#its my fav parallel probably

[yvainart]

the place where we first met

[torsamors]

Fall Out Boy + Gold (fob + blue)

Songs: Saturday, Homesick at Space Camp, Sending Postcards from a Plane Crash (Wish You Were Here), Snitches and Talkers Get Stitches and Walkers, This ain’t a Scene it’s a Goddamn Arms Race, Golden, W.A.M.S., Rat a Tat, Centuries, The Last of the Real Ones + Genius annotation on The Kintsugi Kid (Ten Years)

Art + artists: Mark Rothko - Untitled, Max Kurzweil - Lady in Gold, Van Gogh - The Mulberry Tree, Canegallo Sexto - The Meeting, XuanWei Su - In Love, Zhiyong Jing - Untitled, Emily Kame Kngwarreye - Ceremony, Richard R. Powell

[saphflare]

If I had a nickel for every fucking time one of my favorite minecraft character on an smp, who also had a divine connection of sorts, ended up killing someone after the explosion of that person's city/base and had the children of that person also witness the death of their parent. Then ended up somehow emotionally connecting with said child of the person they killed and having a odd relationship in which they sorta taken them in at some point, in which they lived near them and just kinda became their guardian of sorts. And the child in some way sees them as someone they can rely on despite the fact of said character being a big source of their grief and pain (sorta, it gets complicated if you look more into that). I would have two (and maybe a half) nickels and things just rhythm somehow.

[mettywiththenotes]

Talking about an au

This is one that has been on my mind since 419 and tbh I thought for sure it could happen

Remember when Tomura shed his skin during the Floating UA battle? Well I wondered if a similar thing would happen again in Mount Fuji

Picture it. In the void, AFO eats Tomura. He's dying as he's told everything about AFO's involvement in his life. AFO takes over his body, hand formed over mouth and all. It looks pretty bad. All the stuff happens with Izuku getting his arms back, the heroes coming to his aid etc. Izuku punches AFO (end of 422, beginning of 423). Here's where it diverges from canon:

Izuku punches AFO and he starts crumbling slowly, from his gut (where the impact was) to the rest of him. Except before it even reaches his chest, his face starts to crack open. Visually we can see this crack isn't the same as the crumbling of his body. It's one we've seen before, across his face in the middle of a battle. A parallel back to this

Except within the crack is Tomura's face. Tomura inside Tomura's body. Tomuraception

What happened? Well, the power of Izuku's will to stop AFO (the punch) allowed the vestiges that got thrown into the body to reawaken and bring Tomura's soul back. At the same time, minutes before, Tomura, slowly dying in the void, began to think. About everything AFO told him, how he was doomed before he was even born. How much that angered him, the rage coursing through his soul. He already had a strong will before, but now he really can't accept what has happened and he can't accept AFO getting away with it. Even if AFO's fate is to die, he'd rather be the one on the other end of it, alive and watching him. Better yet, being the hand that ultimately brings about his end

As a visual representation, it's like Tomura reaches out, desperate to climb out of the abyss he is slowly dying in, and he is met with several hands reaching back, taking his hand and pulling him out and back to the world. The vestiges, who have been reawakened by Izuku

Before, Tomura has not been able to die or stay dead. So why should this not be the same? With the power of rage, spite, his hero and some ghostly relatives, he lives on. He twists his own fate by accepting the hands that reach out and climbing out of the hole AFO threw him in

AFO's Tomura face cracks open. Tomura forces AFO's vessel apart from the head, almost like a butterfly climbing out of its cocoon, almost like he is actively prying his own cage open and escaping for good

AFO had been crumbling and was ripped open, but in a desperate attempt to stay together and stay alive (also fueled by anger at being pushed to the edge like this + Tomura somehow coming back from the dead), he uses his quirks (mostly drills) to keep his body intact for now (this is already shown in 423)

