#in my mindless hole arc once again…

[venusandsaturnsrings]

i have nothin of substance to offer today other than my own personal desires of being on a leash… collar and leash im tugged in to give sloppy head, foot of whomever it is shoved between my legs for me to grind against… gettin a good slap across the face whenever i’m not doin good enough… uuwwaaaa ᏊᵕꈊᵕᏊ

[timextoxhajima]

Playlist Feels: SHORT SERIES PART 1

Member: stripper LEE JUYEON

Genre: angst, smut, exes to lovers because why the fuck not lmao and it fits the song anyw

A/N: at the point of writing this I WAS TIRED AND SLIGHTLY DRUNK BUT LETS GO. also, NOT part of the GEN Z series, i have racer juyeon in stall for you in gen z ;) also i told V that i was never going to write a stripper au for jy until he goes shirtless or grinds on a prop like kim kai did in artificial love... but when i saw this video, i thought of nothing BUT kim jongin. their styles are pretty similar... not to mention kai had an undercut phase too... conclusion: dana is in a mess and she’s drunk

“i know it hurts to smile but you try to.”

what is a story?

a story has a start, an arc, an ending. 

is it pages of cream colored sheets stacked atop one another, word after word after word printed in ink?

is it the lyrics that your neighbour sings in the shower because he associates the beauty of the lyrics with some heartbreak he’s been through, regardless of when he experienced it?

is it the way someone walks in the room and steals everybody’s attention with the sheer amount of confidence and intimidation he was radiating?

so, what is a story?

ups-and-downs. friendship. love. heartbreak. faults.

‘it was my fault, and it always will be.’

god wouldn’t have allowed you to forget that face even if you were dead, even if you had your skull cracked open and your brain was being eaten out in bits like Hannibal Lecter savouring the flesh of his victim. 

it feels like a witch’s long, untamed nails were being dragged across your skin, and she was breathing down your ear, whispering secrets of potions and words to curses like they were part of a song. 

he who is inked in your heart made of stone will never be removed.

blood that runs thick in the color of love forbids a stake foretold.

bones crumble to dust like fine sand in the wind,

for you will never forget that you have sinned.

the scars on your heart slowly tears apart like a wound that never healed, and every step he makes on the space makes you wish that he was stepping on your soul instead. 

not because you were sexually frustrated, but because you deserved it.

��y/n, lighten up! we’re here to have fun, not watch your mopey ass sulk!”

“yeah, you’ve been so stressed lately, don’t you think it’s time to loosen up?”

“for the record,” the music starts to thump in your stomach and the lights dim into a dark shade of red. “i didn’t want to come to a strip club.”

blood has covered the light, for his soul cries over your misdoings. 

“ugh, you’re such a party pooper,” she huffs, visibly frustrated when her forehead creases into lines under her makeup. 

the memory of you aggressively avoiding being dragged to a strip club rings in your ears like a fire alarm. sometimes, you would’ve loved nothing more besides throw a chair when she acts like that; making it seem like you wanted to do something when you’ve clearly stated you didn’t.

unfortunately, you were used to her shitty little habit. 

coercion sprints itself across your arm when she suddenly grabs it, violently shaking you when the music starts. 

dread washes over you like wildfire when he starts to move, and he suddenly becomes one with the music. 

the whiteness of his skin grabs you by the neck and sticks an ice-cold popsicle down your throat. you could still taste the sourness of the lemon flavoured one he would always give you, even though he liked it too.

the shiny, glittery, loose clothes hanging around his physical existence freezes your muscles the way medusa could turn people into stone. the hairs on your arms stand when you remember how small you looked in his clothes.

and his eyes. they hold a dagger at your heart, tip already sinking into the skin on your chest. 

black, sticky, dense tears flood out every hole of your soul’s mouth.

it takes a massive amount of effort to keep every dollop of excruciatingly painful memories to yourself, for you would’ve thrown up your dinner if you didn’t invest that kind of effort.

in your head, you were a demon coated in tears and smudged ink. 

stuck in time like a statue, your eyes were hollow and your voice was no longer. 

red, the color of blood mixed with poison was spewing out every hole from your face, your knees hitting the ground where the a bed of thorns were laid out carelessly.

the same way you laid out the bed of roses for him, only to become his thorns.

the start of the story began when you first locked eyes with him first in the neighbourhood library near your school. 

you never really liked studying in school, not when there were always noisy kids tossing a ball around or someone loudly crunching on chips next to you.

it doesn’t take long for you to notice that he’s been watching you, resulting in you warily turning around to look behind you to see if he was looking at someone else.

a soft chime in the hall pulls your attention to the old clock hanging above the entrance of the library, and an announcement rings through the PA system.

“dear visitors, the time now is 11pm. kindly exit the library and dispose of any litter you may have with you. we hope you’ve enjoyed your time here and we hope to see you soon.”

it was exactly because it was so late, that there was nobody left in the library.

carefully, you return your attention back to him, music still playing softly in your earpieces.

his eyes were glued to his books as he clears them off the table, and you remain seated, taking your time to pack your things as well.

you were hoping he doesn’t come over, so naturally, you panic when he does.

feigning the mindless scrolling on your phone doesn’t do much when he presses his palm flat on to the surface of the table, robbing you of an option to ignore him.

well, you could, but you recognise him. 

how could anybody not recognise him?

his eyes meet yours and intimidation fills you like you were drowning, but he suddenly squats with the support of his hand gripping onto the edge of the table, eyes darting away.

a frown finds itself on your face and you watch cautiously when he stands up again, placing a pen and a candy wrapper on the table before you.

“planning on hiding in the bathroom and staying overnight?”

“i... uh-- no...”

“okay,” releasing the edge of the table, he grips the two straps over his shoulders by the sides of his chest and nods towards the exit. “time to go then.”

lee juyeon had always been a rather mysterious character in school. he was two years your senior but it wasn’t surprising to know that he was friends with three of your classmates, one of them being your closest friends. 

when he wasn’t smiling, he looked like he could kill someone; drive a knife through their faces and not feel a pinch of guilt.

but when he does, it’s like setting off a billion firecrackers at once.

and by firecrackers, you mean the girls in school swooning over him.

if you had to choose a word to describe the way you looked at him, it had to be ‘indifferent’. you couldn’t deny that he was a great painting to look at and pretend ‘ugliness’ wasn’t a thing, but you’ve never really bothered to invest your emotions on anybody you deemed too far to reach.

so when he offers to walk you back to your place because of how late it was, it surprises you. 

“why do you study in the community library and not the school library? i thought i’d see you with sunwoo or eric or hyunjun in school.”

“uh... i stay for awhile just to watch them mess around until they lose their stamina... the school library is filled with idiots who eat and make a fool of themselves which make it not-conducive... so i thought the community library is a better idea. besides, the school library closes at 7pm.”

“ah,” he laughs, and you could hear the swooning in the back of your head. “why am i not surprised?”

silence. 

the awkward atmosphere was killing you, and it was difficult to swallow the fact that you could not think of anything to say.

luckily, you stay just about a ten minute walk from the library, so juyeon walks right past your residence without noticing you’ve stopped.

“uh-- juyeon...”

“huh? oh,” he halts in his tracks and turns around, sheepishly taking large steps back to you. 

“thank you for walking me back.”

“it’s alright.”

silence, again.

“...goodnight.”

“goodnight, y/n.”

you purse your lips and offer him a polite smile, slightly surprised that he knows your name. 

then again, he knows three of your classmates, and you were good friends with hyunjun. 

he doesn’t leave until the lift takes you away from the lobby, the view of him waving to you with his unwaxed, tousled hair makes you smile to yourself once out of sight.

the arc of the story comes when you start to find candy under your desk a few weeks later. 

you had stopped visiting the library because you were cooped up at home working on projects you needing your laptop for. 

the sugar left on your desk seemed to be some kind of coaxing to get you to go back to the library.

the candy on the desk was the same one that you ate at the library, the one with the wrapper that juyeon picked up--

“hyunjun,” you call out to the boy who was passed out on the table, walking towards him. 

“go away, i want to sleep--”

“you’ll sleep in class anyway,” grabbing his shoulders, it takes you some effort to peel him off the desk and make him sit upright. “you know who left this and i want to know who.”

hyunjun looks at you with bloodshot eyes, brows furrowing as he messes up his own hair.

“you sound like you already know who, so why do i need to bother telling you?”

the plastic of the candy wrapper crinkles in your hold as hyunjun’s head meets the table again.

again, it doesn’t take long for you to find out that juyeon might have a crush on you, and neither does it take long for you to reciprocate. 

being with juyeon was like sitting on a car and going on a long road trip. 

not many bumps, not many surprises, frankly, you were more than happy he was such an easy man to be with. 

when juyeon graduates, he gets admitted into a performing arts academy in another city, leaving you in school where you still had to wear school uniform and wake up even before the sun rose.

but he makes an effort to come back to visit you, knowing that he was the older one with more freedom. 

this long road trip, however, turns into a rollercoaster without warning, without your realisation.

the institute you enroll yourself into after graduation was located further away from the academy than your old school, but juyeon promises that he’d be with you whenever you could, and you promised the same.

distance becomes the first problem, when you realise how taxing it is to spend two hours travelling across the country to see him, and spend more time sitting on a bus or a train than actually being with him.

it starts to wear you away at the edges, fire burning the corners of ivory sheets with mandarin colored flames and leaving ashes the shade of coal on the floor.

then when juyeon was in his final year and you were halfway through your four year course, it was almost like he vanishes off the face of earth.

it worried you at first, that it felt like he was treating this four year relationship like he mattress he could fall back on anytime he wanted to. 

you didn’t blame him, but it stings in the wounds that draw on your heart after a considerable amount of time. 

was this what a long-distance-relationship encapsulated? how do couples who don’t even stay in the same country get through it?

you miss his scent, his arms around you, the way he smiles at you whenever you say something stupid or when he doesn’t get a joke and you had to explain it to him. 

it feels like he has forgotten you, and it rips you apart that you knew why, that you understand he has his own responsibilities as a student in a prestigious performing arts academy. 

but you can’t help but to think: if i could find time that i wanted to provide him, then why couldn’t he?

there was an expectation, and he didn’t meet it. naturally, it becomes a parasite in your love for juyeon. not only had you not seen him in months, his replies begin to spread out across days. 

he doesn’t reply until more than 24 hours later, and even when he does, they are short. they are dry.

you start to wonder why he was being so irresponsible with a relationship, especially one that he initiated four years ago. your thoughts start to run wild in your head, and you worry if he had just been playing with you the entire time, and now he was probably kissing someone else in some dance studio in another city.

no, juyeon would never.

then the day came that he appears on social media after a long time. the light that filled you was so intense that you smiled just by noticing he’s finally not dead.

yet, you would’ve much preferred death over seeing another girl on his social media. 

he didn’t have the time to respond to you, but he has the time to go out with another girl?

you leave him a text, trying to keep your cool and convince yourself that she was just a friend, and that he’d reply you as soon as possible if he knew you were feeling upset about him spending time with another girl.

hurt converts itself into something physical when he doesn’t reply. 

one day passes, then two. 

and soon, the whole week flies past. 

calls don’t get through, much less messages.

just what was he doing?

you worry and wonder that he no longer loved you and he was merely running from you in hopes you’d leave him alone.

where had you gone wrong? were you a bad partner?

your grades started to take a toll, and memories of juyeon started to clog up in your head as if you weren’t already trying to tear your heart out of your chest.

juyeon no longer loves you. 

he’s just having the time of his life in another city, with another girl, probably kissing her in the dance studio and running his hands all over her.

the mere thought kills you, so being able to actually imagine it in your head peels your skin off your body, leaving you in a wrecked mess on the floor with tissues used to wipe your tears. 

then, sangyeon came along.

the fresh graduate was flustered when he sees a second-year student fallen apart in a tutorial room on his trips back to the university. but he recognises you from a branching out event you attended a month ago.

it lasted two weeks, and sangyeon was your teammate as a senior, so he was more than aware of your life and existence. 

sang yeon stays a safe distance away from you while you try with way too much effort to calm your sobs down. 

it’s not a surprise when it fails though, and you break down even harder with the force of someone beating you up

sangyeon doesn’t hesitate to scoot over to your side and pull you into his arms.

it was tricky, trying to recall what exactly you told him. your eyes were swollen and your face must’ve looked like a plum while your tears stained his shirt. 

having someone’s shoulder to cry on was so comforting. it fills a gaping hole in your chest that shouldn’t be there in the first place. 

sangyeon’s voice runs through your head like honey, honey that soothes the scalding burns juyeon left on your skin. 

you knew it was dangerous, and there was a thin line to cross if you chose to let sangyeon through the doors of your heart. 

most your friends weren’t truly aware of the status of the relationship, thus telling sangyeon everything at one go combusts you even further. 

the urge to have someone’s skin pressed against yours, promising you that you were safe whenever they were around becomes painful to reject. 

you will never forget the look in sangyeon’s eyes when you kiss him mid-sentence. 

sangyeon tastes exactly his voice sounded, sweet and soft. his eyes were wide open the second you ram your lips into his. 

his reluctance slips across your arm, feeling a small amount of force being applies to your elbow when he realises what was happening.

but that pressure softens, and he lets you treat him like juyeon, in attempt to cure your own broken heart.

you will make the biggest mistake you will ever make in your life that night, and that was letting yourself pretend sangyeon was juyeon.

not only were you the one who initiated the kiss in attempt to redeem the lack of affection you were none but craving, you chose to pretend juyeon was the one who spent the night leaving fluttering kisses all over your skin. to whisper words of comfort into your ears and kiss your tears away.

when you wake up and see a pair of eyes that shouldn’t be in such close proximity to yours, it feels like a sword has been driven through your stomach.

then you hear hell knocking on your door, but he sounds like love and missing.

it is a crack, then a rip and a complete separation of your body into two when juyeon realises the door of your dorm room is not locked, and he has that bright smile on his face when he walks into the room, thinking you were asleep.

everything happens under a minute, and sangyeon wasn’t even fully awake by the time juyeon was in the room, seeing you in bed with another man.

the memory of a fight the magnitude of tremendous proportions etches itself in your brain like a parasite. 

juyeon literally hurls sangyeon out the door, the only piece of clothing on him being his underwear. 

there was an effort to stop juyeon, because you knew it for yourself that it was not sangyeon’s fault.

it was yours, and it always will be.

juyeon has the man’s clothes thrown out the door and he slams it shut in his face before you could say anything to sangyeon, locking both himself and you in the room.

have you ever seen the eyes of someone who has absolutely no clue what he did wrong?

they are broken, confused, hurt, angry. juyeon’s were coveted with a layer of tears just seconds away from billowing over his lower lids when he sees that your face was reddening from shame as well. 

there was a heavy silence that could’ve killed you, and you wished it did. 

“are you waiting for me to ask--”

“no.”

“so what’s your explanation?”

you dump yourself on the edge of your bed, fingers pressing into your temples. if you pressed hard enough, maybe you could drill your fingers into your skull and rip out your brain.

“y/n.”

why did your own name sound so threatening when it comes from his lips?

“why did you do it? the fact that we were saving it so we could be each other’s first after marriage but you go ahead and do it with someone else--”

“oh, is that the only thing you care about? sex?”

“no, that’s not what i meant--”

“i thought you’d be pissed off over the fact that i have another guy in the picture regardless of our relationship--”

“which is exactly what i’m asking right now!”

the skin on your forehead gets pulled back when your palms hold back your hair. being interrogated by juyeon in just a bra and home shorts felt so humiliating, so degrading, but you can’t help but to have that pang of hatred for juyeon.

he was the one who incited this. all you did was react in a way disproportionate to your feelings.

“why’d you do it, y/n?”

his voice is shaky, and you were terrified to look up at him because you knew he was already crying. 

it shatters your heart; you were angry.

with him. 

with yourself.

his feet shuffles against the floor and he kneels before you, eyes desperately searching yours for any sign of remorse. his hands wrap around yours but you pull away with resentment, and you can’t help but to feel like he was guilt tripping you into apologising. 

it was my fault, but he incited it. 

“y/n--”

“stop, don’t touch me--”

“tell me what’s wrong, we’ll figure i--”

“tell you ‘what’s wrong’?” it takes alot of courage to shove him off and you lose sight of what was fuelling your emotions. “i’ll tell you what’s wrong, lee juyeon.”

he is shocked and you could almost hear something crack when he hears his name come off your tongue like you were regurgitating poison.

“you disappear off the face of earth for god knows how long and then when you finally show up again, it’s with another girl?”

it takes you awhile to notice you were now standing, and he was leaning back with his palms flat on the floor behind him. 

tears were streaming down the corners of his eyes and you know it was solely from the fact that he’s caught you red-handed but you weren’t showing signs of regret or remorse. 

it eats you that he thinks this is not his fault.

“look me in the eye and tell me confidently that you’ve been a responsible partner.”

gut-wrenching surprise writes itself across his face when the demand leaves your lips like venom. 

your eyes finally give in, hiccups starting to form in the back of your throat when the still silence gives you some kind of hint that this relationship was as good as gone. 

“i wait for you to reply for three days, sometimes more, and all you do is say ‘okay’ or ‘alright’ or ‘nah’-- how am i supposed to be convinced you are invested in this relationship? i haven’t seen you in like, what? four months?! not a proper text, no proper calls, you don’t bother to visit me though you know i can’t because of my work--”

the breathlessness in your chest is a cage with loosened screws and nails, an angry, uncontrollable beast inside waiting to lash out and give juyeon a tight slap across the face.

