#i was so sad that it was defunct by the time i got to it

[furbovision]

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[roryacker]

WereGhost Part 5

Surprise, part 5 :D

I will note Simon's unclothed for a while but there's little to no detail given and it's just for a perfectly SFW bath scene. It's not for any nefarious reasons I promise, he puts some clothes on eventually

I forgot to add this at first and considered if I even needed it but figured just to clarify, it couldn't hurt.

Imagine Simon's surprise, of course, when the very next morning he was awoken from his uneasy sleep hearing a familiar voice. That accent he'd grown far too used to, calling out the silly name he gave Simon on a whim, uttering something about him looking like a ghost story. It got him to wake up, at least, shuffling around to be able to poke his head out of the crevice he'd made a cold rock den out of, eyes wide. Sure enough, on the very edge of the small territory, the edge Simon made sure to rest close to in order for an easy escape, wandered Johnny, calling like he'd lost the family mutt and not what he thought was a wolf.

Except Simon isn't even a wolf, really, he never was. Hell, he only first started learning to shift when he was seven or so. Even now his body isn't lupine in appearance. Staying in that form for months on end while staying with Johnny meant that his body was tired and sore from it. And of course, the only way to offset that was to avoid shifting for a while, enough to remind the body that it's two creatures and not one. He can't help the discomfort that wells in his chest at that fact, glancing down at himself with furrowed brows and tugging an old deer pelt further over his body. It's rare he keeps the pelts, especially with wolfhunts, but they're really all he can get for warmth outside of his canine form.

Still, a greedy, hungry part of his mind grins at the thought that the (frankly stupid) human came to look for him. The dog got out somehow, and Johnny's gone out of his way to get him.

Simon bares his teeth in a grimacing snarl at the thought, nose scrunching as if he can scare it away the same way he might a competitor, if there were still any in the area. The hunts have killed most of his kind nearby off, if they didn't simply decide to leave before it got bad. Simon's only company outside of Johnny, as of late, have been the hares, rabbits, and occasional deer he makes a meal out of. Sometimes even a pheasant or the like if he can catch it, though he finds the meat to not match his tastes.

Maybe that's why he clung to the human like that. Maybe some part of Simon is lonely.

Maybe that's why he reluctantly decides to slip out of his sad excuse for a den.

Not to follow the call; he never did respond to Ghost, fitting as it may have been. He doesn't want to seem like a loyal hound now of all times.

It's mostly to watch Johnny; sit crouched in the grass, covered only in the deer's pelt and the wolf's skull that somehow follows him between the shift when the rest of his clothes become torn and ragged- the real reason he doesn't bother, truthfully, otherwise he'd happily bask in the warmth- watching intently as the human wanders about. It's bitter for a moment, a sour feeling that only deepens the frown etched on Simon's face.

But of course, if life were ever in his favor, Simon wouldn't have monthly hunts deciding which lucky man will be able to hang his pelt on a well, make it into a rug maybe, he would have never waltzed into that bear trap, maybe going by the humans' idea of good luck he would have never been a beast at all, but as fate so has it, he's Simon goddamn Riley, the town's chicken-eating ghost story-

-and Johnny meets his gaze even through the grass. He falls silent, dumbfounded, and it takes Simon a second too long to realize that fact and shift back in a hurry, scrambling backwards with his ears flat and a genuine snarl in his chest hoping that the sound of it might finally force the human's defunct survival instincts to kick into overdrive and not question it, but of course, he steps forward once, and then again, and then before Simon knows it the man's crouched down in front of the opening of his sad little cavern, staring at a familiar monster with raised hackles and bared teeth, tail tucked between his legs in a gesture Simon hasn't made (hasn't needed to make, truly) in years. There's recognition in Johnny's eyes, and he looks tired, like he hasn't slept for a while.

They're both silent, Simon shifting anxiously and trying to back himself further into his hole, hoping that Johnny might get the hint, but no. The idiot, the absolute numbskull he is, reaches his hand forward, knuckles up, to offer it for Simon to sniff. His expression looks so soft that he can't even bring himself to pretend to be aggressive. If Simon were an ignorant man he might just assume it to be acceptance, but he reasons with himself that even if he knows otherwise he can afford a risk, being close to Johnny's size even in this form. So, he hides his teeth once more, fur smoothing down, and leans forward to sniff as expected, grunting softly at the familiar scent.

It's the one he's used to- not flowery and sweet, but warm, given the wild of the forest around him to further add to it. It smells right. He huffs and shakes off, backing off like he might just be stung if he lingers longer, but Johnny isn't having it and reaches over to scratch behind his ear, much to Simon's surprise.

"Dunno what you are..." he murmurs, voice so quiet compared to the desperate, nervous tone it had before.

"I mean- I know you're no good. Townsfolk've done wonders spelling that one out." Simon bristles at the words, then, narrowing his eyes and growling lowly, but is quickly shut up by another hand settling on the ruff of his neck, that one joining in on the soothing scratching that he's only slightly offended by.

"But you could've eaten me, aye? Could've mauled me in my sleep. And you didn't." He finishes, a bit more firmly, gripping Simon's muzzle in both hands and shaking slightly as if to try and emphasize his point. It's enough to get Simon to keep quiet for good, meeting Johnny's gaze for a fleeting moment before he huffs, nudging his snout into the touch for just a split second, and pulls away.

He's been caught, but at the same time, this is the same man that went so far out of his way to make sure he'd heal up. The man who let him sleep in his bed, let him be a nuisance lounging about the house, who came looking for him when he disappeared without a word.

He shakes off, grumbling quietly as he shifts back, clumsy hands going to cover himself with his pelt-blanket once more instead of simply being draped over himself, and turns his gaze down not in a sign of nervousness or fear, but submission. It's been ages since Simon had to submit, the last time being his father before, still a young adolescent, he realized that pack hierarchy meant nothing, that he could challenge it and win if he used his claws and teeth cleverly enough. To do it willingly and not by force? That's new.

Even if Johnny doesn't understand the gesture, the changing is clear enough. Simon is weak in this form- weaker, anyways. His teeth are still sharp, but they don't pack quite the bite, and his claws are thinner and less of an aid. Simon tries not to let his expression shift hearing the hitch in his breath, but tugs the pelt tighter around his body anyways, muttering something more for his own ears than anything.

Eventually Johnny pulls away, and for a moment Simon's mind scrambles to try and figure out what the hell he does from there "you're screwed, it was a trick, run off before he calls the hounds" but again, the man simply stands, and reaches a hand out to try and help Simon up as well. He stares blankly, confused by the gesture, but snorts, shaking his head off, and begrudgingly takes it- stumbling and shaking on two unsteady legs, but eventually settled.

"Do they know your face?" Johnny questions, letting one of his hands drift to rest on Simon's back- to keep him up, no doubt, though he still bares his teeth on instinct, growling at him and lurching slightly. Shockingly, Johnny doesn't budge, only shifting his hand to rest against his shoulder, instead. At that realization, he relaxes just a bit, if only not to waste energy on useless threats, huffing instead.

"I'll take that as a yes, then. Careful it is. Not very chatty, eh?" He laughs, and for a moment Simon falters, glancing up at his face as his own relaxes just the tiniest bit, before his brows furrow again and his gaze drops, grunting quietly in reply as his nose scrunches. Johnny, ever the patient bastard, simply chuckles and rubs at Simon's shoulder, and he can't help the way he leans into the touch, really, it's not his fault.

"Don't even know your name... hope you don't mind if I stick with Ghost." He doesn't. It's familiar, by now- it's been years since he's heard "Simon" from someone else, even from himself, outside of the rare times he mutters it to try and remind himself of what his voice sounds like- of what a voice sounds like, when it's not yelling and whistling and shouting commands. He shakes off the bitter thought, growling softly and leaning up against Johnny. The human is surprised, he can smell it, but doesn't shove him off.

They walk for a while, and Johnny manages to smuggle him into the house without being caught, all while he talks Simon's ear off about the ruckus he caused and what's happened since he left. He doesn't mention the woman- the house doesn't smell like her, but stress and sorrow, instead. Something about the lingering scent, now fading out with the eagerness and happiness sticking to the man, makes Simon feel oddly comfortable. No, not just that- it's pride. The same feeling he gets after a hunt, after establishing his territory as his own, after winning a fight. He's won, here, even if he didn't intend for there to be a fight in the first place.

Johnny tries, for a bit, to find him fitting clothes, but Simon is huge, for lack of a better word, and none of them would really fit. So, he's allowed to linger in all his glory, only decent because of a pelt- not that Simon cares any. Wolves don't wear clothes. He's sure after all this time they'd feel about as comfortable as that trap.

Speaking of which... Johnny reaches for the leg, moving slowly and carefully in what Simon assumes is an attempt to not scare him or trigger his aggression. Reluctantly, he lets him, and the human takes the chance with a pleased little smile, rubbing his fingertips gently along what's now just a scar.

"Healed well, I see. Did you even need me? Never seen a wound that bad scar this fast... now I wonder if I've been tricked by a wolf."

"Would've taken another month without the help." Simon replies, his voice low, more of a growl than anything pleasant on the ears, and he can see the pure shock that crosses his human's face when he hears it. But he doesn't recoil in discomfort or disgust- just laughs and nudges at his knee.

"Well, good to know I wasn't just being used by you... hell, even if I was, I think you do deserve a bit of a chance to be lazy after all these folks have put you through, mm?" Yes, yes that sounds nice. Simon is uneasy for a moment, staring at Johnny's face, before he realizes the man's being genuine, and he allows a soft little snort to leave him.

"You do stink, though. Like mud and old blood..." He murmurs before Simon can give any response. He should probably feel bad or maybe insulted, but he can't muster up anything negative, really.

"Probably last kill. Got a fat rabbit." Simon hums, licking his lips at the memory, suddenly hungry once more, but the thought quickly leaves when he sees Johnny moving again, and he's quick to follow. He doesn't miss the little laugh or the shake of his head, but it seems the topic is done for now as they both set off towards another room in the house.

Johnny decides to set up a bath for him, still complaining about the smell, and Simon has the decency to pretend to be apologetic about it as he fills the tub, readying some soap that smells a bit too pleasant for Simon's tastes. For a moment he wonders if he should shift back, perhaps, if Johnny plans on scrubbing him down, figuring it would be less awkward if he took on his wolf form again, but Johnny simply guides him towards the tools he needs, offers some loose instructions, and says he'll be back with clothes for Simon- either through raiding the older man's closet (John, he learns his name is, though he decides that he doesn't like how close their names are) or through buying new ones. Simon doesn't like the idea of him leaving, but hums in response, hesitantly dropping the pelt and leaving it folded on a countertop before lowering himself into the bath.

The water is comfortable, he finds- not the warmest, per se, but far warmer than the river water he sometimes treks through if he's especially dirty- and it's still, meaning it doesn't tangle his fur... or hair, in this case. It's calming, really, enough that he decides to lean back and shut his eyes for a bit. It feels much safer in there than a little cave, after all, and his rest the night prior had been uneasy at best. It's only when the water's grown cold and he hears familiar footsteps approaching that he realizes he'd fallen asleep in the first place, perking up and lazily resting his jaw along the side of the bath as Johnny enters the room, fresh clothes in hand. They look new.

"Well, you didn't even wash up."

"Got tired. Besides, not used to having hands..." Simon mutters, stretching out with all the comfort of a fat housecat, rolling over so his weight's on his knees and he can rest his body up against the side of the tub. He's just giving Johnny a hard time, really, but finds himself tensing slightly when the man sighs, leaving the clothes on the counter atop Simon's pelt, and approaches, crouching beside the tub and reaching for a rag.

"I think you just like bein' a nuisance."

From another man, or maybe in another case, the words might sting slightly, cause some anxiety- but the amusement in Johnny's eyes and the pleasant feeling of the fabric scrubbing along his back simply has Simon sighing in something akin to relief, shutting his eyes once more and allowing his body to all but melt into the surface under him. The smell of the soap is diluted by the water, and really isn't all that bad, a hearty herbal scent that isn't too harsh on the nose. Part of Simon is tempted to sneak outside and roll around in the mud or something when Johnny's asleep just to feel it again, but that'd just be stupid, of course. Instead, he savors it while it happens, his eyes only opening when the human finally pulls away.

"Alright, you mutt. Up you go. Towels are in the cabinet, and I'll assume you know how to dress yourself..." he isn't given the time to make any smart remark or anything before Johnny's leaving the room, and he mourns the loss only for a moment before he begrudgingly moves to stand, shaking excess water off while he's still in the bath before moving to step out. His skin is clean, he finds, lacking possibly years worth of dirt and grime that had been there before. Scars remain and become slightly more prominent without the earthy coating over them, but he doesn't mind the look. Really, it's not that bad.

