rp on tumblr — it'll usually, if not always, be in prose/paragraph form. formatting is a fun touch, but not necessary. as you can see, i'm using small text here with some little chunks of text in bold/italic or regular size text to add some visual interest. again, not necessary! experiment, figure out what you like!

lots of people will use icons of different sizes — 100x100 is the most common, but they really do vary. i would suggest going smaller rather than bigger (like don't use full post-width gifs or icons, try to keep them under half the size of the post? that's the most common vibe at least.)

icons can be used to "illustrate" your character's expression among a bunch of text, if you want Visual Spice. but they are soooo not necessary! totally up to you.

here are some examples of my icon styling!

there are lots of rp resources out here for cool coloring psd's and graphic templates for ya blog. create something fun and pretty that you like! <3

to reply to a thread, reblog it and add your post.

important: i highly recommend downloading and installing XKIT in your browser. it's an extension that lets you trim posts to the last two reblogs (common around here), customize your blog experience, and just makes it a lot easier to exist on tumblr haha.

ummmm i think that's it actually! you're finally free of my rambling. i really hope this helped!! please let me know if you have any questions, and gimme a follow when you start up a blog — i'd be happy to help you out however i can.

[not-me-simping-for-blasty]

ive got nothing of importance to add here and rlly no thoughts at all

but like,, y’all i just love bakugou sm. like, i was rewatching the training camp arc bc like, obviously?? and shEESH. i adoRE him. thats it. thats the thought.

[longroadstonowhere]

okay so here’s the thing @catdotjpeg tagged me in within the last month, maybe even the last week! that would be an exciting change, me actually responding to one of these that fast, haha

why did you choose your url— it was the name of my livejournal account, and when i made my livejournal i figured i should have some kinda artsy sounding name? that’s what livejournal was about, right? and longroadstonowhere felt appropriately artsy and relevant to how i live my life, haha

any sideblogs?—...... okay technically i have exactly one sideblog, but i have literally done nothing with it and i don’t think i’ll have the motivation to do anything with it at any point, so it functionally doesn’t exist

how long have you been on tumblr— christmas eve 2010

why did you originally start your blog— my high school friends were all on tumblr and after a year and a half at college, i was feeling out of touch with them, and then i got tired of individually checking their blog pages so i decided to get a tumblr myself so i could just see them all on the dashboard

why did you choose your icon— this renamon sprite has been and will continue to be my user icon on like every website ever

why did you choose your header— ..... okay so i was making my tumblr, and i was going through choosing stuff, and then i was like ‘i’m tired of choosing things’ and the header was ‘untitled’ by default and i was like you know what? that feels right, that feels artsy, we’ll keep it for now, and now i have a weird element of ego about never changing it (also i went looking for the weird element of ego post but a quick blog search didn’t turn it up)

what’s your post with the most notes— i have no idea how to easily figure this out, i’m gonna guess it’s the one that was functionally about this dude in college who mixed up our dorm room with someone else’s room, thought we were having a party, and just kinda hung out for five minutes while we were playing dnd (the actual post is an amusing play on the two different kinds of party, you see)

how many mutuals do you have— .................. is there like a systematic way to check that? i’ll say i know like fifteen (ish, very very ish) people who are mutuals and active and such, but man that is very much not how i think of things to be honest, haha

how many followers do you have— 711, apparently - i know most of them are real because i block the bots as soon as i see them, but i’m sure the vast majority of those are inactive folks

how many blogs do you follow— 135, the vast majority of which are dead comic or story blogs that i follow in eternal hope

have you ever made a shitpost— i mean what even is a shitpost, you know? i’ve definitely said a lotta shit but nothing that got super popular, if that’s even an important metric of shitposting

how many times do you use tumblr a day—it’s not even a ‘times per day’ kinda thing, because i constantly have a tumblr tab on my computer and i have it up on my phone now too (since my phone can actually handle tumblr at this point), and i even warn folks when i know i’m gonna be gone for a few days, haha

have you ever fought another blog— my dude, my guy, my friend..........i don’t fight a goddamn thing in my life, let alone some rando on the internet

how do you feel about “need to reblog” posts— not a fan, really - i’ll reblog info that seems potentially useful to folks, i’ll pass anything i’m not in a headspace to comprehend when i come across it

do you like tag games— yeah, they’re fun, but i do take like six months to respond to them sometimes, haha

do you like ask games— yeah but i don’t reblog them because i got it into my head a while back that i shouldn’t reblog an ask game from someone without asking them questions, which is a good sentiment but spoons are limited so i don’t end up doing either

which of your mutuals do you think are tumblr famous— uh...... probably none of them? like i know a few mutuals are more widely known in particular fandoms, but none of them are on the level of, like, prokopetz or usernames like that where it’s like ‘oh, i’ve seen like twenty posts with this user’s name, yeah i don’t even have to follow them to get what they’re about’

do you have a crush on a mutual— that sounds like way too much effort honestly

tags— ...... look i just tagged some folks for a different thing and i’m overthinking it in regards to this one so i’ll just leave this bit alone (the overthinking is like ‘should i tag some of the same folks i tagged in the other post? or should it be all new folks? i definitely shouldn’t tag all the same people as the other post, or at least not just all the same people, but who else should i tag then?’ and that’s about where i decide this isn’t worth the brain power, haha)

[adelaidedrubman]

🌱, 🌎, 🤷‍♀️, 💛, and 😇 for Jessie?

thank you kate!! these were really good questions i hope the answers are okay <3

[   🌱     ] what themes are relevant to your muse?

answered here!

[   🌎     ] are there any aus you have for your muse? what are they like, and how is your muse different in them?

yup! she has most of the standard fc5 aus i’d say, although i really haven’t done much of anything with any of them besides her no reaping au, which does have a fully formed plot of its own i hope to flesh out more. (in short, she hooks up with john at the spread eagle and eventually avoids the full scale reaping by preemptively arresting joseph for Being On Her Lawn.) but she also has a no collapse au (john seed house arrest cinematic universe, coming soon to a theater near you), herald au (Regular, published, and Flop, unpublished and unwritten but much more real), no cult au (two versions, only one actually sparsely written, still unpublished). also a supernatural au.

i haven’t written for it in a good while, but she also does have an au where she doesn’t go to the holland valley first and thus fails to develop John Brain Worms and ends up with tracey lader instead. and several aus with other ocs. some of those she learns to be normal some she just develops different Brain Worms.

[   🤷‍♀️     ] how does your muse approach strangers? how does this compare to how they interact with close friends or lovers?

answered here!

[   💛     ] how empathetic is your muse? how compassionate are they? is this something people expect from them, or are people surprised when they find out how compassionate or empathetic they actually are?

this is actually a really hard one to answer. i would say she’s empathetic but not particularly compassionate. she’s actually fairly good at understanding implicitly what people are thinking or feeling when she devotes her attention to it. like, for anyone who’s read her fic, most of the moments in which she’s being an ass and plays it off as an “oh haha look at me i’m just socially clueless” she actually shows complete awareness of how insensitive she’s about to be and just powers through. and she does value other people and recognize that they are as important as her, there’s just a disconnect on actually relating to them. and she understands basic social norms and values, she’s just pitifully out of synch with them because frankly they’ve caused her nothing but great personal harm. but there are also points at which she’s arguably extending empathy much further than any of the other Nice Folks around her, just in her own abrasive manner. and again, it doesn’t necessarily extend to compassion and if it does it’s certainly not expressed appropriately.

i think most people would be genuinely surprised at how much empathy is going on in there based on her behavior, with the exception of a few characters who give her an automatic undeserved benefit of the doubt. (jerome beloved stop letting her get away with shit please!!)

[   😇     ] what would your muse do if they became a god?

answered here!

[m6pr]

Doing Eula’s Story Quest So You Don’t Have To:

disclaimer this is just a presentation of the quest with relevant quotes(and some lesser analysis) and not a judgement call on whether eula is worth sympathizing with. please defer to actual poc on that matter.

under cut for length

Opening scene, excerpt of conversation with Jean:

Jean: I have recently received multiple reports from the Knights of someone within the Lawrence Clan having close dealings with the Fatui.

Paimon: The Fatui! Again?

Paimon: But who are the Lawrence Clan?

Jean: There was a dark period in Mondstadt’s history when the aristocracy ruled over the city. The hard-won freedom that followed with the fall of Decarabian was lost once again, as slavery spread throughout the land.

Jean: The first Dandelion Knight, Vennessa, spearheaded the revolution that overthrew the old aristocratic system and established the Knights of Favonius, leading Mondstadt to become the city that you see today.

Jean: The aristocrats, that had oppressed the people of Mondstadt, were none other than the Lawrence Clan.

...

Jean: Unfortunately, the Knights of Favonius and the aristocracy have been at odds with one another for as long as I can remember.

Jean: We have considered every possible way of resolving our differences, but it seems the descendants of the aristocracy remain antagonistic toward the Knights...

Jean: ...No matter what stance we take when dealing with them, the outcome is always the same... Our efforts only result in adding more fuel to the flames.

The Lawrence Clan is not painted in a sympathetic light, and this attitude toward them(bar Eula, for obvious reasons) persists throughout the quest.

Jean then sends the protagonist to talk to Schubert, the Lawrence Clan member in question. He very much holds onto the past structure of oppression, demonstrating extreme classism and going so far as to say that in the past, the protagonist would have been whipped for their insolence(which, in this case, is just the act of trying to have a casual conversation with Schubert).

This sets up Schubert as the antagonist of the quest, though not the entire Lawrence Clan, as Eula and Schubert are the only clan members present or mentioned.

The protagonist then runs into Amber at the Knights of Favonius Headquarters.

Excerpt from conversation with Amber:

Amber: Hehehe, I've been on the receiving end of [Schubert’s] lectures many a time. The Lawrence clan can be very particular about such things.

Paimon: Uh... You mean everyone in the Lawrence Clan is just a big headache?

Amber: As aristocrats, they believe there should be a certain distance between themselves and common folk. *sigh* I understand their thinking, but that's just not how things are anymore. Amber: However, there is one exception among the Lawrence Clan. My good buddy - Eula!

Paimon: B-Buddy?

Amber: That's right! Not only is she from the Lawrence Clan, but she's also Captain of the Knights of Favonius 4th Company.

Wayfarer: Jean told us that the Lawrence Clan sees the Knights as enemies.

Amber: Eula is special! She's not quite like the other members of her clan. She has her own beliefs and it shows. 

Amber: In other words, she doesn't really adhere to the strict rules and conventions of her family.

Amber: However, she's still quite knowledgeable about dealing with the Lawrences. I'm sure you'll see what I mean if you meet her.

Paimon: Hmm, that's strange. If Eula is a member of the Lawrence Clan, then why would Master Jean choose us for the task? Couldn't she just ask Eula? 

Amber: Ah, well... It's a little complicated. Basically, the Lawrence clan has frowned upon the fact that Eula joined the Knights, her family members don't particularly care for her…

Amber: In their eyes, Eula is nothing but a traitor to the family. 

Wayfarer: She sounds like quite the character.

Amber: She's very easy to get along with. Just explain the situation and I'm sure she'll help you come up with a way to get along with Schubert.

Amber: In fact, I think she's out in the wilderness on patrol this morning. You should be able to find her around Stormbearer Mountains.

Paimon: Thanks, Amber! Alright, you heard her, let's go find Eula!

The protagonist meets Eula after battling some Fatui, when she saves them from being killed by an enemy they were unaware of.

Excerpt from conversation with Eula:

Wayfarer: So you must be Eula?

Eula: Yes, that's me.

Paimon: Paimon thinks she's pretty strange... Although, at least we can communicate with her.

Eula: You dare to call someone you've just met "strange"? Forget the aristocracy, that's rude even by normal standards!

Eula: Speaking of which... how do you know my name?

Paimon: This is the Honorary Knight of the Knights of Favonius. And speaking of rude, we're trying to investigate an aristocrat named Schubert Lawrence.

Paimon: He's so obsessed with etiquette that he's not even willing to speak with us!

Eula: Hahaha! I understand now. That's my uncle alright. 

Eula: But why do you mean to investigate him?

Wayfarer: He may be secretly involved with the Fatui.

Eula: I see... Haha, you have some nerve defaming a family member right in front of me. I will have vengeance for this, too!

Paimon: No, no, no! This is an assignment from Master Jean! It's just an investigation, that's all!

Wayfarer: Aren't you curious about your uncle?

Eula: To the everyday citizens of Mondstadt, everyone in the Lawrence clan is scum. It's natural for rumors and unwarranted gossip to lead to such suspicion.

Paimon: Hard to avoid such a reputation when you're known as the ruthless rulers of Old Mondstadt.

Eula: So that's what you think of me? Yet another transgression to avenge...

Paimon: But didn't you say it first!? Argh...

Eula: Hahaha, curious... We've only just met, and you've already given me three causes for vengeance. It's been a while since I've encountered anyone as interesting as you.

Wayfarer: Your definition of curious is... curious.

Eula: I assume you need me to teach you the conduct of the Lawrence clan. Only then will you finally be able to communicate with my uncle, correct?

Eula initially presents herself in a similar manner to the aristocracy, seemingly obsessed with vengeance over minor transgressions. She seems to care greatly about the image of the Lawrence clan, and appears to resent the negative image it (quite rightfully) has.

Eula then attempts to train the protagonist in the ways of aristocratic speech via demonstrations. It goes very badly. As one would expect, the working class citizens of Mondstadt don’t like being demeaned by a member of the aristocracy that used to oppress the city, even one that is slightly more sympathetic for her role in the Knights of Favonius.

Conversation with Randall, the last one of these demonstrations:

Eula: You there, lowly worker, I-

Randall: Yeah, I've already heard it all before. Look, just spare me the time, our answer is always the same. We've got nothing to say to the likes of you. 

Randall: I mean, seriously, can't you just take a hint?

Paimon: Please calm down, we don't want to cause any trouble. 

Randall: *sigh* I know she's a Knight of Favonius, and that the Knights wouldn't misplace their trust, but the name Lawrence carries too much weight with it.

Randall: Even to this very day, the descendants of the Lawrence Clan are still scheming to reclaim Mondstadt and reinstate their aristocratic rule. 

Randall: And if that wasn't enough, here you are purposefully using their awkward way of speaking just to put on an act? Don't you care for the feelings of us ordinary folk?

Eula: You have a point.

Eula: But mark my words, this transgression will not go unnoticed!

Randall: H-Huh? You wanna fight? Listen here, I might be no match for you, but I'll be sure to lodge a complaint with the Knights of Favonius!

Wayfarer: Maybe we should just call it a day now.

Randall: I'm sorry but... I want her to understand that I'm serious!

Randall: Listen here, if you don't want things to get more unpleasant, then you'd better just stop.

Eula: Forget it, there's no point in quarreling any further. Let's go.

Randall: *sigh*...

Eula: It's alright, this happens quite often. Let's find someone else to talk to.

Paimon: Uh, Paimon thinks we've seen enough now. Let's just stop.

Excerpt from the conversation with Eula after this segment of the quest:

Paimon: Actually, Paimon thinks we should apologize for asking you to demonstrate for us. We had no idea the feelings between the Lawrence Clan and the people of Mondstadt were so bitter. 

Eula: Haha, what can we do? The Lawrence name is already a dirty word among every household in Mondstadt. Even three-year-olds know the story. I see this kind of attitude all the time.

Wayfarer: And somehow you still manage to brush it off with a laugh?

Eula: Don't worry, what with me being a Knight of Favonius, they're usually willing to speak a few words with me.

Eula: Perhaps my aristocratic manner of speech provoked them today. Believe me, it's not a big issue.

Paimon: So this is the way things are normally for you? There's no need for them to direct their anger at you personally. 

Eula: That's the way things are. Perhaps it's just fate for those who've made mistakes. Accepting punishment is only fair, right? But when your family has committed atrocities, I'm afraid there's no easy path to reconciliation.

Eula: As memories are carried in the city breeze, the faults of such grievances are passed on from one generation to the next. It is now my turn to bear this burden.

Eula: At least I have a means of living a relatively normal life compared to the elders of my family. I have nothing to be discontented about. 

Wayfarer: So you knew all along that we'd encounter these kinds of problems? 

Paimon: Yeah, why were you so willing to try and demonstrate for us?

