#i watch the sonic movies and basically nothing else

[askepitheterased]

Giovanni— Godfather is about an italian mob boss running a crime syndicate, i think you’d like it :)

oh also Sylvie have you seen the Princess Bride and what’s your rating of it

Giovanni : Ooh, a mob boss, got it. I'll ask my moms if they have it somewhere. Sylvie : I've heard a client or two mention the movie, and from what I've heard, it's apparently pretty good.

[lavaridgecookie]

Horror Movie Time with Sonic F/Os

General imagines for watching horror films with Sonic characters! What types they're into, what kind of movie watcher they are, etc. I originally wanted them to be able to be read as romantic or platonic, but eventually I just kinda went full romance.

Characters: Sonic, Shadow, Silver, Amy, Rouge, Omega

Spoiler warnings for Poltergeist and Alien, and a very minor spoiler warning for The Thing

Sonic:

Is more a fan of the 'campy' horror movies, although he'll also watch slashers - they get his blood pumping and his heart racing, and he lives for that. He doesn't like seeing you actually afraid, so he'll definitely take your tastes into account when picking a movie- if you say no to a specific thing, he'll tease you a bit but he'll pick something else.

Does NOT like supernatural horror. He will not watch ghost movies. He won't watch movies about doomsday scenarios. Basically, if he doesn't think he could fight it off in real life, it horrifies him and he can't stop thinking about it. What if that stuff happened to him? Happened to you? Haunts him for days or months afterwards. You made the mistake of watching The Thing with him, and for three weeks afterwards you had to talk him out of making you do the blood test every time you were apart for more than 5 hours.

He's fine with werewolf movies, for obvious reasons. Been there, done that, still tries to use his foot to scratch his ear sometimes.

All in all, he just wants to have fun with the movie, and with you. If you say 'tonight, we are watching a bunch of Disney Channel Original Scary Movies and eating our weight in popcorn,' he'll be just as happy as if you wanted to watch every Halloween movie.

Shadow:

Is a more all-around moviegoer, although since meeting you, he's found slashers are harder to watch. He can't help but think about you suffering through those scenarios, and ultimately dying.

Meanwhile, he loves sci-fi and supernatural horror. He's a product of science, he knows what it can do, so he can completely relax when watching movies like Alien.

In fact, and he'd never tell you this, he likes that one a LOT more after meeting you. He can easily see you in Ripley's place- resourceful, smart, trying to keep everyone alive. Going back for Jonesy seems like something you would do. He likes imagining you, triumphant, coming home to him.

Shadow likes it a LOT when you cling tightly to him- you can grab his arm as hard as you want, you can squeeze him like you're a boa constrictor, whatever. It doesn't hurt him, he's the Ultimate Lifeform! He likes the physical contact that he doesn't have to ask for, but he also very much enjoys knowing he makes you feel safe.

You should definitely expect him to start appraising the movie afterwards- he doesn't actually care, but he wants to talk to you and he's not great at conversations without a set topic. Please indulge him.

Silver:

is kind of a weenie and and doesn't really like actually scary movies all that much. He's been through enough, thank you. He's much more of a children's Halloween movie guy- your Mostly Ghostlys, your Scary Godmothers, your Cry Baby Lanes. Basically, nothing scarier than Tremors.

If you do make him watch a horror film, he's shaking in the first five minutes, and once bodies start piling up he's crying into your shirt.

There is one exception.

He loves Tobe Hooper's Poltergeist. Everything about it speaks to him, and he loves sharing it with you. He'll hold your hand whenever Steve and Diane are supporting each other, and he'll pull you into his chest and hold you during the scary parts. Afterwards, he'll tell you about how he hopes you two can be together like that someday- how he'll never abandon you when things get tough, and how he knows you'll stick by him, too.

He likes it because throughout all the horrible things, everyone is looking out for each other. He loves that everyone lives. And if you like the movie, too? He's the happiest hedgehog that ever lived.

Rouge:

Is a big fan of slashers- the gorier the better! She's the kind to cheer when some idiot gets murdered. But she also much prefers watching them at home, with you. She wants her head in your lap, taking sips of red wine in between mouthfuls of heart-stoppingly buttery popcorn, just having a great time with you.

But, and you won't find this out on the first date, she's also a huge film buff and adores the cult classics. If you so much as mention cult horror, she'll start trying to get you to watch her Criterion Collection DVD of Hausu, and wants to discuss the finer points of horror.

And she is trusting you not to spoil her reputation by telling anybody else about this. Especially you shouldn't tell anybody that she LOVES Them!

She also really likes horror films with a romantic bent, and she keeps saying that she'll tease you during them but honestly when the time comes her eyes are glued to the goddamn screen... it's the perfect time to slip your hands into hers.

Amy:

Likes two kinds of horror moves. She loves psychological horror- it keeps her guessing, keeps her engaged. When you watch with her, she likes to voice her theories out loud, and loves to hear your thoughts on it!

In the same vein, she also likes cult classics- her favourite is the 1962 film Carnival of Souls. Expect a lengthy discussion every time you guys watch a more 'cerebral' film- she really does like to hear how you felt about it! It helps her feel like she can see into your world a bit better.

But on days where she doesn't have that much brainpower to spare, she really enjoys a good horror/comedy. Her go-to is the Three Flavour Cornetto trilogy, but honestly she's not that picky. You guys watched Werewolves Within together and about died laughing. The genre is basically the mental equivalent of icecream to her.

Whatever you two watch, you are smushed up together in one corner of the couch. Doesn't matter who's in front and who's behind, one of you has your head in the crook of the neck of the other.

123-Omega:

He also like slashers, and he's kind of unbearable to watch 'em with. Every time anybody dies, he either says 'That would not have happened to me' or 'I would not let that happen to you.'

It's kind of cute, but once you're an hour and seven deaths deep, it can get a bit annoying. That said, you appreciate him for who he is, so you knew this was a bit inevitable and you love him anyway.

Once you asked him what he would do to protect you from 'unkillable' slashers like Michael Meyers, and after a second of thinking, he picked you up, took you out to the gun range, put you down behind him, and proceeded to absolutely obliterate everything in front of him one long, sustained round of heavy fire. Probably used up at least $6k of artillery. He then turned back to you and stated 'Michael Meyers could not survive being turned into a fine mist'

