#i thought it was really funny but not worth putting into the liveblog post so you're getting it on its own

[superbellsubways]

vivian confused about 4th wall breaks compilation

[toastedicarus]

I was feeling bad about missing the first post, but apparently the next update is in MARCH so I'm not too late if you think about it?

One of the things that put me off reading Twig the first few attempts was that instead of joining on the premise of 'superheroes' or 'magic' I was instead slapped in the face with the premise of 'biology' which while I think Wildbow does an excellent job of mucking about with to create cool, horrifying, and other sorts of rad shit with, isn't exactly my personal cup of tea? I'm a fake wildbow fan, I'm here mostly for the Rad Shit and rely on other wormbloggers to present Themes and Ideas and such.

Sy this is a lizard. A snake with legs is just a lizard. Did you perhaps miss the second lesson, after 'life needs these elements' in which they go 'this is a lizard'?

The beginnings of Sy being a little shit. I don't remember him laughing a lot later on though? I've heard people (including wildbow) describe twig as a coming of age story, so maybe this is part of it. Like I said earlier, do not expect particularly deep cuts in this liveblog lol.

Hello Fred-From-Scooby-Doo. I sure hope you don't rot away first when these child experiments are revealed to have expiration dates. This is also the second mention of the wax masks that I thought were going to be like, an Everytime thing instead of just something prepared for this particular outing. I dropped my first reading this very chapter because I didn't want to read about wax cracking just as often as taylor reached out for her swarm, given wyvern makes Sy watch peoples faces for tells or whatever.

Hello the girls! I'm sure the gender ratio of the team here will have no surprises later on. Lillian gets a smaller introduction here compared to the other lambs(? I'm not sure if they're called that at this point.) I faintly recall her being the unenhanced medic/intern on the team, and I wonder if Sy thinking about her less here is intentional.

Hello Helen, who's apparently the best lamb (And I found myself agreeing with this with what little I read.) I forgot you were a fucked up blonde little girl like bonesaw, with the 'bending body in odd angles' I had swapped your mental image to the girl from the ring after a bit.

I had to google Wallaces law, because I am dumb. I don't know if this is 'alt earth Wallace got more credit for shit than Darwin did' sort of thing or if Wallace's Law is also a real thing.

Is this the problematic yuri I've heard about or am I reading too much into things because the next chapter comes out in march?

Giving Sy the benefit of the doubt for now that he's doing this because he thinks it's funny to make her mad and genuinely doesn't think it's an issue, and is also twelve(?). May change my tune later given I've heard it doesn't really get better?

Mostly clipping this bit trying to burn the aesthetic into my mind given I forget it over time, replacing every location with a new Generic Brown Brick Building. Haphazard buildings with petrified trees holding them up. Not just Detroit but More British.

We live in a so-Sy-ety.

Oh yeah it was intentional. I remembered one thing about twig, woo.

Very good character establishing being done here.

Hi Jamie. Trying not to read too much into initial description seeing as I know some spoilers about them, but not liking how they look with short hair instead of being happy with long hair is relatable. Men's haircuts suck.

I wonder if we ever get details about the gangs previous monster of the week shenanigans. Also if one counts the kittens, this is two mentions of baby murder in the first chapter.

Sy doing his thing is fun. The fact he's like 12(?) and looking down on the ten year old is also fun.

Wildbow fixing his problems with numbers by introducing ten dollars as a lot of money to share between a few ten year olds. Any attempts to calculate how much anything is actually worth in the twigverse is going to be wrapped up in this murkyness.

So you were curious then.

And given Helen's manner of sitting it actually is a recurring problem. god damn it Sy.

Wollstone, after a google, is just a reference to Mary Shelleys mother, and not another real scientist I should feel dumb for not recognizing.

I could not picture Jamie's hiding spot or the way the door was propped up. Taylor and your omniscient swarm to make sense of wildbow tabletop RPG paced fights, I miss you. I'll even take Victorias 'thinker 1' power. Someone stitch echolocation bat ears on Sy or some shit I'm begging you.

Confirmation that Sy was being a twelve year old about the ten year old he was playing.

I guess I can let the lizard thing go if Sy is only calling that because they're giving all their cases dorky saturday morning cartoon names

I remember Sy calling himself dogshit at fighting and I really hope theres more of these moments where shit he tries just fucking fails like this.

The gang of 12 year olds watching a man be devoured by his own creation, and Sy is more interested in putting Lillian in the out group for covering her eyes. I think this is why I dropped twig the second time, I judged it by it's first chapter and thought with the 'monster of the week' type of plot, with the focus on hunting and food, pretty much every death was going to be indulging in vore instead of other fun ideas for death in a 'biopunk' setting. Snake charmer is a decent starter antagonist, I'll probably have more thoughts about him once we have others to compare him to. Being against the academy but wanting to join it, spouting a few lines about

I don't know Sy well enough yet to know if he was lying to me, the reader about the fake fall he made sound natural in the narration, or if he's just actually bad at fighting. There's a post going around about 'real people falling for the acts that characters put on' and Sy might be doing that to me.

Hooray government created child murderers! You did it! See you again in March, apparently.

[taylorkellyreporting]

i hope no one minds if i liveblog this bitch: the captain swan show rewatch edition 🪝 🦢

right s2 let’s go

snow reuniting with her family 🥺

poor emma :/ must be so bittersweet

“i thought you’d changed.” “what, in the hour you’ve known me?” lmfaooo

i gain killian and sleeping warrior this season!!

“i made a promise to henry. she’s not dying.” parents die all the time, he’ll get over it. let that bitch GO

“you love him.” oh baby not in the way you think

rewatching the hat scene in regina’s office and it’s so obvious to me now that emma had magic in her like it wouldn’t work til she gripped regina’s arm

“i don’t want to hurt anyone!” “hard to believe you’re from the same family.” oh you’ll believe it eventually

“gramps” 🥺

regina is such a horrible mother idk how henry tolerates her

henry calling regina out for what she’s done to him👏🏻

“you will hold the hearts of your people in your hands.” lady you have no idea

“and i won’t become like her?” you’ll be worse

letting henry leave with charming was the only selfless thing that regina has ever done

regina: i want to redeem myself

also regina: *continues doing terrible shit*

henry and charming taking a drink of their sodas at the same time was so cute

“we can’t do that with our tales between our legs! no offense.” 😭😭

“have you ever seen an ogre?” “pretty sure i’ve dated a few.” pls i love her

“when is the last time you shot an arrow?!” “28 years ago. guess it’s like riding a bike.” 😭

mama charming 🥺

“actually, she’s my mom.” aurora’s face gjvjfjsk

“what kind of corset is this?” 😭

josh has such beautiful eyes, woah

snow and charming having lancelot marry them so mama charming can be there to see it, i’m crying

the way that’s not even lance

“is there…something i need to know?” lmaoooo

“you gave up…everything for me. and you’re still doing that.” i love their relationship so damn much

“i’m not used to someone putting me first” 😭

oh God snow crying as she looks at the nursery!! shoot me and it would still hurt less

rewatching emma and killian scenes is gonna hit so hard like they hated each other at first and all i’m gonna think about is how the series ends with them happily married and parents to a baby girl 🥹

henry’s face as he’s watching jefferson reunite with his daughter 🥺 he misses emma so much

that nasty old man watching charming and henry :/

THE LOVE OF MY LIFE MY HUSBAND MY NUMBER ONE HE’S FINALLY HERE

disney+ having the description for this episode be that rumple tries to save his wife being taken by pirates is so funny knowing she leaves him willingly

hate that i have to watch more of rumple’s past in order to get killy but yk what it’s worth it

ladies and gentlemen…him.

and from this moment on…the show changed forever

“he’s a tad taller than you described” 😭

sexy ass mofo

“on your feet for the captain” i’d be on my feet…knees…anyway-

“you have my wife.” “i’ve had many a man’s wives” pls

oh how i wish that belle would’ve stayed at the library, been best friends with red and eventually fallen in love with will

he’s so fine pls

gold going to charming for help, oh i know he’s desperate

this pic is so soft🥺

oh brother, mila wasn’t stolen

riiighhht he took his heart

oh wait no it was his hand he takes duh lmao

“are you asking for dating advice?” “of course not, no” plsjdjfjfksb

skipping every rumbelle scene is self care <3

and now he’s captain hook :)

really wish belle wasn’t so weak

LMAOO THERE’S NO BEAN IN HIS HAND

emma and killian soon!!

those poor people cora ruthlessly slaughtered :(

them <3

THEY FOUND KILLIAN, IT’S HAPPENING

neither knows that they’re looking at the love of their life i’m gonna cry

love the intro this ep

hit my pic limit so gonna make another post 👍🏼wasn’t gonna post ep by ep but here we are

[give-grian-rights]

HERMITCRAFT 8 LIVEBLOGGING

fifteen hermits worth of liveblogging. i am losing my mind. LONG POST AHEAD.

JOE HILLS (First HC8 Video)

Mumbo did the speech. he forgot everything he was supposed to say <3

Pearl and Gemini were just .in a pit . having stuff thrown onto them

Every Hermit is staying on the same continent !!

FIRST DEATHS VERY QUICKLY, Iron Golems took out Tango and Etho (maybe more?)

Joe seems to be the only one looting the chests

Evil Jevin !!

Evil Xisuma appearance on Jevin’s 60 second video!

Pearl has something planned for an “archeticual wonder” for a resupply area upon death?

Stress, Xisuma and Joe are capturing villagers and starting up a resupply debut.

Bdubs is killed by Cleo and is now OUT FOR BLOOD

First death counts- Etho, Tango, Bdubs, Cleo?

Cleo was killed by Keralis

Joe has now supplied Cleo with weapons and food . She left but not before saying “Time to kill BDubs again!”

Gemini was killed by Bdubs! They both died and are now at spawn.

Pearl was killed by Cleo

Pearl is planning a respawn inn !!

Cleo was killed by Iskall

Cleo was killed by Pearl

False, Stress, and Gemini team up??? AA!!! they brought a delivery of supplies to Joe <3

i wish i knew what was happening on that end .

APPARENTLY XISUMA IS ONTO MAKING THE SECOND VILLAGER BREEDER ALREADY ??

Iskall is the first with Diamonds??

Breathe in that ash !

WAIT IS TANGOS EYES LIKE THAT RN BECAUSE HES TEAMED WITH KERALIS AND BDUBS ???

KERALIS, BDUBS, AND TANGO TRIED TO DO A SHAKEDOWN ON JOE. HE TRIED TO DROP LAVA, GOT HIMSELF ONTO TWO HEARTS BECAUSE HE PLACED IT ON HIMSELF, AND IS NOW SWIMMING OUT INTO THE SWAMP

the big eyed trio are now off to shake down Gemini

Joe fell in Lava in the Nether

Joe Death To Lava Two: Electric Boogaloo

Joe drowned trying to kill a glowsquid

WATCH JOE’S VIDEO OH MY GOD SEAN HILLS RECAP RAP??? MY BELOVED????? i am gonna be streaming this unironically later LIKE OH MY GOD THIS SLAPS. ALSO THE CREDITS AT TEH END IS HILARIOUS

Zedaph Episode Recap

Zed gave us a recap of the continent every Hermit will be living on !!

Wouldn’t recommend Zedaph as the first video for the season, he skips the intro/speech but it’s Zedaph and hes making it fun!! Lots of nice editing :)

~SCIENCE TIME !~

Zedaph.. why is your starter base made out of concrete ?

There are no sheeps whatsoever on his mountain

Hes calling his lab an icecream sandwich..yeah i see it

Zed tried to make a portal underater...f

Scar died to a creeper </3

Zedaphs base is gonna be tracking how long hes there/someones loading the chunk!

XISUMA LIVE BLOGGING

A cool cinema scene of him becoming an axolotl!! <3

NOW I CAN SEE IT, GRIAN WAS THE FIRST DEATH!! Death by Iron Golem!!

XIsuma’s baseplans need over 45 THOUSAND BLOCKS TO BE PLACED

He’s also planning on making a shulkershell farm!!

i’m not gonna lie ! talking axolotl X is horrifying ! thanks !

Day one Villager Breeder... chaos.

Xisuma Derp! looked straight at a buncha wool and said how badly he needed beds and then walked away

THE GIRLS CAME OVER AND CONVINCED HIM HE NEEDS TO MOVE THE DESIGN OVER MY FIVE BLOCKS FOR SWAMP VILLAGERS..

THE GIRLS ARE JUST LAUGHING AT HIM AND HIS VILLAGER TROUBLES

day one and Xisuma has got his axolotl!!

Very pretty starterbase!!

XB’s

..I’m not gonna lie theres not much to say!! He’s very calm :) he says hes going into it without a plan, and htat last season was the only time he had any thought of what he was gonna do.

He made a real nice starter house and thats about it!

Cleo’s

Bdubs: “She ain’t gonna hurt me!! i’m invincible, babey!”

Cleo learnt that BDubs will never hurt her even if she deserves it . I am starting to realize why she kills him

SHE DECIDED SHES GONNA BE A PROPER CHAOS GREMLIN THIS SEASON...

AISDJASID CLEO GOT PAID TO KILL BDUBS?? HDUIAIHSI SCAR WHY

“Alright I found my mission for the season! Murder.”

Cleo, Mumbo, Grian, and Scar are all holed up in a cave together!

..Scar died from a skeleton !