“ask yourself, lee juyeon,” the sobs become one with the hiccups, and droplets of agonising reality falls off the point of your chin. “who was that girl and why did you not bother to text me back? call me?”

his face falls as if he wasn’t already in a million pieces. the silence feels like a dozen paper cuts on your fingers and your lips cracking in the cold. it sounds like a the car on a roadtrip screeching to a violent stop, and it hurls both of you through the windshield.

your soul is bleeding when you see a muscle in his face twitch, because you now know he is as guilty as you are, even if he didn’t sleep with her. 

heartbreak forms a hand on the crown of your head and pushes you to nod. the tears along your jawline get wiped away with the back of your hand, the mucus running down your philtrum is a mess on your bare chest and your face is not recovered from the excessive crying in the last twelve hours. 

juyeon is quiet, but screaming in pain through his eyes. 

the weight of how broken the both of you were slams down on both your shoulders without warning, and you find enough energy to gulp and clear your throat.

“get out.”

the scene looks like a freeze-frame, and you shake your head at the sight of his unwillingness.

“get out, juyeon.”

it feels like a knife is being dragged across your throat when you say the last words you thought you’d ever say to him.

“we are through.”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

PART 2

[srrrokka]

WIP Tag

I got tagged by @exultedshores to post a snipped of one of my wips! Thank you, Shores, you know that this is the only way they shall see light of the day :’)

The following bit is from the first chapter of To All That Is Lost, a Corvo/Daud fic. (Couldn’t find a good moment to crop this so it’s a bit over 3k, just saying.)

I shall tag @screwtheprinceimtakingthehorse, @puppyblueao3, @modlisznik, and @ptera-novaeangliae :3c

▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬

Maybe it was that he became too cocky, too confident after a month-long streak of easy, uninterrupted burglaries and theft—or rather scavenging, considering the flats he entered had been mostly emptied by the plague already—or perhaps it was the gnawing hunger, twisting his stomach into painful knots that spurred him onward into actions bordering on straight up idiotic. Regardless of the cause, Corvo found himself south of the river, uncomfortably close to a Watch outpost swarming with officers and equipped with not one but two arc pylons. 

A string of colourful Serkonan curses fell from his lips between one heavy breath and another as he ran out onto a narrow makeshift bridge linking two opposing buildings, and prayed to the Outsider, and any other being listening, that he wouldn't get shot from the street below. He fisted his left hand, ignoring the throbbing headache it caused. Turquoise light flared from under the too long sleeve of his tattered sweater. The moment his fingers unclenched, he was on the other side, slamming the balcony door shut with his foot. He stumbled forward, looking for a way out, his worn leather coat flapped around his shins as he whirled around.

Stairs. Stairs leading to the ground floor. No breaking legs today.

Angry shouting from the footbridge pushed him forward as if he had wings and he nearly flew down the first flight of stairs, jumping three steps at a time. The few things in the canvas bag slung over his shoulder slammed their sharp edges into his thigh where it bounced with every step. But he barely registered the pain.

"Stop! Stay where you are!" Corvo froze at the words, his eyes wide behind the simple leather mask. He nearly ran into the Watchman climbing towards him.

Upstairs a loud bang and the sound of shattering glass announced other officers being right at his tail. He let out a strained breath. If there was no way up or down... there was always left and right.

He swallowed hard and, using the handrail like a springboard, jumped over it and into the drop between the steps. The fall wasn't massive, but it was enough to nearly make Corvo land on his knees, all of the muscles in his body strained with the impact. Probably only due to the adrenaline rushing in his veins and humming like a waterfall in his ears did he manage to not stumble and immediately broke into a run.

The way out was so close, so very close. He could make it. He could live another day.

A light blue shine on the right caught his eye. Whale oil tank powering one of the arc pylons. He forgot about the arc pylons!

"Don't move! There's no escape!" yelled one of the officers behind him and he shot a quick glance in his direction. There were five of them, already nearly at the ground floor.

With a metallic scrape, Corvo yanked the whale oil tank from its socket and blinked down at it as the contents swirled dangerously behind the glass. He had an idea. It was a bad idea. But it seemed to be just the day for those.

He tossed the tank towards the staircase and broke into a desperate sprint.

The heartbeat in his chest counted down to the explosion along with his frantic footfall. He caught one hand on the door frame to aid in taking a sharp turn. But instead it helped him not to tumble forward when he slammed into someone's solid form.

It felt as if time had slowed down for him. Against all logic there was enough time to look at the man in a red leather coat in front of him — his light grey piercing eyes wide in surprise, grab his lapels into a grip so tight Corvo's knuckles felt like they were about to dislocate, and yank him away from the entrance, spinning them around and slamming him against the wall right next to it. The man opened his mouth, a scowl growing on his features, but whatever he had to say was swallowed by an explosion that shook the marrow in Corvo's bones. They both instinctively curled in response, trying to shield themselves as much as possible, as a ball of fire shot out with an angry roar from the building. 

Through the ringing in his ears, Corvo heard what seemed like quite a large number of people yelling. He couldn't quite make out the words but when he lifted his head and his eyes met the red-coat's, he knew it was time to go.

They both lunged away from the swarm of Watchmen at the same time as if signalled by a starter pistol. They sped down along the street, kicking up clouds of dust and Void knows what else, as a thunder of several gunshots cracked behind them sharply like a whip. A bullet hit the cobble near Corvo's feet and ricocheted away with a high-pitched whistle. He grit his teeth, willing his legs to go faster.

Regardless of how bad the Watch was at aiming, they would eventually get shot if they continued on in a straight line like that.

As if knowing his thoughts precisely, the man at his side yanked him by the arm to the left, nearly throwing him over in the process. Corvo scrambled gracelessly with him towards a narrow, shaded alleyway. It was closed off by a tall brick wall, too tall even for him to Blink on top of, if he had any energy left for that in the first place.

But his companion didn't seem too perturbed by the fact that he was leading them into a corner. Either he had a plan or he was simply insane. Either way, one thing was clear — there was no going back now.

Corvo was about to open his mouth to voice the concern, when a strong, gloved arm pulled him closer to its owner, wrapping itself tightly around his middle.

In the space between a heartbeat and another, an endless sea of whispers like the last breath escaping a hundred souls surrounded him along with a swirl of ash. The sensation of misplacement that followed was familiar in the most unfamiliar way — weightlessness guided by the purpose of another, not his. Then, as the ash parted, the world caught up to him in a wrong angle, wrong space, wrong altitude.

And with a breathless exhale he fell.

The only thing that saved him from landing three stories down in a pile of broken bones and blood on the hard concrete, was the mindless instinct to grab. The old cast iron balcony railing rattled dangerously under his weight, as the gravity almost wrenched his shoulders out of their sockets and his solar plexus hit the outer edge of the stone floor, making him fruitlessly gasp for air with a painful wheeze.

Above him, heavy boots on either side of Corvo's palms, the red-clad man struggled to keep his balance on the balustrade — arms spread wide, attempting to counteract the wobble Corvo was causing. Quickly enough, he regained his footing, jumped back onto the landing, and, having thrown a glance to the mouth of the alley, grabbed the back of Corvo's coat and helped him clamber up and into the building.

With a ruckus equal only to a herd of blood oxen, the stampede of Watchmen turned the corner and ran into the dead-end below, to their surprise, finding it completely empty.

The wave of relief that came over Corvo, as he watched them scramble aimlessly through a dust-covered window, was like a splash of pleasantly cool water. His lungs were burning, all the muscles in his body were screaming with exhaustion, and his head was pounding, but he was alive and he would continue to be, even if the following morning he'd probably regret his continued existence.

A dry barking cough brought his attention back to the person in the room with him — tall and well built, with a narrow face on the side of which was a long scar that disappeared all the way under the collar of his thick white shirt, and armed to the teeth. But most importantly–

"You're Marked," Corvo found himself rasping out with disbelief between the slowing breaths, and cleared his throat. It wasn't a question, the man was just like him. It never even crossed his mind he could meet another blessed by the Outsider. "Who are you?"

"Depends who's asking..." he replied, voice low and husky. His eyes narrowed as he looked over Corvo with a gaze calculating enough to make him irrationally self conscious about his scruffy appearance.

Having lifted his left hand, Corvo slipped his thumb out of the hole in the side of his sweater sleeve, showing off the back of his hand. The Outsider's mark stood stark black like spilled ink on his skin. "A fellow heretic," he supplied with a self-satisfied note in his voice and bent his fingers, willing a flash of turquoise light to highlight the sharp lines.

It reflected in the man's steely eyes but, apart from the most subtle shift in posture that did not escape Corvo, it invoked no reaction whatsoever. Maybe it was best to let him mull the news over for a moment or two. If the gifts of the Leviathan were as rare as he was made to believe, the man was surely as shocked as he was.

With that through, Corvo peered outside again and found only two officers still standing in the alley. The irrelevance of that number let him relax further and he rolled his aching shoulders as he looked around the abandoned flat. It must have been grand once — high ceilings of white stone and wooden flooring with intricate patterns now filled with grime and dust like everything else. Several pieces of furniture were still there; maybe some other treasures could be found too.

"I'm Daud," the Marked finally said dryly, the arms crossed over his chest nearly audible in his words.

Corvo didn't turn to look and continued rifling through the drawers of a water damaged desk. "Just Daud?"

"You're not from around here, are you?"

He froze, fingers just above the splotchy brown surface of a tarnished brass knob. For the second time that day his heart jumped straight to his throat. Was that one innocent question really enough to give away his complete lack of knowledge about Gristol? "You that famous?"

"As much as getting dubbed the 'Knife of Dunwall' warrants," Daud said darkly and leaned his shoulder on the nearby wall, making some loose flakes of plaster and paint fall to the floor.

"Oh, right, I heard about you. Head of the Whalers." Corvo finally reached into the drawer and shuffled the yellowed papers around.

"And you are?" Daud put a bit more stress on that question, clearly getting irked by him avoiding any solid answers.

Nimble fingers pocketed a silver coin from under the papers and, not having found anything more of interest, he turned around to sit on the edge of the dresser. "Attano. Corvo Attano." With his thumb he pushed the leather mask up to rest on the top of his head and rubbed the sweat off his forehead with his sleeve. "Nice to make your acquaintance," he added with a cocky smile.

"Attano," Daud repeated slowly as if trying his name out. "A Serk, huh?"

"Problem?"

"Not at all. I'm from Serkonos myself."

"A little pale for that," Corvo grinned at him smugly from across the room.

Daud raised an eyebrow, the arc of it a sharp angle. "So are you."

"Touché."

In his most recent memory he wasn't — he used to be quite tan, skin sun-kissed with constant running around in the Serkonan heat — but it must have been decades ago, considering how he looked at the present and how the gap between then and now felt nearly endless. A black void of a sudden cliff's edge.

"So, Attano." Corvo's attention snapped back to the assassin as he spoke again. "How long have you been in Dunwall?"

The desk whined underneath him when he shifted, eyeing Daud with narrowed eyes. Something felt off about this. "No offence, but what's it to you?"

"Just curious," he shrugged.

"Aha, sure. Do you show this interest to every person you meet on the street?" Corvo gritted out and got properly back onto his feet, ready to move at any time. Did the man think he was stupid? "Listen, if you want something from me, say it and stop running circles. But, as far as I see it, I saved your skin and you saved mine so we are done here."

"Straight to the point, I can appreciate that." Daud pushed himself off of the wall and half-heartedly dusted off his shoulder. "I want to offer you employment. You've got some skill, and certain other advantages, which I would definitely use among my men."

That caught Corvo completely off guard. "What, you want me to be a Whaler?" he asked incredulously. "Sorry, Knife, but I am no assassin."

"No one said you have to be an assassin. Other positions are available."

It seemed too good to be true. As far as Corvo and many other people of his status were concerned, the looking a gift horse in the mouth saying was a steaming pile of oxen dung. Always question an overly generous gesture because it might turn out that under the surface it isn't one at all.

But despite that, Corvo couldn't stop a spark of hope igniting at the very back of his mind. Having a job, no matter how shady, would not only give him some means to live but also put a sense of structure into the confusing wreck of his life. The Outsider only knows how difficult and terrifying the last month was for him.

Daud graciously let him consider the offer for a good while but when he finally spoke again it was like putting a marble block on the scale. "I can also offer you a safe corner to sleep in and a reliable supply of food."

A ravenous twist of his empty stomach sent Corvo's thoughts to the two heavily bruised apples at the bottom of his bag — his only food. "You got me there..." He exhaled slowly. There shouldn't be any harm in chancing the truth, should there? "Listen, it's not that I'm not willing. I just doubt I would be useful to you."

Confusion clear in the tilt of his head and eyes scanning, Daud questioned on, "How so? You seem capable enough to me."

"What if I told you I can't remember the last fifteen, maybe twenty years of my life?" Corvo asked, throat tighter at the admission than he expected. It occurred to him then that he hadn't told anyone about this before. He hoped it didn't sound too much like a weird excuse. "I doubt I would be useful to you because I don't even know what I can do."

"That's... rough," Daud managed. His grey eyes darkened under a deep frown. He seemed horrified by that concept, in a faraway, concealed way. Or maybe Corvo just wanted him to be.

Corvo laughed mirthlessly, "Yeah, tell me about it... All I've got is the last month and then nothing until I was a kid." His eyes dropped, fingers fidgeting nervously with the edge of his tattered bag.

"We can always find out what you can do. Or put you through training," the assassin offered.

That wasn't a bad concept. He definitely had muscle memory of some skills, like the mark and various sword fighting techniques he doesn't recall knowing in his youth. But it was unexpected how easily the Knife came to accept his affliction. So with a frown of his own he looked the man dead in the eye, challenging. "Excuse my distrust, but you are very... intent on getting me on your side. Why?"

Daud considered his words for a short moment. "You're Marked," he finally said simply. "There are very few of us and those who are alive are very powerful. I would most definitely not want an enemy out of you."

"And that's why you want me under your heel. Makes sense," Corvo thought out loud and immediately winced inwardly. It sounded much more malicious than he intended. Fortunately, Daud didn't seem bothered by that remark.

"You would be under my command, yes, but it's not like I would be able to control you, Attano," he reasoned. "You can leave whenever you want to."

"So what are your conditions?" Corvo asked as if he hadn't decided already.

The corners of Daud's narrow lips curled up in a knowing smile. He was undeniably handsome, in a sharp and dangerous kind of way that either made one's blood freeze or run hot, no in between. With slight amusement Corvo found that he fell under the latter category. There was something exhilarating in being under the scrutiny of those icy, attentive eyes.

We learnt something new about ourselves there, huh?

"The Whalers are more of an organised force compared to other gangs — everyone has their own function and a strict hierarchy is in place. As such, I would expect you to follow my orders and those of the ones above you." When Daud began moving in his direction with leisurely steps, one arm behind his back and the other gesturing loosely as he talked, Corvo straightened his back instinctively. With eerie ease he felt himself slip into the alert stiffness he could expect from Watchmen during an official briefing. "To trust you with our secrets, I need your loyalty. But as I said, you can quit at your discretion. Preferably by telling me, otherwise it might so happen that you could be considered a traitor and hunted for sport." The last words were accompanied by a dark glint in the master assassin's eyes. That was not an empty threat.

None of what he was asking for was unreasonable, Corvo had to admit. And considering he wouldn't be forced into killing people, it seemed like a great deal all around. Then again, casting his mind back to the officers he blew up — probably gravely injured, if not dead due to his actions — didn't fill him with too much remorse, so maybe they could make an assassin out of him still.

Lightly, he tapped the heel of his boot on the wooden panelling several times, rolling all of it over in his head for the last time. Then on a long exhale he said, "Alright. I'm all yours."

[gunnerpalace]

It is Time to Kill The Common Understanding of the Dome of Las Noches Fight Once and for All

I’ve been thinking about @starrdustcrusader​‘s post making fun of BBS’s interpretation of Full Hollow Ichigo, and while it is very good and covers a lot, I felt that I had something further to add. Please go read that post first so you are on the same page.

I also invite you to go read chapter 350, The Lust 4, and the next few chapters as well.

Now, like I said, the post in question does a very good job of pointing out what’s happening here: Full Hollow Ichigo has less than zero concern for Uryuu or Orihime. He is not interested in protecting them whatsoever. Indeed, he directly attempts to kill Uryuu, with that attack being very likely to kill Orihime as well. It is only stopped by Ulquiorra’s intervention.

And why did Ichigo attack Uryuu? Because he was a threat.

When you are doing dispassionate threat analysis, whether that be tactical or strategic, when you are thinking with an essentially military mindset, motive stops really mattering, because it cannot be taken for granted. What matters is capability. What someone says their intentions are, or what their intentions seem to be, often matter less from this perspective than what they can do, or are doing.

What is Uryuu doing in this fight? He is interfering with Full Hollow Ichigo killing Ulquiorra. And that is Full Hollow Ichigo's only goal. Thus, Uryuu is an enemy and is also to be killed.

And so is Orihime (if “merely” as collateral damage).

It's that simple. This is again pointed out in the original post. In the same way that Ulquiorra earlier said to Ichigo that, "Killing you is synonymous with protecting Las Noches," killing Uryuu and Orihime at this point is synonymous with “protecting,” because they are in the way and are actively impeding the mission. (”Protecting” what? We’ll come back to that.)

I haven’t said anything new yet, now have I? So let’s get to that.

Here is Orihime demonstrating several flavors of hubris, and also completing failing to do anything to save Uryuu from his imminent demise. What do I mean? Well, let’s take apart her statements:

“Because I said that, Kurosaki-kun is trying to help me.” This is an assumption on her part, and it is wrong.

“I trained because I didn’t want to be a burden to him.” Mind you, she also says this in both the Xcution and TYBW arcs, and is a burden and fails in both as well (the infamous ”Why am I crying?” and “Her shield didn’t work” moments). This should have been a learning moment for her and it was not.

“I came here because I wanted to protect him.” There are other meta posts that detail the selfishness of Orihime’s actions in Hueco Mundo and in general. I would also like to point out that this was also her exact same logic in going to Soul Society. She didn’t learn anything from that experience either.

