#her villain era is so hot but i do miss my sweet girl

[caitlynprotector]

hahhahahahahahhahaha *starts sobbing uncontrollably*

caitlyn went from being willing to hand over her gun without hesitation to keep vi—someone she barely knew—alive, to gripping it tightly, not caring about her own life or vi’s

[nevenabadr]

50 Shades of You! Tom Hiddleston X Female! Reader

Note: This is my first ever fanfiction for Tom Hiddleston. I have not written fiction for ages. English is not my first language.

Inspiration: this is inspired by:

“I will live in thy heart, die in thy lap, and be buried in thy eyes.”

–Shakespeare, Much Ado About Nothing

Word count: 2660

Warnings: Romance, sweet words, and smut–this is +21 and not for everyone.

Enjoy reading and please comment with your feedback. 💚

-------------------------------------------------------

During the summer Cambridge University was having a conference "Gothic Elements In John Milton's Paradise Lost." As you the young professor of literature, the coordinate manager suggested that the University alumnus could join for not just attending, but acting a piece of the tragedy. Amongst the candidates was the Classic department graduate and famous actor, Tom Hiddleston. 

You know that he might have scheduled issues or time conflicts, but you suggested the committee email him. To your surprise, he accepted the offer. 

 

The scene of choice was casting the devil out of hell.

On the stage during the conference eve, you did not have the perfect time to watch him, but you took a glimpse of acting from far.

He even caught your show and face attending the rehearsals.

The conference day was pressuring. You were trying to get everything right, in the middle of your so-close meltdown. A voice brought you to reality, "Hello, is this professor Y/N)?"

You turned to find the British handsome alumni smiling peacefully at you. "Yes, how can I help you?"

"Indeed, I am the one offering help." As he adjusted his glasses, I asked the committee manager to take upon some errant backstage. Maybe I can assist with the front ceremony?"

"Of course," you paused for a moment, "can you help me with the dinner's seats arrangement? My assistant is absent and I have to print and arrange them myself."

"Just show me a computer and all will be done."

Both of you took your time arranging an evening missing up some seats. 

 

"Here comes my name. You will be seated with the professors, of course!" He was busy putting name tags over the table.

"Oh! Don't remind me." You replied as if it is a conversation with an old friend and continued "the Classic department and Literature."

"They might start a war." Both of you started laughing 

"I have an idea." He took a tag from his table and moved yours next to his. "Now you will be with a friend"

The presentations finished, you had to go for the gym showers to change and wear your conference and dinner dress.

By the time you arrived, the scene from the tardy was about to be played. You took your place in the front seat.

Tom was playing Satan. He noticed that you were reciting the lines with him. He even almost smiles at you. Could not hold himself from looking at you in the front row while playing the scene of...

 

"All is not lost; the unconquerable Will, And study of revenge, immortal hate, And courage never to submit or yield; (And what is else not to be overcome?) That glory never shall his wrath or might Extort from me to bow and sue for grace With suppliant knee and deify his power, Who from the terror of his arm so late Doubted his empire[.] (I, 106–114)"

 

Your facial expressions captured his eyes, the movement of your lips and then the flame of your applause. 

At the dinner, he was interested to hear all about your work and writings. His eyes could not able to leave you.

 

By the end of the dinner, he walked you to your car, "this was lovely, thank you for tonight" 

You smiled at him, "thank you for accepting our invitation."

You shake hands and opened your car door like the gentleman he is.

"Would you like to go out with me, for a coffee? Books and coffee, maybe." He did not hesitate to ask.

"I would love to. You already have my number within the conference contact information." You raised an eyebrow and smirked.

As your car drove away, he knew he was up for an adventure.

Three months later, you are happily dating and sharing sweet kisses. He suggested a film marathon. Each week one of you chose a topic.

That Saturday's topic was Russian Literature and you had to add: "or inspired by it" 

"Excuse me, but Tolstoy has no comparison!" He grimaced

"Shadow and Bones, love!" You teased him, "it the Netflix adaption of the era" 

"After Anna Karenina, please," he sounded like an old professor.

"Alright then, deal." You tickled him and kissed his lips softly

Both of you enjoyed Anna Karenina, however, you were crying in his arms.

"That dreadful ending." 

He hugged you "Hey, Shadow and Bones will make it up to you, let me make extra popcorn." Once again, he kissed you.

He came back with popcorn that will at least survive three episodes. You snuggled between his arms.

"Look at Alexie, how he said 'Make me your villain.'" 

You were swooning as a fangirl.

"I beg your pardon, I am literally a villain," he complained

Oh! I would literally," stressing upon the last word, "let him have me"

His face was irritated and you not coming close to making love made him anxious, that you might not be ready. He never inquired about you.   

You caressed his tummy, "hey, a penny for your thoughts, sir." It sounded like one of the Jack the Ripper prostitutes, about which you have constantly been talking.

His voice evolved deeper and his eyes did not leave yours "your deepest sexual desire. What do you crave?"

Comparing to your age, you were nervous and inexperienced. "My life was spent between books. I..."

He did not let you continue speaking and took your lips between his drawing your body closer to him, uttering between his hot kisses "I am not just a villain" his lips made the earth move "I am a God" whispering against the sport skin of your nick " a king" his hands were moving down the same tomes his lips reached the line of your bosom whilst his hand slides prevailed touching down pussy and dug his fingers driving you till the edge.

"I want you," you whispered between your soft moans.

He neglected your cravings and maintained his rhythm, watching your complexion and closed eyes till you arched your back in awe.

You collapsed between his arms heavily breathing "that was extremely wonderful, but I need you"

He kissed your lips playfully. "you are a delicious girl, Y/N, but..."

You hashed him with a kiss that he pulled from "if your life was between books, I want you to write me your deepest desire."

