#i think that given that's our only canon reference to mike being 'in love'

[sevensided]

Who do you think is the more romantic one, Mike or Will? Personally, I think it's Mike.

This question makes me feel feral. Okay.

I agree completely: Mike is the more romantic one. I can, will, and shall elaborate...

I feel like Mike is more romantic because he’s clearly a very ardent personality. He is passionate and expressive. He is particularly whipped for Will (putting their arms around each other in S2E01 makes me want to die). Like, Mike loves his friends, and he’s very close to Lucas and Dustin, but it’s different with Will. There is a tenderness there; a deeper appreciation for Will’s perceived eccentricity and sensitivity. I think that’s because Mike sees those same traits in himself - he’s just not quite had the chance to express them as Will has, and, importantly, I perceive Will as a more introverted personality than Mike. So, even though Mike is certainly just as sensitive and imaginative as Will, he expresses it differently. In the case of relationships, Mike expresses that through touching and talking.

I think there’s plenty of evidence for Mike being romantic. Take his relationship with Eleven. Yeah, people give Mike a lot of shit for how he treated her and talked about her in S3, but I think they’re missing the wood for the trees. If you take Mike’s actions in the abstract, he’s clearly trying to enact romance in the best way he knows how (and, remember, he is fourteen years old). Though it’s fairly clear he doesn’t share the same “love language” that he believes El to have (for example, expressing confusion over buying her a present), he’s willing to try, and he takes himself out of his comfort zone to do so. Another example is his speech in the middle of S3, the “because I love her” speech. I made a comment the other day about how, really, what Hopper wants for El - for her to be careful with herself, to be moderate and smart, to not push beyond the limits of her power - is exactly the same as Mike. But because he expresses himself very poorly, the fandom go completely in the other direction and perceive his talk about “controlling” El to amount to being an abus*ve boyfriend. Listen. He’s not. He’s just trying to figure out how he can balance these very new, huge feelings with Eleven’s need to be independent. Mike wants her to be free - that’s what he eventually learns at the end of S3 - but to get there he goes through this struggle, because it’s reconciling his possessive streak (remember, Mike is used to being in charge and being “bossy” - he’s literally the game master of the Party) to keep El happy and, therefore, around.

Earlier, I said that Will and Mike were just as sensitive as each other, but Mike was more extroverted, and therefore expressed himself in a different way. I think the same goes for romance. Will is an inward-looking person. He is self-sufficient. He has spent a lot of time in his own head, quietly figuring things out. This is why I think his coming out will be much smoother than Mike, because he has an innate sense of self that Mike does not. Mike is very much at odds within himself, although he has certain touchstones - namely, helping other people - that help bring him back. In short, Mike needs that external validation, and Will needs internal validation. It’s why the Upside Down is such a huge frightening thing for Will, because his internal world is careful ordered, so to find himself slipping in and out of what is very definitely disorder is a very traumatic thing. When it comes to the romance between Mike and Will, I think the key is mutual respect. It goes without saying that every relationship needs that. But with Mike and Will I mean something very specific.

Mike respects Will’s self-assured nature and creativity. Will respects Mike’s courage and steadfast resolve. They feed what the other person needs. Will is sensitive enough to listen to Mike’s wildest, most nerdy thoughts and feelings, because he won’t judge - Will is also extremely nerdy, so he appreciates and understands it intimately. And Mike is confident enough to give Will the strength he needs to get up and keep going. He’s also very loyal. I think Will often feels alone, even when he’s surrounded by people. But you know who is always watching and looking out for him? Mike. Mike is the person he can always, always trust, because Mike won’t let him down. And Mike cares about and needs Will so desperately that he would quite literally sacrifice himself to ensure Will’s safety.

At the end of it, I think it’s all about expression. Will would be quietly romantic: small gestures of affection, thoughtfulness, being patient and listening. Mike would make all the grand gestures (“I bought us tickets to [insert something totally ridiculous]”). Mike would also totally remember all their anniversary dates and have a preternatural ability to know when and where their next mini milestone was. Will would probably send off all their Christmas cards and write both of their names in it (signed Mike and Will, naturally), or would remember to buy gifts for their families and friends. Though... and I’ll just say it... Will would so be the one to initiate any, uh, physical activities. You just bet that Mike would be 1000% enthusiastic, always, but Will would just be simmering in the background.

So, Tl;DR Mike is without a doubt the more romantic one. But they’re just romantic in different ways!

Sources: Headcanon, the fact that they’re both Aries but Will almost certainly has a Pisces moon... don’t get me started on horoscopes

[willbyerssupremacist]

let's talk about the fact that most mushroom stans use the romeo and juliet references to deny byler.

as we all know, mitochondria has had plenty of romeo and juliet references made towards them, but what i find particularily interesting is that nobody is really taking the time to actually read romeo and juliet.

now, microwave is actually so similar to romeo and juliet's relationship, but thats not a good thing. in fact, it's actually a really bad thing, at least for them.

for one, people seem to forget the fact that romeo was rejected and juliet was pretty much a rebound. this makes plenty of sense in relation to malignant tumor because mike found eI right after he lost will, which parallels directly to romeo losing rosaline (due to rejection) and getting with juliet instead.

my second point, romeo did not love juliet, not really. now we do know that mike cares about eI, however, i strongly believe that it is platonic love. romeo was with juliet because he wanted to be loved. this is pretty much the same exact situation that mike is in. mike wants so badly to be needed, and this was made canon in season 4. in the van scene, mike went on and on about how he wanted eI to need him, and how he was scared she didn't need him anymore. to me, this confirms that he's pretty much only with her because he craves being needed. just like romeo loved the idea of being with juliet, mike loves the idea of being with eI. he likes being needed, especially by someone as cool as eI. he goes on and on about her powers, comparing her to superman, talking about how he's lucky someone that cool landed on his doorstep. he likes the idea of her and that is SO clear.

finally, romeo and juliet are arguably the most popular example of a doomed relationship. now many membrane shippers think that this means that mike and eI are going to romantically die in eachothers arms or something but given the fact that the duffers essentially confirmed that they won't kill mike off i seriously doubt it. i truly believe that they are just a doomed relationship. they weren't meant to last, this is literally canon since eI was supposed to die in season one. they are simply just not meant to be.

now many people are gonna think that this analysis is looking way too far into it but come on. the duffers love parallels and references. if you truly believe that these two writers who came up with the concept of the most popular netflix show ever didn't read and analyze romeo and juliet, one of the most popular pieces of literature ever and has been referenced on this show a multitude of times, then you are really naive. they know romeo and juliet, trust me. they are being referenced for a reason, and it isnt a good one.

that being said, i hope i gave bylers some piece of mind because god do we need a break from michigan stans calling us delusional and constantly trying to disprove our evidence.

[iamnmbr3]

So it looks like the MCU has decided to celebrate Pride with some disgustingly blatant queerbaiting and homophobia. How unfortunately on-brand. Mike Waldron, the head writer of the Loki series, sat down with Vanity Fair and had this to say:

One love story to keep an eye out for is brewing between Hiddleston’s god of mischief and Owen Wilson’s TVA bureaucrat Mr. Mobius. The two spark and spar, building on the duo’s chemistry from Midnight in Paris. “Mobius and Loki, that’s one of the love stories you might see in Loki for sure,” he says. “Although if you print that, knowing our fans, they’re going to take it the wrong way.” When I clarified that their love story might be more akin to the platonic one between Tom Hanks’s FBI agent Carl Hanratty and Leonardo DiCaprio’s con man Frank Abagnale Jr. in Catch Me If You Can, Waldron says, “Exactly. Right.”

What do you mean by the “wrong way” Mike? Would you say that if you were talking about a male and female character instead of 2 male characters? Oh right. No. The reading would only be “wrong” in this case because that would be queer, and you clearly think queerness is disgusting and wrong and a joke. I’m sorry. Assuming that by “love story” someone means...a LOVE STORY is perfectly reasonable. If you know people are going to make that very logical assumption why would you refer to it that way? Oh right. Because you wanted to bait the fans. But then also mock anyone for picking up on the bait because to you queerness is “wrong” and a joke. How dare people assume you mean “love story” when you say “love story” about two characters, one of whom is canonically queer (which I’m sure now is going to get erased)?! This is both egregious queer baiting and extremely homophobic. 

He knows exactly what he’s doing. Guess he’s trying to one-up the queerbaiting in The Falcon and the Winter Soldier. I mean c’mon. “It’s a love story. But tee hee! Some silly people might think that means queerness. And that would be wrong and icky!” We already had the Russos queer baiting stucky fans in a very similar way, and then in IW and Endgame Steve and Bucky didn’t even get to talk for more than 3 seconds. I mean. Really. Why say “love story” otherwise. Only to clarify it’s like Catch Me if You Can. What?? Catch Me if You Can isn’t a love story; it’s a movie based on the true story about a financial conman and the FBI agent in charge of tracking him down. They did later become friends after he went to prison. But it was hardly a love story. and it’s certainly not presented that way in the movie. 

Furthermore, his disdain for the fans is palpable. Clearly he thinks “knowing the fans” that of course these 2 characters will be shipped just by virtue of what? Both being male and being in the same space? That’s not what shipping is about. People actually choose their ships for a reason. And they care about the characters. That’s why depending on the characters every ship dynamic is different. People are usually drawn to ships because they are interesting and emotionally compelling for one reason or another. If you look at the popular MCU ships they’re between characters that had compelling interactions and emotional arcs with each other. But sure. Let’s just turn it all into a joke, assume these characters will be shipped because they’re near each other, and bait the fans while mocking them and reiterating how gross and wrong you think queerness is.

Also. From what we’ve seen from the trailers, Mobius and Loki’s relationship is absolutely NOT a love story. I’m not saying you can’t ship dark ships. I certainly do. But that’s not love in a positive sense. That’s why dark ships are called DARK ships. They’re about obsession or toxic romance or power and control or all sorts of dark things. And that’s not what he’s getting at here. He’s using it in a positive sense. He’s calling it a love story (presumably a platonic one) while also queer baiting fans. But. Where??? 

We’ve seen Mobius be nothing but absolutely awful to Loki. He has quite literally not treated Loki decently once in any of the trailers. We’ve seen him silence and mock and denigrate Loki and show him 0 compassion or understanding or respect. We’ve seen him hurt and frighten Loki - the one trailer that actually leaned into this had the best moment of any of the trailers because Mobius is a great antagonist and when they utilize him as such it leads to actually emotionally compelling drama. I mean, already twice in the trailers he’s quoted Odin directly. How can they have him do that and then not take advantage of those parallels to make him into the perfect villain that he could be? Also, Mobius is part of the organization holding Loki captive and enslaving him. How exactly is that a love story??? Nothing Mobius has done has been loving at all. Calling it a love story validates that mistreatment. 

Why would I want to ship this in a positive sense??? I want Loki to get as far away from Mobius as possible, preferably after wiping the smug look off his face. Mobius is awful to him. And it doesn’t personally appeal to me even as a dark ship either. There’s no real complexity to their interactions or reason for me to want to see a romance - either dark or otherwise - explored. Mobius is Loki’s annoying, grating jailer who he just met and who so far has not gotten a single thing right about him. The assumption that every fan would see this trailer and just go “squeeeeeee!! SHIPPPPP!” is really insulting and denigrating. 

Waldron really seems to dislike Loki as a character and to dislike the fanbase because it is full of exactly the kind of people he so obviously despises and looks down upon. Why was this man given the chance to write for Loki? Imagine if we had a writer with professionalism and empathy - like Russel T.  Davies - at the helm. 

Given Waldron’s obvious disgust for the concept of queerness I’m sure he’s either erased Loki’s sexuality or has turned it into a joke. Happy Pride from the MCU I guess.

[discotreque]

LwD 2.05: An Embarrassment of Dooplers

So I was a little nervous about this one! I hadn’t heard any spoiler-spoilers, but screeners have been out for weeks now, and I’d heard a bunch of individual, vague, non-spoilery hints about (1) big character moments, on the scale of a mid-season finale even though the show’s not taking a mid-season break; and (2) an ending that would make me cry.

I guess I imagined something relatively serious and dramatic, like “No Small Parts”? This show makes me cackle with laughter and giggle with nerdy glee and “d’awww!” at heartwarming friendships every week, but it’s only ever made me cry once—and then I was impressed that they were going to get there from the wacky hijinks we saw in the brief teaser.

The lack of a cold open made me apprehensive too—in my experience, that’s typically a sign that there’s so much plot in the rest of the episode that they need that extra scene—but after ~21.5 minutes of aforementioned hijinks, I was having so much fun that I’d completely forgotten about the alleged tear-jerker at the end…

…and they were not the tears I was expecting.

I didn’t think I’d be smiling and crying!!!! That was wholesome as SHIT!!!!!

I almost can’t believe they earned that—but they totally did.

After a Mariner–Tendi episode and a Boimler–Rutherford episode, we’re back to the “usual” Season 1 pairings… except the relationships between these characters have changed since Season 1. Mariner still feels thwacked in the abandonment issues by Boimler bailing for the Titan, and Rutherford’s having a tiny little existential crisis about losing an entire year of his life.

Both of which are extremely understandable and very heavy situations—and both of those situations get resolved because everyone in them is vulnerable with each other and honest about their feelings—AND that honesty and vulnerability brings both pairs of friends closer together. Are you kidding me?? I would watch SEVENTY seasons of that shit. Put it in my veins.

Onto the notes:

So basically Dooplers are Tribbles, but for cringe comedy instead of slapstick? Ohhhhh boy.

Look at Ransom the diplomat, tossing his own fork on the floor! I like that he’s actually a pretty competent Starfleet officer, despite also being a completely ridiculous person.

Wait a second, is that—OH HOLY SHIT, THE DOOPLERS ARE VOICED BY RICHARD KIND.

It makes sense that B. Boimler would find William annoying—who likes seeing their own flaws reflected back at them? And who could be a better reflection of one’s flaws than one’s literal duplicate?—but most interesting to me is that it implies on some level, Bradward knows the stick up his butt is a flaw. (Does William?)

Why does the Cerritos model have working phasers?!?!

I’m loving hot pink as the currently en-vogue colour for “dangerous sci-fi energy” in animation (cf. almost every previous episode of this show; Into the Spider-Verse; other stuff I can’t remember right now). As a former child of the 80’s, I’m living for it… but as a former teenager of the 90’s, I can’t help but wonder if it’s going to age as poorly as the harsh neon green of The Matrix, every Borg appearance on Voyager, and like 80% of the websites I made in high school…

SKANTS! SKANTS! SKANTS!

That fake-out joke with the fly-by over the Cerritos model was in the season trailer weeks ago, and I was so enthralled by that handsome lady that the sticker coming into frame still got me good 😂😂😂

BECKY Mariner????? omg yes

Some top-quality Boimler screams in this one. Poor Jack Quaid must drink gallons of throat-coat tea when he records.

One of the great things about Star Trek to me is that you never know what you’re going to get from any random episode. A murder mystery? A road trip? A spooky thriller? A cheesy romance? Broad comedy? Body horror? Didactic political screeds shrouded in tissue-thin science-fiction metaphors? Brain and brain, what is brain??? And after this many years of watching, you’d think I’d be hard to surprise. But if I ever told you I thought I’d see a Blues Brothers–style car chase through a frickin’ shopping mall on an episode of Star Trek, I would have been straight-up lying to you. I loved it, it worked for me, my jaw was on the floor and I was clapping with joy—but I’m definitely comfortable calling this one “unexpected.”

It’s CAPTAIN SHELBY!!! And an ancient babydyke crush rose from the depths of my childhood subconscious… (Also I think her Number One is based on the original makeup—eventually deemed too complicated—for Saru? Now that’s a deep cut.)

In 20th-century Trek, you almost never got to see what was going on inside a starship from the outside. Even after they switched from physical models (where it was next to impossible on a single episode’s budget) to CGI (which was still in its infancy, still not exactly cheap, and still broadcast in SD anyway), it was a rare thrill to see any meaningful interior details in an exterior shot. Disco’s modern VFX have given us some tasty, tasty treats in that department, but nothing quite as sublime as all the pink Doopler light glittering through the Cerritos’s windows.

Mariner says she’ll take her contact Malvus down with her, and threatens that they’ll end up “in the same cell.” Malvus is a Mizarian, a species introduced in TNG’s “Allegiance,” in which Captain Picard is held in a mysterious prison with one. I think I see what you did there, McMahan?

Bartender… so hot… lesbian circuits… overloading…

The Tendi and Rutherford C-story was, well, a C-story within a 22-minute episode, so there wasn’t much to it, but the one scene that mattered actually mattered a lot. I’m ambivalent on whether they should end up romantically involved—I’d prefer they don’t, but they’ll be one of the cutest couples in Trek history if they do—and as long as they keep that pure, sweet friendship between them at the heart of whatever else happens, I’m on board.

Carol Freeman was already one of my favourite captains before this season, and she’s been steadily moving up the list. The quiet throughline about her ambition to be on a better ship has been fascinating so far, and it’s starting to actually make me feel a little conflicted: I’m of course rooting for Captain Freeman to recognize her worth, make Starfleet recognize her worth, and become the ass-kicking captain of a hero ship that she’s clearly ready to be—but that almost surely means she’d be kicking ass off-screen, because LwD isn’t about those kind of adventures, and I’d be devastated not to have Dawnn Lewis on the show every week. So I’m kind of on the edge of my seat about this one!

I had so many favourite jokes this week I put them in a separate list:

“Even the replicated water on the Titan tasted better” is a low-key brilliant dunk on people who can’t shut the fuck up about the cooler places they used to live.

“Ooooh, they have a Quark’s now! That used to just be an empty lot where teens would make mistakes!” ← That’s literally me every time I go back to where I grew up. I felt so Seen™ I almost hid under a blanket.

“I would never go down the stairs!” (evil grin) (goes up the stairs)

The “well, shit” expressions from Mariner and Boimler as their crashed car sank right into the water… which started to bubble innocuously… and then the bottles of Data bubble-bath popped up, paying off a joke I thought had already been paid off—that was the one that woke up my poor cat this week. Just exquisite timing.

“YOUR PAGH IS WEAK, AND IT DISGUSTS ME!” “I don’t even know what that is, but I don’t like your tone!”

“Okona’s in there? He’s not even Starfleet! This is outrageous!” made me shout “NO!” at the screen like I was scolding my cat for scratching furniture. (She did not wake up that time.)

Best background joke: the neon sign at the dive bar advertising FREE SHOTS & BEERS. (Get it? Because they’re on a Federation starbase? Where nobody uses money?)

And of course Quark merchandised DS9.

This wasn’t just a standout episode of Lower Decks, this was a brilliant episode of Star Trek, period. The Dooplers, though extremely silly, are nevertheless also a clever sci-fi metaphor for real and relatable personal/interpersonal issues, and an effective plot catalyst for meaningful character growth from all four of our ensigns and the captain.

The jokes were hilarious, the action was kinetic, the A-, B-, and C-plots linked up thematically, the visuals were consistently and thoroughly gorgeous, the character beats—between Mariner and Boimler, Tendi and Rutherford, Mariner and Capt. Freeman—were all genuine, heartfelt and wholesome, and the references to other Trek canon were both deep and deeply affectionate.

Only 15 episodes in, and this series knows exactly what it is, exactly what it wants to do, and knows that it can knock our socks off doing it. Mike McMahan has said in recent interviews that the back half of S2 (and the apparently almost-fully-written S3) is a straight line uphill in quality from here—which surprised me at first, because McMahan seems like a pretty chill dude who doesn’t normally brag about his own work like that.

But then the Prophets sent me a vision of my space dad Ben Sisko, who reminded me of the words of 1930’s baseball player Dizzy Dean:

“If you can do it, it ain’t bragging.”

[Thanks to cygnus-x1.net for the screenshots this week—I was too lazy to do my own.]

[strangertheory]

I’ve heard so many different opinions on the Duffer Brothers. On one hand, I see the cinematic parallels point to a queer awakening for Byler and I see how their employees are supportive of the LGBTQ+ community (stranger writers), but I also hear people say how Maya had to “beg” them to make Robin a lesbian, and how they are “queer baiting” us, or that they are homophobic. It’s so confusing and conflicting to hear people refer to the Duffers as “homophobic” because it puts a damper in my confidence when it comes to Byler, even though I believe in it 100%. The way they are handling the relationship between Will and Mike seems like it could be a wonderful case of Good Queer Representation, and when you add Robin to that mix, it would be even better and make ST a show with healthy queer rep that I think we need more of. But they could easily queerbait us and chase popularity and comfort, and take the easy way out by making it one sided. They have so much power in their hands, and I am not sure if they’ve ever made it explicitly clear what their stance is on LGBTQ+ but I’ve heard some rumors of them being misogynistic on set, and it definitely makes me nervous. I’m so tired of being queer baited.

As with anyone famous that I am only familiar with through social media and PR and tabloid news: I have very little reliable insight into their personal ideologies. I treat most of what you've described as gossip and hear-say and as the variety of information that comes from tabloids and news sources that prioritize clickbait, controversy, and dishing out rumors about celebrities in order to increase the number of times their story is re-shared and engaged with on social media. I suspect that much of what you may have heard is embellished by unreliable fandom gossip as well. 

Even if Maya used the phrase "begged" herself (I'm unsure — I don't have a source on hand, but that's irrelevant to my next point) the context of that is not inherently a sign that they are homophobic and could very easily be related to their originally different plans for Robin's character arc.

I have no idea what any of the cast and crew truly think on any given issue, and I think fans should remember that they don't truly "know" any of these celebrities either.

