#i feel like i'm going to end up making a followup to this at some point; whether by itself or in a different post about adjacent meta

[angorwhosebabyisthis]

Pericles and Purple Scarves (or: why the fuck is the parrot so horny, and why does it matter)

(or: did i think about this way too much, or exactly the right amount? yes.)

[cws: fantasy racism/ableism, dehumanization, mention of homophobia and canon-typical grooming, non-detailed discussion of canon-typical SA/sexual harassment and canon-typical bestiality. this show is a thing and a half]

-

something i think about a lot is that like.... i joke about how delightful it is for various reasons that they made pericles So Relentlessly Horny, and it's fucking hilarious to me to see in real-time the dawning horror of people watching the show for the first time and realizing he's sexy. (their reactions to the tentacle scene are comedy fucking gold every time.)

on a doylist level the creators are obviously paying homage to his voice actor, making him stand out from the other mascots, and trying to make him charismatic, memorable, and that much more uncomfortable to the audience. and it worked! pretty much everyone thinks he's one of the best scooby-doo villains out there, and they're right.

(i'm not biased, i swear.)

when you look at it in-character, though, it makes a lot of sense that he'd be that way, and that's important. he's doing it on purpose.

for one thing--again--he stands out among all the other talking animals we see, because he is the one who comes across most as a depiction (an intentional one, anyway 🙃) of an actual person who happens to be shaped like a bird. the others all are Some Kind of Uniquely Goofy in the way that they act, be it how they talk or their general mannerisms or the fact that none of them seem to really have an implied Age. pericles is the only one who doesn't have some kind of silly voice or speech impediment or catchphrase what-have-you, and he's also the only one who comes across as being in specific life stages you could map onto a human corresponding to how old he is. he's even the only time we ever hear mention of a talking animal being a child, or having been once. everyone but pericles is just Mascot-Aged.

(fwiw, my personal read is that scooby is about the same age as the gang or equivalent. also there is So Much to unpack here about all that re: the mascots in general but that's a post for another time)

and the one thing they all have in common except pericles is that they are NOT supposed to be sexy. if anything, the ones we actually see talking (in a fever dream, to be fair) except scooby and pericles are obviously meant to be borderline or outright really goddamn annoying. (reggie/dyno-mutt is adorable but he is also on thin ice with me on this one, sorry little guy.)

and like. all of this lines up with the fact that the talking animals very obviously represent disabled people. even moreso than they represent racial minorities, which they very much do! they're a lot further toward ableism on the sliding scale of xeno bigotry (which is a big reason i'm iffy about just calling it fantasy racism). the infantilization of disabled people is, you know, A Whole Ass Thing, and being aggressively desexualized is a major part of that. Disabled People and Disabled Mannerisms are a Bonerkill.

enter pericles, who does not truck with any of this shit.

i've already got a lot of posts planned going into this subject in general, because there is So Much. but in short, the thing to remember when you examine anything about pericles is that he lives in a world that draws zero distinction between people like him and animals.

practically everything he does is, on some level or another, him yelling FUCK YOU LOOK AT ME I AM A PERSON, LOOK. I'LL MAKE YOU IF I HAVE TO. and what's something animals don't do, whether actual animals or annunaki descendants (at least the latter ones he's probably been around most)? they don't flirt. they aren't sexy. they don't act like a brand of seductive, even skeevy, person you might feasibly meet irl, if maybe a theatrical larger-than-life one who runs in certain circles.

(gay ones, to be specific. super, super gay ones. more on that in a minute.)

and, what's more: they don't flirt with humans. we never see anyone really comment on the very obvious Thing he's always had going on with ricky; but that doesn't come across as them thinking it's normal or acceptable so much as not noticing that it's a thing at all. it is that aggressively unthinkable that it would be. and this is backed up even more by the fact that people hear scooby ask shaggy if he's cheating on him by having a girlfriend and think nothing of it, and it continues to be treated as Romance vs Platonic Friendship/Pet Ownership. Gal Pals, but Worse!

so yeah, we have no idea what society would think of anunnaki descendants having sexual/romantic relationships with humans that they couldn't ignore. presumably it would be Pretty Well Disapproved Of, but like. who the fuck knows.

what we DO know is that pericles is considered so utterly beneath personhood that no one would so much as blink at him fucking an honest right to god animal. if it were anyone other than, y'know, pericles, they might even think it was cute.

(AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA.)

(moving on.)

so all things considered, as you can imagine holy SHIT would he have a reason or two to broadcast as hard as he can that not only that he is A Sexual Being, but one intended to appeal to human standards. it brings to mind queer people presenting in ways meant to be attractive to other queers, not straight people, except, well. instead of trying to get the attention of supportive people like you on the downlow, because you don't want the majority to know what kind of sexuality you're announcing, he's blaring I AM ONE OF YOU at that majority out of desperation and spite.

which, speaking of signaling queerness: pericles is a hundred percent gay-coded, as in the actual definition of 'as close to explicit as they could get away with, done on purpose.' there's the obvious--his relationship with ricky--but his VA, who he is to some extent modeled after, is an openly gay indie horror film icon, and given that and the time period he grew up in i don't think it's a coincidence that the one piece of clothing he chooses to wear is a purple scarf. (they even made him a sexual predator! yippee!)

so like, if anything it's pretty feasible that he might have actually observed that kind of thing as a phenomenon, especially with the demographic he'd actually be interested in, and pick it up accordingly. who knows if he ever managed to actually, y'know, Involve Himself with any human men--my interpretation is that he did and it went poorly 🥲--but it makes sense to me that he'd wear something like that; that he'd use his one opportunity to express himself with clothing to go HI HELLO I AM A PERSON DID I MENTION I LIKE MEN. WHO ARE PEOPLE. BECAUSE I DO

......and he STILL gets ignored no matter how hard he tries. i feel like that's one of the reasons he ended up being such a creep, honestly: operating on similar logic to the tag rant in this post, the conclusion he comes to is that well fuck you, you can't ignore me having a sexuality if i make it a problem for you. even if you try to pretend sexual violence and harassment aren't sexual, or don't recognize that it's happening at all, you are not going to walk away unaffected by it. if the only lasting evidence he's able to leave in the world that he's a person is causing damage that can't be shrugged off or undone, so be it.

(a real irony, isn't it, given how things turn out in the end.)

and like. this is one of the things that really bothers me about people trying to act like you shouldn't ship pericles or think he's attractive because Ew Gross Cringe That's an Animal (or transparently pretending it's because Problematic, not because cringe). either way do what you want 'cause a pirate is free, to be clear, but like... that's the point, man. that's the whole point. the writers are assholes who wanted you to miss it, and you did.

basically: just about everything pericles does is acting out in some way or another, and that's why we know what this man would sound like busting a nut. you're welcome.

[ghostzzy]

googles ‘how to stop feeling guilty all the time about everything’

[heliianth]

mini meta because i cant get this fucking scene out of my brain:

its one of my fav Alluka scenes because its a sneak peek into her frankly miraculous emotional intelligence that simultaneously contextualizes it. She's still a little kid. Alluka is a smart cookie who can properly recognize and identify what people are feeling, can generally guess why they're feeling it, and get an idea of what would make them happy. But that "feeling" is hate for her, and what would make them happy is her disappearing. Really heartbreaking.

but the way Killua responds is also pretty fascinating to me? like, he pivots so fucking hard LOL. And I get it, it's such a loaded question. Would the Zoldycks be happier if Alluka was gone? Realistically, the answer is no... but admitting that would require a self-awareness about his family and his abuse Killua doesn't have yet. He probably doesn't even know how to answer, doesn't know what the answer even is.

So instead of digging into that can of worms, Killua cocks his own shotgun and fires back another loaded question: "If I were the only one who loved you in the whole world... would that make you sad?"

There were like a dozen other, much safer ways to both avoid this question and comfort Alluka. It's not even a full dodge, it's directly related to Alluka's fear via implication (the rest of the family doesn't love you). And it's not like Killua hasn't verbally weaseled his way out of tougher conversations. So... why?

I'm gonna try to truncate my full thoughts because I literally have a WIP 5k+ meta about it and I don't want to go down that rabbit hole, but Killua projects onto Alluka and Nanika a lot in this arc. Keeping that in mind, I think this question is his best, most earnest way of comforting Alluka because this train of thought is what's comforted him in the past.