"Darling, it was a series, Alexie is fictional." You wrapped your arms around his neck.

"Fictional or not, he is a man, you are paying for this." 

He was deadly serious "write me your longing."

You laugh "What? Like the 50 Shades of Y/N?"

He gazed into your eyes "aiming to please and punish you, darling, avenging my honour"

The next morning when you were with your family on Sunday's lunch, he opened an email titled "50 Shades of Y/A"

 

The content was as follows:

"You!"

 

He grinned to himself and determined to show her how fiction can become real.

Your week was busy. He had signed a new contract for a mini-series and was supposed to film soon.

Not replying to your email made you nervous, even went meeting for dinner. He was quiet about it. 

You checked your sent box millions of times to make sure it arrived. Still, you knew he was busy working, and you were busy with the finals coming soon.

Thursday’s dinner, nothing yet, nothing but gaggling and discussing your days and current reads. 

"Darling, we did not decide this week's marathon" 

He did not take his eyes off the menu "Are not you having a big family week, you should go" he was confident and calm. 

Deep inside you wanted to grab his neck and jiggle him, but for the lady you are and the restaurant, you were calm.

"Wonderful!"

The dinner was over; he drove you home, kissed you goodnight.

Saturday morning, a ringing at your door. Apparently, you received a package, a big one.

You kept thinking that some books might have come early from your publisher. Unwrapping it to a surprise satin 1950 coat with Ruby red entourage and black heels.

There was also a note, she recognised the handwriting:

 

"Wear nothing but this for your punishment. If other pieces were found upon your body, then fear my fury and vengeance.

Love, 

T"

 

So, it was her version of Mr Grey. But have you ever been ready to comply with anyone?"

Suddenly, a message arrived on your phone 

"Reminder, a black will pick you tonight at 8, don't disobey me, Princess."

Your heel clicked on the floor as a man dressed in an old fashion suit opened the car for you. The windows were blacked out, so you did not see where it was heading.

"Welcome, Princess," he greeted you as if you were royalty, "My master is awaiting your presence."

You took his hands. The place was carved out of one of your favourite dark fantasies, a mansion with gargoyles, dark lighting, and a vast garden.

You could not believe your eyes. Tom knew your deepest desires indeed.

But that is not the end.

The inside was as of a dark enchantment with deep red flowers and candles. The servant showed you the way to a dining room fit for a feast. Tom was not there. 

"My master requires you to await his arrival." The servant bowed and left.

You were like a child been left inside her favourite toyshop. The ornaments, the lighting, and even the shapes of the food. That aesthetic you only could dream of but never reach.

"Enjoying yourself already?" You turned to find your man dressed in a black Victorian suit. His face was shaved, shorter hair, no glasses. Just all of the handsome glory.

You took a step forward "no princess, I shall come for you"

He kissed your hand and then sat on the table's head, while it sat on the opposite side and faced you away indeed.

"Are you pleased, princess?" He raised his glass of red wine.

"Yes, my Prince." You smile.

"In here, you shall address me as your king." His eyes lit with fire, and his voice was harsh.

You played along and raised an eyebrow "my king."

"This is not a game, princess, you are my prisoner"

You dined quietly, as he did not drop his eyes from you.

"Enjoying yourself?"

You flirted "deeply, my king"

He left his chair and came closer to you, his fingers left your chain so you can gaze into your eyes.

He asked, "care for a dance?"

You smiled "I would love to."

You stepped forward and took his hand to a ballroom, just for you and him, the dark king.

The following piece of music was sensual and moving.

"The coat, princess, I want to see nothing but heels on your body,"

You obeyed the king, but for a tick. When you took it off, underneath it a short emerald green strapless corset dress tight upon the curves of your body and pushed your bosoms to their glory.

He grinned and his eyes darken "looking for further punishment, I suppose?" 

"Anything to please the king." You took his hand and kissed it. He did not expect it.

He turned furiously and the next song was romantic. He wrapped his arms around you once again, waltz, you sneaky woman, deserved joy before being punished.

Twirling you on the dance floor like the earth has no one but the two of you.

By the end, he carried you "to my chambers, little one"

You were nervous and anxious. What if he did not like what was underneath the dress?

He entered a candlelight room with a four-poster bed in the centre. The curtains of the bed were black and emerald. 

He laid you in bed, kissing your lips and playing with your hair. 

His breathing was heating against your skin.

"You won't miss that dress, will you, princess?"

He did not wait for your reply as he lifted a dagger amongst the layers of his suit and cut the corset down to the last piece of the dress.

You wore nothing else. You were lying exposed as he stood to look upon your naked curves for the first time. 

You spontaneously tried to cover your bosom and private parts.

"No, do not you dare" he was angry and you could not distinguish reality from fantasy.

You throw the rest of the dress away. Hands laying by your head and he stood there for a juncture, gazing at every inch of your body.

"Turn," he ordered angrily as if the soul of Loki took over him, "I said, turn" 

You nearly dropped tears "here my king" 

You felt the softness of his lips upon your delicate shoulders.

Kissing the line of your spine. He knows this will work like magic. You tickle from your back, now trying to lick you, taste you, slap you.

He flipped you to face him. You were sobbing. He could hear it under your moans.

"You are not a princess, you are not a queen."

He wipes her tears from her cheek "you are a goddess and I am your slave."

You giggled between your tears, wrapping your arms around his neck "my king"

"Your, slave" As his voice became softer, he hushed you with a finger.

He kissed every inch of your body. You were playing with his short blonde locks.

"Let me worship your bosom, my goddess" he kissed, licked and played with your nipples and cupped your bosoms gently.

Kissing down till he reached your pussy, "Let me worship your temple" as he licked your clitoris.

You were moaning loader now

“Not this time, my king I want you inside me."