I do know, however, that the first season of Stranger Things features multiple moments in which homophobic characters are presented as the antagonists and characterized as clearly villainous: Lonnie is written as a deeply dislikeable character, as are Troy and James when they mock Will and then Mike (one of our obvious main heros in the story) shoves Troy to the gym floor in response to his bigotry. Neil Hargrove is also characterized as an abusive father figure who hurls homophobic slurs at Billy.

Consistently and regardless of whatever any individual involved in the creation of Stranger Things may think: the clearly written stance within the Stranger Things universe is that homophobia is offensive, villainous, and wrong. Additionally, as you mentioned in your Ask, I believe there is incredibly strong evidence that Mike having eventual romantic interest in Will has been foreshadowed in a variety of narrative ways in every single season thus far.

Regardless of what anyone involved behind the scenes thinks, the canon story itself has been very consistently pro-lgbtqa+ in both its text and subtext and combined with the consistent pro-lgbtqa+ messages from the official writers' room Twitter account I see no reason to fear that the team behind the important decisions in the making and promotion of the show is queerbaiting.

Yes, queerbaiting still happens far too often in popular media. But I think we do a disservice to not only ourselves but also to production teams that are working on unfinished series and who still might be planning to reveal plot twists to us in future seasons if we start treating them as though they have already failed us when the story is incomplete. I have seen fans literally cursing at creators of unfinished shows on social media and accusing them of queerbaiting rather than respecting that queerbaiting is, by definition, when a story does not deliver on intentional build-up and foreshadowing by the stories' conclusion.

Too many fans not only in this fandom but also in other fandoms do not understand the definition of queerbaiting. If a story reveals that two characters were in love or that a character is queer by the end of the series after a lot of subtext is established in the story prior to the big reveal: that is not queerbaiting, that is called foreshadowing.

I respect and empathize with the anxiety that some fans in the community have but I hope that they remember that the story isn't over yet and that not everything you hear in pop culture "news" or in the fan community rumor mill is always as trustworthy as you might think it is.

I hope that gives you some comfort. 😊

[hawkinsschoolcounselor]

hi! i'm the most recent anon. i was referring to how you sometimes yo-yo between opinions. maybe it's just that i'm reading all the posts out of order but on some posts, you talk about the reasons why mike could be gay or bi, and likes Will, but in others you say that Mike likes Eleven. In one, I can't remember what it is, but you said something about how the moment eleven walks into the room, mike forgets about will. and a bunch of other stuff why you believe that byler is unlikely. i was (1/?)

about why you were contradicting yourself. but i think you answer mostly cleared it up. So my new question I guess is, why did you change your mind between those older posts and now? thanks for dealing with my stupid rambling and i love your theories! (2/2) I’ll admit, some of my older posts make me cringe a bit, but I wanted to include them all in my index post to show how my thoughts have changed over time. I’m a firm believer that Mike and Will are headed for a canon relationship, but I still falter when it comes to whether the writers will go through with it. One thing to bear in mind is that I’m human. My emotions can run high, I can miss things, and I can be stubborn. There’s no reason for me to try and hide that. You all deserve to see all sides of me, not just a part that’s carefully curated. You might find this post useful: Why I stop short of hope

I wrote that after realizing how I tend to regress into thinking I’m only seeing what I want to see. No matter how much evidence I find, and no matter how many well-supported analyses I can write to support Mike and Will, my past leads to me being pessimistic. I have a cynicism built over years of being let down. It might be ironic for me to be like that given that I’m a counselor, but we have our own personal flaws and demons just like anyone else.

Seriously, you, and anyone else who wonders how I can bounce back and forth like that, should read the above post if you want to get a better insight into how I see things.

[hollymartinswrites]

Chapters: 7/? Fandom: IT - Stephen King, IT (Movies - Muschietti) Rating: Mature Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply Relationships: Eddie Kaspbrak/Richie Tozier, Ben Hanscom/Beverly Marsh Characters: Eddie Kaspbrak, Richie Tozier, Ben Hanscom, Beverly Marsh, Bill Denbrough, Mike Hanlon, Original Child Character(s) Additional Tags: Fix-It, Post-Canon Fix-It, Post-IT Chapter Two (2019), Domestic, Light Angst, Family Feels, Childhood Trauma, Adoption, Kid Fic, Adopted Children, Richie Tozier Loves Eddie Kaspbrak, Eddie Kaspbrak Loves Richie Tozier, Marriage, Eddie Kaspbrak & Richie Tozier Are Parents, Angst, Fluff, Fluff and Angst, Minor Ben Hanscom/Beverly Marsh, Beverly Marsh & Richie Tozier Are Best Friends, Catholicism, Richie Tozier Has Issues, Extended Tozier Family, Medical Examinations, Stephen King References

Summary:

Eddie and Richie embark on the most terrifying experience of all—parenthood. Or, the author desperately needed a domestic, family fix-it for Richie and Eddie and it turned into a much longer, angstier exploration than I expected.

Chapter VII: Eddie struggles while he and Richie search for answers about their daughter. But perhaps there's light in the darkness.

“This is crazy,” Eddie muttered, straightening and walking away from the desk. “Absolutely fucking crazy.”

“Eds, come on,” Richie implored him, turning away from the open laptop screen where Mike’s face gazed up at him. “This is interesting stuff.”

“Interesting but bullshit.”

“You don’t know that,” Richie insisted.

“No, but I do know our daughter isn’t a fucking science experiment,” Eddie declared, whirling around, his hands waving wildly. “This is real life, not that show on Netflix.”

Richie sighed as Mike hurriedly said, “I’m not saying Tess is that, I’m just saying, we have evidence of children with...with…”

“Powers?” Eddie provided, raising an eyebrow. “Like fucking Superman or something? Come the fuck on.”

“Charlie McGee claimed to start exhibiting pyrokinetic abilities as a toddler,” Mike said, flipping through a stack of papers. “It’s all right here in that Rolling Stone article from 1980.”

“And in the same article, it’s explained that her parents were mentally ill drug addicts and that the ‘explosion’ she caused with her mind was from an anti-government terrorist attack, Mike,” Eddie continued. “It says it right there in the link you sent us. Besides, even if this is true, our daughter isn’t exactly setting things on fire with her mind.”

“No, but I did find something that sounds an awful lot like what Tess is doing,” Mike continued.

“She’s doing nothing but being a kid,” Eddie said, exasperated. He looked at Richie. “I’m done with this. You want to stay up all night talking conspiracy theories and thinking our daughter is something out of The X-Files, go ahead, but I’m not listening to anymore of this.”

“Why not?” Richie begged. “How is any of this any crazier than what we went through?”

Eddie closed his eyes and sighed, a prickling of fear spreading through his body. It had to be crazy, it had to be, because if it wasn’t, then Pennywise wasn’t the worst of what this universe was capable of.

“Here,” Mike said suddenly, “I’m sending you some more links.”

A new email appeared in Richie’s inbox and he quickly opened it, clicking the first link. It was an article from an academic journal.

“The fuck’s this?” Richie mumbled, trying to make sense of the scholarly jargon in the first paragraph.

“There’s a girl out there, well, a teenager, and she has exhibited a lot of the same things Tess has done,” Mike explained. “She’s been studied by several different universities and they all admit, no one has given such accurate results in multiple tests.”

“Tests in what?” Richie asked.

“ESP, telepathy, clairvoyance, even astral projection,” Mike said, sounding terribly excited. “And she’s not the only one. She claims there are others like her out there.”

“That’s it,” Eddie groaned, rubbing at his eyes, “I’m going to bed. You and Mike have fun. I’ll handle the Tooth Fairy tonight since you’re so busy.”

Richie waved his hand distractedly as he squinted at the screen, clearly engrossed with the article. Eddie rolled his eyes, said good night to Mike, and walked out of their home office. He glanced at his watch. It was near midnight. He hadn’t stayed up this late on purpose in a long fucking time.

Quietly, he inched into Lydia’s room and reached into his pocket for his wallet. She was fast asleep, starfished on her bed, and Eddie allowed himself a relieved smile. He glanced at her nightstand, on which sat a piece of paper with the words FOR THE TOOTH FAIRY written on it in crayon with an arrow pointing to said tooth. Eddie was once again grateful he had had the forethought years ago to insist that the Tooth Fairy was too busy to go digging under pillows all night. Quickly, he slipped the dollar bill in the tooth’s place and, just a quickly, crept out of her room and down the hall.

He passed the office, and could hear Richie and Mike talking behind the closed door. His shoulders drooped, and he fought the desire to walk in there and demand Richie stop freaking himself out and come to bed. But Eddie had the sneaking suspicion Richie needed this, even if it was all bullshit.

And it had to be. It was bad enough they lived in a world where an ageless entity from space could terrorize children, erase their memories, and know their deepest fears. Eddie had to draw the line somewhere. Superheroes, magic, whatever, didn’t exist. His daughter was just that; his daughter. A little girl...with just an odd ability that had to have a somewhat rational explanation.

He opened his hand and gazed down at the tooth in his palm. He sighed, went to their closet, and found the leather travel bag. He unzipped it, took out the tiny jar, unscrewed the top and placed the tooth in it. He returned the jar and bag back to the closet. He still found it a somewhat creepy practice to keep their daughter’s baby teeth but Richie had insisted it was totally normal (“Besides, she can make a necklace out of them when she gets older, Eds!”).

Eddie closed the closet door and turned towards the bed. It looked terribly inviting. He was about halfway to collapsing in it when the door creaked open, and a little face peeked through.

“Tess?” he said softly. He headed to the door and opened it fully. “What are you doing up, sweetheart? It’s the middle of the night.”

“Daddy,” she whispered, her voice thin.

“What is it?” he asked, crouching down. “Did you have a bad dream?”

Her mouth fell open, and for a split second, Eddie thought she was about to vomit. Instead, she slumped, as if she was a marionette whose strings had just been cut. She remained standing, but her eyes dimmed and her body appeared boneless.

“Tess? Tess, answer me,” Eddie said firmly, gripping her little arms as cold fear gripped his heart. “Tess, sweetheart, look at me. Answer me.”

A great shuddering gasp escaped her and this time, her legs gave out fully. He gathered her into his arms and stood, repeating her name desperately.

“Daddy,” she repeated, slurring slightly and her head lolling, “Papa’s...get ‘im.”

“Tess, baby, just breathe with me and keep your eyes open, okay?” Eddie hurried to the office and kicked open the door. Richie jumped and immediately paled when he saw Tess languid in his arms.

“Oh, God, Tess, Tess,” he gasped, rushing up to his husband and daughter. “Tess, look at me, please, kiddo.” “Get your car keys, and wake Lydia, we’re taking her back to the hospital,” Eddie said, shifting her in his arms.

Tess turned her bleary gaze to Richie. She reached out for him.

“Papa,” she mumbled.

“I’m right here, baby,” Richie said, his voice thick, taking her little face in his shaking hands.

“You…” she shuddered, blinked, and all at once, was their daughter again, her eyes clear and her voice strong. She burst into tears. “You almost flew away!” she wailed, as she all but launched herself out of Eddie’s arms and threw her own around Richie’s neck. Both men stumbled.

“Tess, I…” Richie looked at Eddie over her head, his own eyes wide and frightened. “I’m right here. It’s okay, kiddo, I’m right here. Are you alright? Does your head hurt or something?”

“Don’t fly away,” she begged through tears.

“Hold her,” Eddie said and maneuvered her into Richie’s arms. “I’m starting the car. We’re going to the hospital.”

“What was that?” Richie demanded over Tess’s sobs. “Another seizure?”

“I don’t know what it was,” Eddie said. “But I’m not waiting for another one.”

Pennywise couldn’t have been all-knowing, Eddie realized, because if It had, It would’ve shown Eddie and Richie this—their daughter sedated and lying, helpless and vulnerable, on the table before the yawning mouth of an MRI machine. This was worse than the leper or Paul Bunyan’s grinning razor-sharp teeth; worse than losing your childhood memories—because now, now they were really fucking helpless.

“It’ll take about ten days before we get the results back,” the neurologist explained. “And she’ll definitely be feeling the effects of the sedation afterwards. She should spend the next twenty-four hours resting.”

“Neither of us are working today,” Eddie muttered, clutching the shitty, cold coffee a nurse had given him earlier. He glanced back at Richie, but he was clearly lost inside his own head and not listening. He was sitting in a seat against the wall as they waited for the procedure to finish. Lydia—poor, patient Lydia who had been woken up in the middle of the night and thrilled by the sight of a dollar bill on her night stand, only to be told to put on her shoes, they were going to the hospital—was curled up, asleep in his lap, his jacket around her protectively.

Eddie sighed and rubbed at his forehead. The MRI technician smiled sympathetically at him.

“I know it seems to take forever,” he said, “but we’re nearly done.”

Eddie nodded. He was familiar with the process, having gone through it when the migraines became too much. Myra had insisted on second and third opinions. Eddie clenched his eyes shut and shook his head. The idea of Tess waking up after an MRI only to have Myra, or worse, his mother, waiting for her turned his stomach.

“How can she sleep through all that banging?” Richie muttered suddenly. Eddie remembered that Richie had never even seen an MRI machine until now.

“It’s loud, I know,” the technician said gently, “but between the earplugs and sedation, she doesn’t notice a thing.”

If he had said that to make them feel better, it only did the opposite. Eddie stood and stepped towards Richie, brushing his husband’s hair off his forehead.

“You need a haircut,” he muttered.

Richie glanced up and somehow, smiled.

“That’s the least of what I need right now,” he sighed.

Eddie leaned down and kissed the top of his head, uncaring that the technician was less than three feet away. Richie smiled again and for a moment, Eddie thought that if he could keep Richie smiling, then maybe they could get through this.

Recovery rooms had always been Eddie’s least favorite part of a hospital. He hated the waiting, the fact that you were trapped with other patients, that you had virtually no privacy. But now, he especially hated that they were surrounded by other children and their families, all nervous and on-edge.

Tess was one of the lucky ones. She hadn’t gone through surgery, but the doctor still wanted her to sufficiently recoup from the sedation before she went home. Richie and Eddie were miserable.

Eddie sighed and shifted Lydia, still sleeping, in his arms. Richie had needed a break and also desperately wanted to hold Tess’s hand as she slept. Eddie remembered how despondent he had been when he had woken up after surgery in Derry, only to discover he was the one patient in the recovery room without any visitors waiting for him. It was only later that he discovered the doctors had not allowed a single Loser in, seeing as they were not family and not listed as an emergency contact. Luckily, Mike knew one of the nurses, and when Eddie was transferred back to his own room, they were all there, beaming at him—except for Richie,who still looked terrified, as if certain he was gazing at a mirage.

“She looks so tiny,” Richie suddenly whispered.

Eddie blinked and turned his gaze to his youngest daughter, her little chest rising and falling steadily. He nodded.

“Even tinier than when we first got her,” he agreed.

“She was underweight,” Richie continued, his thumb running over her little hand. “Remember how light she was?”

Eddie nodded again and rested his cheek on the top of Lydia’s head. He closed his eyes and immediately saw Tess in their doorway, hours earlier. He sighed.

“She looked like you,” he whispered. Richie turned towards him, confusion on his face. “During her seizure tonight. She looked like you when you were caught…” he lowered his voice, “when you were in the deadlights.”

Richie swallowed.

“Maybe that’s what she saw,” he replied quietly.

“The deadlights?”

“No, me,” Richie said, reaching with his other hand to stroke Tess’s hair. “She said, don’t fly away. Maybe she saw me in the deadlights, too.”

Out of the corner of his eye, Eddie noticed movement. He glanced over, and spotted a nurse hovering across the room, who quickly looked away. Eddie frowned. He doubted the nurse could overhear them, but he felt nervousness form in the pit of his stomach. Perhaps he was a fan of Richie’s, but surely no nurse would dare approach him in a recovery room, right?

“Eddie, that girl Mike told us about,” Richie whispered, his eyes wide, “I think you should read what he sent.”

“Rich, not now, please.”

“It sounds like...like this is real. She’s seeings things from before she was born. How is that possible?”

Eddie spotted the nurse again, who was making quite a show of reading a chart a few beds away. Eddie frowned.

“Can we at least wait for the MRI results before we jump to conclusions?” he begged.

Richie followed his gaze and spotted the hovering nurse, too. He swallowed and looked back down at their sleeping daughter.

“Alright, Eds,” he sighed. “Whatever you say.”

The next ten days went by in a blur of family visits and constant check-ins from the Losers. Apparently when a small child gets her brain scanned, it’s all hands on deck. Richie’s parents and sister babysat, brought food, and distracted the girls while Eddie and Richie walked around in a daze, waiting for the results that could potentially change their lives.

Mike Facetimed everyday, never bringing up any of his research, but simply listening. Bill, stuck in Europe with limited wifi on a movie shoot, sent goofy videos and uplifting emails when he could. Bev called multiple times a day and Ben fucking flew in, because he was just that sort of kind-hearted bastard.

“Bev can’t get away from work until Sunday,” he explained gently. The results were due to come in on Friday. “She wanted to be here.”

“It’s fine,” Richie said, faking a smile. “You guys are acting like this is a wedding. We’re just getting a bunch of paperwork telling us what the fuck is going on in our daughter’s brain. No big deal.”

Ben offered one of his patented You’re making jokes about being sad and that’s sad faces and Richie just shrugged.

“We’re glad you’re here,” Eddie admitted softly. “Besides, Lydia’s thrilled.”

“That’s true,” Richie said, “Lyds loves you, Ben. I think she wants you and Bev to adopt her.”

Ben laughed gently and ran a hand through his hair.

“Tess still needs to warm up to me,” he said.

“Tess still needs to warm up to me,” Richie shot back.

Eddie rolled his eyes.

“She adores you, Rich,” he said, brewing another pot of coffee. “She even lets you read to her now.”

“Yeah, Berenstain Bears, not Dr. Seuss,” Richie muttered. “I hate the fucking Berenstain Bears.”

Ben laughed and squeezed Richie’s shoulder affectionately.

“Having kids seems a lot more complicated than I thought,” he admitted.

“Trust me, man, you have no idea,” Richie said, scrubbing his hand over his face.

Friday came in a blink. Ben and Richie’s sister Sarah watched the girls while Richie and Eddie went to get the results. They drove together in tense silence, waited in the waiting room silently, and when they were finally called into the office, still said very little.

Later, Eddie would realize that for something that caused such overwhelming anxiety for so long, it was all very anticlimactic. The results showed nothing in Tess’s brain. Once again, the doctor insisted there was no physical reason for her apparent seizures. It was good news...right?

As they walked out, stunned and exhausted, both men were lost in their own thoughts. Eddie felt weak with relief but he still couldn’t get the image of his daughter in that MRI machine. Time to make another appointment with his therapist, he figured.

By the time he reached the door, he suddenly realized Richie was not beside him. He turned around and spotted Richie down the hall, hurrying after him.

“Where were you?” Eddie asked tiredly.

“Nowhere, nothing,” Richie said quickly. “Let’s go home.”

“Rich?”

“I wanna see the girls,” Richie continued, rushing through the doors.

Eddie sighed and shook his head, following his husband.

“But that’s good news!” Ben exclaimed when they got home. “Isn’t it?”

“It is,” Eddie said, running a hand through his hair. “I mean, she has nothing physically wrong in her brain so thank God. But we still don’t have clear answers.”

Sarah frowned and shook her head.

“There has to be one,” she insisted. “Did they talk about medication or anything?”

“A bit,” Eddie sighed. “I just...something about it feels wrong. I can’t explain it.”

“What does Richie think?” Ben asked.

“I...I don’t know,” Eddie admitted.

“Where is Richie?” Sarah asked, suddenly looking around her. She peeked into the living room where Lydia was playing with the Wii. “Lyds, did you see where your dad went?”

“I think he’s in Tess’s room,” she answered. “Aunt Sarah, it’s your turn to play. You promised.”

“I know but—”

“Please,” Lydia begged, putting on her best puppy dog eyes.

Sarah sighed but smiled affectionately. “Duty calls,” she said, and walked into the living room.

“I should go check on Richie,” Eddie said tiredly.

“Sure,” Ben said before placing his arm on Eddie’s shoulder. “Listen, you don’t have to tell me anything you don’t want to, but is there something else going on? Like, you and Richie don’t seem...yourselves.”

Eddie tried to offer a smile but Ben saw right through it. He looked genuinely concerned and Eddie had to admit, it was nice to have someone else worry, too.

“It’s fine, we’re just...figuring this out,” he admitted softly. “I’ll be right back.”

He walked down the hall and knocked on Tess’s half-opened door. He peeked in. Richie was sitting on her bed with Tess on his knee, speaking quietly to her.

“You two okay?” he asked.

“Eds, come here,” Richie said quickly. “And close the door.”

Eddie did so with a sense of unease. He stepped towards the bed and gazed down at his husband and daughter expectantly. Richie turned back to Tess.

“Now, kiddo, tell Daddy what you told me,” he said gently. “Just the same.”

“Okay,” Tess said, shrugging as she looked up at Eddie. “��Member when I fell down?”

Eddie huffed a laugh.

“Yes, I definitely remember that, sweetheart,” he said.

“Well,” Tess began, fiddling with the hem of her shirt, “I fell because Papa fell and it hurted.”

“Papa fell?”

She nodded vigorously.

“Yep, he was flying,” she said. She turned back to Richie. “How come you don’t fly at home?”

Richie shook his head.

“Because I can’t really fly,” he admitted.

“But you did in the cave.”

“I wasn’t flying,” Richie explained gently. “I was floating.”

A wave of nausea rolled in Eddie’s stomach.

“Richie, stop this,” he insisted.

“Wait, listen, go on, Tess. Tell Daddy the rest.”

“Daddy saved you,” she said, shrugging. “And then Daddy got hurted. And you was sad but now it’s okay.”

“Yes, it’s all okay now,” Richie agreed, kissing her on her forehead. “Why did Daddy float?”

