#i fucking hate that term but i like the visual metaphor

[asuccessfulbusinessman]

While a lot of focus has been put on the RMT side of things (an important subject to be sure) ignoring the time investment required to gain this generosity is placing the other half of the predatory business as a given assumption.

The game still wants you to build a daily habit, the game still utilizes FOMO and sunk cost fallacy with seasonal passes, progression is slowed by design and certain content is there to played past the point of enjoyment to gain resources for the next "freebie."

"Just play it everyday" or even a more reasonable "play it everyday for a month per season" are still massive concessions to gain this generosity despite not costing a dime.

I'm even going to push back a little regarding curbing predatory practices regarding RMT - though this does fall more cleanly under "all gacha games are evil" - can you really say a practice isn't predatory if one isn't the target prey? Will the generosity given sate the true target (profitable) demographic - those collectors who strive to unlock every price of content and max it out?

Only legitimate criticism of Limbus Company I’ve seen is “All gacha games are evil and being pushed on us 24/7 it’s just slot machines that make you gamble your real money away made by greedy companies,” and I’m not saying this isn’t a fair criticism of an entire genre of games but Limbus Company’s gacha system does everything it can to not be predatory.

You can, conceivably, grind daily bonuses for maybe a month or two and get a rare unit without even touching your free gacha currency. You could save up Nominal Ego Shard Crates between Mirror Dungeon rewards and seasonal pass rewards (they just hand you NESCs once you cap level 60) and once you hit 400 you can trade them in for the specific SR or SSR-tier unit of your choosing. You can effectively get 000 units without even touching your free Lunacy. 

That’s not getting into how once you role a specific E.G.O. out of the gacha pool it permanently leaves the pool and thus increases your chances of getting a different one.

I understand it’s still ultimately gacha at the end of the day but Project Moon actively tried to do all they could not to encourage addictive gambling. Time will only tell if they continue to be this generous but for right now they’re defying every rule of what makes a successful gacha game up to and including curbing predatory business.

[boinin]

Batten down the hatches: Rin's ego is about to land

The latest chapters show Rin playing with an unfamiliar aura: what looks like swirling rivulets of water.

This represents the refinement of his ego and playstyle since the under-20 match. But what exactly are they going for with the swirling water? Here's my two cents.

Rin is strongly associated with water, specifically the sea. He grew up by the coast; he and Sae shared a love of watching the sunset over the water after training together. Those childhood memories are turbulent now, like dark clouds on the ocean's horizon.

It's here he realises that he can no longer play the puppetmaster football that helped him thrive in Blue Lock. As good as he is, it wasn't authentic... and it's nowhere near where he needs to be to compete with his brother, or even Isagi.

Rin's flow state is the most unique out of any others we've seen. Let's dig into it. All panels are from the official translation, which is important as the translation choices are 1) consistent and 2) likely chosen carefully.

In the dying moments of the match, Rin complains about feeling restrained. Being Itoshi Rin is eating him alive.

Cool, calm and aloof.

A genius. Prodigy. Puppetmaster.

Team player. Team captain.

Isagi Yoichi's partner. Shidou Ryuusei's rival.

Itoshi Sae's little brother.

The prospect of defeat rudely wakes him up. His pretence comes crashing down hard, triggered by his ineffectiveness in spite of the teammates around him. It's one of the best rugpulls in sports manga.

When the power of friendship comes knocking, Itoshi Rin tells it to fuck off and die.

What a glorious moment... and not just because it posits Rin as a Uchiha Sasuke kinnie. I prompt you to examine his eyes in this panel.

They're a swirling vortex of hate and destruction, befitting Blue Lock's angstiest character. The shape reminds me of this:

Satellite images of Hurricane Franklin and Hurricane Idalia, August 2023. Image credit: NOAA Satellites.

Rin's true ego, which he unleashes against Sae, is a storm.

Optional soundtrack for the rest of this post (because Rin 100% listens to this once it comes out in Blue Lock's universe).

Although it isn't portrayed visually as such in the under-20 arc, the metaphor fits Rin's evolving playstyle. What is more destructive, more uncontrollable, more senseless than a hurricane? A violent force of nature that we can predict but never avert?

When a storm approaches, all we can do is rank it, track it, then attempt to mitigate the inevitable damage.

In football terms? Sounds a lot like playing Rin.

It's even alluded to in chapter 250: the graphics for Rin's formation are similar to the satellite images of large storms.

Within the U20 match, there are exchanges that support this theory. Darai calls Rin's evolving playstyle arrogant and avaricious. The latter (meaning extreme greed) is evocative of a force that pursues what it wants without regard for anything in its surroundings. What it can't have, it destroys.

Niou is confident enough in his physicality to try withstand his opponent's attrack. Rin literally flips him into the air. Niou's hubris brings to mind all man-made constructs which are supposedly storm-proof... until a cyclone comes along and proves otherwise.

The contrast between Rin and Sae's egos are interesting. If we accept Rin's is a storm, i.e. a destructive force of nature that cannot be controlled, Sae's is the opposite despite being as impossible to defy. Sae's motif is defined in the manga as "beautiful destruction", plays and passes depicted in graceful data strings. Rather than natural, his playstyle is sleek and controlled, and dominant to the point of appearing pre-ordained by his opponents.

Their attitudes are equally different. While Rin drools and loses composure in the final minutes, Sae does little more than raise his eyebrows throughout the entire game. He's completely emotionless.

It's the extremes of human nature: animalistic rage versus robotic detachment. This time, the latter wins. Will Rin have an opportunity to face his brother again, with a better grasp on his ego? Here's hoping.

My final thoughts on Rin are speculative. How does one beat a storm? Not just endure—but subdue and calm one?

It's beyond human capability. The ability to control the weather exists only in myth and fantasy, and even then it's usually in the hands of powerful entities, not mere heroes or wizards.

Subduing something as powerful as a hurricane would require a god.

Is this Isagi and Rin's endgame?

Time will tell.

[sometipsygnostalgic]

adventure time season 6

we rewatched breezy last night, i showed kim that episode for the first time, and her reaction was. “other than the arm stuff, that was a great episode but NEVER show me that again”. which is exactly as i predicted so i am the amazing adventure time reaction predictor. 

i enjoy the episode as its metaphorical exploration of finn engaging in casual relationships in order to stave off depression, until he hears the song of another lost soul, and rediscovers love. visualised through a vision of PB knighting him with a special sword - Finn’s original passion. of course, that metaphorical exploration probably had NO place in adventure time, and it doesn’t help that the storyboarder responsible was more than a bit creepy about his ex. however i can still connect to it. 

mostly because, that was adventure time to me!!! not just when I was 16 and it saved my life.... but a decade later when I was 25. after years of dealing with empty rage, and the pandemic, adventure time obsidian came out and i fell in love with the show all over again, i hadn’t had such a passionate awakening for an interest in a long time. 

we also watched the other s6 eps leading to that point. I can’t stress how AMAZING it was being an AT fan at that time, and how soulcrushing it felt watching Finn grow his arm back, and then there was Something Big which people didn’t like, but it was also the final time that I was deeply involved in the show’s fandom while it was still running. At least until Obsidian aired 6 years later!!! 

The Tower is still a complete classic and the moment Finn loses his arm in Citadel might be the most powerful scene in the series. I didn’t feel it deeply last night but that’s probably because I had a headache and felt sick, but the episodes are so BEAUTIFUL visually. Season 6 looks damn good. 

Sad Face is actually fun, I love how jake’s tail goes everywhere

and James II was contextually the funniest episode in the series, realistically we should have hated it when it aired, but it was such a nice breather after the intensity of the season premier and of the original epsiode. i love watching all the characters laugh on the wall at the silly banana guards. 

season 6 suffers from... primarily... no women being in the writers room at the time. absolutely none. that is everpresent, there is a piece of the show’s identity missing, the writing suffers because of it, cos up to that point they at least had rebecca or ako around. and i think this is no more greatly personified than by how Marceline is FUCKING ABSENT for the entire thing. they didn’t want to touch sugar’s character.

it’s also prevalent because of how season 7 has an immediate improvement in terms of warmth and emotional depth, with the introduction of writers who were not cis men. 

however i think season 6 is otherwise an excellent experiment in terms of what you can accomplish in 11 minutes, it is not afraid to go out of its way to explore spirituality for example. i would say it marks the end of adventure time’s insane creative era where it was in constant flux, as in season 7 the show settles down into a consistent nostalgic warmth. 

[mitochondriaandbunnies]

Miami Vice S1E8: No Exit

Bruce Willis plays one of the sleaziest villains in all of Vice, directed by David Soul.

One of my favorite early episodes-- this is definitely a good candidate for trying to convince someone to watch Miami Vice. Fair warning that it’s fairly upsetting!

While Paul Michael Glaser (Starsky) directs 3 episodes of Vice, David Soul (Hutch) only did this one. PMG’s episodes are brisk, sarcastic, and laden with visual metaphor. This episode from Soul is dark, contemplative, and artistically spare. Both directors, however, use music absolutely beautifully, and seem to understand the almost visceral connection between Sonny and Rico, even this early in the series. It’s a shame we never got another Soul episode, but this one is damn good.

I love that Tubbs mentions that he is scared of machine guns, because it’s something that sets him apart from the other men in the department. He’s willing to admit his weaknesses and fear and isn’t as wrapped up in the I’m-the-toughest-cop-here machismo bullshit. His ability to be a little more honest with himself is almost certainly a protective factor in terms of why he doesn’t crash and burn quite as badly as the other characters over the course of the show.

Poor Lester the bug man. Lester is one of those early Vice characters who was clearly intended to be recurring, but he mostly spends the beginning of this episode trying to explain how his tools work while Tubbs is like “shut up I’m creepily looking at ladies through a telescope” again. Jesus, Tubbs.

Sonny and Rico are so fucking mean to Paul, the FBI agent who is supposed to be going undercover. Sonny jokes that the guy “must’ve taken drama in high school” and Rico patronizingly says that he “thinks they’ll handle it.” Then they proceed to send Rico, who has like 3 months of inconsistent undercover work under his belt, and whose Jamaican accent occasionally sounds Transylvanian, to do the job instead. Great work, boys.

God. Just-- the way Sonny is simultaneously truly, genuinely, and deeply concerned about Rita and wants to get her out of Tony’s grasp, and yet in the next breath he’s utterly manipulating her so Vice can use her. “Can you do that, Rita?,” he asks her, looking desperate and mournful, “Can you buy us some time?” It’s so goddamn bald-faced. You wonder if he justifies it to himself-- he has to make her do this to save her-- or if he just goes home hating himself that night because he knows what a bastard he was for even asking.

The sequence that follows is utterly wrenching. Tony offers Rita earrings, and when she doesn’t react with the level of excitement (fawning?) he was hoping for, he slowly stalks her down the spare, white hall and then slaps her so hard she falls to the ground. It’s a repetition of the same slow, white-backgrounded violence from the interrogation scene in Calderone’s Return pt. 2; it’s shot and framed like Tony is a horror movie monster; it’s set to the tinkly, synthy, shmaltzy strains of Stay with Me by Teddy Pendergrass. The intentional musical mismatch makes it all the more painful to watch; the age-old excuse that abuse comes from love or the fear of losing the victim’s affection falls apart when a love song is juxtaposed with such stark violence.

I think it’s very telling that Sonny’s call to Rita after he witnesses this (and, rightly, blames himself for it happening) is shot with him standing in almost exactly the same way at the exact same kind of payphone as when he calls Caroline in the pilot. In both cases, he’s calling theoretically to offer some kind of support or reassurance, but in actuality appears to need reassurance himself. He wants Caroline’s confirmation that she did love him once; he wants Rita’s forgiveness. Sonny’s ongoing issue with women comes from the same place as his issues with his self-esteem; he sees himself as a hired weapon at worst and a protector of the innocent at best. When he fails to protect someone, especially a woman or a child, his self-image starts to collapse. He doesn’t believe he’s good for anything else-- so in S1, he asks those he’s failed for reassurance that he is still a good protector. In later seasons, he just believes he really isn’t good for anything.

