#just let me see those fucked up little characters without a load of aesthetic posts clogging up the tag

[eggmeralda]

the secret history literally rewired my brain but my god going through the tag is so annoying LIKE. THE SPAM

[who-talks-first]

Okay I'm having trouble finding everyone's posts from Friday. But I just watched chapter 9 and I have some thoughts.

Opening the episode with Din saying he doesn't gamble then ending it with him making a massive gamble was interesting. Although I genuinely don't think he ever does anything he doesn't believe he can do.

The fights in this episode are amazing. Just stunning:

The fight at the arena. The Child ducking when he sees the Birds activate. "I'm not." Really. Din, stop being so goddamn fucking hot, I'm trying to watch the damn show! The whole dangling the gangster part. "You won't die by my hand." (one of the best parts of the character Din Djarin is he is both viciously ruthless and honorable to a fault. I love it!)

The fighting at the end. Both men flying in sync to kill the beast. The Raiders and townsfolk grudgingly working together. But it would have worked better just leaving the loaded bantha in the valley, luring the best out, and detonating it. Fewer civilian deaths but what do I know, I wasn't raised in the fighting corps. And god at the end when Din soars out of the monster's mouth! I that was how the episode would end as soon as I saw the explosives. But still so fucking cool! Is there a name for that trope? I call it the Hercules.

Can we talk for a second about how Din looks in this ep? The strides, the poses and posture. He exudes so much bde that it physically hurts me. Clearly a lot of that is Mandalorian in nature, if those images of Boba Fett from the comics tell us anything (Fett sitting spread in his ship and Din doing it on the wagon at Sorgan have p much the same energy). Just looking fine as hell through the whole thing, even covered in deadly dragon stomach acid.

And can we talk about how much he says this episode? He explains the Tuskens' behavior, translates, plans, barters, smooches doggies, etc. He talks a lot. And I think that's interesting. Din has this reputation as being awkward in social situations and quiet. And like, it's one thing feeling shy around the beautiful widow who's hitting on you. But he says what he means clearly and more or less concisely, including some one-liners and sarcasm. I think he could be described as "laconic" (my character does describe him as such in the thing I'm writing), which means they use as few words as possible to get their point across. Din has no hesitation in speaking, he just prefers to only speak when he has something to say, if that makes sense.

So happy to see Aunt Peli! And Din being like "eh let them work" That's what we call growth.

The casting. I nearly lost my shit when Timothy Olyphant was under the helmet, looking like a whole ass meal. Like that is the most flattering haircut and beard combo I've ever seen on him. Don't @me but he could get it. And poor typecast Leguizamo. Still great tho. He was fun little asshole.

I love when this show doubles down on the western themes:

Vanth's name, accent, role, and general appearance all line up with a small town wild west sheriff. Just showing up and saving the town, so they're like, you're the Lone Ranger now! Olyphant has played western roles before, including voicing The Spirit of the West (an avatar of the legends and ideals of the wild west modeled on Clint Eastwood's western characters) in the animated film Rango (a lot of the Mandalorian's aesthetic comes from Eastwood's movies).

The Mandalorian theme but softly strummed on a Spanish (nylon string) guitar is very evocative of a border town.

The tuskens represent an Indian tribe. The abandoned mining town. The mysterious stranger who comes to town and saves it. Vanth and Din nearly have a quickdraw shootout! The child is hiding in a spittoon for chrissakes!

It really echoes the 7 Samurai theme of chapter 4. I know it's an overlapping, repeating theme in western film. I guess I was surprised to see it again so quickly.

I don't know how I feel about Din speaking Tusken. Signing was one thing. But I just giggled uncomfortably the whole time feeling it was kinda silly (and I had assumed the reason he signed was because humans couldn't speak Tusken). Was that our big hero, heartthrob, and favorite actor Mr. Pascal sitting in the studio making those noises? Rrrhehh rheh rrhehh! I dunno I'm just. Reeling.

Isn't interesting that Din would annihilate the entire populace of Jawas without batting an eye, but he would do almost anything to protect the Sand People? I know there's something to that, about marginalized/eugenicized groups versus like colonialism and whatever vulture like construct you would attribute to the Jawas. But I'm not smart enough to articulate it.

Okay, so the obvious: Boba Fett. Really shocked to see his armor on someone else. I'd already seen the casting of Morrison, so I wasn't like, "is he dead?" and I knew right away this hick didn't take it off him. I wonder if the Jawas stunned him and removed it. Either way, there's going to be hell to pay. I can't wait to see Din and Boba interact; I wonder how they'll respond to each other. And even though Fett should be in his early 40s (I think) he really looks like hell. I mean, I know he's seen some shit. But I wonder what's been up with him in the last decade or so.

Some stuff I thought I noticed, but I need y'all to help me confirm:

Was that Anakin's podracer engine?

Was that C-3PO graffitied on the wall in the dirty city?

Were we supposed to recognize R5?

There's a couple others but I forgot em. I gotta watch it again.

Some questions:

What was the spherical thing the Tusken Raiders recovered from the beast's remains? The scene mirrored the Jawas and the mudhorn's TSUGA! Tsuga tsuga! Tsuuuga! But that didn't look like an egg. If I didn't know better I would swear it was a pearl. (which almost makes sense if you take into account that this guy eats dirt for a living and could have an organ or extra stomach in there like those gross hard balls they used to pull out of ox bellies) Or was it mentioned earlier and I didn't catch it? There was a lot going on.

What are the sand doggies? They're so cute! And that totally establishes our mans as a dog person. Writers, start your fics!

I'm a bit confused about the town's history. How have the people survived for so long with the beast there? Was it the Krayt dragon that wiped it literally off the map? How does the slaving mining guild fit in there?

It really looks in chapter 4 that those krill are native (it's not explicitly stated tho). If no one even knows where Sorgan is and it doesn't have a big export economy, how do these people in the middle of buttfuck nowhere have spotchka?

On that note, how did that city gangster hear about Fett/Vanth? I mean, I dig that he's a collector of beskar'gam, but like, that's still way out there.

The jingling spurs sound in chapter 5 is deliberately obvious when that mysterious figure comes upon Fennec Shand. Can we assume that's Cobb Vanth there? Because clearly, Fett has been without his armor for a while. If it was Vanth, what did he do with her? I don't believe for a second that she's dead. He's not a bounty hunter and he wouldn't have any idea she was valuable since the Guild had abandoned Tatooine. Barter for help/transportation /goods/labor /etc? Also, if it was Vanth, did he witness the whole thing? If so, he knows who Din is. Maybe knows Toro. I dunno. Lots of thoughts. Did he just stumble upon her while traveling back to his village? I forgot the name already lol Mos Pelegrino?

Okay it's nearly 4 am. I genuinely can't remember if I had anything else to say. Please continue to tag your spoilers cuz I will again not get to view the episode until after y'all do next week. But until then, please come yell at me about our favorite show and space boyfriend. I like crazy theories too.

Love y'all. 😘😘😘

[vaguely-concerned]

The Mandalorian Chapter 11; the rewatch edition

I have found a bit more enthusiasm for this one on the rewatch, so here goes!

- din snapping ‘I’m trying my best here!’ in a vaguely annoyed tone as his entire ship is going up in flames around him because he mostly doesn’t get angry as much as sulky... the height of cinema 

- I love frog husband’s clothes, because they’re in a very similar style and colour scheme to frog lady’s but also incorporate the knitwear we see on the people of trask, so it both underlines his belonging with her and implies that he’s been on this moon for quite a while, they may have been apart for some time  

especially his scarf is a darling detail and there’s a bit of contrast in texture to it next to his wife’s, it’s nice. he’s wearing a similar kind of vest to what we see on the fishermen later, too 

- I think my favourite part of this entire episode (well second after din cradling the baby against him after nearly drowning) is just the design and Vibe of the planet and especially this harbour

for one I LOVE that it’s shown that even in the middle of the day it’s dark enough that the electric lights are still on when it’s overcast (it reminds me a bit of norway during the winter, actually, when dawn just never quite breaks and then slinks off in embarrassment before it’s even noon). and there’s also the... sails? nets? hanging around looking almost like flags, which are very Aesthetic but god knows what they’re for. maybe for drying fish on in the summer? 

I think the building in the distance behind frog husband’s back here is a lighthouse? or it could be one of those towers for loading you see when they scout out the empire ship too, I suppose!

and one for my strange obsession with Texture on this show: these fabric-covered crates!!! they look exactly as dingy and moldy as you’d expect them to be in this climate, I wonder what they’re for (& I vaguely want to touch them) 

- from the sound of it din’s vibroknife is uh ‘on’ when he pokes the squid thing, and he also goes for the tentacle the furthest away from the baby <3

proof the calamari flan have been scratched up a bit during all that time in din’s pockets! (the attention to detail in this show sometimes istg) 

- this is 100% me reading too much into things again, call the overthinking police I’ll do my time meekly lol, but the boat looks a little bit like the mudhorn signet from this angle: 

again din keeps his hand on or sooo close to his blaster in this entire scene, he knows this is sketch as all hell 

a) once again I want to praise the effects team for how GOOD the aliens look in this episode holy shit and b) the hell is this dude wearing on the straps of his overalls tho 

- the dude mando (axe woves) uses his little... wrist launcher thing to shoot with to finish two off the fishermen, so my theory that they can be loaded with other things than the whistling birds for slightly less effective use (maybe without the level of honing we’ve seen din’s be able to do?) is looking good!

- din actually has quite good form when diving into the water, I’m guessing he can swim at least tolerably when not in full armour, being stabbed at from all directions, having just had his son eaten by a sea monster and also being trapped in with said sea monster (I’m a strong swimmer and I can tell you that there’s a reason they make you swim with clothes on from time to time to see how hard it is, it sucks. with metal plates strapped all over you as well? yeah good luck) people don’t tend to hit the water that gracefully without some kind of training in my experience lol. might be some of the training with the jet pack has carried over too, considering he throws himself off that cliff in chapter 12 with similar confidence?

it’s interesting that they’re once again showing us a threat where the armour doesn’t help and even hinders him. we’re so used to the ways it can make him near-invincible, but it can also drag him down (literally, in this case. aha ha ha. well if I’m not here for my own entertainment then what am I here for honestly)

- din’s voice sounding like he’s just on the verge of crying as he cradles the baby (and the sound he makes as he realizes the baby’s alive) is my kryptonite, turns out. fucking breaks my heart into tiny pieces every time, I would die for this man and he wouldn’t let me

- in support of din’s paranoia: so far this season we haven’t been able to go five minutes without someone talking about peeling the precious beskar off a mandalorian corpse, I can see why his mind was primed to move in one particular way there

- I think the fabric of din’s cape has been treated with something that makes it waterproof; the water seems to pearl on top of it rather than soak in! can you imagine how heavy it would get if it did absorb water tho christ

(a bit hard to see at this size but that’s what it looked like to me close up anyway! could also be that it’s wool and that’s why it looks that way but I prefer an elaborate sci-fi explanation here, because it doesn’t look particularly weighed down afterwards) might also explain why he doesn’t seem worried about it catching on fire when he uses the jetpack haha, maybe this is something the mandos do with fabric they’re going to use for a long time 

I also enjoy part of the gambeson/undersuit thing poking up from under the shoulder pauldron and cape; I think this is about as disheveled as we’ve seen him since immediately post-mudhorn 

- the sound mixing in this scene, where din’s breathing is layered a bit over everything else so you almost feel like you’re in the helmet with him listening to what the others are saying........ oh my GOD, it embeds you so deeply in his POV but so subtly 

- not to be biased or anything... but din and the armorer’s armour design is so vastly superior to these guys it shouldn’t even be a competition lol 

din looks like an honest to god knight in shining armour except also sci-fi western and the armorer looks like a fucking war goddess from a time beyond memory; the clone wars mandos look like high end cosplayers (eh maybe it’s just my dislike for the boobplates that has me so 😒 lol. also a lot of dudes were very shitty about that whole thing and I don’t say anything but the ‘vaguely-concerned will remember this’ telltale message pops up in the corner every time) 

moment of saltiness over: I do like the differentiation between their individual character designs 

the differences in body type and helmet design is nice! they look like a unified team, but with individuality. I suspect the ladies have those belts and their armour plates on the hips instead of the front of the thighs to emphasize the ‘female’ silhouette, which. okay fine whatever

- bo katan looks very pointedly down at the baby after saying ‘a group of religious zealots who want to return to the ancient ways’ which makes me VERY nervous for reasons I can’t quite articulate

- the mournful guitar version of the mando theme as din watches the sunset...... hmmmmngh (this might be some Symbolism happening to us folks strap in for the identity crisis he still hasn’t processed) 