“‘Cause of the light. Aunt Bev saw it, too,” she answered nonchalantly. “Can I have a snack?”

“Of course you can,” Richie said happily, hugging her tightly before placing her on her feet. “Go on, Aunt Sarah and Uncle Ben are in the kitchen.”

She rushed out. Richie and Eddie stared at one another.

“You can’t deny it, Eds,” Richie said, his voice oddly light. “She sees our past. I don’t know how or why, but she does.”

Eddie swallowed and suddenly realized his hands were shaking. He closed them into fists.

“It?” he whispered.

Richie shook his head.

“I don’t think so,” he said. “This is something else. Like something you’re born with.”

“Richie…”

“And earlier, at the hospital, a nurse stopped me,” he said, standing and reaching into his pocket. “He was in the recovery room with us last week. I saw him looking over at us and I thought he was just being a dick but he heard us. He stopped me on our way out today and gave me this.”

He pulled a crumpled piece of paper out and handed it to Eddie. Eddie looked down at an unfamiliar name.

“What’s this supposed to be?” he asked.

“He said he used to work with this guy, he has what Tess has,” Richie said excitedly.

“For fuck’s sake,” Eddie sighed. “This could just be a crazy person. That nurse could be a crazy person.”

“His name is in one of the articles Mike sent us,” Richie insisted. “About that girl.”

“And? What are we supposed to do about it?”

“We can reach out to them.”

“No fucking way,” Eddie said, raisng his voice in shock. “You wanna read articles or look up theories on the Internet, fucking fine, but there is no way we are opening ourselves to some fucking lunatics. Especially when it comes to our daughter.”

“I’m not saying we introduce Tess to them, I’m saying we ask some questions.”

“Absolutely not,” Eddie hissed.

“So what do you want to do?” Richie asked angrily. “Wait around until this happens again? Throw some meds at her and hope for the best?”

Eddie threw his hands up and turned away.

“This is crazy, Rich, totally fucking crazy,” he gasped.

“Eds—”

A knock at the door. Ben stuck his head in.

“You guys want lunch or something?” Ben asked gently. “Tess and Lyds are hungry.”

“Yeah, yeah,” Richie said, taking a deep breath. “We’ll be right there.”

He nodded, gave a penetrating look at his two friends, and left. Richie stood and gazed down at Eddie, his eyes soft. He took Eddie’s face in his hands, caressing his cheekbones with this thumbs.

“We need to figure this out,” he whispered, “and I can’t do it alone.”

Eddie sighed, closed his eyes, took a deep breath, and nodded. He didn’t see Richie smile but he felt it in his kiss.

Life went back to normal—or as normal as it ever was in the Tozier household. Bev still offered to fly out but there wasn’t any point, so after thanking him profusely and offering to visit soon, Richie and Eddie sent Ben back home to his wife. He looked oddly reluctant to leave, but he hugged his two friends tightly and told them he loved them before his flight. Eddie caught Richie blinking rapidly before turning away.

Sarah still visited often, along with Richie’s mother, but they had their own responsibilities, too. And, as far as the medical world as concerned, Tess was physically fine.

Soon, they had less than a week until the new school year, and the Tozier family was busy. Last minute supplies had to be bought, schedules finalized, Tess reassured constantly about the safety and fun of preschool, and teachers informed about her seizures. The preschool took the information well, and assured them that they had plenty of experience with children with epilepsy. Richie and Eddie considered explaining that Tess did not have that, but let it go. Perhaps it was easier to pretend she had an ordinary diagnosis.

Lydia and Tess’s first days started together and, in an effort to make the preschool drop off as easy and meltdown-free as possible, Richie volunteered to take Tess alone. She’d still freak out but it wouldn’t be as violent if Eddie was there, they figured. Eddie agreed reluctantly. He hated the idea of his daughter breaking down at the front steps of the preschool, but he hated the idea of missing her first day even more.

“I’ll film everything,” Richie promised. “It’s only for half a day, anyway.”

Eddie nodded and finished packing her snacks and blanket. Lydia was practically vibrating with excitement, showing off her back to school outfits and re-organizing her Batman backpack. She was, both men had to admit, better at distracting and empowering Tess than they were. She spent their last day of summer vacation going on and on about the excitement of school, of how much fun she has with her friends and the nice teachers, and when Tess starts kindergarten next year, she’ll just love it.

Tess listened carefully and asked many questions. Lydia, always a fan of being in charge and all-knowing, was in her element. Eddie smiled and felt his heart twist as he watched his two daughters. Perhaps everything will be okay, he thought hopefully.

That night, he and Richie helped the girls wash up, change into their pjs, lay out their first day clothes, and climb into bed. Lydia needed very little encouragement and simply kissed them both good night before asking for her copy of Ramona Quimby, Age 8, and promising not to stay up late reading. They left her room, content in the knowledge that Lydia was quite fearless and adept at rolling with the punches.

In their younger daughter’s room, Richie tucked Tess into her bed, her night light on and her eyes heavy. Eddie brushed her hair from her face and she smiled sleepily.

“You’re going to have a great day tomorrow,” he said gently.

“Yeah, you’re going to have so much fun,” Richie agreed. “I can’t wait to hear all about it.”

Tess yawned.

“Yep,” she said, “a good day.”

“And you’re so smart and brave,” Richie continued. “You’re gonna blow everyone away tomorrow.”

“I know,” Tess replied, rubbing at her eye with the back of her hand. “‘M not scared. ‘M not scared of anything anymore.”

“Good,” Eddie said, impressed. Lydia should become a motivational speaker, he thought briefly. “You have nothing to be afraid of.”

“Nope,” Tess replied. “The nice girl showed me.”

Unease, like a blanket, fell over Richie and Eddie. They glanced at one another, both frozen. Richie licked his lips and swallowed before asking, “What girl?”

“The girl who visited me,” she yawned. “She showed me lots.”

“What did she show you?” Eddie whispered, terrified of the answer.

“Magic,” Tess replied, closing her eyes. “She says I’m magic, too.”

“Tess…”

She smiled as her breathing slowly evened out, and they knew she was falling asleep.

“She says I shine like her,” Tess whispered.

[thisweekingundamwing]

This Week in Gundam Wing 14-20 April 2019

Here’s this week’s roundup!

Remember to give your content creators some love! And join in on the events at the bottom!

~Mod Hel

Fanfiction/Snippets/AU Ideas:

@anaranesindanarie

Merchant Marines (Ch. 2) https://archiveofourown.org/works/18440453/chapters/43856074#workskin

Duo Maxwell/OC, Trowa Barton/Duo Maxwell, Chang Wufei/Duo Maxwell, Trowa Barton/Chang Wufei, Trowa Barton/Chang Wufei/Duo Maxwell

Duo Maxwell, Trowa Barton, Mike Howard, Lady Une, Quatre Raberba Winner, Chang Wufei, Heero Yuy, Sally Po, Mariemaia Khushrenada, Relena Peacecraft, Dorothy Catalonia

AU, do I even need to add an angst tag at this point?, I'll add one anyway, Angst, Rebels, Wars, Civil wars, Une pissed off the wrong people, Trowa flirts, Duo is oblivious, and a disaster

Lady Une oversteps and the former Gundam Pilots run off to do their own thing. What could possibly go wrong?

And Howard wears his bermuda shorts.

@doctormegalomania

Eldritch Holiday (Creature of the Night) (Ch. 15) https://archiveofourown.org/works/17802668/chapters/43841089?view_adult=true

Duo Maxwell/Heero Yuy, Trowa Barton/Quatre Raberba Winner, Chang Wufei/Original Female Character(s)

Heero Yuy, Duo Maxwell, Trowa Barton, Quatre Raberba Winner, Chang Wufei

Horror, Body Horror, Occult, Comedy, Eventual Romance, Post-Break Up

Riko doesn’t think she’ll ever get used to the Gundams. Duo disagrees.

@offspringchick29

Ok kid... It’s a pancake http://offspringchick29.tumblr.com/post/184219226590/ok-kid-its-a-pancake

Heero Yuy, Duo Maxwell, Original Characters

Heero takes to Facebook to show the world what he goes through on a Saturday morning with one of his very picky sons and a pancake.

You woke me because your socks came off? http://offspringchick29.tumblr.com/post/184219639565/you-woke-me-because-your-socks-came-off

Heero Yuy, Duo Maxwell, Original Characters

Duo suggests something Heero could do when the kids are teenagers to get back at them for waking him at 4am for stupid reasons. Heero lets Duo know that very same reason happened that morning. Well... The socks were a cover for the real reason.

Legos, the bane of the feet of a dad http://offspringchick29.tumblr.com/post/184285952100/legos-the-bane-of-the-feet-of-a-dad

Heero Yuy, Duo Maxwell, Wufei Chang, Original Character

Duo posts what he thinks is an innocent meme about being a single dad. Doesn’t realise it bites him in the backside because of Legos.

@ransomedbard

WIP: Peacekeeper https://ransomedbard.tumblr.com/post/184306798288/wip-peacekeeper

At the age of 39, Quatre has grown the Winner Corporation into one of the Earth Sphere’s most powerful businesses.  His life is entirely centered - some would say consumed - by his work, until an unexpected request from Dorothy shatters his routine.

shinigamiinochi

A Stagnation of Love (rewrite) (Ch. 77) https://www.fanfiction.net/s/10433322/77/A-Stagnation-of-Love-rewrite

Genre: Romance/Angst Rated: M Character: Duo M., Heero Y.

Duo Maxwell has been stuck his entire life. With an abusive father, a mother who doesn’t even realize he exists, severely bullied at school, and hiding his sexuality, he has given up all hope for a better life. When he falls in love with his bully’s boyfriend, he needs to make a choice about his future. Will he continue to let himself be abused, or will he fight back?

@tatakau-monotachi

Hall of Cranes (Ch. 6) https://archiveofourown.org/works/18304061/chapters/43747843

Trowa Barton/Quatre Raberba Winner, Chang Wufei/Duo Maxwell

Chang Wufei, Trowa Barton, Duo Maxwell

Alternate Universe, Palace drama

Wufei, Crown Prince of the Chang'seo Dynasty, must find a consort before his ascension. His chamberlain Barton is anxious that he should marry to secure his throne and the love of his people. But the only woman Wufei likes enough isn't quite what she seems to be. Meanwhile, Duo is in completely over his head in this palace intrigue.

The curious case of Vayeate and Mercurius https://tatakau-monotachi.tumblr.com/post/184266048422/the-curious-case-of-vayeate-and-mercurius

Meta Essay

@terrablaze514

Crossover Idea https://terrablaze514.tumblr.com/post/184275532332/happy-birthday-3-hope-your-day-is-filled-with

Just a Birthday special (posted April 18th) in response to an interesting question. It's a short Gundam Wing/Black Panther crossover. There's no title for it.

Rated T (or lower); hinted Relena x Dorothy, 6x9; no warnings in sight. Also starring Wakandans and mentions of Avengers and Preventers.

Fanart:

@bluesquishylemon

https://www.tumblr.com/dashboard/blog/bluesquishylemon/184209993547

Duo Maxwell

Head Canons:

@lifeaftermeteor

https://lifeaftermeteor.tumblr.com/post/184306028145#notes

Playing Bride and Groom ‘Keep Away’

Chats/Discussions:

@kirinjaegeste

https://lemontrash.tumblr.com/post/184182503889/i-love-that-the-consensus-among-the-gw-community

Trowa’s Gay, discussion.

@lemontrash, @helmistress, @seitou, @doctormegalomania, @incorrectgundamwingquotes, @robo-rad, @sweethoneysempai, @gwkimmy, @softnocturne, @terrablaze514

@liesfromsatansbuttcheeks

http://simulacraryn.tumblr.com/post/184232919258/vegalume-liesfromsatansbuttcheeks-new

Treize being a father/dad.

@vegalume, @godofalleyeteeth, @paleghostinthecorner, @outofworkshinigami

Quotes/Dialogues:

@incorrectgundamwingquotes

https://incorrectgundamwingquotes.tumblr.com/post/184324819002/duo-hey-cmon-it-aint-ruined-it-looks-pretty

Duo & Quatre

https://incorrectgundamwingquotes.tumblr.com/post/184316436461/duo-heeros-acting-crazy-trowa-crazy-for-heero

Duo & Trowa

https://incorrectgundamwingquotes.tumblr.com/post/184313911477/trowa-to-heero-and-duo-why-are-you-guys-carrying

Trowa, Heero, & Duo

https://incorrectgundamwingquotes.tumblr.com/post/184310273226/zechs-i-was-a-fool-all-that-anger-all-that

Zechs, Duo, & Everyone Else

https://incorrectgundamwingquotes.tumblr.com/post/184306041018/duo-if-i-die-my-funerals-gonna-be-the-biggest

Duo, WuFei, & Trowa

https://incorrectgundamwingquotes.tumblr.com/post/184301653476/dorothy-flirtatiously-wow-quatre-you-look

Dorothy & Trowa to Quatre

https://incorrectgundamwingquotes.tumblr.com/post/184293205753/at-preventers-hq-duo-fuck-the-feds-wufei

Duo & WuFei

https://incorrectgundamwingquotes.tumblr.com/post/184290594855/at-preventers-hq-wufei-proofreading-heeros

WuFei & Heero

https://incorrectgundamwingquotes.tumblr.com/post/184329272842/quatre-duo-just-referred-to-sand-as-heterosexual

Quatre & Rashid

https://incorrectgundamwingquotes.tumblr.com/post/184267718666/on-a-mission-quatre-heero-wait-what-is-that

Quatre & Heero

https://incorrectgundamwingquotes.tumblr.com/post/184264285168/heero-you-value-our-friendship-more-than-your

Heero & Duo

https://incorrectgundamwingquotes.tumblr.com/post/184250040089/gw-fandom-to-sumizawa-you-were-so-preoccupied

GW & Sumizawa

https://incorrectgundamwingquotes.tumblr.com/post/184244954283/heero-i-admire-you-duo-duo-really-why

Heero & Duo

https://incorrectgundamwingquotes.tumblr.com/post/184241542387/gundaaamn-incorrectgundamwingquotes-theres

Trowa and Coffee

Added Commentary by @gundaaamn

Calendar Events:

@acworldbuildingzine

Rhythm Generation https://acworldbuildingzine.tumblr.com/post/183502874098/hello-from-the-rhythm-generation-zine-crew-with

Donations have 6 prime locations!

The Rhythm Generation zine will be released digitally as a PDF on May 4.  To receive a copy, please be sure to sign up via our Mailing List Form!

Go here to sign up! https://acworldbuildingzine.tumblr.com/post/184021107308/were-27-days-from-the-zine-release-date-the

@gundam-wing-bingo

Come help us determine what will be on the bingo cards!

https://gundam-wing-bingo.tumblr.com/post/184103375846/gundam-wing-bingo-hello-all-welcome-to-gundam

@gwcocktailfriday

Cocktail Fridays!

Post responses on Friday, during Happy Hour between 3 & 5 pm in your own timezone.

Here’s the prompt for Friday, April 26th! https://gwcocktailfriday.tumblr.com/post/184318224372/cocktail-friday-post-responses-on-friday-april

For those going to Pillowfort, find us here.

If anyone has ideas for prompts, PLEASE send them in! Our ask box is always open.

In Need of Summery Prompts https://gwcocktailfriday.tumblr.com/post/184265772053/alright-wingers-weve-got-prompts-queued-up

@seasons-of-gundamwing

Summer of Zechs 2019 https://seasons-of-gundamwing.tumblr.com/post/183734829321/summer-of-zechs-2019

Come vote for a month to host it in and send in prompts!

Month Vote Count https://seasons-of-gundamwing.tumblr.com/post/183825139256/votes

Voting for what month will be open until the end of the month, then it’s time for PROMPTS!

Here’s the Pillowfort discussion.

@thisweekingundamevents

Gundam Wing Mini Bang Theme Suggestions

Food https://thisweekingundamevents.tumblr.com/post/184020447910/food-d

Based off of Official Art https://thisweekingundamevents.tumblr.com/post/184266136185/another-prompt-idea-for-consideration-and-voting

Unorthodox Undercover Work https://thisweekingundamevents.tumblr.com/post/184334667155/if-you-are-still-looking-for-theme-how-about

Gundam Wing Mini Bang https://thisweekingundamevents.tumblr.com/post/183830183720/mini-bang

Let us know if you’d like to participate and if you’d like it to have a theme!

Mini Bang Logistics https://thisweekingundamevents.tumblr.com/post/183847883850/mini-bang-logistics

Mini Bang Q&A https://thisweekingundamevents.tumblr.com/post/184002246410/q-a-mini-bang

Mini Bang Logistics Part 2 https://thisweekingundamevents.tumblr.com/post/184002543210/mini-bang-logistics-continued

[taffysannotatedsonichu]

Sonichu 10 Page 57

MICHAEL: Thank you, sir. We are very excited for your arrival. Alec is not the best caretaker here; he gives more care and attention to Asperia, Max, Benny, Sitting Chu, Jonas, Dixie, and that nameless green one. He formed us to look low-resolution, blocky, gross, and retarded; is that a notion of a caring individual? No, it is not.

BOBBY (ALEC’S WILD): He cursed us seven with his own Aspergers and negative influances. Even worse, he pushes homosexuality onto me with Evan’s Simonchu… it is a constant nightmare to me, even being forced to do the act in the “honeymoon” video… wahhh!!! God, please release me of this hell!!!

KITTY (ALEC’S BUBBLES): We never wanted to be named after the original ones in your world; I wanted to be named Kitty. “Sonichu” wanted to be called Mike, “Wild” Bob, and so on. Alec tore the spikes and tails from some of us. We were all born here in Minnesota from our father Sonichu who was also born here. Upon breeding the bunch of us, as well as Asperia, Benny, Sitting Chu, Jonas, Dixie, and the green guy, there were five Roseys that Alec decided not to care for at all. They get treated like hamsters.

TRISHA (ALEC’S ANGELICA): Actually, there’s only four of them now; one tried to report Alec to the ASPCA, but before she could make it there, she lost her life by the hands of Dino Dash… that was one example that scared us all with intense fear. The remaining four have grown to be regular Rosechus now… caged in Alec’s basement. My name should be Trisha.

WHISP (ALEC’S PUNCHY): Uh!!!!… Uh!!!!… I’m Whisperin’! You know what I’m sayin’? My name’s Whisperin’!

SWIFT: I used to have my psychic powers, but Alec numbed my mind with the Aspergers… Numbie be my name… the “Grandpa” Sonichu was our father… he was 20 when the last of us was bred between him and Alec’s Ditto… Dad became old with Bill’s age-acceleration machine… headache!!!

ASPERCHU: We never wanted Aspergers; we never wanted to look stupid, gross, and retarded, and we are sick and tired of Alec and his crew. This body type and these glasses are terrible. I need a girlfriend too.

SONICHU: My God! Well, Chris and I will set the girls free and get them well-fed and started on a better life. For now, y’all gather round. I will cure y’all of your mental blocks, improve your looks, and raise your IQ and self-confidence greatly.

TL; DR: Alec’s a jerk and he forced us to be in Asperchu, we’re not the original Sonichu/Chaotic Combo, we’re not gay, we hate our names, Alec keeps four women tied up in his basement and killed a fifth, but don’t worry, GodJesus Sonichu’s love saves all.

Michael’s speech tells of how Alec gives preferential treatment for stuff like page time and not getting brutally murdered to the various OC’s Asperchu introduced: Asperia, Asperchu’s dream daughter from the future, much like Chris’s dream daughter Crystal, who would eventually be born as a hideous deformed mutant Rosechu; Max, a friend of Asperchu’s who is a pink puffy blob that can copy the abilities of people he inhales and is a 100% original character and not Kirby in any way; Benny, a one-shot character from issue 1A, who worked with the fundamentalist Christian couple John and Kendra who feuded with Asperchu that issue; Sitting Chu, the Asperchu version of the Anchuent Leader of the Cherokian Clan; Dixie and Jonas Chu, Asperchu’s dream girl and his romantic rival; and the “nameless” green Sonichu, actually named Peter, is a minor friend of Jonas Chu’s. For whatever reason, Chris omits from this list the greatest Asperchu character, Jivin Pickles.

Bobby goes on about how they were not born with Asperger’s and Alec cursed it upon them, and that, unlike Asperchu’s version of Wild, he himself is not homosexual. In Asperchu, Wild Sonichu and Evan’s Simonchu, the True and Honest Simonla, were a gay couple to mock Chris’s decision to make Simonla a girl and pair her with Wild. As you can well guess, Chris was not a fan of this relationship, or their “honeymoon video” that Magi-Chan mass debates to.

Alec’s Bubbles, Kitty, explains that they had no desire to have the same names as Chris’s EHPs, and that they each had picked a name for themselves. Kitty also implies that, in order to make these EHPs resemble their Chaotic Combo counterparts more accurately, Alec painfully disfigured them, implicitly I think we’re meant to assume that Alec had the tail removed from Whisp Sonichu to make him more resemble the unnaturally tail-less Punchy. Also according to Kitty, apparently they’re all brothers and sisters, along with the OCs of Asperchu, and this quintet of Roseys that apparently were of no use to Alec, thus they were ignored and caged in Alec’s basement. These Roseys have no basis in Asperchu canon, as Rosechu herself had yet to appear in Asperchu at this point.

Trisha’s speech tells the tale of the tragic fifth Basement Rosechu, who apparently got reasonably far in an escape before getting killed by Asperchu’s version of Clyde Cash, Dino Dash. Her death was used as an unsubtle warning to the remaining Asperchu cast that resistance against Alec was futile. This is a weirdly dark plot point, and yet the surviving Sonichus and Rosechus seem to not care particularly much about their fallen comrade (Kitty even introduces their group as a quartet until Trisha corrects her). The surviving Basement Rosechus don’t express any sorrow for the loss of their sister, who isn’t given so much as a name. It’s almost like this character was just created to defame Alec. Hmmm.