"Alright, as the pleasure of my goddess, I shall obey." 

He adjusted his weight on you and asked, "wider for me, my goddess of beauty" 

You opened for him as he enters you for the first time. You let out a loud breath "are you alright" he took your hands between his.

"Continue, my king."

He is just thrusting himself gently inside you. Your moans filling the room 

"I am a villain, a king, a god, and a man"

Your hands were free to run along his back as he continued, "a man, no, a slave for my goddess"

You were moving with him and moaning louder, "my king, what else?"

 Thursinting himself harder and moving with a faster pace.

"My goddess, the sculptures of beauty," between his breathing and moaning "Da Vinci would not be able to capture your grace"

You were kissing as your nail dug inside his shoulders.

His last whispers as moving himself inside your pussy which was clutching around his manhood. He moved with pace, as you rocked your lap against him

"I will live in thy heart," kissing your lips as you bite his lower lip between your steamy breath. "Die in thy lap, and be buried in thy eyes.”

He was going faster now and you were in tremendous awe and your skin was heating up with your pleasure.

"Look at me goddess" you were closing your eyes as you become close to you your orgasm "look at me," he ordered 

"I love thee, Tom," you said as your pussy was clutching around his manhood and trembling underneath him. His enormous climax followed your orgasm. 

You were shaking. He used his hands to keep himself from crushing you with his weight.

He rested his forehead on yours till both of you caught your breath. Gently took you between his arms as resting on his side "and I love thee, Y/N"

kissed you and as you were falling asleep, yet muttered, "I made you my villain, did not I?"

He giggles, "I beg your pardon, your God, King, and lover"

You kissed for the last time of that night and snuggle between peacefully each other's arms.

----------------------------------------------------

Tag list:

@shafverani

@imsebastiansta-n

@brokenwitty

@221bshrlocked (awaiting your feedback)

@sinner-as-saint

@zemosimp05

@buckys-fairy

[thefudge]

any trash songs that are dear to you, dr. fudge? especially that go well with trashy ships hehe

sorry for replying eons later 

well, this question has the power to truly Expose™ me on the first day of Christmas, but… here goes nothing

i think ppl expect me to respond with something like “tear you apart” from she wants revenge, which is a great song! but i’m afraid i’m going to have to take you back to the ye olde days and show you what really embarrassing, early ‘00s trash sounded like. 

first, a few concessions: 

 trash by suede and poison by alice cooper are 80s/90s classics of the “you’re bad for me but i can’t help it” dynamic. but they’re too classy for this list. there’s not gonna be any Divine on this list, no 80s late-disco jams, no “west end girls” by pet shop boys, no britney doing “toxic” or “momma i’m in love with a criminal”, no christina aguilera wrestling in the mud while singing about being “dirty”, no baz luhrmann-esque “lady marmalade”. that’s all great. it’s just not this list.

 you also won’t find any my chemical romance, panic at the disco, evanescence, papa roach, marilyn manson etc. because they weren’t part of my trash experience. i mean they were there in the background, i was aware of them (and who hasn’t watched edits with “bring me to life”? don’t lie…)… and they’re kind of similar to what i have here, but they weren’t the trash i was particularly attuned to (plus, manson can choke).  

some other exclusions: i remember the original p&p edits back in 2005 had all of these “cuz there’s you and me and all other people” songs that were really wonderful, cheesy, shippy songs. but that’s…not this list (although that would make a great list too! remind me to do that one too!) 

i once got a message about how “mr. brightside” by the killers would make a great song for a bonkai edit, and…i like the killers just fine, and that’s a great song, but…no. this list ain’t that. 

the trash here is not trash on purpose, it’s not tongue-in-cheek, it’s not a “steamy hot mess”, it’s just…really bad and angsty and earnest and totally committed to the “no one understands me (but you)” vibe that a lot of early ‘00s trash ships fostered. 

okay…let’s…shame…me…: 

1. cold by crossfade - back in the late ‘00s, you couldn’t find an anime AMV that didn’t have this song in the background, ESPECIALLY if your male character was a murderous, brooding (secretly soft) boi who disdained the female sex because “feelings are weakness” or something. it was baaaad, but it’s a nostalgic fave.  the whole song is basically about how that arrogant, cold guy who’s shunned you and treated you badly was secretly into you all this time. yeaahhhh. (i remember this song was also popular with m/m ships because you had that classic dynamic where one of the guys was still in denial about his “gay” feelings. god i miss 2006.)

2. vermilion pt. 2 by slipknot - another 2005/2006 era song that capitalizes on the bad guy/good girl trope where she’s too “good” for the brooding antihero, but he can’t help but ruin her. or something. it’s soooo angsty. it has the great, eerie feeling of a doomed romance which was also definitely written by teenagers. i love it. 

3. i hate everything about you by three days grace - obviously, you can’t leave out the big dick energy song. 

4. anything by nine inch nails’ 2000-2010 period, but especially “fragile” and “we’re in this together now”, because they’re very much trashy power couple aesthetics, but also aaaaangsssst. “fragile” always cracks me up because it’s basically that one direction song about how the girl doesn’t know she’s beautiful, except it’s alternative rock and trent reznor is screaming about how he has to save this beautiful, pure soul from the corruption of the world. (for anyone expecting “closer”, that’s a great song…but i said real, embarrassing trash).

5. vampire heart by HIM - because OF COURSE. 2006 me was LIVING for Vampire Hunter D AMVs. that iconic line “love me like you love the sun” POETRY OKAY. another fave line has to be “you can’t escape the wrath of my heart”….like, whew, what a badass. 