You were still in your jammies, and you couldn't help but laugh so hard you fell over. God bless your loving sentry turret.

~~~

Hope you all enjoyed! These were fun to write for, and I'd definitely be willing to do more for other characters if requested!

[occasionally-writing]

Movie Date Night

A/N: Howdy my peeps. Bet you thought you've seen the last of me XD just kidding but it has been a while since I even wrote anything. Well, surprise!! I actually buckled down and wrote something. I legit had the idea for this fanfic to come to me at like...2 in the morning? And I've been writing it for the last two days. This is my first time writing for these two but I legit love Alan and Jeff so I couldn't not write for them. Enough rambling from me! Enjoy the fic!!

Summary: After countless ideas for a wonderful date for he and Jeff, Alan decides on something simple. A movie date night! Just a night alone for the two of them to enjoy each other's company and watch movies.

Word Count: 158

To say Alan was stumped would be an understatement and he would protest about not just being stumped but also in a rut. The man had no idea or how many countless ideas he had tossed out of his mind, unable to come up with anything that seemed perfect or even good. Alan wanted to come up with the perfect date night for him and Jeff. Roller skating was obviously out due to him almost eating pavement the last couple of times Jeff had tried to teach him but what else was there to do? It’s not like Jeff was too hard to please…right? 

Letting out a troubled sigh, Alan continued to pace and mull over his thoughts until a thought that seemed so simple crossed his mind. He recalled a conversation that he happened to overhear in the past between Charlie and Jeff back at the garage. At the time, from what Alan had gathered, the two were trying to plan if they should just go to see a movie at the theater or stay home and watch a movie at their apartment. This led to Jeff making a jab about how people didn’t buy dvds anymore and it was concluded that the two would just go to the theater once Jeff got off work. 

“A movie night could work…” Alan mumbled, his arms crossing against his chest as his brow furrowed in thought. The idea was simple and seemed like something Jeff would like but would that just prove that he wasn’t as young as the rest of the group? To Alan, there was nothing wrong with getting dvds and a player and just sitting at home and watching them there but to the younger generation, it just wasn’t done. Would Jeff make a jab at his age like North and Sonic do? Shaking the thought from his head, Alan quickly decided to just go through with a movie date night. Afterall, Jeff was nothing like those two troublemakers. “Okay…now I just have to set up the dvd player and dig through some movies that Jeff could like…”

____________________________

To Alan’s relief, picking out the movies did not take long at all. From what he had in his collection, the man picked out two or three movies that could pique Jeff’s interest. Taking no time setting up the player, Alan heaved himself up and glanced outside. The sun was just beginning to set which meant it was time to text his boyfriend and have him come to the living room for their special night. Alan had already made sure that they would be completely alone so that no interruptions in the form of North, Sonic, Kim or Babe would get in the way of everything he had planned. Thankfully, North and Sonic decided to basically kidnap Kim to their local hangout to have some fun and drink while Babe mostly stayed home, his mood not quite the same since Charlie’s accident. 

“Uncle? I got your text and uh…what’s all this?” Adding the last touches in the form of soda cans and popcorn, Alan turned around to see Jeff, who was taking in everything with an adorable look of confusion that had Alan wanting to squeeze his cheeks. Ushering Jeff towards the couch, Alan settled next to him and laid out the movies in front of them, explaining what he had planned for their night. Once he was done with his anxious sputtering, Alan waited for Jeff’s reaction, his brown eyes sparkling in hope that Jeff would not deny the night he planned. Letting out a small snort, Jeff met Alan’s hopeful gaze and smiled, the grin practically warming Alan’s heart. “You really planned a movie date night for us, huh?”

“Yeah…and uh, I know that you think dvds aren’t the thing anymore but I just wanted something for the two of us. We’re not completely alone while in the theaters and I just thought you’d like a nice and quiet night instead. Was I right?” Alan questioned, his hands rubbing together with nerves since Jeff hadn’t really said anything regarding their date. As if sensing his boyfriend’s nerves, Jeff softly laid his hand on Alan’s, halting the movement before he tangled their fingers together which caused Alan to smile. “I even picked out some movies I thought you’d like! Do you approve?” 

Letting out a hum as he examined the movies, Jeff couldn’t help the pleased smile that rose on his lips at how much effort Alan had made to make this night special for him and Alan was right, some of the movies did catch his attention. Lifting his gaze to find Alan observing him, Jeff let out a fond sigh and nodded, trying not to snicker at the triumph noise Alan had made before he was suddenly across the room, dimming the lights until it was almost completely dark.

Handing Alan the movie he wanted to watch first, Jeff brought the bowl of popcorn to his lap and selected his soda, leaning back against the couch while Alan inserted the dvd and settled back next to him, pressing play on the remote. Opening his own can of soda, Alan took a sip and softly scooted closer to Jeff, the movement not quite subtle since Jeff did the same, their thighs touching and ankles looped. Laying his arm behind Jeff, Alan gently pulled him closer until Jeff’s body was completely pressed against his own. Not saying a word at how they were practically glued together, Jeff continued to munch on some popcorn and just settled comfortably into Alan’s warm embrace.

__________________________

“That ending was unexpected, huh?” Alan mumbled, brushing his fingers through Jeff’s soft hair while he watched the credits roll, signaling the end of the movie. Letting out a sleepy hum in agreement, Jeff slumped a bit off Alan so his boyfriend could get up to put the last movie on. “This one was my pick but maybe you’ll like it too!”

Staring at the cover while his boyfriend inserted the dvd, Jeff noticed it looked like some romantic comedy which wasn’t exactly his cup of tea but since Alan had watched most of the movies Jeff liked, it wouldn’t hurt to watch something that seemed to pique Alan’s interest. Stretching out his limbs before Alan settled back next to him, Jeff placed the now empty popcorn bowl back on the table and snatched up another can of soda, claiming his place against Alan’s side once more just as the movie began to play. 

“Oof, that is one creepy dog…looks more like a rat. What do you think, kid?” Alan asked, his eyes never leaving the dog on the screen until he realized he had no response from Jeff. Holding Jeff close, Alan couldn’t help the soft smile that bloomed when he noticed that somewhere along the way into the movie, Jeff had fallen asleep, his head flopped against Alan’s shoulder and the can of soda he had gotten before now between his legs to prevent it from spilling. Pausing the movie so he could carefully maneuver the soda can out of Jeff’s legs and safely back on the table, Alan checked the time on his phone and winced when he noticed how late it was. “Wow…sorry Kid, didn’t realize how late it got…”

“Uncle…” Placing his phone on the table, Alan gently picked up his boyfriend, holding him close as his name left Jeff’s lips. Not caring whether or not he left the movie on pause since he knew Sonic, North or Kim would turn it off for him, Alan carried Jeff carefully up the stairs, making his way towards his room as quietly as he could. Pushing the door open with his foot, Alan let out a soft sigh when he finally reached his bedroom, the big bed seemingly inviting both of them to rest for the night. “Uncle? Where’d we go?”

Gently shushing him, Alan placed Jeff on the one side of his bed and pulled the covers back. Helping his boyfriend out of his button up and jeans, leaving Jeff in just a t-shirt and boxers, Alan did the same for himself and he climbed into bed. Covering Jeff up first, Alan made sure he was comfortable and warm before he settled in as well, a yawn slipping out of his lips.

“Uncle…” Letting a sleepy smile quirk his lips up, Alan opened his arms for Jeff as the other wiggled closer, burying himself happily in the arms of the man he loved. Letting out a comfortable sigh, Jeff snuggled further into Alan’s chest and tangled their legs together, not leaving a single part of them not touching. Pulling back a little so he could stare into Alan’s eyes, Jeff leaned in and pressed a soft kiss to his lips, the act of affection giving both of them butterflies in their stomachs. “I had a great night. Thank you.”

“I did too and I’m so happy you enjoyed it too,” Alan whispered, pressing butterfly kisses all over Jeff’s face until the boy was softly giggling, the smile on face seeming like it could light up the whole room. 

Pressing a final kiss to Jeff’s forehead, Alan pulled him closer once more as both of their breathing even out, the warmth of the blankets and each other’s bodies lulling them into a peaceful slumber, the only sound emanating in the quiet room being their soft breaths and the click of their couple bracelet clicking together to form a heart.

[blazehedgehog]

A Eulogy for my Playstation 4 Pro

So since I was a brain genius who decided to transfer all my fundraiser money to my bank account on a weekend, let's have a little eulogy for my poor Playstation 4 Pro.

I bought it in 2017 after a hellish move from Colorado to Nevada. We'd lived in Colorado for 26 years, and rented the same house for 24 of those years. I literally grew up in that house. Then our landlords got greedy (as all landlords eventually do), almost tripled our rent, and we had to move.

One of the last things I did before I packed up my computer was release The Definitive Way to Play Sonic Adventure on Youtube. That video was a modest success, but it had a secondary effect where a no-commentary gameplay video I'd uploaded for the fangame Sonic Utopia got picked up by the algorithm as a result, and that video suddenly took off like wildfire. I found myself sitting on a pair of videos that were about to pull in close to a combined 3 million views. It was the most I'd had a video blow up in a very long time.

I was now flush with a few thousand dollars of cash that I could do whatever I wanted with. That was great, as I got to help cover some moving expenses. I gave my Mom some money, I paid one of the deposits on our new apartment, paid to fix some stuff that got broken in the move, I bought myself a new desk, new computer chair, some storage shelves, a new bed frame, and still had about $700 left to spare. So I bought a PS4 Pro and a small handful of games (The Nathan Drake Collection, Yakuza Kiwami, The Last of Us Remastered, and Parappa the Rapper Remastered, I think). It was the first true next-generation console I'd bought in 11 years -- I'd had a Wii U, but that doesn't count.

Within that first year, I'd already run into my first problem with that Playstation 4. Back in the Xbox 360 era, I had a moment in my life where I was a psychopath that was running a media server off my PC. Every morning I'd wake up, download everything my Youtube subs had posted the day before, along with whatever GiantBomb had uploaded that day, and threw it up on the media server. The 360 could see the server, and those downloads would basically become my background noise for the day. I watched the entire GiantBomb Persona 4 Endurance Run that way: on the 360, through my media server. For context, these were the days before there was any way to watch Youtube on a television. There was no app. Youtube was just a website. So the Media Server was what I had to do to see Youtube on another screen.

In the move out to Nevada, I'd bought a cheap 32GB USB thumbdrive from the back-to-school section at Wal-mart and filled it full of movies and videos and stuff. With the PS4 set up, I plugged that thumbdrive in and tried out the PS4's media player capabilities, hoping it worked like the Xbox 360.

It did... for about 45 minutes. In the middle of watching Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: The Movie the media player suddenly crashed and refused to see the USB thumbdrive anymore. I reached down to pull it out only to find it was almost too hot to touch. I might have actually dropped the thumbdrive because it shocked me just how hot it was. I have never felt a piece of electronics be that hot before.

For the rest of that day, that USB port was dead. Nothing you plugged into it would be recognized. Eventually, it finally started working with controllers, but it never accepted any other thumbdrives, ever.

After about three years, I started to notice recordings were starting to get a little weird. Clips I'd record of my Fortnite matches would have huge 2-3 second chunks go missing, or the encoding would corrupt and smear. But then it went away, so I figured maybe it was just a problem with the game and not the console. It'd come back every now and then, maybe once a year, but it only ever happened with Fortnite, and only occasionally.

About a year and a half ago, I started to notice something else weird. Unless there was a specific game I needed to play for work stuff (like Sonic Frontiers or whatever), my PS4 was mostly just a Fortnite machine, and mainly because the PC version of Fortnite is a disaster.

But for months I'd left a disc in my PS4's disc drive. I think it was probably Balan Wonderworld or something, and as I booted up Fortnite for my daily founder's mission rewards, I noticed a sound. I'd been hearing it on and off for a while, but now I was finally paying attention to it. I realized: the console was sitting there scanning the disc, over and over and over, like it couldn't read it. I'd hear the disc motor spin up, the soft click-click-click as the read head scanned for data. It'd spin down, spin up, click-click-click, whirrrrrr, click-click, spin down, spin up, etc. Over and over. It'd do this for a good 30-45 seconds, then finally settle down and identify the disc.

The first time I noticed this, I ejected the Balan disc and put in something else; I think it was Dreams. PS4 read the disc instantly. I shrugged, figured maybe the Balan disc was just cursed and didn't think anything of it.