Whisp offers no useful information with his eighth of the page whatsoever. His “whisperin’” name is possibly meant to be ironic, as he appears to be yelling in his speech bubble.

Swift, despite apparently having been a long-ignored prophet a la Cassandra two pages ago, has apparently been stripped of his psychic prowess thanks to Aspergers, and suggests that he has been cruelly nicknamed “Numbie”, possibly by Alec and crew. He also goes more in depth regarding the team’s genealogy than Kitty did, explaining that the “Grandpa Alzheichu” was in fact their biological father, their biological mother being a Ditto, a Pokemon famous for its ability to breed with most other Pokemon in the game. However, to sync up the ages of the Chaotic Combo (presumably 19 like rest of the team) with the age of Alzheichu (elderly), Swift says that he was exposed to an age-acceleration machine, made by none other than former Team Rocket lead scientist Bill Schwartz. Okay, two questions. One, aside from wanting to make Alzheichu more closely resemble Bob Chandler, what’s the point of even inventing an age-acceleration machine? No one likes getting older, so it seems like this machine would have no practical use. Two, we see Bill at the end of this chapter, for the first time since Sonichu 1, and he’s completely turned “good” and is working for CWCville’s hospital. He even specifically mentions ditching Team Rocket to save lives at the hospital. He makes no reference to ever working with the Asperpedia Four. Granted, given that by the time he reappears the Asperpedia Four are wanted murderers I wouldn’t exactly blame him for wanting to hide any former affiliation with them, but it’s nevertheless an unexplained plot point.

Asperchu, the only character Chris has zero claim to creation (and thus the one Alec later had the most issue with Chris stealing him here), goes on and on about how ugly Alec made him and how he needs a girlfriend. Weirdly, Chris never gives him one despite this request (granted, Kitty, Trisha, and the basement Rosechus are all apparently his sisters, and every other female Rosechu of dating age is already paired up, so it’s possible this was a conscious decision.) Sonichu, moved by their plight, prepares to cure of all that ails them.

[sinceileftyoublog]

Top 70 Albums of 2018

Every year here at SILY, we’ve increased the number of records in our year-end list by 10. Over the last few years, that move has been mostly arbitrary, aside from the fact that we increasingly listened to more and more great albums. This year, it seemed like a necessity--there was no consensus #1 album among any of us like there was in previous years. Plus, contributors Lauren Lederman and Daniel Palella didn’t share a single common album in their individual list!

While we know there were more great records in 2018 than just the ones listed below, these were our favorites.

70. Tal National - Tantabara (FatCat)

Tantabara features the best singing on any Tal National album so far. From the long screaming notes of “Belles Reines” to the soft, lovely harmonies of “Duniya” and “Trankil”, each member of the band is given the opportunity to showcase his or her unique style and tone. Tal National is a collective, but let’s not forget the individuals that make up the great band who are now 3-for-3 over their past few records. The difference with this one is it makes them essential listening.

Read the rest of our review here.

69. Robbie Fulks & Linda Gail Lewis - Wild! Wild! Wild! (Bloodshot)

We should be thankful that we have a document of a collaboration between Chicago folk hero Robbie Fulks and the legendary piano player and singer Linda Gail Lewis. Wild! Wild! Wild! is a collection of Fulks originals and covers. On each song, he leads the band and produces. The credits list is, as expected, insane, The Flat Five part of their backing band in addition to a ton of collaborators on individual tracks.

Read the rest of our review here.

68. Brigid Mae Power - The Two Worlds (Tompkins Square)

The Two Worlds–whether referring to pastoral beauty vs. raw anger, the present vs. the past, or something else–is an album for the #MeToo era in 2018. And not just because it’s a protest against toxic masculinity, but because it allows Power to embrace and celebrate her own artistry.

Read the rest of our review here.

67. Shannen Moser - I’ll Sing (Lame-O)

If any album took me by surprise this year, it was Shannen Moser’s country-tinged I’ll Sing. It feels timeless, a piece of folk for the current age that both borrows from the genre’s storied past and the more recent history of indie rock. “Every Town” paints a vivid picture of a backyard party and the wistfulness of the unknown. “West Texas Blues” sounds like it was recorded on the fly, a quick expulsion of emotion mid-road trip. Meanwhile, “Joanna”, “Trouble”, and “One for Mama” could be from another decade, covers of dusty songs from the canon. Yet, the songs are all Shannen. Her warm vocals and the melancholy of her lyrical portraits are what kept drawing me back, lines like “If I could feel something good, I would share with you/You know I would.” There’s a plaintiveness to each song, one that rolls through the album that’s only enhanced by the emotion Moser pours into each vocal performance. - Lauren Lederman

66. Stove - ‘s Favorite Friend (Exploding In Sound)

After a string of Stove EPs occupying the space left in the wake of Ovlov’s initial breakup, a new Stove release has come to feel like an unexpected gift. Beginning to play with drum machines and softer songwriting sensibilities across their previous records, ‘s Favorite Friend comes not as a bold new direction for Stove’s sound, but a refinement of it. Steve Hartlett and Jordyn Blakely have nailed a sound that departs almost completely from the Dinosaur Jr. fuzz soup we have come to expect from Ovlov, diving into more personal anecdotes and ballads, but not totally stripping away the punch Hartlett is capable of. “Liverwurst” encapsulates this perfectly, with its breezy acoustic riff and touching lyrics, leading way to a loud but orchestrated catharsis. “Duckling Fantasy” gives the listener a welcome foray into drummer Blakely playing frontman. Its frantic feeling and confidence solidify it as one of Stove’s briefest moments of brilliance to date. Overall, ‘s Favorite Friend displays that Stove is its own unique entity, capable of great variety and very effective songwriting. - Daniel Palella

65. Sons Of Kemet - Your Queen Is A Reptile (impulse!)

The title Your Queen Is A Reptile is a strong rebuke of the British monarchy’s mistreatment of black immigrants that gains even more political weight in context of Meghan Markle. But instead of making a protest record, Sons of Kemet shone a light on other queens throughout history–black women who have made a positive impact on society at large. With co-production by Dill Harris and features from performance poet Josh Idehen and Congo Natty, Your Queen Is A Reptile takes you on a journey through a wide variety of black stories and black music.

Read the rest of the review here.

64. Joey Purp - QUARTERTHING (self-released)

My real introduction to Joey Purp was his 2016 mixtape iiiDrops and his connection to his friends in the same scene like Noname and Chance The Rapper. What was so exciting about iiiDrops was Purp’s confidence, and QUARTERTHING not only feels like a step forward for the rapper but a leap into the spotlight. Joey Purp has arrived, confidence and flow surrounded by excellent production. “24k Gold/Sanctified” kicks off the album with a sense of joy and celebration, but lyrically, it recognizes that pull back to reality, the realism of the world and its violence, going from “I’m still alive!” to “I know we still alive / But I wake up to bullets flying.” That’s a theme throughout: the weight between celebration and survival, that pull between idealism and realism. “Elastic” reminds me of a grown-up sequel to “Girls@”, and the footwork-inspired beat of “Aw Sh*t!” is infectious. And while he’s more than capable of carrying out an album on his own, Purp finds some help from local names like Ravyn Lenae and Queen Key, but also a few more instantly recognizable names like both RZA and GZA. It’s a debut for an artist who’s been creating for years, but one that revels in its confidence and self-assured boldness. - LL

63. Foodman - Aru Otoko No Densetsu (Sun Ark)

Toying for years with the traditions of Chicago’s footwork scene, there has always been a sense of child-like playfulness conveyed in Foodman’s compositions. The Japanese artist’s rhythms stutter and juke in ways we have come to expect, but the sounds themselves are the artifice of a mind operating fully on a sense of wonder. On Aru Otoko No Densetsu, Foodman strips away what we expect from a dance record, or even a simple reduction thereof. What we are left with are percussive sounds surfacing, seemingly from toys and simple objects, mingling and slowly taking form--not with an end goal or rhythm in mind, but simply with the intent of play. Despite this, there is no feeling of lackluster or aimlessness--every bleep and hit on Aru Otoko No Densetsu explores what one can do when conventions and expectations are subverted. - DP

62. Years & Years - Palo Santo (Polydor)

Olly Alexander purported to release a concept pop album where gender and sexuality don’t exist and whose title was essentially a dick joke. On paper, Years & Years’ Palo Santo sounds like an ambitious album destined only to disappoint. In reality, it’s ambitious and impresses. The trio of Alexander, Mikey Goldsworthy, and Emre Türkmen have made a forward-thinking, percussive pop record about relationships that simply bangs. Whether Alexander is reflecting about a fling with a supposedly straight man or getting over being left, he’s dancing most of the time.

Read the rest of our review here.

61. Kississippi - Sunset Blush (Alcopop!)

If you managed to catch Kississippi live this year, you’ll likely have seen a full band surrounding Zoe Reynolds, but she alone writes the band’s songs. Sunset Blush sees Reynolds tapping into dreamier, poppier indie fare compared to her last EP, the moody We Have No Future, We’re All Doomed. The shift suits her. Her voice worked well with the starker, lo-fi feeling of that EP and is just as strong on her latest. “Easier to Love” feels lush with its synth-driven melody as Reynold’s voice wraps around the sound. That’s not to say the guitar-driven tracks are few or lacking here. “Cut Yr Teeth” finds strength in circling guitars and a realization in the lyrics: “The person you made yourself out to be / Would feel sorry for what you have done to me”. If Zoe had any nervousness about pivoting to more of a pop sound, Sunset Blush proves that Kississippi effortlessly made that move. - LL

60. Kraus - Path (Terrible)

Kraus’ Path is a triumphant effort of pushing sounds so deeply into the red that their proclamations are felt completely despite such careful shrouding. The Texas artist never felt quite a part of his hometown scene, and this isolation and yearning is felt in every blistering moment of Path. The slow, clean build of “Bum” gives way to an absolutely crushing wall of distortion, giving just enough headroom for Kraus’ adept and feverish drumming, as well as his mangled vocals, to cut through. It is all around a unique entry into both shoegaze and experimental music at large, showing what can be done with simple tools pushed to the point of breaking. The emotional quality of this record cannot be understated, even if it cannot be fully understood. - DP

59. Protomartyr - Consolation EP (Domino)

For a band as consistent as Protomartyr, destined to put out a new collection of movingly bleak post punk every couple years, it’s remarkable that an off-year EP would be just as good as a full-length. It’s even better that the EP offers something new for the band. Containing some of their best songs to date, Consolation, recorded by R. Ring’s Mike Montgomery and featuring Kelley Deal on two of its four tracks, is at times more sad and at times more hopeful than anything the band’s ever done.

Read the rest of our review here.

58. Now, Now - Saved (Trans)

Six years after the release of the atmospheric Threads, Now, Now returned with Saved, which shifted their sound to glossy, danceable tracks that still capture some of the desperate, emo bend of the band’s previous output. That’s not to say that a sense of desperation of heightened emotions detracts from Saved. On the contrary, the album encapsulates those seemingly unquenchable feelings of desire into demands (“I want it all” on standout “MJ”) and declarations (“Don’t you know I’m desperate for you?”), giving the synth-focused music an even more commanding presence. On lead single “SGL”, KC Dalager purrs, “Give in to me.” It’s easy to slip into the slick, desire-and-devotion fueled world of Saved, so let yourself in and enjoy the ride. - LL

57. drowse - Cold Air (The Flenser)

It is hard to not draw comparisons from Droswe’s Cold Air to Have A Nice Life’s reissued classic Deathconsciousness. Themes and feelings of loss and hopelessness are carried by crushing guitars, washed out vocals, and a penchant for doom and gloom. What Cold Air excels at, however, is making this sense of dread feel so personal and connected to the artist. Kyle Bates’ ability to make sonic cacophony convey such personal pain takes his efforts just as much into the realm of Mount Eeerie as it does Have a Nice Life. This isn’t romanticizing the apocalypse--this is a real and unguarded glimpse into the personal dread of one coming back from the brink of death. - DP

56. Thalia Zedek Band - Fighting Season (Thrill Jockey)

You can run, or you can hide. You can love, or you can fight. Or, you can do both sets of both, or all of them at once. Picking your battles–that’s what Thalia Zedek’s Fighting Season is all about. Today, the struggle we all share is balancing the personal and the political, and Zedek dives right in on her latest record. Written–you guessed it–in the wake of the 2016 U.S. presidential election, the album shows a woman whose voice is weary but whose instrumental chops are ready to battle.

Read the rest of our review here.

55. The Sidekicks - Happiness Hours (Epitaph)

If you’re a fan of The Sidekicks, you’re aware of the magic that awaits in each of their albums, the joy that radiates through the crowd at one of their shows. And if you’re not in the know, someone out there is ready to share with you the virtues of the Ohio band. Their fifth album Happiness Hours glimmers and shines like a Midwest summer. Bright guitars give each song a slick, competent indie rock sheen, one you’d want to blast while walking along a sun-drenched sidewalk. But within each song are lyrics that range from tongue-in-cheek to self-deprecating, juxtaposing so well with the bounce in the music. If you don’t know The Sidekicks, take this as your call to action: go give Happiness Hours a listen and then see how many times you catch yourself recommending it to someone else. - LL

54. Skee Mask - Compro (Ilian Tape)

Similar to Objekt’s brilliant Cocoon Crush, Skee Mask’s Compro seeks to explore the intersection of dance music and ambient music. Unlike Objekt, however, Skee Mask does so by introducing and slowly unmasking more traditional forms. Break-beats and dance floor standards surface among more haunting sounds. Whereas Cocoon Crush swirls and unravels, Compro takes a veteran sensibility for rhythm and allows it to breathe and build, firmly but satisfyingly swaying between danceable cuts and soundscapes in a wholly refreshing manner. - JM

53. Olivia Chaney - Shelter (Nonesuch)

Singer, songwriter, and multi-instrumentalist Olivia Chaney takes traditional forms of music and standards and imbues them with the type of beauty that can come only from vulnerability and doubt. Shelter, her most recent album, is filled with moments, stories, and broader feelings of letting one’s guard down–whether that’s being open to embrace or being honest with yourself–and the benefits of doing so. “Bare weakness open / There hides strength,” Chaney sings on standout “IOU” over dobro riffs way bouncier compared to her normally downtempo material. That’s the essential idea behind Shelter, an album named after a word that’s got an increasingly negative connotation, whether to describe over-protection of kids or living in a sociopolitical bubble. The type of shelter Chaney sings about is a safe space where she’s supported, can admit to both her shortcomings and her “demons”, and ultimately thrive.

Read the rest of our review here.

52. Restorations - LP5000 (Tiny Engines)

Year-end lists are a great way to encapsulate achievements from the last twelve months, but they’re also a great way to look back and revisit a specific time and place. A listen to Restorations’ cheekily titled LP5000, their first album since 2014, not only shows a band refining their sound but presenting us with a portrait of this year. Punk guitars and Jon Loudon’s tender, graveled voice shine throughout each track, leaving no wasted space in the album. For a short run time, Restorations has a lot to say. It’s a concise, muscular album that clocks in at just under 30 minutes, but Restorations doesn’t need much time to cover the way neighborhoods change and gentrify (”The Red Door”, “Caretaker��), the uncharted territory of suddenly being responsible for more than yourself (”Nonbeliever”), to calling out what so many of us think as we check our phones for the twentieth time in a day: “You’re taking a sip of your coffee / Glance at your phone and you mumble, ‘I hope he dies.’”

It’s an album that commiserates, that takes the time to pull up alongside you if you want to have a conversation or would rather shout along the lyrics, a shared catharsis either way. - LL

51.  공중도둑 (Mid-Air Thief) - 무너지기 (Crumbling) (Mid-Air Thief)

South Korean artist Mid-Air Thief is the musical enigma I never expected this year. Crumbling carries a sense of psychedelia so wondrous and un-forced that wistfully carries the listener through a joyous array of synthesizers and textures. Punctuated by acoustic guitars and soft vocals, this record drifts in ways and through spaces previously untouched. A mysterious release from a seemingly unknown artist, it lends itself to the same sense of wonder explored by many Japanese artists such as Cornelius and Fishmans. Here, however, this curiosity is not tethered by collage, but rather by careful and euphoric movement through moods and spaces, keeping its palette and scope refined but always tinkered with. - DP

50. Sleep - The Sciences (Third Man)

Earlier this year, Sleep released The Sciences, their first new album in 15 years, comprised of some songs that were totally new and some that were written during the sessions for their opus Dopesmoker. But when and where Sleep tracks were born has become increasingly irrelevant since their songs thrive from losing a sense of time and place. They exist seemingly with no beginning or end. And so do the albums themselves.

Read the rest of our review here.

49. The Internet - Hive Mind (Columbia)

Hive Mind is their long-awaited follow-up to Ego Death, and it’s influenced by the aforementioned time away from home and newfound fame and acclaim. For one, Syd hands some singing duties over to Lacy. While previously, especially live, she seemed shy over the course of a full album or show, here, she takes full advantage of the songs she sings, showing off a shiny swagger. Both Syd and Lacy hand over production lead to Christopher Allan Smith. What results is a great album because everyone sounds fresh. The band is wise without being weathered.

Read the rest of our review here.

48. Marisa Anderson - Cloud Corner (Thrill Jockey)

Marisa Anderson’s Thrill Jockey debut Cloud Corner reminds me of something Red River Dialect’s David Morris said to me earlier this year: “Relaxation is a form of growing.” Inspired less by the nihilist expanse of Ennio Morricone scores and more by the necessary buoyancy of Tuareg desert blues, Cloud Corner acts not just as a safety net for Anderson but replenishment during a time of political chaos.

Read the rest of our review here.

47. Half Waif - Lavender (Cascine)

Listening to Lavender, the new album by Half Waif, it’s hard to believe the album is less than 40 minutes long. A bold, maximal, exhausting, and ultimately brilliant affair, Lavender was created by Nandi Rose Plunkett, Adan Carlo, and Zack Levine, all at one point in Pinegrove. Plunkett’s voice and lyrics are centerfold. The album’s title refers to lavender that her grandmother, 95 years old at the time the album was written (and now deceased), would pick and boil. Naturally, the album’s about aging and collapse–of people, of relationships, of the United States of America.

Read the rest of our review here.

46. Bettye Lavette - Things Have Changed (Verve)

On Things Have Changed, LaVette doesn’t just cover lesser-known songs. She covers some of Dylan’s arguably weakest material and makes it her own. Appearances by Keith Richards and Trombone Shorty don’t matter. This album is all LaVette.

Read the rest of our review here.

45. Parquet Courts - Wide Awake! (Rough Trade)

A punk album you can dance to: It’s not a novel idea or even always a good one, but Parquet Courts have made that and more with their latest Wide Awake! With none other than Danger Mouse producing, the band has made a spiritual if not entirely aesthetic sibling to albums like There’s A Riot Goin’ On and Maggot Brain, one that combines their usual biting, witty, and respectful social commentary with heartfelt personal stories. It’s their greatest achievement yet.

Read the rest of our review here.

44. Ruston Kelly - Dying Star (Rounder)

“How the hell do I return to normal / If I'm always ending up flat on my back?”

Ruston Kelly has been through hell, and Dying Star is his document of that time, from overdose to his “return to normal.” For someone who’s made a career out of writing songs for other artists, Dying Star is Kelly’s most focused and refined effort so far, offering sharply painted portraits of addiction and heartbreak. It’s the album of an artist who has been to the brink and stared down the options on either side of a thin line.

Inspired by outlaw lyricists, there is no charm in Kelly’s depictions of drug use and the destruction that so often follows, but there is emotion deep in each track, and even humor (see “Faceplant”). A masterful storyteller, Kelly’s album ultimately celebrates survival and the emergence of a songwriter exorcising his own demons. And if that wasn’t enough to get you to listen, Kelly shows off his figure skating skills (yes, really, he once trained in the sport) in the video for the haunting “Son of a Highway Daughter”. - LL

43. Damien Jurado - The Horizon Just Laughed (Secretly Canadian)

The horizon laughs at Damien Jurado on a song where he illustrates a time he considered ending his life. “The clock is a murderer / My time is her burden,” he sings on the incredible “The Last Great Washington State” on his gorgeous The Horizon Just Laughed. It’s true–everybody dies. But Jurado wants to be there for his own death. “What good is living if you can’t write your ending?” he sings. A move from the Pacific Northwest to California has stirred up a lot in Jurado’s mind while simultaneously spurring some of the breeziest Laurel Canyon or 70s AM radio pop he’s ever made.

Read the rest of our review here.

42. Bonny Doon - Longwave (Woodsist)

The songs of Longwave are heartfelt but lighthearted. There is a personal and relatable touch that accompanies it’s 10 track tenure. “A Lotta Things” explores of sense of personal shortcoming, a desire to shirk one’s responsibilities and expectations. But it is held together by an almost sarcastic quality that keeps it from veering into overtly moody territory (“I’m faking my own death, so I can get some rest”). “I Am Here (I Am Alive)” borrows from David Berman’s sonic frontier while maintaining its own sense of brooding and listlessness. “Where Do You Go?” captures and grounds this listlessness with more anecdotes of youthful daydreaming. The way Longwave winds down with a slowed down version of “Try to Be”’s playful riff is a fitting closer to an album whose aim seems to be to wander. - DP

41. Hop Along - Bark Your Head Off, Dog (Saddle Creek)

Listening to Bark Your Head Off, Dog, the incredible new album from Hop Along, I can’t help but wonder how in the hell lead singer Frances Quinlan has the time to think about all she does. Like all of us in this day and age, she wrestles with the idea that even though everyone dies, it’s important to have empathy for those with a harder road to the eventual endpoint. But that’s not where Quinlan’s mind stops. As everyone else broadly analyzes the tale of Cain and Abel, she wonders what their childhood relationship was like. As everyone is aghast at the state of Arkansas rushing lethal injections before the drug reaches its expiration date, Quinlan thinks about the vacation of the judge who presided over the decision. As a songwriter, she’s able to focus on individual events as representative of something larger. Her illustration of her formative experiences causes her to reflect on those of others, and likewise, us on our own.