Sonny: Well, time for you to go to jail / Tony: No one can ever make me go to jail / Random government agent: Yeah uhh so we use him for proxy wars in the Southern Hemisphere, you know how it is with the US government and guns and cocaine and something something contras, so uh, yeah, he can go free

....but Miami Vice definitely is just about speedboats, right

I consider the ending of this to be the most classic/the “ur” Miami Vice Freeze Frame ending. It’s perfect, because like. Yeah, sure, there could be a denouement, but... why bother? There’s nothing that can be said that hasn’t already been said, and nothing that can fix what has happened that wouldn’t utterly undermine the themes of the story. It just sucks! The system is corrupt! They failed because they were set up to fail! You can’t fix the justice system from inside the justice system! This is the theme of the series in one abrupt freeze!

Okay. Okay. So. If Don Johnson is to be believed, he got Bruce Willis either the role or the audition for the role here. And he knew him because Bruce Willis was a waiter at a restaurant he liked. Not to put my tinfoil hat on or anything, but I find it utterly hilarious that Phillip Michael Thomas and not Don “hey boss, I need you to give a job to this hot talented waiter I know” Johnson has a scene here where he and Bruce Willis feel each other up in a men’s room. Look up photos of DJ and Bruce Willis from the 80′s. Look at DJ’s face and tell me I’m wrong.

[blueskittlesart]

What was your favorite dungeon in P5?

hmmm. well ok this is embarrassing to admit as someone who is openly obsessed with dungeon-based games but i never actually fully completed a single dungeon in p5 lmao. i would secure the route as quickly as possible and then get out. my honest opinion is that as far as dungeons go persona 5's design is kind of lacking. it's very stealth-based which is already a downside for me bc i hate stealth and most of the puzzles are either super obvious and involve fighting something for a key to the next room or are basically portal mazes. that's not to say the dungeons were BAD or took away from the gameplay, (not usually at least) but they were means to an end more than anything. p5 to me is much more of a visual novel than a dungeon crawler so i think some lackluster dungeon design is fine/to be expected and doesn't really take away from my overall enjoyment even as someone who enjoys good puzzle & dungeon design.

as for. your actual question. i am wracking my brain here trying to remember all the dungeons because honestly all i remember is a lot of tedium LMAO. okumura and futaba are out of the running instantly because they sucked. kamoshida wasn't BAD but it was the tutorial dungeon so i probably only liked it because it was easy LMAO. madarame and kaneshiro are kind of equally unmemorable to me? i think madarame had some cool stuff going on in terms of like. set design. i remember thinking the fact that he had his former pupils up on the wall as his work was a cool visual metaphor. i also liked that brief little section where you had to walk through the painting maze. i kinda wish that was implemented in more than just that one room. uhhhh who am i missing here. sae and shido?? and maruki ig but im not rlly counting him his was just boring lol. sae's was kinda cool i liked cheating at gambling and it was fun to infiltrate with akechi even though it ended Like That lmao. shido's was just. LONG. so long. and there were a bunch of parts where you had to trigger certain conversations in order to even get your key into the next area to SPAWN and i kept missing them and running around like an idiot trying to find whatever random npc i was supposed to talk to so that was fucking annoying. but um tldr i guess madarame's was the best??? at least i cant think of any open complaints about it LMAO

[dont-look-up-at-the-sky]

Really I couldn't agree more with @e-th-er. Being the most toxic pairing doesn't equate to being the most interesting/fascinating one – all of my fav ships have more than just a bit of unhealthiness in them, but, for e.g., I would happily give it to those two sick psychos from Killing Stalking which I could NEVER ship together if the yardstick is the mere toxicity and not the personal liking. The fact itself that KS didn't make it past round 2 really tells a lot about how the results are biased towards the most liked/popular ship instead of toxic, and I stress it again that being more toxic it's not a valuable thing if the term of comparison are the already mentioned Sangwoo and Yoonbum.

Suzaku and Lelouch are toxic to each other to such an extent that, as much as I recognise them as one of the very pillarstone in the history of the yaoi couples, if I'm being honest I don't truly ship them. I'm obsessed with their dynamic, SURE, bc it's so emotionally twisted, sick and tragic, so damaged, that I can't help to find it immesurably interesting (also, they're not a side aspect of Code Geass, their relationship is the fundament and the driving force of the plot itself). But I personally can't see a single moment where they could have worked well together in a romantic sense without it being straight up painful at the best and then, after a certain point in the story, out of pure self-loathing and mutual emotional abuse.

So I don't want to make it just a matter of kill count (even if damn THERE'S A LITERAL FUCKING NUKE INVOLVED. A NUKE. And that it's just to say one!), it's the way they're insane, morbid, downright destructive and chained to each other as if their relationship was a cell they can't escape even if it feels like being buried alive in a tomb where your only company is the ghost of what could have been IF… if there had been no war, if it hadn't been too late since the start.

The cell one is not a random metaphor. I can't give context to those who haven't watched Code Geass because it would be too long, but at some point in the OVAs they're actually prisoners in the same cell. Everything is dark, suffocating, claustrophobic, illuminated only by a neon green artificial light, which makes everything even more alienating and is also visually shaped like a net. Now, just imagine it. You, Suzaku, are trapped there with the person you (should) hate the most, a person that in his hallucinating state is also trapped in a more deep cell in his mind, which is the memory of the long-gone innocent time you spent together as you were still children, and precisely the day you shared the promise of being friends forever. Imagine being forced to revive that memory over and over and over again since your delusional cell mate keeps on talking about sunflowers and asks you for water bc in his mind it's a warm summer day, but in reality you are stuck in a prison, in winter, in Russia. You try as much as possible to isolate yourself, but at some point you get up to your feet and, without a blink, acting like an emotionless dead corpse, you put your hands around his neck to choke him, but more like you were trying to strangle that part of yourself that's still attached to what he once meant to you because the only way to free yourself is to kill him in your head first, to kill the past and all the pain it brings, but then… you can't. That's for me a very depicting way to express their kind of obsessive, poisonous, suffocating relationship.

I wanted to add my take on this aspect because a lot it's already been said about the more prominent events of their story, especially the murder-suicide ending. But really, if you like Hannigram better as a couple I totally understand, if you think it's more toxic… obviously you're allowed to have your opinion, but I don't comprehend.

Toxic Yaoi Tournament Finals: Suzalulu (Code Geass) vs. Hannigram (Hannibal)

[finsterhund]

My brain deciding to retreat into my research driven science autism to combat how my body has been actively shutting down and trying to die from the agony and retraumatizing it's been going through lately (thanks to subhumans that shouldn't be alive spreading their diseases all over good things on the internet) is a welcoming change in the fact that right at this moment I don't want to fucking die as bad and me having no outlet for how much I need to righteously kill people other than chewing and chewing and chewing is currently the slightest bit ignorable.

but man do I fucking hate how unfriendly academia information is online nowadays. I can't just have fun and explore scientific info anymore. I have to hope some fucking YouTuber is talking about the specific niche subtopics I'm focusing on or else find a paper if after digging through Wikipedia doesn't land me sources that aren't as fucking dry. These fuckers are so terrified of visually appealing illustrations and diagrams. Would it fucking hurt to show images when you are talking about VISUALLY DISTINCT PHYSICAL DIFFERENCES!!??? COME ON MAN. FUCK OFF. I DO NOT WANT JUST A WALL OF TEXT. We have fucking highly evolved frugivore special eyes and you fucking insufferable dipshits won't put in as many images as possible. Die.

And I'm not one who can't read anything other than grade 6 reading level layman's terms but come on can somebody have a authorial style that isn't fucking clinical ass wikipedia article? Bad enough I have to use those to start my search because the internet is a corporate nightmare but then any real fucking source I find talks like that too. Maybe I don't want to have to exclusively read research papers all the time. Bro why in the fuck does society hate education and knowledge. Unless you pay for it of course 🙄

The internet is supposed to be a big fucking library but it's all just spam and ads and shitheads and stupid fucking garbage. Andy want go library Andy want go library screaming crying throwing up

The fact that you have to like, actually do the damn research yourself because it's presented in such a currently inaccessible way.

I mean it's not like I'd just be able to go into a regular ass library because if I'm lucky there's like 1 relevant book and there's only 1 chapter that's relevant in that one book.

You stupid bastards shouldn't make it so that you have to owe some shitheads money for life as punishment for the crime of getting more education.

What do you mean I can't just get more science class for free I am going to fucking kill you and set everyone on fire. Life would be so much fucking better if I could just have an adult tell me more and more and more and more biology and astronomy and paleontologically and shit until I fucking throw up. Instead I have to fucking dig through garbage.

All of which doesn't really reflect on the absurd stupidity how this was only first brought on today by what essentially equates to me metaphorically chasing after a fictional animal and screaming, demanding to know what its skull looks like.

Because the fucking encyclopedic worldbuilding brainrot cannot be repressed. Because fucking of course it can't. Why can shitheads churn out awful fucking art but then my life sucks so bad that all I can do is make an encyclopedia related to the art I want to create. Everything I love and care about is dead or worse.

[willowaudreykeyes]

Prompt: myths and chaos with Logan with the line “so apparently microwaving this ancient manuscript isn’t a good way to find out its secrets.”

Remus’ Puzzle Temple Of Friendship And Chaos

Warnings: Baby eldritch thing, tentacles, one eye, vague sexual reference that’s from a song

Platonic Logince, brotherly-and-on-good-terms Creativitwins and Intrulogical of whatever relationship interpretation that you want.

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

Roman

“Remind me to thank your brother at dinner tonight.”

“That’s if we make it to dinner. And you all call me extra; he made an entire temple for us to explore within a week!” He spent a lot of energy on it too. I still remember the shaky finger he pointed at me after the second day of working on this Incan-like temple; slurring tiredly about not going into the space between our Kingdoms and ruining the surprise. He also forced me to carry him to his room as he dangerously swayed on his feet. I’ll have to thank him by working just as hard for his and Logan’s adventure after the two of us finish this one.

“I know; yet I’ve yet to thank him for doing so. And I must ask how long it took to make this language.” Taking my first glance at said language, I recognise it immediately as the first language that Remus and I had known. We had known it better than English at one point, until Patton insisted that we make English our main language so that we wouldn’t confuse Thomas. 

“Oh, we’ve always known it. We used to speak it in front of Patton as kids to confuse him and we still use it occasionally whenever we send a letter, or in his case a slab of mysterious leather, between our Kingdoms.”

“So you can translate this?”

“Of course!” I hold the slightly chipped black and red tablet out at arms length, quickly noticing that everything on the tablet makes no sense. No wonder he was so tired after every day in the Imagination; he even made us a puzzle. “It’s encrypted though, so we have to figure out what the cypher is first. And knowing Remus, it could be anything.”

He takes it from my hands and adjusts his glasses for the fiftieth time today before tapping his chin. I doubt Logan realises that he has so many visual tells when he becomes passionate and interested. “He would leave a clue somewhere where we could find it. He’s chaotic, not unfair.”

“Aha!” In a spark of inspiration, I rough up my hair and gain a huff of defeat from the neighbourhood nerd as I do the same to his own. It had dust from the temple in it anyway. “We just have to think like Remus! Now what’s the most logical place to put a cypher for this thing?”

“Where we found it.”

“Okay. Now what’s the opposite of that?”

His eyebrows do that cute thing where they pinch down a bit when he’s confused. I don’t bother hiding my smile as his eyes shift around, taking in invisible words as he tries to find my line of thinking. “I’m… not following. The opposite of where we found it is every room that we didn’t find it in, and we went through forty-three rooms and eight hallways; perhaps half or less of the entire temple judging by the size and spacing between each room.”

“And only twelve not-too-tough traps, which is less then his usual quota…” Probably because of the exhaustion, but I should have figured that out earlier. I’ll up the level of hazards in his next one as a double thank you for his hard work. “Anyway, we must think chaotically if we are to beat the chaotic one!”

With a silent nod, he attempts to fix his hair as I take in our camp and the temple before us. It’s very reminiscent of an Incan temple in design yet is mainly made out of pitch black obsidian; with intricate wall carvings engraved with pure ruby, emerald, moonstone and diamond; and a whole lot of animal and human skulls that are packed tightly into every ceiling. And I must say, adding the creatures from both of our Kingdoms as the wall carvings is a nice touch. 

