#it’s also part of a subgenre I like to think of as

[minimanic]

Initially I thought Civil War looked kind of stupid and I wasn’t wrong about that But However after seeing a couple of reviews it finally clicked in my brain that whatever this sucker might lack in scathing/meaningful political commentary it would almost certainly make up for by being an Alex Garland dystopian road trip movie and brother I was RIGHT

[asexual-levia-tan]

i love the bias + the fan pairings so much because on the surface its very "oh, well, the bias just has to fall for the fan and then its happily ever after" but no! its way more fun than that!

the fan isnt in love with the bias. in fact, the fan doesnt view this world as reality, nor do they even view their bias as a human. the fun part of this pairing is the fan having to recognize the world they live in as their new reality and the people around them as people! the bias falling for the fan is just part one, the fan falling for the bias as an Actual Human Being is just as important an element

[starsiide]

as someone who listens to "real" rap I can confidentally say you're all being annoying as fuck when you gatekeep rap

[absolutebl]

Pit Babe - it's time for a Trash Watch!

I had to. Well, no I didn't, but COME ON. It's like Thailand is negging me. Let's burn rubber, shall we? Burn rubbers...?

The things I had been told going in about this show:

it's about car racing (this bores me)

it stars Pavel (my BL ult bias, he is my icon for a reason)

it started as an omegaverse y-novel but the A/B/O aspects would be stripped from the BL series

it's high heat

(There some chatter about whether point 3 was a mistranslation of something the author said, but don't bother me with trifles.)

Here's a definition of omegaverse:

Omegaverse, also known as A/B/O (alpha/beta/omega), is a subgenre of speculative erotic fiction, and originally a subgenre of erotic slash fan fiction. Its premise is that a dominance hierarchy exists in humans, which are divided into dominant "alphas", neutral "betas", and submissive "omegas".[1] This hierarchy determines how people interact with one another in romantic, erotic and sexual contexts.[2] (Wikipedia)

In my experience and opinion, omegaverse archetypes and tropes are often used to strip out female characters (and The Feminine) and as a tool to excuse extreme hyper-masculine behaviors without a critical feminist lens (leading to lazy characterization). Just as heat is an excuse to get nkd quickly, A/O/B is often an excuse for taboo and dubious consent actions and behaviors. Do I get why writers/readers enjoy it? Yes I do. Do I personally like it? Not particularly. (Although there are always exceptions.)

Putting all that aside, the above represents my foundational knowledge before Pit Babe started.

Oh and that the familiar BL faces appearing in this show were follows:

Pavel Naret (aka Pavel Phoom) from 2 Moons 2 & Coffee Melody - Pavel is a fluent English speaker, a bit of a drama monger, and a motorcycle rider/car-dude, this role suits him

Nut Supanut from Oxygen & Something in My Room - has an amazing voice, his somewhat wooden acting has improved steadily since Oxygen

Pon Thanapon - one of Star Hunter's stable first seen in the Gen Y series (where he stole the appeal of an intended pair), also v good in Make a Wish, I wish he'd get a lead role as he has a likable screen presence

Pop Pataraphol from La Cuisine - he's playing the Alpha rival and I'm not convinced he's suited to this role

Michael Kiettisak from Love Sick, Oxygen, Call it What You Want, Till the World Ends - playing the comic relief this time rather than his usual tortured stoic... huh

All the rest are either fresh faces or older experienced actors. Interesting mix. They must have some money behind this.

And now, get out your marshmallows! The dumpster is on fire! Let's start the roast.

Episode 1 - Platypus, Pickles, Pavel, & other Smoking Hot Problems

This first segment told with a 4 day retrospect, because I decided to do a trash watch only after @aliceisathome said I should.

My initial reaction:

the sheer audacity of Thailand being like "PitBabe is not omegaverse" and then serving "Alpha" to us on a platter in the first sex scene is

how dare

but also

what the actual fuck is going on? what world are we living in where a/b/o is LIVE ACTION ON OUR SCREENS?

we getting heat, knotting & mpreg next?

apparently this is my reality now

I'm not sure what weird quantum time stream I've jumped into but someone was all,

yes the whole world is hella screwed, but also...

Thailand has decided live action mm fanfic is gonna win it the culture wars

and I'm beginning to think they may be right

BL is now the platypus of the film industry

4 days later:

Considering how much chatter this caused there's a part of me that wondered if it was all intentional and a marketing ploy (to say it wasn't omegaverse when obviously it is). In which case... brilliant Machiavellian tactics, production.

But Thai studios are rarely this calculated in their promo. So I think it's all accidental. But it certainly caused a raucous few days on Tumblr.

On a completely different note, Babe's house looks like it started life as a particularly inventive Olive Garden. Or is that just me?

More random thoughts:

Pavel has had work done, why honey? You were the definition of perfect.

The smell thing is great, I love stuff to do with scent and necks. If omegaverse brings this to the table, fine. But...

Being all Alpha perfect butch manly man = I do not like Babe at all, I kinda want him to be brought down a peg. (Woo... pegging!) I never like narratives that glorify the captain of the football team (side eyes Cdrama CEO romances and Love O2O), Babe better have depth and damage (forget the pegging) of some kind or his behavior will get old FAST, faster than he drives (also, forget the pegging idea)

Nut is ideal in the Beta role. I mean, that's Way's character right? We all can see that. If it's not intentional, it's a miscast. I love how soft he is as as screen presence. He's great in this part.

None of the other characters are sticking out to me yet, but I'm prepared to love the side dishes in this, please make them swoon worthy!

I'm glad they didn't hold the Charlie = trickster reveal off, I like knowing he is a double agent up front.

Finally, with respect to an adequate trash watch, I'm in a pickle.

How am I going to drink for this show when there is so much else airing on Frigay? I can't keep track, if I'm drunk.

I need a strategy for this trash fire if the puns and snark are to spout forth! (HA Fourth!)

Controlled burn?

Anygay, see you all next week.

Episode 2 - Side Dish Addiction + Second Lead Syndrome are both infecting me at once

[FYI I gotta have my backup computer to watch this so that's why Imma sometimes be delayed getting the trash out to the curb.]

3 minutes! 3 minutes in and I needed to pause and wax snarkful. (Ouch, bet that hurts. Is waxing snark similar to a Brazilian but for BL? Is that why they all so hairless in The Sign?... I digress, where was I?)

Okay so the subber said Daddy but I don't think that word means what they think it means. Because Way said simply nong paa.

Usually they'll use the English word Daddy (pronounced Dah-deee) for, ya know, Actual Daddies (tm).

Wait wait:

Calling Daddy Actual

(My dumb sci-fi loving arse will see myself out the back before I start drawing Battlestar Galactica = Pit Babe connections. TOO FAR ABL. Too far.)

Look, I like the tension in this show. It's good to set up an unlikeable Alpha dog and then immediately turn him into an underdog, makes him a bit more likable. I still don't like Babe, but now at least I'm on his side.

Charlie = cute but v sus. Fortunately for him, Babe = cute but v thick.

Everyone calls Charlie Babe's dek. Yes sounds a bit like what you think but also means kid/child and SHOULD be translated as boy in this show. Why doesn't the subber get that? They a sub...ber after all. (I'll see myself out.)

Honestly, the script writers might know what they are doing with abo but our eng sub translator sadly does NOT. I'm so glad this is coming now in my BL watching life. When my ear and knowledge of Thai is so much better than it once was. Others much be SO CONFUSED.

Snicker. They just fucking with us, but it's fun to watch the mpeg speculation abound.

File this one under: Thailand's trouble with ESL plurals and also "you should have Pavel helping with these subs" sweethearts.

Production knows entirely what it's doing with this show and its omegaverse shizz (even if the subber doesn't) and I am very much enjoying the online carnage that results.

This dumpster fire continues off screen into the blogosphere and I continue to roast things over it.

Meanwhile, hi Pon! You so adorable! When you gonna lead out a BL for us?

Is Idol Factory stealing all of Star Hunter's talent? Are they the Red Racers of the BL world? These are the questions I ask myself as I watch this.

Is that AGE GAP I smell before me?

Is the 20 yr old college kid meant for the pit boss? Cause you all know I am a slut for age gaps.

Moment of a/b/o: Jeff's fear of touch/heightened personal space would be a plot marker for "baby doesn't want Alphas close cause he smells like an omega" but of course this show it not omegaverse. Not omegaverse at all.

nuh-uh

Linguistic corner!

Lung (sounds a bit like loo) is uncle(ish) it means basically a male relation older than phi. So Alan is the oldest in the crew.

Alan calls Jeff nu (which the subber translated as boy I would have gone with cutie or little one). Nu is a diminutive affectionate term that's technically gender neutral but is most often used by/on cute girls/women. Jeff did NOT like it. Then Alan sort of dodges through pronouns/particles settling on phi for I, ger for you, and ja for a particle. This is interesting because ger & ja kinda lower his age and status into a casual sphere. Not more intimate more equal to jeff... fascinating.

I love the new "Korean" red racer, he drinks my brand of soy milk. He is now my baby snake in the grass.

Get it? Snake.

He and Babe should end up together.

The fight wasn't bad, do both actors have kickbox training in their backgrounds?

Who am I kidding, I care only about Uncle Alan and Nu Jeff now. All others are irrelevant to me.

Also...

WHERE IS A BOY FOR WAY?!!! Or a Daddy. I do not care. (Methinks nether does he.)

