#i'd be fucked if i had to actually see the symbols to know what i have to push

[lovedrruunk]

Girl next door જ⁀➴♡ Chapter 3

In which Joel plays Cupid in order to help a hopeless Ellie win over the cute girl next door.

Series Masterlist!

chapter 2! - chapter 4 [coming soon!]

"Flower symbolism and all that."

w.c; 1.3k

[silly awkward Ellie Williams x fem reader!]

Ellie found herself smiling first thing in the morning. It had been two days since she had lunch with you at the cafe and she'd be lying if she said you weren't constantly on her mind. She said good morning to you from the driveway the other day and she could've sworn you smiled at her wider than usual. So as the birds chirped and the sun rose Ellie skipped down the stairs happily daydreaming. Just as she was about to peek around the corner her jaw dropped.

"Ellie! Come join us."

There on the couch was Joel sipping away at his coffee with that stupid face of his, and next to him was you.

Y'know, Ellie liked your company. She liked your face, she liked looking at it, oh and she liked your voice too, she could listen to you talk all day but even though she adored all these things she couldn't help but wonder; what the actual fuck were you doing here?

"Y/N... Hi." Her voice strained and although she was talking to you her eyes were on Joel the whole time absolutely glaring at him.

"Morning!" you chirped ignoring her hilarious angry face.

"Y/N here was just about to help me get the garden sorted. You know how long I've wanted to work on it."

Ellie looked around, finally taking notice of the gardening tools and bags of fertilizer around you two. She forced a smile, not wanting to sour your mood. "Sounds... fun."

Joel raised an eyebrow, clearly amused. "You alright, Ellie?"

"I'm amazing Joel." Ellie replied, not so amazingly.

"Great!" Joel stood up, happily putting on his jacket. "I'll go grab some more fertilizer from Tommy's. You two start with the digging and planting, Y/N here is an expert when it comes to flowers."

As Ellie watched him leave, her jaw clenched. She took a deep breath, calming down.

"You don't actually know anything about gardening do you...?"

"Nope!"

. . .

As the two of you started working, Ellie stole glances at you, feeling her annoyance slowly dissipate. The sun was warm, and the conversation was light and easy.

"Here Ellie, you should plant this one," you said excitedly looking towards the crowd of flowers and plants Joel had mysteriously brought in earlier that morning. Carefully picking up the pot you handed it to her. "It's a gardenia!"

Ellie took the plant with a smile. "Pretty."

Crouching down to plant it she continues, "Thought you didn't know anything about gardening?"

"I don't, not really! I just know a lot about their symbolisms and stuff, useless information that keeps me busy." You shrugged as you went to sit next to her digging up another hole in the soil. "Like here, what's your favorite flower?"

"Oh I'm more of a fern type of person... but if I had to choose I'd say... violets."

"Violets huh?" you said, a thoughtful look on your face, "I totally see it. From what I remember violets stand for humility, and women used to use it to symbolize their love for... y'know like other women I guess? It represents like sapphic......ism? If that's a word... But yea it's one of the more romantic flowers, lot's of history and symbolism behind it." There was a short pause as you contemplated continuing or not. You figured it'd be best to stop and save yourself the embarrassment or rambling as you had already been fumbling your words terribly. "Sweet isn't it?" You decided to ask keeping your eyes on the dirt in front of you

Ellie nodded, "Yeah, it is." She was totally fucking with you.

Of course she already knew what violets represented. She just wanted to see if you knew. Y'know... testing the waters or what not. It's not evil.

"So, if I give someone a bunch of violets, it's like saying, 'Hey, I think you're cool... and also, maybe I want to kiss you on the mouth?'" She said as she finished planting the gardenia, now just sitting down looking at you dig.

You laughed, shaking your head. "Pretty much. But, y'know, in a way cooler, more poetic way. Like," You turned towards her continuing "'Hey, I'm trying to subtly tell you that I think I'm into you without making it weird.'"

Ok now you're fucking with her. Fair enough... But were you? You definitely were. Right...? Maybe.

"Well that's all good to know. Maybe I should start handing out violets like business cards. 'Hi, I'm Ellie, and yes, I like girls. Here's a flower to prove it. I like you and I don't think its weird at all... ha ha'" She let out the most monotone laugh you had ever heard in your entire life which caused you to start laughing while Ellies face fell as she looked away. 'too much?'

You grinned, playing along. "It’s a bold strategy. But hey, it might just work."

Ellie nodded silently before continuing, "So what about you? any favorite flowers?" she asked changing topics.

"Hmm tough question, there's a lot. I'm partial to daisies." you said with a shrug.

Ellie smiles again as she looks at you "Fitting."

"Yea? Why's that?"

"It just feels right."

"Oh don't give me that!" You said as you hit her shoulder teasingly.

Ellie chuckled faking a tiny 'ow' as she lightly rubbed where you had hit her. "I don't know how to explain it! You're just sweet, and... simple. In a good way of course!" She had said defensively.

You raised an eyebrow, clearly amused. “Sweet and simple? That’s the best you’ve got?”

Ellie's face flushed as she frantically tried to explain herself. “I mean, not simple in a boring way! Just… like, you’re easy to be around. You make things feel… uncomplicated.” Okay she has got to stop lying to you... but would this even count as a lie? The only thing complicated was her own feelings so technically that's on her.

You laughed softly, letting her off the hook. “Relax, I’m just messing with you. I get what you’re trying to say.”

Ellie sighed as you laughed.

The two of you continued to work side by side, the earlier banter giving way to a more comfortable silence. Every now and then, your hands would brush against each other as you reached for the same tool or flower, and each time it happened, Ellie felt her heart skip a beat.

As you placed another plant into the soil, you glanced over at Ellie, noticing the way she was concentrating on her work. “You know, you’re not so bad at this gardening thing yourself.”

Ellie looked up, surprised. “Really? I thought I was just following your lead.”

You shook your head. “No, you’ve got a good touch. I mean, look at that gardenia, it’s practically glowing under your care.”

Ellie chuckled, a bit embarrassed by the compliment. “I don’t know about glowing, but I guess it’s not dead, so that’s something.”

You nudged her playfully. “Give yourself some credit, Ellie. You’re doing great.”

Ellie smiled, feeling a sense of pride “Thanks. But honestly, it’s been nice having someone to do this with. Makes it a lot more fun.” She said as she got up and made her way back towards the other plants.

“Agreed,” you said, your tone softening. “I’m glad Joel roped me into this. I wasn’t expecting to enjoy it so much.”

Ellie nodded crouching down, her back turned towards you as she scanned the pots. “Yeah, me neither. But, y’know… it’s nice, spending time with you like this.”

You kept your eyes on the garden in front of you, a small smile playing on your lips. “It is. We should do it more often. And maybe next time, we can, uh… talk about something other than flowers.” You let out a slight chuckle that disappeared when you were met with silence. You looked to her noticing her stillness but decided not to say anything as to not disturb her.

You continued to dig making room for more plants eventually humming to fill in the silence, although it came to a stop when Ellie sat beside you with a pot in her hands and a toothy grin on her face.

"I found some violets."

. . .

“I guess Joel would be... a cactus?”

“A cactus?”

“Yeah,” Ellie smiled, “Prickly on the outside, but deep down, he’s just full of... water. And love... But mostly water.”

. . .

Authors note!! I actually feel like a deadbeat dad... I KEEP BREAKING MY PROMISES U GUYS IM SO SORRRYYY anyways! i think this idea was cutesy but i wish it was longer (i say as i am the one who wrote it aka the one who gets to decide how long it is), i wrote a different ending where joel comes back and blah blah blah but tbh i love sudden endings its like a guilty pleasure yk... but yea thats all from me for now!! see u in another month!!! (JOKING.)

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[sanctus-ingenium]

Just wanted to ask, please forgive me if you've already answred this, what program do you use? Your art fucks HARD and like. I was looking at your art of the two moths over the city they die in and I was hit with the wave of "oh that looks really fucking fun actually." Like i know my art program can't do some of those effects and like, I'd love to try fucking about with them.

hi there, thank you! all my art is done in procreate and paint tool sai

because you mentioned that drawing in particular i thought it would be fun to break it down and show ppl what exactly went into each part of it so check this out

sketch & lineart - the brushes come from georgbrush.club and the urban sketcher is my most commonly used lineart brush, it has a nice irregular shape. the square brush is nice for big blocky sketches.

the cityscape was REALLY hard but basically I got a photo of the skyline of florence, traced some basic building shapes, then bullshitted the rest using the vertical symmetry/mirror tool to cut down on the amount of work (so i only had to sketch one half of the city). then for lineart I turned off vertical symmetry, turned on the two-point perspective tool, and got this:

the rose windows were made using the radial symmetry tool.