Except I won’t say it out loud because the majority of them are of naked people, naked cannibals and of naked murders. 

At least our camp has some more class to it! Logan wished for something realistic, but was soon swayed by my enchanted Harry Potter tent that’s magically large enough to have a working bathroom and still look like a ‘regular’ camping tent from the outside. I do like regular camping, but I prefer to have a shower after a tub of Thomas-knows-what is dropped over us and getting into every uncomfortable crevasse. Just thinking about that disgusting concoction makes me shudder.

“... Perhaps our microwave?”

I snap my gaze back to him, beaming at his rather shy sounding remark. He always sounds shy when he says something that deviates from his path of logic. At least he’s opening up a little more. “Perfect! I knew you’d think of something!”

“It was the first usable thing that I saw. Were you daydreaming again?”

“Nope- Using the microwave to solve a cypher sounds like something Remus’ mind would think up. He did mix sardines, lettuce and one of your ties in the blender before drinking it once.” I mumble the last half -I probably shouldn’t out Remus just yet for drinking Logan’s tie a few months ago- and put the tablet in the microwave and set it to three minutes. Three is the magic number after all.

“Did you say something?” 

“Mumbling ideas to myself is all!”

The microwave suddenly glows a bright purple and I manage to drag Logan in close before blocking something from hitting the both of us with my summoned shield. With a pop, crackle, fizz and several loud noises that sound like tearing metal; I risk peeking over it in perfect sync with Logan. The sight of three large tentacles wiggling out of the new holes in the camp's microwave brings out a sigh from me. A very loud sigh. Remus could probably hear it and currently giggling to himself from the comfort of his bedroom.

“It may be best not to touch those. Or the microwave.”

“But the tablet!” Logan pushes by my shield and barely escapes my reach before I am able to pull him away. With a straight posture and a quick slick back of his hair, he opens it and nearly jumps into my arms Scooby-Doo style from the loud pop that occurs. I’m in front of him again within a moment, but the usual feeling of hostility that Remus puts on his dangerous creatures as a warning is lacking. At least this thing won’t try and face-hug me like that faceless chicken that guarded the temple did.

Inside was a brown-black-blue ball of tentacles, with three longer than the others that retract out of the newly-made holes in the microwave. My heart stutters as a singular, goat-like, boysenberry coloured eye opens from one of the many seams in the creature; just to quickly dart it’s vision between the two of us before landing it’s creepy gaze on Logan. “Huh. So apparently, microwaving the ancient manuscript isn’t a good way to find it’s secrets- but a great way to hatch an eldritch abomination.”

“If you’d hand me a blanket, perhaps bringing it with us would be advantageous in future explorations.” Of course he wants to bring the nightmare creature; he always does. I hand him the nearby dish towel instead as I don’t feel like leaving this thing alone with Logan would end nicely.

“As long as you're carrying it.”

“Of course; you’re the one with the sword and shield.” I’m rather sure that that means that he would make me carry the disgusting creature if I wasn’t the one with our only ways of defending ourselves; and I don’t know if I should dramatically put my hand to my chest in horror or just pout.

I go for the pout.

Only for it to be rather rudely ignored as he cradles the little beast in its new home, wrapping it’s longer tentacles around Logan’s hands and attempting to remove his watch for a moment before I manage to grab it before they do. Logan’s too busy holding it in one hand and going through his cue cards to notice though. “And I shall name it as randomly as I can; since Remus seems to name all of his creations.” 

“Why?”

“It’s only polite to follow custom; and the custom for Remus is to name his creatures.” I hate everything about this -plus the tablet is just full on missing or destroyed now too- but Logan seems enraptured by the little thing. I roll my eyes and put on my backpack as Logan already begins walking up the temple steps. We just had lunch, so we have a chance of leaving before dinner, but I highly doubt it.

Despite not being able to see, the creature manages to grab out one of the cue cards from Logan’s hand before letting him snatch it back. With a quick smile after reading it, he pockets them all again before getting a better hold of the thing before it runs away and eats a whole deer or something. “It’s name shall be Anaconda-Do-Not.”

God-fucking-dammit Remus. I frown at the thing as we enter the fire-lit entrance, glad that its eye is hidden under the dish towel. Sheep eyes have always kind of creeped me out; especially on things that aren’t sheep. “You’re not allowed to hang out with Remus, Virgil or Janus anymore if they keep giving you those weirder cue cards.”

“This one’s from Remus. It’s a metaphor about-”

“I KNOW WHAT IT IS!” A light pain follows my facepalm, but I ignore it and march onwards. Hoping to get rid of this thing as quickly as possible. “Let’s just… go shove it into a keyhole or something already.”

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

By the way, I really hate that stupid Anaconda song and so I know that it’d be perfect for Remus. Hopefully the ending is alright because it was the only bit I really had issues with ^^’

Oh and Remus definitely fell in love with the new Eldritch creatures name.

@ladyedwina @5am-the-foxing-hour @sparrowofsong

[malhare-archive]

Oh yeah pal, the wolf monologue basically made the film for me. Like before I was just like "This is an interesting weird movie I guess" but after that I was like "Oh god. Oh fuck." Like personally I'm more of a scorpion person, I've been obsessed with them since a young age and also playing HIKEBACK, a psychological horror / sci-fi short visual novel about abuse and change (or the ability to), did something to me that no other story will ever be able to do, and that game used Aesop's scorpion and the frog as character themes (it can even be seen in the designs now that I think about it) and metaphors. And also I'm like weirdly obsessed with that pop culture retelling of the fable, where the scorpion doesn't sting the frog and says that it can't choose its nature but it can control its actions or something like that? I also have a love/hate relationship with the original fable because on one hand I'm like "REAL SHIT 👀👀👀???" and on the other I am like "When I die I will take a book of these fables with me and I will hit Aesop really hard with it every afternoon for the rest of eternity because this fable is wrong and goes against all my convictions and ideals and it is imperative to my wellbeing that Aesop is aware of that."

But anyway wolves are cool too, it's just that, I don't know, I just hate relating to wolves because if I say it, people will surely think that I'm one of those weird guys who are like "Oh I'm a total wolf I'm a Super Mega Alpha Male haha lol". Or they'll think that I'm saying that they're like cool and badass and majestic and I'm too. But what I am in fact saying is "I was born with; or perhaps was made to grow; metaphorical claws and teeth so sharp they bite when they should kiss and cut when they should pet. My love is caustic and smells of burning plastic, it bites and takes and tears your throat out until there's nothing left of you to give to me, to nurture my empty body with. My hair raises at the tiniest sound and my heart is always racing to run or fight. I'm a wild animal, a pack animal, but I'm rabid." you know?

Anyway the wolf songs. Well the most obvious ones are:

I Know I'm A Wolf by Young Heretics

Little Red Riding Hood by Amanda Seyfried

Wolf Like Me by TV On The Radio (or this cover)

Then there's WOLF by Siamés, which is from the POV of the wolf and uses it as a metaphor for addiction

Then The Wolf Song by OMNIA, which actually may be rather literal because OMNIA is a bit out there

Then Be Nice To Me by The Front Bottoms uses the wolf metaphor once but it isn't the focus

Songs that are focused on their metaphor but use a slightly different animal are:

Lion by Hollywood Undead

and Dog Teeth by Nicole Dollanganger (actually I'm mildly sure this one is supposed to be about sexual assault but I can't really be sure sure about it and personally I don't treat it as that kind of song but as a general thing. Mostly because I can relate to "You're cold on the inside, there's a dog in your heart, and it tells you to tear everything apart." and actually a lot of the lyrics in general.)

Some other miscellaneous songs are:

Wounded Wolf by Giles Corey, which is named that but never actually mentions a wolf???

Bitten by Patrick Wolf (lol), which yeah talks about being bitten and stuff but isn't really focused on that. Honestly I just like the song.

Silt by Half Waif, which uses a few lyrics of a lion metaphor but otherwise talks more generally about loving with venom

Tongues and Teeth by The Crane Wives, which is also pretty vague in terms of metaphors but it fits the general concept.

I'm actually somewhat sure I knew more very specific wolf songs, but I can't find them at all right now?? Idk might get back to you with more if I ever remember the titles lol.

YOOOOO, sorry this took me a while to get around to I just [inhale] have a lot of thoughts and wanted to be able to give a thoughtful response! Thank you so much for the reccs, I LOVE getting music reccs and I LOVE wolf metaphors/imagery so I put all these songs on a playlist to listen to at work!

I've already heard a few of these - Funnily enough, "Wolf Like Me" is my favorite TV on the Radio song! I also love "I Know Im a Wolf" and "Dog Teeth"!! Im excited to listen to the rest <3

I really like the Scorpion and the Frog fable too! That "nature vs self determination" debate is really close to my own heart.

I also definitely feel you on relating to wolves in that way, especially the bit about “having claws and teeth” that accidentally hurt others. My connection to wolves isn't some macho lone-wolf deal, it's about trauma, overcoming your own nature and life obstacles, and inner strength though I'm now starting to get more into my relationship with my patron deity, Fenrir.

[vgceilingfan]

I've got a whole lot to say about this. Let's analyze it piece by piece.

"they act as stupidly preachy about shit they don't know about,"

In their exit interview, Bot sympathizes with others who aren't as lucky in terms of being accepted as their true selves and expresses a desire to help said others. I for one believe that Bot knows plenty about acceptance and how hard it can be solely from their own personal experience, so I don't see how them "preaching about stuff they don't know about" makes much sense when they've literally been through those things.

"honestly their change should have upset test tube more."

Test Tube was probably just happy to see Bot finally be able to express themself with any connection to Bow finally being severed. If she wanted to be upset at Bot wanting to change, she wouldn't have bothered helping Bot at all starting from episode 8.

"taking an established character like bow and just making it a weird ass half baked trans allegory"

You're not "transforming Bow" when the whole point of Bot's arc is that they were never Bow to begin with. The actual Bow is still vibing in Purgatory Mansion with Dough, Marshmallow, and Apple.

"and then turning from a fun character into "all i am about is being trans and nonbinary and trans and only trans and that's all i talk about""

Again, you're completely missing the point. Bot's all about being themself, being unique, being "the one and only". Why else do you think they didn't want Springy to market them and then became as distressed as they did when Springy tried to anyway?

"also weak choice to have their new voice be the most stereotypical cartoony 'girly' voice, why,to the nonbinary character."

News flash! All nonbinary people have to be expressly neutral because this guy on a throwaway account doesn't like it when a nonbinary cartoon character has a feminine-sounding voice!

"why not have a changing voice per episode,"

Would get confusing for audiences rather quickly.

"or have it be more robotic-like with a filter."

Does the name Bot not make it obvious that they're a robot? Even if they did have a more robotic voice, you'd probably still complain because "tHeY'rE jUsT a RoBoT nOw".

"or,fuck it, a more masc voice."

Based on your earlier points, you would have a problem with this too for similar reasons as to why you hate the fem voice.

"this is a fucking reskin of 'nonbinary is girl-lite' AT LEAST BE FUN WITH IT how about them being genderfluid? or boygirl or yknow. ANYTHING but what we got."

Seems to me that they were having plenty of fun with what we got. You just don't like it and are therefore claiming they "weren't having fun" because of that.

"once bot 'came out' ALL that was done for them had to do with their voice,identity,self worth,their fear of a visual transition, the stupid butterfly metaphor. to the VERY end."

That's a lot of things that needed to be done, and a lot more was done thanks to these. Bot empathized with Floory, became besties with Cabby, grew a lot closer to MePhone4 than anyone else ever has, and is starting off on the right track with Fan. What else needed to be done with them, if anything at all? Their story throughout Season 3 is complete as-is.

This blog feels like it's criticizing Bot's character as a whole rather than their nonbinary representation specifically, which makes the title confusing. Why not just say you hate Bot? You already made a throwaway seemingly just for this blog! Additionally, some of the information presented is downright incorrect, so I'm correcting it here.