I am now captain of the Way Appreciation Society. Let's all find a way... to get him some dick.

Also the BTS stingers are tons of fun. Looks like the set was a blast.

Finally, and I mean this kindly. Why isn't Noh Phouluang in this? He should have been cast as Winner. Bah. I'm biased.

But one should be with Noh.

Episode 3 - Side Dishes Delux

Gayest bridge n Thailand has made its obligatory appearance.

How much do I love uncle & nu? They are SO damn cute. Also nu flustered is the best kind of nu.

I could not care less about Babe and Charlie. Except I do love the smell thing.

Way will break my heart by getting his broken. He is right tho.

Tra la la. I feel like this is a bit like KP 2.0.

Charlie is a such a princess (and ace manipulator). Good thing Babe clearly likes being buttered up.

Babe's backstory was more interesting than I expected, I didn't think we would go so far into the paranormal side of a/b/o. I like it and I hope they lean into it quite a bit more. Make it part of the plot.

Unlike the kissing thing which seems to have been gotten over rather quickly.

I gotta say I'm enjoying the corporate sponsorship jockeying and tension more than I thought I would. I'm curious as to who Jef and Charlie are working for and what their motivation is. The plot itself is keeping me intrigued and that is rare for me with BL.

So no trash talk this ep, I was largely absorbed and entertained. I didn't event need booze. Shocking behavior on my part.

#giveWayaboy2023

Episode 4 - I (who never ship) am shipping the impossible

Here’s the thing. I just want this to be a better story than it is. Right now it’s kind of like a soap opera. I don’t hate lakorn, I really don't. To Sir With Love is a glorious chewing of the diamanté scenery (completed with death glitter). But...

If this is gonna be a soap opera it needs to lean into the messy side more than the tailored high concept side. Support characters and evil needs more screen time.

Instead, right now, I don’t know where I am with this show because it doesn't know where it wants to be. I’m kind of dangling in the middle of a dirty situation. It’s uncomfortable for me, and the show feels uncomfortable for the performers. 

Also... I have questions.

Yes, of course I want to know what Charlie & Jeff are up to. Why can Jeff see the future?

But more importantly I NEED to know why Babe has a flying saucer bed?

That kind of lighting makes nobody look good, especially not at that angle. It’s very traumatic and I’m not wild about the shag rug either. I have concerns about Babe's taste. I guess is what I am saying. 

On a COMPLETELY DIFFERENT note:

There’s absolutely no chemistry to justify this, but I have decided that I am going to personally advocate for, and ship, Way and the interloping not-really-Korean. They are both sort of own-moral-code types. I have tiny crush on Kim, and Nut is the prettiest, and Way is Best Boy so there it is, I would like them to hook up, please & thank you.

#giveWay2Kim2023

Arrow guy is cute, too. Will we get to see him bone?

Is he going to be another one of the adopted alpha super-kid pets?

What the hell, throw Arrow Boy a bone! All hot boys in BLs deserve bones.

Plot thickens.

Hah.

Thickens.

(I am an immature idiot.)

Episode 5 - wait wait way-t, can arrow boy have Way?

Look, BLabies, I didn’t get any screen caps this episode because frankly there wasn’t anything worth capturing.

I guess Charlie really does love Babe? Very dramatic if idiotic saving from the burning car. But Babe has gone to the broken Alpha place of extremely unlikeablability (frankly he was almost there at the start). If I were Charles B Spectacled I would be OUT by now. 

Is that?

NO.

Don't get the plastic bowl.

No white towel sponge bath. Please kill this trope.  

I mean, it's not as bad as singing, but that's because NOTHING is as bad as singing in a Thai BL.

AND the main boys are back together.

I don’t find their relationship or Babe’s lack of senses a particularly interesting aspect of the plot.

Unless, of course, Babe is pregnant and that's why he lost his Alpha sniffer.

BUT I do love the sides.

Jeff = the introvert precog who can’t/wont do people and Alan = the extrovert people person who WANTS but doesn’t understand him. 

Were Jeff and Charlie ALSO raised by Evil Daddy MacEvilPants? 

I liked the way Arrow CEO & Way looked at each other. Way, hon, give up on Babe (he sucks) and get thyself a billionaire bf with great aim and BDE.

On a completely different note, the best thing about this show is the blooper reel. That thing with the green smoothie going down his pants was hilarious!

In conclusion, this was a green smoothie down the pants episode. I was entertained, and it’s probably gonna be good for the plot in retrospect, but it was kind of squishy and unpleasant at the time.

Episode 6 - Are they actually listening to us now? Is Tumblr bugged?

This was a fun ep full of like actual racing and shizz.

Whatever.

Charlie is on the team now. All the teams, apparently.

Can we talk about Jeff and Alan?

The apology scene! Did you hear that Alan dropped to chan/ger? Eeeee!!! So cute. (He equalized their relationship in a soft way.)

Get it with that language play hottie. Next up: lengua play.

Please & thank you. 

Meanwhile, as all of the Internet knows, they went fully in for omegaverse - no bars.

I have to say, one of the greatest typos (or whatever) in existence is enigma instead of omega.

That's where I personally would rank in the omegaverse.

Hello, my gender is... enigma.

 Apparently it's a/b/o and sometimes e!  Also sometimes switch-ee 

Oh I'm very proud of myself with that one.

Funfunfun

Charlie. Babes. When a man asks to be thrown up against the wall. You throw him against that wall.

OMG is that arrow boy looking at Way in the bar?

3 seconds later.

Noooo.

Wait come back.

Noooooo.

That’s what I actually want to watch! 

OMG. Who said nu was the first step to teelak?

I flipping love Alan. 

Ah the boyfriend ep. Thank you, but I still don't trust Charlie.

Poor Way.

But nice crying jag, and I don’t say that often in Thai BL.

Now let him go, Way.

A boy with his arrows is waiting. 

(source)

Note for the future: tumblr has a bug that stops allowing edits after a certain time/number, thus my full trash often occur in 2 segments as a result. Click on the "abl trash watches bl" tag for the full thing if you're reading this and later episodes are missing.

[pynkhues]

I would LOVE to read your analysis of louis as byronic hero as apposed to his reading as gothic heroine. lots of the latter and zero of the former in the fandom.

Sure! Mmm, okay, so –

What are we talking about when we talk about Gothic Heroes?  

When we talk about gothic heroes, we’re really talking about three pretty different character archetypes. All three are vital to the genre, but some are more popular in certain subgenres i.e. your Prometheus Hero may be more common in gothic horror, whereas your Byronic Hero might be more likely to be found in gothic romance. That’s not to say they’re exclusive to those subgenres at all, and there is an argument that these archetypes themselves are gendered (in many ways, I think people confuse Anne being an author of the female gothic with Louis being a gothic heroine, but I’ll get into that later), but this is also not necessarily something that’s exclusive.

Anyway, I’m getting ahead of myself, haha, so the three gothic hero archetypes are:

Milton’s Satan who is the classic gothic hero-villain. You can probably guess from the name, but he was originated in John Milton’s 1667 poem, Paradise Lost. He is God’s favourite angel, but God is forced to cast him out of heaven when he rebels against him. As an archetype, he’s a man pretty much defined by his pride, vanity and self-love, usually fucks his way through whatever book or poem he’s in, has a perverted, incestuous family, and a desire to corrupt other people. He’s also defined as being “too weak to choose what is moral and right, and instead chooses what is pleasurable only to him” and his greatest character flaw, in spite of all The Horrors, is that he’s usually easily misguided or led astray. (I would argue that Lestat fits into this archetype pretty neatly, but that’s a whole other post.)

Prometheus who was established as a gothic archetype by Mary Shelley with Frankenstein in 1818. Your Prometheus Hero is basically represented by the quest for knowledge and the overreach of that quest to bring on unintended consequences. He’s tied, of course, to the Prometheus of Greek myth, so you can get elements of that in this character design too in that he can be devious or a trickster, but the most important part of him is that he is split between his extreme intelligence and his sense of rebellion, and that his sense of rebellion and boundary pushing overtakes his intelligence and basically leads to All The Gothic Horrors.

And the Byronic Hero, who as the name implies, was both created by and inspired by the romantic poet, Lord Byron in his semi-autobiographical poem, Childe Harold’s Pilgrimage which was published between 1812-1818. The archetype is kind of an idealized version of himself, and as historian and critic Lord Macaulay wrote, the character is “a man proud, moody, cynical, with defiance on his brow and misery in his heart, a scorner of his kind, implacable in revenge, yet capable of deep and strong affection.” Adding to that, he’s often called ‘the gloomy egoist’ as a protagonist type, hates society, is often self-destructive and lives either exiled or in a self-exile, and is a stalwart of gothic literature, but especially gothic romance. Interestingly too, in his most iconic depictions he’s often a) darkly featured and/or not white (Heathcliff being the most obvious example of this given Emily Bronte clearly writes him as either Black or South Asian), and b) is often used to explore queer identity, with Byron himself having been bisexual.

Okay, but what about the Gothic Heroine?

Gothic heroines are less delineated and have had more of an evolution over time, which makes sense, given women have consistently been the main audience of gothic literature and have frequently been the most influential writers of the genre too. The gothic genre sort of ‘officially’ started with Horace Walpole’s 1764 novel, The Castle of Otranto and Isabella is largely regarded as the first gothic heroine and the foundation of the archetype, and the book opens even with one of the key defining traits – an innocent, chaste woman without the protection of a family being pursued and persecuted by a man on the rampage.

