#imaginary crimes

[feltcreature]

i would trust this guy

[whatisyourchildhoodtrauma]

AMBER BENSON as Margaret Imaginary Crimes (1994) dir. Anthony Drazan

[lorengirl]

Undercover mission 👀.

[rosetyler42]

After watching Fosters Home, I realized Drericka kind of have a similar dynamic to Mac and Bloo: the pragmatic traumatized voice of reason who keeps the other out of trouble and the chaotic gremlin who helps the other cut loose, have fun, and come out if their shell. Realizing this, I had to draw this Mac and Bloo moment from Crime After Crime as it fit them BEAUTIFULLY.

Ericka KNOWS Drac has a mischievious side under all that "Count Control-Freak"/"I'm a cool, calm, responsible leader" image of his. She LOVES this side of him, and enjoys getting him to let it out. She came of course from a place where she had very little freedom at all aside from little acts of rebellion, and sees the freedom Drac has as leader of the pack to be a huge gift. The whole monster community adores him. He could do almost whatever he wanted, without anyone really minding. This may seem like a "I can make him worse" situation, but to ERICKA, it's actually BETTER for him to let loose sometimes than to repress himself like she has. She sees it as helping HIM the way HE helped HER.

@lovelylivelyv @black-ak9 @hotelt-resurrection @ssleeping-in-a-coffin @serial-serializednovelreader @blo0st4r @deathfangirl9 @wingingfromthezing @heartsong1994 @ebevkisk @kittyball23

[agronian]

okay listen up! these two fuckin BADDIES.... *deep breathing* uhg... ok. sorry. lost myself- THESE TWO ARE THE BADDEST MOST MEAN-MUGGIN' ASS-KICKIN' AND CODE-CRACKIN' PAIR OF LOVESTRUCK PARTNERS THAT ELRIEL HAS E V E R SEEN, PERIOD.

if you have played morrowind and are aware of the concept of CHIM, yeah... that's the kind of power we are dealing with here. total. freaking. badasses.

ON THE LEFT IMAGE, WE HAVE:

[S P L I C E R]

she is a 7 foot tall lizard woman but do not be fooled- she WILL beat ur ass, and then kiss u on the forehead afterwards, of course. (goodboy;) mwah) BUT LET IT BE KNOWN- HER LOYALTY IS 100000% UNBREAKABLE. she is beyond devoted to her partner.....

who is.... undoubtedly so....-

-THE MAN ON THE RIGHT-

[X E N O T R E K]

without a doubt, xenotrek has senority. as a 55 year old killa, the mere fact of his age combined with the length of his loks of pale red hair, this man is obviously deadly and quite stylish.

despite being a bit of a gallavanting fiend, he has taken splicer under his watchful eye to apprentice her under his art, the mastery of lockpicking. she is a fast and ready learner, already cracking most of the locks thrown her way, as well as a few in real world examples.

more shall be revealed one day... for now, we bask in the ephemera.

[thelordofgifs]

In Defence of the Sons of Fëanor

Wait, again? Yes, always. But not anything really bad! Kinslaying, I hope we can agree, is pretty indefensible. But an accusation I often see levelled against the younger sons - that they failed to rescue Maedhros from Angband out of cowardice/stupidity - is bugging me. So! Before I get a fandom reputation as "the Gil-galad poster", I thought I might write something about a character I actually care about - Maglor! Also his younger brothers, but Maglor is the one I’m particularly invested in defending.

In fic (particularly a lot of Russingon fic) the views I tend to see expressed by characters, and backed up by the narrative, go something like "The Fëanorions heartlessly refused Morgoth's offer to release Maedhros and left their brother to torture for thirty years! Dangling from a cliff in full view of their camp! But then heroic Fingon showed up and immediately rescued him with nothing more than a bow and a harp - he barely even stopped to eat first!"

Firstly, I obviously understand that views expressed by the characters are not that of the author. It is absolutely valid for Fingon to accuse the Fëanorions of cowardice, and completely in-character for Maglor to feel incredibly guilty about not rescuing Maedhros (and in fact a pretty essential part of their dynamic, in my opinion). My issue is with fics that very much imply that this view is the Only Correct One. There are a lot of things Maglor does wrong over the course of the Silm. This is not one of them.

Beginning with the refusal to surrender to Morgoth in exchange for Maedhros’ release - I hope nobody seriously considers this a bad decision? A crushing one, certainly. You can write really sad fic about this (I plan to). But the Noldor had just received an excellent lesson in why trusting Morgoth to parley was a bad idea. They had no reason to believe that Morgoth would actually release Maedhros if they surrendered - which is correct. He wouldn’t have. The published Silm adds, “and they were constrained also by their oath” - incidentally, a fairly compelling point of evidence in favour of the oath being binding in nature to some extent, but not the point here. The point here is that they couldn’t have surrendered to Morgoth, and shouldn’t have anyway.