Also, I guess it depends on what you would like to believe, but the way I see it, Tomura could come back either with just his decay OR with the vestiges choosing another vessel for what little power they can give left and so backing Tomura up with the last of OFA. Aka 10th user Tomura. It's not as powerful as it was with Izuku but it still adds a lot, just enough to pack a real punch. Personally I think if we're already throwing away "what is realistic" then I might as well go big or go home and go with 10th user Tomura my beloved

It's from this point that he and Izuku begin to work together to kill the old body. As you can imagine, it's probably not an immediate bonding of friendship or whatever, but it's more or less teamwork formed with the general statement of "we still have things to work out, hero, but I don't care about that right now. I hate him more than anyone else on this damn mountain and I can't stand the thought of letting anyone else kill him but me" etc but then progresses as they fight

[vesselmade]

walking side by side

[whatwillyousing]

didnt have the patience to actually watch the anime all the way (esp bc they adapted the last manga arc as the anime's prologue for some reason? and also i find that part the most boring LOL) but from what i skimmed it seemed like the anime almost entirely cut out the isobeyan segments? which is just so disappointing knowing how it works as an embedded narrative & what a missed opportunity it was not adapting it as an old timey showa era anime...

[0wllight]

sorry for the radio silence ive been consumed by thoughts(tm) I gave my friend the idea of a knight/royalty au but I realized It could also work for sovaspectrum so ive been rotting over that the past hour or two.. help me...

[wohnjatson]

when dose Hawkeye start to trust BJ? because BJ trusts Hawkeye immediatley but I'm not sure when it really clicks that Hawkeye trusts BJ. I don't mean that he dosen't immediately like BJ, because he dose, they click instantly on a pretty core level, but i'm interested when that sort of intellectual thought out comes into the relationship.

[ccelicaa]

Parallels.

Taking a step back from the goofy silly arts and getting a little serious for this one.... this is promo art for their story I've been working on!!!

It's an idea of what I'm planning, and I'm hoping to write their story for a fic! So I wanted to ask if you guys would be interested in reading it?😳😳

I didn't think I'd be getting this invested LOL but I'm hoping to draw scenes out of the fic too if they're that good🤷guess we'll have to see. lol anyway

I FINALLY FINISHED THIS I posted the wip of this on twitt a while ago, and it's probably been my fav piece for them 😭😭at least in terms of the process because I was listening to so much music related to them....and it got me in my feels for them...... (if you guys wanna hear the playlist I made for them I would gladly share....) (ALSO MAKE A PLAYLIST FOR YOUR OCS / SHIPS GUYS ITS SO GOOD) ANYWAY HOPE Y'ALL LIKE!!

EDIT: IM PUTTING THE LINK TO THE PLAYLIST HERE you guys should send me links to urs too 😍 lmk what you guys think!!

Here: SebSol Playlist

[driftwooddestiel]

get to know me ‼️

thanks to @dear-space-cadet for the tag :-)

1. Do you make your bed? not really, but i do tidy up my bed a little

2. Favorite number? probably 7, i know its a popular favourite number but thog dont c aare its a good number

3. What's your job? don’t have one 💪 🔥 💯 i plan to apply to some like. shelf-stocking and similar type jobs soon when i get round to it

4. If you could back to school, would you? haven’t left it yet so i dont have much choice in the matter here lol

5. Can you parallel park? never tried but i doubt it considering i cant drive lmao

6. Do you think aliens are real? i believe theres bound to be other forms of life somewhere out there but idk if i believe in aliens in the traditional sense

7. Can you drive a manual car? once more i cannot drive any car

8. Guilty pleasure? watching true crime videos and then getting paranoid, getting into stupid arguments in youtube comment sections & getting way too invested in niche internet discourse

9. Tattoos? none atm and i dont think i plan to get any . but that could change

10. Favorite color? dull-ish blue (similar to the colour of my blog)

11. Favorite type of music? truly i cannot pick one

12. Do you like puzzles? jigsaw puzzles im ambivalent towards, logic puzzles i usually enjoy

13. Any phobias? no full-on phobias but i do kinda freak out at the idea of swimming with jellyfish

14. Favorite childhood sport? climbing!

15. Do you talk to yourself? all the time 👍

16. Tea or coffee? to be fully honest i drink neither but i’d have to say tea . ive had more tea than coffee in my life and i enjoy tea more generally

