#hugo in particular is calling my name

[hopefulstarfire]

Do yall wanna know my actual favorite butterfly effect?

Two people fucking on a mountain indirectly lead to my favorite comic of all time, Under the Red Hood.

Let me explain.

Joseph Hugo married a woman named Sophie Trébuchet in 1797. He was a general in Napoleon's army so they moved around quite a bit. In a letter he would later write to his son, he and his wife had been on a trip on June 24th 1801 to get from one post to the next and he believed this, on the highest peaks of the Vosges Mountains, is where he believed they conceived their son, who would later become the Ocean Man and famed author Victor Hugo.

(Fun fact: Jean Valjeans prisoner number, 24601, is absolutely in reference to his believed conception date)

Victor Hugo grows up and obviously is responsible for many works, such as Les Miserables and The Hunchback of Notre-Dame and was never one to shy away from political commentary. Thus, he was exiled from France and sent to living on the Channel Islands. It was here that he wrote a novel titled The Man Who Laughs.

Like many of his works, this one does have different adaptations. One in particular came out in 1928 starring Conrad Veidt as the character Gwynplaine, or the Man Who Laughs.

Fast forward about a little over a decade later in 1940. A comic book writer comes into work to be greeted by two artists he worked with, one who did significantly less work than the others. These three men were Bill Finger, Bob Kane and Jerry Robinson.

Now the details of this meeting are...well, up in the air. Each man had their own account to it, and Bob Kane especially is the most unreliable given that he took credit for literally everything and we went over 70 years without Bill Finger getting any sort of credit to actually creating Batman. But what we do know is that there was a drawing of a playing card and a face for the joker card; and Bill Finger said, "Hey, that looks like Conrad Veidt in the Man Who Laughs."

They pushed further with that angle in making the character, a new villain for their hero; the obvious, Joker.

Some years later we get a little bit of an origin story in 1951, in the comic The Man Behind the Red Hood! (ALSO written by Bill Finger) Some college students are trying to solve this decades old case of a burglar in a red pill helmet that was called the Red Hood and trying to figure out who it was. Teaming up with Batman and Robin, they find out that the Red Hood was in fact Joker's old alias. He used to be a lab worker that was stealing from a playing card company with that alias. He was caught by Batman and threw himself into some chemical waste to escape, thus becoming the Joker.

This origin has stuck around in some form ever since. The moniker was unused for quite a long time after this, but would eventually find a new home in a different character.

See, in the 80s, Batman's second sidekick, Jason Todd, was killed off in a very brutal fashion after a fucking poll that people could call two different numbers to decide if they were going to save him or not. I will get into why I have so many frustrations with everything surrounding this story another day, but the important thing to know here is that the Joker killed Jason while Jason was trying to save his mother.

And for a good period of time there, Jason became a character that you did not bring back to life. Until they did.

A storyline running from 2005 to 2006 came into life, called Under the Hood. In it, Batman has to fight a new foe taking on the mantle of Red Hood, only to discover its Jason Todd, brought back to life from the Lazarus Pit, and taking on the mantle of the man that murdered him to go fucking murder the Joker and take control of crime in Gotham and do what he believes Bruce couldn't, all while dealing with trauma and feeling replaced.

So yeah. We wouldn't have my favorite character or story if it wasn't for Victor Hugo's parents fucking on a mountain and conceiving him there where "The elevated origin seems to have had effects on [Victor Hugo] so that [his] muse is continually sublime". That is a quote from that letter. Victor Hugo's mountain conception where he got a great muse is the reason for the Joker and Red Hood. Thanks for coming to my Ted talk.

[magicmindless]

hello yes... i would like to order some headcanons... carlo flavour please :]

A HC List but it’s just Carlo Romano

Portallinis pretty boy

-Speaking of which, everyone Romano has a title to them they’re famously known for. As for Carlo, his title is “Portallinis sweetheart”

-Despite fame, Carlo is a very humble person. He lives up to his reputation of being the sweetheart of the quartet, though he has pretty low self-esteem

-He’s a pretty decent singer. His voice is very smooth and soft like a cinnamon bun, albeit a more limited range than Bruna. Because of this he prefers not to sing for the official quartet albums or singles despite how much fans beg him to

-However, he does plan on someday making a solo album in the future. He still wants to be part of the band, but it’d be neat for him to create music which he can truly call his own

-Though Gino is his cousin, he sees him like a big brother. Gino used to give him piggy-back rides as a kid and even taught him the basics of string instruments. He always credits Gino for his skills whenever he can

-He’s best friends with Deano (currently teehee) and has been friends with him since childhood. He even used to sneak away from band practices just to see him

-When his mom died, Deano attempted to write Carlo a poem trying to cheer him up. Deano insists the poem is kind of ass but Carlo still keeps it on a pinboard in his room to this day

-In return, when Deanos mentor, Maximo Del Mare passed away Carlo wrote a song for Deano to try and ease his grieving

-He can’t whistle. Not matter how much Deano has tried to teach him he can’t get the hang of whistling, which balances out the fact Deano can’t sing

-In my hc Koilee was the one who got the Scooperia first. Carlo got a job there as a delivery boy during his hiatus from the band because he was feeling uninspired and bored with being in the band

-He really isn’t picky with what music he likes. He can like just about anything

-Unsurprisingly, being famous has a lot of downsides, which he’s expressed on Hugo’s podcast where they both got to discuss their struggles within their music careers (not knowing if people wanna genuinely be friends or if they want clout, burnout, etc.)

-Deals with imposter syndrome. He got mortified when Hugo told him on his podcast that between the 2, even without the the rest of his family Carlo was much more famous than Hugo was, even joking that the views on his podcast would probably skyrocket just by having Carlo in it. It’s not that he was wrong, but it made Carlo wonder if he truly deserved his fame, because he could name more than a few music artists, including Hugo, who were much more talented than him and didn’t even have half of his fame (…wait that’s actually a good fanfic idea someone should write that *cough cough* @sosoribro you know what to do *COUGH COUGH*/nf)

-He identifies as biromatic asexual, and it makes him uncomfortable whenever people try to speculate what his sexuality could be (it’s not usually the fans, they’re pretty nice, but particular journalists who try and speculate via his interactions with other celebrities)

-Has only dated once in his life, and it was a girl back in high school. They didn’t end on good terms

-He always carries snacks with him in a backpack, and always likes sharing them whenever he can. He just thinks food tastes better shared with others

-Has pet rats and loves them all dearly, but is also ironically a cat magnet. One of his and Deano’s favorite things to do as kids was to pet the stray cats they ran into

-Incredibly stylish. He doesn’t buy designer clothes (most of his clothes come from thrift stores or local clothing stores I imagine), nor does he always dress up in whatever’s trending, but he does sometimes study how men dress in fashion magazines

-He was a bit hesitant towards Olga at first, seeing her as just his dad merely replacing their mom, but he grew to like her with time

-Learned how to knit from Olga, and the first thing he did was his new skill was make a scarf for Deano

[miraruinada]

When Granja Recognized Iovan

"Subjectification is love. But why do we love someone like that? Let's leave the matter here. I gave it a formula. I was talking about self-relating negativity in terms which are full of traps. That's not unusual. Everything I say has traps. Why on earth would I say it was about something else when it's about the spirit? We know that language never gives, never allows us to formulate anything but things which have three, five, twenty-five meanings. The subject presumed to know."

Granja, as he spoke in this lecture, could not finish this specific line of thought. Iovan Herrera, before then simply a person who'd sneaked into those lectures, felt a desire to stand up, walk up to the podium, and wash her hands inside Granja's pitcher of water. Granja watched her without saying a word. Iovan continued without saying a word. They did not speak until at last other students stood up to try and drag her away.

"What's this? Are you going to rough me up? I was just expressing myself, like this gentlewoman, understand?"

