#i tweeted this but might as well post here too bc tbh i have more ppl to talk to abt twsb here surprisingly KJFSJ

[milkbreadtoast]

Cant stop thinking abt this ever since I noticed it but...

Look at how low the placement of the shoulder seams are... he's wearing an oversize cardigan... which means... moe sleeves🫠

(had to draw it bc im obsessed)

[good-things-do-happen-dean]

oh here’s my thought that cracked the code for me but idk why i didn’t post it earlier: the you know whos think we hate sam because he “““gets in the way of our ship””” (utter garbage, but ok.) because they hate cas for that very reason

[redxblueihateloveyou]

Hey i really love your blog!!! I just plucked the courage to actually send u an ask fhdjhd but GOSH i love your video edits and your gifs and your meta article posts, you're so articulate and you can explain/describe moments in a way that makes me go "oh wow, i cant believe i haven't seen it that way before!!" Haha ANYWAYS i'm just here to say that i completely agree with what all u said, Free creators might do a lil fanservice here and there for the 25 ships that exists within the fandom's circle, but rinharu's storyline is clearly the most romantic one! And i'd argue it's the one closest to being canon esp after part 1, i mean the fact that they put such an explosive emotional outburst right at the end of the second to the last movie means a lot. It's like reinforcing the fact that this series has always been about them, and everything that has happened only happened either because they met or they grew appart and miss eachother. I kinda feel like maybe.. juust maayyybe there's a chance KA wants to make the ship canon, since it's the last movie and they want to end it on a highnote maybe (bcs honestly i think the only reason they've been holding back is purely bcs of the merch sales, since they don't have a problem showing a wholesome lesbian love story in kobayashi maid dragon) butt i could be wrong, maybe i'm just overly optimistic and delusional, they could somehow ruin it and give an ending that panders to all the ships again 😅🥲, but at least there's a clear-cut guarantee that part 2 would dedicate a large portion of it fixing rin and haru's fight!!! Oohh how can i wait another 6 months now!!😭😭 (sorry for the long ask btw!! 🙏🙇‍♀️🙇‍♀️)

OMG thank you so so much!! For watching my vids too! ❤️❤️❤️ It really means a lot to me! Ahhhh wow, thats the longest ask I've ever recieved! 😍 I'm trying to explain myself so hard lol I'm glad its appreciated, bc sometimes I'm like "I don't fucking know how to say this" xD

Well, you know me, I only care for one ship, which is the only one with confirmed info that they're both actually gay and have mutual feelings for each other. There are some other ships in free! I'm fine with (those do not include Rin or Haru in them xD), but I just mostly don't care, bc after reading all the stuff, you can see that in some of those to one the other one is actually like his second option, which I just do not like. Others I just don't even see, bc again to me who witnessed great close male friendships and having two sisters who I'm very close to, I just do not see anything romantic in that.

It's not just Free! tbh, it's like any sports anime these days. They see two guys walking together, it's a ship. And like no one cares if they're just bros. Like I'd get i they did some fanservice fanservice, but like I never saw anyone in Free! crossing the line the way rinharu do. I can without thinking much name you 10 rh moments that no matter how hard you think can't be explain as being bros, but can't name one when it comes to others. I just find some ppl shipping everyone with everyone weird sometimes. It's like western fans see like some eastern actors or singers slap each other ass lovingly and they're like "oh they're fucking" I'm like "yeah, ofc all 500 of them, you're absolutely right". And Free! doesn't do anything even like that, I just do not get sometimes like what moment even brought on some ships. I'm genuinely confused. Albert and Haru? You fucking fell from a sakura tree or smth? I'm...

I'm especially confused when it comes to guys, whose character type is who I call "I only want this one and if I can't have it, then I'm ok" xD. It just always surprised me, when they try to pair up them with someone else, it's like a complete ooc.

I'm also not into this whole "well, if there are gays in this anime, than everyone there is gay". I'm like... huh. It's like with KNB and MDZS I had same feeling. It's like you have already couples there who are canon/borderline canon, why do you need another 10 who don't even interact or just don't even go there? I'm always so confused in those situations. Or like wangxian is married and some are like "no, I actually don't like it, let me write a fic when they're with other ppl". Lan Zhan... being in love or having sex with someone else? Yeah, that's not Lan Zhan, dude, you're writing about someone else. Might as well change the name at this point.

But last time I went to twitter someone had a thread about how if they make s4 of Free! they should mainly explore there Momo's angst (and no, it wasn't a joke), so I'm already like, I'm just.. nothing will surprise me no more. But I'm forever gonna be confused.

Yeah, I eel you about "going there". I mean seeing part of it, it just kinda cemented my confusion, bc I do not get how it can be considered platonic. We were just discussing since yesterday with @freeseafirefly how I now even more perplexed and do not understand how they will resolve it without going into relationship territory. It's just our point here is that like... no one forced them to go there (I mean its not like this whole fandom has some wild expectations or anything already), we were waiting or our usual friendship and swimming and maybe tiny conflict about struggles of pro-careers and some usual rh implications (maybe all the rh gay in dramas as always). Not some pure fanfiction coming to life here haha.

Like why I'm laughing is bc I twice used in my "fics" bringing up him leaving Haru as a force to push the confession, bc there's no way if he adresses this it won't lead to this. And now we not only have this (bc Haru just basically layed it out there), but an actual scene of him playing on their feelings for each other and a literal image of Rin leaving and "taking Haru's heart with him" to the point when he's for the first time in his life openly crying on the ground. And it's not like this scene can be interpreted as anything else, the whole fandom talks same, bc the whole fight was just about them, what Haru said was just about them, there's a literal boom of his heart getting out of his chest, before he falls and now he's heartless.

So our question is like... why go there?

It's like some say that they might still resolve it with "they're special to each other" and swimming, but still like we already knew that, there was no reason to go that far is what I'm saying. And to think that it was planned since forever giving the clues is like... ???

The whole spoon theme also throw me on the loop because like, lets be honest, it's wedding themed. And that part of the interview about part 2 there also made me go...?????? Because I mean, huh?

This is just all in all very interesting turn of events to say the least. I do not see the point of all of this if its not what I think it is, esp after seeing tweets like "even I see a rh wedding and I'm mh T_T". It's just all very unsubtle, that's why we're confused.

Like who knows, maybe we'll really by some magic turn of events get lucky and they really decided that since its the ending, it's okay to go for it. But I also don't wanna to hype myself much, I'm already really happy with it, just bc again, this scene already proves all of my points.

And yeah, I'm sure they'll pander to everyone, bc it's the end and etc and we have to handle everything on the good note and there's a whole line of ppl who's obsessed with us, esp with Haru xD, but like bromance pandering and romance pandering are different things, you know *wiggles eyebrows* and u know who always gets the second one.

[d0llygard3n]

i had this random idea pop up in my head while thinking of a request, so here ya go! ☺️ can i have some headcanons of jirou scrolling through social media and whatnot, and she sees posts made by the gn! reader (her crush) that are about a recent album made by their favorite artist/band? ya know, and it’s evident how excited they are ‘cause they’re like “PLS STREAM (ALBUM) BY (ARTIST/BAND) ITS SO GOOD”. regardless of whether or not jirou is into the same type of music/artists as her crush, she’ll listen to it anyways and she finds herself in love with the album? i thought this is lowkey cute hehe

a/n: sorry if this was late, i got distracted- n e ways, this is so cute omfg (she looks so cute in the gif omg)  (i changed it up a bit bc im tired so srry ;-;)

it was just an average day for jirou. scrolling through twitter while listening to mina rant about love.. or something like that-

she wasn’t listening tbh, as she found more interest in you, her crushes, twitter

ofc she would occasionally nod or “mhm” at mina so she would know she was “listening” 

while she was scrolling through your past tweets (stalker-) she got a notification

it was from you, of course

she clicked on it and read

[username]: “pls check out (fav song/album) by (fav artist/band) it’s so good omg-”

she smiled and blushed lightly (mina teased her, asking if she had a bf, jirou waving her off)

she decided to check it out, thinking “well if they like it then i might as well check it out”

she listened and...

she liked it

like, really liked it

she commented under the post

you got a notification as you were listening to (fav song/album), you looked and saw that it was a comment

you clicked and read it

earphone_jack commented: “i like that one too! :))”

[ranboo-my-beloved]

I’m new to the fandom, so forgive me if I sound ignorant: can someone explain to me the differences between dt tumblr, Twitter, tiktok and Instagram? Is everything said about one or the other really true or just generalizations? (Like “dt Twitter is toxic”, and what not) should I be avoiding certain platforms of the fandom? (So far I’ve been on dt tumblr and insta, and they seem pretty chill to me so idk)

i only have personal experience about tumblr and twt so i invite anyone to add onto this

here are some basic stuff to the best of my abilities:

twitter

huge differences between 'big' and 'small' accounts

cc's can see what you post (can be negative or positive)

groupchats play a big role in meeting new people

overtly anti-shipping

great fanart, and if you're an artist and wanna show your work to the cc's you can @ them

'events' like when ppl get together to trend a hashtag, or for example the selfie day that happens every month

you don't get too much 'privacy' (ppl can see who you follow and what tweets you like - you could get called out for it)

nsfw accounts are there, but you likely won't run into them if you don't deliberately search up things

tumblr

no one knows how many followers you have so basically everyone is 'equal' in dteamblr

we panic every 2nd day about a cc possibly having a blog, but it's all red herrings so you're probably safe to post any bullshit you'd like :)

we kind of all know each other but also don't. i personally consider everyone my friend who interacts with me like 2x

shipping is free-for-all (respectfully ofc) and there is also 'truthing' which is essentially believing that a cc isn't straight

breathtaking fanart as well + some rlly amazing fanfic writers are here too

when some makes a good post you're gonna see it 20+ times bc everyone reblogs each other's stuff

no one has to know who you are - you can just pop out of nowhere any day with half a personality (that you might have stole from a cc but shhh) and you're gonna get a warm welcome

90% of our communication is done in the tags tbh

you might see some more offensive-ish jokes or hot takes

the use of tone indicators is strongly encouraged (/j; /hj; /lh; etc.)

as i said i don't know anything about insta and only a tiny bit about tiktok so i can't really talk about them

i don't think you need to avoid any part of the fandom, every fandom has its chill and not-so-chill parts, so you kinda just have to experiment with them to find out which one you like the most

[facelessxchurch]

Good news first: HarperCollins’ and Landy’s tweets confirmed multiple artists (AKA not just Percival) worked on this book so we might actually got some good canon art out of it.

Now on to the rant (and a bit of wishful thinking at the end)  below the cut:

I have more time now, so here are my more in-depth thoughts on the Grimoire.

As I had already said in the previous post: I had hoped for the Grimoire to look more like an in-universe item AKA more like an actual leather bound Grimoire (based on it’s name) or like a mock-up of actual top secret case files.

Here he said the book is meant to exist within the world, so having it be leather bound would make sense. Especially since he said it’s meant to have been written by Sanctuary archivists.

Considering that, making it look ‘punk’ makes no sense. Not that the cover even looks punk-ish. It looks like street art, which is more a general teenager thing than a punk thing. Also, why would these archivist slap Skul’s face on the cover? Unless it was like, I dunno, poorly taped on photo of Skul and not so street art looking.

So yeah, I think he’s lying about them having chosen this design on purpose. I think they wanted it to be a leather bound book (or at least it looking like one) but the budget wouldn’t allow it.

Tbh when I looked at the cover my first thought was Etsy art tbh

[This stuff is from TashsTalismans on Etsy btw.]

My second thought was that it looks more like a placeholder cover of a proof copy. For reference, this is the uncorrected proof copy of the first Skulduggery Pleasant book [picture from @lucaspiszu on Twitter].