The gothic heroine was, for years, defined by her lack of agency. She was innocent, chaste, beautiful, curious, plagued by tragedy and often, ultimately, tragic. Isabella survives in The Castle of Otranto, but she’s one of the lucky ones – Cathy dies in Wuthering Heights, Sybil dies in The Picture of Dorian Gray, Justine and Elizabeth both die in Frankenstein, Mina survives in Dracula, but Lucy doesn’t. There’s an argument frequently posited that the gothic genre was, and is, about dead women and the men who mourn them, and Interview with the Vampire certainly lends itself to that pretty neatly.

Of course, the genre has evolved, and in particular by the late 1800s, there was a notable shift in how the Gothic Heroine was depicted. The house became a place of imprisonment where they were further constrained and disempowered, she was infantilized and pathologized and diagnosed as hysterical, and as Avril Horner puts it in her excellent paper, Women, Power and Conflict: the Gothic heroine and ‘Chocolate-box Gothic’, gothic literature of this era “explores “the constraints enforced [by] a patriarchal society that is becoming increasingly nervous about the demands of the ‘New Woman’.”

This was an era where marriage was increasingly understood in feminist circles to be a civil death where women were further subjugated and became the property of their husbands. This was explored through gothic literature as the domestic space evolved into a symbol of patriarchal control in the Female Gothic.

Female Gothic vs Male Gothic

Because here’s the thing – the female gothic and the male gothic are generally understood to be two different subgenres of gothic literature.

While there are plenty of arguments as to what this entails, the basics is that the male gothic is written by men, and usually features graphic horror, rape and the masculine domination of women and often utilises the invasion of women’s spaces as a symbol of further penetrating their bodies, while the female gothic is written by women, and usually features graphic terror, as opposed to horror, while delving more specifically into gender politics. More than that though, its heroines are usually victimized, virginial and powerless while being pursued by villainous men.

The Female Gothic as a genre is also specifically interested in the passage from girlhood to female maturity, and does view the house as a place of entrapment, but she is usually suddenly “threatened with imprisonment in a castle or a great house under the control of a powerful male figure who gave her no chance to escape.”

That’s not Louis’ arc, that’s Claudia’s arc twice over, first with the house at Rue Royale, then with the Paris Coven, and Lestat and Armand aren’t the only powerful male figures who imprison her.

Claudia as the Gothic Heroine

Claudia in many ways is the absolute embodiment of the classic gothic heroine. Even the moment of their meeting is a product of Louis’ Byronic heroism – his act of implacable revenge against the Alderman Fenwick which prompts the rioting that almost kills her. She’s a victim of Louis’ monstrousness before they’ve even met, and while he saves her, he arguably does something worse in trapping her in the house with both himself and Lestat, holding her in an ever-virginal, ever-chaste eternal girlhood, playing into Lestat’s Milton-Satan by enhancing the perversion of family and ultimately infantilizing her out of his own desire for familial closeness.

Claudia has no family protection before Louis and Lestat – a staple of the gothic heroine – she is completely dependent on them in her actual girlhood, and again in adulthood, never developing the strength to be able to turn a companion, to say nothing about the sly lines here and there that further diminish and pathologise her (Lestat calling her histrionic, Louis making her out to be a burden, etc.). This is all further compounded again with the Coven, and when the tragedy of her life ultimately leads to the tragedy of her death.  

Louis as the Byronic Hero

Not to start with a quote, but here’s one from The Literary Icon of the Byronic Hero and its Reincarnation in Emily Bronte’s Wuthering Heights:

“Generally speaking, the Byronic hero exhibits several particular characteristics. He does not possess heroic virtues in the usual, traditional sense. He is a well-educated, intelligent and sophisticated young man, sometimes a nobleman by birth, who at the same time manifests signs of rebellion against all fundamental values and moral codes of the society. Despite his obvious charm and attractiveness, the Byronic hero often shows a great deal of disrespect for any figure of authority. He was considered "the supreme embodiment [...] standing not only against a dehumanized system of labor but also against traditionally repressive religious, social, and familial institutions" (Moglen, 1976: 28).

The Byronic hero is usually a social outcast, a wanderer, or is in exile of some kind, one imposed upon him by some external forces or self-imposed. He also shows an obvious tendency to be arrogant, cunning, cynical, and unrepentant for his faults. He often indulges himself in self destructive activities that bring him to the point of nihilism resulting in his rebellion against life itself. He is hypersensitive, melancholic, introspective, emotionally conflicted, but at the same time mysterious, charismatic, seductive and sexually attractive.”

Louis as he exists in the show to me is pretty much all of those things, and I think to argue that he’s a gothic heroine not only diminishes Claudia’s arc, but robs Louis of his agency within his own story. Louis chooses Lestat, over and over again, he’s not imprisoned by the monster in the domestic sphere, he is one of the monsters who’s controlling the household, including making decisions of when they bring a child into it and when Lestat gets to live in it – he wanted to be turned, he wanted to live with Lestat in Rue Royale, and while there are certainly arguments to be made about their power dynamic within the household in the NOLA era, importantly Louis actually gained social power through his marriage to Lestat, particularly through The Azaelia, he didn’t lose it in the way that’s vital to the story of the gothic heroine.

Daniel Hart even said it in a recent twitter thread about Long Face, but there is an element of Lestat and Louis’ relationship that is transactional, and to me, for that to exist, they both have to have a degree of control over their circumstances and choices in order to negotiate those transactions. Claudia is the one who can’t, she’s the one who’s treated effectively as property, and she’s the one who lacks control over her circumstances.

While you could perhaps argue the constraints of the apartment in Dubai lend more to the gothic heroine archetype, I’d argue it as furthering the Byronic trope again by being representative both of Louis’ self-destruction and self-imposed exile. As Jacob has said a few times, Louis does seem to have known to a degree that Armand was involved in Claudia’s death on some level, and it’s that guilt and misery that has him allowing Armand his degree of control. The fact that Louis was able to leave Armand as easily and as definitively as he was I think demonstrates that distinction too – after all, to compare that ending to Claudia’s multiple attempts to leave the confines of the patriarchal house, both in Rue Royale and Paris, which were punished at every turn – first by her rape, then by Lestat dragging her back off the train, and then by the Coven orchestrating her murder.

Louis gets to leave because Louis can leave, he has both the social and narrative power to, and the fact that he does is, to me, completely at odds with the gothic heroine. Louis can, and does advocate for himself, Louis is proud, moody, cynical. Defiance is a key part of his character, just as his exile from NOLA society due to his race, and his chosen rejection of vampire society in Paris, is. He’s intelligent and sophisticated, travels the world, and has misery in his heart, guilt that eats him up, and self-destructive tendencies. That’s a Byronic Hero, baby!  

[alpaca-clouds]

So, You Wanna Write A Solarpunk Thriller

Based on the blog I wrote yesterday about conflict in Solarpunk stories and how people either don't understand how stories work, have never read a book, or plainly act more dumb than they are. Because, yes, you can in fact tell almost any sort of story in a Solarpunk work - without resorting (like, sadly, way too many writers do) to "Actually the utopia is a lie and Solent Green is people!"

Meaning: If you need a "dark secret in society" to have a conflict in your story, you have a skill issue.

But let's talk about the genre that usually comes with those kinda dark secrets. While not necessary for the genre per se, it is a common trope here. Thrillers.

Ironically we all have some picture in our heads what a thriller might be - even though it might be one of the most loosely defined literary genre. Though probably we will think first of some movies.

The top 10 thriller movies according to this list on IMDB, the top ten thrillers are:

Seven (Police/Crime)

Silence of the Lambs (Police/Crime)

Shutter Island (Psychological)

The Sixth Sense (Supernatural)

Zodiac (Police/Crime)

Inception (Crime)

North by Northwest (Spy)

Identity (Psychological/Crime)

The Game (Financial)

The Prestige (Psychological/Crime)

Something you will note to your surprise: None of those actually feature a central conflict based on the society having a dark secret. In fact half of them are basically just Mystery movies with higher stakes (which is what turns them from mystery/crime drama to thrillers).

In fact I would argue that at least half of those movie plots could be rewritten fairly easily to take place in a Solarpunk world without any problem. Like, sure, The Game would not work, because this story very much is build around capitalism existing. And one could argue how those stories, where the main character is a cop need to be changed (because I know that my vision of a solarpunk does not involve cops).

In fact, going through the list of those 50 movies in total, I count a total of 6 movies in which a government conspiracy is part of the central conflict. Out of those 6 movies 4 are Cyberpunk.

Generally speaking, there is a variety of concepts for thrillers. There is the police/crime thrillers, but others as well. Wikipedia lists those kinds of thrillers:

The legal thriller, spy thriller, action-adventure thriller, medical thriller, police thriller, romantic thriller, historical thriller, political thriller, religious thriller, high-tech thriller, military thriller.

And I might add, I am very much missing the psychological thriller in there.

So, what am I saying here?

Basically: All you need to write a thriller is high enough stakes. In the end, a good thriller works by the stakes being high (though what means "high" might also vary from subgenre to subgenre), and by the readers or watchers understanding the stakes well.

So, that said, let me go through the kinds of thriller we have named above and name one example each for how the story could be made solarpunk.