Cleo has now split from Grian and Mumbo! Scar is missing in action

CLEO FOUND A GOAT

SHES KILLING THE GOAT???

she got a HORSE <3 and Joe gave her a saddle! I think her name is..Widget?

She LOVES the candles for shamboo n waterbottles and bits n bobs for her armorstands!!

Got her Armorstand stickgod book <3

Geminitay POV

NEW HERMIT NEW HERMIT NEW HERMIT!!

She has a LOVELY voice!!

The pov of her in a hole . being surrrounded . is kinda hilarious

It might’ve been Etho who was first death?? I GENUIENLY CANNOT TELL BECAUSE OF EDITING

All the murder was just for heads!

Seriously her voice is. wow

WE LOVE A QUEEN WHO KNOWS HOW TO CRAFT A SHIELD WITHOUT USING THE GUIDE <3

False, Gemini, and Stress are on the great journey for MOSS !

Gem just blew their minds with the moss.

TANGO KERALIS AND BDUBS ARE BACK Keralis: “Show the diamonds show the diamonds show the diamonds!” Gem: “Keralis. This is not how you make friends.”

The boys suecessfully recieved a diamond each

Etho n Iskall are travelling together!! You dont see those two together often

Etho got a glowsquid head!!

Gem: “Etho doesn’t share, is what i’m learning..?”

Etho hooked her with a fishing rod and said she has to do what he said .

In order to get the diamonds, Tango, Keralis, and BDubs placed down a sign saying “Gem is Great!” and Gem used a glow inksack on it.

Etho: “So..What is this? Do you have an ego, or this a motivational thing, or..?” He said, while laughing

Iskall: “I think its really funny that you have set your base up in the middle of a birch forest.” Gem: “I love birch forests! Do you not like my birch forest? Iskall: “I love it, yeah.” Gem: “This is the best biome in the game, Iskall.” Iskall: “Mmmm..” Etho: “I’m pretty sure I heard Iskall talking earlier that like, of all the biomes in the game, there was one he hated more than anything. Gem: “Oh really? And what was that one?” Iskall: “..Taiga.” Gem: “Taiga.. That’s true, thats a good one, thats a good one.” Iskall: “Don’t like Taiga.” Gem: “Mhm.” Etho: “Which one do you hate more than anyone?” Iskall: “..Diorite fields. Thats a bad one.” Etho: “Yeah thats a bad one.” Gem: “Didn’t know about that one. Well make sure to avoid’em. Birch forests are really good.” Iskall: “I’m a big fan of birch forests.” Gem: “Yeah, me too, me too. I’m glad we’re on the same page :) This is so beautiful! All the white and- and the like zebra stripes! is fantastic.” Iskall: “I..Um.. Yes.”

OH SHE’S CANADIAN,, ETHO HAS A FRIEND /j

She’s still in college :O SHE’S A SCIENTIST?? SHES WORKING AT A HOSPITAL?? POG!!

She accidentally found an enchanted golden apple in a mineshaft!! she thinks its the first she ever found in survival!!

She has a cow, sheep, and a few crop farms set up!! Her starter house has INTERRIOR!

SHE CHANGED HER SKIN AND ITS SO PRETTY AND HAS OVERALL AND I LOVE IT!!

shes doing a cottage core inspired base!

WOAHH!!! SHE MADE HTE MOST GOREGOUS CUSTOM TREE I’VE EVER SEEN ??

BDUBS IS HERE and he is so so so impressed by the tree ?!

also hes carrying a clock.. :(

He’s here with a present!

HE BROUGHT BAMBOO!

she thinks its so funny that he stops conversations to sleep AOIDHFEAUI\

SCARS

WE GOT A TRANSITION SCENE!! the canonical reason for the bed in his old village always being occupied is because underneath it, was his wizard portal!

Bdubs: “It’s a new season! You’re the little guy now!”

They are all very amused by that ^

they’re rubbing the fleece of bdubs jacket .

Bdubs: “Have a nice rub :)” PLEASEAHSIOJDIUASLDHIASDA

His starter base is gonna be a wagon and he wants the end game to be a bioshock esque skyscraper!

he confused a horse for a player . flashback to iskall thinking mumbo was a mob

PEOPLE THINK MUMBO DOESNT HAVE PANTS ON.... </3

Scar, Mumbo, and Grian.. have NO braincells. at all. THey just placed a crafting table with a boat on top with a bed on top with a boat on top .

this is what BROS FOR LIFE looks like.

BOATEM POLE !

SCAR IS STUCK UNDERGROUND IN THE MIDDLE OF THE NIGHT IRL AND HAS NO PICKAXE..

AND HE DIED TO A CREEPER .

it seems like Grian, Mumbo, and Scar are working together !!!! HOLY SHIT !!

THERES SO SO SO MANY FARMS???????

he died several times trying to catch a skeleton with a sword

FIRST CHEST MONSTER OF THE SEASON <3

SCAR JSUT TOLD BDUBS HE LOOKS LIKE OSCAR THE CROUCH... BDUBS CANNOT EVEN ARGUE

OH NO.... GRIAN WENT AFK IN A HOLE . WITHOUT A HELMET .

THEY PUT A  GLOWSQUID HEAD ON HIM

OH MY GOD MUMBO MADE A NOTEBLOCK SONG?? AJUDA

SCARS BUILTING IS SO SO SOOS GOREGOUS SERIOUSLY GO WATCH THE VIDEO OH MY GOD ITS HUGE

its a giant ass house boat wagon . its pulled by a llama . that killed him . so now its trapped, pulling hte agon, forever

Grian: “..Thats a very big house, for a very little hat.”

GRIANS SUPER SPECIAL EGG??

SCAR PUNCHED IT..

they really came out here . and killed the egg already.

Scar: “..I touched the thing”

TANGO POV

We see the three big eyed boys forming <3 they interrupted Tangos intro

THEY’RE BULLYING HIM ABOUT HAVING SMALL EYES AHIDUIASUHDWIS

HE TRIED TO CALL THE TRIO TEAM BUG EYE... THE OTHERS ARE VERY OFFENDED

they found an axolotl and Bdubs was TERRIFIED just screaming “WHAT IS THAT YELLOW THING?!”

BDUBS IS ATTACKING IT ???

okay nope Bdubs caught one and Tango lost it

Bdubs is naming his axolotl Idiot

AMAZING HOUSE. WHY IS TANGO SO GOOD AT BUILDING AND REDSTONE??

Impulse POV

MUMBO TRIED TO PLACE DOWN A BERRY BUSH TO HURT IMPULSE . HE FORGOT HOW BUSHES WORK..

I DIDNT EVEN NOTICE THAT IMPULSE WAS IN THE BOATEM POLE

so it looks like those four are hteo nes who grouped up together

PEARL BROKE THE CONSTITUION SHE GOT IN THE WRONG BOAT SMH

THIS IS SEASON EIGHT! FIVE BROS !

So its gonna be about five people in the same area!!

YOO!! Fantasy build for Impulse!!

G gave Impulse a spyglass, they had a fun moment of zooming in on eachothers face and complimenting eachother IHAUDIHAW

Grian and Impulse worked on an xp farm!

ASHDUIWAHISD GRIAN JUST LOGGED ON INFRONT OF HIM

a pillager stole his boat . not just any pillager . the one with a banner. </3

he has to live with Mumbo tuning a song .. </3 haha

Mumbo POV

it took fifteen seconds until Grian ran in during Mumbos intro

CONFIRMED? GRIAN WAS FIRST DEATH?

SECOND PERSON TO THINK MUMBOS PANTS ARE SKIN COLOR. GRIAN..

Grian: “Can you..Briefly explain why you’re just wearing a hawaiian shirt?” Mumbo: “Uh- what do you mean ‘just wearing a hawaiin shirt? I have shorts on as-well, dude”

FOLLOWED BY

Mumbo: “Can you explain why you’re wearing a red jumper?” Grian: “You know- you know i was born with this!”

MUMBO AND GRIAN STOLE THE BOAT LOOT FROM RENDOC

I THINK RENDOC JUST STOLE THE DIAMOND MUMBO THREW??

Grian: “Is that Scar?” Mumbo: “I can’t see past your giant waffle!”

DSFSDFJIOA they did an edit where they placed down a boat, both Mumbo and Grian got in, they made noises and then bopped up on top of the ravine they were in <3

THEY HAVE NO BRAINCELL THEY JUST PLACED DOWN A BENCH AND SAID “THIS IS THE MARK OF OUR VILLAGE!” and then placed a torch and a boat and a bed and aANOTHER BED..

..Mumbo is trying to be a pacifist this season!

Grian’s taunting him with beheaded things

And obviously part of being pacifist means he’s gonna be vegetarian in minecraft!

..he cannot use monster farms because pacifisim..

Mumbo was in the middle of reading the magical Timmy shack that Tango made (did i remember to mention that? who knows) and IN THE MIDDLE OF GETTING TO THE PART ABOUT IF YOU REMOVE STUFF FROM THE CHEST, NOTHING WILL BE ADDED IN IT AGAIN. Grian opened the chest . Mumbo SHOUTED HIAUDHUW Grian jumped man

They renamed it “Cave of Do Not Enter” HIAUEDUH

Mumbo and Scar BOTH did not know- at least Mumbo didn’t, Scar forgot,  that podzol spawns from two-by-two spruce..

him and his guitar song to be played underneath his house.. it goes with the aesthetic i suppose

MAN HE NEEDS SO MUCH HAYBALES I FORGOT THATS NEEDED FOR THE TUNE HE WANTS

Mumbo: “What.. On Earth.. Scar, it’s meant to be a starterbase, buddy! What is this? This is many things, many many things, a starterbase is NOT one of them!”

HE LITERALLY DIDNT KNOW THAT THE DRAGON EGG TELEPORTS... WHEN YOU TOUCH IT...

BDUBS

nothing special we havent seen yet!! just him screaming about axolotls.

He was working in the Mesa in his intro, skipping the “speech” from Mumbo

He released Idiot the Axolotl and lost it .

Him SCREAMING “Gemini” is HILARIOUS

While Gemini gave away those three diamonds, Keralis got so excited he won a bet with Tango and Bdubs, that he gave back . two of the diamonds . and none of htem released until well after they left

Bdubs: “That’s why i have my mwoss skin!” PLEASE I LOVE THE WAY HE SAYS IT.. make the moss hood.. REAL..

it took me a while to figure out what his base is but i LOVE IT so so much!!!

Nothing much new to add !!

Stress pov

please i love her . very good !! False seems to have joined her sheerly because Stress sounded like she knew what she was doing. she does not.

False felt peerpressured and asked Stress for permission to fight her because everyone was killing eachother .

It ended up with Stress following False. they found a village!

ISKALL only saw him one other time today!!

JEVIN APPEARS AGAIN !

XISUMA FELL INTO HTE BREEDER AND IT WAS SO FUNN IUAHHYIAUSD

Ren: “Ya look goregous, Stress!” Stress: “Thanks! Don’t murder my dog!”

She’s so proud of herself for caving!! (with False n Gem

Iskall blew up!

..Iskall fell from a high place

Stress has a LOVELY ravine base!!

False

False wants to become pirates with Stress <3

gatekeep gaslight girlboss

BIG OL MUSHROOM HOUSE !!

it looks like a mushroom church and i LOVE IT.

Nothing new we didn’t see from Gem. She does want to come up with a banner design for her base, though!

Grian

..Mumbo just thought Grian had a purpose so decided to follow him <3

ALSO HIS INTRO, AS HE JOKED ABOUT IN THE OTHERS VIDEO, WAS, IN FACT, THE BOATEM POLE

Grian is SO PROUD of the fact taht they got good loot from a treasure map. Ren and Doc are NOT IMPRESSED

Grian: “Lets go, potato boy!”

Mumbo: “I don’t have to replace everything I break! Peace Love and Plants- are these plants..?” He says, mining amethyst

pants

he who controls the egg, controls the server... Grian.. you’re doing great sir

...He decided.. his goal.. is to make his OWN..caves and cliffs update... HELLO..?

Grian was the first one to kill the enderdragon, MAN. Speedrunning career WHEN? /j

Grian: “And now [Mumbo] is flexing on my bed!”

he might not have a base. but he has an egg.

It is now 2am. i cannot do this anymore. This will be continued.. tomorrow!

[retphienix]

It's been 6 years :)

On March 30th, 2015 I decided I wanted a gaming side blog. (so we're early, but shush, it's the month for me)

I didn't know what I'd use it for exactly, but I had ideas- something I always have even if most of them only get as far as daydreamin' or writing out before closing them :P

For proof on the lack of direction the blog initially had- the March 30th date is the anniversary of my first post, an in-depth and lengthy review of Dragon Warrior Monsters for the GBC.

If you know the blog then you know "Extremely long and in-depth reviews" aren't the norm around here. As a matter of fact, that first post is the ONLY one I've done!

The closest I've come to ever repeating that would be the (word of the day) Directionless video I put out on Hades to get a grip on the concept of making videos, but that wasn't nearly as much of a 'review' as that first post is.

Tangent, definitely planning on trying my hand at videos some more for the foreseeable future. Probably not gonna use the tagline Full Impressions that I tossed as a whim for the Hades video but yeah- I'm excited to try my hand at a few videos :) tangent over.