“So why? Why at the very end did I depend on him?” A great question. One that she never truthfully owns up to, given (2). But there was a reason Kisuke told her to stay out of the war. You may recall Rukia's statement to Orihime in chapter 228, Don't Look Back, that "In a battle, the ones who get in the way are not the ones that lack power, but the ones that lack resolve." She went on to say "Of all the battles in Soul Society, no one was a burden to anyone else. Not Ichigo, nor Sado, nor Ishida, and neither were you, Inoue. If any of you were less than who you are, I wouldn't be where I am today." This was very charitable of Rukia, because Orihime's contribution to her rescue was negligible and was, to reiterate, not why she was even there. Furthermore, Orihime didn't listen to her here either: she is once again demonstrating a lack of resolve, as she will continue to.

So Orihime doesn’t learn. Great. But maybe you’re thinking about (1). What do I mean she was wrong? I mean, doesn’t the manga confirm she’s right?

This is the crux of that argument. And this is also one of the cruxes of IchiHime as a whole. The thing is... it’s complete and utter bullshit.

This is the exact same scene in the original Japanese:

Now, I don’t speak or read Japanese very well at all. I’m still a novice at it. What I can do, however, is use optical character recognition and translation tools.

(よ)呼んでる - Yonderu - Calling

(よ)呼んでるんだ - Yonderunda - They’re calling

(き) 聞 こえる -  Kikoeru - I can hear

(た)立てよ - Tateyo - Stand up

(た)立 て - Tate - Stand

(おれ)俺が - Ore ga - I will

(おれ)俺が - Ore ga - I will

俺が護る - Ore ga mamoru - I will protect

(The parentheticals are furigana used as a pronunciation guide.)

Now do you see a single instance of “her” or “she” in this dialogue, particularly when it comes to the final line of “I will protect”? No, you don’t. Because it’s not there. It was never there until a biased translator inserted it into the dialogue. I’m not alone in this analysis, by the way.

Quite some time ago, @kodoku-no-maria​​ did a wonderful analysis about Ichigo’s instincts (”Mistranslations that Created the IH Fandom”) that also covered this (using anime quotes instead) and came to a similar conclusion. It’s a great post and you should read it. 

This isn’t the post she mentions in hers, but there is one done specifically of the manga by a deactivated account. You should read this post too. (This also notes other things, such as how Orihime says “Help, Kurosaki-kun!” and not “Help me, Kurosaki-kun!” so we can take it that the Mangastream / Mangareader English translation is just generally dodgy all around at this point. Which may well impact the points I made above about Orihime’s character; but I think given the events of the Xcution and TYBW arcs that it is evident she did not in fact learn anything, so I will stand by the basic thrust of them.)

Okay, so I’ve marshaled my evidence on the battle and provided corroborating analysis. (I have also reblogged all three of these posts because they’re good, although the links are to the original sources or as close to them as I could get.) 

Ichigo didn’t turn into Full Hollow Ichigo because of Orihime. She had nothing to really do with it. Great. So what?

Well, let’s now move on to my theory.

Now, you might be thinking that it is fairly obvious that all of those lines are Ichigo’s inner monologue. But I don’t think it’s so obvious. In fact, I would suggest to you that it is actually a dialogue.

On the second page, with the third panel, it suddenly zooms in to the wound in Ichigo’s torso. This notably later becomes Full Hollow Ichigo’s Hollow hole. You notice here the dialogue changes, from commands (e.g., “Stand”) to personal pronouns (e.g., “I”).

I would submit to you that the first three lines are Ichigo’s. But I don’t think the last five are. I think they belong to two other entities. Especially the last three. First, let me steal two of Maria’s highlighted panels to make a point:

So who is talking? It’s simple:

Do you really think it’s a coincidence that Zangetsu (Hollow Zangetsu) shows up wearing the exact same outfit as ‘Full Hollow Ichigo’ after Tensa Zangetsu gives a speech about how:

I don’t think so. Ichigo "fell into despair and halted [his] progress" and Zangetsu, as 'Full Hollow Ichigo' is "the "source of [his] despair." (This is the same despair that Rukia noticed when Ichigo came down from the top of the dome to confront Yammy.) As has been previously pointed out in the linked posts, we see this despair on the dome after Ulquiorra’s defeat in Ichigo’s attitude. Starrdust covered these, but let’s go over them again:

He’s doesn’t seem all that shocked or concerned here, to be honest.

He’s a lot more shocked at what he did to Uryuu.

But the thing that really gets him is that he’s gone and killed Ulquiorra. That’s his despair.

This is the first time he’s out and out killed somebody. (And yeah, Ulquiorra is dead because he had his bits vaporized with a cero, not purified.)

He finally has to learn this isn’t all fun and games, that you can’t turn everyone to your side and redeem them and be friends with them afterward, as he did with Ikkaku, Renji, Kenpachi, Byakuya, and even to an extent Dordoni and Grimmjow. This is exactly what Dordoni was warning him about. This is the lesson he will be forced to learn again after weakening Aizen long enough for Kisuke’s kidou to work on him.

And it is why later, his determination to “save everyone” in the Xcution arc by cutting Ginjou down and killing him (even if he turns into a Plus as revealed in TYBW, undermining the whole symbolic importance of the act) is a big deal for his character development, and one of the few redeeming aspects of that arc: it shows that Ichigo learned a lesson from this fight: sometimes to protect you have to kill.

And who taught him that lesson? Zangetsu.

Who was speaking in the 4th and 5th lines in that transformation sequence? My bet is “Zangetsu” (Quincy Zangetsu) or Tensa Zangetsu. And who was speaking in the 6th, 7th, and 8th lines? Zangetsu.

What was Zangetsu protecting? Ichigo. That’s his instinct. That’s all he cares about protecting, just like Tensa Zangetsu. He sure the fuck wasn’t protecting Orihime or Uryuu. And the mask of ‘Full Hollow Ichigo’ is there to protect those instincts. And the mindless rage of ‘Full Hollow Ichigo’ is Zangetsu’s rage at Ulquiorra for trying to kill Ichigo.

We of course know from much later, in TYBW, that zanpakutou spirits aren’t some separate entity from the wielder, but are the wielder (hence why we go from “The Blade and Me” to “The Blade IS Me”) which Ichigo will affirm in the reforging of his into the “two Zangetsus.” So this can ultimately be read as self-preservation instinct. These are the aspects of Ichigo that were willing to do what he himself consciously wouldn’t in order to stay alive.

(Also, Uryuu was an idiot and wrong to stop Zangetsu as Ulquiorra still clearly constituted a threat, so he frankly got what he deserved, if a bit harshly.)

In summary, not only did the fight above the dome in Las Noches not have anything to do with protecting Orihime, but it was entirely about Ichigo’s character development and relations with the personifications of his powers, and everyone has been reading it completely fucking wrong for years and years.

If you don’t know, now you know.

[sylaesschasewind]

Return to Icecrown

The broken sky made her shudder.

Maybe it was her own sickness coming to weigh in, but the sight of it sawed against the last nerves she had that weren’t frayed. A number that was becoming remarkably few.

Sylaess had returned to Acherus--and summarily Icecrown. The dread twisted her stomach, but there wasn’t anything left to expunge. 

Her dignity wasn’t really much of a concern any more. Not here. The Argent Crusaders could look her sideways all they wished. The Acherian simply tugged her cloak tighter in the wind. Luckily it hadn’t managed to rip her hood off just yet. 

Armour creaked. 

“...How has it come back to fighting the Scourge?” 

The wind carried her words away. Tearing at the silk banners on the parapets behind them.

Her eyes drew back to the sky.

“Argonas, I don’t... know what to do.”

She felt tinier than a child. This was way out of her league. 

“First things first.”

A familiar voice approached from behind the Kaldorei, her Draenic accent - while lighter than most - unable to disguise her. Not that Avehi was very subtle to begin with. She stepped out, crystalline hammer slung over her plated shoulder, and stood beside Sylaess.

“Getting these stray Scourge under control is the immediate concern. Then… we stop whatever those things are.”

She pointed up towards the ominous sky; specifically for a winged creature resembling a val’kyr, flying high up against shattered veil. They were few, but clearly not of this world.

“Just like old times, yes?”

She blew out a long-held breath, hoping to scrape up some semblance of that confidence that Avehi displayed.

Who knew if it worked.

“Something like that.” 

Inky eyes fell back on the glacial valley teeming with Scourge once again. An odd sense of been-here-done-this. It left her feeling disgruntled. She knew Avehi, and all at once, she did not. There were alarmingly massive gaps in her memory.

The lanky elf stepped forward on the crunchy snow. Did her best to ignore the broken sky and orange hue. Shuddered anyway.

“What have you got figured out, then?”

“She did this.” Avehi replied, venom in her tone. “She shattered the Helm of Dominion, and the veil shattered with it. Her ties to the Shadowlands run deeper than we thought…”

She grunted, following Sylaess out into the frozen wastes, leaving her own prints alongside the elf’s. Her tone and demeanor both were that of someone who took this all personally. Avehi had long been trying to unravel the mysteries of what was happening beyond the veil. But clearly, she figured it out too late.

“The Four have Him. The Highlord.” she informed her Kaldorei friend. “He’ll know more. For now, we defend.”

She stopped, eyeing Sylaess over as if to assess her. The last time they spoke didn’t instill an abundance of confidence. But seeing that she kept her word here and now was… pleasant. She nodded in appreciation of that fact.

“I’m glad you’re here.”

Syl blinked a moment, but didn’t respond. Didn’t know how. Stared at the crystalline hammer a moment.

But it didn’t really matter in the end.

Her head snapped up, the hair on the back of her neck rising. “Sentries.” She pulled a single blade from the pair on her back. Turning a slow circle. Steady. Had she heard them?

The shadowy gargoyles came at them fast from above. Not the valkyr like monsters they’d spoken of, but a remnant of the Scourge. 

“Seven?--no, eight.” 

They were clever, flying in a disorienting pattern. Weaving. Sylaess set her feet and waited for the first to dive.

Avehi eyed them, hammer already drawn and ready. It was odd; no panic or wariness overcame her, only a familiar, practiced anticipation. Excitement, almost. She’d done this thousands of times, both in life and in death. She watched them eagerly as they descended in pairs-- two at a time, for each Avehi and Sylaess. For all the seemingly random circling, they dove in well-coordinated unison.

The two for Avehi dove in a shadow pattern, with one behind the other. She smirked, reaching up to tug the far one down swiftly with a shadowy grip. The gargoyle screeched, crashing into its formation partner to cause them both to plummet down into the snowy fields below. Avehi readied, hefting her hammer up in an arc, then bringing it down atop the two unholy beasts as they crashed into the ground. They shattered like brittle glass beneath the force of her hammer, reverting to mere rock chunks in the frozen wastes. She readied her hammer again for the next wave.

Sylaess met the first sentry with an easily fluid motion. A side-step, sweep of blade and it went tumbling aside. Blood gouted from the severed wing in an arc. 

She threw her left hand out as a counter balance. Light steps. A twist, and the second one blundered into her armored shoulder. Took the grace out of the dance. Her torso jerked back as she brought her blade to bear in a high guard.

In time for the rest to set down upon them. 

It was dream-like. Or like being under water. She found no joy, no rush. No exultant flow of sustaining power. 

Breathe out. Step, slash. Move.

Dispatched the second with a quick thrust. Kicked it off the end of her single blade. The third and fourth were already on top of her--she had no idea how Avehi was doing, but she wasn’t remotely worried for either of their sakes. Just concentrated.

A yank at her cloak had her reeling on a heel as one settled for trying to rip her face off. Silver arc blur of motion from her sword--a pair of clawed hands went tumbling aside. Sylaess shifted her weight, pulling forward on her cloak hard. Enough to bring the sentry along. Fell back hard into the stony creature. A gauntlet came up to remove the clasp of her cloak and she spun away from the tangled creature enough to stab through her cloak and into its head cleanly. The sight of it broke the disconnect. Drew out a weary sigh. “...Fuck you, I liked that coat.”

The lack of cloak meant her head was exposed. The skin on her face had been drawn tight. Withered. The scar was there, but her eyes looked like shining black gems in their hollow sockets. Her lips were cracked, nose healed roughly straight but damn. There’d been some mileage. Damage done. She really did end up looking two steps on the other side of the grave after her last fiasco.

The final two gargoyles swept in from either side of the Draenei; a coordinated pincer maneuver. These weren’t the most mindless of Scourge, but still rather short-sighted in their tactics. As they swooped in, Avehi lowered her hammer in a feigned low guard… but her icy gauntlet clung the hilt firmly. She waited, patiently, as the monstrosities drew closer…

*CRA-CRACK!*

In a precisely timed retaliation, Avehi quickly spun on one hoof, hammer crashing into one and then the other in rapid succession. The gargoyles were knocked back, falling in heaps along the frozen ground. They flailed, attempting to get back up in a hurry-- but one was too slow. The Draenei had already moved in, leapt up, and brought her hammer down to crush the monster’s head. The other, however, managed to get airborne once more. With a screech, it dashed for Avehi as her back was turned, clawed feet gripping her shoulders! It flapped its wings furiously, lifting the Draenei up into the air. 

Avehi grunted in frustration, reaching up to hit and claw at the monster in an attempt to break its grip. Both hands found purchase on one leg. Channeling her unholy strength, Avehi pried the gargoyle’s leg apart, snapping it clean in half! The monster screeched, its wing flapping slowing considerably-- enough to gently descend with its would-be prey back to the ground. Once her hooves met snow again. She tugged hard and slammed the gargoyle into the snow. Quickly, and mercilessly, she followed up by stomping her hoof into the beast’s chest. Once, twice, enough to crack and shatter it at its midsection. She grunted once more, as she hefted her hammer back over her shoulder.

“Are you well?” she asked, turning to Sylaess.

One smooth turn and the sentry that had tried for her face was lighter by a head.

Put that single silver blade away. Weary, wired. The hunger would never be sated. She grunted and extricated her cloak from the stony corpse. Sighed again at the new hole in the side of it that she stuck her fingers through. 

“I’ll continue to scrape my ass along.” 

A quick glance cut at Avehi. “Are you ok?”

“I endure.” came the Draenei’s cursory response. “More will come. Friend and foe alike.”

She motioned up to the necropolis, hovering ominously over the frozen wastes far behind them. Similar gargoyle waves had begun harassing Acherus, warded off by Knights on skeletal gryphons and frost wyrms easily enough. But only a handful of Knights like Avehi and Sylaess were on the ground, protecting the encampment on the ground. The liaison camp between the Ebon Blade and the resurgent Argent Crusade forces.

“The word has reached Alliance and Horde both, I hear. We’ll see what the living manage to send.”

“If they manage.”

The wind howled again, muting her words. She shook her head, letting her eyes rise to the gaping wound in the sky. Her shoulders slumped back, bearing some unknown weight. 

“How the fuck do we fix this?” 

It was self-directed. Bleak.

“I’m... glad to have you near, Avehi.” Softly. She was, truly, but there was no deeper knowledge of why. Nothing substantial left in her memory of their relationship. Had they known each other long? The investigation would need to be done carefully. Her chest felt tight with the level of unknowns she was staring down when she eyed the carefully manicured draenei.

“I’m glad you decided to join me here.” Avehi returned the sentiment, remembering well their shared history. “I feel, one way or another, we’ll find the answer to that question by the end of… whatever this is.”

She motioned vaguely to… everything. The restless Scourge, the shattered sky, the congregation of forces rallying. Not since the march on Icecrown Citadel had this place been so tumultuous. Avehi feared whatever was happening here fell in that same vein of severity. But it was better, strangely, back then. At least then, she knew what had to be done. No one had such luxury now.

“Come, let’s return to the camp.” she suggested, turning back that way herself. “Others aren’t as skilled as we are. They’ll need our help, surely.”

Her lips curled to a smirk as she glanced over her shoulder-- prideful, perhaps? Unabashed, all the same. It was strange, even to her, where she drew excitement these days. Dismal as it seemed, she seemed… excited to face the challenge. Perhaps because she saw it coming so long ago. Even though she found no immediate solution, nor managed to prevent it… her work over the last few months had been in preparation for this. This sky-shattering. This tear in the veil. Others who had opposed her now came to fight at her side. It was satisfying.

Vindicating.

Sylaess just nodded mutely while she replaced her ragged cloak and pulled the hood up. Though she managed to not clutch the lined inside of her cloak, she hid the tremors in her nearly skeletal hands with the folds of it.

It wasn’t going to get easier. But she had made the choices to bring herself into this situation. The lack of chaotic Old God blessing left her struggling on the surface of some unknown ocean. Absently, she wondered about the void elf and his journey out of this. Did he truly make it, or had she hallucinated that, too? 

Some of Avehi’s confidence seemed to buoy her out of the worst of it. She leaned into that mentally like a crutch. 

One step at a time, Syl. Move.

[currentlyreadingmanga]

Toilet-bound Hanako-kun Chapter 19: Mitsuba (Part 2)

Previously: we started a new arc! We shifted the focus to Kou and his new ghost friend, Mitsuba. He’s a new-ish ghost and not at all what I expected (but I’m honestly kinda living for it). Together they’re trying to work out what Mitsuba’s unfinished business is so he can move on. They seem to work well together (in a very chaotic type of way). It started out very cute and then it got real angsty real fast, and I suspect it’s only gonna get worse this chapter :)) I can’t wait :)))

Now onto the next chapter!

You know when you say you’re gonna upload more regularly but then life happens and you get sick (AGAIN)........yeah, don’t know what that’s like or anything……..sigh

Anyway, time to finally keep going with the feels train from last chapter. And omfg

Only the first page and I’m already feeling all the feelings ;n; Look at them!! They were so precious! I know it’s not rare for people to stop being friends when they change classes but still :C

He’s saying that he tried to reach out to everyone he considered a friend but none of them recognized him. I know I said it last chapter but god, this is so heartbreaking, this poor child. Kou looks speechless, and I can’t say I blame him, it’s a lot to unpack.