17. First thing you wanted to be growing up? when i was like 3-6 i would always say i wanted to be a dog (bc i did) and when i eventually came to terms with that not being a career option, i would usually say artist (but i also somewhat wanted to be a comedian from like ages 7 or 8 to age 10)

18. What movies do you adore? saw (2004) is my absolute fav, i also love donnie darko, american psycho, zoolander, ten inch hero & anything directed by jordan peele. + horror movies in general are my favs

im gonna actually continue a tag game for once SOOO. tags (no pressure ofc 👍): @nintendont2502 @gorillaxyz @s-ccaam-era-crepe @paranormalglass @dykesism

[thiriumstains]

i have so many things to say about how the android revolution was handled in dbh, especially how most of the conflict was around markus’s choices to be violent or peaceful. idrk how to phrase it all but like. ugh it just bugs me how the androids Have to be peaceful and cooperative in order to gain freedom

a huge part of the revolution is ‘we can’t stoop to the same level as the human’ and it makes me so mad. like yeah sure, murder and hurting ppl isn’t good. but protests for rights have never been peaceful. you don’t gain rights by being peaceful and perfect. i just hate it so much. plus, the game has obvious parallels to the civil rights movement (even if david cage says it’s not. it is. even if it wasn’t, this game is political no matter how u view it. the topic of rights and freedom will always be political) and to imply that the android revolution has to be near perfectly peaceful to succeed is crazy. girl does he think the civil rights movement was entirely peaceful?? someone put him and all the other writers in a god damn history class

not to mention markus. i think the writers saw him as like the equivalent to mlk jr, with the parallels to the civil rights movements and such, which is crazy considering they turned him into their Savior and led the whole movement. like. side eye. idk i love markus’s story, but i think the whole revolution and being turned into a savior robo jesus was so so bad and tone deaf (thank u david cage..) . and the whole revolution TOOK PLACE IN A WEEK. A WEEK. THATS INSANEE. A WHOLE REVOLUTION IN A WEEK IS INSANE. i understand that a game needs to end but we don’t need to see Every Single Second of the story!! spread it out over a month, give characters time to form relationships, let the plot thicken, let things get tense, let things simmer and develop!!! not everything needs to happen on screen!!! one of my biggest gripes about the game is its timeline </3

i know i just rambled a bunch but god it annoys me so much. markus’s story was done so wrong for so many reason, and as a queer person who’s largely interested in protests and movements for rights and such, it just makes me so mad how badly and idealistically it was created. it feels like it was written by humans, by OPPRESSORS, dreaming of a utopia where they are still good people. :/ which i suppose it IS in a way — but still u get my point

EDIT: here are some more things i said in the reblog a that i want more ppl to see

i hate how north’s violence and anger is seen as a bad thing. i hate how markus never gets a moment to rest or interact with people outside of conversations that love the plot forward. i hate how jericho just accepts that they’ll die before they’re violent in order to ‘win.’ i hate that ‘winning’ is even a thing in this context. i hate that androids constantly have to be better than humans and not stoop to they’re level. according to these writer, they can’t be angry in the face of their oppression and that SUCKS.

when i played this game with my cousins, we were so desperate to make every pacifist choice in order to raise our public opinion so we could win. we could tell from the first few markus scenes, he wasn’t allowed to be angry or mad or hateful or violent if he wanted to have close to the same respect humans got. and that SUCKED. it made us feel like we were just taking hit after hit after hit and never accomplishing anything.

i love this game and i love markus (he’s probably my fav character) but the way the revolution is handled is awful considering how it’s such a metaphor for oppression and oppressed ppl. it’s not even rlly a metaphor — it’s just direct symbolism. like. androids are oppressed yet the only way they can fight back without getting murdered and ran down is by being entirely peaceful. there should have been a Balance. you should have valences the violence and the peace in order to get a good outcome. not all one way and all the other way. the game also should’ve been longer than a WEEK. bc that’s rlly a huge issue with it.