So, with that out of the way, we can accept that what Maglor et al are being accused of is not refusing to parley with Morgoth, but failing to mount an independent rescue mission.

(Incidentally, it’s generally assumed that Maglor, the second-eldest brother, was the one in charge during Maedhros’ captivity. I usually subscribe to this myself, but I would also like to note that Maglor is not once named during the description of these events. It’s always “the sons of Fëanor”, as a unit. You could make a pretty strong case that they were deciding things together, or even that one of his younger brothers had usurped him somewhat - C&C have form in that area…)

Actually before I move on from Morgoth’s proposed deal, an important question: did Maedhros’ brothers know that he was alive? According to (I think) the Grey Annals, Maedhros was captured in YT 1497, and suspended from Thangorodrim in YT 1498 - presumably after his brothers had refused Morgoth’s offer. That’s potentially around 10 years in which they heard nothing, before Morgoth makes them the offer! Perhaps they reasoned that Morgoth wouldn’t have put such a valuable prisoner to death; perhaps not. It’s doubtful they were offered actual proof that Maedhros was alive, at any rate.

“Sure,” you might say, “but they definitely knew he was alive once they could see him suspended from Thangorodrim!” I can’t actually express how strongly I disagree with this common headcanon. The Fëanorions couldn’t see Maedhros on the cliff! Where did people get this idea from? I presume it’s because of Legolas’ various physics-defying feats of eyesight in LoTR. I would like to make the argument here that there’s no reason to assume Noldor accustomed to the light of the Trees could see as well in the starlight as a Silvan Elf of shadowed Mirkwood, but that’s not really necessary. There’s much stronger evidence pointing clearly to the fact that Maedhros wasn’t visible: Fingolfin’s host marches right up to the gates of Angband and nobody notices him. He even yells for help, and they don’t hear him! There is no way that anyone knew he was there (and the Sun had risen by this stage, too. If he was visible, they’d have seen him.) I’m allergic to geography, so don’t take my word on this, but my understanding is that Thangorodrim is a whole little mountain range or something, not like a single cliff. As additional support for this, Fingon gets lost on his eventual rescue mission (in which he’s trying to break into Angband itself, because that’s where he thinks Maedhros is) and only finds Maedhros when he hears him singing. The Fëanorions were absolutely not spending thirty years going “ooh look clear day today! Give Nelyo a wave!”

The next thing to tackle is the odd implication that rescuing Maedhros was really easy, actually, and his brothers were cowards for not even attempting it. Not only do I think this untrue, I don’t see why you’d want it to be true? Fingon’s rescue of Maedhros is one of the best parts of the silm. It’s moving because Fingon is so so brave, and he’s brave because what he attempted was impossible. There is seriously NO reason why that should have worked, and that’s what’s wonderful about it. Suggesting that Maedhros’ brothers held back from attempting a rescue because of cowardice or not caring about him, and not because it couldn’t be done, imo really devalues the magnitude of Fingon’s act of grace.

On a more practical level, nothing about the description of the rescue mission suggests it was easy and anyone could have done it? I genuinely hate to make this joke but… one does not simply walk into Angband. Fingon is specifically described as “aided by the very darkness that Morgoth had made” - a darkness which, you recall, he had made in response to the light of the new Sun. If you’d tried to walk up to Thangorodrim before Morgoth had made his smog, you’d have been caught! There were orcs there! And probably all manner of other fell beasties! Maedhros absolutely couldn’t have been rescued before the rising of the Sun, and specifically Morgoth’s response to it.

A final point - the somewhat common claim that Fingon immediately, the instant he learned what had befallen Maedhros, set out to rescue him, and didn’t even stop to like, brush his teeth first. This is a nice image! The Russingon feels are unparalleled! Unfortunately, I don’t think the text backs it up. The published silm states that Fingon went to Angband “resolved to heal the feud that divided the Noldor”. This rather strongly implies that Fingon only left on his mission some time after he arrived at Mithrim, since there was clearly time for tensions to arise between the two hosts. One of the Annals (Grey or of Beleriand? I get them mixed up - at any rate, the timeline on Tolkien Gateway) puts this in even starker terms, stating that Fingolfin’s host arrived at Mithrim in Year 2 of the Sun, and Fingon rescued Maedhros in Year 5. That’s three years of waiting around before he set out! Now, you could headcanon that maybe Maglor et al told Fingon that Maedhros was dead, and he only later learned that they meant “captured and we never found a body” - but it’s also possible that he knew Maedhros was a captive the entire time, and still didn’t do anything. Three years is obviously not the same as thirty, but I find this detail interesting even so. It rather muddies the dichotomy of “Maedhros’ brothers didn’t care enough to rescue him, Fingon immediately saved him” that I often see.

tl;dr the Fëanorions weren’t cowards who didn’t love their brother, they were sensible and it’s tragic.