The narrative paints Eula in a sympathetic light for “dealing with the alienation of being a member of the Lawrence Clan”. However, she acknowledges the fact that Lawrence Clan deserves this foul reputation given its history, contrasting with the first conversation the protagonist has with her.

More training of the monster fighting variety ensues, finishing with a trip to Good Hunter to buy a diplomatic gift for Schubert. There, you run into Amber. Sara ends up giving Amber a salad on the house, prompting Eula to swear vengeance.

Excerpt from conversation with Eula, Amber, and Sara:

Eula: So... we clearly didn't order this, yet you prepared it without authorization... Hmph! Mark my words, this transgression will not go unnoticed!

Paimon: Uh... you're going to take revenge on her for giving us a free salad!? 

Sara: You should know me by now, that's the kind of villainous character I am! Hehe...

Sara: Well then... please wait a moment while I get the dish for your uncle started.

Eula: Hmph, delicious unauthorized delicacies... Sara will pay for this.

Paimon: Why would you choose Gebratenes Fleisch mit Sauerkraut as a gift for your uncle? Paimon's never even heard of that dish before... Eula: This dish isn't actually on Good Hunter's menu. Only long standing patrons such as my uncle would know about the dish. The old aristocrats seem to take a liking to it. 

Amber: Because of the sour flavor of the sauerkraut, not too many people are fond of it these days. I guess it's become less popular over time.

Amber: Eula treated me to the dish once, and I couldn't even finish a bite. I've nicknamed it "Gebratenes Fleisch mit Vengeance" ever since. Yuck!

Eula: I never expected us to have such completely different tastes in food... If I weren't in such a good mood, I'd say that constitutes grounds for transgression...

Wayfarer: Huh, so even Amber doesn't escape your vengeance?

The “transgression” that Sara commits? Eula gets her vengeance by paying for the food, but putting the Mora under the plate. This is the first sign that though Eula cares about “transgressions” and “vengeance”, she does not seek to hurt people she doesn’t feel deserve it.

Amber and Eula leave, and the protagonist takes the gift from Sara, leading to this conversation:

Paimon: Paimon's been meaning to ask... No one could stand the sight of Eula when she was trying to speak with the others in Mondstadt earlier.

Paimon: But she seemed to get along fine with you and Amber just now… what's up with that?

Sara: The people of Mondstadt don't take kindly to anyone bearing the Lawrence name. 

Sara: They are unable to see past her family, therefore they don't actually see Eula for herself.

Sara: So no matter what Eula tries to do, it's seen as a wrongdoing. It essentially strips the meaning of anything she tries to accomplish.

Wayfarer: I think I understand now.

Paimon: How come you're able to see Eula differently then? 

Sara: Well, when she joined the Knights of Favonius, it caused quite an uproar.

Sara: Many people signed a petition, demanding that the Knights reverse their decision. 

Sara: At the same time, numerous members of the Lawrence Clan crowded the entrance of the Knights of Favonius Headquarters, clamoring for Eula to give an explanation.

Paimon: Whoa... so both sides were unhappy.

Sara: That's right. So, you can imagine how determined Eula must have been under such circumstances. 

Sara: But thanks to Grand Master Varka and the unwavering attitudes of others in the Knights of Favonius, they were able to quell the unrest. Tensions still remain beneath the surface, I'm afraid.

Sara: In the eyes of the people, she's a stain on the Knights of Favonius... and in the eyes of the Lawrence Clan, she's a disgrace to her family. 

Sara: But she simply fulfills her duty as a Knight, silently helping one person after another, myself included.

Sara: People like Eula should be approached with care and understanding. She could stand to be treated a little more fairly.

Wayfarer: It's good that you're able to understand her.

Sara: I believe a day will come when things will get better.

Eula is clearly defying her family’s oppressive mindset, but the narrative still disparages Mondstadt for not welcoming a former oppressor with open arms.

You meet Schubert, and, surprise surprise, he is scheming with the Fatui to take over Mondstadt. You follow him into the Fatui’s lair, when Eula catches up to you.

Excerpt from conversation with Eula and Schubert:

Schubert: Don't touch me, get out of my way! I'll leave on my own!

Eula: It seems we've finally caught up with you. This place is crawling with Fatui. 

Eula: Oh, it's you. It seems your investigation went well.

Wayfarer: It was all worth it.

Schubert: Aha! I see now. So you're the one that taught them our etiquette? And I thought you despised such pleasantries!

Schubert: Furthermore, there is a rule in our family. Such traditions are never to be taught to outsiders!

Eula: Ah yes, rings a bell. So what? I had no reason not to teach them. 

Schubert: Y-You have brought shame to our family and ruined my plans! It's all for naught now!

Eula: I know that you poured great efforts into these plans, uncle. But you were well aware that it was not the right thing to do. As a Knight of Favonius, I could not overlook your actions.

Schubert: Knight of Favonius!? Let's get one thing straight. I am your uncle, and you are a member of the Lawrence Clan! You should strive to restore your family's glory!

Schubert: You still have a chance. Defeat every Knight of Favonius here, and leave with me!

Schubert: Then I shall plea with the family to spare you and give you a new beginning! 

Eula: So just to be clear, you want a Knight of Favonius to attack the Knights of Favonius?

Schubert: I shall say this one last time. You are not a Knight of Favonius. You are a descendant of the Lawrence Clan!

Schubert: The blood of the Lawrence Clan flows in your veins! You must comply with the will of the family!

Eula: Since when have I ever complied with the will of the family?

Schubert: Wh-Why you... you unruly maid!

Eula: If anyone should be angry, it should be me. As a member of the Lawrence Clan, you knowingly plotted against the city of Mondstadt and threatened its safety.

Eula: Had you ever stopped to consider the trouble it would bring to so many people? Had you considered how many enemies you would make trying to keep the plans under wraps?

Schubert: Y-You dare lecture me!

Eula: That's right, in the name of the family that you so dearly revere, Uncle Schubert.

Eula: I've never experienced the age of "glory" you always speak of, and I've never understood our family's incessant pursuit of it.

Eula: But I am capable of discerning right from wrong, and I deeply understand what "freedom" means to the people of Mondstadt. 

Eula: The Lawrence Clan should never and will never become what you've dreamed it to be!

Schubert: Grr...

Schubert: Oh, the disgrace of it all! How could such a rebellious monster emerge from our own family!?

Eula openly defies the oppressive goals of the Lawrence Clan, solidifying her stance against them. However, she still claims to act in the name of the family, but her idea of restoring their name appears to be to make amends with the people of Mondstadt, not to rule over them again.

The protagonist escapes the Fatui lair, and has a boss fight, after which this conversation ensues, and the quest ends:

Eula: *sigh* And there was me thinking that he was just another elder of the family and a lazy one at that. I never suspected he could stoop this low. So stubborn... Mark my words, vengeance will be mine!

Paimon: Oh yeah, you suddenly appeared at just the right moment.

Eula: Yeah, about that...

Eula: Because you stole my targets by attacking the Fatui I'd been tracking earlier...

Eula: ...I came to exact my vengeance. You tried to do my job for me, and I'm here to return the favor.

Wayfarer: So getting the diagram of Mondstadt's defenses was your way of exacting vengeance?

Paimon: Finally, after all this time, Paimon understands what you're saying!

Paimon: In reality, you sensed that something might happen to us during our investigation... 

Paimon: You were worried about us and your uncle, so you brought a team to take a look!

Eula: My purpose was vengeance, don't twist the story.

Eula: Hmph, you don't look too bright, but it turns out you have a knack for scheming...

Eula: And mark my words, I'll remember that...

Paimon: Hey, what do you mean Paimon doesn't look too bright!?

Eula: You have seeded a deep enmity between us... just you wait.

Eula: Even if you were to be completely destroyed, I would never forget you!

Wayfarer: So, does that make us your "arch-enemies"?

Eula’s definition of “vengeance” is shown once again to be naught more than a front.

In summary:

The narrative sympathizes with Eula, and disparges the people of Mondstadt for alienating her, though they have every right to do so.

The Lawrence Clan are not sympathetic, and Eula is directly at odds with them.

Eula does not seek to restore the glory of the Lawrence Clan in the oppressive sense, and wants to not be judged for her family, but her actions.

[dndaddyissues]

Hi there! My friends and I just started playing DnD and we want to play a second campaign (our current DM is not available a lot) but none of us have any DM experience (and we've all only done one campaign, our current one). Do you have any tips/resources on how to start DM'ing? I really don't know where to look/start😅 thanks already for replying! Love all the memes on your blog haha

hello! yes! i’ve answered similar asks here, here, and here, but i’ll also add onto those lists with these quick tips/reiterations:

- run a session 0. since you’re all friends already, you probably know each other pretty well, which is fantastic. but it never hurts to gauge what players want out of their dnd experience. do they wanna kill shit? do they want a politically intricate world? how about hot NPCs to romance? how about a post-apocalyptic setting overrun with monsters? meet your players where they’re at – some will have a deeper and more concrete understanding of what they desire, while others will likely just shrug and say “idk, i just wanna tell a story with friends.” both are fine. take notes during your session 0, and use it to design a campaign around your players’ “wish list.” you can also run character creation during this session 0, during which you should decide if your players all know each other already, if they’re just meeting for the first time, or a combination thereof. finally, a session 0 can be used to determine meeting frequency, scheduling logistics, and “squicks” – topics players want to avoid in the campaign. you can also introduce a “campaign menu” to your players during session 0, so your players can pick their favorite plot hook from it and you can plan your first session based on the characters they make surrounding the hook. easy peasy breezy beautiful  covergirl.

- control the pace. as the DM, you control the speed, tone, and pace of the story. if players are just sitting around, confused and unsure of what to do, throw an encounter at them. combat, roleplay, exploration, any of those things, all of those things. anything to move the story along. if your players take forever to get to the plot hook, bring the plot hook to them. if your players decide to split up, generate quick cuts between scenes so we don’t spend too much or too little time on one person. if your players are confused about a rule, you can spend 5-10 minutes looking it up and delaying gameplay – or you make an executive decision on the spot. just be sure to make it clear to your players that this is a quick ruling to move the story along, and that you will look up (and implement, if you want) the actual rule later.

- who’s afraid of the big bad railroad? ok, this might be controversial, but whatever. in my experience, a genuine “sandbox” campaign can be deeply frustrating and feel pointless if players are just running around, from waypoint to waypoint, killing dozens of goblins in random encounters that have no bearing on the greater world. that’s why i honestly prefer what people might mistakenly call a “railroad” campaign – basically this is just a campaign with concrete and visible goals in sight, and a cool “endgame confrontation” on the horizon. at the end of every session, your players should feel like they’ve accomplished something – or, at the very least, are on the way to accomplishing something. that often makes sessions more fun. 

- start in media res! ah, session 1, that most terrible and beautiful of sessions. nothing wrong with starting in a tavern – many of the most memorable campaigns start in one. but there’s also nothing wrong with starting in the middle of the action. this doesn’t necessarily have to be combat, though it certainly can be. throw your players into the middle of a plot-relevant situation, and see how they respond. they can be the main agents – perhaps they’ve stalked an evil wizard to this lair, and are facing down his horrific automatons at the top of  session 1. or they can be background characters, in a “wrong place wrong time” situation – they’re all in a fantasy elevator, a man walks in with a briefcase, the door closes, and the man falls to the ground, dead ��� with a dagger coming out of his back. your players get a chance to look at each other, talk this out, make decisions, before the elevator stops, the door opens, and there are a bunch of fantasy police and bystanders milling about. what do they do?

- take notes! TAKE NOTES! i’m really guilty of not doing this often enough. it’s my greatest vice. but yes, take notes during your sessions! what NPCs did you make up on the fly? what improvised magical items did you give your players? where are they going next? what information did they uncover? etc etc. write notes during natural pauses in the game, or when players are arguing with each other about which road to take.

- prepare! some GMs improvise everything. i am not one of those GMs, and i am terrified of them. when i improvise my sessions, they either turn out great or horrible. i’m a risk-averse person, so i want to avoid that coin toss. my solution? prepare my sessions in advance. if you have the time, draw out maps of big set piece battles you think might occur. prepare lists of NPCs that the PCs might encounter in an area you’re pretty sure they’re going to reach. write out some random plot hooks (brownie points if they’re related to the greater campaign story) just in case weird downtime occurs and the players feel lost /listless /confused. and, if you want, prepare a written narrative speech – brief, vivid, visual, and performative – for the beginning and maybe end of your session, vividly describing where your players are, what the environment’s like, what’s around them, and what they could do with this information. having a written “speech” (but no longer than a paragraph or two) ready for just the top of your session really helps make you seem like you have your shit together lol.

that’s all i can think of right now! what advice do other folks have?

[calliecat93]

One of the biggest criticisms of Volume 4, if not the biggest criticism, was it usage of multiple plotlines. While an ambitious idea, the balance was really off which really affected the pacing. It felt like everything was scattered around and like things were being dragged out, or not even given as much attention as needed. But it looks like with Volume 8, CRWBY is getting a chance to try it again. One advantage is having all the relevant characters in tow main groups so only two major plotlines to focus on. This chapter focuses on RWBNP as they break into the Atlas Military Facility. How will it go? Well... since this is late you already know, but I’m gonna blab anyhow. Enjoy~

Overview

Team RWBNPM have made it into the military compound and Penny has located where the terminal is. They’re able to wonder around the base undetected via May’s Invisibility Semblance and Penny is able to use Pietro’s credentials to access the doors. They eventually reach an area that even with May’s Semblance, will be too difficulty to get through without being spotted. Penny, however, has a solution. You remember how Harriet pointed out Ruby’s Semblance was more than she thought in V7? Well Penny actually breaks it down here. Ruby essentially breaks down her mass and is able to more or less teleport herself and others before reforming, so Ruby should be able to do this with all of them.

Meanwhile, remember when Watts got taken by security last chapter? Well it’s because Ironwood is now forcing him to work for him, having a whole squadron ready to shoot him to death if he doesn’t comply. What does he need Watts to do? We’ll go into that later. Until then, Watts points out that Pietro’s credentials have been used, causing Ironwood to raise the alarm. This means that the team has to hurry, so they trip a worker with coffee as a distraction. As the guy's co-workers yell at him, RWBNP move past via Ruby’s Semblance as May goes to commandeer a ship.

Eventually, RWBNP reach the terminal. It is a VERY highly secured area with the door being guarded by some powerful electricity. It’s so secure that no humans even work in there. Penny allows Pietro to take over manually to begin the process of green lighting Amity. During this, Blake expresses concern about ruby and Yang’s fight, though Weiss assures her that sometimes sisters just disagree. Nora also tries to help by pointing out that Jaune, Yang, and Oscar should be fine (haha...) but noticeably leaves out Ren. It’s here that Nora expresses how upset she was about their argument and how just when things look up for them, it goes right back to zero. Even worse, without Ren, Nora doesn’t feel like she even knows who she is aside form the strong girl who hits stuff. Blake and Weiss point out to her that Ren is only a part of her, the rest however also matters and that maybe she can use this chance to discover more about herself.

The process is completed and Penny can now launch Amity. But despite wanting to resume helping Mantle afterwards, both Pietro and the girls believe that it’s best for Penny to remain with Pietro and Maria in Amity once it launches. This disappoints her. As the group gets ready to leave, they are confronted byt he Ace-Ops. Vine tries to reason with the g4roup, but they continue to refuse. it doesn’t help when Harriet and Elm essentially blame Penny for Winter’s condition and accuse her of stealing the Maiden power, nor does Harriet threatening to lock up Ruby alongside her uncle. To no one’s surprise, the group refuses, so the Ace-Ops trap RWBN in the room, leaving Penny to fight on her own.

Penny is ale to hold her own, even managing to make good use of her Maiden powers. However, the Ace-Ops are able to match against her and eventually Marrow is able to use his Stay power on her. RWBN try to break through the door, bot nothing is working. Nora, staring at the electric door, decides to do what she dos best be strong and hit stuff. Using her hammer and Semblance, Nora absorbs the electricity until she’s powered enough to blow the door off it’s hinges. However, even for Nora, this was far too much as her body gets some ugly scarring. She collapses, her Aura breaking.