I didn't like it being so flat, so I used the liquify tool to make a kind of fish-eye effect (limited success tbh). I liked how it looked but the buildings in front needed something to cover them up to make the liquification less obvious...

first pass colours. I felt they were very washed out, aside from the sun which i loved. I use the spectra brush (default procreate) for skyscapes a lot, I love the texture. Although the clouds were filled in using the lasso selection tool, I softened the edges using the square pencil again and added texture using true grit sampler grainy brushes. The translucency effect comes from my setting the brush as an eraser. The sun rays come from the radial symmetry tool.

Blocking in the moths' colours was done with the urban sketcher again.

Something people may not have noticed is the labyrinth hidden in the sky! yeah I had a bunch of versions where it was more obvious but I found that it clashed a bit and was too busy, so I made it subtle. But yes. I searched for "royalty free labyrinth" and picked one.

The toner grit brush is one you've seen before if you've looked at any art on tumblr lately (this is such a popular brush) and it's from the true grit fast grit set. The pointillism brush is from the true grit free sampler pack, like my grain brushes.

I added shadows to the moths, increased saturation overall, and changed the clouds to a translucent blue (you can even see in the sun where I forgot to block in the sun itself because the clouds over it used to be opaque lol). Moon rays were drawn using the radial symmetry tool but this time with rotational symmetry off. I also moved the moon down closer to the moths because I felt that it was a bit far away, and this served to visually divide the drawing into three equal parts, so I chose to lean into that and divide the sky colours too, to show passing time, or an endless moment - morning, evening, night, etc.

And then the oroborous, I tried a few different effects on it because I wanted it to be very clearly separate from the main scene - I settled on a dot matrix newsprint texture, using procreate's onboard tool, and some heavy chromatic aberration. This is because the oroborous isn't real, it's purely symbolic and the moths' demise started when they became photographers so I liked the print media aspect there as well. The story itself is about grief without closure, cyclical violence, and sunk cost fallacy, while everyone explores an endless labyrinth, so an oroborous fits I think

what makes art fun to me is thinking up ways I can tell a story using just a single image. and sure a lot of it will be lost to an audience who isn't familiar with the characters or backstory but i want to leave enough in there that even complete strangers to my work will be able to construct a narrative about what's happening here, rather than it just being a cool image. that's my goal.

Finally I exported it to sai on my pc to give it a once-over. this is really important because the retina display on an ipad is oversaturated on purpose, to make everything look amazing and vibrant. but what this means is that on other screens, your work might look washed out. it's especially bad at displaying yellows! so i look at it in sai on my pc and i make minor adjustments, in this case I actually added another multiply layer on the moths and an overlay on their non-shadowed parts to increase the contrast there.

finally if you've read this far, I played a little trick with the caption of the drawing. yeah, THEY die... but only one of those moths is a theythem pronoun haver... the other has to survive. he isn't given a choice in the matter.

[devondespresso]

FINALLY

after NINE. HOURS. (NOT including meals and sleep) ITS FUCKING DONE.

A complete floorplan of the entire Harrington house. Including too much thought about random, throw-away lines from characters and squint-to-see-it background glimpses inside.

plently of stuff in the actual house is altered or straight up ignored in favor of following the fiction logic and because I Wanted To. A lot of this is motivated by my headcanons for the Harringtons and how I'm writing them in my fic, but I'm also certainly not an architect so it's by no means perfect. It is, however, unreasonably canon compliant in the few bits we do see.

Thought Process (for context):

the darker shaded floor areas are lower than the rest, some bits like the garages having stairs and some areas like the sun and dining rooms list being like a step lower. Windows are marked with dashes along the outside, sliding doors are two thin lines slightly overlapping, stairs change color as they diverge from the level we're looking at, and furniture is eyeballed so don't look to closely a the scale.

not all closets are labeled, just the ones i figured could be confusing. Steve and the guest rooms have closets i promise.

the laundry room and pantry are not the same size but by the time i noticed i was exhausted. so pretend they're both more reasonably sized.

i don't know what the floorplan symbol for garage door is and then i forgot to look so the headlights point to where the doors are and you can see them clearly in photos so yeah.

The general layout is based on the idea that the Harringtons are or were into hosting dinner parties and business meetings in their home, especially as a young rich couple looking for respect in their circles (Mr. Harrington taking on his father's business and reinforcing that power, Mrs. Harrington climbing her own social ladder and building an image).

So the house is laid out with hosting areas towards the right with the office big and near the dining room because it's more than just a workplace, it represents him as a businessman. In canon the entryway and living room both have very high ceilings and no second-floor above them, so I'd imagine they're also aware of how the top floor looks from below, hence the fancy double/french doors to the master bedroom which is in plain view from below. Steve's room and the guest room are's nearly as visible.

As for the kitchen and sun/pool rooms, I see them more as secondary hosting areas that aren't used as the main location most of the time and are more this background setting to these events that still feel rich. The kitchen is massive and mostly for dinner-parties and Mrs. Harrington's social events.

The kitchen and main bathroom's placement is based on a line Steve said to Barb giving her directions to the bathroom: "down past the kitchen, to the left". With the massive living room on the left and wanting to keep the dining and office close by, i interpreted the "to the left" part being like "find the kitchen, then turn left". And with the rest of the area being open-concept, the bathroom would be the only normal door over there and easy to find. it's a bit of a stretch with just that line, but it makes sense to me with the rest of the context for the layout.

the basement is similar to this, though not as openly displayed so I imagine its for slightly closer friends. Theres a garage door down there so I figured Mr. Harrington might have a cool car he shows off, like he's letting people in on a personal detail about himself. There's also a guest room down there (the only one still considered 100% for guests, more on that later) for those people.

beside the basement garage, there was originally one main garage that holds two cars, obvious Mr. and Mrs. Harrington's cars. I imagine they bought the house before having kids, so a third one wasn't on the mind but after having Steve they added the front one (either turning the carport into a closed garage or they never had a carport and added a whole new addition, up to you)

Both garages lead to the same part of the house, and that area is the only one besides the water heater room that is purely function over effect. It still looks good like the rest of the house but it's not made to be fancy because guests would rarely need to be over there if at all and it's not noteworthy from other parts of the house.

In my headcanon, Steve's room used to be a guest room, staying his room from nursery to present with Mrs. Harrington renovating every now and then. Its one of those places in the house that doesn't have to look perfect for all to see, so she gets creative and has fun with it.

The upstairs guest room is also unofficially Mrs. Harrington's room, based on a line where Tommy mentions a fireplace in "his mom's room" instead of "guest room" or "parent's room" or "master bedroom". I belatedly realized this could be a solidarity thing with Steve hating his dad and calling the master bedroom his mom's room, but that was after 9 hours of this and im not changing it but there you go. In this version, I imagine she leaves the master some nights because her marriage with Mr. Harrington is failing (cheating and all, I wouldn't want to be in the same bed with someone who cheated either)

the master bathroom was an executive decision, just looking at the house in canon and not having enough space in my first attempts, i decided the triangle roof part above the dining and office could fit a master bathroom.

Feel free to use or reference this in your own fics! Feel free to block out my furniture or walls and make your own version. If you share my image please credit with an @ mention!! (again, 9 hours) (thank you fhalsfhd)

[witchofthesouls]

I do think it's a good thing to point out: violence is always the answer to violence when it's the system that creates the violence.

Megatron in every continuity was right that it needed to be a violent overthrow because the upper castes would not listen and would not change.

The title of Prime is a god-king status above the caste system entirely, but it does beseech its own violence just by existing.

Even if Optimus is a good person, that doesn't erase the damage and cruelty Primes are apparently known for. He is patient and he is imperfect and the tragedy of it is, does he even know that he's changed? How much of the difference is he aware of from his time before the Maxtrix to what he's become as a direct result of it?