About a week later, I caught it doing it with the disc for Dreams. And then Sonic Frontiers. Then Sonic Superstars. Pretty much any disc I'd put in there. As the months wore on, it started taking multiple minutes for it to identify the disc.

A few weeks before it died, I ended up taking the disc out and basically resigning myself to only putting a disc in if I was going to play it, and removing that disc the moment I was done, because that scanning process seemed like it was making the problem worse.

A few months before it died, I got a full hardware crash on the console. The error code it gave me pointed to a hardware failure, but a google revealed that it was a generic error code that could mean literally anything. Right around this time, the video corruption in my Fortnite recordings came back around. I had a feeling it was the HDD.

Thus began the saga of trying to replace my PS4's HDD. I knew it could take SSDs, so I did some research, saved up $100, and bought a 2TB SSD that was compatible with the console. Followed Sony's official instructions on replacing the HDD, and...

It didn't work.

I vowed to get my money back and order a different HDD, but prices went up and realizing the other mounting problems with this machine (including the fried USB port), and my general mood overall, I just kept the money and figured I'd ride or die until the machine breathed its last.

8 months later... it refused to boot up at all.

Rest in piece, king. The only other console I've ever had straight up die on me like this was my Xbox 360, and if I'm being honest, I kind of smothered that poor boy a little bit hoping to get a sturdier console back from the repair center.

(I did not, but that's a story for another day.)

[666herescared]

So... This is a little out of nowhere and has nothing to do with my other posts but I watched (these) (two) videos on Sonic.EXE and felt the itch to make my own.

Trigger warning: Blood, Mild Body Horror, Descriptions of Disturbing Events

![PROCEED AT YOUR OWN RISK]!

Meet Sonic.CHAR, AKA Charic!:

He's just a sketch, but I have a bunch of ideas including stuff for two games {See Minigames for gameplay concept} The first would be a 2D game where you just play five minigames, then choose to either kill Charic or "Play Forever", and Play Forever leads into the second game.

The basic plot for game two would be that you've been sucked into the game now. The second game would include 3D renditions of the minigames, interspersed with lore details told to you by Charic himself. There would be a larger focus on the story and character of CHAR in the second game.

(Minigames:)

Find the Chao - Just a hide and seek style minigame where you find 10 chao. BTW, they're dead. Gotta keep the atmosphere somehow.

Cooking - A fairly simple cooking minigame where Charic walks you through the recipes.

Duo-Dancing - Plays sorta like FNF, but with the context of dancing with this poor sap.

Obstacle Course - Real simple. Charic set up an obstacle course and you have to run through it on a timer.

Fishing - I dunno what to tell you. It's a fishing minigame.

(Backstory:)

Charic, or Sonic.CHAR was an experimental AI that managed to wise up and export his file to keep his home safe. He was intended to be Sonic. Essentially a way for kids to meet their fictional idol.

He was the only of these experiments to be made yet, so his friends were still scripted. He didn't take it well. One of the flaws and reasons he wasn't considered "ready" yet was that he couldn't control his speed, so he'd hurt people on accident.

Don't worry though! He always fixes his mistakes ;] (He taxidermied his friends) They wouldn't ever be perfect again, but he didn't see that, or at the very least, he didn't want to, so he tore out his eyes(Eye? Who knows with Sonic anymore?)

He didn't want to hurt anyone again, so he learned to move slowly and tore his claws out by their roots. He tried something similar with his teeth, but quickly remembered that he needed those. Same with his quills.

He doesn't want to hurt anyone and is desperate to be harmless. He wants a friend! Won't you be that for him?

(Personality:)

He's cautious and kind, but mischievous at times. (For example, the planned opening of the first game, where he jumpscares you, then laughs about it.) He has some major trauma from what he did to his friends and is often delusional - doing things like watching movies or having picnics with them.

He's thoughtful sometimes, like hiding his creepier features when asked. (Hence the blindfold) He loves playing games, but struggles with actually being the one playing, which is why he needs a playmate. He's not bad by any means. Just insane.

(Easter Eggs:)

This will be short because these will just be in one scene for the second game, but essentially, the second game begins with you creating an avatar in a strange closet room. You ring a bell when you're done, Charic comes and gets you, then the minigames start, but you're able to recreate a few of Charic's friends during this. You don't get to play as them, but you can still show Charic.

Amy: "You're do- oh.. Never liked her much anyway.. Pick something else!" Charic slams the door, a teary eyed angry expression evident on his face.

Knuckles: "You're do- oh.. Why are you like this?- Ugh! Pick something else!" Charic slams the door, looking frustrated but sad.

Shadow: "You're do- oh.." Charic shuts the door, a pensive look on his face, then through the door he tells you to, "Pick something else!"

Tails: "You're do- oh.." Charic looks pissed, storming up to you and picking you up by the fluff. "You bastard. THAT'S MY LITTLE BROTHER- Err.." Regret shines through and he puts you down gently. "Just.. Pick something else." He shuts the door. You hear a couple soft sniffles before he collects himself and keeps walking.

(Win Screen:)

Charic applauds you cheerfully, the text, "Congrats!" written behind him. The background includes hand puppet versions of any carcasses around the level.

(Lose Screen:)

The music screeches to a halt and Charic appears in front of you - very close - before backing up and giving a shy smile, encouraging you to try again. The text, "Too bad!" is written behind him for this one.

(Conclusion:)

Yeah, I'm not sure if he even counts as an EXE. It's not in his name, his title, or his personality. He's not a demon or a god, or even an eldritch abomination. Whatever he is though, I'm attached and I think he's cool!

Give me any input you have in the replies/re-blogs, fanart is always appreciated, and as always,

Have fun, and happy scrolling!

[frenchy-and-the-sea]

thank you for the tag @merrigelblogs! 

1. Are you named after anyone? - I am not! At least not that I know of. Thankfully, while I don’t particularly love my full name, it can at least be shortened to a decidedly less feminine form, which is a massive blessing.

2. When was the last time you cried? - Legit this morning, I watched a proposal video that was v sweet and I got weepy about it. I’m a Pisces, it’s basically my day job 

3. Do you have kids? - No, I gotta be like WAY more on top of my own shit before I can think about being responsible for another human being like that!

4. Do you use sarcasm a lot? - Y...yes.... but I work hard to only use it to highlight the ridiculousness of a situation rather than to belittle what someone has said

5. What is the first thing you notice about a person? - Clothing, mostly! I am that person who is out in a crowded area and tries to read what everyone’s graphic tee says, in case it’s something I recognize. I like to know where I can connect with people!

6. What’s your eye color? - Green/grey-ish! 

7. Scary movie or happy ending? - Both?? Can I say both?? I like watching horror and I like watching comfort movies. It really just depends on the movie!

8. Any special talents? - I can quote the Sonic the Hedgehog OVA almost word for word because my sister and I watched it so often as kids. (So....no LMAO)

9. Where were you born? - Oklahoma! And then we immediately moved away and I never ever went back LMAO

10. What are your hobbies? - Recently? Reading (lots of SF/F), writing, playing FFXIV and d&d and a smattering of a few other video games, and generally being a menace to people online!

11. Do you have any pets? - I do! Two black cats named Gizmo and Kitkat, and a dog that some family friends found wandering around in the woods outside of their house! Her name is Beau. :> Here’s a picture of her begrudgingly sharing a bed with Gizmo. (Kitkat is not there because the only person in the whole wide world she likes enough to cuddle with is me.)

12. What sports do you/have you played? - Once upon a time, I played soccer, but that’s pretty much the only thing I ever did long term. Most of my free time in school was dedicated to marching band, which technically isn’t a sport, but demands your attention like one. (I played trombone!)

13. How tall are you? - 5′9″!

14. Favo(u)rite subject in school? - English was and will always be my favorite subject, but I DID rather enjoy my anthropology classes in college! Shoulda done more of those back then, they were delightful.

15. Dream Job? - I don’t think it’s really viable as an option for me, but I’d love to work for a literary agent. I just wanna hype people’s work up as a career, and help them navigate the process of getting it out in the world! I think it’d be neat. :>

Bonus: any significance to your blog's name - my nickname in college was Frenchy, and I have had a particular fascination with different kinds of sea-related things quite literally my entire life. also, nothing else I tried was available

Tagging @phoenix-failing, @blujayonthewing, @urdnotgrunt, @ghilegab​, @nuclearanomaly​ and anyone else who feels keen to waste some time! Only if you’re feeling up to it, naturally :3

[denimbex1986]

'*****

Isaac Newton had Indian heritage and the Doctor is gay and fancies him.

Yes, the returning showrunner Russell T Davies’ second episode back continues to gleefully rub the faces of the haters in a big pile of steaming Woke. In fact, ‘Wild Blue Yonder’, which Davies also wrote, has a false start purely to do that – ok not purely, also to set up a brilliantly silly running joke - with a little stop off in 1666 when the Tardis crash lands into the tree under which Newton had just had the apple drop on his head, before toddling off again to the location of the episode proper. It’s a highly amusing little flourish, since Newton is played by the excellent British-Indian actor Nathanial Curtis from It’s a Sin, and it causes Catherine Tate's Donna to reflect later, "Wasn’t Isaac Newton hot?", and for David Tennant’s Doctor to concur: “He was, so hot…oh! Is that who I am now?” slightly taken aback at this apparent change of sexuality in his new incarnation. “Well it was never far from the surface,” Donna deadpans.

"Wait, the Doctor isn't gay!...and…and I think you’ll find Sir Isaac was very much white!’ splutter a thousand GB News trolls in their front rooms, before hurling their toad-in-the-holes at the flat screen.

Come now, chaps, sit back down. Of course the Doctor has to be a bit gay - knowing the flux of genders he’s been through by this stage, it makes perfect sense for him to be bisexual at the very least. As for the Newton stuff, well, who really cares about the details, he's supposed to be sexy in this and Curtis most certainly is that. More to the point, this is the kind of freewheeling, nod-and-a-wink, devil-may-care attitude that embodies Tennant’s and Davies’ Doctor Who, which, after a joyous return last week in 'The Star Beast', is now fully in the groove with this five-star instant-classic episode.

At the end of the last one, Donna spilt her coffee into the console of the spanking new Tardis, so it’s now in flames and crashing around time and space. After the bit of Newton ogling, the pair find themselves on board a massive spaceship (Donna: “I’d hate to be the cleaner.”). No one else is around apart from a rusty old robot which takes one step about every half an hour. The ship keeps on reconfiguring in some way. And, actually the ship is not space, they realise, it’s in a dark void beyond the edge of the universe, “absolute nothing”. The ship’s computer reveals an air lock opened and closed again three years ago to let something in. Worrying. The best thing to do would be to get back into the Tardis and get the hell out of there, but the Tardis does a runner on them – the Doctor stuck his sonic screwdriver in its keyhole to regenerate it after the fire, but in its recovering state it left because it senses danger.

“There’s something so bad on board this ship that the Tardis ran away...”

As in 'The Star Beast', this represents Davies leaving behind previous showrunner Chris Chibnall’s multiverse and taking things back to basics, as the very best science fiction tends to do. After the Newton escapade, the episode is just a two-header, with the Doctor and Donna in isolation on the ship. It is reminiscent of Alien, of Silent Running, and, given (bit late to give a spoiler alert, but: spoiler alert) the fact doppelgangers of the Doctor and Donna turn up, Solaris. Of course, it’s not at all pretentious, with huge dollops of The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy thrown in too – the way the doppelgangers can’t “get the arms right” is a giggle for the kids watching. There’s a delightful puzzle to the episode that works as a satisfying mini-movie, while also delivering some intriguing lore tidbits and tease Davies’ overall new arc.

And actually, it even manages to not cast aside Chibnall’s work, but to humanise it a little more. Chibnall worked it so that the Doctor is not actually a Time Lord at all but the ‘Timeless Child’, a kind of Patient Zero for Time Lords, who’s from another universe entirely. Anyway, Jodie Whittaker had to deal with the shock of that, but Tennant does great work here in tugging some heartstrings to show how haunted the Doctor is by this new knowledge. After being riled up about the fact he doesn't know who he truly is by the spooky space doppelgangers, Tennant kicks at the ship in a rage, and generally demonstrates in his Hamlet-meets-Ace Ventura way that he is very tortured indeed, but still a laugh. (Incidentally, are his suits getting tighter? Is another lore-busting sub-plot here that the Tardis is actually some kind of intergalactic spin dryer slowing shrinking the clothes on the Doctor until he loses his mind? Just putting it out there)