- I Cannot get over din being so unimpressed by and uninterested in bo katan’s ‘retake mandalore’ sales pitch from literally the first moment dfhasdkjfhsad sorry lady kryze this man just does not do main quest shit, he’s all side quests all the time and that’s why I love him  

- as someone who after chapter 8 wrote a whole-ass fic that was wholly & exclusively about din telling the baby he’ll always come back for him... some of the shit he’s been saying this season does feel like it’s been written to mercilessly victimize me, personally and specifically 

- guessing this structure in the background is the traffic control tower! doesn’t really matter, I just thought it was neat

- this part of the soundtrack is called ‘ship o hoj, mandalorians!’, which I found incredibly charming haha (it’s ‘ship ahoy’ except how you write it in swedish, good one herr göranson)  

- bo katan is vague about who exactly the new mand’alor would be if they took back mandalore to begin with, she doesn’t specify she is planning to be the ruler until she’s already got din on the ship and in no position to refuse to help. gotta respect the grift at least lol  

I do love her voice, though, it reminds me a bit of jennifer hale as shepard

- “I need to get back to my ship, with the foundling” your honor I uh love him so fucking much 

- frog lady stroking the baby’s back a bit as she holds her hand behind him to make sure he doesn’t fall backwards while playing with the tadpole ;___________;

and also frog husband and frog lady reaching out to hold hands and frog smooching as din and yodito leave ;____________________________________________;

- when din says the exasperated “mon calamari. unbelievable” line, the baby makes that little blowing a raspberry sound he does as if to agree ‘uh-huh unbelu -- unbelly -- unbelievable dad smh’ and it is very very adorable 

- there’s quite a bit of Stuff in the concept art that didn’t make it in this time around; I wonder if maybe they cut some stuff for pacing or whatever and that’s why this episode is so short? water leaking into the cockpit of the razor crest, something that looked a bit like whaling going on on the docks and more spaceships taking off (maybe there were originally meant to be some smaller ships defending the big empire one?), there’s quite a bit here  

[peeterparkr]

limits of desire⤳t.h.

chapter one: set the date.

MADE OF HONOR|AU

So, after that photoshoot, I decided to get back on my shit. I’m re-uploading it, editing it and changing a few things. Yes, I’ve posted this fic before but I feel like I’ve grown as a writer and it’s a fic with so much more potential. 

summary: Tom has a new life and he bumps into y/n who definitely isn’t into him. 

pairing: fuckboy!tom holland x reader

warnings: alcohol mention, swearing

word count: 4k

btw I’m afraid I’ll disappoint so tell me what you think

teaser

next chapter

series masterlist

October 2016.

October is the best time of the year for some people, particularly for students who’re on the verge of trying not to collapse. Cold weather, but not too cold, orange leaves on the floor accentuating the aesthetic we’re all thriving to have, outfits that include the best fashion possible, the basic but seasonal favourite pumpkin lattes, excuses to drink tea just by the window, watching horror movies and blaming them for not being able to sleep.

Halloween was just around the corner, two days away to be exact.  Sadly, exams were also around the corner. However, that particular combination gave the perfect excuse to the students of every university in London to get drunk to forget all their troubles while being dressed as completely different strangers, meaning it gave them the amazing opportunity to throw parties all around just to hook up with equally drunk beings. 

And it gave Tom the perfect excuse to play his favourite new game, too. Tom Holland, of course, was not going to waste the opportunity on dressing up as his new favourite women-magnet, his Spider-Man costume and his oh-so-charming smile. Him and Harrison were enjoying themselves at one of the parties that were thrown around town, the third party of the week, to be more exact. Thanks, Andrew Jacobs who had been kind enough to invite them. The parties from university students had been the best for Tom, whose popularity had increased after appearing on Civil War, and of course, after being cast as Spider-Man. He’d use that popularity to his advantage, and of course, he had been really busy each night. A new girl each night. 

He wasn’t always like that but the moment he saw that many girls were dying to be with him, he decided he simply liked that. It had started on a party with several girls gushing up to meet him, and after having a no so nice breakup, a rebound had been nice. But suddenly that rebound turned into more rebounds and so his life as a new casanova started. Being wanted was something nice, and he was definitely liking it so far. He came up with a rule, never the same girl twice in a week, and nothing more than a one night stand. The rule was simple, and he could easily follow it because, oh they were raining. Tom couldn’t complain, as if he would.

He had had a little too many shots that night, and after making out with a chick dressed as a character from Stranger Things, he decided it was time to gather on the first girl he had bumped into, two days before in yet another Halloween party. He knew he would score with her easily after he told her he had to go back to shoot Spider-Man homecoming. Her face had lit up and her room number had been written on a napkin, which Tom had saved for his own convenience, and he knew that night was the night, he was just across the room where she lived, so he might as well give it a try. So he just needed to look out for her, he expected her to be already in her room, waiting for him. She had told him she’d be dressed as a sexy nurse, and hell he would not pass up that opportunity.

He was going to go to the dorms to meet up with her,  they were just across the street, so as he walked out of the party there were many students on the street dressed up for Halloween, some of them were just laughing and spilling their drinks, most of them were making out. Tom laughed, amused at the situation, seeing that he had actually already gotten some of those girls numbers. He giggled to himself as he stared at the paper where the blurred writing was placed on. He walked in confidently to the dorms humming a song to himself as he kept looking for the room.

“246….246…And here it is,” he smirked as he reached for the key Rachel, the sexy nurse had given to him, he opened the bedroom door, the lights were off, and a girl was sitting on the desk, with headphones on, and head laying down on her book.

“Hello, hello, Rachel, Rachel?” He whispered as he smirked. He walked over and he reached her to kiss her neck, with his Spider-Man mask covering half his face  “Hey, hey, I’m here, baby,” he said in between kisses. 

She suddenly moved as she woke up turning her sight to him, she started to scream the moment she looked at him, he screamed back at her. 

“Bloody hell! Who are you? What the hell is going on?” She yelled. At that moment, Tom realized he had fucked up. The girl wasn’t Rachel. 

She grabbed the book on her desk and slammed it against Tom’s face, and then she reached over to her night table which had a bottle of perfume on it. She started spraying it at his face, spraying it entirely on his mouth, causing Tom to scream even more and stumble back to fall on her bed. He coughed from the perfume. 

“Ouch! My nose, my mouth! fu-” Tom yelled as he covered his face. “I can’t -blagh, ugh my-” he coughed. “Ugh.”

Her screaming didn’t cease. He took off the mask, as he looked at her, trying to cover himself. He stood back up and motioned her to calm down. She kept screaming. 

“You’re not-you’re not Rachel!” Tom yelled.

“Of course not! She’s my roommate!” The girl yelled at him. “How did you even get here?”

“She gave me the key!” Tom answered as he reached for his nose, and then lifted the key up to show her. 

“So that automatically made you think you can kiss her roommate’s neck?” 

“She said you wouldn’t be here! She said you’d probably be studying somewhere in the library because you’re a nerd!”

“I’m not a nerd!” The girl grabbed the pillow and threw it at Tom angrily.

“What the heck? What was that?” Tom asked, and she glanced over at the pillow and frowned. “No, the other..the gosh, my nose! What’s that taste?”

“One hundred years of solitude by Gabriel García Márquez,” the girl answered. “And… Chanel n°5”

Tom covered his nose as he stared at her, and finally, let out a chuckle.

-

4 minutes later, he had his head held back in the common room, where there were some students drinking coffee, or some others were studying, she made him tilt his head forward. “Are-are you sure this-”

“Shut-” She made him pinch his nostrils together to stop the bleeding.

“Ugh, next time I’ll see who I’m getting in bed with,” he said.

“And that would be so hard, wouldn’t it?” she rolled her eyes as she stood up and poured herself some coffee and then handed him a glass of water.

“Should be more careful, yes,” Tom conceited. “So, what’s your name, sweetheart?”

“Please,” she rolled her eyes at him, sitting back down beside him. “Don’t even try it.”

“What?” Tom faked innocence. “What could I possibly be trying?” He chuckled as he gave her an ironic smile, pressing the ice against his nose.

“Yeah, I know all about you, Tom Holland.” She crossed her arms watching him.

“You do, now?” Tom smirked, as he stopped pressing his nostrils. “Wikipedia doesn’t say all the truth, you know?” 

“Don’t, you’ll start bleeding,” she ordered and placed his hand back on his nose. “But I do, I know everything about you, I know exactly who you are.”

“You’re a fan?” He asked as he slid closer to her, making her roll her eyes.

“You’ve slept with half my floor,” she sentenced. 

“Well, could’ve slept with more, but you don’t seem interested and well, your roommate wasn’t where she was supposed to be,” Tom chuckled.

“Whatever,” she rolled her eyes. “Rachel did tell me about you, and how excited she was Spider-Man was coming to the party, which honestly, I don’t see the deal with it.”

“Ah, but I am Spider-Man, and who wouldn’t want to be with Spider-Man?” He raised an eyebrow. “Shit, your book did hurt me.”

“Great, that’ll teach you on not kissing random girls without their consent..”

“Hey, hey, you can’t blame me,” Tom teased with a laugh. “Your roommate, she was dressed as a nurse today, and well… you’re not, I mean she was …she was showing way more skin than you.”

“I’m a decent girl,” she nudged him.

“A very feisty one,” Tom giggled. “So, now, please, you say you know me.”

“Yeah, you’re an actor who suddenly got his career launched and now, obviously uses that to sleep with women, but in reality, you’re actually pretty lonely and you’re using your fame to get back for all those years when you were rejected. You’re overwhelmed by all the attention.”

Tom stared at her, she could’ve left by now, yet she hadn’t. “Uh…huh, yeah that ain’t me,” Tom rolled his eyes but then gave her a small innocent smile. “I’m a nice boy.”

“Of course you are,” she threw her head back. “You’re the worst type of players, you’re one of them” she laughed at his confused expression. “You’re the kind who actually falls in love, don’t you?”

Tom bit his lip with a smirk, she did have him all figured out. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“You play the nice boy who falls in love, and gives off that prince charming vibe, and then in the morning you leave, saying you won’t be able to have your heart broken by them, and making them feel guilty as if they had used you instead of them.”

“I do get my heartbroken,” he defended himself.

“All of this is new right? All the attention, and you can’t get enough, bet you were the skinny weird kid.”

“Getting too personal, are we?” Tom frowned.

“I’ve got my loads of guys like you.” She shrugged. “Know all your games.”

“Really? With actors?” Tom laughed in disbelief.

The girl stared at him as she shook her head. “No, but with kids who suddenly got shredded, and suddenly found out they were attractive.”

“Am I attractive?” Tom blinked bashfully at her. She turned herself completely to him, as she watched him curiously as she sipped her coffee, taking in his features.

“Not really my type, no,” She snickered.

“Yet you’ve said you’ve had a load of guys like me,” he gave her the cockiest of smirks.

“None of them were Tom Holland,” she winked at him.

“Exactly, none of them were Spider-Man,” Tom pointed out as he winked at her.

“Hm, guess not,” she chuckled. “I’ll try to get your game, you probably first play the shy guy, probably, no, it depends on the girl, you’re an actor so you see what works with each girl, but bet you tell all of them that you’ve met RDJ,” she watched him carefully, as he ran a hand through his hair. “Ah you do that with the hair, and then give, there you are! The puppy eyes,” she smiled pleased with herself, as Tom’s eyes widened. “You lick your lips and always raise your arms to show out your muscles, huh?”

Tom felt naked with her, she knew what he was doing. “I mean,” Tom puffed his chest. “All guys… do that.”

“Could be, but okay, you probably talk about your time on set, and how you are so excited to be playing such an iconic role that Spider-Man is.”

Tom blinked as she kept talking, she was pulling her hair back in a ponytail, and she had her eyes lightly covered by dark circles, probably from all the late-night studying. He felt like such an idiot as he was getting his imagination go wild. 

“Hm, it is an iconic role,” he defended himself, coughing, as he ignored his cheeks going red.

“Yeah, gotta give that to you, I’m a Marvel fan, so yeah, you did a good job so far, I mean we’ve only seen you in Civil War and I guess that was decent,” she shrugged, trying to sound as careless as she could. “But, we are not talking about that.”

Tom felt his confidence back on track: if she was a marvel fan he could easily use that in his favour. She was definitely a girl he would love to score with, maybe it was a tough task, but he was determined. It was interesting, he knew that with this girl his usual flirting style wouldn’t work. Yeah, she wouldn’t fall for the nice boy vibe so maybe the whole douchebag style could work on her. Or maybe not. He could play the guy who doesn’t actually want anything with her and then make her beg. 

But it couldn’t work either.