Skyquake said he'd never side with a Prime. Not that he'd never side with Optimus, or the Autobots, but A Prime. The idea. The symbol. The Decepticons are fighting to be free from the shackles of a lineage of god-kings endlessly creative in their cruelty who, by some irony, they are compelled to follow by the nature of the relic.

Ratchet is a very good example of the hypocrisy. He was medical- upper middle to upper caste- and in TFP, we know Iacon hoarded a lot of resources. We see his prejudice plain as day just from how he describes Orion Pax and Megatronous. Hell, I'd say he flat out hated Megatronous for teaching a young Orion to speak his mind. He doesn't understand the righteous anger that the gladiator carried, and I don't think he cared.

Tl;Dr: there's a reason the Decepticons are more appealing, honey, most people just don't want to think about it too hard

Uh, I don't know if you're new here, anon, but yeah? Keep on cooking!

I don't know if this is a response to the reblog from nukeli about shattered glass, but under my 'analysis' and 'tf headcanons' and 'gladiator soundwave' and 'cybertronian culture' tags, I do talk about the roles of violence and how it's cemented within Decepticon culture as well as the 'appropriate behaviors' of low-caste vs high-caste of the Golden Age, especially between Orion Pax and Megatron and how it essentially fucked them up after the disaster meeting. Plus, I have posts about the potential cultural damage caused by the Quintesson occupation on Cybertron since they were the ones to implement the caste system.

Ratchet is such a great example of the show's use of unreliable narrator and how he encompasses a higher-caste sensibilities, especially when you take in his background. Compared to Orion Pax, who literally bypassed all the regulations and went from uneducated bumpkin from the middle of nowhere to a cushy and prestigious position underneath Alpha Trion, Ratchet had the correct frame and went through the right channels, so he never had to deal with the kind of discrimination others would speak about. I think of him like that prideful, racist grandpa who the "but you're not like them" locked and loaded. There's a lot of those instances across the show, but I really enjoy it since it fleshes out the story and the character. Ratchet isn't subtle. Not at all. And no one calls him out on it, so it's super telling on what kind of society Golden Age Cybertron was.

Personally, I thought it was really interesting when Skyquake had said that, especially with how Aligned/TFP done the Thirteen since Megatron literally took his name from Megatronus Prime, the direct opponent of Prima, and had tried to legitimize the movement with the Primacy. That's how I read Megatron's demand since it was proof of real change, but there was no way the High Council was going to allow that. Instead, they decided to take advantage of Orion Pax as a way to break the Decepticon movement and send a message to everyone else. Orion wasn't meant to be a Prime. He was just a figurehead, a token of empty promises, until it went off the rails, and he actually unearthed the damn Matrix.

Going back to Skyquake, I guessed that the TFP!Decepticons do have devotees to outlawed sects along with atheists as Megatron has no issues with getting Primal Artifacts, even if he needs to commit corpse desecration to a Prime of the fucking Thirteen to use the Artifact. (Which is another wild event under that mech's belt. It's a good thing they don't have balls because nothing could carry his.) So Optimus was basically barking at the wrong tree. But a majority of the Decepticons would be like that since Optimus represents Prima's reflection of a Prime and civilization. That distinction is really important because after the death and exile of over half of the Thirteen Primes, very few were actually left to guide the fledgling societies. Each Prime represented different Aspects and Domains, so with none able to challenge Prima... is it really a huge surprise it went wayside?

Prima was the Firstborn and Eldest. He was literally the God-King as the Prime of Light. Megatronus Prime was the only one who could truly challenge him, but he laid down his weapons and chose self-exile, and with death of Solus and Liege Maximo, Onyx, Micronus, and Thirteen joining the Allspark to kickstart it, Nexus separating himself, and Quintus, Amalgamous, and Vector leaving... Alpha Trion and Alchemist weren't enough to stand against Prima, who had a vision on how Cybertron should be.

My point is that the Decepticons stood against Prima's Champion by fiercely declaring their own leader. Megatron would have been an uncrowned Prime, a call to return to the long past before city-states, or a symbol a future without them.

[m1ssunderstanding]

Understanding Lennon McCartney Rewatch Part 1.2

George: We don't have to keep [an image] up, we just remain ourselves. Don't we, Ringo? Ringo: well, we do, I mean, it's the other two we're worried about. It's a joke about John and Paul being bigheads, but a crazy person – definitely not me – could also see it other ways if they wanted to.

Paul talking about their mutual friend when asked how they met and John telling him not to complicate it. They're so married it's ridiculous. 

Always looking at each other with every single joke. 

He looks like he's in a lovely enclosure at the petting zoo. I've always been so confused by this footage. Can anyone tell me what the hell is going on?

I LOVE that we now know Paul was cast as Thisbe and John as Pyramus and then they switched. I'm actually dying to know how and why that happened though. My first instinct was “of course. Paul was scared he'd look too convincing as a woman, so John did it for him.” But no. Paul dressed as a woman at the cavern, wore ladies lingerie in Hamburg, and wanted to do a full drag show on TV in the early seventies. So why not Thisbe?

Why do you as a man randomly bring up the color of your friend's dick while staring lovingly into his eyes?

It must be noted. They had a wonderful time playing star-crossed lovers. 

The bickering pianos are so cute! And then John (prompting Paul): and John and I . . . Paul: oh I hate this. John: will probably carry on . . . Paul: we'll carry on songwriting . . . You just know Paul didn't hear the end of that one interview answer for a long long time. And it's because John just had to hear it over and over again.

Love the editing so that Paul smacks John's ass right as the symbols crash. 10/10 A+

This iconic moment. Poor George tally number 4.

Interviewer brings up marriage and John takes a shot like he wants to forget that the whole concept even exists. Literally poor Cynthia. And not even in an “lol her husband's gay” type of way. Just in a genuine “the way their relationship fell apart actually breaks my heart because she really did love him and in his way he loved her too but they were just so thoroughly incompatible” type of way. 

Paul: makes a stupid dad joke. John: giggles gleefully and kicks his feet

I have never seen someone so disappointed that they didn't need to lend their friend a pen. Paul had his hand in his pocket before John even asked the interviewer for a pen and when the interviewer gives him one, Paul literally hangs his head like he's just been cut from the school play. I just. The obsession is frankly cartoonish. But also, he just needs to be needed, you know? How many songs does he have which conflate being needed and being loved?

The juxtaposition of Paul and John elaborately messing with the interviewer (“yes John Lenard, that's me” and “actually it's done by mirrors.”) vs George's “I don't know” and “yeah.” it's actually kind of mean editing but whatever. It is ULM not UH. Someone should make that though.

Again, John. Calm down. He's not that funny. Just look at Jimmy. That's the normal person's reaction to that joke. John is half the reason Paul has such a big head honestly. 

Paul's answer to a question about the Beatles gaining a lot of adult fans is nice. Sometimes he shocks with a bit of wisdom. Sometimes his words don't get messed up at the point they hit his throat as he says. 

What the fuck? Okay so the interviewer asks Paul what he likes in a girl, right? I've always been too distracted by Paul saying he likes a sense of humor and John doing an obnoxious fake laugh in the background because John. It's embarrassing how obvious you are. Stop.

But I never noticed Paul actually says “people”. The interviewer asks about girls and he says he likes “people - er - girls” to have a sense of humor. Huh. Okay. 

So ULM was actually what made me a serious Beatles fan and this was the first moment where I had to pause it and verify to see if what I'd just read was actually true. It really is a doozy. 

How to flirt. A guide by Paul McCartney. Step one: get your crush’s attention. This should be extremely easy. Just gesture vaguely at something you're holding. He'll be interested. Step two: do something suggestive to a phallic object. Step three: that's it. You've got him. He'll do whatever you want.

The editing in this thing truly is brutal. Just the jump cuts from a question about Cynthia to John and Paul making each other laugh to girls screaming to John and Paul unnecessarily touching to girls passed out on the ground to John and Paul desperate for each other's attention to girls waving signs to John and Paul sharing weird eye contact to girls physically mobbing them to John and Paul beaming at each other to a question about Jane. It really does drive home the immense pressure of compulsory heterosexuality back then. 

