#is this the greatest power in the universe?

[ink-and-dagger]

Okay. Opinions on the alternate happy universe Silco for act 3? Also do you think there would be an Astrid in that universe? If so, what would she be like/her story with Silco.

Oh boy, okay, my opinion on happy AU Silco?

Lovely as it was to see him freshly bathed and enjoying retirement, he was also wildly out of character and his presence in this timeline made very little sense.

I mean, the AU timeline as a whole didn't make sense. At the time of Vi's 'death' Shimmer had already been created and deployed, yet in this AU there's zero trace of it? Singed created Shimmer for himself — a means to bring back his daughter — Vi's dying wouldn't change that. Nothing would. Plus, at this point in the story in season 1, Silco's eye and scar were already corrupted, yet in this AU his eye and scar show absolutely no sign of Shimmer treatment whatsoever?

Also, I'm sorry, but there is absolutely no universe in which Silco would forgive Vander so easily. Again, the writers have taken the lore and characterization established in season 1 — this soul-rending, utter betrayal that left a young man broken beyond repair and bordering on feral — and have carelessly erased the depth which made their stories so poignant. I can't remember who on Tumblr said this, but they were so right: If the Silco we know from season 1 had found the note that Vander left in the mines, he would have wiped his ass with it and set it on fire.

Not only would it take a monumental gesture for Silco to consider forgiving Vander, but if he did end up forgiving him he would never, NEVER, in any universe or lifetime, say the words "Greatest thing we can do in life is find the power to forgive". It's not even the sentiment of what he's saying that I'm referencing here, it's the literal words that come out of his mouth. This is not Silco's brand of cringe, and once again just demonstrates that the season 2 writers seem to have little to no understanding of these characters and weak dialogue composition to boot.

It's honestly so hard for me to even imagine what Astrid's relationship to him would be like in this AU, because to me that simply isn't Silco. It's some bizarre, superficial changeling look-a-like.

[coolunspokenforname]

First Superhero AU I've had since... Never Mind All That

In a universe where some people develop powers at 18, but can be detected as early as infanthood, every set of twins in the Pines family have become the greatest superheroes or villains in their age. With this knowledge, the Superhero Training Department (STD; unintentional by them, 100% intentional by me) has taken in these children to train and raise into the perfect soldiers.

Mabel Pines

The eldest Pines twin in this generation, but still not even 13, so her powers haven't developed yet. She and her brother were brought in at three, and have been trained separately, though they were allowed time together, and formed a close bond. Neither knows why they are always separated, or why some of the older staff look at them with great suspicion. Mabel usually gets the brunt of this suspicion, especially when she does something the staff disapproves of. She also notices that her punishments are far harsher than those given to the other kids, though she never tells Dipper about it.

Mason 'Dipper' Pines

If Mabel is treated like a troublemaker, Dipper is treated like he can do no wrong. He is always given special treatment, extra lessons, though this means there is more expected of him than everyone else in the program. It's frustrating, of course, but what he absolutely hates is how he sees the staff treat Mabel, despite her attempts to hide it. He knows something is up, but he just can't figure out what. He knows that if he gets out he could find out the missing pieces, so he focuses on getting an early apprenticeship, and hoping to take Mabel with him.

Until things change

One day, Dipper and Mabel find a way to escape. It's hard, and they need to figure out how to work together on the fly, but they get out and make it to a nearby city. Then comes the next problem: how are two almost-teenagers going to survive on their own, with absolutely no normal social skills to go off of?

For a couple weeks they wander from place to place, trying to figure out how to survive, running from the staff, and even heroes occasionally. It goes relatively well, at least they aren't captured, until they're cornered by a group of government agents. They think it's over for them, that their escape would lead to them being killed or, worse, never seeing each other again. That is, until someone comes to their rescue.

Stanley Pines

Also raised in the Superhero Training Facility, he escaped at seventeen, and since has been on the run; first as an escapee, and for the last thirty years as one of the most wanted supervillains in the world. He had heard of the twin's escape and had come to help them, knowing how it was like to be on the run alone. Though, he didn't realize that meant they'd be staying with him. To be fair, he didn't have much of a choice, since after getting the agents to buzz off the twins wouldn't let him out of their sight (Was he like this after escaping? Definitely not. (he was worse)). He takes them to his base of operations, a little shack in the middle of nowhere, with a museum and giftshop portion. Definitely not what the kids would expect from the worlds greatest supervillain, but who can judge?