Seeing the fight, Watts suggests that the Ace-Ops get one of Penny’s swords. Ironwood orders this, and they bandage to rip one off of Penny before retreating, though Marow noticeably is hesitant. WBNP reach a hangar where May has gotten an airship. They escape, but Nora is still passed out and seriously injured. After this, Penny agrees that she needs to remain in Amity and it’s time for her to go. She and Ruby hug one more time, promising to see each other again before Penny flies off for Amity. Meanwhile, the Ace-Ops turn over the sword to Ironwood. Why did they need this? The same reason that Ironwood recruited Watts: to hack into Penny and turn her back onto their side.

Review

Ah, action, emotions, and spilt coffee. All the things I love in a RWBY episode~

Let’s talk about Ruby’s Semblance first since I’ve seen some debate about it. IDK how scientifically accurate Penny’s explanation is... but Ruby is a girl who can trail rose petals behind her, so I’m not all that concerned about accuracy here. But this just more or less confirmed what I’ve been thinking for a long time now. I, as well as others, have pointed out that her Semblance doesn’t really appear to act line a speed-based one. Heck as I said, Harriet pointed it out just last volume. Now we know that Ruby’s power is essentially a slow-formed teleportation. Considering I always assumed that Summer’s Semblance had a similar breaking her body down function, this makes a lot of sense to me.

I’ve seen some complain about how Ruby didn’t know this... but really? That’s perfectly in-character for her. She’s a clever girl, but she’s always been one to act more than give deep contemplation. She knows the basic function of her Semblance, to move fast compared to normal, and that works for her. Heck remember last volume when she used her split apart trick. Oscar asked how long she could do that, and she answered that she had never really thought of it. Sure Ruby HAS carried people with her Semblance before (Penny in V2, Nora in V4, Weiss in V6), but that was with a single person. She had never tried it with a group before. It fits into how Semblances evolve over time and I’m really happy to see Ruby grow more. I get the feeling that she needs all the happy development she can get before things really go off the deep end.

Speaking of though, the chibi art accompanying Penny’s explanation? Both cute and hilarious. It reminded me of Ruby’s imagine spots back in Volume One. This chapter had quite a few funny moments. Weiss pulling Nora’s ear for last episode, Nora pushing all the elevator buttons. Blake clearly hating all forms of unconventional transportation, and while I feel it clashed with the tone a bit the coffee guy tripping up was great. The crude poster of a Shark Grimm (when do we get that?) especially got a giggle out of me. Like I said last review, it’s nice to have these bits of levity. I love it when Ruby gets feelsy and serious, but I don’t want it to divert form fun and light-heartedness all the time. They’ve gotten a lot better at keeping a balance and transitioning us from one mood to the other. I feel last chapter did it a bit better, but this was still well done.

Now lets talk about Penny. It was nice to see her act like her usual perky self a bit with her Semblance explanation and the direction to the terminal. But still, it’s clear that things are still haunting her. She’s still reminded of her robot identity with May’s comment, which no IDT May was trying to be offensive or anything, after all Robyn uses nicknames like that all the time and she DID use Penny’s name after the correction. But even past that, we have Pietro manually taking control of Penny. Now it WAS done with permission and there’s a good reason why, but my reaction to it was the same as Ruby’s. You ca tell that Penny wasn’t looking forward to it since it one more emphasizes that she is a robot. We all know she’s more, but Penny is still trying to figure out her new place.

This is especially evident in her reaction to remaining on Amity. Of course she doesn’t want to do that. She still considers herself the Protector of Mantle. She is now the Winter Maiden. She wants to help people. She wants to be out there doing good alongside her friends. But unfortunately with the target on her back from both sides, it’ simply too dangerous. She not only puts herself at risk, but those around her. We already know that ironwood will now go to any extreme to get his way, including work with an evil scientist and have a firing squad ready to fire. Salem... do I need to explain any further? The safest thin is for Penny to remain in Amity, but it still clearly pains her even after accepting it as necessary. And with Watts now having a piece necessary to hack her AND the episode showing us how it can be done... yeah, pray for Penny folks.

She DID however get to kick ass with her Maiden powers. While we had some Grimm fights last chapter, this was the first major fight of the volume, and it was awesome. Penny, even after just getting her power, uses it to great effect. Not as much as Raven or even Cinder, but is clearly more than capable of controlling it. But the Ace-Ops do manage to match her. They aren’t holding back now, they are going in for the kill and all of them (save Marrow, I’ll talk about him in the CH4 review) seem to be on the same wavelength. I think this helped the complaints about the Ace-Ops losing to RWBY (ones I don’t agree with, but still) and shows how even with Clover dead, they are still a capable force. Harriet and Elm’s words were still overly cruel, but I can’t deny that they can fight. Oh and we also FINALLY got to see Vine’s weapon, so there’s that. It was a fun action sequence~

But now we get to the star of this episode for me: Nora. Now... I have made it no secret that Nora is my least favorite character of the main group. Why? There’s two main reasons: her lack of development compared to the others and her character largely revolving around Ren. I won’t lie, some of the over-exposure and her portrayal in Chibi also contributed, but those don’t really affect her character in-show. While I feel that she has slowly improved, last volume especially being a step up, I still felt like she was the least developed. So going into Volume 8, I was very curious about hat they would do with her now that she and Ren are divided and she is on her own.

I have to say... I am very happy with her in this episode. It addressed my complaint about her and Ren being co-dependent as far as their portrayals in-show went. They outright existed more or less to fill out Team JNPR, and they spent Volumes 1-3 as comic relief to focus on Jaune and Pyrrha. I miss Pyrrha to this day, but her death DID allow the two to finally grow as characters. I don’t like it when the focus of a character is mainly on their relationship with another, hence why shipping gets on my nerves a lot. It was a HUGE issue I had with Renora until they became fleshed out. Here we have Nora expressing how upset she is about Ren, how every time it looks like they’ve gotten closer something comes in to ruin it (Volume 4 for example), and now that she’s without him for the first time in who knows how long... she doesn’t really know who she is. This has been something that I’ve wanted the show to go into since at least Volume 4, and it is FINALLY happening.

I love how the ones who talk to her are Blake and Weiss. Blake struggled with separating herself from a previous attachment, and knows how hard it is to remember that that’s only one part of yourself. Weiss has struggled with carving her own identity which while not in the romantic context, is still relevant as her family name is only a part of her, not the whole thing. It’s a dynamic I never knew I needed, but I am SO glad we have it now! I think as hard as it is, Nora needed to part from Ren for now. She needs to remember to care about herself and know that she is more than just the girl who likes Ren and hits stuff with a hammer. She’s funny, she’s caring, she’s loyal, she’s fun to be around, she can get carried away with things yet it’s always entertaining when she does. She is Nora Valkyrie before everything else. And in the end, she more or less sacrificed herself to break the door and save Penny. IDK if she knew that the electricity would be too much, but she still made the choice by herself. Now we just need to hope that she recovers... and that when Ren finds out, he doesn’t snap...

In the intro, I talked about how V8 seems to be a second attempt at the split teams plot in Volume 4. While I find V4 underrated and a nice character development/world-building volume, the handling of the split plots... did certainly cause pacing issues. The biggest issue was cramming essentially six storylines into the volume, four of which were vital, and not being able to give them all proper attention. Essentially, it worked fine when binged, but going week by week it could get tiresome very quickly. This time, we have the entire team split into two groups with the side plots being the villains and Ironwood’s forces. This only leaves two major plotlines that need the main focus and allows for unique character dynamics, like Nora with Weiss and Blake. 

So far, the pacing with these two groups has been done very well. While we don’t see JYRO in this episode, last chapter did enough that we already know what to expect when we get back to them. Nothing feels out of focus or like one plot is getting more attention than the other. It feels balanced. It feels like both plots matter and I want to see what happens. The writers have clearly learned and improved over the years, with this being a clear example. It’s been really fun (and scary) so far and I’m really excited to see more of these different group dynamics (and since I’ve already seen Chapter 4, they are delivering!), though hopefully we will get the team reformed before long. But for now, I’m loving this~

Chapter Stats

Favorite Character: Nora Valkyrie Favorite Scene: Nora, Weiss, and Blake talk Least Favorite Scene: Coffee Guy Favorite Voice Actor: Samantha Ireland (Nora) Favorite Animation: Penny going Winter Maiden against the Ace-Ops Rating: 9.9/10

Final Thoughts

Three chapters in, and already this volume is looking to be one of the best. Some nice humor, great character dynamics and focus, an epic action sequence, and a lot of heart and emotion put in especially with Penny and Nora. This was a fantastic episode that gave me everything that I was hoping for! If the quality stays at this pace, the this is absolutely going to become a great one! And considering what happens next chapter, we haven’t strayed from that yet. But that review is for another day, for now I’ll say that this chapter was great~

[innovativestruggles]

TsukiYachi speculations, thoughts and theories based on canonical evidence - PART 2

EDIT: Read Part 1 here

Okay following on from my original thesis, I thought I would put up a Part 2 now that I have finally caught up with the manga. And seeing as the manga is in it’s final arc (though this may take awhile to complete considering how long an arc takes), I thought I would do a final wrap up of my TsukiYachi speculations/theories up until the timeskip (final arc of the manga). If I see any other interesting stuff during the final arc, I will write a Part 3 but judging from what I have read so far, I am unsure if there will be any more details.

In saying all this, Part 2 is relatively short as the interactions between Tsukki and Yachi are non-existent minimal. So what I will do is draw on some comparisons between the earlier parts of the manga series and the arc before the timeskip. Do I make sense? My mind has been a jumble these past few months ughh

WARNING: This post contains some manga spoilers

Interactions

Following on from the Shiratorizawa arc, it’s sad to see the very minimal page time for Yachi. Tsukki still had some of his moments but there was nothing major in terms of character development. There were scenes of flashbacks that looked at comparing his development re; before vs. after but that was pretty much it. 

Yachi just had a few panels of interesting facial expressions during the game.

Yeah I’m gonna put them in below even if it is irrelevant to TsukiYachi - cause Yachi is a gorgeous lil freaked out bean. And mind you, a couple these reactions involved Tsukki blocking so yeah maybe it is like 30% relevant (don’t ask me how I came to that percentage) lmao

Comparisons with Earlier and Later Chapters

I want to use the Shiratorizawa arc as the ultimate baseline for this paragraph, as this was where we saw the most (and important) TsukiYachi moments hehe. So having just caught up with the manga, I’d still like to say that Yachi’s page time over time becomes less and less. When she was first introduced to about the first quarter of the Inter High Spring Tournament prelims, we get to see quite a lot of Yachi. Then it dropped dramatically until the Shiratorizawa arc and then very, very minimal again thereafter. 

Likewise on Tsukki’s end, post-Shiratorizawa we see a lot less of him (prob because his major development time has been done and dusted). 

So my concluding thoughts? We don’t see anymore Tsukki character development after this arc, so the one and most important time for his growth occurred with Yachi having extra page time (yeah she makes a comeback with more page time just for this dork). Hehe, overanalysing much? Yeah I think so too but I fucking love it, cause it proves this ship ain’t no crack ship. 

Again, Furudate could pick anyone to get in on the Tsukki character development commentary (he did so with Yamaguchi in the earlier parts of the manga, and considering how close Yama is to Tsukki, I would think Furudate would use him again. Or even Kiyoko! She’s the damn manager! but yeah he chose cute Yachi instead).

Post Spring Nationals (before timeskip)

YO CHECK THIS OUT! FURUDATE DREW THEM NEXT TO EACH OTHER AGAIN! 

FOR THE SECOND DAMN TIME! 

Cause we all know how important a panel with all them players are sitting down together and eating. The panel below was of the team after they finished up at Nationals. LOOK AT THEM! LOOK AT TSUKKI AND YACHI EATING BESIDE EACH OTHER! I can’t. I’m gonna cry tears of joy.

AND THEN THIS ONE! WHEN THEY WERE SAYING GOODBYE TO THE GRADUATING THIRD YEARS! Ughhhhhh ... look at how small Yachi is next to Tsukki. These twwwwwwooooooo <333 

Furudate thank you for feeding my TsukiYachi soul. Like one panel after another. I’m gonna faint....

Extra Info on Star References

I already wrote this in my other post, but I wanted to put an image of how much Yachi loves her damn stars...HER BLANKET...AND THE LIL END OF THE SANTA HAT AAAAAAAAHHHHHHH 

(and Tsukki with his giant star in the manga)...I’ve lost count of how many star shirts he got in varying colours and with different star sizes lmao...

Timeskip

Not much to post here except the fact that Yachi looked adorably pretty and her star accessory migrated to her ears as earrings instead. Yeah this girl still obsessed with them stars. 

So I am looking for future references whether grown up Tsukki still wearing his star shirts..or got any other...variations...

Currently awaiting for more chapters. Fingers crossed Furudate gives us more subtle references for grown up TsukiYachi teehee.

Bonus

The three lil munchkins all grown up. Lmao Tsukki looks so sass here..

Bonus Bonus

Unsure why Tanaka gotta be in this image but Tsukki and Yachi together in a merchandise promotion for Season 2

Bonus Bonus Bonus

Both these precious dorks were born in September (Yachi: September 4th, Tsukki: September 27th). They be September babies together <333

Why are these two so matching?!?!?!?!? <3

I had so much fun doing this! HAHA! The major evidence are all in the first post I wrote. So this one is just some extra materials I found along the way and whilst finally catching up in the manga.

Also, for @mimi-cee-hq​ because I know you will always be interested in TsukiYachi materials hehe

That’s all folks ! Peace out !

[blessedarethebinarybreakers]

(1/2) hi there! so, i don't really consider myself a "new" christian- i've felt drawn to god since i was young- but i only started reading the bible about a week ago. i set a goal for myself of reading 20 chapters a day so that i will have read the entire bible in ~2 months, which was very manageable initially because april break was still in progress when i started. however, now that i have schoolwork to do, i'm finding that i just don't have enough time in the day to read that many chapters.

(2/2) i don't want to disregard my goal, but if i force myself to read too much each day, i fear that i won't be able to retain or appreciate much of what i read. i'm not sure what to do. should i lessen my ambitions at the cost of taking longer to read it overall, or somehow muscle through 20 chapters a day at the cost of not fully understanding them? sorry this isn't relevant to lgbt matters- i'm just always comforted by your advice and wasn't sure where else to turn. thank you for your time!

______

Ah, don’t be sorry! If I could talk about the Bible all day every day, I’d be thrilled! (I’m autistic and scripture is my mainstay special interest haha)

This gets super long so tl;dr: I vote for revising your goal and reading less per day. You don’t wanna get burned out, and you want to be able to retain what you read and have the chance to really mull it over! 

It means a lot to me that folks like you come to me for suggestions; I’m by no means an expert but golly do I love the Bible, and I’ve been reading it since childhood -- first picture book & abridged versions, then the “real deal” starting in ninth grade, and these days I often translate passages from the original Greek and Hebrew. So I’m always joyful to share what I’ve learned about reading the Bible, particularly in ways that combine the spiritual and the scholarly. 

_____

I super admire your dedication to reading the entire Bible; most Christians never do so and while it’s by no means a prerequisite to being Christian, I find that actually reading it all can be a great help in many ways:

First, it means that no one can tell you what’s in the Bible without you being able to bring your point of view to the discussion, because you’ve read it too. You don’t have to just accept what others say about it, ya know? 

Secondly, there really is deep richness in the Bible; the Holy Spirit will breathe through the pages as you read and enliven your heart. You’ll learn more about what it means to be in relationship with God, with yourself, with other humans, and with all Creation. 

Finally, only in reading the entirety of the Bible to you come to see the overarching themes of scripture, the fullest glimpse of the God it reveals. The separate fragments and books of the Bible are distinct from one another in many ways, written by many authors with differing opinions and understandings of God; but once you’ve read them all it is possible to trace the path of the Divine across them all. 

Hopefully, you’ll grow more comfortable with things like contradiction and doubt. You’ll learn how to scoop up glimmers of the Divine even in Bible stories that make you shake with anger or scratch your head nonplussed. You’ll learn that being faithful doesn’t = having all the answers, but instead is about a willingness to engage in dialogue with God and with others, to constantly learn and question and grow. 

All that being said, 20 chapters is a lot to get through in a day!! Whew!! I do recommend reconsidering your goal. It was a valiant one and I’m impressed you were able to do it for a time, but it’s totally okay to re-plan things. I used to be really, like, averse to the idea of revising goals; I felt like a failure or like I was weak or something if I had to change them? So if that’s what you’re feeling, do what you can to let that feeling go. There is no shame or weakness in realizing that your current plan isn’t working for you. The true shame is in refusing to change your ways when everything is pointing to a need for change! 