Then a question that's obviously meant to poke a nerve and start some bad feelings. “Paul. Is John the leader of the Beatles?” Easily rebuffed with “no I'm not” and “there's no real leader”. I know I'm dramatic but really it's like every aspect of that society was against them you know? And they just kind of said "fuck you, we're crazy about each other."

Question: what do they think about when they're imprisoned in their hotel rooms? John: we don't think about one thing. *Whips head to look at Paul* well, some of us do. Oh and you know that how exactly? What, do you just have a printout of his every thought? Do you keep constant tabs on his dick?

Someone give me the heterosexual explanation of that moment when John very clearly and obviously checks out and appreciates Paul's ass as he and Ringo are pretending to be cowboys. Seriously. I'm at a loss here. 

Poor George tally number six? Seven? They're asked what they'll do if England reinstates the draft. John brings up Southern Ireland. George brings up Germany. Paul and John plan their joint escape to Southern Ireland as if George hadn't even spoken. 

The choice to play “Another Girl” over that quote of John's being like ‘Paul's actually much meaner than i am’ is great. Because that's seriously such a jerk song. I don't much like Jane, honestly, but fuck, she deserved so much better than Paul. He was such a douche.  

Literally all the song choices in this are phenomenal. “Hide Your Love Away” over the montage of 60s homophobia moments? It's so genius. Saying everything without saying anything. Letting the Beatles do the talking. 

The laugh track over the cartoon is honestly so sad. Nobody asked them if they were okay with being mocked like that and they never even made a dime off it. What would that have felt like to know that your being “too close” with your best friend was a running joke on TV?

“It's only love and that is all. Why should I feel the way I do?”

[nutklcker]

For your Swansea eye post, consider It relates to them both knowing what he's done? Also think about this, they probably didn't mean for this but like, think about it 'See right through you' Curly lost his right eye, he really cared about Jimmy, they were friends Swansea fucking hated him - he saw right through him, took some time to get there

death makes that no longer possible

YO WAIT YOURE ACTUALLY SO RIGHT: Context.

So like in Anya's case, she sees how absolutely fuckoff terrible Jimmy is but due to the manner in which she was abused (ie the way she's seemingly been forced into writing it off as "not that bad" or "deserving" [saw a post on this concept specifically a while ago but don't remember if I reblogged it, gonna go look for it now: edit I COULDNT FIND IT :(]) she excuses it. She excuses the absolute hell she went through due to the way Jimmy manipulated her.

And in Daisuke's case there's a handful of reasons why he could be either intentionally ignoring or unintentionally unable to realize Jimmy's worse-than-hellish behavior ranging from his age to his upbeat demeanor to a sense of camaraderie (in regards to that scene where Daisuke breaks down after drinking too much and reveals he's also pretty pessimistic about the situation but trying to put on a brave face. He might feel like he's putting on a brave face for Jimmy too because he sees that same pessimism in him), but whatever it is that led Daisuke to not really realize Jimmy's assholery, we can see by the time he gets into the vent he STILL thinks Jimmy's doing the right things. Like he agrees to follow his plan of getting in the vent of course, he also doesn't really bat an eye when Jimmy only mentions saving Curly and not Anya (which Jimmy probably does cuz Anya saying something along the lines of "I'm finally doing what you told me to" implies Jimmy told her to off herself after he learned of the pregnancy. So he knows what she means when she says that and probably knew in advance that she had killed herself and was now focusing on making sure she hadn't killed Curly too) and, even in death, Jimmy isn't the one that killed him.

Fun fact I just realized about that: the way he was killed specifically avoids both his eyes while crossing between them. I'd like to posit that this could mean that, in game, eyes symbolize the ability to properly see reality and the trap of being overcome with delusion or wishful thinking. The way Daisuke died separated those two, implying he was never able to choose one or the other and instead saw both, fully. He never got an answer. He never realized that Jimmy was an asshole, he never got definitive proof that Curly didn't crash the ship, he never got to "grow up" and face reality as an adult with a job. I also find it interesting that when Daisuke dies Jimmy is sitting on his side that the "sees reality" while Swansea is sitting on the "blinded by delusion side" which could imply that he FINALLY sees that Jimmy is the problem but is simultaneously still blinded by devotion to Swanson, unable to recognize the damage his alcoholism has had on him (Daisuke).

With all this in mind I LOVE the idea that Swansea and Curly both losing their right eyes symbolizes they've lost the ability to be deluded by wishful thinking, they both, finally, COMPLETELY see Jimmy for who he is. They are forced to only see reality. Anya is forced into a balancing act between the two, as is Daisuke until his death, at which point his ability to choose between reality and wishful thinking is split in half, forcing him to see the reality of Jimmy's existence and the wishful thinking of Swansea's predicament (meaning he might view Swansea's murder of him as a mercy killing).

[ladyluscinia]

I know my last experience with a season ending on a note everyone hated and unanimously tore to fucking shreds for destroying the story on every level was... atypical. Lockdown. 6 month mass hysteria at minimum. Conspiracy theories that were, like, real things we had on camera. There was a Twitter wedding. Creative fervor that broke 100k fics on AO3.

Like. I know this is not a rational point of comparison and I'm not going to expect anything in my lifetime to match it 🤣

But.

If that was the highest high of post-season fandom engagement built on a cocktail of tasting everything you ever wanted AND the absolutely lethal levels of spite and swearing to eat showrunners' hearts in the marketplace, then whatever the fuck is going on after OFMD S2 is the opposite of that.

OFMD S1 was a huge fandom explosion. One silly little streaming show that had a gay kiss and then it skyrocketed. Fic numbers were soaring, high activity fic and meta engagement lasted for at least four months, it was constantly trending and flooding the dash... Like, fucking hell, over a year and a half after the immediate finale fervor it beat Stucky in the top ships bracket?!? To the point I was willing to give it what felt like due credit toward its potential as a future juggernaut ship. Not guaranteed, of course, but the potential was there.

In that context, new content should be a blow out party. Which it kinda was pulling off as it was airing, but looking back now? Not even quite a month later?

The effect of S2 on the fandom is like... a blip. Possibly over already.

New fic numbers started dropping off the moment the finale aired and have returned to deep hiatus levels. It's dropped off trending and streaming leaderboards... I'm very curious to see the first tumblr Week in Review since the finale, though we're still waiting due to the holiday.

Like, I've even popped on to scroll a few Izzy hater blogs that I know loved the finale out of morbid curiosity what they were up to, and I'm telling you... if I hadn't just watched the new season I'd think they were still over a year into hiatus. Saw some standard bitching about the izcourse / Edward takes (aka the one thing that kept them going all hiatus), they're currently passing around posts mocking one specific long OFMD version of TJLC I'm just hearing of, the same BTS gifsets everyone else is thrilled by... But barely any new meta or discussions. There's like 2 people posting actual analysis of S2 that's getting reblogged and they aren't even names I recognize from the hiatus. Nor is it particularly interesting to read. 🤷‍♀️

In July of 2022 I could pop onto a random OFMD blog and scroll through a dozen enthusiastic Stede or BlackBonnet metas about jacket colors or that moth from 1x07 or lighthouse symbolism or whatever. Now the new stuff has the same energy as posts from June 2023. It's borderline dead. And this is what it's like when there's an active campaign to engage fandom and Renew as a Crew?

(I will say fanartists are bringing some energy and there's some lovely pieces being passed around, which I do think the Renew as a Crew campaign is helping to boost?)

Even the hundreds of people saying it was a beautiful season and they loved it so much don't seem to be finding it a very engaging or inspiring season.

It's such a turn, like, what the fuck.

[grison-in-space]

I know we're past this point, but I'm beyond exhausted with ARA mentality making its way into the public consciousness. Flaco being championed as a symbol of freedom, Dodo promoting anthropomorphism, celebrities backing PETA, fucking TIKTOK. I work with sled dogs and I don't know how many people per week accuse us of abuse because dogs should be free and not "chained up" and why do we "make" the dogs work. No matter what you say, they just twist your words and take your frustration as admission. Sorry for the rant, but it's getting beyond annoying! How do we combat the misinformation when they take your information and say that you can't read an animals mind, even when the animal's behavior suggest its content?

Yeah, I know what you're talking about. I'm right there with you! It frustrates me, too, especially because animal communication and signaling was a huge part of my doctoral work, so I have spent a lot of time thinking about how animals can encode and unpack information from signals and cues* to communicate and share information with one another.

