#i wish that was a good thing
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Hi! Hi. Guess who's in. Love y'all.
#so i guess i am allowed to post about the plurality without Gail deleting it now#i wish that was a good thing#anyhow; we've been carouseling!#Gail can't keep a grip on the front for the life of him#usual state of affairs is that he fronts most of the time#and me and Fenn cofront with him periodically#sometimes we front without him for a bit but not for as long as he can go without us#frankly Gail's blessed existence is the only reason why we got HoR as polished and published as it is#i don't think SP is going out on time gang; let's aim for May 2026 should our world not collapse by then#current state of affairs is that I'M in charge mostly and fuck damn i don't want it#i want the guy who gets stuff done in or at least the guy who likes to be here#Fenn is not able to make firm grabby hands for the front either which is not usual he's the second most common guy in#and ALABASTER has been showing up#which happens once in a very blue moon#she's a sweet kid nowadays but how do i address this delicately#i don't want her to have to deal with this because her traditional answer to stress is “what if we stopped existing”#and i want to say that i'm not tempted by her old default solution but FUCK#don't worry#we will be fine#i just needed to bitch about it a little bit#i'll make it fine#please help me i'm the “fight or flight” part of us leaning mostly on “fight”#i don't have the necessary skills to outpace slow tigers#don't haul me out until an actual apocalypse happens
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One Piece final battle
poorly drawn extra:
#one piece#mihawk#dracule mihawk#one piece mihawk#akagami no shanks#shanks#red haired shanks#mishanks#akataka#redhawk#monkey d luffy#monkey d. luffy#one piece luffy#luffy#straw hat luffy#one piece fanart#roronoa zoro#zoro#one piece zoro#ronoroa zoro#zoro one piece#one piece art#one piece comic#sorry for another shit post comic ndjaksndjkas#i saw a b99 meme that was basicaly the first page of this comic and i had to do it#i wish i had made a final version with good linework etc but i actually have to work on the comics i am being paid to make#not ANOTHER shitpost for one piece ndjkasndjkas#and drawing mihawk's den den mushi sure was an experience#ugly ass thing lol
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the fact that alfred was the one to put up jason's memorial is so important to me
#alfred's military background and his sudden shove into parenthood are things i think about a lot#alfred using the term 'soldier' as something honourable. as something to take pride in.#alfred putting 'a good soldier' on jason's plaque to show his care#the voice in bruce's head referring to his children as his soldiers sounding suspiciously like alfred's#bruce initially refusing to acknowledge jason's existence after his death bc it's the only way he can keep going#& alfred saying 'i will not let you do this. if you will not acknowledge him in your daily life i will make you do so every night'#because alfred doesn't know how to acknowledge the absence of a child either#besides going about your life and praying hoping wishing that they return somehow safe and sound#but he knows how to honour fallen soldiers.#and he will help you in the only way that he can.#sorry i just have so many thoughts about this#(justice league 19)#alfred pennyworth#jason todd#red hood#bruce wayne#batman#edit: neeeed people to stop telling me this is a new52 thing. do you think i was unaware when making the post.#there are a lot of things from new52 that i dislike. this is simply not one of them. thank you.
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I've got you all figured out fanartists
#I should have learned how to draw#i have so many ideas and so little time to write#i wish i could make a vague comic about them and have a fanfic author get hooked and write it for me 😭#fanfiction#fanart#meme#crispy talks#shitpost#this was inspired by some overlord huskerdust comics with incredible ideas i saw on twitter#where the artists are clearly waiting for someone to get hooked lol#hazbin hotel#the witcher#hannigram#hannibal#geraskier#good omens#ineffable husbands#my edit#helluva boss#the magnus archives#house of the dragon#dungeon meshi#atla#stranger things#aang#zuko#steddie#mlp#dc#percy jackson
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there is always tomorrow
#lovecore#hopecore#webweaving#the presence of love is beautiful in itself#you got this#self care#self love#recovery#healing#hopepunk#recovery is not linear it is okay to have bad days you have the entirety of your life to have a better day#i wish anyone reading this a good life#i love you#you are loved#and i hope you will find happiness in the small things#i’ve been struggling a lot recently but i always remind myself the good set in store for me and look up places in the city i’ll move to#and it motivates me a bunch so i hope u all find things to strive towards mwah
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I absolutely hate HATE the fetishzision of goth girls/people. I fucking hate it. We need to go back to being weird as fuck, off-putting, odd, whatever. I like being a gross nasty goth with a teeth collection and interested with Victorian medicine and death and has messy smudged grimey makeup and cracked lips and letting spiders crawl into my hands after they fell from their web to put them back. Everything that will make people who just see goth people as just a freaky sex thing to turn their noses because jfc I'm more than that.
#i wish i could add more but im not good at describing things#gothique#goth rock#gothic lolita#gothic#goth aesthetic#goth girl#goth guy#goth#gothic vampire#vampire goth#victorian gothic#vampire
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Dev thinks the Minecraft movie trailer is epic, I think.
