#its a really good comic btw. would recommend

[wolfzbanez]

so ive read tiger tiger.

luck...... im free next saturday

[thewertsearch]

Mega-Giga Ask Comp: Part 3

@manorinthewoods asked: I'll be honest, I wrote the Locked Tomb ask having not read the Locked Tomb series. I literally only know the starting and ending strokes of the first book. That being said, I do like the half-soul-Sollux idea, and it works pretty well with the Locked Tomb's general theme of Lyctorhood, and how knotted the whole situation with Alecto, Gideon, and Harrow ends up being. (What is even going on with Nona) ~LOSS (4/13/24) @manorinthewoods asked: You know, if you hadn't already read Gideon the Ninth, I'd have recommended it as a good second liveblog. It really does fit your preferred sort of mystery. From all the clues presented, you could probably hit very close to the ultimate solution to the Lyctoral puzzle - as close as anybody could be expected to get. ~LOSS (25/4/24) @manorinthewoods asked: The Locked Tomb's prose is pretty good. On occasion, it happens to chime with a sound of 'Homestuck', but I only recall that twice so far in my reading. I like the skelebook. ~LOSS (27/4/24)

Once again, I'm glad my hidden agenda - convincing this blog's entire readership to check out The Locked Tomb - is bearing fruit.

I agree! TLT does occasionally give Homestuck vibes, presumably because its author is a fan. For the most part, though, its prose style is all its own.

Anonymous asked: Reference to American culture: the sphere of Jade's home dropping and the timer that preceded it are references to the Times Square Ball, an annual event held every New Year's Eve. A giant ball descends down a pole at 11:59 PM and reaches the bottom at 12:00 AM, January 1. I believe that you can figure out why the reference was included in the first place. Anonymous asked: btw the gamzee page was released on new years. ‘the miracle of a new beginning’ is the new year and the lab dropping is supposed to be a reference to the ball dropping in times square

Some America Lore here that I wasn't aware of.

I was wondering exactly what Gamzee meant by 'a new beginning'. Maybe Alternia practices the tradition as well.

@omnilew asked: the way you speculate and go indepth into sburbs features and how it affects the kids, made a silly headcanon that your kidsona is reading the comic while playing out their session though this is mainly because "Eventually, we were bound to cross a couple of wires that should never have been allowed to touch" kinda references chargerkind

I like it! Maybe my 'sonas have access to a more in-depth version of Rose's walkthrough, and are adding their own commentary in quiet moments during their own adventures.

@manorinthewoods asked: Your excitement over the resurrection of Dream Jade gave me a form of suspenseful mirth. Seeing how happy you were at her resurrection, while also knowing exactly what came of it, is perhaps textbook dramatic irony. If only you'd read a panel further… ~LOSS (26/4/24)

She looked so happy to be back, too! That certainly didn't last long.

She was prototyped with a smiling corpse, though. Maybe that was just her 'default' expression, and it vanished as soon as her actual feelings asserted themselves.

@thetinygladiator asked: 'I hadn’t really thought about Sally’s ectobiological parent - but now that I am, I think the funniest possible option is that it’s her landlady.' okay but i just gotta say… this immediately makes me think about how that relates to the house-building aspect. Like, with the giant tower, are they gonna charge the Imps for rent? That might work, honestly. Where do imps even live? Bet they don't have good AC or Wi-Fi, lemme tell ya.

300 GRIST/DAY NO CRUXTRUDER NO ALCHEMY NO PETS

@manorinthewoods submitted: How many computers would you have on your person if you were playing Sburb? Jade recommends at least 5. I say I'd have a laptop, phone, a spare of both of those, and computer gloves if I need to compute really fast. Also spare gloves. Speaking of the phone - is it possible for people to put phones in their pockets? Given Karkat (and a minor gag in Act 6), we can assume that it's difficult or uncommon to carry items without using the Sylladex - or maybe it's just tied to your dexterity, and you have to hold things gingerly to avoid captchaloguing them when you pick them up. On the other hand, there's no issues with accidentally storing something you've unstored and are using - so how does the Sylladex actually work? Do people just instinctively store their items once they're done using them? Is it difficult to avoid storing something you aren't using anymore? Can you stuff phones in pockets? If not, then why develop a PDA in the first place? Given the Sylladex, it should be much more commercially viable to make a tablet. ~LOSS (24/4/24)

Since Karkat can physically pick up a book, you can probably pocket your gear - although maybe there's a difference between holding an object and trying to add it to a physical 'inventory'. Either way, the issue is easily circumvented by employing wearable tech, like the kids do.

As depicted in my alchemy binge, my primary computing device would be the Pocket Holodex, which can remote into any computer in my sylladex.

In addition, my Modular Ring shirt is also a computer, which can presumably be augmented by adding extra mod1ules over time. I'd probably also captchalogue every computer in my apartment, of which I currently have six.

I'd be exploring the Medium with a minimum of seven computers, plus one pseudo-computer, plus a phone. Jade would certainly approve.

@iris-in-the-dark-world asked: the tension in act 5 act 2 is perfect, i love it. maybe even moreso on rereads, the foreshadowing and generally ominous vibes always get to me @heliotropopause asked: You're getting to the part where the comic really starts hitting its stride. This'll be fun.

The ever-present countdown certainly adds a degree of urgency to the situation.

I'm really liking the pacing of this current act, as things slowly progress towards some critical point - one which, for now, is still shrouded in mystery.

Anonymous asked: Forwarding another ask for the person with no account ~DJ: Eridan's deal seems to be based on Wizardry Herbert - a proto-Homestuck work by Hussie. A parody of Harry Potter dealing with whether magic is real. [] But Methods of Rationality began in February 2010, so "Harry Potter but obsessed with science" might have also been an intentional reference to that.-RM @heliotropopause asked: Eridan Ampora and the Methods of Rationality sure is an idea for a fanfic. He'd be so bad at it.

Eridan would be an extremely funny choice for a ratfic protagonist. He'd be so smarmy about it - and thus, a perfect addition to their ranks.

What would the definitive Homestuck ratfic be called, do you think? I think Tool-Assisted Speedrun would be a decent choice.

@killedthekat asked: An interesting thing about doomed timelines is how they serve to prevent stable loop metagaming. As a basic example, in a typical stable time loop scenario, if you observe yourself unharmed in the future, you can throw yourself into high danger high reward situations and know that probability will twist itself into whatever improbable knot it needs to do to keep you safe. But in homestuck if you lean too hard on predestination you just get shunted into a doomed timeline for your trouble.

It's true. Timehopping just isn't fun in Homestuck, as you're constantly walking a tightrope, desperately trying to stay in the one timeline that might not get you killed.

It's a good way to prevent time-travelers from becoming overpowered - something which is probably necessary for a comic which makes such heavy use of the concept.

Anonymous asked: Now that you're updating while HS^2 is, I've realised that while I'm barely keeping up with ^2, I just yelled "Oh! Upd8!" out loud when I checked your blog, so to me? You're the real continuation of Homestuck

What an honor!

For veterans of the comic, this blog is more Homestuck: Revisited than Homestuck 2. As a woman who would much rather watch video essays about old Simpsons episodes than new seasons of the show, I completely understand why some would prefer the latter.

@manorinthewoods asked: I've since finished Worm. I think Sophia's by far the best Vriska candidate. Lisa, Amy, and Colin are less so, I think. ~LOSS (21/4/24)

Oh, nice, you got all the way through it! Worm is an absolute behemoth, and I know a lot of people who started it, and gave up halfway through.