Decrease your goal to something more manageable, so that you don’t start dreading your scripture reading and get burnt out. You don’t want to resent the time you reserve for reading! You want to be open to the Spirit’s wisdom as you read. 

Honestly, if your goal were to become as general as “read at least one chapter each day,” or even “read at least one paragraph each day,” that would be totally fine! There may be days when you get more done, but even a little passage of scripture is full of richness. And you’ll be showing your dedication and learning spiritual discipline in making time for even a little passage in a busy day. 

Yes, you’ll be reading for a lot longer; but there is no rush. Reading the whole Bible isn’t just about cramming all its contents into your brain; it’s also about letting the words seep into your heart. That takes years, lifetimes even. 

Still, I understand the desire to have the whole Bible in your head. So the rest of this post is going to try to balance the “scholarly knowledge” of the Bible that you logically want to get into your brain as soon as possible with the spiritual wisdom and impact of the Bible, which is cultivated over a lifetime.

______

The spiritual side of Bible reading

I’m gonna share a passage from Sister Macrina Wiederkehr’s book A Tree Full of Angels about Bible reading, because she describes the richness held in the tiniest crumb of scripture and the wisdom in taking it a little at a time better than I can. 

Let’s start with her explanation of the spiritual discipline called “Lectio Divina,” reading the Bible in an embodied way that enriches our understandings of God’s presence in all Creation:

“Here is a way to harvest the Word of God. 

The monastic tradition to which I belong has always stressed the value of seeking intimate communion through persistent dwelling with and in the Word of God. We call this form of prayer Lectio Divina (Divine Reading). Lectio Divina is far more than what we ordinarily understand as spiritual reading. It is reading...with the eye of God, under the eye of God. It is reading with the desire to be totally transformed by the Word of God, rather than just to acquire facts about God.

The incarnational aspect of Christianity reminds us that all of life is full of God. God is in all. Lectio Divina, then, is a way of reading God in everything. ...

In the tradition of our desert fathers and mothers...the emphasis was on the reading of the Scriptures. This was the Word of God par excellence. The discple was encouraged to hover over the word of God in the Scriptures as the Spirit once hovered over the birthing world. ...The one who is immersed in the Word of God in the Scriptures is eventually able to read God in all things. ...

Macrina then brings up Guigo II, a monk from the 1100s who came up with four phases or degrees of the Lectio: reading, meditation, prayer, contemplation. 

It sounds to me like you’re currently most focused on the “reading” phase, since you’re busying yourself with getting through the whole Bible as soon as you can. That is totally cool! 

Guigo II described the reading phase as putting food in the mouth, while “meditation chews it, digs for the treasure. Prayer extracts the flavor and helps us get to know the treasure. Contemplation embraces and welcomes the thirsty soul.��

I know that there are days when I just can’t seem to get my spirit into the latter three phases of the Lectio; I can only manage the reading phase. So I read, with the faith that by absorbing the content of Bible pages into my brain, there will come a time when I chew on that content, digest it, find the treasure in it. Thus I don’t think it’s a bad thing to read the Bible primarily in that “info-gathering” mode -- the more scholarly mode -- but when you’re ready and able to wade in deeper, do so! That might be every day for you, especially if you don’t spend all your time and energy on cramming in as many passages as possible; or it might be something you don’t really get to until you’ve read whole books of the Bible. I’m not saying there’s one right way to do all this -- just stuff to consider! 

But I will emphasize the “meditation” phase Macrina describes next, because I think it might help you decide that yes, you do need to cut down on just how much of the Bible you read daily. Here’s what she says about how much of the Bible she reads in one sitting:

“Read until your heart is touched. When your heart is touched, stop reading. After all, if God comes in the first verse, why go on to the second? A touched heart means God has, in some way, come. God has entered that heart. Begin your meditation. 

Meditation is a process in which you struggle with the Word of God that has entered your heart. If this Word wants to be a guest in your heart, go forth to meet it. Welcome it in and try to understand it. Walk with it. Wrestle with it. Ask it questions. Tell it stories about yourself. Allow it to nourish you. Receive its blessing. To do this you must sink your heart into it as you would sink your teeth into food. You must chew it with your heart.

... You may ask if there is ever a day when my heart is not touched. Yes, there are many. On some days each psalm or gospel passage is like the parched earth. There is nothing moist or life-giving to be found in the words I read. I see this barrenness as a message from God also. ...God also speaks in silence and darkness. So when nothing comes, when darkness prevails, then too, I lay my Bible down. My word is silent darkness. I carry the dryness, the emptiness, the silent darkness with me through the day. It is only in darkness that one can see the stars. I have seen too many stars to let the darkness overwhelm me. Even though You are silent, still I will trust You.”

So, yeah. That’s Macrina’s instruction for reading the Bible -- it leans very heavily onto the spiritual side of Bible reading. But the scholarly side is important too, especially for your first go-around! Let’s get into that.

______________

The scholarly side of Bible reading

People who have to read part or all of the Bible for school know that Macrina’s method of reading only “till your heart is touched” is pretty, but not pragmatic. There were times when I’d be assigned all of Exodus, or all of John, or all of Paul’s letters to read within a few days or a week in seminary -- so I wasn’t that focused on getting spiritual fulfillment out of the words then! I just had to cram that info into my brain so my teacher would know I did the homework!

I feel like your first Bible read-through is probably going to lean more heavily on the scholarly side than the spiritual, because if the stories aren’t already in your head, getting them in there is your primary goal. 

As you read I cannot recommend enough the use of footnotes or commentaries or other resources to help you make sense of what you are reading. Especially when you come to the more problematic or culturally-complex parts of the Bible. You’re not the first to have questions and confusion and distress about things in scripture; so let others who’ve been in your shoes and done research help you out! By finding trusty resources, you’re leaning on a whole community, just as Christians are called to do. 

I’ve got a post here with recommendations for Bibles with good footnotes, for online Bible resources, etc.

One of the resources listed in that post is the Bible Project’s YouTube series that offers a short video for each book of the Bible. It might be cool for you to watch through all of those in the coming month, so that you can get those “main ideas” and Bible stories into your head now, even while your reading of the actual Bible slows down. Those videos can be like a “sneak peak” for what’s in store as you continue to read through scripture. 

If you prefer text to video, you could also consider getting a “family Bible” / “children’s Bible” to read through! I recommend the DK Illustrated Family Bible, because it has wonderful historical notes and images, and it quotes from the Bible verbatim rather than paraphrasing it in kid-friendly language. Reading through that Bible could totally be done in 2 months, no sweat, unlike getting through the whole Bible. And then you’ll have the main stories and themes in your head asap, while not letting your Bible reading overwhelm you or burn you out.

________

To wrap up, here are a couple other resources you might find useful as you continue your reading:

A webpage I made discussing a framework for scripture that takes it seriously and affirms LGBTQ+ persons; concepts like divine inspiration, “cherry-picking,” and the rule of love are also discussed

A post addressing misogynistic passages of the Bible; oh and another post on sexism in the Bible

A post addressing the potential for antisemitism when reading the Bible through a Christian lens

And in my Rachel Held Evans tag you’ll find quotes from her wonderful book Inspired: Slaying Giants, Walking on Water, and Loving the Bible Again, which is such a helpful little book for those wanting a crash-course in things like cultural context, divine inspiration vs. human authors, and grappling with violence in the Bible.

I hope that something in this post helps you out, anon! And best of luck to you as you continue your journey through scripture! 

[hirazuki]

So, I finally caught up on... season 2? the movies? whatever we are calling the most recent installment of LotGH: DNT XD

Some bulleted thoughts/impressions under the cut! I’m still in a whirlwind of chaotic emotions, so who knows if these make any sense :D

REU 👏 EN 👏 THAL 👏

Okay, had to get that out of the way XD

That’s it, that’s about as coherent as I can get about him right now. There was an instant spark of “future favorite character” back in S1 simply based on his design and his demeanor, but I now have actual character actions and development to back up my love.

I can’t remember for sure because it’s been *checks* almost two years holy shit it’s been almost two years since I stopped watching the original series with any regularity due to having no time, but they switched the order that scenes are presented in, yes? I don’t remember meeting Hilda in the original yet, nor any of the stuff with the coup d’etat happening. I had left off right after a bunch of flashbacks regarding Galactic Empire nobility, which I didn’t see incorporated here, so I’m assuming they pushed the present-day events up in the chronology of what events/scenes they’re showing. Watching stuff for the first time was exciting :D

Reuenthal + Mittermeyer = best duo combo since the Akatsuki pairs. I never knew I needed to see two competent admirals acting like gossiping fishwives in my life, but here we are and my life is all the richer for it.

Oberstein is right. About what? Everything. Next.

Walter von Schönkopf continues to be amazing, even showing up 10 min late with not only Starbucks but kisses too, I can’t with this man.

Poor Yang. Let him retire. FREE HIM.

Let’s just skip over the main big event of this season, I’m not ready to talk about that yet I mean, I knew Kircheis would die at some point; he’s not a character who can continue to be at Reinhard’s side story-wise, if Reinhard is going to continue on his set path. It’s like when you kill off the comic relief in a tragedy; it’s necessary. But I wasn’t expecting it to be so soon, like damn. I miss him already T_T

Did I mention that Reuenthal is awesome? He’s awesome. The only silver lining here was that Kircheis’s absence allowed for Reuenthal to take the stage more.

I love all of Reinhard’s admirals (except Bittenfield)  Okay, ngl, I love Bittenfield for what he adds to the story and character dialogue/interactions XD

Jessica T_____T Another one I knew was coming but like :(

It is an extremely odd experience to be watching this at this particular moment in time in 2020. Not that it isn’t relevant to any given point in human history with regards to its takes and nuanced understanding of humanity and human nature, but like. Especially right now. 

Cults. It’s always cults. 

Forever grateful to Yang for retrieving my man Cazerne (sp? is there a consensus? I’ve seen a million different variations XD) from the frontier. He did absolutely nothing wrong, took responsibility for people who didn’t listen to him, and I was worried I’d seen the last of him when he got sent off. 

I love Yang’s whole crew. They are all babies <3

Falk... reminds me of certain personalities I know irl. Very strongly. Watching him is a highly unpleasant experience.

I am so relieved Admiral Bewcock was okay. One of the few extremely capable and rational men in the upper echelons of the FPA military. Protect him. 

The Schönkopf-Julian dynamic? I am so here for it.

I’d comment on the politicians of the FPA, the coup d’etat folks, and the Empire’s nobility, but I’m pretty sure y’all already know my thoughts on all these clowns XD

Super worried, in terms of whether they’ll continue rebooting the series, to see that they kept the same opening; but they had a brand new ending song, by Anly no less, so... tentatively hopeful? 

Animation was stunning, expected no less from Production I. G.

Voice work also, goes without saying. (Haha, Miyano Mamoru has such a distinct voice when his characters go into panic/frenzy; even if he sounds really different while voicing a character the rest of the time, once it goes into that oh-shit spiral of self-destruction mode, it’s so familiar).

Hmm... that’s all I can think of off the top of my head at the moment! 

[go-events]

GO Rom Com Spotlight: @cassieoh

The wonderful @cassieoh has claimed The Decoy Bride to adapt for Good Omens in the Good Omens Rom Com Event.

For reference, here’s a little background about the source material!

About The Decoy Bride: Famous actress Lara Tyler can't get married to author James Arber without intrusive paparazzi crashing the ceremony. Because of James's best-selling book set on Hegg Island in Scotland, Lara's agent, Steve, checks out the little known Hegg as the site for their next attempted wedding. Unfortunately, James’s book relays little of of the island accurately. Katie, an island native and the only unmarried woman on it, has been unlucky in love. She's working on writing her own guide to Hegg Island when Steve and crew arrive, eventually hiring her as a reluctant decoy bride to distract the paparazzi. 

We spent some time chatting about how the adaptation is coming so far, as well as future plans for it! Now, get to know @cassieoh a little better!

* * *

goromcom: Let’s get to know you a little better! You’re also on AO3 as cassieoh. And also, here are the tags Tumblr associates with you! (If you open a Tumblr chat with someone you haven't chatted to before, Tumblr tells you two things they post about.) I wanted to tell you that yours reports that you post "#broose and #space." I had to look up "broose", but I am intrigued now. Does that tag have any connection to your rom com prep?

cassieoh: 'Broose' is how I tag anything with Bruce Wayne since I don't want things to crop up in the tumblr search haha, it's a mercy tag for my followers who might not be into the Batfamily. So no, sadly nothing to do with my romcom prep.

'space', however, is certainly relevant to my romcom fic ;)

goromcom: Wow, this is a crazy coincidence then, because it turns out that a ‘broose’ is also a Scottish term for a race to the bridegroom's house after a country wedding! You were planning your rom com subconsciously for a long time, maybe? ;)

You chose to adapt Decoy Bride as your rom com. Has this movie been a favorite of yours, or is there some other reason you chose it?

cassieoh: It's definitely one of my favorites! Outside of fandom, I'm a professional linguist and I adore any movie that highlights marginalized dialects in a way that isn't making them the butt of jokes, so I love all the wonderful Scottish accents in DB. I've also always loved that the 'rival' love interest isn't demonized (even if the narrative isn't the kindest to her, but hey, I can fix that!) 

goromcom: What's your favorite moment of your chosen rom com, and are you looking forward to presenting it in your adaptation? Any loose plans for that scene that you can share?

cassieoh: I mean, the 'hiding from the rain in the toilet' scene is a classic and I'm very excited for that one. I'm also excited for the actual wedding scene because they're still an angel and a demon so the church is going to be interesting for Crowley :D 

goromcom: Oh goodness, I hope Crowley has his tap dancing shoes!

Do you plan to stick very closely to the story beats of the original movie, or make bigger changes?

cassieoh: There will be some pretty big changes! I'm setting this in a version of canon where they never met in the Garden of Eden. Azirpahale is taking the place of James Arbor, so the circumstances of the marriage are quite different. The island itself is a bit of a player; there are only a few places on Earth Holy enough for an angelic wedding, which is also the reason Crowley is hanging about (it's just Holy enough to hide the energy signature of a single demon on the run from Hell after escaping his trial post-Apocalypse, but not so Holy that it will kill him.)

goromcom: What's an interesting decision you've made in your planning so far--a notable casting decision, a changing of venue, or some other plan you have to paint Good Omens all over your rom com?

cassieoh: I'll add that Aziraphale's fiance is Raphael (no, Crowley wasn't Raphael before he fell, though they do have a connection). Raphael and Aziraphale worked together to prevent the apocalypse on the Heavenly side of things and are now trying one final gambit to stave off retribution for that (i.e. married Angels are off limits to certain forms of divine punishment, and they certainly like each other, like spending time together, even if it isn't love. It's not like either of them has any hope of ever finding love anyway *wink*)

goromcom: I am blatantly stealing this last question from The Good Place: The Podcast, but here goes: Tell me something "good". It can be something big or small. It can be a charity you think is doing good work, or you can talk about how great your pet is.

cassieoh: My dogs and lizard are pretty great (and there are so many pictures of them on my tumblr haha) but the good thing I always want to tell people about is all the amazing work various Indigenous folks are doing to reclaim/revitalize/reawaken their languages. We're now seeing some of the first kids being raised entirely in languages whose last native speakers died generations ago, kids who won't ever have to wonder how their grandparents spoke or miss out on that connection to their heritage and that's such a beautiful, healing thing. If people are interested in learning more they can always message me or check out Jesse Little Doe's work on her heritage language Wampanoag which has a wonderful (and hopeful!) documentary. There's also a great organization called the Endangered Language Fund which helps linguists and Indigenous scholars/language activists in this sort of work. They can always use people's support!  

goromcom: That sounds like really important work, preserving such rich fonts of cultural history like entire languages before they die out. <3

And after all of you check out that documentary @cassieoh has just recommended, remember to keep an eye out for the upcoming GO adaptation of The Decoy Bride, as well!

[uraharashouten]

THE POSITIVE & NEGATIVE; Mun & Muse - Meme.

fill out & repost ♥ This meme definitely favors canons more, but I hope OC’s still can make it somehow work with their own lore, and lil’ fandom of friends & mutuals. Multi-Muses pick the muse you are the most invested in atm.

My muse is:   canon / oc / au / canon-divergent / fandomless /

Is your character popular in the fandom?  YES / NO.