It didn't take me long to come up with what I'd like to do for the blog though :)

A few months later I liveblogged a challenge run of FFT where I used only Ramza- a solo run. - Which maybe only happened because I tried a nuzlocke run a year prior on my main account-

(Nuzlocke | FFT challenge run)

Thanks to that haphazard liveblog experiment I started to realize a couple things which became the primary motivators behind this blog.

1) I LOVE sharing experiences. No brainer, I'm sure, but being able to share my experiences, and compare them with others' experiences, and just that mutual sharing is uplifting and feels good to do.

2) Liveblogging is an EXCEPTIONAL motivator to buckle down and play all those games I said I'd play (cue everyone laughing because I'm still way behind and have an immeasurable backlog).

But I mean that, on both respects. I have plenty of motivators toward the blog today, but if I were to be concise it's pretty much "It's easier to beat games if I liveblog them- otherwise I get distracted and play other games" and "I love sharing experiences and thoughts with people about my favorite thing- games."

Since 2015 I've tackled around 70 games as full playthroughs, and an untold ton as one offs or just to ramble about for a bit.

I've had a lot of highlights over the years, and I don't talk much about it as an overall experience so I thought for the anniversary I'd try to do just that. Not everything- I can't say I have photographic memory that would bring all of it up without prompting after all :P But whatever comes to mind as I browse some of my old stuff- as well as some thoughts on what I'd like to see in the future.

It's gonna be a bit self-centric I assume as I type this preamble to it, so let me say outright that this blog wouldn't be half of what it is without all the people who've given it the time of day over the years.

From recommending games they love or appreciate, to comparing thoughts, to offering kind words for analysis I've done over the years, to pointing out when I'm dumb and misread a situation :P- to, yes, even the people who decided "Fuck this guy's ramble" and deleted my captions before reblogging my gifs way back during Hamtaro (Of COURSE I remember that! It's amusing lol).

This is better because of others, because of the interactions and the people I've gotten the chance to chat with or befriend. It's just a liveblog more or less, my own little bit of fun I toss out for myself if for anyone- so seeing others enjoy this or that from the work I put into sharing my experiences or thoughts is always a joy in itself :)

Anyway, onto selfishly rambling about some tidbits of the past :)

Also sorry but no, opted to not shove a ton of photos in, it does have a handful of links to old posts though :P

This'll be disorganized as heck as I'll add to it over time before I feel it's worth posting (or the tumblr post editor becomes a hassle and more or less forces me to).

First~

FFT Solo Ramza Challenge: Considering it was roughly the first thing this blog has done, it's also something that's stuck in my head a lot more clearly than most of the other stuff I've done to be honest lol.

In truth, this is partially because FFT is my favorite game, bar none. But it's also because the whole experience was pretty new to me. Prior to it I had really only done one self-imposed-challenge that wasn't requested by the game in some manner and that was a nuzlocke run of Blue version.

So adding a challenge to my favorite game was a fantastic experience!

Notes I just wanted to say today about that run: If anyone enjoys FFT I honestly recommend giving it a shot for the unique story it lends itself to. I do recommend skipping the rules until after the second battle but that's up to YOU to decide.

My first post on the subject is me complaining about spending 4 hours grinding out the second fight and, despite hyperbole being my natural state, that was NOT hyperbole.

It DID take 60~ restarts to beat. It DID take 4 hours. The reason is that that 2nd battle is RNG as HECK, you HAVE to have Delita do some meaningful actions, you HAVE to have the enemies miss and make poor plays, you damn near HAVE to crit a few instances to save yourself from taking too much damage.

It's a numbers game to the extreme, so I wouldn't fault anyone for 'cheating' and skipping the 2nd fight for the ruleset lol.

The memory that stands out the most for that run is actually isolated in a post in which Ramza (Purrick in this run) talks like a total badass as just ONE DUDE running into a room full of enemies. I just think on that as a great encapsulated view of what it was like. The run started off face grindingly difficult, but because FFT is a game that offers so much freedom to the player it was extremely easy to 'break' the game into making Purrick overpowered as hell.

That's something I love about some tactical RPGs, I love having the ability to play smart so that I can play stupid later on, and breaking the game into making him one shot god is certainly a good payoff for playing smart early on :P

RetQuick: I miss RetQuick, it was primarily a short experiment I did in 2015 where I'd play a game for a short span of time (REALLY short, like 10-20 minutes) and record that for the purpose of making gifs and saying a short piece on what I thought.

It's one of those formats where the purpose was pretty shallow- but had a reason. I wanted to try making some gifs with some tools that existed online, so I made an excuse to do just that.

I also wanted to play a TON of games, usually through emulation on my sister's PSP, and this let me do that.

These two minor goals came together and so I spent a while making RetQuicks which were honestly more fun to make than they had any right to be. I mean the gifs were tedious but the playing? The thought sharing? The end product ocassionally having more appeal than just a photoset? It was fun.

I'm thinking whenever I have trouble picking a game for the blog I'll revisit the format... sorta.

I already reused it for a short stint to show clips I had no plan on expanding into a playthrough, but that died as well as it was too similar to Tidbits posts (another tag I no longer really use).

My thought is to rebrand retquick as something of a tryout for what game comes next. Play a handful of my backlog games for an hour or so each and say some thoughts before saying which one I'll continue as the main game for that period of time.

Old Tag Stuff: One of those things that only sticks to me since I made the decisions but it's always funny for me to look back on my old posts because I was apprehensive as hell toward making my posts visible. The reason my early playthroughs on the My-Tags page are variants of Ret instead of just "The name of the game so people can find this post" is because I felt like a liveblog would just spam the tag to hell-

Something I don't remotely feel bad for doing anymore.

So I avoided getting any sort of spotlight for quite a while on the blog for little reason.

Why Retphienix?: This is just a dumb thought I wanted to share and I'm sure I've said before.

It stands for retro!

Yeah!

Ain't that dumb and also not a real shorthand? lol

I think I have some sort of deer in headlights anxiety towards naming things, I mean do you think I think Full Impressions is a good summation for a video? I don't. But perhaps that's overshadowed by the other inexperiences and anxiety driven decisions that had- doesn't matter.

Retphienix is Retphienix because I sat there in 2015 and thought "Well... what do I name an alt account?"

My main is Redphienix, which yes, is ALSO a terrible name AND is misspelled. But it's that because of sentimental reasons. As a kid I misspelled Redphoenix when making my gamertag (I knew how to spell Phoenix back then as well, I was too excited about xbox live and misspelled it) and it's become something of a sentimental misspelling.

So I wanted to make a mix on that for my game blog, but I had no idea what. In the end I thought "RetroPhienix? I don't know. Retphienix is closer to Redphienix. I'll do that" and so it was done.

And just like how Redphienix is both bad and misspelled but exists because of sentimental reasons- Retphienix has acquired the same 'flavor' in my eye lol.

Aspirations for the blog: I have no immediate ramp up plans or road map or whatever, and in truth I'll be happy if the blog stays just as it is forever- up until tumblr ends- I cry over lost posts- and I reopen it on another platform.

But I do have blurry half-considered daydreams that I'd like to see happen for the blog through some hard work or shifts on my part.

One is something I'm already doing kinda, hence my embarrassing means of bringing it up a lot lately. Videos- I want those. I wanna make some looks back on series people don't talk about that I enjoy, I want to make videos sharing my thoughts on games I beat for the blog (like what full impressions kinda was, but I don't think they'll have a unified name from here on out). Maybe retrospectives, but mostly when I think of making a video tied to retphienix or me in general it's me looking at a game that said something to me, and saying it louder with my own interpretations on it.

You know the kind, videos where they talk about a video game but not the whole thing- just a singular message they really heard loud and clear from it intentionally or not. I dig those and I know I end a lot of games having plenty to say that could be directed into such a format.

We'll see.

And I'm along for the ride on that one as well- currently I'm keeping my eyes on whatever is directly next, which happens to be "I plan on playing Omori, if it clicks as something to talk about I would like to take a shot at that in a video too!"

The other is that I'd like to build a small community. Wouldn't know the first thing on doing that in a modern sense, but just a little online friend group to chat with and play games together. Something that could open up multiplayer and coop experiences being better shared on the blog and would just in general expand my gaming to what it used to be back on the 360 when I had a large group to play with.

Since the 360 era ended I've pretty much closed off- stopped playing competitive games due to lack of interest- and slowed down to playing all games either solo, with randoms (and no mic usually), or with my cousin. It's a rare instance when I play with some good people like @gamesception or another friend of mine, John.

When I diverted from playing competitive games nonstop toward other genres I didn't intend to also cut out all my online gaming buds, it just kinda happened, and I never really put any effort into rectifying that.

So more or less I'd like to one day sit down and work on a discord server, and then buck up and put the leg work in to make some gamin' buds again, but that's such a vague concept anymore.

Sounds all sad and what not but it's more ambivalent, I made decisions that

changed how gaming worked for me after the 360 and this is just where it landed for better and worse- I'd just like to see if I can make it a little better :P

General things I think when I think retphienix: Honestly? I think of how much fun I've had over the years and how thankful I am to have had an outlet that encouraged me to explore more of the medium.

I REALLY love games. I went to college for games, I've written LEAGUES about games, I've played countless games, my childhood was games, my adult life is games- games games games yada yada yada.

So when I think of retphienix I think of how without it I probably wouldn't have explored a lot of the corners of gaming that I have.

I genuinely, and I mean this, might not have sat down and beaten FF7 for myself and would have considered the amount I played as a kid to be enough.

I might not have played Chrono Trigger yet, and I KNOW I wouldn't have played Chrono Cross, and I'm happy as hell to have played both of those. CT was a mind blowing moment for me that showed me just how good an RPG can be, and CC gave me miles to think of in terms of innovating an RPG and how beholden to the narrative a sequel should be (I don't feel CC should have been chrono at all lol).

I DEFINITELY wouldn't have given New Vegas another chance. And I know I'm a sourpuss on NV, I've been that way since I maxed my achievements on the 360 for it, but replaying it really did reveal to me how exceedingly negative I was being.

My memories had become "It's brown and a boring location >:(" and "The factions all suck and it doesn't do anything with the idea of bad factions >:(" and became "It's... a little brown guys, not a big fan of the area" and "They didn't do enough with exploring the gray factions" while adding "Wait. This is pretty damn fun. And 90% of the additions are stellar. And I forgot about Dead Money, my favorite dlc in any game ever with a story that tears at my heart every time I think of it, NV good actually?"

Faxanadu would have remained a cool game I saw on SSFF and not a game I played to the end and fell in love with the aesthetic feel it has!

Also that's a game I cheated like crazy on lol, I would do it again! Save state scumming games meant to be rudely difficult is only fair :P

I probably would have never sat down to play through Windwaker which was such a positive and uplifting experience that I now get the most relaxed and warm feeling in my heart when I see those blue waves.

There's so many experiences I would have left on the table in favor of like... putting more hours into a live service title or something.

Maybe, and no offense to my cousin or anyone else playing it, but maybe I'd be no-lifing World of Warcraft nonstop just stagnating my interest toward the skinner box mechanics of an MMO?

Some offense, actually but lightheartedly lol.

But beyond the entire games I've played for the blog, when I think retphienix I picture all the time making gifs, all those games I played on the PSP for short stints, buying a retron 5 to add to what I could explore and being stoked when they shipped a freebie box of old controllers to go with it, getting angry at the retron for being a Piece Of Shit lol, crying at the end of damn near every game with an emotional story because I'm a big emotional mess of a person who finds investing and crying at a story way too easy thanks to empathy pulls, oh!-

Getting excited whenever I found that I had a "*controversial*" opinion that no one would care about lol. Like the one that comes to mind is that I thoroughly believe that Dragon Ball Z II: Gekishin Freeza!! for the NES is WAY better than the fandom recognized and appreciated sequel/remake Dragon Ball Z: Legend of the Super Saiyan!

How many people do you hear talking about either game, let alone saying the NES game that is roughly half of the SNES remake is the better one :P But I stand by that! The SNES one is a remake of DBZ1 and 2 for the NES but it loses all the charm and some of the fun of the NES ones by being a lackluster SNES game!

lol

I admitted wholeheartedly that this post would be a lit-

little directionless (gotta love the new tumblr poster making me break sentences like that), but to sum things up.

It's been 6 years. It's been an untold amount of work to be honest- liveblogging a game, at least for me, hasn't been the easiest thing. It's a lot of thinking out my thoughts (heh), it's a lot of learning tools to make the capturing process possible, it's a lot of experimenting, it's a lot of writing and editing, and, well, sometimes it's just tough.

I mean I went to school for coding, not video editing, not writing, not image processing, not this or that- but this hobby has introduced a lot of things even if only at a VERY base level (I admit fully to using online alternatives to make gifs for instance).

I learned a lot about, well, a lot of things in order to use this blog to learn more about games- and all that work has become part of why I've loved all 6 years of this blog.

6 years of gaming, work, and you all- and it's been worth the investment :) Here's to many more and all of you whether you stumble upon this post or not- literally anyone who's interacted in these 6 years, thank you, and anyone who hasn't I offer you well wishes as well.

<3

[nobody-knose--archive]

hmm i think i will watch the dinosaurchestra commentary today. contrary to my damn skippy commentary liveblog this one will be all in one post for the sake of my followers. i also probably wont listen to/watch the whole thing tonight cause it’s getting late and i have things to do tomorrow & tonight. anyways:

-by god i wish this was another audio commentary. even having it be split audio would be preferable to this, who wants to have to sit and watch the video of an entire album’s worth of songs. sure some commentary is better than nothing but this is partially why i never got through watching this all the way the first time.