‘Wild Blue Yonder’ has a tremendous sleight-of-hand climax, and ends on a particularly emotional moment with a returning cast member. It's pretty much as perfect a piece of televisual entertainment you could hope for in the year of our Time Lord 2023. Truly, we’re all watching way too much TV, but this returning Doctor Who makes you think that actually this is a worthwhile thing to do with our lives.

Oh, and ‘Wild Blue Yonder’, they explain, is a war song, so another question was why the Tardis was playing while it was on fire? What’s coming? Spooky space stuff, no doubt. Roll on episode three...'

[karinta-agogobell-unified]

I was tagged by @valenshawke! Thanks.

Currently reading: Wikipedia articles on stuff like Schenkerian analysis, Balinese gamelan, and mensural notation.

Last song: “Oxford Town/Cumberland Gap” by Crooked Still.

Currently watching: a Youtube dissection of the “Lightlark” YA novel, and a sonic deep dive into an E.F. Walcker pipe organ built in 1845.

Current fic (I'm reading/invested AF): nothing specific currently, because….

Writing? Yes! I’m working on a Turn A Gundam fanfic with the basic premise of “post-series, with trans-fem Loran Cehack”.

Next on my watch list: anime-wise…. it’s either the Evangelion Rebuilds, Shoujo Kakumei Utena, or Shouwa Genroku Rakugo Shinjuu. Movie-wise, I know exactly what I’m watching next — Godzilla Against Mechagodzilla (with my friend).

Current obsession: Turn A Gundam in general and Loran Cehack in particular. Also, the Romantic trumpet in 6-foot F (as written for by Bruckner, Debussy, and others).

Tagged: @zweizilla98, @anthurak, @doctorvelious, @valalaraptor, @wassailingreader, and whoever else wants to partake!

[aquillis-main]

I think...you are misinterpreting my tone. There is no moral high-ground, and I apologize for my coming across that I was making one. Looking back at some of my other asks I can see why you'd think that from the outside looking in. I did come off as cutting, my apologies. This is exactly what I brought up earlier regarding online vs in-person discourse XI.

Even then, I don't see how my saying that your feelings on Robotnik in the first movie were antithetical to your feelings now was in bad faith. I must be misinterpreting something... If I am, that would explain your reaction to me saying that. I would never purposely misinterpret something and then base an argument off of it, trust me. That's lame.

Even then, looking back at your original posts, I really don't see how else to interpret it? :/ With how much animosity you expressed toward Sonic, it really felt like you wanted him to get captured by Robotnik. Especially since you said you didn't see how Robotnik chasing Sonic was wrong. Again, the online tone barrier could be in effect here. If you want, you can re-explain what you meant...or you can block me...since I guess this technically breaks your stipulation?

I can't really block when I answer an ask, anon.

The fact that you misinterpreted the entire asks about Movie!Sonic and my opinions on how the first movie's story was handled as 'him needing to be captured by Robotnik to be experimented on' is why I can't seriously consider you as anything but disingenuous and acting pedantic about people who are seriously clamoring to gruesomely watch Maria die. I've actually made it clear, in multiple posts, that my issues with Sonic in the movie is that the consequences for his actions don't align with how the story tries to portray him.

In the movie, they make Sonic this sad little child that did nothing wrong, looking for a family and be miserable because he didn't have said family... When he technically went against his supposed mentor's warning to not flaunt his power too much, this causing Longclaw to send Sonic off to some other world in order to not be used for his power, sacrificing herself in the process because Sonic thought of his wants more than his situation. Even in the montage of living in Green Hills, Sonic does nothing but cause trouble - Tormenting a crazy guy for the hell of it, possibly stealing people's things from their homes to flesh out his little cave, and (eventually) starting the plot of the movie by causing a blackout so damn big, it shuts down over half of the USA. That type of blackout is the kind of blackout you don't recover from quickly, and it makes sense the movie had the military send out it's top agent Dr. Robotnik - whom, btw, only had the 'crime' of being an asshole to not only his subordinates, but also the people who don't technically have clearance to that point - to try and figure out the situation and get it under control.

On top of that, Sonic is a serial stalker - he watched through Tom and Maddie's window, spied on them doing their daily routine, and had the dumb audacity to believe he could get help from them from the government to escape the actions he pulled. Even guilt-tripped Tom into getting him to San Fran because Sonic had the 'brilliant' idea of opening a Ring gate in Tom's garage, and basically roped Tom to getting the rings back with Sonic. All the bad events that happened in the movie are due to Sonic's actions, and instead of actually looking into this and allowing Sonic to grow into his own character without the humans, the movie brushes it off to make Sonic bond with the guy he manipulated to help.

Instead of reading through my points, thinking 'hey, maybe Aquillis' issues have to do with how the movie was written, and not about Sonic himself', you instead decided to immediately go 'Aquillis hates Movie!Sonic! How dare she!' and started condemning me on a thing you barely bothered to read through, then tried to tie in your feelings about how I 'don't like Movie!Sonic' with the discussion I was currently having - people making jokes about Maria's death affecting Shadow - when they were two completely different points, and the only relation to each other was that I'm talking about the same franchise here.

You did the equivalent of jumping into a canyon without a parachute, then kept hitting weak ledges in order to make me seem like some kind of monster that manipulates people to get them to see the way I want them to see. Instead of asking for a clarification of my opinion in the first place, you put me on the chopping block and wanted me executed, because you already decided I was 'guilty' for not thinking the same as you. I don't see how I wasn't any clearer, considering there's a few posts recently that say 'I don't like the way the movie let's Sonic off without consequences beyond being chased by Eggman'.

Don't let your feelings get in the way of what you're reading, that would be a way to figure out if someone acts like you think they are or not.

[transparentlandcheesecake]

Theirs a fake leak in 4chan and its where the Hawaiian shirt Shadow basically started. Couldn't find the link but theirs a copy paste of it. so it goes like this

"Hello, I am a storyboard artist working on the upcoming show Sonic Boom. Because I know some of you are interested in that program today I will share some small factoids about the show.

Obviously, because this is all still subject to nondisclosure agreements, I won’t provide any evidence that could reveal who I am or lift a finger to prove what I say is true, fair warning, but if you’re still interested you can save this post and wait until March for the public reveal to compare.

-

For starters, Sonic Boom is essentially a relaunch of the Sonic franchise, a full reboot that SEGA intends to become the definitive version. All designs, character changes and plot devices are directions that come directly from them. The controversial Knuckles redesign? That’s all SEGA.

None of the previous games are canon, except the upcoming Wii U/3DS game. Let me emphasize, I know basically nothing about the next Wii U game, so don’t bother asking about it, except that it will reveal the new origin story for Sonic and takes place before the events of this cartoon.

The premise of the show is about Sonic battling Eggman through time. Each episode Sonic and friends will travel to new locations and time periods to combat the mischief Eggman has caused in his attempts to rewrite history so he inherits the world. Eggman comes from the bad future, and Sonic comes from the good future.

-The Cast

Sonic, the hero of the story, loves chilidogs, faster than a speeding train, not very smart but he doesn’t need to be, he’s cool but also kind of a dork. His Marty McFly redesign is no accident; he even has a hoverboard for water.

Tails, the smart one, engineer and pilot. Can drive any sort of vehicle. Best friend of Sonic and plays the bagpipes. Tails would prefer to be at home watching sci-fi movies than adventuring, but he begrudgingly comes along for the ride when people are in need. Wears lab equipment all the time.

Amy, sports captain, perfect student, and Sonic’s proclaimed girlfriend. The daughter of a rich car magnate, Amy uses up cars like tissue paper in her pursuit of Sonic. Still hangs out with everybody like part of the gang. Considers any time she gets to help stop Eggman with Sonic “dates”. Wears a retro inspired outfit, no hammer.

Knuckles, the most mellow and spiritual of the group, unless you manage to tick him off, then he’s out of control. Very trusting and gullible, will often be fooled by disguises nobody else would fall for. Guardian of the Master Emerald, the main time portal, honestly not very good at his job, but he tries. Wears bandages on his knuckles and skinny jeans.

Eggman, he’s always travelling through time to steal ancient artefacts like some sort of fat, bald Carmen Sandiego. Hates Sonic with a passion, but will sometimes work with the blue blur when his plans go out of control. His lair is in a rundown themepark, Eggmanland, and beyond his dream of ruling the world, he wishes to be ringmaster at the circus. Wears a retro inspired outfit, with current Eggman proportions, except he is much taller with long lanky limbs.

Metal Sonic, originally Eggman’s finest creation, Metal gained independence and freedom after Tails reprogrammed him. Then he’s Sonic’s main rival for the series, and a sort of anti-hero. His main objective is proving he is better than Sonic, in speed races, saving people or even a burping contest. Wears, nothing. He’s metal and blue like Sonic.

Shadow and Rouge Eggman’s bumbling henchmen. These two are snarky, sarcastic, lazy, deceitful, devious, greedy and often bear the brunt of the pain when Eggman’s plans inevitably go wrong. Rouge is the brains of the operation, and often likes to make alterations to the plan if she sees something worth stealing for herself. Shadow is the muscle of the operation; he can almost go toe to toe with Sonic if he tries, which is never. Shadow prefers to give the least effort possible. Wears, Rouge wears a pink toob top with purple sweatpants, she has blue wings. Shadow wears an open red Hawaiian flower print shirt, he has sunglasses on all the time.

Silver, starts as the annoying bratty neighbour of Sonic who always wants to hang out in their group. After he successfully pesters Sonic into taking him on an adventure one time to stop Eggman, Silver betrays Sonic to gain ancient psychic powers. As a villain, Silver is basically just a bully, he wants to get even with Sonic for humiliating him, but he’s not adverse to stealing things for personal gain. Perpetually eating. Wears, nothing but a large black belt with golden buckle and matching boots. Has a significant proportion change, very large and fat.

Blaze, a princess from a foreign land, she’s living in Amy’s mansion as an exchange student. Somewhat shy and awkward, Blaze is not sure what to make of all the crazy occurrences that happen around Sonic, but it’s much more interesting than princess life back home. She has the innate ability to control fire with her hands, and always keeps an oil lantern on her person. Wears a purple scarf and fluffy ushanka. Long sleeve shirt with armless vest over the top. Purple skirt and high heel shoes.

-The Chaotix, feat Vector, Espio and Fang A group of criminal antagonists who aren’t all bad. They work for whoever has the most coin, which is usually Eggman. Vector is the leader of the gang, he pretends to be a tough guy, but secretly he wants to be a dancer. Perpetually broke, he owes money to everyone in town. Espio is a ninja who travelled from the past and had his life saved by Vector, who he now serves to pay his debt. He’s not very fond of criminal activity, but goes along with it, so long as no innocents get hurt. He is constantly astounded by the technological advancements of the future. Fang is the most rotten of the group; he’s quick to turn traitor when things get sour and the only reason the others keep him around is because he’s good at what he does and very good a grovelling. Wears, Vector wears a leather jacket and gold chains around his neck. Espio, nothing but shoes and gloves. Fang, wears a wide brim hat and bandana over his mouth, wears a brown belt and spurs on his shoes.

Evil Sonic Hailing from the Bad Future, Evil Sonic is what it says on the tin. A loose canon, he still will occasionally work for Eggman if their goals are the same. Hates his goody two-shoes distaff with a passion, will go to elaborate ploys to ruin his image, such as impersonating him. Wears, the same as Sonic, but in inverted colors. His fur is a slightly darker shade of blue.

And that’s basically scraping the bottom of the barrel for recurring main characters. I’m sorry if you’re disappointed a character you liked isn’t going to appear, we didn’t get to choose which characters we used.

Sonic Boom is a children's comedy first and an action show second.

There are a lot of quirky things like that in this series. Like Sonic sleeps with a night light.

-gross out humor Yes

-overarching plot and yes.

Sonic Boom takes a lot of inspiration from cartoons such has adventure time. So there are a few fart jokes and characters eating gross foods, but nothing much worse than that, it's pretty tame.

Plot wise we obviously can't do very much, since this show has to stay subservient to future game canon. So don't go into it expecting dramatic character growth or world changing events, but there is nods to previous episodes and build up to a large plan by Eggman as the series progresses.

Sonic and friends live in the Good Future, which acts sort of like the series hub world."

Have you heard of that Sonic Boom link about Hawaiian Shadow and fat Silver?

i heard about hawaiian shirt shadow and even saw a little animatic of the gag, wtf is this about silver though

[piko-power]

Power Bump