Also, making the tagline ‘The Secrets History of the Universe’ makes it not only seem even less than an in-universe item, but also appears to be inaccurate since Landy said the Grimoire will mainly focus on Skulduggery (and Valkyrie) and unfortunately less on the world of SP itself.

And as @adler-obsessed​ already pointed out: why is the Sanctuary logo a SKULL and a cicada? This better have nothing to do with Skulduggery...

[Btw they already uploaded a pretty high res version of the cover on the UK website if ya wanna get a closer look at the cover.]

Tbh I feel more like it might be an Easter egg/a reference to ‘The Silence of the Lambs’? It does seem like a movie Landy would enjoy, doesn’t it?

Instead of the cicada having a skull like marking on it’s back it looks more like a mix between an exclamation mark and keyhole, tho that might just be coincidence? 

Meanwhile Waterstone is putting am emphasise on the ‘deliciously dark story’.

So hopefully it will go into detail about Skul’s death? Or maybe that’s just wishful thinking bc I want details about how Nef did it since I’ve already read a bunch of different fan versions of it. 

Imagine it being in form of an Sanctuary agent interviewing Nefarian during the Truce about it tho. Ngl I’d love that.

Imagine someone voice acting Nef for that part and actually doing a good job of it, unlike the English and German audiobook narrators. Hm, that might would inspire me to do a little something for it. IF it happens, that is, considering I rarely get what I want with these books.

And I gotta say, him already messing up the phase 2 timeline up badly and his answer to us correcting him is not exactly confidence inspiring. I mean, it is good that he is asking fans on Twitter for corrections, but it’s fairly last minute and I wouldn’t trust the SP fans that terribly much either considering the poor state the Skulpedia is in...

The cover art looks cheap and rushed too which makes me worried about the quality of the art inside. With Percival at least I know what we’re getting, but they didn’t name any of the artists that are/were working on the Grimoire, so it could either be really good or it could be really bad bc they might be doing that Grimoire on a budget and... well, you get what you pay for, so I really hope they paid up for the inside art even if not for the cover.

[vagarius]

misukazu 21

(if you saw me fuck up the other one no you didnt)

EDIT I THINK THIS ONE GOT A LITTLE FUCKED UP TOO BUT IT’S... READABLE...

questions from this post, and answers originally written for this thread!!

If you had to change the pairing’s very first meeting, how would you change it?    their canon first meeting is already so good SHDGFLJASHG but if i had to choose a different one that's still within the context of mankai... meeting as kids and losing touch and coming back together completely different at mankai

What song fits your pairing the most?    uhhHHhhHHH i don't have a real answer but i do have a partial playlist for one of my misukazu aus and the only two songs in it are furaregai girl by sayuri and champagne's for celebrating by mayday parade and i feel like that says enough sldhgalsdhfalsh

What is your favorite AU/prompt idea/trope for your pairing?     ALL MISUKAZU AUS ARE GOOD but. i really love any au where their first meeting is in the future and both are still kind of lost but they're Older and it's hard to let themselves fall into the easy trust they find in canon. i just think that'd be neat.

Do you prefer canon ideas or do you have your own headcanons for them?     I'VE SAID THIS MANY TIMES BUT CANON MISUKAZU GIVES OFF MADE FOR EACH OTHER VIBES AND USUALLY I DON'T VIBE WITH THAT BUT THEY REALLY ARE WHAT THE OTHER NEEDS... AND I THINK EVEN IF THEY HAD TO PART THEY'D STILL BE ABLE TO BE BETTER PEOPLE BC THEY HAD MET

Favorite canon moment of them?     THERE ARE SO MANY but the one that immediately comes to mind is misumi carrying drunk kazu to bed (latest bday line) because drunk kazu is so soft and it implies that misumi wanted to wish happy birthday to kazu pretty late... what did he want to give him...

Least favorite canon moment of them?     hmm... there's not really one i can think of??? IM SORRY I DON'T KNOW WHAT TO SAY I LOVE ALL THEIR CANON MOMENTS

Favorite headcanon trope/idea? (Your own or someone else’s)    this is somehow both vague and very specific but i think misukazu gives off this vibe: He's beautiful. I can't tell him. or "Kazu is always beautiful~" Don't call me that, Kazu thinks. I'm not. so... insecurities i guess ????? AJSHAJJD

Favorite aspect of them/their relationship dynamics?     THIS IS GOING TO SOUND SO CHEESY but i love how /real/ they allow themselves to be around each other. misukazu at their best is when one thinks "you're you. and i love that you" and the other knows this. i just. THEY VALIDATE THE OTHER SO MUCH CRIES

Least favorite aspect of them/their relationship dynamics? (Can be headcannon)     this isn't a "least fav" so much as "it makes me sad" but if either of them showed any sign of not being interested anymore the other is more likely to give up then push anything. sort of like "it was bound to happen, so i'll enjoy now until they drop me" or EVEN WORSE they think the other would be better off without them and pushes them away. so yeah the fact i can see one of these happening makes me sad.

If they aren’t a canon pairing, how would you get them together?     they give off "everyone knows we're dating but us" energy but at the same time i feel like they'd acknowledge there's something and just not define it bc a) they don't need to (misumi) or b) they're too nervous to (kazu). in other words i think one day they are holding hands and misumi says "kazu? is this dating?" and kazu holds his breath before asking "do you want it to be?"

If you had to take them and plunk them into another fandom, what fandom would that be? Why?     i think theyd be hilarious in any sports animanga (kazu is manager tho bc noodle arms but maybe they bond when misumi walks him through some of his usual training menu one night - ahem. anyway) BUT ALSO horimiya au...

How hard is it write/draw your pairing? Scale of 1-10.     AJDHAJDHSF I REALLY LOVE THEM SO IT COMES PRETTY EASILY... but sometimes you try to put them in tropes and realize they would Just Not Work Like That. idk where i'm going with this. but yeah. anyway 3 for sankaku.

Is there a pairing that you think rivals them?     in terms of what i ship, i tend to ship kazu and misumi individually with a lot of dif charas AJDHAKD. but in terms of like... in-universe "rival" pairings: kazu side: tsuzukazu (maybe, lbr it would take them 273924 yrs to actually get together), kazu x someone from winter (i... have my reasons but they'd take longer than what this answer entails) misumi side: ... surprisingly none that i can think of ahdjahd

Which character of the pairing do you like more? (Would you ever pair yourself with them?)     you know that tweet that's like "sometimes a ship is just your two favs"? yeah that's misukazu for me. but if i had to choose... misumi AJDHAJHDSF I HONESTLY WASNT THAT INTO YUME UNTIL THESE TWO CAME AROUND (NOT COUNTING 707)... but yeah if they wanted to hold me in their arms i wouldn't oppose

Which character of your pairing would be the one to break up with the other? Why?     OOOOOH BOY well. i think it could be either of them. i don't think they'd break up for lack of love but too much love and wanting the other to be happy and thinking that the only way to give them that is to let them go. so i guess the question is which of them would be more likely to be selfish and hold on. thinking this way, i think misumi would be more likely to break-up, bc kazu has lots of friends who are better than him!! and misumi is more ready to leave if he thinks he needs to than kazu is. now im sad.

Are they relatable as characters or as a pairing?     THE NUMBER OF TIMES I'VE BEEN CALLED KAZU KIN... in all seriousness kazu's struggles with speaking out and (shinobi spoilers) his uncertainty over his future hit real close to home... while i don't relate as much as misumi, his struggles always manage to tear my heart into pieces... ((oversharing alert) i guess what really separates me from misumi is his struggle with his desire to connect with family who has treated him poorly... whereas im more "lol fuck you") tldr i relate to kazu slightly more LOL

Did you once/ever dislike one/both of them?     i never disliked them but i was NOT expecting either of them to shoot up so quickly into my favs list ahdjahdjf. also i started shipping them Immediately After reading summer main story so there's that

On an estimate, how many posts have you made about them?    as of september 28th 2020 i make up 11/78 fics on ao3 in the romantic misukazu tag and 2/12 in the platonic one. i may have brainrot.

What made you decide to ship them?     TBH I FINISHED THE MAIN STORY AND WENT "OH MY GOD... THAT'S MY SHIP" but now that i'm here i continue to ship them because they have the potential to bring out both the best and the worst in each other and i'm all about that

Favorite genre for them? (Angst, fluff, etc.)     angst. i just. angst hurt/comfort all the way. im so sorry babies.

lol you thought there would just be 21 ANYWAY EXTRA 1: how do they spend breaks/vacation?    they'd travel a lot when they're older!! kazunari loves to travel and misumi would follow kazunari anywhere (also, new triangles!!) so they go somewhere new whenever they have the time. however i think eventually one or both of their future careers will take them anywhere and everywhere anyway, so their "ideal vacation" might turn into an evening in, cuddling and catching up (as if they didn't already send play-by-play updates over the phone of whatever they did during the day)

EXTRA 2: first date?     i don't they ever have an explicit first date, but if asked they'll cite the time they had a picnic in the park turned triangle hunt turned accidental dip in the duck pond. at least, kazunari will. misumi just tilts his head and wonders what you mean.

EXTRA 3: gifts?     IM FEELING REALLY CHEESY SO I'M MAKING THIS ABOUT ANNIVERSARY GIFTS they both end up getting each other jewelry (although kazu was really really nervous bc he wasn't sure if misumi would wear it). kazu gets misumi a bracelet (with triangles, of course although misumi only wears it sometimes because he doesn't want to lose it) and misumi gets kazu a pair of triangle earrings "so we can match!" and kazunari combusts at the implications

EXTRA 4: sharing clothes     THEY'RE ACTUALLY AROUND THE SAME SIZE (and tend to wear baggier stuff barring kazu's skinny jeans)... but they have completely different Styles so it's still really obvious when steal each other's stuff ahdjajdkaf. as cute as kazu would look in sumi's sweatshirt i think the much more likely scenario is kazu wrapping misumi in his jackets because this boy nEVER BRINGS HIS ANYWHERE anyway just. accidental shared wardrobe misukazu.

EXTRA 5: lake house au    consider: kazunari living in a house on the shore of a lake for a summer for Art Purposes (and a little bit for Dealing With Life purposes but he's not gonna admit that) and meets his lake neighbor misumi who kazu thinks might be a ghost or spirit for a while but he actually just lives further down the lake and misumi unknowingly helps kazu with his Life Issues and maybe they fall in love

[greengay]

Thank you for being one of the only blogs to talk about rpf 🧡 I like it a lot, but I feel like it’s become taboo to mention it? I don’t post about it because I’m worried people will think I’m weird

LOL JUST DOIN’ MY PART....

TBH!!! sooooo many people feel like you do LOL like, a lot of people enjoy it and know it’s harmless and SO MANY PEOPLE follow my nsfw gd blog (sorry for not answering the asks yet......executive dysfunction....)

1) i don’t care about followers or whatever, i am just here to scream into the void and if people tune in, cool

2) YA it’s become taboo moreso recently because I think fan culture has gotten.....younger? because of people being able to access the internet easier? like back in the day, you used to have to either have a computer or log onto the family computer IF you were allowed, so fandoms skewed older? like at least 15+....now 9 years old all have iphones and can access fan communities etc. which is....terrifying tbh.

BUT! with that, i think especially with l*rry and r*den and ph*n (disregarding if the relationships were real or not) younger people don’t understand boundaries as well and can’t really comprehend the fact that the people they’re reading fic about AREN’T the same people that they’re tweeting/commenting on ig posts of.......i mean they are, but i think it’s pretty much understood that in fic.....none of these things have actually happened. it’s just taking a daydream about a hot celeb and writing it out, or it’s using gerard way’s face + likeness + personality traits gleaned from on stage/interviews and creating a character based on that.