I mean, think about it. Someone who will love and accept you no matter who you are or what you've done? Just one person who doesn't care? He's putting himself in the position of Alluka's Gon-figure here. And if you buy into that, the followup—"I'll always be there for you. Don't worry about anyone else"—reveals how a portion of his subconscious saw his emotionally dependent relationship with Gon as well; that is, as a comforting means to psychologically avoid confronting harder questions about himself, his upbringing, or how other people view him. It's kind of no coincidence that the minute Gon is wholly and totally incapacitated and Killua starts mucking around with the revolutionary idea of boundaries, he immediately starts thinking about his family again (in some manner).

And as an indulgent aside, I want to point out that when he ends up sending Nanika—who is, unlike Alluka, a subject of Killua's darker and more self-hating projections—away and Alluka fights back instead of internalizing it, Killua immediately recognizes the irrationality...

...because it breaks the mirror.

anyway. squeezes and shakes them like squeaky toys

[tinytalkingtina]

Not Your "Cute Little Button"

Written for the @strangerthingswritersguild kinktober day 10 prompt "size"

Rating: E (18+ only please) | 1.2k words | Ao3 link Now with a followup fic: Not A "Big Deal"

Tags: Steve/Eddie, Eddie has a micropenis, Steve loses his mind over said micropenis, mutual insecurities, blow jobs, fluff/smut/comfort, modern AU, bisexual Eddie and Steve, no feminization

All under the cut because we jump right in haha!

"Eddie," Steve moaned out somewhere above him. "Eddie wait, hold on." He pulled off with a pop. Steve looked the picture of debauchery, laid out naked on the bed.

"You can go deeper," he offered. "Never had much of a gag reflex, trust me I’m really enjoying this." And oh was Eddie ever. Steve was thick and heavy on his tongue and so deliciously responsive.

Steve laughed.

"I can tell man, but I'm on the edge of exploding over here and you haven't even taken your pants off." Shit, Eddie had hoped to delay the inevitable for just one more date, to distract Steve with pleasure. But of course the guy would want to be a selfless gentleman about it.

"Oh, it's fine, these would be a bitch to take off anyway." he said, grasping at straws.

"Hey." Steve cupped his hand around Eddie's face. It took all of his willpower not to melt into a puddle of goo. "I just wanna make you feel good too."

"I. Thank you, but...it's not like I'm exactly packing down there, not much to work with." Eddie blushed as he admitted it. He couldn't look Steve in the eyes. "I'm sure you could feel it in the club."

Tipsy and belting out lyrics to some Madonna song, he'd forgotten himself for a minute and ground into Steve's gorgeous ass.

A thumb gently brushed his cheek. "I did, and it's okay, I wanna see all of you."

"Just. Don't laugh."

He'd had enough of taking someone home just for them to mock him when he took his clothes off. Of girls only using him for his hands and tongue, because why would they bother with something that wouldn't fill them up? Of guys not even asking what he wanted before turning him over and sticking fingers in his ass. At least now he had the self respect to pack it up and call it a night if someone cooed over his "cute little clitty" but.

He really liked Steve.

Their four dates had been great, with conversation flowing easily from the start. Something had just clicked for him with Steve in a way that no one had ever before. If Eddie wasn't careful, his heart was going to end up crushed to pieces beneath the weight of those soft eager eyes.

An appreciative once over across his tattoos as he stripped his shirt off gave him a little confidence, but he'd gone mostly soft from their conversation. It was with shaking hands that he undid his belt and pushed both his jeans and boxers off in one fell swoop to get this over with.

Steve's mouth fell open in a perfect "o" as he stared.

Eddie cringed, an apology halfway formed on his tongue when: 

"Can I blow you?" Steve sounded desperate.

He peeked over to find Steve's eyes were filled with heat.

"You, what?" Eddie asked, baffled. This wasn't how the scene usually played out.

"Please, I need to get my mouth on you right now."

Stunned, Eddie nodded and lowered himself down onto the mattress. Immediately, Steve pounced. He set to work sucking a hickey right on his thigh, and gave the tip of his dick little kitten licks. It didn't take long for Eddie to get hard again. Once he did, Steve let out a moan as he stared at all three and a quarter inches.

A quiet "Fuck!" was all the warning he got before Steve swallowed him whole. For a second, Eddie saw stars as he arched off the mattress. Steve's mouth was so warm and wet, and it had been so long since anyone had done this for him.

His hands instinctively reached for Steve's hair, and he was rewarded for his efforts by a pleased hum.

"St-Steve, sweetheart you feel so good." Eddie's mouth ran away from him, spitting out praises that Steve drank up. Nestled between his thighs with his eyes closed, he looked absolutely blissful.

After a while, he pulled off, a line of spit still connecting him to the tip of Eddie's dick. "Shit, can you—can you fuck my mouth? Never been able to take anyone else completely before, but you're so perfect Eddie please, use me. I want it so bad." Steve's pupils were so blown out his eyes were nearly black.

Trembling, Eddie nodded again. "Ye-yes, fuck, yeah we can do that?"

He slowly started pumping in and out of Steve's heavenly mouth, both of them letting out groans. Steadily, he built up steam and watched as the lips wrapped around his dick turned cherry red. It didn't take much for him to fall over the edge, a stuttered warning barely coming out before he did. Steve swallowed each and every drop, his tongue licking Eddie clean as he writhed beneath him.

Finally he stopped and sat back, breathing heavily. As Eddie tried to move his jellied limbs to reciprocate, Steve brought their lips together in a bruising kiss. 

"So hot baby, you should see how you look right now. Stay there, just like that." he babbled as he pumped his dick furiously. The tip was so dark it was nearly purple. "Can't wait to ride you next time, won't need any prep, can just sit all the way down and go as hard as I want immediately."

Eddie stared up, overwhelmed. Steve wanted a next time, wanted to bottom. Wanted him. 

"You're perfect." he whispered. That was all it took to get Steve to cum all over Eddie's chest. He collapsed with a gasp. Ignoring the sticky mess between them, he bundled Eddie up in his arms and immediately buried his face in his by-now very frizzed out curls.

"Thank you." Steve said. The words were muffled but the naked affection in his voice made Eddie's heart leap.

He couldn't help but giggle. “‘Thank you’ he says. Guy sucks my soul out through my dick and thanks me for the privilege?"

Steve hugged him tighter. "Yes, and I'll do it again. You know how many people try and get into my pants after thirty minutes of small talk? You actually wanted to get to know me first."

Eddie wriggled around to face Steve, taking his face in both his hands. 

"Fuck those people," he said solemnly. It was Steve's turn to giggle. 

"Sweetheart, don't get me wrong, I fully intend on writing like, an entire album's worth of ballads about your ass. But I really wanna hear you bitch about the new Star Wars sequels, and make you only slightly burnt toast in the mornings, and find out what your favorite color is because I'm only just realizing I don't know and we need to fix that."

Steve smiled softly as he tucked a stray curl behind Eddie's ear. "It's navy blue. Come on, let's go shower so you can stare at my ass some more. Need you to start writing those songs, clearly my self-esteem is in the toilet.”

Eddie felt the deep-seated ball of shame inside him slowly start to loosen. He was wanted, and if he was given permission to, he'd spend the rest of his life making sure the man tugging him towards the bathroom felt wanted too.

Author's notes: -Thanks to the STWG for being horny this morning and inspiring me to write today, and to @little-annie for giving it a quick once-over!

-Ended up taking this out in favor of showing that Eddie was interested in getting to know Steve before jumping straight to sex, but in this universe, Steve's gag reflex is not very good, and his past partners haven't been kind about it. So Eddie's dick is literally a g-dsend for him and his oral fixation. They will spend many evenings in the future with Steve in complete bliss cockwarming his boyfriend.

-Many thanks to steddiecameraroll-graphics for the divider!