outside of maybe the kiss with north and returning to carl’s house/grave, markus doesn’t get a single moment to exist without the revolution and the plot. even those two scenes kinda serve the plot. meanwhile, connor gets moments like looking through hank’s desk, breaking into hank’s house, talking with hank on the bridge to develop his character and relationships outside of the plot. markus doesn’t get that (kara kinda does? but instead of being tied to the plot, she’s just tied to kara the whole time, which can be just as bad).

markus’s friendships never felt… real? they largely felt like it was just bc of all the jericho stuff and the revolution. all his friends just served a narrative purpose. north was the violent choices, josh was the peaceful choices, and simon… well i’ll be honest, simon died rlly early in my play through so i barely knew him. but from what i’ve seen, he’s the ‘cowardly’ route. honestly markus and simon’s friendship seems the most realistic since simon is constantly sacrificing himself for markus and such. which is saying something considering north is markus’s love interest (and that came out of NO WHERE)

with markus and north’s romance, it feels so forced. not to say i hate norkus, but it’s so fast and sudden and u can just Tell it’s for plot reason — which is proved by the kiss at the very end of the game. they had no time to get to know each other or form a relationship outside of the android revolution and keeping jericho together and alive. it gives the vibes of ‘in 2 months we’ll realize we were just in a relationship because he felt we had to be, not because we liked each other romantically’ which, i’ll be honest that vibe is awesome, but considering that was Not what the writers were going for, it falls very flat.

all in all i love markus’s story but by good did the writers fuck it up. get me behind the pencil, i’ll do it myself

[kichona-s]

Hereby requesting facial structure rant

ok for those who dont know this is reference to my post where i cry about george's beautiful fucking face at 2am

this is pretty fucking specific and also pretty long so i wont clog your tl with it so its under the cut

OK FOR GEORGE. Personality and everything else aside he has my most favourite face out of the entire grid (sorry guanyu) BECAUSE. LOOK AT HIM. THERE SO MANY NICE ANGLES AND ITS SO NICE AN LONG AND HIS CHEEKBONES??? THE JAW??? his nose also fits his face really nicely ok but the key is to not look at him head-on you need to get the side profiles and the 3/4 views because FUCK. i love so much theres so many points of interest for his face also his chin juts out really strong which looks lowkey kinda funny in some pictures but it really adds to the whole angleley bony face structure he has going on anyway. george my number 1 fav face the only thing im not a big fan of are his ears rip theyre too round for the whole angular coherency BUT THATS FINE IDC

MOVING ON TO MAX VERSTAPPEN (this is not done in a ranking order btw i havent drawn the whole grid so i cant properly rank everyone) ok like im gonna be real with yall. i thought he was fucking ugly as shit when i first got into f1. like i looked at his photo and was like ??? ig he wins a lot lmao OK BUT THEN LIKE A FEW MONTHS AGO I KEPT GETTING MAX STUFF ON MY TIKTOK FYP AND I WAS LIKE. HOLD ON. HIS PERSONALITY KINDA CUTE ASF. ok yea basically i gaslit myself into loving his face (either that or charles possessed me). for max im way too drawn to his lips (@loquarocoeur bro u know this lmfao) and ngl anyone who read the notes in my face breakdown u could probably tell but i love his lips??? so much??? gonna keep it pg here but he should suck on more things other than the twisty redbull can straw things

still on max but i really like how fucking square his face is. its so refreshing to draw. also did you notice that he has a small ass forehead?? bc he does. he looks wrong when i draw his forehead too big its kinda funny (looking at YOU oscar). i also really like his ear shape? it bends pretty low so it looks kinda cute and i try to make sure i draw it properly lmfao. special note to when hes looking down but then his eyes look up and holy smokes it brings out his nose bridge and the eyebrow bone thing SO WELL???!! anyway i want to eat him

for oscar uh. his face is oval? i guess?? after all the oscars ive drawn youd think i have more to say but i dont :( his face is pretty and also sometimes a pain to get right but other than that nothing too much for me to rant about. OK BUT HIS HAIR??? LOVE HIS HAIR I LOVE THE FUCKING SWOOPY THING IT DOES (it also makes my life WAYYY easier bc i can just draw the swoop and most people know its oscar yay for good character design). also everyone is right he does look like a cat. a cat with a massive fucking forehead. also whenever i draw him i remember that hes only three years older than me and its pretty scary ngl! thats hitting a bit too close to home for my taste! hes cute though and ive definitely drawn some banger oscars so one love