3) ALSO. celebs/musicians/etc. have gotten 1000x more accessible? AGAIN, with ryden.....back in the day it would stay on livejournal or tumblr and ryan and brendon (i know he’s cancelled or w/e but i think ryden is the best example) wouldn’t be exposed to it unless they actively sought it out (except for the crazy fans that would wait for them in airports LOL but that was v few and far between). but then. instagram and twitter became WAY more popular and suddenly fans could access the love of their life any time they wanted!!!! and why not use that access to confirm/get more “lore” about their favorite ship? /s which kinda related to point #2 bc it was mostly young people doing this.

now if you see frank iero MENTION gerard way the twitter replies will be FILLED with “frerard” 😬 and 1) if you do believe they had something (i believe they DID....not currently tho) it obviously wasn’t public, so why not respect their privacy lol. not to mention that it’s in the PAST and we don’t know if it was a painful split (frank was HEARTBROKEN after mcr broke up and would shit talk gerard in interviews lol so) its best to assume it was and NOT bring it up to hurt him more and 2) it affects their real life relationship at this point!

there’s a difference between knowing something is out there and being tagged in it/having it shoved in your face. for the most part, bands have never cared abt ships and actually would tease them a little cos they knew it would “sell” the band better and excite fans and show that they aren’t like......abt to go into a gay panic bc someone thought they were fucking their friend.

THIS IS ANOTHER ESSAY/RANT ENTIRELY, but i think band rpf is a safe and healthy way to explore sexuality + emotions if you are too scared/traumatized/whatever to go out and try everything you ever imagined. especially if you are afab and you want to have sex with men. it’s scary out there!

like. real men might be assholes and take advantage of me and could hurt me. but projecting onto billie and mike is completely safe, especially because i’m so far removed from it. there’s also like....this is fake deep, but whatever....the aspect of exploring Queerness in a safe way? like in fics that aren’t just smut. LIKE 12-17 year old me reading NOTHING but m/m fic with some f/f thrown in there and still thinking i was straight LOL. and it just being....completely normalized for me until i was comfortable enough to admit that i was bisexual to myself? IDK IF Y’ALL KNOW THE COMPARTMENTILIZATION PEOPLE THAT GROW UP IN VAGUELY CONSERVATIVE AREAS WITH NO REPRESENTATION GO THROUGH. i would LITERALLY stare at my friends (who were girls) lips and think about kissing them and just be like....HM! THAT WAS WEIRD! LET’S NEVER ADDRESS THAT INTERNALLY.

you can argue that there’s an aspect of fetishization, but i think the concept of celebrity & stan culture is fetishization in and of itself. like.

Fetishization refers to a process of imbuing an object or idea with power. A fetish object is often associated with sexual gratification, desire, and worship. Fetishization marks a cultural, psychological, and social technique of fetishizing things by making them appear larger than life, animate, or sexually desirable (→ Sexualization in the Media). It is argued that this process has profoundly influenced contemporary consumer culture (Fernbach 2002; Jhally 1987; Schroeder 2002). (x)

like if you even vaguely idolize a celeb/put a celeb on a pedestal or reblog a text post about them........that’s fetishization, babey! you don’t ACTUALLY know them!!!! they’re just.....some guy! billie joe is just.....some guy who’s really good at writing songs. he’s actually kinda ugly but we all find him attractive and go 😍 over his traditionally unattractive features cos he is talented and famous. if he was some dude at your gas station you would NOT be posting abt him on instagram.

but because i love and respect him i think he is beautiful 💖 and the only reason i can “love” someone i don’t know is celeb worship culture.

and the people who compare girls liking m/m fic to LESBIAN PORN. LOL. i think that’s so deeply insidious that, again, it’s another post. ACTUALLY i think i’ve already posted abt it waaaaay back.

omg i’m sorry this turned out so long...

[ikonist]

this is abt hanbin and ikon so keep scrolling

so i was high a few days ago nd watched a video about hanbin and yun and realized that yun took such good care of hanbin. he always played the ‘hyung’ card on him, teasing him and saying that he loves hanbin all the time, said his ‘mission’ was to make hanbin happy. and that got me thinking that yun must’ve helped -both emotionally and physically- hanbin throughout the years… like,,, hanbin rarely acts childish around the members since he is the leader/songwriter/composer but he does it w yunhyeong bc yun doesn’t mind it.. yun always cooks for him knowing that he was up until late in the studio, avoids waking binie early (but does if he has to), and the other members said this a bunch of times but yun is a great listener so can you imagine the amount of times he listened to hanbin’s concerns and self doubts and never complained abt it cuz he’s yunhyeong lol but those thoughts made me so sad thinking how hard it must’ve been for hanbin these past 11 months without his brothers.

tbh i don’t care if hanbin decides to live his life quietly or just producing songs for himself/his friends. i don’t care if he comes out with a full comeback, mv, etc. i rlly don’t care. the only thing i genuinely care about is if he’s happy doing whatever he is doing, and he seems to be happy these past days, so that’s enough for now. i think i’m past that point of wondering what on earth he is doing, if he’s producing more songs, creating a label, etc, but if i could ask for just one little thing, it would be to show him how much his fans love him; to show him every tweet i see with “i miss hanbin”, “hanbin pics to brighten your day!” or “hanbin compilation” posts. to show him the heartbreaking and incredible edits and posts i’ve seen about him, and how much he is loved. i know that in demo 3 he said “i know i was loved”, but i want to tell him he is loved, still. ikon is loved. ikonics never gave up on them. god, not even one ONE!! hanbin fansite closed, and it has been almost a year. think of kpop idols who lost fansites for even less than that (not that i like fansites that much but the symbolism is there). i’m so grateful that he knows how much we think about him, but every time i feel like it’s not enough. i want him to know that we’ll always be here and he’ll always be in our hearts too. i wish hanbin could see himself thru my eyes and know how kind, talented, heartwarming he is.

sometimes i ask myself if i’m not being too ‘blinded by love’ when it comes to ikon (but especially about hanbin), but then again, what is it about ikon that makes me appreciate them so much? what makes me feel this empathy for them? what is it that when i think of them, i don’t see a boygroup. i see friends who are a ‘chosen family’, who know each other so well and would never give up on their brotherhood. never. how they are totally different people, but learned what being respected and appreciated feels like, and saw how much they could grow if they listened to one another. i’m not saying that they never fought (if anything i’d put my finger on donghyuk cuz hes a capricorn living with an aries ARIES and a capricorn sag dom.. i mean…. i’d throw hands if i were him), but they learned that hierarchy in the group wouldn’t lead them anywhere. in that iheart radio interview where the lady said ‘what is ur secret to have such great teamwork/chemistry’ and they said they don’t rlly have hierarchy and (to me) this is so important for a group like ikon. 

imagine if they never took anything chanwoo says seriously just because he’s the maknae even tho he is one of the most logical members? or what would happen if hanbin had to always act like the leader when he said yunhyeong would be best fitted for that? if bobby got mad at donghyuk for playing with him just because he’s younger and they never developed that friendship? at times like this i thank ikon for being such a down to earth group. they never took anything for granted. they were humble from the beginning and kept being humble, even when they received (a lot) of  awards. in the mma speech, hanbin said ikon was a group who tried to fill an ocean into a teacup, but that only made water spill everywhere, and i think that’s true. ikon was ambitious and had such a big desire to win that it led to so many heartbreaks and tough paths for them. 

i realized once i started (fully) stanning ikon that they make you feel this immensive empathy towards them to the point where i got choked up with tears learning about their hardships. i’m not trying to say that they’re the only group who went/goes thru this; in fact, i don’t believe anyone should be put to what they had to endure predebut until now. the countless times i cried watching videos of them sleeping on the floor on tour, watching interviews/vlives where they said they want to show us what they’ve been working on, watching concerts where they broke down in tears because ‘they just wanted to see us’. it breaks me because ikon are such good boys but they aren’t even allowed to show that.

in that concert where bobby said “please protect us” and hanbin said “please protect me”... that’s what i’m talking about. ikon was always true to us. the concert was in early 2019, so imagine what they’ve gone through in 2013-2015, when they were trainees. god i can’t even wrap my head around to think how much these boys (who at the time were 16-20) suffered in their early days. being called ‘b-list’ idols because they weren’t as good as the other yg groups. having to tour for a year doing two concerts a day sometimes, while preparing for comebacks/recordings. having to use oxygen masks to perform bc they were too tired. but they always put the biggest performances because they know that moment was once in a lifetime for us. 

when ikon won soty in 2019 it was clear to me how much they appreciate what we’ve done for them and how personal the fan/idol relationship is with them. i don’t mean it as in some delulu shit but... ikon knows that we trust them. they know we will always be loyal to them, and that’s why they treasure their fans the most. only ikon knows what they went thru since 2013, but some fans who have been with them ever since are proof that the bond has always been strong. for fuck’s sake even the fan chart for most of the songs “we will protect you ikon / we will care for you ikon / we will shine on you ikon / let’s be happy ikon”. i don’t wanna sound fake deep but ikonics reflect ikon in so many different ways. ikon is loyal, they are caring,  they never gave up on what they dreamed of, even if it seemed unreal. they know what’s like to see the ones you love fall and try to get them back up again. ikon lived so many failures and were SO critical about themselves for not debuting in 2013, trying to debut again in 2015 but not doing so well in charts, not being able to be free. they just wanted to sing. to be with each other. and yet they kept meeting obstacles along their way, but even so they never gave up. and i think that’s kinda what being an ikon fan is about too.

so, as for now, no one is sure about ikon’s path in the future but i can say that even though things might get tough a few months from now, ikon will always be that group for me.

IKON BEST BOYS

[not-a-feron]

Buckle up here are my thoughts on Deltarune

I’ve been seeing a lot of ppl here and videos on YouTube talking abt theories and stuff so I thought I’d make my own megapost to surmise my thoughts and my own theory on wtf is going on in this game Part of this was @brigadeinvader​ and me talking over discord and discussing the game, I don’t think either of us would’ve come up with this on our own

Timeline Placement & Stuff

As Toby stated, Deltarune is neither a sequel nor a prequel because it’s not the same world as Undertale, and this is important. You can call it an AU if you want, it’s not far from what I believe it is. However, somethig doesn’t have to be a prequel or sequel to happen before or after something else. Lemme explain.

I personaly stand for the idea that Deltarune is an alternative wolrd to Undertale, hence why the same characters are there, only different. It being an alternative world means it’s still somehow connected to Undertale. If you know anything about the multiple worlds hypothesis, then you should know Undertale and Deltarune’s timelines would run parallel to each other without interfering (they might’ve been one and the same at some point, but not anymore. And timelines cannot merge back). This still means the events of one can take place after or before the other, just in different worlds.

Not necessarily in that order, but like so. We have two dates to go by, and those are the begining narration of Undertale and Ralsei’s cut manual for Deltarune. Undertale’s is 201X, while Deltarune’s is 202X. This would normally mean Deltarune goes around a decade after. However, the date at the beginning of Undertale is not the date the events of the game take place on, but the date the Fallen Human (I’ll refer to them as Chara) ends up in the underground. The game asks us to name the human from the beginning narration, which isn’t Frisk, so we don’t know exactly how much time passed between Chara’s arrival and Frisk’s. It has to be a lot of time, though, seeing as six other humans fell down in that time and most of the monsters underground don’t remember/flat out haven’t seen the surface or the humans by the time Frisk arrives. And if we take Asriel’s transformation at face value, then enough time has passed for a Dreemurr to age from a kid to a... young man, I guess. Which is certainly more than a decade.

Arsiel being in university in Deltarune doesn’t put it after Undertale, because I’m pretty sure Asriel would also be around that age, if not older, by the time Frisk comes around if he hadn’t died.