6. hate me by blue october - AAAANGST. aaaaaaaaaangst. maybe the apogee of late ‘00s cheesy alternative rock. but probably not. there’s always one that goes harder. this list, unfortunately, is 90% this genre because they really SLAPPED when you put them together with trashy ships okayyyyy there was an innocence and earnestness that the ‘post-9/11 iraq invasion’ atmosphere really captured. 

7. let me go by 3 doors down - see, i was wrong, THIS is the apogee. “you love meeeee, but you don’t know who i aaaaaam” belts the lead singer of this oft-forgotten band aaaaand 15-year old me screamed yaaaaaaaaas

8. pieces by sum 41 - WRONG AGAIN. IT’S THIS ONE. the anime AMVs…my god….i can even tell you, beat by beat where the angsty edits happened depending on the breaks in the song.

9. sour girl by stone temple pilots -  “bad” boy waxing about how he’s ruined a good girl? check. super Extra lyrics that go “what would you do? what would you do if i followed you?” check. sarah michelle gellar/buffy being a dark goth muse for the tormented bad boy? triple check!!

10. hold me, thrill me, kiss me, kill me by U2 - i meaaaaaaan. it’s in the title. 10-year old me WAS LIVING. this is THE batman song, and if there’s a god, it will be featured in the upcoming robert pattinson movie. ppl wanna say this song is more of the “trash on purpose” variety, but i don’t think so. i think joel schumacher plays this dead straight (and “batman forever”, while being one of the cheesiest movies ever made, takes itself extremely serious). 

11. insatiable by darren hayes - finally breaking away from the alt rock scene a bit for this one. ppl who are now trying to make this song “respectable” and classify it as sweet 00s nostalgia are WRONG. everything about this song is convoluted and overly wrought and pitch perfect, even the fact that you would never believe that this waspy blond dude in the music video has anything to do with the actual song.  

12. behind blue eyes by limp bizkit - don’t look at meeeee. this is basically a meme song. the band itself turned out to be dumpster fire and fred durst is…blehh. but this song stiiiiiill slaps, i have the courage to say it.  the video definitely helps, i mean u got that trashy dynamic of prisoner/guardian @___@ and halle berry @___@. half-naked fred durst kinda ruins it, but it’s still got its charm. 

13. i have to include some linkin’ park songs here at the end and i’m choosing the ones that were trashiest to me and that’s gotta be “one step closer” and “somewhere i belong”  because they were always juxtaposed with villain/heroine ships in edits, and i remember fanfic authors would use them in songfics. “in the end” and “numb” are waaaayyy too classy.

additional “kinda too good for this list” rec:  the entire Queen of the Damned soundtrack, but especially “slept so long”, “system” and “before i’m dead” and really ALL the songs.

this disaster list could definitely go on (i’m sure u guys can pitch in. and hey, i might be persuaded to do part 2) but imma stop here before i lose my last shred of credibility on this website lol. k byeeeeeee

[radioleary-blog]

Hef Tragedy Jam

Hugh Hefner died yesterday. When the news was announced, over fifty women said they were dismayed. No, wait...over fifty women said they were “Miss May”. Fifty more were Miss June, and, well, you get the picture. If you were lucky you got their pictures.

Few of you reading this are old enough to remember that Playboy magazine was about the only place you could see a naked woman, and I say that because there are probably few of you reading this, period. But hey, my column gets more readers than the average suicide note, statistically speaking. Although I’m trying to increase my readership, and the average suicide note is more of a stand-alone project. I bet if George Lucas ever wrote a suicide note, he’d follow it up with three prequel notes. Each successively worse than the last. People would be like, “Why did he have to ruin that original suicide note, which I loved, with those awful prequel-suicide notes? I don’t care why he got depressed, but clearly only a manic depressive could make such a desperate cry for help as introducing Jar-Jar Binks. If I ruined a billion dollar franchise by coming up with an offensive racist caricature like Jar-Jar Binks, I’d probably consider putting a lightsaber in my mouth too.”

I grew up with Playboy magazine, and my early knowledge of female physiology was less from a volume of Grey’s anatomy or sketches by DaVinci, and more from volumes of Playboy magazine. It was like a reference guide, one that you would hold up with one hand. In fact, the first time I had a girlfriend who got naked, I wondered where her staples were. Of course, today, I’m the one who should have his stomach stapled, but that’s another story. Ah, sweet irony!

I’m sure Hugh Hefner went to Heaven, but whatever gleaming Mansion in the sky awaits us, no matter how glorious, for Hugh Hefner it’s going to be a pretty big step down from the Playboy Mansion. It may actually be Seventh Heaven, but Hef has been living on Cloud Nine since 1956. But, hey, he’s already wearing a robe. You know when you see depictions of Heaven, everybody is always wearing white robes? That’s because they were wearing those white robes in the hospital when they died. And they make you wear those awful robes that don’t close in the back because that’s where your wings will come out when you get to Heaven. It’s all part of God’s plan. I bet you’ll still have that plastic wristband on too, St. Peter just scans it at the gate to let you in. <beep> “Cardiac arrest. You’re good. Check in at the registration desk. Have a valid photo ID ready.”

Hugh Hefner was such a consummate pussyhound, I wouldn’t be surprised if he made a deathbed conversion to radical Islam, just to get the 72 virgins in Heaven. God would be like - I mean “Allah” would be like, “Pretty tricky Hef, pretty tricky. But...technically it counts. You old horndog!” Of course, you know what Hugh Hefner calls 72 virgins? A slow Tuesday.

The Playboy Mansion was famous for its out-of-control parties, and the mansion had a natural cave-like grotto on the grounds where everyone would go to snort coke and have sex. I guess Hef was a lot like Bruce Wayne, a millionaire with a mansion and a cave. And didn’t they call Bruce Wayne a millionaire playboy? Hef was a Playboy millionaire. But the difference is, Hef would rather do coke and fuck super-models whereas Batman would rather do-good and fight super-villains. Plus, Batman slides down the Bat-pole, and crazy hot chicks slide down the Hef-pole. In other words, Hef was sane, and Batman was, well, not so much. Batman is basically a billionaire who just wants to hurt people and not get sued for it and pretend he’s a hero. Kind of like Trump.