Sophia is likely the closest match to Vriska in personality. I agree with an earlier comment, though, that the most Vriska-like character in terms of audience reaction is probably Amy.

Anonymous asked: Cannot believe someone would propose a Homestuck/Locked Tomb scenario and leave Gamzee as part of a spare pairing, when the Homestuck fic The Serendipity Gospels, written by the author of The Locked Tomb, stars Gamzee and Terezi in the proto-necromancer/cavalier dynamic. Absolutely appropriate to have Gamzee as Ninth though, since his facepaint is the direct ancestor to Harrow's. Gamzee and Terezi is such a funny pairing to go with. I'm certainly looking forward to checking out The Serendipity Gospels when I'm done with the comic - both to compare it to Homestuck and to the Locked Tomb.

As am I. Apparently it was left unfinished - but considering how long this liveblog is taking, maybe Taz will have updated by the time I'm done!

Wishful thinking, of course, but I live in hope.

@bladekindeyewear submitted:

(I started Dragon's Dogma 2 a couple weeks ago and did my best to a Gideon Nav pawn (NPC ally), facepaint and two-hander and all, and the "Jaunty Straightforward" voice selection has been EXTREMELY distracting / game-improving because her voice and attitude chatting beside my player all the time sound almost straight out of the audiobook.)

Damn, you really captured her essence. Pawn is a very fitting title for her, too :(

@manorinthewoods asked: On the topic of blood color names - Blue through Purple were renamed in Hiveswap. Originally, Vriska was Cerulean, Equius was Blue, and Gamzee was Indigo - which I like more than their modern incarnations. I think 'bronze' might also be a Hiveswap thing, although I won't dispute it, and rust might have been renamed to burgundy? Maybe burgundy is a synonym. Idk. ~LOSS (4/13/24)

I think I prefer the likes of olive, indigo and bronze over more generic terms like green, blue and brown, which would quickly lead to confusion.

Vriska's blood, for example, is also a shade of blue, so it would be a little strange if blue blood was an official term, but it didn't apply to her.

@mxamericanblue asked:hi i have been absolutely BINGING your live blog rn and i gotta just get this out this is so so cool watching you react has been giving me so much joy, i don't have a computer so i can't really experience homestuck again casually when i want to but watching you read it and react and THEORIZE??? omg your theories have been so fuckin killer it's given me a new appreciation for Hussie as a story teller and how spectacular this comic truly was thank you for this, i've been having a grand ol' time, and it's all cuz of u

Thank you! I feel like I've been theorizing a lot less since I came back from my hiatus, mostly because the comic hasn't introduced many big mysteries recently - aside, of course, from Aradia's unexplained explosion.

(Pre-posting update: Since first drafting this ask, my statement above is no longer true, as Gamzee has been revealed as Homestuck's most important character. What the actual fuck.)

@lilietsblog asked: re fifth house aradia: she's an archeolodist :)

Oh, shit, you're right.

Maybe she'd be in more danger from the Lyctor than I thought.

@ben-guy asked: Vriska's ascension to god-tier is, in my personal opinion, one of the most visually striking scenes in all of Homestuck. Also, one of the panels you didn't include (which is understandable w/ Homestuck lol. Sacrifices for the sake of brevity) specifically the one where she has him write "[…] plenty of time for that l8r" above her head… Think about the position she would have had to move him to to write that.

…jesus, Vriska. You can't just do that!

@martinkhall asked: "What is treasure but a fortune, waiting to be found?" Or stolen if you're the THIEF of Light.

Son of a bitch. That's why she's a pirate, isn't it?

Because a Thief of Light is someone who steals fortunes!

@manorinthewoods asked: Eidolons. A species purpose-built to play Sburb, while breaking every mechanic you can solely with biology. Eidolons don't sleep, and live in a hive mind. Their psychologies are very poor at recognising distinct things, with Eidolons seeing the world more in terms of a blur of colors and shapes. They thus have a very difficult time understanding Classes and Aspects, never mind that their mythology never involved deities, and they never invented chess, or games of any sort… ~LOSS (15/4/24)

The idea of a species engineered from the ground up to be Players does raise the interesting question of whether there was a first species to play Sburb.

Of course, with all the time-loops we've been working with, there might not have been a first species - unless Sburb was 'created' in some sort of metatemporal space, 'before' any loops were put in place.

@manorinthewoods submitted: You are very good at analysing Vriska's psyche. Vriska's character was executed very well, I think, and I would hate her with a burning passion platonically but to a high degree if I knew her in real life. She's just… really horrible. She's a horrible person. And half her shtick is that she keeps evading consequences in spite of that. All of her mental torture of Tavros, for instance, ends in her becoming the most powerful player in the session. What sort of justice is that, Terezi? ~LOSS (15/4/24)

She hasn't entirely evaded consequences, but it's undeniable that none of the consequences she's experienced have actually stopped her from doing the things she does.

She's lost an arm, an eye, she's been beaten up, she's bled to death, and literally none of it has caused her to let up on Tavros, even a little. Letting up on Tavros, to her, would be worse than any physical harm, because it would be an attack on her worldview.

@sanctferum asked: "Has anything come of this since, actually? I haven’t heard anything about this new comic – although I do scroll in the opposite direction any time I see a reference to Homestuck, so I guess it makes sense that I wouldn’t." - The general feel I've gotten from the community has been largely positive re: the new Homestuck 2 updates, which have indeed been happening. It's being updated once per month for now, so a lot slower going than non-hiatused OG Homestuck. But I'm enjoying it so far!

Once a month seems more sustainable than Hussie's original barely-believable pace for the comic. With Hussie no longer at the helm, expecting daily panels seems like a pretty big ask - most people don't have the time, money or energy do what Hussie did.

Anonymous asked: I don't know if you read UTDR fanfiction, but this Tavros and Vriska situation reminds me a little bit of Flowey Is Not A Good Life Coach. she's trying to push him to his limits and torture him into being someone who will kill, and he just won't. say, what's your read on comparing Flowey : Vriska?

Flowey does what he does because he's lost his emotions, but Vriska does what she does because she's consumed by her emotions.

If anything, Flowey has more in common with Aradia. They're both time-travelers whose ability to feel is somewhat compromised.

Anonymous asked: WHATTTTTT HOW LONG HAVE YOU BEEN BACK???????? I THOUGHT YOU WERE STILL ON A LONG ASS HIATUS BUT I JUST JOW DISCOVERED TUMBLR ISNT GIVING ME POST NOTIFICATIONS FOR YOU ANYMORE EVEN THOUGH I HAVE IT TURNED ON FOR YOU AND IT WORKS FOR OTHER BLOGS???? WHAT THE HELL. IM GOING INSANE.

This has happened before - but before, I was also removed from Tumblr's search function, which doesn't seem to be the case this time.

Is anyone else having issues with Wertsearch post notifications?

@elkian asked: So has anyone mentioned the godhood joke yet? (The God Tiers costumes have hoods. God Hoods. Badum-tish)

LOL, I did miss that.

Anonymous asked: Fun Homestuck fact! After writing Karkat, someone brought up that the writer of the 'Programming For [Expletive]s' book sounded a lot like Karkat. Andrew responded by telling them to imagine that it was actually written in all caps, basically canonizing that the 'Programming For [Expletive]s' book was written by Karkat. At least, I think that's how that went? ~LOSS (28/2/23)

And it could be any Karkat, too. Maybe one of the Karkats from a doomed timeline actually learned to code from Sollux, and became a famous ~ATH developer.