I wanted to do a quick little pre-sequel Sonic Movie story before I continue on that one other fic. Since today is Father's Day I thought it'll be perfect for this story, since it's about the origin of the whole power bump tradition in the Wachowski household.

Plus this is actually my first Sonic fic I'm posting here. Not a lot of people post fanfics on Tumblr, usually on AO3. But since I don't have an AO3, I thought Tumblr it's the next best place to show off my stories. XD

-

The quiet music played over the credits while the small blue hedgehog snored away the night. Tom looked over at him and chuckled. Sonic's first movie night and he already went out like a light halfway through the movie.

It was a fun movie night too. It's basically a tradition to have a movie night a few times a week. Usually when he's accompanied by Maddie and Ozzie, and sometimes Wade.

But tonight was a special movie night.

It was almost more than a week ago since Sonic had entered Tom and Maddie's lives, though it still felt like yesterday since the day his emerald eyes lit up seeing the attic now transformed into his very own bedroom.

He is pretty much part of the family now, especially now that he's part of movie night, which is one of his favorite things to do. Even before he lived with him and Maddie.

Before, he used to watch from afar, at least from outside the window behind the living room couch. He would watch movies from there, listening to the film and Tom and Maddie's commentary.

That also means he probably saw some violent movies, unfortunately. Sonic is obsessed with Speed and he refuse to watch anything else, much to Maddie's concern. At least he's got good taste in movies.

He doesn't blame Sonic though, it's also one of his favorites. So it's no wonder he wanted to watch Speed with him and Maddie.

Tom couldn't help but smile seeing the sleepy little hedgehog resting his head on one of the pillows, almost letting the empty popcorn bowl fall off the couch. Though he should be sleeping in his own bed, in his room.

Tom leaned forward to reach for the remote, to turn off the TV for the night but was stopped from Sonic groaning. "No..." Tom blinked. Does he want to watch the film again? It's almost eleven o'clock! He leaned back on the couch, chuckling to himself.

"N-No! Wait!" Sonic then reached his hand out for... Something. He wasn't talking to him, wasn't he?

"Buddy?" Tom placed his hand on Sonic's shoulder. It was clear that He was still asleep, and probably dreaming. "You alright?"

Sonic's eyes shot open, and he quickly sat up looking at the sheriff. "HUH?! What now?! What happened?" He looked at his surroundings, surprised and confused. "Whoa. Buddy, relax." Tom patted his shoulder. "You were dreaming."

He looked back up at Tom. "I... I was?" There was a pause.

"Oh! Yeah. Yeah... I knew that." He chuckled. He knew well that Tom wouldn't buy it. "You sure about that, pal?" The hedgehog can only respond with a small shrug, smiling.

"I just thought something was wrong." The sheriff added. "Oh, no! Nothing's wrong, Tom!" Sonic said. "...Nothing is wrong." He repeated himself quietly.

From the way Sonic said the last bit, he knew something is quite wrong. "Are you sure you're okay? Do you want to talk about it?" He asked. "I mean, it's okay if you don't want to, but-"

"Tom. I'm fine, really." Sonic said, looking away from Tom for a moment. "I just dreamt about Ro-butt-nik taking me away from you is all. I'm awake now." He then smiled again, reassuring him that he is okay.

"Ah..." Tom nodded slowly. It also wasn't too long since the battle between Sonic and Robotnik. Those two days of running from the government, and causing a bar fight, to even getting attacked by his robots on the highway, nearly cost the hedgehog's life. Twice.

Not to mention that throughout his life he has been by himself, watching his home town and no body knew until that day. If Sonic didn't survive Robotnik's attacks, he would've lived his whole life without friends. Or a family.

Sonic would think about those scenarios even if he saved the town from the mad doctor. But Robotnik is gone, stranded on the mushroom planet where he won't bother anyone anymore.

The poor guy shouldn't worry about that anymore. He's safe now. He's got friends by his side now.

"Well... Don't worry about that, little buddy." Tom began, giving Sonic the sweetest smile. "You kicked that government weird-o's butt and he won't be taking you away anytime soon. You're good." The young space hog's smile grew wider. "Haha! I know!"

"...Wait a minute. Did you say 'Ro-butt-nik??'" Tom laughed. "I thought that was his name?" Sonic's one ear drooped slightly. "Buddy, it's 'Robotnik.'" He corrected.

Sonic froze. "...Huh. He really likes robots." He said, scratching one of his ears. "You do realize you just accidentally made a pun, right?" Tom chuckled once more.

"NO I DID NOT." Sonic said sternly. "Yes, you did." He poked Sonic's arm jokingly. "GAGH! Quit it, already! I didn't mean to, okay?!" He quickly backed away from the silly sheriff, crossing his arms and looking away from him again.

He then noticed the TV playing the credits. "Aww, the movie's already over??" His arms lumped back down on the couch as he lay on his back, disappointed. "You fell asleep halfway through!" Tom said, getting up from the couch to turn off the TV.

"Aw, well." Sonic sat back up. "At least I had fun with you guys!" "Me too." Tom said, putting the remote down. "I know I was involved in this sort of thing before, just... Not when I was actually with you..." He slowly said, placing his hands together. "But now I get have movie nights with you guys now! I can't wait to do this again!"

Tom turned back around to see that silly little smile on the Blue Devil's face. He smiled back. "...We will do it again, right?" "Well, of course!" Tom beamed. "How can we not do this again? It's always so fun to watch movies late at night with Maddie and Ozzie, even with a few friends. I think it's impossible to even say "no" to something like this"

"Hmm..." Sonic looked down at his socks, trying to think of a question to ask. "What's up, buddy?" Tom asked, walking over to the hedgehog. "I've been wondering..." He started. "How did this whole tradition started?"

"Well..." Tom began. "I don't know about 'tradition.' It's just something our family likes to do time to time. It's been a thing since I was just a little kid. Me and my dad would watch movies together til we just fall asleep on the couch." Sonic giggled. He continued to listen.

"It always brings me back to my childhood whenever we have a movie night." Tom continued softly. "It's just one of the many Wachowski "traditions" we do here." He sat back down on the couch next to Sonic. "And now you're part of those traditions." "Yep!" Sonic grinned.

"But you know the best part? It's not just our 'traditions,' it's also all the other fun activities we can do together now! Even the holidays!" Sonic said. He then gasped and had an amazing thought. "I can get to have my first Christmas with you guys soon! And Halloween, and thanksgiving! And even- AND EVEN THE FOURTH OF JULY!" He exclaimed, shaking Tom's sleeve.

"Haha! Yeah! That's coming up soon, actually!" Tom added. "Emerald Hills Park throws the best firework shows on that day. Maybe we can head to the park to watch them together." "YEAH! That'll be so cool!" The hedgehog's fists stim in excitement.

"I just... I'm just so glad to finally be out of the shadows and actually be part of this town!" He said. "I'm not afraid to show what I'm capable of, or what I am, anymore, and it's all thanks to you, Donut Lord."

Tom's smile couldn't get any wider. "Thanks, little guy." He patted his head slightly. "Sadly there are some people out there that do only care about what you are, not who you are, but I'll... We'll, make sure those people won't be in our way. Just like Ro-butt-nik, haha."

"Yeah!" Sonic pumps his fist in the air. "No one messes with the Donut Lord and the Blue Blur!" Then he moves his fist towards Tom. "POWER BUMP!"

Tom stared at his fist for a moment before he looked back at Sonic. "...What?"

Sonic blinked. "Y-You know, Power Bump?" Of course that didn't explain anything.

"Buddy, don't you mean a fist bump?" Tom said. "THAT'S what it's called?" He cried. "I've been calling it Power Bump for the longest time!"

Sonic scratched the back of one of his ears. "I just thought it's really cool. Like some sort of unbreakable promise or something." He has seen Tom and Maddie do multiple fist bumps before and he thought it was pretty neat. Like a high five but for fists.

"A 'Power Bump' huh?" The sheriff knew that Sonic knows a lot about Earth and it's customs, but not all of it. He thinks it's pretty cute that he came up with names for certain things. "That's actually a pretty cool name."

The small hedgehog's cheeks burn from embarrassment. "No it's not. I had no idea what it was actually called at the time. I didn't mean to confuse you." He mumbled. "No. Don't apologize, Sonic." Tom placed his hand around Sonic's arm to comfort him. "It has a nice ring to it! I really do like that name."

Tom then puts up his fist with a smile. Sonic's eyes lit up. "And I'm going to assume it's a promise to make sure that we stick together?" Sonic's smile is as bright as the sun. He tried his very best not to get emotional. "Yeah!" He said.

"Well luckily for you, Sonic Wachowski, we stick together no matter what."

"You said it, Donut Lord!"

Then, their fists finally meet each other. "POWER BUMP!" They both exclaimed.

-

Just a sweet story I wanna write down real quick. Thank you so much for reading and HAPPY FATHER'S DAY!

REBLOGS ARE SUPER DUPER APPRECIATED!

[taylorswifthongkong]

Taylor Swift broke all her rules with Folklore — and gave herself a much-needed escape The pop star, one of EW's 2020 Entertainers of the Year, delves deep into her surprise eighth album, Rebekah Harkness, and a Joe Biden presidency. By Alex Suskind

“He is my co-writer on ‛Betty’ and ‛Exile,’” replies Taylor Swift with deadpan precision. The question Who is William Bowery? was, at the time we spoke, one of 2020’s great mysteries, right up there with the existence of Joe Exotic and the sudden arrival of murder hornets. An unknown writer credited on the year’s biggest album? It must be an alias.

Is he your brother?

“He’s William Bowery,” says Swift with a smile.

It's early November, after Election Day but before Swift eventually revealed Bowery's true identity to the world (the leading theory, that he was boyfriend Joe Alwyn, proved prescient). But, like all Swiftian riddles, it was fun to puzzle over for months, particularly in this hot mess of a year, when brief distractions are as comforting as a well-worn cardigan. Thankfully, the Bowery... erhm, Alwyn-assisted Folklore — a Swift project filled with muted pianos and whisper-quiet snares, recorded in secret with Jack Antonoff and the National’s Aaron Dessner — delivered.

“The only people who knew were the people I was making it with, my boyfriend, my family, and a small management team,” Swift, 30, tells EW of the album's hush-hush recording sessions. That gave the intimate Folklore a mystique all its own: the first surprise Taylor Swift album, one that prioritized fantastical tales over personal confessions.

“Early in quarantine, I started watching lots of films,” she explains. “Consuming other people’s storytelling opened this portal in my imagination and made me feel like, Why have I never created characters and intersecting storylines?” That’s how she ended up with three songs about an imagined love triangle (“Cardigan,” “Betty,” “August”), one about a clandestine romance (“Illicit Affairs”), and another chronicling a doomed relationship (“Exile”). Others tell of sumptuous real-life figures like Rebekah Harkness, a divorcee who married the heir to Standard Oil — and whose home Swift purchased 31 years after her death. The result, “The Last Great American Dynasty,” hones in on Harkness’ story, until Swift cleverly injects herself.

And yet, it wouldn’t be a Swift album without a few barbed postmortems over her own history. Notably, “My Tears Ricochet” and “Mad Woman," which touch on her former label head Scott Borchetta selling the masters to Swift’s catalog to her known nemesis Scooter Braun. Mere hours after our interview, the lyrics’ real-life origins took a surprising twist, when news broke that Swift’s music had once again been sold, to another private equity firm, for a reported $300 million. Though Swift ignored repeated requests for comment on the transaction, she did tweet a statement, hitting back at Braun while noting that she had begun re-recording her old albums — something she first promised in 2019 as a way of retaining agency over her creative legacy. (Later, she would tease a snippet of that reimagined work, with a new version of her hit 2008 single "Love Story.")

Like surprise-dropping Folklore, like pissing off the president by endorsing his opponents, like shooing away haters, Swift does what suits her. “I don’t think we often hear about women who did whatever the hell they wanted,” she says of Harkness — something Swift is clearly intent on changing. For her, that means basking in the world of, and favorable response to, Folklore. As she says in our interview, “I have this weird thing where, in order to create the next thing, I attack the previous thing. I don’t love that I do that, but it is the thing that has kept me pivoting to another world every time I make an album. But with this one, I still love it.”

ENTERTAINMENT WEEKLY: We’ve spent the year quarantined in our houses, trying to stay healthy and avoiding friends and family. Were you surprised by your ability to create and release a full album in the middle of a pandemic?

TAYLOR SWIFT: I was. I wasn't expecting to make an album. Early on in quarantine, I started watching lots of films. We would watch a different movie every night. I'm ashamed to say I hadn't seen Pan's Labyrinth before. One night I'd watch that, then I'd watch L.A. Confidential, then we'd watch Rear Window, then we'd watch Jane Eyre. I feel like consuming other people's art and storytelling sort of opened this portal in my imagination and made me feel like, "Well, why have I never done this before? Why have I never created characters and intersecting storylines? And why haven't I ever sort of freed myself up to do that from a narrative standpoint?" There is something a little heavy about knowing when you put out an album, people are going to take it so literally that everything you say could be clickbait. It was really, really freeing to be able to just be inspired by worlds created by the films you watch or books you've read or places you've dreamed of or people that you've wondered about, not just being inspired by your own experience.