He likes nfts and ai art too smh
#fop nature au#fop#fairly oddparents#fop a new wish#fairly oddparents a new wish#fop hazel#fop dev#hazel wells#dev dimmadome#art#digital art#fanart#He does not understand what any of those things are but his dad says they're good so#remembering when my dad tried to get me into nfts (shudders)#My dad is like a legit high ranking programmer at a major tech company so theoretically he is actually qualified to speak on the subject#unfortunately I do not understand his explanations at all#anyway I am glad I did not take him up on the offers
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Hello Madam. Sorry Madam.
[First] Prev <–-> Next
#poorly drawn mdzs#mdzs#wei wuxian#lan wangji#madam jin#jin zixuan#jiang yanli#'Hey what is WWX trying to do here?' some kind of grab-and-twist maneuver that would be very upsetting to watch.#I know LWJ technically assists WWX in this scene in terms of blocking someone's blow on his behalf -#- but let's be honest. Real friends stop you from doing the truly stupid things.#Or maybe it was envy. Penis envy. The non-freudian kind.#Regardless...man this whole scene was just full of “and then someone else walks in”.#I swear to god every cultivator who is supposed to be hunting ends up wandering into this part of the woods.#a bonus for me because it gives me several good joke opportunities.#Madam Jin gets top prize for best entrance and exit. I wish her all the best. And a divorce…madam please leave him…#And can we please address the horses? I love horses. But why...why do they ride in on horses when they HAVE FLYING SWORDS?#I can only imagine it is for the dramatic flair? It just feels so jarring hearing someone clip clop in#and then another person swoop in on a sword.#The rules of mdzs's world can get fuzzy and I have to nod in an impressed manner at how much MXTX gets away not explaining.#Maybe the sword gets tired after a while and they need to give it a break? Maybe there is a sword union that dictates working hour limits?#…Would that make Chenqing a scab? Oh god it would… unions *hate* this flute!
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pursuing the unknown
( EPHEMERWEEK 2: curiosity )
#kh#kingdom hearts#khux#kingdom hearts union cross#ephemerweek2024#kh ephemer#ephemer#i need to lay down . good lord#i thought this was gonna be easier than day 3 but i forgot i had to do a background .#granted this is easily the best background ive ever done and i really like the lighting#but my god i was out of my depth LMAO#anyway on to the question: I WISH WE GOT TO SEE THE UNION LEADERS HANG OUT MORE OUGOHUGHGHG#i also wish we got to hang out more w ephemer too..... just doing friend things.........#i get why they didnt but they couldve had special events like the sewer crew did or something....... it wouldve been so cool oughgh#myart
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My two cents on how much of Mind!Varric is Rook’s mind trying to fill the blank space and how much is Solas actively talking through a convenient blood magic paper doll of the mind: I think it's a mix of both, a truly collaborative psychosocial horrorshow if you would, but waaaay more towards the second. It feels too directed and tactical at times to be anything else. Rook's mind is willing to go along with the denial phase as far as it can fucking carry them to not have to face the grief and regret and does its part in papering over details that don’t make any sense, the way brains will strive to create coherent meaning even out of deeply confusing input, but to my understanding it's a collaborateur in how that plays out, not the instigator or control center. Solas is using it as a path to agency and to gather insight into Rook as a person unguarded as he can't count on in his own guise. (That stoic option that leads to him being like 'oh I see you're cautiously denying me access to your inner life. well. at least you still have Varric to talk to. y'know as an outlet :)'. You absolute BITCH Solas! That alone convinced me that he HAS to have an active hand in it on some level.)
My guess is that it takes considerable effort on Solas’ part to make Mind!Varric do anything more involved or complicated than seeming to sit up in bed and give casual commentary, and that’s why he keeps having eerie five minute shallow pep talks with you before he announces he conveniently needs a nap aaanyway good luck kid you got this haha. When he’s just spouting NPC lines from his bedrest, I’m ready to believe that could be Rook’s mind being allowed to improv lines for him more freely because it’s less about Solas trying to get something out of them or working an angle and more ‘Still here! Still totally alive and fine and the mentor figure you know and love and trust :) don’t even worry about it! Thankfully there is no war in Ba Sing Sei, as we all know’ upkeep work lol. Rook’s mind is allowed to set the tone of Varric, the outlines, but not always the content.
AND, on a (beautifully fucked up) character psychology level, I feel like Solas is indulging in actually getting to be the good supportive mentor figure to Rook with one hand to assuage the guilt he feels about what he's done -- and what he's going to do -- to them with the other. Same internal logic as he uses in Trespasser about the Qun. ‘Almost everyone is going to die from the course of action I’m doggedly pursuing eventually. But at least I can make their last years happier and freer and kinder than they would have been otherwise. and that kind of makes up for it right. a little bit. doesn't it. doesn't that make it better at least. I need that to make it better)'. Did I really take your beloved mentor and friend from you if you don’t know yet that I did? Some philosophers would argue not really! So it’s probably almost ok actually. Isn’t it even a little noble that I’m taking all this grief and guilt on myself and shielding you for now. With undertones that I’m not sure he would realize himself (and might be mortified by if he did) that he is so incredibly lonely, and even a dishonest and indirect emotional connection is more than nothing when you’re that desperate. In this setup he gets idk. Both the control he craves so incredibly badly in relationships and over himself, and the scraps, the fading afterimages, of intimacy and warmth and companionship, even second hand. The one thing Solas and Rook agree on deep deep down is that they really wish Varric weren't gone. They're handshake memeing this in the saddest and most creepy way possible.