@morganwick asked: So with conversation 8=8 apparently taking place in the immediate aftermath of Rose destroying her gate (even technically during Descend), and Rose's attitude towards Kanaya in the part of it that we see, does that change how much you think her attitude in their previous conversations reflects her genuine mental state?

Oh yeah, no, I’m pretty sure she was genuinely in a bad mood here. Not really so much because of Kanaya, and I think the anger directed at Kanaya specifically was inauthentic, but the bad mood itself was real. She'd recently been injected with several months of traumatic memories, after all.

@manorinthewoods asked: That panel, of John in Vriska's 'fabulous outfit', is actually pretty neat, because you can see from the proportions how young John really is. He's small, not even fully a teenager yet, and he's been thrown into this chaotic world of humans and trolls, quadrants, violence and danger. Everyone in the game must be scared, in some degree, but none of them ever show it. It makes you wonder just how strong Skaia's children really are. ~LOSS (29/4/23)

Seriously. In what universe are 13-year-olds the people most qualified to make universes? Sburb has some very funny ideas about the optimal way it should be played.

I suppose this is something that had to be true, though, for Homestuck to be the coming-of-age story that Hussie wanted it to be.

Anonymous asked: My interpretation has always been that "the Blind Prophets" are actually just Terezi herself, in a time loop-y/predestined way. She's blind, her class is Seer, AKA prophet, and those are her numerals. Also, on an unrelated note, but to weigh in on your last ask, according to Latin conventions, the plural of lusus is lusus. Does Homestuck follow those conventions? Well…

Or, since there are two Seers in Homestuck, maybe they’re Terezi and Rose. She’s a Light Player, so a blinding would be suitably ironic.

Anonymous asked: re: captchalogue codes and the states of objects: it takes a relatively small change in the physical arrangement of atoms and whatnot to turn a ghost dad poster into, say, a little monsters poster, but the two have a relatively large difference between their conceptual nature. on the other hand, it would take a relatively large rearrangement of atoms to make the slime pogo ride be anything other than a slime pogo ride. perhaps this makes the former change state more easily than the latter? alternatively, maybe the captcha system just knows that all it would really take to make the slime pogo ride stop being covered in oil is soap and water and it's happy to do that on its own, but paper is harder to clean so it wants you to jump through more hoops for that one new question: if john had used his posters for alchemy before he was able to see their defacement, would the resultant objects also be beclowned? evidence seems to suggest that players with unawakened dream selves Will draw on their walls in their sleep and not see it until Ready, so there not being mechanisms in place to deal with that seems less likely than the alternative to me, but especially considering people who aren't them Can see the drawings, how??? would that even??? work??? what would've happened if john had done alchemy with the arms cake. i think it would be funny to see that

I think he’d still get the clown posters.

The kids keep accidentally making magic items, so It's clearly possible for someone to alchemize an object with properties they didn't foresee. Therefore, I think John would make what appears, to him, to be a normal poster - but Rose would still see it as it truly is.

Anonymous asked: any thoughts on what the horrorterrors are? beyond their (admittedly vague) intentions?

I think they’re a sign of the wider cosmology beyond Sburb - and, more specifically, a sign that there is a wider cosmology beyond Sburb.

I don't know if we'll necessarily get more expansion on them than we've already had, because their whole shtick is that they're unknowable. Needless to say, I'd love to be proven wrong.

[kerubimcrepin]

Dofus: The Production - reviewing the artbook

This post won't go too deep in detail, it's just my commentary on the artbook — but the next (or, well, one after the next), post will be me doing some actual research outside of it. I recommend you to buy the artbook, and go see its contents for yourself, if you're curious about it. (or download it. It's been scanned to hell and back...)

God, this makes me deranged and insane. Even being baby does not stop Kerubim from loving Joris's jokes... I'm insane...

This part of the artbook has always scared me because like... Does he kill people in Dofus 2, Tot?. Does he.?

Epic events is a funny way to refer to this movie's unending barrage of traumatic events, but man, we were kinda robbed of cool draconic winged Joris. That's sad.

I won't include too much art from the artbook if I can help it, but I wanted to report that this is a very good art and theres a lot of love and um and they love each other and um and [CAR CRASH] [GLASS SHATTERING] ‘GOOD LORD!’ [GENERAL COMMOTION] [BABY CRYING] ‘WAAAAH WAAAAH’ [YELLING] [POLICE SIRENS] WEEWOO WEEWOO [HELICOPTERS] ‘WE’RE REPORTING LIVE-‘ [EXPLOSION] ‘MY LEG… MY LEG…’

I wish I knew what the fuck Tot meant by this. However, knowing that Pupuce is Kerubim's pet, who just liked her owner's kid more than her owner, has fueled some of my headcanons for years and years:

This version of his armour matches the one we could see in the Dofus Manga. :)

I find it quite fascinating that at one point, it was considered for Julith to be an osamodas huppermage, considering it was theorized for some time that Joris might be an osamodas.

I wouldn't call her a tender mother, but eh. She's more of a... "very loving yet despaired mother who doesn't even know her son" mother. A "wants to get back the past which will never return to the point of putting her son into the torture nexus" mother. A "has love in her that is so mentally disturbed" mother. AND I LOVE HER FOR IT!!

I know that her being an alcoholic is a retcon that Dessous did, but its such a good one. I think it's a good show of her decade of slow slippage of sanity. Comic retcons win over Tot's ideas for all Joris-related media once again.

This post was made by "I love Kerubim's dead family from Dofus Heroes Kerubim and Bakara Alcoholism Lore from Dessous de Dofus" gang.

These two huppermages from the movie's concept art were reused in season 4 of Wakfu. Though it would be easier to say what in season 4 of Wakfu isn't reused stuff considering the "shoestring and a piece of chewed gum" budget it was made on...

God, him petting a pupuce is the most important part of the artbook, save for perhaps...

THE KHAN & THE RED-LIGHT DISTRICT & JORIS UNDERAGE DRINKING SCENE

The fact that this was cut is the biggest personal tragedy of my entire life, and I am NOT joking.

Apparently, in this tavern, we were supposed to learn more of his backstory, — like how his father was a gobbowler, but sadly (or happily, if you really hate Khan) it was cut.

But listen. Khan would go to some sexworkers to stare at them and do nothing. He's that much of a loser. He would take a 10yo as his drinking buddy.

This is where my headcanon that he buys Joris booze post-movie comes from, btw.

Compared to the movie's exaggerated visions of Kerubim crying, these images feel like something Joris would remember seeing in real life, something he'd want to avoid.

It feels more real, than just his panicked visions.