Legal Thriller: The easy example here would be the fight for a Solarpunk world. Either pre-Solarpunk and a group of environmentalists is taking a big company to court for what they did against the environment. Or in a Solarpunk future I could also see some former rich folks trying to bring down the Solarpunk society by trying to find loopholes in the legal system - and a group of lawyers fighting against it.

Spy Thriller: This one will depend a lot on how you construct a Solarpunk future. The easy answer here is a world in which not all of the world is solarpunk - and we basically have a cold war happening between the solarpunk state and the old world state. Works out fine.

Action-Adventure Thriller: A good chunk of the movies in these genre feature natural catastrophes. So... Uhm... An earthquake will still happen in a Solarpunk world - and people try to survive. Easy. Next?

Medical Thriller: Another easy one. There is a break out of a new pandemic. People work hard to prevent further spread. Bonus points: Here we can actually use the setting to show the advantages and the shortcomings of a Solarpunk society, that is an anarchic and socialist/communist society.

Crime Thriller: (I will say, no police, because I do not believe in Cops in Solarpunk.) Again, even though it is to be assumed that crime will go back a lot if we create an equal society, there will still be some people who will kill. And there might still be a serial killer. And there will be those, who will try to capture that serial killer. Again. Easy.

Romantic Thriller: Okay, let's face it. The romantic thriller is so watered down by now that it is "a thriller that also has a strong romantic subplot" for most of the part - rather than the romance being the source of the trilling elements. But for the sense of saying the actual "romance turning into a thriller"... Let's be honest. Even if we had a Solarpunk world in which polyamory was the norm, there would be still crimes of passion - and just plainly abusive partners. So, here my prompt: One partner in a polycule goes to a mental crisis. In the attempt to protect them, the polycule gets drawn more and more to violence.

Historical Thriller: Uhm, okay, I will leave this one out because historical and scifi setting do not quite gel xD

Political Thriller: We have a more anarchic world, but there are still some people who hold more influence, because old habits die hard. Some of them try to use political tools to get the world to revert into the old ways, just to gain more power for themselves.

Religious Thriller: Let's face it. This genre is often very close to horror. But to go with the non-supernatural way... No, I do not believe in forbidding religion in a Solarpunk future. However, there is the issue that religion will always make it easier for cults to form. So, this is the story of a young man who gets into the claws of a religious cult - but only realizes too late what he got into.

High-Tech Thriller: (Translate: SciFi Thriller) Alien, but Solarpunk. The only difference: There are in fact people trying to help. They just fail to do so.

Military Thriller: Like the spy thriller - but instead of cold war it is open war.

Psychological Thriller: I am going here with a parent who gaslights their adult child, while the adult child tries to differentiate reality from the fiction presented by said parent.

So, why did I do this?

Basically just to show you: If you really think the only story you can tell as a Solarpunk author is how the Solarpunk utopia is in fact an illusion made to paint over a corrupt system, then it is very much a skill issue. You just are not very good at telling stories.

Thankfully there is a cure for that: Consume more stories. Watch movies. Read books (or listen to audiobooks). Read comics. Watch shows. Just consume more media.

[neptunedivine]

astro observations pt. ii

hi! I hope you’re doing well! I know it's been a while. I have a lot of things I wanna talk about. But for now, here are some observations I've noted since I've been gone. I hope you enjoy the read!

mutable signs and intelligence ✧ ALL MUTABLE PLACEMENTS SHOULD BE KNOWN FOR THEIR INTELLIGENCE. Since Virgo and Gemini are both ruled by mercury, I feel like this is a given. Sagittarius rules the 9H which controls higher education, so the same thing can be said for them. But then people throw Pisces under the bus…as if Virgo isn’t their sister sign. I feel like people see sister signs as opposites of each other, but in reality, they have their sister’s traits in subtlety.

As a Pisces sun and mercury myself, I understand the anxiety my Virgo homies get, it’s f*cking intense. But will I ever feel it full throttle? I don’t think so and I’m thankful for it.

But yeah, Pisces placements are not airheads, their smart too. I just think their intelligence is out of the ordinary or just not palatable like the other signs.

9H suns ✧ Kind of an addendum to my last bullet, but a lot of 9H and 12H sun celebrities are really smart. I’ve noticed this with Kendrick Lamar because he’s a 9H sun (in Gemini @ 9° -- damn), and he’s considered a conscious rapper (a subgenre of hip-hop that focuses on creating awareness and imparting knowledge). When I think of him, his words always have meaning, they’re not said just because. The same thing can be said about SZA (9H Scorpio sun @ 16°) and Frank Ocean (12H Scorpio sun 4°).

I'm noticing that they're both Scorpio suns at a Cancer degree, I might investigate that more in the future.

When they put out a project, I get annoyed when people immediately have a response (in all I think I get annoyed when this happens to any long-awaited album), because with the lyricism they have, let the words marinate. Their words are never just face value, there's always a deeper meaning.

SZA is also just smart period. She went on this little biology rant a couple of weeks ago. I was shocked but I loved it. Idk sometimes I forget that celebrities have other traits because they choose what they present to their audience and a lot of the time that isn’t intelligence.

✧ Do any other Pisces mercuries talk in funny voices or accents a lot? Like an unhealthy amount? Just me? Okay.

✧ Undeveloped Pisces placements want yes men to their delusions.

LGBTQIA+ ✧ Having mutable + Aquarius Venus/Mars placements and/or aspects could be an indicator of identifying as part of the LGBTQIA+ community. Mutable placements are used to changing their mind a lot, so when it comes to who they’re interested in, they might not have a fixed answer. With aqua placements, they’re not used to sticking to the traditional. So going against the grain with who they’re romantically/sexually involved with is a common manifestation.

mars-jupiter and clumsiness ✧ Those with Mars-Jupiter aspects can be clumsy. Maybe because Mars can rule the physical body and Jupiter expands, they may be overestimating their range of motion.

aries/1H mars and headaches ✧ These placements can be prone to headaches, yes because Mars rules the physical body and anger, and Aries rules the head. But you guys are also quick to anger, so you kind of set yourself up for it. Breathe please, I don’t like seeing you stressed out babes.

aries/scorpio placements and tattoos ✧ Speaking of Aries placements, Aries and Scorpio placements, in general, could like tattoos, whether they want some themselves, have them, or just like the look of them. I feel like Venus and Mars placements are attracted to those who have tattoos, while Mercury placements could have the desire to tattoo people/become tattoo artists. If you have Aries/Scoripo in your midheaven, this could be a good career for you!

that’s all for now! I hope you enjoyed the post, see you later!

[elumish]

My Experience With Digital-First Royalty-Only Publishing (Part 1)

Disclaimer: this is just my experience and my not reflect everyone's experience with this story of publishing.

The Concept:

The are two major distinct components of this sort of publishing: that it's digital first and royalty only. Digital first means that their primary business model is based in selling ebooks rather than physical boks. They don't sell in brick-and-mortar stores, but for my publisher, at least, you can buy physical copies of the books, which are made to order. Royalty only means that authors aren't paid an advance for the book. Instead, all of their payment is directly from royalties, which they start getting paid immediately (as opposed to needing to earn the advance before you get paid any royalties). Generally, these royalties are higher than for traditional publishers.

This is considered indie publishing, as opposed to traditional publishing through one of the Big Five (Penguin Random House, Hachette, HarperCollins, Simon & Schuster, Macmillan). I have basically only seen this for romance publishers, though there may be others that I haven't seen.

This is not vanity publishing--I don't pay my publisher, they pay me.

My Publishing Story:

In 2023, I wrote 10k words of a new story in three days, mostly on my phone. After a bit of random internet hunting, I decided to send it in to the publisher with a series plan for another three short pieces (10-15k words) that would together make one full story. A couple months later, they responded and asked if I would make it a full novel and also write another two in the same series. I agreed.

In April 2024, the book was released.

The Submission Process:

A number of digital first romance publishers (including those that give advances, like Harlequin) accept both agented and unagented submissions. That means that you don't need to already have an agent to submit to them, as opposed to most more traditional publishing companies, which only accept agented submissions.

Pro: lower barrier to entry, you get to avoid the querying process

Con: you have to advocate for yourself

Every publisher has a different submission process and different guidelines--some have broad word/topic guidelines and anything within that is fair game, some have specific calls for stories (e.g., we want stories of 30-80k words about billionaires), some have specific imprints or subgenres with different guidelines (e.g., historical romance for 50-80k words, fantasy romance for 60-100k words).

Generally they also request a summary, an equivalent of a query letter, and sometimes also some verion of a series plan.

The Contract:

Probably my biggest issue with working with this publisher was the contract. After a bunch of back and forth after they sent me the contract, they told me that they don't negotiate their contracts with unagented authors.

This is a sort of nuts line to draw, and to be totally honest I almost decided not to publish with them because of it. It would be totally reasonable for you to not publish with anyone who has that policy.

Ultimately, I decided to still publish with them for three reasons: 1) I did a lot of internet sleuthing and couldn't find anyone talking about issues with working with the publisher any time in the last decade, 2) I was comfortable enough with the contract terms to agree to them, and 3) the book is a niche enough subgenre that there's basically no chance I would get it published elsewhere.

If it was a different book or I was in a different stage in my career, I might have made a different decision.