I think an important element too is that Solas needs Rook and their team to *succeed* — up to a certain point. He needs someone to hold the two other elven mean girls off until he can get out of here. Ideally, in a perfect world, even do all the hard work of killing them so he can swoop in at the end and do his thing when both sides are exhausted and out of resources to stop him, and then Bob’s your uncle! Same logic as he was using with Corypheus, and after that worked out so well, too! King of choosing to never learn from a single solitary mistake he’s ever made even though i fully believe he could have the capacity to Fen’Harel <3 The underlying idea isn’t flawed, you see, it was just unforeseen circumstances getting in the way. This time for sure it’ll all work out the way I cleverly imagined it in my head beforehand. Cue By Talos this can’t be happening etc. in the form of a statue almost crushing him like a bug.
So he's providing guidance and forging Rook into a leader from two angles: one Rook might not trust, and one they probably will. Shaping them into what he needs slowly and carefully. He’s helping you hone your team into their most effective state, as he might have done with his own agents back in the day, setting up his chess pieces even if he has to squint through two glimpsed realities to do it haha. Pincer maneuver of an insidious stealth mentor you never asked for. Also… at one point mind Varric gives you a whole little monologue about how Solas' problem is that he’s always seen his interpersonal connections as flaws and see where it’s landed him, all alone and the worst part? it hasn’t even worked. it’s all been for nothing he’s back where he began with nothing to show for it but his mistakes. Like...that has such strong 'uh okay happy to play your therapist from two rooms away here what the fuck kind of traumadump is this' energy to me, I’m not sure Rook like. Thinks that much about Solas as a private person. So much of Solas' self-loathing and futile insights into his own flaws seem to shine through in Mind!Varric's dialogue all the time — I just can't believe that there's no guiding hand behind it as it were.
Most of all. I feel like people underestimate the degree to which Solas is incredibly funny. As in, he has a very consistent and recognizable sense of humour. It’s one of my very favourite things about him. We must remember — it is crucial that we always keep in mind — Orlesian accent and wig Solas from May The Dread Wolf Take You (my beloved, the explanation for why I love this dude even with the. All of the everything else. No one does it quite like him). He is not at all above doing things or adding little flourishes for his own obscure amusement, in fact that seems to me to be one of his most consistent traits. The Randy Dowager Quarterly comment Varric has? The ‘Maybe this is the Dread Wolf’s revenge. Forcing us to house sit for him’ thing? To Me this is 100% Solas amusing himself in his boring Fade jail surrounded by the screaming hellscape of all his regrets. Source: it came to me as divine revelation through pure vibes trust me bro
If nothing else I find it much more narratively interesting personally if the connection between Rook and Solas really is that defenselessly intimate and entwined (and so unbalanced!), and the sense of violation and invasion and betrayal afterwards consequently all the more nauseatingly intense. Even if you kept him at arm’s length in the open, he’s been under your skin the whole time, looking around, gathering what he needs to destroy you, wearing the face of a friend. Regretfully, probably, but choosing to do it every step of the way anyway. (Sound familiar, Inquisitor? Solas doesn’t have that many tricks when you actually look at it, he keeps returning to old tried and true ones like a dog with a bone haha.) Maybe he even genuinely meant some of it as mercy, which only makes it so much worse. It makes his sin against his own core principles of autonomy and the freedom of all beings in mind, spirit and body so much more juicily grave if it’s something he pursues actively and consistently, rather than it half-falling into his lap as a happy accident mainly orchestrated by Rook’s own subconscious. Solas, too, is at his very lowest point, the closest to giving in and becoming his own antithesis fully that he’s ever been, and it makes the choice of whether you still reach out your hand to him one last time or not all the more impactful and difficult.
#dragon age#dragon age: the veilguard#dragon age: the veilguard spoilers#dragon age spoilers#dragon age meta#solas#varric tethras#rook#I love what weeekes has managed to do with solas in this game honestly. both kinder and harsher reads on him?#completely supported by the text and completely valid. it really does come down to how you feel individually at the end of it all#there are good arguments to be made in every direction. sing o muse about a complicated man.#and also a motherfucker (affectionate *and* derogatory)#forgiveness isn't about him it's about you ultimately. do you find it in yourself or are there things that shouldn't be forgiven? up to you#he deserves both compassion and to be slam dunked straight into hell often with equal intensity. and i think that's beautiful#face in my hands. it keeps happening to me. I black out and I've written a whole thing and feel like I've been through a meat grinder#clearly my brain needs to Process things very badly but god I wish I could maybe control a bit more when and how intensely it does it lol#obligatory disclaimer that this is only my personal opinion and read on the game and characters involved etc. YMMV
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here we go :) part one of three, updates to be released weekly!