[wonderlandsakura]

Niche Things I Think People should Write/Read More: Part 2

I ran out of tags, anyway Part 1 here. If part 1 and/or 2 gets like,, 100 notes, I'll add recs if they exist (someone asked so I did it anyway hehe)

- Fics where Izuku is such an amazing analyst (and the UA staff know it) that they just. Let him teach the class (or anything where they aizawa know he's more skilled and just leave him to teach so they aizawa can nap)

I would prefer it if he's a literal child that just gets the position, but sadly I haven't found that

The UA Analyst Kid of RogueVector's Announcer AU series on AO3 is the closest I think

I do have fic recs of him being an analyst and/or teacher at UA tho, but I'm too tired to find them

- Zuko is given A Child and Will Die For Them (he is so mother coded)

There's Bound To Be A Ghost At The Back Of Your Closet by anactualforrealadult is what I was thinking of when I wrote this, but it doesn't fit perfectly (btw it's zukka)

- Danielle Phantom and Dark Danny are Standard Danny's kids, I need this please I must be FED

Like a few of my reblogs, but I'll see if I can find them

- Monkey D. Wyvern, if you know you know

I'll add this soon, but you can find art for it on Tumblr too :))

- The Reluctant Kings friendship (Danny & Din Djarin)

The Phantom Mandalorian series on AO3 has Danny essentially adopted by Din, but it would be nice if there were fics where they're just friends who are unknowingly OP

- Mandalorian S3 dinluke fix-its /hj

I haven't been able to stomach actually reading these yet, but they do exist

- Gottlieb/Geiszler + Jayvik Xovers where they get to Science!

forming new limestone by wobbeegong on AO3, actually a favorite fic of mine, I was sad when I couldn't find anything like it after I read it but that might have changed

- Jinx being Silco's daughter even after time travel (Jinx the Sapphire of Zaun)

And I know this body's not mine (Wish I could crawl out) by Hopelessjoy14 is where I got this from, it's incomplete but good so far

- Co-parenting Koushirou and Mihawk; like not together but these 2 sword obsessed men are co-parenting Zoro

Doesn't exist yet, and I don't recommend looking if you don't want to get bombarded by bad misogynistic parent Koushirou fics :/, anyway I'm working on it

- the Shimotsuki-Dracule siblings, where in a Kuina lives! (but is severely injured/paralyzed) AU, Zoro gets to be hounded by not only little sister Perona, but also Big Sis Kuina (bonus if modern au)

Same as what I wrote for co-parenting Koushirou & Mihawk, I actually have a fic outlined (it's not modern au tho, but could be), but I'll probably never finish writing it. If I post it on Tumblr I'll link it tho

- Zosan gets accidentally married at WCI AUs cause why not, it's absolutely hilarious

Sadly doesn't exist somehow?? I'll have to check if that's still the case

You can see me screaming about the idea here tho

- I somehow didn't mention Agatha/Gil/Tarvek last time? But yeah, from Girl Genius, I want them to get married and rule Europia, is that too much to ask?

Sprocket for Your Thoughts by zombiecheerios on AO3 is a good fic about them getting together, if incomplete (also you kinda need to have caught up on the comic)

The Most Stable of Polygons by 1_NoName_among_many is like a shorter version of it tho

Then there's the Sparkgate series that originally introduced me to the concept of them ruling together (I've not finished even the first fic tho)

- Zoro being Soba Mask aka Stealth Black aka Sanji's overprotective guard dog/tiger (I read a really good fic okay??)

Fic is Stealth Black Unmasked by HaveMyWeedCookies on AO3

[kustas]

Do you have reccs for "ugly" art (manga, comics, movie, etc.)? Thanks for the Tekkon recs btw I really liked it

That really depends on your own personal media landscape and what your definition of "ugly" is! As a random example, I've seen many people call ONE's art ugly because of the wobbly linework when I think it's lovely. Ugly could also mean something a bit shocking/crass in its themes. Etc, etc... I'm going to go with the definition of "something that's a bit jarring to look at or go through" here :)

Disclaimer: a lot of these tackle sensitive topics, sometimes for fun and not always tastefully. If there's themes you really can't handle in media, do your research before looking into them.

Manga

I keep recommending yes because it rules but Dorohedoro and its scratchy messy art and gore galore. talking about the manga exclusively here the anime is too polished for my taste

God's Child (Kami no Kodomo): tbh this one is for the art only I hated the writing. very gruesome & unique looking short story

I hesitate to recommend this one because it's edgy as hell but I shan't lie I had a lot of fun with Hellsing. it's "bad" in the same areas as something like berserk but unlike that one it does not take itself seriously

if you liked Tekkon i strongly suggest trying out more stuff by its author (saying this with immense biais). the most ugly/messy thing i've read of his, which isn't a lot because i find his work very delicate, is No. 5 which i would less describe as "good" than "very compelling to me". i also recommend this wonderful essay tearing it down

Comics (non JP)

FLEEP: a short story about a man who wakes up in a phone cabin seemingly encased in concrete. one of the comics i always recommend for its length and storytelling. (link leads to the artist's website where you can read it for free!)

The Astonishing Exploits Of Lucien Brindavoine: a young artist gets drafted in the first world war and goes through a series of almost supernatural adventures. beyond the adventure book aspect, a harsh criticism of nationalism/patriotism that's still awfully relevant

Animation

Ruben Brandt: Collector: a psychiatrist suffers from strange art related nightmares ruining his life. his clients, a bunch of high profile criminals, decide to help him fight off his demons by organizing one long vacation where they steal every painting involved. extremely unique visually, a fun heist movie with thriller elements.

Junk Head: goofy post apocalyptic movie about a man on a quest to save, who keeps losing sight his goal because cartoony violence episodes have his head tumble into new lows, literally. this is, perhaps, one of my favorite animated films ever, it's earnest and fun and lovingly crafted. very unique of a watch

The Apostle: freshly escaped from prison, a thief is on a mission to find treasure hidden by his old cellmate, and finds himself stuck in an ancient village who's strange looking elderly inhabitants are way too insistent on his stay. classic spooky folktale with its millennial curses and foreboding warnings, it's also a nice peek into the culture of Galicia and old world medieval weirdass catholicism. you can buy a DVD on their website

MKFZ: dumb as hell high adrenaline animated B movie with excellent animation. there's a plot about alien living undercover in fantasy california but you don't watch this kind of film for the plot. fair warning this is adapted from a french comic so of course, it's crass and racist

Blow to the Head - Lightning bolt: awesome music video (YT link)(warning for flashing/strobing lights if you're sensitive to that!)

Canon Fodder: from the Memories omnibus film. little slice of the life of a fantasy war obsessed industrial nation

with its new movie on the horizon, it's a great time to get into Mononoke, despite traditionally pretty visuals its got a unique style and gets pretty offputting

Live action cinema

7:35 in the morning: short film about the fear in improvised musical numbers where you don't expect any. it's on youtube in bad quality

The Draughtsman's Contract: an artist is hired by a Lady to draw several vistas of her house, in exchange for money, good drawing condition, and the Lady. follows a good hour of cunts in powdery wigs being awful to each other for their own gain. if you're into dark humor it's a good test, otherwise it has a really satisfying murder mystery to follow too.

Three Kings: during the gulf war, a group of US soldiers decide to steal Hussein's gold for themselves under the mighty standard of kuwait's loot repatriation. extremely caustic take on good ol murican international politics. i was shocked at how far it goes and it's express, low budget treatment which i did not expect from a hollywood film. the movie tires itself fast and becomes less good in its second half but the it's opening acts are interesting

Delicatessen: a sliver of humanity survives in an old timey stone building in the middle of nothingness on top of a functional butcher's shop. gossip follows the arrival of a new roommate. how does one even maintain a butchery in a no man's land? weird film with a unique(ly goofy) take on the post apocalyptic genre

Other

For traditional artists, I like the works of Beksinski (<3), Schiele, Giger. For modern artists Oleg Vdovenko (heavy gore warning for that one), Jeff Simpson

I'm less a fan of the MV and live performances they got infamous for than their music proper but I really like the band Cardiacs, who's judged by many of my friends to be extremely hard to get into lol.