Editing:

The editing I received was primarily copyediting rather than developmental editing. There was a little bit of developmental editing, but the vast majority was copyediting. I'm not so arrogant as to think that that's because my writing is just so perfect that it didn't need developmental editing.

There were ~3 rounds of editing that I went through with my editor. She would make a combination of edits in track changes and comments, and i would either accept, reject, or change. There were some things I rejected because they were intentional stylistic choices, and there were some things I accepted even if I didn't love them because they were part of the publisher's style guide. Everything else was a negotiation.

Overall, I didn't give in to something that I hated, and I don't think my writing suffered for the editing. There are choices that I wouldn't have made, but that doesn't necessarily mean that I'm right.

Part 2 will include marketing, payment, and my path forward in publishing

[p-paradoxa]

i’m still early into Dungeon Meshi but I enjoy how much it concerns itself with ecology. no part of the dungeon exists in a vacuum. adventurers are not just an outside force that loots and kills, although adventuring does in some way end up sustaining cycles of oppression (read: orcs). rather, adventuring itself is integrated into the ecosystem—each kill they deal, every death a party incurs, any waste they leave behind is taken into account as being something a component of the environment is adapted to, from the individual to population level.

we even see adaptations that have evolved over short periods of time, as with senshi’s golems adapting to the nutrients used to farm on them

another detail I enjoyed from off the top of my head was when senshi warned marcille not to use a spell that would damage a wide area of the lake, because the fish would die and the merfolk, krakens etc. would suffer in turn, despite a general interest in keeping the monsters at bay. this is narratively smart because it leads to more creative solutions, and also communicates a value of animal life without reverting to “isn’t it just fucked up to hunt things.” the focus of cooking and eating in the manga feels very intentional as a way for the characters to interact with this premise. unlike accumulating treasure, trying to earn fame and fortune, or hunting specific monsters (besides the one that swallowed a party member), eating is a necessity to life, which life itself factors in as part of its cycle. the party members became a part of the ecosystem the very first time they entered the dungeon, but by choosing to sustain themselves from it, come to a better understanding of it—this isn’t a value judgment or an appeal to nature, at least to me, it’s just an observation about how these systems work that the series is making, and something the author wants people to be mindful of

a last point that really hammered it in is an explicit visual representation of the dungeon as an ecosystem—the flashback to the sprite project (analogous to real life insect cultures). the sprites thrive when the cultures mimic dungeon conditions. because that’s all a dungeon is: a self-sustaining ecosystem (as long as it has the resource of magic, as well as other life-giving resources), which is resilient and yet sensitive to change

so far I think it does subvert most of the sensibilities of the dungeon fantasy subgenre in a meaningful way, which is to say it draws the emphasis somewhat away from battling and racking up kills in favor of environmentally conscious problem-solving and acknowledging the lives therein as being in interaction with each other

this is all surface-level praise as I’m only on like chapter 20 but I’m saying. I think you should read it. don’t just take my word for it though. check this out:

oops that’s just a picture of marcille being a big big lesbian whoooops post cancwlled

[kooberryfields4ever]

of course first post has to be nsfw blog rite of passage…… my take on the nsfw alphabet :3 gonna go thru and edit a bunch of fics to start posting but until then have this !!!!! been thinking long and hard abt heeseung&02z …….. needed to get this off my chest rly

content warnings : major nsfw under the cut, cumplay, masturbation, piv sex, etc etc

MDNI !

A = Aftercare (what they’re like after sex)

i don’t see heeseung as swaying particularly dominant/submissive…… not necessarily vanilla but almost lazy in the way he has sex so i don’t see aftercare being a big deal to him

ofc expect the bare minimum: cleans u up, helps change the sheets, kisses n cuddles

heavy on the cleans them up.. ..… …. can’t help but think abt how much heeseung LOVES to see his partner covered in his cum, whether he finishes on ur chest, ur belly, ur thighs or ur pussy doesn’t matter to him he just loves to see it🤤🤤🤤….. .. … so yeah cleaning u up is a necessity almost every time

B = Body part (their favorite body part of theirs and also their partner’s)

fav part of himself is his hands…… do i even need to elaborate

just loves touching his partner and why else would he find any other body part as good as his hands when his other body parts can’t grab a handful of ur tits/ass ????

fav part of his partner’s is drum roll plz………….. their tummy

when he’s eating u out he just can’t help but reach out n press his fingers into ur hips n his thumb into ur belly….. .. though he loves to cum anywhere on u his all time favourite is ur tummy, could get him hard again easily if he sees his cum pooling in and around ur bellybutton urrtgghhhhg

C = Cum (anything to do with cum, basically)

i literally cannot see heeseung not loving cumplay . like come on

self-admitted jealous type ……… yeah it’s over ur getting painted with his cum and fucked full if u even so much as mention another man

messy with it, loves cumming inside but give him the opportunity to pull out and finish somewhere he can rly see it and it’s a done deal

D = Dirty secret (pretty self explanatory, a dirty secret of theirs)

watches league of legends porn . it’s miss fortune …. not elaborating.

E = Experience (how experienced are they? do they know what they’re doing?)

i reckon he’s experienced enough to know what goes where and all that ….. would probs be able to be vocal abt what he likes

i can’t see him getting much time in his schedule to explore his sexuality much so count jacking off and enjoying subgenres of porn as a pillar for experience as well

F = Favorite position (this goes without saying)

missionary DONT YAWN. just loves being able to bury his head in ur tits and fuck u slow and hard until he cums … and then guess what ……. ur tummy is right there

G = Goofy (are they more serious in the moment? are they humorous? etc.)

i’d say he can be a bit of a goofball, i don’t see him taking sex too seriously

not necessarily the type to just crack jokes during but not opposed to having a giggle if one of u makes a silly noise or if someone walks in

H = Hair (how well groomed are they? does the carpet match the drapes? etc.)

trims but isn’t too fussed about it really, makes him feel manly when he sees his full bush. occasional groomer of the pubes

I = Intimacy (how are they during the moment? the romantic aspect)

can be super romantic if he rly rly misses u but idk i don’t see heeseung as the sentimental romantic type much…… likes sex cos it feels good and its an excuse to look at ur tits

J = Jack off (masturbation headcanon)

frequent enough . he is a libra after all

probs the type to get a bit bored on his day off and have a wank after going 3/11 on a league game

K = Kink (one or more of their kinks)

cum cum cum cum cum cum cum

like idk heeseung seems sooo messy to me during sex like if he eats u out he wants to see u dripping onto the sheets nd i don’t need to mention the cumming on ur body thing again ….

L = Location (favorite places to do the do)

his bed, he likes it best when ur both a little tired but too horny to sleep so he can just push ur panties to the side and slip in to fuck u slow until ur cumming around him

M = Motivation (what turns them on, gets them going)

ur boobies . whether they’re out or under a shirt or small or big he just loves seeing them…. plays with ur nipples while u scroll on ur phone in bed, maybe pulls up ur shirt n sucks on them until he makes himself too horny to stop n he has to fuck u (and paint ur tits white)

N = No (something they wouldn’t do, turn offs)

anything too public … likes having u to himself and when ur in the privacy of his bedroom/dorm he gets to make u all dirty, he can’t do that without getting arrested in public unfortunately ://

probs hard dom stuff …. maybe not too shy for a spank here and there but the idea of being rly dominant or degrading u or tying u up etc is just not for him

O = Oral (preference in giving or receiving, skill, etc.)

loves receiving, he gets to cum on ur face and tits which is always a bonus👍

not a selfish lover but definitely gets bored of giving head sometimes …. thinks quite literally with his dick like he needs to see it stuffed in u

P = Pace (are they fast and rough? slow and sensual? etc.)

i think heeseung is generally slow and sensual but if u asked he could fuck u faster n harder

he just loves how u clench when his strokes r slow and deep nd he can press against ur cervix without bruising u and ruining the fun

Q = Quickie (their opinions on quickies, how often, etc.)

quickies are not his forté ! he’s definitely not opposed to them but he prefers being able to take his time…. quickies mean sensible cumming and heeseung would rather wait…..

R = Risk (are they game to experiment? do they take risks? etc.)

i cannot see him as a risk taker at all, riskiest he would go is having u bounce on his cock in the living room while nobody else is home, but even then he’s just thinking abt how close his bedroom is and how easy it’d be to pick u up while ur impaled on his dick nd take u to bed :((

S = Stamina (how many rounds can they go for? how long do they last?)

a sturdy 2 rounds if u guys haven’t fucked for a little while, he’s still young his refractory period is in training !!!!

particularly statistically more likely to want a round 2 if he’s a) not tired and b) can see his cum plastered somewhere on ur body (source is my thalamus) …… drives him crazy nd makes him almost desperate to fill u up as well

T = Toys (do they own toys? do they use them? on a partner or themselves?)

got gifted a fleshlight one time for his birthday but it’s just stayed tucked away in his wardrobe…. tried it once and it was just not as good as the real deal

would be open to using a toy on u for the sole reason that it might make u squirt and he is desperate to see u get that messy

U = Unfair (how much they like to tease)

gives in instantly . u just need to whip out a titty and he is a goner…. very very weak willed man…..