The grotto cave on the grounds of the Playboy Mansion had a huge, heated Jacuzzi pool, where movie stars, rock and roll gods, and celebrity athletes were eagerly humped by groupies, star-fuckers, and aspiring playmates. Unprotected 1970’s sex was messier than Michael J. Fox eating an ice cream cone, so the pool was probably 60% water, 2% spilled cocaine, and 38% James Caan’s jizz. The lifeguard got syphilis just from giving mouth to mouth resuscitation. At least that was her story. But that was about the same time Grand Funk Railroad was in town, so who can say? I do think ‘grotto’ must be the Italian word for ‘gross’.

I hear some of the more politically correct crowd, or as they’re more commonly known, nitwits, complaining that Playboy exploited women. And I guess it was exploitation, in the same sense that Vogue magazine is exploiting the mostly-naked teenage anorexic girls slash super-models in their magazine. And I say slash because that’s what these girls often try to do to their wrists. Unlike Vogue magazine models, at least the Playboy women didn’t have eating disorders. They’re a lot less likely to stick their fingers down their throats. I’m not saying they’re any less likely to have something down their throats, but not their fingers.

Exploiting women. As if Hugh Hefner was hanging around the Newark bus station looking for a girl down on her luck and fresh off the turnip truck from Topeka. That sounds more like the plot of a 1930’s movie than the way his business empire was run. I think what Hef did was have his photography editors, both men and women, spend endless hours going through duffel bags of mail sent in by thousands of women from all around the country who wanted to pose for Playboy. The staff would narrow it down to probably a few dozen, and then get Hef’s opinion on who was not only the most beautiful, but who had the look that would be right to feature in the magazine. That’s exactly what the editors and publishers do at Elle, and Vogue, and every other magazine that holds up a particular brand of beauty as an ideal.

And I don’t know any women who haven’t worn out the related links on their favorite porn sites jilling off to whatever their particular porn flavor might be, so who exactly are these people that still have a problem with Playboy? Because without Hefner’s decades of battles against governmental and religious censorship, there would be no porn sites. Hef made it possible to look at porn sites without pretending you go there for the articles. Without Playboy, people would still be saying, “Did you read that insightful article on the humanitarian crisis in Darfur? And that recently-found short story by J.D, Salinger?” “Why, yes. I particularly liked the profile of Jazz trumpeters from the post-bop era. And I did notice some delightful porn as well, between the articles, of course.”

The reason Hef could get away with putting in naked chicks is his magazine is because Playboy was a serious, respected literary magazine. The greatest writers of the day were in Playboy:

Ray Bradbury wrote original content for Playboy, and serialized Fahrenheit 451, which was coincidentally the exact temperature of how hot the playmates were.

The Beat writer Jack Kerouac wrote for Playboy, and that cat was cool as hell. Beat, Jack, that is exactly what Playboy readers do.

Ian Fleming published short stories in Playboy, and the James Bond novel “On Her Majesty’s Secret Service” was published first in Playboy. We all know James Bond got enormous amounts of pussy. But compared to what Hef was getting, James Bond looks like a bible salesman with erectile disfunction. Or a guy who works in a comic book store. Think about that for a minute; the world’s sexiest pussyhound spy still gets less women than the guy who published the magazine his story is in. And Bond is fictional!

Roald Dahl wrote for them, too. The author of “Willie Wonka” writing for people who wonka their willies, sounds apropo.

Kurt Vonnegut wrote for them all the time, and that dude was cooler than Ice Nine. There’s a reference for ya!

Joseph Heller published a lost chapter of “Catch-22” in Playboy. I think the title Catch-22 might be the number of social diseases you’d get if you had sex in the grotto.

Margaret Atwood, author of “The Handmaid’s Tale” started writing for Playboy in 1991. I would imagine one of her stories was called “The Handmaid’s Tail”.

Hunter S. Thompson. Gabriel García Márquez, John Updike, Joyce Carol Oates, Truman Capote, they all wrote for Playboy. This magazine was the real deal, kids, it was smarter and cooler than absolutely anything you know today. You see, all of these stories were longer than 140 characters. Or even 280.

I actually learned quite a bit about culture from Playboy, between rounds, if you know what I mean. By middle school I could discuss the literary feud between Gore Vidal and Norman Mailer in English class and sound like a friggin’ genius, I just couldn’t tell the teacher where I learned it. “Where did I learn that? Oh, you know. Around. Literary journals, and the like. At that building that has all the books. Yes, exactly, the library! That’s the one! I frequent that establishment, I‘ll have you know.” What was I gonna say? My father’s sock drawer?

The Playboy Interview was legendary, they were deep, involved discussions, frank and uncensored. Here are some of the people they interviewed: Salvador Dali, Patty Hearst, Groucho Marx, Ansel Adams, Stanley Kubrick, The Beatles, Albert Schweitzer, Buckminster Fuller, Orson Welles, Peter Sellers, Abbie Hoffman, Tennessee Williams, Erica Jong, Allen Ginsberg, and Bertrand Russell. Then there are the so famous they’re known by just one name:  Fellini, Castro, Brando, Nehru, Sartre, Bowie, Nabokov, Hoffa, Carson, Antonioni, Mastroianni, Gleason, and Sinatra. And Playboy was woke, they interviewed Malcolm X, Martin Luther King, Jr., Alex Haley, Miles Davis, Muhammad Ali,  Eldridge Cleaver, Dick Gregory, and Huey Newton. Holy shit, right?  Who do you see interviewed today? Kardashians? Ryan Gosling? Taylor Swift, but interrupted by Kanye West? This time we live in today has less culture than a petri dish.