Awwww baby he was bullied in elementary school for “looking like a girl” and being “cocky” :( I know not everyone is like that, but people like these are the reason I was so glad to be over with high school (not elementary school because I went to school with basically the same people since I was five). Kids can be so unnecessarily mean :/

Ah, okay. So when he started middle school, he decided to change things up.

Oh, sweetheart ;; He tried, he tried so hard because he just wanted to have friends and be happy but it backfired. I can’t even imagine how that must have felt. Like, what was the point of locking away his true self if no one cared about him either way? “A boring guy who barely stands out from the background” I really resonate with this line (and I’m sure a lot of people do as well). I’m quite shy nowadays but I was extremely shy when I was younger; I only really had two close friends in class (they’re thankfully two of my best friends to this day) and I knew everyone else didn’t particularly cared about me unless they needed something. I didn’t really get bullied but I was made fun of a few times because I was a bit overweight, and that, inaddition to my anxiety, really dealt a blow to my self-esteem. I only started to really open up during my second year of college when I met a lot of people who had interests and personalities similar to mine. What I’m trying to say with all this is that it can take a really long time for you to be comfortable in your own skin and to be comfortable sharing who you are and what you enjoy; hell, I still have a hard time doing it. But it gets better, even if it doesn’t seem like it will, it does, and it breaks my heart to see that Mitsuba didn’t get the chance to experience that, that he didn’t get the chance to find friends that loved him for who he was when he was still alive.... Oof, okay, that got sad fast. Let’s keep reading.

In his own clumsy way, I think he’s trying to lift Mitsuba’s spirits. Since he’s one of the people who forgot about him, he probably feels guilty, so this is his way of saying “I didn’t remember the fake you, but I will do my damn best to remember the real you and I’ll let the others know as well”. And yeah, it’s brash, but I like it, I see it as a way of preserving Mitsuba’s actual memory, who he really was and not the persona that just made him unhappy.

Ah, good, he apologized for not remembering him and he also explains that the reason he didn’t recognize him was because he was so different from when they first met. Fair tbh, there’s quite a gap between the seemingly soft spoken boy and Mitsuba’s actual teasing nature and colorful vocabulary.

Kou is such a good kid. Like, I know Mitsuba is already dead but I’m so glad someone told him this. And hey, it could help him move on as well. OH! HANG ON. Okay, so, Mitsuba said that he thinks his regret has something to do with taking a picture he couldn’t when he was alive, right? If we take into consideration what we’ve learned so far, it seems like Mitsuba’s biggest regret centers around the fact that he couldn’t form long-lasting friendships. So like, is the picture he wanted to take one with his friends?? Because that’s- that’s so sad but also so sweet I think I could cry. Kou, in his own way, tells him that he’s a pretty alright guy and Mitsuba says “a lot of good that does me now” but hey, it actually does, because I think he really needed to hear that.

Ahhhhhh Mitsuba asks him if they could have been friends if he were still alive. Of course you could have, sweetie! Come on, Kou, tell him!

ಥ‿ಥ ಥ‿ಥ ಥ‿ಥ ಥ‿ಥ ಥ‿ಥ ಥ‿ಥ

He’s taking a picture of Kou!!!!!!!

(TдT)(TдT)(TдT) my heart oh my god I love them so much look at these babies.

Kou is being oblivious but Mitsuba tells him not to worry about it and that he thinks that once they develop the pictures, he’ll be able to move on ;; (Or at least I think that’s what he means.) 

(⚆.⚆) (⚆.⚆)

(;;⚆_⚆) Oh…………..there he is……..oh dear

But ALSO, hello?? do they know each other?? how? when??? (also imo the stylistic choice of making that speech bubble black is incredibly effective because you can just feel the malice behind it)

Oh, I’m so glad that Kou realized so fast that he isn’t Hanako. Like, yeah, the clothes are a big help but I feel like this boy’s aura is so different from Hanako’s (well, from regular Hanako, since he does have some moments when he smiles creepily).

Σ(ﾟДﾟ|||)  (ﾟдﾟ；)  Σ(ﾟДﾟ|||) HOLY FUCKING SHIT W H A T

What is he doing???? what??? did he like, kill him off, like, for good??? wha   t????

Σ(ﾟДﾟ|||) Σ(ﾟДﾟ|||) Σ(ﾟДﾟ|||) OH GOD, IT KEEPS GETTING WORSE

………………….oh? So he does work as a “Hanako-kun” like Amane? That’s interesting because when I first came up with that I thought it would be possible if “Hanako-kun” was one spirit that split itself depending on who summoned him. But now that I know that he’s actually Amane’s twin, I have to wonder how and why did this happen. Like, why is it that both of them ended up with this role? Is it because they are twins and since they look the same the rumors then would consider them to be just one entity?

Mitsuba’s wish was “I want to stay in everyone’s memories” and I just ;;;;;;;;

(ﾟдﾟ；) (ﾟдﾟ；) (ﾟдﾟ；)

First: please let the child go omfg. Second: that’s not your decision to make. If Mitsuba thinks that having Kou remember him is enough, then that’s it, there’s nothing more to argue. And I repeat: ple a se let go of the child. Why is he trying to interfere? Like, yes, Hanako helped Yashiro as much as he could when she made her wish(es), but he only kept interfering because she still wasn’t happy with the outcome. Mitsuba seems to be okay with it, so he shouldn’t have a reason to meddle.

“Don’t you lay a hand on my friend!!” I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: Kou is such a good kid, we don’t deserve him. But also he’s being reckless and it fills me with worry ;;

Ohhhhhhh okay. I didn’t consider that before. Whether Hanako could only grant wishes to living people or not, I mean. I assumed he did, so it’s interesting to know that there’s someone who can grant the wishes of the dead. That brings up a couple of questions, though. Like, what are the limits of his powers? What does he take in exchange? Are the wishes of the dead similar to Mitsuba’s or do they have a bigger range? Is any spirit able to summon him or are there restrictions like in Amane’s case (even if we still don’t know what the conditions for summoning him are yet)? Also, again, it seems like he’s more “pushy” than Amane is in regard to his wish granting.

…...oh, oh no. they’re gonna forcefully change his rumor so that his wish comes true (even though Mitsuba was happy before and ghost boy here doesn’t like to listen to other opinions, apparently)

[also now I feel really bad about the crooked man joke I made last chapter. I didn’t think it would come back to bite me in the ass like this;;]

Oh god, that’s some horrifying imagery. There’s nothing gruesome but the way that it’s drawn conveys the despair he’s feeling so well.

“If you can’t tell him his name then he’ll break your neck to make you look like him” jfc that’s just cruel ;; to turn his sincere and desperate wish into a weapon, to turn him into a mindless weapon (because we know that he’s gonna have to do it unless Yashiro is able to change it or unless Hanako takes matters into his own hands). Also it just hit me that Mitsuba is not dead dead so like, why the fuck did Hanako n°2 put a hole in his chest???? what was the point?? just to be a piece of shit?

…………………..I-

Yes. that, same. Wh-what the fuck

OH! Haku-joudai went to report to Hanako what happened! Oh boy, oh dear. He looked shocked and slightly afraid and I’m :)) terrified :)))

So, he’s on the side of chaos, basically. Like, he clearly does whatever the fuck he wants, and he wants complete and total freedom to do so, without a care about how that might affect others. Lovely :))))

[angel-e-v-a]

AM I THE ONLY MAN OUT HERE IN THIS WORLD WHO REALLY THINKS THEY SCREWED LUCIFER'S CHARACTER IN HIS LAST SEASON... like i know it's basically irrational to hope for good character writing in spn but FUCK dude they had a whole thing of subverting expectations with his characters, about him not lying, about him burning cold and needing consent, etc, while still having him be an effective villain. and then they scrapped so much of it in his later appearances.... anyways i wish he had a good arc

You’re 💯 percent right!!!

I mean, come on man, they turned him from a terrifying and suave villain (not even a villain actually, just an extremely pissed of victim) he was in season 5 to a comic relief and mindless ball of rage he was in the last seasons. 

It came to the point where I kept loving his character only on the account of Mark playing him, and well, the fact that I simply don’t give up on characters I grew fond of during the course of the story just because they changed. 

Yeah, I know the character change can be explained with the following: he burst after being caged again, gave up trying to be normal, etc. but still, so many plot holes you have to fill for yourself. Sure, fan-theories are good, but when you have to fill an entire arc with theories just for it to make even an ounce of sense, what’s the point in that?

And what they did in the last season was an outrage. I’m not pissed they didn’t give him a redemption arc. I don’t care he’s evil, I fell in love with him when he wanted to burn down the entire human population, I didn’t need him to become a goody-two shoes, but I hate the fact they gave us Jack as the hope that he could at least tone down a notch, not for others, but for his own sake, for his happiness, only to ditch all that effort they put into the story-line and make him try to off Jack in the end.

Also, what few mentions of him they gave us in season 14, totally crushed what knowledge we had of him from seasons past. The way Abraxas described they were chosing him a vessel? Man, that makes no sense at all, damn it, throwing darts at a phone book, that’s what we as drunken teenagers did when we tried to choose who to prank call once we got our first postpaid mobile number. Surely a devil would know better. Besides, wouldn’t that prove absolutely useless, seeing as most normal people burn from holding him instantly, like we saw in season 12?

Anyhow, I still hoped he could come back, because I just wanted him to make everything right for himself, and was bloody week-long tears when it failed. At this point, I’d rather have him stay dead (though I’d still wish more than anything for them to bring him back and reconcile him with his family) than seeing him tortured anymore, since they don’t wanna try and give him a normal arc..

Because I want to remember him as what Kripke made him to be, composed and highly intelligent angel, ruthless but sympathetic, someone who cared for his vessels, someone who felt sorry for Nick and actually loved Sam and wanted to give him everything. Someone who wanted a meaningful revenge because he was wronged, someone who cried over his brother, someone who was prideful not someone who tried to murder his own son, someone who resorted to childish games and allowed a demon like Crowley to humiliate him around.

Sorry for this wall of text, anon, but damn, I’ll never get over what they did to my precious, beloved baby, and it shows.  😭 💔 😭 💔 😭 💔 😭 💔 😭

[rebelsofshield]

Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order-Review

Respawn Entertainment breaks an over decades long curse and delivers a phenomenal, if rough around the edges, Star Wars experience.

(Review contains minor spoilers)

Cal Kestis (Cameron Monaghan) is a Jedi survivor of Order 66. Having survived the traumatic first stage of the Jedi Purge, Cal has spent the last several years on the fringes of the galaxy, keeping his head down and avoiding detection by the Imperial warmachine and their fearsome enforcers. However, when Cal uses his Force powers to save a friend in danger, he draws attention to his relatively normal life and he is soon once again on the run from the Imperial Inquisitorius. Luckily, he is found by two other renegades, former Jedi Cere Junda (Debra Wilson) and crotchety ship captain Dreez Gritus (Daniel Roebuck), and offered safe harbor. It comes with a catch though. Cere needs Cal to unlock the secrets of a potential list of new Jedi hidden by her former master, Eno Cordova, and scattered throughout the galaxy. Cal and Cere have their own secrets though and a deadly Inquisitor follows them at every step.

It’s been a long time since there has been a good Star Wars video game. At least, a single player experience that rewards with story in addition to gameplay and visuals. This decade has already been pretty sparse in offerings after the comparatively abundant 00’s, but even more so for those hoping for some kind of narrative from their gaming trips into the galaxy far, far away. Sure, 2017’s Battlefront II offered a short and deeply flawed campaign, but for anything more substantial we would have to look back to 2011’s The Old Republic MMO or 2010’s sloppy sequel to The Force Unleashed. For a franchise that offered some of the best experiences in the action adventure genre several generations ago, Star Wars was struggling to make its mark in this medium even with the pure abundance of film, comics, books, and TV offered each year.

Luckily, Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order is a success. It’s a profoundly satisfying experience for Star Wars fans in addition to just being a rewarding and joyful gameplay experience. It may not be perfect, and it is certainly rough around the edges, but Respawn Entertainment has created a Star Wars experience that is among the best out there.

Much of this comes from Fallen Order’s outstanding narrative and story direction. Game director Stig Asmussen and narrative lead Aaron Contreras have spun a Star Wars tale populated by endearing and compelling characters, filled with interesting mysteries, and even populated by a few trademark Star Wars twists.

Cal Kestis, despite his profoundly bland character design, quickly establishes himself as an engaging protagonist and player stand in. Due in large part to Monaghan’s performance and a strong direction, Cal is a character that has experienced world shattering trauma, but is still fundamentally good hearted and courageous. Much of Cal’s arc becomes one of finding purpose in a new, much darker, world while also coming to terms with the violent events of his own past.

Trauma and its effect on a cast of people trying to survive a cultural genocide is a major theme of Fallen Order throughout. The majority of its central characters, light and dark, are survivors of the climactic events at the end of The Clone Wars and their methods of coping often end up shaping their personal narratives but also the trajectory of the plot. Of these, Cere proves to be the most compelling. Played with incredible nuance by Wilson, Cere is an atypical Jedi mentor that wishes to guide the future generations of the Force, but is just as often plagued by her own trauma, which frequently manifests in ways that are unhelpful or potentially dangerous to her pupil. Her journey at times even eclipses Cal’s and is frequently filled with moments of triumph and great sorrow.

Despite its male protagonist, Fallen Order is filled with a cast of compelling and dynamic women characters with Cere just being one of the most notable. The game’s primary antagonist, The Second Sister, has a tragic story of her own, which slowly changes and recontexualizes the events of the game as the story continues. Most fun however proves to be a surprising late addition to Fallen Order’s party of protagonists who adds a fun wrinkle to an extended part of the Star Wars mythology.

Any discussion of the game’s characters wouldn’t be complete without the endlessly endearing BD-1. The best droid companion this side of BB-8, BD-1 in typical Star Wars fashion is equal parts friend and McGuffin, and is often key to some of the game’s best story telling moments.

Fallen Order’s narrative direction is often its best tool. Respawn blends gameplay, cut scenes, and interactive exploration to evolve a story that reaches surprisingly affecting emotional beats before headed into one hell of a finale. The fact that Stephen Barton and Gordy Haab have crafted a new Star Wars score that feels a part of the franchise, but also infused with its own themes and identity certainly helps. Cal’s theme is a new classic for the saga and it’s even more infuriating that we don’t have a release for this music a month after launch. It makes for a narrative that is fun to savor, hard to put down, but also lingers far after conclusion. I can’t recall the last time I missed characters this much after putting down a controller and I’m very eager to return to the world that Fallen Order has spun.

Now time for a confession. I have played video games my entire life and I have very fond memories of all kinds of games. I love action adventure games and my most fond gaming memories of the last decade have been from Mass Effect and Uncharted. I’m also very, very bad at them. It may be my dysgraphia, which makes hand eye coordination very difficult, or it may just not be in my skillset, but I often find even the easiest games very difficult.

So when, Fallen Order announced that it would be taking inspiration from notoriously difficult games such as Metroid or Dark Souls, I was suitably worried that it was going to leave my flustered and confused despite really enjoying the adventures of Samus Aran.

What Respawn has done with Jedi: Fallen Order is take key elements and concepts from numerous other games and spin them together in a tight and exciting package. Those familiar with each genre of game are likely to see what Fallen Order does as a considerable pairing down. It ends up being a sort of gameplay smoothie of Uncharted, Dark Souls, and Metroid in an experience that blends all well, but doesn’t come close to being among the best in the genre for any of its many inspirations.

This may sound like a criticism, but for the larger experience that Fallen Order crafts this ends up working to its benefit. The puzzles in its Zelda like temples are never enough to stump you, but encourage you think outside of the box. The climbing and exploration is free flowing and easy to navigate and offers frequent narrative rewards for players that are ambitious enough to explore. The sheer amount of optional locations in Fallen Order is impressive and it’s easy to find yourself falling down amusing rabbit holes that easy could have been blown past on quicker playthroughs. It says something that this is the first game where I’ve actually felt compelled to hit that little 100% complete marker before running for the final boss encounter.

The combat itself is amusingly layered and just technical enough to feel like it takes mastery. Refreshingly, Respawn goes the opposite direction of other recent Star Wars adventure experiences and avoids falling into mindless power fantasy. You won’t be crushing AT-ST’s with waves of telekinesis or leveling rooms with storms of Force Lightning. You are encouraged to treat each combat encounter with the mentality of a vulnerable, if skilled, Jedi. Rushing in blindly will likely get you killed quickly. Measured blocking, dodging, tactical strikes, and creative employment of Force powers is the way to success and it leads to a combat experience that may seem familiar for fans of Souls games, but also feels very in tune with the spirit of the franchise.

Similarly, the leveling system is tied more into emotional discovery and personal acceptance. It avoids making the power system in Fallen Order too much of a gamification of the Force and helps keep the spiritual and emotional aspects intact.

That being said, there is some weirdness to it all. For the amount of effort put into making sure that gameplay matches the feelings of Jedi philosophy and mentality, the fact that murdering rooms full of enemies is often the only way to progress can feel a little jarring. Incorporating some form of stealth or noncombat alternative for certain sections may have been beneficial and even more in keeping with the larger goals of Respawn and Fallen Order’s narrative.

There’s also just a general bugginess to Fallen Order. Enemy AI can behave in ways that are often very strange and counter intuitive to their own survival. Graphical pop ins and oddities are frequent. Powers occasionally don’t work in ways you would expect them to. The environment occasionally drops out and leaves you stranded behind a rock or underneath a pool or puddle. Few of these are game breaking and are often few and far between, but it can be jarring and frustrating when they are appear and often take you out of what is normally a well-crafted experience.

