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sagurus · 3 years ago

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Regarding a Common Misconception of Hakuba Saguru

Lately I've been doing some reflecting on Saguru & the various ways I've seen him portrayed, as well as the ways I've portrayed him in the past. And then I was rereading some MK manga, and had some realizations. I've been feeling like rambling about them! So here I go, rambling.

[Disclaimer: I'm not personally taking issue with anyone's interpretation or impression of Saguru - just sharing my own impressions! This is just for fun <3 ]

Misconception: Saguru is constantly accusing Kaito of being KID

It’s a generally accepted fact in a lot of fics I’ve read (and honestly, maybe some fics I’ve written -- I used to hold this belief too!) that Saguru just unendingly insinuates that Kaito is KID--alone, in front of other people, always.

I won’t cite any here, but I’ve seen nods in fanwork to Aoko feeling a little stressed/frustrated about the fact that Saguru thinks Kaito is KID and makes it known. I’ve also seen fanwork where Saguru explicitly calls Kaito KID, presses Kaito for information, or otherwise makes his beliefs clear, even when others are around.

There are only five scenes in the Magic Kaito manga where Saguru makes direct indication toward his knowledge of KID’s identity.

First, of course, we’ve got chapter 17 - the first chapter where Saguru puts together that Kaito is KID.

For a long time, when I’d consumed more fic than MK canon, I recall an image born in my head of Saguru singling Kaito out in class and making the claim that Kaito is KID in front of everybody. I don’t know if I ever read any such allusion in a fic, or if it’s just an assumption I drew based on portrayals I read, but imagine my surprise when he does nothing of the sort.

Now, to be fair, Saguru is A LOT in this chapter. MK is still heavily in gag manga territory, so his behavior is extra extra played up. But if we take away the visuals, the dialogue between Saguru and Kaito can be summed up thusly:

[First scene where Saguru makes direct indications as to KID’s identity]

Kaito: You look so tired. Haven’t gotten enough sleep after chasing KID for three nights In a row, huh?

Saguru: Hmph. Aren’t you tired as well?

And then, a few beats later in the conversation:

Saguru: I’d like to invite you to the Ochima Art Museum tonight, where KID’s declared his next target. Kaito: Eh? Saguru: Then, you’ll understand why I’m so tired. Or, do you have other plans tonight? Kaito: Okay, I accept your invitation. It’ll be great to see your work in action!

And that’s it, that’s the big class confrontation. Aoko is present for it, but she’s more interested in joining in on the fun, and while I do think Aoko pieces together that Kaito is KID, she prefers to live in willful ignorance of it until it becomes impossible for her to ignore. She’s bright enough to pick up what Saguru’s implying, but because he never brings it past implication, there’s no reason for her to look at it too hard. Anyway, I digress. That’s conjecture and headcanon talking. My point is that Saguru never makes any explicit claims, just invites Kaito along to the heist.

Another neat thing about this scene is that--while certainly not motivated by mercy in this case, Saguru does give Kaito an out: “Or, do you have an excuse not to go tonight?” Of course, if Kaito took it, it would be rather damning, but I do think it would have been enough confirmation for Saguru. I don’t think there would have been any arm-twisting to get Kaito to agree.

But Kaito and Saguru are competitive bastards, so here we are.

Let’s move on to the heist!

Once again, the manga certainly plays up the whole ordeal. Saguru is intense and waiting for his moment, and Kaito’s being, well, Kaito.

At the heist, there are a few points where Saguru has opportunities to make allusions to Kaito being KID in a way others would pick up on, or otherwise make his suspicions known, but he doesn’t.

First of all, is this exchange:

Nakamori: Why are you guys here? Aoko: Hakuba-kun invited us! Nakamori: What’s the meaning of this, Hakuba-kun? Saguru: I thought she might like to see if KID is arrested tonight. Nakamori: You’ll fail if you’re too cocky! Saguru: We’re well-prepared. Besides, who knows… KID may already be here.

Saguru does imply KID could be present, but he makes no indication that he means Kaito. His next opportunity to hint at Kaito being KID or otherwise make accusations is when Nakamori asks him to consult as a magician.

Nakamori: Kaito, since you’re here, do you want to use your magic against KID? Kaito: [laughing sheepishly] Saguru: Oh, I want to see that fight, too. If you really can do it.

Needling, yes. Saguru knows what he’s saying and so does Kaito. Accusations, no. This is well within the realm of something Saguru would have said even if he didn’t suspect Kaito, considering their dynamic up until this point.

And then, the most explicit Saguru ever gets in terms of literally calling Kaito out as being KID, beginning when Kaito excuses himself to go to the bathroom right before the heist:

[Second scene where Saguru makes direct indications as to KID’s identity]

Saguru: [handcuffs himself to Kaito] Kaito: Huh? Saguru: I won’t let you do that, Kuroba. Kaito: What do you think you’re doing?! Saguru: I got the report back from the lab. The hair I got from KID indicated that he’s a high school student. After I compared KID’s data with other high school students’ data in the database… Kuroba Kaito came up in the final list. Kaito: That’s a coincidence. Saguru: Really? We’ll see soon enough. Let’s wait until the time KID is stated to come. [Some heist hubbub occurs as officers get into position even though KID hasn’t arrived at the heist time] Aoko: What? KID’s not coming? Saguru: Ha! It looks like I win! You’d better confess who you really are.

And from there, of course, ‘KID’ (Akako in disguise) swoops in and takes care of the heist. That more or less wraps up chapter 17, the first chapter where Saguru understands that Kaito is KID. And I would argue this is the most aggressive Saguru ever is. In fact, rather than persist in trying to accuse/capture/implicate Kaito as KID, he straight up vanishes from the narrative for several chapters.

Saguru doesn’t show up again until the Chat Noir heist, in chapter 25, when he calls from France.

It’s also important to note that at this point, Magic Kaito’s narrative has experienced a slight tonal shift. At the very least, while still often comedic, it reads less like a gag manga. Between the last time we saw Saguru and now, we’ve learned the apparent motivation behind Toichi’s murder, we’ve met Snake (an albeit rather incompetent villain) and Kaito has faced down gunfire and the danger posed by Snake and his men.

The way Saguru is portrayed has also shifted to reflect the shift too. Instead of a hulking antagonist-like character in a Holmes cosplay, he’s dressed primly and presents more as a cheeky but polite character. He’s also more effectively emulating the charm that the story tried to imply he had early on (“Hakuba Saguru, at your service!”, the girls in class fawning over him, the newspaper calling him out as a famous detective making a long-awaited return to Japan).

The interaction is entirely less antagonistic, too. For reference, I’ll paste the exchange (sans Saguru’s massive info dump) below.

[Third scene where Saguru makes direct indications as to KID’s identity]

[At the heist for the golden eye] Kaito: [Hiding in a bathroom stall while putting on a disguise] [His phone starts ringing] Hello…? Saguru: Hi, it’s been a while. Are you still alive? Kaito: [Thinking] This sugary yet obnoxious tone of voice is... Hakuba?! Saguru: You’ve made quite the stir in Paris. They’re all talking about how France’s Chat Noir is going to go up against you in Japan. Kaito: Idiot! It’s not me. It’s Kaitou KID! Saguru: Ha… it doesn’t really matter. I’ll share some information that I gathered over here. [Info dump cut from dialogue] Well! That’s about all I have to say. Do your best. I don’t want to see you lose to anyone until I capture you myself. Kaito: Like I’ve been saying, I’m not KID! Saguru: Oops, it’s almost time for the Paris Fashion Week. See you! Kaito: H-hey…

The only part of this conversation that I could consider to fall into the territory of antagonistic is when Saguru says “I don’t want to see you lose to anyone until I capture you myself.” And more than anything, I think this is less reflective of a real desire to capture Kaito, and more reflective of his competitive nature. Not to mention, within the context of the conversation, it feels much more like teasing than anything.

Saguru’s motivation for making the call is clear: He doesn’t want Kaito to lose, and he wants to help ensure Kaito’s success.

And most interestingly (although I’d like to see the raw manga to confirm this, or otherwise a more literal translation) he never explicitly calls Kaito KID either. Outside of alluding to KID’s actions, Saguru doesn’t explicitly say Kaito is KID or mention KID at all. It’s Kaito who does that.

When Kaito points out that he is not, in fact, KID, Saguru doesn’t argue. He simply brushes off the denial and shares the information he’s collected.

So, to summarize what we’ve covered so far: after Saguru failed to arrest Kaito during chapter 17, he stopped troubling Kaito so thoroughly that the next time he features in the story isn’t until he’s calling from overseas to try to lend Kaito some helpful information. He’s not even playing a part in trying to capture this thief he allegedly wants to catch.

And then, Saguru dips back out of the narrative, although for a shorter period this time. The next arc he appears in is a few chapters later--the Nightmare Heist which he arrives in the middle of. But, there’s not any interaction between him and Kaito, nor any allusions made by Saguru about KID’s identity, so we’ll move on.

The fourth time Saguru makes any indication that Kaito is KID is during the Corbeau arc, when KID is being challenged by a clad-in-black KID lookalike.

Before jumping into that specific scene, though, there’s another interaction I’d like to call attention to--between Saguru and Nakamori. Not because of something Saguru says, but because of what he doesn’t say.

Nakamori: Hahaha! Looks like you let your guard down because you thought I was at home with a cold! Saguru: Our plan succeeded, it seems. Nakamori: But I only told Aoko I had a cold, so how does KID know…? Saguru: Hm...

If Saguru were wanting to make some kind of accusation, even a non-explicit one, he would have made some remark. Instead, he doesn’t say anything at all, which continues to speak to the fact that he isn’t really interested in implicating Kaito.

Anyway, the next time Saguru makes any sort of implication that Kaito is KID he is, once again, trying to help. Last time it was over the phone, so the conversation was private. This time, the conversation is in a classroom, although based on the panels, it seems like Saguru and Kaito are alone at the beginning--or at least, no attention is being paid to them.

[Fourth scene where Saguru makes direct indications as to KID’s identity]

Kaito: [Talking to himself] It must be the case, there’s no other way. There must have been some trick with the case.

Saguru: [Eavesdropping, apparently alone in the room with him] The case didn’t contain any hidden mechanisms. Kaito: Eh? Saguru: No hidden doors or things like that, as are often used in magic tricks. Kaito: W-what on earth are you talking about? Saguru: A new notice from Corbeau arrived this morning. ‘I’ll come and take the real Midnight Crow tonight.’ My name is Hakuba--so I don’t want a ‘white’ person to lose to some ominous black crow. [From here, Akako and then Aoko jump into the conversation.]

Surely a classroom is a risky place to have a conversation about KID, but the nice thing is that Saguru--once again--doesn’t bring up KID at all beyond saying that he doesn’t want the ‘white[-clad] person’ to lose to the black crow. From the outside looking in, all he’s doing is sharing information about the case with Kaito. It may also seem unwarranted from that perspective, but not at all implicating.

Also, another thing I’d like to call attention to is that when Akako joins the conversation (and seemingly blindsides Saguru, as if he wasn’t expecting anyone else to join), Saguru stops talking. He continues to be quiet when Aoko chimes in, and he doesn’t have any relevant dialogue for the rest of the scene.

Once again, Saguru’s clearly motivated to share information in the interest of helping Kaito. He has to share with Kaito’s civilian identity, since he can’t exactly arrange a conversation with KID, and this is likely the easiest way for him to do it. He makes no accusations, and this time he doesn’t even imply he wants KID caught.

So--Saguru is a part of the narrative again, but since rejoining the narrative he seems less interested in actually catching KID and far more interested in helping Kaito. And no accusations or incriminating allusions have been made since chapter 17, before Saguru’s first hiatus from the story.

The final time Saguru nods to Kaito being KID is from the Sun Halo arc. This is probably the interaction that’s closest to what fanon tends to depict when it comes to Saguru making subtle accusations that Kaito is KID. And even then, I tend to take this arc with a grain of salt if only because it felt less like Gosho was trying to add to the story and more like he was just trying to make a Magic Kaito addition that hit various fan expectations while still being wildly disappointing, lmao.

[Fifth scene where Saguru makes direct indications as to KID’s identity]

Saguru: [approaching and commenting on Kaito’s motorcycle] I see, a Suzuki GSX 250R. Akako: Ah, Hakuba-kun… Saguru: You’ve shown me something interesting. Perhaps this might help the police tonight. And could it be that you’ve forgotten… that the only motorised bikes we’re allowed to ride to school are scooters? Kaito: Eh?! For real?!

Once again, Saguru doesn’t explicitly mention KID at all--and segues from his mention of the police to pointing out that Kaito is breaking the rules right now, actually, which helps blend this teasing comment into the conversation.

Yes, later in the chapter Saguru does show up with a team of motorcycle experts. But that also means there’s more disguise opportunities for KID and more factors to account for, thus complicating things for, well, everyone--not just KID.

Also, I tend to dismiss that as Gosho throwing in some comedy, and as less to do with Saguru’s character. Call it cherrypicking if you like :P

To recount--there are five times where Saguru implies Kaito is KID.

The first two are in chapter 17, when Saguru first puts it together, and it is during this chapter that he gets the most explicit about calling Kaito out as KID, as well as the most aggressively he behaves about it. And he backs off so hard after that doesn’t work, that we don’t see him for several chapters.

The next two times he implies Kaito is KID are both in order to help him. No aggression or accusations, just the sharing of information. Even when teasing or suggesting he’s interested in catching KID, he’s good-natured about it, and when he realizes there are potentially people witnessing the conversation, he stops participating.

The final time he implies Kaito is KID is a tiny comment about finding something Kaito has shown him ‘interesting’ and ‘helpful for the police’ before smoothing into gently teasing Kaito for bringing an illegal vehicle to school.

In conclusion, Saguru may start off apparently aggressive in part thanks to early Magic Kaito’s overall tone, but rather than persevering in trying to catch Kaito after cornering him in chapter 17, he actually seems to back off. Once he’s playing a part in the narrative again, when he interacts with Kaito it’s almost exclusively to help him. Yes, he is on the task force and participating at heists, but where it matters, he’s less interested in catching the thief and far more interested in those the thief is opposing (excluding the police force).

#hakuba saguru #saguru hakuba #dcmk #magic kaito #meta #nefrit talk

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capitainelevi · 4 years ago

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Helloo 🌸 Do you have any hc for famous Petra/bodyguard Levi? (It can be the other way around)

Thank you for the ask!! ❤️❤️

(Some NSFW content I guess?)

Petra is a famous gaming streamer. She had some bad experiences with some "fans" stalking her, both online and in real life. Eld, Gunther, and Oluo all suggested that she should consider hiring a bodyguard, at least for fan events.

Levi is a veteran, special forces, and he got honorably discharged after an injury. Erwin is a mutual friend of Levi and Petra. When he heard about her problem, he went to talk to Levi about it. The hours and money were good, so Levi accepted a meeting with Petra.

Petra liked him from the first minute she saw him and offered him the job on the spot. She felt like she trusted him entirely for whatever reason. And the fact that he was pleasing to the eye did have a say in her decision. Levi accepted her offer and did not miss the fact that she was attractive.

At first, Levi only accompanied her to gaming conventions. Those were a pain in the ass for him since Petra cosplayed every time. At the first one, she cosplayed Widowmaker, and he felt a vein pop. Thankfully, the fans were scared away by his grumpy look and did not try anything funny.

When Levi met her friends, Oluo tried to impress Petra. He told her that he should have hired him instead of Levi, who looked like he could never beat him. Levi just put him on his back without saying a word. Oluo felt fascinated by Levi`s stoic self. After that day, he did his best to imitate him, to everyone`s displeasure.