[archaeren]

Hello!! I hope you're having a good day ^^ I came across your post about writing non-linearly on Notion and I'm excited to try it out because the advice resonated with me! Though, I'm really new to using the app and, if possible, need help with how to do this part: 'where every scene is a separate table entry and the scene is written in the page inside that entry.' ;v;

Hello! Thank you so much for messaging!!! Since that post about writing non-linearly (linked for context) blew up roughly ten thousand times as much as anything I've ever posted, I've been kind of meaning to make a followup post explaining more about how I use Notion for writing non-linearly, but, you know, ADHD, so I haven't done it yet. XD In the meantime, I'll post a couple screenshots of my current long fic with some explanations! I'd make this post shorter, but I'm unable to not be Chatty. XD (just ask my poor readers how long my author notes are...) (There is a phone app as well which syncs with the desktop/browser versions, but I work predominantly in the desktop app so that's what I'm gonna be showing)

(the table keeps going off the right side of the image but it's a bunch of unimportant stuff tbh) So this is more complicated than what you'll probably start with because I'm Normal and add a bunch of details that you might not need depending on what you're doing. For example, my fic switches POVs so I have a column for tracking that, and my fic follows a canon timeline so I have a column for dates so I can keep track of them, and I also made columns for things like if a scene had spoilers or certain content readers may want to avoid, which they can access in my spoiler and content guide for the fic. (As I said, I'm Normal.) I also do some complicated stuff using Status and estimated wordcount stuff to get an idea of how long I predict the content to be, but again, not necessary. Anyway, you don't need any of that. For the purposes of this explanation, we're just gonna look at the columns I have called Name, Order, and Status. (And one called Part, but we'll get into that later) Columns in Notion have different types, such as Text, Numbers, Select, Date, etc, so make sure to use the type that works best for the purpose of each column! For example, here I'm using Select for Character POVs, Number for Order and WC (wordcount), and Text for the In-Game Date. Okay let's get into it! Name is a column that comes in a Notion table by default, and you can't get rid of it (which drives me up the wall for some purposes but works totally fine for what we're doing here). As you can see on the scene I've labeled 'roll call', if you hover over a Name entry, a little button called 'Open' appears, which you click on to open the document that's inside the table. That's all default, you don't have to set anything up for it. Here's a screenshot of what it looks like when I click the one titled 'I will be anything for you' (I've scrolled down in the screenshot so you can see the text, but all the data fields also appear at the top of the page)

(This view is called 'side peek' meaning the document opens on one side and you can still see the table under it on the left, which is what mine defaults to. But you can set it to 'center peek' or 'full page' as well.) All my scenes have their own entry like this! Note that I've said scenes, not chapters. I decide the chapters later by combining the scenes in whatever combination feels right, which means I can often decide in advance where my chapter endings will be. This helps me consciously give most of my endings more impact than I was usually able to do when I tried to write linearly. So hopefully that gives you an idea of what I mean by writing inside the table and treating the table as a living outline. The 'Status' column is also pretty straightforward, and might require a little setup for whatever your needs are. This is another default column type Notion has which is similar to a Select but has a few more specialized features. This is how mine is set up:

(I don't actually use 'Done', idk why I left it there. Probably I should replace it with 'Posted' and use that instead of the checkmark on the far left? whatever, don't let anyone tell you I'm organized. XDD)

Pretty straightforward, it just lets me see easily what's complete and what still needs work. (You'll notice there's no status for editing, because like I mentioned in my other post, I don't ever sit down to consciously edit, I just let it happen as I reread) Obviously tailor this to your own needs! The Order column is sneakily important, because this is what makes it easy for me to keep the scenes organized. I set the Sort on the table to use the Order to keep the scene ordered chronologically. When I make the initial list of scenes I know the fic will have, I give all of them a whole number to put them in order of events. Then as I write and come up with new scene ideas, the new scenes get a number with a decimal point to put them in the spot they fit in the timeline. (you can't see it here, but some of them have a decimal three or four digits deep, lol). Technically you can drag them to the correct spot manually, but if you ever create another View in your table (you can see I have eight Views in this one, they're right under the title) it won't keep your sorting in the new View and you'll hate yourself when it jumbles all your scenes. XD (And if you get more comfortable with Notion, you probably will at some point desire to make more Views) The Part column isn't necessary, but I found that as the fic grew longer, I was naturally separating the scenes into different points along the timeline by changes in status quo, etc. (ex. "this is before they go overseas" "this is after they speak for the first time", stuff like that) in my mind. To make it easier to decide where to place new scenes in the timeline, I formalized this into Parts, which initially I named with short summaries of the current status quo, and later changed to actual titles because I decided it would be cool to actually use them in the fic itself. Since it's not in the screenshots above, here's what the dropdown for it looks like:

(I've blocked some of the titles out for spoiler reasons)

Basically I only mention the Parts thing because I found it was a useful organizational tool for me and I was naturally doing it in my head anyway. Anyway, I could keep talking about this for a really long time because I love Notion (don't get me started on how I use toggle blocks for hiding content I've edited out without deleting it) but that should be enough to get started and I should really, you know, not make this another insanely long post. XDD And if anybody is curious about how the final results look, the fic can be found here.

[kingdomoftyto]

I'm crying laughing, the DVDs are even worse than I remember... Season 1's menus are silent with a single static jpg of the same key character art they use for everything else, and the episodes on the Season 2 discs don't even match what's listed on the box! Absolutely stunning lack of shits given. Truly unparalleled. But I really shouldn't be surprised given... well... everything about how this series has been treated since the very beginning.

Time for a quick ~✨PHANDOM HISTORY LESSON✨~ to give newer/less hyperfixated folks more context for why the graphic novel being as great as it is is such a HUGE deal:

Danny Phantom was one of Nickelodeon's MAIN cartoons, in its time. It was a central pillar. One of the top three or four of their lineup, which is saying something when the competition includes the cultural juggernaut that is Spongebob.

Despite this, and despite its superhero theming making it perfectly marketable, it got basically ZERO official merch.

What little we did get was often ugly and very, very cheap. The dedication at the start of the graphic novel that jokes about collecting the Burger King toys? That's because it was some of the most notable merch the franchise EVER had. (I sadly do not have any of it. There was no BK in my hometown. Here's a pic from the internet, though, to give you an idea.)

If you think I'm exaggerating about that being the most significant physical merch to come out of the series, consider that the first video game had an entire menu option specifically for the Burger King promotional tie-in:

That video game, by the way, was one of only two ever based on the show. The first was an adaptation of "The Ultimate Enemy" in the style of a short sidescrolling beat-em-up, and the second was themed around "Urban Jungle" and (as far as I can tell--I've only played the first couple levels) was an arcade-style scrolling shooter. Both were for the Gameboy Advance, and both are...... fine, as far as cash-grabby video game tie-ins to kids' shows go. This was pretty normal for the time, so I suppose we did okay in that department, actually. They're not GOOD, but they're playable and have at least a bit of effort put into them.

But besides those two video games (plus a handful of simple, long-defunct Flash games on nick.com)? In the decade and a half since the show ended?

Nothing.

No books, no games, no comics, no web shorts--unless you count mega-crossovers with every other Nicktoon (a la Nicktoons Unite), or soulless promotional material like "Fairly Odd Phantom" (which, trust me, despite being the first new DP animation in over 10 years was not even worth the effort of watching).

...I think there was a limited edition FunkoPop once?

So yeah.

A Glitch in Time is not just the first cool, well-made thing we've seen from the franchise in a while. It's the first THING we've seen since the show. PERIOD. And arguably the first worthwhile supplementary material to EVER come out of the show, depending on how you feel about those GBA games and the Nicktoons crossovers.

This franchise is widely beloved even now, almost 20 years after it first aired, and it feels like that fact is now, finally, FINALLY getting some official recognition.

PLEASE read A Glitch in Time. Tell other people about it. The series--no, the fans--deserve this (and more of this, if the folks in charge see enough of a response and decide to grace us with any followup). It's LONG overdue, but better late than never.