NOW FOR LANDO WHOOOOIMABOUTAMAKEANAMEFORMYSELFHERE! ok firstly his face is like a V so i always need to remind myself to bring the sides of his face in more compared to oscar. also did you know his eyes are a bit lopsided? theyre on different parallel lines im telling you go look at the 2023 official driver photos its So Bad i want to cry (that was also my first introduction to him so. i thought he was fucking ugly too). his face is really interesting to draw especially with his eyebrows that fade in and out and are really fucking bushy in the middle LMAO. do i love his face? nah. is it fun to draw? yea pretty fucking fun ESPECIALLY because he somehow suits all the funny shit i wanna put him in like dresses and skirts and bikinis (and also @cx-boxbox is an enabler istg half of the landos ive drawn probably wouldnt exist without her) also his ears look pointy from certain angles and i think thats really cute so i always draw them pointy :))

for charles uh i dont like drawing his hair its a pain. nice face i guess

LASTLY MY ONE AND ONLY!! THE MAN WHO BREAKS ME OUT OF ARTBLOCK REPEATEDLY!!!! ZHOU GUANYU!!!!!!! he's just very cute to me i love his stupid fucking eyebags AND ALSO THE WAY HE SMILES IS ADORABLE I WANNA PASS OUT :(((((( i dont draw his non-chibi version as much bc whenever i do i feel the need to make him Perfect (because hes my fav yknow) so i tend to just. not do it. unless i need to cure my artblock then i draw him so idk hes like my pc reset button. anyway i love zhou and i love looking at pictures of zhou and if he doesnt get a seat next year i will probably cry. also shoutout to sweetcorn the bestest most adorablest cat (wins out jimmy and sassy btw i dont care sweetcorn is the best fight me)

comments questions and arguments are all encouraged i stand firm in my stances (for now at least we'll see again 6 months later)

[ellilyre]

If you had to choose one of OdyDio to canonically die in the Iliad, who would you choose? Odysseus or Diomedes?

What would be/is your favourite Iliad au?

How are you today?

How do you think Diomedes would react to Odysseus getting speared like a chicken kebab in the Iliad?

What do you think Athena would think about OdyDio?

1. Odysseus. (I didn't see you said in the Iliad until I finished writing my monologue TT )

By the time of the Iliad, Dio had a way harsher life. He was at war since he was 14yo, and probably never expected to survive most of the things he has been through. But it does get better, eventually.

Odysseus, however, had (to my knowledge) a pretty chill life until Troy. And it's only once he tries to get home that he really goes through horrible things.

You see, Dio's past is harsh, but Ody's future is even harsher. It's a parallel I like between them. Also I just posted about my HC of Dio being (passive) suicidal, so the fact that he outlived Ody would be very unexpected and interesting.

However if it's during the Iliad, as you actually said, I'd prefer Dio. Atm Ody's story barely started while Dio could be considered to be dead at his apogee.

2. Lately I have been thinking about... CoD x Iliad.... The guys of the Trojan war, they're SAS.... Idk if I'd call that my fav one, but it's definitely something i need to think more about.

I rly like au where Ody comes home to Penelope and Dio, and then they all live happy and together.