Over time, Levi started to accompany Petra to some of her everyday tasks as well. He enjoyed shopping with her or walking her dog together. When Levi started coming over more often, Petra stocked up on his favorite tea.

Petra taught him how to play some games, and they made Sunday night a gaming night. She even managed to convince him to play with her on stream one time. Her chat was full of fans spamming questions about them dating.

When Levi`s job did not feel like a job anymore, he realized his feelings for his boss were not platonic. Levi got to her place earlier one time and let himself in with the key she gave him. He caught Petra during her yoga practice, and he choked on his saliva when he saw her in tight pants and a sports bra. Petra did not miss that and gave him a sly smile.

Petra waited for him to make a move, and when he did not, she decided to take matters into her own hands. She asked him to dinner at her place one evening. He came dressed in a black suit, and Petra almost drooled when she opened the door. Petra prepared his favorite meal and set up the table in her courtyard. She lighted candles and had a slow music playlist playing in the background. When Levi asked if she was trying to romance him, she gave him a coy smile and a "maybe" and sipped on her wine. They flirted through the rest of the dinner. When they finished eating, Petra cleared the table and told him to wait while she gets dessert ready. Levi was checking his messages and did not notice when she came back. Petra sat on the table in front of him, only wearing black lace panties with a matching bra and garter and stockings. She spread her legs for him and asked him if he was ready for dessert. And oh, he was. She got two orgasms in appreciation.

When Levi and Petra announced to their friends that they were dating, the only reaction they got was that they were expecting it to happen sooner.

Don`t forget to buy Petra`s gamer girl water!!

(I don`t remember in what context I edited that, but I wanted to use it)

#petra-realsnk #rivetra #rivetra headcanons #rivetra headcanon #my writing

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leverage-ot3 · 4 years ago

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notable moments from The Nigerian Job

(PART ONE)

leverage 1.01

note: there are A LOT of scenes in this one, but they are all important in one way or another in terms of notability, character-building, etc

Dubenich: I’m sorry Mr. Ford, sorry, I know who you are I’ve, uh, excuse me. I’ve read all about you. I know for example that-that when you found that stolen Monet painting in Florence you probably saved your Insurance Company what 20-25 million dollars. Then there was that identity theft thing and you saved your insurance company I don’t even know how many millions of dollars but I just know that when you needed them… What happened to your family is the kind of thing--

Nate (slams glass down): You know that part of the conversation where I punch you in the neck nine or ten times? We’re coming up on that pretty quick.

- - - - -

Dubenich: I’m serious. Look, look at the people I’ve already hired. Do you recognize any of these names?

Nate (going through file): Uh, yeah, I’ve chased all of them at one time or anoth-- Parker? You have Parker?

Dubenich: Is there somebody better?

Nate: No, but Parker is insane.

Dubenich: Which is why I need you.

Nate (laughs): No. I’m not a thief. (closes file)

Dubenich: Thieves I got. What I need is one honest man to watch them.

- - - - -

Hardison: I’ve been doing this since high school, bro, I’m Captain Discipline.

[Flashback]

(New York City Hotel, Five Years Ago)

Manager: They came straight from the airport and up to their room.

Security: So you never actually saw any of them then.

Manager: No, but the credit card numbers checked out.

Security: Break it down!

(Doors open to reveal Hardison sitting on a couch drinking orange soda while three beautiful women dressed as Princess Leia fight with lightsabers)

Security: Does that look like Mick Jagger to you?

Hardison: This is not the room you’re looking for.

what a fucking GEEK oh my god

like, his flashback is so tame compared to the others???

like, his version of criminality is hanging out with cosplaying pretty girls and watching them fight with lightsabers, all under the guise of pretending to be mick jagger

- - - - -

Hardison (holding up an earpiece): It’s a bone-conduction earpiece mic, works off the vibrations in your jaw.

(Hardison tosses it to Eliot who holds it to his ear)

Hardison (whispering): You can hear everything.

Eliot: You’re not as useless as you look.

eliot being subtly impressed with hardison is my religion

- - - - -

Hardison: I don’t even know what you do.

[Flashback]

(3 Years Ago Eliot, wearing glasses and drinking from a mug of tea, enters a room full of men in Belgrade, Serbia)

Eliot: I’m here to collect the merchandise.

(Most of the men pull guns. Eliot takes a long sip of his drink. Outside, the windows flash with gunfire. Moans and the sound of a body falling fill the air. Inside, Eliot calmly takes another drink. One man sits at a table surrounded by bodies that litter the ground. He places a baseball card on the table. Eliot smiles)

am I the only one that wants to know the context of this???

- - - - -

(Parker drops down between Eliot and Hardison, hanging upside down from scaffolding)

Parker: Can I have one?

Hardison: You can have the whole box.

(Hardison holds the box of comms up for her. She takes one and pulls herself back up)

Eliot: What are you going to do when she finds out you live with your mom?

Hardison: Age of the geek, baby. We run the world.

Eliot: You keep telling yourself that.

(Parker puts the comm in her ear, smiling)

ot3 moments from day one baby

also eliot goes from ‘baby’ to ‘oh god, I’m baby’ in 0.0000005 seconds

- - - - -

[Flashback]

(19 Years Ago in Kansas City, a ten year old Parker stands in her living room watching her foster parents fight. The foster father turns to Parker, holding a stuffed bunny while the foster mother stands in the background, crying)

Bill: You thought I wouldn’t find this? You don’t get bunny until you do what I say. So be a good girl or, I don’t know, a better thief. (walks out of room)

Foster Mother: Bill!

(Parker walks outside and down the walk. Behind her, the house explodes. She hugs her bunny and smiles)

for the LONGEST time I thought she blew up the house with her foster parents until I saw that john rogers confirmed they weren’t home at the time

also this gives HEAVY insight as to how even the smallest part of Parker’s childhood was

abusive, emotionally manipulative, etc

- - - - -

(Parker adjusts her repelling gear, caressing it as if it were a lover)

Parker: Last time I used this rig, Paris, 2003

Nate: You talking about the Caravaggio? You stole that?

- - - - -

Eliot (examining earpiece): Is this thing safe?

Hardison: Yeah, it’s completely safe, it’s just, you know, you might experience nausea, weakness in your right side, stroke, strokiness.

Eliot (puts earpiece in): You’re precisely why I work alone.

shut up eliot you’re about to be so far gone for them it will be amazing

- - - - -

(Parker dives off the roof)

Parker: Yeehaaaa!!

(Eliot and Hardison run to the edge and watch her fall)

Eliot: That’s twenty pounds of crazy in a five pound bag.

what’s the opposite of foreshadowing? because I’m thinking about the long goodbye job and it’s reference to this (also the SIGNIFICANCE in that episode in how both hardison AND eliot repeat this line, finishing one another. because they both are on the same wavelength by that point, so in tune with one another and in constant awe of parker.)

- - - - -

parker just ??? drops the fucking glass ??? onto the sidewalk below ??? like ??? what if it hits someone ???

- - - - -

Nate: Okay, you got any chatter on their frequencies?

[Electrical Room]

Parker: No. Why?

[Unfinished Office]

(Nate checks records)

Nate: There’s eight listed on the duty roster, there’s only four at the guard post.

[Electrical Room]

Parker: I can’t even tell how many guys are in the room. How can you tell who’s who?

[Unfinished Office]

Nate: Haircuts Parker. Count the haircuts.

[Electrical Room]

Parker: I would have missed that.

[Unfinished Office]

Nate: What?

[Electrical Room]

Parker: Nothing.

mastermind father and daughter in episode ONE

- - - - -

we love to see eliot beat up four guys in the time it takes hardison’s bag to fall to the ground

- - - - -

Eliot (empties gun and smiles): That’s what I do.

(Hardison looks impressed. Behind him, the door clicks open. He and Eliot smile and enter the server room together)

the FLIRTING ENERGY in this scene

- - - - -

Eliot: Did you give them a virus?

Hardison: (chuckles) Dude, I gave them more than one virus.

hardison doesn’t half-ass, pass it on

- - - - -

Parker: Problem. Those guards you ganked?

[Electrical Room]

Parker (looking at monitor): They reset all the alarms on the roof and all the floors above us. We can’t go up.

[Hallway]

Eliot: Every man for himself then. (starts to move away)

Hardison: Go ahead I’m the one with the merchandise.

[Electrical Room]

Parker: Yeah, well I’m the one with an exit.

[Unfinished Office]

Nate: And I’m the one with a plan. Now I know you children don’t play well with others but I need you to hold it together for exactly seven more minutes. Now get to the elevator and head down. We’re going to the burn scam.

[Elevator]

(Eliot and Hardison enter an elevator and begin changing their clothes)

Hardison: Going to Plan B.

[Unfinished Office]

Nate (packing his things): Technically that would be Plan G.

[Elevator]

(elevator doors open and Parker runs in. She begins changing while the men look away)

Hardison: How many plans do we have? Is there like a Plan M?

[Unfinished Office]

Nate: Yeah, Hardison dies in Plan M.

[Elevator]

Eliot: I like Plan M.

there are SO MANY things about this scene I want to discuss but here are the top ones:

1- nate calling them out as children? amazing

2- eliot and hardison canonically changed in the elevator together BEFORE parker dropped in, but they weren’t necessarily looking away in a backs-turned way when she came in (when they were still getting finished getting dressed)

3- parker being completely nonchalant changing with two men in the elevator? she must not really care about being naked in front of other people (as seen later in what I think is the morning after job (?), for example)

4- the boys look away to be polite but there is definitely interest in BOTH of their faces

5- so this is what the burn scam entails

- - - - -

parker takes shotgun while the two boys are in the back. I need to see the scene of them awkwardly sitting together in the back. possibly bickering.

- - - - -

Nate: All right, all right. The money will be in all your accounts later today.

Hardison: Anybody else notice how hard we rocked last night?

Eliot: Yeah, well, one show only, no encores.

Parker: I already forgot your names.

Hardison: It was kind of cool, being on the same side.

Nate: No, we are not on the same side. I am not a thief.

Parker: You are now. Come on Nathan, tell the truth. Didn’t you have a little bit of fun playing the Black King instead of the White Knight, just this once?

(they all walk away in different directions)

smh you’re all 0.000005 seconds away from becoming a family

“no encores” my ass

+ I love how hardison is the FIRST one to (immediately) bring up how awesome they worked as a team

- - - - -

(Nate walks slowly down a toward a large room where voices are coming from)

Hardison (holding gun): You mind telling me what happened to the designs?

Eliot: What makes you think I know what happened? Stupid.

Hardison: Look, forget you man. You did it when we were coming down from the elevator.

Eliot: Yeah, that makes sense doesn’t it? You had the file every second.

Hardison: Hold up Kujo, I did my part, I transferred the files.

Eliot: You better get that gun out of my face...

Hardison: What did you do?

Eliot: …or else I’m gonna feed it to you.

Nate: Hey!

(the men turn, Hardison pointing the gun at Nate)

Eliot: Did you do it? You’re the only one that’s ever played both sides.

Nate: Yeah, you seem pretty relaxed for a guy with a gun pointed at him.

Eliot (looks at Hardison): Safety’s on.

Hardison: Like I’m gonna fall for that.

Nate: No, no, actually he’s right, the safety is on.

(Hardison looks at the gun and Nate grabs it)

Nate (to Eliot): You armed?

Eliot (shakes head): I don’t like guns.

(Eliot looks pointedly past Nate’s shoulder. Nate turns, pointing the gun at Parker who is holding a gun on him)

Parker: My money’s not in my account.

(She walks around Hardison, raising her gun as Nate lowers his)

Parker: That makes me cry inside in my special, angry place.

Nate: Okay, Parker. (slowly reaches out to lower Parker’s gun) Now did you come here to get paid?

Hardison: Hell no. Transfer of funds man. Global economy.

Eliot: It’s supposed to be a walk away. I’m never supposed to see you again.

eliot could have IMMEDIATELY taken the gun away but it made hardison feel safe so he was humoring him

and how easily nate took the gun away? interesting, for a former insurance agent

“you armed?” “no, I don’t like guns” eliot sweetie I love you

also parker’s entrance tho

- - - - -

Nate: Then the only reason you guys are here is because you didn’t get paid. And you’re pissed off. (laughs) As a matter of fact the only way to get us all in the same place at the same time is to tell us that we’re not. Getting. Paid.

(a look of realization goes through the group and they all start to run. Nate opens a garage door and directs them out. Hardison trips on the stairs and Eliot pulls him to his feet)

Nate: Come on, come on, get up. Let’s go, hustle. Go.

(the others exit and Nate looks back to see a ball of fire headed toward him)

eliot: I hate you all, I work alone, I don’t care about any of you

eliot 0.000005 seconds later: hauling hardison off the ground so he doesn’t die in an exploding building because ‘I guess he’s by boyfriend now’

- - - - -

Nate: Have we been processed?

(Eliot waves ink covered finger tips at him)

Eliot: They faxed our prints to the State Police.

[Hospital Room B]

Hardison: Yo, if the staties run us man, we’re screwed.

Parker: How long?

Hardison: Thirty, thirty-five minutes depending on the software

- - - - -

Nate: Parker! Get me a phone. What we’re going to do is, we’re going to get out of here together.

Eliot: This was a onetime deal.

Nate: Look guys, here’s your problem. You all know what you can do, I know what all you can do, so that gives me the edge, gives me the plan.

[Hospital Room B]

Parker: I don’t trust these guys.

[Hospital Room A]

Nate: Do you trust me?

Eliot: Of course. You’re an honest man.

Nate: Parker, Phone.

[Hospital Room B]

Parker: This is gonna suck.

(she sticks her fingers down her throat and bends over)

Hardison: Oh. Hell no

the amount of times eliot brings up that it was supposed to be a one-time thing is HILARIOUS considering just how fast he imprints on them lmfao

also how they all immediately trust him, I’m soft

- - - - -

(Parker nods compliantly. The doctor and nurse leave the room. Officer checks her handcuffs then leaves. Parker and Hardison hold up the phones they stole. After a quick glance, they switch phones. Parker holds up the keys she stole and tosses them to Hardison before standing up and talking to the vent into the next room)

domestic pardison

- - - - -

(Hardison leads Eliot to a police cruiser that Nate and Parker are already inside of. As Hardison guides Eliot into the backseat he hits Eliot head on the top of the door frame. Eliot turns and growls at Hardison)

Hardison: Walk it off. Walk… get inside. Get inside.

(Eliot gets in the car)

I love chaotic (pre)boyfriends

- - - - -

Eliot: I’m gonna beat Dubenich so bad that even the people who look like him are gonna bleed.

Parker: You won’t get within 100 yards. He knows your face. He knows all our faces.

Eliot: He tried to kill us.

Parker: More importantly he didn’t pay us.

Eliot: How is that more important?

Parker: I take that personally.

Eliot: There’s something wrong with you.

okay to be fair eliot at least is open to and listens to parker’s reasoning before concluding she’s crazy

- - - - -

Eliot: What’s in it for me?

Nate: Payback, and if it goes right a lot of money.

Parker: What’s in it for me?

Nate: A lot of money, and if it goes right, payback. Hardison?

Hardison: I was just gonna send a thousand porno magazines to his office, but, hell yeah man, let’s kick him up.

these characterizations are so on point

- - - - -

SOPHIE’S INTRO LMFAO

+ how everyone else is horrified but nate just looks entranced

- - - - -

[Flashback]

(In Paris seven years ago, Sophie is cutting a painting out of a frame with several empty frames nearby. The door burst open and Nate enters with a gun in hand)

Nate: Freeze.