He almost looks normal.

It takes a while to dry off, but he finds it's much quicker than trying to get his fur to dry in the wind as he has in the past. From there, his last task is putting on the clothes Johnny had gotten him. They smell of another human, but only faintly, fresh enough- and lacking the scent of the older John- that he's sure they're new.

Simon doesn't like clothes one bit, it turns out. They're confining and uncomfortable and he doesn't like the feeling of the fabric on his body. It feels like a snake wrapped around his limbs, only with threads and seams and lord knows what else that just makes him want to scratch it all off like it's a colony of fleas.

Still, he can tell Johnny had been just slightly uncomfortable with a naked man in his home, so he deals with them even despite the urge to bite and gnaw until nothing itches anymore... he wanders around the house in search of the man, sniffing about in an effort to find him, and finally stalks into the bathroom, head lowered in an unconscious show of dislike for his threaded prison, but content with the smile that meets Johnny's face at the sight, anyways.

"There we go... could almost mistake you for a person, if I didn't know any better." He laughs at his own joke, while Simon only grunts in response. He stands there for a minute or so, before opting to move towards him and start crawling onto the bed. Johnny sighs, but makes no move to shove him off or anything of the sort, and from there it's just a matter of making himself comfortable. He finally ends up on his back, limbs stretched out lazily and one leg hanging off the bed, but cozy enough, anyways.

He's not asleep when he feels Johnny reach over to bury a hand in his hair and rub lightly at his scalp, but he does a damn good job at playing dead, anyways, not moving an inch and letting his breathing stay settled. It's good enough to lull him to sleep, anyways, a warm, nice feeling in his chest that he doesn't really want to shake.

[luckytohavebucky]

Why Bucky Was Treated Poorly in The Falcon and the Winter Soldier (a reluctant criticism)

This entry has been something of a personal so-called elephant in the room, and I was attempting to rationalise not making it, but the more I thought about it the more I came to the conclusion it can't be ignored, so unfortunately, the following are the reason's my favourite show did my Bucky dirty, like:

Point 1: Bucky should not have had to "make amends".

Of course Bucky would wanna help those wronged by Hydra/Winter Soldier and stop those who benefited, but that should've been Bucky's decision, not insisted upon by the government or his therapist or whatever; Bucky is a war hero, and was a POW, and he didn't deserve to be treated like an unpredictable ex felon or someone who would supposedly snap at any moment due to programming that was never really Bucky to begin with and had been defunct for 6 years (even if Bucky was only around for a year of it up to that point), not to mention it didn't actually work like that, and Bucky showed even prior how important it is for him to be a defender/protector, being highly upset when this core value was compromised, but the worst part may actually be how Dr. Rainor says to Bucky: "The whole point of making amends is to fulfill rule number 3." I mean... as great as the scene is overall, Bucky being made to say "I am no longer the Winter Soldier; I am James Bucky Barnes, and you're part of my efforts to make amends" then smile (even though clearly anymore Bucky can't fake a genuine 1) is not only ridiculous, it's also degrading to Bucky (this being something of a pattern throughout that, while not enough to get its own point, is still concerning), and hurtful to those who did in fact deserve closure (even though like I said, it wasn't gone about properly), not to be made pawns of Bucky's unnecessary rehabilitation.

Point 2: Sam was a hypocrite when it came to how he treated Bucky versus how he treated Isaiah.

This is the hardest to say about with this because I more than love Sam, but the fact is he has been unfair to Bucky, and maybe part of it was because of Bucky not respecting right away how come Sam initially thought it was better to donate the shield, but even after that and Bucky apologised, Sam still wasn't as sympathetic to Bucky's ordeal as he was to Isaiah's, and it's not like Sam didn't have any idea what Bucky went through; in a favourite episode Truth, and scene of mine, Sam tells Bucky: "You wanna climb out of that hell you're in, do the work; do it", so obviously Sam must realise on some level how affected Bucky was by Hydra's cruelty/memory manipulations, but at the same time, Sam never asked Bucky what he went through or tried to be fully respecful of Bucky; it's frustrating and sad that there couldn't have been something of a breakthrough in that respect, even if Sam and Bucky did grow closer, and Sam thanked Bucky for helping him which was really nice.

Point 3: The constant implication that Bucky got "corrupted" by the super soldier serum was upsetting.

The subplot of Bucky relating to US Agent and Flag Smasher due to their being changed by the serum and Bucky's assumption that the same thing happened to him is at best frustrating and at worst (most of the time) absolutely heartbreaking; Bucky is the only person besides Steve whose integrity never even slightly faltered after he became a supersoldier (even with Bucky getting basically a bootleg version of the serum and against his will), and it's a coincidence that Bucky became susceptible to Hydra's programming shortly after that seeing as Bucky never totally consciously/conscienciously acted in a manner which would imply otherwise (even the whole section with Madripoor was Bucky either pretending, acting in self defence/in the moment/making the best decision he could under the circumstances just like any Avenger), but not only does no one bring this up to Bucky, that erroneous idea of his is reinforced by a number of other individuals, not being questioned until the part of Sam's speech in the finale and another favourite episode, One World One People, where Sam says: "How did it feel to be helpless?", not directly referring to Bucky, but it's clear the effect those words have on him, then finally when Bucky confronts Yuri about what happened to his son, Bucky says "I didn't have a choice" (which I still maintain it wasn't Bucky anyway, but at least he's realising he didn't choose that, and by the way, I doubt very much Bucky did stupid "rule number 3" at that point), yet it feels like little so-called payoff when Bucky's struggle had been underplayed throughout the rest of the show, only for there to be literally seconds of passing realisation.

Point 4: It's perplexing and frustrating that Bucky was still called "Winter Soldier" by the final.

I know the main focus was about Sam becoming the new Cap, but after Bucky literally said he's "no longer the Winter Soldier", it's weird that he didn't get a superhero change too, and I mean... It's not like Bucky has ever relished being called that considering the potential stigma attached; it just stuck, yet even if Bucky wasn't ready to like officially be the White Wolf, they could've gone with Sgt. Barnes (I know Bucky's retired from active duty technically, but like, Doctor Strange is no longer practicing medicine either, so, yeah) which Bucky would appreciate due to his nostalgia for that time/affection for his men, and, undoubtedly, being part of the Howling Commandos with Steve (as evidenced by the fact he always wears his dog tags ever since getting them back) or even " just" Bucky Barnes, and I mean... I feel like maybe there's that whole taking something negative and turning it into a positive thing, and of course Bucky was reciting what he'd been told to say, however, like I said, Bucky has never shown that he considers that as something he's really comfortable with, and anyway, it just feels rather peridoxical; I would've preferred to see Bucky get out from that in a symbolic way too, I guess, even if it had been a placeholder or however.

Conclusion:

There are a lot of great things about The Falcon and the Winter Soldier; the buddy cop dynamic between Bucky and Sam is delightful, as is Bucky flirting with Sarah (much to Sam's hilarious chagrin), the "wizard without a hat" scene, Bucky attempting to break his fall after jumping from a plane by grabbing onto leaves with his arm when he's pretty much in a clearing, the staring contest, the ending with Sam and Bucky walking into the sunset (very cowboy like, just occurred to me), and there are many others (Bucky finally getting it over on Zemo, when Bucky realises the implication of his freedom from Hydra's programming, and that most genuine smile, which that's where my favourite picture of Bucky is from too, Sam finally embracing being Captain America, just to name 3 more); the show itself has so much going for it (when Cash and AJ are trying to put the shield back after Bucky catches and remprimands them/Bucky's initial reaction to that, so, okay, clearly there's a lot, but I'm done mentioning now except that the music is great, and of course the theme range is my favourite of any show), and in fact, it does make me happy overall, but it's just too bad that it wasn't fair to Bucky as it could've been.

[machiroads]

hit me with 7 and 11 for the fanfic ask game bestie

#11 If you had to pick a single trope to read for the next seven-and-half years, which trope would that be?

Probably like. Slice of life? As much as I love h/c and angst and [REDACTED] I really do just enjoy stories about blorbo from my shows like. going to the grocery store.

#7 Share a line or paragraph you’ve written that you don’t think will ever actually be posted in anything! (Or, if you don’t hoard cut sentences and passages like I do, share anything you want that has yet to see the light of day!)

JUST FOR YOU I also got you a tidbit from the now defunct version of When The Battle's Lost & Won where Kuroboro lives, and he is discussing Mic's uh. Complicated feelings with Aizawa.

"I think Hizashi is mad at me."

Shouta shrugs. "Probably."

"Are you mad at me?"

Shouta closes his eye and passes his hand behind his neck, rolling the base of his skull across his knuckles. "I'm too tired to be mad at you," he replies, a ghost of a smile tugging at the corners of his mouth.

Judging from the deep smear of purple under Shouta's one visible eye, he's probably not bluffing about that.

"I think Hizashi is mad at you on my behalf," Shouta adds, his voice not betraying any emotion.

"Because of USJ," he clarifies.

"And Jaku," Shouta adds. "And the other day. He's tired of seeing me get fucked over by you guys."

He winces at Shouta's language, but really, it's his own crude assessment of what happened, he can call it whatever he wants.

When Tomura disintegrated his elbow at USJ and had a Nomu pound his face into concrete, that was him getting fucked over. When Tomura shot him with a quirk-destroying bullet, then mangled his eye so severely it had to be removed, that was him getting fucked over. When he unleashed the Sad Man's Parade on Shouta and his student the other day, that was him getting fucked over.

"I—I don't know what he wants from me," he says stupidly.

Shouta shrugs again. "Why don't you ask him yourself?"

"I don't think he wants to talk to me."

Shouta rolls his eye, exasperated. "Man with voice quirk doesn't want to talk. Yeah sure," he says sarcastically.

He leans over to smack Shouta's arm, and it's solid, meatier than it ever was when they were kids.

Shouta swats his hand away, a grin playing at his lips.

"The kind of resolution Hizashi wants…I don't think is suitable for someone that's hospitalized."

"You think he wants to fight me?" he asks incredulously.

Shouta smiles. "As much as he loves to run his mouth, he's a tactile person too."

"Kind of childish though, isn't it?"

"We were kids when you died," Shouta rationalizes.

"Seventeen isn't that young," he argues.

There's a tightness to Shouta's eyes, the creases visible even around the eyepatch. "Maybe it didn't feel young then," he says quietly. "But it does now."

It takes him a moment to remember that he's only one third of the reason Shouta is temporarily staying in Tokyo; him, Mirko the number five hero, and Bakugou Katsuki.

"How's Bakugou," he asks. Yet another piece of Tomura's handiwork, several times in the running.

"Doing better," Shouta replies. "He's always been very conscientious of his own health. An early to bed, early to rise kind of kid. He'll be fine."

[voidnoidoid]

Thoughts on Weak Hero's Ending

Weak Hero ended a few weeks ago, and I took some time to process the ending after I read it. Overall, I think it was a great ending to such a wonderfully written series.

I like how things were mostly wrapped up, but left as an open ending. I appreciate how the Union, although mostly defunct, is being kept somewhat alive by Kingsley, who can't accept that Donald is truly gone and that the Union is over. I might write a more detailed Kingsley analysis, but it's interesting how Kingsley, as Donald's right hand man, never fully understood Donald. He placed him on a pedestal and deified him. He did care about him, the most out of everyone, but it is still sad how he got so caught up in making Donald king that he failed to recognise how Donald's rapid ascension and ceaseless violence was a cry for help.

Jake being the one to recognise Donald's true feelings is rather apt. I haven't thought much about his character (as is not fully analysed) but I think he's much more complex than he lets on. He's in a similar situation to both Ben and Donald I think, that being both Ben and Jake are the leaders of their schools, they just want to hang out with their friends and have fun, both shoulder the burden of being the strongest of their schools alone... It's just that Jake has a darkness within him that led him to join the Union. He has an inner bloodlust, one that he recognises in Gray. Jake is very perceptive of others emotional state, so it's no wonder he could correctly guess how Donald was feeling, given that he's one of Donald's most reliable officers.

I'll have to update my Donald analysis soon, because of the revelation that Donald willingly put himself in danger, running in the road screaming for Gray to fight him again. I think on one hand, Donald wanted that connection he felt with Gray again, as well as desiring gray to defeat him. But also I think he felt like death was the only escape left, hence the panel where he had a resigned and accepting expression as the truck neared him. As if he was waiting for his end.

I'm sure the Union will dissolve soon despite Kingsley's efforts. Wolf and Jake have left, and maybe Forrest and Jimmy too. I also like how Jimmy's character arc closed off, with him admitting that all he wanted was to be acknowledged by Donald.