"Yes, I understand."

"I'd just like to add I specifically chose this moment to intervene, and that the composite body which up to fifty years ago could be called culture, that is, people expressing in fragmented ways what they feel, is now a lie and can only called spectacle. The backdrop of which is tied to, and serves as, a link between all alienated individual activities.

"If all people here and now were to join together and, freely and authentically, wanted to communicate, it'd be on a different basis, with a different perspective. Of course, this can't be expected of students who by definition will one day become the managers of our system, with their justifications, and who are also the public whom, with a guilty conscience, will pick up the remains of the decaying spectacle.

"That's why I chose this precise moment to have some fun, to be like those guys who express themselves authentically. I didn't do it to annoy you, but I did choose this particular moment."

The lecture hall applauded. Granja asked Iovan to sit down beside him, and began to speak in response. A few students lingered next to Iovan. Some of them, Ignacio Otxo, Hugo Valdez, were among the first members of the Young Farmers.

"So, let's see what we can do. By expressing yourself in this way, in front of this audience which is more than ready to hear these revolutionary statements. What was it exactly that you wanted to do?"

"That's the question which parents, sages, ideologues, bureaucrats, and the polis always ask the growing number of people who act like me. My answer is, I want to do just one thing. Revolution. It's clear that, at the stage we've reached at this moment, one of our main targets will be exactly those moments when people like you are bringing to people like these justification for their miserable lives. That's what you do."

"Not at all."

After a few seconds of silence, Iovan splashed water on Granja and stormed off. Some of the students followed her. Ignacio stayed, Hugo followed Iovan. Granja was not angered at her actions, only annoyed that his cigarette was snuffed from the water. As he lit his cigarette and wiped his clothes with a napkin, he continued.

"Let's hope there'll be a new organization. It's not impossible, you know? It's not impossible that we see it born in the form of a rule which is called, which goes by the name of that supreme aspiration: that is the whole. As she was just saying, we should all be a part of it, we should close ranks together to achieve... Well, what exactly? What does organization mean if not a new order? A new order is the return to something which, if you remember the premise from which I started, is the order of the discourse of the master, simply that.

"It's the one word which hasn't been mentioned, but it's the very term which organization implies. It is quite conceivable that there be a lot of progress in this sense. If we can call that progress. I mean, what we discover from getting close to what is happening to a certain number of people, that is, that certain something invaluable, which she referred to as will just now, subjective will. This subjective will, if we look at in an absolutely permanent sense, can only manifest itself through its own division, since it is doubtless meant to suggest something to us. It's not, however, our image of the achievement of total harmony. You heard an appeal, one familiar to me. It was very touching, despite the fact that it led to a few problems with my tie.

"It's love! It's love telling you that if we were all like that, all together, loving each other, it would herald the dawn of a New Tenochtitlan. We've seen it various times in history, but never at just any old moment. It happens because something manifests itself which is not strictly within the order of discourse, because there has been a discourse which is proliferating and engendering innumerable little ones, which makes all of you terribly uncomfortable. There is a scientific discourse whose very presence threatens us with the idea that things will be resolved in terms of mechanics, ballistics, equilibria, currents, and the more we understand the better. We'll soon be like products, a certain type of individual who'll fit in with everyone and everything.

"But experience shows us that things aren't like that. What experience shows us is that it is one language, the one you've all grown up with, which you received from the world, from your family. It's something which couldn't have been transmitted to you without bringing with it a whole vibrant, confused reality which was formed by the desires of your parents. So an individual's upbringing is influenced by the parent, by the parental language, by that fundamental something. That is where love turns towards that kind of vibrant call, to that union with... What? With something which is obviously very alienating. What is really incredible is that she imagined that, by beating the sky with her fists, that this alienation which was exactly what she was telling you about is a sort of... An appeal for what? For more of what? For more truth?

"Her words were identical to the truth she believed at that moment, and she became the instrument, the messenger, the angel come to rescue you from your sleep, in the end!"

This incident was also the moment of birth of the Young Farmers.

[quackerzzz]

(Edit: updated the drawing because I didn't like how the previous one looked)

And now for the most controversial of the Rogues and one of my favorites (when he's not written as a pedo rapist), The Mad Hatter

Backstory under the cut (TW: Child death, psychological abuse, addiction metaphors)

Jervis Edwin Tetch was born to Temple and Lorina Tetch in Britain. When he was 6, his mother left his father for another man and they moved away to America. Later, his father married one Beverly Tockman and he got a half brother named William.

When he was older, he became an elementary school teacher who loved to teach children all about science. Particularly, he loved to teach about how the brain worked. He was fond of all his students and they were fond of him, in particular a young girl named Caroline Lewis. Jervis was almost like a father to her, and she admired him a lot. She'd always stay after class to learn more about his lessons.

Not everything good can last however. Jervis, always fascinated by the brain, would start looking into ways to control it. He worked day and night on tiny playing cards with chips, which would scramble a person's brain waves and allow them to be controlled by a special band worn by another. He mostly worked on this project from home, but decided one day to work on it while after class. Caroline, unaware of this, went to visit her favorite teacher like normal. However, her surprise visit startled Jervis and caused him to mess up the circuitry of the band, causing a small fire which soon grew. Jervis, panicked and not thinking of Caroline, dove out the window.

When he remembered this, it was already too late. The fire had already spread through the building quickly, so quickly that most of the teachers and students who were on lunch break did not notice until it was too late. Jervis was one of only 23 who survived the fire.

Although Jervis was never charged with anything due to the event being an accident, he would suffer horrid nightmares and symptoms of PTSD and survivor's guilt. He could not get over Caroline and so many other children's deaths, spending nights sleepless and days lying around the house. William, concerned for his brother, would decide to set him up with a highly recommended Arkham doctor by the name of Hugo Strange.

Unknown to William, Hugo would subject his patients to experimental technology of his own design, taking certain memories and erasing or altering them to his liking. At first, he only altered Jervis's memory so that he wouldn't remember that he left Caroline behind. It worked like a charm for a bit, but soon Jervis found himself coming back. More and more memories were erased and altered, even ones that had nothing to do with the fire. Soon, dates and his interests started being taken from him, his hair was starting to turn blonde, but he still starting going back for more. Bill protested against this, seeing how it started to negatively affect his brother, but Jervis simply dismissed him.

Soon there was nothing left of Tetch to take.

The Mad Hatter was missing his Alice. He didn't remember where she was, but he knew he did something that made her disappear. So using his magic hat, he began to search for his Alice. He found a girl like her, and used his magic hat to make her play with him forever. But then the Jabberwocky found him, and he was locked away in a big comfy white box.

It's okay though. He eventually broke out and did the whole thing again. And he met his other friends too, like the March Hare and Dormouse. Although, one of them, the White Rabbit, always calls him by the wrong name. He keeps telling him that he's remembering things wrong, but that's just silly. Silly White Rabbit!

[loveless-in-nowheresville]

Blog Intro:

Hello~

I’m Love or Loveless, either name works! (You wouldn’t be incorrect if you called me Pixel though, as that was the name I used on my previous blog)

I really enjoy fiction, and especially fictional characters, and wanted to have a blog so I can throw out my silly little ideas.

I do fanart and fanfiction but we’ll see how much I end up posting that kinda thing, haha.