“So, you like Marvel?” He asked her. 

“I love marvel,” she admitted. 

“Who’s your favourite superhero?” He pushed. 

She didn’t answer and turned away to drink her coffee, cheeks getting red. 

“Noooo!” Tom couldn’t believe it. “is it Spider-Man?” He laughed as she rolled her eyes.

“But I’ve liked him since younger,” she defended herself. “Look, Peter Parker is such a great character because he’s a smart broke boy from Queens, he is so real and Spider-Man, you never know who could be under the mask, and he just tries his best! He is so pure, and he just wants to save people because he is a good person, you know? No one rewards him, he just truly wants to help…And I’m so, wow… I love him. ”

Tom nodded in agreement, as he bit his lip giggling. She turned to him and nudged him.

“Woah, no, I meant the character,” she rolled her eyes. “Don’t get your hopes up.”

“C’mon, wouldn’t someone like you be interested to hook up with Spider-Man?” Tom asked again. “It’s a once in a lifetime opportunity. You could write about that.” 

She laughed as she shook her head. “You’ve got to be kidding me,” she stared at him. “You’re actually hitting on me? After all I’ve said to you?”

“No, I’m not,” Tom smirked as he watched her. “You see I’ve got you all figured out as well.”

“Oh,” she scoffed. “Do tell me, please.” 

“You’re a future writer, you’re studying literature or something, right? Top of your class, are we?” Tom inquired. “I bet you’ve read hundreds of books and you like writing poems in your free time.”

She bit her lip as she looked away. Tom snapped his fingers.

“Bingo!” Tom cheered. “You’re the typical girl who is different than any other girl, who brings all that bullshit of not caring and always has this sense of being mysterious and that’s why she judges other girls for being at parties.”

She shook her head as she stuck her tongue out. “Wrong. I’m a feminist, I wanna be a journalist or a writer, I don’t judge other people, I believe that we’re all allowed to party, I’m not a mystery, I’m an open book, I do care, a lot, about a lot of things I just happen not to care about you, and I’m not at a party tonight because I have a big exam coming tomorrow, in fact, I should be studying right now.” 

“You were a prodigy child, weren’t you?” Tom concluded.

“I wouldn’t say-“

“You were, you probably were part of the school newspaper,” Tom interrupted her and chuckled. “But hey, you’ve got class, you’re a refined girl. You basically are the reincarnation of elegance.”

“Refined, elegance, huh?” The girl giggled, taking a chance to stare into his eyes, only for him to notice hers. They were really pretty. In every possible way she was beautiful, but she was smart and that made her way out of his league. Maybe if he tried to play the guy who wasn’t understood.

“Yes, I mean, you did spray me with Channel NO°5,” he laughed.

“It’s pronounced Chanel,” she corrected him, making him feel a fire igniting. He gave her a corny smile.

“So you’re smart, elegant, you like superheroes and on top of that,…you’re pretty? You’re the whole deal,” Tom admitted, she shrugged as she blushed. And he almost had her wrapped around his finger, even if she kept giving him the cold look, he could be sure that she was into him. “What’s your flaw? That’s it! you’re boring!”

And he screwed it up.

“Excuse me?” The girl frowned offended, as she stood up. He realized it then, she was actually making it hard for him, she was giving him a chance to try. And he had blown it up. “Goodnight, Holland, good luck with that nose.”

“No, wait, I’m joking! I’m joking,” Tom called out for her and pulled her back from her arm, receiving a stern look from her. “I was kidding you don’t seem like the boring type.”

“I’m not,” she agreed. “I actually have an amazing sense of humour.”

“Ah, do you now?” Tom laughed. “Okay, let me start over.”

“Honestly, I have to sleep or read,” she said, and Tom chuckled.

“Really? And why haven’t you left already?” Tom inquired as he slid closer and trying to lean against her, but she stood up walked over to the other couch. Tom fell flat on the sofa as he scowled.

“Oh, I assumed you were going to look out for my roommate and I really don’t want to be near my room when that happens, so please just stay on her side of the room and don’t touch any of my stuff,” she warned him.

“Ah, I won’t sleep with her,” Tom answered.

“You won’t?” The girl rolled her eyes, and she picked up her book. “Well, your problem.”

“I wanna stay here and talk to you,” Tom declared as he stood up to look out for food in the room, he was sobering up and he had become extremely hungry. He realized there was a box of cookies so he plopped back on the couch, throwing them into his mouth.

“Told you it won’t work with me,” she said as she had her eyes glued on her book.

“I know that,” Tom walked over and sat on the armrest of the couch. “You haven’t got the look.”

The girl frowned as she looked up at him, closing her book. “The look?”

“Uh-huh, the doggy bowl look,” Tom took her by the chin and she slapped his hand off, making Tom giggle.

“Did you just call me a dog?”

“It’s a theory.”

“Do all fuckboys have theories?” The girl rolled her eyes as she changed back to the original sofa, Tom followed her.

“We do, we go to a course, just like all of you different girls go to that class where they tell you how to destroy a man’s feelings.”

“Oh, I graduated with honours from that class,” she smirked playfully.

“So you do have a sense of humour,” Tom laughed. “Well m’lady that course is paying off.”

“Glad it did,” she poked him. “So what’s that theory?”

“You see when a girl actually likes a guy, she has a look. It’s her tell, like…. poker!”

“Poker.”

“Yeah, and it’s exactly the same face a dog makes when you put down the bowl!”

“You’re disgusting,” she told him. Some other girls had walked into the common room and started whispering to each other, as they giggled while watching Tom, he winked at them causing them to blush and snicker.

“See? See that look?” Tom pointed when they left. “You don’t have the look.”

“You’re crazy,” she roared standing up, picking her book.

Tom chuckled watching her, “I’m honest, I like honesty, I think it’s the best quality.”

She started to walk away but stopped to turn around and glare at him.

“Oh, so you want me to be honest with you?” She crossed her arms with her book in her hands.

“Go on,” he smirked. “Destroy me, why can’t I physically  appeal to you?”

“Your nose is bent,” she pointed to her own nose, and wrinkled it. “it drops down at the bottom, a feature accentuated by the thinness of your lips, you have tiny eyes and they are way too far apart, your eyebrows look weird, and your hair… huh, your hair ain’t that bad but it won’t cover your bent nose,” she poked his nose. “And you are so desperate for attention from being so lonely that you validate yourself by having sport like meaningless, insatiable sex with insecure girls like Rachel who only want to be with you so they can say they slept with a celebrity,” she started to walk away. “and you’re right, I don’t have the look, I’d never have sex with someone like you.”

She walked away from the common room and Tom grinned following her.

“Wow!” He said with excitement as he ran after. “That was amazing!”

“What?” She scowled.

“The honesty, the feisty being it was even better than the sex without uh, the crying you know?”

“Huh, funny it did feel pretty good,” she chuckled as she turned confused to the boy who actually seemed pleased with himself.

“It was incredible,” Tom agreed. “No one’s ever been that honest with me.”

“That’s what friends are for,” she winked at him.

“So you know my name, what’s yours?” He asked her.

“Y/N, Y/N Y/L/N,” she chuckled as they arrived at her dorm.

“Ya know,” Tom looked at her. “Give me your number.” Y/N stared at him with a frown. “I won’t try anything I genuinely want to be friends with you.”

“I just destroyed you as a person,” y/n scoffed.

“Sounds like an ideal friend,” he grinned as he handed his phone over. She hesitated but ended up giving it to him, he tried to steal her phone from her hands. “Now I’ll give you mine so you know who’s texting.”

She unlocked it and she gave it to him, he added himself and took a silly selfie to add it to his contact.

“Goodnight,” y/n said, as he reached up for her chin, making her look at up. “Your hand is clammy.”

“I can see through your blouse,” he snapped with arrogance.

“I’m wearing a hoodie, so no, you can’t,” she informed him.

“I hate you,” he joked, she ended up laughing before opening her bedroom door, to reveal a very drunk Rachel, laying down on her bed.

“He-eeey Tom!” she sat up the moment she heard the door open, her voice sounded particularly dizzy. “Can you…” her talking was dragged. “Can you like… show me your set pictures with Chris Evans… and hic, R… D…J?”

Y/N sighed as she patted him on the back. “All yours, Parker.” Y/N left with a smirk.

Tom blinked watching the woman, whose cleavage was showing a bit more than desired. “Tommy?”

Tom watched the girl puke on a nearby trash can and Tom wrinkled his nose. “Get some sleep, Rachel.” He closed the door before running after Y/N. “Hey, where you heading to?”

Y/N frowned as she watched him. “I am a nerd, so I’m heading to the campus library to read.”

“Huh, but aren’t you hungry? It’s on me.” Tom looked at her as she watched him with hesitation. “Not as a date.”

“Well, what in this world is open at 4 am?” She laughed.“But yeah, haven’t eaten anything since the morning. Whatcha have in mind, Spidey?”

“I know this milkshake place.”

Tom smirked, no he hadn’t scored with a girl that night, but he had gotten something better. The best friend he could ever ask for.

teaser

next chapter

series masterlist

wanna be tagged?

i stole this tag list from another fic tell me if you don’t wanna be tagged lol sorry

tag list @laureharrier @lovelyh0lland @typicaltrashbagg @nano-hero @paradoxparker @its-tchalla @butwhyduh    @clairesrainbow  @desirableprey @fairydustparker @newlove-neweverything @ymeradonnadx @underoosmarvel @tomhollandlovebot @its-the-unknownspidey @savethebabyseals @hermionedeservesbetterthanron @quitetommyy @tomhaz @wronglanemendes  @itsvianny @lovestrucktom  @jake-and-amy-are-married @starlightfound @tiredfeels @thespiderdweeb  @kill-the-stereo @thequeensardine @originalpinkpowerranger @lavenderholland @anxiousdesignerdancerbandlover @organicpurplepants @happywolves81  @nedthegay @skylar-mendes  @emma-worthington @redwhitenbucky @cartiertom  @elefthavraam   @sentimentalquackson  @savannah0111 @vibhati123 @imagine-that-100 @lunagreenwood @hollandhearts @bluparis @badhollandfluff @myspideysensesrtingling @spidermansmj14 @soccerstud004 @marinaabernardii @applenter @silver-winter-wolf  @spiderboytotherescue  @dark-infernal-instruments @claredolphinbear24 @bookgirlunicorn  @tomshufflepuff @avengersgirllorianna @harringtonsbaseballbat @saintlavrents @herofiennestiffinashardinscott.  @almostrosadiazz @tonystark-mcu @tomzfrog @tohollandback @morganhoran1671 @awkwardfangirl2014 @spideysimpossiblegirl  @everythingbooknerd @captainbuckyy  @xapham @parkerswebhead @afilmbypeterparkr @xxtomxo @gioandreolli @tomhollandisagod @danicarosaline @laurfangirl424 @vintageroses1014516 @cinnamon-roll-peter   @the-lost-fairy-tale @lala-florez @fufaation15 @healthyassdonut   @laurfangirl424 @ilcveyou3000 @xxtomxo @socorroann @muffinmari25   @cassindeansass  @rogers-obsessed-barnes-curious @southsidespidey @nathaliabakes @hollandslut @marvelstuck @embrace-themagic @sanniegirl1214 @gioandreolli

[madisonrooney]

hi it's your secret santa! first of all HAPPY BIRTHDAY!! i hope you have a wonderful day! how are you celebrating, if you are at all? safely, i hope! either way i hope you manage to find a way to have a great day full of love!! consider my christmas gift a belated birthday gift as well lol. anyway i loved reading your last answer, it was so thoughtful and sweet. i realized after reading that i barely know anything about dove lol so follow up q: what about dove makes you love her so much?

sorry for the late response! the last couple days have been v busy and ive been super tired and dissociative on top of it so i made a point to save this bc i wanted to give it my full attention!

first of all thank you!! i was going to do a virtual meet and greet with one of my favs from jersey boys but he got confused about timezones so we rescheduled but were doing it next week! then i went to a virtual walt disney family museum panel, had pizza for dinner and watched some liv and maddie, my mom made a cookie cake that we ate while watching the grinch musical, and then some friends and i watched the jersey boys movie together over skype!

im so glad you enjoyed reading my last answer! and oof thats another loaded question (i love it tho)

- like i said when first talking about what drew me to her and liv and maddie, a big thing is just how much passion and love she puts into her characters. ofc she puts passion into every character she plays, but its the passion she puts into characters like liv, maddie, and mal that means the most to me. that goes back to the fact that ive dealt with a lot of negativity directed towards me for enjoying disney channel, and then you have dove out here saying “yah im a teenager/twenty-something who not only respects what theyre doing on disney channel, but puts my all into it” not to mention she even won an emmy for playing liv and maddie in season 4! i hope that passion and talent has started to change the conversation about disney channel, and tbh i think it has at least a bit.  ofc, none of this is to say other people her age acting on disney channel arent talented and passionate, but idk, something about her has always stood out to me. i find her to be more animated and expressive than most. it can be hard for me to read emotions in live action movies and shows, so thats been really important for me. not to mention she was not only playing the lead but TWO lead characters on a four season show with distinct personalities but also subtle similarities. AND the main character in the biggest DCOM franchise in years for 5 years running now. PLUS the fact that there was a period where those were both happening at the same time. she was only 16 when she started all this and hadnt even had any big roles prior to it!! she had a lot of responsibility so it was amazing to see her not only pull it off, but excel at it.