(Sophie grabs her gun and shoots Nate in the shoulder. He responds by shooting her in the back. They both clench at their wounds)

Sophie: You wanker!

so are we, as a fandom, EVER going to talk about this scene ???

- - - - -

(so apparently there’s a 250 text block limit for posts on tumblr so I guess I have to make more than one post for this now. the following part will be reblogged on this post immediately after. reblog that version instead please lol)

#leverage #notable moments #leverage season 1 #season 1 #leverage 1.01 #leverage 1x01 #the nigerian job #mine

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friendofhayley · 5 years ago

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ship history meme

Embrace your past and get to know your friends’ fandom origins!

Rules: Post gifs of your fandoms / ships starting with your most current hyperfixation and work backwards. (Bonus points if you share any stories about how or when you got into that ship! But not necessary!!) Then tag anyone whose fandom history you’d like to learn about!

Tagged by the most gorgeous, smartest, sweetest, and kindest person in my life @sightetsound <3 Sorry y’all, I have a lot of hyperfixations and I’m on NyQuil!

1. Katsuki Bakugo and Eijiro Kirishima, My Hero Academia - I literally can’t watch Season 4 until it’s finished because my heart will Explode if I’m left on a cliffhanger involving these too!!! (Unbreakable T.T <3) I don’t usually like animes but I fell in love with his trash bastard and his soft rock boyfriend by the villain’s attack in S1. It all started when I got a TikTok because a Very Hot Bakugo cosplayer was on there. (Literally, their rendition of Bakugo is just, umph. They have appeared in my dream.). As she got more popular he started cosplaying more of Class 1-A of MHA, and I kept wondering?? What the fuck is this anime about?? Why is there an alien girl?? I soon gave in and watched the show to gain context to this thirst trap. I have so many feels for these boys, even though I don’t post on them much here, and T.T

2. Alec Lightwood and Magnus Bane, Shadowhunters - I literally almost wrote my thesis because of this ship. I got into Shadowhunters because I was depressed in a foreign, racist country where I couldn’t go outside alone because old white men would corner me on the street, and everyone was talking about how Mike from Glee was kissing a guy at a wedding? Instead of partying during my study abroad trip, I gobbled down Malec content. And like who wouldn’t?? Harry Shum Jr. was playing a bisexual warlock?? And he had lines and a main character role??? An interracial couple where the characters are both POC?? Sign me up! But then I quickly fell in love with awkward gayby Alec and immediately knew how it felt to be in his shoes. (Disclaimer: I still haven’t finished the show because I don’t want their story to end, but just seeing their wedding scene????? Tears!!!!!!!!!! Both wedding scenes! I-) I just love how soft they look at each as they realize how lucky they are to be able to fall in love against the odds. T.T They deserve the world and all the warlock and shadowhunter babies and T.T This is just going to devolve into me crying so-

3. Stiles Stilinski and Derek Hale, Teen Wolf - I got into Teen Wolf to escape the hellfire that had become the Glee fandom around S3-S4. (Tbh it might have been Dereklei’s constant Sterek content on my dash that led me to give in.) Stiles was bi (through subtext) and definitely turned on by an older werewolf. What more could a depressed Gleek ask for? And listen - now looking back, Sterek is definitely gay Twilight - if Bella was snarkier, had a mental illness, and also a personality. Sterek was the ship to get me back into writing fanfiction and where I could read paranormal characters working through PTSD, ADHD, and other mental illnesses while fighting monsters and having unrealistic sex! I also love those future fics where Beacon Hills isn’t a Hellmouth anymore, and everyone’s alive and just living as one big found family. Truly, Derek deserves the world and I love him so much, and Stiles definitely agrees.

4. Louis Tomlinson and Harry Styles, One Direction - If it’s a surprise that I’m a dark larrie, please read my bio. HL made me believe that love is real and exists and can last for years. I got into One Direction in 2011 through a Lilo fanfic, but as soon as I watched the Video Diaries,,,we knew. Louis has saved my life in ways I can’t describe and the songs that they’ve written for each other through their tough times are so inspiring to listen and dance to. Seeing how they’ve been dragged apart by management, Sony Entertainment, and the whole music industry as a whole even though they exist in glass closets is very disheartening to see. But their resilience that they show through their art (Only the Brave, Sweet Creature, If I Could Fly, and like so many others) is always there. If you want to fall in this rabbit hole, look at freddieismyqueen on YT and come inside lol. Larry is real.

5. Kurt Hummel and Blaine Anderson, Glee - the ship that got me on Tumblr! I didn’t start watching Glee until the summer before S2 came out. My whole choir was into it and I didn’t want to be “mainstream”, but Kurt was the first openly gay teen character that I saw on TV. When I heard a character played by Darren Criss, a musical theater YT legend from AVPM, I had to watch it. I ended up binging the first season with those Netflix DVDs during summer break (yeah remember when Netflix wasn’t streaming? lol). I watched every episode of that god-forsaken show the night of (or night after illegally, hidden from my parents) for that ship, and then me and my best friend would rant about it for the whole week: rinse and repeat. The episode they got together made me scream and I definitely put those Glee Rewind songs in my iPhone. (Fun fact: I used to cry at night because I wished someone like Kurt could love me like that because I heavily related to Blaine and his whole situation). I naturally stopped watching Glee the moment they broke them up and I’m still mad at their hasty attempt to marry them out of nowhere with no well-written getting together / make-up arc other than Jigsaw?? and a barn wedding?? As if Hummel would. What a trash fire. But dang, Glee fanfics have some of the dirtiest, kinkiest, forbidden fics out there. If you were ever on Glee_Kink_Meme on LJ, you know.

6. Harry Potter and Draco Malfoy, Harry Potter - the ship that started it all, the big kahuna, the ultimate enemies to lovers for 90s kids. Drarry got me into the fandom world in middle school, where I basically lived on FFN and LJ while pretending to do my homework. I used to get ready every day by watching the same playlist of “The best Harry Potter videos on Youtube!” (curated by Ariel333Lindt, who was the only queer person I knew but lived in Eastern Europe, where I could see two gay people kiss and fall in love in the safety of my room through badly photoshopped videos. Please check out that playlist). I just love how each fic is a microcosm where they have to construct how magical systems work, the backstories of pureblood families, creatures, or just wizarding culture for the end goal of having Drarry fuck and fall in love! I love redemption arcs that take 200k to achieve, I love dark!Harry takes, and every single different damn take on Narcissa, Pansy, and Millicent - because deep down that’s the writer trying to come to turns on whether or not Draco should be redeemed to get together with Harry. (I mean we all know they’re obsessed with each other, book 6 anyone?) I feel like Drarry fics have the best worldbuilding and characterizations of these characters, and I just love those moments when Draco and Harry take a moment to take a breath together and realize how far they’ve come. No one else can understand how it felt to be the pariah or the chosen one, they both interacted with Voldemort the most, and they have the most history together. They should have gotten together! But I mean the author’s dead, am I right?

So that was a lot! Those are all the ships that impacted me that I still participate with. They have shaped me for better or worse, and have made me learn more about who I am and what I want (or don’t want) in a relationship. This was the most fun essay I’ve ever written on NyQuil!

I’m tagging @homosociallyyours because I really want to know your fandom story! Also @stozierbrak because I love you and must hear you gush about your boys. I’m also tagging @iamaqualady because you’re literally the most intriguing person I know and I’m glad we’re friends even though we haven’t interacted that much? ish?

#tag #me #kiribaku #drarry #sterek

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ask-de-writer · 5 years ago

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DARING DO and the ADVENTURE of the X'IBIAN VASE! : MLP Fan Fiction : Part 14 of 21

Return to the Master Story Index

Return to MLP Fan Fiction

Daring Do

and the Adventure of the X'ibian Vase!

De Writer (Glen Ten-Eyck)

And

Carmen Pondiego

Cover Art by

Doctor Dimension

52630 words

Writing begun 08/26/15

//////////////

Users of Tumblr.com are specifically granted the following rights. They may reblog the story. They may use the characters or original characters in my settings for fan fiction, fan art works, cosplay, or fan musical compositions, provided that such things are done without charge. I will allow those who do commission art works to charge for their images provided that I receive a copy of each image for my archive.

All sorts of fan art, cosplay, music or fictions is actively encouraged.

///////////////////////

Jeremy’s reaction was instantaneous. He charged across the camp and knocked Sehang off her feet. She was bleeding profusely from her right shoulder. Jeremy told her, “Stay down! We will tend the wound as soon as we can!”

He took her rifle, huge in his hooves, and began to cover the eastern desert.

At his yell of, “Take cover! Watch to the east! Shoot anything that shows itself!” the herd dove for cover. Daring Do pushed Soree down and behind a large boulder.

Staying low, she crawled back to Sang He and freed her own rifle from Sang He’s load. She returned to the shelter of the boulder and handed Soree her combat talwar. “Leave the shooting to us, Soree. If it gets to close quarters, you will be better equipped than we are!”

Daring Do was scanning the area to the east. She was looking around the lower part of the boulder side. She took careful aim and fired.

The heavier blasts of Sang He and her herd, firing their new rifles rebounded from the hillside.

Jeremy called out, “Hold fire! Wait for targets! I will take point and move up on them! Keep me covered!”

He ran forward toward another large shielding stone. Two of Sang He’s herd fired past him, keeping the enemy down while he took his safe position.

He called back, “Sang He, Mon Leiu! You advance next. Henea San, Kanya Ama, you follow. Then Corba Jai, come up to me. Once everybody is advanced and under cover, Corba Jai and I will move up to the next advance point. We will follow this pattern to advance on them as safely as we can for us.

“Our objective is to capture at least two alive.”

Under the steady cover fire organized by Jeremy, they advanced on the rag-tag band of outlaws.

When all were rounded up, Jeremy shook his head at what he saw. Antique design muzzle loaded muskets were the best that they had. Three of the nine in the band lay dead. Four more were wounded.

Sang He took over the questioning of them in X'ibian. She looked up at the end. “They were the remnant of War Lord Quchee Ban’s army. He tried to set up a strong fortress overlooking the Dunn See to force tolls from river trade.”

Skeptically, Jeremy asked, “What happened to cause them to be here?”

After a brief exchange, Sang He replied with a grin, “Qushi Han Le happened to them. The river monitor Peaceful Flower’s guns destroyed the fortress and many of the War Lord’s followers. Marines from the ship took care of the rest. These are the only survivors. They fled with almost nothing. They found us by accident. The rest, you know.”

Jeremy turned to Daring Do, who had come up after the battle was over. “Doctor Do, you know these ponies better than I. What should we do with them?”

~~ ~~ ~~ ~~

The caravan of trucks was advancing up the road with only one problem. Dusk was falling and a test of the controls showed that the night driving lamps were no longer working.

Overthrow was at the wheel, guiding their truck and watching anxiously ahead. They were well into the big bluffs that flanked the river. They were coming to a wide turnout that was sheltered from the drafts and chill.

For once, Tyranny was not blaming either of his cohorts. “I will be so glad to stop here, Overthrow. That crazed animal breaking this door is making it uncomfortably drafty.”

Robber noticed that Tyranny was still not taking any responsibility for the severe damage to their expedition that he had caused. Overthrow, without words, agreeing about the condition of the truck, pulled over into the wide turnout.

He parked with care, a distance from the bluff itself. The Chineighese drivers parked their trucks together, close under the bluff.

Robber took a careful look about the turn out in the fading light. He nodded to himself and said, “Good choice of a parking place, Overthrow. This will make it easier to rig a tarp or something over the door to keep out drafts. Gives us better access to the engine too. We need to inspect it before we go much further.”

“Thanks, Robber. I was a little worried about those bluffs too. Those clouds look like they might dump some rain on us and the gullies could run some water or mud out onto the paving.”

Tyranny overheard and snorted, “They have a weather authority, just like Equestria does. They would never allow such a thing!”

Robber and Overthrow looked at each other, as they rummaged for a tarp to go over the smashed door. “He doesn’t get it, does he, Overthrow? This IS NOT EQUESTRIA. Their weather authority is very careful with the annual monsoon. They keep an eye on larger storms to stop them if they will cause problems for crops. Otherwise they allow the weather to be natural.”

Overthrow, having found the tarp, was rummaging for the ropes that they would need. Over his shoulder, he commented, “It is something to do with their philosophical system. They prefer things to be as natural as practical.

“I have to wonder how somepony as learned in the Lore of the Heart of Discord, could miss that.”

Robber nodded thoughtfully. They took the ropes and tarp to begin covering the damaged door of the truck. As they worked, Robber commented, “I am worrying about that too. This whole expedition to gain the Heart of Discord and use it to create an Empire of our own was his idea.”

The rain that Overthrow feared began to fall along with a strong wind, driving it solidly into the hillsides above them.

Robber was drying himself off. “We finished setting that tarp just in time, Overthrow.”

Tyranny was studiously ignoring them. He had out a modern copy of an old X'ibian fold book and was carefully writing a translation of the text. Overthrow, peeking over Tyranny’s shoulder, pointed and was saying, “That’s wrong. Dromedary in that context means elegant or grace …”

The rumble of sliding mud and stone interrupted him.

~~ ~~ ~~ ~~

<==Previous Next==>

Return to the Master Story Index

Return to MLP Fan Fiction

#DARING DO AND THE ADVENTURE OF THE X'IBIAN VASE #Part 14 of 21 #MLP Fan Fiction #Written by De Writer and Carmen Pondiego

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eponymous-rose · 6 years ago

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Talks Machina Highlights - Critical Role C2E43 (December 4, 2018)

Tonight’s episode features Marisha Ray and Travis Willingham!

Announcements for tonight:

New Pumat shirt! Matt and Taliesin will also be playing some Fortnite with a Pumat voice pack. As you do.

#EverythingisContent stream tomorrow at 4PM Pacific: games on the all-new MAME cabinet!

Travis’ FPS stream will be happening next week!

Travis strongly recommends tuning in right at the start of the episode on Thursday. Right at the start. You and all your friends. Don’t miss it. There’s a sneak preview of some sort of animation!

Check out Gil Ramirez’s (an amazing smith, but also of “don’t fuck me Gil” fame) kickstarter!

Stats!

This episode had more spells cast than any previous episode: 76.

3rd time Beau has attempted to Extort Truth, and the 2nd time it’s succeeded.

Fjord has used four potions, all administered to other people. Brian: “For as much as you like swallowing... potions, not so much.”

Fjord has just passed Molly’s natural 20 count, reaching 26. Beau still sits at the top, with 49.

Travis and Marisha agree that this was one of their top five episodes of the show.

Fjord “totally dug” Caleb’s call to go with Wall of Flame to bring the situation with Avantika to a head. He points out that they’d had a conversation about keeping this whole situation in check if need be.

Brian: “You sound like McCree’s drunk uncle.”

The group planned (”we obsessed”) over the game for the entire two weeks, hundreds and hundreds of messages. It pretty much went according to plan. Marisha: “We had contingency plans. We had an ideal initiative, but we were like, if we fuck up, then Nott will take the journal. We had main roles and then understudies.”

Fjord thinks being able to summon demons is pretty much in line with all the weird shit that’s happened to him up to this point. He hasn’t even considered the consequences. Marisha: “I feel like that’s this entire mission. We’ll consider the consequences later.”

During the “I... wait” scene, Brian and Dani were yelling at their TVs, Travis was trying to telepathically communicate, and Marisha had complete tunnel-vision. She knew that if she’d fucked that up, they would have all died. She turned to Travis after Beau got up there and realized, “It’s just me and my words.”