V = Volume (how loud they are, what sounds they make, etc.)

main vocalist like …. do i need to say more

prettiest softest moans uve ever heard ….. breathing into ur chest and whispering how close he is and how bad he needs to fill u up into ur ear

not loud enough for anyone but u to hear tho…. but that’s fine bc u like being able to have him all to urself ^.^

W = Wild card (a random headcanon for the character)

can picture him getting randomly horny while playing games while u lay on his bed …. pulls off his headphones to face u and asks u so nicely to come suck his cock while he plays … and of course u do because how could u say no to that face :(( he ends up losing his lane and going afk at base because he’s too busy watching u swallow his entire length like a pro . sorry to his team but the 15 minute afk ban was so worth it

X = X-ray (let’s see what’s going on under those clothes)

not huge but not small, average

a good 5.5 with some juicy balls

circumcised 🙏

Y = Yearning (how high is their sex drive?)

pretty high but not in the way that its hard to control …… like he just kind of just always wants u

Z = Zzz (how quickly they fall asleep afterwards)

after he cleans u up he’s out like a light …… good luck tryna get him to wake up

just accept that ur tits are his pillow for the next 7 hours as he sleeps

[stars-and-the-min]

☆ the wrong way to hard launch (7) | OP81

summary : oscar's girlfriend is a walking pr problem for literally everyone (including herself) social media au

pairing : oscar piastri x zhou!fem!singer!oc

a/n switch out one shitty ex for a slightly less shitty one

masterlist | last part | part 7 | next part

ARTICLE

Revisiting 'Twelve More Days' : How Empty Bottles Spun Their Signature Sound on its Head on Tour April 12, 2024 · Written by Catherine Moore

Almost halfway through the Asian leg of their world tour, it's finally time to talk about what the pandemic-era rock band Empty Bottles has been up to. For greener artists, it's the cookie-cutter way to stick to a genre that has previously worked and give the masses what they want but instead, Empty Bottles have taken their 2022 sophomore sensation 'Twelve More Days' and tweaked the songs for their world tour.

Long-time fans of the Sydney-born band are familiar with the classic rock elements that brought Empty Bottles into the spotlight; claiming influence from fellow Sydneysiders 5 Seconds of Summer, Arctic Monkeys and other croony rock artists, so it was a rather big surprise for critics and fans alike when the album opened with a much softer, hypnotising approach.

The even bigger surprise was the creative and musical approach they took with their tour. As noted by various critics back during the album release, 'Twelve More Days' had a not-so-subtle jazz flavour to their sound, and the band seems to have embraced the jazz-rock sound by opening their tour with a speakeasy-style set, complete with the band decked out in snazzy 1930s reminiscent suits and frontwoman Selina Bui in glittery minidresses, opera gloves and a thematic vintage ribbon microphone.

Despite close to three years since she last performed in front of a live audience, Bui took to the stage like a fish to water, instantly entrancing her audience with her universally acknowledged rich sirenic vocals, drawing in the attention and sending the venue back to a 1930s speakeasy. Strangely, she performs this part of the show without her trusty guitar, leaving the grunt work on the other lead guitarist, talented Lukas Zhang, who delivers without a hiccup with no twin guitar to help cover any mistakes.

Quite a few of the sophomore album's songs are given a jazz-rock twist that nobody could have predicted. Other already jazz-influenced songs - namely deluxe track number 13 'money talks' and track 6 'typo' - have been breathed to life, as well as a couple of songs from the band's debut album 'overtime'.

Empty Bottles then returns after a brief intermission with their award-winning pop-rock sound, spending the rest of the set in much more familiar-looking leather jackets and t-shirts and a guitar returned to Bui's hand. Bui, very well known for having an interesting sense of humour, made the choice of returning to the stage with the fitting song choice of 'do you remember me?'. One thing you have to give the 22-year-old is that she really does know how to pick her moments, and the now-iconic first chords of the cocky, energetic track are enough to send the crowd screaming.

The exploration into the many subgenres of what is considered rock 'n' roll has always been a very fuzzy point of conversation, and it's been an honour seeing Empty Bottles have fun playing jump rope over that line. What makes this tour such a raving success is their perfect balance of experimentation and keeping to what is tried and true for them; the classic, hard-hitting, no-nonsense, inane-lyricism rock coupled magnetically with Bui's captivating execution on stage.

Would you find me at one of their shows again? Absolutely, there was truly nothing more thrilling than the first moments you see Selina Bui walk onto stage with her infamous cheshire cat smile. What did I personally think about the sound change? I was pleasantly surprised at how seamlessly they've adjusted the songs to fit the jazz-rock genre, I also believe that they have found the perfect sound to complement Selina Bui's voice. It's uncanny how it just clicked that she was born to sing the soft, almost lullaby-like, calming songs. If they were to release another album with a similar soft sound, I would happily eat it up.

Empty Bottles wrap up the Asian leg of the tour in Bangkok, Thailand later this month and then shortly begin the European leg in Sofia, Bulgaria.

INSTAGRAM

cameliazzz

liked by aidan_ebass and 122,394 others

cameliazzz life lately 🐾 tagged: selinabui

aidan_ebass Yes ma'am 🫡 ↳ selinabui @aidan_ebass i'm dying u are such an old man ↳ lukaszhang @ selinabui he's like barely a year older than you??

cami.png the hottest drummer ever 💜💜💜

conangray a little commotion for the drummer pls and thank you ↳ cameliazzz @ conangray stop i'm blushing 🙈

TWITTER

fiona🩷 @fififorlina · 4h i mean we can all thank tommy for one thing and that's for twelve more days lmao ↳ lina bui x2 grammy winner @urdaisea · 3h i forget that not all empty bottles fans have read this article but i think they all should: Why 'Twelve More Days' isn't a Break-Up Album, it's a Healing One

emme @flowersforcami · 1h yes twelve more days is full of t*mmy slander BUT remember that all the band members have writing credits and they ALL helped write songs so basically what i'm trying to say is that twelve more days is actually the rest of the band roasting the shit out of lina's ex ↳ emme @flowersforcami · 1h every one of those bitches rocked up to the studio and went for blood. that is a universally hated man in their group chat.

amie <3 @mieflrs · 2h it's been 3 years, i think it's time to admit that keeping tabs is absolutely not about thomas fucking howard ↳ amie <3 @mieflrs · 2h i don't care how delusional u are, where in those 3 minutes 54 seconds did you hear a single line that sounds like anything like that sorry excuse of a man??? now a certain japanese-american singer who is exceptionally hot playing the guitar on the other hand... ↳ lukas 🔛🔝 @lukiepookie28 · 2h yes i agree it's not about t*mmy but it's also not about CHRISTOPHER like WTF R U ON???

oscalina real ?! @ emptyginbottles · 32m we're in an oscalina drought and it's plain to see not all of us are coping well

MESSAGES

from the phone of selina bui

INSTAGRAM

selinabui

liked by chrisyamada, oscarpiastri and 279,384 others

selinabui now he's thinkin' 'bout me every night, oh is it that sweet? i guess so

amelia_belrose pop!lina perhaps 🫣

oscarpiastri Didn't need to call me out like that ↳ selinabui @ oscarpiastri don't tell me u miss me already

sabrinacarpenter she's working late coz she's a singer

lukaszhang woman you hate coffee what are you on ↳ selinabui @lukaszhang why are u even here

MESSAGES

from the phone of selina bui

TWITTER

Yamada Updates @chrisyamadanews · 2h 🚨| Chris spotted at the Empty Bottles 'Twelve More Days' Tour in Seoul Night 2

Yamada Updates @chrisyamadanews · 32m 🚨| CHRIS ONSTAGE WITH EMPTY BOTTLES!!!

↳ Yamada Updates @chrisyamadanews · 30m this made me break ok, i am so fucking thrown off. WDYM WE GOT SELINA BUI AND CHRISTOPHER YAMADA ON STAGE TOGETHER IN THE YEAR 2024???

mabel @ maplemabel32 · 25m i can't breathe chris and lina??? chris and lina???????? after so long??? CHRISTOPHER AND SELINA???? as in "hello it's chris" "and lina"??? MY BESTIES REUNITED???

june @linafesting · 18m sometimes, i'm convinced lina spins a wheel on how to break the internet today

↳ kat ୨୧ @yamayaps · 2m with all due respect, this stunt was NAUT selina's idea, this was a move that christopher 'no boundaries' yamada suggested

INSTAGRAM

emptybottles_official Olympic Gymnastics Arena

liked by chrisyamada and 334,294 others

emptybottles_official Nowhere as incredible as Seoul! Always special to have @chrisyamada join us on stage. tagged: chrisyamada

chrisyamada someone better return the favor later 👀 ↳ selinabui @chrisyamada u begged me to let u come what are u on ↳ chrisyamada @ selinabui ok maybe i did

pi4str1 ok someone catch me up bc i did not know chris and lina were friends??? ↳ linasgirl4 @pi4str1 it's probably best we don't get into it

✧･ﾟ: ✧･ﾟ:✧･ﾟ: ✧･ﾟ:✧･ﾟ: ✧･ﾟ:

taglist @ririyulife @ashy-kit @fionaschicken @namgification @cherry-piee

[puddin-dear]

Therian v Furry? I didn't start hearing Therian until my trans nephew started calling itself one, is there a meaningful difference?

There is a difference! Hear lemme help you out in understanding these terms!

Furry

A furry is someone who has an interest in anthropomorphic animals. Such as dogs that talk and walk on two feet.

Furries express themselves in a range of ways. Such as wearing fursuits (a costume based off a fursona- or a furry OC/persona), creating art of fursonas, watching furry media, or simply just admiring other furries works.