- i just love like....her aesthetic?? shes always seemed to be a very old soul to me, into old jazz music and poetry and stuff like that. its just very charming. and for her to have that aesthetic on top of being a disney channel actress is a fascinating juxtaposition.

- this is kind of sappy and it gets tiring to hear it said over and over again but that doesnt mean it isnt true: i love how transparent she is about her struggles with mental health issues, trauma, and such. she has been for a long time but even more so over the last year or two. no shade to anyone else, but a lot of actors dont really give you a look into their personal lives, they just share and promote their product. im not saying theres anything wrong with that, its good to know what youre comfortable sharing, ive just felt all the more close to her with her being as open as she is, especially as someone who has gone through trauma myself, albeit different from hers.

- kind of connected to that, i love how important spreading kindness, positivity, and love is to her. thats another thing thats been said a million times but still, its very important to me.

for example. she’ll randomly tweet things like “i love you” a lot. im one to always think of the thought process that goes on behind whatever someone posts, texts, etc., bc personally i put a lot of a thought into pretty much anything i say or do before i put it out there publicly, probably bc of my social anxiety. even tho its a simple statement and takes her a couple seconds to post, she still had to have the thought “i want to remind my fans that theyre loved” or something along those lines. and she has this thought FREQUENTLY. to just randomly get a notification every few days or weeks or so of her saying something like that is just very heartwarming to me.

the reason i connected with miley so much when she helped me through my initial trauma was bc it felt like even if no one loved me, she loves her fans, thus she loves me. thus the person i love and admire the most loves me. even if its only one person, it can be enough. it was for me at the time. i feel that same way with dove. when she came into my life, i didn’t feel as unloved, but her love was still helpful to me.

- of course i need to specifically talk about her kindness in person too. dont get me wrong (ive been saying that a lot havent i lol), i totally and completely loved her long before i met her, but naturally, i love her 10x more after the experiences ive had getting to know her in person.

i could go ONNNNNNN about the experiences ive had with her, and i have lol, and if you already heard me ramble about this in the server i apologize, but the most important thing ive taken away from every encounter ive had with her is this: she always goes the extra mile. she always goes out of her way to make people feel special. what i mean by that is she could say/do HALF as much as she has when meeting me and i would still leave over the moon feeling loved. you can tell she does this in excess bc she really truly means it and cares about people like me, she doesnt have any kind of ulterior motive and isnt just going through the motions doing whats asked of her, she simply cares about me and the rest of her fans. some examples - the first time we met, i was sobbing (lol) and she hugged me for a really long time, rocking me back and forth, brushing my hair with her thumb, calling me sweetheart and honey. she even started to tear up a bit herself. - a couple months later, i went to my first liv and maddie taping. i was preparing to reintroduce myself (i looked a little different bc id been cosplaying as maddie the first time i met her) and ofc when preparing myself, i fantasized pretty heavily as i usually do and pictured myself showing her the pic of us on my phone, her gasping, jumping out of her chair screaming, and hugging me, thinking that was probably way more than i was gonna get. that is EXACTLY what happened. then she went on to tell me how my costume made her whole weekend. things like this would continue to happen where i would set the bar impossibly high and not only would she meet it but she’d exceed it. - our usual interaction from there on would start with her face lighting up when she saw me, her calling me some kind of cute name like love or baby, and then hugging me without me even having to initiate it. - when i saw her in mamma mia, i didnt know when id be seeing her again afterwards after pretty consistently getting to see her for 2 years, so i wanted to make sure we got some kind of closure. at the stage door, i reminded her how much she meant to me and just expected like an “aww i love you too” or something back, but she said “you are an angel in my life” and i will never forget that. obvs, i havent told her ALL the details about what she and her characters mean to me but like...she can tell. she can tell if im in a homemade maddie costume sobbing into her arms that theres something there, and shes VERY appreciative of that. - i thankfully got to see her at a meet and greet a few months later and every time i thought i should get going cuz i didnt want to hold the line up, she would just open her arms for another hug. speaking of being appreciative, she even said “thank you for being such a supportive fan.” as i left, i turned around to say one last goodbye. i made sure she wasnt with the next fan yet and yelled out “bye!” and she yelled back “I LOVE YOU!!” and blew me a kiss. again, its the little things. - i saw her at a small panel in new york a few months after that. she walked in the room when the lights were down as they were playing a clip, she quietly waved hi to everyone, then saw me and loudly whispered HI BABY!!! and stopped on her way to the stage to give me a hug. (then she looked at me from the stage and asked which way i thought she should cross her legs for the interview lol) - sometimes when she sees im next in line, shell give me a knowing smile or whisper “hi baby!!” or something like that. she saw me in the crowd after clueless and seemed to make a point to come to me last bc she knew wed be talking for a while, which we did. she even told me she’d seen me in the audience, asking if i was in the front on the left, which i was.

even all that is still just scratching the surface. weve “known” each other for 5 years now and every time i think she’s done the most she can do, she outdoes herself again. not to mention when im at these events, i see her treat all the fans she meets with all of that kindness too. naturally all of this has made me love her all the more.

- finally, lets just be honest here..........................shes REALLY fucking hot.

[kwritersworld]

CHRISTMAS PROMPT EVENT’19

KWRITERSWORLD's first Christmas Event will be a prompt claim - Fic Event centered around the most wonderful time of the year! Are you ready? 

Claiming is first come, first serve! You can view the list of prompts under the read more at the end of this post. Prompt Claiming will be opened on the 23rd of November, at 6PM CET, until the 30th. We will post a link to the document where you can simply write your name next to the prompt you want to claim. 

After you claimed your prompt don’t forget to apply through the separate application (that will be linked then) as well to verify your claiming! Once you did all that, you’ll receive a confirmation message from the admins and you can start writing!

Who is allowed to participate? Every member of @kwritersworld​, @bangtanarmynet​ @btswriterscollective​ @btsbookclub​ @bangtansmutcentral​ are allowed to participate. 

And the rules are? Simple! Your story has to be at least 500 words long, everything over that word count is up to you. You can also write a chaptered-story, but the first chapter needs to be posted until the due date.

Make sure to follow the rules of the KWRITERSWORLD network as always or else we won’t be reblogging your work or add it onto the event’s masterlist. 

Don’t forget to tag your fanfic-exchange related work with the official tag #kwchristmasevent & #kwritersworldnet (as far as you’re a member of this network). If you’re not a member of Kwritersworld however but are participating through an affiliated network, please only use the tag #kwchristmasevent and the tag of your network so they can reblog your work as well.

You can start posting your stories on the 1st until the 31st of December which is the due date!

If you have any more questions before or need help while working on your fics don’t hesitate to send the network an ask. We only would ask of you to do so off anon, so we can reply to you privately!

- Your KwritersworldTeam

You can find all prompts to look at under the cut. 

Scenarios:

A made B a Christmas playlist but it’s just Mariah Care’ys “All I want for Christmas is you.” B can’t tell if they are hitting on them or if it’s a joke.

A & B are both stuck at the airport for Christmas eve.

A & B are neighbors and A just got locked out of their apartment. A was baking cookies that will burn if they don’t get in there quick.

A is robbing the bank on Christmas eve and B is a hostage but A is actually really nice - wait what?

A & B hate each other, but they are standing under the mistletoe and their friends won’t let them leave until they kiss

A & B were too busy thinking about the Christmas dinner that they forgot about the decoration and quick! Their family will be there in a couple of hours!

A & B gets trapped in a shopping mall after hours doing last-minute Christmas shopping.

A was having a snowball fight with a friend in the park and accidentally hit B instead.

A slipped on ice on Christmas and guess who their doctor is...

A & B cuddling in the bathtub together, because it’s cold outside

A & B are avoiding the mistletoe at all costs, while everyone else is trying to get them under it

A did that annoying thing where they put loads of smaller boxes inside one big box and B is getting really mad but they have no idea what’s in the smallest box and A can’t wait to see their face.

How did A & B get chosen to help Santa at the mall? These elf costumes look ridiculous - although B looks kinda cute.

Person A gets super drunk during a Christmas party with their family and Person B has to try and keep them under control. 

A sudden snowstorm forces A and B to cancel all their plans and spend the whole day at home together. 

Person A trying to set up the tree for Christmas but Person B has to pick Person A up for them to put ornaments on the tree because they’re so short.

Person A and B decorating their house/apartment together and when Person A goes to another room to grab some more ornaments they hear Person B yell. When they rush back into the room they see Person B has somehow tangled themself into the Christmas lights and fell over.

Character A overhears Character B’s Christmas wish and decides to fulfill it.

A & B go to the Christmas market together.

A is waking up hungover after an office party and not remembering what happened.

A gets a Secret Santa gift from a secret admirer and tries to discover their identity.

Person A makes hot chocolate for Person B but when they hand them their mug, Person A drops it spilling the piping hot drink on Person B. Person A then helps Person B clean themself up and treat any burns they might have.

A and B are meeting their friends at a family cabin to spend Christmas, only to find that their friends aren’t coming - it was a set up.

Person A and Person B were supposed to go out for a date but a snowstorm hits and they get snowed in. Person A is really sad about it so Person B builds them a blanket fort so they can spend the evening snuggling and watching Christmas movies together.

A and B are Christmas shopping together, A finds the perfect present for B and has to buy it without them noticing. 

A and B getting into a fight while decorating the Christmas tree because A wants to throw everything on and get it done, but B is invested in making it aesthetically pleasing.

A and B get caught in a snowstorm and have to share body heat until they can get somewhere warm. 

Person A being sad when they weren’t able to buy a real tree to decorate for Christmas so Person B buys a little bonsai tree for them to decorate, even though it’s only a foot tall.

Quotes:

“You’re making a mess.” // “Shut up and pass me the tape.” // “There’s more tape on that present than wrapping paper.”

“You didn’t really think I’d let you spend Christmas alone, did you?”

“Exactly how much more hinting do I have to do?”

“Fuck it let’s just get drunk”

“Can we please watch something else? This is the 4th time today we’ve watched elf. And it’s November 1st.”

“Did you break into my house??” // “You refused to put up any Christmas decorations! What choice did I have?” 

“Don’t feel bad… you didn’t COMPLETELY ruin Christmas dinner. There’s still this… jello stuff.“

“Who walks on an ice-covered pond anymore? Don’t you know how stupid that is? You should’ve died in that pond. Natural selection.”

“Everyone shut up and pretend to be happy.”

“It’s not what’s under the tree that matters, it’s those who are gathered around it.” // “Shut up and give me my present.”

“So, still no boyfriend this year, huh?” // “Still no job, huh?”

“Are you seriously making a gingerbread house at midnight?” 

“Is that a candy-cane in your pocket, or are you just happy to see me?”

“You can’t just disappear off the face of this earth, make a reappearance for the holidays and think everything will be okay.”

“See? None of this would have happened if we had just stopped and asked for directions when I told you to.”

“Oh, I know exactly what you’re trying to do. But you will not ruin my Christmas. Not again. Not this year.”

“Wow. You’ve got some nerve inviting them here.”

“What do you mean your parents are coming over?”

“Can’t I just give you $20 and you can buy something for yourself?”

“Merry Christmas, you little shit.”

“You know, you remind me a lot of the Grinch. The only difference is in the end, his heart grows three sizes, but you stay an asshole.”

“Merry Christmas to all and to all-wait, not you, I don’t like you”

“What do you mean you’ve never been ice-skating?”

“I can’t believe you did all this for me.” // “It’s Christmas.”

“You didn’t really think I’d let you spend Christmas alone, did you?”

AU’s

Fake!Boyfriend/Fake!Girlfriend AU

Snowqueen!AU

Elf!AU

Neighbour!AU in which one gets drunk on mulled wine and ends up knocking at the other’s door, drunkenly trying to seduce the other and- instead- passing out in their living room.

