#i feel pretty review

[aropride]

guy in the club on his phone squinting at a wikipedia article and then holding both his hands out making L shapes with his fingers to figure out his right from left so he knows if the guy with the hankys in his pocket is a top or a bottom

[putterphubase]

Can't you just stay here? I'll do nothing and just stay by your side.

THE TIME OF FEVER (2024).

[anna-scribbles]

MY BEST FRIEND MADE ME A COPY OF CALL IT EVEN FOR MY BIRTHDAY😭😭😭

[bacchuschucklefuck]

❗❗Official Class Swap Sorcerer!Kristen Post Alert❗❗ you can: look at her

[palmettoshenanigans]

Someone suggested Aaron deserves a chance in a rage room but now I'm just wondering... what would every Fox be like if offered an hour in a rage room? Like I know those things usually give you options so like,,, what would they do?

[keyofjetwolf]

Just made the last payment on my school loan heeeyyyyyy

[nerime]

i wish i could be excited for veilguard, but everything i see about this game seems so corporate 😭

[aroaessidhe]

2024 reads / storygraph

Those Beyond The Wall

sequel/companion to The Space Between Worlds, set a decade later

character-focused sci-fi set in an area divided in two, the rich protected city on one side and everyone else in the post-apocalyptic desert

follows a woman who works under the Emperor in Ashtown, keeping the peace

when mangled bodies start showing up with seemingly no murderer, she’s tasked with finding the cause, and finds out that it’s the result of corruption spanning both cities and multiple worlds

explores oppression and messy revolution, police violence and apartheid

bi & polyamorous MC

[yeyinde]

have you read (and/or enjoyed) Haunting Adeline? I’ve seen some stuff about it that kinda piques my interest but i have seen a ton of people say it sucks and i’m hesitant to buy it in case i hate it but i trust your judgement lol

when i went searching for dark romance books, it frequently popped up and was one of the first i ended up reading. Haunting Adeline, That Sik Love, the Predator, the Ritual, Den of Vipers, Carnage, Haunt me Darling, Take me With You. pretty much anything that came up on a quick search, i devoured in a span of two weeks. but out of all of them, i was really disappointed by Haunting Adeline :/

it was so hyped up on tiktok, Reddit, goodreads, and rec pages that i was really excited for it, only to feel pretty swindled after. i won't get into spoilers since you haven't read it, but i was not a fan of a lot of the plot choices and character decisions. idk. i guess i just like it when things make sense.

for most of the book, i was bored or mad. usually, if i'm sucked into a plot, i can finish within a few hours of non-stop reading. but this one took me a whole two days to get through. i just wasn't interested in continuing. i'd read a little bit, get overcome with a visceral feeling of "oh for FUCK'S SAKE!" and then do something else because i'd couldn't be bothered to continue. it was not living up to the expectations i had for it (or the ones set by reviews i'd read), but even outside of that, it just didn't click with me at all. i just didn't find the leads compelling enough to stick around. it was trying to be too much at all once, and for me, it failed at a lot of it.

BUT! the smut was good. very hot. fmc made some very typical fmc choices (re: stupid ones that no person living in the real world would have, but easily very forgiveable). for most of it, i was kinda wishing Addie lobbed the mmc upside the head with a shovel. he was so useless, it made me wanna cry. and i love unrepentant mmcs, but i just didn't click with his character at all because he was a walking contraction and his values made little sense to me at all.

in all reality, i should have dnf at 45% but i suffered through and now i wake up in a cold sweat thinking about these lines:

[keep-ur-head-low]

Song List for Gatsby: An American Myth

Yesterday was the official opening night for Florence Welch's Gatsby at the ART and I noticed it hasn't been posted here so here's the official song list! Note that this is an entirely different adaptation of The Great Gatsby than the one currently on Broadway and this list is still subject to change in the future.

ACT 1:

Welcome To The New World

Golden Girl

Valley Of Ashes

Shakin Off The Dust

New York Symphony

One Heart Beat

Deathless Song

Feels Like Hell

A Smile Like That Is Rare

Month Of Love

I've Changed My Mind

Pouring Down

Mr. Nobody From Nowhere

Act 2:

Just A Little Party

Welcome To The New World (Reprise)

Driving My Way

What Is This Worship

What Will We Do With Ourselves?