As a whole though, Jedi: Fallen Order may be the best Star Wars gaming experience in a generation. Its heartfelt narrative and smart gameplay make for a strong and frequently stellar experience. It has its problems, but they are hardly enough to discourage from joining Cal and his allies on this adventure. Grab a lightsaber and head on in. It’s a journey worth taking.

Score: A-

[zayneternal]

《 Sunday Is For The Boy 》

summary ↠ Sunday nights are easily your single most favorite time of the whole week. Getting lost in the pages of your favorite book while responsibility is a thing of the past and schedules are to be worried about tomorrow. Jimin coming home early from practice and sleepily demanding your affection only makes this particular Sunday night worth leaning into all the more.

genre ↠ oh the FLUFF member ↠ park jimin warnings ↠ clingy baby word count ↠ 2.9k

moodboard from Pintrest || No request, I’m just feeling uwu soft for Jimin today, so here’s this. It’s pointless and fluffy. Enjoy.

~

Sunday nights.

It’s the solitary time when everything behind you is finally settling itself into the past week, and the events of the upcoming haven’t quite begun. They always feel the most peaceful, the few blissful hours of mindless attention you’re allowed to give to whatever you want always leaving you with a moment’s respite to look forward too amidst the hectic and grueling schedule of this fall semester. The hours of the passing days seem to be continuously eaten by the ravenous jaws of term papers, group projects, and covered shifts at your part time on campus, though you’re not entirely bitter towards your tight slate. 

Having a boyfriend as busy as Jimin makes being someone with too much free time on their hands the equivalent of a wandering beggar, constantly searching for something to fill the vast holes of time he spends at rehearsal, or the even wider gaps of distance he spends running halfway around the world breaking hearts and making history. That’s an alternate reality that you never want to experience, much more content to be worn and weary at the end of each week if only to make these brief moments of rest all the more sweet. You’ve come to quite enjoy being as booked as Jimin: it doesn’t allow near as much time to notice when he’s not there, even at times like this when you know he’s just across the city at the studio, scheduled to be in the country for at least another month before flying off to places unknown once again. 

But these thoughts are far from you at the moment, your eyes gripped between the smoothly inked pages of the book laying in your lap, printed words painting a vivid wall of a world around you, encasing your attentions inside and away from the worries of the week. This is usually how you spend your Sunday’s, raptured by the written word or occasionally sucked into an addicting binge on Netflix that you’ve been dying to finish. The novel currently splayed over your blanketed legs, however, has demanded its finishing since the moment you opened the cover, the characters and plot just too unique and immersive to put down. 

Your fingers fiddle anxiously along the edge of the page, eyes unable to absorb the scene fast enough as you race through the paragraph, itching to turn the leaf and discover who the true identity of the antagonist is. The breath in your chest is audibly quickening, the eloquently drawn descriptions leaving you yearning to read on as the intensely arcing plot draws deaf ears to the sound of the front door swinging open and then shut with a dull bang. 

You’re blindly unaware of the body kicking their shoes off at the door and shrugging their jacket away from the firm shape of shoulders, a taxed sigh passing through parted lips as they do so. Your eyes continue to ski down the slopes of words, eagerly drinking in the last few sentences before the climax--

“Mhh-hm.” The abrupt sound of a throat being cleared to the side of you jolts you away from the story, imaginary walls tumbling down around you as you flit wide eyes from the pages, turning with surprise to find Jimin, weary and hunched, standing just behind the couch. 

“Jimin,” you breathe, relieved yet slightly confused. “Don’t you have rehearsal?” Scrunching your eyebrows, you bend to check the time on your phone, affirming that it’s much earlier than normal for Jimin to be anywhere but the studio.

“Hmmm,” Jimin hums in response, not really confirming or denying your question as he shuffles forward a few steps, stopping instead by the arm of your chair as he looks down at you, blond strands splayed in disarray, flopping loosely across his forehead. You gently fold the corner of your page, closing the cover with minute reluctance as you set it to the side of the armchair.

You look up at Jimin with raised brows for another moment, watching his serenely tired face, washed with the remnants of practice, expecting him to say something in explanation, but nothing comes. Instead, a slow, lopsided grin begins to take shape along the corners of his mouth, smooth face bending from obvious weariness into a placid gloss as he reaches down with one of his soft hands to slip his fingers between yours.

“C’mere,” he mumbles, tugging with enough gentle force to pull your body from the hug of the chair, your sock clad feet shuffling along the floor after him as he yanks you towards the couch, his own solid stature falling easily back against the cushions as you follow suit, left with no choice but to be lead atop his chest. You release a hushed yelp of surprise as you’re pulled against him, his hand leaving yours to instead aid his other in snaking around your waist, his head falling forward into the crook of your neck and shoulder, his plush lips pressing chastely upon the small sliver of skin exposed under your sweater. 

You sigh into his touch, your book long forgotten amidst the arms of your lover as a shy smile fights its way onto your lips, your own head leaning against his. One of your hands raises to run up the curve of his neck, fingers fitting themselves in the mess of his hair while your nails slowly trail along his scalp. A low moan of contentment seeps from Jimin’s throat, vibrating against you as his grip tightens, fingers rubbing over the fabric of your top.

“You don’t have rehearsal?” you decide to ask again, gently against his soft hair, still somehow sweet smelling after all morning at work. He slowly shakes his head into your shoulder, his lips pressing on your skin once more.

“Tae wasn’t feeling well,” he explains unhurriedly, shifting slightly on the cushion to better fit you against him. “We got the rest of the day off.” 

You hum in understanding, nodding as you continue to stroke gentle circles at the nape of his neck. “You didn’t want to go get some sleep at the dorms?” You shift your head to try and get a look at his face, but he only nuzzles further into you, wrapping the full length of his arms around your waist. 

“I wanted to be with you,” he states quietly, his shoulders rising and falling at a sedated pace as your fingers move. You can’t help the baby smile that tugs at your lips, urging you to turn and press them against the crown of Jimin’s head with a lingering kiss, the reciprocating pressure of his embrace sending a warm tingle down your spine. 

“Are you hungry?” you ask after a moment of blithe silence. He shakes his head into your neck, the warmth of his skin brushing yours. 

“Hmmm,” you hum in thought. “Do you want to sleep?” Again, he shakes his head. “Do you want to do anything?” You lightly chuckle down at him, amused by his rooted, baby nature. 

There’s a moment of silence, after which you assume Jimin isn’t planning on answering, so you begin to shift your weight, preparing to move off of him in an attempt to find something to pass the time when Jimin’s arms squeeze you back into his chest, his fingers fisting around the hem of your shirt as his nose nuzzles against the line of your collar bone, cool breath fanning along your skin. “Let’s watch a movie, jagi.” 

“A movie?” you repeat, a little surprised by his odd request. Movies weren’t usually his thing, though at the mention of it, your heart is swelling, movie nights being one of the purest forms of comfort to you. You can’t think of a better way to spend your night in, and the fact that Jimin is asking to willingly participate only makes you warmer. “Okay, we can do that.” 

“Can we watch it in your room?” he asks with the slightest whine in his voice, the end of his words turning up in an endearing and adorable manner that shouldn’t be allowed to come out of those lips. 

You huff with a fond chuckle, pecking against the top of his head one last time. “Sure, babe.” You’re about to slip off of his lap, reaching your feet to the floor when Jimin’s arm is suddenly scooping under the bend of your legs, his other curling around the small of your back as he adeptly rises from the couch carrying you bridal style like it’s nothing to his weary limbs. A squeal escapes your lips as your hands flatten on his chest, steadying yourself from the sudden change of position, your wide eyes flying to Jimin’s to find his face alight with a boyish grin, crescent eyes squinting with delight as he laughs, turning and scampering off down the corridor with you hooked tightly in his arms. 

“Jimin!” you reprimand, your hands holding onto the fabric of his shirt, wrinkling the material between the pressure of your fingers as you bounce along the hall, the bell-like giggles bubbling from Jimin’s chest leaving you dumbfounded as to where this sudden burst of energy has come from. 

He rounds the corner to your bedroom, running into the dimly lit space before lithely tossing you from his arms and onto the plush mattress of the bed, a muted “oof” exhaling from your lungs as you make contact with the pile of decorative pillows. You push yourself up to the headboard, tossing a stray pillow that’s gotten in your way to the floor before you shoot a wide glare at Jimin, blowing a piece of fallen hair from your face.

“What?” he asks innocently, holding his stomach as a myriad of sweetly crafted giggles expels into the room.

“I don’t remember asking to be abducted,” you emphasize, reaching your hands up to stuff your wild strands into a messily wound bun as you roll your eyes. Jimin coos, feigning sympathy as he steps forward to you, his hand outstretched.  

“Aw, is my baby mad at me?” he teases, his bottom lip jutting out with a dramatic pout. You turn your body from him with an indignant huff as his hand reaches for you, his arm stalling mid air as a slow, enamored grin steals away his lips. Suddenly, he’s bounding over the bed, his arms encircling you as he tugs your bodies into the mound of pillows, plush comfort blanketing where he has you captured, his strong grip holding you fast against him. 

“Jimin!” you squeal in surprise, your hands splaying across the planes of his chest as you fight the relentless affection he’s stippling you with, plump pout puckered and peppering feathery kisses all over your face, your cheeks, your forehead, your nose, your jaw, and anywhere else he can reach. 

“I’m sorry, yeobo,” he mewls, pressing his cheek to your hair as he squeezes you against him, your hands locked between the walls of your chests. “Forgive me?” Before you have time to answer, Jimin is back to showering you in kisses, his mouth hovering over every inch of skin above the collar of your sweater, the feel of his smile obvious against your neck as you begin to giggle into his shoulder, the tickling strands of his hair and the ministrations of his lips leaving you a pool of honey laughter. 

“Jimiiiin,” you whine, shuffling in his grip as his laughter begins to softly mix with yours, the sound of it blithe. “Just pick a movie, you idiot.” You eventually manage to wriggle free of his hands and roll away from him, breathing heavily as you lay back against the headboard, watching with a blissful grin as Jimin slides from the bed and wanders to the stand sitting under the hanging TV against the opposite wall. He crouches there, sifting through your collection of various classics, romcoms, horror thrillers, and series, allowing you to admire the natural beauty of him for a quiet moment, grinning lopsidedly as his sweet face turns to hold up different selections, asking for your approval.

Eventually, you both decide on an old favorite of yours, an easy going comedy with an equally interesting plot, and Jimin slides it into the player, waiting for the beginning previews to appear before he turns and races back to the bed. Just before he makes a move to get in, however, he shifts and reaches for the bottom drawer of your dresser where he knows a few of his clothing items are stored for nights just like this one. He yanks out a darkly colored fabric before he begins changing. 

The previews momentarily forgotten, your wandering eyes turn with your body to the side to watch as Jimin peels the material of his dark jeans from his muscular legs, allowing you a delicious view of his porcelain skin and the shape of his pert bottom rounded under the tight fit of his boxers before he tugs up a pair of sweatpants, the band sitting low on his jutting hips. His hands grip the hem of his dark shirt, before he pulls it up and over his head, discarding it along with pants on the floor as he opts to remain shirtless, much to your approval, your fingers already itching to trace countless, mindless patterns against the warm, smooth skin. 

When he turns back to find you with your head leant in your hand, admiring the view, he mirrors your teasing smile, wiggling his brows at you before you roll your eyes, blushing hard at his seductive tactics as you giggle. He approaches the bed swiftly, peeling back the cozy comforter before he slides himself underneath it, casting a glance your way as he awaits you to do the same. You comply easily, silently thanking yourself for already having changed into a soft sweater and cotton shorts earlier in the evening as you fold your legs under the warm blanket, sighing into the cocoon of comfort.

Jimin wastes no time now, finally having you all to himself as he easily finds your body under the covers, his strong arms coiling around your waist as he pulls you into his side, the two of you meeting in the middle of the plush mattress. One of his arms remains tightly wound across the small of your back, curling you into his body, as his other hand snakes around to find the web of your fingers, slowly fitting his own between them as he rests your entwined embrace against the muscle of his smooth stomach. You hum in contentment, turning to gaze up at Jimin as you lay in his arms, the homeliness of them so familiar. He meets your gaze, hazelnut irises flitting glossily between yours as his lips twitch with a soft grin. You mirror his smile as he leans in, planting a slow and gentle kiss upon the jut of your lips as you sigh, the warmth spreading down your spine only melting you further into the lull of his hold.

As he pulls away, you fit your head in the juncture of his solid shoulder, the hand that isn’t held by Jimin’s curling around the side of his own back, searching for the line of his spine as your fingers begin to run lethargic tracks along it, reveling in the reverberating hum of gratification that rumbles through his chest. 

The movie begins to play, then, and the night is ethereal. You half pay attention to what’s going on screen as you steep in the feeling of Jimin’s body against yours, smiling sedately to yourself at the sound of his squeaking laughter echoing around the room at every comical moment, his habit of needing to touch something when he laughs holding fast with every squeeze of his hand around yours or his arm around your waist. Your fingers continue to trail lazy lines across his back, your lips pecking soft affection against the rise of his collarbone whenever the urge strikes you, tingling when you feel his lips reciprocate in lingering issuances atop your head. 

Halfway through the film, the both of you have slipped from sitting upright to splaying among the pillows, Jimin’s head still elevated enough to see the glowing plot play out on the TV. He seem’s to be enjoying himself, eyes blinking slowly, happily, an ever-present expression of contentment gracing his sharp face as his fingers dance lullingly over the fabric of your shoulder. Your eyes are drooping, now, your head laid bare against the plane of Jimin’s pectoral, your arm thrown loosely over his midsection as your fingers curl around his side. 

As you struggle to keep your eyes open, desperate to enjoy these precious moments alone with Jimin, his simple grace and beauty so profound to you, he glances down at your sleepy face, smirking amusedly as his hand raises to thumb across your cheek. “Go to sleep, baby. It’s okay.” He bends to run his lips along your forehead, the brushing of them so tender. 

“I can’t...don’t want to--miss you,” you mumble incoherently, squeezing around him as you shift impossibly closer. 

You keen at the sensation of his chest rumbling with laughter under you, his thumb continuing to caress the skin of your face as he whispers, “I forgot to tell you. We have tomorrow off too. I promise I’ll still be here when you wake up, jagiya. Just go to sleep, now.” 

Your lazy grin is unmistakable as you take in his words, your hazy head not too far gone yet to register the happiness they bring you. With this newfound comfort hanging over the both of you, you allow your eyes to drift shut, the warm and familiar scent of Jimin wafting around you as you relax into the peace and serenity of your Sunday night. 

~

[owl-eyed-woman]

Pacific Rim Uprising: A Comparative Review

A miracle has occurred. Pacific Rim, the brainchild of Guillermo del Toro that bombed in the US but soared internationally for a total box office gross of $400 million, has, against all odds, managed to get a sequel. Am I dreaming? Pacific Rim: the movie (and now franchise) that could.

But though the existence of a follow-up to this underdog of a movie (if a Hollywood blockbuster can be called that) is certainly miraculous, we must ask ourselves if a greater miracle has occurred: Is Pacific Rim Uprising actually good?

The answer is no… and yes. Wait, let me be clearer. This is a bad movie… and I dug it. OK, this is still confusing. I guess ‘patchy’ is the most accurate word here. The patches mostly consist of giant gaping holes of badness, but there are patches of (relative) goodness.

Let’s get this out of the way: Uprising is, in most ways, not the Pacific Rim we know and love. Set 10 years after the first, sporting a new director along with an almost entirely new cast, it is unmistakably a departure from the first one. Yes, it still has giant robots and giant monsters and they do indeed punch each other, but it is a fundamentally different movie in so many ways that it isn’t really surprising to find that something essential has been lost in the sequel.

I almost feel bad comparing Pacific Rim Uprising to its predecessor. As special as Pacific Rim was, I do typically believe that movies should be judged on their own merits… but it is a sequel and such comparisons are inevitable, so screw it, I’m doing it anyway.

Before we can unpack what Pacific Rim Uprising lacks, we first need to understand what made Pacific Rim so beloved.

Pacific Rim was special from the start. Guillermo del Toro, a man who has made a career out of penning revisionist love letters to cherished nerd genres, somehow managed to get 200 million dollars to make a big budget ode to monster movies and mecha anime. This once-in-a-millennia, stars-aligning act of providence made Pacific Rim, from its inception, something to behold and treasure.

But to suggest that the improbability of Pacific Rim’s existence is what makes it so special, is to do a disservice to Guillermo Del Toro and the film he created.

On a purely surface level, Pacific Rim has some of the most striking visuals of an action movie in recent years. Pacific rim could have just skated by on the novel prospect of trashy anime and B-movie visuals paired with the polish of a Hollywood blockbuster. Instead, Guillermo del Toro paired this already enticing spectacle with what can only be described as an explosion of saturated rainbow. In a time when The Dark Knight-inspired grey was the norm, Pacific Rim was a sweet, candy-coloured treat for sore eyes. I would even argue that the neon wonder of Guardians of the Galaxy and Thor: Ragnarok have the bravery of Pacific Rim’s psychedelic colour palette to thank.

But the uniqueness of Pacific Rim goes much deeper than its admittedly stunning surface. What makes Pacific Rim stand, maybe not above, but most definitely apart from the crowd, is tone and theme.

At its heart, Pacific Rim is a silly movie. Its premise is ridiculous, its spectacle is over the top, it’s big budget, b-movie, anime trash. In the hands of a lesser director *cough Steven S. Deknight cough* this kind of movie would most likely be couched in a form of defensive snark and detached irony, as if embarrassed by its own frivolousness; the implication being that a movie like Pacific Rim is an indulgence we can partake in, but only if we feel guilty about.

This is what makes Pacific Rim so refreshing; it isn’t ashamed of itself. Every ridiculous line, every overwrought emotion, every heroic sacrifice and every earnest declaration, contains not one ounce of shame or cynicism. Instead, Pacific Rim oozes self-love, pride and, perhaps most unexpectedly, gravity.