IceSkater!AU

Christmas lights rivalry!AU

Baking Cookies/ Contest rivalry!AU

Getting Snowed in!AU

Christmas Ghosts!AU

Grinch!AU (A is not fond of the Holidays but B is making it their life goal to give them a wonderful Christmas!)

Drunk Christmas Caroling!AU

Eggnog and chill!AU

Frozen!AU

The Nutcracker!AU

sources: x, x, x, x, x, x

[alphabees-writes]

Glee - S1 E4 (Preggers)

And from this moment onwards, Kurt Hummel proceeded to steal every single damn scene he was in. I’m actually unironically excited for this one. I didn’t think that could still happen! Here goes!

I will always love this Single Ladies scene. I will always love season 1′s Tina/Kurt friendship. Also, Brittany’s here, inexplicably. Did he pay her for this? In Pixie sticks, perhaps? Or Monopoly money?

“Kurt’s Superstar Playlist” is the most adorable name his playlist could possibly have. All we get to see on it are 4 Beyonce songs, and 1 Gwen Stefani - but it’s a cute little insight.

God sometimes I forget how cute Jenna Ushkowitz is and then this scene really slaps me round the face with it huh!!!

WHY are you filming this, Kurt? What are you using this for? I’d love to know. I’d say it’s just to check out his own dancing technique but it’s in black and white… Where are you posting this!!!

I want that swingy-suspended chair thing he has in his room sooooo bad

Ok now the fact that this is being filmed is giving me fic ideas…

BURT HUMMEL!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! BURT F U C K I N G HUMMEL BABIE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

God the look of fear on all three of their faces when they see Burt??? Don’t you worry kids he’ll come around real soon…

Burt’s approving nod when he yanks on Kurt’s unitard… God I love this man.

The LOOK on Kurt’s FACE when Brittany says he’s on the football team… I can hear his inner monologue like “bitch we may be in the basement but I will make a window to throw you out of”

Kurt just wants to relate to his old man so bad :( Baby boy he’s already so damn proud of you!!! Also that LAUGH.

He really just slapped Tina’s ass! And she completely rolls with it, the absolute champion. Also, the subtitles Netflix provided me with were (smacks bottom) and I just love that.

Oh god it immediately cuts to the WORST scene. Terri learning to give birth. William Schuester trying to help. Just let me perish, RIB?

Shout out to Kendra’s actress for somehow managing to make her character even more despicable than Terri!

Actually the shit she says to Will here is almost valid… All three of them are fucking awful huh!

Seriously why are Kendra and Terri the best actresses on this whole show? It’s the only reason I care about this fake pregnancy arc anymore…

The teacher’s lounge is always either an arid, desolate wasteland, or the only watering hole within 100 miles where all the thirsty ass teachers congregate. Take your pick.

Why does Will pretend to hesitate before going to sit with Ken and Emma? They’re the only people we ever see you talk to dude!!!

Ken with the psychoanalysis, wow. Just hit her right there buddy!

THAT’S HOW SUE C’s IT!!!

Rachel really just EXPECTS every solo… I almost forgot how bad she was when she started. “Maria is MY part!” Not anymore!! Kudos to Lea Michele for managing to make Rachel really sound like she thinks she’s the victim when she really isn’t.

Tina’s face… She was seriously happy. Season 1 Rachel SUCKS for even trying to take this from her. She IS talented. She IS ready!

Everybody else knows it’s a fat load of BS… Kurt lowers his sunglasses to look at her like she’s a bug beneath his shoe. Also, Kurt, why sunglasses? You don’t start getting hangovers ‘til next episode, sweetie!!

“You’re trying to punish me” I think being a total martyr might be one of Rachel’s worst traits early on in the series. I get that performing is her deal, but she can’t even take a second to at least fake being happy for Tina? Unreal.

Everybody else just moving straight on with it is hilarious. They’re all so happy for Tina and don’t give a shit about Rachel’s melodrama, which I’m living for!

I wanna be all “Finn’s an arrogant bastard for assuming Kurt wanted to ask him to prom, grr!!” But then I remember Kurt’s canonically in love with him at this point, so I’ll let him off this time

Kurt’s devious little smile when he asks Finn for a favour… I love one (1) boy!

AHHH THE TRYOUT SCENE. INCREDIBLE. This might honestly be my favourite scene from season 1. It’s definitely up there, anyway.

Cute brotherly Furt moments. Finn putting that helmet on for him. “Red’s your colour!” And they DON’T make Kurt get all giggly about Finn just being nice to him? Kurt just telling him he’s really cool? Pure.

“Rehearsing–” “PRACTICING!”

Finn tells Kurt he’ll be murdered if he uses his music and Kurt comes straight back with that rum chocolate souffle line. This show would be NOTHING without Kurt.

And THIS is what I mean when I say Kurt was a Gryffindor from the get-go. Even now he’s refusing to be anything less than himself for anybody, even the jackasses that harass him every day when he’s on their pitch.

Shut the fuuuuuuuck up, Puck!

“Hi, I’m Kurt Hummel and I’ll be auditioning for the role of kicker.” What did we do to deserve him?

His starting pose… His hips… The footwork… “That was good, right?” His whole ATTITUDE. THE ROYAL WAVE.

As if the TV network would cancel Sue’s news segment for having a few Cheerios in the glee club?

Oh god. Quinn telling Finn she’s pregnant. The fucking cinematography here… The camera work, the audio mixing…

“Think of the mail… Think of the MAIL…”

Did Quinn seriously just say “Ask Jeeves” told her the hot tub could knock her up? I mean, I know she’s lying, but ASK JEEVES? That should’ve tipped Finn off more than anything else…

Damn. Season 1 really had the power to get me shook, laughing, and then crying in the span of 30 seconds? Or maybe it’s just because I can’t stand seeing Diana cry…  

Sandy lets his kettle whistle for far too long, it stresses me out

Sue just… Offers this fired man a job? I know she’s got Figgins by the balls over the stockings commercial, but come on, surely the council would get involved or whatever???

Rachel sucks right now but god damn it Taking Chances gives me chills every time I hear her sing it… And she’s so cute when they tell her she got the lead!!!

If musical stuff is so frowned upon socially here, how are they expecting to get a full cast for Cabaret? Especially if NONE of the other glee kids are interested?

And there’s no funding for the arts but they have a whole ballet studio on school property…?

Sign #12 That Mr Schuester Is An Asshole: He just straight up tells Rachel that he’s the only person that likes her, which is wrong for so many reasons

He does have a point about Rachel needing to take a step back sometimes though. I hate that she’s so awful sometimes that I have to agree with Schuester.

He’s not HURTING you Rachel, he’s giving a chance to grow to somebody else!

Jenna did a beautiful job with this solo… Tina’s so cute too! I love her singing this sweet song with her goth aesthetic

This scene between Mr Schue and Tina was almost sweet BUT:

Sign #13 That Mr Schuester Is An Asshole: He did NOT need to touch Tina’s shoulders, or get that close, or whisper to comfort her.

Don’t take one for the team, Tina! Take one for YOURSELF!

I’ll let him hugging Finn slide because, wow, Finn’s breaking my heart right now…

However I will not let it slide that he’s seemingly taken him off campus for lunch…???? Dude, take him to your office. This is creepy as all hell even if he has good intentions…

“I got this at the school library. Did you know that you can just… Borrow books from there?” Protect him. Protect him at ALL costs. He was so genuinely inspired by watching Kurt make those goals that he went to a library for the first time in his LIFE oh my goodness

Oh god. The camera panning from a random father and his young son, over to Mr Schue looking at Finn? HE’S NOT YOUR SON MY GUY, HE IS YOUR PUPIL. PROFESSIONAL BOUNDARIES!!!

Terri and Will are both brushing their teeth with no toothpaste… Freaks…

Have I mentioned how much I adore those little background choir soundbites between scenes? They did so much for this show…

SHUT! UP! PUCK! Drink your fucking character development juice already!!!

Kurt just casually dropping in Sun Tzu’s Art of War… He just knows that. He’s prepared to just drop that in conversation. Son, why are you so ready for combat,

Also the way Kurt commands their attention? They can rag on him all they want but they all know he’s legit…

Look at all these doofuses in their football gear busting a move. Look at Kurt sat at the front just watching, judging, as he was born to do

MIKE! KILLING! IT! I love that they let us see a sneak peek of his moves… Serious HC that Kurt making the football team dance is the first time that Mike really got to show off his skills

Kurt shooing Mr Schue away like that gives me life!!! Sit down old man

“All right boys…”  And they all look so concerned behind him lmao… “Oh– SNEAK ATTACK back to the ring…” Mike’s trying so hard to keep in time. I love him. OH and there’s Matt! Most valid glee club member simply because he never says anything.

“Comb through the hair… SLAP THE BUTT!” And they’re all trying so hard… 10/10

“I’m your best friend,” says Puck, to the boy he has been consistently fucking over for four (4) episodes, and presumably many years prior…

I really do hate Puck for the first part of this season but god damn does he have some lines. “’Sup, MILF?” “Well, CALL the Vatican! We got ourselves another ImMaCuLaTe CoNcEpTiOn!”

I remember the first time I heard the term “Lima Loser” but I didn’t know the show was set in a place called Lima (I would’ve been, like, 9) and I thought it was lime-a-loser. Like he was going to have limes thrown at him. And it was this big, serious threat…

How the FUCK did Terri get into Quinn’s car? Why is that never addressed? Like, ever? Quinn doesn’t even ASK?

Do this many people turn up to American high school sports events irl??? And do they really play the national anthem? That must get old

Why are all these football players 30… I’m so thirsty for realistic casting…

BURT’S HERE TO SEE HIS SON!!! We love a proud dad.

“I TOLD YOU! I TOLD YOU!!!” And now he’s doing high kicks. Kurt’s doing the absolute MOST.

I will never understand the rules of American football… And I mean NEVER.

“Ring on it on three” I love that it has a code name. And they were all too busy being dudebros to call it Single Ladies…

The one dude on the opposite team who starts boogying along is the real MVP

NEVERMIND. BURT BOPPING IN THE STANDS IS THE MVP!!!

“Can I pee first?” Legendary

Burt just going “he’s so little…” In the middle of the silent crowd…

MY BOY NEEDS HIS MUSIC!

BURT’S SO FUCKING PROUD I’M ACTUALLY CRYING??? YOU CAN HEAR HIM SHOUTING “THAT IS MY BOY!!! THAT IS MY SON!!!” THROUGH THE WHOLE CROWD!!!!

I feel like Puck seeing Finn and Quinn kiss and then the crowd going silent as he walks away is meant to make me feel… Bad for him…? But we’ve only ever seen him be mean to Quinn, really. You’ve got to earn those moments!

Ah… The skincare routine. He’s thriving.

Burt! Hummel! Is! Proud! Of! His! Son!

Burt… I’m pretty sure he assumed you wished his mother was alive. As opposed to her corpse being at the big game.

Oh boy here it comes…… Chris looks SO young here. So scared. So vulnerable. The way he slightly stutters… He nailed this scene. So much.

He’s gay!

He knows.

Do they make sensible heels in sizes for three year olds…? Asking for a dad

The raw EMOTION on Kurt’s face. It’s killing me.

This is the starting point… “I’m not in love with the idea, but I love you.” And it only gets better from there…

And he THANKS his SON. He’s sure. He’s so sure, Burt, and you are going to be so proud of him forever.

Finn gives Quinn that blanket his dad gave him when he was a baby… Did she give it back? I fucking hope so…

You tell him, Finn! Puck IS an asshole!

MIKE’S IN GLEE!!! SO IS MATT!!! And Puck’s here I guess, yay… He’s got a season or so of sucking to go before I can get excited about that.

“Regionals” here we come? My guy, let’s get through sectionals first…

Rachel’s big, cruel smile when she thinks she’s going to be handed Tina’s solo. Why would she presume that it’d just get handed to her??? I mean, I know why, but like, why… And she has the audacity to look like she’s been betrayed. Not even slightly, hon! You deserve nothing if not getting one solo is all it takes for you to quit!

This Sue’s corner genuinely gets me through some shit. “There’s not much of a difference between a stadium full of cheering fans and an angry crowd screaming abuse at you - they’re both just making a lot of noise. How you take it is up to you. Convince yourself they’re cheering for you. You do that, and someday, they will.” Hits me hard!

This one was longer. Primarily because of Burt, I will admit, but it can’t be helped. Perhaps it’s the best episode of season 1 because of Burt! Now that’s a break through…

[strawberryybird]

Me sees the character songs post, immediately wants to know what character songs you have for the characters and why.

ok so. welcome to the rabbit hole that is my music taste and what is my no.1 most frequently done activity.. plastering emotions i have for fictional characters all over my music taste. I restricted myself to ¾ songs for each character & then to Edie, Hubert, Dorothea, Lysithea & Byleth because otherwise we’d be here all day (and those are the Primary Daydream Candidates rn)

under a rm because as im sure we’ve all seen.. i just don’t fucking stop.. also i got weirdly deep about some of these topics. i don’t know how to tag it. tread careful?