In that vain, what's it like to sit down and write something like “Betty,” which is told from the perspective of a 17-year-old boy?

That was huge for me. And I think it came from the fact that my co-writer, William Bowery [Joe Alwyn], is male — and he was the one who originally thought of the chorus melody. And hearing him sing it, I thought, "That sounds really cool." Obviously, I don't have a male voice, but I thought, "I could have a male perspective." Patty Griffin wrote this song, “Top of the World.” It's one of my favorite songs of all time, and it's from the perspective of this older man who has lived a life full of regret, and he's kind of taking stock of that regret. So, I thought, "This is something that people I am a huge fan of have done. This would be fun to kind of take this for a spin."

What are your favorite William Bowery conspiracies?

I love them all individually and equally. I love all the conspiracy theories around this album. [With] "Betty," Jack Antonoff would text me these articles and think pieces and in-depth Tumblr posts on what this love triangle meant to the person who had listened to it. And that's exactly what I was hoping would happen with this album. I wrote these stories for a specific reason and from a specific place about specific people that I imagined, but I wanted that to all change given who was listening to it. And I wanted it to start out as mine and become other people's. It's been really fun to watch.

One of the other unique things about Folklore — the parameters around it were completely different from anything you'd done. There was no long roll out, no stadium-sized pop anthems, no aiming for the radio-friendly single. How fearful were you in avoiding what had worked in the past?

I didn't think about any of that for the very first time. And a lot of this album was kind of distilled down to the purest version of what the story is. Songwriting on this album is exactly the way that I would write if I considered nothing else other than, "What words do I want to write? What stories do I want to tell? What melodies do I want to sing? What production is essential to tell those stories?" It was a very do-it-yourself experience. My management team, we created absolutely everything in advance — every lyric video, every individual album package. And then we called our label a week in advance and said, "Here's what we have.” The photo shoot was me and the photographer walking out into a field. I'd done my hair and makeup and brought some nightgowns. These experiences I was used to having with 100 people on set, commanding alongside other people in a very committee fashion — all of a sudden it was me and a photographer, or me and my DP. It was a new challenge, because I love collaboration. But there's something really fun about knowing what you can do if it's just you doing it.

Did you find it freeing?

I did. Every project involves different levels of collaboration, because on other albums there are things that my stylist will think of that I never would've thought of. But if I had all those people on the photo shoot, I would've had to have them quarantine away from their families for weeks on end, and I would've had to ask things of them that I didn't think were fair if I could figure out a way to do it [myself]. I had this idea for the [Folklore album cover] that it would be this girl sleepwalking through the forest in a nightgown in 1830 [laughs]. Very specific. A pioneer woman sleepwalking at night. I made a moodboard and sent it to Beth [Garrabrant], who I had never worked with before, who shoots only on film. We were just carrying bags across a field and putting the bags of film down, and then taking pictures. It was a blast.

Folklore includes plenty of intimate acoustic echoes to what you've done in the past. But there are also a lot of new sonics here, too — these quiet, powerful, intricately layered harmonics. What was it like to receive the music from Aaron and try to write lyrics on top of it? 

Well, Aaron is one of the most effortlessly prolific creators I've ever worked with. It's really mind-blowing. And every time I've spoken to an artist since this whole process [began], I said, "You need to work with him. It'll change the way you create." He would send me these — he calls them sketches, but it's basically an instrumental track. the second day — the day after I texted him and said, "Hey, would you ever want to work together?" — he sent me this file of probably 30 of these instrumentals and every single one of them was one of the most interesting, exciting things I had ever heard. Music can be beautiful, but it can be lacking that evocative nature. There was something about everything he created that is an immediate image in my head or melody that I came up with. So much so that I'd start writing as soon as I heard a new one. And oftentimes what I would send back would inspire him to make more instrumentals and then send me that one. And then I wrote the song and it started to shape the project, form-fitted and customized to what we wanted to do.

It was weird because I had never made an album and not played it for my girlfriends or told my friends. The only people who knew were the people that I was making it with, my boyfriend, my family, and then my management team. So that's the smallest number of people I've ever had know about something. I'm usually playing it for everyone that I'm friends with. So I had a lot of friends texting me things like, "Why didn't you say on our everyday FaceTimes you were making a record?"

Was it nice to be able to keep it a secret?

Well, it felt like it was only my thing. It felt like such an inner world I was escaping to every day that it almost didn't feel like an album. Because I wasn't making a song and finishing it and going, "Oh my God, that is catchy.” I wasn't making these things with any purpose in mind. And so it was almost like having it just be mine was this really sweet, nice, pure part of the world as everything else in the world was burning and crashing and feeling this sickness and sadness. I almost didn't process it as an album. This was just my daydream space.

Does it still feel like that?

Yeah, because I love it so much. I have this weird thing that I do when I create something where in order to create the next thing I kind of, in my head, attack the previous thing. I don't love that I do that but it is the thing that has kept me pivoting to another world every time I make an album. But with this one, I just still love it. I'm so proud of it. And so that feels very foreign to me. That doesn't feel like a normal experience that I've had with releasing albums.

When did you first learn about Rebekah Harkness?

Oh, I learned about her as soon as I was being walked through [her former Rhode Island] home. I got the house when I was in my early twenties as a place for my family to congregate and be together. I was told about her, I think, by the real estate agent who was walking us through the property. And as soon as I found out about her, I wanted to know everything I could. So I started reading. I found her so interesting. And then as more parallels began to develop between our two lives — being the lady that lives in that house on the hill that everybody gets to gossip about — I was always looking for an opportunity to write about her. And I finally found it.

I love that you break the fourth wall in the song. Did you go in thinking you’d include yourself in the story?

I think that in my head, I always wanted to do a country music, standard narrative device, which is: the first verse you sing about someone else, the second verse you sing about someone else who's even closer to you, and then in the third verse, you go, "Surprise! It was me.” You bring it personal for the last verse. And I'd always thought that if I were to tell that story, I would want to include the similarities — our lives or our reputations or our scandals.

How often did you regale friends about the history of Rebekah and Holiday House while hanging out at Holiday House? 

Anyone who's been there before knows that I do “The Tour,” in quotes, where I show everyone through the house. And I tell them different anecdotes about each room, because I've done that much research on this house and this woman. So in every single room, there's a different anecdote about Rebekah Harkness. If you have a mixed group of people who've been there before and people who haven't, [the people who’ve been there] are like, "Oh, she's going to do the tour. She's got to tell you the story about how the ballerinas used to practice on the lawn.” And they'll go get a drink and skip it because it's the same every time. But for me, I'm telling the story with the same electric enthusiasm, because it's just endlessly entertaining to me that this fabulous woman lived there. She just did whatever she wanted.

There are a handful of songs on Folklore that feel like pretty clear nods to your personal life over the last year, including your relationships with Scott Borchetta and Scooter Braun. How long did it take to crystallize the feelings you had around both of them into “My Tears Ricochet” or “Mad Woman”?

I found myself being very triggered by any stories, movies, or narratives revolving around divorce, which felt weird because I haven't experienced it directly. There’s no reason it should cause me so much pain, but all of a sudden it felt like something I had been through. I think that happens any time you've been in a 15-year relationship and it ends in a messy, upsetting way. So I wrote “My Tears Ricochet” and I was using a lot of imagery that I had conjured up while comparing a relationship ending to when people end an actual marriage. All of a sudden this person that you trusted more than anyone in the world is the person that can hurt you the worst. Then all of a sudden the things that you have been through together, hurt. All of a sudden, the person who was your best friend is now your biggest nemesis, etc. etc. etc. I think I wrote some of the first lyrics to that song after watching Marriage Story and hearing about when marriages go wrong and end in such a catastrophic way. So these songs are in some ways imaginary, in some ways not, and in some ways both.

How did it feel to drop an F-bomb on "Mad Woman"?

F---ing fantastic.

And that’s the first time you ever recorded one on a record, right?

Yeah. Every rule book was thrown out. I always had these rules in my head and one of them was, You haven't done this before, so you can't ever do this. “Well, you've never had an explicit sticker, so you can't ever have an explicit sticker.” But that was one of the times where I felt like you need to follow the language and you need to follow the storyline. And if the storyline and the language match up and you end up saying the F-word, just go for it. I wasn't adhering to any of the guidelines that I had placed on myself. I decided to just make what I wanted to make. And I'm really happy that the fans were stoked about that because I think they could feel that. I'm not blaming anyone else for me restricting myself in the past. That was all, I guess, making what I want to make. I think my fans could feel that I opened the gate and ran out of the pasture for the first time, which I'm glad they picked up on because they're very intuitive.

Let’s talk about “Epiphany.” The first verse is a nod to your grandfather, Dean, who fought in World War II. What does his story mean to you personally? 

I wanted to write about him for awhile. He died when I was very young, but my dad would always tell this story that the only thing that his dad would ever say about the war was when somebody would ask him, "Why do you have such a positive outlook on life?" My grandfather would reply, "Well, I'm not supposed to be here. I shouldn't be here." My dad and his brothers always kind of imagined that what he had experienced was really awful and traumatic and that he'd seen a lot of terrible things. So when they did research, they learned that he had fought at the Battles of Guadalcanal, at Cape Gloucester, at Talasea, at Okinawa. He had seen a lot of heavy fire and casualties — all of the things that nightmares are made of. He was one of the first people to sign up for the war. But you know, these are things that you can only imagine that a lot of people in that generation didn't speak about because, a) they didn't want people that they came home to to worry about them, and b) it just was so bad that it was the actual definition of unspeakable.

That theme continues in the next verse, which is a pretty overt nod to what’s been happening during COVID. As someone who lives in Nashville, how difficult has it been to see folks on Lower Broadway crowding the bars without masks?

I mean, you just immediately think of the health workers who are putting their lives on the line — and oftentimes losing their lives. If they make it out of this, if they see the other side of it, there's going to be a lot of trauma that comes with that; there's going to be things that they witnessed that they will never be able to un-see. And that was the connection that I drew. I did a lot of research on my grandfather in the beginning of quarantine, and it hit me very quickly that we've got a version of that trauma happening right now in our hospitals. God, you hope people would respect it and would understand that going out for a night isn't worth the ripple effect that it causes. But obviously we're seeing that a lot of people don't seem to have their eyes open to that — or if they do, a lot of people don't care, which is upsetting.

You had the Lover Fest East and West scheduled this year. How hard has it been to both not perform for your fans this year, and see the music industry at large go through such a brutal change?

It's confusing. It's hard to watch. I think that maybe me wanting to make as much music as possible during this time was a way for me to feel like I could reach out my hand and touch my fans, even if I couldn't physically reach out or take a picture with them. We've had a lot of different, amazing, fun, sort of underground traditions we've built over the years that involve a lot of human interaction, and so I have no idea what's going to happen with touring; none of us do. And that's a scary thing. You can't look to somebody in the music industry who's been around a long time, or an expert touring manager or promoter and [ask] what's going to happen and have them give you an answer. I think we're all just trying to keep our eyes on the horizon and see what it looks like. So we're just kind of sitting tight and trying to take care of whatever creative spark might exist and trying to figure out how to reach our fans in other ways, because we just can't do that right now.