-who are these other people to have invented the word dinosaurchestra? presumably neil learned this when making it the title of his album but when will i learn it? now? now.

-alright so it’s a new orleans traditional jazz band, with the a capitalized for some reason. cool.

-neil you say this is your first cannibalism reference but i cannot for the life of me think of another. this came out before vm, iabc, nt, and sp and i don’t know of a single instannce of child cannibalism in any of those albums. there’s other cannibalism but not child cannibalism. guess we know what type of music we have to look forward to from lemon demon

-damn ive never noticed the backwards loop was part of a later track. is it fine? this hyper world? deep in the ocean? the too much song? eyewishes? your imaginary friend? i have no idea at this point im just listing all the songs from this album i know off the top of my head.

-ah yeah this junk drawer comment is like the only thing i remember from my first look at the commentary. the video i’m watching this on or maybe the commentary itself messes up a bit and plays the “shave and a haircut” line too early, before it plays in the song itself.

-god the game Bad Dudes. a game he hasnt even played. i’m just going to take this as a sign i’m going to get a fujckton more ridiculous references in this commentary track again. it was hard enough in audio form but at least this time i’ll be able to know exactly what neil is referring to each time.

-the year was 2006, and the concept of “micheal bay puts a lot of explosions in his movies” was a lot more novel and relevant and funny than it is today. i still remember that meme but honestly i wouldnt be surprised if some of the ld fans today dont know anything notable about that guy.

-on god what is a tofu maraca neil you terrible enigmatic wonderful bastard.

-youve really never used the word spiffy before? i could swear ive heard it used in another ld song but maybe it came out later.

-so neil’s using the synth for this piano bit? i thought he had an actual out of tune piano, the one he used in word disassociation. i think this because i heard it played briefly on the audio damn skippy commentary track. what happened

-oh shit ive never noticed the sizzling wick before. how many times will i notice something for the first time in this i wonder.

-neil’s mentioned using this stitching technique for solos multiple times, and i remember it specifically because along with the guitar solo here and one or two in damn skippy (boy how many times will i reference it and it’s commentary track in this) it was used for the recorder solo in i earn my life, with neil saying something funny and anecdotal that i dont fully remember right now. he said he’d record like two notes and then stop and record some more which made for an interesting visual, i think.

-i recognize the name van halen but not the other guy. add it to the ever-growing list of terrible references neil makes in his commentary tracks.

-that’s kinda morbid neil. i knew you were fucikd up but not like this neil. not like this.

-fine and this hyper world are the atomic copper claw and ive got some falling to do of dinosaurchestra, respectively. this is because i’m always surprised by how early fine comes in and how late this hyper world comes in, to the point that ive forgotten that it’s there by being suitably unfocused on the order of songs by then.

-”half cheery optimism, half ironic denial” actually it’s about if nagito komaeda and makoto naegi combined to make one massive lucky disaster of a human being

-i’m not going to tag those two but if you know who they are you know what i’m talking about. just think about it.

-what is one quarter gonzo supposed to mean. isnt that a gotdam muppet. neil please neil please neil please neil please

-listen neil i dont know what most of those categories mean together but individually this song does not feel hip, surfy, or new wave and i’m especially qualified to talk about that last one because my parents play that music all the time and i know what it sounds like. the accordion is a big part of it that’s true.

-hm yeah those hi-hats are really the only percussion in this song arent they

-subliminal solar eclipse imagery? i mean i just saw it as two opposing forces/sides coming together in harmony but yeah that sounds cool too. maybe it can be both.

-well you havent ruined the mystique of anything yet neil. ive heard some stories about the anti-symbolic meaning of your later songs so let me just say, youre on thin ice buddy.

-neil uses the phrase “hifalutin’ hi-hat hijinks” and my soul ascends to purgatory where it will plot for the rest of its life how to join him in heaven above. maybe some crayons will help.

-oh hey big shoutout to Rotten Legacy in the comments for transcribing everything. that’s just fantastic for those who don’t want to spend an entire hour trying to go through this.

-you sound like quite the clown talking about this part- oh my god neil im so sorry i didnt mean it its okay it’ll be f- oh god no i didnt mean it please

-it’s not really full circle when those two parts occur at different parts of the song but ok neil

-”i think it ends pretty soon” man neil you still dont know your own songs huh. i’d say some things never change but it’s been like a year since ds so that doesnt really mean much here.

-ah yes lawnmower aka the song where neil’s brain stops working and he goes a lil insane

-just a bit. i mean this anecdote, did it really happen? how would we know

-the requirement for when neil goes insane is that you must reciprocate in kind. thankfully i’m in a near enough state of mind as is. i mowed the lawn today, but not the today that this is probably being posted as. hyakugojyuuichi sunday, amirite? not now, but now, given the nature of time as an infinite past present and future. why can’t future start with at p too? it’d make it a lot more cool and poetic. what a shame. puture.

-why would you think lawnmowers are cool? like they do what theyre meant to do. what their name says they do. how is that “cool”. there are many words you could use to describe it but not that one.

-which president? like i’m not such a neil fan as to know his lineage so which president would be in office when his great-great-grandfather couldve plotted to assassinate him with a “lawnmower” is unknown to me. i mean he couldve just murdered the president instead, probably much easier than assassination. easier to type too my hands are not doin well tonight. ive forgotten everything ive learned over the past ~5 months of dvorak practice.

-yeah ive never mentioned i use a dvorak keyboard did i. i’m more comfortable with it than qwerty now, but i could switch at any time because it’s a digital thing with my laptop and not an actual physical keyboard. thatd be expensive. anyway neil’s grandfather just did identity theft, rad

-makes sense that a solution for such a sweet purpose such as that would need a sweet ingredient. i think i’ll sign off for the night real soon. it’s more than obvious enough now that i’m out of my head as i type all this.

-is canada where french toast comes from? there are a lot of french people there. i’d never asked.

-neil im pretty sure if you try to tickle a lawnmower’s tummy you will be the one going to sleep as their tummies are comprised of blades. like even tickling a still blade wont have you in a very good state now will it.

-and with that bonus fact we reach the last fact of the song. that was like, 5 separate facts? wow that must be a new record for highest number of neil cicierega facts in one song. congratulations. of course i have yet to listen to the spirit phone commentary (yall can look forward to that someday) so perhaps that record can one day be surpassed. also i just checked and i cant believe i guess the correct amount of facts on the first try. loolin’s luck strikes again.

-officially signing off now. coincidentally, possibly, with the end of lawnmower. good night good day good evening good life good death good fuck.

-alright im back approximately 14 hours later. time for stuck which is a song ive recently made an oc for but havent put in the masterpost. maybe ill talk about them rn

-fucking fantastic commentary there neil never couldve figured any of this out for myself. thank you so much i do in fact see what you are talking about

-that’s whistling? i just thought it was some evil and messed up recorder or something.

-is this like, the only alum with mentions of neil’s name? oh wait he’s answering that question for me hold on. yeah this is the only album in which neil himself is referred to by name by himself

-god i didnt know neil was dedicated enough to his work to record this early in the morning like that. sounds horrible. i just thought he made his voice sound like that on purpose. i wouldnt know personally what a stoner so i just assumed he was trying to sound depressed, as the lyrics would imply.

-how is a melody supposed to fake one out anyways? anyways about that oc i mentioned. as neil says theyre named Carlos Betty w/ no last name. their whole deal in the world of my ocs is that theyre painfully and depressingly aware of their existence as a character from a song that i fleshed out somewhat. he breaks the 4th wall and looks out beyond the horrors it contained and just dies inside. he’d prefer he didnt exist and that i didnt keep writing his character, giving him backstory and interactions with the others and whatnot. it’s all rather depressing.

-and no, too bad for him, i dont ever skip this track. it sounds nice enough for me to listen to it and i like the experience of going through the whole album with no stops, deviations, or interruptions.

-he’s like 5′7 with long wavy brown/auburn hair (maybe dyed) and likes wearing sundresses and gardening. that’s just backstory anyways, it’s not like he’s ever seen doing it outside of cameos in the background of a scene. the same can be said of their wife and kids. that’s just how it be.

-i like the subte organ in the back here. can hardly tell what stops it uses because it’s just a midi, so probably just some crescendo pedal type thing.

-oh no. neil’s saying oh no again. he fucked up big time.

-how many times are we going to hear from neil’s junk drawer? i’m pretty sure it precedes this hyper world as well. and what’s in it anyways, like what do you need to make those sorts of rather uncommon metal clinking sounds.

-”‘hit’ song” singular neil? dont pretend you havent released popular bop after popular bop. just look at all the animations youve got on albinoblacksheep. did you know Fiberglass Monkey of all songs has a flash animated music video? yeah neither did i until i lil while ago.

-oh yeah it’s the same guy who did the Ebaum’s World Dot Com video and i think one or two other ld videos. what a coincidence that i spoke about that song so recently and now here it is.

-right i’m not just going to repeat all the trivia neil says verbatim, if you want that  you can watch the commentary easily enough yourself, though on youtube, like me, and not on whatever outdated app i believe it’s meant to run on.

-only 6 million views? i’m pretty sure it’s in the tens of millions now, on youtube at least. it’s probably accumulated more on newgrounds too but i wouldnt know. never went on that website, and i’m pretty sure the animation is about as old as i am.

-why is neil apologizing for using ^_^? it’s a good emoticon. was that cringe back then or something? since when has neil cared about that sort of thing? i guess life was just different back in 2006.

-god i’d really like to see this reanimated someday. a reanimated collab for the ultimate showdown of ultimate destiny sounds awesome, even if some of the scenes would be hard to coordinate. it’d still lend itself to a lot of creativity, doing things differently or similarly to the original animation, putting whatever characters you like for the chorus, and of course updating it to the pop culture climate of 2020. if anyone knows how to host one of those things they should get on it im surprised noone’s thought of this before.

-here’s something else to add to the list of neil’s supernatural powers.

-is neil saying chuck norris jokes fell out of style by 2006? seriously? i was seeing them unironically all the time on i can haz cheezburger in like, 2012. but maybe i can haz cheezburger was just out of touch (shame this aint being done on a thursday) seeing as i dont remember it ever changing the types of memes it produced well into like 2015. yes i browsed it as a wee child i couldnt very well go looking through forums on my own when my family had 1 computer between the whole of us and there was no privacy in using it whatsoever.

-actually maybe this song single-handedly revived chuck norris jokes as an art form. he’s probably powerful enough to do it.

-the blue meanie from yellow submarine and not the wrestler. im pretty sure even if the animation didnt have the right one i would still know which one youre talking about because ive never heard of that wrestler in my life. add it to the incomprehensible neil reference pile

-yeah i think Lo Pan was the one and only guy i didnt recognize in that whole arsenal so i actually appreciate the clarification here. still adding it to the inrp along with the majority of the commentary for this song

-foreign people wont know who mr. rogers is? i think theyre a whole lot more likely to not know who literally anyone else is than mr. rogers. i mean i think he’s gained some popularity post-mortem but he’s really well known in my opinion.

-so neil’s not going to confirm the canonicity of mr. rogers’ death, like a coward.

-honestly i never payed enough attention to notice but yeah you do kinda talk throughout this entire song dontcha neil.

-the violin is supposed to be a form of communication? the best form of nonverbal communication? and not like interpretive dance or calligraphy or fucking sign language? oh god neil youre just. not incomprehensible sometimes just a little confusing.

-ok granted ive never read the lyrics to this song but he really says mentalese? i thought he was just saying mentally in a weird way. god how can you just make that a lyric in a song when i would have no gotdamn clue what that is without reading this. once again not quite incomprehensible but confusing.

-same neil. ive tried being completely and utterly silent, taking as close to a literal vow of silence as possible, and all it resulted in was a lack of friends and benig stuck inside my own head all the time. developed a bad ego too. wouldnt reccomend.

-who’s edgar bergen? add it to the inrp

-goddam it neil this is what you get for making 20 billion bonus tracks onto what’s already your longest album. not even spirit phone is as loud as this, or hip to the javabean with it’s 9+ minute ending song. audio commentary would it make it so much easier to make this liveblog because i wouldnt have to cut back to the video every 5 seconds and make a 4 minute song take 10, 15 minutes to get through. this is why it’ll take like 2 hours to get through the rest of this.

-i thought you said you werent good at whistling? you sound pretty good here ngl. like it’s not easy to whistle well, especially well enough for an actual song

-teller and silent bob are going on the inrp. ive never heard of either of those guys or their shows, and while i have heard of harpo marx i still havent seen anything of him or knew he didnt speak so he’s going in the pile too. AND WHO IN GODS NAME IS CHICO AND WHY DO THEY NOT HAVE KNEES. THATS THE NAME OF ONE OF MY OCS GODDAM IT.

-sorry about that sometimes im instilled with a righteous fury at the sheer quantity of incomprehensible neil references found within these commentarys. like i love them but by god i am just a little bit scared of whatever the spirit phone one will hold. at least view monster’s is/wouldve been alright.

-like genuinely? you dont remember the creation of neverending hum? ok. also ive heard from most people with tinnitus that its more of a neverending ringing than a hum. also yes, the slight low-pitched hum that can be heard “now” is edited in. ive said this before somewhere and i’ll say it again. youre not going crazy.