Is your character considered hot™ in the fandom?  YES / NO / IDK.

Is your character considered strong in the fandom?  YES / NO / IDK.

Are they underrated?  YES / NO.

Were they relevant for the main story?  YES / NO.

Were they relevant for the main character?  YES / NO / THEY’RE THE PROTAG.

Are they widely known in their world?  YES / NO.

How’s their reputation?  GOOD / BAD / NEUTRAL.

How strictly do you follow canon?  As closely as I can! I admit to some gaping holes in my knowledge -- I never really read all of the Fullbringer arc or the Thousand Year Blood War. I think I have the gist of some of the novels; some I lean into more than others. But I try to stay true to the Urahara Kisuke of the Bleach manga, and borrow from the anime, movies, and novels when it’s fun!

SELL YOUR MUSE! Aka try to list everything, which makes your muse interesting in your opinion to make them spicy for your mutuals.   Urahara Kisuke plays the part of the humble (and handsome!) shopkeeper of Karakura town, though his résumé includes head of secret police and prison warden, Gotei 13 captain, scientist, and Special War Power. He is talented in problem-solving, psychology and tactical thinking, and despite his protests to the contrary, he’s always scheming something. In addition to his mental prowess, he is an expert swordsman, hakuda master, and a proficient kidou user. A consummate tinkerer, inventor, and maker, his favorite thing to make is mischief, and he will bend the rules and push his luck as far as he can, much to the chagrin of his associates. But he means well, usually.

Now the OPPOSITE, list everything why your muse could not be so interesting (even if you may not agree, what does the fandom perhaps think?).  Move along folks, nothing to see here. These days he’s just a simple candy store owner... You’re not buying that? ---Well, the truth is that he is a bit of a home-body. Never mind what you’ve heard about him turning up when you least expect him; he’s more likely to remain backstage than at the heart of the action. And he knows more than he’s telling; you can never get a straight answer out of him, and it’s maddening. You won’t get anywhere interacting with him, I promise. Complete waste of time.

What inspired you to rp your muse?  When I was new to Bleach, tumblr, and roleplay, I settled on Kisuke because he seemed so... avuncular. He’s not quite responsible enough to be your dad, but he cares like your dad (and sometimes more). He’s full of pranks and sage advice, and you’re never certain which you’ll get, or some combination thereof. He runs the gamut from nutty uncle to creepy godfather, and I’ve found him to be an incredibly versatile character to play.

What keeps your inspiration going?  He still fascinates me.

Some more personal questions for the mun.

Give your mutuals some insight about the way you are in some matters, which could lead them to get more comfortable with you or perhaps not.

Do you think you give your character justice?  YES / NO.

Do you frequently write headcanons?  YES / NO. (I’m more likely to write meta! For me, the line can blur -- but I rarely come up with a headcanon that isn’t in some way supported by canon.)

Do you sometimes write drabbles?  YES / NO. (very occasionally!)

Do you think a lot about your Muse during the day?  YES / NO. (You know, it’s funny. When I first started roleplaying Kisuke, I thought about him constantly, almost to the point of method acting. These days, I’m relieved to have my own headspace back.)

Are you confident in your portrayal?   YES / NO.

Are you confident in your writing?  YES / NO.

Are you a sensitive person?  YES / NO.

Do you accept criticism well about your portrayal?  I’d like to think I’d be big enough to accept some well-meant constructive criticism, and I do like to have outright mistakes corrected. I mean -- it’s not a good feeling, and I’m usually embarrassed -- but I’ll be grateful if they’re pointed out sooner rather than later, and especially if you’re kind about it! Just please remember that in order for it to be constructive, criticism must be specific and positive -- tell me what to do, not what not to do.

Do you like questions which help you explore your character?  Sure! ....I may not answer them right away... or... ever... Anything that makes me stop and think risks sending me off onto a research and reflection tangent from which I may never return! But I will appreciate the question!

If someone disagrees to a headcanon of yours, do you want to know why?  Yes! Why? WHY do you disagree with my headcanon? Do you know something I don’t? Spit it out, because I have to know what you do! (And then if we have the same knowledge and still disagree on the interpretation, I’ll probably stick with mine, but I’ll at least consider yours.)

If someone disagrees with your portrayal, how would you take it?  Disagrees with my --- what does that mean? I like to think I’d be reasonable if someone thought I wrote something out-of-character, and brought it my attention. Hey, it happens, and goodness knows I’m not always ‘on.’  I don’t mind being questioned or corrected about that. But if someone disagrees with entire aspects of my interpretation --- go... write your own version, then? Or find someone else who’s more your cup of tea? There are as many interpretations of a character as there are people. I like seeing them all, and I would be interested to see yours!  I’m not offended that you don’t like mine. (But I will be hurt if you decide you don’t like me because of it; this is fiction and that’s just petty.)

If someone really hates your character, how do you take it?  I mean... there are reasons to hate him. If you tell me yours, I’ll probably be sympathetic. He’s a (bad) liar; he can be ruthless; he’s got an awful track record of using child soldiers and crossing consent boundaries with women -- and you’re allowed to hate him for that or any number of other things. I like him in spite of himself, though, so that won’t change. (Just don’t hate on me because I write him, because again, this is fiction, and that’s just petty.)

Are you okay with people pointing out your grammatical errors? Yes, please tell me right away so that I can correct them before too many people see them and I embarrass myself!

Do you think you are easy going as a mun?   Well... more than I used to be. I think I’m friendly and easy to get along with, and very difficult to offend, and I’m almost never neurotic about roleplay anymore! Haha! I won’t pester you to reply (certainly not when it can take me anywhere between a day and several months). ...I can be a bit of a perfectionist sometimes, and I’m my own worst critic. I don’t go around correcting other peoples’ grammar anymore, though, because I realized... this is fiction, and that’s just petty.

That’s about it, congrats for filling out!

Tagged by:  @hirako5hinji [[ Thanks Anna!! ]] and @xyuuken​ [[ Thanks Eli! Glad you’re back. ]] Tagging: Who hasn’t done this yet?

[davetheshady]

may I politely request ⭐dealer's choice director's commentary⭐for pretty much any part of Love is All You Need to Destroy Your Enemies?

Did you mean: infodump about Chapter 5?

We start off in medias res during Pteranodon Attack-Gate from Episode 4: PTA Meeting. Since most of the fic runs parallel to WTNV’s storyline for the first ~two years, the way I narrowed down which events to feature was to read through the transcripts and take note of which ones had Carlos, which ones featured science/magic/time travel-related elements, which ones had weird discrepancies or unsolved details that could be explained by Carlos/science/magic/time travel/all of the above, and which ones I just liked a lot. 

Incidentally, Cecil issues a correction that the winged reptiles in question were actually pterodactyls, not pteranodons, which was then promptly forgotten by the showrunners lol.

"—And then Kelly pulled her hamstring while they were doing the Fixing of a Nail position. I'm trying to convince her that she and Joe should do yoga together, I think it would really cut back on minor injuries and also they both look great in yoga pants. Anything new with you, Carlos?"

"Nothing that compares to... hamstring injuries," says Carlos, from his position on top of the Sciencemobile.

"All right," says Kate, adjusting an enormous pair of mirrored aviator shades. "Then describe the Barstow formation."

Since literal character doubling was such an important part of the plot, I had a lot of fun with thematic character doubling, too. Carlos and Kate (and the other grad students) are actually pretty close in age, and here we see her willing to put herself into danger to get the job done while casually chatting with her colleagues. Also, there’s a nice dose of karma for the books in Carlos having to deal with someone else oversharing details about their relationships, compounded by the fact that unlike his all of Kate’s are actually true. (In nicer doubling news: Kate is the one who gets her degree in science, has functional romantic relationships, AND continues to work in Night Vale, which are all eventually Carlos’ hashtag life goals.) 

"Maybe it was future you," asks Julie, who does not sound appropriately concerned for the potentially diverted course of the Currents of Time. Or for the potentially diverted course of the already unlinear life of Carlos.

This is the first conversation where she’s ‘Julie’ in his mental narration. I enjoyed having her be hilariously unsympathetic to his concerns here, because her priorities are still very different, but it also sets up a baseline. She doesn’t bother worrying about hypotheticals from the weird shit, but actual hard data (like, Carlos not sleeping and having minor breakdowns in her lab) is what prompts her to share reactions besides SCIENCE! and snark.

His stomach roils at the thought of more time travel. "Some kind of illusion is more likely," he says: some person or creature temporarily assuming his form, probably for sinister purposes. He reluctantly adds those weird doubles from the sandstorm to his list of possible suspects, though his dissolved right in front of him in the middle of next March and there haven't been any sandstorms recently.

oh hey haha what’s that

One of my biggest pet peeves in fiction is when allegedly intelligent characters ignore obvious plot points so the writer can railroad the story in their chosen direction. On the other hand, it is genuinely difficult to avoid spoiling your plot twists if your main character is actively trying to figure them out. I leaned heavily on “the character has all the basic details… along with so much other information they can’t realistically narrow it down”, combined with some red herrings: an obvious one (illusion magic) and hopefully a more convincing one (time travel as the only relevant plot: it's DEFINITELY involved, but its presence is obscuring another facet of the plot altogether).

There's always a risk that astute readers will figure it out, but, like… so? That just means instead of shocking plot twist reveal, they get an “I KNEW IT!” reveal, which is equally satisfying in a different way. As long as the characters have convincing reasons for not figuring it out, it's hopefully still enjoyable to follow along with them as they wander around in the dark. 

(And just for clarification: that was Doppel-Carlos crashing the town hall meeting when he and Dr. Raith were testing out time vortices.) 

Andre hands him a copy of the Night Vale Daily Journal. “’Look your best to face the void. Smooth-chinned souls are most enjoyed’,” reads Carlos. “‘Burma-Shave.’”

"No, below the ads," says Andre.

1) ‘character reads wrong piece of information in paper’ is a classic goof (“There’s a sale at Penney’s!”) and I found it very amusing to repeatedly attribute it to Carlos, since he’s genuinely trying to locate the important information. Unfortunately for him, he lives in Night Vale and no longer has a filter for “useless nonsense”, because even the nonsense has proven relevant and/or kinda murdery before.

2) Burma-Shave! This was passed down to me as part of our Great American Roadtrip Family Lore (I come from a long line of roadtrippers) and it’s definitely the kind of kitschy 50s detail that fits so well in Night Vale.

"Oh!" says Cecil. "What were you studying?"

"Bioremediation for contaminated pit lakes via sulfur-reducing bacteria," says Carlos truthfully.

Why? Because I edited one of my friends’ papers on it, that’s why. (Birds kept landing on it and dying, which is also a very Night Vale detail.)

When he returns, he finds Cecil standing by the record player with his back against the wall, staring fixedly at Carlos’ vinyl copy of Ixnay on the Hombre.

One of the DF books (I think White Night) had a hilariously high number of characters showing up wearing band t-shirts, and Carlos’ was for The Offspring. (The original file name for this fic was Original Prankster, back when I thought it would be three chapters long.)

“It’s about a wizard stranded in a strange, uncharted desert territory,” [Cactus Judy] says serenely.

Cactus Jane! I decided to make her a recurring character because 1) she’s in a time travel episode (Episode 18: The Traveler), 2) both she and TMITJ had the detail where no one can remember their real name, which seemed significant, and 3) WTNV itself did not have very many recurring female characters at that point. She’s into Shakespeare because I personally knew a lot of relevant Shakespeare quotes, but also as a hint that’s she’s a lot older (and thus a lot more supernatural) than she seems: Shakespeare was a HUGE part of pop culture in the 19th century, particularly in the southwest. Theater companies used to make more money going on tour through states with precious metal mines than they did during their whole season in the big coastal cities, probably because jaded city folks never threw gold nuggets on stage to show their appreciation.

If life is a contest between good and evil, Cecil would be one of the people handing out stickers just for participating.

This is one of my favorite lines.

My plan is fool-proof! It's sheer elegance in its simplicity!

Look, if you enjoyed this fic, WTNV, and/or The Dresden Files, you should probably go watch The Middleman. Yes, I know it’s not streaming, do it anyway. Load up on antivenom and go rent it from your local library.

“Could you [create a time vortex]?""Oh, for sure," says Carlos. "All I'd need would be a couple years to do nothing but work on a highly illegal spell and figure out a way to steal an entire ley-line's worth of power and excise my sense of morality and self-preservation.”

And WHAT are the odds of THAT

It's not that Carlos doesn't like him. It just wouldn't be fair to lead him on when Carlos wouldn't actually—

Well, Carlos wouldn’t mind asking but he doesn’t normally go for—

Okay, Carlos could definitely make an exception for Cecil and—

And—

oh NO he accidentally used logic to make himself admit he has FEELINGS

One of the reasons I love this pairing is that you have Cecil, who is incredibly emotionally open (all the time, on public radio) as a distinct contrast to Carlos, who is so used to putting up a very specific facade that he even does it to himself and then struggles when he doesn't have it to rely on. It creates conflict, but it also means they have very different perspective they can share with each other. 

"Did the earth move for you, too?" says Cecil.

"Bwuh?" replies Carlos.

"At the monitoring station," says Cecil, because right, they're talking about science and not about how Carlos may or may not have accidentally developed a tiny, tiny crush on Cecil, who is standing right in front of him and looking extremely interested in what he's saying and will commit his words to memory and lovingly repeat them for all the world, or at least all of Night Vale and anyone else who received the same odd death curse as Carlos, to hear.

"Oh. Hmm – unh," replies Carlos, then shakes his head. Not talking, that's the way to go. That way he won't accidentally say something he doesn't mean, or worse, something he does mean but probably shouldn't say. Cecil can ask him science questions and he can shake his head yes or no, and maybe refer him wordlessly to supplementary materials, and it will all be very professional and—

"Where did you get your shirt?" asks Cecil. "It fits you so well."

"I'll look at my notes and computer models and see if I can figure out what's going on," Carlos blurts out, and practically runs from the room.

One of the reasons I started writing this fic (SEPTEMBER 2013, BABY god I feel old) was because we all knew Carlos was immensely important to Cecil, but had relatively little information about him, and ALL of it was filtered through our unreliable narrator. So… I just kind of ran with that. 

But on top of the obvious unreliability of “didn't notice Carlos was a wizard from a different series”, I wanted to do it on the smaller scale, too, and put a different spin on the touchstones of their growing relationship that everyone was already familiar with. So this interaction is now a crisis for both of them, and for dramatically/hilariously different reasons. 

“If you’re worried about going native, I’ve got bad news for you, buddy, because you do more chanting than anyone I’ve met.”

Another one of my favorite lines.

“I’ve had to hunt down people I know before, and trust me, it’s not a fun date night!”

Between Molly and fanon interpretations of Cecil, Carlos’ type is apparently 1) weird tattoos, 2) unusually-colored hair, and 3) can kill him

There's a brief hiss from the TV's speakers, and then Cecil says, in a small, forlorn voice, “I don't know if he listens to me, sometimes.”

Carlos puts his head down and laughs bitterly.

I LOVE IRONY 

But even though I wanted to subvert the surface meaning, Cecil DOES still have a point. He got a good look at Carlos’ soul when they first met and still fell in love instantly, but Carlos has a difficult time hearing that because at this point he fundamentally does not believe he’s worthy of that kind of love. In order to truly believe Cecil, he also has to start learning to love and accept himself. (It’s very much a work in progress, but nobody’s perfect.) The title isn’t just meant to refer to romantic love – self-love, friendship, familial love, and unconditional love for the humanity of his trash fire town are equally important, because they all support each other.

hmu for more dvd commentary!

[bladekindeyewear]

Boots Reads Homestuck Epilogue(s) Part 15 - Candy Page 34

==>

John finally decides to let the relevance of his story end, and enjoy that he’s made at least some of his other friends happy with his choice.  Time to read Page 34...

VRISKA: Pfft, yeah, wh8tever. I’m basically Immortal, bitch.

Preeeetty sure you’re confusing yourself with one of your parents.

Pff, actual healthy kismesis with a Tavros?  Wow, we’re getting all sorts of redemption by not-really-Vriska proxy here.

HARRY ANDERSON: he’s always getting all weepy whenever i talk to him anyway. HARRY ANDERSON: i don’t think i could have taken another round of him choking back tears while apologizing to me about “what happened with me and your mother, harry.” HARRY ANDERSON: i mean, god. he’s not even fucking DRUNK when he does this. HARRY ANDERSON: that might actually be the most embarrassing part.