Now then, let's go over to the Eunjang kids!

Although they lost the fight, they won the war. Losing meant they didn't have to bear the burden of being the strongest. Though they may face some fights in the future due to the resulting power gap left in Donald's wake. But that's a story for another time.

Eugene woke up and is happy and well! I really love how despite Eugene thinking he didn't contribute much to the fight, all his friends comforted him and reassured him of his major role thanks to his light controlling device! Yay Eugene appreciation!

Unfortunately Gray was deeply affected by Donald's death and entered a spiral of self guilt... the scene with his reflection mocking him hurt to read. Thankfully his friends were by his side to ground him. Gray really does have a kind heart after all.

Finally, Stephen and Gray meet again! I like the reintroduction of Jeremy, and that he remains a good friend of Gray by telling him Stephen is okay! His reactions to Gray being the White Mamba was so funny to read. I can't express how happy I was to see that not only was Stephen still alive, also that he's all better and working part time at a cafe! Gray's monologue at the end was so touching, and im glad he was able to greet his most treasured friend with a big smile.

I really wanted a Stephen and gray epilogue where they interact, but I do like the happy open ending. I think Stephen would be so happy for Gray and he'd fit right in with the eunjang kids! I guess that's what fan fiction is for lol. (sorry for the lack of weaktober writing... ill try to write something.)

I kinda wish some side characters had more cameos, like Toby, Lily and Julia, but their arcs were wrapped up relatively well too.

That sums up my overall thoughts on Weak Hero's conclusion!

Thank you to Seopass and Razen for creating a wonderful story!

[destinysbounty]

The whole time travel thing? The fact that getting rid of the golden weapons in the past means the mega weapon should've never been made means the devourer wouldn't have been defeated means Lloyd shouldn't have aged up means the entire episode wouldn't have happened

Help

Ooooh, I've been wanting to talk about this for a long time (as in, since middle school). So thank you for giving me an excuse to rant about this subject!

First, let's identify all the issues with the s2 time travel situation:

They went back in time and shot the Golden Weapons into space - not just the ones from that episode in season 2 (taking the form of the Mega Weapon), but also the ones from the pilots-era that Kai had found in the past.

If the Golden Weapons were destroyed in the past, Garmadon wouldn't have used them to escape the Underworld and head for the Realm of Madness, which is where he acquired his four arms. He also wouldn't have any motivation to grow two extra arms in the first place (remember that he only gave himself four so he could hold all the Weapons at once).

On a related note, Samukai wouldn't have died from wielding all four of them at once. So if not for the Weapons, he'd...probably still be alive.

Garmadon also used the Golden Weapons to defeat the Devourer. Like, I'm sure he could have killed it with a different weapon, but this definitely changes how that scene would've gone down

Without the Golden Weapons existing anywhere in Ninjago, past or present, Garmadon couldn't have been able to create the Mega Weapon.

This means all the Mega Weapon's effects are now defunct. He wouldn't have used it to rebuild the Bounty. Soto wouldn't have been resurrected, thereby nullifying his involvement in Skybound. Not to mention the Bizarro Ninja wouldn't have been created, which...doesn't have a big impact on things, honestly, but still kinda makes me a little sad.

And of course, as we're all mutually confused by, Lloyd wouldn't have had any reason to take the Tomorrow's Tea, and as such should have spent the rest of the series aging up much more normally.

When coming up with a theory to explain the s2 time travel situation, we need to make sure whatever we come up with provides reasonable rationale for all (or at least most) of the above-mentioned points. Which...okay, that's a bit of a tall order. But I think we can do it!

In the end, I've come upon a theory I personally consider to be the most believable:

Alternative History Theory

These events - Garmadon growing four arms, Lloyd growing up, all of it - was meant to be. They were simply machinations of destiny, setting up the Final Battle to happen exactly as it was intended to. These events had to happen. They were part of a master design as planned out by the Cloud Kingdom and the Overlord alike, a plan over a thousand years in the making.

Garmadon has to eventually grow four arms and Lloyd has to eventually grow up and defeat him. So long as the events occur, destiny doesn't care about how we get there.

What I'm saying is that the timeline rewrote itself to ensure things stay fundamentally the same, in an act of preserving destiny. The journey changed, but the destination remained the same. These events that had to happen, still happened, but the way they happened is now suddenly different.

In other words, Lloyd still took the Tomorrow's Tea, but now the reasons and context for his decision are different.

What messes with my head about this theory is the possibility that there's an entirely different, alternate version of the first half of season 2 that we don't know and will never see. S2 shows us the timeline the og4 got to experience, but not the timeline Lloyd and Nya remember living through.

(I admit I've always kinda wanted to write a fic exploring what that alternate timeline would look like, but I've never figured out a good way to write the premise without first writing an essay to explain the theory behind it)

So then with that in mind, let's consider how such a timeline would transpire. What would a Golden Weapons-free version of s1-2 look like?

...huh. It's actually surprisingly easy to imagine.

When you think about it, none of these events strictly necessitate the use of the Golden Weapons:

Samukai could have died another way.

While we don't entirely know the terms of his banishment, it's reasonable to assume Garmadon could've found another way to the Realm of Madness.

So long as Garmadon hit the Devourer at her weak spot, he still could have killed her with any other weapon.

Nya and Jay could have rebuilt the Bounty instead of Garmadon using the Mega Weapon to do it. They've done it several times throughout the series already, so this is well within the realm of possibility.

The Mega Weapon isn't the only means of resurrection present in this series. Even if it didn't happen by Garmadon's hand, there's a myriad of other ways Soto's crew could be brought back to life. It wouldn't even have to happen during s2 specifically.

Strictly speaking, Lloyd was only aged up because of the Tomorrow's Tea. The events leading up to this don't necessarily require the presence of the Mega Weapon. Something else entirely could've happened to require him to take the Tea, or maybe it happened on accident. Or maybe his friends were in danger and Lloyd was the only one able to save them, so he deliberately sought out and used the Tea in order to be strong enough to rescue them. Anything is possible here.

Ninjago is consistently a story about doomed narratives and the inescapable nature of destiny. No matter how something happens doesn't change the fact that it will happen. The Serpentine were meant to open the Stone Warriors' crypt - so if Lloyd hadn't released them, they would have escaped another way. The Devourer's venom was what awakened the Stone Warriors - even if Pythor hadn't awakened her, someone would have. If Garmadon didn't get his extra arms in the Realm of Madness, it still would have happened some other way.

And if the Grundle didn't force Lloyd into taking the Tomorrow's Tea, something else would have.

So yeah. Blah blah blah, destiny is inevitable, everyone is doomed by the narrative and it sucks, you get the idea. Make sense?

Wow, that was fun. Thanks for the ask <3

[thefandommind]

With the established ideas in my last sphere post, here are other things that have come to me based on the sphere's set up.

Months and years are established completely by the moon, since the sun is defunct.

The Powers as concepts are not well known about, the mass population accepts them as figures but on a mythos type scale. They don't really understand them to exist actually, or really understand their purpose. Unless a person in this world is in the know and has met a Power personally, they are only mentioned in an old card game, and as swears, which ofc is a literary decision to get around popular curses such as "dear God" or "Jesus fucking Christ".

With this we can infer that the larger population historically sees the powers as gods. I'd like to propose that there are other "gods" that came around through the need to understand the spirit world. Or at least fairies and lore.

Like, imagine a world, pre Spirit Court spreading understanding and setting a standard for how wizards should act. Where enslavers are common, wizards are treated with fear, and the spirits when awoken are mysterious and alarming to the spirit deaf. But they still have religions and beliefs that are spread word of mouth. (In a blog post by Rachel Aaron I reposted about Daggerback, she mentions that the cards don't have words on them, because before the Council of Thrones, the majority of the continent was illiterate. And I've latched onto that since I found it, I could talk about that for hours.)

There could be a Moon deity who watches over the night while the Shepherdess sleeps. A snow goddess who got into an argument with the Sleeping Mountains and the winds, and that's why it only snows in the mountains and the North, because of a mythical grudge. There could be a folk legend about a powerful spirit who turned a man into flowers and the only way to protect yourself from that spirit is to wear a woven crown of them.

Things that have nothing to do with the canon magic system, because it adds to the realism of the humans in this world, and also further divides the spirits and the humans. It gives the Spiritualists more work to do, as they have to break away from these archaic ideas. Not to mention, they already deal with Morticime Kant's A Wizard Historie. So they'd have propaganda and then hundreds of years worth of belief systems tied to it to unravel, it would make sense why Miranda would be so annoyed with Eli blatantly showing the world this avant-garde use of spirits.

also noon happens the same time for everyone. crazy

anyway humans being younger then the death of the seasons makes me sad.

[shychick-52]

Where was Gyro in 'How Santa Stole Christmas' (and other thoughts)??

(A LONG post from my defunct blog)

Whenever I watch the season 3 DuckTales episode ‘How Santa Stole Christmas’, Gyro’s absence hits me hard.

This is for three reasons:

(1) We see everyone else on Team Science (Fenton, Manny, Lil Bulb, even Boyd) get a present delivered to them, except for him. Huh??

(2) It’s yet another reminder that Gyro had been absent from most of the third season after episode 6's ‘Astro B.O.Y.D.’ (‘How Santa Stole Christmas’ is the 19th episode, and he would finally show up again in the very next episode ‘Beaks in the Shell’).

(3) If you’re a huge Gyro fan like me, back when the final season was still coming out, you were probably waiting anxiously for his next appearance after his incredible character development in ‘Astro B.O.Y.D.’ (and what more they would do with that). And honestly, I originally wondered- and dearly hoped- if we might see a scene of Gyro celebrating Christmas with Boyd (you have no fucking idea how gutted I was this wasn't the case).

(Doofus Drake's house - nooooo)

Gyro home on Christmas Eve and how he even feels about Christmas?

On the other hand, does Gyro’s absence from the lab mean he actually went home for Christmas Eve instead of working late?? Apparently so, and honestly, that is really cool if it's true!! I always imagined him being totally indifferent to Christmas at best, thinking it’s a frivolous waste of time for a stoic workaholic like him, so it would make even more sense for him to have fallen asleep while late at work! And it was really weird to see the lab all decked out for Christmas, unless Fenton, Manny, and Lil Bulb secretly did it after Gyro left for the day! And maybe Fenton and Team Science insisted he go home for Christmas and he begrudgingly listened (which I can totally see), or maybe Gyro surprisingly enjoys Christmas! OR if the episode- which is a standalone episode, not meant to take place at any particular point during the third season, which I discuss more below- is meant to take place after ‘Astro B.O.Y.D.’, then maybe as part of his emotional and mental healing, he wasn’t staying so late at work as much. What do ya'll think??

But still, whether at the lab or at Gyro’s house (and since he wasn’t at the lab on Christmas Eve, it would’ve been a neat excuse to actually show where he lives), it’s just unfair that he was the only member of Team Science not shown receiving a gift! And this episode was directed by Jason Zurek, who apparently did a lot of the Team Science episodes and was apparently the biggest Gyro/Team Science fan on the show, so why wouldn't Gyro have a scene??

Manny and Lil Bulb:

Manny

I know the production crew was obsessed with Manny and loved using him every chance they got, but couldn’t they have Gyro asleep at the lab with Lil Bulb instead?? I mean, it’s practically canon that Gyro pulls all-nighters anyway, so it just would’ve made perfect sense!

(And was Manny’s presence meant to imply that he doesn’t actually have a home and lives in the lab??)

Lil Bulb

So, I mentioned what a wasted opportunity it was for Lil Bulb to have his own little stocking with his name on it (especially if Gyro had actually been shown with him). But it especially makes no sense for Lil Bulb to not be with Gyro, especially since he’s his loyal, right-hand machine and is pretty much always with him (I always assumed he stayed with Gyro at his place when the inventor's not at the lab). And you’d think he’d especially want to be with his inventor/father for Christmas (and vice-versa). The thought of Gyro being alone on Christmas is really sad. I mean, Lil Bulb’s friendship with Manny is cute, but still…

Boyd:

But I think what infuriates me even more than Gyro being excluded from this episode altogether is the fact that Boyd was shown to still be living with the Drakes!!

Like I said, When I first watched 'How Santa Stole Christmas', I was so hoping that we’d see Gyro with Boyd after neither of them had been seen since ‘Astro B.O.Y.D.’ (and somebody on Tumblr asked Frank Angones if their relationship was improving, and Frank responded- and I quote exactly- “Oh, yes. Very much so”, and I always felt his answer placed a lot of emphasis on that, which gave me a LOT of hope… but they weren’t seen together again until the very last episode; and even though the few scenes they shared were absolutely lovely, they still didn’t feel like enough. We never really learned know how they interact or what their relationship is like). I’ll never forget how utterly GUTTED I was to learn that not only was Gyro absent from the Christmas episode altogether- especially after the rest of Team Science was included- but that Boyd was still living with the Drakes after all.