Here are some songs.. welcome to my (notoriously bad) music taste. alsoi go in Very heavy handed about it all. i make only a few apologies:

Edelgard:Everybody wants to rule the word - tears for fears. (ucan go with Lorde’s cover but i prefer the original bc im like that.) i meanit’s pretty heavy handed but it’s such an Edelgard song it !!!! fuels my ficwriting. if it’s not so very Edelgard’s relationship with twsitd then idk whatto tell you. plus it’s an iconic song

Medicine - daughter. (daughter is My Favourite Band. Ever. I cannot articulate how much ilove their (and ex:re’s) music!!) anway. this is a hegegard song & i don’ttake constructive criticism. I’ll reiterate this better in other descriptions,but please don’t take my inclusion of a song about such a topic as adevaluation of it in any way, that’s not my intention. The reason I go so feralfor Hegegard is because im no stranger to watching someone you care about hurt themselvesin a way you can’t stop, and that’s what the AM ending evokes in me. Hence: asong I love that one can read the same story in. And then the lyrics ‘You couldstill be / What you want to / What you said you were / When I met you” just !! parallelsEdge of Dawn’s lyrics about regret & overall I’m very feral about this.

(Don’t Fear) The Reaper - blue oystercult. this is PRIME Edelgard telling freshly-awokenbyleth she’s been waging war for 5 years. also !!!! “Seasonsdon’t fear the reaper / Nor do the wind, the sun or the rain, we can be likethey are” >>> “The Edge of Dawn (Seasons ofWarfare) (フレスベルグの少女～風花雪月～,lit. Girl of Hresvelg ~Wind, Flower, Snow, Moon~)” .. the link is tenuous but coincidence?? is it, fuck.

Seneca - Novo Amor. this is another one of those songs that could mean something different to everyone. very easy to project onto, is novo amor. I like the story of being prepared to run and break ties at any given moment, but ending up - emotionally or physically - in the same place one always was. apart from the glaring tie of how Edelgard returned to garreg mach, this song is a lot of me trying to repatriate Edelgard’s lack of emotional arc in the game by saying . well. this song. 

You can call me Al -  paul simon. am i projecting edeleth thoughts onto my favourite song? it’s morelikely than you think!!! but also i like the chorus and all the exasperating ‘call me el’jokes i can make.. i may be half writing a fic based on this song.

Dorothea:Agnes - glass animals. so i have significant emotions about edelthea at the best of times !! and this song !!! really bloody hits it home !! yes I knowit’s got a really heavy and real subject matter and I’m not trying to devalueit or minimise it.. but the story - about watching someone close to you hurtthemselves/get hurt, and doing so in ways you can’t stop them from - is adamn real one. And a Lot of why I love Dorothea’s character in the gamebecause she’s the one who can’t stop her friends from getting hurt – through exposureto warfare .. or  stopping Edelgard becomingthe monster at the end of the story. Even though she’s one of the healers onthe beagle’s team. And I feel that.

Ex’s and Oh’s – Elle King. So you know that one spn fanvid featuringthis song about all of dean winchester’s relationships? That, but for my flirting Queen Dorothea Arnault. (and I have the dumbest most fun little headcanon thatonce Dorothea and Sylvain derailed a lgbt+ society meeting whilst Edie wastrying to go over the budget by blasting this song and dancing on the table.The idea makes me laugh)

Hold My Girl – George Ezra. The whole thing about wanting just that onemoment to cherish the people you love for one moment more before you have goout face the world? If that’s not the timeskip’d Dorothea Arnault Aesthetic, Idon’t know what is.

(Call Me Out – sea girls. On a much lighter note, this song is fueling the later half of mydrafts of road trip au. And it’s literally because of that one verse. im gayshut up.)

Hubert:Red Right Hand – nick cave and the bad seeds. Is it on the nose? Is itheavy handed? Oh u fuckin bet but that won’t stop me!!! A) it’s a good song. ItIs. B) I like narrative songs. C) Any ‘red right hand’ symbolism in Anycharacter has me love them immediately and also plonk this song in the middleof any playlist about them. sure, the artic monkeys version might be a bit more on hubert’s brand.. but my mileage varies about it lmao

I had fortress by bear’s den earmarked for Hubie, as I think it’s easilyread about boundaries and a one sided intense relationship & that’s! Hubiebaybee! But I can’t possibly cover unhealthy relationships without shoving thealbum Hospice by The Antlers into every which way of it. It’s by no meansdirectly translatable to Edelgard and hubert’s relationship and it’s arguable ifI should even mention it in the same sentence as a bloody fictional character… that beingsaid, I’ve been having emotions about:Shiva – the antlers. This song specifically reads to me to be a really goodarticulation of my own thoughts about Hubert’s perspective of Edie getting experimentedon. heavy but damn. I like that. I just see a lot of what their teen years togethermust have been like in Shiva.

Time – Pink Floyd. Ok so.. it’s like Hubert in parallel bc I think thissong is a lot about searching for a purpose/reason or a quote unquote bloodyred path in life. And I may have been listening to it when I watched Hubert/DorotheaA support & now it’s just permanently associated with it bc it complementedit so well. And I like it. So . it stays. It’s very much a beagles song to meas well.

Lysithea:The Beautiful Dream – George Ezra. Ok so I read this Edelysithea ficwith this on repeat bc the title reminded me of it, and then I stuck it onrepeat because it worked too well and now.. im crying.. and i like the inflection of Lysithea’s bitterness over the titular lyric. (but also, it remains one of my steadfast edeleth songs.. sorry lys)

Secrets (Cellar Door) – Radical Face. Another Edelgard&/Lysitheasong!! I really like their relationship ok. And given the song itself can beread straight or an allegory for whatever you particularly want, but the storyis just too on the nose for me not to mention it here.(also general advocation of listening to the whole of radical face’s musicbecause I’ve loved it for years now & the work is beautiful.) (also it’swonderful for fe awakening projection. Or ur own.)

Oh Children – nick cave and the bad seeds. there’s a million different interpretations of this song, but to try nail a few onto Lysithea.. there’s the harry potter use of making/finding a light in the depths of tragedy & i love that for Lys. there’s the whole ‘the kids aren’t alright’ theme and it’s various depths. and i like narrative lyrics to plaster my large fictional-character-caused-emotions onto, so make of this one what you will.

Marianne (and Lysithea too if you like)Bad Blood – Radical Face. Ok so. This is one of my favourite songs in bloodyexistence, and it’s so loaded with meaning & it has a metric tonne of it. Icould wax lyrical about how much I love Radical Face’s work. I don’t want myinclusion of this song (specifically this one) to in any way devalue it. Butmusic is ofc incredibly subjective, and so is my reading of a lot of threehouses – in case it’s not bloody obvious by now. There’s a Lot of stories onecould take from Marianne’s character (and none of them are More Valid^tm thanany other), and I do see a very personal story in her – as I do in this song. Hgghhghive just spent 10 minutes trying to find an impersonal way to talk about twovery personal and relative stories, which naturally doesn’t work. That, and theway I read her story is Real Fucking Dicey for tumblr.com. so if this song is about accepting rejection because of parts of yourself so deep they’re in your blood, i think.. y’all can see.. where my neurodivergent gay self is going with this..

Byleth:Something to Believe In – Tom Walker. Yeah. You’re bloody welcome. If this isn’ta completely on the nose Byleth song, I’ll eat Dorothea’s hat.

Don’t Let the Man – Fatboy Slim. ~ And the sign said green-hairedpartially possessed emotionally void mercenaries need not apply for aprofessorship at the country’s most prestigious academic centre… ~

Emigrate - Novo Amor. this just fucking Got Me in the ‘actively choosing crimson flower’ feelings. im an emotional wreak but its aight. the lyrics just matched up too well for me to let it go !!!

Alps - Novo Amor. this hit me in the ‘i miss the gremlin child sothis’ feelings one day and now it’s permanently stuck that way.

Make Them Gold – chvrches. (this is very much associated with awakening’sfuture past kids and also the Carmilla series in my mind But!!) I love a story about‘if we’re all falling, we’re going down together’ and the magical power of teamwork, and how it brings out the best in people.. & that’s what this song& Byleth kinda bloody stand for ya know??

woooh.. oh my god . i need another cup of tea.

[make-it-mavis]

got any nsfw headcanons for the shit goblins? :)

OooooOOOoooh sugar, what a can of worms you just opened.

I actually did make a post about the development of their physical relationship here, and how it helps them learn to communicate with each other.

But as for general HCs? Yeah I got a few lmao. Listen, sexuality has been one of my special interests for years, I love using it for character building. It’s so fun.

Beneath the cut will be lots of naughty HCs. 18+ for some explicit/graphic language. You’ve been warned.

Mavis has a huge punishment kink. Her favorite is being caught in the middle of a naughty deed and being forcibly punished for it, being scolded all the while. But scolded in a way that’s still sort of complimenting her on what a slick prankster she is. Things like, “Finally, I got my hands on you. Wait ‘til everyone hears how I finally put the arcade’s biggest problem in her place.” Just as an example. But she never submits immediately – she’s a really bratty sub that likes egging her partner on so she’ll get punished even more.

Along with that, she’s a real big masochist. Mavis loves almost anything that makes her feel a rush, and pain’s a big one. She loves Turbo’s sharp teeth and how bitey he is. She loves being choked, slapped, scratched, having her hair pulled, being tied up too tight, etc. It’s very rare that she comes out of an encounter without at least a few marks.

Turbo, for the most part, loves being in control. He loves having his ego stroked even more than his dick. Winning a struggle for dominance is a big one, so it’s good that Mavis isn’t a pillow princess and fights back. He loves being worshiped in any way – really let it show how much you love touching him. Begging and praise are huge turn-ons, and there’s nothing he loves more than reducing Mavis to the point where she’s mad with desire.

Turbo loves dominant sorta roleplay shit but not the usual "daddy" or "master" kink. He likes being treated like royalty, being called things like "your majesty/grace/highness/flattering word" or "my king/lord", and showered with so much praise, affection, and adoration that it borders on worship. Mav's role in that scenario is the unruly court jester, a snarky playful little shit that's still ultimately there to entertain the king. (Hilarious if you think of Pyrite later) 

That being said, though, very occasionally, Turbo’s been known to enjoy being dominated. People constantly in control or with a lot of power tend to like playing into the fantasy of a power shift in the bedroom. It’s a safe, rewarding way to experience losing, which is otherwise so taboo for him. That’s not to say he’s 100% submissive either, he’s less of a bratty sub and more of a straight up spiteful sub. Glares, insults, growling, nipping at fingers. He hates how much he loves it.

With that, the things he tends to “enjoy” the most are being tied up, being degraded, being leashed and commanded. He’s not as much of a masochist as Mavis but he still enjoys some biting, hair-pulling, and a bit of choking. As a sub he often takes on the role of a wild, ill-tempered animal that needs to be broken into an obedient pet. That involves a nice mix of teasing, praise, punishment, and humiliation while still encouraging him to push back and refuse to fully submit. Quite often, those scenarios end with him either being freed or breaking out of his restraints and going wild on Mavis, overpowering her and paying her back for all the rough treatment. Resistance and scolding on her end is all part of the scene, but before long, she’s always pulling hard on the leash and urging him on, praising him for being such a good demon boy. He earned his reward.  

I’d like to think that they own a strap on (it’s Mavis’ dildo), but straight-up pegging is not something Turbo’s down with. That level of submission is just a smidge too far for him. Which is fine. But Mavis still likes to make him suck her strap-on dick, especially if he’s tied up and she can knot a fist in his hair and force his head down onto it or fuck his mouth. Turbo’s straight, but he’s pretty secure in that fact (and homophobia kind of isn’t a thing in my arcade ‘verse). He’s sucking a dick, but it’s a girl’s dick, so he’s still into it. (Transphobia isn’t a thing either. Gender’s super vague and unimportant.)

I’ve been asked enough times to remark upon it what Turbo’s dick is like. I hadn’t thought of it too much bc for me, dicks aren’t all that exciting appearance-wise lmao. But it’s inevitable if I’m going to talk nsfw about him. So my answer is…. length-wise, it’s pretty average, but it’s a little bit on the thicker side. I believed I described it as, it’s just nice enough that you might see it and be like, “Goddamn it, such a fuckin’ douche canoe doesn’t deserve a dick that nice.” It’s not all that vascular, it’s grey, and it gets darker towards the head. (I know I’m gonna have to draw it eventually. I draw nice dicks so be ready)

This isn’t relevant to the shitgoblins really but I think that the Twins have similar dicks to Turbo’s since they’re all brothers, but theirs are on the longer side rather than the thicker side. Mavis has seen them, and she just laughed, to the Twins’ displeasure.