I like talking and I’m super social so feel free to talk to me! Simping over fictional characters to deep character and story analysis, I’ll talk about whatever~

Some of my interests are:

Cowboy Bebop (seen it all)

Fire Emblem Three Houses (Played it all)

Persona 4 (haven’t beaten it but know a lot about it)

Crash Bandicoot (beat main 4)

Ace Attorney (played and beat almost all of them)

Chrono Trigger (my favorite video game. Played it many, many times)

Pokémon (played most of them)

Hunter x Hunter (entirely caught up on the anime)

Jojo’s Bizarre Adventure (reading Jojolion)

Metaphor Refantasio (I have been playing obsessively but I’m on hard mode and I am bad at video games, so I’ll get there when I get there lol)

I’m sure I’m missing a bunch, so I’ll add to it as I come up with them~

But yeah, I’m just here~

Don’t mind me~

-(Some of) My Favorite characters in no particular order-

Spike Spiegel (Cowboy Bebop)

Tohru Adachi (Persona 4)

Jade Curtiss (Tales of the Abyss)

Magus/Janus (Chrono Trigger)

Jeritza (Fire Emblem)

Felix Hugo Fraldarius (Fire Emblem)

Edelgard von Hresvelg (Fire Emblem)

Kristoph Gavin (Ace Attorney)

Epsilon (Pluto)

Rohan Kishibe (Jojo’s bizarre adventure)

Bruno Bucciarati (Jojo’s bizarre adventure)

My writing tag will be: Loveless letters

Because I think it’s funny

[mermaidsirennikita]

have you read notorious by minerva spencer?? it was the first book of hers i tried and the way she wrote the hero felt so off to me that i DNFed and haven't tried any of her other works. i've seen you rec other books by her though so i was thinking of giving her another try but idk where to start. would love to know what you recommend i should start with <3

Yeah, I have, and while I liked a lot about that book, I agree with you on the way the hero was written. Her first trilogy and that book in particular (and in some ways the followup book to Notorious) are just... not books I'd recommend. What I find weird is that THUS FAR I don't think I've encountered anything similar in her LaViolette (her pen name) books? But to be fair, there are a lot of those, and I haven't read all of them.

Sooo I would jump into a LaViolette book! Some of my favorites:

The Seducers Trilogy. This series is focused on a set of sex workers who all know and work or have worked with each other, finding love. It's got romance, it's got sex, it's got darkness and humor. I will say that, as you can imagine with the nature of the content, there's some harrowing stuff; these books don't linger on sexual abuse on the page, but they are often a part of the backstory/villainy. I've read all of 'em, and they break down into

Melissa and The Vicar—A jaded madam goes on vacation due to a stomach ulcer (she's stressed!) and meets a super sweet, VIRGINAL vicar... who has no idea who she is... and is finally having his fire LIT. The book where right after she introduces him to anal sex his immediate response is like "I want you to meet my parents", I am nOT KIDDING.

Joss and The Countess—A former sex worker (who was good at laying it DOWN) is now a footman for a frosty widowed countess. He's also her bodyguard for her sojourns into town, where she's trying to have good sex for the first time in her life. And... he quickly realizes that she may not know what she needs, but HE does. An extremely horny yet also extremely touching book (harrowing, though) with an older heroine and a younger hero, and some HOT sex scenes.

Hugo and The Maiden—A famous sex worker is transported after being framed for a crime he didn't commit. The ship wrecks and he washes ashore on a tiny island, where his arrogant, selfish ass gets stomped on (metaphorically) by a bossy vicar's daughter. I call this "Devil in Winter on steroids".

The Masqueraders Trilogy. About three people who, you guessed it, AREN'T WHO THEY SAY THEY ARE!!! Another "proceed knowing that these can get harrowing" series. All good, but I'd especially recommend

The Footman—A teenage footman is thrown in prison when his boss's spoiled daughter convinces him to kiss her and they're caught. He escapes and reinvents himself with a new identity in America, becoming wealthy and returning to England to ruin the girl, now a widow, for revenge. But as you can imagine.... he plays himself.

The Bastard—A scarred former bareknuckle boxer (whose backstory is INSANELY sad, omg) is out to take revenge on his father, who never claimed him. However... He's gobsmacked by the kind nature of his father's sister-in-law (not his aunt by blood... to be clear) specifically after she like, is nice to a dog in front of him. So, naturally, as someone who clearly over-identifies with the dog, he stalks her for a while and eventually ends up offering her a deal: he WON'T ruin his father's (and by extension her sister's) life... If she marries him.

The Bellamy Siblings is her ongoing series that's perhaps the least WACKY? Still wacky at points though. It's about a family that falls on hard financial times due to the father's gambling, which means it falls on the sisters in particular to find ways to make money (often through marriage). Again, all good. My favorites include

Hyacinth—One of my favorites of hers, the top spot is probably between this and Joss and The Countess, but a unique story about a neurodivergent card shark heroine who disguises herself as a man at night to get money for the family. (And also... because she has fun with it.) A scarred, notorious duke notices and befriends her, and eventually catches on to her gender, but not her identity as a lady. They stark a FWB situation, with neither one believing they'll fall in love... AND YET.... Super emotional but also funny, verrrrrry sexy, great ending.

Selina—Directly after the above book, the beautiful Bellamy sister Selina, always raised to save the family by marrying rich, has an identity crisis and runs off, taking a job as a housekeeper under a fake name. The catch, aside from her not having any job experience: the lord of the house is incredibly dickish and grumpy, as he's a rake who lost his sight the year before following a terrible carriage accident. This one is less big on the plot and more about the loooove stoooory. It's really sweet and one of her softer books.

The Academy of Love is an ongoing series that has little artistic themes for each book, which is lovely. I've only read the first one so far, but I loved it

The Music of Love—A mysterious widow arrives to teach an equally mysterious wealthy man music. However, they have a massive attraction to each other and quickly have impetuous sex, which leads to Consequences and a quickie marriage. So now they barely know each other, are into each other, and are dealing with a fresh marriage on top of their mutual secrets. Very gothic, very hot, and also omg my heart. The hero has albinism (which I haven't read in any other romance novel) and is ostracized by society. That's why she was borught in to teach him music. It's just a really good book.

Victoria Decadence is her historical erotic romance series, which is ongoing (I think—she recently added a new book). I've only read one so far, but I looooved it, another big favorite. It's

His Valet—A rich businessman's devoted valet is actually not a man (Jo was assigned female at birth and uses she/her pronouns for the most part, but is clearly meant to be read as nonbinary) and is also obsessed with him. Taking on the identity of a mysterious woman soon to be wed, Jo begins meeting her boss for kinky sex... and it's supposed to be anonymous and all about the boning.. but oh now now they're falling in loooove...

She also has another ongoing series, the Hale Saga, which I've yet to read. But I imagine it's probably good! It sounds Bellamy-adjacent.

I hope this helps!

[dolphin1812]

I’m not an expert in late 18th/early 19th-century French history, so I’ll leave most of the analysis of this chapter to those more familiar with the material than I am, but I do want to add this link:

http://thesiecle.com/supplemental11/

The Siècle podcast read aloud this chapter and included a version with links and annotations below if anyone`s interested!

For the material I am a bit more familiar with:

“Colonel Selves was going to Egypt to become Soliman-Pasha.”

A former soldier in Napoleon’s army, Colonel Selves (Sève) converted to Islam and went to live in Egypt, where he worked in the military. Egypt’s relationship with France during this period was complicated. Napoleon had occupied Egypt in 1798, and although he was soon driven out by various forces (the Ottomans, the British, local Egyptian forces), the impact of that invasion on Egypt remained. In the aftermath, Egypt’s governor gained a lot of power by eliminating many of his political rivals and began implementing reforms in various areas, including the military. He used Europeans (especially Frenchmen) to train his men in these fields (hence the presence of this colonel in Egypt). Many of them ended up getting Ottoman titles like “pasha” as well.

I don’t remember many references to French imperialism in this novel off the top of my head, but I’d be curious to look for them. Les Misérables covers a pretty crucial period for French colonialism in North Africa and the Middle East in particular: while alluding to Napoleon’s invasion here, it’s also notable that France invaded Algeria in 1830 (so during the time covered by the book). I don’t really trust Hugo to deal with this history well, but I’m curious about how present it will be. Here, this was more a contextualizing comment than anything else, underscoring how turbulent 1817 was for France. 