If you don’t want to take Toby’s declaration too seriously, since he doesn’t outright say anything but Deltarune being a different world from Undertale with different characters that lived different lives; then Chapter 1 still has some evidence that points towards this. None of the characters you meet that were also in Undertale are exactly the same. Not even their sprites. Everyone has at least something different in their designs when compared to the ones seein at the ending credits of the Pacifist run in Undertale. Asgore doesn’t have a crown, Undyne doesn’t wear an eyepatch, Alphys doesn’t have her labcoat and was probably never a scientist, Mettaton never became a star, Toriel has a darker shirt underneath her purple sweater (check it, I’m serious), Bratty and Catty hate each other, and so on. Sadly we don’t get to see Papyrus, The only one who’s exactly the same is Sans.

Sans

There’s a post by @napstamuse (idk about putting links bc of tumblr’s recent algorithm, sorry) comparing all the main sprites of the characters in both Undertale and Deltarune, and Sans’ jacket is has the same color, even down to the hex value of the blue. Not only that, but his personality remains untouched. He still has some sort of attraction (I don’t mean romantic necessarily) to Toriel, still fond of puns, etc. He’s the only one of those we see that’s exactly the same in Deltarune as in Undertale.

He’s more than probably even the exact same Sans from Undertale. As in, he somehow moved from one timeline to the other, unlike the rest who aren’t the same characters per se. We all know by now Sans wasn’t from Undertale, not really. His Genocide fight convo states “I gave up trying to go back a long time ago.” and “getting to the surface doesn't really appeal anymore, either”. This means 1) he’s not from there, from Undertale’s world/timeline and 2) whatever place he’s from isn’t the surface. That’s important. Because a lot of details point towards Sans being originally from Deltarune’s world, then for some reason moving to Undertale’s sometime before Frisk arrives. But when we find him in Deltarune, what does he say?

And when you ask about “Friends”.

Meaning he also came from somewhere else. Considering Deltarune’s town is in, apparently, the surface; then it makes sense why Sans didn’t originate from there, since he didn’t come from the surface. And he knows the surface, as evidenced by him telling Papyrus what the Sun is (though that could also be bc of Alphys’ anime).

But if he doesn’t come from Deltarune’s town, and he also deosn’t come from Undertale’s world; then where does he come from?

I propose Sans is a Darkner. I don’t know if someone has already made this point in a video or post, but hear me out.

Unless Sans is from a different world altogether, then the only place in Deltarune that isn’t the surface (that we know of) is the Dark World. Not only that, but we know thanks to this infamous scene:

... that Darkners bleed.  Monsters do not bleed. Susie right there more than probably doesn’t bleed either, and yet Lancer assumes everyone in the Fun Gang does. That can only be because his species, the Darkners, all bleed. You know who else bleeds?

Sans does. And yes, I’m aware there have been ppl saying the red thing coming from him is actually ketchup from a bottle inside his jacket (which, knowing sans, wouldn’t surprise me tbh), but that wouldn’t explain why it comes out of his mouth as well. Hence it must be blood. Monsters from the underground all turn to dust upon defeat, yet Sans is the only one in the game who doesn’t. It doesn’t help the fact that we never see him die on screen and the sound effect that plays when the battle ends isn’t the one of a moster being defeated, but of one being spared. We also never really see Darkners bleed, that’s true, since they all flee from battle and you can’t kill anyone in Chapter 1; but Lancer’s bucket scene tells us that yes, blood is a thing in the Dark World that does come out of bodies when they are beaten.

There’s also another thing that might be minor, but all Darkners get tired after enough time in a battle. It’s the way you defeat the Chaos King and it’s the easiest way to spare enemies in Chapter 1. They all fall asleep. After enough time in a battle, Sans also falls asleep. It’s also the only way to defeat him in Genocide.

So Sans might be a Darkner. Why he left the Dark World (what is the Dark World) and why he then left the world of Deltarune to arrive at Undertale... we don’t know. It could have something to do with Undertale’s Gaster (or maybe Deltarune’s), but again, we don’t know. We’ll have to wait for the rest of Deltarune to come out to have more material to go on, I suppose.

Also the stuff about the “don’t forget” picture with the three smiling people on it. The song at the end credits states “don’t forget, I’m with you in the dark”, and the Fun Gang is comprised of three people. But we have no definitive evidence on that either.

More on the Timeline Placement

I personally believe Deltarune takes place before Undertale, though I suppose a better term would be “earlier” than Undertale in the split worlds. By no means whatever happens in Deltarune affects Undertale, we know that thanks to Toby’s tweet. But Sans being there means something happened that made him leave and enter Undertale, so in some ways it is before that game.

I also know there are some things that make this difficult. I still believe Deltarune comes before, but untill we see Asriel or have any definitive dates we cannot be sure as to which one is earlier in the timeline. Gerson being dead complicates things even more, unless you want to tell me monsters age slower in the underground.

Jevil & Seam

Seam’s line if you speak to him after defeating Jevil, the “darker, yet darker one”, is too specific not to be deliberate. We know Jevil spoke to someone that broke him, and we also know said someone was not the Knight. Not only that, but Jevil uses sprites way too similar to the Everyman to also be a coincidense, when using his carousel attack. We also see the Everyman in the wall of the alley Alphys is at the end of Chapter 1. So something is going on there.

Gaster

I think by now we’ve all somewhat accepted the idea that Gaster is more present in Deltarune than he is in Undertale. The same sound that plays during Entry 17 can be heard if you try to use your phone in the Dark World, and it’s also the noise that sounds near the red doors in the woods of town, only slowed down by a crap ton. The tweets before Deltarune was launched are also more than probably written by Gaster, considering the name of the account was changed to black bars and every tweet was in his text style.  During the survey part of Chapter 1 it’s also very probable the one conducting the survey is him, judging by the text style and all the weird choices (like blood types C and D, or the PAIN flavor). That is, of course, until someone else interrupts them. The text stopps being all in uppercase and the speech pattern changes, which is even more evident in the Japanese version as it starts using the correct form of speech (kanji + hiragana) instead of the weird one from before (katakana + hiragana). Coincidentally enough, the only character we know of that speaks in a textbook example of correct speech (thanks to the Japanese version of Undertale), is Chara.

And before anyone starts saying Gaster isn’t there; he is.  We just don’t know where. He has to be there, with no Core to build and no accident to happen that means the Gaster of Deltarune is 1) untouched, probably the same he was before everything went down in Undertale and 2) not a scientist, by that matter. Alphys is a teacher, so Gaster has to be around somewhere (more than probably behind the red doors south of the church, but who knows). We can say, though, that there might be more than one Gaster there. Since Undertale’s was “shattered across time and space” because of the accident, and Deltarune’s never had said accident, then both could be around during Chapter 1.

Also the game continues to crash/restart if you try to name either creator or vessel after him.

Dark World

It exists, lets get that out of the way. I highly doubt it was a dream or an hallucination or something, and there’s some evidence pointing to that. 

It is very probable, though, that it doesn just... exist. How do I even began to explain this.

It might have been created by some otherworldly power influenced by what was present in the abandoned classroom when Kris and Susie return to town. There was a chess board, chess pieces, a deck of cards, a stuffed toy that looked like Seam, etc.  But it did certainly happen. They entered the supply closet. If everything had been a dream or a game, then 1) Susie wouldn’t be surprised and confused (in the case of a game) and 2) they would still be in the supply closet by the time they return. But they were not.

Also, the pencil Kris carries changes if you defeat Jevil before coming back. Not only that, but there’s an item that carries over into your inventory from the Dark World. The egg.

If you are given the egg behind that tree by... whoever that was, it will still be in your inventory when you return to town. You can leave it in Asgore’s fridge and it will multiply, much like the Dog Residue of Undertale. What is up with the egg, we don’t know. Who even gave Kris the egg is also unknown, but for every character we don’t know we could simply answer “Gaster” so we don’t have any clues either.

Kris

Some random thoughts before I close this off.

So Kris. Great adittion to our sweater wearing protagonists, now we can call them the kfc gang.

Seriously, though, Kris. I don’t even know where to begin here.

You can still move their soul when they trap you in the cage.  I think this points to the idea that we control Kris by their soul. It’s what appears on the map when we avoid attacks and what, just like in Undertale, we take control of during battles.

It’s also Kris’ file the one we overwrite at the beginning of the Dark World. It’s pretty obvious that we are taking control over them by taking control over their soul. It might just be a bad case of silent protagonist, but Kris never reacts to anything, even when those around them are shocked. He never tries to do anything on their own, except for that one time they chose to protect either Susie or Ralsei (I don’t remember). Also the “your choices don’t matter” theme going on in Chapter 1.

Us being in control instead of them is even more evident when you try to drop the Ball of Junk once you return to town. Kris doesn’t want to, and is upset when we force them to, but they still throw it away; because they have no control over their body. They’re even relieved if you decide not to after the first question.

We can also suppose this control we haver over them isn’t a first time thing, though maybe not necessarily our control. The only objects they posses are the Ball of Junk and the cage over the red... wagon? (I forget what that is called). The rest of their side of the room is empty, as if they were afraid of having anything the ones controlling could simply toss away.

That explains perfectly why they rip their soul out at the ending of Chapter 1, though not the knife and the smile. Though that’s the most speculation in this rant. 

Anyway, congrats if you read through all that lol Feel free to add your theories/thoughts and help me correct stuff if there’s anythign contradictory in either games that could debunk anything here.

[shoushatohaisha]

review: hajimari no kyojin (osaka 6/1)

so. hello. i usually write up my butai thoughts as, um, 100+ tweet threads in the immediate wake of whatever i just saw, but this time around i thought i'd work them out into a proper report, of a sort. if you, too, have seen this show already and want to talk about it... please. any time. always.

about reviewing: this is my very favorite 2.5D franchise, ever. but this is also a review, not a cheerleading exercise, so not every single thing i have to say is unrelentingly positive. having said that, i respect kinoshita, wada, suga-zachou, and the staff at large more than just about any creative team in this corner of japanese theater fandom so like. i'm not here to drag, lol.

about spoilers: i talk about the plot elements covered but try to avoid spoiling any of the fun production surprises. :) happy to do a more spoilery play-by-play later if folks are curious.

about length: i just checked and it's 2400 words im so sorry.

without further ado...

first of all, i admit that based on the preview clips i doubted, and i was swiftly taken to task for doubting. IM SORRY WORRY-SAN i trust u implicitly and i should have known better. after the major changes in shinka no natsu, i was concerned that bringing back the revolving stage and the original opening theme would feel stale/regressive. it did not. while they did bring back the revolving element they also extended the stage backward and added a second level behind a full stage height projection screen – the second level was used to do some neat staging for flashbacks/parallels and the screen was used to, how shall we say this, up their projection game in a major way, which i frankly did not think was possible. i will not spoil the details but it was pretty great, on a purely technical level.

i also realized that a lot of the repetition – opening with the bike scene, bringing back the original opening credits music, the staging, etc – is the "look back" over the last couple years that i'd expected to come this fall. they are very obviously already preparing for the end – you could think of this as part one of their last show, with the fall as part two. the show opens with a restaging of sixth grader hinata seeing the little giant on tv for the first time – then the current karasuno team take the place of the tv and hinata joins them for a team jog. "karasuno, fight!" "oh!" "fight!" "oh!" only then each character calls out their signature line from the show so far. "uchi no renchuu wa chanto tsuyoi" / "mou tobenai karasu nante yobasenai" / "murabito b mo tatakaemasu!"

and haha. let me tell you. BOY, DID I FEEL THINGS. a lot of things. i think yachi got me the worst but they were all real bad. (i have so many feelings about yachi's story and what a beautiful job saitou ami did with her character on stage. god. ;_;)

the theme of this play was the role of captain – what makes a good captain, what a captain does for the team, and how to step into those shoes when the captain is gone. the johzenji match is fun, but here, in a sense, it exists more or less to set up the wakutani match – (re)establishing daichi's importance so that his absence feels like the gut punch it is. and fully settling the weight of that responsibility on ennoshita's shoulders, as both daichi's substitute on the court and the captain-in-waiting.