Right I hope that was a fairly measured and reasonable post (it was supposed to be at any rate) so now I can very quickly say how DARE you imply that Maglor didn’t love Maedhros consider how close he settles to Himring consider how he’s the only one Maedhros brings with him to the Mereth Aderthad consider their last debate ie the most heartbreaking dialogue in the entire book consider how he’s right and yet he still follows Maedhros in stealing the Silmarils consider how he only finally breaks after Maedhros’ death you can pry that tender loving codependent relationship from my COLD DEAD HANDS ok I’m normal now :)

[asongofstarkandtargaryen]

"Dany abused Jon" is the most ridiculous got take I've Jon//sa stans have.

The only person who actually abused Jon is your other favourite, Catelyn.

[mswyrr]

I'm an adult in this current shitshow of a real world where real awful things that matter are happening to real people. If I want to take the fictional "crimes" of an imaginary person against other imaginary people lightly I damn well will.

[fantasyfantasygames]

This Game Is Familiar

This Game Is Familiar, Beebo Bunkums, 2022

There are so many jokes one could make here about TGIF and "but I haven't even seen it before" and "In Soviet Russia...", so hopefully you can fill those in yourself.

In This Game Is Familiar (TGIF) you play spellcasters' familiars. The game uses the term "witches, wizards, and warlocks", so I guess the implication is that warlocks are non-binary, which I think the NB folks I know would be down for. You could be helping your caster succeed in school or work, rescuing them from their nemesis, keeping from embarrassing themselves, etc. It's much more on the "beer and pretzels" side than the "serious games about serious topics" side. Or maybe on the "together they fight crime" side.

The mechanics are in the Honey Heist / Lasers & Feelings area, with two axes instead of one. Axis #1 is Size vs. Speed. Axis #2 is Power vs. Personality. Each axis has to add to 7 independently, and you do the usual 1d6+stat. After that comes a power system that's pretty similar to the one in Everway. I think it evolved separately, but it's possible that (checks author credit) (checks it again) Beebo Bunkums did read Everway and decided to house-rule things. There's a page full of d66 tables with personality quirks.

It's a little unusual to see any substantial add-ons for a L&F hack. In addition, the powers don't really mesh with the rest of the mechanics - they're more in the "it works or it doesn't" category, like flight or not having to breathe. I wonder whether BB is actually two people who mashed their games together.

The game's setting is just sort of an assumed-D&D-type world. There's nothing explicit beyond the existence of spellcasters and some sort of magic society, so you could theoretically play this in a high-tech setting if you wanted. You'll just have to do the work of setting-building yourself.

The art is part scratchy b/w linework and part greyscale watercolor, which lends a little more credence to the "two authors" theory. The linework has the "creepy but friendly" style, where that crow could stop snacking on an eye long enough to give you a hand with the stuff on the high shelf. The watercolors are more in the Addams Family style, morose but morbidly funny.

The game's on itch, but you probably figured that out from the title and author. It's only 13 pages but it's nice and cheap.

[r0ckst4r-c0re]

for some reason, my brain has been bursting with this funny slice of life au where instead of jinshi always telling maomao that her obsession with poisons is weird, he instead slowly starts seeing the appeal. (he wouldnt go as far as to experiment on himself, he still finds that absolutely horrifying) After showing the appeal, maomao and jinshi start to form some kind of bond (?) over poisons. Basically before the romance the two have a casual friendship where they both solve mysteries (like usual in the story) and they have fun and be classic friends who make fun of goofy people in the mystery cases.

TL;DR: jinshi gets unjinshified and takes an interest in poisons. also maomao becomes friends with him

[aroacettorney]

love how ludger rejecting divinity means so fuckin little because even if he is not a "proper" god hes still the most op and successful character in the entire multiverse

[yourcocksuckerr]

how dare you like this thing i don’t like don’t you know you’re supposed to cater to ME personally, MY milquetoast ship/character preferences. and i should never feel uncomfortable on here/other sites ever and if i do feel uncomfortable then its YOUR problem bc you like said thing making me, specifically, feel icky even though i could simply mind my business and be decent enough to move on without verbally assaulting you for enjoying fiction in a way that’s unethically appealing to you.

[cheetour]

my dad and i were talking about transgender people in the olympics (i.e. it's not a huge deal but complicated and interesting, and it's a shame there's so much transphobia in the world so people aren't actually looking at the sport/game/any evidence at all) and he remarked, "Maybe they'll make their own Olympics, like the Paralympics."

Obviously in reality this would be flawed, but in the utopia of my imagination I love the idea of the Pride Olympics. The circles but they're all different pride flags. Going jogging because I'm training to qualify for the Gay Olympics. The Gold Olympic Medal For Kink At Pride Discourse.

[autumnrory]

"women are crazy for thinking they could ever be attacked in their home" is certainly a Tumblr Take

[griffinsboyfriend]

Idk what the general reception of CoP2 is, but I want another one of these crime books to go on more gay adventures with Trystan doing… fucking anything.