Gif of the Week: the executive goth approves of Fjord’s demon-summoning! Henry models the prize:

Travis gets asked why Fjord slipped into his real voice when yelling that Caleb needed help. Travis pleads the Fifth: “My what?”

Marisha had no idea her mention of the Cobalt Soul would carry so much weight with the Plank King. It was a last-ditch effort after Fjord’s diplomacy fell flat with him. Travis desperately wants to know how much of what Beau said was true.

Brian: “Only Mercer could make Plank King cool again... Planking? Remember?” There is a brief threat of mutiny in the studio. It’s a Tuesday.

Matt mentioned to Marisha that, if Avantika had been allowed to speak, she would’ve called for a trial. Things could’ve gone very wrong for the Nein.

Out-of-context quote of the night: Dani: “Can you fit a puppy in your pocket?” Travis: “Yes, I’m enormous.”

Beau is surrounded by people who can do all sorts of absurd magic, “so of course she’s like, ‘Yeah, I can punch the shit out of you. I’ll start a fucking fight to do it!’”

Travis isn’t working with anything custom for his class, apart from the sword. Brian: “So your gag reflex is right out of the Handbook?” Travis: “That and personal experience.”

Travis on Fjord’s reaction to Avantika’s death: “All great stories are laced with truth. That fucked me up, because I hadn’t realized until that point that if she’s toast, I won’t get to ask her questions.” Not to mention the whole island having reactions to Vandren’s name. “I went back and watched it twice. The ritual, the tattoos, how she found her sphere, all of that shit, I’m feeling more like I knew less of the man than I thought I knew, and she knew more about him than I ever did. It’s fucking me up.”

Fanart of the Week: “I... wait.”

Marisha on Avantika’s very sudden death: “You know how things happen, and you go, wow, I should’ve seen that coming...” The outcome of the first plan was just to get her arrested, and then the fight happened, so she wasn’t thinking about immediate repercussions. She was expecting an arrest, and maybe she’d get executed after they left, but “I mean... that was brutal.” Travis: “It just kept escalating, and then she kept saying nothing after nothing. We’re going to be front row center for this.”

Travis: “Fjord is Lawful Good, clearly--” Brian: “You’re fooling no one with that Lawful Good bullshit, Travis.” Travis: “At least 40% of the audience. Lawful Good. Clearly feels a little distressed that she had to pay with her life.” But he points out that it wasn’t the first time Fjord wanted to see her dead. “If he could’ve seen to it himself, I think he would’ve.” It’s not something he’s very practiced with, but he’s emboldened by his new abilities.

Beau was definitely intimidated by the Plank King, but still had a bit of her contempt for authority figures. “I think it set in pretty hard that she was going to be terse, she was going to be blunt, but she wasn’t going to try anything that was going to get her throat slit immediately.”

Travis hadn’t intended to start picking up pieces of lost friends as part of his identity (Molly’s sword, Vandren’s accent), but it felt like the right fit, since he’s trying to establish his identity for the first time. He’s emulating what he admires about them.

Fjord’s in his early 30s. Beau’s in her early 20s. Playing Beau younger than Marisha lets her give Beau a little extra room for development; it also makes sense with her backstory. For Fjord, he was old enough to have mostly figured out what he was doing... and then everything changed.

Travis: “Fjord saw in Vandren a leadership that empowers people to rise in their station.” It’s about the team succeeding, not one person gaining more power. He’s constantly trying to put people in different situations for success.

Fjord is very attached to this group, but he’s also uncomfortable with how much attention is starting to be put on him. His whole survival mechanism is based on blending in, and being pushed to the front and being forced to make decisions is hard for him (Travis: “And me.”). Fjord is loving everything that’s been happening. The world’s never been richer or more exciting, and he wants to protect that if he can.

Brian: “Are you preparing for when things are as Beau-focused as they are... Fjord-focused right now?” No pun intended. Beau: “It’s a horror that you cannot prepare for. One day Matt will just introduce an NPC and he’s going to look at you and he’s going to be like, ‘Hello, Beau,’ and I’m going to be like ‘AHHH’.” Travis: “The tension is palpable. It’s real.” They compliment Taliesin on his handling of the first character-centric arc in the first campaign.

Brian jokes about everyone stumbling into Yasha’s story while Ashley’s still away, so Travis would have to play her through the whole thing. Travis gives a sneak-preview of how that would go, grabbing Beau’s hand and staring deeply into her eyes.

A gift for Travis from fans! He’s blown away.

Talks Machina: After Dog

Essential update on Henry: he likes wearing costumes because “it feels like being hugged”. There’s talk about him doing a Grog cosplay.

Pumat impressions all around. Travis’ is, according to Marisha, “Like Grog doing a Pumat impression.” Marisha has some practice because she was the one who wrote all the Pumat promos. Travis: “Wow, that puts your Swedish accent to shame.”

Fjord and Jester? “Fjord picks up on some subtle things and some not-so-subtle things, and then probably second-guesses those things.” He’s not too sure where they stand.

Everyone’s worried about their favorite artists’ tumblrs.

Travis reads the German on the back of his chocolate. Marisha: “There are way more syllables there than what you said.” Travis offers the last chocolate to Brian, and promptly eats it in front of him instead. “You gotta act fast on that shit.”

There were some ideas that didn’t work out: Travis was going to cast a spell so everyone could breathe underwater, and they were going to jump off the ship.

A question for Henry: Who’s a good boy?

Quote from the text thread: “Oh shoot. There is an a-hole with a crossbow. Dangit.”

Finally, in case you were losing sleep wondering, Brian is still dabbing every time he says the word “slash” in a URL. Further updates as warranted.

#critical role #critical role spoilers #talks machina #talks machina spoilers #long text post

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someguy1023 · 5 years ago

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Nobody’s gonna care about this, but maybe someone will

i think it’ll help convey why im so stuck on this, and why i seem to be focusing more on Holly and, according to messages i kept getting, “white knighting” for her. I’m not gonna justify Holly’s behavior. thats not what this is about. I just want this off my chest.

(im gonna regret this)

also, just to preemptively defend myself, i know how cheesy all this is gonna sound. But its the truth.

so. i guess i should preface this by explaining when I first heard about Holly. Maybe it’ll help this make sense in context. Maybe not. I don’t know but it doesnt hurt to try.

I didn’t actually learn about Holly through the internet like i assume most others did. I actually first found her through TV. More specifically, through that Heroes of Cosplay show SciFi has produced a few years back. I enjoyed it, but found myself mainly enjoying the work Holly and Jessica did while on the show. They were my favorite team, and I always tried to watch whenever they were in an episode. After a while though, I, like a lot of others apparently, got bored and moved on, and eventually forgot about Holly.

It was a few years later that I would find her again. This time, like many others, through Grumps. More specifically, through Ross and Steam Train. I was surprised when it turns out that one of my favorite members of GG was also married to one of my favorite people on HoC. Small world. I stayed a more casual fan, watching the occasional playthrough or crafting episode on her channel. I was more of a fan of GG and Ross, so I tended to watch more of his stuff than hers, but I still made sure to keep watching her stuff. It wasn’t anything major, she just made me smile.

A few years later, it meant something more to me.

In 2016, my father died. Normally, that wouldn’t be such a big deal for something like this. It was everything leading up to his death that was the problem. I always had a very “problematic” relationship with my father. He was abusive towards me when I was younger, lashing out at me for really minor problems. (for example, one time he had lifted me up in the air by my throat and began strangling me when I was ~6. Why? Because I had used some money our neighbor gave me for cleaning up his lawn to buy a popsicle from an ice cream truck, ate half of it, then put the other half in the fridge. He found it, got mad at me, and then began to yell at me. I had a nervous tic when I was younger where I giggled uncontrollably when I was scared. Sure enough, I began to giggle and could stop it, and then he, enraged, lifted me up. I realize years later he was probably drunk, considering he smelled really weird. It isnt a good memory.) He eventually left my mom and I when I was almost 7, moving down to Alabama with this lady he met in a bar, and proceeded to do pretty much every major drug imaginable. I didn’t see/hear from him again until a few years later at his mother’s funeral. He seemed remorseful for what he did to me, and a year or two later, moved in with his cousin back in the state I was living in at the time. I began visiting him when I was 13, and he seemed to be better. He apologized to me for what he did, he tried to be a good dad, and I believed him. That was my first mistake.

Flash forward to January 3rd, 2016. I was visiting him for the weekend after staying at my cousin’s, and was sorting through my things to make sure i didnt forget anything. We had visited one of his friends to get something he borrowed (according to him) then got back to his house. He was sitting on the couch, watching TV, and I thought he fell asleep. I noticed he had a cigarette in his mouth he was going to light before he passed out, so I went over to put it aside. I figured out he wasn’t sleeping. It turns out, he was overdosing, and what I thought was snoring was his throat closed shut and the air escaping his lungs. He was dying. I told his wife (at the time) what what happening, she called 911, and I went upstairs to hide in my bedroom. A lil while later, the ambulance came by, and the paramedics gave him whatever that stuff is they give addicts who OD. (At the time, I didnt know what was going on. He had really bad lungs, and I thought they were shutting down or something. I was told it was from him overdosing later that night.) He woke up, and they drove him to the hospital to make sure he was okay. I went back to my moms house, and stayed there. That was the last time I saw him alive

As it turns out, my dad had been using me for over 2 or 3 years. He was not only stealing money from me under the pretense of helping him with driving for over an hour to pick up/drop me off from my moms place to visit, but had also been heavily manipulating me for years in order to control me. He had tried to turn me against my mother and her side of the family, claiming she had used me to verbally abuse and control him when they were married, telling me lies in order to keep me under his thumb. (like how she threatened to abort me if he didnt marry her after knocking her up, or how she had him steal from his sister during her wedding, etc.) I began to despise my mother, arguing with her constantly, and, on his insistence, never told her anything about what he was doing or what he told me. It wasnt until after that day that I learned it was all lies.

I was devastated. I felt hurt, used, and betrayed. (I realize now...its because I actually was.) I was a wreck. It didnt help that 4 months later...he died. Needless to say, it was a very, very tough grieving period. I locked myself away in my room, unable to summon the energy to even get up in the morning. I had suffered from mild depression prior to this, but it was much worse. I couldn’t find a way to get through this, suffering for months, and eventually, began to think about suicide.

Thats where Holly came back in.

Besided the playthroughs helping cheer me up a lil whenever I put them on, it was her advice that really began my path to healing. Her kind words and support to others began to help me sort through the baggage I had been dealing with about my dad. I began to follow her advice on how to deal with my depression, and began to slowly ull myself back from the edge, and, over time, began to pull myself back up. Eventually, with her help, I began to attend regular therapy sessions, and managed to fully come to terms with what my father had done to me, as well as properly manage both my depression and anxiety problems. I honestly don’t know where I’d be right now if it wasn’t for Holly. She helped keep me going when I really needed it. She, for lack of a better expression, helped save my life. I’ll always be grateful to her for that...despite all of this. Ever since then, whenever I felt my depression weighing me down, or felt my anxiety creep back up on me, I could rely on her to help keep me grounded.

When all this happened, I couldnt help but notice I felt the same way as I did all those years ago. Despite the fact that its just some random lady on the internet, and shouldnt have mattered as much as it did...it still hurt on a personal level. The worst part of this whole thing? I can’t go back to the thing that helped me out whenever I felt this way. Not without being reminded everywhere I go of how everyone thinks of her.

So...maybe thats why I’m doing all this. Not just to stop people from spreading hate and rumors based on speculation...but because part of me cant/doesnt want to believe one of the people I relied on and put trust in could be the bad guy. Because part of me just refuses to let go or lose someone who meant so much to me. Because part of me wants to believe that things will get better...even if I know they wont.

If you read through this, thank you. Maybe someone out there feels the same way I do. Maybe, if they dont, someone can understand. Its been a rough month for me. I just hope things will look up somehow. I dont know if I’m gonna come back to this. Im realizing it probably isnt healthy. The only thing I have left to say, then, if I dont come back; please, try to spread good. I know this is the internet, and even worse, tumblr...but i think people need some light nowadays. and constantly spreading hate and cruelty...that wont help anyone. I know nothing i say matters, that nothing i’ve done has changed any minds. but even if you cant trust Holly anymore, or dont believe anything she says...at least believe in one of her beliefs. That kindness is the greatest thing to spread to others, and the world can sure use a lot more of it.

Good night.

#atelierheidi #commander holly #heidi o'farrell #heidi o'ferrall #holly conrad #jared knabenbauer #projared #projared scandal

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armada-of-ships-against-antis · 5 years ago

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Gush about some of your favorite ships please

Sorry for the long wait, but I think I might be ready for this now. (and before anybody wonders, of course it is in the middle of the night and I should go to bed now! Cause it’s the best time to gush over your ships!)

Okay lets begin with Spirk - man I was raised being a Trekkie and to be honest I never saw the great appeal of Kirk, cause my fucking younger than 10 year old heart already belonged to that vulcan! And I bailed my eyes out when he died! But after Kirk and the crew did everything to bring him back, I was like: Okay Kirk is a good one, okay! Nobody will ever be able to seperate them, only over my dead body. Back then it was more about the friendship but I’ll be dammned if I didn’t become a Spirk shipper some 10 years later when rewatching it. But why stop there, get Bones into the fun, too! Try to provoke that human side of Spock, trigger some unlogical feelings, try to beat him in 3d chess!

Okay bear with me there are three other Star Trek ships I wanna gush about! I pretty much watched the series in the order they came out, so next was TNG that I saw, and although I loved data to every bit and byte of his android being, I was at a loss for a love interest for him. Okay there is always Geordie I guess or Picard, but TNG never hold a deep appeal for me in that field. So on to DS9. When I saw it as a kid, is was boring shit with all that politics and religion. I was around 18 when I rewatched and then in only the fourth episode I became suddenly aware of how motherfucking much Garak flirted with Julian Bashir! And I fell so deeply in love for their weird dynamic of a young and easily impressible human doctor with a mysterious cardassian spy tailor. I ran around showing scenes with them to people who were not shippers and they agreed, that there was tension. And right there was my first time finding background informations about my ship. It was there! I didn’t just interpret too much! Andrew Robinson, the actor said himself he thought of Elim Garak as an omnisexual character who had a certain interest in Julian. It was absolutely mindblowing to me (also I started to google what omnisexual meant and found about pansexuality, so this is kinda part of finding my own identity, thanks to the closeted representation of a queer alien in sci-fi show from the 90s)

Okay two more and I’m done with Star Trek. But both are from Voyager. Throughout the series I loved the chemistry between Janeway and Chakotay. The slightly forbidden, the pressure, the loneliness of being captain of a ship so far away she probably would never see her husband again. Tragic shit and so perfect set up. And then came Seven of Nine and manged to shake things up. Suddenly I was a multi shipper, because I couldn’t decide if she or Chakotay should be with Kathryn. The one was loving, supporting and the other was awkward, learning new things about finding humanity again. One was frowned upon because of their ranks and the other because Seven was still more borg than human in how she behaved. So pretty cold, while also confused a ton of times and Janeway ALWAYS had the time and nerves to explain it to her. Just like the doctor (who speaking between us is also a solid shipping option for Seven!)

Damn I tricked you by forgetting myself, that I did develop a shipping crush on Q x Picard. Damn have you ever seen those two interacting. The cockiness in the room, the mocking tone, the resistance. Have you seen those scenes you could perfectly take out of context and already have a “morning after sex” scenario?