-m. monkey screams? honestly at this point i cant be bothered to say anything more that’s just neil in action. fucks sake.

-the beauty of pointlessness

-ive heard of devo from jjba and that one mashup neil made but not polysics, so it gets to go in the inrp.

-damn shoutout to neil jerma and all those other lads that hail from the self-aware chowder state. unrelated note my wrists are starting to hurt from how i rest them on my laptop when i type. might take a brief break. not from typing from the video altogether i’m incapable of holding in my thoughts on something when i’m in the mood for it.

-my critter is named diamond and it’s a bone china toad that gazes imperiously and occasionally looks like a candy salesperson.

-yknow id make a point about how often neil makes up completely fake shit in these commentaries but then i remembered he does that all the time on like all 3 of his blogs. did you know he ran windows95tips?

-yeah while i adore the lyrics of this segment it also serves as a very good reminder of the presence of drums here. theyve got a weird bitcrushed sound to them that works pretty well with the song and i’dve loved to see it in a deporitaz song. oh well.

-i imagine neil just did a quick hum and while he was humming he spontaneously remembered his guitar and just immediately strapped it on and started jamming. fun. then he scatted some more

-yeah i find myself in situations where i can only attribute my success to the workings of my subconscious so i relate to not wanting to know exactly how it works because i think if i ever figure out what goes on inside my head ill never be able to live a happy life. cant think of any specific examples of this type of thing but it just happens like more than once a day on average.

-just got back from a quick snack break, had some dump cake my brother(s) made yesterday. honestly a really good and easy treat, very rich which is what you expect from literally concentrated chocolate cake, even though i’m not the biggest fan of the maraschino cherries and pineapple. if you want go ahead and ask me for the recipe and i’ll see if i can get it to you, it’s honestly very simple.

-tick-tock, heart-beat, di-no-saur-che-stra. it’s really easy to forget how short this one is, the first part was a moderate length and the first song of the album, and the final part is really long.

-that weird piano-sounding thin in the background is a harpsichord? doesnt sound like any harpsichord ive ever heard before. you do you neil.

-alright, Stephin Merritt is going in the inrp too. join the party

-simply fantastic commentary- and we’re back in the junk drawer for what, the 3rd time now? i want to keep track.

-...i think i remember that transition into your imaginary friend sounding different in the track itself. the wooden sticks definitely were off here. wonder what’s up with that.

-ayy! Alora cameo! sick. and neil plays the bass himself.

-and oh boy here’s one of those lines about a lack of symbolism that i’m sure upset many people when hearing it for the first time. i cant deny i think there’s some meaning to this song, ive got a brain-amv with a plot and everything. then again, to say that the words just “complement the mood” when the mood is clearly that of a sort of childhood nostalgia deal means there’s bound to be consistency in the meaning of the words. don’t know about it being a love song though. that just sounds wrong.

-the fucking what from the movie what. god this is why i’m jokingly infuriated by these references, they smack a completely foreign meaning onto a song i otherwise thought i could understand. i guess the immortal old people from the movie being john malkovich are going in the inrp now.

-well i guess some things will forever remain a mystery about this song which isnt a problem when i never thought they were mysterious in the first place, neil

-the thing about imaginary friends is that i never got the concept of them when i was younger. in the media all the parents thought their kids had them when the kids were really going on fantastical adventures so if i, young and autistic, imagined myself and like my friends or dogs going on epic adventures too, did that mean i had imaginary friends or was just imagining things in general. i knew nobody who had an imaginary friend, or at the very least they never spoke about it, and i just generally devoted very little of my time to the idea when i could be pretending my dogs were superheroes or something.

-god who does neil think he is, calvin from calvin and hobbes? oh wait he’s saying he actually did all the stuff mentioned in dinosaurchestra, the songs and album. cool cool

-this isnt the first time youve mentioned how you keep lil bits and pieces of songs in your head for a long time before using them in actual songs. although it might actually be the first time because i could just be thinking of you speaking about this on your blog.

-trust me with how frequently you use accordion nobody really misses it. little bits and pieces of Cap’n Crunch scattered throughout the album is plenty im sure.

-i really love this vocal break right here. shame it’s so short.

-did he ever reaplly the backwards guitar thing somewhere else? because i could swear ive heard it in another song before. seems like something he’d do. i mean he’s yet to do a bagpipe solo so who knows (nobody knows)

-If You Give A Scotsman Acid

-neil dropping some hot takes on satan and wishing techniques over here. you sound awfully defensive about the satan thing actually is there a story there. oh nevermind ive never heard of Yani point canceled, you’re going in the inrp.

-and here comes archaeopteryx and the midway point of the album. i believe him about the bird segue but it also makes a great thematic segue because both songs are rather nonsensical but in different ways. i’ll elaborate in a dinosaurchestra theme post if i ever make one, this one is long enough already

-i thought it was a bit weird how you had both dinosaurchestra and archaeopteryx as songs about going back in time to deal with dinosaurs (or dinosaur-adjacents), but they could be thematic parallels or something. like he said, this one’s about jealousy and murder vs playing in a fun band and then dying (aka growing up ik i said id save the themes for later i just had to say this)

-yeah that is a bit of a doorbell melody aint it. id never think of describing it that way but it’s really accurate honestly. nice

-oh boy is the rhyming of fossils and apostles an amazing move. this whole song has some really nice writing in individual pieces even if the whole thing means barely anything at all.

-are you kidding me? “i can’t get no aviation” is a classic rock reference? i deserve a hug for all im being put through with this, another one for the inrp. a shame, devastation and aviation are another great rhyme.

-the interesting thing about this song meaning is that everything but the chorus supports it. what on earth is a “featherhead metropolis”, and why the “liar liar wings on fire” anyways. also yeah the archaeopteryx may have been the most well known ancient “bird” then but imagine that guy going back in time to see that like most velociraptor-type dinosaurs have feathers. would that be fkct up or what.

-i wikipeia too much when i write period neil, you aint special. particularly my lemon demon ocs. wow

-we have no idea what the dinosaurs sound like, a meow is perfectly appropriate. exactly

-god neil’s singing seriously improved with time. listen to when he died or reaganomics or really cool wig or everybody loves raymond or even christmas will be soon and it’s obvious how much better his voice has become (if by voice i mean. ass)

-same neil. just look at all this shit ive written. most of the time i dont even know what im going to say before my fingers hit the keys and all this just comes right out. i dont filter a single gotdam thing. and it’s great. i hope

-my wrists are genuinely starting to hurt so uuuuh. poetry

-i’m back! i appreciate this lil line-by-line explanation of these lyrics when they honestly make very little sense on their own. like yeah i can get this guy hates the archaeopteryx and birds and wants to make sure they never evolve but what on earth are bird tricks.

-i like the mellow outro to this song. nice lil bit of humming. shame i cant do that irl or my brother will come into my room and kill me but oh well. hang on

-hey neil your joke is bad and you should feel bad. anyways

-yeah the melodies in this song are so pleasant, give off a lovely vibe, like youre calm but also wishing to do harm against someone some day. dinosaurchestra isnt my favorite album but i sure cant say this song is bad at all. very nearly a highlight of the album but unfortunately the next 2 songs greatly overshadow it.

-your commentary is getting bad for the same reason mine will get bad near the end of this. ending thoughts are always the hardest to get across because there arent any left. youve said all you need to say why must something more be said to provide closure. just for this i wont do any sort of ending line to this post.

-oh nice ive wondered how that sound was made for a while. it’s really pretty honestly i love hearing it every time and this song in general kicks ass.

-5/4 time! hell yeah, what’s a lemon demon album without an unusual time signature. i think the answer is spirit phone/view-monster, but that’s not too important (and if we’re counting bonus tracks isnt true, creepy is an enigma)

-wait this song features- hang on i need to look some stuff up. yeah that’s accurate. this is disco rock? cool didnt ever think of that before but i guess now i know what disco sounds like.

-you’re required to catch the eyelash as it falls to make a wish. i dont make the rules.

-imagine being so starved for wishes you cant just like give some money to a hobo on the street (this is a “the magic of generosity” reference in case it wasnt clear)

-this still sounds nothing like any harpsichord ive ever heard but maybe ive just been listening to harpsichordio too much. it’s a good track if a little short and if you havent heard it go listen to it right now. im actually not sure if it can be found on yt but try the ld wiki and it should be there

-this isnt unique to this song and ive said it before but i love how clearly neil sings his songs (unfortunately this doesnt apply to some of cc and lfthcs because of the weird voice filter teen neil used so much), i can easily catch all the lyrics to a song and memorize them. here watch

-im without a soulmate i noticed so are you what’s with that anyway copycat i hate you mirror mirror on the emotional wall im dancing like a fool but noone seems to care at all

-i swear i wasnt listening to the music as i typed that. oh and just because i recognize this beetles reference doesnt mean it’s exempt from the inrp.

-well, the guitar “chorus” is in 4/4 which is easy enough to dance to and i’m sure if you tried you could dance (like an idiot perhaps) to a 5/4 rhythm. it’s easier than 7/4 that’s for sure.

-more humming that i wish i could partake in but cant for fear of my life. i dont blame my brother for finding it a negative stim i just wish it didnt have to be my positive stim that does it to him. this humming is about as good as mine so you better not insult yourself like that neil. and i’m pretty bad at whistling purely due to lack of practice so maybe i should stop the comparisons here

good-bye

-if bystand were a word would the past tense be bystanded or bystood. i had a relatively intense arguement with my brothers about this a couple months ago (might have been last year even, this one’s been hard to keep track of) and in the end all the elder had to say was that it’s supposed to be stood by. which isnt what i was asking but i dont blame him for being annoyed at that point.

-oh that line about cycling by is in reference to bycicles, just like how every line is based on a certain numerical prefix. just caught that

-it’s pretty obvious this is a slowed down version of the eyewishes bassline but it’s cool nonetheless.

-that one extra beat right before the quin- verse always manages to catch me off guard. considering this song is in 5/4 again, that makes this specific measure in 6/4, though it feels more disconcerting than a measure of that length would otherwise do.

-Ripley? mr. believe-it-or-not? or some other guy? whatever, it’s going in the inrp

-shame we cant tell it’s the smoothest song transition because this upload (or maybe the commentary app in general) puts a lil stutter pause inbetween each track, which is especially annoying in the eyewishes-bystanding-indie cindy trifecta of smooth af transitions. they’re slick and we cant even hear it.

-oh it’s officially a one-girl band? i was considering doing that for my universe and now ive honestly forgotten whether i did that or let Amane also be part of it. doesnt matter honestly.

-”moe is we” is unironically a cool name for an lp. who wouldnt buy that, especially from none other than acrobat unstable records.

-a self-made musician with inconsisntent confidence, yep that’s them. making Cindy an oc was easy just because of how much characterization this song provides, especially when i listened to being a rockstar a few dozen times, thought of making an oc of it, and realized that indie cindy would make the perfect character.

-right sure, maybe only she listens to them at first, but i’m going to say they show it to their friends eventually because that’s more fun. Amane and Nakia listen to it and go hey, these sure are some lo-fi hip hop beats to relax and study to and Cindy briefly considers death. Nakia confirms it’s nothing like rock and so they live to see another day and then all is well in the world.

-i dont have a broken synth but i do have an absolutely terrible electric home organ. each keyboard is like 2 octaves smaller than it should be and some of the stops sound wrong at certain pitches at other stops arent volume balanced and others (there’s some overlap between all of these) have ineffective secondary tones that are quiet but only appear on certain notes so it sounds terrible when going up a scale. the pedals are unreasonably quiet most of the time and the two keyboards arent balanced correctly and most of the tremulants are bad and each stop sounds nothing like an actual organ and more like a bad synth. it’s literally impossible to use the solo/great keyboard for anything but the trebel clef because it lacks anything past an f3. there are exactly 2 4′ stops per keyboard and 1 of each of them is terrible and there isnt a single II or IV stop. it’s awful and it’s all ive got at home so it’s what i use to practice and i wouldnt dream of complaining out loud. the chime function is also literally dischordant.

-yo hold on neil would know a lot about the struggles of being a solo artist who does unconventional music because he is one. how has it taken me this long to realize this. gotdam am i thick. artistic differences? solo project breaks up? torn down studio? oh neil oh neil oh neil

-i should use the words cyclonic and displacement in my writing thank you for these good good words

-neil “basement dweller” cicierega

-i should take that back he’s married and has a child now

-harmonica? seriously? i could swear that’s a melodica. so long as you dont tell me the melodica in a mask of my own face isnt a harmonica too. it’s much harder to picture a person wearing a mask playing a harmonica than a melodica. yes i’m talking about my oc again. ive got the oc masterpost tagget with “masterpost hell yeah” if you need it. it’s not very good and there are a load of things i should redo and add to and clarify but it’s what ive got.

-gotdam he plays synth and guitar and keytar and bass once and now harmonica and a load of other things i cant remember? neil you musical genius why cant you pass on your skill to the rest of us huh. hogging all the talent. i love you

-back at it again with the real bass. is it Alora’s again?

-an rgb person, a living computer presence. yes this first verse is a tad enigmatic but i cant believe, once again, i missed the connection between rgb elecronic capabilities and “a living computer glitch”.