Other notes:

“What separated two men more than an abyss was to say, the regicides, or to say the voters; to say the enemies, or to say the allies; to say Napoleon, or to say Buonaparte.”

The way people talk about Napoleon is going to continue to be important, so it’s good to remember it. “Buonaparte” is the Italian version of Napoleon’s last name (Bonaparte), and it was used to insult him because of his Corsican origins. We’ll see it employed by characters who particularly hate him (namely, royalists and really radical republicans).

I also like how Hugo ends the chapter with a sign that there will be plot-related stuff next:

“In this year of 1817 four young Parisians arranged “a fine farce.””

I don’t want to say this digression is unimportant, especially since Hugo specifies that history “neglects” these details and that it’s unfair to call them “trivial.” However, it’s funny that he spends the chapter on something completely unrelated to what we just read and ends with a single sentence suggesting that something will happen in the next chapter, with just a few signs telling us that we’ll be dramatically changing the scenery. First, we’re moving on to Paris. We’re reading about some young people there, so we’re no longer following Valjean. And the only connection to anything familiar so far is the year. I’ll miss Valjean, but the presentation of this is kind of hilarious.

Spoilers below:

It would be more hilarious if I didn’t know what the farce was and that Tholomyès is about to appear, I hate him so much that I’m actively dreading the next chapters.

[itsthestutterforme]

“From the Past” [1/2] (Aemond Targaryen x black!reader)

Summary: Five years after your heartbreak at Aemond’s hand, Queen Alicent hosted a reunion banquet. You and your mother were invited and it caught Aemond off guard by how much you’ve grown.

Notes: GIF is not mine, all mistakes are my own, dark themes (angst, cheating, murder, disposing of body, attempted assault)

—

There was an eerie feeling in the pit of your stomach when you lay your eyes on the castle at Kings Landing. You thought your mother pulled a joke on you when she said the Targaryens were having a reunion and invited you and your family to it. Though you grew up together, after everything that happened, you’d hardly call them family.

You weren’t blood related but your mother was close with Queen Alicent and you were close with me one of her children in particular: Aemond. Too close. You gave him your heart and he stabbed through it when you caught him in bed with another woman.

It’s just water under the bridge now that it’s five years later. You have your.. situation and you’re sure he is married by now, so it won’t be as awkward.

“Everything’s going to be fine,” your mother soothes, giving you a pat on your thigh as you kept your attention on guiding your dragon to land. Your kings guard were close behind on your other dragon. You and your mother looked over your shoulders to see one of the kings guard vomiting into the sea below.

The two of you chuckle and you commanded, “Tegon paktot kesīr” (Land right here). Your dragon, Kegan, slows speed and glides down to land on the massive pad of concrete. Your other dragon, Hugo, follows suit and you slide down from the harness on Kegan’s back. “Good boy,” you tell him, rubbing under his chin with vigor so he can actually feel it.

Your mother freed your belongings from the net and tossed it to you from the dragon. “How do you feel about your beloved finally being back to Kings Landing, dear brother?” Aegon asks Aemond in the Queen’s chambers while they wait for their guests to arrive.

Princess Rhaenyra and her family arrived about an hour ago and busied themselves by going to Flea Bottom and out of the castle. Family from Driftmark have yet to arrive. Aemond was looking forward to terrorizing his nephews until his mother mentioned you were coming.

“I’m surprised she agreed after moving a weeks trip away from you,” Aegon adds. “One more word out of you and you’ll be coughing up blood,” Aemond threatens in a soft, casual voice. Aegon gulps audibly before standing to leave. “Boys,” Alicent reprimands.

“Your guests from Egypt have arrived, Your Grace. Lady Y/N and Mother Ria.” The kings guard announces. Alicent rises from her seat with a wide smile on her face, opening the door. Are they by the dragons?” She asks. “Yes, Your Grace.” Alicent gathers her dress and scurries down the halls.

“That’s the fastest I’ve ever seen mother move,” Aegon comments as he rises from his seat with Aemond. They calmly walk a few paces behind their mother until they went outside where the dragons were kept. Aemond freezes when he sees the outline of your figure talking with your mother.

“Ria?” Alicent calls and your mother’s ear perked at the sound of her name. Her own smile presenting itself when she saw the queen. “Alicent?” They rushed over to each other and hugged one another really tight. What catches Aemond’s attention- and eventually Aegon’s- was your curvy form casual walking to your mother’s side.

The longer, coarse 4b hair you had when you were younger was trimmed to about three inches in length. The shine of your curls were as gorgeous as your mocha kissed skin. Your sheath dress hugged your curves, concealing the swells of your breast. You linked your hands in front of you. “Oh, Y/N, don ’t be so tense.” Alicent says, pulling you in for a tight hug. You hugged her back, smiling at when gives you a squeeze.

“Look at you, all grown up. You look absolutely gorgeous. Your new look suits you. ” She rubs the sides of your arms. Aegon smiles as he watched Aemond thoroughly examine you from head to toe. Your eye crinkle when you smiled was the same from when you were younger. But as far as anything else, you were a completely different person.

“Your clothing is so thin. You’ll freeze.” Alicent observes. “It’s traditional Egyptian clothing, sheaths. It’s so hot that you can harvest dragons egg without a furnace,” you explain, Aemond’s heart sank to his stomach at the sound of your voice. “Yes, we quickly learned that if you wear long hair and thick dresses, you’ll soon die of heat stroke.” Your mother explains.

“Is that so?” “Though I advise we change into other dresses. I do not want to get frost bite.” “Still cheeky, I see.” You flashed her an innocent smile and she laughs. Aegon clears his throat and Alicent adds, “Oh! I almost forgot. You remember my sons, I’m sure.” “Forgot?” Aegon says, earning a glare from Alicent.

“Of course,” you gave a curtsy and slowly met Aemond’s gaze. His hands rested behind his back and you saw his shoulder relax a bit. You caught Aegon’s mischievous gaze. “Is there a problem, Aegon?” “Oh not at all,” “Your smile says otherwise,” “I was just.. wondering where you stood with us. Given you’ve been away for so long.”

“We’re all adults now, Aegon. It’s just water under the bridge now.” “Mother, we should get changed.” You add, changing the subject and that didn’t go unnoticed by Aegon. “I agree. Let’s get you all inside. There is much to discuss.”

Later that night, the banquet commenced and you and your mother sit on either side of the Queen. “Y/N, Aemond would like to ask you to dance.” Aegon announces and all of your gazes fell to Aemond. His eye blinked a few times, a nervous tell. “I think that’s a grand idea. Add some life to this banquet.” Alicent says, glancing to Princess Rhaenyra and Lord Velaryon talking amongst themselves across the room.

When Aemond hesitates, you decide to brave it out. You stood from your chair and offered your hand to him. “It’s just a dance, Aemond. Water under the bridge, right?” He rests his hand in yours and his voice was soft. “I’m afraid I’m out of practice, Lady Y/N.” He says, standing from his chair.

“Lucky for you, I’m a great teacher.” You said to him before leading him to the dance floor where Haelena and Jace danced. You held his hand and rested your other hand his shoulder. His hand rested on your lower back, the warmth of his hand burning through your dress. The two of you moved to the beat of the music.

“You grew your hair out. It suits you.” You break the awkward silence, gently smoothing your hand down his silver locs. “Your new style suits you as well. Was it your husband’s idea?” He cautiously followed your feet when you broke into waltz.

“Wouldn’t you like to know?” You said with a smirk. Aemond found himself breaking character with a soft smile. “Is he.. smiling?” Aegon says as he watched you two dance. He expected things to end awkwardly and Aemond storming out in embarrassment. Not the two of you getting along.