Good now let’s take a deep breath and come to the Harry Potter fandom. Or in my case Severus Snape’s playground to be shipped to literally everybody! If it had Snape in it, I would read Everything during that time. Snarry was my most favourite, followed by Snape x Lucius, Remus, Sirius. But I also was looking into x Hermione, Draco, Lily, James, McGonagall, Dumbledore, Ron, Neville (Oh what a small and angsty ship), Bellatrix, Voldemort, Narcissa, Tonks, hell I even read one with Hagrid! (Okay I admit I didn’t enjoy that). Snape was my shipping bitch. Beside that I was of course loving Sirius x Remus.

Okay we move a tiny bit backwards in my life timeline, because before I started to excessively ship my ship bitch with everybody that was breathing, I had a rare ship in Final Fantasy (VII to be more precisely). Hojo x Vincent. You know just your ordinary crazy, mentally instable old (as in probably 60 years old) mad scientist having his way with a young agent from a special task force who canonly had a love interest in his wife… yeah. You know the totally normal stuff you ship every day! ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

I mean I also had the regular Cloud x Sephiroth, Cid x Vincent, Cloud x Tifa, Tifa x Aeris, Reno x Rude or Rufus and so on, but hell yeah I wrote one of my longest fanfictions with most of my OCs for Hojo and Vincent and someone commented on it. That person became my fucking best friend for now over 13 years who went with me through so much shit but is still my shipping partner in crime till now.

Together we discovered the movie Megamind and watched it more than 10 times in one week! We were so instantly on board with Megamind x Roxanne that it nearly hurt. And when we started an rpg, we shipped the fuck out of them, gave Minion a mermaid to love and that was the most perfect and sweet shit. They are just adorable! He’s such a goofball, sick with love only hold back because of his supervillain image.

I also met my second girlfriend via fanfiction comment. I had written a smut one shot about Tarrant Hightopp, the mad Hatter with ‘his’ Alice. That was also the first one I attempted to translate into English. When we met for the first time, we also watched Alice in Wonderland around 10 times together and we were in love with the lovely dynamic. We were frustrated when we found out, there was even a kiss in the script that never made it to the fucking screen! It was outrageous! I started to learn how to write a scottish accent and strew in some scottish words in our rpg to make it more authentic.

(And after that I managed to pull her into the pit of the Harry Potter fandom, hell I even pulled her into the pit of shipping mlm which she didn’t like until Snupin. But our main ship was suddenly Snape with her OC and we wrote a lot. Like between 2-8k word for one single post in our rpg! In the end we had enough to fill two books. We did even cosplay as them.)

Let’s get back to the Final Fantasy fandom a bit and let me gush over the other ships I had over the years. I’m still a huge Squall x Quistis shipper from part 8 and Laguna x Kiros! I also have an eye on Cifer x Fu-Jin (hah one eye, cause she has a an eyepatch, urgh I know that was a bad joke). And while I started as a big Auron x Tidus shipper, it shifted more to Auron x Rikku. I shipped them when I was about 15 (her age) and I thought I wasn’t allowed to do that, so I made a whole fucking AU where she was older and it developed into a totally original story of my own, which I have never ever written down even one page). With X-2 I satisfied myself with Paine x Rikku, they were such cute opposites of each other, I couldn’t resist! Only some years ago I played FF 15 and damn it was a shipping paradise again for me. Like all of the four protagonists are a match for each other! And then Ardyn appeared and made me weak in the knees. So Ardyn x Noctis but also just because those the truly most favorite characters: Ardyn x Ignis. Not exactly the fluffy happy stuff, I can tell you that. Manipulation, angst, abuse it had it all.

I can’t talk about Final Fantasy and leave Kingdom Hearts out, so yeah I started as a typical Sora x Riku (not Rikku from FF 10) fangirl and with part 2 I also feel for Axel x Roxas. I know, I know but at least with Organisation 13 you had a whole bunch of shippable characters. Just make one or two of them your shipping bitch, in my case Xemnas and Xigbar and ship the shit out those guys with everybody you can think of in the organisation.

And when we are already talking about Kingdom Hearts, I just jump into Disney a bit. Like every girls dream was to find their prince, ect and I was like: yeah Mulan and Shan Yu seem to fit nicely… Frollo is a fucking ass creep, but damn that scene in the cathedral when he sniffs Esmeraldas hair… Jasemine you look good in that red slave outfit for Jafar to be honest and dear Adam, you should have stayed a beast for Belle. Happy ruining your childhood. You’re welcome. :D Not that I shiped those during seeing those movies the first time, but you know I rewatch stuff!

Good okay let’s check the watch… good 1 hour later…. I’m not gonna finish this any time soon…. I’m sorry. I just tried to make a list of ships that seem important to me and I would probably write another hour or two. I just hope this satisfies you for the moment ;)

If you or anybody else wants to hear about more video game, movies or series ships and me writing an essay about that shit… feel free to ask I guess LMAO

Good Night dear people (or maybe not I see 15 messages on my dash)

#ask me #armada #too many fucking fandoms to tag!!

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oaesiir-beloved-of-heaven · 6 years ago

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NEWER DISCLAIMER: While working on my blog about lawn-mowing I discovered this old thing. I was pretty proud of it at the time and thought it gone for good. I decided to go ahead and post it with a few edits to replace my older more problematic and ignorant viewpoints with ones that more closely reflect reality and my now more liberal viewpoints. DISCLAIMER: I wrote this for a Facebook group I was talking to people in who were predominantly National Socialists. The kind who think Hitler did nothing wrong. So if my words seem directed at such a kind of people, don't think I'm talking to you the reader specifically. It's intended as a story to illustrate the flaws in their position and how the whole "We Must Suppress X Minority Group Based on Race and Conspiracy Theories!" is a self-fulfilling prophecy which perpetuates an endless cycle of instability. I was writing this on a Friday night and had plans to go out. As it got time for me to leave, I saved the document and left. But I came back to find I'd been banned from the group. I didn't want all that work to go to waste however. So, here it is.

I'm going to tell you all a little story. I'll come back later to see what you all have to say to it. But I have more important things to do tonight. But for now I'm going to leave you all with a parable to consider. If you want to become more well-read on the subject you are all welcome to do so.

The Parable of Visigothic Spain.

In the region we now know as Spain, Jews and Christians lived side by side without any qualms under the Roman Empire. There were absolutely zero instances of ethnic or religious-based violence between the two groups.

Then the Visigoths showed up.

Like most Barbarian groups they were leaving Northern Europe as a mini Ice Age gripped those regions, rendering harvests and food supplies nonexistent. The Visigoths eventually settled in the regions now known as Spain and Southern France.

Eventually the Visigoths in Spain adopted Christianity, even though it was Arianism. Their formal entrance into the Catholic Religion would not come until much later.

Even after their formal merge with Rome, the Iberian Church had a very basic knowledge of Christianity. Mostly derived from oral tradition and the Bible.

In the Bible, it's pretty clearly laid out after the Gospels in the New Testament that the first persecutors of Christianity were the Jews. In spite of this, however, very little in the way of what we might recognize as "Antisemitism" appears in the Biblical texts. In Rome at this time, documents like "Sicut Judicaeris" outlined civil rights for Jews. Saint Augustine said Jews were to be valued, not exterminated, as an important part of Christian history and a valuable asset for the preservation of the Old Testament, its history, and an understanding of it.

But the Visigoths themselves were very cut off from Rome and just emerging from Barbarism. As such, Tribalism governed much of their policy. "Us vs. Them," if you will. So even though they found themselves rulers of a multiethnic and multicultural area of the world, they continued their policies largely as though they were governing only Visigoths.

Couple this with their primitive understanding of Christianity, and we have one of the first appearances of Antisemitism in a Catholic government.

Without explanation, context, or reason Visigothic synods and kings were passing laws to suppress Jews. But apparently even though they had never been before, the Jews were a threat to civil order as a whole and had to be suppressed, oppressed, and controlled.

Flash forward a few hundred years to the Moorish Invasion of Iberia; no one knows precisely why the Moors invaded. Various theories are tossed about, from Eastern versus Western understandings of Feudal sovereignty to an over-sized colonization force to a simple series of raids that got bogged down and accidentally built a civilization. One theory rapidly gaining ground is that the Moors were invited by a deposed Castilan king. However a lack of written record from the time period concerning the motivations and plots of the parties involved in the invasion leaves room of speculation. Most Iberian Catholics simply saw it as an invasion to conquer and destroy their Christian civilization.

At this specific instance in history, the Catholics in the region were oppressive toward Jews and the Caliphate of the Moors from North Africa was somewhat tolerant for the moment. Both these factors had little to do with religion and more to do with the present leadership; any student of Islam can say the religion doesn’t have a track record for treating Jews that is dissimilar from Catholicism.

The result is that the Jews welcomed the Moors. They helped them in their conquests. For no other reason than they wanted more freedom than what the Catholics offered.

So it was for most of the period we all know as the Reconquista. The Jews helped the Moors; there were exceptions I feel I should note. Many Catholic rulers, knowing the Faith better and seeing how the Caliphate was turning against Jews (the "Sephardic Golden Age" didn't last very long) became more lenient towards them and treated them much the same as they did Muslims who did not oppose them. They did what was best for their realms and their people; ideology was secondary to that. The only overarching thing that - mostly - guided Catholic rulers was Catholicism.

So let's fast forward to the Post-Reconquista. The Moors have been pushed out, but many Muslims and Jews remain in the southern regions of Spain. But not just Muslims and Jews; Muslims and Jews with a real stake in the Caliphate. Money is involved now.

But there's something else at play; most of those who fought in the Reconquista don't know much about the Visigothic Period. Their only experience with Jews is with them as traitors and friends of their oppressors. They don't know much about the Who's and Why's of the Visigoth Antisemitic Laws, because there's little to no way for them to know. Even then, that doesn't matter; it doesn't reflect the present reality.

So the Spaniards see the Jews as traitors and a subversive element; they don't know anything else. The Jews don't particularly care at this point about reconciliation; they have a larger stake in helping the Moors at this point. The unified Spain is a young entity; can it truly survive? Already Jewish forces were establishing contacts with the Moors. If another invasion was tried, they would certainly help. Figures in local government were still Jewish and/or Muslim.

So the Expulsion of the Moriscoes takes place, and the rest is history.

But what's the point of this story?

I'm going to make a bet that most people on /pol/ are in favor of the "Final Solution" to the "Jewish Question." That most of you don't like Jews just on principle.

My question is: why? Because of some unfounded theories and suppositions? For all you know, that Jew you know who is your neighbor has no problem with you. Or he wouldn't if you didn't hang a fucking Swastika in your window. He doesn't want your rights subverted anymore than you do.

He probably doesn't feel any special connection with his Jewish history beyond the superficial.

But I'll bet that if you and a bunch of "Daily Stormer" reading-buddies got together, starting cosplaying as Nazis, and having your own Kristalnacht in your neighborhood, very quickly those who find themselves targeted by you would unify against you.

Because human nature is funny like that, with how it reacts to adversity and oppression. When you attack a large group of people as a whole, they unite.

If a whole bunch of Black Panthers went on the warpath where you live looking to kill Whitey, I'll bet you and all your buddies would rally really quickly. I bet lots of White People would join you or hide behind you if only for their own survival.

This is how human nature works and why racial prejudice is self-defeating. It is always a self-fulfilling prophecy. One race persecute another, it resists, and the oppressor shouts, "SEE!? They were against us all along!"

Except any other ethnicity would do -the exact same thing-.

I've heard South Africa is a pretty bad place to live for a White Man now. I'll admit, I don't know much about the whole affair. But let's say it is.

Let's suppose the Whites in South Africa are in a position identical to the Jews in Visigothic Spain. For added sting, let's assume South Africans are predominantly Muslim and the Whites are Christian.

Now let's assume a foreign Christian power invaded South Africa for whatever reason. Let's assume they didn't successfully conquer all of it.

Every White Supremacist would cheer and support every act of terrorism, every bit of mob action, every racist scree, every act and word written to undermine the native Black South African government. Let's assume Black South Africans win the war and reunify the country under a Black Muslim government. In spite of the fact the Whites were openly seditious, you would decry any attempt by the government to control a clearly traitorous group. Because they're White, so you have to help them, and that's all that matters.

This is why Racial Supremacy is a farce. This is why canards spread about Jewish supremacy are self-fulfilling prophecies. It's barbaric tribalism that is doomed to keep the world and all its States ever-shrinking and ever-unstable and ever-warring.

We have to better than that. We must.

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closetofanxiety · 6 years ago

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Nitromare: We Got Some Hot Action in the Ring Tonight

The date: Monday, November 15, 1999

The place: Little Rock, Arkansas, the Alltel Arena

The occasion: One month into the Russo-Ferrara tenure at WCW and “one fo the most important nights of 1999,” according to Tony Schiavone

H/t to Mark for the screen caps

We open up with an actual wrestling match. Or, I guess, an approximation of a wrestling match. Norman Smiley comes out in full football pads. Jimmy Hart comes out in a Renaissance Faire suit of armor. I never understood why they call medieval cosplay events Renaissance fairs. Different time periods, folks.

This is a terrible travesty, and Brian Knobbs comes out to hit Smiley in the head with an unprotected chair shot. The 1990s, ladies and gentlemen. The crowd is hot, at least. They are cheering Norman and booing Hart and Knobbs. I tell you what, Knobbs had a transcendentally cascading mullet deep into the 1990s. Good for him. Norman gets the pin in 4:46 after one of the worst table spots I have ever seen in my life.

“There’s more competition here than you’ll see in the World Series or the Super Bowl,” Bobby Heenan says. That seems preposterous, but the ‘99 Series saw the Yankees sweep the Braves, and the Super Bowl was a lackluster win for the Broncos. So ... maybe? Maybe Brain is correct?

We get recap and a backstage skit where some of the Nitro Girls scuffle. Russo was really eager to make the Nitro Girls into wrestlers.

The Outsiders come out. This is the episode where Nash has a horrific makeup job to make him look like Sid Vicious, which has attained a degree of immortality in wrestling social media circles where people post out-of-context screen captures. In fairness, it’s a pretty uncanny likeness: Big Kev looks like a “Spitting Image” puppet version of Sid.

Sid comes out to a big pop. Ah, this is the one where he says “You are only half the man I am, and I have half the brain you do.” This is kind of a classic episode for devotees of Sid’s unintentional comedy.

Backstage with Russo, who still hasn’t appeared on camera, berating Kim Page and telling her that she has to wrestle Asya. Russo is mad because Kim doesn’t want to be a Nitro Girl anymore. This is ironic, as Russo didn’t want the Nitro Girls to be Nitro Girls anymore.

Booker T comes out for a handicap match against Creative Control, the latest identity for Ron and Don Harris. I believe they were “Skull” and ... “8Ball” (?) in the WWE during the Gang Wars period. Here they are guys in suits enforcing the will of Russo. The crowd is still really hot. They love Booker T. The Harris Twins win clean (well, as clean as you can get in a handicap match) and the crowd is livid. Then the lights go out and the mysterious woman from last week is in the ring. She and Booker T go to town on the Harrises. WCW really wanted their own Chyna, boy.

Backstage with the Harris Twins being berated by Vince, who brings up their unsuccessful WWF gimmicks, namechecks Dutch Mantell and scoffs, “Yeah, remember DOA? That was really over.” If there was one thing WCW’s still-huge TV audience couldn’t get enough of, it was INSIDER MINUTIAE.

Evan Karagias comes out to wrestle your older cousin who never seems to hold a job for more than a couple of weeks. Approximately: a normal-ass guy in jeans and a tank top. This is Johnny Boone, the WCW referee that Karagias scrapped with last week. The commentary team does a bad job of explaining this. Madusa interferes, hypnotizing Johnny Boone with her womanly wiles, and Karagias gets the roll-up win in 2:50.