When you are able to perform again, do you have plans on resurfacing a Lover Fest-type event?

I don't know what incarnation it'll take and I really would need to sit down and think about it for a good solid couple of months before I figured out the answer. Because whatever we do, I want it to be something that is thoughtful and will make the fans happy and I hope I can achieve that. I'm going to try really hard to.

In addition to recording an album, you spent this year supporting Joe Biden and Kamala Harris in the election. Where were you when it was called in their favor? 

Well, when the results were coming in, I was actually at the property where we shot the Entertainment Weekly cover. I was hanging out with my photographer friend, Beth, and the wonderful couple that owned the farm where we [were]. And we realized really early into the night that we weren't going to get an accurate picture of the results. Then, a couple of days later, I was on a video shoot, but I was directing, and I was standing there with my face shield and mask on next to my director of photography, Rodrigo Prieto. And I just remember a news alert coming up on my phone that said, "Biden is our next president. He's won the election." And I showed it to Rodrigo and he said, "I'm always going to remember the moment that we learned this." And I looked around, and people's face shields were starting to fog up because a lot of people were really misty-eyed and emotional, and it was not loud. It wasn't popping bottles of champagne. It was this moment of quiet, cautious elation and relief.

Do you ever think about what Folklore would have sounded like if you, Aaron, and Jack had been in the same room?

I think about it all the time. I think that a lot of what has happened with the album has to do with us all being in a collective emotional place. Obviously everybody's lives have different complexities and whatnot, but I think most of us were feeling really shaken up and really out of place and confused and in need of something comforting all at the same time. And for me, that thing that was comforting was making music that felt sort of like I was trying to hug my fans through the speakers. That was truly my intent. Just trying to hug them when I can't hug them.

I wanted to talk about some of the lyrics on Folklore. One of my favorite pieces of wordplay is in “August”: that flip of "sipped away like a bottle of wine/slipped away like a moment in time.” Was there an "aha moment" for you while writing that?

I was really excited about "August slipped away into a moment of time/August sipped away like a bottle of wine." That was a song where Jack sent me the instrumental and I wrote the song pretty much on the spot; it just was an intuitive thing. And that was actually the first song that I wrote of the "Betty" triangle. So the Betty songs are "August," "Cardigan," and "Betty." "August" was actually the first one, which is strange because it's the song from the other girl's perspective.

Yeah, I assumed you wrote "Cardigan" first.

It would be safe to assume that "Cardigan" would be first, but it wasn't. It was very strange how it happened, but it kind of pieced together one song at a time, starting with "August," where I kind of wanted to explore the element of This is from the perspective of a girl who was having her first brush with love. And then all of a sudden she's treated like she's the other girl, because there was another situation that had already been in place, but "August" girl thought she was really falling in love. It kind of explores the idea of the undefined relationship. As humans, we're all encouraged to just be cool and just let it happen, and don't ask what the relationship is — Are we exclusive? But if you are chill about it, especially when you're young, you learn the very hard lesson that if you don't define something, oftentimes they can gaslight you into thinking it was nothing at all, and that it never happened. And how do you mourn the loss of something once it ends, if you're being made to believe that it never happened at all?

"I almost didn't process it as an album," says Taylor Swift of making Folklore. "And it's still hard for me to process as an entity or a commodity, because [it] was just my daydream space."

On the flip side, "Peace" is bit more defined in terms of how one approaches a relationship. There's this really striking line, "The devil's in the details, but you got a friend in me/Would it be enough if I can never give you peace?" How did that line come to you?

I'm really proud of that one too. I heard the track immediately. Aaron sent it to me, and it had this immediate sense of serenity running through it. The first word that popped into my head was peace, but I thought that it would be too on-the-nose to sing about being calm, or to sing about serenity, or to sing about finding peace with someone. Because you have this very conflicted, very dramatic conflict-written lyric paired with this very, very calming sound of the instrumental. But, "The devil's in the details," is one of those phrases that I've written down over the years. That's a common phrase that is used in the English language every day. And I just thought it sounded really cool because of the D, D sound. And I thought, "I'll hang onto those in a list, and then, I'll finally find the right place for them in a story." I think that's how a lot of people feel where it's like, "Yeah, the devil's in the details. Everybody's complex when you look under the hood of the car." But basically saying, "I'm there for you if you want that, if this complexity is what you want."

There's another clever turn-of-phrase on "This is Me Trying." "I didn't know if you'd care if I came back/I have a lot of regrets about that." That feels like a nod toward your fans, and some of the feelings you had about retreating from the public sphere.

Absolutely. I think I was writing from three different characters' perspectives, one who's going through that; I was channeling the emotions I was feeling in 2016, 2017, where I just felt like I was worth absolutely nothing. And then, the second verse is about dealing with addiction and issues with struggling every day. And every second of the day, you're trying not to fall into old patterns, and nobody around you can see that, and no one gives you credit for it. And then, the third verse, I was thinking, what would the National do? What lyric would Matt Berninger write? What chords would the National play? And it's funny because I've since played this song for Aaron, and he's like, "That's not what we would've done at all." He's like, "I love that song, but that's totally different than what we would've done with it."

When we last spoke, in April 2019, we were talking about albums we were listening to at the time and you professed your love for the National and I Am Easy to Find. Two months later, you met up with Aaron at their concert, and now, we're here talking about the National again.

Yeah, I was at the show where they were playing through I Am Easy to Find. What I loved about [that album] was they had female vocalists singing from female perspectives, and that triggered and fired something in me where I thought, "I've got to play with different perspectives because that is so intriguing when you hear a female perspective come in from a band where you're used to only hearing a male perspective." It just sparked something in me. And obviously, you mentioning the National is the reason why Folklore came to be. So, thank you for that, Alex.

I'm here for all of your songwriting muse needs in the future.

I can't wait to see what comes out of this interview.

This interview has been edited and condensed.

For more on our Entertainers of the Year and Best & Worst of 2020, order the January issue of Entertainment Weekly or find it on newsstands beginning Dec. 18. (You can also pick up the full set of six covers here.) Don’t forget to subscribe for more exclusive interviews and photos, only in EW.

[blazehedgehog]

Let's say we were to condense Sonic's world down to just one timeline instead of different ones for games/shows/movies etc. What would you want to keep from each of the existing storylines?

I'd probably be pretty boring and just keep the 1991 Sega Sonic origin. Which is to say: Sonic does not have an origin. Much of his lore is a mystery. Deliberately.

Deep down, I'd put what I want to the side and focus on what would be the most normalizing for the entire franchise: and that's just that Sonic is Sonic, and what you see is what you get. What is he? Unknown. What are the Chaos Emeralds? Unknown. Parents? Unknown. Birth place? Unknown.

I feel like I said this before, but there was a great breakdown of Batman: The Animated Series, which posited that the reason that show was so massively popular is because it did not create its own version of Batman. It was just a pure distillation of Batman's world, his character, and his villains. The most simple, readable, version of everything. Don't know who The Joker is? Doesn't matter. Watch any episode and you'll pick it up within five minutes.

So that's what we do with Sonic: focus on the iconography. Which isn't really too far from where we are, but it does mean ignoring things like Sonic X, or the Sonic OVA, or the comics, etc.

No big or complicated shifts in story complexity. Every game remains self-contained. Introducing new characters is where the line is drawn (Batman went through two Robins, Nightwing, and Batgirl after all), but nothing more than that.

If I wanted to go buck wild and be selfish, writing a version of Sonic that's just for me, I would take that opportunity to go back and officiate some of the Archie characters, for real. I am on record as being a Sally Acorn liker. She's closer to Sonic's age, they've maintained a healthier relationship, and I think she adds a fun dynamic where Sonic can be this reckless action hero and Sally bounces off of that in interesting ways. She's trying to get him to slow down, he's trying to get her to speed up, and both have to find ways to compromise for each other.

I don't think we have to bring in the whole Kingdom of Acorn or anything insane like that. Probably just Sally. She's just an orphan in the fight against Eggman. Still a Princess, but we just ignore her parents in the same way we ignore everyone else's parents. She hangs out in a central HQ and acts sort of like his navigator. She probably doesn't see Sonic in person for a long time, but when there's a mission to be done, they touch base and chat on the radio a lot. Their banter is sort of like Shara and Sonic in Secret Rings.

We could bring in some more legally-clear characters, like the Wolf Pack, or maybe even blend in IDW characters like Tangle and Whisper. Plus the idea of a secret good guy base. Get back to the vibe Archie had right before they ended the comic.

Which I now realize is sort of what Sonic Forces was probably going for. So I'm basically saying I'd try "Sonic Forces, but done right."

[sapphire-mage]

Okay! I finished! Story time!

Read more if you want to read a brief shit talk from me about Tommy T!

So, I watched a lot of G4 when it was around, and that definitely included Electric Playground (the review show Tommy did with Victor). I think Victor is still doing it, but solo. I never watched it beyond what was shown on G4.

This show was the reason I learned to take ALL reviews with a grain of salt, cause the show had some SHIT TAKES! Which Hbomber even points out.

The game review I'm discussing is Silent Hill 3.

Mind you, I wouldn't say, from a gameplay standpoint, this is the strongest game in the series, but from a story and sound point, it's excellent. It's a lot of people's favorite. It's my favorite. And it's considered to be one of the three 'great' Silent Hill games (or four, if you're cool and include Silent Hill The Room).

And you're probably thinking, "What? Tommy thought the game played like shit."

No.

He hated the game for footstep noises.

...FOOTSTEP. NOISES!

Which yeah! The game had a sound situation where every step Heather, the main character, took, she would make the exact same footstep sound. Her clonking boots would repeat where she walked or ran.

MIND YOU: This sound DID change depending on what she was stepping on. Wood steps vs metal steps vs metal grating steps vs sludge/blood steps. All different, but it WOULD repeat the same step for each of those separate floor types.

Also mind you, these footsteps would often be muffled by music, ambient noises, monsters screaming at you, monsters chasing you, random sounds of crying or screaming, and god knows what else that was trying to scare you.

And his entire negative review... was just that.

Mind you: This is from Team Silent. A team with such a legacy in our current era of horror games! A team that was known for masters of sound and music. Just... Listen to this! No jumpscare coming. No scary monster. Just bloodstains on the floor, an eerie sound of a wheelchair wheel, and a recording from an old TV from 9 years ago.

This eerie moment of the game would be followed by basically nothing but a puzzle to solve. There were no monsters here. That wheelchair thing was just there to unnerve you, AND IT FUCKING WORKED THANKS TO THE SOUND TEAM!

This bring me to another game EP would review: Advent Rising!

I have no real opinion on this game. I never played it. I'm sure it's good.

But when the EP review came out, Tommy sang FUCKING PRAISES THROUGH THE MOON! And you want to know the reason why? Because every footstep sound had a different tone to it, making each sound different!

And while I'm not saying that isn't worth praise...

GUESS WHO DID THE SOUND FOR ADVENT RISING!?!

This level of self-adoration CONTINUES when you consider the fact that, for Video Games Live, a concert that I admit I have gone to three times for three groups of people, ALWAYS INCLUDES ADVENT RISING TO THEIR PLAYLIST!

The VGA Live playlist is usually random, especially depending on if they have a female or male vocalist sometimes, or if a certain area requests it more. They had ones they recognized they could never skip like Mario, Zelda, or Sonic, but anything else was usually randomized.

BUT NEVER ADVENT RISING!

Everytime I saw that show, Advent Rising was one of the games they perform! EVERY! TIME! Never saw Silent Hill. Caught Castlevania twice. Caught Chrono Cross once.