“I have no husband. I’ve been busy with other duties.” He hummed in response. “Has Vhagar grown since I saw her last?” You ask Aemond. “She has. She surprises me every day. How are your dragons?” “Kegan is still an angel. Hugo is a newer addition, a rescue with personality to say the least.” “How do you mean?” He asks when you pull away and link your arms together as you walked in a circle.

“He enjoys terrorizing the king’s guard because he knows they’re terrified of him. I’ve heard him laugh before.” You said with a chuckle. “Dragons never seize to amaze me-“ “You mind if I cut in?” Luke asks, looking between you and Aemond. You didn’t ignore the increase tightness of his hand on your waist.

It was clear Aemond didn’t like his nephew, Luke. You pulled his hand away and held it between the two of yours. “We’ll catch up later, yeah?” You tell Aemond before taking Luke’s hand. Aemond’s jaw clenched the sight of Luke’s hand on your waist. Don’t, she’s not yours. Aemond tells himself. Yes the fuck she is.

[warningsine]

favourite succession episodes?

My favorite episodes are—naturally—the ones that cause me the most pain. Either they tear me apart emotionally or they terrify me with their spot on sociopolitical commentary.

It's hard to watch a democracy crumbling in such plausible ways when you take a look at what's happening around the globe, you know?

Anyway, my top 10+1 episodes are:

All the Bells Say (Season 3, Episode 9). The back-to-back epic betrayals and tragedy (Shakespearean, Greek, Roman, Jacobean — you name it) have bewitched me body and soul and I love them. And the cinematography? Some frames look like Renaissance paintings.

Connor's Wedding (Season 4, Episode 3). Honestly, this episode is why I watch television. Now excuse me while I sob.

America Decides (Season 4, Episode 8). Give Kieran all the trophy awards for managing to make Roman so loathsome and disgusting when 5 episodes earlier he had me crying like a baby because of how pitiable his character was. "Succession" had always made it clear that these characters are awful yet human. That being said, I love how this particular episode focuses on how complicit they all are (Jess, Greg, Hugo, Gerri, Karl, Frank, the dude that takes the "pending call" decision) and how it makes you hate the Roy siblings for damning an entire nation. Kendall? Unlike Roman, he knows right from wrong and how terrible of a father he is, but when it comes down to it, he's a spineless coward. Shiv? Believes that she cares for the world (democracy, misogyny, racism), but is actually a huge hypocrite. When her country is about to succumb to fascism, the first thing she can think of is to double down on her deal with another amoral and abusive billionaire. She cares more about sticking it to her brothers more than anything else.

This Is Not for Tears (Season 2, Episode 10). Everything about this episode is perfect: the music, the script,the direction, the acting. I'm a Shiv stan, but Tom's "I wonder if the sad I’d be without you, would be less than the sad I get from being with you" absolutely breaks me. Logan mentioning the Incas and Kendall Judas kissing him before fucking him over? [chef's kiss]

With Open eyes (Season 4, Episode 10). Sad to see you go, happy that you chose to keep your legacy and not drag, beloved show.

Church and State (Season 4, Episode 9). Please respect my privacy while I cry. There was Roman's heartbreaking breakdown of course, but what really got to me was Marcia touching Kerry's hand and then telling Shiv that Logan hurt all of them. Hiam Abbass is there for 5 mins and unsurprisingly manages to steal the show.

Nobody Is Ever Missing (Season 1, Episode 10). When the series turned from capitalist satirical drama to tragedy of the highest caliber was when it really won me over. "You're my number one boy" indeed.

What It Takes (Season 3, Episode 6). Like Shiv said about Jordan-Peterson-meets-Trump Mencken, it's terrifying to watch a “YouTube provocateur” whose vibes are “aristo-populism … ‘rape is natural, it’s all red pill, baby'" gain power.

Chiantishire (Season 3, Episode 8). Dickpicgate, comedy gold. Hearing your mother tell you that it'd have been better if she had had dogs instead of you and that you'd make a terrible mother too? Harriet Walter, the actress that you are.

Tern Haven (Season 2, Episode 5). I love season 2. I love the Pierces. I love Rhea. I love Nan. Holly Hunter and Cherry Jones should have been regulars is all I'm saying.

Dundee (Season 2, Episode 8). "L to the OG" way before "R to the IP" took place.

--

Honorable mentions:

Tailgate Party (S4E7). That Tom/Shiv balcony scene... Give Snook all the awards.

DC (S2E9). When Shiv manipulated and silenced that victim of sexual harassment and abuse, showing us her true colors. When Rhea proved that she had something resembling a moral backbone after all. “This doesn’t feel right" indeed.

Rehearsal (S4E2). Because the last thing that Logan said to his children was, "I love you, but you are not serious people."

Honeymoon States (S4E4). Had not expected this episode to be so funny and yet.

Too Much Birthday (S3E7). Always a pleasure to watch Kendall fall apart and the 3 siblings backstab and be awful to each other.

Which Side Are You On? (S1E6).

Safe Room (S2E4).

The Disruption (S3E3). For Snook's acting after Kendall interrupts Shiv with Nirvana's "Rape Me" and Kendall's cowering in the server room after Shiv published that letter about him. Jeremy Strong's acting says so much even when his character doesn't utter a word.

The Munsters (S4E1). Greg's "Where are your kids?" was pure savagery. Logan should have been given some aloe vera for that burn. No, but how dare Brian Cox make me feel bad for the fallen king? It's "Breaking Bad" all over again.

[back-and-totheleft]

The Son Also Kneels

Oliver Stone was deplaning at LAX following a 16-hour trip from Indonesia when he turned on his phone and found it blowing up with texts from his office. Apparently the media—what he called the “paparazzi”—had been in touch. They wanted to ask him about his son, Sean.

In particular, they wanted to know what he thought of Sean’s decision to become a Muslim. Oliver instructed his office to decline comment.

“He never consulted me,” the elder Mr. Stone recalled in a phone call to The Observer from his production office in Los Angeles. “That is something you normally talk to your parents about.”

The director is a practicing Buddhist. “Obviously the Muslim religion believes in a singular god,” he added. “I don’t.”

Sean Stone, a 27-year-old filmmaker who was raised a Buddhist and spent his youth exploring his Christian and Jewish roots (not to mention any number of film sets), is like his old man, a determined—some would say obstinate—truth-seeker. He is also a man of firm opinions who is unafraid to express them in a highly public fashion.

But to peg him, as one Yahoo! News commenter did recently, as “another nut from a spoiled confused family,” is to miss the point entirely.

To hear him tell it, accepting Islam as his faith (and adopting a new Muslim middle name, Ali) is a demonstration that one man can embrace three Abrahamic religions as a gesture of peace.

“I don’t take a priest’s interpretation as sanctity,” he said. “I would not take an imam’s ruling on the Koran as being definitive. I would not take anyone’s word except my own interpretation of the books.”

Mr. Stone’s conversion was only part of his recent media coming-out party. In announcing his newfound faith, he eagerly stepped into perhaps the thorniest foreign policy question of the moment: whether Iran is secretly developing nuclear weapons, and whether its president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, is a total nutjob.

“My main thing is I don’t want to see a war, an imperialistic war, because I know what it could do to the region,” he said. Mr. Stone also defended Mr. Ahmadinejad—the man who infamously referred to the Holocaust as a “myth” and declared that Israel should be “wiped off a map”—as a “rational actor.”

“The media is so biased in trying to paint him as a madman, because if he is a madman, you can’t talk to him,” he explained to The Observer.

Mr. Stone first met with Mr. Ahmadinejad in February, when he was a featured guest at the “Hollywoodism and Cinema” conference in Tehran. The president gave him a copy of Omar Khayyam’s Rubaiyat.