3. Great!! The bus ride has been pretty fun so far :3 rn it's 3am, I was half sleeping for the past 2h, and im torn apart between feeling excited and quite energetic and the urge to nap again lol

4. Listen, I am pretty sure Ody does at some point get kebab'ed. I have heard about that but. I genuinely don't remember reading about it (I forget many things I read). As I don't visualise the scene at all its a bit tough for me to answer sry TT (i knew I should've take my Iliad with me... /Hj)

5. She's happy to see her favourite mortals (I like to think she actually has a sweet spot for them both) being close, although sometimes it's a little too close (throw back to one of my last posts lol). Also I hc that (like most gods) she doesn't rly understand/care for the mortals' cultural laws, so she has none of the era's homophobia. It's kinda like you adopt 2 stray cats and one day you see them grooming each other, you're like "yay they get along great :)"

[leahsfiction]

i find word-by-word glosses of classical chinese poetry to be incredibly useful sometimes as a learning aid:[1] to indicate a proper noun,[2] an archaic meaning, a literary device, or linguistic feature not immediately obvious in a poetic translation. also in the case of regulated verse, it's a great visual way to appreciate the technical beauties of parallelism.

however i don't usually write & post them, for a few reasons:

it's extremely easy for them to look like "broken" english -- something i'm sensitive to as a second-gen [diaspora/person of hyphenated experience/etc.]. like i grew up in an area that was like 40% asian and still managed to hear "me love you long time", random gibberish syllables, etc.

that aside. there's a tradition of western readers of classical chinese poetry coming away with all sorts of overgeneralizations about how each character is a world unto itself, etc., etc., how the poet is not present in the poem because they never use the word "I",[3] etc.

also, they look like a "bridge" or intermediate step in the translation process when that is not the case for me.[4] creating a word-by-word gloss is kinda an entire translation process of its own, with different objectives & priorities!

so yeah! my (extremely amateur) translations are trying to be poetic more than scholarly translations, but at the same time i yearn for people to engage with them as translations and talk to me about the process (which i am terminally lazy about writing up). word-level glosses would probably help, but those are my reasons for not writing them.

my fav resources for learning classical chinese poetry as a beginner both make extensive use of individual word glosses: the East Asia Student blog and How to Read Chinese Poetry: A Guided Anthology, ed. Zong-qi Cai 

a lot of times, with brevity being prized in classical chinese, names (and thus entire careers, moral lessons, eidolons) get abbreviated to a single character 

obviously there are lots of instances of ancient poets using the word "I" or referring to themselves in general, but also. just in my limited experience. SO many poems are autobiographical or have a specific voice??? 

i do rely heavily on dictionaries and annotations, but also on my accumulated experience with reading and discussing poetry, my knowledge of the language, my personal tastes/interpretations/goals/mood when it comes to composing a specific translation... you know, things that are less tangible & easy to point to. most of the time i don't know exactly why i've made a specific choice until @/garden-ghoul asks me about it. 

[okkos-ferrum]

Unorganized helluva boss apology tour rant cuz I think I'm going crazy

Disclaimer, cuz I know helluva fans can get defensive: A lot of this is probably my subjective opinion. I'll state my tldr as my actual objective piece of criticism, but otherwise my gripes throughout this could be based on my tastes and expectations. I genuinely don't want to take away anyone's enjoyment of this show nor hate on anyone involved, so if u just want to enjoy helluva, totally skip this :]

I think I'll actually have to give my hot take here and criticize this episode, because everyone has given way too much praise for an episode I think - in the long run - hurts the show

Im not gonna even bother organizing my thoughts I'm just gonna rant, but to start, i think the decision to start the ep right after full moon chronologically wasn't the best move. The full moon episode cliffhanger was an impactful scene and a dramatic way to start the rift between stolas and blitzo. It's where the dam of two-ish seasons finally breaks, where to me, stolas and blitzo have already said everything needed to be said, at least at the emotional maturity they currently are at. Any changes in said conversation about their relationship would require growth from both separately in order to foster a healthy discussion.

So to undercut that tension by IMMIEDTLY having blitzo somehow wiggle his way back into stolas's private property to have both double down on their stance diminishes the weight new moon's finale had. The conversation, while it does add further clarity, feels repetitive and emotionally taxing to watch, because the show has literally zero scenes of either of them reflecting on the previous night. So it's just them starting up the same fight with the same talking points we already know.