Theres no requirement to being a furry, except for just wanting to.

Being a furry is a hobby, its not an identity in the way being queer (for example) is, but an identity in the way being part of a fandom is.

Therian

Therians are folks who identify as animals on a spiritual, psychological or physical level (though physical also plays into being non-human, which is another identity.)

Therians are folks who find themselves not being only/fully human. Whether because they believe that they have a connection and bond to a previous life or because they find themselves mentally thinking like/seeing themselves as/being an animal.

Therianthropy can be a result of plenty of things such as Imprinting on an animal at a young age and then growing up identifying with/as one, a way to cope with trauma, a result of a delusion, a spiritual belief, a religious belief, etc.

Theres a wide variety of reasons for being a therian.

Therianthropy is a subgenre of Alterhumanity, which is an umbrella term for all the ‘not totally normally human’ kinda identities. Which are too complex to explain in this post, but if you feel like diving into it, feel free to ask for resources that can explain the complexities better than I can!

Therianthropy is an identity sort of in the way being queer is

Furry is an identity based off a fandom

At the end of the day both Therians and Furries still live their lives the same as everyone else, just with slightly altered experiences. Neither group would bark or snarl like a rabid dog at a random person because of their identities.

Wishing you and your nephew well! feel free to ask for any ways you can support it :3 We’d be glad to help!

(and if any fellow critters want to rephrase anything I said or add to this, feel free. Hopefully nothing I said is off, I just woke up lmao)

[yamayuandadu]

Sorry If i am bothering you but i want to know what role did the wilderness and its animals play in Mesopotamian mythology?

I like answering questions about Mesopotamia which indicate genuine interest, so no need to worry.

The most straightforward answer would be that the wilderness was generally perceived negatively (see ex. Wiggermann’s Scenes From the Shadow Side). The steppe in particular was usually portrayed as a place where one can get robbed at best and as the dwelling of ghosts, demons and the like - or just straight up the underworld -  at worst. The mountains were frequently viewed as a site of confrontations between gods and their opponents but more neutral or even positive portrayals pop up in literature too. It’s also important to note that the marshlands were viewed pretty firmly positively. As for wild animals: by far the best overview of Mesopotamian zoology is offered by Jeremiah Peterson in his dissertation A Study of Sumerian Faunal Conception with a Focus on the Terms Pertaining to the Order Testudines. Niek Veldhuis’ Religion, Literature, and Scholarship: the Sumerian Composition Nanše and the Birds, with a Catalogue of Sumerian Bird Names is really good too. There’s also quite recent Entomological Knowledge in Ancient Mesopotamia by Vazrick Nazari but you should bear in mind the author is an entomologist, not an assyriologist, so some sections are… less than reliable and sources as old as from the 19th century, and as questionable as Paropola’s phantasmagoric visions,  are employed once the focus shifts away from identification of insects.

More under the cut.

Animals were generally seen as an essential part of the world outside human dwellings. Positive comparisons to certain taxa - wild and domestic cattle and lions - are very common in myths, royal hymns, and other genres. The bovine analogies are so popular in Mesopotamian texts that even scorpions could be metaphorically described as a sort of bull.

Demonic traits could be attributed to some animals viewed as dangerous: snakes, scorpions and dogs in particular. Additionally, omen texts indicate that ants were seen as messengers of Ereshkigal, presumably because their burrowing lifestyle made the Mesopotamians assume they could move all the way down to the underground land of the dead. Finding ants while digging foundations for a new building was therefore an ill omen; seeing flying red ants above a house, meanwhile, was a sign the owner is at the risk of being killed. Due to such risks, behavior of ants was sometimes observed by religious specialists, and some of the namburbi protective rituals specifically deal with them. Locusts were a bad omen too, but that’s a given. On the other hand, moths were viewed as bringers of good omens.

Some deities were associated with the wilderness, and broadly with animals dwelling there. Most notable examples are Ninkilim (addressed as “lord of the creatures”; his name was at times confused with ninka, “mongoose”, leading to the development of the idea that he was a deified mongoose himself), Sumugan (though he was associated with domestic animals too) and to a smaller degree Numushda, arguably. Ennugi, a minor courtier of Enlil, could be addressed as the creator of grubs, though a similar role is also attested for the mythical king Alulim; attestations are limited to incantations against field pests, though. For more context see here.

A special case is Nanshe. Two of the major literary texts focused on her focus on interactions between her and animals - Nanshe and the Birds and Home of the Fish. These belong to the subgenre called “enumeration literature”: while there is an actual plot, and deities are involved, the goal is mostly to fit as many terms from a single category into a single composition. As a result, Nanshe sounds… unusually passionate (fixated, even) on the core topics. I think it makes for really unique characterization but alas, as a major Mesopotamian deity who fits neither into questionable Bible takes nor into the madonna-whore complex she’s not getting anywhere in popculture. Something that’s generally missing from the Mesopotamian repertoire are myths involving anyone turning into an animal. There are two notable exceptions, Enlil and Namzitarra, which involves Enlil turning into a raven to test a devotee, and Dumuzi’s Dream, in which Dumuzi asks Utu to turn him into a gazelle to escape underworld gendarmes pursuing him.

Major gods were not theriomorphic, and with some small exceptions (Tishpak, whose skin is in one case described as green and scaly; Ishtaran, who might have been depicted with the lower body of a snake) didn’t even have any animal body parts. However, deified animals are nonetheless also attested - multiple examples of divine bulls are the main example, obviously (for instance Indagara, Buru, the borrowed Hurrian Sheri and Hurri, possibly Magiru, “obedient”), as expected divine lions also pop up every now then, but that’s not all.

There’s a number of deified birds, though most of them occur only in Early Dynastic sources which do not provide any real insights about their character. One example that comes to mind is the deity Kiki or Ninkiki (“lady of the kiki); we have no clue what sort of bird the kiki was though, other than that it was loud enough to be compared to the storm. Nirah is a deified snake.

Deified invertebrates are much less common but it’s still worth bringing up Eḫ, a member of the court of Nungal whose name is pretty semantically similar to English “bug” (though it might also specifically refer to a louse. There is also an either divine or demonic centipede, Ḫallulaya. Among the numerous ancestors of Enlil there is a pair named Engiriš and Ningiriš, “lord butterfly” and “lady butterfly”. It is often claimed that Uttu, the goddess of weaving, was portrayed as a deified spider, but the evidence is at best limited, see here and here for details. Peterson doesn’t list her among deified animals.

A mythical creature listed in enumerations of Ninurta’s enemies, kulianna (“friend of heaven”), might be a supernatural dragonfly, though it’s also possible it was imagined as something else altogether and the link to dragonflies is just the result of homophony with Akkadian kulīlu, “dragonfly”. For more detail see here, p. 89. In art there’s a fair number of depictions of animals behaving like humans, but the full context of such works remains poorly known. There’s a brief overview here from p. 237 onward. 

Especially in Assyria wild animals were customarily hunted by kings, and trophies acquired this way served as a way of showing off the extent of their dominion. It has been suggested that they could eventually acquire apotropaic qualities, as evidenced by the preparation of protective statues  of the apsasîtu, the burḫiš and the nāḫiru, sometimes interpreted as water buffalo, yak and whale. However, the meaning of these three terms remains uncertain, for some recent considerations see here.

[read-write-thrive]

part 1 (both girls in their full outfits) ; part 2 (Edwina in several other outfits/sketches) ; part 3 (the companion to this piece aka Edwina getting ready :)

part 4 of my fem!payneland fanart series!!!! as I talked about with the poll, I have quite a few variations of this piece as I couldn’t make up my mind on a few of the elements, but I listened to your feedback and have included them all here !! the winner of the poll is above the cut with the rest of the variations below to hopefully make this not take up too much of your dash lol

lmk what you think - especially people who voted on the poll!! I’ve also included my thought process below the cut since I know y’all are interested :)

- first and foremost: I have absolutely no idea what order someone would get ready in with all these outfit components, so if you’re sitting here like “why is her makeup done when she has to pull a shirt over her head?” or something like that: you’re probably correct but my getting ready process is always chaos and there aren’t exactly articles on this sort of thing

- along with that: her straightening her hair is probably not accurate to how hair works but again I’ve got v little experience to pull from and trying to find a proper reference was a pain in the ass

yes her bra is fully rendered and then got covered up by her arm. I'm still mad that I did that to myself but I like the pose too much to change it so oh well

- (onto actual historical stuff!!)

- her hair is being straightened here despite straight not being in style during this era for several reasons:

1. I based her hair (and a lot of her style, as per part 1) on Rhoda Dakar of the band The Bodysnatchers, which was an all-female band that was part of the ska revival in the late 70s/early 80s. Rhoda Dakar in particular is a British artist (who’s still making music!) with an English mother and Jamaican father—so not only was she one of the only women of color I could find as part of this subgenre/in ths era/with plenty of photo references, but considering Jayden Revri is Jamaican and English (alongside Indian) himself I thought it was fitting! Her Bodysnatchers look is also much more femme leaning than the rest of the band, as well as her hair styled in a way that suggests straightening, so I carried that over to Charlotte here as well.