When asked what they talked about, Mr. Stone didn’t really remember. The meeting might have seemed an opportunity to do some diplomatic work for his father, who had been eager to follow up his documentary portraits of Fidel Castro and Hugo Chavez with one on Mr. Ahmadinejad, but had been rebuffed (many Iranians took issue with perceived historical inaccuracies in his Alexander the Great biopic). Still, the younger Stone didn’t push the issue.

It soon became clear that Mr. Stone’s views on Iran are not all that radical. For instance, shortly after he defended his opinions to network news blowhards Bill O’Reilly and Piers Morgan, Meir Dagan, the former head of the Mossad, appeared on 60 Minutes to declare that bombing Iran right now was “the stupidest idea [he] ever heard.”

Still, his comments were controversial, even within his own family. “When you’re younger, you can make mistakes by saying what people don’t want to hear,” the elder Mr. Stone noted. “Sometimes he says stuff that I think is downright fucking stupid.”

The Observer met the Son of Oliver at a rear table at Think Coffee by Union Square one March morning.

Tall, strapping and square-jawed, Sean Christopher Ali Stone appeared more Winklevii than Wahabi. He did not have his father’s self-described “Mongol eyes” or the gap between his teeth.

What he did have, however, was the family curiosity, and that knack for taking controversial positions.

“I think it’s important to have that spirit of inquiry, that spirit of investigation,” Mr. Stone said as he periodically sipped from a cup of chai tea. “If you keep slandering people, calling them ‘conspiracy theorists,’ you’re killing the desire to investigate, the desire to actually know.”

Mr. Stone, who is single and divides his time between Los Angeles and New York’s Alphabet City, wanted to make it clear that his highly publicized spiritual transformation was not intended as a publicity gambit.

It all began on Valentine’s Day 2010, when he and his filmmaking partner, Alexander Wraith, were at Letchworth Village, an abandoned institution for the mentally and physically disabled in Rockland County. They were there to film Graystone, Mr. Stone’s feature debut, about two men (named Sean and Alexander) who visit supposedly haunted sites to explore their belief in the supernatural.

He and Mr. Wraith had brought along candles from St. Patrick’s Cathedral, which they lit and placed on the ground as they prayed aloud. They heard screams and howls and a child’s laughter, which scared them both shitless.

“That’s why there’s an expression ‘There are no atheists in foxholes,’” he said. “Either you find your faith and you believe that there is a higher power guiding you and protecting you, or else you basically surrender it and say there is no God.”

Two years later to the day, Mr. Stone found himself in Isfahan, Iran, sitting inside a mosque across from a Shiite cleric, explaining his reasons for wanting to be a Muslim. He was accompanied by a man named Bahram Heidari, an Iranian living in Canada who was helping him develop a feature film about the Sufi poet Rumi (Mr. Stone is also prepping a documentary on djinn, or genies). With an Iranian TV news crew on hand to document the occasion, Mr. Stone said the shahada, the Muslim declaration of belief.

“I didn’t ‘convert,’” he pointed out, “because I don’t believe you can convert from the same God. It’s an acceptance of Islam as an extension of what I call the Judeo-Christian tradition going back to Abraham.”

He said he was surprised the event generated so much attention. “We had not arranged for any press,” he said. “We don’t know how they found out about it.”

But when everyone from CNN to Agence France-Presse jumped on the story, he went with it. He later defended Iran on cable news. “It seems that every time we sanction this country and turn the bolts tighter around it … it’s just going to make them potentially more radical and dangerous,” he said. “You can’t just bomb your way to an accord.” While defending Mr. Ahmadinejad, he also was emphatic that “there is no room for Holocaust denial.” (Not long ago, his father also was quoted minimizing the Holocaust.)

It’s not hard to understand how Mr. Stone developed a certain sympathy for men of strong convictions who are unafraid to offend.

“He says things that rile people, I’m not going to deny that,” Mr. Stone said of Mr. Ahmadinejad. He says the same about his dad. “I think he likes controversy,” Mr. Stone said. “I think as much as anything, he likes that people get riled.”

Sean Stone was born in Santa Monica in 1984, the eldest child of Oliver and Elizabeth Burkit Fox, a production assistant and Oliver’s second wife.

He made his screen debut at 6 months, with a cameo in Salvador. At age 2, he was playing Gordon Gekko’s kid, “a fat little capitalist son,” as he put it.

His earliest and clearest film memory was being on the set of Born on the Fourth of July, in which he was among a group of kids shooting at each other with fake guns in the woods.

“That’s pretty intense when you’re, like, 4,” he said.

Mr. Stone’s early film career was more a matter of convenience than raw talent. “He was available and I thought he was photogenic,” his dad admitted.

Sean’s parents separated in 1993 (“It was not an easy divorce,” Oliver said), and Sean and his brother Michael lived with Elizabeth. When he could, Oliver took Sean on weekend trips “where he could be outside the normal Los Angeles ‘shop, drive, and die’ routine,” said Oliver.

They also traveled the world, from East Africa to Tibet, where Oliver, an Episcopalian who had converted to Buddhism, introduced the then 9-year-old Sean to the Dalai Lama.

“It’s a different kind of Buddhism, it’s an atomistic form,” Oliver said. “It must have been amazing for him.” The experience was eye-opening, Sean said. It inspired him to take up the practice of meditation and fostered a curiosity about all forms of spirituality. It was also around that time that Sean began to discover his father’s films, each one violent and provocative and dubious about the powers that be.

Mr. Stone was 7 when his father released JFK, a film that brought a mix of reviews both approving and vitriolic. The knocks on his father bothered him at the time, and still do. “Of course it hurts,” he said. “To me it’s a disgrace that so many people get away with calling him a conspiracy theorist, when the truth is he’s always based his work on evidence. He does his homework.”

After graduating from Brentwood School, just around the same time the second Iraq war was getting underway, Mr. Stone considered joining the Army, “more out of a desire to have a life experience,” he said. (Oliver, who dropped out of Yale and eventually enlisted in the Army in 1967, earning a Purple Heart and a Bronze Star for his service in Vietnam, recognized the impulse.) Rather than enlist, Mr. Stone wound up at Princeton, where he enrolled in the ROTC, bailing after a semester to focus on academics.

In 2009, after apprenticing with his father, Sean began to focus on his own filmmaking, starting with Graystone, which will be released on video-on-demand in the fall.

Mr. Stone’s long-term goal is to be a filmmaker, though his father is quick to tamp down expectations. “It’s very hard to assume the mantle, so to speak,” Oliver said. “It’s true about anybody in any profession, whether you’re the stockbroker’s son or a garbage man’s son.”

Mr. Stone agrees that it will be hard to step out from his father’s shadow and make a name for himself, though that new middle name of his is certainly a start.

Even so, his embrace of Islam goes only so far. For instance, Mr. Stone isn’t quite ready to forswear alcohol altogether.

“I know plenty of Christians and Jews who violate the Testaments all the time,” he pointed out. “It all depends on how you practice.”