Turns out, the shack and the town nearby have become a haven to people hiding from the Superhero Training Department, not that Stan knows this. Almost everyone has something to hide, but despite this Dipper and Mabel make new friends and start to live a normal (at least as normal as possible) life in Gravity Falls.

And for the next while they live in peace. Though, that's going to change pretty soon, when someone from Stan's past comes looking for the kids.

[queereads-bracket]

Queer Adult SFF Books Bracket: Round 1

Book summaries below:

The Priory of the Orange Tree by Samantha Shannon

A world divided. A queendom without an heir. An ancient enemy awakens.

The House of Berethnet has ruled Inys for a thousand years. Still unwed, Queen Sabran the Ninth must conceive a daughter to protect her realm from destruction – but assassins are getting closer to her door.

Ead Duryan is an outsider at court. Though she has risen to the position of lady-in-waiting, she is loyal to a hidden society of mages. Ead keeps a watchful eye on Sabran, secretly protecting her with forbidden magic.

Across the dark sea, Tané has trained to be a dragonrider since she was a child, but is forced to make a choice that could see her life unravel.

Meanwhile, the divided East and West refuse to parley, and forces of chaos are rising from their sleep.

Fantasy, epic fantasy, secondary world, adult

A Magical Girl Retires by Park Seolyeon

A millennial turned magical girl must combat climate change and credit card debt in this delightful, witty, and wildly imaginative ode to magical girl manga.

Twenty-nine, depressed, and drowning in credit card debt after losing her job during the pandemic, a millennial woman decides to end her troubles by jumping off Seoul’s Mapo Bridge.

But her suicide attempt is interrupted by a girl dressed all in white—her guardian angel. Ah Roa is a clairvoyant magical girl on a mission to find the greatest magical girl of all time. And our protagonist just may be that special someone.

But the young woman’s initial excitement turns to frustration when she learns being a magical girl in real life is much different than how it’s portrayed in stories. It isn’t just destiny—it’s work. Magical girls go to job fairs, join trade unions, attend classes. And for this magical girl there are no special powers and no great perks, and despite being magical, she still battles with low self-esteem. Her magic wand . . . is a credit card—which she must use to defeat a terrifying threat that isn’t a monster or an intergalactic war. It’s global climate change. Because magical girls need to think about sustainability, too.

Park Seolyeon reimagines classic fantasy tropes in a novel that explores real-world challenges that are both deeply personal and universal: the search for meaning and the desire to do good in a world that feels like it’s ending. A fun, fast-paced, and enchanting narrative that sparkles thanks to award-nominated translator Anton Hur, A Magical Girl Retires reminds us that we are all magical girls—that fighting evil by moonlight and winning love by daylight can be anyone's game.

Fantasy, contemporary, climate fiction, novella, adult

[bougiebutchbinch]

goin' back to ships where I love every possible dynamic and permutation because of That Nonsense and just. goddamn primeverse tfp switchy megastar fuckery does something to me.

the size difference. the immesely fucked up Problematique power disparity. the blatantly abusive dynamic (coupled with hints that maybe, just maybe, once upon a time, they had a chance at being the greatest, um, genocidal war criminal power-couple the universe has ever seen!)

megatron is sooooooooo powerbottom coded in my head. I need him to ride starscream until he literally breaks his poor twiggy flyboy's hip - all while loudly moaning the name of Optimus Prime.

but I also need him to smirk like the devil as he obliterates that skinny twink with his spike (which is half the size of starscream's torso and stretches him so wide and deep starscream feels it in his tanks). overstimulating starscream into a shivering, drooling wreck every other day-cycle won't fix him. probably. but it can't hurt, right???

and I need starscream to get the upper hand once in a blue moon and eat megatron's valve until he makes his huge buff beefcake boss whimper (he almost drowns down there, especially when Megatron squeezes those thick, armour-crushing thighs - but that's another story).

and I need starscream to teasingly sashay up to megatron while he's sprawled on his throne, then climb onto his lap and ride his spike while his claws glide juuuuuust a little too close to the vital energon lines in megatron's throat!!!

and I need megatron to be awful and abusive and brutal, a monster starscream needs to escape

and I need that to be true, while starscream is also a terrible person who will leap at any chance to flip their dynamic on their head and repay all of megatron's abuse tenfold

and I need starscream to kill megatron and walk away without looking back

and I need starscream (the ultimate coward!) to run towards the Omega Lock and his dead 'Master', screaming for him with such broken-hearted devotion

and I need them both to be hurt survivors who grow and learn and heal just not necessarily together because they're awful for each other

you know what I mean???!??!?!??