What I will usually do if I run into someone like this is treat the comment that "you can't read an animal's mind" as pertaining to both of us. I sure can't read an animal's mind, and neither can you, friend! So how can animals communicate with us about what they want? How can we use evidence from the animal'l own behavior to indicate its preferences?

Well, when we give animals choices, what do they do? Matilda doesn't love harnesses for their own sake, but she knows that she doesn't come with me for the day if the harness isn't out. When she sees the harness, she approaches me and stares intently; if I don't pick it up and put it on her, she will sometimes move in front of my and block my path to the outside. Or take my mice. When we open the top of the cage for a behavior session for the mice in my lab (a noninvasive "game" that asks them to choose between one side or another in exchange for little squirts of watered down Ensure), it's common to see mice pop out of the cage and start racing around the rim, trying to climb onto a hand. Animals learn cues from us about what is going to happen next, and they behave accordingly. If they aren't enjoying a task, you can usually tell!

Okay, that's for small, easily understood time units. What about the big questions? Would a dog rather run free than run in harness with a human handler? Well, it's certainly hard to get an informed consent from an animal, because again, no language to communicate risks TO THEM. But you can also go, okay, what does freedom actually look like for free roaming wild animals? There's... an awful lot of bad deaths out there, it turns out.

Like, a lot.

Hey. You're a human who presumably prefers to live in society. If I told you that I had the offer of a lifetime for you, where you'd be released from all debts and obligations to human society and in exchange you could go live on a naked island by yourself in a hut with a bucket to drop waste in and no running water, and just enough food to keep you alive until you learned how to successfully forage for yourself, would you do it? Or would you keep your debts and your job in exchange for being able to rely on a society to prevent your neighbors from deciding to murder you for rations, construct safe and hygienic ways to handle drinking water and waste, and devise predictable and palatable things to eat? Would you like to be released into the world without a social group or any connections, or would you rather stay in a society even though you're not able to make any possible decision that might flicker into your head?

If they tell me "yeah I'd love that actually," ask why they're not doing it right now. Like, I'm assuming you work tourism in some capacity, Nonny; why are they shelling money out for this dogsled ride if their dream is to be free of Society? Living in a big collective group always entails some loss of freedoms (e.g. I cannot play big brass music at full volume at 10pm unless I want my housemates to riot), but the potential gains (increased comfort, lowered costs, rewarding long term relationships) outweighs those costs.

Which is why when my dogs do get out, they usually stay in earshot and return when they're bored with brief exploration or they hear our alarmed contact calls. If the great outdoors was that much better, do you really think so many domestic animals would come right back?

*Technically speaking, you can extract information from both signals and cues, but a signal is intended to transmit information to a receiver and a cue is a physiological byproduct of an individual's state. Think of it as the difference between a human making eye contact with you and then glaring versus seeing a human having a whole-ass meltdown directed at no one in particular on a park bench. This is a meaningful difference for animals, too: I did quite a bit of work on eavesdropping in the animal world, where messages intended for one kind of receiver can be detected, accessed, and unpacked by another, much less desirable party — like a competitor or a predator.

[fangirltothefullest]

Thoughts on the welcome home update because YES. Spoilers below the cut.

That sleep aid pill is called remderem which is almost "remember" but the d would be backwards, and its also almost "murder me" while missing the u. Is this anything? I don't know. Im always looking for names of things in args.

We have seen through two puppets eyes. First it was Wally and his discomfort and/or dissociation, and now it's Eddie's discomfort and/or dissociation. Which is fun because we've heard that Eddie would do crafts for the show and you'd just see his hands so that was a fun touch.

First iteration of the website we had mail letters (Eddie) giving us clues. Second iteration had bugs (Frank?) and active drawings (Wally?) giving us clues. Now we have symbols giving us clues and they remind me of stickers a little bit so possibly a connection to Sally? Who else would give the tiny pictures? Questions questions.

At the end of that commercial before his existential crisis, they say Eddie has been invited and they did his job for him so he could rest. Eddie does not seem happy about them doing his job for him instead of letting him do it himself. I am reminded of how clumsy with the mail he seems to be sometimes and how much work they make him do in the other audio clips. I wonder if he is feeling extremely overwhelmed but also unappreciated and that they can do all this work to help and choose not to most days? Sally insists it was easy to do and Eddie does not sound pleased.

One thing i can't stop thinking about and i have to go back and really re-watch the commercials closely, is Poppy. When they invite Eddie to the party they say everyone is there but there's no Poppy in the picture? And earlier they poured gravy on an ornament that, to me, looked very oddly shaped and almost like meat, and we hear Poppy, but we don't see her. So... a pea on a plate..... "P" on a plate? My brain could be misconstruing but did they eat Poppy and is that what he's actually seeing and is that why it's all red? I'd he seeing the reality beyond the mask? Is it more than a pea?

Eddie says "where?" In his crisis as a response to Frank calling his name. People are talking about this as if he doesn't know where he is. I agree this is a likely idea but what if he's asking where Poppy is? Do we ever actually see her in any of the videos or do we just hear her?

Wally has feelings a lot which is good to confirm he has feelings! Eddie also said he would be happy with an apple every single day and my he is an innocentbautism creature wally agenda is flourishing.

The amount if commercials has me fascinated because people used to do that for TV shows (still do but those earlier type ones welcome home is referencing is spot on) commercials for basically everything is accurate and what is funny is the accuracy of what each person is selling. Howdy with the cigarette commercial- he takes every opportunity to sell you something no matter what even if it's not good for you. Sleepy looking Wally selling you sleeping pills happy with the thought of the dream.

Wally being nervous about getting the holiday correct. Is it because he's never done it or ia Home going to hurt him?

Did home hurt Eddie because he was upset during the party? It sure fucking looks like it with home watching him so intensely. Does the chair have something to do with it?

Eddie's scribbled writing reminds me of the people trying to decipher the code on the safe.

On the secret pages it's signed "-W." But it talks as if it's a human person who watched the show and is working either the WHRP team. It also talks too grown up to be wally. Who is this?? Is it the same person from the terrified scribbles of the hidden page previously? It seems maybe so because of referencing needing the cleanup.

[nellie-elizabeth]

The Legend of Vox Machina: Thordak's Throne (3x09)

Oh shit, I can't believe they did that. And by that I mean... well, I'll talk about it in a bit.

Cons:

I have one small and one kind of medium-large complaint to lodge here before we go into how much I really did adore this episode.

Okay, obviously Travis broke my heart with his line delivery on "can you fix him? Please, you gotta fix him." But I do kind of miss his original improvised version that had more heat to it. The bellowed "FIX HIM" lives in my head rent free and we didn't get that here. Small nitpick, this version also tore out my heart, but thought I'd mention that. The thing about Grog is that he's our big lovable dummy, but the other thing about Grog is that he can be scary sometimes, even to the people he loves most.

Then there's the bigger thing. Pike's big moment was like... well, I'm not like, super angry, really, it's more of a "let's see where they're going with this thing", I guess. I have thoughts. Honestly, the stuff with Pike and the Everlight in this show has always been kind of muddy to me, and a plot progression where Pike finds strength in herself instead of in her goddess is totally fine with me in theory. But I thought in the past seasons the setup was more like... her faith as an anchor to her own strength. Or believing that she is deserving of the Everlight's favor and that thus the power she wields is her own, but the goddess is her supporter as much as Pike is a follower of her goddess? Like, does that make any sense? Pike having a complicated but ultimately loving relationship with her deity is what I was looking for here. That image of her actually throwing aside the Everlight's symbol was kind of... Not It, for me. I wish it had been more like "It's not just the Everlight's magic, and it's not just the Dawnfather's armor. It's me, who I am, being worthy to wield the powers they offer." That's the nuance I would have wanted here.

Maybe they're setting shit up, I don't know. There's clearly something going on with Pike here that I don't fully understand, since it's new material added to the show! But her big triumphant moment of using the armor to deal a devastating blow to Thordak left me a little uncertain, if I'm being honest. Pike does love her goddess, it's part of her strength. I don't want the story to take that away from her. Maybe whatever Zerxus was on about, that whole thing about her being "special," will shed further light on this, and what seemed like a triumphant moment in this episode will ultimately turn back on itself? That's kind of what I'm hoping for, in a way. I want Pike's final resolution as a character to be her reconciled and comfortable with the Everlight's place in her life, even if it's a relationship that has evolved, somewhat.