[kerakeriza]

If someone you knew wanted to start reading Damian wayne where would you recommend for them to start? 🎤🎤

FIRST!!! you NEED to read batman: son of the demon (1987). this will give you the understanding you need of bruce, talia, their relationship, and also ra's. the fact it hasn't been canon since the 90s doesn't matter because it's still the best book about bruce and the ghul family you will ever read.

then... you may cautiously proceed to batman #656 (2006), while keeping in mind that talia is so wildly ooc that it makes me want to pluck my own eyeballs out of my skull. keep reading until #658, then you can stop because damian disappears for a while after that.

you can read batman #666 if you want to (it's set in an alternate future universe), but damian is bald in it. :( you should probably read it anyway though lol.

next, go on to batman annual #26 (2007). this is the start of the resurrection of ra's al ghul--the arc is good and all, but ra's is so unbelievably ooc that i again want to pluck out my own eyeballs. damian is adorable in it, though, so do read it. but he talks a lot more casually than he's supposed to, that's all you need to keep in mind. (at this point in his character development, he's still the epitome of "spoiled prince," and talks exactly how you'd expect a spoiled prince to talk.)

go through the rest of the resurrection of ra's al ghul after that -- robin annual #7, batman #670, robin #168, nightwing #138, detective comics #838, batman #671, robin #169, nightwing #139, detective comics #839. (please note that the nightwing issues specifically write damian the best, in my opinion. fabian nicieza is one of my FAVORITE damian writers! you know, besides morrison, since morrison created him and all. paul dini is also a huge favorite of mine btw.)

after that, you can go ahead and read batman #675, #680, and #681 (2008).

skip battle for the cowl because you won't really get anything good from reading that lol. long story short: everybody fights for no reason and dick becomes batman and damian becomes robin.

move onto batman and robin #1 (2009). just read it all of it! (the new earth universe finishes at #26 i believe, then new 52 starts.) it's all really good. i also recommend reading all of red robin (2009) and batgirl (2009), damian doesn't show up in every issue but he shows up quite a lot, and regardless, they're just really good books!

you also need to read batman: streets of gotham (2009). again, read all of it, INCLUDING the manhunter specials at the back of the book! damian shows up in those sometimes. :)

also... batman annual #27 (2009) and the other half of its story in detective comics annual #11 (2009).

then, read batman: li'l gotham for some fun fluff. :)

another must-read is supergirl #61 - #64 (2011).

also, teen titans #89 (2011). just read from #89 - #92, then come back around #99 - #100 for maximum damian. it's a pretty good series regardless though.

(one more thing: batman #700 and #703.)

as for new 52, you can keep reading the batman and robin series. but even more importantly, i think you should check out batman: the dark knight (2012) #10 - #15. it's one of my absolute favorite stories between bruce and damian.

besides that, i haven't read a lot of new52 comics, even though i should... or much at all beyond new52, either... but i did read super sons, and i can highly recommend that whole series!

gotham academy #6 and #7 are also super cute new52, sort of AU stories, damian features in those issues and he's adorable and well-written, if you ask me.

so that's where i'd tell you to start! there's way more that even i still need to read, but i'm so bitter about new52 and rebirth in general that it takes me a while to even want to pick up a book from the modern era.

edit: while you could read the batman/tmnt comics featuring damian, i actually recommend just watching the movie they made based on those comics. it's REALLY good.

[chiscribbs]

Asking some AU comp competitors & supporters:

- Are there any AUs you weren't familiar with that have recently caught your attention, or that you would like to learn more about?

- What are some AUs/fanworks that you enjoy, and would encourage more people to go check out? (Doesn't have to be in the comp!)

Oooooooooooh my gosh, SO many!! I wasn't terribly involved in the fandom before this, mostly just stayed in my little remote corner and got whatever happened to find its way into my space. This contest has introduced me to a whole host of fascinating AUs that I'm definitely going to be checking out in the near future. Just to name a few: @noval1t's Void Brothers AU, @theemployees AU, @theserpentsnight's Red Rover AU, @phoebepheebsphibs's Until I Found You AU, @twinpathy AU, @separatedleoau (which I'd seen some content of before, but had yet to check out for myself), @donniesbrows' REBOOT: Second Chance AU, @getindumdums' AU (that I got a brief, but very memorable, glimpse of via that one comic lol), and uuuuhhh...oh gosh, so many. Just- A *lot* of really neat and interesting AUs to be had around here that I found thanks to this competition. THANKS, @tmntaucompetition!!! ❤

I've been a big fan of @vangh17a's Wanderer comic and @kathaynesart's Replica comic for awhile! I also absolutely adore @star-sparkler's fanchild Augustine Hamato and @shiveagit's Spiderverse AU is one of the coolest I've seen, the designs are just - *chef's kiss* - SO beautiful! I also have to take this chance to promote an incredible fanfic series that a friend introduced me to awhile back that I have not been able to put down and as someone who typically isn't the most avid fanfic reader, that means a lot - it's called "Mind Over Matter" by @danzinora-switch on AO3. It's SOOOOO GOOOOOD - the characterization is so on-point, the plot is so well thought-out and developed with good pacing that makes it easy to blow through several chapters in a sitting. I especially love the way the author shows whose perspective a chapter is being told from, it's easy to tell which brother is "narrating" based on the way that they think and how they see things. Mikey's has to be one of my favorite examples of this. Anyway - I won't spoil any of the plot, but I highly recommend giving it a read if you haven't already. 👌

Thanks for the ask, btw - this whole event has been such a fun and thrilling experience for me and it's nice to see people out here spreading love & appreciation for each other's works. Hope you have yourself a nice day!

[gleefultogo]

How??

Someone showed me this from kique's Patreon description and I'm confused all heck. How are his comics anthro? I don't think his pretend wanna be human characters would be considered that. They are dogs and are in feral bodies, they don't bipedal or anyhting. The only character I could consider being an "Anthro" is maybe that avanti? character. but she's one character and it wouldn't make his comic considered Anthropomorphic. Unless I'm wrong, then correct me. Unless kique really out here thinking it is because these dogs so magically can build, wear clothes, harvest meat and fight with knives. All while having no thumbs or the joints do to that sorta things. But alright I guess? I'm not counting the amount of human poses these dogs do, because its so unrealistic and would be uncomfortable for a feral dog in the first place. Or if the characters or art style was more cartoony so the characters could be able to do more instead of being based on realism in anatomy and art. Then okay then maybe it would of been considered semi anthropomorphic. But it's not The comic lost scent does a really good job at that aspect and makes sense why they are able to wear things and pick up objects. which btw I highly recommend you reading, it's really good ^^

[nutcrawler]

X-Men 2024, or, what the fuck should I read this year?

As someone that wasted the last week catching up on all current X-titles, here's the long short on which books are nice

Uncanny X-Men

The first one I read because it has my boy Kurt, with Rogue, Gambit, and Wolverine, traveling a bit and hanging out in Louisiana until the plot comes to get them with 4 new younger mutants being hunted.

Exceptional X-Men

This is the slice of life book. Kitty Pryde is a bartender in Chicago, while she balances trying not to fuck up her wlw dates twice in a row with rescuing every baby mutant that she crosses paths with. Pretty gay, I like it, it has good writing.

Adjectiveless X-Men, aka X-Men

The Scott Summers Show, I would actually recommend this one above Uncanny, as it seems to be the "true" book the x-events are moving around. Scott & Co. living in Alaska, Beast is back and trying to cure Magneto, Glob and Quentin are here too. If you are only gonna keep up with one book, this one wouldn't be a bad pick.

NYX

Or, the Young Mutants Pride book. The Kamala Khan/Laura Kinney book. Pretty focused on the "community" aspect of mutants, issue #3 has a scene that really highlights this with regards to where you belong, what you hide, etc. So pretty gay like Exceptional, a Morlock even mentions scalie fetishists. I don't really like X-23 but she's good with Kamala in this book.