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sam says 4 (game master cinematic universe, part 3)
Ruby was at her mum's for a family dinner she couldn't miss on pain of death, apparently, and the Doctor was many things, but a family dinner kind of guy wasn't one of them—particularly when Carla had already slapped him once in the short time he'd known her. He thought he'd broken his streak of bad luck with mums, but… well, seemingly not. So he was companionless for a few hours, and while he could wait for her to get back, maybe catch up on his reading—what was the point of waiting when you had a time machine?
He ran his hands over the TARDIS console, marvelling at her clean lines and metallic flourishes, the way that even now she felt brand new but familiar, and paused. He’d just pop off for a quick adventure, nothing too dangerous, but—where to go?
He could scan for a distress call nearby, and pitch in to help. He could drop in on Donna and Shaun and Rose, beautiful Rose, and see how they were all doing. Or he could just hit the randomiser button, and jump in feet first wherever he ended up.
He remembered a conversation from a long time ago, when he wore a different face, and his gorgeous TARDIS wore a face too, for the first and only time.
“You didn't always take me where I wanted to go.”
“No, but I always took you where you needed to go.”
He grinned. Who could resist an offer like that? He pressed the button and whooped as the time rotor spun into action, ready to see where the universe would take him.
---
Apparently, he was needed pretty close to where he already was. Earth, 2024. Huh. Same planet, same time—within a few months of where he’d left Ruby, even. The main thing that had changed was the location: he was now in the good old US of A. California, to be more specific, and Los Angeles to be more specific still. And to really narrow it down, the Doctor discovered as he poked his head out of the TARDIS doors, he was in… a broom closet. Not bad, as a parking spot—a bit squeezy, but out of the way. And as he poked his head out of that door, he could finally see he was in the backstage corridors of a studio of some kind. Film or TV, if he was to hazard a guess, it was a different vibe from Abbey Road.
With a shrug, he decided to go exploring.
It couldn’t have been more than a minute before a young woman wearing the full-black outfit, headset, and permanently stressed expression of a production assistant came running up to him.
“Are you the fill-in Sam organised?” she asked breathlessly, and honestly, seeing the look on her face, the Doctor didn’t have the heart(s) to tell her no. And really, what was the Doctor, if not a professional fill-in? This, this was why he had a randomiser button on the control panel, because whatever he was about to get himself into was going to be fun.
“Sure!”
“Oh, thank god,” sighed the production assistant, relief dawning across her face. “When Ally tested positive this morning, I thought we were sunk for the record, because we called around and we couldn’t get a hold of anyone. But then Sam said he could get someone in, and, you know, here you are, and just in time, so—ah, yeah, if you could follow me this way?”
Smiling all the way, the Doctor followed his guide through to hair and makeup, looking around as they went. The studio seemed to belong to a company called Dropout, according to the branding scattered around, and things seemed, at least on the surface, to be… well. Fine. He couldn't tell why he'd been brought here yet, which meant that when he found the reason, it was going to be particularly tangled. He couldn't wait!
And then he looked back at his guide, still engulfed in a miasma of anxiety, and realised he'd been too busy looking for clues to notice the person right in front of him.
“Hey, it's cool, you've found me,” he started with a gentle smile. “You can relax. Hi, I'm the Doctor. What's your name?”
“Oh!” she said, startled. “The Doctor, yeah, of course. Um, hi, I'm Kaylin. Look, sorry, it's just that I've been so busy this morning, I'm so distracted… Shit, and I would've completely forgotten to get your details too. There's paperwork to fill in, but you can do that later. Um, just for now, though, can I get your pronouns?”
The Doctor thought for a moment. “He/him, for now.”
Kaylin nodded, making a note on her phone. “Okay, cool! And do you have any socials?”
“Not me, babes,” he replied. “I'm hardly sitting down long enough to be able to update, you know?”
“On a day like this, I know exactly what you mean,” she said. “That's okay, Lou didn't have socials either for the longest time. Right, so if you go through there, the team will get you sorted, and once you're done, someone will take you up to the greenroom. All good?”
“All great,” the Doctor replied. Kaylin flashed him a quick, relieved smile, then hurried off.
Hair and makeup was a fairly quick process, the sound mixer fitted him with a microphone, and before too long, Kaylin was back to take him upstairs.
“This is the greenroom,” she said, pushing the door open. “The rest of the cast for the episode are already here—they’re great guys, and they’ve both been on the show a lot, so they’ll be able to help if you’ve got questions. And if you need anything else, just come find me or any of the other PAs, okay?”
The Doctor nodded, beamed at Kaylin, and walked in.
---
The greenroom was small but comfortable, and its occupants, two men around the same age as the Doctor appeared, looked up as he entered.
“Oh, you’re new,” the taller of the pair said, clearly giving him the once-over.
The other sighed with a mixture of fondness and exasperation, just as clearly used to his friend’s antics.