Yeah, maybe it is in character for blitzo to demand a conversation after new moon, but it shouldn't have been the path the show took. It should've allowed the story to stew in the feelings brought out in new moon, both in a narrative and meta sense by taking a break from stolatiz.

Cuz honestly I'm a bit drained of it atm. The show sells itself on the premise of blitzo being a "boss" (a hell of a bos-) and him working with imp. But all of s2 has had this obsession with stolatiz ever since the popularity of ozzie's (for good reason that episode was amazing and one of my personal favs still).

Just abt half the eps in s2 carry an emotional weight around the stolitz relationship. (where s1 has stolitz is make out sessions and the occasional threat to their life, s2 takes it up to actual life or death situations and full backstories) . This increased tension and focus draws away from the intial episodic format to become a more serialized (and imo) melodrama abt the status of the stolitz relationship. Rather than concern itself over any of the imp characters and their emotions, helluva has made all of its emotional beats and stakes throughtout the whole season relate to stoltiz in some way (or it's parallel with fizz and Ozzie in ep 7).

To return back to the ep, I also take issue with its writing of verosika. I will admit that this could be subjective, as my partner, who loves verosika and was worried abt her writing going into the ep, enjoyed how the ep integrated her. But idk, I think it is so lame that an ep like full moon, which is marketed to be abt stolitz, is fine wasting its time writing the cherubs for 90% of the episode, while can't bother making verosika a larger character in her own ep.

Like she's a SINGER, but no she's back up for STOLAS'S SONG this ep. And it's not stolas's hasn't had the chance to sing love ballads before, he's got plenty. But no, the host of the party can't even be a duet to stolas, she's gotta be back up. Like it couldve been a way stronger connection between these two if they sang a duet, rather than the show AGAIN prioritizing verbalizing stolas's emotions again.

We get a full flashback to blitzo's relationship with both fizz and stolas, but nothing on his other significant relationship??? Just a line or two of how it went down and that's it??

Side tangent: It gets on my nerves how so many people are realizing now that verosika is not a bad person. Like it's clear from even in her intro ep in s1 ep 3 she's angry rightfully for how blitzo screwed her over. But now that she actually is being nice and forgiving to stolas and blitzo respectively, now she has earned the fandom's respect??? Like the amt of comments of "Oh wow, verosika isn't a villain, she's an anatognist" drives me insane

Like to me, this ep should've stepped away from stolas directly, and focus on blitzo and verosika. Have blitzo go back to ignoring his feelings by jumping back head first into business, now with the asmodeous crystal. Then bump into verosika somehow. However it may happen, verosika and blitzo, either angrily or calmly, reflect on their own past relationship at the end, which might have blitzo making a realization of how he is repeating his past mistakes. Use the episodic format to slowly allow blitzo to mature so the next time he meets stolas, he won't just double down like he did in the beginning of the ep.

I think, personally, the decision to have verosika host the anti blitzo party diminishes her as a character. It chooses to again define her by how blitzo hurt her, rather than touching on the other underdeveloped parts of her character. She has shown to be very petty yes, but to go through all this effort seems too much, since she is a pop star and should have better things to do.

Maybe explore how she, a succubus, who is meant to have primarily sexual relationships, goes abt on her day to day as a celebrity who went to rehab. Or her relationship with maybe knowing barbie. Or the other ways to explore the set ups for her in ep 3. But no, she plays second fiddle to her second focus ep for the stoltiz drama. But yeah sure, let's have full moon be abt the cherubs.

On a final and likely my most pettiest point, this ep made me cringe a lot. I'm sorry, this is very subjective of me, but I need to say it. So much of this ep felt like fanfic. Always hammering in how "he's a prince and you're an imp" kind of deal. Stolas getting overly drunk after taking a swig of one drink to have blitzo handle him being drunk. The million puppy dog eyes by blitzo, like it felt too pitying. The rushed pacing felt like a result of this indulgent kind of writing, where it priotizes creating the cute shipping scenes before thinking about the actual plot and its effect later on. Again, just my taste tho

Alright I think I ranted enough but ...