There's so much more to Bot besides their queer narative, and that's why I love them so much! The amount of things that can be done with them, especially now that Season 3 is over, intrigues me. I have plenty of my own ideas for my own adaptations of the character, but that's for another time.

actual hot take: Bot fucking sucks as nonbinary representation, they act as stupidly preachy about shit they dont know about, and honestly their change should have upset test tube more. taking an established beloved character like bow and just make it a weird ass half baked trans allegory and then turning from a fun character to a didactic ass "all i am about is being trans and nonbinary and trans and only trans and that's all i talk about" also weak choice to have their new voice be the most stereotypical cartoon 'girly' voice, why,to the nonbinary character. not to mention a nonbinary character that is a ROBOT. PB has a neutral voice,test tube has a deeper voice,but bot had to pick the most high pitchy cartoony voice. like what the hell. that's such a weak choice. why not have a changing voice per episode,or have it be more robotic-like with like a filter. or,fuck it, a more masc voice. this is a fucking reskin of 'nonbinary is girl-lite' AT LEAST BE FUN WITH IT how about them being genderfluid? or boygirl or yknow. ANYTHING but what we got. once bot 'came out' ALL that was done with them had to do with their voice,identity,self worth,their fear of a visual transition, the stupid butterfly metaphor. to the VERY end.

[dustedmagazine]

Punk’d History, Vol. VIII: This Machine [blank] Fascists

Photo by Richard Young

It has the appearance of a worrisome pattern: any number of punk rock’s founding figures embraced the symbolics of Nazi Germany. Ron Asheton, an original and indispensable member of the Stooges, played a number of gigs wearing a red swastika armband, and liked to sport Iron Cross medals and a Luftwaffe-style leather jacket. Sid Vicious loved his bright scarlet, swastika-emblazoned tee shirt, and Siouxsie Sioux, during her tenure as the It-Girl of the Bromley Contingent, mixed her breast-baring, black leather bondage gear with a bunch of “Nazi chic.” And how many early Ramones songs (inevitably penned by Dee Dee) referenced Nazi gear, concepts and geography? “Blitzkrieg Bop,” “Today Your Love, Tomorrow the World,” “Commando,” “It’s a Long Way Back to Germany,” “All’s Quiet on the Eastern Front,” and so on—for sure, more than a few.

“Appearance” is the key term. Poor Sid lacked the sobriety and smarts to have much of a grasp of fascism as an ideology. Siouxsie was just taking the piss, and gleefully pissing off the mid-1970s British general public, for much of whom World War II was still a living memory. Asheton and Dee Dee? Both were sons of hyper-masculine military men. Asheton’s father was a collector of WWII artefacts, and the guitarist shared his father’s fascination. When the Stooges adopted an ethos and aesthetic hostile to the late-1960s prevailing Flower Power rock’n’roll subculture, the Nazi accoutrement seemed to him fitting signs of the band’s anger and alienation. Dee Dee hated his father, an abusive Army officer who married a German woman. Dee Dee spent some of his youth in post-war West Germany, in which Nazi symbols were highly charged with anxiety and vituperation. Casual veneration of Nazis was a convenient way to reject the triumphal ennobling of the Good War, and of the military men associated with its traditions. And (as Sid, Siouxsie and Asheton also noticed) it really bothered the squares. 

None of that makes the superficial use of the swastika or phrases like “Nazi schatzi” any less offensive — it simply underscores that in the cases noted above, the offense was the thing. The politics weren’t even an afterthought, because the political itself had been dismissed as corrupt, boring or simply the native territory of the very people the punks were striking out against. If that’s where the relation between punk and fascism ceased, there wouldn’t be much more to write about.

The post-punk moment in England provided opportunities to rethink and restrategize the nascent détournement of Siouxsie’s fashionable provocations. Genesis P-Orridge and the rest of Throbbing Gristle were a brainy bunch, and their play with fascist signifiers was a good deal more complex. The band’s logo and their occasional appearance in gun-metal grey uniforms clearly alluded to Nazism, with its attendant, keen interests in occult symbols and High Modernist representational languages. TG’s visual gestures were also of a piece with an early band slogan: “Industrial music for industrial people.” Clearly “industrial people” can be read as a highly ironized coupling: the oppressed workers marching through the bowels of Metropolis were a sort of industrial people, reduced to the functionality of pure human capital. TG seemed to impose the same analysis on the middle-managers of Britain’s post-industrial economy, and their uncritical complicity in capital’s cruelties. But it’s also possible to argue that industrial people are industrious people; like TG, industrial people (middle managers, MPs) can get a lot of stuff done. They can produce things. They can make the trains run on time. And what sorts of cargo might those trains be carrying? What variety of conveyance delivered the naked “little Jewish girl” of “Zyklon B Zombies” to her fate?  

To be clear: I don’t mean at all to suggest that TG was a fascist band. Like their punky contemporaries, TG traded in fascist iconography in a spirit of transgressive outrage, expressing their hot indignation with equally heated symbols. And other British post-punk acts flirted with fascist themes and images, ranging from ambiguous dalliance (Joy Division’s overt references to Yehiel De-Nur’s House of Dolls and to Rudolph Hess; and just what was the inspiration for Death in June’s band name?) to more assertive satire (see Current 93’s appealingly bonkers Swastikas for Noddy [LAYLAH Antirecords, 1988]). But a more problematic populist undercurrent in British punk persisted through the late 1970s. The dissolution of Sham 69—due in large part to the National Front’s attempts to appropriate the band’s working-class anger as a form of white pride—opened the way for a clutch of clueless, cynical or outright racist Oi! bands to attempt to impose themselves as the face of blue-collar English punk. And literally so: the Strength through Oi! compilation LP (Decca Records, 1981) featured notorious British Movement activist Nicky Crane on its cover. It didn’t help that the record’s title seemed to allude to the Nazis’ “Strength through Joy [Kraft durch Freude]” propaganda initiative.  

Of course, it’s unfair to tar all Oi! bands with an indiscriminate brush. A few bands whose songs were opportunistically stuck onto Strength through Oi! by the dullards at Decca Records — Cock Sparrer and the excellent Infa Riot — tended leftward in their politics, and were anything but racists. But for a lot of the disaffected kids sucking down pints of Bass and singing in the Shed at Stamford Bridge, it wasn’t much of a leap from the punk pathetique of the Toy Dolls to Skrewdriver’s poisonous palaver.  

In the States, a similarly complicated story can be recovered:

In numerous ways, hardcore intensified punk’s confrontational qualities, musically and aesthetically. The New York hardcore scene made a fetish of its inherent violence, which complemented the music’s sharpened impact. So it’s hard to know precisely what to make of the photo on the cover of Victim in Pain (Rat Cage Records, 1984). If inflicting violence was an essential element of belonging in the NYHC scene, with whom to identify: the Nazi with the pistol, or the abject Ukrainian Jewish man, on his knees and about to tumble into the mass grave?  

Agnostic Front seemed to provide a measure of clarity on the record, which included the song “Fascist Attitudes.” The lyric uses “fascist” as a condemnatory term. But the behaviors the song engages as evidence of fascism are intra-scene acts of violence: “Why should you go around bashing one another? […] / Learning how to respect each other is a must / So why start a war of anger, danger among us?” That’s a rhetoric familiar to anyone who participated in early-1980s hardcore; calls for scene unity were ubiquitous, and the theme is obsessively addressed on Victim in Pain. But the signs of inclusivity most visibly celebrated on the NYHC records and show flyers of the period were a skinhead’s white, shaven pate; black leather, steel-toe boots; and heavily muscled biceps. Those signifiers clearly link to the awful cover image of Strength through Oi! The forms of identity recognized and concretized in the songs’ first-person inclusive pronouns have a clear referent. 

Agnostic Front wasn’t the only NYHC band to refer to and engage World War Two-period fascism. Queens natives Dave Rubenstein and Paul Bakija met at Forest Hills High School—the same school at which John Cummings (Johnny) befriended Thomas Erdelyi (Tommy), laying the groundwork for the formation of the Ramones. Rubenstein and Bakija also took stage names (Dave Insurgent and Paul Cripple) and formed Reagan Youth. But unlike the Ramones, there was nothing tentative or ambivalent about Reagan Youth’s politics. Rubenstein’s parents, after all, were Holocaust survivors. The band’s name riffed on “Hitler Youth,” but specifically did so to draw associations between Reagan and Hitler, between American conservatism’s 1980s resurgence and the Nazi’s hateful, genocidal agenda. Songs like “New Aryans” and “I Hate Hate” accommodated no uncertainties.  

Still, it’s interesting that Victim in Pain and Reagan Youth’s Youth Anthems for the New Order (R Radical Records, 1984) were released only months apart, by bands in the same scene, sometimes sharing bills at CBGBs’ famous matinees of the period. And while Reagan Youth toured with Dead Kennedys, it’s Agnostic Front’s “Fascist Attitudes” that’s closer in content to the most famous punk rock putdown of Nazis.

It’s odd what comes back around: Martin Hannett, whom Biafra playfully chides at the track’s very beginning, produced much of Joy Division’s music, moving the band away from its brittle early sound to the fulsome atmospheres of the Factory records, and to a wider listenership. “Nazi Punks Fuck Off” similarly addresses a formerly obscure, tight scene opening to a greater array of participants, some of whom were attracted solely to hardcore’s reputation for violence. Like “Fascist Attitudes,” the Dead Kennedys’ song itemizes fighting at shows as its chief complaint, and as a principal marker for “Nazi” behavior. Biafra’s lyric eventually gets around to somewhat more focused ideological critique: “You still think swastikas look cool / The real Nazis run your schools / They’re coaches, businessmen, and cops / In a real fourth Reich, you’ll be the first to go.” The kiss-off to punk’s vapid romance of the swastika (it “looks cool”) complements the speculative treatment of a “real fourth Reich.” Both operate at the level of abstraction. The casual, superficial relation to the symbol’s aesthetic assumes a sort of safety from the real, material consequences of its application. And the emergence of a fascist political regime is dangled as a possible future event. That speculative futurity undoes the “real” in “real Nazis.” The threat is ultimately a metaphorical construct. The Nazis are metaphorical “Nazis.”  

Still, it’s the song’s chorus that resonates most powerfully. So much so that the song has found its way into other artworks.

Jeremy Saulnier’s Green Room (2015) is frequently identified as a horror film on streaming services. We could split hairs over that genre marker. The film gets quite graphically bloody, but there’s no psychotic slasher killer, no supernatural force at work. And cinematically, the film is a lot more interested in anxiety and dramatic tension than it is in inspiring revulsion or disgust. It terrifies, more than it horrifies. What’s especially compelling about the film (aside from Imogen Poots’ excellent performance, and Patrick Stewart’s menacing turn as charismatic fascist Darcy Banks) is its interest in embedding the viewer in a social context in which the Nazis are a lot less metaphorical, a lot more real. In Green Room, the kids in the punk band the Ain’t Rights are warned about the club they have agreed to play: “It’s mostly boots and braces down there.” And they understand the terms. What they can’t quite imagine is a room — a scene, a political Real — in which fascism is dominant. Their recognition of the stakes of the Real comes too late. The violence is already in motion. In that world, the Dead Kennedys song provides a nice slogan, but symbolic action alone is entirely inadequate.  

OK, sure, Green Room is a fiction. Its violence is necessarily aestheticized, distorted and hyperbolized. But perhaps the film’s most urgent source of horror can be located in its plausible connections to the social realities of our material, contemporary conjuncture. You don’t have to dig very deep into the Web to find thousands of records made by white nationalist and neo-fascist-allied bands, many, many of which deploy stylistic chops identified with punk rock and hardcore. You can listen. You can buy. (And yeah, I’m not going to link to any of that miserable shit, because fuck them. If you do your own digging to see what’s what, be careful. It’s scary and upsetting in there.) It feels endless. And the virulent sentiments expressed on those records are echoed in institutional politics in the US and elsewhere: Steve King (and now Marjorie Taylor Greene, effectively angling for her seat in Congress), Nigel Farage, Alternative für Deutschland, elected leadership in Poland and Hungary. Explicit white supremacist music also has somewhat more carefully coded counterparts in much more visible media (the nightly monologuing on Fox News) and in very well-positioned, prominent policy makers (Stephen Miller, who’s on the record touting “great replacement” theory and is a big fan of The Camp of the Saints). It’s a complex, ideologically coherent network, working industriously to impose and install its hateful vision as the dominant political Real. 