Read the rest of our review here.

40. Screaming Females - All At Once (Don Giovanni)

I never would have seen All At Once coming from Screaming Females. Three years ago, they traded the Steve Albini-produced punk of Ugly for the Matt Bayles-addled plodding sludge of Rose Mountain. The results were predictable. However, working again with Bayles, generally more known for his work on post-rock, post-hardcore, and metalcore albums, has provided the band to establish a flourishing relationship with the producer. Marissa Paternoster and company have made an album that’s the perfect sonic manifestation of her anxieties and obsessions, each song essential and traversing a different style.

Read the rest of our review here.

39. Glenn Jones -  The Giant Who Ate Himself and Other New Works for 6 & 12 String Guitar (Thrill Jockey)

Glenn Jones communicates through his guitar, and never more so than on The Giant Who Ate Himself and Other New Works for 6 & 12 String Guitar. Recorded in New Jersey with Laura Baird and engineer Matthew Avezado, it’s an album that’s at times buoyant and at times melancholy but always transparent. Jones’ strings vibrate on the opening title track, alternating between major and minor chords. The instrument and the medium is just as important as the stories themselves. The arpeggio guitar lines with Flamenco flourishes on “Everything Ends”, the dissonance of the swaying “The Was and The Is”, the blues picking of “Even the Snout and the Tail”–for much of the record, Jones is coming up with contemporary standards.

Read the rest of our review here.

38. YOB - Our Raw Heart (Relapse)

YOB lead singer Mike Scheidt suffered an intestinal disease that threatened his very presence on this earth, let alone during the making of the band’s new album Our Raw Heart. Hearing the album, you’d think it was recorded after recovery when Scheidt was so thankful to be alive he couldn’t help but shout to the heavens. That it was recorded during his time of turmoil only makes the record more life affirming.

Read the rest of our review here.

37. The Field - Infinite Moment (Kompakt)

I was lucky enough to see German producer The Field perform 2 months ago. A night of house music and friends was a well needed break from the scenes I typically find myself in. I recall an energy in the room, a sort of joy typically found on the dancefloor. When The Field began his set, the eerie, distant vocals of “Made of Steel. Made of Stone” might have brought this energy to a halt. But the moodiness of these infinitely stretched notes took the energy of the room and seemed to crystalize it. Infinite Moment could not be a more apt title for this record--I saw its captivating hypnosis take effect on a room full of club-goers. The dancing didn’t cease; it just felt suspended in time. Throughout his set and throughout Infinite Moment, there is a persistent feeling of moodiness, an intangible emotion that is preserved indefinitely, reverberating through the record’s 65 minutes. It’s a worthwhile journey, and one that asks the listener to surrender to peace. - DP

36. U.S. Girls - In A Poem Unlimited (4AD)

The 6th album from musician Meghan Remy as U.S. Girls is a self-described protest, like lots of her other work, but it’s an unlikely funky one. On In A Poem Unlimited, the experimental pop artist recorded with a live band and worked with co-producer Steve Chahley (Neko Case) to make a record that takes just as much from Parliament/Funkadelic and Sly & The Family Stone as it does art rock, tackling the power of patriarchal institutions and lauding the women fighting for some share of the power. But it also notably sympathizes with the everyday struggles women experience without wallowing, using its instrumentation as a celebration for a changing moment in time. It’s fitting that In A Poem Unlimited came out right after so many powerful men have finally faced the consequences of their actions because it dares to be joyous despite all reasons for despair.

Read the rest of our review here.

35. Let’s Eat Grandma - I’m All Ears (Transgressive)

I can’t help but think that the vitriol over the band name Let’s Eat Grandma has had a little to do with the fact that the music comes from two teenage girls. Sure, to some, the band name is the type of phrase that’s often followed with “that should be a band name,” but a simple Google search reveals that the phrase is often used as an example of why commas are important. It’s a tongue-in-cheek move made by the duo of Jenny Hollingworth and Rosa Walton, who have followed up their debut I, Gemini with I’m All Ears, an assured album of “experimental sludge pop”. Despite amazing production from Faris Badwan, SOPHIE, and David Wrench, the album is undeniably the duo’s. Its sequencing is perhaps the best of any album all year–it gets better as it goes along. The album itself follows many of its best songs; it starts cautiously and becomes ominous. And it couldn’t have been made by anybody but these two girls.

Read the rest of our review here.

34. Soccer Mommy - Clean (Fat Possum)

Sophie Allison’s debut Clean wraps you up in its world completely, with both its lyrics and warm guitar tones. It’s an album filled with anecdotes that feel personal and universal, the reflections and musings of a young woman navigating relationships of all kinds. It’s revelatory and familiar, soft and angular. Take the opening images of “Still Clean” and the way Allison positions dipping a bloody maw into clear water. Lyrically, the album vacillates between ”I don’t want to be your fucking dog” and “I wanna be the one who makes your stomach tied”, but it doesn’t reflect indecision. Rather, Allison captures what so many of us know so well, whether we’re in our early twenties or beyond: Our desires and relationships are never so simple, but always valid. There’s never a clear answer to the why of it all, but the album’s centerpiece, “Scorpio Rising”, seems to settle on the idea that experience and the chaos that is the universe and genetics might help explain some of it away: “And I’m just a victim of changing planets / My Scorpio rising and my parents.” That this is Soccer Mommy’s official debut can only bode well for the musician’s future output. - LL

33. Culture Abuse - Bay Dream (Epitaph)

Culture Abuse aren’t just a band. They’re a community, they’re on a mission, and their live shows are raucous indoctrinations into their world. Like their Bandcamp bio says, they’re definitely a good time, and Bay Dream’s sunniness feels like a drive down a coastal highway with salt-sprayed air flowing through open windows.

A little less aggressive than their debut Peach, Bay Dream comes in with a stoned, fuzzy optimism that ripples through each track. A song like “Bee Kind to the Bugs” might not work if frontman David Kelling and the rest of the band weren’t so damn earnest. A lyric like “S'why I like you around /' Cause you make me feel good” might not land without a hook, but Culture Abuse’s confidence shines. It’s an album I found myself turning to throughout the year, one that added a little bounce and ray of joy to a monotonous commute or even another rough news day. While Peach was an introduction to the world of Culture Abuse, Bay Dream feels more like is its manifesto. - LL

32. Playboi Carti - Die Lit (AWGE/Interscope)

2 years ago, before Playboi Carti’s debut commercial release, there existed only a small string of Soundcloud tracks to his name. There was an insatiable desire from fans to hear more; I recall playing “Broke Boi” on near-constant repeat. Its simple, airy beat and unending barrage of ad-libs, broken up only by a simple refrain, was so effective and perfect. Carti plays to these strengths--simplicity, energy, and raw confidence, paired with perfectly complementary beat selection--on Die Lit. Much of the production is handled by frequent collaborator P’ierre Bourne, who’s refreshing take on modern rap production has been making huge waves in the past couple years. The most important quality of Die Lit, though, is its completely unrelenting momentum. The beats are unendingly fun, and when Carti is done playing with a track, it moves right forward to more of the same sugar-high. Its frequent comparisons to punk are apt but reductive--the energy and ethos are there, but what Carti accomplishes on Die Lit is unique and a welcome entry in one of the strangest years for hip hop in awhile. Between its never ending joy and a long list of rap’s finest collaborators, Die Lit does so much with such simple terms. - DP

31. Emma Ruth Rundle - On Dark Horses (Sargent House)

To say that misery makes great art is all too fetishistic. Emma Ruth Rundle has made an incredible album about love, creativity, pain, and trauma all at once. Inspired by everything from her past experiences with substance abuse to her move to Louisville and musical and life partnership with Jaye Jayle’s Evan Patterson, Rundle and her collaborators (Patterson, bassist Todd Cook, drummer Dylan Nadon, recording artist Kevin Ratterman) turned On Dark Horses, her third studio album, into a crash, burn, and come out stronger emotional affair. They thrust you in the middle of her head-space on “Fever Dreams”, its bluesy, creepy guitars, keys, and drums starting like the song’s been going on for hours. “Release me away from fever dreams,” Rundle asks, knowing full well her confusion will not subside, as the song slows down in the middle to allow space for swirling, noisy, psychedelic riffs.

Read the rest of our review here.

30. Odetta Hartman - Old Rockhounds Never Die (Memphis Industries/Northern Spy)

Produced by her partner Jack Inslee, who combines beats and field recordings to give Hartman’s tales a sense of space, time, and place, Rockhounds is an album of clear, disparate elements that somehow combine beautifully. I’m not talking about the mere echo on the banjos of the opening track. More like the electronic percussion and static of “Cowboy Song” mirroring her foggy memories of riding a train from San Francisco to Chicago with a real cowboy, remembering his tales of people he met. It’s the unexpected dissonant violins and vocal entrances of the whispered “Widow’s Peak”, originally a studio mistake but resulting in a sense of spontaneity. Or the drifting instrumental autoharp interlude of “Auto”, the stainless steel bowl instrumental “Freedom”, even the electronic beat of “Sweet Teeth” that couldn’t be aesthetically further from the limber banjo picking. 

Read the rest of our review here.

29. Mint Field - Pasar de las Luces (Innovative Leisure)

Sure, Pasar De Las Luces is ripe to be described as ethereal, nostalgic, Interpol-meets-Low–whatever. That’s all true. But a track like “Club de Chicas” separates them from the standard descriptors, starting slow with an echo on the snare and building up to a high-speed pop chase and exhaling back to stasis. In a sense, Pasar De Las Luces–translated to “Passing Through the Lights”–is really an album that encapsulates constant movement and texture, always advancing, always there.

Read the rest of our review here.

28. Wild Pink - Yolk in the Fur (Tiny Engines)

You know Yolk in the Fur is going to be unlike anything Wild Pink has ever made from the first breathy synthesizers. “Burger Hill” is a shift in aesthetic for the Brooklyn band who makes some sort of variation on heartland rock. What remains is their specificity, the sense of time and place that an equally expansive band like The War On Drugs only has on one or two songs. Singer John Ross, looking down, describes the setting as being in a “prenatal snow globe.” The image is layered and loaded–a scene in a life, neatly packaged and edited before it even starts. Throughout Yolk in the Fur, it seems like Ross no longer needs to make snow globes out of things that are infinite. “I woke up too fast from a dream,” he sings later on “Burger Hill”, starting his journey to accept the boundlessness of life.

Read the rest of our review here.

27. The Beths - Future Me Hates Me (Carpark)

You might think an album called Future Me Hates Me would be sadsack and self-aggrandizing. But like the title track from which it takes its name, it’s instead a tongue-in-cheek look at contemporary relationship anxiety. It also knows when to turn the sincerity on and off. New Zealand’s The Beths, jazz-trained musicians who play crunchy guitar pop punk, have delivered an instrumentally explosive and confident debut filled with harmonies, hooks, and feeling.

Read the rest of our review here.

26. Eric Chenaux - Slowly Paradise (Constellation)

Paris-via-Canada guitarist Eric Chenaux has given us his most confident, at ease, and best record with Slowly Paradise. Usually solitary, this time around, Chenaux teamed up with Ryan Driver to write the lyrics that sit atop his gorgeous compositions. He recorded it with Cyril Harrison behind the boards (Sandro Perri is credited with engineering work), and the results are as cohesive as they are adventurous.

Read the rest of our review here.

25. Eli Keszler - Stadium (Shelter Press)

The tone and melody of the synthesizers on “The Driver Stops”, a standout track from Eli Keszler’s latest album Stadium, recalls a film noir or mystery. That’s funny, because Keszler’s sonics cause similar quizzical reactions. Even if there’s a video of him playing it all live, Stadium yields the most “How did he do that?”s per minute. He plays his instruments live but uses Sensory Percussion drum software, and so the balance between control and randomness is vulnerable and ambiguous. Nonetheless, he’s managed to create a cohesive album of sounds inspired by his move to Manhattan--lots of randomness, little control--and specifically his East Village apartment. Some of the tracks, like “Measurement Doesn’t Change the System at All” and “Flying Floor for U.S. Airways”, feature buoyant jazzy snare rolls and ripples of one-off high-pitched synthesizer tone, anchored only by perhaps a steady bass line. No matter what, there’s always anxiety. Queasy Mellotron pervades “Lotus Awnings”, and the relentless plinking on “Which Swarms Around It” render the calming cymbals neutralized. Stadium is ironically named--it’s the huge soundtrack for living alone, together, for city commutes and unit isolation, where you do your best to drown out the noise but ultimately accept its inevitability. - Jordan Mainzer

24. Lucy Dacus - Historian (Matador)

“The first time I tasted somebody else’s spit, I had a coughing fit,” begins Lucy Dacus’ great new album Historian. You assume she’s talking about a first kiss only until the next line: “I mistakenly called them by your name.” It sets up an album that messes with your interpretation of time and space, about everything from her breakup with the abusive former bassist of her band, the death of her grandmother, and the loss of her Christian identity. Dacus, in preparation for a new record more ambitious in scope than her debut No Burden (1 track but 12 minutes longer) read epic novels. You can hear it in the complexity of the instrumentation, like on the 7-minute “Pillars of Truth”, and in the constant change of point of view or addressee. Sometimes, as on “Addictions”, she talks to herself. Other times, she chastises or admires others. The whole record is, to an extent, funny and self-deprecating. It’s mostly self-aware.

Read the rest of our review here.

23. Drug Church - Cheer (Pure Noise)

"At least there’s some self in self-destruction,” vocalist Patrick Kindlon sings on “Foam Pit”, one of many songs on Drug Church’s Cheer that chides corporatism and individualism. Like the best songs from Pissed Jeans or KEN Mode, Cheer is a self-hating, sarcastic, satirical take on the fragile masculinity present in both the economically oppressed and the oppressor. Opener “Grubby” hilariously decries both adult male children and the scumbags with “handshakes and lies” in their pockets. “There’s a guy with a search history darker than a sea trench,” Kindlon sings on “Unlicensed Hall Monitor”, the title character a perfect metaphor for undeserved power tripping. Sure, Kindlon shows some sympathy--the twinkling “Strong References” recalls his experience being pushed to uncomfortable situations as a male model, and “Weed Pin” is call to increase the minimum wage--but for the most part, the chugging hardcore punk perfectly complements the bratty nature of the subjects he inherits. “If you live long enough, you’ll do something wrong enough,” he sings on “Unlicensed Guidance Counselor” before describing crimes that, well, most people don’t commit. “Conflict Minded”’s illustration of selfishness, while on the surface level exaggerated, hits close to home. “Leave your Sentra in the tow lane / Take off from your brother’s wedding / Pull the plug on mom days early / This is your window, don’t you blow it,” Kindlon chants. If you don’t have that guy in your family or aren’t perpetually ashamed by narcissists in positions of power, Drug Church make it at least easy to empathize with their victims. - JM

22. Eartheater - IRISIRI (PAN)

What makes us human, and what makes us individuals? These admittedly unanswerable questions are at the center of IRISIRI, the third album for Queens-based multi-instrumentalist/vocalist Alexandra Drewchin as Eartheater. On the record, Drewchin combines voice--both her three-octave chords, live guests, and sampled chatter from humans--with electronics, to blur the lines between technology and the self. Despite her vocal talents, much of Drewchin’s singing is less stunningly operatic or beautiful and more imperfect and at times cacophonous, contrasting the beatific harp strumming on “Peripheral” and the bouncing hip-hop beat on “Inkling”. But despite who’s voice is at the helm, Drewchin’s lyrical wordplay furthers her aims. “OS In Vitro” juxtaposes “computer” with “you can’t compute her,” while on video-only release “Claustra”, Drewchin alternates between “the owning of my loneliness” and “the end of the loaning of my onliness,” cementing a non-ideal state like being alone as the more personal aim than the ideal companionship. Appropriately, despite star turns from Odwalla1221′s Chloe Maratta and the ever-dominant Moor Mother, IRISIRI is unequivocally Drewchin’s statement of self. “Nobody’s looking” repeats a collection of ambiguous, pitch-shifted voices on “Slyly Child”. But for Drewchin, it doesn’t matter who looks or who doesn’t. She’s there; are you willing to listen? -JM

21. Makaya McCraven - Universal Beings (International Anthem)

Universal Beings opens with chatter. Usually, on an album it’s a gimmick, a thematically forced insertion of a document of capital “a” Artists at work. “A Queen’s Intro”, however, is crowd talk before a performance, introducing the various levels of dialogue at work within Makaya McCraven’s defining album to date. The band players–in this case, cellist Tomeka Reid, bassist Dezron Douglas, vibraphonist Joel Ross, and harpist Brandee Younger–are in collaboration, improvising off of each other. There’s also a level of interaction between band and audience, though, and it’s a fitting introduction to an album that McCraven wished to break down barriers between “scenes” that can often be too academic, insular, and exclusive, whether in terms of social status, class, race, or gender. Launching into a decidedly old school hip hop beat and removing yet another barrier–genre–McCraven and company are ready to go to work.

Read the rest of our review here.

20. Tony Molina - Kill The Lights (Slumberland)

Got a 20 minute commute but still want to listen to a full album? Like power pop? Kill The Lights is for you. Tony Molina’s latest is not just a collection of fantastic spurts of ideas. I haven’t heard an album with this much emotion and style conveyed in such little time since Joyce Manor’s Never Hungover Again. The influences are all over the board--Molina favorite The Beatles on “Now That She’s Gone” and “When She Leaves”, jangly college rock on the melancholy “Give He Take You”, Nico’s “These Days” on the fingerpicked “Wrong Town”--but it’s the combination of the concision of Guided By Voices and the sweets of Big Star that makes Kill The Lights sound so classic. On “Look Inside Your Mind/Losin’ Touch”, Molina crams in two songs, organ-led pop to folk, with a guitar solo and piano outro to boot. The final track, the instrumental “Outro”, combines country-esque twang with baroque piano pop. You can’t help but wonder that if Molina packs this much in a 14 minute opus, does he have an epic in him? But then you realize that Kill The Lights is perfect as is. - JM

19. Laurel Halo - Raw Silk Uncut Wood (Latency)

A departure from previous efforts for the revered Hyperdub label, Raw Silk Uncut Wood is somehow more grounded than Laurel Halo’s dancefloor cuts. This comes through both in instrumentation from Oliver Coates and Eli Kezsler (previous collaborator and uniquely frantic percussion virtuoso), but also in the path these pieces take.These tracks are unfractured, moving forward and building in ways that are both calming and fulfilling. Raw Silk Uncut Wood is a record built upon a generous amount of space, allowing Halo’s excellent sense of texture and composition to take the reins. - DP

18. Rival Consoles - Persona (Erased Tapes)

The new album from Rival Consoles, Persona, is purportedly inspired by Ingmar Bergman’s film of the same name, but such context is not necessary. Persona is very much an album to experience in the present moment. Its use of analogue-heavy synthesizers, acoustic and electric instruments, and effects pedals toy with perception, space, light, and darkness. In listening to it, you experience emotions ranging from melancholy to joy, and for that, it’s complex in its parts but simple in its sum.

Read the rest of our review here.

17. Camp Cope - How to Socialise & Make Friends (Run for Cover)

With anger, earth-shattering power, and empathy, Camp Cope decry selfish and self-obsessed men, call out sexism in the music industry, and lift each other up--and that’s just in Track 1. “The Opener” is lead singer Georgia “Maq” McDonald’s simultaneous look back on her former relationship with The Smith Street Band’s Wil Wagner, who always tried to one-up her with his laments, and her rallying cry for inclusion. “It’s another man telling us we’re missing a frequency / Show ‘em, Kelly!” Maq screams, inviting bassist Kelly-Dawn Hellmrich to show off her bass chops, bucking tradition for something slinkier, rawer, and better. Recorded in 2.5 days, Camp Cope’s How to Socialise & Make Friends is a melancholic, yet inspiring statement of female empowerment and togetherness. “The Face of God” is Maq’s tale of sexual assault that illustrates a thought process all-too-common among victims, unforgivably due to a culture of toxic masculinity: It can’t be, his music is too good. Ultimately, the band do their part to combat it--“Your voice is loud in my goddamn head, boy,” Maq sings on “Animal & Real”--but also find a common humanity in good people, in the man filling a gas tank on Christmas day, in Maq’s mother who doesn’t like her tattoos, and in her late father who died from complications from prostate cancer. The last story is told on acoustic tearjerker closer “I’ve Got You”. “I’ve got you / You’ve got me, too,” Maq declares to her father, but also to anyone who supports her and each other. - JM

16. Petal - Magic Gone (Run for Cover)

Honesty is a word and a concept we seem to throw around these days, but it can save your life. Magic Gone documents a moment for Kiley Lotz, the artist behind Petal, where coming to terms with her own queerness and mental health comes to a head. But it’s that release, that moment of honesty and acceptance, that can change everything for the better, that can mean survival. “Will they love me if I am honest?” Lotz asks on “Carve”.  It’s not just a document of a moment of reckoning for Lotz, but further cements Petal as a songwriter with a knack for poetry in lyrics and gentle, sometimes stark instrumentation that builds a world for those words to live. Take album closer “Stardust”, which begins with a sole, lilting piano that frames Kiley’s clear voice as the song builds. Though the song deals with the strangeness of falling out of love, there’s a sense of hope in the way the final line “I can’t say I didn’t love you,” repeats as guitars crash, only to give way to that same lone piano. - LL

15. Foxing - Nearer My God (Triple Crown)

Foxing has always been able to distill that apocalyptic feeling into their music, taking moments that seem small on the outside and making them monumental. Nearer My God is an expansion on the same idea. Named for the hymn that also soundtracks the dystopian doomsday video CNN was set to play at the literal end of the world, Foxing seem to take everything they can grab and push the limits of just how much one album can hold while not only remaining cohesive but remaining so purely Foxing, too. To simply call it ambitious feels like an understatement.