[nym-wibbly]

Fanvidding used to be one of my things, last century and early in this one. I'd spend hours, days, with two VCRs or basic editing software, or with a mixer deck, especially if I wanted to extract a snippet of dialogue and mute the background music. "Labour of love" doesn't even begin to describe the process of getting a fanvid from concept to convention in the 1980s or 1990s.

I just had a couple of days trying out vidding on a high-powered Mac for the first time; a quarter-way-into-the-21st-century hardware and software setup, with nearly instant access to HD source video via the internet, and with by-the-hour rented cloud servers for uber processing power and AI automation when I need it.

It's like I've lived in 2 different worlds. Like, all that stuff I'd spend days doing by hand and ear and eye and brain to control the sound levels or trim a clip to the millisecond - there's software today that can do it at the click of a button in seconds. You want the soundtrack or ambient noise to vanish to isolate the dialogue? Done. Poof. Magic! Upscale that fuzzy old TV show to HD? Click! In an absolute pinch, my bloody phone can output a passable vid.

Vidding is still a labour of love, no question, if only because you need an awesomely detailed working knowledge/memory of the canon to cherrypick, but the whole production time scale has changed immeasurably within my adult lifetime. Amazing.

[cuntylouis]

INTERVIEW WITH THE VAMPIRE 1.03 "Is My Very Nature That of the Devil"

[aingeal98]

Early orv Han Sooyoung is so important to me. She's one of the three most powerful and important people in the universe and no one knows it including herself. The first time we meet her she's formed a cult. She convinces said cult to unleash a dragon that kills many people including the main character. Then she gets her head cut off by the protagonist and just keeps talking shit. The MC lectures her on plagiarism while she's a decapitated head. She thinks she's one step ahead of everyone. She's not. Dokja thinks he's got her all figured out. He really, really doesn't. They're both so silly and also their scheming causes many, many deaths. The first time we meet her main body, her carefully planned evil scheme, that we've been building up to for an entire arc, lasts all of 10 seconds before falling apart:

She's incredible. She's there solely to cause problems for everyone including herself. At this point I was already in love when the only thing I knew was that she was an evil loser who Dokja hated for being a plagarist. She then goes on to kill Dokja's bully, get cursed, antagonise Sangah, unsuccessfully try to convince everyone to kill a kid, and then get hit by a bus offscreen and dies. She fails upwards more than any white man you know. Who's doing it like her honestly.

[turtleblogatlast]

I am once again overcome by the sheer magnitude of pranks Mikey and Leo could commit on the world of archaeology through their combined abilities of time and space

With enough time for Mikey in particular to be strong enough to make a small time portal - again within Leo’s portal opened in Someplace, Somewhere - they could plant so much shit just to mess with historians.

Like - Mikey wanted to try painting Greek-style pottery and Leo is like “hey hey wait…”

And now there is newly discovered evidence of Greek depictions of humanoid turtles laying around.

[quantumleper]

Goku throughout the Tournament of Power | Dragon Ball Super | Universal Survival Saga

[eddis-not-eeddis]

One of the most beautiful things about being a Christian is the fact that I can take my sorrows, my worries, my pain, my joys, my desires, my hope--all of it!--directly to God. And he cares about it. Even when it's small and personal, and even when it's so big I can't deal with it myself. I can take all of it to him, and I know he will take care of it.

[thegreatyin]

*n* tell me where you play the game.

mtg arena!

from what i can tell, it's essentially just. the game but an online port. very convenient. there are the typical mobile game microtransactions but that's to be expected with games like that in a genre like this

[wonderbatbvs]

I NEEDED MORE WONDERBAT & WONDERGAL IN MY LIFE DO YOU UNDERSTAND?!