Hef lived so long that most people today have no real idea how influential he was, what an important cultural icon he was, and that he somehow talked Marilyn Monroe into posing naked on the cover of the very first issue of his magazine way the hell back in 1956. That’s a dude with the Kavorka, big-time. And nobody was naked back in 1956. Not in this country. In 1956, people showered wearing a suit and tie, and apart from time shampooing, a smart fedora. They say people were more cultured back then because they went to art museums, bullshit, I think they only went to art museums to see the nudes in the oil paintings. You would too, and you know it, don’t even try to deny it. You’d say you were admiring the Titian, but you were really just admiring the Tit.

Nearly every issue, Playboy featured a very prominent celebrity with a well-established career and respected in her field who actually wanted people to see how beautiful she was without any clothes. Starting with Marilyn Monroe. And she was smoking hot, too, an icon in her absolute prime. Future historians will be more grateful for that photo shoot than they are for the discovery of the Nag Hammadi texts. Where do you go from there, Playboy? Well, how about Farrah Fawcett, the biggest sex-symbol of the entire 1970’s! The list of gorgeous, talented, famous, successful women that wanted to pose for Playboy might be hard for you to imagine, as you live in an age where women pose in magazines like Maxim with their clothes on! And men today pay to see that? Wtf? Man, I can see women with their clothes on just about anywhere I go. I can see that in line at the deli counter, I don’t need to pay for it.

Here are just a few, a very few, of the already-famous women who chose to pose with no clothes:

Daryl Hannah. Olivia Munn. Kim Basinger. Charlize Theron. Drew Barrymore. Denise Richards (she had kids with Charlie Sheen, so posing for Playboy was comparatively a relatively sound decision). Shannen Doherty. Belinda Carlisle. Jayne Mansfield. Mariel Hemingway. Margaux Hemingway. Nastassja Kinski. Sharon Stone. Rosanna Arquette. Vanna White. Elle MacPherson. Brigitte Bardot. Uma Thurman. Kate Moss. The list is almost endless. I almost said bottomless, but being Playboy, “bottomless”  goes without saying.

Sure, the last decade and a half weren’t great for Hef, but who stays cool past the age of 75? Only Bob Dylan and Picasso. Hef couldn’t let it all go, and at the end it was pretty sad. It was like Sunset Boulevard with viagra. But I’ll miss the Hef of fifty years ago, that man was at the forefront of political movements, cultural progress, gay rights, equal rights, reproductive rights, and the right to take your goddamn clothes off if you feel like it.

This may be the first funeral where you should bring condoms. In lieu of flowers, please give blowjobs. So long, Hef. Thanks for the mammaries.

[stina-is-a-punk-rocker]

stephen king’s ‘it’: a rant-review

Alternatively titled: an almost verbatim account of the 12-page rant I wrote in my diary after being driven to a catatonic rage by the 1100+ page monstrosity that was IT.

WARNINGS: spoilers, blood and gore, violence and general icky stuff, death, suicide, demeaning descriptions of women, both adults and underage, mentions of child pornography, my two brain cells trying to make me sense of this damn book

I fell in hate with IT the way you fall asleep; slowly, then all at once. The beginning reeled me in- it was great, that perfect first sentence all writers strive for- it’s got a compelling start, and it gradually gathers momentum onwards. The writing’s good, nice diction, nice use of words, a bit too much exposition, but what’s a few hundred more pages of ultimately worthless crap if it keeps you engaged?

And then it starts to go downhill.

The book’s too long. I got really, really bored by around page 800, because the book was dragging on for way too long and there was no sign of it ending anytime soon. There’s so much extra crap you could’ve straight up cut out from the story and it wouldn’t’ve made any difference to the final outcome.

The back-and-forth between the past (1957) and the present (1985) was pretty interesting- I much preferred the past accounts to the present ones, admittedly.

There’s a fuckload of characters the book could’ve done without. Way too many people my lizard brain couldn’t keep track of; yeah, sure, you can include the people Pennywise made a meal of by name- but you could easily lop off a few pages’ worth descriptions of characters that don’t play a bigger role than becoming clown chow in the course of the story.

The Losers are pretty much your everyday group of misfits: you’ve got the ringleader William ‘Stuttering Bill’ Denbrough, Stan Uris, Richie Tozier, Ben Hanscom, Eddie Kaspbrak, Beverly Marsh and Mike Hanlon- alias the self-insert, the Jew, the guy who makes offensive jokes but gets away with it because ‘that’s just the way he is!’, one of the few characters in this entire book that I don’t want to punch the living daylights out of, the hypochondriac, the tiddies and the black guy.

It’s painfully obvious that Bill’s a self-insert. Everyone and their grandma know that the moment there’s a character in a book who’s an author, they’re going to be the self-insert. Middle-aged cis het white male author? Now, whoever could that possibly be based upon, Mr. King?

And hey, despite all my mediocrity, I’m guilty of doing the same. I’ll write a story about someone who likes to write, and then suddenly the character’s a woman with dark hair and brown eyes and horrible myopia.

And yet, there’s something about Bill that makes it impossible for me to like him. I liked him well enough as a kid; he had a very Peter Pan role with the rest of the lost boys + person with boobs, and everything he did was a bit too perfect (because Big Bill- yes, they really called him that- had ALL the answers) for me, but I’m willing to let that slide.

(I’m not, I’m really not. Please give me flawed characters, not Characters with One Singular Flaw Who Do Everything Else Perfectly.)

I don’t think calling Bill a Mary Sue would be too far of a stretch. Also, he cheated on his wife with Beverly- big surprise there, I called it way before it happened- and characters who cheat will never be redeemable for me.