[paper-mario-wiki]

I feel like I've ended up in the same spot as so transmasc before me: I have a lovely cis boyfriend who loves my tits which I love for him, but I am getting dysphoric to the point I wanna lift my lips and show a lil teeth when I see his hands coming towards them. Feels bad because they are his favorite and we haven't been fucking as much because as soon as he starts touching me I am out of it™ and get all in my head and freeze up. Any advice?

good god, brother. i am utterly baffled at why you have elected me as the strategist for this problem, and i'm even more confused as to why you have chosen to go into as much detail as you have.

but.

if i were to give you some advice on this

i'd say that you should consider a conversation with your partner about the long-term plan for the relationship. a "relationship" is two lives that are connected, right? and your life is not one where you're gonna have boobs for the rest of it (or at least based on what you've told me i would assume, should you have your way, those bad boys are gettin lopped off at some point), therefore it's pertinent that it be brought up, because it concerns your life, therefore it concerns the relationship, therefore it concerns him, yes?

now, the first and most obvious thing to start with out the gate is the boundary, made clear and concise: the hills are now closed, off limits to tourists. all discussions regarding this come next. make it clear that it's about something quite core to your identity, and something that does in fact cause physical pain (a panic response from the nervous system is pain homie).

this brings some followup questions (and remember, this isn't an interrogation, it's a dialogue to share): how does he feel about this? if he's against, why? for that matter, how much does it bother him? is there something he doesn't understand about your discomfort? is there some concern he has about your financial or bodily well-being with regards to the procedure? is it because it's vital to his attraction to you as a partner? if that's the case, would their removal be a deal-breaker?

now keep in mind, these question can be brought up whether or not you've got immediate plans to engage in the aforementioned lopping-off of your aforementioned Bad Boys, because the actual point of this dialectical exercise is to create a simple, easy to navigate, easy to understand conversation, which will set a foundation for further negotiations-- should you learn something new about each other, or yourselves, or the relationship as a whole.

either way, i do not think that letting it keep happening and keeping it to yourself is a good idea. i can understand feeling guilty about withholding some physical and emotional gratification you could give "easily" to this person you care dearly for, but trust me when i say that it's not the way to let it be. not just because it's unfair to your partner to secretly grow to resent them for a reason you don't want to vocalize, but to yourself as well.

you may not know it, but by keeping it to yourself you're slowly building up a resentment. that frustration actually shows up pretty clearly in your message. and even if what you're frustrated about is only that particular activity, that activity is irrevocably tied to another person. specifically, a person that you consider to be a pretty central pillar in your life. if that resentment grows, it can evolve into anger, hatred, fear, paranoia, and all sorts of nasty things. and even aside from the emotional and psychological damage that can do, it can grow into a physiological issue, where your brain wears out more and more due to the growing emotional distress ripping through your neurons with all sorts of "emergency" chemicals. like i said, the panic response is a physical pain, even if your body doesn't feel like it "hurts".

so. to summarize.

ABSOLUTELY bring it up. if you don't, it could become damaging to your relationship, and also your actual real life physical brain.

when you do bring it up, remember that the goals are to set a boundary, and to reach an understanding through mutual conversation. it's a dialogue, not a lecture.

when you reach an understanding, figure out if the relationship needs to be renegotiated in some way. that usually means new boundaries, or expectations. or maybe nothing! though surely your boyfriend can find more things to love about you.

that's as best as i can muster. you don't have to follow it, but hopefully it'll at least give you some ideas you can use.

[kozachenko]

[Click for better quality]

Ok so as a sort of followup to that Yachie drawing, I did one of Yachie as well. I already had a pretty solid idea in mind (though tbh drawing her wasn't as fun as drawing Saki) but I'm overall pretty happy with this drawing.

Artist's Notes;

So I knew that I would never forgive myself if I completely missed the oppurtunity to give Yachie face scales, which is something that I haven't really seen many people do yet. I do feel like I could've pushed it a lot more, but I'm liking the direction my take on her is going.

I also wanted to take this opportunity to talk about some of my headcannons for how Hell's fashion works since I've had this on my mind for a while. So ever since I refined my own design for Zanmu, I really liked the idea of having there be some connection between her and Satori in their clothes because they're both the defacto "leaders" of their respective Hells, and then I had the idea of having Hell's fashion trends mimic real life history where it mimics whatever the upperclassman are wearing in someway? I've always been really fascinated with the idea of how Modern Hell works as a society and also how Old Hell was impacted by it's abandonment, and while I am aware that the animal realm isn't exactly Hell and is moreso it's own thing right next to it, I imagine that there would be some overlap in the fashion and culture due to their close proximity to each other. Of course, I still kept a lot of elements in from Yachie's original design, the only thing I really added to the outfit was the jazzed up sleeves and the bottom of her shirt as well as those cool triangle things ZUN added to her shirt in 19. I also have her some nice and sharp nails since I thought they fit her. I also tried adding some scales onto the tips of her ears though tbh IDK how well they read. Her colour palette also ended up becoming a lot more teal than I had anticipated, but I honestly like it as I love it whenever people make Yachie's colour palette and design a lot more teal. I also wanted to try and differentiate her face from Saki's, though I do plan on experimenting more on how to avoid same face syndrome, as it's a problem that haunts me in my dreams. There's not really much I can say here aside from "hee hee clothing rendering go brrrrrr" and how the Clip Studio Paint charcoal brush is really all you need for any given piece and it is literally the only brush I use aside from the occasional airbrush for lighting (sometimes) and the blend tools. I've been doing a lot more simple character art recently and I've just been waiting for a cool enough idea for a full blown piece.

Though now that I've talked about some of my headcannons about how Modern Hell works, I really just want a Touhou manga spinoff about Modern Hell. Like, please ZUN I'm begging you, just do it, it would be so fucking cool because Touhou 17 is literally the only time in modern Touhou when we've been to Hell proper, does modern Hell have any settlements of Oni and other Youkai? Does it have cities? Towns? Villages? What's the technological level of Hell? How do they keep sinners from pulling a Touhou 17 and summoning a fucking god to save them? Where do all the characters associated with Hell as of right now fit into everything? You can't just drop a character like Zanmu who is stated to essentially be the king of fucking Hell and then not elaborate further on how she fits into the general framework of Hell! Is she officially the king or is this more of a "true mastermind using the official king/ruler as a puppet" type deal? How does the Animal Realm fit into all of this? Did Hecatia purposefully create Hell so it would be right next to the Animal realm? Did it just appear there on it's own once Buddhism started popping off on Earth or was it established once Zanmu established Modern Hell? How long was Keiki a problem for, and how did that affect the rest of Hell? Seriously there are so many unanswered questions here and I don't know if I just need to read an interview Zun had where he was asked these same questions and if so please tell me because these questions have all been stirring in my brain for quite some time and I really wished we'd just get a new fucking manga instead of going over the same settings in Gensokyo over and over and over and over again dear god. Like, I get that there's still a lot to explore with what we already do have, but it would just be really nice to see the Animal Realm get a little more explanation as to how it fits into the overall grand scheme of Gensokyo's worldbuilding because that would just make such an already interesting idea for a setting in Gensokyo so much better.

I'm hoping to get the drawing for Keiki done before Touhou 17's 5 year anniversary, though I am willing to postpone that and take my time on it and I also have something coming up where I won't have access to my main drawing tablet for a while so it might be a while until I post again, maybe, who knows, consistent posting schedule? Who are they, I've never heard of them. I do fully intend on talking about my thoughts on Touhou 17 though, even if it's a day or two late, it's Touhou 17's birthday month so it still counts! Also because out of all the Touhou game anniversaries, this is the one I care about the most because Touhou 17 was the first Touhou game I played and 1CC'd(???) on normal, and even though it has plenty of flaws (i.e. the many missed opportunities for it's gameplay, how unbalanced the mechanics are and also screen visibility), I'm always going to have a bit of a soft spot for it and I think that the game's strengths make up for some of it's weaknesses in my opinion.

[aihoshiino]

chapter 144 thoughts!

I don't think any other chapter of Oshi no Ko has ever baffled and confounded me quite like this one. Viewed solely in isolation this is a perfectly fine, functional chapter but as the followup to 143 and everything it contained, I actually feel like I'm losing my mind a bit. 143 might as well not have happened for all the weight it's given in this chapter. Ruby is not remotely acting like a girl who just tongued her crush of 18 years and in general, the total absence of any reference or cushioning of the shock of that event is just so loud and so jarring and so completely out of touch with how OnK has handled romantic developments in the past.

Both AquAka kisses had at least a scene or two in the chapter immediately following of characters reacting to and reflecting on both the event itself and the status quo change it represents in the relationship. Even 124 has that scene of Ruby clinging onto Aqua to let the viewer know what the new dynamic between them is going to be from now on. This chapter has nothing of the sort; I wasn't kidding when it says it feels like the kiss never even happened. The only thing I can point to is Ruby's little "we have sensei at home" exchange with Tsukuyomi but that's… kind of just exactly what she would've said even before the kiss. So if it has resulted in absolutely no change to their dynamic that we can see thus far, what was the point in ending the chapter on that note?

The part of me that is cynical and jaded can't help but suspect that this is intentionally hot button reaction bait paced specifically for the purposes of keeping OnK a trendy topic in the lead up to season 2 of the anime airing, But Who's To Say, Really.