But then… I learned a couple of interesting things. One- ‘How Santa Stole Christmas’ is a standalone episode, not meant to take place at any particular time during the third season (although I would argue that ‘Astro B.O.Y.D.’ took place fairly early in the episode- both when it actually aired and within the actual show). And two- according to the production codes of the third season, ‘How Santa Stole Christmas’ was actually made before ‘Astro B.O.Y.D. even though it aired much later:

At first, this relieved me! But then, I thought of something else. Even if 'How Santa Stole Christmas' was actually produced before ‘Astro B.O.Y.D.’ and wasn’t meant to take place at any particular time during the season, Frank said that the premise for AB was created way back when season 2’s ‘Happy Birthday, Doofus Drake’ was in production. Not only that, but they obviously knew ‘How Santa Stole Christmas’ would air way later in the season, being a Christmas episode… so, they obviously knew it would air after AB. In that case, there was no excuse for them not to show Boyd with Gyro!

I was really hoping the book The Art of DuckTales would offer some behind-the-scenes explanations for some of these questions, but Gyro wasn’t even mentioned under this episode.

[dj-of-the-coven]

Hit me with your favorite defunct website

You will regret this.

Have you ever felt isolated by the modern internet, or nostalgic for the way that you can vaguely--but not entirely--remember experiencing as a child? Well I can't speak for everyone, but the past few years certainly have left me feeling that way. Certain nostalgia posts made circa 2021 got my brain churning in that direction, dredging up ancient memories of reading personal blogs and spending hours on flash game websites that were more or less entirely nuked from the internet by my adulthood. The more I remembered, the more distressed I felt by their absence, even though it'd been years since I even remembered most of that stuff existed...

Aside from Animal Jam, I wasn't sure if anything I knew from my mid 2000s-early 2010s childhood experience was out there on the web somewhere--so, I did as any normal teenager would and I started doing copious amounts of research into a subject that basically didn't exist. I discovered the internet archive entirely on accident; spent days examining the layout of early youtube and any other sites I could remember, navigating by year and trying to figure out when everything took a turn for the worst. I started browsing through webcore tags on tumblr just to get close to what I wanted, because "old internet" yielded few results at the time, and google's input was less than useless. Only a few blogs on tumblr had the kind of content I was looking for, but eventually I struck gold when one of them pointed me in a brand new direction of hope.

This is when I discovered neocities.

Of course, I was already familiar with the webhosting platform of geocities from the old days. Geocities was one of the primary hosting platforms that I remembered without the help of research, but you may already have guessed by the lack of a link that it's dead--and you'd be right. It actually shut down back in 2009, which I learned through the same post that advertised its independent successor. For some reason, I'd always associated the memory with the time I was in kindergarten, but the date of shutdown actually confirmed that I must've known about it earlier, making the platform one of my first memories! It's been gone for a while, but not the impression of it that I had as a core pillar in my early web experience. And then there was neocities. What was that? I immediately went to investigate.

Of course, I was mostly doing this in between two late-night bussing jobs to afford my shitty apartment, aside from being in my final year of high school, so progress was slow. At the starbucks next to my school, I was always holed up in the corner during my short window of off-time with a coffee and my computer setup. It took some time, but I began browsing through the top pages one-by-one, following links and cataloguing where they led to. I took stock of which sites linked to one another. Eventually, I noticed a pattern: a lot of them linked back to a website called sadgrl.online, a purple and black neon haven of internet culture run by a webmaster known as Sadness. Everyone say hello to our defunct website of the hour!

At the time, the thing was absolutely bustling. Almost all of the most popular sites on neocities were linked to Sadness' site somehow, usually through her button collection. My own personal site, which I started building around that time, also contained one of her web buttons. She has several, but her most popular one looks like this. (I apologize if you're on mobile. It will NOT look good.)

I was intrigued! In a community so removed from the usual mainstays of the internet, there existed a blog that hundreds of neocities users were visiting every day, and I very quickly became one of them once I finished looking through her thought-provoking essays on programming and web culture. Her site went through a number of layout changes while I was a regular visitor--the vast majority of them are catalogued on the site itself if not also on the internet archive. It was a blog dedicated to the exact thing that I was interested in; what I had been searching for since the modern web started rubbing me the wrong way in my burgeoning adulthood. Her page prominently featured an essay on the faults of centralized internet and her journey to foster a space more accepting of individuality, information, and creativity without thought of profit. I was totally enamored, especially with the appealing gothic graphics that surrounded the lengthy text!

(here's a capture from August 2022)

Aside from Sadness, several other active community members had formed an alliance of websites dedicated to the preservation of old internet culture and the cultivation of unique online spaces. These people called themselves the Yesterweb. The yesterweb was run mainly by webmasters known as Auzzie Jay, Madness, Tsvety, Grafo, Cinni, Vincent, Iris, and Sadness herself, but webmaster Melon (of MelonLand fame) also ran a forum that was parallel to the movement. The yesterweb was a massive project that included an online newspaper, a web radio station, several introductory programming manuals, a forum, web-themed essays from neocities users, button makers, layout creators, and terms and definitions for people new to the decentralized experience. It was easy to get lost in it all... for a time, the rabbit hole felt endless and exciting.

Every day, I returned to check updates on Sadness' various projects while I began work on my own website. She had totally convinced me of my own convictions--I bought the dream hook, line, and sinker. My only goal for a while was for my site to eventually be included in the yesterweb webring alongside all these amazing programmers. I wanted to contribute to the world of creativity that I could only dream of when HTML was still just meaningless jargon to me! But I was too slow learning the languages necessary, and the yesterweb was just growing too fast to be contained. I dipped for a few months to focus on my move to a new city, and by the time I returned, the whole yesterweb had disappeared scorched-earth style.

Okay, so what the fuck happened?

Currently, on the front page of what used to be a hopeful and inspiring collection of internet resources, there's a long essay made by the webmasters who founded the project, detailing burnout and massive stress due to the community growing faster than they could moderate it. It is certainly not poorly-intentioned. However, the discovery was absolutely devastating to me. My dream had gone up in smoke before I could even try to reach it, and I was apparently a part of the problem by caring so much about it. The radio station is gone. The webring was deleted. The forums shut down. My favorite webmasters' sites were no longer being updated. I felt awful for the people who had been affected by all this stress and pressure, but after so long of working to join the movement, I felt betrayed by their abandonment. The yesterweb disappeared in almost exactly the same way the old web did the first time--ripped from my fingers before I was able and ready to participate. And I can only wonder... what happened to the goal of turning the internet back into a place for us? How did it get to the point of ruining these people's lives within the span of maybe two years? I'm really not sure. There's a lot about this story I still don't know, and there's not really a way to access the drama that happened in a discord server that I never joined. The information published on the yesterweb's page is the only reliable source I'm currently aware of.

Still, in spite of it all, Sadness' website has remained one of my major inspirations in programming and web philosophy. I may be in mourning about a dream that died before it could truly live, but whenever I think about the months that I spent eagerly browsing her site for updates, I remember that spark that initially inspired me to begin researching the net in the first place. She was a major player in the game--not the only one. The website that she created was my favorite while it was active, and now it is my favorite website that is currently defunct.

Thank you for coming to my tedtalk.

[thathartleykat]

A very lengthy letter before the series' departure.

Hey, everyone, Hartley here.

By June of 2023, it would be my 4th year in the Hilda community, and i'm still in disbelief that i've been active in the community for this long, as well as the animated series is coming to an end tomorrow.

I have been wanting to post this since then, but i've been extremely busy in my life, as well as my personal computer was broken for almost an entire year - hence why my activity in the community also got died down a little bit.

I have a lot of things to say to everyone, from people in the community to the people who worked on the show, as well as the past, present and future, so for the convenience of your reading, i'll divide what i want to say into chapters.

I. About me & how i got into the show ( Trigger warning: Deaths ) I've rarely talked about this to anyone, but... I live by myself, and there's a good chance i might not be around for much longer. It's sort of the reason why i got into Hilda from the first place.

I first found out about Hilda in October 2018 when i was browsing on Tumblr, but never really watched it until May 2019, when a friend of mine gave me a month free subscription of Netflix. I started to go down the list of things i wanted to watch on the platform, and when it came to Hilda, i never thought i would get fixated on the show. Well, guess where we're at now?

I was stunned by the show's colorful vibes, amazing plot writing and how the show built the characters and mythologies, especially how they portrayed the mentality of the children in the show when the kids interact with each other or with adults.

The one thing that i also extremely adore in the show is the relationship between Hilda and Johanna... because it deeply reminds me of my parents when they were still alive. I had a similar life and relationship with them. Every time i see Hilda and her mum together, it always makes me remember about my former childhood life, how kind my parents were to me, and how i wanted to be the adventurous kid that never disappoints them.

I had a pretty good life until my parents got cancer when i was 11 years old - the same age with Hilda in first & possibly second season. Things got worse since then, and they passed away a few years after that.

Now i'm pretty much alone, with a good chance that i might follow them, so if i ever just disappear without telling anything, well... at least i had a good run, i never thought i'd make it this far anyway.

The show had made a significant change on my life, as well as some of my future decisions and helped me through hard times.

It would be an understatement to say this series meant a lot for me.

Because of this, and the feeling of the show doesn't get enough attention that it deserves, i've been dedicating myself for the last few years to help the show and its community thrive.

II. About the animated series Sometimes, i feel really sad that they couldn't have done more for it. - As someone who lives in Vietnam, it's really sad to see the show lacks Vietnamese subtitles and audio language - despite there being a huge number of Netflix users in the country. Due to this, the series basically got hidden from anyone who's watching with their Netflix's interface language set to Vietnamese, which makes the show really hard to be recommended to anyone here. At the same time, many other animated series on the platform have either or both of those. - A lot of merchandise of the franchise has either never saw the day or short-lived. Hilda's GUND plushies only lived for 1.5 years, and by my count, there were 3 Hilda board games that got reported to the news, but never got released. - Hilda video games. The only official Hilda game we ever got was Hilda Creatures, and sadly, the company that made the game went defunct in April 2022, dragging Hilda Creatures along with it. - Netflix. Batch releasing the show and giving it the bare minimum marketing. The same thing happened with Jojo and we all know what happened to its hype. - The mishandling of social media pages, which led to Hilda's Facebook page got hacked for an entire month during May 2023, as well as a lack of interaction posts after season 1 to keep the community up.

I really wish the show got better treatment in a lot of stuff, but at the same time, i'm grateful for the crew's work to get the series this far. One of the directors at one point confirmed that the show got pitched to various networks like Cartoon Network, Disney, Children BBC, Nick... and no one accepted the show until Netflix came along. If Netflix never took the show in, or if it was another network that got it ( which i suspect it'd change the direction of the show by a lot ), where would we be now...?

Though the show will definitely not be reminded by Netflix every now and then as other networks do, but at least it is going out with a bang. Really wish the show would become a sleeper hit at some point in the future.

III. About the community Genuinely, it's one of the most amazing communities i've ever been in. People who are younger, same age, or even parents who are much older than me... I had amazing experiences with all of them. I've made many friends from here, which sometimes makes me wish our community would stay the same like this forever after the series ends.

Honestly, i don't know what else i could say about everyone, other than thanking you guys for making my days within the community, as well as your efforts in making it an amazing place for me and everyone else to stay in.

IV. About the future Well, i've been thinking about it quite a lot.

After the animated series ends, i'll try my best to continue sticking around in the community and do a lot more stuff for it. The franchise will still seem to continue for at least some more time, with the upcoming release of the new prequel Hilda comic series, "Hilda and Twig".

I'd be selfish for saying this, but if the current state of animations improves in the future... I'd want to see Hilda's world return as animation at some point - either following the same blue-haired girl that we all know and love, or just a spin-off from an entirely different character. It's hard to imagine how the worldbuilding we've seen in the last 12 years, where "there's so much we've never seen, so much we don't know" and "there's mystery everywhere you look" would potentially disappear after this... I really hope i would see it again, as well as be around long enough to see it.

As of now, this chapter is about to come to an end. So before it does, i want to say thanks to everyone who has been involved in this show.

Thank you Luke Pearson, the people who made Hilda the series possible, and especially - you. Whether you worked on it or are just simply a fan of the show, you have my sincere gratitude for all the great things that happened to the series in the last 4 years.

This is Hartley, and i hope everyone enjoys Season 3.

[motheatenscarf]

And last but not least, Endwalker Society Quests! Again, I really liked these. Technically no weak links but there is one I'd have replaced just to be more on theme with Endwalker.