Sometimes it feels as if no progress at all has been made. Maybe we’re moving toward the reactionaries. Contrast Skokie in the late 1970s with Charlottesville in 2017. And now if the Neo-Nazis have licenses for their long guns, they can strut through American streets wearing them in the name of “law and order.” It’s even more disturbing that a subculture that wants to clothe itself in “revolution” and “radicalism” is so tightly in league with institutional politics. Say what you will about Siouxsie’s Nazi-fashion antics, no one suspected that her prancing echoed political activity, policy-making or messaging in Westminster.

So what’s a punk to do? It’s certain that a vigorously free society needs to preserve spaces in which unpopular speech can be uttered and exchanged. Punk should pride itself on defending those spaces. But speech that operates in conjunction with an ascendant political power and ideological agenda doesn’t need defense or energetic attempts to preserve its right to existence. In October of 2020, that speech (in this case, speeches being written by Miller, texts by folks who have spent time in Tucker Carlson’s writer’s room and songs by white supremacist hardcore bands) has become synonymous with political right itself.  

So now more than ever, it’s important to be active in the public square, to stand up to the fascists and to say it, often and out loud:

Jonathan Shaw

[corpsentry]

What is a series* you would recommend?

All the stuff I hear about seems super out of my alley. Like Game of Thrones. Or Supernatural. Or Dr. Who. Or whatever.

I guess what I'm asking more is actually what series* you wish more people knew about?

*honestly whatever form and kind of media comes to mind. Live action, animated, written...

I’VE ALWAYS WANTED TO TALK ABOUT THINGS I LIKE. THANK YOU FOR THIS OPPORTUNITY. i’m mainly an animated and textual storytelling kinda guy so i’ll mostly recommend stuff in those general regions HERE ARE A HANDFUL

anime-- shinsekai yori for a refreshing, non-western-ya-lit take on dystopian fiction and a sick soundtrack. mawaru penguindrum* for an equally dazzling soundtrack, existentialism, and absurd, haunting metaphors about child broilers alongside brilliant, charming characters. kyousogiga for bright, buoyant energy, a story centered on family relationships, interdimensional chaos, and a girl with a big fucking hammer. made in abyss* for the fantasy exploration genre taken to its logical extreme, absolutely stunning visuals, and a big ass hole in the earth that just keeps going

manga-- haru no noroi* for the most convoluted but vivid portrayal of the human condition i’ve seen in so few chapters (and a sick art style), ran and the gray world for magical realism that’ll whimsy the pants right off of you, beastars for nuanced portrayals of morality and incredible character development, the land of the lustruous for the most awful, brilliant, and terrifying main character development i’ve seen in my life (phos eclipses kaneki ken in both tg and tg:re in terms of physical and mental transformation), and the umibe no etranger/harukaze no etranger pair of stories which present not only the woes of teenage romance but also the early twenties, and then the late, and then the thirties, and also your dad has depression

novels/plays/other printed matter-- a little life* (hanya yanagihara) for the kind of character-driven narrative  most people only dream of telling and breathtaking, heartbreaking, fucking disastrous lines that punch you in the face and then stare at you for three hours. never let me go (kazuo ishiguro) for being what it is, which is incredibly fucking sad but also grounded, and whimsical, and resilient. rosencrantz and guildenstern are dead (tom stoppard), especially if you’ve seen hamlet, for the kind of meta shit that makes you go what the hell and then sets your desk on fire. when you reach me (rebecca stead) for giving you hope.

i realize you asked about series’ and compared to supernatural’s 499 season run these are all incredibly short, but on the bright side you can blast through most of them pretty fast and decide if you like them or hate them in record time. as a bonus, please allow me to recommend the writing of ao3 users twoif, batman, SORD, and gamblers. i have read kpop fic because of these people. i have read homestuck fic. i have read. they’re all very good at what they do. fucking incredible really. thanks again for the question dear anon, and have a wonderful day

series’ labeled with * contain some potentially upsetting content so you may want to look up content warnings before you take a look at them because i sure was caught off guard half the time wahoo

[atamascolily]

Metaphors vs. world-building in Star Wars landscapes: a ramble

Readers of my fics will know I am a big believer in the idea of the landscape as a reflection of the inner life of my characters. They also know I'm fond of "layers," which is my term for plot and character decisions that resonate on both literal and symbolic levels, and draw on archetypes and references that I find interesting and meaningful. One of the reasons I enjoy playing in the Star Wars sandbox is that the original trilogy really GETS that; one of the major reasons why I think the franchise is so popular is that it taps all this other stuff on both conscious and subconscious levels.... and this is especially true when it comes to landscapes.

Take Dagobah, a swamp planet shrouded in mists. As he struggles with his training in The Empire Strikes Back, Luke is literally bogged down, trapped in a landscape where his vision is obscured and nothing--from the tiny creature who turns out to be the teacher he was searching for to Darth Vader himself--is what it appears to be.

At the same time that Luke is struggling on Dagobah in ESB, Han and Leia are having their own struggles with illusion and deception on on the gas giant Bespin. Cloud City is literally a "castle in the air," beautiful in appearance but lacking any grounding--as a dis-armed Luke literally discovers when hanging suspended from what passes for foundations.

(As an aside, I appreciate Luke's "fall from grace" during his fight with Vader, and its parallels to the myth of Icarus. Icarus ignored the warnings and flew too close to the sun, only to die because his father couldn't reach him in time; Luke ignores the warnings and confronts Vader, only to deliberately refuse his father's outstretched hand. I don't know if the filmmakers consciously intended that parallel, but they nailed it.)

Yet by the time Luke returns to Dagobah in Return of the Jedi, the ubiquitous mist has vanished, and he is able to walk through the swamp in knee-high black boots without a speck of mud on him. The "veil" over his eyes has been lifted both literally and metaphorically--he now knows the truth about his father, and has accepted it.

We all know that world-building in Star Wars ranges from mediocre to non-existent, but there’s very little in any of the OT landscapes that seems grossly out of place within the context of the films themselves. The same is not true for the ST, where the filmmakers toss the world-building out the window and just go with what looks/seems the coolest (*cough* Starkiller Base *cough cough*).

In The Last Jedi, the Ahch-To sequences are supposed to parallel what we've seen in ESB of Luke's own training under Yoda. The filmmakers chose to site Ahch-To on Skellig Michael, a World Heritage site off the Irish coast, which works great on a metaphorical level. At the same time, they claim “Temple Island” be the site of the original Jedi Temple--which was a poor choice from a world-building perspective. 

Just as the island is a lonely, rocky peak emerging from the ocean, so is Luke, tucked away in his self-imposed exile. I hate that nu!canon did that to him, but metaphorically it checks out. Just as Christianity survived in large part due to small, isolated outposts like Skellig Michael, so too have the Jedi been reduced to this final bastion. Luke's decision to self-isolate makes no sense in a larger context, but the symbolism is clear and consistent. 

Because of this, the Ahch-To sequences are the most visually compelling in the entire movie for me. I like the juxtaposition of Rey, a desert child, literally out of her depth in the cave sequence--although I would have had her "vision" arise from staring at her reflection in the water as opposed to an actual mirror, because, you know, METAPHOR.

On the surface, Skellig Michael seems like a reasonable choice from a world-building perspective. It's home to a famous Gaelic Christian monastery founded somewhere between the 6th and 8th centuries. Since the Jedi are envisioned in the PT as space warrior-monks (retconned from the samurai analogues they are strongly implied to be in A New Hope), a monastery seems like a good fit for them, right? Well, yes, and no.

The problem is when nu!canon tries to claim that this is the home of the first Jedi temple--because that doesn't make sense from a logistical OR metaphorical perspective.

Historically, there were only 12 monks and an abbot living at the Skellig Michael monastery at any given time. I'm sure some of the Jedi could have doubled up, but there's still only so many people the island can support, unless their food is coming from elsewhere (From the Lanai? From somewhere else? who? what? how?) And where did those Jedi come from? Were they born on the island? Were they all related? Why did they build their temple THERE as opposed to some other place? How did they get off the island and into the stars? What was their tech level like, given that all we see of them (books, architecture, etc) is very low-tech to begin with?

To be fair, it may well be that Ahch-To is far more variable than the single-biome worlds we see elsewhere in Star Wars, but...do we see any of this, ever? NOPE. And the whole point of using Skellig Michael is to visually explore how little the Jedi Order has changed over the centuries... even their stonework is still there, thanks to the Caretakers (note that Rey, the disrupter, keeps knocking them down because METAPHOR), so I feel like it's okay to say that other things were probably the same however long ago the Jedi Order arose (which nu!canon is kinda vague about).

There is one reason why you'd build a temple there, though--and it has to do with the "Jedi as space mariners and star navigators" motif that nu!canon has been building up as a precursor to its High Republic mode. The temple site is literally a lighthouse, perched over the ocean, with the sun streaming in along the floor in a way meant to evoke ancient devices for measuring the arc of the sun. And I bet it has a fantastic view of the stars--perfect for people whose books are filled with geometrical depictions of planetary orbits and carry star compasses attuned to the Force.

But the FIRST Jedi temple? The first ever?? This I very much doubt, any more than Christianity itself originated at the Skellig Michael monastery. Not without a hell of a lot more world-building than they've ever bothered to show us.

Nu!Canon also tries to tell us that Ahch-To is the original homeworld for the uneti trees, which again, is fucking ridiculous without a little more world-building given that SKELLIG MICHAEL HAS NO TREES and the only one that we see in TLJ is ALREADY DEAD. This works well as a metaphor--the Jedi are a literal dead end, one that must be burned to rise like a phoenix from the ashes--but makes no sense from a world-building perspective.

I'd believe it if you told me the Jedi had come to the island to build their temple-monastery-observatory and planted the tree there from elsewhere. But they didn't do that, and it drives me crazy, because it was so easy for them to make it make sense and they didn't bother to think it through.  

I think it was Philip Pullman who said, "Never make a metaphor do the work of a fact," when someone asked him about how/if daemons eat. Trying to make functional ecologies out of metaphor is probably a futile task doomed to failure... but some ideas are easier to work with than others and the best settings (in my opinion) exist as both.

I guess we'll put this down as yet another reason nu!canon doesn't work for me.

[grammartrolls]

Stepping In: A Hyperbolic Drabble

that’s right i’m actually posting writing on here deal with it

ship: hyperbole (foseti x apiuma) (and a little bit of apiuma o8< natter >8o foseti)

When Foseti Mafdet agreed to play a video game with a bunch of people she barely knew, if at all, she never expected to become a god. She wasn’t much of a gamer, after all, so when her moirail told her about some game called “SGRUB” in which the players make “a new world” she assumed it was some kind of metaphor. 

But here she was, a newly made god of a newly made universe, arguing with a bunch of other newly made gods about how the newly made rules should function in this newly made universe. 

It was exhausting and excruciating.

Watching the highbloods argue for a stricter caste structure, arguing with her more radical minority for a deletion of the hierarchy…it all became very tedious very quickly. It was a new, different kind of tediousness than Foseti was familiar with. It was…newly made.

Godly, even. You know, Foseti used to be an atheist before this all happened, but all of this bullshit has made her more open to the idea that perhaps there are gods…and maybe they were just as exhausting and annoying as these ones. It would explain why their world is so fucked up. 

Foseti wished she was still an atheist. Ignorance is bliss, after all. 

Back on her home planet, discussions took a different approach. Sometimes they were violent, but Foseti tried her best to keep them peaceful. Terse, but peaceful. But now things are significantly different. Now, the two sides were no longer arguing for the long term or the theoretical. Not that Foseti had any desire to argue in pure theory, being a woman of pure praxis, but regardless, discussions were now discussing…the Now. The immediate. The Thing That Is Literally About To Happen. 

The birth of a new universe.

…It got exhausting. Breaks needed to be taken. So here she was, taking a break… when who chose to saunter in but one Apiuma Abella. 