What Of Love, What Of God

The Dream Fought On

The Damage That You Do

Vigil

America, She Breaks

Pouring Down (Reprise)

We Beat On

[zincfingermotif]

smooth talker

[cloudsoffire]

big godzilla fan but i will never in my life interact with the fandom based on what i've seen on here

[tokiro07]

Undead Unluck ch.202 thoughts

[Wake-Up Call]

(Contents: battle analysis - Language/Ichico/Nico, speculation - Feng)

NO! DIGNITY! FOR! FENG!!!

I don't care what happens in the rest of this fight, Feng getting dragged in half-naked, unconscious and drooling is the funniest thing that could have possibly happened in this moment, and I love it. Keep pushin' this man down the stairs, Tozuka, you'll only make me love him more

As much as I want to go on a tirade about how endearing L101 Feng is compared to the psychopath from L100, there's a good handful of details in this chapter that I want to focus on

For me, the detail that stuck out the most in my mind is the fact that Lan created a loophole to circumvent the "N" rule in Shiritori. So long as the Japanese word doesn't end in "N," it's fair game, and I'm willing to bet that even if she does end with the Japanese "N," she'll say that she still has a valid move with the other language word, so it's valid. With this knowledge, the already unbalanced game has tipped even further in Lan's favor, which rang a very familiar bell for me: "You're a UMA and you can't even follow the rules?" Nico once praised UMA conceptually for their adherence to rules, that they must abide by the changes to science that they embody, and yet both Ghost and Language have demonstrated that they aren't above cheating, both in regards to Nico specifically

Lan's ability to conjure things that don't exist with properties that they otherwise shouldn't have (Shenlong is a storm dragon, and yet she made it breathe fire 🙄) pretty squarely lands her among the category of "unscientific Rules," which L100 Nico bluntly declared were "an enemy to science and to [him]." Basically, Lan can just make up whatever she wants; things don't have to be accurate so long as she can imagine them working in her favor. Sure, it's better if she can justify a thought, like creating the Lance of Longinus rather than just a regular lance, but even then, the Lance of Longinus is really just a regular lance that was used in an important moment. I guess maybe it's an Artifact with special properties, but it's noticeably lacking the stylized Fu (不) kanji that is typically indicative of Artifacts, so I think she's deliberately basing it off the legend and attributing special abilities to it because of its notoriety

In short, Lan can just headcanon whatever she wants into existence as long as she can justify it contextually. She mentions the Shinto concept of "kotodama," the idea that words have power in and of themselves, and is using it to enhance her concepts. In the first round, she created a meteor and specified that it was made of iron so that it would have maximum offensive output...for a normal meteor. If, however, she had the opportunity to say a word like, oh, I don't know...Chicxulub Impactor? She would still be summoning a meteor, but she'd also be summoning the meteor. The prototypical idea of how dangerous meteors can be, the accepted cause of the extinction of the dinosaurs! Now, maybe she wouldn't have been able to summon a meteor with quite that much destructive power, or she'd be worried about getting caught in the blast, but theoretically that would have been pretty much a game-ender

Picking a word with a clear definition is one thing, but picking one with a specific connotation? In a fight between imaginations, word association is a powerful tool, which I think is why Ichico's Umibozu ended up being such a weak defense against Shenlong. She was just scrambling for any mythological creature, but she doesn't seem to have any idea what an Umibozu is or what it's capable of. Dragons are associated with destruction and fire and invulnerability, and just about anyone can tell you that, but Umibozu are pretty specific; they sink ships. Ichico doesn't seem to know that, and in fact didn't even imagine the generally accepted shape of an Umibozu, instead making something that looks more akin to an oni or maybe a namahage. Some fans have speculated that Ichico, living in Britain, may be a diaspora and unfamiliar with her Japanese heritage, but regardless, she's definitely unfamiliar with her peoples' mythology. If she had been, not only could she have at least made an Umibozu that was the right shape and size, she might even have chosen something more appropriate for fighting a dragon - from Shen Long's [G], Ichico would have been better served summoning [G]rass Cutter, or Kusanagi no Tsurugi, a weapon associated with the slaying of Yamata no Orochi and which was said to have been used to control wind in order to divert flames, giving it a clear advantage against both Shenlong's scales and fire breath