I also had my worries about this last chapter, but unless we skip back in time to address it, it really looks like we've skipped over the remainder of the KamiAi romance and everything to do with the early stages of Ai's pregnancy. This is incredibly frustrating to me - they're parts of Ai's story I had been incredibly curious about and was excited to see her thoughts and feelings on, even filtered through fiction. In general, the way the Movie Arc has been increasingly dropping its focus on actually conveying Ai's story has been a real sore point for me. I fully acknowledge this rankles me more than perhaps it should because I am so deeply invested in Ai above any other character but… fuck, man! Once again, remember when this was supposed to be an arc about her? About her inner life, her pain and struggles and Aqua and Ruby working to a better understanding of her? I was excited for the Movie Arc specifically because I thought we were going to get peeks at parts of Ai's life we weren't privy to beforehand, but at this point it almost feels like Akasaka has just lost interest in following through.

Not only that but… uh, where's that KamiAi breakup scene, Akasaka? The one we were promised during the script reading? That huge I CAN'T LOVE YOU elephant that's been patiently sitting in the room? I can only assume that the 15YL version of this breakup happens after the twins are born or maybe even when Kamiki visited Ai at the hospital the night the kids were born but. What the fuck is even going on here anymore lol. The Oshi no Brainrot discord has been kicking around a joke theory that we were seeing the events of the Movie Arc out of their actual chronological order and it is becoming increasingly less of a joke in my brain because I can't make any sense of its progression otherwise.

oh my god i'm almost 1000 words in and i haven't started talking about the actual point of this chapter yet. god help me.

Anyway, MY SON IS HERE LET'S GO MELT!!!!!!

Ngl, I've always been a little disappointed that we didn't see much more of Melt in this arc, both just because I like him and because I think there's some really interesting potential in drawing on the parallels between Melt and Kamiki. I'm not the first to point out that Melt's experience with a dubiously consensual sexual encounter at the hands of an upperclassman - when he wasn't that much older than Hikaru was when Airi began abusing him - echoes at least in spirit Kamiki's experiences as a CSA victim; both were young boys, noted to be pretty and desirable, who were taken advantage of by older female figures. I think it would be extremely interesting and a great character moment for Melt to have some degree of engagement with that material and maybe to have some thoughts about it. It feels like a little bit of a missed opportunity to pass up on that, but I also acknowledge that Melt is ultimately not a huge mover and shaker in the overall story and I don't know how that would've fit into the Movie Arc as it stands, so I'll just have to make eyes at the AO3 tag and hope someone writes a fic about it.

Anyway as a lot of people predicted… here's Ruby being a jackass to Melt about his performance!!! Joking aside, I will admit it's a little jarring to see Ruby being so hostile to Melt over this…? Gorou is a sore spot for her, obviously and she would undoubtedly have high standards for his role in the movie. In addition, Ruby being snitty with people who rub her the wrong way definitely isn't new for her, but it still feels kind of odd both coming off her own struggles to connect with Ai through acting and her little "holy shit other people have feelings" breakthrough in the wake of the RBKN fight for her to be like this about it. I do think this is mostly just supposed to be just goofs and I'm overthinking it, it was just one of those things that kind of gave me pause as I was reading.

ruby's little little princess shirt is really good though, as is her referring to herself as a fan of the 'original work'. both of those got a solid sensible chuckle out of me.

Another thing that gave me pause for a very different reason was Melt and Ruby's exchange about his little merch pin. First and foremost, I think this is a really good Melt moment; while we saw him busting his ass to improve his acting in Tokyo Blade, that was very much when he had something to prove. Here, he really does seem to be going above and beyond for what is basically a bit part purely out of a desire to improve his craft and a passion for acting overall. It's nice to see the story double down in this being a lesson he did properly take away from Sweet Today and that he has committed to acting upon it (no pun intended) in the long term, not just when under outside pressure to do so.

The other thing that jumped out to me about this exchange is that… technically speaking, both Ruby and Melt are wrong, here? It's a very nice, flowery description of Gorou and it certainly lines up with his more positive traits but the idea of him not wearing his Ai merch in front of Ai herself is actually incorrect. Gorou is depicted (in the anime, anyway) as openly wearing the charm at what's implied to be all times, even in front of Ai herself. The manga also implies by way of where the charm is on his person when Ruby finds his body that this is also the case in that version of events, too. I don't think it's a retcon and may be an unimportant detail in the grand scheme of things but it did pique my interest.

There's a few ways to take this, I think; a more positive spin is that this is in line with what the story wants us to take away from 15 Year Lie as a production, where the literal granular facts of its events are sometimes less important than and can be bent in favour of supporting the emotional narrative it wants to convey. Melt may not literally be correct here, but he at least achieves the spirit of the right answer in his efforts. "Lies are love", after all.

However, given that Ruby enthusiastically endorses this interpretation - and is thus wrong alongside Melt - this could potentially be an indication of there being cracks in Ruby's rose-tinted view of Gorou. This strikes me as a fascinating idea and one I hope the series plays with; it would follow quite naturally from last chapter's framing of Gorou as Ruby's 'idol' that she's 'gachikoi' for. Oshi no Ko has pretty consistently portrayed the idol/fan relationship as inherently unequal, even when approached with the best of intentions and to truly know someone, you must let them off their pedestal first. She has sort of begun this process with Ai, just through empathizing with her during the 15YL production but we have yet to see anything similar happen with Gorou - if anything, we see the opposite here, where she asserts herself as the authority on Gorou's character as if she has the final say on who he was and what he felt and thought.

But the thing is, how well can Ruby really say that she knew him? They were only in each others' lives for a few months and in that time, she was only exposed to a very narrow slice of his life and his personality. Hell, you could even argue that Akane knows more about Gorou than Ruby does, given that we have no indication that Ruby or Sarina was ever privy to the details of his birth and his home life. Again, it's entirely possible that I'm reading too much into this, but now the idea is in my brain I'm simmering on it a bit. If nothing else, I hope the series takes the time to prod and poke at this angle, especially now it has made the fan/idol aspect of this dynamic explicit and textual.

Ruby and Melt's little senpai/kouhai dynamic has the potential to be really cute and I do hope the series actually spends some time on it. I've always thought a RBML friendship could be really fun to watch play out and seeing Melt gain some confidence in himself by teaching someone else could be really great. But with how unfocused the Movie Arc has been, it's really hard to get my hopes up that we'll be sticking with this even past this chapter lol

oh hey there crow girl we thought you were dead

Surprisingly, I don't have a lot to really say about her little lore drop here, since it's mostly mystery boxing and implications and, man. It's been 69 (nice) chapters since she first started showing up ominously muttering about supernatural things and while I don't mind her presence and I think she's evolved into a fun character, it's a little hard for me to get interested in these little supernatural tidbits until they resolve into something that feels meaningful for the characters.

This isn't helped by the fact that we don't really know what kami means in the context she uses it here. While 'god' and 'gods' are not strictly incorrect as translations, I think an English speaking viewer is primed to think of Abrahamic, capital G-Gods, which isn't necessarily correct. The term kami is a catchall that covers all manner of things from divinities to venerated earthbound humans, so kami can perhaps best be understood as being an umbrella term for something like 'an otherworldly being', which I think better lines up with Tsukuyomi's assertion that those who have memories of past lives are like kami in of themselves.

Ultimately though until we know what kami really means and amounts to in Oshi no Ko, it's hard to say what this means for the characters and I am ultimately only really interested in the characters. So until we know what this actually amounts to in-story, I'm just kind of nodding long with whatever Crow Girl says because sure. This might as well happen.

can we talk about how fucking funny her anime antagonist jump out of the tree was, by the way

break next week, or so i've heard... one of these days, we'll beat the allegations....

[cactusspatz]

November recs

Yuletide is coming - but this should tide you over until then!

IRIS Log #1548 by deadchannelradio (Batman, gen)

(01:25) Red Hood: (Mild static) (Out of breath, slurred) You motherfuckers. Put some fuckin- (01:25) Batman: (Shaking) Red Hood- (01:25) Red Hood: Shut up. Put some fucking respect. On my name. Start fucking copying me. I just got thrown fucking. Um. 40 feet. Into a fucking uh. What's it. Ditch. I'm still fucking conscious. (01:25) Batman: Red Hood, do not move, we're en route- (01:25) Red Hood: What'll I win if I stand up. (01:25) Batman: (Loud) Do not stand up.

Absolutely hilarious slice-of-patrol-life story, featuring a VERY concussed Jason.

Easy as Pie by Ptelea (Batman, gen)

Five times Jason baked something for or with his siblings, and one time they baked for him. A drabble sequence of triple drabbles written for the Seasons of Drabbles Summer 2023 challenge exchange.