.......

Okay, having grown up with a father who suffered from serious depression and would break into tears embarrassingly easily, uh.  I can relate?  But also fuck you, that’s inconsiderate.

--Dammit, new Vriska is catching wind of old Vriska.

Vriska and (Vriska) both start shrieking at a pitch John’s only ever heard one time before. It was a sound that once accompanied the end of everything. A sound once heard the night he dreamt in anime.

Oh that’s brilliant.  If the entire Candy arc ended here it’d be great, though I know it’s not quite over yet.

==>

...Oh shit, we actually get to see what happens immediately next.

Interesting introspective thoughts!  Or, trying her best NOT to be introspective and failing.

Oh my god, SHUT UP Gamzee.  Vriska, just kill him already??

PFFF HE SENT A PIC OF IT TO KARKAT :D

Pfff.  Yeah, Vriska, TRY and ignore what just happened and how it was almost entirely your idea.

(Vriska) is so furious, she has no way of pinpointing the exact moment her intent stopped being intimidating him into silence and started being guaranteeing his silence, forever.

Thank FUCKING goodness, PLEASE kill him.

YAY he’s dead! :D  (Even though he’ll probably revive anyway because bullshit.)

Heheh. NOW we get a cross-Vriska heart to heart.

==>

Alright, a bit more John moping.  Man... this Candy section is a whole lot easier to swallow AFTER Meat than I imagine it would have been before.

.....heck.  EITHER of these epilogue branches are really fucking hard to swallow the first time around without the other’s context.

Oh huh, it’s his house from the Medium then?  Relocated and stuff?

Jake, hm.  Is Jake going to try and leave his son with John like that failed kidnapping in reverse or?

Jake snaps the elastic on his pair of red underpants. It’s the only thing he’s wearing.

Oooookay then.

JAKE: She had a certain way she liked me kipped out and well, i didnt want to bring anything that belonged to her when i left. Nothing she er, might miss. TAVROS: You took me,

Jake winces.

TAVROS: And,,, you took you,

Jake’s wince deepens.

Oh, so that’s what this is!  Jake fleeing with his son from an abusive relationship.  About gosh darn time.  .....geez, how bad did it get for JAKE to finally muster the gumption to do that himself after all these years???

Jake is one whole wince now

I know THAT feeling.  Or at least feel like I do.

John you dedicate your life to keeping this child happy

JOHN: it’s just been kind of a rough forever.

:C

JAKE: Maybe you should blame me? JAKE: Maybe i need someone to blame me. For once. JOHN: ...huh? JAKE: I think im starting to realize that ive been going through life with the mindset that nothing has ever really been within my control.

YES.

This is how Vriska broke Tavros way back in the comic, by constantly denying him agency.  Jake’s been battered down the same way too, and it’s not too late to pick up the reins.  He’s already DONE that by finally leaving his genocidal wife.

There’s a bit of Page of Hope-yness to this whole disastrous Candy timeline, come to think of it?  People fulfilling others’ desires out of obligation constantly, doing what they think others want?  Roxy, Jake, Dave and Karkat... all fucked over at the aggressive whims of more active folk, rolling over when they really shouldn’t have?  Or in Roxy’s case, her CHARACTER basically SHOULD NOT HAVE IN THE SLIGHTEST?

JAKE: Havent you ever wanted to let someone make the tough choices for you?

Huh.

Or maybe he is doing exactly what Jake has always done. In a certain light, isn’t ascribing all this mess to some unconscious influence he might have had over the metaphysical shape of reality just a way to brush off his simpler failures as a man and a father?

Yes.  You can act and change this too, John.  You almost did with the kidnapping before!  Go and take down the new Batterwitch.

Hm, Hopey thing?

JAKE: John. JOHN: yeah? JAKE: Take my hand. JOHN: what? why?

Oh shit.  Are they going to be able to FIX some of this BS with some sort of hopey thing??? :D  Probably too much to hope for but still!

Being flung from Jake’s orbit of Hope and Change

Pffff.  Had to throw in an Obama didn’t you.

...Oh.  Oh wow.  Oh we get to figure out what the fuck was up with Roxy all this time.  Oh boy.

JAKE: So what if it doesnt change anything? Wont it matter to your family to see you care? JAKE: Wont it make you feel better to try?

:D

Heheh, Hope aspecty stuff.  The ability to believe that something matters even when you “know” it doesn’t.

==>

...Yeah, it’s pretty easy to relax on a dead Gamzee.

Oh cool.  These Vriskas are alike enough to bond!  New Vriska is still in her teenage unbalanced go-for-it stage, and old Vriska has been knocked down a peg by the clown incident, putting them on a close enough level to not want to instantly disown each other, unlike old Vriska and ghost Vriska.

VRISKA: The Mayor’s dead, dude.

HOW did the Mayor die?!??  Did I just FORGET that from the end of Homestuck or something??

(I mean, probably.)

Callback to the clouds in that first Jade dream John had.

(VRISKA): Or may8e the truth just makes me kind of nervous. VRISKA: What “Truth”? (VRISKA): Don’t tell him I said this, 8ut, I think John is just an extremely powerful 8eing. Even when he sucks. (VRISKA): And he certainly does appear to suck in this reality. (VRISKA): And yet, the uneasy feeling is there. (VRISKA): It’s a vague feeling I’ve had in the 8ack of my mind for a long time, 8ut it really hit me when I was talking to him earlier. (VRISKA): It’s distur8ing to think a8out that much power 8ottled up in one stupid nerd who’ll never understand it. VRISKA: What Power are you even talking a8out? VRISKA: Like, lame Wind Powers? (VRISKA): No, I mean... (VRISKA): The power to shape reality. Even without intending to.

FUCK did he really cause all this??? Even the Roxy shit?!???  D:  D:  D:

It’s being left vague but it IS sounding like John was actually RIGHT about all that stuff.  FUCK, if the “villain” who messed up Roxy is actually just John’s subconscious...  :C

Even if the epilogue ends right here, though, with John about to call Roxy, I can imagine it working out, though.  It’s on a right enough track there.

(VRISKA): I’ve spent so long caring so much a8out what other people thought of me. Mainly that they saw me as important, or making a “difference.”

Mhmm mhmm.  Light n stuff.

Yeah, realizing that importance isn’t ALL that’s “important” is really, um.  Important.  Ahem.

Hm, other Vriska, that smile had seven pairs of dots, not eight.  :?

(VRISKA): The POINT is, I was so mad at her. (VRISKA): That happy ghost version of myself, who was free of everything. (VRISKA): I was pro8a8ly mad 8ecause she got to 8e who she really was, without stressing a8out it, which is something I never felt like I was allowed to have.

Indeed.

(VRISKA): I guess I mean there’s someone specifically I fell out of touch with, who it feels like I’ll never see again.

Too bad, only ghost Vriska got her reunite with ‘Rezi.  :P

(VRISKA): On some level I knew she was right. She was happy and honest with herself. And that’s what made her... (VRISKA): A version of myself who was actually worthy of someone I cared a8out.

Yyyep.  As I said.  :)

VRISKA: You’re just talking a8out The Girl You 8linded that one time, aren’t you? (VRISKA): Ummmmmmmm.

Heheh.  Yeah, you’re not going to hide that sort of thing from your sharp near-clone.

Oh cool!  She gets to see all those messages and feel turboguilt or something.

...oh shit.  Is a message going to actually get to her?  It-- oh shit.  Didn’t Terezi have her phone buzzing in her pocket and ignored it in the end of Meat or something?  Or at SOMEONE did and I thought it conspicuous but it didn’t get addressed in that side of the story and-- FFFFuck is she eventually going to see it or??!  D:

She’s GOT to have seen it before running all the way off with villain Dirk, right?? D:

==>

Okay.  You seem to be thinking clearly, Roxy.  What’s going through your head? Give us some answers.  Don’t fuck this up too much, John.

but she knows by now that it’s not her job to make him happy. That was something she gave up on years ago. But wanting to? That feeling is still as fresh as it always was.

FUCK was this all just a placid feeling of obligation to make John happy for all he did to ensure victory or something??? D: D: D:

She’s still working through what she feels about distancing herself from Jane

Yesssss

If he’s truly about to be real with her for the first time in forever,

Gosh fucking DARNIT John, you could have fixed all this DECADES AGO if you had a real talk with her ONCE!!!!!

ROXY: the more i thought abt it the more i figured holdin on to that one thing made me lose out on some other shit ROXY: u might relate JOHN: haha, you got me there i guess.

:c

JOHN: i’ve been doing a lot of thinking about how things got to be like they are. JOHN: i guess i’ll just come out and say it. JOHN: i completed fucked up your entire life. JOHN: i’m not going to pretend like there are two sides here. it’s my bad, totally. JOHN: like, not just what happened to our marriage, though it’s also true that that’s completely my fault. JOHN: but even before that... JOHN: i think i fucked up on just this massive, fundamental level, and it’s what i did— JOHN: or, well, what i didn’t do— JOHN: that caused every stupid bullshit thing about the way this world is.

...Huh.

That may not actually be true, and Roxy might be about to prove how self-absorbedly reductive that is.

ROXY: oh nah ill stop u rite there my man

Okay YES.  If this wasn’t him, then SET HIM THE FUCK STRAIGHT.  :D

She knows more than he does, and she doesn’t need to hear it.

TELL US TELL US TELL US

YES TEAR INTO HIM he’s wanted that for so long stand up for yourself and tell us what the fuck happened and why

He’s been looking at her, really looking at her, and she doesn’t want to blink, just in case that shatters it.

Yes because he was looking for the real Roxy that would call out his BS

JOHN: i used to be so angry that you wouldn’t tell me what you really thought, before. JOHN: not like i wanted to FIGHT fight, but like. JOHN: i’m just not used to this flavor of roxy. ROXY: hm ROXY: sounds to me like u just disproved ur own hotshot theory then genius JOHN: huh? ROXY: you wished i was one way the whole time we were married ROXY: but i wasnt

YES!!! Yes his theory’s disproven!  He never WANTED Roxy to just act that way, he wasn’t the cause of this, I was hoping for that!  :D

ROXY: i was bad at standin up for myself then and im learnin to be good at it now

D:

That’s....... sad, if that’s the explanation.  But it’s better than mind control I guess.  :(

JOHN: but... JOHN: you were never like that before i... ROXY: dude ROXY: where tf do u get off trying to decide what is or isnt me being “like me” enuff ROXY: do u think ppl stay the same their whole damn lives or what

Oh wow.  Now Andrew’s slamming SLAMMING of fanfics.  He’s saying “who are you to know for SURE that they wouldn’t act that way”??  That’s pretty good.

ROXY: i like the way things turned out just fuckin fine ROXY: so maybe u could stop wastin precious eternity thinkin ur so special that its ur fault everyones not perfectly happy

:’)

Mhmm, and they’re free from the heroic design arcs or what have you.  Or... were, until Dirk tore them back in again.  Tossed aside their fucking victory with his selfish... ugh.

Mhmm, Roxy’s the perfect person to explain that not being in a canon, Light-filled timeline isn’t really a bad thing.

ROXY: i just do things the best way i think to do em and then shrug n hope it works out?

Roxy thinks about time and the spirals of choice that hang just outside her periphery, and the vertigo grows.

Good advice, and hm.  Maybe there’s some Void sight kind of playing into this as well, making it easy for her to get paralyzed by indecision and she’s had to learn to work through it.

...Ooh, that was a really cool non-binary gender diatribe in the narrative text.  That’s some nice stuff.  I felt like that was missing from the Meat side, glad we got it here at least.  :D

JOHN: there’s literally nothing to do but keep moving forward. JOHN: i may as well not be a big fucking downer about it if i don’t have to be.

Thank goodness.

YES, JOHN SHOWING HIMSELF STRAIGHT-BACKED FOR HIS SON!!! :D

Man, I wish my dad had done that instead of all the other shit he did.  At least he’s dead.  :)

(Here’s a hint in case you’re wondering why I was relieved when my Dad offed himself.)

But that’s off topic.  Let’s wrap up this epilogue already!!

==>

Page 39... only three or so pages left, right?

Pff, Karkat’s keeping them safe.

Heheh, more shitty Liberty statues.

Heheh, using them for weapons caches.

Gosh I hope they actually love each other and are mostly happy.  Jade seems happy, at least.  :(

Dammit, there go the doubts.  He wouldn’t have had those doubts with Karkat. :C

He’s standing in the Oval Office of the White House.

Oh heck yes.  Please tell me...

And over there... is something he doesn’t quite recognize. It doesn’t seem to fit in. He steps closer to investigate, wiping away at the layers of moss and dirt to reveal a surface he most certainly does recognize. It’s a transportalizer.

YES

Dave doesn’t waste any time. You don’t find something like this in the Oval Office and start agonizing over whether or not to use it. He steps on the platform, and in a blink his surroundings are completely different. The centuries of overgrowth are gone, and he appears to be in some sort of crypt, boxed in by walls of smooth, golden stone. At the far side of the room, something is hanging on the wall, encased in a sort of display. It’s a mounted god tier costume, about the size an adult male would wear. He recognizes the symbol. It’s the same one Jake used to wear when they were teens. It is the symbol for Hope.

HELL FUCKING YES

YES OBAMA

OBAMA: Hello, Mr. Strider. OBAMA: I’ve been waiting a long time for you to show up.

Dave’s jaw hangs open. The legends have been confirmed. As well as several key headcanons of his. Without thinking, he drops to one knee and bows his head.

DAVE: m... mr president DAVE: its an honor sir

Man, forget my past stomach clenching.  Forget my hesitations, my turbulent emotions, all the ups and downs the various facets of these Epilogue chapters have given me.  THIS is the best.  THIS makes it all worth it.  This is the best thing to have ever happened, and if I ever feel any regrets about ANYTHING that transpired in the Epilogues, I’ll feel infinitely better the moment I remember it gave us THIS.

The most beautiful scene I’ve ever witnessed.  All my liberal, economy-ranting hopes and dreams confirmed.  It’s glorious.

OBAMA: Come on now, Dave. We can’t be having that. OBAMA: I’m nobody’s king. I’m a democratically elected representative who took an oath to serve his country and his people. People like you, Dave. OBAMA: If anything, I should be the one bowing.

OBAMA.  I MISSED YOU OBAMA.  I CAN HEAR YOUR VOICE THROUGH YOUR TEXT AND ITS SO COMFORTING AND UPLIFTING

DAVE: mr president what i mean is im a huge fan of yours and i hope this doesnt sound fucked up but on some level i feel like ive been waiting my whole life for this moment?? OBAMA: I know, Dave.

Yes, yes you have.  Yes, we can.

OBAMA: Most people thought I was gone. But I was keeping an eye on events. OBAMA: Wouldn’t miss it for anything.

I, too, would like to have the feeling that Obama is still out there, keeping an eye on things.  Watching, smiling... providing some last background of Hope as things seem so temporarily sour.  That feeling would be amazing.

...I mean he’s still alive IRL, sure, but not Obama watermark smiling lovingly from the sky or anything like it should be.

Yes, back to reading.  Back to this glorious, definitely canon moment.  The moment we learned that Obama was with us the whole time.  :’)

DAVE: sorry if this is nosy but if you didnt die when you disappeared then how did you die OBAMA: Most of that is classified, Dave.

Pfffffff  :D

OBAMA: When I was a boy living in Hawaii, on my thirteenth birthday I was visited by a mysterious stranger. OBAMA: He was an older man with a mustache. Kind of a corny, old-fashioned, adventuring type. He tried to convince me we were related. Of course, I thought he was full of shit. OBAMA: To this day, I’m not sure about that. Maybe he was. I didn’t think much of his tall tale at the time, but what did pique my interest was his story. OBAMA: He was voyaging all over the Pacific looking for a mysterious island, which supposedly had all the answers he’d spent his whole life searching for. OBAMA: During his travels, he set up outposts all over the ocean to help with his search. Such as one near where I lived as a boy. The outpost had a laboratory, an archeological dig site, a network of underground tunnels, the works. OBAMA: One time, I snuck in there and did some exploration of my own. Somewhere in the maze of underground ruins, I found a transporter pad, just like the one that brought you here. OBAMA: It sent me to a new realm. A place they called the Medium.