They'd do Final Fantasy and Kingdom Hearts pieces on all three, but hilariously, he wouldn't pay for the rights for Square games to show footage during the concert. So instead, he'd use Disney movies for the KH bit and fan-made art or cosplay pictures (request to use them questionable) for Final Fantasy.

And mind all of this... Video Games Live has an official CD. You want to see the Discography!?!

Every concert, everyone had to sit through six and a half minutes of Tommy (assuming it's Tommy's) music. I've never played Advent Rising, but because I saw this show three times, I've listened to nineteen and half minutes of Advent Rising music.

And this has irked in the sense that Advent Rising hasn't had that much of a following beyond Tommy. I don't know, now or in the past, anyone who loved that game. I just know its fame because of Tommy. The fact that this is his love child in concert has made Advent Rising 'his game' which he didn't even program.

And the fucking sucks, because it means two things:

For the crime of 'footsteps', Tommy felt the need to shit on Team Silent, a team that was already falling apart and having a crisis despite their amazing work and despite Konami being assholes. And all because he wants to emphasize how much better of a sound and music composer he thinks he is.

An entire game, Advent Rising, gets to be reduced to his own little trophy of "How Good of a Composer I Am", overshadowing everyone who worked on that game and gave their blood, sweat, and tears (except Orson Scott Card, fuck him)!

And I have had these 'bad vibes' about him tucked away for nearly 15 years, and HBomberguy just validated every bad feeling I've ever had about him.

I'm glad time has gracefully shown Team Silent in a better light, and many of them are getting more credit for such amazing sound, visuals, design, and storytelling. And god... I really hope Tommy actually composed those Advent Rising songs. CAUSE I DON'T KNOW ANYMORE!

As someone who already knows a decent amount of Tommy Tallarico... I'm about to start the HBomberguy video.

[boobachu]

best place to start w sonic media?

Sonic the Hedgehog's biggest strength and weakness is diversity. There are infinite takes on what Sonic the Hedgehog should be and that's part of why the fandom's so split cuz we want one or more specific aspects so I'll give you some hints on where you might want to start cuz there's really no one good starting point.

Games where holding down on the D pad makes you roll and speed up: Sonic Advance. It's not as hard as Sonic 2 and it's not as long as Sonic 3 & Knuckles. It also has one of the better special stage systems. If you liked this game I'd go for Sonic 2 next, and if you thought the game was WAY too short then Sonic Mania is for you!

3D games that focus on platforming: Sonic Lost World is in my opinion the most fun to play as Sonic the character. It has a good progression of difficulty, but unfortunately the game does a poor job at teaching you how to use your moves.

Best grab bag game: Sonic Adventure 2 no contest. It has a really cheesy action-adventure story and three really different and fun gameplay styles. Plus it has the best version of chao garden if you wanna pet some dudes and race them

Hardest 3D Sonic game: Sonic Unleashed easily. If you wanna go as fast as possible and try again and again and again to get the best ranks you play this game. Also the werehog is god of war.

Hardest 2D Sonic game: That'll be Sonic Rush, it's also super fast paced and you'll struggle to balance speed and platforming.

Easiest 3D Sonic game: Sonic Forces. This also has a very customizable character (and technically has really difficult challenges, but you'll only run across that for 100%)

Easiest 2D Sonic game: Sonic 4. The second episode has way more depth tho and there's no real bonus from playing both episodes besides Metal Sonic

Comics: the new IDW comics, I love Archie but it's very '90s superhero comic and also very much an Archie comic (love triangles and romance drama) though the earliest Archie comics are very gag driven which would never be revisited until Sonic Boom (which, the Sonic Boom comics are the best thing to come out of that side project)

So far the first 30 or so issues of IDW are really, really good and the last 20 issues are really really okay. It's the one Sonic comic I'd recommend above all else. (also read the 30th anniversary special, that likely won't be on any online sites as it's technically a different canon alongside the movie one-shot)

Cartoons:

Sonic the Hedgehog (the movie) It's probably the most Sonic Sonic cartoon, but it's also only an hour long since It's a two episode original video animation and failed pilot.

Sonic the Hedgehog (the ABC series, aka SatAM) is easily the best if you love adventure and drama and want to see Sonic the Hedgehog have PTSD

Adventures of Sonic the Hedgehog is basically what if Americans made Sonic, it's the most like the story of the games (Sonic & Tails wandering the world and stopping Robotnik) but it's also a huge homage to early animation such as Felix the Cat (who is a big influence on Sonic's design, if you want to see Sonic's spiritual predicesor, watch The Twisted Tales of Felix the Cat, whom one of the directors/writers of AoStH did some episodes and designs for)

Also go for the new movies, the second one is way better but they're going for the slow decent into villanous madness for Robotnik and that's something that'd be lost by skipping the first movie.

Though, just like the '90s Super Mario Bros. movie, it's heavily inspired by Sonic's canons, it's not an adaptation of any pre-existing story. So don't be shocked if the games and comics are nothing like this (but if you turn out to like it good news Tails is getting a movie and Knuckles a mini-series so yay!)

Sorry if that wasn't helpful, I've never really had to reccomend Sonic before, most people I know either played Sonic 2 or SA2 or something at least once. It's like reccomending Mario, you just assume people'd play it already.

Though I guess it's not the '90s anymor eXD

[incorrect-sdv-quotes]

Okay so I know this is a SDV Incorrect quote blog but I really wanted to show off my SDV headcanon’s so you may ignore this post if you wish (I’ll go back to the normal posts after this, I have like 13 quotes queue’d up right now) 

Headcanon’s under the cut:

1.Alex’s real first name is Alexander he just prefers to go by Alex

2.Alex is a trans male so he was born female but transitioned to male at age 13

3.The bachelors ages are (listed youngest to oldest):

 Alex: 19 

Sebastian: 19 (one month older then Alex)

Sam: 20

Harvey: 25-30

Elliott: 36

Shane: 38

4.Despite Sam being older then him Alex is taller (if you put them side by side Sam looks taller but that’s only cause of his hair if you flattened it you could see Alex was taller)

5.Sebastian is secretly a vampire (He does look like one anyway)

6. Haley and Alex kind of have a Hazel and Xander from Bunk’d relationship where they’re kinda friends but one of them *cough cough* Haley *cough* has a huge crush on the other to where it’s at yandere point- Haley is not QUITE as crazy about Alex that Hazel is about Xander and unlike Hazel Haley can hide the craziness she does have around people but when it’s just her and Alex she’s all crazy and clingy- 

Like, she’ll call him pet names like “My jock prince” or “Alex-zandy-” or “My knight in shining armor” Etc. etc- or hug him and never let go until someone LITERALLY prys her off- Talk about nutty nutty nut-so-

7. My headcanon voices for the bachelors are: (Well some of them, if a name is in strike through that means I don’t have one for that one- yet)

Alex: Shining Armor from MLP

Sebastian

Sam: Rottmnt Leo/2020 Sonic the Hedgehog/Dewy from Ducktails (this one might change)

Harvey: Fozzie Bear (Harvey: WaKa WaKa (I’m sorry))

Elliott: Gunther from Shake It Up

Shane

8.Shane is basically the god of chickens he’s such a good caretaker of chickens that he could summon an army of chickens to peck the eyes out of everyone in town with one “Babock” CHICKEN ARMY!!

If you decided to read this post and you liked my headcanons then this is it for now more might be added later as I play the game and scroll through the SDV tags on Tumblr more 

EDIT 1: More headcanons!:

9: Elliott is an amazing actor but a horrid horror-movie actor (It’s just his screams are unrealistic he will literally just say “Aaaah” otherwise it’s the same as the rest of his acting) (This scream-glitch is an easy fix if you yell “Ghost” more on that in 10)

10: Elliott is TERRIFIED of ghosts even those cute and/or clearly fake ghosts (Why else do you think Spirits Eve/Halloween has Skeletons every year and not ghosts? No one wants to scare anyone Too bad.) Actually Alex dared Elliott to watch the Disney Junior show Vampirina which went fine until Demi came on screen- Elliott literally wet himself and screamed for 3 whole hours- (Poor Alex who had to listen to that the whole time-)

11: Elliott treats his pocket crab as his ACTUAL son, not as his pet but as his actual biological son (it’s actually really cute)

12: The portraits in this video for a portraits mod is how the characters actually look to me (Excluding Elliott Sam and Sebastian they still live in my brain with their cannon looks): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cmBW8BzSZpU&list=WL&index=1&t=5s

13: Krobus is Sebastian’s father (yeah you THINK it would not make sense along with Hc numb.5 but if you think about it if his father is a monster and his mother is human he’s gonna be born as a human-looking monster! Which is a Vampire!)

EDIT 2: Damnit. I was scrolling through this and I realized I missed a Hc and it slipped through the original post and the EDIT 1!

14: Alex has Dyslexia (this bugger Hc belonged in the original post but it slipped through both edits)

EDIT 3: MORE HEADCANNONS-

15: Both Abigail and Sebastian used to have hair to match their parents (Abby’s was brown (Like said in game) and Sebastian’s was Ginger) but due to their “Unusual” parents (Abigail: Wizard Sebastian: Krobus) their hair changed color when they got older and their mothers just pretended they died their hair so both the towns people and Abigail and Sebastian themselves would not freak out 

16: Sebastian has snake bite piercing's but he only wears them when he’s alone (he got them in the first place cause 1: Sam dared him and 2: he decided it would be a fun way to rebel against dead to Sebastian Demetrius, he didn’t have to keep them but he ended up liking the look) 

17: Sebastian owns a giant frog plush, it’s twice the size of him, is really soft and is incredibly fat (it’s to the point it’s just a circle that has stubby legs) he loves it more then anything Excluding Alex but he does not want anyone finding out he loves it let alone owns it so he stuffs it under his bed when people are in and/or near his room

18: Sebastian’s first word was literally “Froggy”

Ex:

Robin: Can you say “mama”?

Baby!Sebastian: ...Froggy!

Robin:

Robin: Out of all words your first word is “Froggy”? Really?

19: The shortest to tallest Bachelors are:

Shane

Sam (If you take his hair and go *Squishes flat*)

Alex

Sebastian

Sam (If you count the added height from his Mullet)

Harvey

Elliott (Tall stinky sea dude)

20: Sam got Sebastian to scream “Bubbles” for 5 hours straight 

Details on that:

Sam: It’s impossible to say “Bubbles” threateningly

Sebastian:

Five munities later:

Robin: Uhhhh Sam? Why is my son on the roof screaming “BUBBLES”?

21: Sebastian owns a biker jacket but he only wears it when riding his motorcycle cause the jacket makes him look way more goth then emo and he prefers the emo look over goth look despite he acts more like a goth

22: One Feast of The Winter Star Sebastian got everyone an empty box and when they opened it Seb said: “It’s a void of nothingness. Just like life.” He did not get in trouble or nothing cause your allowed to give what you want but he did not do that again

23: Sebastian requires glasses to read, he can see perfectly but when it comes to reading on a computer or on paper he needs glasses

24: Sam does a perfect Darth Vader voice and Darth Vader breathing noises

25: Sebastian has vampire powers (cause he is a vampire (Hc 5)), he knows about them and is chill about it but he does not use them unless necessary cause he just does not feel the need to use them otherwise (His powers include, immortality (he also can’t be killed cause on my take on Vampires the stuff that “Traditionally” harms/kills them is just a mith and actually does nothing to them), super strength, increased speed, fast self-healing, telekinesis (I know this is not “Traditionally” a vampire power but Seb does have it) and the ability to change into a bat)

26: Both Sebastian and Elliott are actually pretty jacked (Not Alex level jacked but still) you just can’t see it unless they’re shirt-less (but in Seb’s case at least loose the hoodie)

27: Harvey’s doctor’s mallet weapon is just as heavy and as big as himself so he rarely goes into combat cause he has trouble welding his own weapon- 

Harvey: Time to explore the mines! *grabs his giant doctors mallet*

Harvey: Nope going down. *falls backward with a thud*

28: Elliott carries at least one very sharp pencil with him at all times so if he sees a very annoying person or a slime that escaped the mines he’ll grab it and go *StAb*

29: Everyone else makes Hermit jokes around Elliott which he finds funny and annoying at the same time (They used to do the jokes about Sebastian as well but they stopped cause when they did Seb strangled them Darth Vader style) Ex of the hermit jokes:

*singing* Someone’s on the beach with a hermit! There’s a hermit on the beach I know I know! Someone’s on the beach with a hermiiiit! And the hermit’s name is Elliott!

30: If you think Elliott’s cannon SDV schedule is anti-social you should see how anti-social he gets when writing a book-

EDIT 4: Surprise, there’s more

31: Elliott is a mermaid merman (he’s a human by day half human half fish by night but he’ll change forms sooner if you dump water on him- found that out by Haley throwing water on him in hopes he’ll melt-)

32: When in ‘fish’ form Elliott’s tail is incredibly strong (if you get hit by it you’ll go flying 900 feet in the air in 5 seconds at full strength)

33:Elliott only lets Harvey call him “Elly” if anyone else does so expect Elliott to dump water on himself then hit you with his fish tail)

34:Vincent will sing The Little Mermaid song “Under the sea” around Elliott and Sebastian (Sebastian cause think about it and Elliott cause he’s an IRL Mermaid)