-neil only understanding what he wrote after the fact is a writing mood and a half. i only realize when ive done symbolism when im waist deep in it.

-im sorry since when have wizard of oz references been hard for you. youve not only starred in a decently well-known production based on the film but you wrote a whole-ass song about it too. both specifically about the scarecrow. what’s up with that

-even if it isnt a word used very often the rhyming of methinks with sphynx is one of the best things neil’s ever done and is the only reason this song pops into my head with the frequency it does

-i’m sure i could slow down footage of someone blinking but as im sure itd be something of a horrific experience i’m afraid i’ll have to pass. taking your word for it is easier than you think

-ah yes stereo panning, that’s the term. he uses it again in being a rockstar specifically for the word heroin and i think that might be why i adore that song so incredibly much. i dont have to say more because i already went ham over that song during my view-monster psuedo-liveblog from a few weeks ago. you’re welcome.

-is neil a gotdamn beetles fan? oh yeah these lyrics are honestly incredible but i wouldnt say it’s the best on the cd. especially since that includes the bonus tracks (everyday french, anyone?) but most certainly not the most violent, did you forget about ultimate showdown already?

-thank you for pointing out your own play on words. hey listen to that it’s the return of that voice modifier neil was in love with in his first 2 albums. never expected to hear a return of that.

-i get neither how self abyss is a pun on self abuse nor the nietzsche allusion. does this mean it goes twice into the inrp? eh why not.

-yknow by the time youve completely gouged out both your eyes i dont think filling them up with mercury will make that much of a difference in terms of pain. it will poison you so i guess that’s a boost in the long run.

-since when has neil had a “signature modulating square wave sound”. i dont know what that is and cant point out a single other song it appears in because of that.

-oh this last bit is an actual beetles reference, which officially makes neil a fan sorry i dont make the rules. get his ass and his monkeys into the inrp.

-the onion was a thing all the way back in 2006? somehow i’m not surprised. i am surprised that neil somehow doesnt own a suitcase. does he never travel? i know he’s hosted a lemonic demonade at some point by now, and he mustve gotten one in time for youmacon and the like later on.

-that’s a piano? i seriously thought it was a guitar. god like 1/3 of all my liveblogs are just me being surprised by stuff neil points out about the songs themselves and not anything else. wonderful content right here

-I am lopsided! And so are you! Nothing worth loving isnt askew!

-in which neil confesses his hatred of modern architecture/modern art in general (probably shouldve said this earlier)

-is this the 4th and final return to the junk drawer? well if all weve got is a synth it must be, surely there’s nothing more of use in there. i anticipate being proven wrong.

-neil you can pretend this is about being silly and having fun all you like we all know it’s about adhd/autism and the like. the same about geeks in love and gay people, although that’s more of a modern development, considering the concept of geekery was a lot more niche and shunned back in 2005 than it is today. the same can also be said about gay people just less so.

-it’s being sung towards me neil. thank you for taking note of my birth earlir and writing a song about it. it cant be about you when it’s about me and also youre the one singing it towards someone.

-considering how much shit youve done over the years i doubt that’s true

-if it’s that hard then how come i’m so good at writing commentary about both your commentary and the songs themselves huh? man if neil ever returns to tmburl and sees all the things i say about him he’ll probably assume i hate him or something. nah it’s just easy to say things somewhat passive aggressively towards a distant reciprocant and i think compliments all the time so they arent as noteworthy.

-172 bpm. that is fast. has he ever been faster? see this is the problem neil when your commentary is lackluster i run out of things to talk about.

-i like the call-and-response like structure to the verses. reminiscient of how one’s brain can hop back and forth from subject to subject super quickly, to the point where it can be hard to follow when youre not nd.

-just got back from some faspa. i started this last night i think around 8 and today 1:30 and now it’s been another 6 hours. i mean ive been taking breaks and stuff but by god. it really takes time to listen to and read something while giving your thoughts on it all. especially when you arent the best typist in the world.

-a rooftop marathon sounds like the most fun way i could spend a carefree morning ever. 

-c a# and g? that’s interesting, in a good way, because c is 2 steps around the circle of fifths to the a#, a relatively small journey, while g has it as it’s minor counterpart, and g is one step forward along the circle from c. really creative.

-understandable neil only using solo falsetto in this one song. makes it all the more apparent how much he’s improved in spirit phone, just. listen to when he died. literally who thinks neil is female here. noone. although having alora or emmy would be a cool move. do a collab neil. that’s how you should ressurect lemon demon, by collaborating with your own sister.

-what can ya do about it? in my case, it is the fact that ive written so much and omitted apostrophes on so many words that my words are no longer being spellchecked-im no longer given the lil zigzag when words are misspelled- so if there are more misspellings and typos than usual from here on out that’s my excuse

-please never use the word neatoriffic. that’d be neaterrific anyways cant even use a decent word. for goodness’ sake neil be professional

-haha i was wondering when you might make an “i dont know” joke neil! youve done it! good thing ive yet to see a use for it in my liveblogging so far

-there he goes again. see ya space cowboy

-only the most professional of water sfx techniques used here at MC NC studios

-i hate to say it but deep in the ocean is like my second or first least favorite track on this album (not counting bonus tracks). it’s not bad at all! just doesnt do quite enough to make it better than any of the other songs.

-god of course not even neil knows what this one’s about. ive never payed close enough attention to the lyrics to say for sure myself. i just figured it was about what went down in the depths of the sea where naught but the hardiest inhuman souls can see what goes on, aka Sultana, my mermaid oc from The Ocean.

-hey actually now that i think about it i can make some uuuh lore out of this. it’s their love that keep the wristwatch going, and they found it one day shortly before meeting Manamea because it was dropped from the boat she was on. maybe there’s some uuuh dark stuff that goes down because this man was so drunk and she’s a lesbian and whatnot idk. and then they meet when Sultana’s trying to return the wristwatch to it’s owner and meets her and they fall in love and stuff the end. listen to the song and think of my oc’s and pretend to be me and you’ll understand what im saying hopefully

-this line about people becoming fish ppl again always caugh my attention where nothing else would. like is this what the narrator wants? is this what they believe to be inevitable? is it something they just figure could happen? are they specifically talking about mermaids in the context of my universe that i made? who knows (nobody knows) (this is the second time ive made this joke today)

-as if there’d ever be capitalism in the ocean. what kind of underwater life would ever have the buying and selling of private property. or colonization the fuck is going on here. armed revolution thats what. god what a dramatic turn of events.

-so human life is fated to exchange roles with that of the fish if we ever decide to impose conquest and capitalism upon the seas. i suppose this is meant to be a cautionary tale, then. thank you for this, neil, you dastardly prophet you. also SUPPORT YOUR LOCAL LIBRARY but not not because boy are books hard to disinfect

-man first neil’s accordion has a name and now his harmonica. does his keytar have one too? i could swear it does but that’d be after this album anyways. ah hang on nevermind that was a joke. thanks neil. love your recorder and lips

-bubble time bay be. im goin a lil mad again if you couldnt tell. i think neil is too.

-oh the sound of a fist smashing a piano in reverse sounds sick. just the idea of that being a way of making a sound. for a song. musically. is really cool. who are you neil and how do you come up with these things

-yeah this part is decently loud, especially compared to earlier, but my headphones are already about as quiet as they get. they’re just obscenely loud, i have to keep my computer at like >10 volume at all time and i still get occasionally attacked by like a deporitaz song from the directory.

-another 120 bpm song, making it a good match for dinosaurchestra- and hey that’s where the backwards part came from! nice, im going to think of that every time i listen to this album from now on. and now the resolution of the underwater storyline, in which people have to adapt or die and because mermaids are like already a thing, they’re all going to die. another dinosaurchestra parallel. hooray

-that is so ominous the fuck does that mean Neil

-ok. tick-tock, vocoder dinosaurchestra time. sounds pretty good. i’m almost always going to think of kobalt rad’s amv for this song when i listen to it just because it’s really good. tells the song’s story nicely, which is all i ask for in a song’s amv.

-right time to admit something. i dont know what a concept album is. what does neil mean by this. oh he’s saying this whole album is based on the time-travelling adventures of neil cicerega, the new animated series coming to pbs this fall. ok ok cool. just don’t tell bill watterson- hey that’s why it’s a bonus track here! because of the story of the album! or something! nice

-anyways the general consensus is that this album is themed around childhood and nostalgia, which i generally agree with in various forms. like most ld albums, the theme shifts over the course of the album, with the second half being clearly different from the first. like i said earlier (i think) if i talk about dinosaurchestra’s themes it’ll be in another post, so i’ll just leave what ive said so far as it is.

-wow neil the master storyteller here giving us a riveting tale of near-death experiences at a young age. im on the edge of my seat except not because my desk is so small i can fit neither my chair nor my legs and body underneath it.

-i’m not saying much rn because neil’s just telling the story of part 3 from a closer perspective. there’s not much to say and i’m having too good of a time with this to bother. just wait a little longer until the too much song for more commentary.

-actually while this is going on i have reached the end of my birthday jar of pimento stuffed manzanilla olives and will now consume the last one in memoriam of neil’s dearly departed dinosaur friends.

-hooray, theyve made it back safe. i honestly didnt expect neil to be as good at storytelling as he is but this is a genuinely nice, light, child’s story. fits the themes of the album to a t. ive got a real-ass smile on my face.

-hang on i know it came out earlier but are these time-traveling exploits the basis for Behold The Future!? it talks about someone with associates, so that could be the dinosaurs, and it goes from i think 2004 to 2013. that’s a distinct possibility.

-so the dinosaurs are due to appear in a few days? id say i’m looking forward to it if i didnt know that tomorrow never comes. a few days away will always be a few days away, because every day is today and yesterday already happened. such a shame- if only we had a time machine, and could make it all the way until a few days from now, to see 6 year old neil rock out with the dinosaurchestra.

-tick-tock tick-tock tick-tock tick-tock tick-tock tick-tock tick-tock tick-tock tick-tock tick-tock tick-tock tick-tock tick-tock tick-tock tick-tock tick-tock tick-tock tick-tock tick-tock tick-tock tick-tock tick-tock tick-tock tick-tock tick-tock tick-tock tick-tock tick-tock tick-tock tick-tock tick-tock tick-tock tick-tock tick-tock tick-tock tick-tock tick-tock WAKE UP IT WAS ALL A DREAM (yes i counted all 37 tick-tocks. there’d be 38 if the alarm didnt go off, but thanks to that last one now there is.)

-the too much song can genuinely take you by surprise the first time listening through it. i know it did for me.

-simple, repetitive, dreamy. you took the words right outta my mouth. this is the most explicit love song of this album, and by explicit i mean this is overtly about love and not asymmetry or imaginary friends or something like that.

-ive got a brain pv for this song about a pairing from doctor who. given what ive said and posted about that show so far you have until the end of this liveblog to guess what pairing im thinking of.

-oh that’s a cool thing about this song that i never noticed. it’s constantly adding onto itself, with each verse. that could be symbolic for something if i tried hard enough. nice

-cliche? not terribly. even if the lyrics were somewhat so the music itself and structure of the lyrics make it more than distinct enough. there’s a true lemony demony flavor to this that means i, an aspecromantic, can really enjoy this blatant love song.

-i wonder what it says about neil, at least in 2006 (idk if he was with ming by then) that he’s less creative with the love songs than the nonsense.

-that bit about songs begging to be written apllies to pretty much all writing. i’d know.

-this song is one of the ones that always puts me in a Mood. the exchanges of lyrics, repetition, and vibe of the instruments just gets me. a bit more contemplative than i usually am.

-man most ld albums end with a song that is decidedly more melancholy or subdued than the song immediately preceding it, especially when the preceding song was hype as shit. sick puppy, spiral of ants, eventuality, something glowing, elsewhere, movie night. basically the eps are the only exception and that’s because theyre too short to allow for a big enough emotional journey.

-what im sayin is  you dont need to apologize neil. this is great, one of my favorites from the whole album honestly. which is saying a lot considering how much id normally be disinterested in a song like this.

-after the asmr of view-monster, the video game ive already forgotten the name of from damn skippy, the weird movie quote of clown circus, and the surprise content of hip to the javabean, you cant blame me from thinking there’s something at the end.

-oh no wait he’s talking about something real. yeah i dont have the cd but uuh that song and it’s accompanying flash animation can be found on youtube if you want even though it sucks like a deporitaz tune with guest vocals.

-damn neil out here with the reverse reverse reverse psychology. go white boy go

-im losing my mind a bit

-hey you know, i think ill borrow that mentality for my writing. i can write eighteen chapters of stuff i know other people will like and ill do one or more that i know other people will like and it doesnt matter if they dont like that ive put it out as well because theyve got all of that to keep them happy. theyve no room to complain, let me have this one

-happy and sorta sad, like this emoticon (:) whic only counts as an emoticon if you really make it

-i’ll admit, with this album it’s a bit easier for me to get sick of the music than usual. and the individual songs dont appear in my reccomended as easily as i might like so i generally dont hear it very often, and try to save full album listen-throughs to special occasions. and considering how much i like that song i guess it is a little bittersweet how infrequently i listen to it, given it’s tucked all the way at the end of this album.

-putting a year’s work into it means people have been waiting patiently. i dont want to say anything about that given the current state of ld today to not sound rude. leave those thoughts to yourself and i’ll do the same.