We cut to Dr. Death Steve Williams coming into the building with “Oklahoma,” one of the worst ideas of the Russo era. This was Ed Ferrara doing an impression of Jim Ross that included mocking Ross’ Bell’s palsy.

We have a five-way Piñata on a Pole match between El Dandy, Juventud Guerrero, Psicosis, Silver King, and Villano V. Most of the match is devoted to Ferrera’s shitty Jim Ross impression. Steve Williams looks like he would rather be getting a root canal. The average “BAH GAWD HE’S BROKEN IN HALF” YouTube parody clip is a better JR impression than Ferrara, who was last heard from teaching creative writing at the for-profit, accreditation-challenged money pit known as Full Sail University.

The match ends in a no-contest when Dr. Death runs in and beats up all the luchadors. It sucks. Everything about this sucks.

Goldberg vs. Curt Hennig with a needlessly complicated stipulation that involves Hennig’s career. It’s a good nasty brawl that starts in the back before the bell rings. Hennig could still perform at a high level even in this shitshow. He taps out to what might charitably be called a figure four in 4:23. Goldberg celebrates his victory by spearing and jackhammering Hennig, who has not lost his WCW contract despite losing the match, because he tapped out rather than getting pinned. Or something.

The Misfits come down with Vampiro, for a match against Berlyn. Or maybe it’s a handicap match? Or a tag match? Berlyn and the Wall (hur hur) are wrestling four guys, although three of them are the Misfits. One of the Misfits who is not Jerry Only (Doyle?) takes a chokeslam from the wall, and lands on his neck rather than his back. That looks extremely painful.

The Wall and Berlyn have the match won, but start fighting amongst themselves instead of getting the pin. Maybe one was from East Germany and one from West Germany. At any rate, after some arguing, the Wall gets the pin on Vampiro, who then gets whipped by a chain-wielding Berlyn.

For some reason, Torrie Wilson is being forced to referee a match by a still-unseen Vince Russo. She has to wear a bikini while doing it, because of course she does. She protests. “Have a cream soda!” Russo says, for some reason. Then he dismisses her by saying “Go on, hit the skids,” probably meaning “hit the bricks,” but “hit the skids” was certainly a fair summation of Nitro’s trajectory under Vince Russo.

Sid Vicious and Rick Steiner are wrestling. It immediately turns into a brawl through the crowd, which the crowd loves. Someone in the audience has a sign that says “Big Johnson, Inc.” This is all Sid, because Rick Steiner had pretty much had it by this point in his career. Sid powerbombs Steiner through the wooden stage, which is pretty great.

“The Millennium is upon us,” Sid tells Tenay backstage.

We’re backstage and the Barbarian and Gerry Flynn (Gary Flynn?) are having an “MMA-style fight” for some reason. There’s no explanation for any of this. “This is WCW’s version of a fight club,” Tony Schiavone says. Tony: the entire wrestling promotion is a fight club.

If this had been a real fight, Barbarian would have killed this guy, whoever he is. Barbarian is one of the famously legitimate tough guys in wrestling history.

I don’t know why this exists on this program. It ends.

Asya and Kim Page are going to have what a fan’s sign describes as a “cat fight,” with a bikini-clad Torrie Wilson officiating. “Oh Lordy!” Tony shouts. She’s not good at being a referee, because she gets into a (JOEY STYLES VOICE) catfight!!!! with Asya. Then the Filthy Animals come out and take Torrie away. Kim puts a sleeper hold on Asya, although there is now no referee, sexxxy or otherwise.

One thing this terrible exercise in self-hatred has taught me: I really like Kim Page.

David Flair comes out with a ref shirt and a crowbar. Kim Page runs away. Asya beats the shit out of Flair, dropping the elbow onto his crotch. “Right in the Man Department!” Heenan says, and I laugh out loud.

Flair turns it around and starts beating on Asya. The Revolution comes out and saves her. A match that started out as Asya vs. Kim Page ends as Dean Malenko vs. David Flair.

Now we have Scott Hall vs. Chris Benoit, another match in the never-ending heavyweight title tournament. “How Bout Those Hogs,” a sign in the crowd asks.

Hall comes out with Nash. Benoit comes out with Bret Hart, because Canadians stick together. Benoit was a Stu Hart guy too, if I recall correctly.

This could be a decent match. Hall still had gas left in the tank at this point, and Benoit was on the road to becoming arguably the best in the world.

It starts well, with both guys trying to take the measure of the other, eventually settling into an exchange of truly brutal chops. Hall gets the upper hand with the help of Nash. Hart is not doing much to help Benoit beyond pointing sternly at Nash.

“Marry Me Julie!” a sign in the crowd pleads. Julie: think hard about this.

Benoit rallies and knocks Hall out of the ring. Nash begins beating on Benoit as referee Nick Patrick looks on. For some reason this is not grounds for a disqualification. Bret Hart walks over and is very cross indeed, but doesn’t do anything. In the ring, Sid runs in and powerbombs Hall. Benoit gets back in the ring and hits his diving headbutt, then gets the win via submission. The whole thing takes 9:38. It’s OK.

Another match in the longest title tournament in history, because this will never end. Ever. This time it’s Bret Hart vs. Billy Kidman, and Rey is joining Tony and Brain on commentary. It’s pretty good, but before long Scott Hall and Kevin Nash walk out and start brawling with Konnan and Eddie Guerrero. For some reason. Kidman taps to the Sharpshooter in 3:46.

How is it possible that there are still matches left in this tournament? It evidently is, because we have another one: Buff Bagwell vs. Jeff Jarrett. Tony starts calling Jeff “The fair-haired child of ...” and then there’s like 10 seconds of silence, probably with Tony trying to remember if he’s allowed to mention Jerry Jarrett’s name on TV. He plays it safe and says, “... of the Powers That Be.”

The match gets off to a good start, and then the Harris twins come down to the ring. They interfere, but the referee doesn’t see it because he’s ... tying his shoe. Jarrett gets the win, and then he and the Harris boys beat on Bagwell. Dustin Rhodes runs in to make the save. The crowd loves it. An old-school babyface tag team of Dustin Rhodes and Bagwell probably would have been really popular, but why would you do something that people would want to see?

Backstage, Bill Goldberg slams his head against a Surge soda pop vending machine, and a can of Surge pops out. There is nothing more Late Nineties than this moment.

We’re getting a cage match now, pitting Malenko and Perry Saturn of the Revolution vs. Konnan and Eddie of the Filthy Animals. This isn’t the main event, meaning they set up and broke down the cage during the show.

Shane Douglas joins the commentary team. “You’re like every other mark on the Internet who thinks they can call this better than me,” Tony says. This sucks so bad.

Eddie gets handcuffed to the cage while Konnan brawls with Malenko and Saturn. “Eddie’s trapped like a bug in a rug!” Douglas says, apparently not understanding that turn of phrase.

Saturn and Malenko now handcuff Konnan to the cage, and we have a sexxxy bondage match. Douglas enters the ring and the referee calls for the bell at 2:57. They set up a steel cage for a match that didn't even last three minutes.

Luger and Liz come down to the ring for, I think, ANOTHER match in the Tournament That Cannot And Will Not End. It’s against Stinger. Luger tried to trick Sting into eating brownies loaded with laxatives before the match, because eating a plate of baked goods is absolutely part of Sting’s pre-match training regimen. Instead, Hacksaw Jim Duggan, trapped in some version of hell, intercepted the brownies and ate them. I hate that I am even typing these sentences.

Sting just starts beating the shit out of Luger, and the crowd loves it. This reminds me that there really was a WCW audience that just stopped following wrestling after 2001, instead of jumping to WWE or picking up on TNA. Sometimes that happens. America used to be full of boxing fans.

“These two men have been friends ever since they came into this sport together,” Tony says, then quickly corrects himself: “I mean, into this business together.” Did Russo ban mentions of wrestling as a sport?

The match is good until it Russofies:

Ref bump - Liz maces Sting - Lex puts Sting in the torture rack - Meng runs in and starts killing Luger - Liz maces Meng - mace means nothing to Meng - Meng puts Sting on top of Luger - ref counts the pin

Backstage, we’re in a toilet stall with Jim Duggan, feeling the effects of the laxatives. Why was I permitted to do this. To do any of this.

Finally, mercifully, it’s time for the main event: a streetfight between Sid and Nash. They start brawling outside the ring even before the bell.

“This is going to be the best pay-per-view in the history of pay-per-views,” Heenan says of the upcoming Mayhem 1999, which, as it would turn out, was not quite that good.

Back when I did a wrestling podcast, one of our running gags was that we were perpetually in search of a good Kevin Nash match. This is not that match. A lot of sluggish brawling around the ring, occasionally in the ring. I think a double axe handle is the only “move” in the first five minutes, apart from punches and knees.

“These two can go all night,” Brain says, perhaps while watching a VHS tape showing a Kawada-Misawa match instead of this.

There can’t be a single match without a run-in, and this time it’s Hall. He and Nash team up and start beating on Sid. It’s legal, because this is a streetfight. Then Goldberg runs in, but that is not legal for some reason. Maybe this is an anti-Semitic street where the fight is happening. The ref calls for the bell. There’s a disqualification. Sid now gives Goldberg a low blow and starts beating on him, and Bret Hart runs out to make the save.

This was completely bad.

#Nitromare #WCW #1990s wrestling #show reviews

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godzillamendoza · 7 years ago

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Leaving Behind 2017 - Relationships are haaaarrrrdddd

So much to some people’s surprise I’m sure, I’ve been with a couple girls this past year. Like real ones, not those ones that holographically project themselves over prostitutes that you can install in your ceiling. (does anyone get that joke? No one saw that movie but me, right?) Ah jeez.

Gotta learn to quit automatically deflecting with humor when something stressful comes up. Gahh! This is a healing/learning experience.

Okay, so context is important. I know all of this is stuff from before 2017, but it leads into how this year went so its important to cover: in 2015 I had my first girlfriend, whom I shall not refer to by name. She and I dated on and off for about 5 months and it was the first real relationship I had been in. We started dating after I told her no 2 times. The third time she asked me to be her boyfriend, her friend was there and they sort of pressured me into it so I just went with it. Then I had my first kiss with a crowd of her friends standing around me, watching to make sure I followed through on the day after. The majority of our conversations were through text or skype, even though we went to the same school. She was just too busy to ever hang out with me outside of school. She was often jealous of me talking to other girls, she mocked me constantly and called all my hobbies “nerd shit” and rolled her eyes at me when I said I didn’t want to smoke weed with her. Then she told me she’d be hanging out with a guy named Patrick at her house after she met him over snapchat. I was obviously a little worried about it and she told me I was being controlling and needed to back off, so I did. Then a week later I tracked down Patrick and confronted him, asking why she was suddenly so cold and distant. He bragged to me about how good of a time they had together and how she complained about me constantly. He said the sentence “she’ll be mine by the end of the week.” Being cheated on by your first girlfriend in addition to some emotional abuse and being kept at a distance constantly... well all of it is like a perfect storm of PROBLEMS that you’ll have to deal with later. We broke up after I told her that I knew what they did, though it was like 2 weeks later because I was naive and forgiving at first. She’s dated around 5-7 people since that venture ended 2 years ago, so clearly she learned a lot from it. She also offered to go out with my again while she was dating another guy, which caused me to... well let’s just say I wrote a very long, very mean spirited message that I don’t regret.

Naturally, after all that, my self esteem was subterranean. I had a lot of image problems due to her comments on my appearance. I had severe trust issues with... well pretty much everyone. I had problems liking myself and I just needed outlets to focus on while I was lost. So I started making more videos on comic book stuff. While I was dating this girl I made a short video essay/editorial thing on my thoughts for casting Spider-Man in the Marvel cinematic universe. She was quick to dismiss it, but I felt like it was the first thing on YT that I was truly proud of and I wanted to make more. After we broke up I did that video about Spider-Man videogames you might have seen once or twice. It currently has over 400 THOUSAND views. I owe it to this girl I suppose, she made me so miserable that I accidentally became a z-list internet celebrity to take my mind off being miserable. It didn’t exactly fix my emotional issues, but it was a coping method that was better than becoming a meth addict or something.

--so on to 2017. This was the year where I started dating again. Obviously I would still have a lot of baggage after that first girl and everything that happened with her. I met a rather mousy girl in high school who I’ll refer to as... uh... how about Sandra? That’s extremely far off from her real name. Sandra. Well anyway, I met Sandra in high school and we kinda became friends. I wasn’t all that attracted to her physically. I’m still not. She’s not ugly, nor is it a shallowness thing, she’s just not really my type. I’m not the guy to just “take whatever I can get.” So it was a difficult decision when she told me how utterly heartbroken she was when she had no date to prom. I figured it would give me a good excuse to go to the prom and I would be making someone else happy, so I took her. And from that point forward she became rather infatuated with me and I made the hideous mistake of “just going with it” so I didn’t hurt her feelings. I tried my damnedest to find things to like about her as a girlfriend, but we were really a pretty bad fit. Plus, we had this sort of non-commital and strange relationship where we didn’t consider ourselves a couple, but still ended up holding hands or hanging out outside of school a lot. Sandra had never dated anyone before and I was a trainwreck because of the girl from 2015, so it was this stilted and halfhearted attempt at romance.

She wrote me a letter once, confessing her feelings about me and the way she thought of me at night. She was too nervous to give it to me in person, and had a mutual friend deliver the note. It was full of grammatical and spelling errors, and her handwriting lacked something to be desired. I was both honored... and slightly put off by it. She was 18 years old, with her own car and a paying job, but her methods of going after this relationship reminded me of the silly things I did in 5th grade. I guess that’s when I realized that I couldn’t keep leading her on and that it wasn’t really meant to be. I was looking for something a little more serious and age appropriate, but she still couldn’t handle something like that and I didn’t really feel for her how she felt for me. So I... just couldn’t figure out what to tell her. I ended up using graduation as a means to distance myself. We were moving off to different colleges with different goals and ambitions. I felt guilt for a long time for just brushing her off without saying anything beyond “I’m not really at a good place for a relationship right now, mentally.” Which was the truth, but I felt like I could have said more. We’ll put a pin in the story of Sandra for the time being, because it has a more clear resolution later.

Shortly before graduation, I received a piece of fan art on twitter that was truly special. It was probably one of the most accurate and detailed pictures of me anyone had ever drawn. Whoever did it clearly spent a lot of time staring at my old mug to make it happen and I was really impressed with it. I showed it to my classmates to not-so-humbly brag about my following online (come on, I had to be excited about something SOMETIMES, its not like I did it more than that one time). Then to my surprise I saw that there was a particularly pretty girl in the profile picture of the person that sent me this piece of fan art. I think my female audience is kind of small, so I was really happy to see one of them sending fan art and kind words. Plus I thought she was cute.

I sent her a DM on twitter saying that I thought it was really cool and probably one of my favorite pieces of fan art ever, she responded and we just kind of started talking from there. The more I learned about her, the more I liked her. We had a SCARY amount of things in common. Like, favorite comics, movies, books. We shared a similar sense of humor, we had the same extremely jaded reaction to fictional violence and laughed while looking at covers of “Crossed” together. We even took the same type of antidepressant medication. I fell for her really quickly, probably in the first 15 minutes of what would be a 9 hour conversation. Of course our mutual insomnia kept us from caring about sleep and we just kept talking and sharing stories and pictures of cosplay. I felt like I had never felt before. For the sake of protecting her identity, let’s say her name is uh... Lila. Sure, some of you internet detectives might be able to find out her real name, but I ask you... please don’t harass her or ask her about any of this. Respect her privacy, respect her decisions, and respect her in general.