First single “Slapstick” eased listeners into this new soundscape, offering an approachable and familiar sound, horns coming in towards the end, always a highlight to a live show. But you can find almost every genre within the tracks of the album: Conor Murphy’s R&B-tinged falsetto on multiple tracks, near trap beats, the proggy chaos of “Gameshark”, the absolute shredding guitar solo in “Lich Prince”, and the wait-are-those-bagpipes?-yes-those-are-bagpipes climax of “Bastardizer”. That’s just a start, and to dive into the lyrics of the album would take much more space than this review.

Ever evolving, Foxing has made a statement with Nearer My God, taking the raw emotion fans know and stretching it with finesse. The apocalypse never sounded so foreboding, so danceable, and so damn good. - LL

14. SOPHIE - OIL OF EVERY PEARL’s UN-INSIDES (Transgressive/Future Classic)

The title of SOPHIE’s debut album is an alternate way of spelling “I love every person’s insides,” a sentiment that pervades the stunning release. First hinted at in 2017 with the release of “It’s Okay To Cry”, the first SOPHIE song to feature her own vocals and image and reveal she is living as a trans woman, OIL OF EVERY PEARL’s UN-INSIDES is a showcase of sexual liberation and aggression and a celebration of individuality. The maximalist production and soulful vocals from Calia Thompson-Hannant, aka Cecile Believe (fka Mozart’s Sister) of BDSM anthem “Ponyboy” propels the album into a sort of ironically synthesized humanity. The pitch-shifted vocals on “Infatuation” become a moving falsetto, and the chopped and screwed singing on “Not Okay” are grounded in comparison to the alien crunch of the instrumentation. But the album peaks at the cheerleader chant of “Immaterial”. “Without my legs or my hair / Without my genes or my blood / With no name and with no type of story / Where do I live?” sings Thompson-Hannant. The answer? Everywhere, as long as there are people who love people. - JM

13. Earl Sweatshirt - Some Rap Songs (Tan Cressida/Columbia)

Earl Sweatshirt has so long been mired by a mystique stemming from young stardom and talent that, for better or worse, has been hard to shake. And though we seem to have been granted glimpses into his true self on previous records, his greatest achievement to date, Some Rap Songs, leans fully and perfectly into the haze that surrounds his persona. His tongue-in-cheek wordplay and seemingly effortless delivery have drawn comparisons to the likes of Madvillainy. But the likeness is thin--Earl’s aim is not simply to toy with language and meter. There is an intangible but ever present mood that dangles in front of you through all 24 minutes of Some Rap Songs. Fractured jazz samples and static make up a wall of mist, with Earl peeking through for brief but brilliant nuggets of wisdom and personal anecdotes. - DP

12. Low - Double Negative (Sub Pop)

BJ Burton strikes again. Though he worked with Low on Ones and Sixes, it was this year’s Double Negative that was a true radical shift in sound for the band. Thematically, it’s inspired by everything from an injury Sparhawk suffered to the band members justifying their religion with liberal thought and today’s political world. But a sense of sadness, as always, presents itself through the stunning atmosphere. Alan Sparhawk’s voice oscillates, barely audible on the hissing “Quorum”, thumping “Dancing And Blood”, and whirring “Tempest”. Mimi Parker cries on the shimmering “Fly” and hymnal “Always Up”. But it’s “Always Trying To Work It Out” that actually combines the old and the new. Over a pseudo-hip hop beat and angular, warbling guitar, the two’s auto-tuned vocals flourish over a bed of swirling noise that could find itself on a previous record like The Great Destroyer. Looking back and looking forward, Low march on. - JM

11. Young Fathers - Cocoa Sugar (Ninja Tune)

With Cocoa Sugar, Young Fathers become cleaner and more accessible, but they want you to know it’s of their own volition. “Don’t you turn my brown eyes blue,” they sing on “Turn”, a song on an album about celebrating who you are in the face of people wanting you to change. Recorded in their studio, Young Fathers this time around opted for something both mellower and bigger than they’ve ever done, and the result is something immensely personal. “Tremolo my soul,” they chant over snares, hand percussion, and 808 pops. In other words, they crave the ups and downs of real life. “I’ve never seen wicked ones face their fears / Yet I’ve always seen brave men filled with tears,” goes opener “See How” on which dissonance contrasts with steady percussion and a hopeful gospel choir. Honesty and embracing oneself is way more difficult than self-deception, but it pays off. On closer “Picking You”, the trio add another element of Scottish music to their grime-influenced sound: bagpipes and drum rolls. If “good men are strange” and “bad men are obvious,” Young Fathers would take strange any day. - JM

10. Pusha T - Daytona (G.O.O.D. Music/Def Jam)

“I’m top 5″, Pusha T claims in the first words in the first verse of “What Would Meek Do?” He’s always been a braggadocio--this time, that’s not enough. On Daytona, Pusha crosses the line with unparalleled lyrical dexterity. Setting himself up with a couple tracks where--what else--he talks about his history hustling, he goes so far as to be thankful for addiction. On “Come Back Baby”, producer Kanye West starts with a sample of “The Truth Shall Make You Free” by The Mighty Hannibal (a song lamenting addiction) before Pusha reveals how much he makes off of dope. Even the album art--a photo of Whitney Houston’s bathroom taken after she died--is tasteless.

And then there’s “Infrared”, which has now infamously set off a chain of events wherein Pusha claimed Drake uses a ghostwriter, Drake responded with a lame freestyle, and Pusha annihilated him in “The Story of Adidon”, wherein he, among other things, said Drake fathered a child with a porn star (true) and makes fun of Noah “40″ Shebib’s Multiple Sclerosis. Even if “Adidon” were a part of Daytona, the album would still be the most eviscerating listen of the year in less than 30 minutes. Pusha didn’t even need to say he’s top 5. - JM

9. DJ Koze - Knock Knock (Pampa)

Perhaps not since this very site’s namesake has an album reached such sample-based bliss as DJ Koze’s Knock Knock. While The Avalanches’ opus was a crate digger’s paradise, Koze’s source material ranges from the familiar to the recognizable but still manages to make something entirely new out of it. Bon Iver’s voice is twisted over tropical techno thumps on “Bonfire”, while Gladys Knight provides equal parts sorrow and soul over immortal club anthem “Pick Up”. You’ve got Kurt Wagner’s trademark vocoder singing on “Muddy Funster” and Roisin Murphy’s wailing on the propulsive “Illumination” and growling “Scratch That”. But perhaps the most appropriate sample is on “Planet Hase”. Over skittering hi hats and hand claps, Koze takes dialogue from a documentary about Alzheimer’s in which someone pontificates on the need for music and art in achieving scientific breakthroughs. When we pay attention to the physicality of music and what it conjures within ourselves, we can achieve a sort of nirvana, argues Koze on the finest album of his career. - JM

8. Ovlov - Tru (Exploding In Sound)

For many, the expectations for Tru were uniquely immense. Ovlov’s cult status in the world of fuzzed out indie rock--rightfully earned through the adored AM--had left fans daydreaming of more from Steve Hartlett’s songwriting camp. And though the 5 year span has been punctuated by break ups and releases from the Hartlett-fronted Stove, we long awaited the signature blissed out wall of warm guitars and strained, yearning vocals that are unique to Ovlov. From the opening chords of “Baby Alligator”, Tru is a welcome invitation to experience a band’s unique sonic footprint, re-imagined through a matured sense of songwriting. Whereas AM explored a set of themes and icons or characters, Tru feels more obviously personal. Hartlett touches upon feelings of self-care and relationships, as he did in AM, but now with less of a sense of guardedness. You can always tell when he sings about himself and those around him, but the themes and references feel less obtuse. The band’s sonic palette is taken in more varied directions as well, from the screeching harmonics of “Half Way Fine” to the start-stop wail of “Stick”. Tru’s well-crafted blend of loud 90’s indie worship, shoegaze, and punk solidifies Ovlov’s place in the modern indie circuit. - DP

7. Janelle Monae - Dirty Computer (Atlantic)

Though not technically part of her collection of “android” albums, Janelle Monae’s Dirty Computer takes the theme of human vs robot to a head and adds sexuality to the mix. “Text message God up in the sky / Oh, if you love me, won’t you please reply?” Monae begs on the opener and title track. She struggles with embracing religion because of what many major religions have to say about non-straight people (Monae is pansexual), so Monae realizes that she has no choice but to love her self. “Crazy, Classic, Life” is a thumping anthem to queer black pride, while “Django Jane” is an all-rapped ode to her amazing accomplishments. Her message back is “accept me for who I am,” yes, but its her double entendre-laden ode to her own sexuality in which she finds power. “You fucked the world up now,” she sings on “Screwed”, before declaring, “We’ll fuck it all back down.” Of course, there’s “Pynk”, the Grimes-featuring, finger-snapping gem of a power pop song with a legendary video, that’s a tribute to the vagina, but over the course of Dirty Computer, Monae finds many different ways to say that whether or not our orientations are coded into our DNA, love is love. - JM

6. Objekt - Cocoon Crush (PAN)

An artist solidly known for his bold exploration of techno, Objekt now takes a plunge into a new kind of ethereal beauty on Cocoon Crush. A foray into ambient music, Objekt subverts a lot of what we have come to expect from him. The line between digital and analog is smeared. Tracks are ungrounded, punctuated still by percussion and synthesizers, but in patterns and textures that materialize in mysterious ways. And just as they appear, they stutter and morph in ways unexpected to the listener. The cold machinations of the dancefloor are still present; they are just stretched and masked in exciting and rewarding ways. - DP 

5. Kacey Musgraves - Golden Hour (MCA Nashville)

We like Kacey Musgraves at SILY and included her last album Pageant Material as one of 2015’s best. So what is it about her that makes us continue to return to her music? With this year’s Golden Hour, she takes a step beyond her tongue-in-cheek takes on small town country living and branches out with a gorgeous collection of songs that look inward. It’s a bit of a “What does it all mean?” album, and Musgraves takes her time with each track, as she says on shimmering opener “Slow Burn”: “Old soul waiting my turn / I know a few things but I still got a lot to learn”. That’s not to say that she leaves that broad, hazy question completely unanswered. There’s her LSD-induced meditation on family on the minute-long “Mother”, or the gentle wonder she conveys at her surroundings on “Oh, What a World”, which sees the use of vocoder, adding another dimension to her “Spacey Kacey” nickname.

That’s not to say her knack for wordplay and tweaking tropes has faded to the background. It’s sharper here. Golden Hour shines a light on a disco ball during “High Horse” and heightens the timelessness of a “classic in the wrong way” fake John Wayne. “Space Cowboy” dares you to not crack a smile at the pause between the title’s two-word phrase as she tenderly sings, “You can have your space, cowboy”.

Yes, Golden Hour is a Kacey Musgraves album through and through, and the title encapsulates its themes so well: that flash of ethereal color in the sky, one that we can all see if we just take a moment to look up and savor it. - LL

4. Mitski - Be The Cowboy (Dead Oceans)

Mitski has found strength in the mythology of the Old West. Her latest album Be The Cowboy sees her wishing to embody the confident spirit of the title character in order to find her strength in music and relationships. Co-produced by Patrick Hyland, the album, like Puberty 2, is concerned with the body, and Mitski’s decision to replace guitars with synths allows her to feel empowered through dancing. She feels wanted on “Nobody”, and while she’s dependent on an ex in “Why Didn’t You Stop Me?”, the disco beat of the song steadies her. “Toss your dirty shoes in my washing machine heart,” she begs on the bouncy “Washing Machine Heart”, constantly finding new and humorous ways to sing about emotional baggage.

Read the rest of our review here.

3. Saba - CARE FOR ME (Saba Pivot)

Saba’s CARE FOR ME gained prominence as a tribute to the Chicago rapper’s late cousin John Walt, but it’s also a personal record about being a young black man in America. Over warbling synthesizers and minimal, cloudy production perfect for storytelling, Saba alternates between raw stream of consciousness and meticulously arranged poetry to tell his story. Walt’s death, dealing with depression, anxieties about sex, and fear of police are some of the many themes that bookend the record. On “BUSY / SIRENS”, he raps, “Sirens on the way / Now you’re laying where the angels lay,” while the record ends with him stepping into the shoes of someone dying and on his way up to heaven ( “Chalk outline look like the shape of my shadow”). In between, he details how he’s stayed alive. With the directness and dryness of Vince Staples, he blatantly says, “Momma mixed the vodka with the Sprite / They killed my cousin with a pocket knife,” on “LIFE”. But what has he learned? Each of “FIGHTER”’s verses is dedicated to an altercation, whether physical or verbal, but more importantly, introspection about what happened and why its led him to abstain from negative conflict.

All the while, CARE FOR ME seems to be a breathing document of Saba discovering himself. “Wrote the amount of raps just on a mission to find something,” he declares on “CALLIGRAPHY”. He eventually details the circumstances surrounding Walt’s death on the climactic “PROM / KING”, but what’s important is while life is uncertain and violent, no matter our background, we’ll always have art to make sense of it all. - JM

2. Yves Tumor - Safe in the Hands of Love (Warp)

Yves Tumor’s patent interplay of noise with a brilliant sensibility for pop music is fully realized on Safe in the Hands of Love. To be clear, though, this is not a jarring dance between the two worlds. Whereas most music which could be hastily labeled as “noise” seeks beauty in harshness or through a violent deconstruction of what we know to be beautiful in music, Tumor expertly weaves grating, free-flowing chaos into a gorgeous whole, channeling R&B, hip hop, electronica, rock, and everything in between. Opener “Faith in Nothing Except Salvation”, with its stuttering horns and general sluggishness, somehow perfectly sets the stage for a record that feels cohesive despite its tattered and fractured parts. The following track, “Economy of Freedom”, explores a frightening soundscape, punctuated by low, rumbling bass and an ominous thud. It trods along patiently, slowly making way for angelic vocals, creating something that borders on hip hop while also resembling a Prurient track. “Noid”, while situated in this record, could stand on its own as a magnificent pop song. It’s bouncy sense of rhythm and unrelenting energy are twisted in directions both unexpected and rewarding. Tumor’s ability to gracefully merge all of his sonic talents together without seeming even a bit contrived makes Safe in the Hands of Love an unforgettable foray into experimental music. - DP

1. Noname - Room 25 (self-released)

Our #1 album of 2018 was born out of financial obligation, Noname having moved to L.A., living out of different hotel rooms, and struggling to pay rent. That this context birthed Room 25--an expression of a sexually awakened black woman and staunch observer of the world at large--is extraordinary. In between her debut Telefone and Room 25, Noname lost her virginity, something she doesn’t shy away from talking about on the latter. “Fucked your rapper homie, now his ass is making better music / My pussy teachin ninth-grade English / My pussy wrote a thesis on colonialism,” she spits on “Self”, calling out those who thought she couldn’t rap--many of whom rap only about sex and money--by rapping about sex and money better than they ever could. “Window” details her sexual encounters over sparse arrangements, strings, drums, and no real beat to emphasize her amazing flow. (“I bought you game 5 tickets / Made my pussy the sequel.”) And “Montego Bae”, featuring sultry sing-speaking from Ravyn Lenae, is a play on a location in Jamaica notorious for its sex tourism; Noname finds empowerment in a potential partner.

But as much as her deserved sexual braggadocio stands out on Room 25, it’s Noname’s self-evaluation that makes the record essential. In other words, before she can “focus on the part of me I’m trying to be,” she has to deal with open wounds. “You title email 'Noname thank you for your sweet Telefone / It saves lives’,” she reveals on the whispered “Don’t Forget About Me” before revealing, “The secret is I’m actually broken.” If posse cuts like “Ace” (featuring Smino and a scene-stealing Saba) and rap battle level punnery like “With You” are surface-level confidence, it’s the final track, “no name”, where Room 25 comes to a head. Explaining why she chooses to go by her ambiguous, anonymized moniker, Noname lists, “No name for people to call small or colonize optimism / No name for inmate registries that they put me in prison.” But if it initially seems like self-protection, it’s actually the most individualized moment on the record. By letting her art and words do the talking, Fatimah Warner makes a defining statement. - JM

[scifimagpie]

Evil is Boring, and Other Unexpected Things

Like a chipmunk crouching in a forest next to a nuclear reactor, Canada is in close proximity to the slow-motion disaster that is the United States of America. With a president who coasted into office on a wave of electoral fraud constantly compromising the safety of the country's information and people.

A part of me - perhaps unbelievably - is a little embarrassed to be excoriating Trump as thoroughly as I am, even though it's nearly a universally understood truth at this point - and even though his party's legislation has directly resulted in the caging of immigrants and their children, and their detainment in concentration camps.

That said, I think one of the hardest things to understand about Donald Trump is that, inasmuch as he's basically as evil and villainous as it gets, he's not the kind of villain I was raised to to expect.

What is evil?

That's a complex question, but for our purposes, I'm going to reference both aesthetics and intentions. My personal stance on evil is that it's more of a verb than a noun. One's actions, weighed in the balance of their impact, as well as the current historical or contemporary perspective, tend to determine whether or not one is classified as evil. For instance, Winston Churchill tested mustard gas on Kurdish villagers before deploying it during WWII, and the otherwise admirable Franklin Delano Roosevelt, who created the "New Deal" and a number of important social security measures for American citizens, also was responsible for the internment of Japanese-Americans. Canada has its own examples of leaders with similarly mixed legacies. In the context of colonialism and that resulting violence, it's hard to canonize any leaders, especially those in the "New World."

That being said, Adolf Hitler's actions and his legacy are pretty good examples - nearly archetypcal examples - of what we see as evil nowadays. (Well, those of us who are not neo-Nazis, anyway.)

But do they look evil?

Between Disney and other fantastical films, very clear portrayals of "a villain" emerged - a villain was supposed to be stylish, attractive, usually or frequently non-white, damaged, and either coded-gay or overtly homosexual (sometimes asexual). In contrast, heroes - especially in the nineties - were usually laid-back slackers, usually white, straight, and male; always heterosexual, and both mentally and physically well, often athletic or extremely nerdy, and usually lacking self-confidence and/or social skills. Frequently, said heroes were disproportionately popular, due to some inexplicable "leadership quality," and I'm sure many of my readers will be familiar with the token reward girlfriends usually accorded to such heroes as a matter of course.

The state of the present

Much hay has been made of the idea that young white men grew up seeing themselves as heroes based on their birthright, and therefore, have not had to do anything to deserve that mantle. Said young and less-than-young men are also increasingly fond of mocking marginalized people who dare set boundaries on the portrayals of their cultures, sexuality, and themselves.

Given that white men and white women voted for Trump in droves, and have continually shuffled out of the way when held accountable for inequality issues, I feel it's fair to say that both the left and right have come to see straight, white, cisgender, heterosexual, and able people as - well, the "enemy," or at least a source of antagonism - and as a "persecuted minority," respectively. That said, from what I can tell black people and other people of colour don't really hate white people, not really - but centuries and decades of persecution and marginalization and abuse have led to a lot of pain and entirely reasonable resentment.

More recently, in addition to the many nigh-endless microaggressions and larger acts of violent discrimination perpetrated against people of colour, images of the cargo shorts-clad and tiki-torch wielding racist protesters trying to "defend their white heritage and children" are inescapable. For white queers, a similar dynamic exists with "the straights" - it's not that we hate straight people, but we exist in a constant state of trepidation, wary of that moment when a friend or relative will suddenly reveal that they hate people like us, or have no interest in preserving the rights of people like us.

Because narratives cut us out of the spotlight or cast us in antagonistic roles, queers and people of colour grew up fixating on minor characters and often, on villains. When I thought about it tonight, my heart cracked to realise that the people who were supposed to be the heroes fighting injustice - ordinary white men - seem to care little about our rights and their so-called birthright - and those who were always cast as villains had ended up being, well, the ones fighting for people's rights to marry, control their own bodies, vote, and not be incarcerated or killed on fatuous or fabricated charges.

Coping with it

On the other hand, I finally had the emotional resources and the chance to watch Black Panther recently, and I think the movie - which did not disappoint - offers both hope and some potential solutions. Martin Freeman's (hilariously) American CIA agent is overtly (and rightly) called a colonizer, but he learns to listen to Nakia and Shuri rather than questioning them or assuming he knows better. The movie nods to the historical reality of American interference in other countries' governments, but unlike Andy Serkis' character, he doesn't refer to the Wakandans as "savages."

The peaceful resolution at the end of the movie brings tears to my eyes as I recollect it. Conquest and murder won't make reparations for the sins of the past (and present). But resources and nurturing might, and will save the current and future generations - as well as enriching all of us.

And personally, that's the future I want. Let me be clear - as a scary leftist, all I want is for everyone in my city, my province, my country, my continent, and this world to be housed, fed, and safe; for people to be happy, healthy, and loved. That includes the straight, white, cisgender people, not just the marginalized.

I want to see what the world can be if we work together to take care of it. I want to see what kind of art we can produce when we have the opportunity to make it, and what we can discover if we put the resources towards the sciences. And from what I've gleaned from talking to anarchists, communists, socialists, and even many people on the liberal spectrum - that's what all of us want.