Oh, how Foseti hated Apiuma Abella. 

There were many annoying things that happened at these godly debates. That seadweller, Pequod, and his outlandish idea for a vengeance-based universe…the clown, Latena, arguing for a stronger military, Shakti being…Shakti. Even her own moirail got on her nerves, with his refusal to care about how stupid his optics look when he screams about “lowblood supremacy”. 

But by far the worst actor in these debates was Apiuma Abella.

It’s easy to see that Apiuma should, one would think, have the most skin in this game. Foseti knew that Apiuma didn’t even leave her house back on their home planet because she would immediately be culled in the street. Apiuma had a chance to help Foseti create a new universe built on equality, where lowbloods finally had the rights they deserved.

But, no, apparently Apiuma is blissfully unaware of any oppression that existed in their world. 

At least, that’s what it looks like to Foseti! It’s how it would look to anyone! 

The reason Apiuma was easily the worst part of these debates is her insistence on giving “everyone a chance to speak”. Ugh. What grift. 

The very idea that Apiuma, easily the most oppressed person here, would insist on hearing “everyone’s side”, when one of the “gods” at this table wants her and every other lowblood dead was downright insulting to Foseti. 

And here came she, likely going to spread her “moderate tolerance” somewhere else. Not that…there was anywhere else to go, of course. They were on a…giant spaceship… whatever, it’s irrelevant. 

As Apiuma passed Foseti, she shot a quick look at her. 

Foseti repaid it in full. “Apiuma.” She said, tart. 

“Foseti…how’s it going?” Apiuma responded, attempting to veil her clear upset…ness. 

“Not good.” The rustblood responded coolly. She wanted it to be obvious.  

“Oh. I’m sorry. That’s a shame.” Apiuma said, perhaps in an attempt to genuinely feel for Foseti, before attempting to leave again. 

“It’s because of you, you know.” Foseti said, rising. 

Apiuma stopped and turned around. “What? What did I do?” She said, incredulous, hands on her hips.

Foseti stepped forward and stared the yellowblood down. It was times like these, their confrontations, where the aesthetic difference between the two of them was thrown into stark contrast. Foseti was taller, slimmer, but not without muscle. She had tattoos and piercings. Her hair was big and loud. She was a punk! Apiuma, meanwhile, was small. Squishy. Cute. Undeniably cute. Frustratingly adorable. And soft. And nice to look at, yes, Foseti can admit it! But she still hated her. But, god, she was cute. Being a kismesis is weird sometimes. 

In these confrontations, Foseti couldn’t help but feel some sense of satisfaction, even if it was buried under all the anger, in the visual tension between the two of them. Foseti was staring her down, tall and lean. Apiuma was staring up, not weakly, Foseti could admit. There was a fire in her adorably and comically big eyes. The contrast was attractive to the both of them. They were both equally strong in their relationship, and although they despised each other, they gave each other a fire and a passion. This was, Foseti presumed, the essence of a kismessitude. The two of them hated each other. But, god, it was hot. Being a kismesis is weird in general.

But that’s not what this is about. This is about something less personal, of course.

“What did you do? You platformed a supremacist!” 

“What? What does that even mean?” 

Of course Apiuma didn’t understand. 

“Of course you don’t understand…you are so insistent on hearing “other opinions” that you refuse to deplatform one that should absolutely not have a seat at the table.” Foseti snipped, bitter.

“A seat at the…are you talking about Pequod? You know he did a lot to help us in the game! He gave the killing blow to the Black King! We all saw it! He literally helped us win the whole game! He earned his seat at the table like all of us. Also, can we go back to ‘of course you don’t understand’…? What the heck is that supposed to mean!” Apiuma buzzed. 

Foseti crossed her arms. It’s true that Pequod did a lot in the campaign. That weapon of his, the Stygian Shade…? It certainly carries a lot of firepower. But whatever, his actions don’t change the fact that his beliefs are toxic as shit. “He literally still believes in a blood hierarchy and actively advocates for it. He literally just did that. You were watching, weren’t you?” 

“Of course I was watching!” Apiuma huffed, also crossing her arms. A yellow blush colored her cheeks just a bit. 

Cute. Foseti tried to suppress a satisfied grin. 

“This isn’t even a political discussion...” Apiuma spat, somewhat under her breath.

“What! What are you even talking about! ‘This isn’t a political discussion’? That’s ridiculous, and you fucking know it. When discussing the making of a new universe, the politics of that universe are kind of vital, don’t you think? And including supremacists like Pequod, or grifters like Marina, or war-advocators like Latena is not the morally responsible thing to do, don’t you think?!” 

“Well, if it’s such a political discussion, I don’t see why you have to involve everyone, especially people who want to stay out of the politics, like me!” Apiuma burst. 

Oh, here it is. The moment Apiuma pulls out the ‘apolitical’ card, and Foseti gets to pull out all the stops. 

“Oh, that’s right, I forgot you don’t actually care.” Foseti said dryly, turning around. 

Apiuma gasped. “How dare you!” She rushed in front of the rustblood. “How dare you suggest such a thing!” 

“Well, if you actually cared, you would be willing to take the steps needed for equality.” Foseti shrugged. “But instead you choose to be a caste traitor.” 

“C-Caste traitor!?” Apiuma repeated, shocked. 

“I said what I said. You have repeatedly refused to take the necessary steps for lowblood liberation, and continue to do so now.” Foseti leaned forward, and rested her hands on her knees, getting close to Apiuma’s adorable face. “What other word is there to use but traitor, babe?” 

Apiuma puffed, clearly offended. 

Normally, Foseti would not use such…incendiary tactics. She was normally far more professional than this, but there was something about Apiuma…

“What, so I’m supposed to join the revolution like a ‘good lowblood’? I’m supposed to be blacklisted from every major city, I’m supposed to be enemy no. 1, like you, babe? Sometimes, people just want to cope.”

Foseti backed up quickly, a bit surprised. Apiuma didn’t usually have stops to pull out like this. She was kind of impressed. 

“Besides, it really is none of your business at all what I think or believe or do with my time. I have a right to do things completely unrelated to politics. It’s, honestly, pretty offensive, really, how much you harp on my apolitical…ness, since it’s obvious you only do that because I’m the lowest blood color among the whole team. Why should I have to be staunchly political, like you? Because I’m a lowblood? A near-mutant? It’s super unfair and annoying, honestly.” Apiuma crossed her arms, and looked away. She was frowning, but Foseti could see a satisfied glint in her eye. 

Clever. Foseti wasn’t expecting all of that. Not that Apiuma wasn’t clever, of course, but this is usually the part where she gets flustered and walks away. Or they make out. It’s really 50/50 at this point. 

Foseti averted her eyes. She honestly didn’t know what to say. It’s…possible that…Apiuma might…be right. But it doesn’t matter.

“The fact still stands that your refusal to stand for our rights shows that you, on some level, don’t care. Or you just can’t be bothered. Either way, it’s disappointing. And yes, a large part of that is because of your blood color. I find it unbelievable how apolitical you are because of your caste. You have the most to gain and the most to lose in the movement, so why don’t you choose to stand up?” 

Foseti prided herself on that answer, especially since it clearly upset Apiuma more.

“I hate revolutionaries!” Apiuma threw her hands up, clearly frustrated. “Nothing anyone does is ever good enough for you! Why can’t you just accept that some people don’t care about politics without calling us ‘grifters’! That a lot of us just want to live our lives and not have to think about any of that stuff!” 

Foseti was surprised. And angry. Not at Apiuma responding at all, no, she found a great satisfaction in their debate. But the idea that anyone, especially with a blood color as low as Apiuma’s, wouldn’t want to think about the problems that plague their society, wouldn’t want to fix it, made Foseti furious. 

“…Whatever.” The rustblood said, bile coating her words. “I shouldn’t keep you. You probably have clown makeup to paint on, don’t you? Faygo to drink? I bet you have to go play ‘make-believe highblood’.” Foseti crossed her arms again and looked away, satisfied at such a line. 

“That would invalidate everything…you say…” There was a silence. 

Apiuma wasn’t responding to Foseti’s insult. That wasn’t normal.  

Foseti looked down to see a completely different expression on her kismesis’ face. 

Shock, offense and hurt was splayed on Apiuma’s cheek. The small yellowblood looked down at her feet. 

“I…” Foseti could hear Apiuma’s voice shake. Her face was obscured from view, but immediately Foseti got that feeling in the pit of her stomach that she said something she really, really shouldn’t have. Apiuma held her hands together, and Foseti could see they were shaking. Oh, no, no, this wasn’t how it was supposed to go. A kismesis isn’t supposed to make their partner cry. Er…well…this wasn’t how it was supposed to go.

“Hey…” Foseti reached out. 

Apiuma ran away. 

Oh, shit. Shit, shit, shit, did she just fuck this up?

“Wow, you fucked that up.” A different voice. 

Foseti turned around to see a familiar, bespectacled, nihilistic near-jade. “Oh, it’s you…” Foseti sighed. “What are you doing here? Er—how long were you standing here?” 

“Enough to know you have royally fucked up.” Natter Schlau stepped forward toward the rustblood. 

Foseti didn’t have particularly high regards for Natter either. She was, perhaps, just as apolitical as her moirail-turned-matesprit, but at the very least she has a more philosophical justification. It’s a bullshit one, but at least she has one. Regardless, most of her interactions with the nihilist were unpleasant, but that’s probably just because Natter is an unpleasant person. 

“Why didn’t you rush to your matesprit’s aid earlier?” Foseti asked, with a slight sarcastic twinge.

Natter shrugged. “I assumed it was some strange blackrom courtship ritual.” 

Foseti shrugged back. “…It kind of was. But…ah shit…I really went too far with that last comment. The ‘make-believe highblood’ comment. That was a terrible thing to say.”

It truly was a shitty thing to say. 

“Yes, terrible would be the key word. How did you even know that?” 

“Know what? I made that up.” Foseti rubbed her temples. “It…it was hyperbole, you know? I was being facetious.” 

“Oh…” Natter groaned slightly, before rubbing her eyes underneath her glasses. “Well. Congratulations. You have picked upon a very sensitive wound.” She gestured sarcastically. “Good job.”

“Wait…don’t tell me…”

“Alright, I won’t.”

“I’m being serious. Apiuma…actually pretends to be a highblood?” Foseti asked in disbelief.

Natter sighed. “…Sometimes. I have caught her doing that, yes. She practices putting face paint on and pretending to be a purpleblood. Honestly, I don’t know if she is play-pretending at being a highblood or genuinely desires to become a subjuggulator, or a convert, or however that heathen cult works,”

God, Natter could be an asshole, even to the assholes.

“Regardless,” the near-jade continued, “She sometimes practices putting on clown makeup. I’ve asked her about it. We’ve discussed it, but as of now she does not desire to discuss it further, so I leave it at that.” 

Foseti sighed and ran her hands through her hair. This…this was weird.

“Oh…fuck…I fucked up so bad.” She began massaging her eyes, feeling a headache coming on. 

“Yes.”

Well, at least Natter was direct, if a bit abrupt.

Foseti struggled a bit. She was not a bad kismesis. Apiuma has said that, and Foseti understands what a bad kismessitude looked like. No, neither of them were overly abusive or wanted each other dead. It was just little jabs and pokes, stabs and gripes, that made a good pitch relationship. And Foseti was pretty sure that she and Apiuma have that. Well. It might become ‘had’, if Foseti doesn’t go patch things up. Oh, and Foseti definitely knows she’s going have to be the one to fix this. But apologies are not…her strong suit. She’s apologized before, of course, as has anyone, but it never gets easier. She sighed. 

“I’ll fix it. Don’t worry.”

“I am not worried. Apiuma is stronger than you think. She is very unstable, of course, but who of us isn’t?” 

Again with the thoughtful insights. God, Natter was insufferable. But she was right. 

“However!” Foseti pointed out. “Her unstable nature does not make my points any less valid.” She said, mainly to herself. 

Natter cocked an eyebrow. “What does that have to do with anything?” 

“Our debate. I know when I go apologize she’s going to try and say that her feelings being hurt makes her arguments somehow more valid. They aren’t.”