We'll start with that one, which is the Arkasadora.

I want to first state emphatically and on the record that I LIKE them. They're cute, the NPCs are fine, and "juvenile delinquent hippo cart racers turn their lives around by inventing less exploitative uber eats" is an INSANE premise that I fucking love. What I don't love is the coding on the tiny naked matanga from the steppe who speak in broken sentences and cheat and steal and need to be civilized. But, picking my battles here, it's enjoyable for what it is.

But like. This is Endwalker. What are we doing here? We've been to space.

And even if we're not gonna talk about our sense of scale in regard to who needs our help, let's think about our sense of scale in regard to who needs our help RIGHT NOW.

Thavnair's recovery from the Final Days sees these youths struggling to make good choices and has made it difficult for this woman to open the small business of her dreams.

...

Meanwhile,

Garlemald is such a smoked out ruin that the combined role quests sees the Garleans decide to go live on the fucking MOON where they'll find more fertile soil to til than the debris of rust and hopelessness that is their home of the last 500 years!

Why am I here!?

We do not need to shark tank ideas for this woman and her angry naked friends! If we want goofy, light-hearted content, Hildibrand is back and we have Island Sanctuary! We could have made a VERY powerful statement by putting fucking GARLEMALD'S reconstruction in the same category as the "beast tribes" they've been oppressing for so long. And also rather than making joke racist caricature elephant barbarians, we could have used some on-screen time to make the Garleans confront the injustice of their entire social structure and come to terms with the imperfections of their empire, almost like it was on theme with the expansion or something!

But.... yeah... Grading it for what it is and not as a missed opportunity, I will admit that the Arkasadora are fine and the Hippo Riders are fine. The quests are fine. This is MY problem for it not being what I want it to be and not a problem with the Arkasadora. I'm fine with it, I'm just a hater, it's fine, they're fine, it's all fine.

Anyway, not unlike the Garleans, now let's go to the moon.

Loporrits were an instant favorite for me, I can't help it. They have a huge advantage by being so cute. I love the premise of helping them find new dreams to find personal fulfillment now that their collective purpose of preserving as much of eitherys as they can is defunct with the Final Days averted. Similar to An Lad, I love the one sad bunny for the exact same reasons and I needed to help him find a reason to keep living or I was going to kill everyone else and then myself. I'm very predictable in what is going to affect me, and Depression Bunny really got to me. I know his name, but I won't say it for spoiler reasons, and I'm not going to spoil this for you because you should play this. All I'll say in regard to spoilers is that his speech on the radio at the end of these actually got me to tear up because it's about sending a message out into the universe never knowing for sure if anyone will hear it, if anyone will understand it (or you), but the compulsion to reach out being what makes us human anyway. It's the drive that makes people create in the hopes that someone, somewhere, will find meaning in your art. It's the drive that makes us send Voyager out beyond the solar system hoping that someone, somewhere, will see it and know that we were here. It's the drive that makes you risk getting hurt again and again and again by continuing to reach out to people. It's good, y'all. It is ON THEME.

And last but not least, maybe the best society quest in the entire game??? The Omicrons.

Yes, really, the Omicrons.

It's like 5 society quests in one and fits in as well with Endwalker's themes about finding hope no matter what as the Pixies were with Shadowbringer's themes about grief and legacy. You remember all those visions you saw of other fallen worlds that the Meteia encountered during your exploration of Ultima Thule and The Dead Ends? .... yeah, those weren't visions, those were revived amalgams of memories made out of dynamis and they're still here. They're here, they're alive, and they matter. And you have to help them find the hope they need to overcome the despair that destroyed them as they learn from their hubris that led to their self destruction the first time. Yes, all of them. And you're going to help them build it together- even if they were once mortal enemies. Even if they chose oblivion before this. And even if they were once the monsters of history who are now realizing how pointless their conquests were. The NPCs are great and they have character growth that fits in with the themes, they still manage to flesh out the main two despite there being so many other micro-societies to juggle with this one.

THIS is the the thesis statement on all society quests. This is the best society quest story in the game. It's not my personal favorite, that's probably still Pixies, but imo it's the most on-theme and the best executed. It's so good that the combined society quests for Endwalker this time just essentially sees you bring the Arkasadora and Loporrits here to share in the wonder of what you've built at the end of the universe to have a low-stakes, good, wholesome drag race across the stars. It's beautiful and extremely uplifting and life affirming and fits perfectly with Endwalker.

It is so worth doing and is the only one of these that has made me cry. I frankly don't know why they even bothered to put society quests in Dawntrail after this. Nothing they do will ever top this, it is the beautiful ribbon on the slog of getting here and honestly made all of it almost feel worthwhile.

... okay, maybe not the Ixal, but nothing is worth that. But this almost is!

[tactician]

it's time for a reides update!!! this post is going to focus on reides the kingdra's generation 6 adventure!

first of all, you might be wondering why there's no post devoted to the ribbons of generation 5. like i mentioned briefly towards the end of my gen4 post, the gen5 pokemon games have no ribbons in them... not even one for entering the unovan hall of fame! thankfully, this weird lapse in the ribbon trend was relatively short-lived, as ribbons came back in earnest for generation 6! and so the grind continues...!

this generation of the pokemon games includes both the kalos AND hoenn regions. thanks to my friends and our shared memories of playing these games together, i have a whole lot of personal fondness for this generation - so i knew that i'd enjoy this segment of reides' journey. also, since reides hails from emerald version, it meant that he was going to have a bit of a homecoming.

of course, i gotta take a quick moment to mention my other ribbon master posts! they can all be found in my ribbon master tag or on my neocities blog.

now then, let's get started!!!

luckily, since i got my first file of y to the post-game and never replayed it, i was able to use playthrough from Way Back When in reides' ribbon quest. this saved a whole lot of time, of course! for those who don't know, gen6 of pokemon introduced a somewhat controversial decision. in an attempt to streamline the ribbon page, gamefreak consolidated all of the contest and battle tower ribbons into two fancy plaques. on one hand, this is kind of sad, as it meant that 48(!!!) ribbons were now just... 2. that meant for way less scrolling on the ribbon page. however, on the other hand, it's kind of cool, too, as the contest memory ribbon and the battle memory ribbon are both styled like plaques and are really, really gorgeous.

since reides managed to gather all of the relevant ribbons, he got two shiny gold plaques for his hard work. you can see those plaques in the bottom row of this picture, which i took upon his arrival in kalos.

it's worth noting that, in generations 6 to 8, the golden battle memory ribbon has a requirement of 8 battle tower-related ribbons. in these gens, if you have less than 8 battle tower ribbons, you get a silver plaque instead. a few months ago, however, gamefreak made a FANTASTIC decision and changed the golden battle memory ribbon's requirement to 7 ribbons! this was likely implemented to make up for the now-defunct gen4 wifi servers. it was great news for people who didn't have the means of connecting to the fan servers that i detailed in my gen4 post. regardless, i was still really happy to have the gold plaque at this part of my journey. i didn't regret my decision to take on the world ability ribbon in the slightest... even if the sight of a perfectly normal machamp now makes me tense up out of fear of dealing with a hacked no guard sheer cold user.

anyway, my first order of business was definitely opening up pokemon amie so i could FINALLY play with reides!

i was looking forward to this for such a long time!!! i immediately fed him a bunch of poke puffs and pet him a whole bunch. i would've done this even if i didn't have to do it to get a ribbon - but it turns out that maxing out your pokemon's affection in amie is, in fact, a requirement for one of the gen6 ribbons! namely, you need your pokemon to ADORE you for the best friends ribbon.

there's actually a way to grind for this ribbon so that you can get it pretty quickly! i'd feed reides pokepuffs until he was full, then i'd pet him until he started spawning music notes instead of hearts. at that point, i'd play three rounds of tile puzzle on easy mode so that i could get more pokepuffs, reset his appetite, and get my petting to spawn hearts again. each round of this puzzle game can be completed really quickly, so i figured it was the optimal difficulty for my purposes - but any minigame would definitely work! the tile puzzle game also gives you some cute little pictures of your party as you complete each puzzle, which i thought was a great added bonus! sometimes, additional pokemon would photobomb, too.

for maxing out reides' affection, i got a throne fit for royalty.

i then visited bonnie in lumiose city, where she was chillin over in prism tower. (apparently, she only shows up after you beat lumiose's gym leader - namely, her brother, clemont.) she was impressed with the bond that reides and i shared and we got the best friends ribbon.

we then scuttled on over to the pokemon league, which we challenged in order to get the ribbon for entering kalos' hall of fame. i'm still sad that we couldn't get one in unova, but i digress... maybe someday, be it in a remake or some sort of new adventure set in unova. (since we're going to unova for the upcoming indigo disc dlc, maybe it'll even be there!)

at any rate - i somehow forgot that kalos' league is absolutely amazing! each member of the elite four is so iconic, and they each have BEAUTIFULLY decorated rooms that reflect their respective personal styles very well. i had to take a photo of champion diantha's room; it was just so, so gorgeous. the stained glass flooring reminded me a lot of terapagos' terastal form! the place's aesthetics aside, reides was pretty much able to solo the league on his own... what a champ! even though he did most of the heavy lifting, my whole party (including this random gengar named gaspar that i got wonder traded way back when; he was in my party when i arrived so i decided that he could come along) got kalos champion ribbons.

it was then time to take on one of my favorite little mechanics introduced in the kalos games: super training! while ev training off wild encounters is my usual go-to nowadays, i really like this feature. back in the day, it pretty much introduced me to the concept of ev training, so i feel like it deserves a whole lot of my respect, haha. i had all of the courses unlocked thanks to my training in the past, but i still had to clear all 30 of them with reides. i got to work on that while i was doing some super training of my own - i.e. while i was walking on a treadmill. lmao.

eventually, reides had all 30 of the necessary medals for the training ribbon. i hopped in a cab to go see the character who'd give it to me and learnt that super training is a whole Thing in kalos; the term 's.t. meatheads' had me losing it.

though i put it off for as long as i could, it was finally time to face gen6's battle tower - the battle maison. thankfully, gamefreak realized that they went a little too wild with gen4's six battle tower-related ribbons and i only had to get two battle maison-related ribbons in gen6. the first of these ribbons would be from beating one of the normal battle modes (namely, emerging victorious against the chatelaine at battle #20 of it). the second one was for achieving a streak of 50 on one of the super battle modes, which would require beating the chatelaine at battle #50. i decided to take on the single battle mode for this ribbon master quest, which... may have been quite the choice. it was my first time taking the maison on, and i heard (both from friends and from various posts made by people online) that the single battle mode was the hardest one. you may be wondering why i opted to choose that mode, then. unfortunately, i don't really have an answer for that. I Just Did. HAHA. speaking more seriously, i'm generally more comfortable with battling one-on-one, so i opted to go with what was familiar to me versus what would be easier to me. as it turns out, the first battle maison ribbon (the skillful battler ribbon) was incredibly easy to get on reides. i used the same ol' team of albatross, origin and reides and yoinked it on my very first try. after breezing through it, i had one HELL of an ego. "gen4's tower was way worse," i told myself. "if my team got through that, they can get through anything." I WAS WRONG. AND THIS SMALL CHILD WAS RIGHT.

my streak in the super singles battle mode broke several times in the 30s; more times than ever before!!! my team was being hard-countered. even when i opted to replace reides with persana the suicune (you only need your ribbon master for battle 50; it's fine if you don't have them present in your party for the full streak), we were still having an incredibly hard time. i knew that i couldn't brute force my way through the maison if i wanted to get through gen6 in a timely manner. so i opted to try out a very, very popular little strategy for grinding wins in it.

this strategy involved none other than the cute steel bug known as... durant.

(fair warning: this part of my post is gonna get a little technical!)

wild durants typically have the swarm or hustle abilities. however, truant is available to durants as a hidden ability... and a truant durant is the absolute crux of this strategy.

truant is a strange little ability that makes it impossible for your pokemon to attack consecutively; your truant pokemon can attack on turn one but will then spend the entirety of turn two lazing around. this ability sounds like it'd be absolutely useless on a durant, right? it probably would be... if our awesome little bug didn't learn entrainment at level 44.

entrainment allows your durant to change its target's ability to match its own ability. this isn't permanent, of course - a pokemon who got its ability changed by entrainment gets its ability back to normal once it's switched out, or after the battle ends. but pokemon in the battle maison are very rarely switched out, so... you see where i'm going with this, surely!!!

the truant durant strategy basically relies on outspeeding your opponent and landing entrainment on them so as to pass the traunt ability to them. after doing that, you swap your durant out for another pokemon. it can't just be any pokemon for this strategy to work, though. you'd need one with the move protect, as well as a stats-boosting move, such as dragon dance or shell smash. by using protect on the turns that you expect your opponent to attack on and using your stats-booster on its traunt-afflicted turns, you can safely max out your pokemon's stats and proceed to sweep the entire enemy team. the general pattern is therefore as follows:

your durant uses entrainment, giving the opponent traunt

you swap to your stats-boosting pokemon*

your stats-booster uses protect, avoiding damage from the opponent

your stats-booster uses its stats-boosting move*

repeat 3 and 4 until your stats-boosting pokemon has maxed out stats

SWEEP!