“Hey, I’m Brennan,” he said, levering himself up to standing from his perch on a chair arm, and holding out a hand. “That’s Grant.”
The Doctor took it warmly. “The Doctor. Just passing through, and happy to help.”
Grant’s eyebrows quirked. “Doctor… something?” he prompted.
“Or is it just ‘the Doctor’?” Brennan asked.
“Just ‘the Doctor’,” the Time Lord confirmed cheerfully. “You’ll get used to it, everyone does.”
Grant didn’t look convinced, but—
“Copy that,” Brennan shrugged, and settled back on the arm of the chair, returning his gaze to the door.
Grant, in turn, looked at the Doctor and rolled his eyes in a clear expression of ‘no, I don’t know why he’s like this, either’.
“Okay,” the Doctor said after a moment of watching the watching. “I wasn’t going to ask, but now I think I have to. What’s up with the door?”
Brennan huffed a laugh. “Well, the last time there was one of those up—” he pointed to the Out of Order sign stuck to the bathroom door, “—we got locked in here for the game.”
“He’s paranoid,” Grant interjected.
“Well, yeah, maybe,” Brennan retorted. “Or just cautious. Because Sam’s been acting weird lately, and we’re coming up to the last few records of the season, so he’s probably planning something way out of the box for the finale. And the original cast was you, me and Beardsley, so…”
He shrugged one shoulder meaningfully, and Grant nodded, conceding both the point and the potential for chaos.
“So if Sam comes in to give us the briefing, rather than waiting til we’re on set,” Brennan continued, “or there’s anything else weird going on, I’m gonna know about it right from the beginning.”
He turned to the Doctor. “The only reason I'm not quizzing you is because I know for a fact Beardsley was genuinely scheduled for this, so you can't be a plant by the production team. No offence.”
“None taken,” the Doctor smiled. “That sort of thing happen often, does it?”
Grant and Brennan exchanged a look.
“More than you'd think,” Grant answered with a grimace.
“Alright,” the Doctor said slowly, then brightened. “So what is it we're actually doing?”
Grant gave him a disbelieving glance. “You don't know—?”
“Very last minute fill-in,” the Doctor said breezily. “But don't worry, I'm a quick study.”
“Well, you're not that much worse off than the rest of us,” Brennan said encouragingly. “You know about Game Changer, obviously, if you know Sam, and we only find out the rules of the game once we get on set. Hopefully,” he added, with a dark look back at the Out of Order sign.
The Doctor nodded. No, he didn't know Sam, and he didn't know Game Changer, but he could work out the situation from context clues. This was a game show. And with the Toymaker banished, and Satellite Five not coming into existence for another 198000 years, give or take, he found himself smiling. Maybe third time would be the charm.
“Mmm, hopefully they aren't going to throw you in the deep end,” Grant said. “Because Brennan might seem lovely now, but as soon as we get out there, he's a whore for points. He'll stab you in the back and won't even blink.”
Brennan barked with laughter. “Yeah, and you wouldn't?”
“Excuse you, I'm always a goddamn delight,” Grant replied, the very picture of injured dignity.
“Oh, absolutely!” agreed a new voice. The Doctor turned to the now-open door to see a bearded man in a pinstriped suit smiling broadly. “That's why we keep inviting you back!”
Grant bowed sarcastically. “Why, thank you, Sam. Good to know I'm appreciated by someone here.”
“Always,” Sam replied, gently but firmly ending that particular path of the conversation. He scanned the room, and his eyes lit up when they landed on the Doctor.
“Ah, you must be the Doctor!” he said with obvious delight, walking over with his hand outstretched. “I'm Sam—thanks for filling in for us, you've made sure we're going to have a good show. Seriously, it's a pleasure to have you here.”
“Aw, cheers!” the Doctor smiled, shaking the offered hand. “Glad I could help out, I'm really looking forward to this!”
“Well, great!” Sam exclaimed, then took a step back, regarding all three players in turn. “Now, folks, I'm just letting you know that we're just about ready to start the record, so if you can start heading down, that'd be great.”
Grant and Brennan nodded—Brennan, the Doctor noticed, with relief.
“See you down there,” Sam said, smiling. “Have a great show, and—”
His eyes caught on the Doctor's for a second, twinkling.
“Good luck.”
---
Backstage, the Doctor, Brennan and Grant were marshalled into podium order and given a final briefing from the crew. And then, with a thumbs-up from Kaylin, that was it.
Showtime.
“Get ready for a Game Changer!” came Sam's voice from onstage. “Tonight’s guests: he can shoot off a monologue with laser accuracy; it’s Brennan Lee Mulligan!”
Brennan, his back to the camera as the curtains opened, spun on his heel and, with a stone-cold expression, pointed finger guns straight down the barrel, before letting the facade crack open. “Hi!” he exclaimed, and walked over to the leftmost podium.
“It’s his first appearance, but he’s already on fire; it’s the Doctor!”
The Doctor leant against the archway to the stage and flashed a broad smile towards the camera, then in a few skipping steps, had bounded over to the next free podium. What the hell, why not make an entrance?