Pros:

But okay. Enough of that. This episode kicked ass.

Let's get back to the "oh shit, I can't believe they did that." I can't believe they killed Kash!!! Like, okay, there are so many things to talk about in this episode but I have to start with how fucking shocked I was by this. Totally out of left field, did not see it coming, completely crushed my soul. Because that's not just Kash, character who has been in like... two episodes of this show and cracks wise and flirts with Keyleth and how he's dead. That's who the character is to animated series watchers, and I'm sure his death is very sad from that perspective, but... but that's... fan favorite guest PC, played by Will Friedle, that's a character who gets to live happily ever after in the world of Exandria as far as the campaign story is concerned, and they killed him dead! And like... he's dead dead, we all know it, don't we? Yikes, this was so depressing! They did that very effective thing of having him and Zahra being all cutesy and kissing and then engaging in banter and doing cool battle combos together and then... SQUISH.

It was an enormously effective change, I can't even be mad at it. This show is not beholden to the streaming canon, they've told us that a thousand times. And let's be honest, we know what's coming up for certain other beloved characters. It makes a lot of sense to me that some named characters needed to be casualties of these big bad dragons before the end. This was... a fucking heartbreaking choice but I found it enormously impactful in exactly the right way. Zahra's despair was so moving, and I love how she got to give Pike that final angry pep talk to push her into her final moment of figuring out how to use her vestige. I also loved the imagery, of Kash standing up and looking down on his own mangled corpse, looking over at the group, and... seeing Vax, seeing him? Then the Matron imagery behind him as he turns and walks into shadow. Just... masterfully done, a super emotionally devastating death for a character who didn't need a lot of screen time to make a huge impact on my heart. Also, just, it was so MEAN! Ouch!

So much else to say. I don't know how to go in a linear order just talking about all the moments that I loved, so get ready for me to jump around just listing things that totally destroyed me and/or I totally cheered at.

All of the cool NPCs and side characters getting shown in small moments, kicking ass! Allura and Gilmore with their spells, and Kima and Groon as always being cool as shit, and Vex and Vax's dad being just kind of... shell-shocked by the mass destruction but then bickering with Cassandra about how to evacuate the troops. It just makes the world feel so full and like we've been to all of these places and met all of these cool different people.

Grog really got a lot of shining moments in this episode! I loved how when their original plan went to shit, Grog is the one who steps up and comes up with an alt. That was such a clever way to adapt one of my favorite aspects of the campaign, which is that Travis often had interesting strategic ideas at the table, but Grog wasn't allowed to be smart enough to think of them. So Grog would occasionally have these tactical insights, but Travis had to hold back a lot of the time. This was a fun way for Travis to possess Grog's body and come up with a good idea and get the ball rolling!

Seeing Grog and Scanlan teaming up was such a joy, you get this sense that theirs is a friendship full of wacky shenanigans and so much heart and love, that Grog has some of his best fun times with Scanlan Shorthalt and really enjoys his company. I loved Scanlan getting him into the rage mindset to defeat the eggs, and I loved Scanlan acting as bait with Thordak. And then... man, this show knows how to turn your emotional reality on its head. I was waiting for how the Scanlan death stuff would translate here, and despite wishing for the more angry version of "FIX HIM," I still was emotionally crushed by Grog's realization that Scanlan wasn't moving! Noooooo. He's gotta wake up, if only because Grog couldn't live with it otherwise!

We get a Keyleth moment where she turns into her fire elemental self, but it doesn't seem to work, which I thought was a cool moment - it makes sense within the mechanical logic of D&D that a big powerful fire thing wouldn't work that well against a big powerful fire thing, but it was also such a cool subversion of expectations to hear that amazing musical theme and see Vax and Keyleth do such a bad-ass combo and then have it not play out the way you would expect it to!

The final beats of everyone circling up around Thordak, then Pike getting that moment to really take him out and get rid of the soul anchor, was visually very cool even if (see above) I'm a little worried about the implications for Pike's character journey.

And then. Man. I knew I'd cry about Vex and Vax's mother, and this is one of those things I think is really enhanced by having watched the stream, and knowing how much this story became healing for Liam in particular. The visual of Thordak getting away, and Vax holding Vex's hand before launching himself into the air, the way he himself became the final weapon, punching through Thordak's body... so fucking beautiful and intense and cathartic. And then we get the twins holding each other in relief. They can't do anything to bring their mother back, or Percy, but at least they've stopped this dragon from doing any further harm.

Tracking Keyleth's mistrust of Raishan through the season has been so interesting, because here she turns up, seems like she might be about to turn on our heroes, and then she plays her part and attacks Thordak in a vulnerable moment instead, forcing him to fly off to lick his wounds, and setting Vax up for that final kill shot. Then you have Keyleth being the bigger person and going to tell Raishan she knows she was wrong, and thanking her for the allyship. But of course... Keyleth was fucking right, y'all, she was right all along, don't mess with my GIRL lol. Raishan is doing something with runes, and then before Vox Machina can stop her, she's vanished with Thordak's corpse in tow. Dun dun dunnnn.

I'm really curious about how we're fitting in the events I think we still have to hit in the next three episodes. Obviously things are so topsy turvey and out of order here. Percy didn't get to do the Thordak fight in this version! Keyleth doesn't have her vestige! Scanlan is unconscious and out for the count and I have to assume that's dealt with... before the Raishan combat? Or maybe Scanlan sits that one out? I don't fucking know, man, everything is so out of order that I'm on the edge of my seat as much as the just-animated-show viewers!

I'm not going to dock too many points for my big Pike question in this episode. I still want to see where they're going with this in the final three episodes. Other than that aspect, I really really loved this episode. RIP Kash, you really caught a stray by showing up in this episode and getting squished so bad. Gonna miss that guy.

9/10

[skunkes]

I've talked about this before I think but I think "art theft culture" is actually what makes scenarios like this worse... and I Know because I've mentioned that it happened to me before, where a few years ago I was heavily inspired by an artist for a couple of style study drawings without acknowledging them as inspiration, they contacted me after their friends notifed the similarities, and it was resolved as I explained that I had no "plans" for long term theft or passing off as my own, I was just passing by and figuring out what I liked about the style. But I should have just mentioned them!

And that's the point I'm trying to get at here, I feel for a lot of people there's still either shame in using references (I took the upper half of a pose for a recent comm from one of the first memorable google image results for it... How embarrassing!), and there's similar in openly admitting that somebody is currently directly inspiring you, or that you liked something someone made so much you're making your own spin on it.

This is probably because you don't know how people (your audience or the original creator, or THEIR audience) are going to react with regards to """theft""" (which I also feel varies. Like everyone I've seen trying to emulate my style has never gotten close. Which is how it works! Its a good thing! Absorb it into your own! Thats what I do!

But I've also had someone lift every aspect of my art identity and basically try to replicate exact pieces, poses, and dialogue of mine with their characters like oh ok nvm this is kinda weird.) so I get it, because it's scary! It happened to Me, I was a perpetrator LOL and that's that it was style inspiration and not direct copying so I get it... I feel it all the time too, but I wish it wasn't like this in General ykwim. Wish it didn't feel so humiliating to admit influence

EDIT: THIS IS ALSO NOT ME SAYING "you need to list off all your inspirations every single time you post a drawing"

Its more like oh this person is using my exact brushes and exact colors and exact half traced poses and my handwriting and exact dialogue and personal symbols to the point where they're pretending my autobiographic doodles happened to them while pretending they've never seen my stuff in their life, or even shit talking me. Some of these individual aspects are okay (I've literally shared all my brushes with everyone, for example, who cares. My colors are awesome...who cares. 4 petal flower shapes don't belong to anyone, I don't care.) But all of them in combination is what's weird. Ykwim. Like that level of "hey man what the fuck"

I'm about to answer an ask going more into depth about this but I also need to explain that it's hard being on the other end of this too because it really isn't that serious ykwim... I see ppl on twitter get clowned on every day because "you can't steal a style" and that's mostly true. Me and some mutuals "steal" aspects from each other all the time without "crediting" because it's obvious, or we know each other, as well as the "stolen" stuff being something we already made our own thing, so I promise this isn't about that. Art is meant to be shared and inspire and influence.