But to do that, we have to figure out what we're fighting for, and maybe, who we're fighting.

As a writer...

I was never prepared for this eventuality. Will Ferguson's Happiness (TM), a book in which the end of the world is wrought by a self-help book, had some excellent points about the banality of evil. I think a lot of us still think of evil as stylish and classy, but where in that schema do we place a tasteless human vuvuzela like Trump? The bland and smiling "worst teacher you had in high school" persona of Mike Pence has something of a place in the rogue's gallery of archetypes, especially in dystopian fiction. But how do we reconcile with the fact that the people we were taught to trust and idolize - for instance, cops and parents - are only too happy to hurt us?

Honestly? I don't have an answer, so I want to know how all of you feel about this. Reblog, comment, and answer - how do you feel about this reversal? How are you going to write about villains and antagonists?

***

Michelle Browne is a sci fi/fantasy writer. She lives in Lethbridge, AB with her partner-in-crime, housemate, and their cat. Her days revolve around freelance editing, knitting, jewelry, and nightmares, as well as social justice issues. She is currently working on the next books in her series, other people's manuscripts, and drinking as much tea as humanly possible. Catch up with Michelle's news on the mailing list. Her books are available on Amazon, and she is also active on Medium, Twitter, Instagram, Facebook, Tumblr, and the original blog.

[marvelandponder]

I’m a Little Upset They Made Me Excited for Something Called Hascon

But, they did, and over the past two days (and counting! expect an IDW comic panel on Sunday!), they’ve released some spoilers and news that’s pretty damn cool.

No real movie news aside from Hype! It’s coming in 4 weeks! because they didn’t want to reveal too many spoilers for that (although I’m still waiting for Hasbro to step up its marketing game with this one), but aside from that, let’s see what news we got for MLP this weekend [if you want Movie insight, I actually recommend picking up the art book. I just got mine in the mail and WOW is the concept art ever pretty]! This is your spoiler warning if you don’t like that sort of thing.

UPDATED: TONS OF STUFF! Movie Screenshots, more season 8 news, IDW comics, and more!

MLP: The Movie!

Not much in the way of spoilers (you can read the novelization or the art book for those, I guess was their thinking), but have three stills!

Equestria Girls

New outfits, designed by an actual red carpet stylist, Carol Lam, for both the new doll line and the characters in canon

New Youtube series officially announced, and it’s Choose Your Own Adventure style! Expected in November

Shorts to continue, and one has even been teased

Another one was a “2 minute short about Sunset Shimmer drawing a comic and them animating it... based around [the] girls catching a jewel thief.”

School play is a concept that’s coming up. Whether in short form, 22 minute special form, or perhaps even movie (although please note there has been no explicit mention of an EG5, so lovers of the movies will have to be patient)

“When asked if there is a Sunset Shimmer doppleganger rolling around, one of the panelists noted that her pet theory is that it was always Sunset's fate to travel to humanland, and there isn't an original Sunset in the world. They are leaving this open in canon though.”

No plans for Discord in EQG at the moment, but who knows?

Find EQD’s report on that here.

Okay, so first off? Loving the new outfits. With any other teenager characters, it would be ridiculous that they’re so well dressed and styled (I noticed Sunset’s hair is juuust slightly different, can’t see the others well enough to tell), but for these girls, it makes sense, since they’re all friends with Rarity.

So, yes, Hasbro. I’ll buy your crazy marketing tactics for now, because cute outfits.

As to the Choose Your Own Adventure series, I think that’ll be interesting, but not quite as cool to me as stuff like the shorts, specials, and movies. Just a matter of personal taste, but the world-building going on in the Overpowered short, for instance, is only really cool if it has a lasting effect on the characters and their world (the report said something about a coal miners daughter wanting to disco, and while that sounds possibly cute, it’s not exactly my cup of tea).

But it’ll be fun to try, no doubt! And definitely cool for younger fans!

The post wasn’t super clear on whether the Choose Your Own Adventure stuff was the only EQG content coming to Youtube (we have been teased about a series, similar to the Hana Zuki show Hasbro has on there already), but until we hear otherwise, assume it’s just the CYOA series.

And a school play theme really does sound like it could be used for a movie or a special, if they wanted to keep doing long-form stories, so that’s what I’m hoping for, personally.

Oh and we still don’t know what these are from/for:

A currently unreleased summertime short, most likely a music video.

A Netflix listing we found out about back in August. This might be the place they feature the specials and shorts, but who knows?

Season 7 News

Clips were shown for next week’s episode, It Isn’t the Mane Thing About You (which might end up being a Pinkie and Rarity episode) and Marks and Recreation 

It Isn’t the Mane Thing About (better clip than the first that was released)

Marks and Recreation (featuring the last song of the season)

Find EQD’s report on that here.

In addition, have some stills from a promo yet to be released on the rest of the season!

Likely from Secrets and Pies

Likely from A Health of Information

Likely from A Health of Information

(Not shown: Applejack falling into the party cave) Likely from Secrets and Pies

From It Isn’t the Mane Thing About You

From Once Upon a Zepplin

Likely from A Health of Information

Likely from A Health of Information (mask modelled after Mage Meadowbrook, so this will undoubtedly feature her story in a similar fashion to Daring Done, possibly told by Twilight, from the earlier screenshot)

From Once Upon a Zepplin

From It Isn’t the Mane Thing About You

Additionally, I’ll point out what we know for the season 7 finale: that there’s a tie into the Legends of Magic comics, and it’s called Shadow Play parts 1&2. Whether “shadow” refers to the character Shadowlock from the main comic series or King Sombra or something else entirely, we’ll have to wait and see!

Okay, so the most exciting thing for me is that Vincent Tong, voice of Flash Sentry and Feather Bangs, gets to sing again! As a villain this time! I could make a joke about him embracing the role the fandom has given him this season (Feather Bangs, the waifu stealer, and now Rumble, the antagonist).

Oh and for those who don’t remember, Rumble is Thunderlane’s little brother, who appears in Hurricane Fluttershy. It’s been a while, but he looked cute there.

I wonder if Starlight will have any role in this episode...

The addition of the Cake twins is to Mane Thing also adds hype for me. I’m still on the fence with the episode concept, mostly because I need to see how they’re going to run with it (could be uncomfortable to watch Rares lose her mane if done wrong), but the Cake twins were extremely endearing in Baby Cakes, and it would be nice to see more interaction between them and Pinkie Pie.

This season has been spectacular so far, so I’m glad not too much was spoiled (or you know, leaked...) so we get to enjoy it in full!

Season 8 News

Seaponies confirmed for season 8, the Movie will tie into the show

An animatic was released as well:

Find EQD’s report here.

SHE RETURNS! 

I find it super interesting that Chrysalis is outright ignoring Starlight Glimmer while gathering DNA, given that she swore revenge against her. A large number of fans are speculating that this will be some sort of voodoo plot, where Chrysalis literally turns Starlight’s friends against her, like Starlight did to her.

Not only that, but if you look in the background of that animatic, you’ll find the mane 7 are in a suspiciously new building...

Some have speculated it’s Twilight’s new castle (meaning the crystal castle will get destroyed at the end of season 7, which is alarming because it’s connected to the Tree of Harmony). I feel like it might be more of an addition to her castle, either a school of Twilight’s own (hence, calling the rest of the girls Twilight’s “teachers”) or a house of diplomacy of some kind, like a U.N. building for the different nations that Twilight and company have been befriending (dragons, changelings, griffons, yaks---heck, even Sunset Shimmer could be considered a diplomat from Equestria to the humans).

It’s still a mystery...

Also, sea ponies! And they’re adorable! They translate to show style really well, actually! And it only makes you wonder just how many other things will carry over from the movie....

New info!

Look for a Cheese Sandwhich cameo

G. M. Berrow wrote a Season 8 episode she is super passionate about and her favorite episode overall. Maybe more book tie-ins like in "Daring Done".

Josh Haber's favorite pony is The Great and Probably Going To Be In Season 8 Trixie!

Derpy won't get a featured episode like Episode 100, but she will be around, likely more than season 7.

There will be two-parters, and that's plural, so it sounds like we return to the opening and closing episodes being epic two-parters. So expect You-Know-You that we saw in that animatic to be in one of these!

Things we already know about season 8 that you may have forgotten:

26 episodes confirmed

Orchestra music from the movie to be used in some of the season’s songs, which are all finalized by now

As well, there will be twice as many songs are there are in season 7, since Daniel Ingram’s time won’t be split up between the show and the movie

Discord confirmed

Josh Haber returning as story-editor

Mike Vogel returning finally after working on the movie

IDW Comics

This year’s holiday special!

For those of you who have listened to the Christmas album, that’ll look somewhat familiar...

MLP:FIM #60 Sara Richard cover!

MLP: FIM #61 Cover revealed! A collection of foreign dignitaries, from dragons, to deers, to cats/abyssnians, to gryphons! 

“The story is going to be a "united nations" type gathering where all the various creatures throughout the planet convene to discuss the future of the planet. So think a Meeting of the United Nations but with Dragons, Buffalo, Hippogriffs, Anthro Cats, and a pony who controls the sun with a mere thought. Oh but there is a discovery made at the conference that could lead to trouble for our little ponies! A problem that might end up costing Equestria ownership of Canterlot!”

Legends of Magic #9! Seems to be a continuation of Flash Magnus’s previous issue, if the cover is to be believed.

Aaaand a page from Legends of Magic #6! Yes, that’s right, zombie ponies drawn by Andy Price. If 28 Pranks Later wasn’t grim enough for you, surely the master of expressions will deliver!

Find EQD’s report right here!

Year of the Pony

[angryacegiant]

Fight me you Twat waffle

Alright you little fuckers, sit down and shut up. I’m gonna prove to your sorry ass that the bible is pro-LBGT+. And there is nothing you fuckers can do about it. So, you, being the little shit you are, may be all like but what about Leviticus 18:22 “Thou shalt not lie with mankind, as with womankind: it is abomination.” It clearly states that homosexuality is a sin!!

So, the verse you’re ever so incorrectly quoting comes from Leviticus (AKA “Levitical Law”), it was part of the life guidelines God laid down for the Israelites through Moses on Mount Sinai after their exodus from slavery in Egypt. We call it “Levitical” because Moses was descendant from Levi, one of the twelve original tribes of Israel and sons of Jacob. The Levites were held responsible for religious duty of the nation of Israel, so the term “Leviticus” as well as “Levitical Law” flows from the recognition of the Levites as the main holders of religious law among the nation/peoples of Israel.

Now, we’ve all heard the arguments from people about which Levitical Laws our modern, twenty-first century Christians adhere themselves to. Most of them are cherry picked for convenience and ease of use. We love to quote Levitical Law against homosexuals, but we seem to forget our reading comprehension when that same law turns to the clothes we should wear and the foods we should eat. What’s more, Levitical Law wasn’t MADE for you, a modern day Christian. It was a covenant law between God and a people who followed him for everyday use and is included in the canonical Hebrew text for reference and context. And that’s really what we need here, isn’t it? Context.

Oh, DO let us open the can of worms about biblical contextualism. Because while you may not think it’s important, it really is. The fact of the matter is that contextualism and contextual reading of biblical text becomes crucial, especially for what we refer to as the Old Testament. Because we no longer live in a tribe mentality and because we no longer live under the social and political laws and landscapes of Ancient Israel and its surrounding and neighbor areas, we absolutely must take this into context before we just throw it out blindly.

Property rights. “Mike”, you say, “What does Leviticus 18:22 have to do with property rights?” And to you I say “Everything”. Because this passage is specifically dealing with and addressing women and men as they pertain to property. Or didn’t you know, that women were considered property in Ancient Israel? They were. They were absolutely considered property to be bought, sold, and betrothed. A man in these ancient tribes was considered a property holder. And a woman was property. She was property belonging to her father upon her birth and transferred to her husband, but not upon what we see as “marriage”. Because in Ancient Israel, “marriage” was not a ceremony and a paper signing, “marriage” was sex. And the transference of property rights from father to husband for a young female was found through sex.

So, what God is saying in these passages is that the divine transference of the covenant of marriage and the ownership (yes, ownership) of a woman comes through the consummation of that relationship. What he is saying is that two men in equal standing lying with one another cannot equally own one another and therefore, it creates disputes and dissatisfaction. Because at this time, sex was the catalyst of property transference. If two men of equal standing lay together, who owns whom?

And the thing is. We do not live there anymore. We do not live with those mentalities. We are not the social and political tribes of Ancient Israel and we do not have their functioning. Two men of equal standing in society in the twenty first century can have sex without implications of ownership. Two women in the twenty first century can have sex without implications of ownership. Your thinking lacks not only context on a historical scale, but also a progressive scale in which you fail to see the passage of time and sociopolitical interactions from a tribe mentality to something more evolved. To continue this line of thought let’s talk about Levitical law in relation to other books of the bible. Moreover, Levitical law was OVERTURNED in Paul’s letters to the Romans! Paul stated that those of Gentile faith are not required to follow Jewish law. That is why we, as Christians, are allowed to eat pork, that’s why we can shave, that’s why we can get divorced, because we are not subject to Jewish law!

Born this way!

Some Christians confidently assert that God did not create homosexual people “that way.” This is important because they realize if God did create gays “that way,” rejecting them would be tantamount to rejecting God’s work in creation. In pressing their “creation order” argument, some Christians are fond of saying, “God made Adam and Eve, not Adam and Steve!” To bolster their position, they often cite Jesus’ words in Matthew 19:4-5, where he responds to a question about whether divorce is permissible:

“Jesus answered, ‘Have you not read that the One who made them at the beginning made them male and female, and said, “For this reason a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife and the two shall become one flesh”? Therefore, what God has joined together, let no one separate.’ ”

From these words, some Christians draw the conclusion that heterosexuality is the creation norm and, thus, heterosexual marriage is the only legitimate way for people to form romantic relationships. Ironically, Jesus’ own words in this very same passage refute these conclusions.

As the dialogue continues, Jesus’ disciples are disturbed by his strict teaching on divorce. The disciples say that if divorce is not a ready option, perhaps it would be best for a man not to marry a woman. Jesus responds:

“Not everyone can accept this teaching, but only those to whom it is given. For there are eunuchs who have been so from birth, and there are eunuchs who have been made eunuchs by others, and there are eunuchs who have made themselves eunuchs for the sake of the kingdom of heaven. Let anyone accept this who can.” (Matthew 19:11-12)

Also in Ephesians 1:4 it states “According as he hath chosen us in him before the foundation of the world”. This is a clear passage that in short means God specifically created LGBT people that way. Along with that, another passage that supports this claim is Psalm 139:14 – “I praise you, nor I am fearfully and wonderfully made. Wonderful are your works; my soul knows it very well.”

Here Jesus identifies three classes of men who should not marry women. Taking his categories in reverse order, first, there are those who have made themselves “eunuchs” for the kingdom of heaven, i.e., those who foreswear marriage to better serve God. Second, he mentions those who have been “made eunuchs by others,” an apparent reference to castrated males. But Jesus mentions a third category — eunuchs who were born that way. Some might argue that Jesus was referring to males born without testicles, but this would be extremely rare. Moreover, this interpretation ignores how the term “born eunuchs” was used in other literature of the time.

Gay people in the bible

From our days in Sunday school, many of us are familiar with the Gospel story where Jesus healed the servant of a Roman centurion. This story is recorded in Matthew 8:5-13 and Luke 7:1-10. In Matthew, we are told that the centurion came to Jesus to plead for the healing of his servant. Jesus said he was willing to come to the centurion’s house, but the centurion said there was no need for Jesus to do so — he believed that if Jesus simply spoke the word, his servant would be healed. Marveling at the man’s faith, Jesus pronounced the servant healed. Luke tells a similar story.

The same Hebrew word that is used in Genesis 2:24 to describe how Adam felt about Eve (and how spouses are supposed to feel toward each other) is used in Ruth 1:14 to describe how Ruth felt about Naomi. Her feelings are celebrated, not condemned.

And throughout Christian history, Ruth’s vow to Naomi has been used to illustrate the nature of the marriage covenant. These words are often read at Christian wedding ceremonies and used in sermons to illustrate the ideal love that spouses should have for one another. The fact that these words were originally spoken by one woman to another tells us a lot about how God feels about same-gender relationships.

In the entire Bible, there are only two books named after women. One is Esther, which tells the story of a Jewish woman who becomes Queen of Persia and saves her people from destruction by “coming out” as Jewish to her husband, the king. The other is Ruth, which tells the story of two women who love and support one another through difficult times. Both books contain powerful messages for gay, lesbian, and bisexual people, but it is the story of Ruth that addresses the question we raised in chapter one: Can two people of the same sex live in committed, loving relationship with the blessing of God?

In the ancient world, eunuchs were widely associated with homosexuality. Here a self-avowed eunuch is welcomed in to the early church without any concerns about his sexual orientation. He was welcomed on the same basis as other people – his faith in Jesus Christ.

Isaiah 56:3-5, which promises eunuchs who keep God’s commandments that someday they will receive a house, a monument, and a name within God’s walls. Perhaps, like gay, lesbian, and bisexual Christians today, he had gone to his religious leaders pointing to the Scriptures which affirmed him, hoping he might somehow be accepted. But instead, he had been clobbered once again with Deuteronomy 23:1. A eunuch “may not enter the assembly of God’s people!” And so he had taken his precious scroll of Isaiah and begun his journey home, reading about another of God’s children who had been despised, rejected, and cut off.

It was at this point Philip, guided by the Holy Spirit, happened along and asked, “Do you understand what you are reading?” The Ethiopian eunuch, still seeking a religious authority figure, answered “How can I unless someone guides me?” (8:31) So, Philip started with this Scripture and “proclaimed to him the good news of Jesus.” (8:35) Then they came to some water and the eunuch said, “Look, here is some water! What is to prevent me from being baptized?” Philip’s answer should be astonishing to anyone who still holds a prejudice against gay, lesbian, and bisexual believers.

Philip responded, “If you believe with all your heart, you may.”

Philip did not say, “Let’s talk about Deuteronomy 23:1.” He also did not say, “I realize since you’re a eunuch that you may desire men; can you promise me you’ll never have a sexual relationship with a man?” Instead, operating under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, Philip said, “If you believe with all your heart, you may.” We have no way of knowing whether the Ethiopian eunuch was in fact gay. But we do know he was part of a class of people commonly associated with homosexuality and that this fact was completely irrelevant to whether he could become a Christian.

On the premise of the LGBT community lets also talk about transgender people and the bible. More specifically how God couldn’t give two flying fucks about it. I bring into evidence Galatians 3:28 “there is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is no male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus.” As you can see, God literally does not care what you or anyone else identifies as.

History

Now its time to talk about the virgin mother, I.e. historical context. The word ‘virgin’ did not originally mean a woman whose vagina was untouched by any penis, but a free woman, one not betrothed, not bound to, not possessed by any man. It meant a female who is sexually and hence socially her own person. But if you so insist that you take to modern day patriarchal version than fine with me. By your own standards Jesus had two fathers and a surrogate mother, which never had sex with either of them.

History lesson: late 13c., "bundle of twigs bound up," also fagald, faggald, from Old French fagot "bundle of sticks" (13c.), of uncertain origin, probably from Italian fagotto "bundle of sticks," diminutive of Vulgar Latin *facus, from Latin fascis "bundle of wood" (see fasces).

"Male homosexual," 1914, American English slang, probably from earlier contemptuous term for "woman" (1590s), especially an old and unpleasant one, in reference to faggot (n.1) "bundle of sticks," as something awkward that has to be carried (compare baggage "worthless woman," 1590s). It may also be reinforced by Yiddish faygele "homosexual" (n.), literally "little bird." It also may have roots in British public school slang noun fag "a junior who does certain duties for a senior" (1785), with suggestions of "catamite," from fag (v.). This also spun off a verb (see fag (v.2).

Burning sometimes was a punishment meted out to homosexuals in Christian Europe (on the suggestion of the Biblical fate of Sodom and Gomorrah), but in England, where parliament had made homosexuality a capital offense in 1533, hanging was the method prescribed. Use of faggot in connection with public executions had long been obscure English historical trivia by the time the word began to be used for "male homosexual" in 20th century American slang, whereas the contemptuous slang word for "woman" (in common with the other possible sources or influences listed here) was in active use early 20c., by D.H. Lawrence and James Joyce, among others.

So in short a faggot is a bundle of sticks that is set on fire that is now a slur for a homosexual male. Yet isn’t it funny that Moses came across a burning bush (sticks on fire) and saw God in them. Isn’t it funny how faggots and God can look the same sometimes?

Let’s talk about that slut Paul:

Now it’s time to slut shame St Paul. It seems that Paul was disgusted with certain aspects of sex in Greco-Roman society. He was at times a bigot and a prude - he even admits as much when discussing whether women's hair should be covered. He at no time discusses equal relationships between people of the same sex. It is possible that if he had known about them he would still have disliked them; after all Paul seems to condemn prostitutes, but given that we know most ancient prostitutes, whatever their social opprobrium, were forced, usually sold in fact, into prostitution, it does not speak well of Paul, that he condemned these poor abused people: Jesus never did!

So, stop fucking using my religion as an excuse to be a bigoted asshole you little self-righteous fucker.

[erickmalpicaflores]

Erik Malpica Flores Erik Malpica Flores recommends: What’s The Opposite of Lit(t)?

Photo by: Ian Watson/USA Network

When SUITS last left the team at [Insert Firm Name Here], it was time for the latest in a long series of name-partner changes. This time, for lack of anyone left to hold the title, it was Louis Litt’s turn to take a stab at running the series’ central business. As anyone who has seen even a single episode could predict, Louis’ first day as the boss didn’t exactly run smoothly; and as a mid-season opener, “Rocky 8” was probably the opposite of what the youths would call “lit.”