with that in mind, the rival schools: imo it wasn't strictly necessary to cast full teams for each school – each match got its own dedicated act, and unlike, for example, nekoma/datekou in karasuno fukkatsu (which had a similar story structure), there aren't really any individual characters on these rival schools who have a role as such other than terushima and takeru. (you know, the captains. see above. XD) so in theory one could get this done with, like, one actor for each captain and then an ensemble cast playing the rest of the team across both matches. HOWEVER, having all those bodies allows them to do super cool stuff visually, and why force yourself to create the illusion of a full team if you don't have to? i.e., /i/ sure am not complaining, isn't it nice to have $$$ to achieve the max vision of your choreographer. XD

i also have no doubt that the kids playing these other characters are doing whatever they can to create a character within the ensemble, and i suspect there's plenty for repeat viewers to pick up on, esp during say the johzenji match (see below). however for the first time viewer following the main flow of the story it's more or less a very large ensemble cast.

the johzenji chaos was well expressed, haha, there was so damn much going on all the time that i hardly knew where to look. (i've also seen opinions on j-twitter that that diluted the impact and i can see that too – it worked for me as a "funny" match that didn't cross the line into comic relief, but ymmv.) i thought the final scene with misaki would pack more of a punch, but i fully expect them to cry at daisenshuuraku so that might fill in the last 10% that's missing rn.

wakutani are another Good Dance Team. one did get a sense, stylistically, of fukurodani- and nekoma-lite with johzenji and wakunan, respectively – i assume that was intentional. mirroring the cats vs owls match, as it were. yanagihara rin's takeru was like… scary?? i had to rewatch those episodes this weekend to see if i'd just forgotten something, but no, stage takeru is not so much reliable middle brother as scowly quiet tough guy. he looked like a kyoutani tbh, and looking at the kid actually cast for kyoutani, one wonders if someone in casting mixed up some paperwork or something. having said that, yanagihara was great at being the character he was, i enjoyed what he did on stage. i'm just not sure that character was takeru. XD (edit: ok having just rewatched, i have to revise this somewhat, i think a big part of my impression was due to being too far back to properly see his expressions the first time around -- up close he was much smilier, and bc i was thinking about it i noticed some nice details like him going over for a family hug afterward.) otoh big post-match scene – all of wakutani, actually – was really good. v effective, i heard sniffles around me.

during this match, johzenji reappeared dressed as takeru's family: FUCKING HILARIOUS omg, everyone involved has clearly learned how to do this right wrt blocking, the very fine line between comic relief and intrusion, etc, after the, er, shaky shousha to haisha experiment of kuroken doubling as oikawa's fangirls. seichou shita na, errone.

also, some great wire work for hinata and takeru – you could tell kenta is really comfortable up there these days. the first time the wires came into play one of the women behind me went "UWO!" which, when a japanese theatergoer makes a noise out loud, that's a true sign something's impressive. XD

nekoma vs fukurodani: Yeah, That Happened. it is a testament to how well done karasuno vs wakunan was that i didn't just spend the entire time screeching BRING BACK CATS VS OWLS because fjkdajfkdlsfjd KYAA. another good staging moment – they used mirrors to create the effect of two full teams playing at a crowded gymnasium, it was brill. i won't spoil some of the fun details but vvjakdlfjdf. and tbh i think the best performance of the four was probably shouri's?? not that this is news but istg idk how someone so soft offstage does THAT on stage. is it this "acting" thing you speak of.

new bokuaka: i mean it was clear some of this material was meant for yoshimoto kouki and i did kinda miss him – i appreciate higashi-san's pinch hitting and he did a solid job. but. ah well. HAVING SAID THAT. fucking "michi wo tsukurimasu yo" i mean we should all be grateful it wasn't kouki and yuuki or it would have just been a fucking fanfic on stage. it was still bad and i don't even go here. XD

and last but not least, arita ushiwaka kenji: not exactly the world's most natural line delivery but that's fine because, i mean, he's ushiwaka. and his physical presence was perfect. which was about all he was called on to do in this particular show, ahaha.

now, for karasuno. and specifically, for my son, kawahara kazuma. remember what i said approximately a thousand words ago, about captains and captains in waiting and stepping up to the plate? (or onto the court, as it were.) ennoshita's story was the heart of the wakutani match and kazuma carried the second act. he was. so. good. he had good material to work with, of course, but he made it even better. i was saying to a friend that in retrospect i think this is one of the very very few parts of the series that actually played better and more emotionally affecting on stage than in the source material (as opposed to differently good/differently affecting). in the manga/anime, you can only see what the paneling or the frame shows you, and those initial paneling/framing choices are focused on the drama of CAPTAIN DOWN. but on the stage, daichi goes down… and off to the side you see ennoshita freeze. and from that moment on, for kazuma, it's go time. he doesn't let up until the end of post-match scene in (here) the locker room – which, jesus, that scene. it packs ten times the punch it does in the anime. because of kazuma.

sorry if i sound like a crazy person here ahaha. but like. like, imagine you have been acting since childhood, you've studied dance with famous choreographers and innovators, you had a main role in The Franchise That Changed 2.5D as a teenager, you've done a solo album, you have a serious history in performing arts... and you get cast in what was initially the smallest role of the entire karasuno team. and you take it! and pull your weight! kazuma was a team player for three years and he deserved this chance to let his actual skills shine so much. ;_; because i don't necessarily think he would have been better in any of the other roles than his actual teammates – but i do think he is a much better actor than several of his actual teammates. and he finally got the opportunity to show that.

anyway, when it came time for curtain calls, the applause swelled noticeably for kazuma – a louder ovation than anyone except kagechan and kenta. and one of those people clapping her hands off, say in row 20, just a random row choice, was definitely tearing up at the same time.

IN OTHER KARASANEWS. kt-san. LIVE IN PERSON KT-SAN BACK IN THE ROLE HE WAS MEANT FOR cries into my hands i love him daichi-saaaaaaaaaan. very occasionally his delivery reminded me he's a model not an actor, if you know what i mean, but like, for the vast part it didn't matter because he is naturally such a perfect fit. have i mentioned i love him.

new suga: mmmmm. he looked and moved fine but his line delivery did not convince me. tbf it's not like suga has a huge role to play in these matches so 1) it's not a huge deal 2) he didn't get much chance to get into the character. either he'll get better or he won't, and if he doesn't it's not going to sink the next play or anything. he seems like a nice enough kid, i wish him well!

kageyama tatsuya: still can't yell and enunciate at the same time. loved that they brought back the archer analogy from shinka no natsu though!! it was one of my favorite things about his kageyama, and it's nice that it's something he "owns" instead of imitating/inheriting from tatsunari.

tsukishima & yamaguchi: miura kairi continues to get even better, i'm so pleased. <3 also, i love love love that they still use the musical motif from shousha to haisha for yamaguchi's jump float serve. it was the same in shinka no natsu, it's the same here. THE TSUKKIYAMA WAS REAL CUTE, great detail work before and after the serve as well as after tsukki's block(s). as for tsukishima, much as they brought back kageyama's archer imagery, they brought back tsukki's fancy katana kill block. (they didn't waste kondou shouri, either, i'll leave it at that.)

last but not least, MY ACTUAL SON AND FEELINGS TWIN, SUGA KENTA: ok like. to set the scene here. i have mad respect for this kid and also love him to death as a human. i think he puts more thought into this production than anyone else in the cast – he is practically worry-san's AD. and he clearly has a lot of real deep thoughts and feelings about the source material. so deep in fact that it took a while for me to come around to his hinata because while, for example, tatsunari's kageyama could have walked straight off my television screen, kenta went down to the manga and built hinata up from there. he didn't have a choice – he's nothing like murase ayumu's voice. all too often we, and i include myself here, think of the two dimensions in 2.5D as anime, rather than manga... but just as there's a big gap between the two dimensions of animation and the three dimensions of live theater, there's as big a gap again between static black-and-white drawing, and movement and color and sound. and when i looked at kenta's hinata as something created solely from furudate's art style, it all slotted into place for me. (naturally, ymmv.)

it also took kenta longer than some of the others, i think, to portray all of what he wanted to. shoen hinata was pretty yelly, and pretty single-register yelly. hinata is a yelly character, of course, but the balance between that hinata and Serious Match Hinata was out of whack at first. this got better and better with every show. and then—

his encounter with ushiwaka here. was IT. it was what i was looking for all this time. his delivery of hinata's big line there was like – i think maybe i clapped my hands over my mouth, unclear, bc it was like the final missing piece and i was so happy. kentaaaaa. ;____;

part of me wonders if this is what kenta's always had in his head but maybe couldn't get his face/voice to express the way he wanted it? OR, IT'S KENTA, SO MAYBE IT WAS ON PURPOSE and his previous Serious Hinata was meant to be like, just a feral hunger child whereas this is the kid who experienced the heartbreak of losing to seijou. i would love to ask him tbh. XD

anyway, my son, after five plays continues to grow in his portrayal of this character. kenta is the heart of gekidan haikyuu in so many ways, and i will be at their graduation show if it kills me.

(breathes out) i think that's. everything. a best setter award to anyone who read this far, and feel free to ask if there's anything specific you want to know about? i will be seeing it again this weekend for daisenshuuraku and will be sure to report back on who cried, etc. all hail volleyball stage the end. 🏐

[somaybeimbiased]

Hold On.

Let’s talk about something for a little bit.

I realize Twitter Kpop fandoms have always been a mess, but lets look at the situation here.

You have a user (go report them) named sugasrighteye who is obviously a huge bts stan. That isn’t the problem. The problem is that this user has been continuously tweeting out rude and attacking comments against SHINee (some /most have been deleted from my understand) such as one that says “I’m sorry Jonghyun. My tweet was pretty insensitive I see that now. I love you and Shinee, even tho y’all are both dead I’m really sorry. I’m sorry you killed yourself. But that’s how life is. You move out of the way to make for for bigger things. Bigger things like bts.”

And This Is Not Okay.

Let me ask what Jonghyun, SHINee, or Shawols ever do to you? The past year has been the worst for Shawols, so why can’t you just leave us be. That’s all we want. Let us enjoy happy things and grieve over sad things. You couldn’t leave us be during his funeral. You couldn’t let us be happy over Jinki’s acquittal. You couldn’t even let us happily celebrate Jonghyun’s birthday. And finally, You continue to attack SHINee, saying how they would be better without x member. 

You think Jinki shouldn’t be in SHINee? It’s your opinion, sure. But this man was voted the best leader in 2015 by other artists. This wasn’t the fans doing. His colleagues, other group’s leaders voted his as the best leader. He is known to have one of the most unique voices in Kpop (fight me on that) and he is literal sunshine and one of the best people I’ve ever known. Also he is innocent, so back off. 

And Key? You are saying Key is washed up? Not good enough? Well, let's start there. Key is SHINee’s ‘master key’ he is good at everything. Singing, rapping, dancing, acting, fashion, he has it all. So why are you attacking such a precious gem like that? He is one of the most real and genuine kpop stars. He has never been one to hide his feelings or thoughts, and SHINee needs someone as outspoken and talented as him.

Now you’re saying dibidibidis can’t rap? Well, honey, you have another thing coming for you. Minho writes the majority of his own raps, and while maybe they don’t 100% fit in traditionally with the beat (Like in Tell Me What To Do) but he is paving a new and interesting path for rap in kpop. And don’t you dare say he is only in SHINee because of his good looks. While he may be fine he is also as much of a vocal as the others. He is also the backbone of SHINee, supporting all his brothers and being SHINee’s biggest fan.