So, Lila and I made an amazing match it seemed. She made me feel... like I had been found after being lost again. Part of me resigned to this notion that I’d never meet a girl who I had things in common with. Maybe I’d live my life with my interests and dreams being silly to the women I spent my time with, or worse, boring. Lila treated me like the things that I did and talked about were interesting. She thought I was cool. It helped undo a lot of self loathing just talking to her for that first 3 days. I was walking with a spring in my step at school for the final few days, I was singing in my choir class instead of just lip syncing, I was acting like I didn’t care what anyone thought of me, because at least she thought I was interesting, and that was all I needed. In a way, just meeting her was what I needed to get over a lot of pain, and I’ll always be thankful for her giving that to me. We didn’t have to be in a relationship, I just needed the validation of knowing girls like her existed. She stayed up until 4 Am with me on school nights, talking with me through text or skype helping me stay awake to finish studying for my geography test. We spent hours just talking about our lives and what we thought of the world. We shared our experiences battling depression. Eventually she told me that I made her happy when nothing else could and I said the same. In almost a week it felt like we knew each other for a life-time. So at 3 AM one night I asked her to be my girlfriend and she said yes. The problem with that was... she lived in a different country.

I never really considered that part until after it was too late. Long distance relationships have always seemed like a huge gamble to me, but I was willing to risk it for Lila. And for about a month, it was working REALLY well. We would watch movies together on skype, share ideas for cosplays, and just chat until the sun came up every night. She even helped me bake apology cupcakes for my mom at 5 AM after I carved a spider logo into the kitchen table on accident. I was feeling freaked out because I felt genuinely happy for the first time in two years and I was just waiting for some anvil to fall on me and everything to be ruined. But the distance and our age became a problem. We were both at the very end of high school, just about to go to college and unsure of where life would go. She mentioned that she was thinking about traveling abroad to go to college. I had a conversation about it with my mom and BOY did she take it far immediately. “Ask her to go to your college! She could move in with us! We have the room now! You could drive her to school every day and eventually get your own place and get married and have kids and blah blah blah blah...”

My mother was just excited. She’s also been going through relationship problems too in the last year, and was just living vicariously through me. My mom wanted something to be stable and long lasting and fun, but she didn’t realize that it was too early to ask Lila for these things... and I... like a complete idiot... asked Lila if she wanted to go to college with me and live in America with me. I pretty much asked her to move in with me after knowing her for 6 weeks. She still had a lot to learn about me, and vice versa. We were worlds apart and it would have been a huge step if she only lived down the street, let alone in a different country. I shouldn’t have asked, and I ESPECIALLY, shouldn’t have asked more than once. I still feel like an idiot for it to this day and it was nearly 6 months ago. Then things started getting worse, mostly due to my previous relationships bleeding into my actions.

The girl I dated in 2015 cheated on me because I was so hesitant to be physically intimate with her. That creates a lot of doubt and shame, so I started asking Lila how she felt about that sort of thing if we were to meet in person one day. She became uncomfortable with the subject and I very awkwardly tried to steer the conversation away from it. Then a message meant for someone else accidentally got sent to her without context that SEVERELY damaged the situation. When being asked about the price of something by a friend, I sent back a number, which went to Lila and without context “... about 8.50″ looks VERY... weird? Maybe even kinda threatening if you misconstrue it the right way? I looked like the biggest creep/moron! So I tanked that 4 AM conversation pretty hard, and then listened to some very, very poor advice from a friend who said “just try to be casual with her about that stuff.” Because of my internal fears of her being bored with me if things didn’t get hot and heavy now and then, I started awkwardly making more casual references and jokes regarding sex over the following two days. It made her uncomfortable, and she kept quiet about it, so I kept doing it until I just couldn’t anymore. I had to tell her that I didn’t like it either and that I was doing it because I was worried she’d end up getting tired of a relationship where it wasn’t a factor. I held her to the same standards as the girl from 2015, and it was unfair. She wouldn’t cheat on me if I didn’t bring up intimacy constantly, and I was stupid for thinking she might. I won’t make excuses, but I will say why I did that. And I know I learned from it and won’t do that ever again. That made things a little more tense and over time, we started having other issues as well.

Lila made an off handed reference to some passage of her diary she wrote about me in the last few days we talked. The thing she said concerned me, as it didn’t sound positive at all. I pressed her on it because I was worried it was just several pages of her listing off the things she hated about me. Eventually she broke and read it off, and it was just several pages of her listing off the things she hated about me. She disliked my dress sense and hated my clothes, she thought the way I ate food was stupid looking(???) she felt weird about dating me for my RACE, because apparently she didn’t talk to many white guys except me. She spent hours of her personal time writing about superficial things about me that she didn’t like, and thus my self image problem had returned and I didn’t wear button up shirts for 4 months. I asked her if there was anything she DID like about me, and after a long time of struggling to find something to say, she said she liked my sense of humor and that I was nice to her. Which are... kinda general reasons to like someone? Like, non-specific and sort of forced. Then over the next few weeks she started insulting me a lot more. She developed a habit of casually calling me a... derogatory term for homosexual... (not sure what twitter’s policy is on cussing and slurs, currently so I don’t want to say it) and saying hurtful things randomly. I figured it was time to accept that the honeymoon phase was over and that she didn’t like me nearly as much as she initially thought. She didn’t like me nearly as much as I liked her. Then the final straw happened.

Being in a relationship with someone so far away can be stressful, because your ability to speak to them is entirely dependent on the use of the internet and all its various outlets. If she were to just decide one day she didn’t like using Facebook messenger anymore and delete it, I wouldn’t be able to speak with Lila through it unless I used something else. So when she casually deleted messenger one day, I just... couldn’t hear from her anymore. She never told me she was going to do it, so all of my messages to her on the first day went to no one. I decided to give her some space and assumed she just didn’t feel like talking. By day 5 I was a nervous wreck and assumed she died and had no idea where she was or what happened to her. I was losing sleep over it, my friend was checking police reports in her area, I messaged her on twitter asking if she was okay. I got no response and felt so scared. Eventually, my friend Damian messaged her on twitter myself and she responded in a few short hours, just saying she forgot to tell me about it and resumed talking to me on twitter like nothing happened. All that worry and anxiety turned to anger really quickly, because she was either trying to break up with me in an indirect way by ignoring me, or she was just being inconsiderate and actually forgot to tell me our main means of communication was going away for no specific reason. I didn’t resent her, but I was upset.

This caused me to think long and hard about the relationship and how it was doing after those short few months. We both made mistakes. I got way ahead of myself and was asking about very serious steps way too early, I let my distrust of people guide my decision to act like someone I wasn’t to keep her interest because of past experiences, and she undermined a lot of my self confidence and said some very toxic things. I wasn’t quite ready for a long distance relationship and I was still hung up on bad things from my past. She hadn’t dated anyone before and wasn’t really ready to commit, nor did she have much interest in it. We agreed that going back to being friends was better, before we started to hate each other. And of course, we talked less and less in the following weeks until not at all. We haven’t spoken in a few months now, and looking back I’m not proud of my actions or hers. I think in another life, another time, after we both did a lot of growing up, we might have made a really great team. As I said before, I’m still very thankful to have met her. I think just meeting her gave me a lot of hope and confidence that even she couldn’t really ever take away. I know now that I have a chance at meeting someone who doesn’t look at me like an alien. I know now that I can’t be distrustful and hold everyone to the same standard as people. I know now that if I were to try dating again, there are a lot of bad choices that I’d avoid (definitely wouldn’t be so damn clingy, ew). And I know now that the girl from 2015 isn’t the only girl on Earth who will be interested in me, I just have to look for another one. As for “Sandra,” I texted her midway through this last semester telling her that I felt guilty about the way things quietly drifted off, and we met up a few weeks before thanksgiving break. That night we tried one more time, going to a restaurant with no open seats and a 2 hour waiting time. She said she wasn’t hungry and we went back to her place where she had no food so I remained starving for that night. Her parents weren’t home, and we... spent the rest of the night looking at vacation photos on her phone. It was clear that the magic just wasn’t there, and I told her before I left that I appreciated her giving me the opportunity to tell her that it just wasn’t meant to be. She had no interest in the things I liked, and while I could see that she tried to like those things too, her heart wasn’t in it. So we ended things amicably like we should have months before. I was proud with how I handled it, and I felt as if though I was finally an adult when it came to my relationships.

I don’t need another person to like me in order to validate my existence. I don’t need to have everyone in the world think I’m awesome. I don’t need to rely on someone constantly to maintain my self confidence and my image. I don’t need to date someone to avoid feeling lonely, because you can be just as lonely in a relationship as you are out of one. I don’t need to say and do things untrue to myself to keep someone interested in me, because if they lost interest when I act like myself, they aren’t worth my time. I don’t need to date someone to feel complete. I don’t need to date someone just because I don’t want to hurt their feelings by turning them down. If you’re feeling alone lately and having a hard time getting into a relationship, just remember you don’t need any of that. There’s always someone out there for you, and your interests don’t make you completely alone, even if it feels like there’s no one else in the world that shares them. Being into “nerd shit” doesn’t guarantee that you can’t find someone to love and care about, and even if someone loves the same stuff as you, it might not work out anyway and that’s perfectly fine. Just remember that the only person you need to believe in you is you and no one else can fix you but you. Try to find someone after you have all that stuff sorted out or you’ll just end up getting hurt again.

In all reality, I don’t need a girlfriend at all, but I’d still like one because the company is nice. There’s a girl out there for me, and I’m going to avoid the mistakes I’ve made in the past, and I’m going to leave behind the baggage and tragedies that lie behind me. Who knows, maybe going into 2018, I’ll get to meet her. Let’s hope so.

#relationships #story

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justgotham · 7 years ago

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This past weekend gave us the third annual edition of Brooklyn, NY's Flame Con, an LGBT-themed comic convention where you can attend some cool panels, ogle some amazing cosplay, and--most relevant to my own particular experience--spend more money than you probably should on the show floor. There's also a quiet "AFK Lounge" where you can step away from the hubub, something that I personally think all cons *coughNYCCcough* should invest in.

But it wasn't just buying art prints when you have no more wallspace, why in God's name do I do this to myself? Ahem. Saturday night saw actor Robin Lord Taylor, who plays Oswald Cobblebot/The Penguin on Fox's Gotham, put in an appearance to talk about LGBT representation, the Penguin's relationship with Ed Nygma/The Riddler... and even to drop a few vague hints about season four, premiering on September 21.

For those who haven’t been watching Gotham—and seriously, I get it, we’re in the era of Peak TV and there are 492 shows to catch up on at any given time, but Gotham is a damn fun show to binge watch while you’re doing laundry, and I thoroughly recommend it—their version of Oswald Cobblepot is a queer man, who in season 3 realized his love for friend-turned-enemy Edward Nygma (Cory Michael Smith). To quote Taylor, it’s less “love” than “[Oswald’s] ideas of what love are”—a somewhat warped idea of romance brought about by decades of bullying, friendlessness, and just generally being an awful human being. (Hello, supervillain!)

“They had not told me when they started the show” that Oswald was queer, Taylor told moderator Kevin Gilligan, board member of Geeks OUT. “We didn’t really discuss his sexuality beyond the fact that he was somewhat divorced from it because of the bullying and experiences he had as a child.”

When the writers told Taylor and Smith about the romance storyline, it was Taylor’s decision not to “go back and write some sort of history with this character and say he always had these feelings. I’m treating this as though he’s opening his eyes. The first person he sees is his mother, and then his father. The only people that he ever loved.”—played by Carol Kane and Paul Reubens. Bow down. After the two of them, “the first person that ever shows him any sort of respect, and someone that he is equally challenged by, was the Riddler. And who also, you know, was kind to him. And that’s the first time he experienced that, outside of his parents. So obviously, for Oswald, because he’s a very manipulative and stunted person, he’s going to glom right on to that. And that’s going to be where we start with these romantic feelings.”

Taylor is careful not to label Oswald’s sexuality, noting that “I would be ascribing labels to someone who’s… coming from a place of such darkness and manipulation and abuse. And I don’t want to ascribe any of that to anyone who’s part of the larger LGBTQIA community… .This character is not an example of any sort of queer experience that anyone in the world should have or really should look up to, because again, he is a very tortured, manipulative, conniving person… He gloms only Edward because, obviously, he wants someone who understands him and also [who] he feels safe with. But his way of dealing with that is to kill Edward’s girlfriend! You know what I mean?” (RIP Isabella - you looked exactly like Kristen Kringle, and it was weird. Are we going to get into that,Gotham writers, or nah?) “This is the person that we’re dealing with here. I want to be sure that context is constantly understood when you see him go forward, especially his relationships with Edward and other people that are coming in season four.” Speaking of season four, Oswald’s taking the lesson that Nygma taught him—that loves makes you vulnerable—and running with it. Taylor admits, though, that as a philosophy “you can’t sustain that… Somebody’s going to come into his path that is going to change his idea of how he should behave and how he should act. That happens in this season.”

So… probably no lovey-dovey endings for Os and Ed, then. No worries. That’s what fanfic is for.

Other season four tidbits: Lee Thompkins (geek royalty Morena Baccarin) is “going to go through a major change this year and really break out of [being] the romantic foil of Jim [Gordon, played by Ben McKenzie] to become her own presence in Gotham City… She’s a badass bitch.” And Poison Ivy, played now by Maggie Geha, will be the Luke Skywalker to Oswald’s Yoda in the world of organized crime. “She wants to have her own agency and be in control of herself… She doesn’t have any interest in being a good person, being a righteous person. She’s like, ‘Yeah, show me the nasty stuff. Show me how to get things done the way you do them.’”

Finally, Taylor spoke about LGBT representation on Gotham in a more general sense, noting that—for all Gotham City is an awful dystopia in many ways—there are other ways “in which it is actually a utopia. In our show, never ever once in Gotham City is anyone discounted because of their race or their sexuality.” (Oswald isn’t the only queer characters on the show, Barbara Kean [Erin Richards] and Tabitha Galavan [Jessica Lucas] having engaged in an on-again-off-again relationship of their own. Renee Montoya [Victoria Cartagena] was a character in season one but hasn’t been heard from in years.) “In that way, Gotham City is almost exemplary. It’s a place where horrible, horrible shit happens, but fundamentally every human being is treated equal.”

If everyone in Gotham City’s OK with the wide, varied spectrum of human sexuality, the same cannot be said of people in our world. Though Taylor affirms that most of the comic book community is very accepting, he nurses a particular irritation for those who reacted negatively to his character’s sexuality on some hella specious grounds. Monologue presented in its entirety:

“People would be like, ‘I love you. I love your character. I just hate that they made the Penguin gay, not because I don’t like gay people, but because it’s not canon.’ And I’d be like: “Fuck you.” It’s not canon?! OK, excuse me! You’re watching our fucking show. When ever did Bruce Wayne and Catwoman hang out when they were tweens? You have a problem with that? No? Oh, OK. Did you have a problem when the Joker killed Batman’s parents in the first Tim Burton movie? Oh, no, you didn’t? Both of these are not canon issues. What’s the outlier here? Oh, it’s a queer storyline. OK, thank you so much, really glad to know that you’re homophobic. Actually, I am glad to know that. I like to know when people are homophobic and they’re completely missing the mark and are completely blind to their own prejudice. ‘It’s not because I don’t like gay people. It’s because it’s not canon.’ Are you kidding me with this canon shit?”