Soft Batsiblings story, with a lot of feels packed into a small space.

Cinema Verite by BoldlyNo (Murderbot, gen)

"Someday, Ratthi hopes, he’s going to run out of things to learn about Secunit that break his heart." Making a documentary in five hours flat is an experience in and of itself, but making a documentary with some of your friend's worst memories as footage is something else altogether.

Will I ever be over them making a documentary FOR GREAT JUSTICE? Definitely not. This is a great Ratthi POV on it.

Reformation by LocalCryptid7 (BNHA, Midoriya/Todoroki/Shinsou)

After a failed suicide attempt, years of bullying, and his mother's death, Izuku Midoriya doesn't think he has any option besides joining the League of Villains. After all, foster care is no place for a quirkless kid like him. Plus, working as a hacker and analyst for the League doesn't sound like it would be too bad. But, after meeting a hurt little girl in Overhaul's headquarters, Toga and Izuku can't just sit back and take orders from Shigaraki anymore. With some careful consideration, Izuku figures a villain reformation program at UA doesn't sound horrible, even if it means having to put up with Bakugou.

Villain!Izuku is usually a hard sell for me, but this works! Mostly because it shows both how Izuku ended up isolated and needing, AND he immediately turns tail once a kid is in danger. And then good followup on the consequences.

The Warlock's Cat by Marchling (Shadowhunters, Magnus/Alec)

Pain raced up his arm. It was a sharp throb that radiated out. More than a broken bone. When Alec went to flex his hand to see how bad it was he couldn’t. His eyes snapped to his own hand and there was no hand. A mission gone wrong leads to Alec being turned into a cat. Alone. Hurt. No one aware of what's happened to him. If only there was a cat-loving warlock nearby to save him.

Hello, I am a sucker for turned-into-a-cat-&-taken-in-by-my-enemy-who-turns-out-to-be-loveable stories - which is a very specific trope, but thankfully people keep writing it! This is a fun exemplar and an interesting AU.

Burgeoning by Owlship (Mad Max, Max/Furiosa)

He smiles a little, an uptick of his mouth, plush lips exposed where he's shaved the mangy beard off in the process of cleaning off the wasteland. "Here," Max says, and nudges into her space, arranges the plant carefully so the roots are properly covered, the leaves brushed free of dirt. Furiosa doesn't realize she's going to move until she does, leaning across the slight distance between them and pressing her lips to his.

Max-returns-to-the-Citadel PWP, featuring poor gardening etiquette and a lovely vulnerable Furiosa.

[sflow-er]

would kill to know more about august’s relationship with his mom like youre telling me your son gets caught for committing a crime and you still dont care enough to even come see him and see whats going on 😭 maybe im looking too much into it bc i wanna dissect him like a lab rat but really like she seems so neglectful

Hello anon! Thank you for the ask 💜

I've felt since first watching S1 that August's mother Louise really is neglectful. Let's look at the glimpses we get of her:

Erik says to Wille in S1E2 that she sent August to Hillerska shortly after his dad's suicide. Fair enough, I'm sure August wanted to go and probably lashed out at her for "not making life easier" for Carl Johan. But she seems to have essentially just left him there without any proper followup on how he was dealing with everything. His grief, their financial situation, his sudden responsibility having to take over from his father... As his mother, she should have made sure he got some help - counselling with Boris for example, but that clearly didn't happen. Based on all the issues August developed in the time leading up to canon, he has dealt with precisely none of his trauma, which also left him so very open to Erik's abuse and influence at Hillerska (as we now know).

She let August believe she would get the boarding money for him up until S1E3, only to turn up at Parents' Day and tell him to get it himself. By selling some of his father's belongings that she must have known meant everything to him. Yeah, that was probably the best and only solution, but the way she handled it was abysmal. And then she seemed surprised that August was angry and disappointed... Whereas August's reaction seemed to hint that this wasn't the first time she let him down (at least in my interpretation).

She was nowhere to be found in the aftermath of the video. August returned to Hillerska early from Christmas break, and it was plain to see he wasn't doing well at all. But we didn't get a single hint of her trying to reach out, nor did she seem all that worried when he suddenly called her weeks later and told her to buy a random horse (despite saying before that he would rather die than tap into his inheritance). She did ask why, but when he said "because I want to", she just dropped the subject.

And as you pointed out, we also didn't see her after he was caught. I'm sure we're meant to infer that August has been in touch with both her and Rickard since Rickard is representing him, but her absence from our screens or even the dialogue leaves a very specific taste. He may be 18, but he's still her son, and she should be there when he fucks up to the point of committing an actual crime. Asking what the hell he was thinking and demanding that he talk to someone about all his problems. This could've been brought up when he had to start seeing Boris after his fight with Wille, for example.

(Not to mention the missed opportunity of having her ask how he feels about having to sell Årnäs for the settlement! I will forever be bitter that this happened off camera and we didn't see August's reaction at all. It would've benefited the story on several levels to actually show his pain.)

So yeah. We could well see Louise again in the finale, but considering August still considers Sara the only person he's ever really been able to talk to... His mother definitely hasn't been there for him enough. I do not blame her for wanting to live her own life at all, especially as her marriage to Carl Johan was probably hell towards the end, but it sure seems like August is yet another example of how the adults in YR have let their children down.

[basedkikuenjoyer]

Transmission Transition

Yeah buddy, I'd want some time alone too after that full-blown verbal holy war Kendrick Lamar dragged your ass with. Kinda shit that makes you need to stop and reflect on your life choices. Drake is back and he is straight-up pulling a Crane Wife hot on the heels of Stussy putting words to some interesting concepts we've seen.

It's been a while, so for a refresher I care a lot about X Drake coming back around because we dangled his report on Wano as a Chekov's Gun way back at the start of Egghead. If he's the one to open up a reinterpretation of Wano...Drake's scenes overlap with Kiku/Izo's a fair amount. So once again, hot on the heels of Stussy speaking that potential baggage aloud here's Drake playing very nice as a followup. Drake, Stussy, Marco. That was the trio I was looking for in this pseudo-anthology's third side story. Speaking of...

It's been a while. Always had nascent ideas about the idea Zoro busts out an attack called Rashomon with Kuma way back when. Of course I've made plenty of mentions of the film reference. Even if you haven't seen it you've seen the story structure. Three POVs on the same event, the real magic is in stitching the truth together out of three unreliable narrators. Marco's perfect to spell it all out as the sorta "framing device" between Wano & Egghead.

It's hard to tell week-to-week what we'll do with this one, but I think we can see what our trio is for Egghead:

First we step away to see a collection of side stories, end on filing in the truth of Sabo/Vivi in Reverie. This though obscured what happened in the lab.

Next we give Bonney a whirl through her backstory with Kuma, where he'll both be a bit of an unreliable narrator and also rewrite some events we've seen prior through giving his POV. When we return we reiterate last night was a gap and add the mystery pile of food for Luffy.

Vegapunk's Broadcast, duh. It was more of a distraction while we saw some relation to the main plot but it still fits the bill. We've done Stussy, we're getting Drake, if you do loop Marco in than it's a way to complete the ASL theme with an Ace connection too. And don't sleep on the York focus here either.

Of course, we'll need to see the next few chapters to really evaluate that. Each one have had their content that raises questions, unreliable narrators and oddball tropes like that. But let's get back to this chapter, there was a cool running line in there I liked:

I could riff on Koby, Grus, & Kujaku getting a bit meta here but I'll save that until I know the next few steps. Kujaku gets to shine a lil more in this SWORD segment as the one checking on Drake but her line here gets a lot more interesting when Bluegrass & Doll have a similar mindset attacking the giants. Bluegrass especially encouraging the young ones to step up and become a star. Makes me think a lot about our OP for the anime adaptation The end of the dream, the end of the sea...but first we have to make a shining legend of ourselves.

It's just funny to me one could interpret the lyrics to "Us" as a threat this arc maybe will break the direction I've long hoped it would is all I'm saying. Let's bring this all home with the main highlight of the chapter though.

It's not just the stinger, the Gorosei seemed a little shocked their first hits on Robonosuke stopped everything. York is relieved but recall last time we talked about her theory that's where the antenna snail was hiding was just that, a theory.

Type of thing that could go either way and either option could have a lot of ways of unfolding. That said...this is a perfect ending if some unknown force is about to take advantage of these gaps to justify being in prime position to hijack the broadcast. Kinda feels like it'd be a cop out to have Robonosuke hanging around this whole time just to get smacked around a little. Still very, very excited for this next stint.