THE MVP OF THE TRINITY DESERVED BETTER

[illholy]

in light of the 'Judith is stupid' allegation. I will not deny it, also I think if she isnt careful she'd forget her name so. . .

[braceletofteeth]

“This movie is the sequel of a spin-off, and also a crossover. There are about 300 side characters. You won't understand anything.”

👆👆 This sign can't stop me because Yagi Yusei is in it!!!!

[castieldelamancha]

the thing is dean's acts weren't the only lessons about free will he was teaching cas, since god was the one moving them around like puppets for the most of it, it was the love he learned from dean what actually gave him freedom, not only through confessing it all, but also in the way that love had cas messing the script, feeling and choosing when he shouldn't have been doing any of that

[kaerinio]

@messanique approached her grace at her name day feast:

Rhaella won't lie and say that Dany's birth was a happy, peaceful day -- it was a wild April storm deep in the southern countryside, in a half-abandoned mansion with no one around except for eight-year-old Viserys, Willem Darry, and Father Bonifer, none of whom knew anything about giving birth (you see, Daenerys was just early enough to throw a wrench into Rhaella's birthing plans, but not early enough to be overly worried about the fact -- though with her history, Rhaella did, in fact, worry a lot). The storm lasted as long as Rhaella's labor did, and afterward? Oh afterward, Rhaella doesn't remember ever feeling that peaceful; just from holding her, Rhaella could tell that Dany was different from Shaena, from Daeron, from Aegon, and from Jaehaerys -- she was built from the same stern stuff as Rhaegar, and Rhaella knew this baby of hers would live, and not even be sick as Viserys was as a toddler. It was nighttime by the time Dany was born and they both were cleaned up -- still raining, though not enough to be classified as a storm still. Darry kept Viserys occupied by making peach cobbler and lemonade from the fruits that fell off the trees outside, and they feasted on that to celebrate Daenerys Hope coming into the world. (There might be other desserts and traditions through the years, but Rhaella always has lemonade and peach cobbler made for Dany's birthday).

But truthfully, Dany's half-birthday is the most special day to Rhaella. This day, more or less, coincides with when Rhaella discovered she was pregnant in the first place. Whatever else might have surrounded Dany's conception, the news of her existence lit a spark in Rhaella. It was the first time she was pregnant since Viserys, and she was determined for this one to live, too. To ensure that, she knew she had to get away from Aerys. And she did it; Dany's way of sparking rebellion, enacting change, ensuring people's freedom began first with her own mother. That shift in her, that newfound hope and desire for life, is not something Rhaella will ever forget, so she has to celebrate it. When early October comes around, Rhaella puts together a brunch that will last until supper (ideally just mother and daughter, but Rhaegar and Rhaenys are welcomed too) and will give Dany personal gifts (an old locket that was once Nana Betha's; Rhaella's favorite book from her childhood, worn and yellowed; Granny Shaera's old diary; things of that sort) while they talk, and laugh, and cry, and finish an entire bottle of champagne between them. While Dany's birthday is an event with shopping and trips and events galore, her half-birthday is meant to be intimate, just the two of them, so Rhaella can pass on how important having a daughter, having Daenerys, is to her.

currently sitting here screaming, crying, weeping, rolling on the ground! i'm sitting here thinking about rhaella in this sanctuary she's created and how she raises dany in this place of love, safety, and warmth. 🥹 the fact that rhaella just brings everything to life and together on her birthday with peach cobbler and lemonade, made completely from the fruits of the mansion, linking herself and dany together to that beautiful home! DAENERYS HOPE? I'M ON THE GROUND. her half birthday being their day . . . how special it is and how special it remains. the familial gifts!! the way dany cherishes them so deeply?? especially her mama's favorite book (which . . . of course she reads when she's tired and cannot sleep or stressed or feeling lost). the way dany always looks forward to not just her birthday, but her half-birthday, as well, because she gets to spend the day with her mama, bonding and being and also celebrating the love that rhaella has gifted her. this is a day she marks off on her calendar, blocking it off automatically. she will never make plans on that day, and she defends that time. when she's younger, she doesn't quite understand why the day is so important, but as she ages, as she begins to recognize that insistence, that shining light in her mother's eyes . . . she gets it. and she becomes so protective of that day, deeming it truly as theirs. 🥹