“And even in the toughest of mazes, you’ll always be able to find him; it’s Grant O’Brien!”
Grant dipped his lanky frame into an approximation of a curtsey, spreading his arms wide, then sauntered over to the closest podium with a grin.
“And your host, me!” Sam announced, a ring of manic white showing around his irises as he beamed down the barrel of the camera. “I’ve been here the whole time!”
“This,” he continued, pushing his microphone shut and stowing it in his jacket pocket, “is Game Changer, the only game show where the game changes every show. I am your host, Sam Reich!”
As he said his name, he looked at his hands, front and back, as if he was pleasantly surprised to be himself, then gestured towards the three podiums.
“I am joined today by these three lovely contestants! Now, you understand how the game works.”
“Of course not,” Grant started. “You know we don't.”
“We can't, Sam, that's the whole point of the theatre you've set up here,” Brennan said over him.
“Not yet,” was all the Doctor said, anticipation starting to drum a tattoo of excitement against the inside of his ribcage.
“That’s right!” Sam said brightly, shooting finger guns at the camera. “Our players have no idea what game it is they’re about to play. The only way to learn is by playing. The only way to win is by learning, and the only way to begin is by beginning! So without further ado, let’s begin by giving each of our players fifty points.”
The Doctor, biding his time, watched the reactions of his fellow contestants. Grant looked at the front of his podium, checking the point total, and nodding approvingly when he saw that yes, it was sitting at a round fifty. Brennan, on the other hand, was starting to frown.
“Players, Sam says: touch your nose,” Sam began, and Brennan sighed the sigh of someone who wasn’t happy to be proved right.
“Oh, no,” he groaned. “Oh, you son of a bitch. Wasn’t one this season enough?”
He touched his nose anyway, as did the others, and Sam smiled encouragingly. “Sam says: touch your ear.”
When they all did, Sam nodded. “Touch your other ear.”
Everybody held still, fingers on the ears they had originally touched.
Sam beamed. “Easy, players, right?”
“You say that now,” Brennan said darkly. “Which makes it worse, because all you're doing is setting us up for failure.”
Sam gasped, pretending offence. “Would I do that?”
“Yes,” Brennan and Grant replied in unison, which drew a grin from the Doctor and set Sam off chuckling.
“And I'm not having it,” Brennan continued, leaning his elbows against his podium and pointing at Sam with the hand not touching his ear. “You better watch yourself, because I know how this game works, and you're not going to get one over on me.”
“Strong words, Brennan!” Sam said, clearly delighted by this response. “Okay, then, let's start making things a bit more interesting!”
The game continued as per Sam Says usual, some rounds done as a group and some individual. Points were won, sure, but lost slightly more frequently, and even the Doctor found he was having to concentrate to avoid getting caught in the host's traps.
It was fun. Genuinely, it was like playing a game with friends, and the Doctor felt himself leaning into it. There wasn't any sign of danger—maybe there wasn't a mystery to solve at all, and the TARDIS just decided he needed a total break.
Well, probably not. But the way things were going, he was able to let himself hope.
“Alright, players,” Sam said a good few rounds in, just as pleasantly as he would start any other question, and the screen behind him dinged as a new prompt popped up. “Survive the death beam.”
For a second, everything was frozen perfectly still.
And then came the crash, the explosive noise of heavy machinery moving relentlessly through a drywall set.
The Doctor was already moving. “Everyone down!”
“Duck!” Brennan yelled at the same time.
The two of them hit the ground within milliseconds of each other, but Grant was still paralysed in the face of the giant, science-fiction type laser cannon that had just ploughed through the wall.
It whined ominously, screaming its way to fever pitch. And then a sharp pain in Grant’s ankle made him stagger, pitching forwards onto the carpet behind the podiums as the Doctor rolled away to avoid getting pinned.
“Sorry, babes,” the Doctor whispered. “But it was either kick you to get you down, or—”
A hideous metallic screech ripped through the air, and all three of them could feel the crackle of ozone as a beam of energy swept across what had, moments ago, been neck height.
“…Or that,” the Doctor finished with a grimace.
“Jesus fucking Christ,” Grant breathed, suddenly very conscious of every inch of his 6’9 frame. “Thanks.”
“Well done, players!” Sam exclaimed delightedly from above them. “But… sorry, I didn’t say ‘Sam says’, so that’s a point off for everyone.”
“What the fuck!” Brennan snapped.
“Are you actually insane?” Grant demanded at the same time, his voice overlapping with Brennan’s.
In response, Sam just wheezed with laughter. “You can come back to your podiums,” he said, cheerfully ignoring them.
Nobody moved.
“Very good!” he acknowledged, and even without seeing his face, the grin was obvious in his voice. “Okay, Sam says: come back to your podiums.”
Although the words were innocuous, and his tone was just as light and breezy as usual, there was nevertheless an edge hiding just underneath the surface. And while the death beam loomed large in the minds of all three players, it was impossible to consider disobedience as an option.