And Taemin. God. How dare you say he doesn’t deserve SHINee. This kid has been dubbed the Michael Jackson of Kpop. He is one of Kpop’s greatest success stories, starting as a ‘tonedeaf’ kid into a performance king who also has several solo albums under his belt. He is SHINee’s powerful boy, the dancing machine. And how dare you say he doesn’t deserve all he, no, they have worked for.

SHINee have always been there for each other, and that hasn’t changed. Don’t trash on them and pretend you know them. 

That brings me back to my point. Dear (mainly tbh) BTS stans attacking SHINee on twiter:

Please stop. 

You can feel free to think BTS is superior to our shining SHINee. But don’t attack them, especially if you haven’t done any research.

For example, I’ve been seeing tweets about how BTS is sooo great bc they write their owns songs so groups like SHINee have nothing on them but wait. pause. hold. 

Jonghyun alone has been written and composed over 50 songs for himself, SHINee, Taemin, EXO, Lee Hi, and more. All of SHINee have helped craft and put together songs before. Taemin wrote two songs for himself. Jinki has worked on SHINee’s songs along with Key who also wrote himself a song IN COMPLETE ENGLISH and performed is as a solo stage. And as I’ve already said, Minho has written so many of his own raps, including the infamous Dibidibidis rap.

And SHINee isn’t washed up or old news. They are just as relevant as your ‘oppas’. Maybe they aren’t as well known in America, but Obama talked about SHINee, not BTS, so keep that in mind next time you say SHINee is irrelevant to Americans. 

Also keep in mind that BTS and SHINee are actually friends? Like Taemin let Jimin into his close knit friend group. V and Minho are really good pals too. BTS look up to SHINee, their senior group. And I’m sure BTS would be livid if they knew about their fans who are attacking SHINee in such ways. 

Also, please keep us out of your fanwars. I once saw a post talking about how SHINee World is like a sleeping giant. Peaceful and harmless until you wake us up. And then we can do some real damage. Shawols don’t like fanwars from my experience, many I talk to would prefer to not involve SHINee in toxic stuff like that. But god. You’re making it really hard to be nice and let the comments pass when you continue to attack us while we are still hurting. What is your gain from attacking Jonghyun and his brothers? Is it fun for you to have a ton of people upset at you for making insensitive and plainly rude comments about such a sensitive topic? 

I’m not one to say things or address things like this, but all I’ve seen on twitter and instagram are posts about this. 

I just want SHINee to be happy.

Just leave them out of your fanwars and petty comments and there wont be any problems. 

Thanks.

(I might delete this later, I just needed to rant somewhere and scream a lil)

**Also: This is NOT an attack on BTS, nor their fanbase. I am, however, expressing my displeasure towards the armys and other fans of various groups who find is enjoyable to attack SHINee. If you haven’t directly attacked SHINee, this is NOT directed towards you and I wish you lots of love <3 

[jiminpoppins]

Note: this is a continuation of a post // extremely long

101 reasons why Jikook/Kookmin is my ultimate OTP or 101 times Jikook made my heart flutter (Part 2)

PART 1

51) A jikook compilation wouldn’t be a compilation without THE back hugs.

Hands on waist...

Chin on shoulder...

52) Not long after Jimin tweeted a pic of ramen, Jungkook indirectly replied to him by posting FOUR selcas of him along with a message telling him his ramen looked bland. idk about you but i found this interaction cute.

53) The artistic couple.The muscle pig and manggaetteok drawings that were featured in Snow App. They even drew the chicken drawings on the menu at Isac. I can imagine them sitting and drawing random things together. ㅠㅠ 

54) Jimin posted not one but three videos on Jungkook’s birthday, which means he wished Jungkook three times on SNS and made my head spin thrice.

55) Jimin and Jungkook took photos of each other sleeping.

56) When Jungkook thought there was no camera around when they were rounding the corner so he went up to Jimin and slid his hand around his waist. Little did he know they got caught on camera. I’d like to thank Yoongi’s vj for this awesome footage.

57) The many times Jimin has summoned Jungkook for Armys. In simpler words, Jungkook always tweets something after Jimin, and we all know how seldom he appears on Twitter.

58) “hyung has cute toes” Okay but like who lingers around his friend’s photo shoot and randomly blurts out that he has cute..toes????

59) The look! Jungkook’s expression when he’s feeding Jimin earns him a spot on this list haha. Tbh They’re kinda like eyefucking eo when jimin’s being fed. look at Jimin’s eyes. Apart from that I like how Jungkook fed him.

60) Their interactions the whole ISAC. Masterlist 👣

61)  How can I miss this? Jikook in Japan..this one has a special place in my heart. Back in 2016, it had been just a casual discussion between me and my friends on kakao. Never thought jikook would continue displaying PDA every single time they go to Japan. What’s more when they have very strict no-camera policy during concerts.

62) The amount of heart eyes they shoot at each other.

63) When they had a dinner date in the dorm to promote Mala Hot Chicken. What baffled me was that Jungkook mentioned beforehand he wanted to sleep but he still accompanied Jimin. I’m soft.

64) Jimin has made it very apparent, truly obvious that he likes jungkook. Whether it’s liking him as a dongsaeng, or just someone he’s extremely comfortable with, Jimin always, without failing, reminds us who he dotes on. “Why do I like you so much?” Lately, I’ve been crazy because I like Jungkook so much. I think of this as a start of something beautiful, and I am so glad Jimin didn’t even hesitate in expressing his feelings towards the maknae. I think this might have helped jungkook unwind. Look at jungkook now. That’s some character development right there :)

65) Massage. Quoted line from AHL mentor, Tony Jones “They are very touchy feely and to them, it’s nothing. I’d walk into the room and Suga’s massaging V’s neck or Jimin’s giving Jungkook an intimate back massage..”

66) When Jungkook bent down so he would get closer to Jimin and put the rein-kook headband on Jimin’s head. They’re separated a lot of times during fansigns but somehow they managed to get tgt at the end.

67) When Jungkook blows a kiss, then turns to Jimin whose lips are puckered and does the same to him, using the same fingers he used earlier. Okay I’ve been meaning to say this. Realistically speaking, if you pucker your lips and you put your fingers on them, wouldn’t your saliva stick to your fingers? I’m not trying to imply anything here, just genuinely asking haha. 140529 Ameba Studio

68) When a webtoon artist gave Jimin two dolls, but Jimin decided to give one to Jungkook. She even posted a webtoon of them. To be honest who wouldn’t?

69) *screams to the people in the back* ALL-NIGHTER FRIENDS!!! As written by the man himself, “ALL the time, it’s just the two of us doing something at night. I don’t know what we do”

70) Jungkook scribbling hearts all over Jimin’s birthday drawing. He’s one whipped man.

71) Just other instances Jungkook and Jimin flirting on stage. 

//gif above isn’t mine//

72) When Jimin and Jungkook chose each other when asked “if you were a girl, who would you date?”

73) The shocking fact that Jungkook demanded an apartment from Jimin as a graduation gift. Like, apartment? of all things? What kind of domesticity is this?

74) The way Jungkook takes care of Jimin even though he’s the younger one, and how Jimin is there when he’s the one seeking comfort.

75) I will never forget the Gayo Back hug, ever. I’ve mentioned back hug somewhere above, but this is different.This deserves a point of its own.

76) When Jimin took off one of his rings at the airport and gave it to jungkook.

77) When Jungkook stopped in front of Jimin during his part in For You at Osaka concert, and kind of directed the lyrics for Jimin. Jimin just couldn’t stop smiling afterward :((( The lyrics are: It smells like you The road that I walk on I plug my earphone to my status My true feelings lie beyond there

78) When Jimin and Jungkook steered away from the bunch and instead opted for some alone on the cruise. people say you smile the brightest when you’re with someone you love, yes?

79) The fact that Jimin wanted to become napa cabbage after seeing Kook dressed up as a bunny, so he could eat him, albeit choosing to be cheese initially. What even is that statement lol 👣 

80) The morph of their dynamic. I kind of miss their old moments, when Jimin was bolder, more carefree, and Jungkook seemed to be too shy to reciprocate. (on camera). Now they have matured. They have grown up well. A wave of nostalgia sweeps over me. The transition of their relationship is extremely beautiful.

81) When Jimin became Jungkook’s makeup artist for a day, hovering around the set, even drawing a pic of a bird that’s used as a prop later.

82) their size difference might be exaggerated at times, but you really can’t deny that it is cute, even if it’s not much.

83) When Jungkook changed the lyrics in Spring Day to Jimin.                       Like a small piece // Of Jimin // That floats in the air 

84) When Jungkook showed to the world what a sweet boyfriend he is,making jimin laugh, sitting him on his lap, hugging him on his birthday. Sweet sweet jungkookie.

85) Let’s state the obvious- 21CG choreos!!! i love how they evolved, just like their remarkable, legendary nmd lift.

86) Their sensual dance covers.

87) When Jungkook guides and encourages Jimin during games/missions.

88) The many times Jimin has been spotted wearing Jungkook’s clothes, despite the well-known fact that Jungkook doesn’t share clothes. Newsflash: Jungkook wears Jimin’s too!

89) We know Jungkook knows Jimin like the back of his hand, but that doesn’t mean that Jimin knows any less. I think they spend time together way too much.👣

90) How often the word “JIMIN” trips off Jungkook’s tongue- this what fascinates me the most. At one time he even mistook Jin for Jimin.

91) Jimin’s eagerness to kiss Jungkook for his Coming of Age, being the first one to hold out a hand for a game of Rock Paper Scissors. Bon Voyage season 1

92) When Jimin waited over an hour for Kook to finish filming BTS Flower Boy mini drama, even though he’d finished his part. Jimin couldn’t even stay mad at him for not telling, like how fond is he?

93) The fact that Jungkook is more than comfortable speaking in banmal with Jimin.He once said in Idol Party that he prefers talking in jeondaetmal (polite language) with his hyungs but look at the amount of times he’s dropped the honorific and called Jimin by his name. uhm, let’s talk about treating the other as equals?

94) Jimin and Jungkook, the human embodiment of Piske Usagi.

95) When Jungkook’s bro drew Jungkook as Muzi and Jimin as Con, the inseparable duo on Kakao. Bro knows. 👣

96) In Kkul FM 2016, When Jungkook and Jimin nearly intertwined their fingers . Scoffs bh seemed to think it’s okay to abruptly cut off their scene. What intrigues me most is that they weren’t even looking but their hands still somehow managed to find their way around. Also other instances they hold hands. I love how Jungkook’s slightly bigger hands envelop Jimin’s smaller ones. *Jimin’s pinky tho!*

97) How they’re destined to meet. The fact that they’re both from Busan, have matching moles, Jungkook’s bro named Junghyun and Jimin’s bro named Jihyun..imagine what would’ve happened had Jimin not been the last one to enter Bangtan.

98) When Jimin said he'd be looking at the ocean with Jungkook but Jungkook straight up rejected him and chose to go on a trip with his bro instead. It was quite a strong statement but a moment later Jungkook proved it wrong by reaching out and squeezing Jimin’s hand underneath the table, kinda like a reassurance that it’s all part of a joke. He cares. He truly does.

99) During Jin’s birthday prank at MAMA, these two couldn’t keep their hands off each other. The moment they entered the bathroom, they almost shut everything out-talking to themselves, picking on the cake- until the members gave them the signal to stop w/e they’re doing. Months later Mama kindly revealed another footage, this time consisting of just them, in the bathroom, jungkook right in the middle of buttoning up his jacket, wearing nothing underneath. How was I supposed to sit still?

100) When Jungkook and Jimin take skinship to a whole new level, or simply put, the times Jikook makes us question the real intention behind their acts and excessive skinship.