“Oh. That. How tedious you two are sometimes.” 

“You’re one to talk.” 

“Fair enough.” Natter pushed up her glasses. “What was that whole event even about anyway?” 

“Ugh!” Foseti cried out. “What it’s always about! Apiuma is so…apolitical. I don’t get it.” 

“Oh, right, the same thing you two are always, always talking about.” The exasperation in her voice was obvious, as it always was. “Honestly, I don’t think your argument is as valid as you say.” 

“What makes you say that.” Foseti asked tersely, with another cross of the arms.

Natter sighed greatly as she is wont to do. “Very well. I shall explain. I believe there are several things about Apiuma that you simply do not understand. Mainly, her disposition. It is simply not cut out for politics. As you have seen, Apiuma is a highly sensitive person. Personally, I think that makes her beautiful and empathetic, but it is not a very practical skill with politics, I think you would agree?” 

Foseti shrugged. “I guess.” Natter did have a point. Foseti herself has had to cultivate a pretty tough skin, and a soft egg like Apiuma probably wouldn’t thrive if she was in Foseti’s position. 

“Furthermore, Apiuma has had more hardship than you could possibly know. She has not left her home in sweeps. Well, I mean…now she has, but before we began SGRUB, she hadn’t walked out her own door in a long time. She has suffered greatly, due to her, frankly frustrating, refusal to go hemoanon. And, honestly, I think you would agree that her refusal to hide her blood color is somewhat radical, yes?” 

Foseti looked away. “Sure. I can admit that.” 

“In all this time hiding away, it would have been easy for Apiuma to cultivate an attitude of negativity, of sullenness or anger. But, instead, she chose joy. She chose…pretty things…” Natter paused, slightly lost in appreciation for her matesprit. Despite her dislike of both of them, Foseti could acknowledge that they had a very healthy relationship. She would be lying if she said she wasn’t a bit jealous. 

“Anyway. Apiuma has turned herself into a person that would rather focus on joy and positivity than being mentally bogged down by politics and revolutionary action.”

Foseti puffed a bit. “You can be a revolutionary and be joyful and positive.” She said, prickled. 

“Ah yes, because you are clearly a person overcome with virulent joy and light.”  

Foseti narrowed her eyes and pointed a finger at the nihilist. “Look.” She said, sharp. “I’m only harsh and cold because my movement requires me to be so.”

Natter chuckled a bit, and pushed up her glasses once more; a classic smug Natter manuever, one that she performed every time she felt she made a prescient argument.

“Do you think Apiuma should become you?” 

Foseti stopped. Huh. Hm. 

That’s a weird question. Foseti thought about it for a moment. 

“Let us phrase it like this. Do you think the world would be better if people in it were more like you?” 

Foseti fumbled. “I mean…” She means…it kind of would be? If people were more practical, simple, honest, and strong, the world would be a better place. It would certainly be better for the lowbloods. 

“Y…Yes. It would be. The world would be better if people acted like me.” 

“And do you see a problem with that mindset?”

Of course Foseti did. The moment she verbalized it, she recognized the problem.

“Not everyone can be Foseti Mafdet. Some people are just really not cut out for it, and it would be counterproductive, irresponsible, harmful and stupid to believe otherwise. I am sure you would agree.” Natter stated, frankly.

“You’re right.” Foseti conceded. 

“And someone like Apiuma is absolutely not cut out for it. Obviously. She herself would agree. And so she has every right to not engage in something that would clearly cause her great mental duress. Besides, she kind of already is under mental duress. The very act of existing as she does gives her a great amount of mental struggles. I think you can understand that, being a lowblood yourself.” 

“Of course.” Foseti nodded. Yes, she herself has long buried trauma that simply comes from existing as a lowblooded troll. The attacks, the losses…yes, Foseti understood that pain acutely. “I get that.” 

“So it would be irresponsible to put her into further mental and physical danger. Apiuma is a lot more vulnerable than you.” 

Foseti nodded. “Fine. I can admit that she doesn’t have to become a revolutionary. But she could afford to care more about our plight.” 

“And who are you to say she doesn’t? You do not hear the conversations we have, her and I, and you would be surprised at some of the opinions that Apiuma possess. They are more radical than you might think.” Natter replied.

Foseti narrowed her eyes a bit. “Even if that is true, it sometimes feels like she doesn’t even know how we suffer.”

Natter scoffed. “What a preposterous notion. Of course she does! She is, arguably, more oppressed than you! Not that we should play that kind of game. Again, she cannot even leave her house.”

Foseti raised her hands defensively. “Alright, alright, I get it, I get it. I may not agree with her, but I get it.”

“Oh, do not mistake me,” Natter interrupted. “I have no desire to defend my matesprit regarding some of her arguments. I think several of her opinions are rather indefensible. The idea that someone like Pequod should have any say in how this new universe unfolds is demonstrably stupid. The man can barely function as a social being.” 

Foseti chuckled a bit. Hm. Maybe Natter wasn’t as apolitical as Foseti had thought her to be. 

“I agree with you that someone like that should probably be deplatformed. Apiuma’s fixation on not hurting anyone’s feelings is rather ill-advised in this regard. Her repeated refusal to disavow outwardly supremacist rhetoric and people is something her and I are working on. Frankly, it disturbs me that she thinks like this. What if some brigand or blackguard demands something heinous of her and she cannot find it in herself to refuse, for fear of hurting their feelings? It is something that frightens me, not that much frightens me, of course. No, I don’t think any of us are qualified to be gods. Even me. Well…” Natter thought about it. “No. I am as flawed an individual as any thinking being. Really, what is thought? What is a being?” 

Wow. Even when Natter makes a cogent argument, she is still insufferable. It’s a skill, honestly.

“Anyway. This is why I believe that she shouldn’t even be involved in this discussion. But it seems you have somewhat forced her hand.” 

“What?” Foseti  replied, curious. 

“Well. You are kind of forcing all of us to attend these meetings.” Natter said, frankly.

“I think that’s a reasonable thing to do.” Foseti replied, a bit offended by the implication. “We all beat the game, so those of us who have reasonable beliefs should work together to create our new universe.” 

“And yet you find yourself frustrated at Apiuma for being bad at realpolitik when you yourself have forced herself into the position! You have created your own problem here, Foseti,” Natter removed her glasses and polished them. “You force her to do something she is bad at, and then hate her for being bad at it. I am not saying the two of you cannot have conflict. You are kismeses. You hate each other. That is, how you say, the point. But you should at least acknowledge the slight fuckery of the issue here.” The jade punctuated her point by slipping her glasses back onto her face, and gazed at Foseti expectedly.

Foseti shifted slightly. “Fine. She doesn’t have to come to the discussions anymore. But what in the shit is with the ‘make-believe highblood’ stuff!” Foseti threw her hands up in frustration. 

Natter furrowed her brows. It looked like genuine offense was taken there. “You should know, Apiuma fully understands that her fixation on highbloods is extremely unhealthy. That is another thing her and I are discussing. And frankly, her relationship with her own marginalized identity is absolutely none of your business. You had no justification to make a comment as hurtful as that, and furthermore, you have no right to continue to poke the wound. It would be best for the both of you if you both forgot that you said that, but since you cannot, I would suggest you do not mention it again. Besides, who are you to judge how a lowblood copes with their lot in life? Some of us fight back, some of us fantasize, all of us know our own pain. It is offensive to assume otherwise.” Natter crossed her arms, clearly tense. 

Foseti turned away from the near-jade, caught in her own thoughts. Natter was right. This obsession with Apiuma’s trauma responses is horrible for their relationship. She turned back. 

“You’re right. Thanks.” 

Natter sighed slightly, loosening up a bit. “Of course. I care deeply for my matesprit, and desire her to have a healthy kismessitude. By the way,” Natter narrowed her eyes to slits. “If it decays to abuse, I cannot guarantee your safety.”

Foseti cocked a very unconvinced brow. “What even is your strife specibus?” 

Natter shifted slightly. “…I wield a very dangerous shovel.”

“…Right.” Foseti bat the issue away. “Anyway. Thanks.”

A sense of guilt still hung in her head, but she felt more open knowing what the next steps to take are. 

Foseti looked toward Natter. “You know…you’re a pretty great mediator.” 

“Hm.” The near-jade thought about it for a moment. “I suppose I am. Anyway. I must be off.” Natter began to walk past Foseti, in Apiuma’s direction.

“Where are you going?” Foseti asked.

“I am going to comfort my girlfriend. I wish you the best, Foseti.”

And with that, the nihilist left, following her matesprit. What an asshole. She was right, of course, but she was still an asshole. 

Foseti Mafdet took a deep, godly, breath, and decided the next best course of action would be to head to her room to sleep and think. 

...And so she did. And the dreams were good.

[m39]

Homestuck 11th anniversary/413 AKA Why I have more tolerance towards the Epilogues

WARNING!

THIS TEXT IS OVER 1.5 THOUSAND OF WORDS LONG!

Enjoy.

EH MAH GERD! E EASTIT MOON BUCKETS!

Wait…

EH MAH GERD!!! E HAMSTEAK BORTH TOOT!!!

And only on this time of year, when we have two holidays, we can talk about the thing that everyone in the Homestuck fandom loves: The Epilogues! :D

Everyone is pointing a gun at you.

OH FUCK!!

You duck behind your desk while everyone else is shooting.

JESUS TAP DANCING CHRIST!!! CALM YOUR ASSES DOWN!!!!!

10 minutes later. You check out of you can stand up.

H-hello?

…

Can I talk now??

…

PERFECT!!

As you can see, today is not only the 11th anniversary of Homestuck but also the 1st anniversary of its Epilogues. Now, imagine one year ago, you were waiting almost 2.5 year for the Epilogues (three years if you don’t count Credits). You wanted to know the answers to many questions such as: Is Lord English defeated once and for all? What happened to that post-Retcon worthless c8nt who lost all of her character development? Is Terezi going to be okay? etc. Sure you got some supplementary stuff like the 1st act of Hiveswap (after like 5 years after its announcement, despite all of its development problems), Friendsim (that visual novel that detailed characters that will appear in later acts of Hiveswap), you read some fanfics like Cool And New Web Comic (personal opinion: very fucking good) and Vast Error (I didn’t read this one but I heard it was good and many people behind it are working with the WhatPumpkin team and on the other official Homestuck shit), there were some official snapchat photos and while those were very good, you knew that they will mean nothing when the Epilogues will drop in. And they finally does, on the Homestuck’s 10th anniversary no less. So you click on The Homestuck Epilogues, happy and excited as fuck and the first thing you see is… an introduction page ripped straight out of AO3.

You earn what can be basically described as a punch in the face where the metaphorical fist is filled with confusion. But it doesn’t end here. Then you notice something more disturbing in content warning and characters:

Rape? Abuse?? Existential Crisis?!? OC?!?! Polyamory?!?!?! GENDER TRANSITION?!??!?!?!?! BARACK! FUCKING!! OBAMA?!?!!?!?!?!?!?!?!!?!?

Like what in the actual fuck is happening?!!

Then you read the Prologue and you are like: Uhm… Okay. It’s not that bad at all, like, far from it. Maybe that AO3 page is just a joke? Everything will be alright right? RIGHT?!?

Then one week later Hussie (with help of some people) drops two nukes on fandom and it all goes to hell. No seriously, it’s like Hussie built Little Boy and Fat Man expies titled Meat and Candy, dropped them on fandom in which the centers of explosions were Dirk’s and Jane’s fandoms respectively and delivered some of the biggest Broken Base effect in Homestuck after like Act 6. Nothing was the same after that. Everybody were fighting each other over who was right, people didn’t even know what was canon anymore and even up to this date people are still misgendering Roxy for fucks sake (it’s not even that hard to remember it: she/her for the Alpha Roxy and her Candy counterpart and he/him for the Meat one; come on man)!

From what I’ve (mostly) seen on Tumblr, most of the Homestuck fans hates it to the bones. Only some individuals actually like them and I happened to be one of those people who likes the Epilogues.

Everyone is pointing a gun at you. Again.

OH COME ON MA-

One hour later.