Grandpa Jake of Earth A, thank you SO much for bringing us this gift.  The gift of Obama.

OBAMA: Hey, why don’t we take a walk. You’ll have a chance to collect yourself. And there’s something I’d like you to see.

:O :O :O

I am shivering with anticipation.

Ah, leave it to Obama to help Dave with the final steps of his character arc.

OBAMA: Are you sure that’s all he is, Dave?

FIX THINGS OBAMA!!!! :D :D :D

Wait, what if Obama can turn things into an actually legitimate DaveKatJade?  That would be a miracle only a god of Hope could pull off.

OBAMA: I’ve had my share of doubts about all that, just like any other man. OBAMA: And I’ve had plenty of the same kind of struggles as you, Dave. DAVE: wait DAVE: you...

Obama nods, smiles wistfully. Dave arches his eyebrows high above his shades. They stare at each other, and in the look they exchange, they seem to say all that needs to be said between two grown men on the matter.

:’)

OBAMA: Believing is the key to understanding the truth underlying the words, the truth underlying the ideas they represent, and the truth underlying who we are as individuals. OBAMA: The power of belief, the power of Hope, that’s what endows that which is intangible, ephemeral, or uncertain with a sense of reality. OBAMA: It brings focus to the insubstantial, the mirages of the mind, the multiplicity of what is possible, of what could be, and isolates it—concentrates it—to turn it into that which is. OBAMA: And the result of that, Dave, is what we call truth.

I didn’t think we’d be learning more about the Hope aspect straight from the mouth of Barack Obama.

OBAMA: He taught me about many things. Combat, philosophy, life, love... DAVE: love??? DAVE: hold on are you saying DAVE: that...

PFFFFFFFF :D :D :D

OBAMA: She’s settled happily into the specific. That’s her path now. OBAMA: All of you have embraced that life, in this safely sequestered version of planet Earth. OBAMA: All of you until now, Dave. OBAMA: This is why you’re here. OBAMA: I believe you’re ready to wake up. DAVE: ...

:O

...this is suddenly possibly going to be getting slightly sad isn’t it.  D:

--Oh shit, so THIS is where Davebot came from.

How is he going to break things off with Jade though???  D: D: D:

...Oh my GOSH he’s just going to suddenly vanish and abandon her isn’t he.  D:

...alright, merging with his other selves, et cetera...

It defers to its greatest knight, risen anew.

Yeah that’s nice but am I supposed to pretend you’re going to say goodbye to Jade offscreen or

--ah that’s why the bot didn’t have shades, gotta use the genuine Stiller ones

==>

Page 40, and the start of this sounds a lot like the Postscript.  But we’re getting more this time, thank god.

ARADIA: when i watched as everything broke apart ARADIA: and got swallowed up by the black hole ARADIA: which is where i ended up too ARADIA: that black hole... ARADIA: thats basically you right JADE: yes. ARADIA: and when you speak of your brother ARADIA: thats lord english JADE: yes. ARADIA: and hes dead JADE: not just yet.

Oh shit.  John’s final blow didn’t kill Lord English did it.  Alt!Callie is going to strike the very last killing blow herself isn’t she.

JADE: lesser beings have so much trouble perceiving divinity in the uncanny.

Divinity?  Like, Lollipop-style divinity?  I mean, I guess this IS the Candy branch...?  But what made this so “perfect” to begin with?

JADE: this world, unlike the canonical horrors from which it is hermetically insulated, will always fail to meet the combined criteria for truth, relevance, and essentiality that would endow this realm with any real gravity. JADE: its own naturally occurring supply of gravity, rather than the artificial supply i have given it. JADE: as such, what transpires here is characterized by experiential frivolity. JADE: physically, it is cordoned off by the black hole’s event horizon. it is safe. untouchable. JADE: inescapable. ARADIA: that sounds ominous

Oh.  So this outside-of-canon timeline-verse whatever that Candy takes place in is like a trap?  For Lord English to be trapped in forever, inside not just his OWN story like we thought before but into a place where he’ll be forever irrelevant, while, like... the “Prince” and others following him for pursuit or camaraderie reasons manage to escape somewhere even different?  --No wait those people are OUTSIDE this place, in the “real” timeline/universe of Earth C. So Dirk’s destination is somewhere completely different; oh, and alt!Callie is the only one with the power to escape the black hole, to bring Davebot and Aradia with her back to quote-unquote “canon” or the closest thing to it to bring bastard Dirkbro down.

Or... something.

JADE: one could describe it as a phantasmal projection confined within my horizon. JADE: it was created by a choice that made it possible for that horizon to expand infinitely, to consume infinitely. JADE: and since that choice could not coexist with canon events, this place manifested to here to support its consequences. JADE: if this world were capable of anything either essential, relevant, or true in some stable combination, then it would perpetuate a corrosive paradox. JADE: as such, insulation from what is out there, and the inescapable well it rests in, is what protects all it holds inside. JADE: and since i am the embodiment of the black hole in which it rests, JADE: i am the one protecting this world.

Oh huh.  So when we saw alt!Callie creating the black hole out of the Sun, she was actually using John’s “choice” and his timeline split to engineer the paradox that drove that singularity’s expansion?  And so she’s going to be the lord and safeguard of all that is Non-Canon, and also seek to guide the heroes trying to save what IS Canon?

Hm!

JADE: physical destruction is one thing. JADE: obliteration of the entire canvas for all of reality over a given cosmic span is another. JADE: and yet there are even more insidious forms of destruction and subversion of life to consider. JADE: methods that are difficult to grasp for those on your plane.

Yep, destroying Heart.  Destroying Soul.  Destroying the uniqueness that drives individual agency and choices, and suborning people completely to your will and ideals without their consent or choice.

Hmm....

JADE: but longer stories have the power to draw consciousness into them. they possess arresting and hypnotic qualities which can be used by their tellers to alter the awareness of the listener.

Yep, like a biased narrator with their claws on the > prompt for characters.

JADE: i brought to your attention that the story you were listening to had a speaker with a specific identity. JADE: and where there is an identity, there can also be an agenda.

Yep yep.  And by commandeering the story to his own agenda, Dirk’s been robbing everyone of a fundamental right to their own existences.

JADE: this is the sort of corruption i now must dedicate my existence in this new body to ending once and for all.

Heck Yes; returning the narrative to as objective a speakerless-ness as can be attained or simulated, and divesting the bias from agenda’d narrators that can wrest all control from the participants in a story, enslaving them and making them the author’s puppets instead of true to themselves as characters, people, etc.

--Oh my GOSH, was Dead!Jade eating the remains of Lord English at the end of that Postscript???  She was, wasn’t she?  :D :D :D

That’s pretty fucking awesome.  And a pretty fucking fair fate for him to get cannibalized by his sister.

JADE: consume his body. JADE: absorb his essence. JADE: and then using this host, i will generate enough power to move beyond the staggering pull of the event horizon encasing this world. JADE: a prison of my own making, which can be escaped only through the supreme unification with my other half. JADE: it is crucial to the cosmos that i succeed. JADE: the prince of heart has to be stopped.

:D :D :D :D :D

Pretty awesome!  A decent setup to a story that probably shouldn’t be told, the implied sequel that Meat invites up or whatever.  And... oh phew.

Oh PHEW.

OH FUCKING PHEW. HOLD ON.

So.  The very last line of the epilogue, the last bit:

The hole leaves behind an absence in the sky so calm that continuing to call it a sky wouldn’t seem to do it justice. It’s a perfectly neutral expanse into which anything one can imagine might be summoned. And for a while, anything was. But not anymore. Where the hole gaped just moments ago, there now exists an imaginary line.

Above this line resides all that matters. Below exists all else. Never again the twain shall meet.

Okay!  :D :D :D

So, when I read that last line, I was INCREDIBLY disheartened.  I thought that Andrew was declaring that canon would never interfere with anything again, that this was the FINAL WORD on Homestuck and everything to do with it as far as canon was concerned, and that Dirk’s crimes and such would forever go unresolved and left to the imagination.

But that’s not what the line meant.

What’s INSIDE the singularity, and thus “under” the imaginary line, is everything non-canon, all the possibility and fanfiction and dead ghosts and such who are trapped in this safeguarded realm alt!Callie created to protect them, away from the influence of any future plot danger beyond the mundane issues they create for themselves.

And what’s OUTSIDE the singularity, above the line, is canon.  A canon which actually continues, and which this line doesn’t necessarily cut short.

I don’t know if Andrew will ever continue this nonsense, maybe to show me a Rose who’s actually happy as a robot or something?  But... er, that’s not the point.  The point is that even though the story “isn’t over”, it’s left so it CAN continue, so that the final state of these ISN’T a permanent cliffhanger to be left forever unfulfilled intentionally.  I’ll still be traumatized by the state some of these characters are left in, until Andrew maybe possibly chooses to resolve some of this nonsense with later content, which he probably won’t.  Heck, this actually might be easier for him to create a new work with, given how much baggage has been left behind on old Earth and in the singularity, so all you have is a much relatively smaller cast of characters on a chase to wherever Dirk is planning to go?  But, like.  When I read that Postscript, I stopped believing anyone I saw suggesting we’d get anything after this.  Any sort of work of... you know... continuing, er, Homestuckiness from Andrew, no matter what it was.  But even just... leaving it open even if he isn’t going to DO anything about it, and having that final line NOT be an aggressive cutoff?  Is just nice.  Nicer, anyway.

And this singularity is kept safe for us to enjoy ALL of the old stuff, the multitude of possibility that the in-singularity version of Roxy glimpses out of the side of her eye.  That--

Oh my Gosh.  THAT’S also what the final line means.

Above this line resides all that matters. Below exists all else. Never again the twain shall meet.

Homestuck fanfiction is now COMPLETELY FREE FROM CANON.

Within this singularity, nothing has to stay true to absolutely every underpinning of the earlier comic.  Nothing has to make sense.  Nothing has to be narratively consistent with anything else, though it’s obviously more enjoyable if it is.  Truth, essentiality, and relevance may all be FLEXED as much as any individual fanfic writer needs to!  And... and earlier, before this epilogue.  When we would get Snapchat stuff of the story on Earth C.  And even before that when all we had was the ending flash.  There was still a FEAR on many parts that there was more to canon that Andrew wasn’t telling us, that whatever was in our imaginations about what may have happened was “wrong”, that any fanfic you wrote was liable to be disproven formally.  But that’s not the case anymore.  Because with that line, with alt!Callie sealing off this realm and taking just a last few soon-to-be canon-impactors out of one of its timelines, Andrew has left ALL of the earlier trappings of Homestuck, of Earth, of all these characters and ghosts and fragmented possibilities, permanently free from canon influence from the rest of time.  Meaning no Homestuck fanfic that takes place in this singularity-granted realm may EVER be busted by Andrew’s future work.  He’s done what he first aspired to do when he declared all fantrolls in existence canon.  He’s finally “killed the author”.  He’s made the very FACT of an author an enemy, to be pursued in its own canon story outside of all this.  He’s set EVERYTHING free.

Wow.  So that’s what all the point of all this was, huh?  :D

Let me read the last few pages of Candy anyway.  Where was I again?

Oh, about to click the last page.  ==>

Oh my GOD.  This Postscript is about the end of MEAT, where the Meat Postscript showed us the end of CANDY!!!  :D

Let’s hear where this shit is all going!  I’ve been wondering what realm Dirk is actually heading towards to try and start fucking up.  Reading...

...Oh, okay.  I thought I glimpsed someone mentioning something about Rose “doing Dirk’s laundry”, and I thought I just missed some narrative comment on laundry made when Dirk took Rose out of the apartment on that final trip out to Jake’s for a spaceship?  But I guess this was the scene they were talking about.  Fuck you, Dirk.

One of her more reckless shipmates chipped a tooth trying one, despite repeated warnings to stay away from the stuff.

So Terezi IS there?  And probably received that final message from Vriska to think about.

It’s a stray ruby slipper. The other is about ten feet away, down the hall. No sign of their owner anywhere.

Yep, that’s definitely Terezi.

...Oh cool, Rose’s body isn’t quite dead?  She could be returned to it or a souped-up version of it if she’s ever brought to her senses outside Dirk’s corrosive influence.

A new planet is within sensor range. She studies the millions of statistics all pouring in at once.

They’re heading for a planet?  Somewhere else in Universe C?

It’s an M-Class planet. The right size, right age, right distance from the sun. There’s no advanced life yet. It’s exactly what they’ve been looking for all these years.

Shit, a NEW planet?  For all this shit to go down on?  Maybe I don’t need to see what happens next, that sounds potentially a little boring.  The future adventure this story entails COULD just be implied and never followed up on.

Once the new race has established

What race??? Human, hybrid?? It’s not TROLL, y’all would have brought Aradia if that was the case, right?  Or is this why there are tons of trolls in Universe C that Caliborn and Calliope’s parent trolls got to incinerate ages later, seeded across planets by these assholes?

The ones who get the chance to play what will arguably be the most important session in the history of Sburb?

Ahhh.  Okay.  So this may INDEED be something interesting, something worth seeing.  A new session, one where Dirk is the villain, Rosebot is enthralled, and old heroes are on their way to help see him thwarted.  Along with the mystery participants of a session we’ve yet to see.

Enough time goes by that she begins to wonder if he’s asleep. But no. It’s just the irritated silence of a man who knows he isn’t currently dressed well enough to attend to something important.

DIRK: Are my fucking pantaloons ready yet?

Yeah, fuck you and your anime pantaloons straight in the Yaois, Dirk Smartass.

Okay!

So that’s the end of the epilogue.  BOTH epilogues.  And... I like it.

I don’t know why.  I mean it was all excellent before, and my stomach’s still a BIT clenchy, but I like it now.  I misinterpreted things from the Meat ending, and now everything... everything makes a little more sense.  Some things seem resolved, others earned...

And... in a way I feel like I could actually oddly accept, even if there’s never anything that touches on this ever again...

It doesn’t seem “over”.  :)

[sole-cuore-amore-e-droga]

Tel Aviv 2019: Straight outta Romania to Eurovision with an edgy plea for a return of special someone

To be honest, I wasn’t that on board with Selecția Națională 2019, like, at all. I get that scandals happened and three songs withdrew from the comp. at various stages due to various reasons, but Romania is just Romania to me somehow. Well there were a few overall gems (some of them out of the finals too), but I just couldn’t be bothered to waste my Sunday evenings on a single broadcast of it. Plus, I was never that swayed by the two big fanwanks from here anyway, so I’m glad they flopped lol.

But maaaan did I have a bone to pick with the people reacting to it. Especially towards the Wiwi jurors. Look, there’s such a thing called as “song growing on you” and “performance elevating the song”, as well as the one that goes “getting over it”. Surely these aren’t make belief concepts of life, hmm? I’m not one of those people who prefer a song more or less thanks to its performance, but there are some good ones that occasionally change my opinion on a song, especially a ‘boring’ one! And thanks to those terrible people, some of Wiwibloggs videos were unfairly attacked with dislikes, and mind you, not only on the Romanian NF interviews that don’t have the current Romanian subject of choice, no - both first-reaction-after-qualifying-to-A-Dal-2019-final interviews (that were of these two) too. And it’s not even the first time a televote winner doesn’t win the NF so you should have SHUT. THE FUCK. UP. (- Penn Jilette) Clear? (:

(lol this is all directed to the people from like three months ago, obviously now that the writeup is late the drama has cooled down A LOT, especially in the light of Ukraine’s events and the actual dust of this Euroseason where everyone made amends with everything, but I can’t help but keep what I thought of this initially because I just wanted to write something for Romania as I didn’t have anything else to say until I remembered the drama so)

So here’s that one controversial subject that unexpectedly slayed the poor man’s “Fuego” and that one homophobic teen by hitting it hard by an extremely unbalanced jury vote (and 24 points to it coming from that core Wiwibloggs duo, no less) and her on-stage couch possessing - the half-local half-Canadian little to no known artiste, Ester Peony, who conquered all in her homeland “On a Sunday”, as her songtitle says (haha bad puns whoop.) Is it any more mesmerizing over the two fanwank fanflops, or is it, just like Wiwi said at first, ‘boring’? Hmm...