* = your pokemon takes no damage, as it is a traunt turn for your opponent.

please note that this order shifts a bit if your durant gets knocked out on turn one! if it does, you get a free swap *into* a traunt turn, so your stats-boosting pokemon doesn't need to start off with protect and can get right to boostin'.

in order to get a traunt durant, i knew that i'd have to use sweet scent in order to spawn horde encounters. within hordes, pokemon have a small chance of having their hidden ability. however... i also needed that durant to have a speed boosting nature so that it could outspeed whatever enemies it faced. ideally, i wanted a jolly one; one that would have reduced special attack for increased speed. i COULD have simply caught a small army of truant durants, but i was wary of testing my luck like that and decided to test it in another way that was, hopefully, less time consuming. basically... i hatched ralts eggs until i got a jolly one with synchronize. with this ralts leading my party, the pokemon that i encountered had a 50% chance of being jolly natured, themselves - even while the ralts was fainted. i then grabbed my sweet scent user - a cute little spritzee - and got to challenging hordes of durants. after catching 3 truant ones, i finally managed to get my hands on a jolly natured durant with the traunt ability. i named her 'donatella.'

then came the matter of my stats-boosting sweeper pokemon. i went through my boxes and noticed that i had a ton of leftover pokemon from various breeding projects during my y playthrough. (just as this gen opened my eyes to ev training, it also opened by eyes to iv breeding!) i saw that i had an adamant dratini with perfect ivs, as well as its hidden ability. i knew that dragonite's hidden ability, multiscale, would give it some tankiness in the battle maison (it reduces the damage that the pokemon takes when its hp is full), and i also knew that dragonite could learn dragon dance (a move that increases both speed and attack) as well. i decided that it was finally this little dratini's time to shine after spending years and years in my pc. i named her 'venus.'

finally, there was the matter of my third pokemon. using one of my already-trained pokemon was definitely an option, but i saw a LOT of people online talking about how cloysters with the skill link ability can easily hard-counter the super single battle chatelaine's team. to employ strategy, you give your cloyster a focus sash and have it use shell smash on the first turn of the battle. the focus sash keeps your cloyster safe from being ohko'd on that first turn, and, after getting the shell smash buffs, it can outspeed most of the battle chatelaine's team. skill link allows cloyster to land the MAX NUMBER!!!! of hits for multistrike moves, giving its icicle spear attack a whole lot of power - enough power to k.o. the chatelaine's tornadus and thundurus. while the chatelaine's choice scarf-wielding landorus potentially poses a problem (as it may outspeed your cloyster and potentially finish off the last of its hp), you can easily circumvent this by using ice shard on it, instead.

this little strategy works consistently, so i figured i'd raise a skill link cloyster, myself... just to be safe. while trying to hatch a jolly ralts with synchronize, i actually hatched an adamant one with synchronize, too - so i used him for my little shellder hunt. i fished a suitable shellder up from the sea in no time at all and named her 'applause.' here is a picture of my new battle maison warriors, all ready for the training grind:

i ev trained this trio of pokemon by giving them power items (which boost the amount of evs that you get per battle) and by taking on hordes via sweet scent. since i had the same ev build in mind for all three of them AND since gen6 introduced the party-wide exp share, i was able to ev train them all at once. i took out weepinbells on route 19 for attack evs, wingulls on route 8 for speed evs, and hoppips on route 7 for special defense evs. you can make this process SUPER fast if you use a high-levelled pokemon with earthquake or surf, as you can take out all 5 members of the horde with one use of the move!

once everyone was all ev trained, i levelled them up by repeatedly challenging cafe le wow in lumoise city while keeping the party-wide exp share on. it was during this training-fest that reides finally hit level 100, too!

in the end, this was my battle maison team:

donatella the durant (choice scarf) ability: truant nature: jolly evs: 252 atk, 252 speed, 4 sp. defense - entrainment - toxic - x-scissor - iron head

venus the dragonite (lum berry) ability: multiscale nature: adamant evs: 252 atk, 252 speed, 4 sp. defense - earthquake - fire punch - dragon dance - protect

applause the cloyster (focus sash) ability: skill link nature: adamant evs: 252 atk, 252 speed, 4 sp. defense - shell smash - icicle spear - ice shard (for landorus) - protect

this team worked like a dream for the whole maison, and i was able to get my streak of 50 wins on my very first attempt with it.

admittedly, i kept applause the cloyster in my pc until the final battle, during which i swapped donatella the durant out for her and slotted reides in, as well - but i was just so relieved to maintain an unbroken streak. there were a few thorny situations, so i don't think this team is entirely unbeatable or anything of the sort, but i definitely recommend the truant durant strategy if you're struggling with the maison. it felt SOOOO great to finally get through it... i did NOT expect it to be as difficult as it was.

also, in hindsight, i could have likely sped this process up a whole lot more if i followed donatella up with applause the cloyster rather than venus the dragonite. i seriously underestimated skill link; that thing lets icicle spear hit like a TRUCK! furthermore, venus needed to use dragon dance 6 times to max out her attack and speed stats, whereas applause's shell smash would only need 3. so... you know. i do think that dragonite offered better coverage, at the very least, so all's well that ends well, i guess. while it may have taken longer to clear the maison with venus, i'm really happy that i was able to raise her properly. that alone is a huge reward, since i LOVE dragonite. more pals sharing in reides' ribbon master journey is always a good thing, too, right?

once i got those final two ribbons, reides' time in kalos reached its end. before leaving, i randomly decided to raise a kangaskhan, because i remembered how cute mega kangaskhan was and wanted one for myself. (shoutout to my friend, rachel, who traded me a kangaskhan with awesome ivs Way Back When and made it super easy for me to raise one of my own!) i named this new kangaskhan 'chips,' since i was snacking on some really delicious sour cream and onion chips at the time, and decided that she'd accompany reides on his adventure, too. (...along with her little baby, of course. that goes without saying!)

with kalos' ribbons handled, it was time for reides' homecoming! i plopped him back into pokemon bank and then booted up my copy of omega ruby. he was all ready to go home to hoenn. hilariously enough, i didn't have a file in the post-game for omega ruby. if this ribbon master challenge has taught me anything, it's that i have a shocking amount of pokemon games that i drifted from without ever completing. fake fan alert. (I'M KIDDING!!!!!) but, anyway... i only had to wrap up some wild plot cover-legendary-related business and nab my 8th badge, so it wasn't like i had to replay the entire game. i really enjoyed how everything played out, and it was also a treat to meet wallace again. he's one of my fav pokemon characters ever, and his oras redesign is absolutely incredible!

immediately after getting my 8th badge, i slotted reides into my team and rushed on over to the pokemon league. since my alpha sapphire file is currently devoted to my shiny badge quest (which will hopefully be a post of its own, someday!), it was actually my very first time taking on the pokemon league in the oras games. not gonna lie, i had low expectations, as i figured it'd be a simple 1:1 reskin of the rse league rooms - but it kind of took my breath away.

like the kalos league, the revamped hoenn league was utterly gorgeous. i tore through it with my team until we eventually faced the LEGENDARY steven stone. it was reides' first time facing him as a champion, as, in emerald, wallace was champion, instead. since he was a level 5 horsea while the rest of my team faced wallace in emerald, i gave him a shot at a hoenn champion battle and let him take steven on.

once reides single-handedly took down steven, my team entered the hoenn hall of fame. even though reides already had a hall of fame ribbon from hoenn, he actually got a second one for entering the oras one!

after weeping openly at omega ruby's beautiful credits, we then headed to lilycove city. once there, we took a bit of a break from the ribbon grind and paid a visit to the cove lily motel. it turns out that some small indie company called gamefreak had just checked in. i talked to the game director, who was amazed upon seeing reides. since reides was from emerald version, he noted just how far he had come and gave us the time travel award. as lovely as this award is (you can even put it up in your secret base!), it's worth noting that the art featured on it is inexplicably shiny locked?!?! so reides had his normal kingdra colouration in mine! it's still a beautiful award, though, so i edited it for the purposes of this post!

i put the award up in my secret base and focused on a much-anticipated part of reides' ribbon master quest: the hoenn contests (part two)! the contests on oras are similar to the ones in rse - however, instead of giving ribbons for each and every contest win, the oras contests give a brand new ribbon for each *master* contest win. this meant that reides needed to take on the master contests for each of the 5 contest categories (the same ol' cool, beautiful, cute, clever/smart, and tough ones). like i mentioned all the way back in my gen3 post, oras also took the sheen limitation away, so i was finally able to max out reides' contest stats. since his stats were already really good, i didn't have to feed him too many pokeblocks for him to have the perfect contest spread.

i was so proud of him for finally having everything maxed out!! it's truly what he deserves. the contests themselves were also pretty easy. i'm not sure if it was necessary or if having perfect contest stats meant that they hit a cap, but i went and picked up the red, blue, pink, yellow, and green scarves from the pokemon fanclub in slateport and put them on reides just in case. also, while i couldn't use the amazing rest + snore combination of rse fame, i used the double team + secret power one (which i learnt about thanks to this post on the ribbons subreddit). my general strategy was:

turn 1: double team for the 1st pumped-up star.

turn 2: double team for the 2nd pumped-up star.

turn 3: secret power! (big boost thanks to being pumped up!)

turn 4: double team for the 3rd pumped-up star.

turn 5: secret power! (for yet another big boost thanks to being pumped up!)

the audience wasn't too pleased about the repeated double team on turn 2, but that didn't matter, as reides was able to win each and every contest category on his first attempt.

since he got the 5 ribbons for winning each contest category at its master rank, reides also got the contest star ribbon as an added bonus!

this was the last ribbon that i needed in gen6, which meant that reides' time in hoenn had come to an end. after wandering around the region a bit, peeking into various friends' secret bases and seeing the sights... it was time to pack our bags once more and gear up for the next part of reides' adventure.

gen7 has even less ribbons than gen6, but i never thought that the battle maison would end up being such a big challenge in gen6 - so who knows how gen7 will go?! (...i do, actually, because i was slightly evil and grinded out gen7's ribbons before making this post. sorry. i won't spoil it, though.) regardless, i hope you enjoyed reading about reides' gen6 journey!

[redhoodiedemon]

The Most Wonderful Time of the Year (The Mean One x F!Reader) NSFW

Divider by: @/dollywons

Ship: The Mean One x Reader Word Count: 1901 Summary: Your new town has a legend about a Christmas monster. Your rage towards the holiday drives you to conduct an experiment. Ratings/Warnings: 18+, sexual situations, medical gore Notes: i warned yall

Divider By: @/fic-dumpster

It has always surrounded you at this time of year, this feeling of melancholy that sank deep into your soul, loading down your heart with lead and leaving a stone in the pit of your stomach. As you walked down the crowded main street of your town, now covered in twinkling lights, red ribbons, and huge green wreaths on every street lamp, you only felt a sense of sadness that haunted you like a poltergeist that had attached itself to your back and followed your every move. Maybe it was because you were a woman of logic and reason, unmoved by childish notions of magic and wonder. You were a scientist, after all. A surgeon, specifically. You moved into Newville earlier this year when a job opened up at the city’s hospital. Sure, it was in the morgue, but a job’s a job. Or maybe, you admitted to yourself, you were just a little bit… lonely. After all, you had been so focused on your career, you hadn’t been on a date in years. Usually you were fine with that, but as the nights got colder you started to feel more and more repressed. 

You had heard the legends of the killing spree from the year prior. The Christmas monster. How a local woman killed the bastard. And how his remains are in an unmarked grave in the mountains. As you arrived at your place of work, you glanced at the filing cabinets full of autopsy reports for every corpse that entered the morgue. They use that story to attract tourists to the town this time of year, say he’s really still alive, hiding in the mountains, waiting to strike again. The swarm of loud, drunken amateur hikers that suddenly descended upon the usually quiet little town was not helping your grouchy mood. 

Your first assignment that day was already waiting for you. You read through the crime report: a man in his mid-40s had been collecting donations for the local orphanage outside the town diner when he was mowed down by some drunk tourists in Santa Claus suits. By the condition of the body you concluded the cause of death was blunt force trauma to the head. As you looked into the lifeless green eyes of the man, and you couldn’t help but think to yourself, “There goes the last decent person in this town.” 