[steampunkforever]

How you handle pacing is in my opinion what will make or break Furiosa for you.

If we're judging the film on whether or not it's a good film, it passes with flying colors. If we're judging the film on whether or not it's a good sequel/prequel, I'll still say it's pretty good. If we're judging the film against Miller's last film, the lauded Mad Max: Fury Road, Furiosa feels a little disappointing, while still being a perfectly good film.

Fury Road is one of my perfect narratives. I've said this in my filmposts, in my podcasts, in general conversation. It's a supremely focused film that crafts its story in a lean, effective manner. The characters of the film drive in a line, stop, then turn around, and the film uses the minimal plot and dialogue to present its themes as succinctly as possible. It's elegant! Furiosa. on the other hand, tackles a story with a much wider scope, and comparing the pacing of both films would be unfair.

I liked Furiosa. It's a good film. As far as prequels set in established franchises go, it certainly handled origin stories much better than classic examples such as the Star Wars prequels (though its explainer of wasteland politics did feel like a phantom menace callback) or the 2010 A-Team origin did. Personally I feel this film went into development back when the 2010s obsession with the origin story was still strong, and Furiosa manages to overcome the fact that nobody really cares to see how superman got his cape anymore. It's a solid film. Just not as good as Fury Road.

The pacing has a lot to do with this. It meanders through Furiosa's story, and Miller's choice to show us Furiosa from childhood up to the start of Fury Road means there's a lot to wander through. Which is to say, there were several moments where my "I'm not sure where we're going with this" reactions weren't so much tied to how the film was going to end as much as they were linked to when we were going to wrap up. The movie has a much wider scope than Fury Road, and the pacing issues are a direct result of this.

Another result of the massive scope Furiosa attempts is a more minor quibble: the CG. Prefacing this, I'll say that I totally get it. To make a film of this scale, CG assets are a must have because this isn't Ben-Hur. Fury Road's limited scope meant that largely practical effects could be used on battles that would be *impractical* for the much larger production that is Furiosa. Even so, the CG was pretty solid for the most part, just a bit jarring compared to Fury Road.

Usually the followup effort for an excellent piece of cinema like Fury Road ends up bad, or at least mediocre. Furiosa is neither of these, instead presenting a good film with interesting worldbuilding that expounded on some themes in a way that made those of Fury Road more poignant after a rewatch. Still worth watching, especially if you're already into Mad Max.

To that, I feel like Anya Taylor-Joy was a pretty mid Charlize Theron replacement until about two thirds in, at which point she really nailed the voice and I finally bought the performance. This is of course made up for by Chris Hemsworth getting let off the chain and getting properly wacky with it. Very fun to see them let him be Australian again.

[hockeyisforthegays]

did you read 264 and 265 chapter's of jjk? if so what are you thoughts? you don't have to answer i'm just curious about what you think because i feel like you have really unique observations

(love you writing, thank you in advance if you end up answering)

oh shit anon let me write you an essay. and by essay i mean a disjointed series of long ass bulletpoints. also im gonna be focusing mostly on 265 because as my friends put it i am "ceo of itadori yuuji" or the proprietor of the "itadori cinematic universe" so you could say. that i am biased

okay. one. as an overall thing. i wish that for pretty much everything . that they would just lean into it more. theres a lot of concepts im into but everything lately seems to be presented without exploration or followup. like im about to analyze this to shit but i feel like im gluing meat to a skeleton. help me out here gege

FOR EXAMPLE yuuji's ultimatum to sukuna. i wish. i wish there was more here. like in theory this is really cool to me. yuuji says You Choose Whether I Eat You Or Kill You. Will You Live With Me? Or Will You Die Alone?

I lay my Body down as a Sacrifice

but more so as a Prison

but most of all as a Mercy

the first to my Friend, the second to my Curse, and the third to the Person i hope is buried deep down inside that evil.

aaaaand then this is kinda undercut by sukuna's reaction to me. not that i need him to go full on mahito quaking rabbit ass on us tbc. but the stubborn non-engagement with the premise just makes me roll my eyes and groan. i wish gege had found a way to let this reveal SOME new or unexplored aspect of sukuna's character? one chink in the armour. one stray thought that we wouldn't expect to hear from him. something. something to latch onto.

this may be unreasonable also given that gege is writing in literally a different language but i hope we find our way somehow to the double meaning of the phrase "flesh and blood" btw. like. sukuna is yuuji's uncle and they shared a body. yuuji is trying to make sukuna come back to that body. theres something there i swear it.

sukuna, come home. we're family. you're my flesh and blood.

(while beating his ass)

like make it scary. god PLEASE put some metamorphosis stank on it. gimme that I Am You flavourrrrr

okay now also. yuuji's domain. i want to talk about yuuji's domain so bad. one thing i noticed was that he doesn't name it. at first i was pretty disappointed because im a weirdo and i love their weird word salad names, i love that e.g. fushiguro and mahito just bust out full poems on i guess instinct when they use their domains for the first time!! so the fact that yuuji didn't get one felt at first like he was being... slighted by the convention almost? but.

this is again a thing i think could have been cool if leaned into, in a few ways. ive just been having these ideas about how yuuji's domain is different from other domains, one of those ways being in its lack of a name.

first of all from a character perspective - yuuji's whole persona in battle is like warpath, tunnel vision, beat your ass shit, so it does kinda make sense that his domain would be just as no muss no fuss just get it the fuck done, in a way. once again. lean into this!!

but also, i started thinking about what we saw with characters like gojo and sukuna, and the idea of jujutsu as the art of elision. when those characters wanted to juice their big moves, they reverted rituals that included vocal incantations. that exact word salad shit. i started thinking - those word salad domain names are like, that, you know? maybe this is explicit and i just missed it somewhere. or i forgor. but perhaps invoking a domain's name makes it more powerful, or easier to establish, or something

(i so much dont want to reread to figure this out. RIP)

if this is the case, yuuji not using a domain name would say a darn something about his power huh???

LEAN INTO THIS. LIKE SUKUNA COMMENT ON IT FOR FUCK SAKE i know you are allergic to acknolwedging your nephew but its for the AUDIENCE'S SAKE NOT YOURS

gege i am fucking inventing lore for you to make it cooler. why wont you. come back here

but anyway. what IS yuuji's domain and what does it do. he learned from kusakabe, so it's at least somewhat akin to a simple domain, but we also know yuuji's body holds the memory of malevolent shrine - does that have any influence on how the domain turned out? it seems pretty... big, for lack of a better way of describing a mental projection. no other simple domain really HAD projections. are there no techniques imbued in it? what about vows, like sukuna with his whatever barrier bullshit? yuuji's forces sukuna back into the yuukuna body. why? how? we've seen how domains can make its targets abide by rules, what rule is this? sukuna also acts nonviolently for as long as yuuji strings him through illusory sendai, and i dont know if this is a choice by sukuna (which idk whether i do or do not understand as a character choice at this point) or if it's enforced by the domain somehow.

(I feel like, these things either need to be More or even Less clear. like i understand just enough to have burning questions. if this were more obtuse and symbolic, i would probably be content to ride the vibes, actually. BUT IM NOT. ANSWER ME GEGE. YOU'VE TOLD ME SO MUCH LORE I DONT CARE ABOUT!!! WHAT OF MY SON!)

anyway closing thoughts wrt 266 you may be able to tell from my Fucking Fanfiction but i have literally been waiting for yuuji's own fingers to become cursed objects for EVER. i was imagining scenarios while watching season 1. im crazy stupid about it. i hope i hope i hope this finger shakes out into something WORTHWHILE. and sorry again this is entirely yuuji centred my only thoughts about the characters who were in 264 is the frustration of the way they got sidelined so carelessly RIP

[oathkeeper-of-tarth]

WIP title ask meme

Prompt: Make a new post with the names of all the files in your WIP folder, regardless of how non-descriptive or ridiculous. Let people send you an ask with the title that most intrigues them, and then post a little snippet or tell them something about it! And then tag as many people as you have WIPs.

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I was poked to do this months ago, twice at least - once by @docholligay and I think the second was @jeejyboard, but I can't find the tag for the life of me. SORRY. I felt like doing something a bit more meta today re:writing and post about The Process, and this was a perfect excuse - thanks for thinking of me. So here's some actual effort! I went and dug deep, trawled through some really old stuff, which was fun. I write and scribble down way, way more than I actually polish and post (which I assume is probably normal, but who knows). 