There is always an urge to dismiss the often-simplistic conflicts and relationships we see in movies like Pacific Rim as mindless fluff, but Pacific Rim just won’t let you. Every part of this movie is delivered with a feeling of weight and import. An elbow rocket may at first seem like a throw-away sight-gag, but honestly, Pacific Rim takes Jaegers, and, by extension, their elbow rockets, seriously and you should too. They are trying to cancel the apocalypse and you need to get on board.

In this way, Pacific Rim doesn’t just make sure you get invested in the movie’s characters, robots, monsters and endlessly goofy dialogue; it makes sure you respect it.

And honestly, as much as I’ve been playing up the more outlandish parts of Pacific Rim’s premise, it’s hard not to respect the truly weighty and revolutionary ideas that Pacific Rim contends with. Its central conceit shows every nation banding together to save the world in a utopian vision of internationalism and global co-operation. Its puppy dog-like characters love each other with all their heart seemingly from the second they meet, truly trusting each other with theirs lives and innermost self. Its Jaegers are literally powered by emotional understanding and compassion between human beings. Every part of Pacific Rim expounds a far too rare faith in humanity’s potential for positivity, idealism and empathy.

In a movie ostensibly about revelling in the apocalypse, Pacific Rim was, in actual fact, creating a utopia by showing us how humanity’s fundamental goodness could save the world. So needless to say, it is deeply disappointing to find that these things that made Pacific Rim so memorable and, dare I say, important, have been abandoned by the sequel.

The most obvious change is, unsurprisingly, the visual style, as the rainbow extravaganza of Pacific Rim is traded in for the grim, muted greys of reality. To be fair, Pacific Rim Uprising is not entirely devoid of colour, but it isn’t soaking in it like the first film.

In the scheme of things, it’s not a devastating loss, but it is indicative of Pacific Rim Uprising’s biggest problem: its decision to trade in the flavour and uniqueness of Pacific Rim for the bland, the generic and the safe.

Thematically, the internationalism of the first movie is still present implicitly in the diversity of its cast, but the unique positivity and unabashed idealism of the first film has been abandoned. Ideas of empathy and interpersonal relationships are inextricably woven into the premise of Pacific Rim, but these elements never really congeal into any coherent message or ideology; it has lost the unique voice and lofty ambitions of Pacific Rim, so it never feels like Pacific Rim Uprising is trying to say anything other than ‘friendship is good’ and ‘let’s save the world’.

Tonally, the child-like sincerity and self-respect of Pacific Rim has been replaced by generic snark and detached “edgy” humour. Mostly, this tonal shift is just boring and predictable – scenes play out emotionally like you’d expect, characters react with defensive sarcasm and contempt, the humour is crude and forgettable. It plays like a typical, middle of the road blockbuster, content in its mediocrity.

To be fair, it doesn’t not work, it mostly just exists, but it also leads to some bewilderingly bad choices when it comes to humour, especially when it involves the younger members of the cast. A joke about a cadet’s plastic surgeon father goes on for far too long and somehow, in 2018, the triumphant blast off for battle is accompanied by, of all things, the Trololol song.  

That’s not to say all the sincerity or joy has been lost – a scene where the team bands together to rebuild their Jaegers hits the right blend of cheesy and awesome, and Jake and Amara’s bond is, at times, quite sweet but in the context of such a snide movie, these glimpses of sincerity seem awkward and unnatural.

Let me put it this way. In Uprising, a Jaeger, the awe-inspiring feat of human ingenuity and mechanical embodiment of empathy and co-operation, flips a kaiju the bird.  This is the what Pacific Rim is now.

It’s appropriate that Pacific Rim Uprising shifts the focus to a younger generation of cadets, because Uprising kind of reminds me of being a teenager. It wants so badly to be detached and cool, but it’s far too desperate and unsure of itself to ever truly be considered ‘hip’; it embodies that awkward teenage posturing we all thankfully escape in adulthood. Contrastingly, Pacific Rim exudes the confidence of an adult, secure in their interests and themselves, and in that, effortlessly achieves the coolness Pacific Rim Uprising so desperately seeks.

By now, I think I’ve made it clear that Pacific Rim Uprising is pretty bad, but the thing is, I actually do think there’s some good in here!

But before I get into that, we need to once again, return to the original Pacific Rim, because I haven’t been entirely honest in my assessment. Though my glowing praise at the beginning of this review may suggest an intense, fangirl-ish love of Pacific Rim, in all honesty, I actually don’t like it that much. I appreciate it, I respect it, and I do enjoy parts of it, but there are fundamental flaws that prevent me from truly loving it, specifically, character and plot.

When it comes to Pacific Rim’s characters, the word patchy once again comes to mind. There is some genuinely strong character work in this movie - Mako Mori was rightfully praised at the time for being a well-rounded and interesting female character with a character arc separate from the men around her – and then there is some bafflingly incompetent character work, namely, Raleigh, the protagonist of the film, is fundamentally uninteresting.

Part of this can be attributed to the dearth of charisma that is Charlie Hunnam who seems unable to imbue Raleigh with any emotional depth, but even setting this bland performance aside, Raleigh just feels like countless other mediocre male leads. He’s got a tragic backstory related to a dead family member that he still hasn’t gotten over and he needs to learn to let someone else into his heart before he can save the world; I’ve seen this plot in most uninspired video games.  

But to be fair, just because this setup is cliché doesn’t mean it couldn’t have been interesting; Pacific Rim is, in many aspects, an example of this, elevating classic genre tropes through thoughtful execution and smart, progressive additions.

This only makes it more perplexing that Raleigh remains so conventional, with no real twist or update. Even the most interesting part of his character arc, that is, the difficulty of reconnecting emotionally with others after a loss, falls flat since Raleigh never seems to struggle with this. Once he agrees to re-join the Jaeger program and meets Mako, he instantly accepts her as his co-pilot and his arc is resolved.

This emotional hollowness also impacts Pacific Rim’s greater plot issues. Pacific Rim’s plot is mostly passable, with a straightforward story propped up by the novelty of the premise and world. However, Guillermo del Toro seems to be aware that to make Pacific Rim great, he can’t just rely on the inherent coolness of giant robots and monsters fighting. To this end, he has intentionally foregrounded human relationships in the very premise of the film with the idea of an intense, emotional connection required for Jaeger co-pilots to control their mech – its ingenious really! But that only makes it more disappointing and bizarre that Raleigh’s arc is so devoid of emotional depth. This setup for emotional conflict never really pays off past the halfway point of the film, with next to no internal conflict between Mako and Raleigh after they drift together. They face external threats of course, like Kaiju, Stacker and an angry Australian, but there is no conflict between our main characters.

That’s not to say there is no emotional conflict in this movie; Mako struggles to reconcile her respect for her adopted father with her need to define her own destiny and avenge her family’s death. But as amazing as Mako is, she isn’t the main character. We’re stuck with Raleigh, a bland, white man who is the hero despite the fact that his female co-star is so much more compelling and, well, heroic.

The other threads in the film are similarly hit or miss. Idris Elba kills it as Stacker Pentecost but the Australian Jaeger pilots are mostly annoying and the resolution to Yancy’s arc is perfunctory and unearned. I honestly loved Newton and Hermann but many people found them grating, and the other secondary characters, while memorable, remain fairly flat, sketched out in broad strokes rather than elaborated upon with depth or nuance.

I still think Pacific Rim is a great, nay, important movie, but I also think we must acknowledge where great movies go wrong and, conversely, where terrible movie go (somewhat) right, or perhaps more accurately, go wrong again but in a slightly different direction.

?) Thus, we once more return to Pacific Rim Uprising. In regards to the film’s protagonist, Raleigh has been cast aside and traded in for a newer model in the form of John Boyega as Jake Pentecost, which, unsurprisingly, is a good decision. As a character, Jake isn’t anything we haven’t seen before, but there are a few things that elevate him above his archetypal beginnings.  John Boyega’s performance makes a huge difference. Unlike Charlie Hunnam, he has genuine screen presence and acting skills to boot, imbuing what could be a flat, cliché role with character and vivacity - he is a speck of salt in an otherwise bland and flavourless movie.  

But to give props where its due, Jake’s arc is just better constructed than Raleigh. Thematically, Jake has more going on than Raleigh; he starts off as a party boy avoiding responsibility to both his family and the world and learns how to move past his father and sister’s death and become the leader the world needs. Already, it’s a stronger base for a character than Raleigh’s, but what really makes Jake work is how he genuinely struggles with what path he should take; he tries and fails, he makes mistakes, he grows, and because of this, when he finally gets his heroic moment as both a leader and a surrogate brother to Amara, it feels earned and makes the earlier struggles actually mean something.

Did I just praise Pacific Rim Uprising? Well, don’t get used to it, because, like its predecessor, Pacific Rim Uprising can’t seem to get a handle on its ensemble. This leads me to the worst part of the movie: the cadets.

The cadet plot line didn’t have to be bad. On a meta-textual level, it makes sense – just as the cadets are aspiring to take over from an older generation of Jaeger pilots, so too is Uprising is taking on the mantle of the original Pacific Rim. On a more basic level, who doesn’t like stories with training montages and burgeoning camaraderie?

But even the most basic elements of character development are absent from Uprising. The cadets have screen time, they appear in scenes and they say things, yet it is all done with no greater purpose or pay-off. For Generic Teens, 1 through 6 (i can’t remember their names and I refuse to look them up), they remain half-baked, under-developed and pointless.

The cadet storyline needed not just re-writing, but some actual writing, because if the filmmakers don’t care about the cadets, why should I? In the end, the only real function the cadets have is to be an attentive audience for John Boyega when he delivers his Pentecost brand inspirational speech.

But as angry as the mishandling of the cadets makes me, I am only saddened by the film’s mistreatment of their female characters.  

Pacific Rim was a feminist film with some caveats: while Mako became a minor feminist icon because of the (sadly) uncommon amount of respect and care given to her arc, she was still the only female character in an otherwise a male-dominated film.

One might think then, that Pacific Rim Uprising, with its noticeable increase in female characters, could challenge the first movie on the feminist front, but apart from Amara (who is fine), every female character is under-served and disrespected.

The most cursory and useless of them all is the ‘character’ Jules. I’ve put quotation marks around ‘character’ because her only character trait is ‘happens to be into Nate’. You see, the filmmakers wanted some sexual tension, along with some bro-conflict between the two male leads but they didn’t want to go to the bother of writing an actual character for these bros to lust after. So they didn’t. You could edit her out of the movie and lose nothing. It is unacceptable to so callously write a woman like this.  

They do better with Shao, the imperious and imposing head of Shao Industries. She works well as a fake out villain, but when she takes a more active role in the third act, she is denied the development and screen time needed to make me truly invested in her. Yes, it’s a cool moment when she pilots Scrapper and saves our heroes, but her appearance is more of a convenience than any culmination for her character.

But what of Mako aka the best character in the whole franchise? Mako returns for a bit as Jake’s older sister and shines as the new boss of the PPDC, before being killed off in the first act. Mako, a character who was never defined by the men around her, has been reduced to fodder for male character development. Need I say more?

I can’t help but imagine what could have been if Mako hadn’t been fridged, and she’d been the one to pilot Scrapper and save her brother and Amara’s life in the climax – what a moment that would have been! Or, if not this, imagine if they had truly fleshed out Shao as a character with an arc. Or, why not simply have two Asian female leads treated with respect they deserve? But maybe I’m being unrealistic (if it’s not clear, this angry sarcasm).

But despite these numerous flaws, I still really enjoy this movie, if only because, unlike the first movie, I was never bored by the story.

Pacific Rim had a great world and premise, but its plot was too straightforward and predictable. Pacific Rim Uprising, by comparison, has a sense of mystery and several reveals that genuinely surprised me. As much as I bemoaned Uprising’s generic tone, for most of the film, I really had no idea where it was going, and that’s not something to be dismissed.

Admittedly, Uprising’s success in this realm is indebted to the original Pacific Rim and the skill with which Guillermo del Toro built its world. It’s because of this strong foundation that Uprising is able to take this franchise into new and bold places, expanding on the world of Pacific Rim in exciting ways, like all good sequels should! We get to see how the Jaeger program proceeds after the threat has seemingly disappeared, as well as new drone tech looking to supersede a human workforce, the repercussions of human-kaiju drifting and kaiju-jaeger hybrids! This is all fascinating stuff and I’m actually getting excited just thinking about it. It reminds me of why I was so desperate for a sequel in the first place.  

Yes, most of it is handled clumsily and it’s still plagued by character and tone issues, but the core ideas and worldbuilding are strong enough that it still made the film worth watching. And sometimes, you even get glimpses of a good movie in there; seeing the effect of kaiju-drifting on Newton, the reveal of Alice and how his and Hermann’s relationship had changed, was so satisfying and well-done it shocked me (I’ll stop here before I start fangirling about Newmann).

This is all supported by some stellar action scenes. Earlier, I bemoaned the loss of Pacific Rim’s rainbow colour scheme, but to the film’s credit, what it sacrifices in visual innovation, it makes up for in clarity and thrills. The fights are faster, the monsters are bigger and every Jaeger has a sword. Like all good action sequels, Uprising ups the scale, the spectacle and the challenge, and lives up to the inherent coolness of watching two giant things fight each other.

There’s a scene in Pacific Rim Uprising, just before the final battle, where the Jaeger pilots and cadets combine broken parts of various mechs in order to build a working Jaeger to fight with. In the film, it’s a triumphant moment, but it’s also the perfect metaphor for Pacific Rim Uprising: it’s a mess of a movie made with broken and disparate parts, that may function, but not as a cohesive whole. Many choices are bad. Some choices are different. Some choices are good. It is the definition of a mixed bag.

But honestly, at the end of the day, I’m still left with a smile on my face, and an eager, grabby hand reaching back into that mixed bag for more.

I hope they make a sequel

(but Uprising bombed at the box office so...) 

[oscar-isaacs-number-one-bitch]

“Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom” Movie Review

Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom is the direct sequel to 2015’s Jurassic World, as well as the fifth movie in the Jurassic Park franchise. Directing duties have shifted from Colin Trevorrow to A Monster Calls director J.A. Bayona, and this installment stars Bryce Dallas Howard and Chris Pratt once again as Claire (in a character shift from amusement park money-maker to dinosaur-rights activist) and Owen, the “action-hero-man” of the franchise whose character never shifts at all. Claire has been working tirelessly to save the dinosaurs from the active volcano island of Isla Nublar, arguing that they should be given the same rights as other animals due to their being living creatures. After the last film’s events, however, some of the world’s leading officials are not so sure this is a good idea, since each time mankind has attempted to control or interfere with the world’s natural order, disaster has struck (as evidenced by the failures of now two dinosaur parks). Eventually, both Claire and Owen are put on assignment to carry out a rescue mission to save the dinosaurs (Claire because she knows the park, Owen in order to rescue Blue, the raptor from the last movie). And, what we’re given here is what’s supposed to be a dumb, fun action movie that tries to be more than what it is and fails miserably at it, albeit with more style and grace in its failings than the previous installment.

I’m no keeper of secrets when it comes to movies I like or dislike despite any mass audience opinion to the contrary (love The Witch and Hereditary, dislike The Greatest Showman, Guardians of the Galaxy felt flat, etc.), so most people who have been following my reviews and general movie “thing” for a while know well enough that I didn’t really like the first Jurassic World. Sure, it was mindless entertainment and there were parts about it I enjoyed, but it seemed to take the “mindless” angle a little too much to heart, with a lazy script filled with lazy characters, an overabundance of filmmaking clichés, and what amounted to cardboard cutouts of villains, dialogue, plot progression, or basically anything that wasn’t purely spectacle-driven. In that vein, Fallen Kingdom has a lot of heavy lifting to do in terms of drudging this series back up where it rested after its predecessor was barely on-par with, or better than, The Lost World, but also in establishing J.A. Bayona as a legit director. And, for the most part, it really, truly fails. Luckily, that didn’t bother me as much this time around.

If there’s one thing Bayona can do with the best of them, it’s style and scale. This guy kills it at bringing larger than life visual creatures to screen and legitimately making them, well, larger than life. The sheer scope in Fallen Kingdom (for like the 15 minutes of the first act that they’re on the island at least) is breathtaking, and Bayona’s visual flourishes don’t just paint the dinosaurs as massive, but also majestic. The director’s understanding of scene geography is something to be commended here as well, as it nearly saves the movie from being ultimately worse than the first one. The visual effects have also been much improved on both a wide and a close-up scale. Do they rival the effects in the original Jurassic Park? Well, not really, but they’ve come to closest since to capturing not only the awe these creatures inspire, but the terror as well. The design of the new dino for this one is entirely frightening, and really highlights the “monster” aspect of these animals. (Side note: there was a moment in this film where I did legitimately start to tear up near the end of the first act and you will too, so good job on that one, movie.)

The performances in this film have also improved since last time. Bryce Dallas Howard getting to play a character that’s much less a product of corporate cartoon-isms and more of an at least two-dimensional character with her own agency without having to wear heels the whole time is a good step up, especially since it gives the actress more to do in terms of informing the character. Chris Pratt is also back, and while I wouldn’t say the character improved, his performance did; stripped of all the generic action hero Chris Pratt-isms that informed much of his character in the last film, it’s a lot less annoying to follow him and Howard around, despite the fact that, again, neither of their characters goes through the slightest bit of a personal growth arc, despite legitimate plot points brought up by this installment’s main villain that could have informed that sort of change.