And then we have Stanley Uris. It’s been a couple of months since I last read IT and I’ve already forgotten what greater purpose Stan served for the story. I might be wrong- remember, lizard brain, goldfish memory- but I honest to god cannot, for the life of me, remember what Stan meant for the plot. Except, well, to die a couple pages in.

(According to my quick Google search, his suicide was sacrificial. As a wise woman once said, “Wait… what.”)

Richie’s actually not a character I hate, despite what I said about him. He’s comic relief for the most part at the beginning, and there are loads of things he says that would immediately cause #RichieTozierIsOverParty to trend on Twitter had he existed in 2020, but he’s an interesting character all the same. He’s got some amount of depth to him, more personality outside of being just another kid who encountered Pennywise.

I have a soft spot for Ben, I’ll admit. I’ve been the Designated Ugly Fat Friend of every friend group I’ve been in, so maybe I’m a bit biased, but I find him a lot more likable than a lot of the other characters I encountered in the book.

About Eddie, I’m not actually sure what there is to write. I remember more about him than I do about poor Stan, but aside from Eddie marrying a woman who’s a caricature of his overprotective mother, there’s not much that comes to mind. I’ve heard that Eddie and Richie had some #moments- my dumbass didn’t notice while reading, I’ve read IT only once and I’m awful at reading between the lines- though the boys more or less ogled Beverly all the damn time (poor girl couldn’t even wear a pair of shorts, but I’ll get to her later) so I hadn’t really considered the possibility of them being anything other than Raging Heterosexuals.

Beverly is straight out of r/menwritingwomen- if I took a shot every time her breasts were brought up, I’d have passed out midway through the book. I find it interesting (no, I don’t, I find it demeaning) how every time there’s a female lead with ‘flaming red hair’ in a group with mostly men, she’s described as this fierce, bold, brave Bad Bitch whose actual Badness doesn’t get half as much as screen time as her boobs. And I get that Beverly’s attractive, you don’t have to constantly remind us that BEVERLY MARSH IS FUCKING HOT OKAY GET THAT IN YOUR HEAD SHE’S A GODDAMN SEX SYMBOL WITH HER FIERY HAIR AND VIRIDESCENT ORBS AND GIGANTIC ASS AND BOOBS SO BIG THEY MIGHT AS WELL BE CALLED UDDERS SHE’S THE HOTTEST WOMAN YOU CAN IMAGINE ONLY LIKE A GAZILLION TIMES HOTTER DON’T YOU DARE FORGET THAT BEVERLY MARSH IS HOT (DON’T FORGET THE GIGANTIC BOOBS).

I think we got that the first time around.

And the constant sexualization isn’t just adult Beverly. As if every man in her vicinity staring at her wasn’t enough to drive the point home, we are treated to delights the likes of eleven-year-old (!) Beverly’s ‘budding breasts’; ‘milky white skin of her flat stomach’; ‘her long, coltish legs’; ‘shorts barely long enough to cover her panties’ (which were yellow, in case you were wondering about the underwear choice of a literal child); amongst other lovely descriptions of someone who literally just passed the fifth grade. She’s sexualized by her own father, and I know those things happen in the real world, but what with all the sexualization we already have of Beverly, it doesn’t sit right with me. I think it’s just creepy and unnecessary.

Also, cis woman to cis woman out here, but those ‘sweet pains of womanhood’, am I right?

Mike’s the final one in the trinity of Losers I don’t hate with burning passion/completely forgot about. The fact that he has such a big role in the story but we don’t meet him properly until we’re hundreds of pages in confused me, but he’s an okay enough guy. He didn’t seem like too much of a Token to me, but maybe I missed it. His backstory’s pretty interesting, too. I would’ve preferred him as a main character- his interludes, though unnecessary and adding more weight to an already obese book, were intriguing- and I liked him better than Bill, sue me.

And then we have the Big Bad, Pennywise the Dancing Clown, It, whatever the fuck it is. After all the terror, the Teenage Werewolf, the Crawling Eye, finding out that ‘It’ was essentially a pregnant, mutant Aragog… I can’t be the only one who went, “That’s it? That’s It?”

After Pennywise being Its most common form, it was jaunting, but in a bad way, to find out that It was just some Daddy (Mommy?) Long Legs who was Fucking Shit Up. An invertebrate, a measly invertebrate, was Its ‘Earth Form’? Was there some symbolism, some subtext there that I missed before Pennywise embodied the spirit of the Other Mother from fucking Coraline?

Apparently not, according to yet another one of my quick Google searches. I tried to see if there was any sort of hidden meaning behind the cosmic clusterfuck in IT, but came up short. Maybe I watched too much BEN 10 in my Youth for aliens to scare me.

I’m gonna get really nitpicky here, but: judging by the huge fern forests the kids saw during the arrival of It, It must have arrived at some point in the Paleozoic Era. To my understanding, It is essentially a Boggart-Dementor hybrid; It manifests into your fears and feeds on that. But humans didn’t appear until the Cenozoic Era, if my memory serves me correct. How did It survive until then? Does It have the ability to feed off of animals and their fears? So many questions, Mr. King, and so little answers.

Pennywise was sinister enough as a killer clown. Giving It a completely different ‘final form’ was unnecessary. No one cares, Mr. King, just finish the damn book. Some ideas are best left unwritten.

Henry Bowers was genuinely one of the best-written antagonists I’ve ever read about. He evoked a visceral rage within me, but I was also downright terrified whenever he popped up, because that motherfucker was unhinged. He was even better of a villain than It, because It killed to survive. Henry was insane.

Also, Mr. King, too much blood. He really dumped it in bucketloads- the first few times were scary, but afterwards, whenever ‘dripping blood’, ‘pools of blood’, etc. came up, it felt contrived and like a tacky fairground horror house.