I'd never point fingers unless it got severe over a long period of time (not adapting it into your own style), with someone who wouldn't talk it out with me but sometimes I wish I could show some of these specific examples, like I promise I'm not blowing up because someone """stole""" uhhhh the little squiggles I add to my commissions. I myself "stole" that from deco sticker sheets. Who gives a shit.

[darlingsfandom]

Professor Harrington fucking reader as a reward for getting an A on her test after class. And she’s so sensitive and loud

Gif credit : @olliviacooke / google images

You could have bursted with excitement as the big red A hit your eyes. Professor Steve smiled at you as he watched you grip the paper .

"And that will finish our unit on symbolism. And since I'm in a good mood plus it's almost time for holiday break... we won't be taking the next test I had planned." The room sighed and cheered. "I'll see you next week! Enjoy your weekends and other classes." Everyone rushed out of class as fast as they could but not you!

You sat in your seat until the last kid left . You put the test in your backpack before approaching his desk. Steve smiled at you as you leaned on his desk on your elbows. "Good job pretty girl!" You leaned in and poked his nose.

"Well you're the one that gave me an A!"

"Because you earned it , not because you let me eat your pussy." Your cheeks went red at the memory of wrapping your legs around his head last week. "You could've done bad and I'd fail you but you actually did well for once."

"Hey now , I got easily distracted ! Not my fault I got the hottest professor in the whole university." You gave him a kiss that got hot quickly. You pulled away long enough to run around his desk and put yourself on the edge of it before Steve laid you down and started kissing down your body. His hand slid up under your skirt and pulled your panties to the side before putting two fingers inside of you.

"Oooh fuck! That feels good already Steve !" You giggled a little bit as his lips attached to your collar bone. It was sloppy and wet as he fingered you harder.

"God you're fucking wet and I only have my fingers in your pretty little cunt." Steve pulled his fingers in and out of you quickly before finally pulling them out which made you pout only for a second because he waisted no time in pulling out his cock and slamming you down onto his hard cock. Steve gave you a minute to adjust before he started bouncing you up and down hard on his cock making your ass jiggle each time. He spanked you each time while you pulled his hair making him groan. You weren't slowing down! Professor Steve attached his lips to your breasts , what was exposed of them, and sucked the purple marks onto them. The sound of his balls slapping against your ass filled the room as you cried out his name.

"God you're perfect! Fuck! Can't wait until you're not my student anymore !! Gonna be able to finally cream pie ya nice and full!"

"Please Steve !! I need you to breed me!" Your lips pouted as your mouth hung open as he started hitting the g spot with the tip of his dick.

"I know honey I know! Soon very soon! But fuck!!" Steve pulled you off his dick as fast as he could before he came on your lips. "I'm sorry honey I couldn't hold back anymore. You know I wanna breed you and I lost it!" You licked your lips clean and got on his desk and spread your legs.

"It's okay Stevie, but you need to make me cum now!" You pulled him in close before his fingers went right for your clit. You were on the edge shaking beneath him. It wasn't long before you were screaming out his name and gushing on his fingers.

"That's my good girl, you can have an A+ for that orgasm."

[veliseraptor]

i'm in a very specific phase right now where i'm only reading jiang cheng-centric fics and then i thought, what has lise written? because i tend to run into your fics even if it's not on purpose (and they're always so good!) and i noticed that two of your fics (which are also not posted that far apart) have lots of Feelings about a lotus pond in the burial mounds, which... wow, talk about heart-wrenching. i'm not very familiar with the exact details of the novel yet so is this something from canon? i know you mostly talk about the yi city cast so i'm not sure whether this is unwelcome but what was it about the lotus pond and what it means for the twin prides that captured your interest so strongly? what do you think it means for jiang cheng to see the tangible evidence of that fact that, in his heart, wei wuxian had not forsaken them? sorry for the long, rambling ask!

I do indeed mostly talk about Yi City these days but I have a deep and abiding affection in my heart for Wei Wuxian and Jiang Cheng and their relationship. it's such a miserable mess. love that.

as far as the lotus pond goes - I don't recall it being a thing in the novel (though I'd have to go back and check to be sure) but it is definitely a thing from CQL, which is where I pulled it from. there it is very explicitly Wei Wuxian trying to bring a piece of home/familiarity to the Burial Mounds, that to everyone's astonishment actually works.

and hoo boy is that symbolically weighty, which was why I used it there! because it is Wei Wuxian bringing a piece of symbolic home with him (because he can't completely leave home behind, even as he cuts himself off from Jiang Sect in order to protect them), and for Jiang Cheng to witness that it is a symbol that Wei Wuxian didn't just ditch and never look back, but that there was still some attachment there, struggling to survive amidst the ruin of everything else. That Wei Wuxian put in the work to grow lotuses in an inhospitable environment, that he wanted them there badly enough to make the effort - and yet he also (from Jiang Cheng's perspective) walked away so easily, left their family behind without hesitation.

the way I put it in one of the fics I know you're thinking of (no flower can bloom for a hundred days):

It shouldn’t be here. Someone would have had to plant it. Someone would have to have wanted it here, to have wanted badly enough to put in the work to nurture it, coax it to grow from poisoned soil. There was a pond like this in Jinlintai, Jiang Cheng thought. Splendid, well-kept. A-jie had loved it. It’s not home, she’d said, but it’s a piece of it. When I miss it too badly, I can sit looking at the lotuses and think of you, and a-Xian, and feel closer to you both.

it's a very loaded and emotionally potent symbol for both Wei Wuxian and Jiang Cheng and that makes it very fun to use, basically. because at that point, of course, it's too late; and also, at that point, how is he meant to reconcile that evidence with the fact that Wei Wuxian did leave, and his anger at Wei Wuxian for all the death that comes after, including his own?

he can't. and that's one of the things that has Jiang Cheng so fucked up about Wei Wuxian, for all the years he spends looking for him.

[sciderman]

I know you visit other ships, but what is it that draws you to mainly create Spideypool content as opposed to Spideytorch content?

well ya got me

by all accounts it doesn't make sense

i haven't made it any sort of secret that i think johnny and peter are just better than spider-man and deadpool in every sort of conceivable way - they're healthier, they have history - they complete each other and they're just... good for each other and they really, genuinely, wholeheartedly love each other. like, right there, on the page. like, all of the ribbing has never, never come from a place of genuine hate - it might've come from a little envy, or other kinds of pettiness - but peter and johnny hold so much love and respect for each other, from the very, very beginning.

the main thing i can say for myself about why i picked spideypool over other ships is - one, deadpool was my first comic book love. i love him so much and i love writing him so much, and i'd miss writing him so much.

and two - well... i just, i like how complicated it is. i like that wade and peter are fighting me at every turn. when i started writing the blog i had half a mind that wade and peter would never get together, and the whole conceit of it is that is doesn't make sense and it's a crack ship that shouldn't work out.

i think i kind of just wanted to take that crack ship in my hands and make it believable, somehow. i thought - actually. actually there's a way this could work. i'm going to make these two fall in love and they're going to fight me at every turn and sabotage and make it nearly impossible for me. i love it when they fight back - wade and peter just, kind of have a life of their own in my head now, and they very rarely do what i tell them to.

i think i love wade and peter being diametrically opposed in every sort of a way, but on an outwards and honestly, even inwards glance they're similar beasts.

i love spider-man being symbolic of everything wade kind of wants and hopes for, but in a way that wade doesn't entirely understand or examine deeper because he's too busy projecting. that's unhealthy, but interesting.

i love deadpool being symbolic of everything peter fears because, what, wade stole his schtick, and is reckless and selfish, and wears all the things peter's ashamed of like a badge of honour. completely unapologetic. peter hates it. it's unhealthy. but interesting.

and i love to see them both overcome, and start seeing each other as people, instead of funhouse reflections of each other. deadpool sees spider-man as what he could be, and spider-man sees deadpool as what he could've been...

i think there's just something i love about this being something that shouldn't work, and absolutely everyone (including wade and peter) thinking it's not going to work, but them just... still trying to make it work.

i had to work So hard to get them this far. and they still have to keep working so hard to get where they want to be. nothing for them is easy. it's all - it's all so...

i don't KNOW man there's just so much good fucking food here that a lot of people sleep on and i just love to sink my teeth into it. it's a greasy, greasy, unhealthy feast. and i love it.