X-Factor

Reality show mutants with a side of "you can't work for our oppressors." Leans pretty comedic when not focusing on mutant oppression and the question of integration. Oh yeah btw all these books are wearing their politics on the sleeves, some more than others though.

X-Force

Forge made a device that tells him where shit is gonna hit the fan, and he's assembled a team to keep shit together, and if they do their job right, nobody will know. Clearly building to something, so the action focus is a little dull for me, but the couple writing between Captain Britain and Askani is nice. Forge is hiding something because he refuses to take off his psi-shield.

Sentinels

The edgy book, people dressed like sentinels and hunting down mutants. The letters page at the end of issue #1 was explicit about how they are pulling the energy of Robocop and Starship Troopers, so if you like fascy tacti-cool stuff, this is the one. Not hating btw I love Verhoeven, I saw some posts on 4chan about how this book is triggering the libs but that's just cope.

The solo focused books:

Dazzler

Mutant and proud, and on tour! That's it, there's only been one issue. Includes an entire mutant pride song called Out and Proud. Didn't particularly enjoy this one.

Storm

Wanting to begin her political career, but starts with the harsh truth that a local nuclear disaster was the fault of a mutant instead of negligent engineers. She also gave herself a megadose of rads and has hours to live. Also only 1 issue out right now, but decent.

Phoenix

Jean Grey, space cop (except she helps people). Has a very strong "actions and consequences" theme. Phoenix's history is constantly brought up Jean works to rehabilitate her reputation. Also some kind of fatherhood theme going on, Jean inadvertently gets an alien girl's dad killed which is slowly working its way around to be a problem for Jean again; Jean also run's into her father in law, who brings her to some Asgardian zombies, it's a whole thing. Not too bad imo, but as the "cosmic book" it's kinda all over the place.

Wolverine

Absolutely unhinged, my boy Kurt gets shot in the fucking face first issue. But it was to motivate Logan to be a good boy, so seal of approval.

oh there is also From the Ashes Infinity Comic that is p good, a sort of anthology where every 3-4 issues is a different story, I actually really liked it despite the Infinity Comic format

So that's the first 6 months of post-Krakoa, p good so far, will keep reading for sure.

Mystique #1 comes out in a few days which I'm kinda hype for, she finally got married to Destiny last year so Marvel's premier lesbian couple is thriving.

So long true believers, and remember:

[okaystoptellingmetomakeanaccount]

LESSER KNOWN STORIES ANY MAGICA FAN SHOULD READ I THINK

NO ROSA NO BARKS NO ARTIBANI

ONLY LESSER KNOWN COMICS

some scarpa will slip in im afraid this is difficult okay.

Thanks btw soony for the inspiration this is actually really fun

One of the earliest Magica stories, this one is from 1969. One of the most creative out there, especially for being such an early one. Also there’s a scene where Magica goes all scarface (i think, i have never watched that stuff i just heard he goes all shooty shoot) and thats quite amusing.

Really sweet comic. Everyone who only knows Magica from ducktales should read this comic to understand how much more complicated her character is in the original comics. It does such a great job at showing the other facets of her character in such a simple way. Don’t listen to the inducks review of m3gr1ml0ck (he’s almost always super based but not this time). Listen to the inducks review of Appie Aap (who is always based because he’s Appie Aap).

Kind of overrated in my opinion but Sarda’s characterization is PERFECTION. Story is average asf (though maybe i need to reread it) but all the little things are so incredibly well done. Molinari is great too of course.

It’s one of the recent more well known comics yeah okay but its mostly known because people thought Vian thought Etna was the Vesuvius (which they solved with a simple dialogue change in the German translation because it really was not that complicated guys) and it should be known for being a great comic instead. One day I will write a really long review about why it’s a masterpiece. Maybe. It perfectly manages to bring back the spirit of the Sarda written comics without some of the annoying quirks of his writing and with the fact that Bruno Enna is writing now and I love Bruno Enna guys robophobia is a masterpiece last hunt is a masterpiece i love bruno enna-

Magica really cares a lot about Ratface. You should read it.

Magica really cates about Ratface part 2. These two comics aren’t must reads but they’re good to help understand Magica and Ratface their relationship. (In italian comics at least. They seem to hate each other sometimes in Denmark)

Talking about Danish stories. Here. (Written by an American and drawn by a Dutchie. Egmont knows no borders) It IS quite well known, but tumblr here seems mostly familiar with Italian comics and this story has never been published in Italy, so I still think it deserves a mention. I was never a big fan of it, but all the inducksers seem to like it and i cant ignore its significance. So here it is i would still recommend.

Magica tells about her ancestor and her ancestor is lovely.

Magica talks about her ancestor and her ancestor is lovely part 2. (these ARE must reads!)

Magica turns herself into a floppy disk and everything you expect to happen happens. You want a typical fun but average Dutch comic? Then i’d recommend this one.

(I wanted to recommend another comic here but tumblr refuses to save it and ive been trying for what feels like hours so im giving up) (for some reason it did save at least this)

I really wanted to suggest more Danish stories but i have either not read them, theyre a gal for gladstone (aka not not well known) or theyre bad.

[wiihtigo]

i kinda want to get into transformers do you have recs on where to start

hmm....probably one of the animated shows? or if any of the live action movies interest you, i really liked bumblebee (2018)

i think the g1 cartoon is great but its a little slow to watch on your own i think? unless thats just my short attention span talking LOL but i found it more fun to watch dragging a friend along to watch with me cuz its so goofy LOL! but starscream is great in g1 so its all worth it. and then youd get to watch the 80s movie afterwards which is a CINEMATIC MASTEPIECE and introduces hot rod (my friend). ive seriously watched the 80s movie like... several times and its great every time

cyberverse is another fun show, i have my criticisms but overall its pretty cute, and the episodes are only like 11 minutes. and i love the art style. really cute designs i think. earthspark and transformers prime are great too. i ended up like tfp way way way more than i thought i would. transformers animated was good :) i liked it less than the other shows though personally, but its very popular so check it out if you want..

i found the shows a good way to familiarize myself w basic tf lore and stuff like what the heck is "energon" and "autobots" and "So the Prime at the end of his name actually means something its not just his full name?"

after that i really liked reading the idw1 comics! particularly more than meets the eye and robots in disguise

honestly i tried reading mtmte at a friends recommendation before knowing anything about tf but i couldnt get into it because i didnt know any of these jobbers and i didnt know anything about tf so i was really lost the whole way. but after throwing myself into a transformers 101 class and coming back to it and rereading from the start i liked it a lot more

im still working...slowly....on my idw1 read through...i want to read the past comics that come before mtmte....but im lazy and stopped after megatron origins (which was very good btw)

so unfortunately i cant give any personal review on the rest of the idw comics chronologically aside from the wreckers saga which i did love...if youre up to it i think its worth trying out though..you can always skim things you find boring and no one will know. i wont tell

[pumpkinrootbeer]

DONT listen to redditors when they tell you a good jumping off point to get into spiderman comics is Superior!! they are lying to you!! not even as a dig at superior spiderman, as much as i love making fun of it it's a good comic run

but I can't imagine recommending the one where Peter gets freaky friday-ed into a dying doc ock's shriveled body and then proceeds to die in said shriveled body as Doc Ock fucks around in Spiderman's body. and you have to read dying wish which is honestly a pretty dense 5 issue run leading up to Superior Spider-Man on its own, filled with characters that you won't have encountered unless you've been reading asm up to that point (be honest how many of you have even heard of horizon labs.) But then the first like 5ish issues of ssm Doc Ock just tries to get with MJ and also it is HEAVILY SUGGESTED to that doc ock has feelings for May. In Peter's Body. And the whole time Peter is just stuck as a ghost watching doc ock SORT OF FLIRT WITH HIS AUNT IN HIS BODY ? and I'll stop here. but in no world would I suggest maybe one of the most absurd spiderman comics (sure it's no sins of the past but come on) to someone who has only seen the movies or the cartoons, and wants to get into the comics. I get that it's like a fan favorite but come on!!

anyway here's what id recommend people read if they want to Spiderman:

Obviously ASM is the main title and if youre really committed to being in the know on spiderman, it's definitely The place to go. But also it has 900+ issues and it can hard to find a good starting place.