Unfortunately, though, that’s where the positives essentially stop cold. This particular installment may have better style and less ultimately clichés running around (though it keeps the same bad editing), but it swaps decisions that used to be purely annoying for decisions that are purely stupid or forgettable. During the course of the film, especially the first act, it’s posited again and again that if these animals aren’t saved, they’ll go re-extinct, and humanity shouldn’t let that happen (notwithstanding the ecological and societal destruction they’ve already wreaked on their own enclosures and would eventually wreak on the world at large if not kept in an enclosure). Yet despite the number of times this is brought up, no one thinks to address the fact that they can just make more dinosaurs, as was the entire premise for this franchise’s now two series-starting films. They have the technology, they have the know-how, and they’re smart enough the acquire the funding to make more, and this never comes up.

In addition to this, the characters being less annoying apparently also meant stripping them of anything resembling what makes a character in the first place. Yeah, I know I said the performances were better, but that doesn’t make the characters better. It’s as if the writers of the previous film made the clichés and cartoon-ish behavior these people once carried the entire point of the characters in the first place, and without all of that, the characters are left to be deflated versions of what they once were; less annoying, but more underdeveloped.

There’s also a solution reveal to the extinction problem that’s played for what ends up being an insanely predictable twist to the point where one wonders if the characters were deliberately ignoring it just so a movie could happen (the “twist” is in the last trailer but the thing that leads to it is not…for some reason they thought that was a good idea instead of the reverse), but it ends up not only ripping a gaping hole in this film’s plot but in the first Jurassic World’s plot as well. One starts to wonder why they didn’t just go that route in the first place, given what’s meant to at first be this movie’s central conflict.

A lot of this has much more to do with the writing of the film than the production of it post-script, but no one thought to stop and question these glaring plot holes not just within the franchise, but within this entry? It’s entirely lazy writing that’s focused on making dinosaurs this big, philosophical talking point in the beginning (forgetting that they don’t have to be because they’re dinosaurs – that’s cool enough), then just wanting them to be mindless, dumb monsters in the end only for the sake of having an action-oriented finale. Not only does it not ultimately decide what message it wants to send (does it want humanity to not mess with nature or does it want us to campaign for animals rights), I don’t even know if it knows what message it’s trying to send, as the script is so fuddled and messy that there’s no clear emotional thru-line to follow. Oh, and in case you were thinking “yes, we finally get to see Ian Malcolm back in a Jurassic Park movie,” Jeff Goldblum amounts to nothing more than a cameo with the most generic dialogue in the film and none of the humor he brought to his previous appearances in the franchise, for a total screen-time of about 2 minutes, maybe less.

I went into this film not expecting much, given that I didn’t enjoy Bayona’s previous film, nor the previous film in this franchise, and maybe that’s why I was pleasantly surprised that I didn’t outright hate this movie. Sure, I wanted to like it, and I was hoping it would be good, but I wasn’t expecting that, so I was likely less disappointed than a lot of my fellow critics or audience members out there. Still, it can’t really be denied that while I personally enjoyed this film more, it is, on as objective of a level as art can be (which is not very, mind you), a worse film than the previous one, and worse than Bayona’s previous work as well. Sure, Jurassic World was mindless entertainment, but even though it did take the mindless part a little too seriously, it was still entertaining even after it was over. This one, while still entertaining (perhaps more so) and rid of the clichés that informed the first one (again, swapping them out for laziness), can’t be bothered to not rip apart at the seams once you’re done watching it. And even as unsurprising as that is, it’s still disappointing.

I’m giving “Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom” a 5.8/10

[helihi]

RWBY’s writing and pacing

It’s not weird to be on Tumblr and notice how people’s opinions tend to be polarizing. It doesn’t matter if we’re talking about politics or a simple tv show, the larger the fandom, the louder people tend to scream.

Last week, the FNDM went from “Does Illia is gay?” to Illia fits into the predatory evil gay trope and she might as well end up dead to fill the Bury your gays quota. Although we were able to see people in the grey area, the extremes were the loudest.

This week the discourse is as follows: RWBY’s writing is bad vs. “Oh my god, why do people always want action packed stories, you need some breathing in between and some exposition to set things up!”.

I’d like to bring an objective view on regards to this subject because I consider it to be extremely important when it comes to the show.

If you don’t ask for better writing, you’re not going to get any.

If you applaud mediocrity, you’re gonna get mediocrity.

RWBY’s writing has never been great. It has had fantastic set ups and scenes, but it has never been great. Yes, that also includes the time when Monty was still alive (Rest in Peace). I’m sorry, but the flaws have always been there.

I’d like to point the following things out for you guys to understand what I’m trying to say:

Volume 1

RWBY was barely starting, they didn’t have a big budget, so the episodes were short. This caused the plot to be very simple and every problem being solved quite rapidly.

The characters at first seem like tropes.

A shit ton of clichés.

Because of plot convenience, some characters act OOC to what we later know about them. (Since Jaune had to stand up to Cardin, no one of team RWBY or JNPR stood up to him when he was bullying Velvet and being a racist prick).

Blake being a faunus ended up leading to the volume finale and didn’t build up Team RWBY relationships and dynamics. We could have had a serious moment of self reflexion, not only Weiss realizing that she was putting every faunus in the same bag, but Yang and Ruby dealing with the fact that Blake hid who she was because of racism (also prompting a realization that maybe, until that point, they contributed to said racism by being bystanders).

However, vol 1 had great things on its side that allowed the show to continue.

Variety of characters.

Rich lore

Cool character concepts and weapons.

The show was funny.

I can accept that the start of the show was not the best, it was understandable giving how little budget they had.

Volume 2

The tone of the series becomes slightly more serious. We have new characters and new villains being introduced into the show. Something big is cooking and this is the first glance we get at it. The good include:

The humor is back.

That food fight scene eveyone loves.

The dance.

Papa Shcnee may not be a good person being foreshadowed.

Yang convincing Blake to go to the dance while also giving her space.

Dr. Oobleck being a great teacher and giving the girls an insight on themselves.

Neo and Raven making an appearance.

However, for some reason this volume seems really blurry in my head. Neptune’s character introduction is really bland, the in betweens of everything seem really irrelevant and most importantly: the season finale seems like a mid-season finale if anything.

Volume 3

My favorite volume; I’m going to be the least biased I can be. This volume featured a Naruto style tournament (I’m sure other animes did it before Naruto, but this one is the most widely known). This allowed the writers to show us some great battles, team combinations, and do some world building.

While the first half of the season relies more on comedy and action, when shit hits the fan it goes perfectly well. I have to say, the moment Yang gets caught after Emerald uses her semblance was the first moment since I started watching the show that I felt hooked. Somehow for the first time ever, I felt that something could actually happen. Stakes were being raised, and it shouldn’t come as anyone’s surprise that this season was the one that attracted as much fans as it did.

There are some bad things, unfortunately, about this season.

Ruby’s silver eyed warrior powers come from nowhere and it was only mentioned in the first episode ever.

A shit ton of new characters! But 0 depth to any of them!

We never get to see Team JNPR interactions that are not JP or NR centric, except that one time Jaune talked to Ren briefly in vol 2.

Seriously this volume needed more character interactions. We could have had Pyrrha interacting with team RWBY more. Even more team CVFY.

The FNDM grew exponentially, and the expectations to how RT was going to follow up to the fall of Beacon built up the moment volume 3 ended.

And finally, volume 4 arrived.

Volume 4

There’s nothing wrong with a slow volume. It’s true that you can’t have a show 100% about fighting. The reason popular animes and good shounen fights are popular is because of the stakes set up by character motivation and the plot. The problem with volume 4 is not the lack of fights, but how bad it fails at exploring the characters after the fall of Beacon.

Jumping from one character’s story line to another one didn’t help either. The constant teasing with cliff hangers began getting really obnoxious here. Is Qrow going to die? Is he? IS HE??

Ruby: she gets no character development. The only scenes that could be considered part of her arc would be: Ruby waking up listening to Pyrrha’s voice, only to find out it’s Jaune’s phone; the small talk she and Jaune have before fighting the creepy Nuckelavee; the letter she writes at the end.

Weiss: probably the best written storyline of the volume. However, having her train and building up the possibility of her actually facing her father before escaping, only to have her running away in high heels was not pay off. You can easily find a way to write Weiss confronting her father before leaving Atlas to find her team and save the world.

Blake: she heads to Menagerie in order to see her family again and find the way to cope with what happened at Beacon. She felt extremely guilty and was really in a bad place. Having Sun be with her makes sense, he says it himself, but the execution was extremely poor. Sun didn’t give Blake a choice. Furthermore, Blake is not able to open up after what happened at Beacon because she gets interrupted every time.

Sun: I’m so sorry his character ended up being comedic relief. He could have learned more about how to deal with Blake, and provide her with more emotional support that he ended up doing but no.

Yang: although I agree with most people that the events of volume 4 don’t have a canonical time stamp (because Miles and Kerry wanted to avoid plot holes), her coping with the fall is awfully paced. Armed and Ready was not earned by the end of the volume. I’m sorry, but Yang is not ready to face her demons yet. She’s suffering from PTSD, clearly needed to talk about what happened at the fall, and her feelings for Blake are filled with rage and hurt.

STILL NO SILVER EYES EXPLANATION DESPITE THE FACT THAT RUBY ALMOST DIED. WHY DOES THE SHOW KEEP TREATING THE MAIN CHARACTERS AS CHILDREN?

Klein being a really good character but only making an appearance twice.

The good of the volume include:

Raven and Qrow.

Ren’s backstory.

Weiss’s family being explored.

Did you miss it? You might have blinked.

Volume 5

This volume promised a lot of fighting, and to be honest, I rather have better set ups. Most of the people who are defending today’s episode claim that those of us who complain want mindless action without careful exposition.

I would like to remind everyone, including Miles and Kerry, the golden rule or writing for an audiovisual medium: SHOW, DON’T TELL.

I was already alarmed when I saw that Illia had more character development in a short, outside the main narrative, than Ruby got in an entire season.

I have many issues with this volume, most of them involve awful writing.

Ozpin’s story: why are the characters of the show getting so little information on him? Story wise it makes sense that us, the viewers, to piece together the information of this important character little by little; but within the show it makes no sense that Jaune and Yang are okay with knowing as little as they do. HOW OLD IS OZPIN? WHO IS SALEM? WHY DOES SALEM WANT TO DESTROY EVERYHTING?

Menagerie: Filled with cliffhangers and the slowest moving story ever. I love politic centered stories. For crying out loud, when everyone dropped snk because of it, I was hooked as fuck. The problem is that once again, the writers give you small doses of a plot line that should already be over.

Raven: is she evil? is she an anti-hero? Can the FNDM stop judging Raven so harshly after barely having any sort of explanation to why she’s doing things?

Most of the exposition during this volume has been through conversations of things we already know. The only things that are new are: Ozpin turning the Branwens into birds, the Branwens joining Beacon to learn how to kill huntsman, Ozpin confirmed for wizard and creator of the maidens.

And the worst part is, the CRWBY has written amazing scenes. Exposition doesn’t have to be bad, it can be perfect when done right:

Weiss and Yang’s conversation during ch8 was so beautiful. It established some common ground with them, it served to show Weiss’s character development; Yang finally gets to open up about Blake. The physical and oral communication this scene has is perfect. I love it so much, this is what the show needs. (Also, the animation was gorgeous, imma cry)

Illia’s conflict: not only when capturing Blake does she confess her feelings, she tells Blake that she was so blinded by her love of Adam that she didn’t know what Illia was going through and why she is acting the way she is now. The stakes are high with her, and I honestly want her redemtion arc ASAP.

Jesus, I wish I didn’t have to explain all of this, but I’m tired of people jumping to conclusions without thinking why people are complaining at the pacing of the show.

RWBY’s writing has never been great, it has had good times, but the pacing as always been terrible. Volume 4 showed the cracks clearer than ever before because more people were watching and the bar was set higher.

Anyways, here’s me hoping next week’s episode is better. This further proofs that my brothers claim is right: “The only way to enjoy RWBY is by binge watching it”.

[rogue-cup-hq]

2019 Recap

"It takes a minute to find a special person, an hour to appreciate them, and a day to love them, but it takes an entire lifetime to forget them." — Author unknown

July 2020:  As I opened my phone to review the notes I jotted down from last year’s event, and began to look over the photos before putting pen to paper to write the 2019 recap, the sadness became palpable and the memories bittersweet. We all felt the brutal sting of losing two friends who, for so many years, had been part of our lives and the Rogue Cup event:  our brother and dear friend Rick Goldfarb, who many of us have known since the youthful days of college, and William Whitehead (aka “WoG”), who had become our Rogue friend of 12 years after accepting Goldy’s invite to make the trip to Deep Creek in 2008. William returned every year thereafter and became a fun, boisterous presence that contributed to the spirit and fun of the event. As Goldy’s health declined in early 2020, there was unanimous agreement from the group to honor Rick by renaming our annual weekend to honor our brotherhood with him, and thus the Rogue Cup moniker will be retired and the weekend will be known as the “RGI” (Rick Goldfarb Invitational) going forward. William was in the midst of helping plan a weekend to honor Rick when we learned the awful news in April that William had unexpectedly passed away.  The loss of two friends in so brief a time is crushing to the soul. Looking back in retrospect and knowing that it was Goldy’s and William’s last time with us, I find myself completely lacking my usual sarcastic, whimsical tone for the narrative of our weekend together, so I’ll offer the abbreviated notes from my phone to at least record for posterity the last Rogue Cup.

WEEKEND ROLL CALL:   Moore, Berner, Goldfarb, Smith, Schnetzler, Whitehead, Katz, Ozenbaugh, Sautter, Anderson, Turner* *Rogue Sultan – presided over event.

THURSDAY PM Everyone arrives and stakes out room and toilet claims. Went to dinner at the Pub & Grille; enjoyed Pizza & Pints special, after which we returned to the cabins and spent the evening doing a lot of nothing. We wiled away the time swapping old stories, there may have been a few card games, a brief vote to again confirm the format of a team event.

FRIDAY AM Coffee on porch - was it rain or mist? The debate raged... Stories – was it Sensations or Secretions? (can someone explain this one to me?) Turns takes the breakfast helm in the kitchen and whips up French toast, bacon, sausage. PA shocks everyone with clean up (it’s the new “me”). We spent a fair amount of time doing completely nothing on the porch time afterwards.   Once we arrived at the course, Andrew volunteers to go shirtless (perhaps the effects of time on the porch, perhaps an Altoona tradition - I don’t quite know why). Friday PM - Round 1 The only thing I directly recall of my own round was a nice wedge chip-in from 30 yards out on the 18th hole (to salvage a 99). Not surprisingly, the foursome of Andrew, Ed, Berner and Ozy fell 3 holes behind; played so slow they were caught by a six-some of elderly women; reports from the course were that lots of breast massaging then took place. I have a note that simply says “Ozy’s stolen birdie” - I have no direct observations; those involved may elaborate, in which case I’ll amend the official record. Team format again, Saturday’s teams, based on scores: Smith/Goldy, Berner/Sautter, Ed/Ozy, PA/Andrew, William/Will 

The balance of Friday evening was mindless Battlebots viewing, some cackling and a unanimous consent decree by the group mandating that Berner play in the 1st foursome on Saturday. The group wound down and began to crash by 11PM, just as Andrew emerged from a 3 hour nap ready to party. Saturday AM Ozy loses golf balls in front yard while practice-chipping before the round We enjoy the usual phenomenal Turner McBerners for breakfast More unproductive porch time.

Saturday PM – Round 2 Rain at the end of round drenched last group PA performed with his usual consistency: 52/43 (which enabled Andrew & him to win nothing) Ed/Ozy take team win after Ozy drives cart back to find Ed and encourage him not to quit, despite the rain Turns took over grill duty and served up a tasty filet mignon, salad, baked potato dinner Berner - bladder was almost empty - saving rest for the ride home tomorrow Who won the Jacket, if anyone? Sunday AM - pancakes and bacon served up by the Turns/Berner tandem - cleanup and farewells

PA then embarked on a “good will ambassador” tour for several days – visiting Schnetz in Lusby, then Erbe in Fenwick Island, then Smith in Virginia before heading home.  Details of each of those visits is unnecessary, and can be left to the imagination, knowing that it was carried out in true Rogue spirit.   The closure to the Rogue Cup era is complete; henceforth, our annual golf weekend event will become the RGI (Rick Goldfarb Invitational). Rather than my usual epilogue looking to exhort everyone to come to California, instead here is a brief tribute to our friend, who will be sorely missed:

A Golden Farewell

The news arrived in monotone As blue sky turned to gray One of the good guys taking flight As night consumed the day.

Roadside monuments to fallen soldiers My car sped past their shields And ghosts peered out from old log cabins Collapsing in the fields 

Guitars lay dusty, silenced strings That yearn to cry and wail Or simply play some chords and hope For wind to fill his sails. 

Shrouded moonlight, pale across A fragile heartbeat’s groove The thirst and hunger fade at midnight As the pickpocket makes his move.

The golden candle flickers dimly No longer burning bright Life slips loose its weak embrace To a quickly arcing flight. 

A fond remembrance of all our days As the night gives way to dawn An eagle landed, its nest abandoned Our brother-in-arms is gone. 

Yet richer now than Gates or Buffett In wealth beyond the stars You gave us all your greatest gift - Our memories of your heart. 

Farewell, Goldy.

[the-desolated-quill]

The Time Of The Doctor - Doctor Who blog (So Long, And Thanks For All The Fish Fingers And Custard)

(SPOILER WARNING: The following is an in-depth critical analysis. If you haven’t seen this episode yet, you may want to before reading this review)

Remember way back when I reviewed The End Of Time Part 2, I said I was afraid that Russell T Davies may have set a precedent for overly sentimental, ridiculously OTT, and utterly self indulgent regenerations that are more about the showrunner than the Doctor? Well if you thought David Tennant’s Lord Of The Ring’s style farewell tour complete with stupid choir music and oh so poetic tears trickling down the cheeks was unbearable, you ain’t seen nothing yet.