Buuut that's not what happened, and Ichico's inability to think of a proper word had the narrative utility of A) showing that she could participate too, B) showing how souls can be damaged during this game of Shiritori, and C) giving Nico a bit of a push towards being able to perceive souls. The idea that the imaginary can be made manifest in this game is clearly starting to have something of an effect on Nico's perceptions, and Ichico summoning a knock-off Umibozu without his being aware of it is the most concrete evidence he's gotten so far that Ichico is present at all (aside from moving the Psycho Pods last week). The more evidence he has of her presence, the more willing he'll be to believe in souls, and eventually he'll just accept them and be able to interact with them normally

Once Nico fully accepts souls, he'll have a much easier time damaging Lan; we've already established that hitting her with lightning won't cut it, so nearly any other physical attack is going to similarly fail. However, damaging her soul will be much more effective, since that's a more direct source of her life and power. In fact, she practically told us that her soul is her weakness: "kotodama," the soul of words. The words she summons with her imagination carry her soul in them. Beast summoned, controlled, and assimilated beasts by extending his soul to them and devouring parts of theirs, so it would make sense if Lan's words aren't just summons, but constructs made of her very soul. I'm sure it's a bit more complex than that, since none of Nico's words hurt himself and the meteor's destruction didn't hurt Lan, but at the very least, things that don't already exist seem to tie directly to the user's soul. Feng defeating Shenlong will likely prove this hypothesis next week

Speaking of Feng! While I'm sure many people are upset that Tella didn't end up teaming up with Nico, there really isn't anyone more perfect for this fight now that we understand the mechanics of it

Sure, Feng doesn't really seem to be the imaginative type, nor does he have literally any linguistic capabilities beyond Mandarin, but A) he's the best hand-to-hand fighter in the entire series, making him excellent for both offense and defense against whatever Lan is liable to throw at the team, and B) he's the only other character outside of the current arc to ever acknowledge souls. If the main goal of this fight is to further the collective understanding of souls, then giving Nico access to both of the L101 Negators with explicit understanding of their souls is absolutely the ideal path. Not only will Feng likely give Nico a method of actually communicating with Ichico, but we're also most likely finally going to understand what L100 Feng meant by "I've got the hang of this soul thing." Even if the current Feng hasn't actually learned it though and his line about "having a firm grasp on [his] soul" was unrelated, this is still a fantastic opportunity for him to retroactively learn that lesson

Also! Going back to the idea of kotodama, one common application of the concept that you're all likely familiar with is the kiai, the spirited shout that martial artists perform during strikes. As near as I can find, Chinese martial arts don't have a term for it, but the custom is still practiced, the idea being that the shout invigorates the attacker and intimidates the defender, increasing the power behind the attack. Stating attack names also fulfills this purpose, so even if Feng doesn't understand the core concept of kotodama, merely giving his strikes a name should exponentially increase their effectiveness against Lan, as their identification should give Feng a clearer image of their intended outcome. A Zessho Hohou should be able to pierce right through her body no problem, and a Hakkai Zanko would probably send her to meet Luna

Again though, this is just speculation, and things will likely end up going much differently. Still, if I've illustrated anything here, I hope it's that Feng's presence has a lot more potential beyond "strongest fighter defends physically weakest fighters." Honestly, the thing I'm most excited about beyond the power development is seeing how Feng interacts with Nico specifically, cus that's a duo I never expected to see and I have zero clue how it's going to go down

Until next time, let's enjoy life!

[hanzajesthanza]

when sapkowski is all “i don’t believe in absolute evil” like he didn’t write like vilgefortz and leo bonhart and birkart grellenort likeeee okkkk but those guys were preeeetty evil though

[malleableplatypus]

Remembering when The Dumb Song first came out over a year ago and I checked some song review website after listening to it. They used a bit from another song in The Dumb Song and I knew it and recognized it but for the life of me could not remember which song and was hoping someone could name it for me.

And, I'm not even joking, literally ALL of the comments were either "I'm an AJR fan and this song SUCKS. They fell off HARD with this. BOOOO!!!!!!!!!!!!! BAD SONG!!!!!!!!!!" or "I'm not an AJR song and this is their only song that I like; it is a masterpiece nothing can compare" and it was actually really funny.💀

[gir-posting]

i wish the barbie movie was good because it had some concepts that kicked me directly in the chest and made me cry my eyes out on the way home. but it is still at its root an overly contrived version of enchanted (2008) that's trying very very hard to be About Feminism and a toy commercial at the same time