-Daniel Edward Rosen, "The Son Also Kneels," The Observer, Mar 28 2012

[dc789]

So I have this idea to combine and two different type of series that I have watch liked and enjoy



hazbin hotel and Wakfu

This idea randomly came to my head so I don’t know if I got all the details in, but I think I’m getting some details in

1. First of all Adam and Valentino, Vox, velvet will take the place of - nox 

Valentino: Alister and Vox will be considered a childhood friend turn into enemies while Adam he does not know them. He is filling his own plan of slaughter

Velvet will join Valentino inbox after other AL leave and pursue his own paths  

Vox: is doing this because of two reasons one you want to see his father again because his father was night swim and he said he died during Vox experiments he does not want to bring his mom back to life however she was considered mean to him two to gain power and to basically rule the world

Valentino: is doing this because he wants power respect to be the Lord of lust all over the world all over the world and to set up his own kingdom, which he will be the king of the world and maybe the universe but for now the world sounds good

Velvet: want to be the most famous person all over the universe everybody will whisper her name all over it

Alistair: craves power as well he want to escape his imprisonment and slavery to his master he will slowly start to care for his teammates and will consider it on fully joined. I’m completely in the near future so basically very little from his canon counterpart will change that’s with some detail here or there

Adam: will be part of a tribe known as, cilegna lehc

They are 6 leaders in this tribe:

The first two Adam and loot represents strength and willingness

The other two Emily and Sarah represent emotion and the minds

And finally able, and the mysterious one will represent determination and forgiveness

This try believe it is their holy trial to conquer improve and make the world of wonder come true they believe this to be their destiny, and they will happily destroy any increaser species or race that gets in their way a progress or if they see them as dangerous not all members of the tribe believe in this, however, and even one particular member make it vocal…

2. I can’t properly say this character‘s name since I’m kind of using a voice to text audio so I’m just gonna call this one from Wakfu The brown dark dragon when he was carrying him the little one was I also can’t say the name of properly this will be replaced to well. Lucifer carrying his daughter somewhere safe

Charlie would take the place of Hugo her two dragon like servants will also take the place of Hugo‘s brother Charlie eventually learned that the man that has been raising her wasn’t her actual dad she was slightly adopted Charlie work at a hotel café for a couple of years before finding out She have all the same ability as her canon counterpart, as well as Hugo abilities,

In this world, vaggy is a sort of princess you know that plant kingdom in the soul, but I can’t remember the name of and I’m talking about in Wakfu yeah that one and as well she’s also half cilegna lehc

Nifty was slightly have the same role as Dolly by the way, if you were wondering, yes in this AU nifty is bisexual there you go 

—- That will be all for now. I hope you liked the idea. 



[otnesse]

Yeah, no kidding. I had to suffer through that quite a few times on Tropedia, then All the Tropes, with a particular mod named DocColress being the absolute worst of them (even called me a radical right-winger when I while trying to tell him to add Maleficent to the Complete Monster list and also implied God if anything would have been more enraged with Hugo being in love with a male goat in THOND than with Frollo's actions right before banning me. Oh, and the first time he banned me he outright assaulted my talk page as well.). I think he's now known as TruthGuard.

Being a Christian in fandom spaces is just continuously rolling your eyes after seeing a community that has consistently hated on you being praised for how 'accepting and welcoming' they are.

[thecouchsofa]

Top 5 books?

I have over 500 books so this is like asking me to choose between my favourite children!

In no particular order:

Everything I Never Told You by Celeste Ng: this book explained sibling bonds to me in a way that finally made me understand them and made me long for that type of bond (all of my siblings are way younger than me). One of the only books I own that made me cry.

Call Me By Your Name by Andre Aciman: I read this book whenever I need to be inspired to write. The prose is gorgeous and I hope to write something as beautiful as this one day. Also the fruit scene is memed but it unironically made me questiona few things about myself ..

The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo by Taylor Jenkins Reid: I read this back in 2018 and I fell in love with it from the first page. I love historical fiction, Americana, and old Hollywood, so this was perfect for me. I love this author's writing style and I own every one of her books (I think).

The Wild Places by Robert Macfarlane: This was required reading for a course I did at uni on nature writing and I absolutely loved it. It made me fall in love with the landscape of the UK and made me look at wildness in a way that I never had before. It's a great piece of nonfiction that makes me some feel type of way.

The Tomorrow When the War Began series by John Marsden: CLASSIC Australian book series. I read this as a tween and read it again every five years or so and it still holds up. It's about a group of teenagers from a tiny outback town who go camping in the bush and Australia gets invaded while they're out there. They then have to utilise guerilla tactics to survive and try and help their families. It's brilliant and every Australian kid should read it.

[magicinaframe-part2]

Two Charismatic Movie Performances, from Out of the Blue

The vagaries and vicissitudes of a movie actor's career... This is a subject worth thinking about.

To someone looking in from the outside, the life of an actor working in movies might appear to be one of ease and comfort, but in my not-so-humble opinion, I think it's a life of frequent periods of anxiety, a roll of the dice, from one project to the next.

The movie actor who has a second job is thinking rationally, thinking ahead, and thinking of security. My guess is that most -- even the older ones -- do not have a second legal source of income.

Try to imagine that you're young, attractive looking, an effective and convincing actor, and that people in the business describe you as charismatic.

The Merriam-Webster Dictionary website defines the noun 'charisma' as follows: "(1) a personal magic of leadership arousing special popular loyalty or enthusiasm for a public figure (such as a politician) and (2) a special magnetic charm or appeal."

I'm trying to think of someone working nowadays in Hollywood who has a special magnetic charm or appeal. I'm drawing a blank -- but that might be an unconscious bias on my part. On the other hand, someone working in the business would probably name a number of performers; i.e., names that I've seen in print but whose acting portrayals I have never watched.

The past was different for me. Two of my favorite actors had charisma: Stewart Granger and Patrick McGoohan.

Recently, I did watch a movie with two major characters who were portrayed by actors with charisma. I'll briefly describe the plot. The movie in question is one that the overwhelming majority of movie lovers, here, at Tumblr, have never heard of...

Sarah Lenaerts (Marie Vinck) is a teenager, soon to be 16 years old. She lives with her two young siblings and her mom and dad, Denise and Marcel, in a comfortable, modern looking apartment in a nice neighborhood in Antwerp, Belgium.

Sarah has been counting the days to her birthday and trying to find the nerve to work towards her one goal in life: to become a professional ballerina.

Her parents are so wrapped up in their lives that they have ignored the emotional development of their first born. Any sign of disrespect from Sarah results in an immediate scolding -- usually from mom, since dad is rarely around.

In the movie's first sequence, Sarah is introduced spontaneously dancing to the approval of her elementary school-age sister and brother. When mom appears and tells her to put a help wanted advertisement in the local newspaper, Sarah impulsively refuses -- resulting in a fight. It's not the first fight between the two, but it lands Sarah with a nasty bruise on her forehead. One of mom's slaps sends Sarah to the floor, head- first.

Sarah's daily route, taking her brother and sister first to their school and then going to her high school, passes by a neighborhood bar and restaurant called The Choice which is run by a young man in his 20's named Vic (Fedja van Huet). Vic has watched Sarah pass by on many school days.

On this particular school day, Sarah is so distruaght that she eventually sits on a bench near the bar/restaurant trying to untangle her emotions. Vic walks by, strikes up a conversation with her, and soon offers to take her to the hospital to take care of the wound on her forehead.

Once that's taken care of, Sarah and Vic sit together on a dock and, from this restful spot, Vic offers both guidance and support, both of which Saarah has needed for a long time.

Sarah has no knowledge of the fact that Vic's real line of work is that of a pimp. The bar/restaurant is the usual spot where his many prostitutes get together with clients.

The chemistry between these two characters is absolutely convincing.

Scene after scene, details accumulate showing how Vic does his work. His supervisor, named Hugo, is both genial and cold-blooded, and drives around the streets of Antwerp in a stretch limousine, looking for more local 'talent.' An unnamed boss is mentioned, from time to time, and never seen.

The bulk of the plot of this increasingly tense movie plays out over twelve consecutive days, before moving ahead four months later to an emotional and inspiring ending.

The name of this unknown-in-the-U.S. movie is THE KISS (org'l title: DE KUS - 2004).

If for no othe reason, movie lovers, here, at Tumblr, should watch this movie for the acting performances of the entire large cast of characters -- and especially for the performances of Vinck and van Huet.

THE KISS is another movie that should be better known and is available on DVD with English subtitles. It flows and moves along effortlessly, with a running time of 100 minutes. I recommend it to all movie lovers.