I don't hate the 2022 run as much as some people do (totally reasonably btw there's some choices I'm not crazy for eithsr), and since it's the ongoing run there's not as much you'd have to read to be caught up. A lot of it is little 3-4 issue self contained stories! There's only fifty-threeee (?) issues out rn so plenty to read but not as daunting as the almost One Thousand Issues that lay before you and a near 60+ year run. I also hear the 2012 run is pretty good but I've only read a few issues here and there of that one so I cannot speak to it myself lol

Another series that's not too long but still has plenty there: Deadpool/Spider-Man! has two fan favorites and absolutely plenty of wacky comic antics. The first big plotline isn't the best but the character moments more than make up for it. Only 50 issues so not too bad! Plus, the run is over so you won't be trying to catch up (im hoping they revive it <-self delusion)

Avenging Spider-Man is another good jumping off point imo! It's a team-up series that will point you to ongoing plotlines without dragging you into them, so if one happens to strike your fancy you can go find those comics to read that storyline. It's fun, heartfelt, and self contained (for the most part). Can you tell I like team up stories yet.

For individual issues you can read completely standalone:

Deadpool annual #2 (2013)

Avenging Spider-Man #4

Amazing Spider-Man #248

Daredevil #8 & #9 (2016) (two issues ik im cheating, trust me though)

And if you're just looking to get into comics in general, here's a couple stand alone miniseries that I really like (all 10 issues or less!)

Gwenpool Strikes Back (spiderman is in this one!)

Hawkeye: Freefall (spideys here too!!)

Defenders 2017 (he's not here though... as far as I can remember)

(also you can find all of these online! (for free ;)) at readcomicsonline.li but for the love of god don't use that site if you don't have an ad blocker)

[shihalyfie]

Hi! recently I read your post about differences you had spotted in the japanese fandom and you mentioned how some people said that tamers wasn't female audience friendly. I don't know if you know why?

(Also I love your blog btw)

Thank you so much! I hope I didn't give the wrong idea (I can't find the specific post but I'm hoping I didn't word it wrong) but it was just one comment I saw that made me think about it a lot; I don't think this is necessarily an opinion beyond just that person, it's just that when I saw it it really stuck out to me and made me really spend time pondering why someone would think that way.

To be more specific, the situation was that an Adventure fan who'd gotten back into it and 02 because of Kizuna brought up Tamers and said they were interested in it, and the commenter said that it was a good series (they were still recommending it, they weren't trying to dissuade!) but warned that it was "more obviously oriented towards a male audience" than the Adventure series (the exact word was 一層男向け).

So I think some specific context about this incident also helps to explain further; it's rather significant that it was said to be potentially less female audience friendly than Adventure-branded works, which were used as a comparison point because the explanation was originally for someone who had never seen anything else besides that. In this case, I think it's less so that Tamers is that female audience-unfriendly as much as the Adventure series is actually considered to be surprisingly female audience friendly for a shounen series of its kind; of course, it still is ultimately made and marketed more for young boys, but it ended up infamously getting a much larger female audience than you'd have expected. The girls having their feelings fleshed out in detail and not constantly having a red arrow on them as The Girls™ of the Group (I think you know what I mean by this) -- something really not very common in shounen anime from 1999-2001 (even now it's not that common) -- made them very relatable to the female audience. And on top of that, you had things like Yamato or Ken infamously being a lot of girls' first love.

And then, well, let's put it this way: it is generally understood that most adult anime fans who made gay fan comics and fanart at the time were female, and so naturally Taichi/Yamato and Takeru/Daisuke got very popular among this crowd. Note the reason why it's Takeru/Daisuke in particular: Ken didn't join the group as an ally or even have a particularly deep interaction with Daisuke (other than episode 8) until halfway into the series, but by that time there were already people enthusiastically churning out gay fanwork with Daisuke and Takeru before anything significant in the series had happened because they were ready for them to be the next Taichi and Yamato. (Obviously, you know how the series actually went, but hindsight is 20/20.) So you had doujinshi artists making and selling gay comics at events, and magazines like Animage and Animedia (generally considered to have a high female reader population) were flooded with subtext-filled gay fanart submissions.

Even now, you can see the subtle acknowledgment that they know Adventure has a ton of adult female fans, given tri. stuff being in the female audience-oriented magazine Otomedia, as well as the tri. stage play even existing at all. (Anime tie-in stage plays are very associated with female audiences, and in fact the actors for the Digimon one even pointed out they had an unusually gender-neutral audience compared to what they were used to.)

So when you look at Tamers in comparison, it's not that it's necessarily giving a cold middle finger to its female audience as much as it's clearly got a lot fewer of the above factors and is more concerned about appealing to the main target of boys, hence the description "more obviously oriented towards a male audience". For instance, fundamentally speaking, Ruki was made to be a "strong" character because they wanted her to appeal to boys (presumably to include ones that wouldn't like "girly-girls"). Now, the good thing is that Ruki ended up becoming important representation for girls who also felt similarly out of place with being pigeonholed as "girls", and I'm not saying Adventure and 02 couldn't have also used some of that too, but keep in mind that the entire development of Ruki's state of mind in this respect has been credited to female writer Yoshimura Genki. I think it's very possible that, in the hands of a different writer, Ruki could have easily fallen into the trap of what I call the "Strong Female Character" Fallacy, which is when you make a female character who's good at violently beating things up but is portrayed more like an object to be cool and hot for the boys than she is a human being because they don't actually bother to pay any respect to her own feelings. (Unfortunately very common with male-oriented works.)

I'm getting off-track here, but my point is that while Adventure and 02 were fundamentally made for boys first, they did have a lot of elements that easily appealed to the female audience and seem to have been outright conscious of the female periphery demographic, perhaps unusually so for shounen anime at the time, whereas Tamers was much less conscious of that and focused more on elements that boys would like, such as plotlines about strength and less on more sentimental things (and there probably really could be something to be said about that kind of attitude's relationship with toxic masculinity, but I don't think we're ready for that conversation, nor do I think the final product went so far in that direction it has nothing sentimental going for it at all or anything).