-for sitting through my laziness, i’d like to thank everybody. youve also made it all the way through this disaster of a post, and i really truly appreciate it. i put my thoughts out into the world to be seen and it means the world to me when people see them. thank you. And Especially You.

[gascon-en-exil]

FE16 Golden Deer Liveblogging

Chapters 16-18. Just like the Lions route, until it isn’t. There’s also some Dimidue content here, but not enough for its own post.

Chapters 16 and 17 are virtually identical to those chapters for the Lions apart from which army you’re controlling. Ferdinand still shows up to die on the Great Bridge, with a generic taking the place of Lorenz. (Oh, and I’d forgotten to say last time that Ashe appears in Ailell. I read somewhere that he can be recruited somehow here, but I didn’t see it.) The big battle at Gronder Field is a fair bit easier with the Deer; the Lions are less mobile and I believe fewer in number, with the only thing that surprised me being Sylvain and Ingrid coming from behind with reinforcements a few turns in.

Keeping Dedue alive is fairly simple in Chapter 17 since you only have to defeat Edelgard and Dimitri to end the chapter, but I’m not entirely certain I got anything special out of it? In any case, I did so by rushing Edelgard’s lines as fast as possible to get close to taking her out before the Lions start moving. Once they move it looks like Dimitri and his two boyfriends’ AI is specifically trained on Byleth (...why?) unless that’s only because mine was about 30 levels below the rest of my army and cowering in a bush because I’m not using him. It’s therefore not too hard to leave a few units behind to rush Dimitri on his way north as soon as Edelgard is down.

Chapter 18 at first looks like it’s going to be a retread of the Lions’ Chapter 20, the showdown vs. the Death Knight in Fort Merceus, but then the plot happens and you’ve got a bunch of Almyran NPCs led by Nader backing you up while everyone other than Claude assaults the fort from a different starting location. Then the DK surprises everyone by retreating, turning it until a rout map unless you can kill him before he leaves. On that plot point, see below.

Claude’s paralogue is technically the first new map I’ve seen on this route, although it’s really just the story map for the Sreng desert one used for skirmishes. It’s not completely awful to navigate once you realize that there’s a path of normal terrain circling the central structure, which was very helpful when trying to grab the loot from a bunch of thieves determined to commit suicide by dragon. The Wind Caller/Macuil wasn’t particularly worse than any other major monster boss I’ve yet encountered, and he was great for dropping little worldbuilding hints. It’s funny to me that the other house leaders’ paralogues target major military installations while Claude goes on a field trip to another country for information.

Character/Story observations

Let’s start with the Dimidue. The reason I say that I’m not sure that sparing Dedue accomplishes anything is that he retreats from battle and the post-chapter cutscenes play out as if this had happened anyway. Hilda describes Dimitri charging after Edelgard alone before collapsing and getting run through by Imperial soldiers. Claude then asks after Dimitri’s vassal whose fate was unknown - and then it cuts to Dedue alone, saying this: “Your Highness! Your ambitions are my own now! I...I will bring you Edelgard’s head... I swear it!” This is indeed the route where these two go full Quan/Finn, and although Dimitri’s offscreen end lacks the poignancy of Yied the results are no less tragic or less gay. And because Dimitri has no son to be fueled with righteous anger, Dedue has to carry within him not only Finn’s unbroken loyalty but Leif’s rage. I know he’ll be making a reappearance in a later chapter, too, so this isn’t the end for them. I wouldn’t be surprised if the anons I’ve gotten on the subject were really about the chapter where you kill Edelgard.

I made a point to defeat Dedue first before rewinding time to see what would come of it, and actually I think that adds even more to where their relationship is/was on this route. In this version of events it’s left ambiguous who’s leading the mysterious Faerghus army until Dimitri appears on the battlefield, and apart from the bit about Cornelia’s coup right after the timeskip no explanation is given for why Dimitri is his one-eyed feral self. Unless the game says otherwise, I’m going to assume that events played out as they did in the Lions, with Dedue rescuing him from prison but needing to sacrifice himself and inadvertently leaving Dimitri to wander alone as a vagrant for five years. This Dimitri is as such violent, contemptuous, and obsessed with revenge, and when his allies die in battle his “mourning” quotes are nothing but ellipses (Sylvain), dismissive grunts (Mercedes), or their names (Felix, Ingrid). For Dedue, though, who protests that he can keep fighting after being defeated, Dimitri says this:  “Shut up and retreat. You must live, Dedue.” So I was right about how this storyline plays out; per his Gilbert support, Dedue has to have his prince command him to live for him to have not charged to his death alongside Dimitri. Also, way to have all that homoromantic co-dependence flow both ways to have even a feral, death-seeking Dimitri insist on Dedue’s survival while all his childhood friends (and Mercedes) are dying around him and he barely spares them a word.

Anyway...let’s talk about lighter things. Not many supports left for me to get; I finally finished off Catherine and Shamir’s line, and it is blatantly romantic down to marriage propositions. As a counterpoint Claude’s last support with Shamir is one of his more romantic and one of the few endings that sees him eventually abandon Almyra. Flayn/Manuela dances around prostitution - good thing Flayn is secretly hundreds of years old, right?

Monastery tidbits: an NPC soldier confirms that the Fódlan year begins with the Great Tree Moon - the April equivalent. This means that numbering the months to match up with the Gregorian calendar was solely so the player could give Byleth a real world birthday. So worth it. I’ve also noticed that there’s a line of minor quests for supplies and skirmishes in Part 2 that are the same across all routes, with the only difference coming from who’s handing them out. For Edelgard it’s Hubert and for Claude it’s Hilda, but for Dimitri it’s Gilbert as yet another thing Dedue misses out on by being dead by default.

In a rare bit of honesty that’s kind of hilarious, Claude admits that he’s using Byleth for their connection to the church, now as a means of smoothing over tensions within the Alliance.

I complained about how the Alliance’s presence and behavior at the Gronder Field rematch on the Lions route has little explanation, and unfortunately the way the Kingdom remnant is handled is only slightly better here. Claude’s forces don’t try allying with them first because their movements have been erratic, and then later because it’s foggy at Gronder...fog that doesn’t stick around for the map itself, thankfully. Dimitri may be feral and unable to be reasoned with, but what about Gilbert or Rodrigue? The rematch is a big marketing moment, but having the Kingdom and Alliance fight each other instead of unifying against the Empire feels like a contrivance either way.

One thing I think Three Houses does really well compared to earlier games is that there’s less of a sense of what I think of as arbitrary chorus characters: people aside from the leads who show up in most dialogue scenes for the protagonist(s) to play off, who get to be there because they have plot armor or are NPCs so they can’t die in battle and therefore don’t need to be written around. FE16 goes out of its way to include every character in your army at one point or another in story cutscenes, sometimes even in plot critical ways. For example, after Chapter 17 it’s Lysithea who provides the plot hook to bring Those Who Slither back into the story by sharing her traumatic past. Meanwhile in Chapter 18 it’s Hilda who comes up with the ruse of invading Fort Merceus disguised as Imperial soldiers...as well as a gag about dressing Claude in drag that’s mildly amusing but goes nowhere.

Oh, right...I need to talk about the DK, and Those Who Slither’s nukes. The DK retreats from Fort Merceus because his side has “javelins of light” that totally obliterate it in the same way that Arianrhod gets obliterated in Edelgard’s route. As this happens in a cutscene I assume the DK doesn’t die there if you defeat him, as he does in the Lions route. If it seems odd that I’m not dwelling on the fact that the enemy now has anachronistic nukes, it’s nothing compared to Claude, who takes the opportunity to have an extended discussion on racism. Lorenz takes him to task for allying with the Almyran general Nader, and Claude reveals his plan to solve racism with imperialism. As silly as that is, he’s still deft (and manipulative) enough not to do so by revealing his own heritage but rather by dragging Cyril into the spotlight as an example of an Almyran among their own forces. Cyril protests, but that’s just how Claude rolls.

Part of Claude’s big speech references the Officer’s Academy bringing together people from many different backgrounds, among them the princess of Brigid and a man of Duscur. You know, an Imperial hostage and the vassal/boyfriend of the mentally unstable crown prince of Faerghus, because those are completely normal circumstances for adding diversity to the student body. It’s also strange to me that he considers Duscur as outside Fódlan. Ethnically and culturally distinct from Faerghus, yes, but Fódlan is a continent with three independent political entities that also includes the peninsula on which Duscur rests. To use a real world comparison close to how I imagine the relations in question, this would be comparable to saying that the Basque people do not live in Europe because they are an ethnic group distinct from the people of France/Spain. I’m clearly putting more thought into this than the game does, but still.

[halfblood-fiend]

So I just wanna make a huge, and I mean massive, thank you post for all y’all that came out and supported me during my liveblogging of finishing The Calling over the last couple days. It’s honestly been the best part of being stuck in bed sick and it actually made me want to finish that bound--forgive my language here--piece of crap. (If you wanna see the posts, you can find it all under #Fiend attacks The Calling and spoilers are tagged, just in case.)

For anyone who’s interested in me doing it again, the other two DA books I haven’t read right now are Asunder and The Masked Empire and you can let me know via ask, message, reply, or whatever, which one should be done next (though I think I know which one might win).

If you replied to any of my posts and didn’t get a shitty personal reply I tried to do through mobile, I am literally gonna put them all here, under the cut (and if you have the time, I feel like it’s worth looking through all of them because some people said interesting things and I like to think I can be pretty funny with my responses. lol). Lmao.

Thanks for enjoying this mess of a book with me! When I first started venting my frustrations, I low-key thought I’d be slamming a book everyone loved. Lol. I’m glad I was wrong.

@inuy21 replied to her own reply post:  I’ll have to give Stolen Throne a look to see if will change my mind Loghain. Though I wasn’t really a fan of his in the game nor Maric’s in The Calling. And it’s Empress Celene, right? LOL

Nah, that book is actually called The Masked Empire. It’s the one where allegedly Celene and Michel de Chevin are The Worst™.

Anyways, do at least take a look at Stolen Throne because Loghain is 15/10 in that, honestly. I hated him too until I read that book and now I’m in love.

@thexann replied to Why do I hate David Gaider’s book’s so much?:  The only good thing his books did for me were make me unconditionally love Loghain, but even then, his writing was so difficult to give a damn about I skipped around the ENTIRETY of The Stolen Throne, read all the good Loghain bits, then never picked it up again!

Same! High five for solidarity sisterrr!!

Skipping around, that was smart. That could’ve saved me a lot of Maric moaning and complaining as he destroyed not one, not two, but THREE of his friends’ lives. WHat a swell guy!

@october-rosehip (I hate it when it doesn’t TAG PEOPLE!!) replied to the same post: Dude needs an editor, BAD. He also suffers from… severe need for someone to hide his thesaurus. He’s written about people sitting redolently, smoking *kohl*, and once, three elves were playing HARPSICHORDS in a town center. Outdoors. Also, pacing issues. Dude has great ideas, but he’s not a novelist. Or historian.

He does! I’m surprised he didn’t have one? Isn’t everyone supposed to have one? Or did it not matter because he was riding on the coattails of a successful game of a hopeful franchise?

But yeah, I noticed that too. There’s overly conspicuous complex words, like he actually went into Word processor and tried to find the biggest word he could to replace his plain English ones. Causing no one to understand him. I mean harpsichords?? outside?? Has he ever SEEN a harpsichord??? Gaider wtf man... I look forward to that nonsense.

@cullenstairshenanigans replied to Dusty. Everything is “dusty” with this guy.: I quit after the 20th use of “the man”

Oh yeah. I saw that. He was notorious for that.

Don’t be afraid! Use people’s names! Do you realize how many men there were in this book?? Especially at the beginning?! Use. Names. There’s some free writing advice for ya, Gaider.

@october-rosehip replied to the same post: Oh, I guess someone DID steal his thesaurus.

Lmao. Only when it wasn’t convenient. Not only did he use “dusty” for everything, he also believes that the only noise swords make is a “clatter,” be it a “dull clatter” or a “clear clatter” (literally both phrases he used in the same scene!) Not to mention that he also thinks warriors just drop their swords willy nilly all over the place, as if they aren’t the most important singular possession to a SWORDSMAN.

@oh-thatcal  replied to “She had never spoken of this to anyone.”:  if you wanna rage, just read The Masked Empire… OTL these books are both good and awful at the same time.

I am actually rather beside myself with excitement tbqh.

@bombasticpro replied to  Oh god now Maric is doing it too…: Dat dab

Now I’m not sure if I’m Young and Hip™ enough to understand this correctly, but I’ll go out on a limb and say, “Yeah, I know right??”

Maric and Fiona bled their hearts out to each other for literally no reason. Do real life people actually do this? I don’t go around spilling my deepest secrets. Maybe it’s just that no one has gained enough Approval to unlock my Tragic Backstory™ yet.

@oblivionscribe replied to Maric has been stabbed by several spears...: For all the head trauma Maric received, I’m surprised he lasted long enough to sire sons.

Me too. I seem to recall that this isn’t new either, that Maric was often receiving head trauma in The Stolen Throne too!

What I would like to know is why is no one wearing a fucking helmet???

@thecrazyfereldan replied to I think that I’m starting to see one...: His writing also tends to be rather dry.