Can I get that printed on a t-shirt?

#Gotham #Oswald Cobblepot #Robin Lord Taylor

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tumblunni · 7 years ago

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I had a weird dream last night that there was like a new sequel comic made by the Bobobobo Bo-Bobo guy and it was calld ‘Blind Nya’ (???) and it was officially licensced by sega and then there was a scene of eggman in Garnet cosplay doing a fusion dance with Don Patch

Also another dream where I was equally convinced that a thing existed, but it was less funny this time and more So Mundane That I Wonder Why I Dreamed This. It was just some sort of anime dating sim that i thought was Ehh kinda average, like i was living in an alternate world where this had been a part of my childhood that was so boring i forgot. I think it was called ‘Goodbye Mayfly’, and in context my dream-mind was trying to remember the word Wallflower, i think? Anyway you are An Anime High School Girl and Date Some Cliche Strait Dood Archetypes. But I think also there was something with a parallel world that was magic?

Like I think I was possibly taking inspiration from the manga Dream Saga Takamahagara (hope I spelled that right) which was actually a very unknown thing that I liked when i was a young kid. (First ever canon trans character I ever saw in anything!) Anyway the plot of that manga is that everyone has a parallel self in a magical mirror fantasy world, and when you dream in our world you wake up there and vice versa. Protagonist was the only one with the power to remember our world when she went to that world, at the cost of not having a parallel life over there so she was totally lost and needed to have her parallel friends explain all the worldbuilding to her. But they didn’t remember her and she had to win their trust again until they awakened as part of the super duper hero team and gained magical girl powers and stuff. then save de world!! Also everyone was lil kids in real world and bishie magical girl/boy type characters in fantasy world, so it had that cool element of ‘wow i wonder what i’ll be like when i grow up and get to have grown up adventures’. (Ha.. ha... kids, the real grown up adventures are just paying gas bills and stuff, don’t idealize us...) And also there was one character whose fantasy world self was a girl and like in the real world she was ‘a boy who wants to be a girl’, and just it was nice to see a trans character explained in rather simple terms for kids, even if also sometimes the portrayal wasn’t 100% perfect. man I wish i could read that story again but its so hard to find the books! i never even got to see what the ending is...

ANYWAY BACK TO THE DREAM So it was a dating sim in that sort of setting, but the mirror world was just a very boring cliche alice in wonderland ripoff instead of the cool desert setting from Dream Saga that combined japanese and indian mythology. And it was just something like you were a princess and everyone else was a prince of a different kingdom and then you had basically the same dynamic as you did in real life high school? So it was just like ‘your choices in real life high school have way more importance and you’ll have an even bigger happy ending’, cos you’d unify some fantasy kingdoms. And then i (sadly) don’t rememember if any of the other princes got to be cool fantasy races or anything, but if I could make this game for real then they TOTALLy would be! Hug your shy and nice ogre boyfriend!! get swept off your feet by the king of bunny boy kingdom! (I am still so pissed that i saw concept art of the Viera race in FF12 as a both genders non sexualized thing, like it makes me even madder to know they wasted a good idea instead of always intending it to be the bad version...) Also I think the game actually had some character customization, and in the dream i was like ‘man this is the only good part of this’. It was kinda basic tho, you just selected from five or so preset appearances for your protag and all of them were white, lol. But it was interesting cos the appearance selection also corresponded to what elemental affinity your fantasy kingdom would have! And you had different kinds of elemental fairy wings. Also i recall that all the selection pictures for the different elements had the protag doing some sort of weird model pose while a lot of terrible ps1 era particle effects floated in the background. Like a non sexualized version of this random character from Monster Rancher: (have a good laugh at the badly translated profiles, lol)

And then like I never got to actually play the game before I woke up? I was just on the character creator screen complaining about how I’d apparantly played it before and I knew that half of the elemental options were essentially unuseable due to bad gameplay balance. Like there wasnt any battle or anything, the element just determined your starting boosts and penalties to social stats you needed to romance all the doods. And apaprantly some stats were easier to gain than others, so certain boosts were essentially useless and certain penalties made the game almost unwinnable. I think I always still picked those broken options tho, cos I was more interested in picking the character i thought looked coolest rather than winning the game. Also all of the dudes weren’t very fun to romance, apparantly! I remember that dream-me was really annoyed about the ‘chair kicking scene’? Like, there was one character who was an immature bully in highschoolverse and then he was supposed to be the super rich and noble prince that’s the best ending in the fantasyverse. One of those ‘oh i was just bullying you cos i liked you’ plots of a jerkass boyfriend who never even apologizes or anything. And the last straw for me was when he kept kicking your chair during class and then lying to get you in trouble when you told the teacher about it. I was like ‘wtf dude, you’re THAT immature? aren’t you supposed to be 16??’ And I think I was mad cos he had turquoise hair and I liked his character design but he was a douche.

Just like how I was annoyed playing Spirited Heart Deluxe cos Frebo has a cool design and is a sarcastic funnyman but then he’s also supposed to be an adult and you’re a teenager and its Creepy. (the damn art style makes everyone look like a teenager, how was I meant to see that coming??) And like yeah, I know that the game keeps going for like six years but there isn’t anything in play to make it so that you can’t marry him until after you’re of legal age and all. And he’s still got a huge age difference even if you wait til the end of the game to tie the knot, and its still a teacher-student thing thats kinda creepy... Oh and randomly I found a site that has pics of all the different job costumes in that game! Good so you can see how awkward it is to try and tell age, cos like your height seems to vary depending on which one you pick, lol.. And while I’m going off on this tangeant I may as well ramble about how its funny that the gay DLC expansion pack had so much of an art improvement that it makes it look weird in comparison. (All those routes were way better written too!) Also I’m still sad that the sequel got cancelled, but its funny how Frebo looks EVEN MORE younger than you! Damn u game why u confuse me with elf dads

#blunni thoughts #this post went in like eight directions

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dearsadgoat · 7 years ago

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recovery

recently, there was a major fire in my city. a little before the fire happened, i went through probably the lowest point in my life i’ve been in thus far. it culminated into one night of forcing myself to break down a number of walls and fake fronts i put up around me. these stood for about 5 years.

during that 5 year period i lied to myself and tried to trick myself into thinking i was something else so i could fit in with my rapidly changing friend groups, both online and in real life. i started distancing myself from a number of things, including shows, interests, and friends. i pushed away mlp for fear that my friends who were now falling out of it would ditch me if i were still into it. i pushed away my desire to learn music because the relationship between my brother and i only got worse as high school went on. i pushed away old friend groups for reasons so stupid i dont remember anymore.

instead of doing videos for fun and my own enjoyment, i started making them with the intention of becoming popular. i was never good at those and i wasn’t willing to learn to make myself better because i only wanted the success. the worst part about this was the fact that i did it for so long i managed to make myself believe that this was what i wanted, to be making low effort gaming videos on youtube well past its peak. because that’s what I thought I was going to “make it” doing. it should be noted i pushed away a group of youtuber friends before this, who may have been able to talk sense into me.

to this day i have only met one other person who makes videos.

fast forward to a few months ago. back in june, i started a new job, the one im currently working, doing lifeguarding at a pool. in july, my friends and i did our annual trip to anime expo, and aside from some incidents it was fun. i went on vacation with my family to arizona, and we saw a number of beautiful sights. i enjoyed it a lot.

however, this is the end of the fun.

anime expo, as always, brought me the panic of being around so many people. it isn’t the volume of people however, im relatively comfortable in a crowd. its the idea that i can look around in any direction and see people probably way happier and in better places in life than i am. look one way, i see a group of attractive people in cosplay that’s way better than mine. look the other way, i see a group of friends all laughing and clearly have shared interests, unlike my friends where we all have kinda splintered tastes so we don’t spend all the time together at conventions.

i spent a good amount of the convention wandering it with my friend mike. we went as Haru and Rin from Free, him being Haru, me being Rin.

around that time i was having major self image issues. i gained a good amount of weight the months prior, and i couldn’t lose it no matter what i tried, and consistently going to the gym, doing workouts given to me by professionals showing me no change killed my motivation. i couldn’t get myself to even go anymore come june.

so when mike was stopped by 10+ people (i stopped counting after a while) for pictures and to compliment him on his cosplay, meanwhile outright ignoring me, i started feeling like my image issues weren’t just “in my head” like i’d been told. despite this i tried my best to ignore it and move on. except i couldn’t.

the other cosplay i did was a crossplay of Mako Mankanshoku from Kill la Kill. I actually had the right length/hair color for Mako’s hair, so I saved money on a wig and got it cut like hers. the hair actually looked fine in context of the cosplay, however the cosplay in the context of anything was atrocious.

i couldn’t fit into the seifuku i bought, despite being sure to buy a size much larger than what you’d expect. trying to ignore my brain telling me im a fat fuck i improvised with a white shirt and a light blue neckerchief. with the wrong color shoes, basic shirt, neckerchief, basic skirt, and my hair cut instead of a wig, i was the definition of awful cosplay.

i hyped up finally being able to crossdress in public to myself for months. i’ve wanted to crossdress publicly since i was 15. at no other convention in the past did i have the courage. i got rid of pretty much all body hair, and upon finally being able to do so, i thought it was everything i wanted.

looking in the mirror showed me i was nothing more than an ugly fatass trying to look cute. i was the fucking person people at conventions take candid photos of and post on tumblr to make fun of. im sure im gonna one day come across a picture of me in that “cosplay” accompanied with some text about how embarrassing i was.

so with now both my cosplays fun sucked out of them by myself, the rest of the convention went on, but i couldn’t fully suppress the idea that i was unhappy.

the arizona trip i’ll save for another post, it’s a complete offshoot with it’s own backstory.

these are nowhere near all of the events i feel caused enough problems for what happens later, just the major ones. also there’s no way i can write every single thing that’s happened to me and contributed to my sad demeanor over the last 21 years.

after that though, the rest of the summer is a blur, i dont remember anything i did, and i don’t remember starting school again. i just know i’ve been going for almost 16 weeks now.

for some reason, a lot of things that didn’t use to bug me have been bugging me. stuff that I thought i’d grown accustomed to seeing, like the ever poisonous anti-male rhetoric that this site likes to parade. i’ve been on tumblr since i was like 13, i’ve seen it, i should be used to it and know to ignore it, right?

i guess not. every post i see related to something meant to make me feel shitty for being a guy takes another chip at me throughout the day. despite my best efforts i can’t forget them.

i just don’t have the energy to put up with stuff anymore, and it really feels like im out of energy to put into caring about things. i’ve been feeling like this since the beginning of the above five year period of not knowing why i wasn’t happy with what i was supposed to be happy with.

eventually we get to one saturday at work. two pools are being used for an event, the third is being rented out for a kids birthday party. im on the tower supervising the party when my best friend kaylie comes to rotate me. we chat for a sec, and as i start to walk off, she says my name. i turn around and she points at the water. no more than 3 feet from where im standing, two kids are wrestling in the water. except they weren’t wrestling for fun, they were wrestling to get on top of one another and drowning each other in the process. mind you, this is the deepest part of the pool and it’s only like 4 1/2 feet deep. I slide in, hoist up both of them, and launch into the caring procedure bullshit.

i get them out, tell kaylie im going to get a towel, and eventually other guards start asking me what happened. all of the sudden people are toting me as being a hero for making my first rescue withing my first year. you’d think that’s something to be proud of, right?

yeah you’d think that.

i felt nothing. all i had was that i was doing my job, and if it were like ten seconds earlier kaylie would’ve got them. i didn’t do anything special.

of course that ended up as a conflict in my mind, and on the way home i bought alcohol and spent the night drinking alone.

fast forward a few more days, and i get home from work. it wasn’t a particularly hard day, or any major thing happened, just a lot of small little things that chipped away at my patience, a few comments made by coworkers that really weren’t asked for, and this and that ultimately led to me driving home at the end of the night upset.

i get home, and think to myself im going to unwind with some video games. i dont remember what happened or what i was playing, but some major thing happened that led to me calmly turning off the game and turning to my computer to stare at it for the next two hours, only occasionally clicking to something new.

nobody tells you what it’s like to break. partly because, they cant. the way i see it everyone breaks differently. every breakdown i’d had up until that point had been loud, angry, and full of jerky motions through teary, blurred eyes. they were like someone kicking over something i was making in one fell swoop.

this time it felt like i watched someone pick away at the foundation until it all started to slide down like sand.

i broke, at first without tears, questioning what i was doing at that moment, and what i was doing in general. nothing made sense. my head couldn’t keep a thought for a moment. i felt like my chest was caving in. i didnt end up eating anything that night. i honestly can’t describe how i felt and what i did, it was such a blur.

i started going on a nostalgia scavenger hunt. something i had seen recently drove me to want to search out the mlp meetup group i used to be a part of. i found pictures of me and my friends at different events back in 2011, 2012, and i started doing what i can only describe as motioning a whimper. as in, whatever you picture when you think of whimpering, only without sound.

I saw pictures of me being happy, truly happy. i hadn’t been truly happy in the last 5-6 years since these pictures were taken. at least not for more than the occasional time.

as if on queue, a friend from one group of friends i changed myself to fit in with messaged me. i asked him if he wanted to take a trip with me, and i spilled everything.

i confessed to being a liar, a poser, a shitty person who couldn’t even tell his friends that he wasn’t everything he said he was. i told him at one point in my life i had actual ambition and ways to achieve success outside of being the scummy piece of shit i’d become when i became friends with them. (please dont misunderstand, they’re good people, i just had a warped sense of what i needed to do to be their friend back then)

he let me angrily type and rant and have a major breakdown to him without interruption for almost an hour, and finally he paused me and started trying to talk me through this.

after he gave me his piece on the matter, i turned to another one of my best friends, jacob. jacob was one of the irl friends i went to meetups with, and we’ve been friends since middle school. we’re closer than anyone else i know i’d bet, even closer than kaylie and i.

because of time differences, our conversation lasted the next two days, basically telling him everything, that i wasn’t happy with myself, that i haven’t been happy with anything for a long time. the only thing that mattered to me in his response was that nothing was different between us. he said he was going to a therapist soon, and said that i should try it. i have not, and i dont plan to for fear of what i might find out. still, everything he said i took to heart and i thank him for it.

at this point, i decided that i could fix all of this, that i could make myself someone i’d like to be. i was going to work hard and no matter what i wasn’t going to break like that ever again. nothing was going to stop me, no matter the odds.

someone up there must love testing my patience.

a week later, the fire happened. within the span of an hour i had gone from coming home from a test, to helping my mom with the recycling, to rushing home because the sky over our house was brown. the next few hours was me running on no food, a sweaty, ash-covered mess, to get everything of importance out of the house. everything that was too hard to replace was taken. as painful as it was it meant leaving behind just about everything that had value to me, as i took only the things that mattered in a worldly view, not a personal view.

God listened to my prayers that day, and the fires burned half a mile from my house, but no closer. The trail i walked a thousand times growing up was no more. it’s about 4 houses down from mine, to give perspective. everything was black and soot, trees stood with burn marks and missing leaves. The creek was dried up. everything is a mess. i walked out and took pictures of it a few days after, just for memory sake.

that day was a test to see whether or not I was actually going to keep my word. i didn’t break that day, despite wanting to often, and i did what was most important for my family.

since then, i’ve shuffled around a lot of different aspects of my life. a lot of things are changing, and im not comfortable with a lot of them. however, these are good changes. i have to make myself uncomfortable to be able to find what i belong to once again.

and i hope and i pray that this is going to be the time i prove to myself i can break out of this

#text post #dear sad goat

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