The Losers’ final battles with It (both as children and as adults) confused me. Maybe I’m too much of a simple-minded fool because some of that cosmic galactic science-fiction bullshit went right over my head. And I don’t mean grazing the top of my hair, I mean several thousand miles above it.

I won’t go too deep into it because I’m still not sure what happened exactly, but it came off like a last-minute addition to the book, because it just doesn’t fit in with the mood of the rest of the story. At most, I expected some contrived demonic exorcist bullshit on par with The Conjuring films- instead, I got some weird outer space (?) opera. I’m confused too, dude, but let’s just roll with it.

I didn’t get the metaphorical tongue-biting; I could only imagine a repulsive French kiss. Who the fuck was the turtle? Why did it choke on its own vomit? What were the deadlights? What the fuck went on in those last few scenes? Am I just stupid- don’t answer that.

And then we have The Scene. The biggest fucking yikes I’ve ever yiked. I’ve read my fair share of fanfiction with scenes of questionable morality, but this was just… ugh.

It’s child pornography, that’s all there is to it. I refuse to believe that Stephen King ‘didn’t think too much of it’ while writing, and I’m disgusted by people who say, ‘it’s just one scene, it’s not a big deal’. That’s easily the worst thing I’ve ever read in a published book, and it amazes me I the worst kind of way when I see people who think it’s excusable. It’s not, it’s really not.

For the people I’ve seen arguing that ‘it’s just a couple of paragraphs’… that doesn’t erase the fact that it happened. You might argue that it has some deep metaphorical connotations about ‘the Losers growing up’ and ‘Beverly taking her sexuality into her own hands’… they’re eleven, you cunt. They’re literal fucking children. Sure, they’ve been through crap no one, not even adults, have been through. And that sucks. But how does that justify an orgy between ELEVEN YEAR OLDS?

And we get a nice little tidbit about the boys’ dick sizes; thank you, Mr. King, I really wanted to know which fifth grader had the biggest penis. The constant sexualization of child-Beverly was bad enough without that scene- that was just the nail in the coffin.

To sum it up: the writing’s good, the pacing’s geriatric, the characters are horrible, the story’s meh, and I’ll probably never read it unless I’m at gunpoint. On second thought, maybe not even then. Stephen King can suck my dick.

[thelonelybrilliance]

Louisa May, we have a problem: Or WHY THE HECK did Jo and Laurie not get together?

DO NOT START.

If I hear one word about that patronizing dude who said “Mein Gott” every other sentence, I will hit the fan myself. 

Dear Louisa May, you wrote a sweet story for the first half. And then you forgot to take a page out of the Jane Austen Wit ‘n Wisdom playbook, and you decided that Meg needed to have children who said their “r’s” immediately--children never say their “r’s” that early--and have John Brooke patronize the ever-living crap out of everything, including some M’F’ING JAM JARS.

But what the heck. I never liked Meg that much. 

JO, THOUGH. We all freaking loved Jo. YOU KNOW IT. YOU KNEW WE WOULD. And you should have loved Jo too, seeing how she was INSPIRED by you. 

I’m sorry you felt obliged to punish her. Your life was a bit bleak; that’s fine. My life’s a bit bleak. So write it up in golden colors! Work those castles in the clouds! That’s what I do! I run two fanfiction accounts and wrote a self-insert Pride and Prejudice fic where someday my self-insert female!Darcy will get to make out with a really hot guy of my own making.

BUT I DIGRESS.

In all seriousness, WHAT THE FOLLY-FILLED LIE WAS THIS?

Mrs. March, A Super-Villain Indeed:  “You are too much alike and too fond of freedom, not to mention hot tempers and strong wills, to get on happily together, in a relation which needs infinite patience and forbearance, as well as love.”

Like take Jane Austen as your example, girlfriend. Live it up in fiction. You didn’t get to have a fairytale ending, so WRITE ONE. Don’t punish Jo for being a free spirit whose dreams are too big to fit comfortably in a small world. Don’t punish her for her faults; she suffered enough already! Let her be strong, DAMMIT. 

BUT NO. 

Like...Jo doesn't get to travel because she sassed Aunt March, the ultimate sassmaster, one too many times? DON'T TELL ME

Jo almost becomes an atheist because some weird old pervs were being *cerebral* and only Professor Bhaer pulled her back from a life of atheistic sensational fiction writing? GET OUT

Laurie and Jo would never have been happy together because they're too alike, when they really would have been a totally badass crazy couple who loved and fought and were basically a Victorian era version of Cor and Aravis from Narnia? DO NOT #IAMSODONE

And then there is the matter of the SERMON.

“Don't laugh at the spinsters, dear girls, for often very tender, tragic romances are hidden away in the hearts that beat so quietly under the sober gowns, and many silent sacrifices of youth, health, ambition, love itself, make the faded faces beautiful in God's sight. Even the sad, sour sisters should be kindly dealt with, because they have missed the sweetest part of life, if for no other reason.”

TENDER TRAGIC ROMANCES AND SOBER GOWNS ONLY HAVE TO HAPPEN IF YOU LET THEM IN THIS WORK OF FICTION, LOUISA MAY. BELIEVE. BELIEVE IN SOMETHING BIGGER THAN YOURSELF. YOU HAD A MEET-CUTE FOR THE AGES WITH THE BURNED DRESS AND THE DANCE BEHIND THE CURTAIN I STG YOU TROLLED LIKE SEVEN GENERATIONS OR MORE WITH THIS CRAP.

ALSO: THIS LIFE IS TOO SHORT TO PUT UP WITH PROFESSOR BHAER'S PATRONIZING PSEUDO GERMANIC BS. Mein friggin’ Gott.