“So then, screw the rest of them.” said another voice in your head. You thought back to the time you spent in Europe, apprenticing for one of the most controversial scientists of all time. This town wants their monster back? I can give them their monster back. 

You were surprised at just how much detail was included in the autopsy report, all things considered. They even recorded the exact spot where the body was buried. You read the cause of death. His heart had exploded due to rapid growth. That would make this easier. You wouldn’t need any other spare parts, not a stomach, or a pair of lungs, or even a brain. Just a heart. And you knew just where to get the last good heart in this town. You gathered all the necessary supplies and loaded them into the ambulance, which you drove up to the mountain. The corpse was right where the report said it would be. 

Back inside your attic, all the preparations were already made. You had always been ready for when you would follow in the footsteps of your mentor back in Switzerland. You washed up and began the grotesque operation, removing the bloody Santa Claus suit, then the green fur, now caked with red blood, which surrounded the open chest wound. You opened the wound further to remove the defunct heart and replace it with the fresh one. You closed the wound with stitches, careful not to let your blood soaked fingers drop the tiny needle. And now it was time for the hard part. Praying you had assembled your equipment in the correct fashion as recorded very specifically and meticulously by your demented and deceased mentor, You spun the wheel which opened the doors in the ceiling, and then pulled the chain which raised the gurney into the night sky.

What was probably going to be the last thunderstorm until spring time was raging outside. You ran to the control panel and frantically flipped switches, pulled levers, and pushed buttons, all the while glancing up at the gurney hanging high in the sky. Just then, lightning cracked through the sky, striking the lightning rod you had attached to the gurney and travelling all the way up and down the table. It was the once-in-a-lifetime moment you had been hoping for. Hastily, you ran back to the chain and pulled the gurney back down into the lab, then spun the wheel to close the doors in the ceiling to prevent the rain from coming in. You turned to the figure lying still on the gurney, waiting breathlessly for any sign of life. You waited. And waited. And waited. You inched closer to it, staring into its face, every nerve of your body on fire in the dead silence. You began to think you had made a miscalculation somewhere, the experiment had failed. Then its eyes opened.

They were a horrible, shocking red, staring directly at you like a crazed animal. You stumbled back in shock and crawled backwards until you hit the wall. The creature rose up slowly and eyed you warily. For a few pulse-pounding moments, neither of you moved. Then suddenly, he lunged. You flinched, bracing for impact, but he went right past you, out the door and into the night. You hastily crawled over to the window, but you couldn’t find him. You turned away from the window and stared at the empty room, and wondered, “What have I done?”

You spent one sleepless night in your attic only to hear no news of a new murder in the town the next morning. But, as the days went on, you began to hear about a few attacks, but nothing fatal, and the tourists hiking the mountains tell people in town they had seen the monster around the same cave where he was originally discovered, and began to wonder if it was true. When you went to the cave you found the rumors were true after all, and like a true scientist, you began to observe your subject, fearing the attacks would become fatal once again. The more you watched, the more you realized just how human he was. He hated loud noises, people encroaching on his property, and rude behavior, all of which amplified during the holiday season. All he really wanted was peace. And, the more you observed, the more you realized that not only was he just like any other human, but he was like you, specifically. And all at once you found the answer to the question that everyone in the town puzzled over for years. You knew exactly the reason, without any doubt. And so you knew what you had to do.

It was Christmas Eve night. The air was still, and freezing cold. You wrapped your jacket around you tighter as you climbed up the mountain. As you entered the cave, a warmth emitted from the deep within. He must have lit a fire down here to keep warm. You ventured further and further in, and then you saw him. Though he eyed you warily, he didn’t look angry. 

“You remember me?” You said. He took a step closer. “I think I know why you become more aggressive and irritated this time of year.” It was now or never. You unzippered your coat and slid it off your shoulders, revealing to him your naked body underneath. “It’s your mating season, and you have no mate. So, it you’d like, you can use me instead.”

Now, he approached you slowly, never taking his eyes off of you. You felt the heat rising between your legs as he stared so intensely at you. Then, he walked straight past you, towards a large boulder at the entrance of the cave. He rolled it to cover the entrance completely. You shivered at the sheer strength he displayed. Then, he turned towards you again. Closing the distance between you and him and cupped your face in his hands gently. You noticed how soft his fur was against your skin. Then, he kissed you, slowly and passionately, his tongue moving against yours expertly, and you realized that his body heat ws making you so warm. His hands moved to caress your body, and soon he lifted you up into his arms while you hooked your legs around his waist. In doing so, you felt a hard cock, usually hidden by folds of skin, pressing against your heat. You were right after all.

He carried you to lay on the smooth rock next to the fire, which was burning in a makeshift fire pit he constructed. Upon closer inspection, the cave was actually quite cozy, the rock above you reformed into such a way that the smoke from the fire could escape without it drawing attention to his location. He was kissing your neck desperately and letting out soft whines as his dick rubbed up against your folds. He moved down to lick and suck on your tits, moaning wantonly as he pressed his face in between them and kneaded them in his long, soft, fuzzy fingers. You moaned as he came up to kiss your lips again, and then slid himself into you. A loud gasp escaped you when you felt him filling you up better than anything else you had experienced in your life. He began bucking his hips into yours. You shifted your hips to sink down further on his cock. Then, it happened. A spot near the base of his cock expanding inside of you, locking him in position balls deep inside of your pussy. You let out a lustful scream. God, that felt good. With his thick tip pounding desperately into your cervix and his knot massaging your G-spot, it’s no wonder you came in only a couple minutes. To your surprise, he came, too, letting out a harsh, throaty growl. But, as you came down from your high, you realized his knot hadn’t gone down. It was just as large as before, still buried inside of you. You looked at his face. It was hazy with lust, and his eyes bore intensely into yours. Your heart fluttered with thrill. You were in for a very, very long night.

By the time he finally came down and pulled himself off of you, it was well into the morning. You could tell by the light creeping in through the cracks in parts of the cave’s ceiling. You rolled over to your side to cling to him, shivering in the cold air. He wrapped his big arms around you, pressing you tight to him and rubbing your back slowly. You reached up to kiss him again, which gained you a satisfied hum. You had tamed this beast, this monster, this creature. Your creature. You decided you would stay, for the rest of the morning, and into the night, and maybe the next day. You were in no rush to leave. For the first time in a long time, you were spending the holiday with someone you loved.

[desertdollranch]

Opening and reviewing my first Starpath doll

As a doll collector, one of the most exciting experiences is obtaining a "holy grail" doll you've dreamed of having for a long time. I got to do that today, when I welcomed a Starpath doll into my collection!

Starpath dolls were one of those 18 inch doll companies that are available for a few years, and then suddenly and without notice go defunct. That's disappointing, because these are really nice quality dolls, and they were paired with story books that could be customized to have yourself as the main character in magical adventures. There were four dolls available in different ethnicities, all with non-character names: Wishing Star, Wandering Star, Shining Star, and Morning Star.

It's been about four years since these dolls were discontinued, and because of their short period of availability and their low popularity, they are quite hard to find now. And when they are listed for sale secondhand, the sellers always list them for a whole lot more than they're worth. So they all sit around unsold for years and years, in the hands of uninterested, mega-profit-motivated sellers rather than collectors who actually WANT to own them. That's pretty common in the secondhand world, and it's always sad to see.

So I got super lucky finding my Starpath doll, Wishing Star, for a serious bargain price, at just a fraction of what I've seen them listed for.

Keep reading below the cut to see my review of Wishing Star!

I love coming home to a doll-shaped box on my front patio.

It did get soaked in the sudden downpour, but my girl was wrapped up right in protective plastic.

She arrived in her original outfit, including her socks and shoes.

Unfortunately she does have some stains on her face, but I'm confident I can get them off with either a good scrub or a benzoyl peroxide treatment.

Her hair is a wig, not rooted. It's very soft and silky. Her eyes do not open and close.

Her body composition is similar to American Girl dolls, with the soft cloth torso and limbs that can be posed. Her arms go up and down just fine, but she can't lift them up and out very far.

She's stitched up the same way. Her head is held on with zip ties.

She has nice details in her fingers and toes. Looks like her previous owner put some clear nail polish on them.

Her body tag is so cute. "Made in China with love for Starpath Dolls." (The website listed there is not only defunct, but I get a warning from my browser that the site may be trying to steal information from me, so you're missing nothing by not going there).

I put her in a few different American Girl and Our Generation outfits, and she fits perfectly into them. Including the shoes!

Overall I'm very pleased with her! She's beautiful, great quality, and definitely worth waiting for.

I don't have her name picked out yet. I've narrowed it down to five choices right now. Then once she's named, she'll get to meet her three younger sisters!

[runwayrunway]

No. 30 - LATAM Airlines

I wasn't entirely forthright last time. About the correct response to my questionnaire, I mean. I didn't lie. I just left out the second half.

Yes. It was a trick question. Brazil has four carriers that have, at one point or another, had solid claim to the title of flag carrier. And right now, the airline which represents them on the long-haul scale, their link to the world, their 'flag carrier'...is LATAM Airlines.

Why doesn't LATAM count? Well, because LATAM is...something quite unusual, a conglomeration of different features which appear in isolation but have yet to rear their head together, creating an admixture which I fear casts a shadow over much, if not all, of Latin America.

LATAM's story doesn't start in Brazil. It starts in Chile. But it doesn't stay there.

What do all these airlines have in common?

Their planes look like this now.

LAN-Chile was privatized in the 1990s. Until then, it had been the country's flag carrier. Now it was on the hunt to become something more. It was one thing to be the largest carrier in Chile, but there's more than just Chile out there. International carriers know this well, since they go outside of Chile.

Around the same time as LAN-Chile was privatized, LAN Perú was created as an independent company. It was a rough time for Peruvian aviation. Its flag carrier, Aeroperú, had just gone under, and its other major airline, Faucett, had lead the way for it two years earlier. They needed a new national airline, and LAN was there, identical in branding to the Chilean carrier of the same name. Unsurprisingly, it was officially made a subsidiary of LAN in 2002. Even the livery was changed.

Over 70% of the market share was now held by what was essentially a Chilean airline, without even the name of the country it served written on its livery.

Also in 2002, LAN created another subsidiary - LAN Ecuador. It obviously looked the exact same as the other two LANs, so I have simply added another picture of a LAN Chile airplane. There is no reason I should care enough not to.

The LAN livery? Well, it's fine. I like the size of the wordmark and the way they committed to having half the fuselage covered, as should be the minimum, though other airlines do this exact shape far better; the layered light and dark blues are nice.

C. For Chile. Or maybe Peru. Or whatever else.

Another subsidiary was created, LAN Dominicana. Argentine airline Aero 2000 was acquired and became LAN Argentina. Both are now defunct.

Colombia's second-largest airline, AIRES, also fell prey to the LAN infection which had now firmly planted its roots and its routes across the continent.

I actually more or less like the AIRES livery, which makes me sad. It's got a real sense of forward motion with those swooping lines and the high placement of the forward-leaning letters. It's...nothing special, but it's good enough.

It's at least worth a C+. I wish it still existed.

It could have been worse - Avianca, Colombia's flag carrier, held on, and is still in operation - one of the only challenges to LAN and what is now LATAM in South America. I'm sure they would have liked to have Avianca, and Panamanian flag carrier Copa, too, but even Copa draws the line here. But Copa and Avianca were small fry. There was only one carrier standing between them and utter domination - the largest airline in all of Latin America.

In 2011, TAM and LAN finalized a binding agreement to merge. The two companies fused into one, by far the largest holding company in Latin America, though much like the many LANs it continued to operate as separate companies. TAM still wore its own livery, but time was catching up to it.

TAM isn't a hero here. Well, nobody is, these are giant corporations that paint different things on their airlines, but my point is that TAM had done nearly the exact same thing.

LAP (Líneas Aéreas Paraguayas) was the flag carrier of Paraguay, until it wasn't. In 1994 it was privatized and sold to an Ecuadorian-Paraguayan consortium which also owned now-defunct Ecuatorean airline SAETA. (Their livery was boring.)

It began operations again as LAPSA Air Paraguay. Much the reverse of the LANs, this was SAETA operating under Paraguayan branding. But this only lasted until 1996, when TAM's Paraguayan subsidiary ARPA (Aerolíneas Paraguayas) acquired it and it was merged into TAM, with...you guessed it...the same livery. (Their livery was boring, though I always appreciate a nice bisected wordmark.)

This is TAM's livery from 2005 to 2008. What was now TAM Paraguay of course shared it.