Slowly, they stood, returning to their places. Now they had the time to look at it properly, the death beam was even more sinister, and Brennan and Grant both kept flicking nervous glances its way, ready to move if it looked like it was charging up again.
The Doctor, however, was focused purely on the man standing in front of them. Unbothered, Sam met his gaze like a challenge, a mischievous smile playing about his lips.
“Oh, you’ll love this one,” he said, and the screen changed. “Sam says, starting with Grant: say my name.”
Grant frowned in confusion, but answered quickly nonetheless. “Sam Reich?”
The man himself shrugged tolerantly, moving on. “Brennan?”
Brennan just stared at him coolly. “Do you take me for a fool?”
“Well caught, Brennan!” Sam said happily. “Sam says: say my name.”
“Sam,” Brennan replied, suspicion clear in his voice. “Samuel Dalton Reich.”
He nodded, still with a hint of indifference. “And lastly, Doctor.” His smile broadened. “Sam says: say my name.”
It was easy. Too easy. And as the Doctor looked into the eyes of the man calling himself Sam Reich, he felt his hearts stutter in recognition, because something had changed. He wasn’t hiding himself anymore, and while the face was different yet again, the Doctor would know the shape of that soul anywhere. It was impossible. It was inevitable.
“You can’t be,” he breathed.
Sam smirked, leaning in across his podium. “Oh, but Doctor… I’ve been here the whole time,” he stage-whispered with a wink.
“He said you lost,” the Doctor said, shaking his head, looking wrong-footed for the first time that Brennan and Grant could recall. “You lost, and he trapped you.”
The other two watched, uncomprehending, but Sam just smiled, drumming his fingers against the podium with an audible beat, fast but distinct. Four taps, four taps, four taps. “I’m waiting.”
The Doctor took a slow, deep breath. Set his jaw.
“Master.”
---
missed an installment of the game master cinematic universe?
original idea by @ace-whovian-neuroscientist: x
art by @northernfireart concept: x scissor sisters sketch: x sam and his doppelganger: x
writing by me (!) part one (escape the greenroom): x part two (deja vu): x part three (sam says 4): you are here!
#game master#sam reich!master#doctor who#dw#dropout#game changer#you know what let's chuck some character tags in here#15th doctor#the master#sam reich#brennan lee mulligan#grant o'brien#kaylin mahoney#clari speaks#clari writes#ah darlings i'm putting my chat down here rather than in the post body for once#so i've thought of this whole saga as 'part three' but i will be a) titling them all and b) just keeping on numbering the parts sequentiall#rather than 'part three part one' etc#otherwise we're getting into homestuck act titling territory and that is ground i do not wish to tread#also fuck i hope i've got the time zones right#i'm planning to post this when an episode of game changer would ordinarily be released. to plug the gap. to tide us over.#(the finale trailer is so delightfully unhinged and i cannot wait til next week)#anyway gang this one was wild#the slight but significant genre shift from 'game changer with doctor who elements' to 'doctor who with game changer elements'#it was fun to write! and hopefully fun to read :)#also i MUST say that eugene northernfireart has a baller comic in the works that this entire thing is based on#this is thousands of words of setup and continuation because the sketch idea was so good it possessed me#and we decided that it had to be a proper dw episode#(hey rtd hire me pls)#anyway eugene is on hiatus bc of life so in the meantime go give him love and be Fuckin Hyped for the comic when it appears bc i know i am
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I think the thing that Gets Me about Veilguard is just how much of an impossible task it had heaped on it from EA from the start of its inception.
It’s arguably supposed to be a soft reboot for the series while ALSO being a follow up to Inquisition. These are two fundamentally incompatible goals in my opinion. This game had to walk the most insane line of any video game in recent memory. I guess EA wanted to have their cake and eat it too.
And the more I think about it the sadder I become for the original team who worked on Joplin. From what I’ve seen of the art book, Joplin was going to be about as firm a sequel to DAI as you could get - with references to rescuing whoever was left in the Fade, having Calpernia and Imshael as companions, having to fight Solas’ agents, etc.
Then EA makes them scrap it for live service. Fine. But wait - now we’re scrapping it again. Back to single person RPG but you also kind of need to distance yourself from the previous games as much as possible while still somehow being a follow up to the previous game.
New setting, few returning companions, and new Big Bads in the form of Elgarnan and Ghilanain to get a clean slate. Any mention of what’s happening in the South (where we spent 3 whole games!) needs to be relegated to letters and codex. ** I dont have the art book yet, so I dont know if these two were supposed to appear in Joplin beside Solas - or if Solas was supposed to be the sole antagonist in that iteration of the game.
But.. I hope you see what I mean when I say this game had a monumentally, borderline impossible task ahead of it. And when I think of it that way, I think it did as good a job as it possibly could. Especially since the actual development time was closer to 3ish yrs to get what we know of as datv today even though it’s been 10 whole years since DAI.
I hope it’s successful enough to get DA5, but who know’s what’ll happen.