The new boss. Remember when Robert Zane and Harvey Specter were bickering like toddlers, and Louis Litt was lit(t)erally the only lawyer left at the firm who was behaving in a mature manner? Well, enough of that character development. Louis prepared himself for his first day as managing partner by being ridiculously extra as he talked to himself in front of his own mirror. Then, when he was finished with psyching himself out, it was time to go parade his way through the halls of All The Names On The Wall, reaching up for denied high-fives and smacking random employees on the butt.

Because professional.

A little bit of strutting might have been expected for SUITS’ “comic relief” character, but 84 years of it, complete with inappropriate touching, wasn’t exactly the way to start season 8.5 off with a bang. And the blatantly unprofessional behavior, all for the sake of what amounts to a pre-pubescent boy’s idea of comedy, didn’t stop there. When Harvey’s case of the week inevitably went down a troublesome path and, at Robert’s insistence, Harvey approached Louis about the case…Well. This happened: “I intend to be the world’s best delegator. If I’m going to do that, there’s no way I can try to tame you. And what I definitely can’t do is put a saddle on you, much less try to ride you bareback.”

Har, har. Louis doesn’t understand that “ride you bareback” can be seen as sexual. All the comedy!

Even when Harvey expressed his discomfort with the metaphor, Louis just plowed right on with it. There was also a fair amount of arm-caressing, complete with a finishing “giddyup!” and slap on the ass. (Because we hadn’t seen enough of those. Just locker room behavior, I guess. Forget the increased focus on workplace harassment, especially in film, following the #MeToo movement…)

Even if that exchange was read for the intended humor, there was still the small matter of Louis being, at least initially, incapable of doing any managing. When one of his longtime clients needed assistance, he threw a tantrum, refusing to give the client up, even after Donna reminded him of his job duties.

By the end of the SUITS mid-season premiere, after a pretty big confrontation, in which Donna — rightfully — reminded Louis that she was the one who put him in the position of managing partner, Louis was finally ready to manage. After being given the case, then yanked off of it, Alex was able to help Louis’ client, Thomas Kessler, solve all of his problems; the Robert and Harvey situation was handled with a “genius” suggestion from Louis himself; and everyone lived happily ever after.

For now.

Remember when Harvey had no idea how to behave like a managing partner until Donna taught him? Yeah. Louis is no different. We love consistently substituting one character for another in a recycled plot!

“This is about handing Andrew Malik a big, fat public knockout.” On Louis’ first day as managing partner, Harvey showed his respect for his frenemy-turned-boss by showing up late to work. But contrary to assumption, he didn’t oversleep after having nightmares about making Louis managing partner: He was busy researching his latest chance to go after his arch-nemesis, Andrew Malik.

Ostensibly, Harvey’s reason for going after Malik was that he wanted to get some justice for Jessica Pearson. Which, ok. We’ll believe that. But I’ve got a bridge to sell anyone who thinks it wasn’t, at least partially, about Harvey’s inability to handle the fact that the other man had beaten him — and on more than one occasion.

The case-of-the-week had to do with a boxer throwing a match, which left the SUITS writers plenty of opportunities to give Harvey sport-related dialogue. (No, no. Not the usual opportunities for Harvey to talk in sport-speak, extra ones!) There were also plenty of chances for Harvey to step into the ring in something other than his business suit, but alas. Those opportunities were missed.

Anyone who watches SUITS for the cases and is sorely missing the Harvey-Mike dynamic probably loved “Rocky 8.” The reason? New OTP, Robert Zane and Harvey Specter. Rarvey? Hobert? Zecter? Who cares what the name is: These guys are amazing together, even in an otherwise weak episode. All of that classic SUITS banter was back; and it was finally, finally time to see Wendell Pierce and Gabriel Macht working together for more than the half-second spurts that they seemed to share in the first ten episodes of the season. Take a guy out of the managing partner role, and he suddenly exists. Who knew?

Aside from Harvey’s complete lack of a soul when faced with the decision of whether or not to throw a guy with brain damage and a family to provide for under the bus, the latest round of Specter (and Zane!) vs. Malik was about as well done as could be expected. And when the job ended with an actual win for “our” side, it was the type of nice wrap-up that SUITS just usually doesn’t provide.

Sure, Malik’s parting words were a clear threat, just to let viewers know that we’d (obviously) see him again, but: “Tomorrow’s going to be what tomorrow’s going to be, Andy. But for today? Jessica Pearson sends her regards.”

We’ll take it.

Things we won’t take: Donna, what are you doing? Let’s try to keep this as brief as possible because SUITS is exhausting with the lack of follow-through or attention to its own canon details.

Thomas Kessler is a client at a firm at which Donna Paulsen is COO. But despite her “rules” about not shitting where she eats, she just couldn’t resist flirting with the guy and giving him a pet name: Stupid.

(Pretty sure she’s used that one on Harvey, too. Or was it Dummy? Something.)

Donna has broken this rule before, with disastrous results. Remember Stephen Huntley from that (awful) British invasion plot? Right.

So, to be clear: Twelve years of shameless flirting, putting themselves on the line for each other, and clearly being more than just secretary and boss meant nothing when it came to Harvey. Or, well. It meant enough to force the man into being what he hated most — unfaithful — before Donna said she felt nothing. And it meant enough for Harvey to end his first supposedly “real” relationship in, like, ever because he chose Donna over Paula.

…but the rules always applied to Darvey, whereas they don’t to Donna and Louis’ surprise longtime client, whom no one has ever heard of before now. There’s no history there, nothing to make this worth breaking a rule — much like Stephen wasn’t worth it. Though, to be fair, Stephen came around early enough in the series that he could’ve been used as either a stepping stone or a lesson learned, neither of which were actually the case  — but hey, let’s have Thomas flirt with Donna and ask her out. Even when she says no because he’s a client, let’s have him promise to ask her one more time after she’s had a chance to “think” more. (Women love being pursued after they’ve turned a guy down, totally. Nailed it.) Because she, apparently, wasn’t thinking when she was trying to be professional.

Was there chemistry? Who knows? Quite frankly, why does anyone care 8.5 seasons in? Shoutout to Stu, who, like Harvey, has chemistry and an established history with Donna but will never be a thing with her.

And after a long-awaited, likely completely off-screen, girls’ night with Gretchen, Katrina, and Sam, Donna will make the decision to date Thomas. Because why not?

It’s not exactly as if either Donna or Harvey’s character development matters, when SUITS can constantly rewrite its own stories anyway.

But wait! There’s more!

“I want this firm to be the same as it ever was.” So, constantly on the verge of collapse? Always with the drama? Retelling the same story over and over again for 8 years? Cool!

“Have you met Samantha Wheeler? I’m not going to make an enemy out of her.” The mood.

“Robert, did you know there are 12 different synonyms for the word ‘incompetent?’” “And after he signs this, there’s going to be a thirteenth: Malik.” I ship it.

“With you overcoming the difficulties of being white, you must’ve thought you’d never make it.” “And you, having to deal with the struggles of being a man.” Meanwhile, Samantha had to overcome institutionalized misogyny, while Alex had to prove himself in spite of the color of his skin. But that’s none of my business.

“I will no longer be getting your coffee, getting your car washed, or trimming your neck hair.” Thankfully, it turns out that Gretchen was joking and has never done any of those things…which begs the question of why Donna was ever, especially as COO, expected to have coffee ready for Harvey.

Speaking of: “There’s this little thing called a kitchen. Just walk down the hall, past reception, and take a left at ‘I’ve never heated up your coffee, and I’m not about to start now.’” So, the mutual delivery of coffee was personal — or just seen however viewers wanted to see it. Noted.

“I know Jessica was your mentor, but she was also my friend.” Imagine getting to call Jessica Pearson your friend. Legends only, here.

“And for the record, my playbook is a lot deeper than just Samantha Wheeler.” “So, she did it for you then.” “Yeah, that’s exactly what I’m saying.” Samantha is to Robert as Donna is to literally everyone else. The end!

I counted at least two references to “co-ed bathrooms” as the biggest joke/worst thing ever. Your home bathrooms, Target’s family restrooms, Starbucks’ gender neutral bathrooms, and countless single-stall/single-sex toilets across the country say hi. Har, har. So funny, though.

Not a fan of pitting Samantha and Katrina against one another. Am a fan of Katrina figuring out who she wants to be as a lawyer (yet another lesson from Donna, of course) and, eventually, establishing herself amongst the other major players.

Big, big fan of a ladies’ night…whether we get to see it or not.

“Do I look like I don’t have nothing to do but to come and watch ROCKY VII with your lonely ass?” Darvey? I don’t know her. Rarvey (or whatever we’re callingn them) is where it’s at.

Don’t miss the next all-new SUITS episode on Wednesday, January 30, at 10/9c on USA.

View Source

Ver Fuente

[deaconwords]

Who are You?

In John’s gospel, John the Baptist is asked, “Who are you?” And without hesitation, he answers. How is it, I wonder, that his response flows so naturally, so immediately from his lips? He seems so competent. From where does his confidence arise? What is its source?

Zechariah and Elizabeth are John’s parents, the Temple environs his home. Zechariah is a priest and he and Elizabeth are both of the House of Levi. They rigorously live the Law and its traditions. Their son, John, therefore, does not emerge from a vacuum. He comes from a place of support and empowerment. How else can he respond so clearly and definitively to the authorities’ questions?

And how does he answer them? “I am the voice of one crying out in the wilderness.” Wow! What an answer. What a claim.

What do we learn about John from this response?

First, we learn that he has received good scriptural instruction for he is familiar with the Prophet Isaiah. He is quoting Isaiah 40:3. And it’s obvious that he has knowledge of his people’s history, Law, and tradition, he is, in fact, steeped in them.

Secondly, we witness John boldly personify, make real, tangible, audible, that which Isaiah referred to only as a voice.

Isaiah’s voice in the wilderness is just that, a voice, a disembodied voice. Not until John boldly claims it as his own does it take on flesh and blood, does it become real enough to change to world.

Today marks my last day as the deacon assigned to St. Thomas Church, a church where I’ve known love, support, encouragement, and challenge for the past 10 years. You have formed me.

And this great gift of formation you have bestowed upon many who have come to you. Many ministers, both lay and clerical, have come out of you or have passed through you. And you have been their safe place of discernment and activation.

Among those who have completed internships here at St. Thomas are the Canon Amy Coultas, Barbara Merrick, Robin Garr, Anne Vouga, and Ed Lane. And I’m sure there are others of years gone by of which I am ignorant.

I happened to mention to the Rev. Dr. Georgine Buckwalter that I would be concluding my service at St. Thomas today. And she gushed with love for this parish. She told me how she served St. Thomas as deacon for 6 years awaiting diocesan approval to pursue the priesthood so she could fully actualize her call to serve the elderly community as its priest. While the bureaucracy of the diocese failed to affirm her, you, this parish, did not fail. You recognized the validity of her call and stood with her until she ultimately became priest and chaplain of the Episcopal Church Home.

My formation started with encouragement from one of your previous rectors, Fr. Mike. Soon after I joined the St. Thomas family in 2008, he had me leading Evening Prayer services and preaching on Saturday nights whenever he was away. I became a lector and a vestry member, eventually serving as senior warden. I was welcomed into this family. Fr. Mike encouraged me to check out the School of Ministry and EfM and I did. And just in case you think EfM is easy, you try taking it with the likes of Kevin Link, Steve Rauh, Tom Roseberry, Peggy Roth, Bill Gaunt, Chuck Warnick, and Harvey Roberts.

Fred White, Meranda Phillips, and Nick Patterson sat on my initial discernment committee and the Vestry supported my ordination to the diaconate.

Shortly after my ordination I was diagnosed with melanoma cancer. It was then that my church family really stepped up to offer prayer and transportation to the Brown Cancer Center. Tom Pitsenberger, Bill Donovan, Joyce Horrell, Lanier Siewertsen, Kathy Eigelbach and Penny Hayden all took turns getting me to and from my appointments.

Several St. Thomas members have died since I was ordained in 2014. And it has been a distinct honor to serve at many of their memorial services. It is with gratitude that I thank those of you who have suffered such loss to have included me in their remembrance ceremonies. As a deacon, I have experienced no greater honor.

At some point in our lives we are all asked the question posed of John the Baptist in today’s Gospel lesson: “Who are you?”

The ability to respond, to claim your voice, depends so very much on the community out of which you emerge. It forms you. St. Thomas, you have formed me.

For ten years here at St. Thomas I have been part of the conversation concerning what our primary thing is, what defines us, you know, what people will remember us for when we are gone.

Highland Baptist Church, perhaps, will be remembered for being that church that put crosses on its lawn every year. Southeast Christian, perhaps, will be remembered for being “Six Flags over Louisville.”

Well, St. Thomas, outsiders may not readily be able to say what makes you unique, but I know. You make ministers. You form them, you love them, you challenge them, you empower them to claim their voices, then you send them out to take the assets you have unselfishly instilled within them to an impoverished world.

So, St. Thomas, I leave you today having been fed and formed. I go out to join those you sent before me taking what you’ve given me to those souls west of 9th Street. And I know, believe I know, that I don’t go alone. I take you, St. Thomas, with me wherever I roam. Thank you and may God continue to bless you, St. Thomas Episcopal Church. Amen.

—Offered at St. Thomas Episcopal Church 12-17-17

[aion-rsa]

Rap’s Czarface Comes to Life Through Throwback Vinyl-Comic Combo

In “First Weapon Drawn,” debuting Saturday for Record Store Day, rap and comics fans finally learn the secret origin of the dastardly hip-hop heel Czarface in an immersive audio-visual experience that resurrects a nearly forgotten storytelling format, to impressive effect.

It’s a scheme as visionary as any a mad scientist might concoct. In the real world, Czarface is the name of the hip-hop supergroup comprised of legendary Wu-Tang Clan rapper Inspectah Deck and veteran underground DJ/MC duo 7L & Esoteric, whose music blends vivid lyrical sparring with equally lavish head-nodding beats. On the page, Czarface is a nefarious antihero akin to the colorful archenemies of comic book and wrestling good guys.

DJ 7L compares the Czarface character to Eddy, Black Sabbath’s mascot, inspiration and avatar. Plainly inspired by classic Jack Kirby heavies like Doctor Doom and Darkseid, artist L’Amour Supreme’s depictions of Czarface have adorned the covers of all of the group’s albums and singles. Czarface’s metallic visage, signature red glove and cape primarily function as conceptual and thematic unifying elements to the music, but the character has been realized in action figures, tie-in comics and even a real-life armor set.

Until now, however, no one has truly known the character’s canonical beginning. And to tell that secret origin, the group wanted to find a way to not only share the tale but bask in its influences.

“Czarface: First Weapon Drawn,” written by Esoteric and drawn by Gilberto Aguirre Mata. Cover, Page 1.

Instead of Inspectah Deck and Esoteric trading barbs over 7L beats, their newest project sees Czarface taking a run at multimedia storytelling. Specially offered as part of the national vinyl-appreciation retail initiative Record Store Day, Czarface’s “First Weapon Drawn” is a throwback-style book and record set that packages a treasury comic detailing the character’s rise (or fall) from a career as a professional wrestler to an energy-crackling supervillain along with a vinyl album that dramatizes and scores the adventure.

CBR has an exclusive preview of the first six pages of the comic, written by Esoteric and illustrated by Gilberto Aguirre Mata, along with a preview of Side A of the Record Store Day release.

The project was modeled after the Power Records albums of the 1970s, which adapted Marvel and DC comics into bombastic read-along stories, with radio-style effects and voice actors. Long before fans could expect to regularly see their favorite super-powered titans in theaters, these albums were what brought characters to life in many readers’ imaginations. To achieve the intended effect, listen to the “First Weapon Drawn” audio while reading the pages, and feel the Czar-force wash over you.

Year One

Almost every supervillain’s origin begins with a slight — or at least a perceived one — and Czarface is no different. 7L & Esoteric had collaborated with Inspectah Deck in the past, but it was 7L who initially suggested they formalize the partnership. Esoteric was skeptical that he and his creative partner of 20 years would be able to land the famed Wu-Tang rapper for an album-length project, but given the chemistry they had all enjoyed on previous tracks, Deck agreed. Then, after Esoteric pitched the Shaolin rhymer on his idea for the group’s potential name and didn’t hear back, he got spooked.

Pages 2-3.

“I remember just talking to him about these different names. I had ‘Czarhead,’ I just wanted to go with something ‘Czar,'” Esoteric told CBR. He grew concerned that he might have offended the rapper he’d admired since hearing the iconic lyric “Swinging through your town like the neighborhood Spider-Man” on Wu-Tang’s “Protect Ya Neck” by suggesting a name too close to a contemporary.

Pages 4-5.

“[Czarface] was the one that we thought best fit, and I was like, ‘It kind of sounds like ‘Ghostface,'” Esoteric said, referring to Wu-Tang’s Ghostface Killah. “And I’m thinking, [if] it kind of sounds like Ghostface and he’s not hitting me back … Is he mad?”

But Deck loved it. “It never even crossed his mind,” Esoteric laughed. Ghostface would even go on to be featured on the group’s eponymous first album.

The Physical Challenge

Czarface’s 7L & Esoteric at Hub Comics in Somerville, Mass. (Photo by Sam Williams)

Now, three studio albums later, and Czarface is a phenomenon. After releasing the “A Fistful of Peril” LP in November, the group set sights on their creation’s next chapter. For guidance, 7L & Esoteric looked back to the roots of their friendship. “One of the first things that we connected on, when we first started making records in the early ’90s, was [7L’s] collection of Power Records,” Esoteric said.

They decided to recreate the Power Records sonics-meet-sequential-art experience that they had mutually dug in their youths. “We kind of always toyed with the idea that it would be a cool idea to do one of those,” 7L told CBR. When they began work on what would become “First Weapon Draw,” they had their model. “We tried to craft it, pattern it, model it after the things that inspired us back then.”

As with the action figures and limited-edition CDs they’ve made in the past, the project’s physical element held particular appeal. “We come from that,” 7L explained. “Collecting things and having things, you know — the latest issue comes out, the newest release, or just finding back issues or finding old records. That’s like in our fabric.”

While they understand the realities and conveniences of digital media and delivery, the Czarface guys are decidedly the types to appreciate a good dig in the crates, and the rare treasures that can turn up.

Page 6.

“Me, personally,” Esoteric said, “I don’t want to do anything if it doesn’t come with the physical copy.” Both his music and his comics have their places. “I want to have it and put it in the vault next to the other ones.”

A limited release aimed at drawing people’s focus off their digital devices and toward something decidedly more analogue held special appeal to the group, who had considered limiting their early music to underground, unofficial releases. 7L, the team’s resident vinyl-head, realized Record Store Day would present a unique opportunity to release something their diehards would truly appreciate.

Photo by Sam Williams.

“When we talked about the idea, [we realized] it’d be cool to do something that’s so limited that’s kind of different and specific that it’ll be this collector’s item,” he explained. To craft something worthy of the attention, they split the duties. Esoteric would pen the comic and radio script that told Czarface’s backstory (and lend his voice to the cast), 7L would compose the accompaniment, including a signature “Czarface Theme,” and all three would executive produce the effort.

If any musicians’ work lent itself to such play, it’s Czarface. Their songs are not only littered with shout-outs to the Spandex set, they’re punctuated with audio clips from old records and cartoons and otherwise. 7L cites De La Soul producer Prince Paul as an influence, noting an appreciation for his use of interesting vocal samples. “I think the humor of it with the seriousness of it is a little bit of, not a template, but an inspiration for me as far as approaching certain things,” he explained.

They committed to capturing an authentic feel for the story. “Musically, we really wanted to nail that element of it sounding like it was from back then,” 7L said. “And not being your typical rap beat — more like the source of what people would sample in hip-hop.”

Marvel honored the cover to Czarface’s “Every Hero Needs A Villain,” left, with a hip-hop variant to “Thanos” #1 by Mike Del Mundo

A Hero’s Return

Already at work on their next album, the members of Czarface were given reason to reflect recently when they were included among Marvel’s Black Panther Nation initiative, which saw them profiled in the pages of Ta-Nahesi Coates’ “Black Panther,” and released an accordingly themed song, “All In Together Now.” Not long after, Marvel paid homage to the cover to their second album, “Every Hero Needs A Villain,” with Mike Del Mundo’s hip-hop variant to “Thanos” #1. For a group who grew up loving Marvel comics, it was a significant recognition. Marvel Assistant Editor Chris Robinson even told Esoteric that with the exception of a possible Kid ‘n Play interview in the ’90s, theirs was the first hip-hop artist interview in a Marvel comic.

Appearing in a Marvel comic, and especially having the opportunity to see his son find his father among the the pages, struck a resonant chord with Esoteric. Long before his musical success, the lifelong comics fan had parted with portions of his prized collection to further his creative dreams. “I sold ‘X-Men’ #94, #95, #96 and #97 to pay for studio time,” he shared, referring to the first four issues of writer Chris Claremont’s seminal run on the title.

Then last week, following a European tour, Esoteric returned home to find a box from Marvel containing “X-Men: Blue” #1, “X-Men: Gold” #1 and “Weapon X” #1. The MC said it felt like his creative life had come full circle. Maybe the new issues weren’t worth quite as much as the ones the he sold all those years ago, but it’s difficult to imagine anything more mint and valuable than the way they got there. Better still, his super co-creation could take on those puny X-Men, any day.

Czarface’s “First Weapon Drawn” Book and Record Set can be found through participating Record Store Day retailers.

The post Rap’s Czarface Comes to Life Through Throwback Vinyl-Comic Combo appeared first on CBR.

http://ift.tt/2oc290z