This is the point where we stop and ask: why do I care? Doesn't this happen everywhere, all the time? Didn't like, thirty legacy carriers eventually merge into five in the US? Well, none of those were really a flag carrier, as much as certain brands like TWA were massive it just doesn't feel like it's quite the same. Not to mention that, unlike LATAM, which operates separate airlines in identical branding, when Delta absorbed Northwest or United swallowed Continental the entirety of their operations were merged into one company. It was what I'd call a 'true' operational merger rather than just occurring at the corporate level, like LATAM.

But aren't a lot of flag carriers owned by some combination of the same holding companies? The best-known example: doesn't Air France own KLM?

Well, sort of, yes. The merger between Air France and KLM is actually quite similar to the LAN-TAM merger in the sense that it's officially a merger but it's quite clear who's absorbing who. The merged company which became LATAM, despite taking a new name (combining LAN and TAM to make the admittedly clever LATAM) kept LAN's CEO, membership in oneworld rather than Star Alliance, and airport slots. It's 60% owned by Banco de Chile. It also keeps LAN's use of literally identical liveries for its branches instead of just mostly identical ones. All of the airlines which are part of LATAM are still operating as if nothing happened despite the fact that, in the sense of branding and identity, they just don't exist anymore.

But KLM obviously exists. In fact, KLM is an upcoming post! Because what LATAM is doing is pretty unusual!

Lufthansa owns Brussels Airlines, Austrian Airlines, and whatever the flag carrier of Switzerland is. The same company owns British Airways and Iberia. None of those brands have been retired. Is it because it would cause massive backlash and thus lose money? I mean, probably, but that's never stopped companies from doing anything. I wouldn't be surprised if it were written into merger agreements in all honesty. When Davey Neeleman and his investie acquired custody of TAP it was on the condition they keep their base in Lisbon. I wouldn't be surprised if Lufthansa's contract included "let Belgium keep its flag carrier, even if it's owned by a German company".

It is almost aggressively normal for one massive conglomerate to own multiple seemingly unrelated brands. Everyone knows the thing about Mars owning every major candy at this point. But that isn't the same thing. That's like if every Mars-owned candy was branded as CANDY YOU CAN BUY IN AMERICA. Not even HERSHEY'S BAR YOU CAN BUY IN AMERICA. Just CANDY YOU CAN BUY IN AMERICA.

It's not TAM, a member of the LATAM Group. It's not LAN Perú. It's LATAM.

Perhaps the strange legacy of Brazilian flag carriers contributes to this fate. Perhaps those of other countries would be less willing to go along with it. You might think that. But the answer is far more gruesome: this is normalized in Latin America.

Avianca is an old, tenured airline with its own history. The Avianca Group is the second-largest airline holding group in Latin America and unfortunately does the exact same thing, being the death knell to flag carriers: El Salvador's TACA (which occupies a similar nominal-partner status as the former TAM), Costa Rica's LACSA, and Guatemala's Aviateca (which I would call a flag carrier by process of elimination, much like TAM), which had fallen to TACA before its absorption.

Believe it or not, Copa, which doesn't even have its own livery, is one of the largest bastions of brand identity freedom still clinging to life. Other competitively large flag carriers still operating in Latin America include Argentina's Aerolíneas Argentinas; Bolivia's Boliviana de Aviación; Cuba's Cubana de Aviación; and Mexico's Aeroméxico; though smaller flag carriers are scattered throughout it seems like basically the entirety of what could be called LATAM is now part of either LATAM or Avianca.

The only way to tell LATAM planes' airline of origin is by looking at the flag near the front and/or the registration, if you happen to know the registration codes for its member countries off the dome.

LATAM operates across six (formerly nine, including a cargo branch in Mexico) countries. It is the dominant airline in Chile, Ecuador, Paraguay, and Perú, and is the largest international airline in Brazil. Its branch in Colombia is outshone by Avianca, but that doesn't really matter, not to me. What matters is that five countries have no flag carrier, and isn't that weird and unnerving and sort of...bad?

This is a very baseless silly claim that means nothing, but it feels like LATAM (and Avianca, sort of) are trying to be the flag carrier of Latin America. And that's a terrible, worrying thing, given that this is an entire region of the world full of diverse countries which should have their own carrier, even if they're part of a larger international holding company. It's normal for airlines to purchase stakes or even majorities in other airlines when they're struggling financially, but it's almost the opposite of this. When Delta offered to buy a stake in JAL it felt like it was almost with the intent to preserve the JAL brand, and this is the norm. There's a reason we still have Brussels Airlines and Austrian Airlines and [whatever your guess on the questionnaire was] instead of Lufthansa Belgium, Lufthansa Austria, and Lufthansa Switzerland. Even Lufthansa gets to claim superiority over LATAM.

So when I discuss the Star Alliance Test, I am talking about something incredibly silly. It's already a little absurd when talking about carriers that are actually members of Star Alliance, and becomes moreso when talking about ones that aren't. But if I happen to discuss a carrier in Latin America, saying "I think it would be a mercy to their livery to be absorbed into LATAM" is possible. It's terrifying. The LATAM test is scarier than even the SmartLynx test by nature of what it represents.

...but is the livery bad, though?

Yes it is!

To be clear, philosophically speaking LATAM deserves an F. This livery should not exist because of what it does to other carriers. But I'll be rating it neutrally of that, much like the alliance liveries. This is the point of my blog.

This was introduced in 2015, which really seems to be the turning point from detached tail to minimally-attached tail. Sure, it was one of the earliest adopters of this, but that doesn't make me respect the bare minimum much more. It has the same problem nearly every implementation of this does, where it looks totally adequate on shorter planes but hilariously bad on longer ones.

This livery in particular is begging for an extension because of this really pretty ribbon-wrapping effect. Why does everything just cut off abruptly at the same point? Why doesn't more of the grey bleed to the main fuselage? Why doesn't that nice blue ribbon keep going? Literally what is stopping you other than convention? Why is the entire underside white except for that tiny little logo, located weirdly high and small where nobody will ever see it?

LATAM has this fantastic color scheme, a beautiful combination of fuchsia and midnight blue which looks stunning on the light cool grey they've chosen for the tail. And they blew it all on a tail-only livery with a mainly white body. They didn't even put it on the nacelles. I'm very exhausted.

The entire livery is centered around this logo. It's approximately the shape of South America and admittedly very nice-looking. I like that the logo almost looks like a descender while the wordmark is above the windowline, but these sorts of little details are absolutely nothing when your plane is a big long white tube with a nice-looking tail transplanted on from a better livery.

LATAM's livery gets a D+.

And this is what we've lost so much to get. LAM, TAN, AIRES, SAETA...we are nearing a dark future where airports across Latin America are just lines of white planes, a thin line carved out by pretty tails cut off before their time.

[kylesvariouslistsandstuff]

Also, apparently this... Something that raises questions...

John Leguizamo apparently confirms a new ICE AGE movie is in the works...

That's merely a kernel of a possible announcement. It could all be moot, but... I do wanna talk about what the future of ICE AGE could be...

I wouldn't put it past Disney to barrel ahead with another ICE AGE movie, despite the fact that they shut down the studio that originated the franchise, Blue Sky Studios.

And suppose a new ICE AGE movie comes out a few years from now, as a 20th Century Studios Animation film WITHOUT any Blue Sky logo or mention, because they no longer exist as a studio... Well, that'll certainly sting, for sure.

Interestingly though, ICE AGE did not begin life at Blue Sky. It was originally going to be a 2D animated film that Don Bluth and Gary Goldman would've been involved with, and it was going to be made at the long-defunct Fox Animation Studios. The studio where Bluth and Goldman made ANASTASIA and TITAN A.E in 1997 and 2000 respectively. The latter feature's flopping put the nail in the Fox Animation Studios coffin by the end of 2000, but before that movie came out, ICE AGE was shifted over to Blue Sky once 20th Century Fox acquired them. So, if we do see an ICE AGE 6, it'll certainly suck remembering what Disney did to Blue Sky, but at the same time I understand that ICE AGE could continue either way with or without the studio where the first movie was made. Sad animation facts-of-life things, you know?

When Disney acquired Blue Sky as part of the Fox package from the Murdochs, it was made clear that Iger and all of them saw potential in future ICE AGE and RIO stuff. RIO's the only other Blue Sky picture to have gotten a sequel. HORTON HEARS A WHO!, EPIC, FERDINAND, etc. didn't. THE PEANUTS MOVIE curiously has a sequel happening at WildBrain, but that's because... It's PEANUTS. I just find it neat that the new PEANUTS movie coming out is using the same style and look of THE PEANUTS MOVIE, so it's basically the sequel to that. Albeit, from another studio. Some of the same crew involved.

That BUCK WILD thing will probably be brought up, but I always saw that as what it is: Some direct-to-video/TV caliber thing like RETURN OF JAFAR. It was first envisioned as a TV series anyways, and Blue Sky had no involvement. Blue Sky's final ICE AGE media was that fun little series SCRAT TALES, that was on Disney+. A fitting send-off to a pioneering studio that did not need to be shut down.

The spirit of Blue Sky, I feel, lives on in Annapurna Animation, who got Blue Sky's NIMONA - which was deep in the works when Disney pulled the plug on Blue Sky - and got it to the finish line. ICE AGE and RIO director Chris Wedge, among other notables, are at Annapurna right now working on some neat-sounding stuff.

But no, Disney likes money, many of the ICE AGE movies are among the highest-grossing animated movies. DAWN OF THE DINOSAURS and CONTINENTAL DRIFT each made over $870m worldwide. COLLISION COURSE saw something of a good-sized dip in 2016 ($408m worldwide, half of what the last two took in), suggesting that maybe the juice was running low... But, ICE AGE is now a 22-year-old movie, soon to be 23 in March 2025... Enough time has supposed, Disney probably could ride the sorta SHREK 5 approach with nostalgic late '90s/early '00s kids who grew up on the ICE AGE movies. Boom, instant big buckeroos.

And who would make it? Well, it'd be a 20th Century Studios release I reckon, with animation services provided by like a DNEG-type studio (they finished NIMONA for Annapurna). I doubt they'd have Disney Animation do it, ditto Pixar.

The only animated 20th Century Studios movies that went to theaters, post-Disney buyout, were pictures that were already in the works prior to that... RON'S GONE WRONG, THE BOB'S BURGERS MOVIE. All waylaid by COVID, no less. What else? Nothing, and nothing on the horizon, either.

With Blue Sky's shutdown in February 2021 also came the kibosh of everything they and 20th Century Fox Animation had lined up. Disney also jettisoned their deal with Locksmith, the studio that did RON'S GONE WRONG (which DNEG also provided animation services for), sooo their future pics are either with Netflix (the upcoming THAT CHRISTMAS) or Warner Bros. (BAD FAIRIES, THE LUNAR CHRONICLES, et al.)

The only post-2019 animated features to come out of 20th Century were Disney+ titles, those DIARY OF A WIMPY KID movies, the BUCK WILD thing, and the animated NIGHT AT THE MUSEUM pic. Since Disney has always had Disney Animation and Pixar, and not only shut down Blue Sky, but also Disneytoon Studios back in mid-2018, it just seems like they're not interested in having a third animation studio. But I can see occasional animated movies coming out of 20th Century Studios every now and then, but only if they're from a well-established franchise.

ICE AGE, obviously, is that. So is RIO. And of course a second SIMPSONS movie is inevitable, probably a FAMILY GUY movie at some point. But that's about it... So, if ICE AGE 6 even happens... I suppose that's how it'll happen.

I find it funny how this all came up... A few days after someone did fanart of the original ICE AGE, with the three friends reuniting with the human baby all grown up... Legacy sequels are a big deal now, sooooo... Uhhhh, maybe that could happen? I don't know lol.

Also funnily enough, to go off on a tangent... I've been listening to this song lately...

You might be thinking... What does that have to do with ICE AGE?

That song above is by a group called Rusted Root, off of their first album - CRUEL SUN, released in 1992. CRUEL SUN also had a song on it called 'Send Me On My Way', which Rusted Root remade in 1994 for their album WHEN I WOKE. That version of the song is the one that became a hit single, and the very version that you hear in the mid-movie montage in the first ICE AGE... An iconic folky worldly-sounding '90s song... and ICE AGE was where I - at age 9 1/2 - first heard it...

I just thought that was kind of a fun coincidence, really.

That was THE era of putting pop songs like that into animated movies, or having the hired musicians write songs like that in lieu of theatre-style musical numbers (think Randy Newman on the TOY STORY movies). ICE AGE used 'Send Me On My Way' in the same way the SHREK soundtrack used its more eccentric song choices, the year prior. And by the end of the 2000s, it became a real norm for these kinds of films... Needledrops, as the cool folk say...