I wish everyone except the EA execs who meddled with this game’s development and are seemingly trying to kill dragon age a pleasant day. I have a cynical detective I need to romance 😔
#ea critical#*shakes fist at studio execs*#datv#dragon age the veilguard#cut content#corporations strike again#sigh#its still a good game#but i think im always gonna wonder how joplin may have played out#who knows if it even would have been better?#the artbook images are certainly intriguing though#positive#i wish they’d just let Bioware do their thing#last ranty post for awhile i promise#rookie rambles
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So when Pristine cut comes out and everyone has time to soak it all in, you’re all going to go ahead and play Scarlet Hollow, right?
#slay the princess#I wish Scarlet Hollow wasn’t so hard to pitch#like Slay the Princess’s whole thing is so alluring#it’s called Slay the Princess for one#a subversion of a trope#and there’s this weird creepy British guy saying to kill her but he isn’t going into detail#Scarlet Hollow is so much harder to talk about#But it’s so good man
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the modern villainisation of demeter will never cease to enrage me bc it wasn’t ENOUGH to just take a story of a girl being torn from her home from everyone who loved her and dragged away to be forced into marriage and twist and corrupt it until it was a romance story about female empowerment that wasn’t ENOUGH they HAD to take the original hero of the story the mother who went to every length to find her daughter again to bring her home and demonise her character until she was this horrific overbearing unloving mother. overprotective controlling without love. they turn the story of her grief at her YOUNG daughter being torn from her without her knowledge into the story of a misunderstood bad boy and a horrible cruel mother who won’t give him a chance and i really find it sickening. it’s ironic, that the ever misogynist age of hellenistic greece, has a better grasp of how disgusting and horrifying this situation was that a modern, self proclaimed ‘feminist’ era.
#ovids version made me cry#imagine you’re just a nymph watching your friend torn away from you by the literal king of the dead#and despite knowing how powerless you are against him you still choose to stand up to him#to stand up for your friend#imagine being so torn apart by the grief of losing her you weep yourself to death#imagine turning that story into a good girl/bad boy romance#weird#anyway#the story of persephone is personal to me#bc i wish my mother loved me like that#demeter was a good mother#you all suck for portraying her as anything less#idc if you disagree#‘oh myth is open to interpretation and reinterpretation’#okay. well i don’t care.#there’s such thing as bad interpretations#making demeter the villain is a bad one#making hades a misunderstood protagonist is also a bad one
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UNFUCKABLE
#GOOD MORNING#CANT EVEN GET FUCKED ON THE WE WANT TO FUCK KENDALL ROY WEBSITE HE IS LITERALLY THE JESTER OF HIS OWN COURT#truly the funniest thing to ever happen to him like this is worse than losing the company and he doesn’t even know its happened#kendall roy i wish you were real so you could see this#succession#m
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Hi! this is kinda an art request if u dont mind. And it's angst related, can you draw like where wanda and cosmo obvs have seen for a while how (human) timmy has been treated by his real parents. I just want to see like the "last straw" which lead Cosmo and Wanda wanting them to make Timmy as their own. (IM HAPPY THAT TIMMY HAS A FAMILY THAT LOVES AND CARES FOR HIM)
The "Last Straw"?
Cosmo and Wanda have seen humans at their best. They've seen humans at their worst. They've seen anything and everything that they've gone numb and used to what humans get up to.
But nothing's shaken them quite like Timmy's case did. Nothing has ever made a Fairy feel such strong human emotions than what Timmy made them feel, on that one particular night.
The thing that broke Cosmo and Wanda was Timmy himself.
Bitties Series: [Start] > [Previous] > [Next]
#asks#itty bitties fop au#germangirl321#tw abuse#tw emotional abuse#tw emotional distress#tw implied death#tw implied sui#tw sui implied#<- ask to tag#(especially ask to tag bcs these are the offered tumblr tags)#godkids wish for stupid things all the time. sometimes they wish for good things and bad things. or things that helps themselves or others#they wish for things that teaches them life lessons or for things that damages them in the future.#but at their core every child has a pure wish that they want more than anything.#for hazel. her core wish is for change to stop. for dev. his core wish is for his father's love#timmy's wish. at the center of everything. is to run away from himself and all that he is. to be something- anything- but Him.#its this core wish that fairies desire most. its their ambrosia. and its almost always impossible to grasp in its purity.#they cant stop change or forge a father's love after all.#Most fairies would be ecstatic to claim a child's core wish. It's the peak of their career- highly coveted highly praised.#but Cosmo and Wanda took no pleasure when they finally consumed their one- and only one for they'd never do it again- core wish.#as said before. cosmo and wanda really. really love timmy turner. and timmy really really loves his fairies. love!!! is a powerful thing!!#anyways this is a heavy topic and a heavy ask so im keeping it out of the main tags#also if you're curious as to whose responding back to timmy#its cosmo#lots of people tend to portray wanda as the more emotional sensitive type. yknow the “motherly” role.#but i think thats wrong.#was considering cutting out their responses for this ask#but then i figured that CosWan would be responding back in earnest to calm him down as best they could
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