General info, for whoever is interested: I mostly use Google Docs with offline backups for fic writing, as I shift between computers a ton, and I put fandom tags at the start of my filenames for organisation. I have a ton of prompt/meme/ask/event collection files - for example, the very latest: "[BG3, STRAHD, SM] Fic Prompts 2024". In these I jot down both the prompts people send or that are listed and the ideas/outlines/notes for each, then when I really get going with a certain fic I spin it off into a separate document. 

I hate coming up with titles and usually do that last, so most of my document names are silly references for my own amusement or just a boring old brief description of the main concept. For instance, my latest posted fic Cerimonia Compedum was for most of its WIP-hood known simply as "[BG3] Tadpoled Isobel". Sometimes I keep different versions/revisions/parts of the same WIP in different files, and if that's the case I've grouped them here. Note that for simplicity's sake this post includes my "solo" fic only, no collabs or coauthored stuff, of which there is also a bunch. 

Some of these are ancient and hit me in the face with "12 years ago" timestamps. Some ficlets will never make it out of the mixed prompt plot bunny dumping grounds into their own doc. I think Sailor Moon 10-ish years ago was the one outlier fandom where I actually wrote most of my concepts out fully and posted them. The ol' brain is currently overproducing stuff for the more recent BG3 flavoured moon lesbians (and no, that ship name will never stop throwing my HaruMichi-loving ass for a loop). Note that some of the SU WIPs on the list I've already posted about here, here, here, and here.

Obviously all of these vary wildly in terms of completion level, word count, refinement, and age (and capitalisation, apparently). So yeah, here's the list, roughly sorted by fandom - ask away, if you feel like it!

[BG3] Moon-chosen, Moon-guided | Moon-chosen, Moon-guided - Part III [BG3] Cerimonia Alārum | ISOBEL TO THE RESCUE AU [BG3] Tremulous Cadence followup | The Return of the Moon Daughter [BG3] Wizard Tower AU | Aylin & Rolan stuff [BG3] Karlach/Minthara Act 2 conclusion aka why are paladins Like That [BG3] I'm having something very strong indeed

[STRAHD] The d'Avenir Treatise verse tidbits [STRAHD] Road Trippin' [STRAHD] In-character notes & ficlets

[SU] eeEEeeeeEE BISMUTH | Bismuth ficlets | Like talking to a wall | Muse. Galatea. Suffering. [SU] SU Daemons HDM AU [SU] The Adolescence of Rose Quartz | But I don't think anyone turns into a car  [SU] Freedom To And Freedom From | Pearlrose Fixit | i love suffering!!! [SU] Forge Showdown AU [SU] Pearl Playing the Field TM | All I need in this life of sin is me and my pearlfriend [SU] The Grand Aventurine Heist (Not Really Grand And Only Slightly A Heist) | oh no who let Rose read the Scarlet Pimpernel

[SM] Future Vision blatantly ripped me off THANKS REBECCA | PUU fic [SM] Outers fall of SilMil | michific | The End is the Beginning is the End

[DS9] Kira fic bits

[TLOK] Five Times Kya Healed Lin and One Time She Couldn't | Kyalin fluff [TLOK] R.C. Noire | Lin BAMFong

[WATCHMEN] Silhouette fic bits

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That's it! I don't think I have a single person that I know writes fic left that hasn't already been tagged in this, so feel free to do it (again) if it strikes your fancy.

[serendertothesquad]

Seren's Studies: Odd Squad UK -- "A Dish Served Odd" Episode Followup, Part 2

We move on to Part 2. Will Orli get the tour she deserves? Let's go and find out!

That's...it's...Orli, sweet summer child, we have discussed what that is.

Worse still, it's not even used for a gag or anything. It's just used so the librarian can get more shouting mileage. Jon, there ain't no "kachow" in the world that can save you.

JON I'M SERIOUS JON. JON. THAT'S NOT EVEN A CLOWN NOSE THAT IS A TARGET SPHERE WHAT THE FUCK ARE YOU DOING.

It...belonged to a clown...who bought things of the wrong size...off the Internet.

Look, this is the Oddverse, and that means I can look some stuff over, but I can't forgive this shit. Everyone and their mothers has bought stuff of the wrong size off of the Internet. Hell, I've bought stuff of the wrong side off the Internet. Where the fuck is my statue, huh??? WHERE THE FUCK IS MY STATUE.

"Yonder?"

"It means 'over there'. And if you watched Wander Over Yonder, you'd know that."

"...What?"

"Oh, it's a Disney cartoon."

"What's Disney?"

"Ozzie, you poor unfortunate soul."

Ah, I see I've found the "gadzooks" guy.

Unfortunately, it came free with a fucking "what person has photos of X" gag.

...YOUR ASS IS FUCKIN' TELLIN' ME THE MOVIE THING WAS A SCAM??????? ARE YOU SHITTING ME?!?!?!?!?!?!?!? ALL THIS TIME I THOUGHT IT WAS ODD SQUAD THE MOVIE BEING CANONIZED AGAIN AND IT'S NOT AND I'M SO MAD and i'm off to the local wallfart to cry in my car

fuck you.

That's gonna be a "yikes" from me, bro. Followed quickly by "hell of a ventriloquist to be speaking like you have your mouth full."

Okay, Trifler, we've had big boi words dropped in this franchise before where no one explained what they meant, thank you.

"Come on, sweetie!"

I can feel the internal Olive cringe from where my ass is sitting in the living room right now.

I can also feel the stupidity radiating off this sonuvabitch and I'm waving my stop sign like a madman.

"See you in 10 years, big red bus."

"Who said you're going to be alive in 10 years?"

"...No, actually, you make a fair point. Damn."

"Act 2 cliffhanger!"

Honey, we are two minutes away from ending the episode. There are no acts. There are no cliffhangers. Smarten up.

Y'know, before today, there wasn't really any villain that I actively hated, other than Xavier and Xena. Who weren't really villains, but they were villainous.

Here, I finally found a bitch. Thank you. Kachow your way on outta here.

So they zap her with an Elbow-Patch-inator -- which, why do they have that in their inventory other than sheer plot convenience? -- and she likes it because it looks like sprinkles.

I couldn't make this sorry shit up if I tried.

Even in this spinoff, we still have the good old "agents let the villain walk away scot-free and don't monitor them for cleanup efforts" cliche.

There's a reason why cleaning up trash as part of community service has someone there to make sure you don't flake.

All that shit Orli had to go through and all she had to do was stop a criminal.

This would be like me getting free unlimited McDonald's because I tackled a guy stealing from the till, when I already paid through the app for my food.

It's stupid, is my point.

Y'know, I've made cracks about writers on drugs before, but Lightning Jon Macqueen must have been on something else to have this much flawed logic in the span of a single episode.

If you have the tour every decade, of course people are gonna get overexcited. If you have it, say, every month, the magic goes away because it's more common.

Don't have to be a dumbass lil' American like me to understand that. And the only way the faulty logic could be justified is if finances were brought into play, and I'm not willing to have a spirited discussion on Britain's financial status without many bottles of chardonnay and a couple joints of grass.

"Ma'am, this is an 11-minute episode of a TV show. This is not a movie."

"...So it's a movie?"

"I just said- ah, to hell with it. Forget it. But I hear there is a new Looney Tunes movie coming out soon..."

And your cast for this episode! Honestly, Horatia Hollywood sounds like a really weird villain name...especially considering there is no Hollywood in Britain as far as I'm aware.

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

So that's it. Overall, for the first 11-minute episode, it was...a bit lacking. I don't think this spinoff, nor the staff working on it, have found their footing yet and are just tripping over their own feet. It's a good premise for an episode, but...it wasn't executed very well. I feel like not enough focus was given to the tour Orli was supposed to go on -- being an immigrant, it would make sense for her to take a tour of her new country, let alone her new town, but more focus was given to solving the case than the tour in and of itself.

Jon Macqueen has potential. I will give him the benefit of the doubt, absolutely (because after all, Britain is not Odd Squad's home country). But I'm hoping that, within the rest of the 20+ episodes we've got (going by 11-minute episodes, mind), he'll right himself and get to crafting beautiful episodes that make me smile and go, "Yes. This is what I want to see."

With that being said, thanks for reading. I'll see you all for the next followup for "Odd Jubilee". Which should be a funner episode, seeing as how it has a song. And anyone who knows me well knows I am a sucker for songs in my funny secret agent children math show.

Seren out!