No one’s asked me what Mav’s vulva looks like (and thank god actually thats a weird question but at the same time why not???? vulvas are nice) but I guess all I can say about it is… it’s cute? To match her “cute Disney-faced young woman” aesthetic. I have to imagine that if Disney studios ever did porn animations they would draw really idealized labia. ALL VULVAS WOULD LOOK THE SAME. That’s a concept I’ve tried to battle with my own nsfw art where I can, but for Mav I can only picture her with simplified cutesy bits. Soft, supple, pink, blushy, etc. Does not at all mirror how she likes said bits to be treated lmao. But I will gift her with a nice, decent sized clit because you can’t stop me

SHE TASTES tangy and sweet like cherry pie filling

Here’s a fun one. I mentioned that Mav is a masochist. I think she takes that to an extreme in her game. For someone not programmed with in-game death or defeat, dying’s probably almost as painful as DYING dying before respawn. And respawn’s gotta be a dizzying rush of relief from that pain. So… I think she occasionally get off on respawning LOL. She only does this alone, though, as she asked for Turbo’s help with it once and he did not end up having a good time. As it turns out, he’s not into killing his partner in bed, lmao.

Mavis’ brush and paint can are loaded with some of her most dense code, so much that she can feel touch through them, and they’re, shall we say, erogenous zones. Turbo knows this and likes to swipe her brush in public and fiddle around with it just to tease her. She also frequently uses the handle of it to fuck herself. 

The shitgoblins are REALLY into PDA. Turbo likes to show off the action he’s getting and Mav just loves the taboo of it. They make out in open public spots all the time, will casually get a little handsy while talking to people, and will straight-up fuck where they can. Tapper’s supply closet is a fave, as well as Niceland’s penthouse, as well as a dark corner of the Qix nightclub. Hidden rooms and alleys in other games work, too. But the best of all is Gene’s closet, with his expensive cashmere cardigans used as cum rags.

Mav is really good at deepthroating. It’s nothing to her.

Turbo has been known to come pretty fast, but he has the peculiar ability to be ready to go again in record time. He’s like the Energizer bunny. He just keeps fuckin’ going.

That’s all well and good, because once they’re fully used to fucking, Mavis develops a taste for overstimulation and likes being fucked past her limit. That’s where communication and a safe word comes in handy.

Since he’s a Speed Demon, Turbo has unusually high body heat. This means… yes, this means his jizz is really hot. Excuse me.

Turbo rarely admits it but he’s obsessed with Mavis’ ass. He loves grabbin onto it while they fuck, and loves casually feeling her up (with her consent of course). A particularly nice view of Dat Ass can throw him completely off what he was doing. Same goes for her legs.

Mavis has a thing for Turbo’s hands. She otherwise never wants hands to touch her so they’re a real special thing to her. He often doesn’t even have to touch her anywhere particularly erotic to get her going – just the fact that she’s being touched is exciting enough. That being said, she loves being fingered, and she loves having his fingers in and around her mouth, to satisfy her oral fixation.

Mavis is of the “try everything once” attitude. Turbo’s a bit more of a princess than her, but probably more adventurous than the average person.

As much as Turbo likes to finish inside her, he’s also got quite a taste for spilling all over her, as a sort of possessive way to mark/claim her. She’s all his, after all.

They looooooove fucking while high.

I think thats enough for now lmao congrats on consuming so much dirt!!

[soulswimmr]

Thoughts on s6~

Putting it all under a cut because I can’t not talk in lengthy paragraphs. Feel free to shoot an ask/message if you want to talk about s6, too

Ok wowie, good season. There were noticable weak points, but I’ll address those along the way. First let’s talk about the 

Plot

It was good. It was surprisingly good. The hidden altean thing where they bold faced put that Lotor was responsible for hundreds or thousands of deaths teeters way out of kids’ show territory. They were not fucking around with that. The fact that they made it clear that the plot was not just paladins vs Galra (esp with Lotor wanting to do away with the Galra), but more along the lines of paladins vs lotor vs generals vs sendak vs so on and so forth makes it not just more complex, but stacks the odds against voltron and adds good suspense. Clone shiro was incredible. It was everything i’ve been waiting for. 

The fight scenes, inside and outside voltron (cough cough KeithvsKuron) were breathtaking. Everything about Krolia was very well put together. THE ANIMATION WAS BREATHTAKING. 

On that note (and dipping into characterization a little bit), they kinda layed it on thick with Lotor romanticizing Allura. He was too goody goody and it made the betrayal lose a little impact (aside from the whole mass murderer thing). there’s a difference between that and foreshadowing. 

Idk why the huge timeskip with Keith and Krolia stuck on that mission bugged me a little, but it did. A timeskip makes sense and is a cool tool to use for the fam to get to catch up, but it just felt. Strange. Two years is a long ass time. Keith was completely unaffected seeing the team again. One could argue that this was bc of the mission, or Krolia teaching Keith how to be a member of the blade and have Super Mission Focus, but still, for Keith to have that much almost-off camera development and not be at least startled to see voltron again was weird. I love my mom to pieces but two years alone with her and eventually I’d go a little nuts.

Characterization

That last point brings me right into characterization, and unfortunately this one is gonna be a little more on the critical side. For the most part, characterization/character focus was well balanced this season. But there were some Moments.

Everyone on team voltron developed, and it was arguably best executed this season than any other. We got to see some great Coran moments, where he really felt like a member of the team. Hunk having a no-nonsense teacher, even just for like 15 minutes lol did him good in terms of communicating with their new allies. Hunk is a people-person, and it shows very well. His camera time wasn’t 100% food related all the time, in fact, barely ever. Bravo.

Pidge of course got her own arc, but it was still a GREAT moment when she admitted to having the coding on Shiro’s arm uploaded and on hand just in case. It was CHILLING when she made eye contact with Kuron before he took off. This is, imo, how Dreamworks should’ve handled other characters who didn’t quite have the spotlight in previous seasons. Not a whole lot of moments, but when they were there, they had impact. I hope they continue to do this.

Do I even need a section for Keith? Holy shit. My boi finally accepting his role as Black Paladin and so much more. :’) I won’t elaborate because c’mon, it was in part, a Keith-centric season

Same for Allura. She really is the heart of Voltron. We got to see a lot of sides of her. 

Lotor being a psycho bitch but still having genuine feelings for Allura?? good shit

LANCEY LANCE. Bless him, Dreamworks is doing their best. In terms of his relationship with Allura, seeing him going from meaningless flirting to serious heart to hearts and a team player was fantastic. BUT I have some grievances, here we go.

Lance got a mini-arc and it was great, and he very clearly grows and changes, this is great! However, regardless of ships, seeing it centric to a romantic relationship, and basically being a rebound for Allura was ahhhhhhehhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh eh. 

Pidge and Hunk teasing Lance about his crush was normal, and them pretending to be Lotor and Allura was adorable and hilarious, but Lance was really hurting and when they didn’t stop and just walked out, I???? What. That, to me, is out of character. Hella out of character. Lance is their friend, and they should be?? Friendly??? I was mad @ them

Finally, as much as I love broganes and the great arc they had, they’ve had a tremendous amount of camera time. We’re well away that they’re practically inseparable. What I really wanted to see was the whole team being involved with finding out about Operation Kuron. With Lance seeing Real Shiro in the astral plane, I was really on board with him pulling aside Keith when he came back and be like “ey dude I saw some fucked shit”, and them rescuing Shiro together was a theory I was personally super into. Was kind of disappointment that we didn’t see the relationship between Shiro and the other team members deepen a little more.  

Ships

If you don’t want to read about ships feel free to stop here and thanks for reading!! Message me if anything I said caught your eye.

First of all, daaaaaaamn that Allurance.

I’ve shipped allurance for a while now, more casually than other ships, so to see Lance change and mature and support Allura while Allura started to show that she really values Lance meant a lot to me. It’s good to see Lance grow up a little. For everything that they were this season, forced was most certainly not one of them. Their relationship felt organic.

However, it was not without flaws. I can’t help but feel like Lance was treated like a rebound, and was almost too? supportive??, and it was telling when Allura was talking with the mice, upon them snITCHIN ON LANCE DAMN MICE, she frowned sadly. I have to wonder if she actually returns his romantic feelings. And I do like the ship a lot, casually and aesthetically. But at the end of the day, what I was hoping to see was a really solid friendship. I think from here they don’t need to be straight up romantic. Their relationship is no doubt one of the strongest in the show, but I think it would be an incredible writing path to keep their friendship, because allurance has been hinted since episode one, and I think it’s almost?? Too easy for the writers to turn it romantic. I think Allura and Lance are a great team and very compatible for friends, but uhhhh read on.

I’ll just address the elephant in the room and come clean, yeahhhhh I like klance and yeeeaaahhhhh I would have really liked to see some more content this season, so sue me lmao. 

If I’m gonna be really blunt about my feelings, I feel like klance is a fantastic direction for Dreamworks to take. I feel like it would be good writing to make klance endgame. Why? Because it’s the path of least resistance. That’s why so many people like it. Keith and Lance were so salty at the beginning, but the crew made an effort to show that in moments that were particularily tough, they have loads of potential and can be very good for each other, romantically or platonically. It’d be harder to write, it’d take time, but I think it’s a worthwhile pairing. And there are definitely some moments that are super disruptic to both Keith and Lance’s development when they, Lance especially, straight up regress in their development and fight for no reason. I think it’s unfair, and it almost always makes me go “wait I thought they were starting to get along better??”. Now that Allurance is a thing, I’ve stated in another post that, because it would be strange for Lance to have two romantic arcs, it’s pretty unlikely that klance will actually happen. Do I think they teased us? Yeah. Do I think they straight up qbaited us? Not really. In the end, my biggest hope is that they continue to develop Keith and Lance’s friendship and don’t abandon the really strong potential they have together. Don’t let them regress, Dreamworks.

I’m not gonna address she/th (or tag it, because who goes into the tag looking for someone to say IM NOT A FAN OF XYZ JUST THOUGHT U SHOULD KNOW) too much because I’m personally not a fan. There’s so much about their relationship associated with “brothers”, and Keith looking up to Shiro that it just doesn’t rub me right in terms of romance. I had to wonder if they aged Keith up two years to justify possible future she/th?? if it happens I’ll be bummed, and I think the random aging up is kind of a cop out, but hey, it’s their show.

RIP Lotura. I stopped shipping it and figured out Lotor was a hoe after his third Dramatic ‘Let’s Bring the Universe Together’ Speech to appeal to Allura’s sense of duty. It’s a shame tho, I was really digging it at the end of season 5

PUNK FOREVER YAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAYYYYY

Thanks 4 coming to my ted talk, get in my ask and discuss w/ me ovo

[sterwood]

it's wild to see how so much of your content is relatively high-effort (you don't seem to just make claims and make it your audience's task to figure out what the fuck you're saying) and even wilder how homestuckposting is the exception to that. I fundamentally disagree that it's good, and I feel like if you had a good argument to the contrary you'd have posted it by now.

This is such a weird ask to me, since I’ve barely been postinganything of substance lately given that I’ve been so damn busy with grad schoolstuff. (And the stuff I’ve been reading, thinking about, etc., wouldn’t makefor very good posts here, since it’s a lot of stuff about Rawls and pragmatismand I just...don’t care, lmao.)

But at the same time: thank you! That’s a very nice thing to see,that one’s effort is recognized even if the culmination of that effort isdisagreed with. 

As far as the homestuck stuff goes though, part of the reason Ihaven’t given any justification of it is that I don’t really see it needing anyjustification, insofar as I’m not often making claims about how great it isoutside of some obviously hyperbolic claims. It’s mostly a private interest,forged out of a depression-fueled quick-read of the comic and the fact that thecomic appeals to a bunch of personal interests/themes/etc. I do think it’sactually great, but I haven’t put forth any effort to flesh out that claim or convinceothers of it in any serious way, mostly because I figure that no one cares.