101) Last but not least, Perhaps my all time favorite moment- When Jungkook was caught observing Jimin’s every move, literally had his eyes only on him.

(Mark 1:17 onward)

I super love this video bc the song chosen matched so well with the situation- like they wanted to reach out but couldn’t so they stayed put, could only observe the other from far...

and that’s it! thank you, you made it to the bottom of this post! In short, everything about jikook makes me feel content. I had thought of doing more  but despite my brain literally screaming at me “Include this! You forgot this!”, I had to stick to 101. Anyway, I hope this mends your longing hearts. Have a lovely day! Thank you for reading!

Bonus because I have to:

when the members revealed on BTS KKul FM 2017 that Jungkook bought a birthday present only for Jimin. Am I your favorite hyung?

When Jungkook, the youngest in the group, called Jimin who is 2 years older than him a baby. 애기야가자 !

[twdmusicboxmystery]

Dissecting the S8 Trailer

Okay. I promised I’d get this posted tonight and here it is! (Now I gotta go to bed bc I have an early morning.) 

Let's talk about this damn trailer because it was amazing! First off, thanks to all the members of my FB group. They know who they are. They helped hash out many of these insights.

***Also, I do mention minor spoilers in here. Just FYI.***

The Coda

I ought to talk about things in the right order. But yeah, really not going to. Let's dive right into the coda. It's what I was most looking for and it did not disappoint.

You all know what I mean by the coda, right? It's that extra little bit that comes after they give the premiere date. At that point, the commercial seems to be over, but no! There's more.

Beth was the coda of the S5 trailer. It showed her getting beaten by Dawn at Grady. They usually go for something shocking and/or mysterious. I don't think there's any way in hell that Beth was the coda of the S5 trailer, and then the episode where she was shot was called "coda." In S6, the coda was Daryl in the woods meeting Dwight and Sherry in 6x06. And we all know that episode had a crap-ton of Beth symbolism. For S7, it was Tara at Oceanside, and of course there's that pesky 7:30-clock in Slabtown. So basically the codas have been about Beth in some way for the past three seasons. Keep that in mind.

This coda showed Rick waking up in a hospital as an old man. We see a cane and we see flowers, and Rick looks very old. I 100% believe this has everything to do with Beth's return. Let's go over a few things here:

Lots of people saying this mirrors the comic books. That it's what Rick will look like after All Out War. I'm not saying they're wrong. At the very least this is probably a foreshadow of that. But guys, keep in mind that the trailers generally take all of their scenes from the first 3-4 episodes of the season. There's absolutely no way they'll get through all of All Out War and a 2 year time jump in the first four episodes. It's ludicrous to think that. Besides, the lighting here is VERY reminiscent of the picnic scene in 7x01, and that wasn't a literal event either. It was Rick's bittersweet dream. I think this will be something similar. But again, that doesn’t mean it's not a foreshadow of something down the line.

That's what it's not. Let's talk about what it is. TD has spent 2+ years showing all the parallels between Beth and Rick. We've shown them, talked about them, over-analyzed them. Of all things, why would they pick the image of Rick waking up alone in the hospital? Probably to symbolize something else. Look at these flowers. (I don't mean that in a Carol way. ;D) In S1, his flowers are dead. 

That was most likely to symbolize that the world died while Rick slept. Now the dead are walking.

In this little coda, the flowers are alive. 

Someone is waking up alive in a hospital, and I don't think it will literally be Rick. It will be someone else. (Hmm. I wonder who! ;D) Besides as I said above, all the codas have related to Beth in some way. I think this is the same. It got me SO excited.

We also discussed in my FB group how the music sounds a LOT like the music that was played at the end of Coda. Not over the scene where Daryl carries Beth out, but just after that with Morgan. I haven't done a detailed comparison, but some who did say it's probably not the EXACT same music. There are some differences. But it's VERY similar. This kind of music is usually reserved in the show for big revelations. And the piano music is almost associated with Beth (because, you know, she played the piano). All of that is super significant.

The Trailer Overall

Remember that trailers in the past have proved very deceptive. Often they portray the opposite of what's actually happening in the season. (Looking at YOU, S4 and S5 trailers!) So keep in mind that whatever they're trying to make us believe (time jumps, etc.) is probably the opposite of what will actually happen.

The other thing I loved about the trailer (which has no bearing at all on the story, tbh) is how much action there is. This is EXTREMELY good for TD, guys. Go watch it again. Look at all those explosions, car chases, fighting, bullets flying. The spoiler site hasn't gotten ANY of this, and majority of it had to have been filmed over the past two months. This is what we've been saying all along. They have the ability to hide stuff when they want to.

The music over the main part of the commercial (not the coda) sounds a lot like Irish punk rock. That may or may not be significant, but we've had lots of Irish references before. (Patty Reilly, Tullamore Dew, etc.) Remember that in S2, Hershel told Glenn all about how his people were from Ireland. It's part of the Greene family legacy.

The spoiler site has several "main" locations they look at, and they're very good at getting shots of those sites. But all the show has to do is take the actors out to some remote site in the woods WITHOUT bringing them to base camp first and no one would ever be the wiser. Let's face it: Beth's first scene when she returns won't be her walking onto the middle of the Alexandria set and being like, "What's up guys?" It will probably be out in the woods somewhere. So no, just because we haven't (and they haven't) seen her filming doesn't mean diddly squat. And let's not forget Norman's tweet about Princess Pants.

Rick's Imprisonment

Everyone's talking about who's eye this is: 

If I had to guess, I'd say Rick's. Why? Because of this shot. 

Pretty sure this is Rick and he seems to be in a box car of some kind. It looks a whole lot like Terminus, actually, and remember in 5x16, Rick talked about having nightmares that he was still in the box car. So, especially as his clothes seem to have disappeared, it almost seems like a weird cross between Terminus and Daryl's imprisonment.

I could be wrong about the eye, of course. No way to tell for sure. Just seems to me that these two scenes are related somehow.

I will also say that a situation like this might be a good time to do dream sequences, which is where the coda may come in. And while they're at it, they might as well include some flashbacks to the 17 missing days after Grady. ;D

Pretty sure this is Rick, too.

Oceanside:

There's been a lot of talk of Oceanside not being in the trailer. Even if it weren't, that would be interesting to me because they're definitely not focusing on Oceanside. (Again, the trailer tries to misdirect us.) But I think there's a good chance this could be a shot of Oceanside. 

Can't tell for sure, but it looks like it to me.

Also, there's this guy. 

From what I understand, this is Siddiq. New character from the comic book. And here's where this gets interesting. This guy is a minor character, even in the CBs, but his ties are to Oceanside. And what's weirder, there's a part in the commercial where it shows faces REALLY fast.

Here's the sequence: Tara, Morgan, Carol, Daryl, Rosita, Rick, Maggie, Michonne, Gregory, Aaron, Morgan, Carl, Tamiel, Jerry, Siddiq, Rosita, Enid, Jesus.

Notice all the rest are characters we know and love and who are going to be part of AOW. Why would they throw in a minor character that the audience hasn't even been introduced to yet? That's kind of weird.

I think it shows that Oceanside will definitely be a part of this season, but they're being very careful to be subtle about showing it.

Hospital Theme:

We see Carol and Tara sitting here. Tara is wearing her funky sunglasses (Beth's blindness) and there's a flower on the wall next to Carol. 

I doubt the flower will be part of the scene. It's background decoration/symbols. We've seen similar ones, though. Both in the chalk mural at the prison (x) and in the drawings at Eastman's cabin. But we see more of this scene here and I'm noticing something interesting. 

This looks a lot like it could be a hospital they're sitting on the roof of. Okay, I know you can't tell what kind of a building it is, but I guess what I mean is it reminds me of TF being on the roof in Coda when Rick went to approach the Grady officers about the prisoner exchange. It looks like it could be the same set. I almost wonder if in some way this could represent Carol and Beth (Tara as her proxy) at Grady. Just a random thought.

It also looks a lot like season 1 when Rick and everyone is on the roof of the building there.

Okay, so I looked through comments on various platforms (most of which are NOT TDers) and everyone is talking about a hospital theme. It's kind of funny because that wasn't actually my first thought. (Not that I'm complaining if they're going for the hospital theme, because that would mirror Grady.) If you look at this room, it's not a hospital. 

It's actually a chemistry lab. And the Saviors or whoever could definitely be used as a hospital, but that wouldn't have been it's original function.

The camera pans over to this hallway, and someone's head shows up from around the corner. Pretty sure it's Carol's. 

Well, the walls are ALL kinds of green. But I think this is part of this building: And this building looks EXACTLY like the Savior outpost TF invaded in S6. (The satellite station.) 

I don't know if it's the same place or another outpost with the exact same layout, but I'd say TF is invading outposts for the war, which is awesome, if you ask me. ;D

New TF Operation?

So at the beginning, we see a lot of the characters sitting around waiting for something. And this scene especially reminds me of Operation Lead the Walkers Away. 

They're obviously putting some big plan into motion, though it's hard to tell exactly what they're doing or why. (Yet another reason I think most of this is probably from episode 1 or 2.)

Later there's this. 

I can't tell if this is TF, but I assume it is. Once again, they're trying to manipulate a walker horde for some reason. The fence here also looks a LOT like the promo posters for S4, which symbolized the downfall of the prison.

Sunrise:

One of the first things I noticed is the sunrise before Rick in this shot. (I was originally going to post a different thing tomorrow that talks about sunrises, but naturally I have to dissect the trailer, so that post will come later. Not sure when. But the sunrises usually start new arcs and phases in the show. They're super important. And remember that the music box started playing again with the sunrise.)

Carzekiel

Not much to say about this except that it still seems to be going strong, which makes me happy. We also do see Benjamin's little brother hanging around Carol a bit, which might prove my theory that he will be the next kid in Carol's arc. (Let's hope he doesn't die.)

Other Random Shots

No idea what's up with Negan and Gabriel, but the walkers against the window look a lot like Grady and Andrea and even Tara in 6x08. We've seen this theme before. Quite a lot, actually.

Carl looks hard at a blond walker in a car. 

If you look close, this walker has a forehead wound where Beth's was. And I can't help but wonder if this is from episode 1, where Carl and Rick were seen filming at a gas station. (We do see them making little gas bombs for Daryl to shoot, so that may be what Rick and Carl are doing at the gas station in ep 1. Which would be yet another mirror-and-yet-opposite to episode 1x01. In that episode, when Rick arrives at the gas station, all the pumps are dry. I'll do a more detailed post on this later.)

I'm curious as to why the crowds are parting for Ezekiel here. Later with Jerry we see him with a bloody face, so that could be why.

Dwight reads a note, but what's interesting about this shot is that it's shown through the spokes of a bike tire. No way that's his motorcycle. The wheels are too skinny.

Morgan definitely seems to be freaking out. He attacks Jesus more than once in the trailer, but it's hard to tell if they're just practicing together or if Morgan's gone back to his PTSD state. He certainly wasn't doing well last season after Benjamin's death.

Someone watches Aaron through binoculars. No way to tell who it is yet, but if it's Boots again, that's the Scavengers. As far as I can remember, the only time we've ever seen the shape of binoculars around the camera this way was from Boots in S7 and when Daryl and Aaron watched Red Poncho Guy in 5b.

Someone's tied up. Notice they give us no clues about what this is about in the trailer. Using wood to escape is a callback to Rick doing that at Terminus. Also notice the blue plaid. Just saying.

No idea what's going on here, but it reminds me of the balloon Enid and Carl found in S6, as well as the random guy/walker Spencer found with a map to supplies just before he died. Honestly don't know what that's about.