-- Drew Simels

[elfyourmother]

romance damien again at the end as a reward, honestly who can can compete, he has a living and a sitting room, he has a skull and butterflt collection, his library has two levels!!!!! he has an extensive garden where you can have tea and he will playfully give you flowers and ask you if you know what they mean as he looks at you coyly with blushing cheeks!

[psalm22-6]

I have a hard time explaining this one . . . it is part of a series called Classics in Slang by H. C. Witwer and in each instalment a boxer named One-Punch McTague reads the classics (like Hamlet and Ivanhoe and Notre-Dame de Paris) and then retells them in “slanguage.” He also fights people with names like Rabit Punch Weird. Apparently Ethel Kingsley is a character teaching him to read and is also his manager (and possible love interest?) ? My disclaimer is that it was kind of hard to track down this installment, let alone the 8 before it so I am quite confused by the particulars of this saga and because the last name McTague is apparently Irish, I’m wondering if the humor is hinging on prejudice? I can’t tell whose slang is being imitated here. Please weigh in because honestly some snippets of this are funny.  Source: Collier's, 25th December 1926  This instalment on Les Misérables was published on Christmas day (people just love Les Misérables for Christmas)

LES MISERABLES By Victor Hugo & One-Punch McTague ONCE upon a time a burly stranger breezed into a little slab in that dear Frawnce, tired, dusty and ragged from a long game of pedestrianship. The facts that he was afoot caused him to be viewed with suspicious looks, as in them days everybody traveled on stilts, except the upper classes, which hadst their own gnus to carry 'em.

Well, ladies and gentlemen, our hero kept on walkin' till he reached the drum where the bishop lived and knocked smartly on the door. In a trice he was inside.

"How are they breakin', Bish?" the new comer says. "I'm Jean Valjean and I been a galley slave for nineteen years come Arbor Day. That shouldst of rated me a job in that movie Ben Hur, but I get the air wherever I go on the account I'm a escaped convict. I'm as homeless as a milk bottle ! Tough, what?"

"I'll say it is!" agrees the bishop, which was nothin' if not big-hearted. "Sit down and knock off some chow, Big Boy; you look in dire straits!"

Whilst showin' the inner man some consideration, Jean told the bishop the reason he'd done the nineteen-year stretch was for stealin' one loaf of bread. The bishop said nothing — just coughed.

Jean couldn't get no shut-eye that night from thinkin' of the high prelate's kindness to him, so to show his gratitude he grabbed all the silverware in the joint and took it on the run. He was no Nurmi [I swear this is a reference to a Finnish runner who won nine Olympic gold medals in the 20s], how the so ever, and was soon brung back by the cops. But to the amazement of all, includin' me and Victor Hugo, the jovial bishop told the John Laws everything was jake, because he'd gave the heirlooms to Jean for him to get a new start in life. As long as the whole silly affair was only in a novel, what did the bishop care?

Jean turned up again in the village of Oo La La and by improvin' on the shape of mustache cups, the chief manufacture of the town, this go-getter soon become a wealthy millionaire. He called him self Father Madeleine and on that account the yokels laughin'ly made him mayor. Everything was hotsy totsy and Jean was sittin' handsome.

But they was one bird which thought the mayor was phoney and that was the chief of police, Javert, whose old man was so stingy he wouldn't give him a first name. Javert hadst been born in jail and spent his life tryin' to make everybody permanent visitors to his birthplace. Hearin' that Father Madeleine hadst adopted a cunnin' little tot entitled Cosette, Javert went to him and says the followin':

"Well, they fin'ly nailed Jean Valjean. He's goin' to jail at Paris next week!"

"So's your aunt Anastasia!" remarks Father Madeleine, unperturbed. "I happen to be Jean Valjean myself!"

"That's what I thought!" grins Javert. "You fell for my plant like the Jasper you are! Will you go to Paris peaceable and take the rap, or shall I call my minions?"

"I love that," says Jean. "I bet you don't even know what a minion is, you big sapolio!"

But, nevers the less, he checked out for Paris that same night and told all to the police, which was so charmed to see him that they sent him to the galleys for life, with the idea of turnin' him in to a master oarsman as a reward for him givin' himself up.

D'ye think all this bothered Jean Valjean? Hades, no! That very same Xmas he come to light again in Sacre Bleu, the French hamlet where he'd put little Cosette to board. He paid her bill and left without stealin' anything, as he was gettin' absent-minded, and they moved into a handsome garret in gay Paree.

Jean never bounded around in the day time as he was duckin' the galley cops, not cravin' to go back to that tiresome rowin' racket no more. But at eve he done all his prowlin' with the other dips which pass in the night, and one gloamin' whilst droppin' a gulden in a beggar's hat he got the thrill which comes once in a lifetime. The beggar was the gumshoe, Javert. More grief!

Scamperin' home, Jean grabbed Cosette and they done a fade-out, with Javert and a battalion of dicks hot on their French heels. They come to a high wall and Jean Valjean hadst to laugh. He'd climbed so many hoosegow walls that this one was a pipe for him. Over he leaps with Cosette in his arms and lands in a convent.

"Nuns the word!" says Jean to the good sisters and stayed there six years as landscape gardener. Javert done nothin' but gnash his teeth all durin' that period.

Jean then went through the motions of changin' his name to Fauchelevent and havin' a yen for the bright lights he again went back to Paris, where Cosette grew up to be a traffic stopper of the first water with more curves than a corkscrew. One of her first acts was to sink to the neck in love with a young youth rejoicin' in the name of Marius, the son of a gil which rejoiced even more in the name of Baron Pontmercy.

Then along comes a passin' revolution and what with bullets and knives flyin' back and forth like sparrows, Paris become another Chicago for a time. Marius was foreman of a street barricade, or a barracuda, as we call 'em, and the first day of the fun he captured Jean's old-time hindrance, Javert, as a spy. The dick was sentenced to be shot at sunrise and was prayin' for a eclipse, when along comes Jean Valjean and asks permission to be allowed the pleasures of bumpin' off this pest personally.

Holdin' his gun in his hand, Jean led Javert behind a bush and there cut the copper's bonds. A boob for the ages, what?

"Beat it!" says Jean. "You're as free as advice for a cold!"

Javert fled a few feet and then turned back with a wild cry.

"I can't be annoyed runnin' you down all my life!" he hollers. "Cook me and be done with it!"

"Who's writin' this book — you or Victor Hugo?" snarls Jean. "Vamp!"

When Jean dashed back to Marius he found that the sheik which hadst won Cosette's heart and hand hadst got himself wounded. The poilus was shootin' everybody right and left, with no regards to lovers and the etc. They was only one chance to escape and that was through a sewer, but Jean Valjean hadst never learned to hesitate. With a maniacal howl he tore off the manhole cover and plunged beneath with Marius on his shoulder!

[from here on out the scan is cut in a way that obscures a letter in the middle of each word down the page so I put in parenthesis words that I’m not sure make sense or can’t see]

The ters raged about him, but he rag right back at 'em and done a [Edeto] the mouth of the river. When come to the surface with Marius, [whoes] he see sittin' on the bank waitin' him but Javert! That simply [poisd] Jean!

By [?] time this funny sleuth was beginni to slightly annoy Jean, so after [?] Marius to a medico he went with Javert to his room. Javert stayed outside thinkin' matters over. Whils the was officer of the law he couldn't leave Jean Valjean escape and on the other hand he couldn't pinch the guy which [had] spared his life. The thing was a [?]-off all around, so Javert run back the river and crowned a life of nonsense by jumpin' overboard and drownin. The big stiff was all damp, anyway.

Marius, wiry youth, got better and wed Cosette, and Jean called 'em both to his side. “As long as Javert has kissed off, kiddies, there’s no kick left in life for me no more, there bein' nobody to chase me!" he sobs, and so did I when I read this. "That bein' the case, I'm goin' to One side, please!" And executin' a back somersault, he fell to the floor deceased, and legend hath it he’s dead to this day!