Tl;dr: Apology tour messes up the pacing and focus of the show by continously centering itself around the stolitz drama rather than allowing time to reflect by themselves

[adobe-outdesign]

Will you review the Maraquan pets? I think Buzz is my favorite based on design, and there are so many really creative/punny ones. Personally, I’ve never liked Wocky.

Maraqua is probably one of Neopets' most distinct lands given that it's, you know, underwater. The idea of making a color that fits with the Atlantis-esq aesthetic just makes logical sense, and the actual designs tend to be pretty cool. I like how there's actual thought put into how [X] Neopet would function if it was adapted to life underwater, with the bubbling pit area vaguely implying it might be a natural mutation (given the amount of "painted" Maraquan pets we see in Maraqua).

Maraquan also didn't do too badly with customization, mostly because they're not compatible with normal clothing anyway so the poses are at least somewhat distinct. That said, it is weird that they changed the poses at all; they already have to have clothing drawn specifically for them, so why force things like fists onto some of them? It's so weird.

Even weirder is the seemingly arbitrary decisions regarding which ones got UC versions; Maraquan Chombys barely changed at all yet somehow got a UC, while Maraquan Zafaras changed drastically but never got a UC. What gives?

(I can't count it on the favorites list because there are too many good still-obtainable Maraquan pets, but shoutout to the unconverted Maraquan Zafara for being one of my favorite Maraquan pets. Shame it's no more.)

Favorite Species:

Gelert: While the unconverted Maraquan Zafara is my all-time favorite Maraquan pet, the Maraquan Gelert is a very close second, and is definitely my fav if we're talking pets that are still obtainable. I love Maraquan pets where the design is just abstract, taking cues from various sea creatures without being a 1:1 parallel of them, and the Gelert is particularly beautiful in this respect. It plays with the Gelert's long ears and tails by making it vaguely eel-ish—adding in a back fin, a few spots, and a lovely green and purple color scheme.

The UC version is particularly gorgeous, having this lovely flow that curves back from the head and leads straight into the curled tail. The converted version is still fine, as it's a fairly accurate recreation all things considered, but the pose is much more awkward (the body suggests an S shape, but the paws and ears are going opposite directions and the chest sticks out too much).

It does, however, at least fix the shading; for some reason the UC Maraquan Gelert has one layer of shading with no highlights or shadows to speak of, which is really weird. (See the above, which is an edit I made years ago that just adds the layers of shading that the actual UC is missing. The lineart should also probably be thinner but I digress.) Anyway, the point is that both are beautiful designs.

Uni: Maraquan Uni are also really beautiful. Similar to a Peophin (arguably too much so, but hey, there's no Maraquan Peophin at the time of writing anyway), they've swapped their legs for a tail and their wings and mane have become fins themselves, with a pretty curved horn and some subtle striping to boot. Even better, the converted version is basically the same as the old art, so there's no difficulty in obtaining one (other than the PB cost, of course).

Lutari: While there are still a lot of great abstract Maraquan designs that I love (Eyrie, Draik, etc.), I have to give a shoutout to the Lutari for being a really great design based off of an obvious animal (in this case, an axolotl). The cream and pink color scheme is lovely, and I love the subtle mottle gradients on its limbs. The multiple sets of ears forming the gills is fantastic, the tail is pretty, the black claws add contrast, and it still reads really clearly as a Lutari despite the animal influence. Really good stuff.

Least Favorite Species:

Kacheek: The Maraquan Kacheek just looks incredibly uncanny to me. The best Maraquan pets are either ambiguous or choose an animal that fits the Neopet, but here they just... took a Kacheek head and slapped it on a goldfish body??? Don't like that at all. The head in isolation isn't terrible and I could see it working on a more Kacheek-ish torso, but this... no. At least it's nicely drawn on a technical level, I suppose?