They show Gavin here. Obviously the douche-baggery is still strong with this one. But it's odd for them to focus on such a minor character. It's understandable why Jadis and Negan would have some focus, but Gavin? On the other hand, his name is Gavin. And Trevitt at Grady was named Gavin. I mean, there must be around a million names in the known world that the writers could use. Do we really think they're recycling names (and focusing on random, minor characters in the trailer) for no reason?

This scene reminded me a whole lot of Rick's escape from the Claimer house in 4b. The stance is almost identical, and that was a very Grady-like foreshadowing. The shelf they obliterate is full of boxes of matches, btw.

There's a Virgin Mary statue here, which we've seen before.

Behind Carol here we see big cargo boxes in cages, many of which are blue. Seems like an imprisonment theme to me.

I can't help but read into Maggie mentioning the farm. We can't tell who she's talking to there, but it must be someone who knows about the farm, and it doesn't get mentioned very often, does it. ;D

An example of how muddled things get in the trailer. There's a part where Aaron has a line and I listened like five times, trying to understand what he says. I think what we hear is, "We pin them in/it takes care of itself. That's the plan." Pretty sure they're running two sentences together there, and he probably doesn’t say anything remotely like that at that part. They've done this before where they change dialogue in the trailer from what it actually is in the episode. That's why you can't trust it.

And of course I'm still in love with Jerry:

I think that's all I have for now. I'll probably watch it a billion more times and may come up with more.

We didn't see Beth of course (which I really didn't think we would). We didn't see Grady either, and I thought that was way more likely. (Bummer)

Just don't forget that all the clocks in Slabtown except one (the 7:30 one) pointed to a time somewhere between 8:00 and 8:05. Can't wait to see what S8 brings us!

How did everyone else like the trailer?

[timelessbian]

I saw the ouat and supergirl homophobic thing you reblogged, can you tell me what both of those shows' actors did, I'm a little out of the loop 😓😬😚

okay i might not be the best person to ask bc i kind of did my best to stay out of the ouat drama when it was big and i’m not really involved with the supergirl fandom but i can tell you what i remember/gathered from my dash:

the ouat fandom has always had serious problems with the cast/showrunners ranging from being dismissive of lgbtq+ relationships to being down right disgusting and rude (mostly in relation to swan queen)

i think it was ginny who tweeted early on that the pilot of ‘once upon a time in my pants’ didn’t get picked up implying that queer relationships are - by nature - x-rated (paraphrasing bc i don’t have the actual tweet saved)

sdcc 2013 was kind of a mess all around if i remember right. jmo made an off-handed comment about how ‘all her ships were on the couch’ (it was an interview with colin and mrj i think and at this point in time sq was an extremely vocal part of the fanbase so she knew) and there was a question asked about swan queen that was answered pretty dismissively imo (here’s a link to a video bc i don’t think i could explain it well)

there was also the whole scandal with michael coleman, the guy who plays happy i think, where he went on a twitter rampage essentially claiming that the entire cast/crew was against swan queen and it was a huge joke on set (once again, i’m paraphrasing but i’m sure someone has the receipts)

i think there was also some twitter drama with yvette nicole brown who was the voice of ursula in 1 ep and she’s moderated the sdcc panels a few times. i think she went on a blocking spree or something and unironically told sq shippers they needed jesus (i’m fuzzy on this one so please correct me if i’m wrong!)

then there was the whole build-up to the queer romance that ‘had to be done right’ and ‘naturally’ and was going to be important to the storyline and then it was one ep and the characters were never seen again oops

and the lovely mulan/aurora queerbaiting too, that was fun

TL;DR: basically it was just a generally messed up atmosphere coupled with sects of fandom that were absolutely disgusting with their blatant homophobia who were empowered every time anyone on the cast said anything. it was beyond toxic tbh (although lana in particular was usually really good at being supportive!)

as for supergirl, like i said i’m not really involved in the fandom but from what i’ve gathered here’s what went down:

jeremy jordan and melissa benoist were doing a singing recap of s2 and not only did they leave out sanvers (aka a HUGE part of the hype for s2) but they also mocked supercorp shippers saying that kara and lena are just friends and that’s all they’re ever going to be (i have not watched the video myself, but it’s out there if you want to)

jj gave a total non-apology where he basically said he was an ally and it was a joke and he’s not homophobic and it was a joke and people are sending him hate so he’s the real victim here (didn’t save the image, but i’m sure it’s still making the rounds)

i guess they confirmed that sanvers is going to be sidelined bc they knew floriana lima could only do one season but they’re not breaking up so they can still pat themselves on the back for having a wlw relationship without having to show it

katie mcgrath gave a GREAT answer about supercorp, saying that it’s not up to her what people take away from her character and shippers’ interpretations are just as valid (that is not sarcasm i genuinely liked her answer)

melissa may have implied that she couldn’t be homophobic bc she was on glee?? have not seen screencaps/videos yet, but i’ve seen posts circulating. don’t know how true they are, but it sounds like something that would happen in this mess rn

TL;DR: in one fell swoop, the supergirl cast managed to alienate a huge chunk of their fanbase and seem to not even realize how/why what they said is fucked up. on top of that, they’re still minimizing their one (1) lesbian relationship while begging for cookies bc of it. (that being said, katie, david harewood, and odette annable have been lovely from what i’ve heard and even though chyler leigh wasn’t there, she’s so incredible to lgbtq+ fans too!)

tbh i didn’t believe that a cast could be more inept (to put it lightly) at dealing with their femslash fanbase than ouat, but then supergirl showed up, sang ‘hold my beer’ and here we are.

like i said, i’m not the best person to explain everything. this is all mostly personal memory/things i heard from this weekend so if anyone has more information or corrections, pls feel free to share

[readysetjo]

PS/ SS - Chapter 3 - The Letters From No One

Two posts in a day! 

@alluringcliche​ @feelsandotps​ @wearywanderer​ @xingshining​

Oh gosh when will the sad Dursley content end??? This is the worst. I want Hagrid. I want Hogwarts. I have this infuriating need to research dates and times, so here’s to sad research I guess. ... Harry was given his “longest-ever punishment” in his cupboard. Starting at Dudley’s birthday and ending when “summer holidays started”. Dudley’s birthday is June 23. And I’ve been doing a bit of digging on the average school schedule for Surrey, UK I’m a bit out of my element, but I think I see that the “Surrey County Council’s” website here says that last year summer term ended on July 21. That makes 29 days (counting Dudley’s birthday). In 1991 it might have been different, but probably not much. That is a whole month. There are no words.

Dudley knocked down Mrs. Figg on his bike, and it’s terrible, but the way JK wrote it made it sound comical almost cartoon-ish bc the woman was on crutches trying to heal from breaking her leg from a month ago. It’s written as slapstick and I feel bad for laughing at it almost. 

Bev, you replied to my chapter 2 about Yvonne. We both mentioned our thoughts that it’s not likely that she was nice, if she kept company like Petunia. Here is Dudley following his mother’s footsteps, by having his “gang”. Terrible people like to find other terrible people to enable their actions. 

I did a bit of Googling on Smeltings to see if it had any real-life relevance, and I enjoyed this brief forum thread of pictures of the over-the-top uniforms at similar-ish schools. Like Dudley’s uniform seemed too impossible to me, but I get the joke now lol. “maroon tailcoats, orange knickerbockers, and flat straw hats called boaters. They also carried knobby sticks”

To you, Nick and Laura, bc you two may not read the US editions. In your books is the public secondary school that Harry almost went to called Stonewall High? I thought that high school was an American thing. 

“’They stuff people’s head down the toilet the first day at Stonewall,’ [Dudley] told Harry. ‘Want to come upstairs and practice?’ 

‘No, thanks,’ said Harry.’The poor toilet’s never had anything as horrible as your head down it -- it might be sick.’”

Harry is so clever. Look at that twist of a phrase! That’s an impressive joke for an almost eleven year-old kid. Like he probably didn’t watch a lot of tv or anything this is just raw talent. Honestly, there is not a single good reason as to why he wouldn’t be good at writing essays for school when he applies himself. 

[After hearing Dudley being praised for his appearance in his school uniform by his parents.] “Harry didn’t trust himself to speak. He thought two of his ribs might already have cracked from trying not to laugh.” /// One of the worst/ best feelings that I know of.

“They heard the click of the mail slot and flop of letters on the doormat.” /// Hedwig’s Theme starts playing. 

“he didn’t belong to the library, so he’d never even got rude notes askign for books back.” /// I laughed for two reasons bc for the first time I imagined that this was something that had happened to JKR one too many times so she added it here. Also, bc I myself currently have almost a two dollar fine at the library.

That is quite the large wax seal if Harry could make out all four animals. And it’s purple, which I’m glad about. When I was a kid watching this scene, I didn’t think that it was a wax seal. Bc the envelope was ripped from Harry’s hand and there was a red seal, I thought Harry got a nasty paper cut for years. It seemed a bit unnecessary to have in the movie.

Harry’s non-reaction to the letter saying “cupboard under the stairs” is the most unrealistic thing in this series tbh.

Why did Petunia not ever imagine that Hogwarts sending Harry a letter was a possibility???

The Dursleys moved Harry upstairs in fear that the letter writers would call the authorities on them I bet. This was probably Dumbledore wanting to strike paranoia into The Dursleys. Good.

Dudley’s terrible temper tantrum astounds me. He threw a living animal “through the greenhouse roof” and hurt his parents. I haven’t read this in a while and I’m shocked again.

On the flip side, here’s JKR’s (literal) slapstick humor again: “After a minute of confused fighting, in which everyone got hit a lot by the Smelting stick”

An almost eleven year-old Harry: figured out that, since the letter writer knew he moved rooms and knew that he didn’t get his first letter, that Harry should expect more future attempts at correspondence, and also repaired an alarm clock. Can we please put to rest the fanon that Harry was “unintelligent” and “unobservant”??? And also do the same for Ron too, bc I hate those unfounded claims for Ron as well.

“Uncle Vernon didn’t got to work that day. He stayed at home and nailed up the mail slot.” /// A.K.A. /// “Uncle Vernon didn’t go to work at a company that sells drills. He stayed at home and used a hammer and nails instead.”

Is friutcake more of a thing in the UK/ England?? I’ve watch a bit of The Great British Bake off and I’ve seen a bit more positive reaction to it and Vernon is eating it here without it even being remotely close to Christmas. And somehow I still remembered that JK likes fruitcake. omg I feel like I need to lay down after remembering that very tiny detail from last year. How does the brain work? I don’t remember where my junior prom was at (and a friend asked me that just last week) but I can remember a tiny tweet from March of last yearrrrr??? 

I just want to know what kind of “nasty letters” the post office were taping to the Dursley’s door saying, “stop boarding up your door we can’t do our jobs.”

They have a milkman. Was that still a thing then??

I looooooooved the deleted scene of a scared Petunia finding the letters in the eggs. 

I would PAY to have Dumbledore and McGonagall’s POV of this chapter. I would pay a lot. I bet it would be filled with both of them fuming and then later laughing bc “Hey Dumbledore, what if we sent a hundred letters to the front desk!!” “OMG, Minerva, that is inspired. Let’s do it.”

Dudley asks the question “Daddy’s gone mad, hasn’t he?” in both the movie and the books, but the movie made Dudley look sympathetic. The book says Dudley asks this “dully”. There’s no concern here.

Its nice to imagine how many letters and bills that got lost to the Dursleys when they left before unblocking the mail slot.

This scene of them on the boat going towards the shack reminds me a lot of Harry and Dumbledore riding in a boat to get the Horcrux. 

Harry shivering under a thin blanket on the ground is similar to one of the night’s rest I got during my camping road trip last year. I feel so sad for this tiny child bc it was miserable for like that hour before I woke her to ask if we could layer our sleeping bags and cuddle with her and her dog. It rained that night too and I woke up to a slightly damp sleeping bag bc I happened to sleep touching the side of the tent. lol The personal story was free of charge.