TRUE. It’s hard to read. Like, I read his story the way I would eat beef jerky: slowly, in near agony because I like the taste but hate the texture, and with my jaw aching because I had to chew so god damn much. And in the end, it’s for what? A steak tastes better, is easier to eat and is still beef.

(the steak in this metaphor is a DA game btdubbs, lol)

But seriously, it goes right up there with show and don’t tell. Telling only takes me to Snoozeville.

@october-rosehip replied to the same post: Dislocated thumbs continue to dislocate for MONTHS if you keep using your hands. Guess how I know. Also? Putting them back in hurts just as much as putting them out in the first place.

Oh, yikes!! I am so sorry there, friend. But, yeah, I can see that because my jaw still gives me trouble. Not that it redislocates, but it’ll pop sometimes and it HURTS.

So that means that Duncan would have been in WAY more trouble by doing that to himself. Imagine being a rogue who’s thumbs kept dislocating??? Especially when he was trying to pick the locks on their manacles again in the climax?

And when Duncan popped his thumbs back in, all he said about it was that second quote (“He took a moment to get used to the stabbing pain…”). That was it.

Gaider, I can only suspend my disbelief so far, bro.

@oh-thatcal replied to @starlanellfic ‘s post about my liveblogging:  Do all the books!

Dude... I kinda want to...

Although I wouldn’t do Stolen Throne again only because it would probably crumble into me fangirling over Loghain which no one, except maybe @@element-104 , would want to see. lol.

@ma-sulevin  replied to Okay, so, as much as I sorta like Duncan...: My personal favorite part is when the mage asks him about Grey Warden stamina and he’s like “uhh….. YES yes we do have that let me show you”

*snorts* omg YES. It was classic! Predictable, but classic, and I was totally willing to accept that from him. xD

@ma-sulevin replied to WHY DID SHE KISS HIM I AM SO MAD... : It literally made no sense

I’m still mad. I haven’t gotten over it. There was no romance until that happened and even that was forced af. Not one piece of it felt real. At least I can thank the Maker that he didn’t write about Fiona “boobing boobily down the stairs” or any of that other male gaze nonsense.

@thesecondsealwrites replied to Duncan has an obsidian dagger. Smh.:  \o/

Bless you, PonySeal. I feel like you might’ve already figured this was a peeve of mine. Lol.

@queenofeire replied to the same post:  0/10 against any kind of armor Hella sharp for 5-10 cuts then pretty much useless….

^^Yup, basically.

Granted, it ended up being magical? But if that mage didn’t enchant it with an Unbreakable spell, chances are it’s still useless. Fite me.

And @fenriswaifu? You’re welcome. :) Sorry if I ruined your Aesthetic.

@valammar replied to Gaider keeps using the word “almost.”:  I’m still cackling at the last line of this post.

Look, I’m still VERY angry about obsidian knives, okay?? lmao. Volcanic glass IS GLASS, it’s not ALMOST GLASS. It is.

It is.

@amarmeme replied to Well that resolved neatly...:  yea, that book was… not my cup of tea

Mine either. Of the three DA books I have now read, The Caling is my least favorite. And by least favorite, I mean it was awful. Sorry to those who love it.

And that’s all te replies for now. LMao.

[crossgartered]

P5R Liveblog (15/?)

School festival!

This is such a bad idea.

I really do think they should 1) invite Akechi, as the vote called for, through legitimate means (aka via Sae or potentially through me since, y'know. we hang out. We have a social link. I don't remember if I have his contact info but I think I remember seeing that brown square at some point so I think I do even if he usually doesn't contact me.

That said.

I also think that if we wanted to get Intel from him, as Phantom Thieves responding to his broadcast, we should 100% do an Alibaba and contact him that way. Why are we not doing that. WHY ARE WE NOT DOING THAT????

YOU REALLY DONT NEED HIM TO DO IT PLEASE JUST ALIBABA HIM

Also, thank you for recognizing that I have his chat id, game

This is a lot to put on Makoto. Can't we at least brainstorm it a little bit to ease the pressure?

YOSHIZAWA THANK GOD IVE BEEN WAITING TO HEAR FROM YOU HOW ARE YOU DO YOU STILL TRUST ME

It seems like she's worried about my well-being; that's good...

Oh man can I hang out with her at the festival please

It's kind of funny; I've only ever managed to hang out with Haru or Ryuji at the festival.

I've dated Hifumi, Makoto, and Haru in my 3 playthroughs of p5. Wait, hold on, I've actually done 4 playthroughs, haven't I. Because I dated Hifumi twice...

The learning at school music is playing but also IS THAT FRIEND FROM COLLEGE SHIBUSAWA BC

Oh. Oh no. False memories, huh...? Now, is that false memory yours or Kasumi's? Atm I'm leaning Yoshizawa bc she's got a lot of weirdness mixed up with her and her circumstances

Man, I'm so annoyed. I was one gaming session away from maxing out my Knowledge and getting the highest grade. Guess I'll have to settle for top 10. It's not like I need the charm, anyway. All I really need at this point is Guts. But I haven't really been hanging out with Takemi or Iwai, so it makes sense. Oh well. At least I can hang out with Hifumi more now.

In my first playthrough of p5, I got through to rank 3 proficiency really quickly, made some tools to quickly bypass Yusuke's thing, and then completely disregarded it afterwards until Haru needed it, and then I prioritized everyone else since I wanted to finish as many people as possible and starting on a stat to start someone new would have sucked. Iirc I did get to rank 2 or 3 with her, enough to get baton pass and maybe something else, but I was very frustrated

...Where was I going with this? Oh well

Shut up, pompous male customer

Hey! I have max knowledge, Sojiro!

Haru is so down at all times to try weird stuff. I love her. She's always up for new experiences

Another reason why she & Yusuke should hang out more

LMAO I love this bit

Yusuke is on top of things as usual. : )

I LOVE YUSUKE WITH MY ENTIRE HEART

YUSUKE THIS ISNT HOW YOU TALK TO PEOPLE

SDJDJDJSJ I LOVE HIM SO MUCH

Oh, this is an extremely interesting counseling session, actually.

"However, if you are the one leading them to their conclusions, are they truly making the choices for themselves? Isn't that just submitting to another person's will?"

"In all honesty, I'm sure there are people out there who think that... But life in this world confines people to certain frames of mind sometimes, and without them even realizing it. If I can help lift the weight off their shoulders and free their minds, I believe the results are worth it."

Fascinating.

"I would wish... For the world to see my mother's painting the masterpiece that it is, no matter how briefly." ...Yusuke...!

Reblog if you crey every tiem

"And if at all possible, I would also wish to meet a wonderful master - one who would take me in and guide my brush with care." YUSUKE...! TAT

JESUS I remember playing this part for the first time. my heart was pounding. I could barely tear my eyes away from the screen I was so nervous like what was gonna happen?!

The tension is still high even after the fifth time seeing this scene but damn that first time was something special

I wonder how he scheduled that phone call

All right, Pancakes.

It's weird seeing the PE Faculty office from this angle

Now THIS was an interesting bit

...wow, nobody invited me to the post-festival party. Not even Haru... I'll have to look up how that works later

Hey, it's Kasumi! Hmm. Maybe it's just that the default changed from Haru to Kasumi.

Kinda sucks for Haru, though. Now we get even less content of her so far. I thought the talk after the festival was actually very interesting stuff for learning about her character.

AHH SHE LITERALLY DRAGGED ME SHES SO NEAT

Members of the dance club? Um. Okay? This is new

IT'S SHOWTIME

...and he just stands there. Dammit

WAIT I TAKE THAT BACK I LOVE HIM

This is such a high school genre thing

Those shoes look really uncomfortable to dance like that in

YES DO IT YOU COWARD

Please be canon good dancer please be canon good dancer please be canon good d

ATLUS YOU COWARDS

Dating this girl would be a tragedy dating this girl would be tragic dating this girl c'mon she's dead you know she's dead and will disappear probably when you break the illusion come on don't do it you know it's a bad idea

But what if I dated her in this playthrough

Hmm? Now they're giving me the option to go to the post-festival party? But I just went? Huh?

HOO BOY

I know that this is an optional event, but damn if I didn't wish it started a whole new subset of rumors

IM SORRY FOR EMBARRASSING YOU

I wonder if you can hang out with Futaba at the festival. That'd be nice

The dissonance between Morgana being like 'we should tell the others about Boss!' And 'nah we'll hold off on telling them about Kasumi' is kinda getting to me.

God, this all happened in one day. What an emotional rollercoaster for our Thieves.

Sojiro...

<3

[writesailingdreams]

Twisted: The Untold Story of a Royal Vizier [conclusion]

Or Act 2

Sorry, I left the liveblog hanging. As I’ve said, I felt...drained from watching it. Not because of the story but because it took longer than I had planned. Logically it would have made more sense to take a break, watch the other movie I had scheduled, and then come back to Twisted and liveblog Act 2. But I just wanted it to be done. So, that was the context of situation. Sorry.

Aside from the story and Disney aspect of the musical I learned two (well, three) new things about myself from watching Twisted:

I am very...detail-oriented. Like when I watch things, especially Disney, I’m going to notice all these context details. And if I write about them, I think it comes across as very...cold?

I like Disney (or animation over live action) because I associate a lot of characters, especially those in romantic relationships, with a low sexual or non-sexual existence. When animated characters express attraction (which, for me, has it’s own signals for recognition) it’s not as weird as live actors.

I can recite the entirety of Hercules, including sound effects, from memory. (I did everything from Herc and Meg meeting while she was accosted by Nessus to when Herc continues on his way to Thebes).

So, onto the actual musical...

I enjoyed Act 2 a lot more than Act 1 and that might be less because of the context and more I wasn’t stopping for (almost) every thought I had to type it up. The action and behaviors and story could just flow naturally. I could have thoughts and reactions but it was a single fluid experience. (Although I feel a little bad because I feel like I might have posted more enthusiastic posts, if I had...)

I’m not sure why, but for some reason, it was in the first scene of Act 2 that the whole Pixar vs Disney (and the eventual merger that happened) finally hit me. So, I got a kick out of that.

Spoilers below

Jasmine’s character arc was good. I liked that she ended up seeing Aladdin for the lying, thieving, potentially rapist guy he was

Genie’s humorous quips were done, as with a lot in the musical, in the context of how he would literally come across to people -- a lot of confusing but funny nonsense. What’s equally amusing is that Genie’s humor, for me, was just humorous voices. It didn’t mean anything to me, because I didn’t know what or who most of Genie’s voices referenced.

I wasn’t comfortable with Aladdin being portrayed as having a split personality, not because he killed his parents but because of the stigma of mental illness being correlated to murderous behavior.

The twist with Jasmine being Jafar’s daughter with Shahrazad made me think of Ramayana variants where Sita is Ravana’s daughter, but where Ravana would actually care about Sita in a fatherly way. It was actually at the end, when Jasmine and Jafar were singing together, that I thought: Yep; this has given me a familial love story and that’s one of my favorite kinds, so yep, worth it.

I’m not sure if there was more in Act 2 but the nods to Disney rumors seemed more noticeable to me. (There was an entire song devoted to subliminal messages.)

Also, it finally hit me (after listening to/watching various Aladdin paraodies) that correlating “A Whole New World” to wanting sex or potential date rape is semi-common? Like my biggest take away from “A Whole New World” is touching clouds, flying on a magic carpet!!!, and the ability to show others wondrous things. (There’s a reason “I can show you the world, shining, shimmering, splendid” and “I can open your eyes, take you wonder by wonder” are a prominent creative mantras for me and my identity.)

I actually had more thoughts about this, but it got really long, so I’m putting it in a separate post. Since it’s less about Twisted and more about Disney couples, attraction, and dialogue.

The biggest highlights of Act 2 was the song where all these villains appeared. (I loved when they all yelled Cruella off stage.) It was literally one of the best parts. I also loved the nods to earlier drafts of The Little Mermaid. Of course, Gaston makes use of the Stockholm Syndrome critique (which, like Cinderella and dreaming, isn’t accurate in the context of the movie.) I mean, because Belle literally runs away because the Beast is a jerk and only stays after he apologizes, after which he stops being a jerk.

That actually brings up how I felt there were different ways to approach Twisted:

in a precise literal Disney movie context

in a Disney rumors and ancedotes and popular culture context

in an alternate pov of context

I was also amused about how, at the end, Jasmine made everyone a princess, alluding to the Princess Franchise. (In Twisted it was all gender encompassing, which I liked.)

Jafar’s rationalism and science-bent spoke to me. Additionally, I thought it fit in-context just for Jafar’s character in general. Like, he’s obviously not a sorcerer in the original movie and uses other means to get what he wants (hypnosis, magical artefacts, disguises). This also reflects what I call the Ron and John villain principle: the villain is often presented in a relatable position in the opening:

Jafar has to detail with the incompetent Sultan

Hades has to deal with the other gods’ disdain

Facilier has to deal with racism and classism

Ursula has to deal with being banished

yes I know there’s Ratigan and Silver and Te Ka/Tamatoa but the principle doesn’t apply to them, imo

I was also amused that Aladdin was the Peddler at the beginning of the film! Which explains why the story was told the way it was. I thought it was a clever twist and explanation.

Finally, my favorite aspect of the musical was the complexity of stories: who tells them and what part of the story endures and, is thus, remembered. Lost and forgotten and overlooked stories -- literally and as a creative impetus -- are like a metaphor about blooming flowers that I can’t quite put into words.