[vidyagamereference]

I have so many feelings about touchstarved character design pt 1 Kuras

So! First lets talk about how his whole outfit is just.... yassified priests garb. Like... the collar, the long sleeves, the "tabbard" straps, the gold. Its all very.... 3 peice suit high fashion is eating a catholic Fathers robes and a protestant Preists robes at the same time. Like the whole suit to me drips power.

Lets count off the different things that imply power to his outfit

Gold and stark white fabric (hard to clean and hard to find)

WELL TAILORED suit (high fashion)

J E W E L E R Y

Religious leader symbolism (Christian)

Fucking EPAULETS???

The hair (weird one but in animated/drawn mediums royalty tends to have longer hair)

If yall told me there was 1 person from Hightown (rich people land) and everyone else was from somewhere else and ONLY showed me the character lineup I'd pick Kuras as the hightowner tbqh.

More analysis under the break

Lets look at his "circles"

I dont have anywhere else to put this so... epaulets look like wings sleeves also imply wings. Makeup = crying gold. Gold bodily fluids = ichor. Ichor = divinity. that is all

A list of imperfect/broken circles/halos on kuras

There's attempted circles with his belts (inturrupted by his buckles and almost always at least two [i'll get to the one on his chest]). The buckles around his thigh in particular remind me of slashed circles.

There is an attempted circle on his chest (implying a flase homesty if you like the theory that veres chest is open bc hes more honest and kuras's is covered because hes more of a lier) that is left open by way of the empty preists collar. Like something religious was taken away. Its highly decorated so i think were ment to see it

The epaulets have some shape language of wings and halos imho and they also continue the trend of doubled up circuits (these are too angular to be circles but square triangular halos were in fact a thing)

His earrings are rayed halos (halos that have sunlight/sunbeams coming off of it) but even they somehow seem inturrupted by his ears when looking at how theres never a perfect circle. Another example of doubling round things

The golden cords on his hip (princely) are also imperfect circles and doubled up round things

What do the doubling up of round things (and honestly most things in some way or another. Makeup, vials on his chest, aprony tabbardy strappy things) mean? I dont know for sure but I'd wager its hinting at a few things

Broken halo

His Angelic body structure (see also: belt talk below)

A duality to his nature

Actually on the topic of halos he seems to imply a lot of shapes of halo! He obviously has the thin circular outline ones (for old testament prophets, angels, saints, Mary, and the symbol of the four evangelists according to Wikipedia), the triangle (less prominently) which is for The Holy Trinity (god jesus and the holy spirit),

and somewhat also (weirdly) square halos. Which was for.... *checks notes* celebrities who wanted to be painted like their blorbo jesus and friends... dont beleive me? Look at the fancy "not a belt buckle" thing he has and if its NOT giving painting frame I'll eat it.

Looking at the belt buckle square halo thing again it has been crossed out which makes me think that maybe kuras hates the rich and idolitry (komrade Kuras)

Another word for halo is glorihole. That is apropos of nothing i just had to learn that and yall do too now. Youre welcome

Anyways back on the topic

His too many belts moment at the hips really makes me think of the standard idea of a biblically accurate angel. Yknow. Rings of eyes around a central flame are a common depiction, the hidden rings on the inside are studded to look like false eyes to me. Especially so hidden behind a decorative false belt

The hiding of so much black (another dye reserved for royalty) under such pristine white makes me think hes lying to us, or at best putting up a facade.

THE ABOVE BEING SAID he only has two stripes of true black, the rest is a humble brown. And the belts look like theyre holding something in. I think theres a third layer to him

Layer 1: The Good Doctor Kuras Of Lowdown. Friends? You mean people im around so nobody suspects I'm not human! Yes i am human man and i eat human food!

Layer 2 possibilty a: MWAAHAHAHAHAHA I AM EEEEVILLLLLLL A FALLEN ANGEL!!! THIS IS WHAT YOU WANTED ISNT IT?!?! [Edgelore noises] [terrified screams of those who just realized this edgelord could kill us all]

Layer possibly b: this is the [insert accurate adjective here] of a killer bell- I MEAN MC. emotions. Like 300 gallons of them in one sitting. Possible 0 sum game. More likely hes a living nuke and will Go Off somehow

Layer 3: hey I'm feeling less catholic guilt can i still go sorta wild ish and not be eeeevillll? And also maybe kiss? Also I'm not actually baby I'm just unsure of how to be myself in this new way will you help me figure it out [happy ending noises]

So yeah tell me if i missed anything :]

@hollana

[scratch-house]

i'm just a shot away from you.

sketch here and here.

hihi! long time no see! i'm gonna infodump about this piece down here.

so when i first started drawing, i focused really heavily on lineart. i was super into finding my "style" in terms of how i would stylize faces and bodies. my coloring style was kind of an afterthought and wasn't really in the place i wanted it to be, so this is me kind of experimenting and trying to go wild in that department.

i think the reason for my years long art block was perfectionism. specifically for digital art, i was very focused on making things pristine and clean looking. i mean that may or may not be obvious from my more recent pre hiatus art, i don't remember, but 😭 mentally that was the issue. i used to always like my sketches more than my lines, and at a certain point i was like, i may as well just have the lines be really sketchy and irregular and chunky or edgy in parts because i seem to be drawn to that, and clearly this precision thing isn't working out. i'd definitely attempted that at other points, but i hadn't really committed and was never really confident about it before now. i think ultimately i just had to reach enough of a 'fuck it' point before i could do it. it's a similar philosophy with the coloring and shading. i'm just letting all the textures and irregularities come through without worrying too much

the idea for the piece changed a LOT. like i started sketching and attempting to color this well before my art block, and i've only just finished it. initially, the doctor and the master were wearing their normal clothes and were holding daggers to one another while locked in an embrace, so the idea was like, the closer they get, the deadlier it is. for some reason i just couldn't get that to work? at some point i gave the doctor navy wings, so there was almost an angel of death thing going on (think the master asking her to kill him), but eventually i went for this! there's still kind of the erotic element with the master straddling the doctor and her Thrusting up, but now they are fencing, and the weapons are a little more front and center instead of hidden, as they were initially. i don't know how obvious it is, but what's happening is the master seemingly has the doctor pinned, both physically and with his rapier, but as she thrusts up, she actually moves his face closer to her blade. his hand on her elbow looks like it's part of the pin, but actually he's trying to stop himself from getting cut more. this thing of the master looking like he's winning, but the doctor actually holding the deadlier (though not necessarily better) position was very important to me, i don't know why. it was a feature of all of the sketches, although in the dagger sketches, there was an element of the doctor's blade being more hidden than the master's, ie in the embrace, the master (facing her) has an arm wrapped around the back of her neck with a blade at her throat, and she wraps her arms around him with a blade pointed directly at his back. you are going to have to figure out the symbolic intricacies of that yourself because i was just doing what felt right sjdjsdk

almost forgot: it's not just the positioning that sorta favors the doctor, it's also the fact that she is slightly more armored than the master. i don't know if you would call that armor, but let's go with that. her mask is pulled slightly more over her face than the master's, she wears her gloves and shoes while the master wears neither, and her rapier has a little cover that goes over her hand, while the master's just fans out. obviously they both have minor injuries, but the doctor also has some Ambiguous blood at her mouth. is it his? is it hers? i don't know. but she has blood in her mouth vibes when it comes to her interactions with the master so there u go

there's also an element of like, fencing is not supposed to get this crazy, so something has gotten severely out of hand here. but mostly i thought it looked cool.

if i could change anything about this, i would make it so that the doc's blade is pointing directly at the master's chin instead of having just grazed his lower face, with the master trying to lift his head away from the blade as he slides down, just so that the threat felt a little more.. i don't know, imminent? so that the strain is more pronounced? they're simultaneously being pulled toward one another (by gravity) and desperately trying to push away. i might've also fucked around with the text a little more because i'm realizing now that it could very easily be misread shjshdjs. but mostly i'm just glad that it's done and it looks cool. it's been YEARS and i finally feel like i'm back on my art feet. but don't hold me to that