It starts of bluesy, with the Western-movie-sounding-pop guitar twangs accompanying the sound, and Ester begins reminiscing her love that left her on a Sunday of September, later followed by snap percussion. And deep inside she wants that person to come back “to [her], to [her], to [he-eeee-eeee-er], eh, eh, eh, eh”. She begs and pleads for the return for her loved one, as I believe the absence deeply upsets her (smoke from the ashtray, everything’s so cold an gray, loving is a hard price to pay) and eats her up from the inside to a degree. I never had someone to leave me like that on a whatever the day was, but I feel for Ester’s song’s protagoniste.

Here are some interesting things I find in this song: its progressive intensity; the decision of putting a 3rd verse up in the place of the bridge; right after some additional “eh eh eh eh” after the chorus (bridges are usually of completely different vocal line ways); cool voice of the singer’s; the strings; the beat... and the fact that it’s described as “electro-pop”. Pop I might get, in fact it sometimes reminds me of those older Billboard chart topper songs from mid-00s por so, or that it could have been one of those kind of songs. You needed just to give it to a popstar relevant of the time and voilà - a hit! Electro... not quite sure on this one. Maybe the bass that occurs in the 2nd and 3rd verses indicates something on it but that’s all.

And man do I hate to say this but the song's attitude is something that makes me wanna scream sometimes. It occasionally happens when I stop feeling so happy clappy for a song a few listens later because I just don't feel like caring about it anymore and that it starts making me feel some sort of a soulache because I trusted it in the first place. Kinda like "Funny Girl", Latvia 2018: I actually didn't mind it at first but its desperation got on my nerves a whole lot that I got completely irritated. "On a Sunday" has enough elements that I like to keep the irritation feeling at bay, but I doubt that even they will not make me want to smash a chair everytime I hear that chorus again... you think you can suppress your smugness overtime, song? Think again about it later

Oh and there's a supposed revamp, I doubt I would be able to feel any better about that song that way, as long as my mind just automatically recognizes Ester's singing as "whining" for some reason. It probably will make me feel less worse if I see a stage show similar to the absurd mess one from the NF where shit happens and Ester's just chilling on a chair. Game of Loans? Student loans? It was random but I definitely appreciated the scarlet madness all surrounding it. I hope to maybe see something similar in Tel Aviv - edgy imagery, why not. Bring on the candles and the ravens.

To summarize, I don’t think it’s a bad song at all. It’s daring, it’s badass, it's kickass, it comes right at you, grabs you in and you adapt to it however you can be able to. However...

Approval factor: I still have mixed feelings about passing it off as something approvable, but objectively I would like to do so. Good for you to try something different, Romania.

Follow-up factor: Anything at least half-decent is a fine follow-up after The Humans’s mediocrisms (I’m helping the dictionary to have more words, one construction at a time!). I liked the Humans more though and Ester... sort of? But in general context, Ester’s a fantastic successor.

Qualification factor: Somehow this did not sound like a definite Eurovision qualifier to me, so at one point I thought it would be just missing out... but it’s a complete effing borderline of a song. At one point it sounds good enough for a filler qualifier, at another it’s just not qualifying somehow. We’ll see how she rehearses it up in two days, though.

NATIONAL FINAL BONUS

I think there’s nothing more I can say about Selecția Națională (refered to as SN from this point onwards) than I already said in the intro, so let’s get to the moments, shall we? ;)

• So what else do I have to say about the fanwank-esses that hasn’t been said? Well, on one hand you have an Amazon-jungle-tribal version of “Fuego”, “Army of Love”, performed by Bella Santiago (who had one of my favourite SN entries last year lmao), who went all out with body paint and wild choreo and a rap bridge in Tagalog (one of Bella’s native languages) to make it all sound slightly different than “Fuego”, but still, that pre-chorus just feels like a pitched-down “Fuego” from a B minor to a G flat minor, with the same acoustics and the beat, and the drop is some limp-ass Amazon flutery magic. On the other hand you have a 16 year old Laura Bretan with an poperatic ode to her “Dear Father” which was praised for her insanely good vocal skills (I forgot what’s that called... an alto? soprano? mezzo-soprano? sorry I know a lot about music but not a lot about those ranges) more than the song itself... there’s a big problem about Laura though as people found out that she does not believe and/or condone a marriage between same-sex people. For Eurofans that’s a major red flag as as of lately Eurovision is very LGBTQ+ friendly and having had Laura next to people like Bilal or Mahmood would have probably been concerning if she knew of them having had boyfriends... Like I said, neither of those are special. Imo people loved Bella’s song because of the “Fuego” vibe and people loved Laura’s song because of her voice combined with her age. I said what I said. (Oh and there was a missed opportunity for Il Volo and Laura to reunite this year in Eurovision had they only been chosen in their NFs.)

• Screw these gals, now here come on the real faves of mine - another rock band, obviously, and that’s Trooper. No but for real, could at least ANY country have sent a rock song this year? It could have even been San Marino for all I cared but this year is so MoR without a rock entry... Trooper’s “Destin” sounds like something coming out from an epic fable about legendary heroes fighting for their glory of the nation by slaying goblins with wearing medieval costumes (with a sleeveless top and metal armor for the chest), bearing their long hair and looking strong and hunky. Lai-lai-la-la-la-lai!

• Now what were the other competing entries I liked? There were quite a few like the folk bop titled “D A I N A” and sung by Letiția Moisescu and Sensibil Balkan, then Teodora Dinu’s captivating pop tune “Skyscraper” and a really catchy non-qualifier entry by a band Steam, named “The Way It Goes”... no really Romania, why’d you let that flop... and why did you also let 2 Gents flop... and moreso importantly WHY DID YOU LET THE FOUR FLOP??? That’s like the best football-anthem-esque song I’ve heard in a while... such a shame it didn’t appear on the national selection’s final. Oh well. Poor those 4 young souls.

• Now what were those 3 (actually 4) withdrawals? First one was concerning the first ever Romanian representative Dan Bittman and his own problems so he couldn’t return to a NF and be one of the potential returning artists to Eurovision. Then there was this Australian-Romanian chick named Xonia who withdrew for seemingly no reason, all last minute. There was one more withdrawal from a semi-regular SN participant Xandra too, as well citing unknown reasons. And then there’s Mihai (or as he likes calling himself nowadays, M I H A I) who once again wanted to return to Eurovision (no wonder his Eurovision 2006 song was called “Tornero” lol) with an entry, and this one is called “Baya”. And then he went on an epic quest of flopping - firstly by withdrawing his song last minute from SN claiming that it’s corrupted, then considering to return as a wildcard, then thinking on to latching on to Eurofest in Belarus, but gotten sick last minute and therefore perma-cancelled his NFs journey this year entirely by not appearing on the Eurofest auditions. <3 Not to mention he’s a bit of a creep by subjecting people to his nude pictures with just him in his underwear. dude you’re almost 40, stop doing that to the kids. you’re not even a “daddy”. just look how alien you look on your song’s thumbnail:

• Netta continues her guest appearances on various NFs, such as in UK and in Spain (in spirit, as it was just the Triunfitos singing “Toy” at the beginning of the ESC OT Gala). This one even had her singing her newest song “Bassa Sababa” alongside “Toy”. Oh and there also was one of the Festivali i Këngës 56 alums coming by, Inis Neziri, to perform something for Romania after having won a music competition in Romania, and here’s her performance. But did she even have anything interesting in her backdrop as this?

We know you did Netta sweetie but do you honestly need to reminds us? I did not see Eleni doing shit like this and I don’t want you to do the same. Well if anything I am glad Netta only gracefully performed “Toy” on EYD 2019 (which I missed in my “National Final bonus” section for the UK’s review (as well as them reminiscing Eurovision’s best moments) but frankly I don’t think you cared anymore about it when you learned I was gonna write so many long-ass paragraphs, so yeah)...

• So what was the exact thing again that made everyone such bitter Betties? Well, everyone foresaw Bella and Laura battling it out in this NF, having succesfully qualified together. They even did well in the televote. But then the jury vote happened, and it included the God-forbidden Wiwibloggs duo voting separately and usualy picking all the similar favourites based on performances. They were very pleased with Ester Peony’s on-stage chair prop and her dramatic mess so they gave her their 12s. INDIVIDUALLY. And that’s one of things that pushed Ester higher for the win, despite only having 3 points from the televote lol. But the worst part about it is their opinions: they have praised “Dear Father” so much for mostly the same reasons others praised it so much as well, and were stunned. A what they thought of Ester’s song? That it’s boring. And their mindset switched when voting on this NF, with 12ing Ester and only giving a few feeble points to Laura. That’s where the backlash ensued - not when Emmelie de Forest (yep she was in the jury too) did not give any points to Bella Santiago’s song - just for that notion alone. Maybe it was because of a REASON. Laura’s song in the end is just an uninteresting pop ballad with some additional vocal exercising (too flawless that you even tire from flawlessness), Ester at least brought something to liven up her song, and maybe Wiwis changed their opinion accordingly by not being enthused by Laura anymore! And what’s the problem with that, eh eh eh?.. oh right, y’all accusing Wiwibloggs having rated Laura down because she’s a homophobe. Real friggen’ obviously because of that, you guys. NOT. Grow a brain a bit, will ya. (and even a contestant named Linda Teodosiu was pissed about Wiwibloggs not giving her enough points lmao... her song was a typical ”rent a NF songwriter” spiel so she has no effin’ reason to be mad her ‘originality’ wasn’t awarded lol.)

Worth noting that one of the other reasons people were mad that the juryvote points overpowered the televote big time (like 7 juror votes against 1 set of televotes - inequal) and therefore did not even listen to what they had to say (again, Ester had 3 freaking televote points lol). It’s a thing y’all should get used to - juries overrating an act one way or the other, against the televote’s will. It’s a given nowadays, remember. I know y'all Romanians wanted to scream "ESTER IS NOT OUR WINNER WE HAVEN'T DECIDED HER WE WANT BELLA/LAURA!!!" but that's the truth with the juries.

And thankfully, that is, what I think, all you need to remember from the SN headache this year. Fortunately it’s much smaller than the last year’s headache that, aside from 60 songs in total for 5 semis (!!!), also had a very strictly eliminative system that had 3 qualifiers each from a semi decided by juries ONLY (geez not even A Dal does that!), only to soften things up by having everyone fall down on televote’s hands only during the final. And then the final had the drama on its own. But if I reminisced it all on here, we’d be taking more than just all day, so it’s best that I stop this here and now, for all of ya who are already tired of all this waffle.

Good luck to Ester! and may all of your fans see you performing on a Saturday :)

[calliecat93]

Star Trek Episodes 42-46

A Piece of the Action: I love how this started with Kirk needing to beam down, Spock and McCoy just happen to enter the bridge, and Kirk just goes ‘yep, I’m dragging you two with me’ and they don’t even try to dispute it. That’s when you know that a formula has been nailed! Anyways, gangster planet... weird but since we had Jack the Ripper posessing the Enterprise not that long ago, I ain’t surprised anymore. Plus I’m not complaining cause this episode was just plain fun. Kirk was a riot with the fizzbin scene, being a terrible driver, and just going into full-on gangster mode cause why not? It’s a pretty ridiculous episode, but that’s not out of the norm at this point and again, it’s a fun one that just takes what it has and rolls with it. The cast, Shatner especially, were clealry having fun and when the cast is enjoying things, the audience tends to as well. Think my only complaint is how Shatner and Nimoy got snazzy suits, but Kelley didn’t... then again I can easily believe McCoy nope-ing out of this part, but still. Ah well! Enjoyable watch all in all. 4/5.

The Immunity Syndrome: We have a situation with a deadly phenomena that outright destroyed a solar system and a Vulcan vessel that poor Spock outright sensed. The conflict comes in when everything starts dying and someone needs to be willing to go into the danger zone, and the choice as to who is between Spock and McCoy. It’s a tense situation where everything is hanging by a thread with everything pushed to it’s limits and whoever goes out is likely going to die take the thing down for good. Then comes which one of the two gets sent with the final decision coming down to Kirk. McCoy has the scientific knowledge suited to look into it, but Spock is more capable fo ha dling the mental toll and has a personal reason due to the Vulcans. In the end, Kirk picks Spock. It’s a very good episode where the ship is possibly in it’s greatest danger yet and everything, and I mean EVERYTHING, is being pushed. Then when Kirk makes his choice, we have McCoy bitter and not wishing Spock luck until it’s too late, which when it looks like Spock indeed died... yeah, Kelley nailed the guilt through body language alone. Then when Spock and Kirk begin recording what may be their final words if everything fails... they all know that they could very well die in this situation. Strong stuff, to say the least. Now of course everything works out with and the scene where McCoy tells Spock to shut up about them leaving him behind and that they are going to save him was a great moment, including Spock’s snarky quip in response. It’s very much a tense episode where with so much being pushed you’re worried about how they’re gonna get out of it. I think that the trio especially were great here, especially Spock and McCoy with their usual banter feeling a lot more... tense here than usual. Great episode! 5/5.

A Private Little War: Well that’s the second episode in a row where Spock nearly died, only now Kirk gets to join in. Anyways, we have some kind of hunting/tribal planet that Kirk and McCoy are stuck on and Kirk ends up poisoned, then essentially put under a love spell when healed. We also have this village trying to get their hands on superior weapons to win a war, which is apparently meant to parallel the Korean/Vietnam Wars. Anyways, it was fine. I can see the parallels to the wars and it was nice that Kirk chose McCoy because he feels that he can trust him and his advice equally to Spock’s, who has to sit out of most of the episode cause even Vulcans aren’t immune to bullets. Which seeing Jim and Bones argue over essentially setting off a never-ending war was pretty intense since I don’t recall them EVER getting into an argument, but in the end Kirk’s decision is pretty much the only one that they have and it’ll mean sentencing one of his friends on the planet to death. In the end Nona used the spell to take Kirk’s phaser to give the enemy, and it resulted in her death and Tyrse abandoning his pacifism to get vengeance with Kirk unable to do anything about it as it’s the only option, A pretty dark ending which makes the war parallels all the stronger, but very much still relevant in today’s world. A pretty good episode overall. Not as much as the first two, but again still relevant. 3.5/5.

Return to Tomorrow: Ho boy, body hijacking! Fun! So we have Kirk, Spock, and Lady of the Week let some alien mind... whatever in spheres take over their bodies while they get put into the spheres... well at least it’s not McCoy geting his brain screwed up this time. He’s only ones who stands by how stupid an idea this is, but even he can’t fight the power of Kirk’s Monologing... which tbf WAS a pretty good one about taking the risk for scientific discovery... I still standby that it was stupid though. I could do without the echo effect that they add to the voices to emphasize the posession because it’s far too distracting, but it does give the actors a chance to go outside the norm. Nimoy especially gets to go full-on expressive/villain mode as while the other teo are only using the bodies until artificial ones can be made, the third decides that it likes having a Vulcan body so... yeah. It’s a fine episode, nothing great but a good watch. I think I just liked watching Nimoy go all villain and he’s clealry enjoying the freedom, haha! I feel sympathetic to Sargon and his wife since they aren’t evil and just wanted to feel human again and were perfectly willing to be androids/help humanity, unlike their companion and their final fate is a sad one... well the wife goes crazy for a bit but still. I also love how they outwitted the villain at the end, it really had me there for a bit XD A fine episode all in all. 4/5.

Patterns of Force: So in this episode we have The Enterprise vs a planet of Nazis! Boy is THIS gonna be fun! I imagine it had to be awkward since Shatner and Nimoy are Jewish and had to dress as Nazis, but hey it is about Nazism/fascism being bad and they’re undercover so I guess for a good cause... and they get to take them down so ah well! It gets it’s point across in showing how inhumane the Nazis are and how bringing it upon another planet for ANY reason was a horrible idea. Also love how it took McCoy like... a full minute to realize that he and the others were dressed as Nazis, himself included, cause he was too grumpy trying to get his boot on. I can see why he became my favorite, haha! There’s nothing too notable about the episode, it’s just our heroes helping a rebellion to defeat the Nazis, and we never complain about seeing Nazis getting their asses kicked. It’s not the best piece of media to address these things, they’re essentially taking down a man who took the infastructure and corrupted it more, but it still ends with the man responsible dying for not learning form history and using that infastructure to begin with. Just feels like they got off easy, but ah well, hopefully things became better in that world. 3/5.

So we got gangsters, Spock/McCoy feels (take that under whatever preference you choose), love spells, posession, war, and Nazis. Fun times, right? Well folks, only five more for S2 to go. Will they keep the entertainment train rolling? We’ll see soom enough.