CAN I FINALLY TALK WITHOUT ENDING UP FUCKING HANGED?!?

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Bogan: y̵i̸s̷.̵.̶.̶

THANK YOU!

Now, I don’t really care who likes the Epilogues and who doesn’t. Everyone has different opinions. But something tells me that the Epilogues (at least here on Tumblr) are overhated. Like, sometimes, the negativity towards the Epilogues is so big that it makes me feel like I was in Star Wars fandom. And when fandom starts to look like the Star Wars one, you know you are in deep shit.

But you might be thinking by now: Dude, where are going with all of this shit?! Well my dear… uhm… pickles? The point of all of this is that I want to share something with you. And that is the reason. The (main) reason why I (in worst case) have more tolerance towards The Homestuck Epilogues than most of the people (on Tumblr).

When I started writing this long as fuck text I thought that I would easily give more reasons, in other words, give like 3-4 points why I like the Epilogues. But then again it’s better said than done because most of them are connected to this fact:

THE. EPILOGUES. ARE. MOSTLY. NOT. CANON.

This is the reason why I like them, why I can tolerate them. The Epilogues are mostly happening in two new timelines, different from the Alpha one. It’s even stated (or at worst implied) by Jade in Homestuck^2’s 6th chapter that the Meat timeline (and also possibly the Candy one) is not the Alpha one:

The reason why the Epilogues are mostly not canon is that the characters from the Alpha timeline (Terezi, Vriska, Aradia, Sollux, Alt!Calliope etc.) make an appearance in one of the timelines (some of them in both).

Some people who hate the Epilogues stated that it RUINED some of the characters no matter if they liked them or not. That’s kind of… over-the-top because characters that are not from the Alpha timeline are clearly in some cases not the same ones that we know as I see it (at least in case of Neo-Condesce and Doc Strider) as a fuck you towards those fanfics that like to shove Ron the Death Eater and Character Derailment tropes down our throats because some fanfic creators didn’t like some of the characters from the original work.

In other words: Almost all of the characters from the Alpha timeline are the same characters as we know at the very end of Homestuck.

There are still lesser things that I find myself enjoying in the Epilogues:

-          The writing is on a very good level and when it’s pissing someone of it’s not from incompetence,

-          Post-Retcon Vriska actually gets some actual character development instead of ending up as a useless piece of shit that only insults everyone who achieved much more than she ever would (I mean it took (at least) almost 4 years for this to happen but still),

-          The fact that behind Neo-Condesce’s and Doc Strider’s turn to evil is some actual sense, like with the former one it was mind manipulations in her childhood (not to mention the literal mind control by Post-Scratch Meenah) and the latter one (in order to become ultimate) ending up absorbing some of the versions of himself that are basically a massive shitheads (like Bro, Hal, even Caliborn counts),

There are still other pros that either I can’t remember or they are too minor co count.

Does all of this mean that the Epilogues are flawless? PFFFFFF! Of course not. Nothing is perfect. There are some stuff that I don’t like.

The biggest one is that the Epilogues are sometimes overcrowded with so many words detailing every single thing that it actually becomes a slog to get through even one chapter (but then again, this is the reason why I don’t enjoy reading books). Sure, the original comic is like almost thrice as long as the fucking Lord of the Rings in case of the dialogue but it has pictures and animations to be more pleasant for the eyes. Which leads to another con: No. Fucking. Pictures. If I want to look for the details, then at least show me something else than words. Every fucking time I must look at dozens of words describing the most minuscule thing in the novel I’m like:

Also in terms of enjoyment I prefer the Meat Epilogue over the Candy one. When some people say that this book is a big, steaming pile of sadness and depression, at least the Meat part tells you from the start what kind of tone it’s going to have. The Candy part? Not so much. First it’s all happiness, (almost) everyone is happy, birds are happy, clouds are happy, nothing but happiness. And then you get punched in the gut, smashed into the ground and getting kicked over and over and over for so long that when the kicking finally stops it feels like 15 years passed by that time. And just to add up, the pacing in Meat is better than in Candy.

I’m going to piss you off even more but there are moments in the original Homestuck that are more cringe/rage inducing than some of the most painful ones from the Epilogues, particularly the intermissions in Act 6 Act 6 (DON’T GET ME STARTED ON WHAT HAPPENED TO BOTH SERKETS I SWEAR TO FUCKING GOD).

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Hey you.

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Are you still reading this?

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GOOD! Because you have reached the end of this long ass post that will get one like MAX. You know, like my other long ass posts. LOL AM I RIGHT?!?!

Jokes asides, we had a wild ride since the last 413. The Epilogues (despite what they are) gave us the answers to the biggest questions that Homestuck left for us, we got Pesterquest, the sequel to Friendsim that concluded the history of the MSPAReader (until another sequel -_-) and, of course, we got the official sequel to Homestuck, over 10.5 years later from the original comic’s debut. So, fuck ton of stuff throughout a year for me.

As for the Epilogues, look, I can, in some way, understand that some of you want to stay at least 10 km away from them but it has been a year (well technically almost a year) since they were published on the Homestuck’s official website. It might be a good time to read them once more. Without all of that hype they have built for 2.5 years after the credits. From the different perspective. Maybe even (and I dare to say it) right after yet another re-reading of Homestuck. Either way, remember that in most cases you can give someone or something another chance.

Before I’ll finally end this I must call out some of the more rabid Epilogues haters:

STOP TREATING THE ORIGINAL, ALPHA JANE THE SAME WAY AS A FUCKING NEO-CONDESCE!! THOSE TWO CHARACTERS ARE DIFFERENT CHARACTERS!! SAME WITH ALPHA DIRK AND DOC STRIDER!! MAKE UP YOUR FUCKING MIND!!! STOP ACTING LIKE A BUNCH OF 12 YEAR OLD BRATS!!!

You are on your last breath.

Tha… that’s it! I’m done… wheeze S… See you next time. B-Bye now! Imma… Immabouttopffffffffffffffffffff-

You fall down on your floor after over 1.5 thousand words of talking. Suddenly you feel urge to check Twitter. You see that Homestuck^2 has just received another update. Roundabout starts playing in the background.

What?! And what is thi- PART ONE?!?!?! Oooooooooohhhhhhh ffffuuuuuuUUUUUUUU-

<--- TO BE CONTINUED

[flying-elliska]

lotrblogging pt 2 - Return of the King extended edition

- I just love this movie so much, it’s just a collection of big narrative payoffs and it’s so satisfying ! 

- I honestly hate Denethor more than Sauron ; he’s just such a compelling antagonist, that despicable figure of authority that lets his biases completely corrupt everything, seeing only what he wants to see, and a good example of the dangers of unfettered pessimism that passes off cowardice as ‘realism.’ And of course what would a story be without at least one terrible father figure, I mean. Also the noble but pointless sacrifice of Faramir/Pippin singing/the triviality of Denethor’s terrible table manners still gives me so much chills. i can’t help but think of Tolkien going through wwi, one of the most egregious examples of brave young men being sacrificed to the pride of older officials, safe behind the battle lines, for completely trivial reasons. Ugh. 

- i think what is so amazing about this movie is that most of the heroes go through a moment of being completely hopeless : Pippin and Gandalf in an assieged Minas Tirith, the Rohhirim charging a much bigger army, Frodo and Sam having to go through Mordor and talk about not coming back, the last battle at the Black Gate they know they can’t win but is meant as a diversion, etc. And from their limited perspective, it really is. But they decide to fight regardless ; and then they realize they’re not as alone as they thought ; because everyone decided to fight. It’s like the opposite of the Prisonner’s Dilemma, and it’s like the Good Ending for so many of the problems facing the world and it’s such a satisfying narrative and ugh - i’m emo

- i already talked about this re : masculinity and shit but i just love how emotionally open everyone is in this movie ! it’s just so fucking delightful ! i think this is part of why i loved the movies so much as a neuroatypical kid who had trouble regulating/expressing emotion. It’s also very straightforward, with little irony or second degree or whatever. very relaxing. I mean, take Aragorn, in the books he is honestly kind of boring, he’s so aloof and serious and remote, but in the movies he just cares so much ! i mean that look of utter devastation on his face when he gets out of the caves and thinks he hasn’t been able to convince the ghost army ! beautiful !!! it could be cheesy or trite but they just play it so earnestly and fully, it’s just !!!!! yeah !!!!

- honestly throwback to my teen self having a crush on a different character everytime i rewatched the movies there are a lot of beautiful people in there

- i find it very unrealistic that there is not one culture in there that has warrior women. and very bland. especially the Rohirrim who are kind of Viking-like, and have a word for ‘shieldmaiden’ apparently but there’s only one around ? and what about the elves who are all supposedly badass and indestructible ? i’m sure any elf maiden could like, seriously fuck up a human dude, also having thousands of years to train. gender roles being so unquestionably replicated in fantasy settings where they don’t necessarily makes sense is so annoyinnnng. that said, Eowyn’s ‘i am no man’ moment of ultimate badassery is just....still so incredible. But I’m glad they didn’t include the moment where Eomer is all ‘war is the province of men’ in the cinematic version because that makes him look like a serious dick tbh and he already doesn’t have a lot of personality so...

- i know it’s based on ancient myth where these archetypes are frequent but like, the worldbuilding is really full of like...um...uncomfortable tropes, like the evil races concept is one thing, but then the movie topped it up with some really problematic design choices, like making some of the men aligned with Sauron look distinctively middle-eastern which, yikes. As a product of its time there’s a lot worse, but i like to think if they remade it today they would be more aware of this, as I am watching these movies as an adult. And also, glad that fantasy is moving away from these tropes today, at least in books. 

- man i love Legolas. he just seems high half of the time, spouting off epic poetry in the middle of a creepy cave full of skulls that’s only tangentially related to whatever is happening. he stops a minute to be a snarky badass, then he goes back to thinking about poetic stacks of mist and golden leaves or whatever. legend. absolute goals. also that drink-off with gimly where he wins and is like ‘oh my fingers are tingling’ with a delicate finger motion. so stupid. amazing. 

- monarchy is bad etc but i love narratives about kingship/leadership as acts of service, and stuff about the king being linked to the land and if he fucks up then everything goes bad, he can’t just do whatever, as a proto-pattern of accountability of power, and mankind having to be a good steward. and Aragorn as a healer. 

- i skipped the bits with the giant spider. when there’s a giant spider in a movie i always make a point of honor to skip it. because that’s just unnecessary. 

-  Sam and Frodo’s relationship is so beautiful, ugh. And honestly it kills me everytime, how there’s these big epic battles but they’re put in parallel with the small acts of compassion and kindness of these two, and with Gollum as well. How these small, personal struggles matter just as much. And of course, the ending, with Frodo failing and Gollum stealing the ring from him and then falling into the pit of Mount Doom...That moment puzzled me for a long time. It highlights the importance of Frodo’s compassion, but it’s also very disturbing, because it shows how much is left to chance in the end, like the fate of the world wasn’t determined by a grand gesture or someone making the right choice. This probably haunted Frodo for the rest of his days. Maybe it shows the importance of putting yourself on the right path ; but also in the end, so much of history really comes down to chance and unrelated stuff. 

- overal it just holds up so well. the visual effects are still mostly incredible and there is such craftsmanship in there, i can’t believe those movies are almost 20 yrs old. i remember my parents allowing me to skip school to go see Return of the King with them, felt like one of the best days of my life lmao. i think part of what makes them so great - compared to stuff like GoT, which had also amazing craftsmanship, but the story really doesn’t make me want to rewatch at all - is that there is this sense of wonder about it. (and they’re not trying to avoid being seen as fantasy, lol.) It’s not shy about the whole ‘and here’s a totally different world, isn’t that awesome !’ thing. And the character arcs are just incredible. It’s far from being flawless, it’s very pompous at times, it’s a zero in terms of diversity, and I can see that more clearly now. But I like that it’s aware of its own myth-like aspects ; stuff that I used to find lame, like Gandalf calling the moth or the eagles, bother me a lot less, because the point is not Realism!!!. It’s the metaphor of small gestures and signs of hope in times of tyranny and mass violence. And that holds on its own.