That said, I can't emphasize enough that this was ultimately one fan's opinion on the Internet, and the reason I ended up resonating with it a bit is that I did at least notice that Adventure and 02 do seem to have a much higher ratio of female fans than Tamers does and thought it would be worth considering why (in fact, even Frontier has come off to me as having a larger ratio of female fans than I've noticed with Tamers). While this might be a bit provocative of a thing to say, I also do get the impression that most of my bad experiences with a certain type of Tamers fan that gets super condescending about its superiority over every other series also does seem to have a suspicious amount of overlap with a certain kind of toxic dudebro fan. However, and I'll put this in bold because it's important, I do not personally believe Tamers being more oriented towards a male audience inherently makes it unfriendly to a female audience. There are a lot of female Tamers fans, including people who are likely reading this post, and ones who found deep connection and meaning with many of the elements in Tamers, and in fact it's a fallacy to conclude that a girl or boy would necessarily like or dislike something (that would be exactly the kind of sentiment that Ruki was trying so hard to work against, after all). Digimon is a shounen series, but at the time Adventure through Frontier originally aired, they aired on the same day as magical girl anime Ojamajo Doremi, so there were a lot of girls (and boys!) who would watch both. Female audience-oriented, male audience-oriented, that's all subjective, and in fact it probably only really matters when it comes to toy sales and capitalism, but that ship's sailed a long time ago. And meanwhile, here I am, as a female fan who likes Tamers myself, so it certainly hasn't turned me off!

[sketching-shark]

btw have you read the original American Born Chinese? its such a good book and its free on the Internet Archive :> yaoguai-ness as a metaphor for otherness always gets me in the feels

I have! Answered an anon about this awhile ago, but the basic gist is that it is a really good comic about the struggles involved with growing up as a member of the Asian diaspora, and presents a pretty unique use of the Monkey King to do so. It's really neat to hear that it's available on the Internet Archive! I would definitely recommend anyone who hasn't done so already to give this work a read!

[cleromancy]

some countdown reread thoughts

btw heres the reading order for jason purposes--asterisk denoting cameo or single-panel appearances: countdown 51-48, teen titans 03 47, amazons attack #2*, countdown 47*, countdown 46-43, the all-new atom 13*, countdown 42-39, the all-new atom 14, countdown 38*, countdown 37-34, the all-new atom 15, countdown 33, countdown presents the search for ray palmer: wildstorm, countdown 32-30, countdown presents the search for ray palmer: crime society, countdown 29-26, countdown presents: lord havok and the extremists #1*, countdown presents the search for ray palmer: red rain, countdown 24, countdown presents the search for ray palmer: gotham by gaslight, lord havok and the extremists #2, countdown 21, countdown presents the search for ray palmer: red son, countdown 20-19, countdown presents the search for ray palmer: superwoman/batwoman, countdown 18-4, then the final issue of countdown.

for simplicity's sake its still readable if you do just want to start at countdown 51 and down to 1--is in fact probably more readable this way--but if you're reading countdown at all the search for ray palmer issues are definitely worth your time; otherwise the only one i consider vital is tt #47. i would also recommend robin 1993 #178 where tim calls donna to ask about red robin suit after that bc it helps tie up that thread a little (albeit not well).

couple questions to look up/theorize on: how long did this take, how many of the earths did they go to... after this Donna goes on to titans 2008, jason does his stint in robin (177, 182-183), then battle for the cowl (😮‍💨), but im not sure where kyle winds up so i should. Check that lol. i know at least at one point someone references two days passing but thats the only indication of time i actually rmr.

overall plot thread for "the challengers": the monitors identify duela dent as a universal aberration by the monitors and shes killed by the rogue monitor who later starts going by solomon; jason and donna investigate her death and run into the monitor jason starts calling bob, who tells them they need to find ray palmer to prevent the multiverse from 'sploding, or whatever; theyre on the run from monitors and various Baddies Of The Week as they do this bc jay donna and kyle are all considered threats to the sanctity of the multiverse or whatever; kyle shows up, saves donna, and joins the team; they find ray palmer, bob tries to kill him gasp shock horror betrayal; bob gets killed by solomon; the other plot threads in countdown converge around here (see next paragraph), and they're mostly just trying to get home with the threat of the next Crisis on the horizon; big fight; jason drops the red robin suit in a dumpster and catches the bus back to gotham with Harley and holly robinson (they landed, i believe, in metropolis, but i would have to double check that).

other plot threads: karate kid caught the most comic-book-y futuristic nanobot plague you can imagine, holly (and later harley) wind up in a gotham womens shelter run by amazons as a covert op situation masterminded by granny goodness who is masquerading as athena on themyscira, piper and trickster are... something to do with barts death im honestly not totally clear what their plot was supposed to be, and mary marvel grappling with gaining losing and regaining magic powers and uh rapidly oscillating in and out of being eeeevil. i think thats all.

so the plot itself is mostly coherent in the point A leading reasonably to point B sense all the way through; the major issue there is just like, 1) the infighting with the monitors being really poorly handled and the logic behind all that being so iffy as to almost be a plot hole and 2) the reasoning for jay and donna to decide to go along with and help bob the monitor in the first place being *extremely* flimsy.

the *character* thread that im struggling with in my mental retelling is how a little over halfway through people got randomly extra hostile to Jason--disproportionately so--and not even in a way where the thread was carried coherently from issue to issue. and on one hand the impact of "the challengers" on the multiverse was so wacky and comic book-y that i *could* do a copout and blame that (at least partially) but like i actually want to figure out where i think donna and jasons friendship can go from this and i *am* interested in the idea that donna was upset enough about jason shooting her as a fakeout to get the Bad Guys off their back that she rapidly changed her mind about him. like that does have a lot of potential. its just that the execution was all over the place.

i guess where im at is the same place i always wind up at with countdown or bftc which is just like. not having any one concrete idea in my head of what i think Really happened, just a fluid set of ideas that have potential to build off of depending on what im doing with any specific story concept. :/. o well lol

[gamer-comix]

i am going to have an aneurysm

(please note I don't mean any of this in a rude way and I apologize if it comes off as such 😭😭)

Hi yes in one of your little comics abt mekakucity actors (love your comics btw) you mentioned that you thought you might have been watching the series out of order and you're absolutely correct unfortunately

The anime most definitely is NOT a good place to start with the series considering that it is, to put it simply, pretty shit and has horrible pacing, along with the fact that the story had to be condensed into 12 episodes so it fails to explain a lot of things that were expanded upon in the novels & manga. The anime basically assumes you've already read both of the above & watched the songs which is fine ig but is not good for new viewers in the slightest

All I'm saying is plspls don't judge the series in its entirety too harshly based on the anime, 86% of the kagepro fandom has a deep hatred for the anime and I'm fairly certain that Jin, the creator the the series, has stated himself that the anime isn't actually canon (don't remember if I have a source for this). While the series definitely has its flaws (the weird time skipping shit that you saw in episode 1&2 occurs in the novels too with 0 explanation, and continues throughout the whole anime!! Hooray) it's actually really interesting once you have proper context for everything so if you find that you like the story by the end but didn't really understand it too well, highly recommend the novels or the manga (as well as the songs!! The songs aren't as straightforward in telling the story but they're definitely very cool)

Apologies for the long wall of text that probably doesn't make much sense it is currently 2 in the morning and I am running off of a pack of goldfish and a brownie

(and oh my god. Episode 9. I REALLY hope you aren't watching the original tv aired version because oh no.)

oh i know it's just the adaptation itself that's bad. there's an interesting story in here, it's just that shaft adapted it in the absolute worst way possible

to give a little peek behind the curtain, i've actually read the first couple chapters of the manga and was pleasantly surprised at how it actually told a story instead of just going through the motions of one while headtilting. meanwhile im five episodes into the anime and Guy C's name has only been shown to us in 1.5 seconds of stylized, onscreen katakana text that even someone fluent would have trouble reading in time

the songs are definitely good. i really like kagerou daze, and even the anime OP (just "daze" apparently) is really good too. im putting off listening to the others until my 12-episode ordeal is over, though

i am very much watching the TV broadcast version because i love to suffer. episode 4 definitely shows a dip in quality. but there's no way episode 9 could be worse than other things i've watched...right?