The Time Of The Doctor is fucking dreadful for the most part. Moffat takes everything that may have annoyed you about the RTD finale and then multiplies it by a factor of 10 before dolloping on a few more ladles of pretentious stupidity for good measure. Combine that with the usual Christmas special bollocks, and it becomes truly nauseating to sit through.

A mysterious signal from a backwater planet attracts an army of Doctor Who villains into its orbit, but before we can ponder on how similar this is to The Pandorica Opens, we’re whisked off back to present day Earth for Christmas dinner with Clara’s family. Clara needs the Doctor to pretend to be her boyfriend (do women still do that? I haven’t seen a TV show try that joke since the 90s), but there’s a complication. The Doctor is naked! Oh how awkward and embarrassing! Why is he naked?

The Doctor: “Because I’m going to church!”

Of course he is.

You know at this point I’ve become so accustomed to Steven Moffat and Matt Smith’s obnoxious bullshit that i don’t think anything will phase me anymore. The Doctor could walk in wearing a bunny girl outfit and I honestly wouldn’t bat an eyelid. It wouldn’t be funny, but I wouldn’t be surprised neither. Because that’s the problem with doing a random, wacky Doctor. After a while the randomness gets to a point where it paradoxically starts to become boringly predictable. I mean it’s not as if there’s any reason for the Papel Mainframe to have a nudity policy, and the characters wear holographic clothes anyway, so if it’s not funny and it doesn’t serve a purpose, what’s the point?

So off we go to church to meet Tasha Yem, played by Orla Brady. A sassy, flirty dominatrix type character who has a thing for the Doctor. Well gee. haven’t seen that before in a Moffat episode. What’s even weirder is not only is Tasha Yem virtually identical to every female character Moffat has ever written, but she also has a lot in common with one specific female character Moffat has written. She can fly the TARDIS, has absolute authority over the Doctor and there’s a reference to her inner psychopath. Was River Song originally supposed to be in this episode? Either way, it shows how unimaginative Moffat is when it comes to writing women.

At this point the thing that’s irritating me the most (apart from Matt Smith) is the whole greatest hits remix. We’ve had cameos from the Daleks and Cybermen, the Silence show up for no reason, and now the Weeping Angels are back. It seems Moffat is determined to squeeze all the scary out of them completely and it’s just bloody irritating. There’s no reason for any of them to be there really and it’s completely self indulgent. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again. Regeneration episodes should be about the Doctor. Never the showrunner.

And just when you thought Moffat was done mining through his back catalogue of crap, the bloody crack of doom shows up again. Turns out this is Trenzalore and on the other side of the crack is Gallifrey. The Time Lords want back in and need the Doctor to answer a simple question so they know they’ve got the right universe. Doctor who? Which leads to the main crux of the narrative. The Doctor having to protect Trenzalore from comedy Sontarans, Daleks that all of a sudden remember who the Doctor is now thus rendering Asylum of The Daleks completely pointless, and a wooden Cyberman with a flamethrower (I’m not even going to dignify that with a response). Armed only with his magic wand/sonic screwdriver, he must prevent another Time War from occurring. Oh boy. Where do we start with this bullshit? Let’s start with the Question itself. Why do the Time Lords need the Doctor’s name for verification? They have no problem listening to Clara’s pleas at the end. Why doesn’t the Doctor just tell them to stop broadcasting the signal and wait a bit while he deals with the mess they’ve caused? And what’s the point of the truth field? Either the Doctor wants to reveal his name or he doesn’t. He doesn’t have to lie about it. Plus Moffat ends up contradicting this by having the Doctor lie to someone about having a plan. So what’s the point?

At a push, this could have worked if the story focused on the people of Trenzalore. Get us to care for them and have the Doctor form a strong emotional connection with them, thus giving this siege some dramatic weight. At least put some effort into trying to justify why the Doctor stays so long (at one point he says he’s finally found somewhere that needs him to stay, but that’s bollocks. I can think of several places that could have benefitted from an extended stay from the Doctor). Instead Moffat seems more preoccupied with other matters. Like how many regenerations the Doctor has left and tying up the loose ends of his bullshit arcs. So the exploding TARDIS was the result of some rogue chapter of the Paper Mainframe trying to kill the Doctor. So they planned to save the universe from another Time War... by destroying the universe? 

And the Silence are genetically engineered priests that make you forget your own confessions?... Doesn’t that make confessing your sins somewhat redundant once you’ve forgotten them?

And then there’s the whole Doctor dying crap. If the BBC had any balls at all, they would have made this the last ever Doctor Who story. The reason Robert Holmes introduced the 12 regeneration limit way back in The Deadly Assassin was in order to impose a limitation on the show. It would still have some longevity, but at the same time it wouldn’t be infinite and threaten to outstay its welcome. After the Thirteenth Doctor, that’s it. Now thanks to the retroactive inclusion of the War Doctor and the Ten clone we got in Journey’s End, Eleven is to all intents and purposes the last ever Doctor. And yeah. Why not? 50 years is a good solid number to end a show on, right? 

But the BBC clearly have other plans.

A more naive member of the audience might think all the Doctor’s speeches about how all things must come to end might be setting us up for the grand finale to the whole thing, but naturally that’s not what happens. Of course Moffat finds some contrived way to extend the regeneration limit indefinitely. Doctor Who is the BBC’s biggest cash cow. They’re not going to let it go quite so readily. So Clara demands that the Time Lords save the Doctor like the spoilt, arrogant, entitled little prat that she is and hey presto, the Doctor can now blow up spaceships with his laser hands (God knows what’s going to happen when Peter Capaldi regenerates. He’s probably going to end up blowing up a small moon).

And don’t get me started on the avalanche of plot holes this opens up. So if the Doctor never died at Trenzalore, how did Clara jump into the wound in time to save the Doctor? Without the wound in time, there’s no Oswin or Clara in Asylum Of The Daleks and The Snowmen. Without Oswin and Clara, the Doctor would never have tried to find present day Clara in the first place. Without Oswin and Clara, the First Doctor would never have picked the right TARDIS back on Gallifrey (ugh). Good luck trying to work out the Eleventh Doctor’s canon now because Moffat has become so liberal with the timey wimeys that the whole thing has just descended into a mindless mess.

And even after all that, The Time Of The Doctor still isn’t finished yet. Oh no. Instead of Peter Capaldi walking down from the tower and into the TARDIS, we get another sappy monologue from Matt Smith about how change is good and how he’ll always remember when the Doctor was him, Murray Gold goes into overdrive with his violins in an attempt to drown us in slush, Clara starts crying her eyes out for no bloody reason (seriously, why the fuck is she crying? She knows what’s going to happen. Hell, she was the one that made sure it would happen. Dozy cow), and just when you thought this couldn’t possibly get any worse, fucking Amy shows up! For God’s sake! No doubt the Moffat fans were crying gallons of tears over this. I was too busy sticking a cushion over my face and trying to pretend this wasn’t happening. Honestly, I have never seen such cringeworthy, self-indulgent drivel in all my life. They should have replaced this with Steven Moffat giving himself a self congratulatory blowjob. It would have had the same effect.

So after all that bollocks, is there ANYTHING I liked about The Time Of The Doctor?... At all? Well... I did quite like Handles. He did make me laugh a few times and I was genuinely choked up when he died. Yeah, when you’re more upset over the death of a fucking Cyberman head than the Doctor’s, something has gone spectacularly wrong. I fucking hated this episode! It’s infuriating, self indulgent, utterly moronic and extremely dull. I was so fucking bored by this episode. I didn’t care about anything that was going on. I didn’t care about Trenzalore. I didn’t care about the Time Lords potentially returning. I didn’t care about the Doctor’s impending death. I didn’t care because Moffat never gave me a reason to care. As usual he’s more concerned about his convoluted series arcs and showing everyone how clever he is rather than telling an engaging story. And the most exasperating thing of all is this isn’t even Moffat’s last series. He’s still got the Peter Capaldi era to ruin yet. So why is he bombarding us with this fanwank tribute to himself? Are we going to have to go through all of this again when Capaldi regenerates this Christmas? Jesus Christ!

I suppose I should end with my final thoughts on the Eleventh Doctor in general. I think I’ve made my views on him pretty clear over the course of these reviews. I’ve got nothing against Matt Smith. I’m sure he’s a great actor and a lovely guy. I did kind of like him in his first series. It was a nice blend of quirky and serious. What really got up my nose was when they started to ramp up the goofiness to the point where I just wanted to hurl something large and heavy at his head in a desperate attempt to shut him up. He got so annoying and so irritating that by the time we got to The Time Of The Doctor, I was more than ready to see the back of him. And look, if you like Matt Smith’s Doctor, that’s fine. More power to you. I’m genuinely glad you got more enjoyment out of his Doctor than I did. It just wasn’t my cup of tea.

[aaliyaeger]

The SilverStripes

A long ass time ago, my girlfriend and myself made OCs: legit OCs in a world that is still nothing more than a concept, and could more than likely fit in a DnD very easily. I never write about them because I’m usually writing about my WoW ones, but today I got something out of both of them. Have some self-inserty goodness.

“They're getting braver, aren't they?”

Silvers spoke the snide sentence knowing he'd never get an answer from his partner, and he instead followed through with his previous motion of snapping the Spawn's neck idly. The horrible amalgamation of flesh and shadow nearly exploded as its spine crunched under his left hand's wicked grip, and the wispy flames of its gangly body immediately dissipated after its fiery death. Yet, the man showed no signs of being injured or slowed thanks to the dark gunmetal gray power armor shrouding his entire form. Complete with a mighty halberd swinging around in wide arcs, he was an absolute engine of destruction. Despite his intimidating visage though, his size still paled in comparison to the colossal orange tiger beside him, who was disemboweling one of the horrors with her back paws as her front ones pinned the screeching Spawn to the ground. Everything in a ten foot radius around both man and beast had been ravaged into a gruesome display of black-tinged blood and splattered gore, and the two bore the brunt of such violence.

And yet the Spawn kept coming.

Watchpoint Free had been under assault for at least a solid hour now, and the legions of corrupt beings that crawled and scrambled their way towards the walls seemed unending. Fatigue was starting to take its toll on the fresher recruits of the Watchpoint, their arms still shuddering from constant recoil even after they had given control of the defensive gatling guns to someone else. Much of the arid grass had been washed so thickly in black and red blood that it was hard to see their yellowing blades underneath the slick coat. And yet those creatures kept arriving, stumbling over the corpses of their fallen with the same mindless fury that lead them to the Watchpoint. Just how many did they have...?

“...No, something's definitely wrong,” Silvers grunted mostly to himself, impaling a Spawn through the chest with ease. The tiger beside him growled gruffly, but seemed to agree as she held her ground, circling around the knight almost protectively as he searched the waves of Spawn marching towards the base. These things liked to attack in huge numbers, but nothing of this variant – there had to be something bringing them in. A dropship? These things never showed enough intelligence to fly a rig before...

“Stripes, we need to check out that back line,” the armored figure called to the tiger, gesturing towards a vague direction somewhere behind all of the Spawn. “If we move fast, we can probably hit it before this point gets overrun. Let's head east and-”

Silvers was politely interrupted as the tiger immediately bounded straight into the Spawn front line, barreling passed the legions of demonic figures with the velocity of a lightning bolt.

“OKAY, THAT WORKS TOO!” the knight hissed, slowly starting to charge as he settled his halberd to his right and began to pick up speed. He wasn't anywhere near as fast as Stripes was, but as he crashed into the line of Spawn, the entire row of shambling creatures faltered as the centurion slammed into them, and went well beyond them. While the tiger could practically bound and bounce atop the Spawn with the same grace that belied her mighty claws, Silvers instead kept smashing through the ranks with unstoppable force, waves of vermillion sparks coursing over his armor as he kept plowing through the Spawn endlessly. For several seconds, the horrid beings somehow tried to slow him to no avail, and it was only after the knight found his tiger friend once again that he realized he was having a hard time slowing down as well. Where she had long since paused in a surprisingly open spot, Silver kept rushing through, halting only when he (and the three Spawn he had stabbed his halberd through along the way) crash-landed into the side of a wall-

Wait. A wall?

There were no other buildings in the once-lush region of Lune Foret besides Watchpoint Free, but Silvers couldn't deny that what he had just slammed himself into was definitely made of steel. When he finally was able to yank himself free of the crater he had made of the wall and the Spawn he just piledrived, he took a step back in confusion to gaze up at the colossal slab of metal. It was definitely a mobile base, but this thing was huge! How could he have possibly missed this after so many days of scouting around? Though, that bafflement paled when Silvers glanced to the middle of the wall, and noticed a crescent moon intertwined with a C:

The same PMC that owned Watchpoint Free.

“I gotta be seeing that wrong... that's not Crescent Commandos, is it Stripes?” Silvers spoke to the tiger lowly. The titanic cat merely growled in the same dark tone, her green eyes locked on the symbol as well. Mobile bases like this were common for science excavations, but were definitely not defensive enough for military conduct. And they weren't easy to pilot – surely the Spawn couldn't have driven it here. So what could have...?

A bellowing screech from behind the two warned that the same creatures weren't so pleased about two mercenaries being so far in their back line. With that, Silvers immediately reached for the keypad, and was surprised when the door opened easily for him. Regardless, he made the motion to enter inside the traitorous vessel – only to come face to face with even more Spawn. They were easily ripped apart by Stripes tearing through them, her long, razor teeth chomping them to shreds as the knight shut the door behind him.

“There's not enough room here to hold that many Spawn,” Silvers murmured gruffly, glaring around the dim halls warily. “How in the hell did they-” was about as far as he managed to continue before he halted himself and sighed wearily. Of course it had to be that simple.

The Spawn had to come from somewhere, and usually it was from their rifts in space that allowed them to enter the earth from their void of chaos and nonsensical energy. There was no possible way to enter such voidspace without being ripped apart by the millions of Spawn within, but at least the portals could be destroyed if the fleshlike gateways were butchered. Though, Silvers had never seen one so purposefully built for the interior of a Commandos' base, despite the one sitting so comfortably before him. Worse yet was the large hole-like depth into an eternal void of black sitting in the middle of the fleshy rift, which was warbling and shifting at random like a dark star. The knight wasn't sure how the Spawn were able to form a rift of this size inside of Commandos equipment, but there it was – and it needed to be destroyed.

“Go clear the way Stripes,” Silvers growled, hefting his halberd downward and cracking his neck. “I've got some cleaning up to do.”

The tiger grumbled dangerously, as if irked she didn't get to enjoy the killing blow herself, but the mighty beast regardless slinked away simply, that long tail of hers whapping against the square of his back as the knight snorted a laugh. Hopefully she wouldn't take that too much out on him later.

Whipping his polearm to the side, the mighty weapon suddenly rearranged loudly, the entire axehead suddenly cracking to the right to reveal a gun barrel, the wide bore ominously pointed at the warbling rift. Despite the sounds of slaughter and angry tiger behind him, Silvers hummed almost merrily, setting up his combine halberd with nearly mechanical speed. The void before him began to also angrily shift about, and snarls similar to those far outside were echoing from deep within. Yet, the knight seemed to have no such hurry, aiming up his modified rifle towards the base of the flesh arch almost casually. He tapped his foot almost idly, bobbing his head as if waiting patiently as a Spawn head splashed out of the rift viciously-

-and he pulled the trigger.

The knight barely had any time to register the explosion before he was hurled back from the force of it, the only reason that his halberd had not abandoned his grip was the magnetism forcing it to his palm. It was lucky that Stripes had left the door open, otherwise his back would have crashed against it. For quite awhile he flew, his power armor blaring warning signs of the heat and corruption smashed into the metal before his back hit the ground, and he skidded like a meteor into it. Several more feet were entrenched out before the man finally halted, and there was smoke still wifting off of his as he gasped in confusion. Usually those rifts weren't quite so explosive. Maybe he used the wrong round...?

Whatever the case, he was definitely dazed. It took him several seconds to realize there was a familiar furry head pointed curiously at him, and Silvers managed to wheeze out a short laugh.

“Hey babe. How was your day?” He mused jokingly, groaning a bit as he ignored the critical power warning on his armor. The worst enemy to his power suit tended to be himself.

Stripes growled dangerously, and then reared on her hind legs – and suddenly shortened. In only a scant second, where there was once a colossal orange cat about to maul the knight of the rest of his life, instead stood a red-haired woman in dark, nearly skintight leathers. Her green eyes, far too feral to be regular human eyes, narrowed even more lethally.

“Most of them scattered when the Rift dropped,” she replied almost with a hiss, kneeling down to dig one of her fingers into the center of his chestplate. “You're going to die doing that someday.”

“Hasn't -hah!- killed all of me yet,” Silvers laughed despite himself. It wasn't a humorful one – something about the ache in his chest forced the chuckle out of him. Regardless, he made no move to stop Stripes as her scarred, sharp-nailed hands reached for his helmet, and gently pulled it above his head. Silvers' own scarred visage came into view, complete with a tidy black beard and unnaturally crimson eyes. He smiled feebly, closing his sight as the other mercenary stroked his face.

“Do that and I'll pull you out of the grave just to beat your ass again,” she growled, but her green eyes flashed warmly. She leaned down to nuzzle her cheek against the man's own, another gentle catlike purr echoing from her as she did so. It was hard to tell if she was human first, or feline.

“Fair point. Just. Let me. Stand up so...,” Silvers started, and attempted to bring himself upward, only to give up halfway. He attempted this again, and then a third and fourth time. “Would LOVE to actually go back to base now.”

“I'll zuk ya deek if you-” was about as far as Stripes managed to tease before the knight suddenly pounced up as if there was a rocket in his back, apparently entirely reinvigorated by half of that sentence alone as he already rushed back to Watchpoint Free. Rolling her eyes with a sigh, the fiery-haired woman soon followed after him with a small smirk.

Too bad she meant if he helped clean up the base so she could sleep.