2. On a related note, there is a clear historical and modern difference in hairstyles worn/made popular/deemed fashionable by non-white versus white individuals and I thought it only appropriate to acknowledge that in my design of her. I even went so far as to research how her mom’s hair may have been styled since I assume that’s who would’ve been teaching her how to care for her hair in the first place. With that, I looked at popular Indian hair trends from the 60s (figuring that’s when Charlotte’s mom could’ve still been in India and following those trends) which also involved a preference for straight/wavy hair, with soft fringe made popular by Sadhana and the styles ranging from long and luscious to styled up into a very 60s beehive. Charlotte could easily also rock a beehive, especially since the 60s revival was a part of the ska revival movement and Dakar herself styled her hair as such, but I figured Charlotte is a little too much of a rebellious teenager to go for a look she’s seen her mom wear!

- her makeup is based off of the different members of The Bodysnatchers as well as other punk/ska fans at the time. The look usually required more blush that what I gave her here, but I wanted to make sure the eyes were the feature (since Charles wears eyeliner himself) and then the lips being any less just looked weird to me. Also, Dakar doesn't seem to wear the same heavy blush that the other members do, which could be a stylistic choice but could also be the potential lack of blush shades that would work well on her skin tone, so I went that route for Charlotte here

- her underwear is all based off of meticulous searching of historical advertisements, though I will admit the sources are (presumably) American since I couldn't find British equivalents (I'm hoping the styles were similar enough...) in particular:

1. Her bra is based off of: Playtex’s New Made for Me, Playtex’s Right For Me, and Playtex’s Thank Goodness It Fits (which are seriously the names of these as per the ads—how creative /s)

2. Her panties (or pants or underwear or whatever term you want to use) are based off of: Sears Best’s Nylon tricot panties, Sears Very Impressive Panties Nylon panties, and JCPenny’s eiderlon fashion panties

3. (In the below variations) Her pantyhose are theoretically based on L’eggs and Spirit by Stevens’s Slim & Slender pantyhose. But, honestly, they’re mostly based on my own experience wearing hose bc almost none of the ads showed how the gusset of the pantyhose actually looked so I needed to fill in the gaps (one of the many reasons I’m still unhappy with them—plus the wrinkles would not look right no matter what I did !!)

4. Her socks are called slouch socks! I don’t have a specific brand for them but the style was all the rage in the 80s-90s (and I want to own some so bad ngl)

- the hair straightener is just a blob based on the reference photo since trying to research historical hair tools was beyond me at the time apparently, but the style of outlet/plug is accurate to Britain in 1989 so there’s that at least (I have no idea why my brain works like this)

- since I talked about it in the poll I feel like I should address it here: technically having a bush was well out of fashion by 1989 due to the grooming boom and new types of hair removal popular throughout the 80s and 90s. However, she’s wearing multiple layers over it and is technically a teenager (in an abusive household and a catholic all-girls school, at that) so I kept going back and forth on it. It won the poll so it’s in the main post, but you’ll see in the below variations that I really went back and forth on it. that being said I do think it’s interesting given her nylon pants being semi-sheer besides at the gusset, so I’m not mad at it. plus I figured she was definitely shaving her legs/underarms, so maybe that balances it out ?

and finally here’s the other seven variations of this piece :) lmk what you think!!

[teecupangel]

Has anyone suggested Desmond as the same species as red XIII from FF7 for the Desmond as an animal/creature subgenre yet

Of course, Desmond gets to be called Red XVII.

Okay, but in all seriousness, considering Red XIII’s real name Nanaki, if Desmond is ever going to get a different name for this one, it would probably be Jyuna or Hina as a reference to Subject 17 (Jyu = 10/ Hi = 1, Na = nana = 7)

For this one, I’m guessing he’s still in AC world? (although it would be fun to play with the idea that he’s one of the small children running with Red XIII in the og ending)

He’d probably be thought of as some kind of exotic feline creature until they see the flames on the end of his tail.

From there, he’d be considered some kind of mythical creature of some kind, maybe he even becomes an example of how shisa truly do exist?

In terms of appearance, I like to think he looks a lot like Red XIII with a scar on the right side of his lips and having darker red fur on his right front leg. He also has the same tattoo on his left front leg and maybe mane decorations very similar to Ratonhnhaké:ton’s?

Both of his front legs are armed with hidden blades that act more like a hidden spur that he can use to attack. The flame of his tail is also the color of the sun.

Wherever he ends up in, he’d most definitely be considered more on the side of a dangerous feline.

But you know the best part?

He can talk.

Which means he can actually converse with his ancestor.

This opens the floodgates because this means he will have an easier time to change history.

… if he wanted to.

…

It’s Desmond.

Of course, he’d want to change his ancestors’ fate at the very least.

[literary-illuminati]

2024 Book Review #8 – The Only Good Indians by Stephen Graham James

This has been on my tbr for long enough that I entirely forget what originally put it there – the only thing I actually knew going in was that the author was ‘the My Heart is a Chainsaw guy’ (I have not read My Heart is a Chainsaw yet either). Given the genre, that was honestly probably ideal. As was the fact that a blizzard hit a couple days after I started it and I’ve been reading it looking out on a frozen snowscape – it’s very much a winter sort of story.

The story’s told in five parts of wildly varying lengths, each with it’s own endearingly cheesy b-horror movie title and each following a different protagonist. The first four each follow one of a friend group who, as a bunch of fuckup teenagers, trespassed on hunting grounds that were really supposed to be reserved for elders and shot a bunch of elk they had no right to – including a pregnant young cow who was for one reason or another special. Ten years later, the Elk-Headed Woman drags herself back into the world, and begins getting her vengeance for the death of her and her child on each of them (and everyone they care about) in turn.

I have a longstanding opinion that a full-length novel is just too long to sustain a real horror story – by 300 pages things have fairly reliably collapse into urban fantasy or action or farce. The breakup into different parts solves this very well – they’re all very much connected and interwoven, but each feels like its own distinct narrative unit with its own tension and rising action.

And this is very much a horror story in the classic, just barely short of shlocky sense. A trespass against vague but understood sacred laws that leads to horrific and bloody retribution against everyone involved is as close to archtypal horror as you can possibly get, after all. The last section is even focused on a Final Girl! Specifically, it’s a subgenre that I can’t really name but feels very familiar to me – and one I’ve always been a huge fan of, anyway. It’s somewhere downstream of The Count of Monte Cristo, a story where the agent of supernatural doom spends the majority of the story consciously working in the background, manipulating events and exacerbating the protagonist/victim’s flaws to lead them to a contrived but tragic end? Think the netflix Fall of the House of Usher, but like about the exact opposite end of the socioeconomic spectrum.

Class is very much something the book cares about. All four protagonists grew up poor on a reservation with little in the way of wealth or opportunity, and by the time they’d turned eighteen all four of them were the kind of young asshole who made life just a little bit worse for everyone around them dealing with the same shit. Ten years latter the three of them who’ve survived that long have gotten over themselves and matured in their own way (and to their own degree), but none of them are exactly flush with cash or living lives of bourgeois respectability (though Lewis comes close). The precarity and only tenuous connections to the society around them just make them better prey for what’s hunting them, of course – in every case, death comes after the (either metaphorical or very viscerally literal) destruction of the few close ties they have, and the only one to survive is also the only one who could really expect people to come rushing to their rescue.

Speaking of close ties the protagonists have – the book’s conception of gender is fascinatingly weird, or at least fascinating in the sense that I’m not at all sure how intentional it is. Of the four main victims, one dies alone at eighteen, and the other three who survive the next ten years are all pretty much explicitly saved (or at least improved and uplifted) by a relationship with a woman who, if not flawless, is basically strictly his moral and practical better. Even the most consistent fuckup of the group has a redeeming feature of being willing to do just about anything for his daughter (despite having lost the chance to really be a big part of her life several times over). With one exception, these women all then die, messily, entirely and explicitly to fuck with and ruin the lives of their men. It’s like someone read Women in Refrigerators and went ‘well there’s an idea...’. It’s blatant enough that I feel like it’s got to be making a deliberate point, but (unless it’s just genre emulation) what the point is does escape me slightly.

Also on the note of stuff I’m quite sure is going over my head at least a bit – basketball! It’s a pretty vital thread running through the entire book, to the point that one of the big set pieces of the final act is literally a basketball game with the monster. Which, like, I watched enough bad anime as a small child to find contrived game-playing under unclear mythic rules with things that really want to kill you instinctively endearing, but I can’t really do anything with this except just point at it.

So as the title might imply, this is a novel that’s concerned with race – all but I believe exactly one character is either is either Blackfeet or Crow, more than half the book takes place on a reservation, and a chunk of the rest is spent having to deal with racist assholes of varying severity. Now, I admit that I have at this point a probably overly cynical view of books that end up on breathless ‘socially conscious horror’ or ‘s/ff from diverse creators you NEED to read’ lists online, but I was still rather pleasantly by how matter-of-factly this was handled? I suppose the best way to put it is that culture, upbringing and racialization deeply inform everyone’s characters, but it never feels like the book is preoccupied with providing some assumed naive and impressionable audience any Important Lessons or provide Good Representation to valourize or emulate? Which is probably just a sign I need to raise and re calibrate my expectations, but.

The monster doesn’t exactly work as, like, a coherent character in terms of her skills and abilities, but as a monster the Elk-Headed Woman is great. But then I love contrived fucked up tragedies and am a longstanding partisan of Spooky Deer Horror, so I suppose I would say that.

So yeah, fun read!