I’ll attempt to spell out a few reasons that I think it’s very good,or at least important, but I want to recognize at the outset that I’m at adisadvantage in talking about this. You say that you ‘fundamentallydisagree that it’s good’ and that I probably have some ready made argument ofwhy it is, in fact, good. Since you’re anonymous, there’s no set standardbetween us for evaluating this claim (good/bad how?),and so I kind of just have to jump in with some generalities about the comic.If you’re serious with your intent in sending this message though (and I thinkyou are, since you started out with a compliment that shows me that you’veprobably given a looking over at my blog and even, dare I say, follow me onhere), then feel free to message me after with something more specificabout why you don’t think it’s good, so at least there’scommon set of propositions that we’re working with (”I think it’s bad becauseit’s overly convoluted” to which I’d disagree; “I think it’s bad becauseof the whole tumblr parody which was really reactionary” to which I’d agree;etc.) and we could move from there.

Let’s move on though. (This will be along post, and I apologize, especially for those on mobile.)

Reasons why Homestuck is At LeastImportant

There’s two major reasons why I thinkhomestuck (HS) is important, or at least should be regarded as a significantmedia product. Firstly, I think it’s a unique contribution to what mediaproducts can do on the internet;secondly, I think it’s important by virtue of what it contributed to mediaculture generally. Note, in this section I’m not strictly saying why I thinkthe comic is good, but only why I think it’s worth paying attention to,especially if you’re a media studies student, say, or someone interested incultural studies generally or whatever. But let’s turn to both of those points.

A quick reflection: I remember howfrustrated I was growing up when I would read articles online that were aboutmovies or paintings or some piece of visual culture that would only pointtowards the media product. I was frustrated, because there seemed to be noreason to simply talk about mediaproducts when you could actually incorporate them into your discussions. Whyonly talk about a scene in a movie, say, when you could include a clip of thatscene in your essay to provide more exacting context? Media productions andcommentaries weren’t simply bound to text, but writers and creators tended to restrictthemselves to this without need. (There are some reasons for this, especiallywith the state of the internet 9 years ago or so [when homestuck began],principally that pictures and videos loaded slowly and would be overlycumbersome. Still, I was frustrated at the unrealized potential.)

I was similarly frustrated by the typeof content that popped up in most webcomics that I was reading at the time. In2010, I believe, I took an on-campus job working in a geology lab. There waslittle work to be done, and, being nineteen, I stupidly blew off the smallamount of work I had. Even in blowing off that work, though, I still needed tooccupy my time while I was working in the office, and for whatever reason Itook to reading a lot of webcomics. I read all of Questionable Content, xkcd,Diesel Sweeties, Achewood, and (most important for my appreciation of HS,coincidentally) Goats. I didn’t actually read HS at this time (that didn’thappen until 2015), but this set the scene for eventually reading it. And whilereading all of these comics, despite liking them, I was sometimes frustratedhow they still read like traditional comics. It was hard to see how thesecomics were webcomics: I couldn’t seeanything that made them particularly different from normal comics, except forwhere they happened to be located.

In this context, Homestuck is the firstpiece of media that I’m aware of (and certainly the largest) which actually expandedthe ways that a comic could operate. Instead of a series of panels with textincorporated, Homestuck is primarily single panel pages with lots of textattributed to them underneath (of course, this barrage of text is also why manydon’t care for the comic). But it is also a series of flash videos, embeddedvideo games, youtube videos, parody accounts (like the DeviantArt one), albums,etc. It really is astoundingly expansive. Again, this is neither good nor bad,but is a reason for its importance. This is the first media production that I’maware of that attempted to take up the internet as a medium for communicationin its full power (even including user generated actions up through parts ofAct 5). This, alone, would make Homestuck worth paying attention to, even ifonly antagonistically.

Now for the second (shorter) point. Isaw someone joke once that HS is ‘the comic of the Obama era’ since it spansthe whole of his presidency, more-or-less (2009-2016). In that time, it createda *massive* internet presence that simultaneously influenced the content,themes, style, and other aspects of many diverse media forms (the wholeUndertale experience is just one gigantic branch sprouting from this Yggdrasilof memes known as Homestuck). It’s impossible to account for the massive impactthat Andrew Hussie has had on the content and form of the internet as weexperience it today (I mean, for one minor aspect of this, just look atSB&HJ and how those aesthetics have informed a massive amount of memecreation).

In this sense, I think it’s impossibleto regard HS as anything other than important. The pure, impossible to measurecultural impact it has had on media artifacts that we enjoy daily—even if theydon’t seem connected—is hard to overstate. For this reason alone, readingthrough some of HS is probably something worth doing (again, even if it’s onlydone antagonistically). To put this somewhat polemically, at the very leastHomestuck should be read as many novels are: not as a great artistic work, butas a window into a certain kind of cultural logic operating during a given timeperiod. And if that is the approach taken, then it’s hard to try and movepassed HS: I can think of no other media product that has had more of asingular impact, more breadth, and more userinteraction than HS has had on popular culture (except for, perhaps, HarryPotter, though that’s in an entirely different way and also—here’s,potentially, my real polemic—HS is much better).

Now on to some reasons why HS may, infact, actually be good.

Reasons why Homestuck is Good

I’ll break this into a few (hopefullyshort) themes: pacing, conversations, villainy, coherence, characterization, and (most controversially) the ending. (I would urge you—thecollective ‘you’ that may have been foolish enough to get this far—to not readthat last section if you haven’t read the comic. I’m trying to keep thisspoiler free, by and large, because part of my purpose in writing this is tosuggest that you should read it aswell [keep in mind Kant’s claim that aesthetic judgements are normativejudgements, lmao], though I think the ending is too important not to tough onto some extent.)

Pacing.HS does one of the oddest and most interesting things I’ve seen with pacing inany sort of media production. Perhaps this is a reason why some people haven’tenjoyed the comic, but it’s one of the reasons that I find it so thrilling toread, even on my multiple re-reads. The comic tends to move at a snail’s pace,with conversations that drag on and don’t advance the plot much (but they dodevelop characters, so it’s notuseless dialog by any means). This pace is enjoyable, but can get frustratingwhen you can see elements of the story building up to…something. Then, in abrilliant flash, the story erupts with tons of action: many diverse strands ofthe story are woven together into a single tapestry, lending coherence,consistency, and progress to the story. And the contrast between the slowtextual pace and the hyperspeed of the flash videos. The most obvious case ofthis is [S] Cascade, though I’d rather focus on [S] Make Her Pay, because Ithink it’s one of the strongest moments in the comic. (You can see the videohere, if you’re interested: https://www.homestuck.com/story/2578.A warning, though: I believe the video still autoplays, and it has music, sojust beware before opening that link.)

I don’t think I’m spoiling much bypointing to this flash video, since I think that almost everyone that has heardof homestuck at least knows that characters often referred to as ‘the Trolls’play an important part. They show up at the beginning of Act 5, which isperhaps a quarter of the way through the comic (given that [S] Cascade isnearly the halfway point). Their entrance into the story marks a kind of ‘reboot’to the story, where similar themes, tropes, etc. that were built in earlieracts are redeployed with these new characters. Further, it marks a definiteincrease in the complexity of thestory, given that it focuses on 12 difference characters, rather than 4, as thestory had done so far. The whole of Act 5 up until [S] Make Her Pay had beentext-based storytelling: detailing the complicated and twisted history of these‘troll’ characters, their involvement in the ‘game’ that forms the basis forthe whole of HS, and exploring new depths for the comic. But it is alsoslow-moving: the comic even makes reference to this pace in multiple partswhere it coyly talks about how we, the readers, ‘don’t have time’ to exploresome such gag, or go into depth about some story point, or to develop a flashanimation for some aspect of the story (e.g. Karkat’s Strife! with his lusus). This all is cut through with theappearance in the story of [S] Make Her Pay, which weaves the whole of Act 5Act 1 together, filling in many gaps of history that were left intentionallyunexplored at that point, and advancing the story by leaps and bounds. Therhetorical and affective dimensions of this contrast are hard to emphasizeenough: going slowly through all this history, all this plot, all this teen drama, in one of the longesttext-only sequences in the comic, only to have that pace flipped upside down bya single short video that connects so many disparate strands is really,well…exhilarating. It’s one of the things that makes the comic so intenselyenjoyable, dynamic, and, I think, worthwhile. I’ve never seen another piece ofmedia do such wonderful things with pacing.

Conversations.Due to this varied pacing, the majority of the comic is comprised of longdialogues. These dialogues have strong rules of how they’re allowed to beconducted, though. Conversations (until a certain element is introduced intothe story) have to take place through some medium: through a chat client(similar to AOL/MSN messengers), dreams, sprites, hand-written messages, etc.No direct conversations can happen between two people. There’s always somethinggetting in the way of conversations. I’ve never seen anything other than HScapture this element of conversations in the 21st century,especially without taking some condescending tone about how ‘screens rule ourlives’ or something. The fact that all the speech in the comic is mediated bysome form of media isn’t meant as a critique, but an accurate representation ofmany actual dialogues that happen. Perhaps this is only a good part of HSbecause it appeals to some of my sensibilities, so I’ll keep this short, butit’s an aspect that makes me enjoy the comic a lot. Growing up in the late90s/early 00s (I graduated high school in 2009, for a sense of my timelinehere), and having forged many friendships—even with friends I knew‘IRL’—through similar chat clients and such, this aspect of the comic simplyseems very real and intimate to me. I know that weird sense of closeness withpeople that you only, or primarily, know through text, and the kind of yearningthat can engender—and I think HS captures that very well.

Villainy.In sending your message, I assume you were prompted by the post I rebloggedthat mentioned that HS features many of the standard tropes of a literary epic.Of those kinds of tropes, one that wasn’t mentioned (and which tends to beparticular to post-1940s epics or pseudo-epics) is the presence of some kind ofabsolute evil entity which corrupts and destroys beyond any realm ofrationality. A figure of ‘radical evil’ if you will: an evil which is cold,calculating, perhaps even intelligent in many respects, but which displays akind of horrifying excess of humanness which is warped into some kind ofabominable evil. HS has such a figure and fleshes him out very well, and healso ends up being one of the best characters in the story (best in the senseof developed, engaging, important, etc. – not ‘good,’ obviously): Caliborn.

Caliborn (and LE) is a reallyinteresting villain because, as Dave mentions at one point, he hasn’t had muchof a direct evil influence over any aspect of the story (“what kind ofvillain is someone you never met who hardly did anything evil to you or yourfriends directly/or even to anyone in your universe for that matter other thanthrough some vague insidious influence/who even is this guy and why should ihate him” (6385)). By and large, he’s been absent fromany direct engagement with any character in the story, and yet his evil isomnipresent. As his constantly tagline goes “he is already here.”

The major way in which Caliborn is evilis through excessively narcissistic he is, how thoroughly self-involved, andhow he desires to make his will reality in all instances. He bends the fabricof time around himself to propagate and ensure his own existence: hisimmortality is guaranteed simply because he will to continue existing. His evilis systemic: it’s the very (genetic) code of the gaming session that all themain characters of the story occupy, and all of its other instances as well.

Further, there’s a level of ambivalentcruelty mixed with enjoyment that we get in Caliborn’s character that’s hard tosee matched in any other literary figure that comes to my mind. Yes, much ofhis dialogue is full of jokes and statements that make him seem very, verystupid, arrogant, etc. But there are a few scenes where we get a sense that heis a kind of primordial, absolute evil, who sees the very purpose of hisexistence as that of wrecking pain and terror across many instances ofuniverses. Two such scenes suffice here. (Potential spoilers follow in the restof this section.) The first is from when Caliborn enters his own session:consumed with hatred for the only other living being he’s known (albeitdirectly), he kills off a part of himself and awakens with joy. He thenproceeds to remove his own leg forcefully (that kind of dedication through painis frightening), and initiate the game. While everything is being sucked into ablack hole behind him, while the whole of his world and life are beingdestroyed around him, he is seen smiling serenely with his eyes closed. He cansmile, because he knows that this is the beginning of his dominance overeverything: this destruction is a prelude to him carrying out his will todestroy everything forever and in all ways. It is, quite simply, chilling.

The second scene happens in a shortconversation with Jake. This comment comes across almost as a joke, but itreally highlights the depth of evil he occupies. In talking about what it meansto be a ‘Lord’ in terms of his class, and how he came to recognize hispotential within this class, he says that “NOW I KNOW. THAT WHAT ITTAKES FOR ME TO LEARN AND GROW STRONGER./IS EXCRUCIATING EFFORT./SO I HAVE ACHOICE. WHICH IS TO EITHER BE WEAK./WHEN WEAKNESS IS COMPLETELYUNACCEPTABLE./OR TO SUFFER. FOREVER. UNTIL NO ONE ELSE EXISTS.” (5671). Despitethe presentation (Caliborn’s manner of speaking often undercuts the severity ofwhat he’s saying, but it’s important for a reader to keep this in mind), thisidea that Caliborn is willing to endure infinite suffering and pain to ensurethat his will is carried out—a will that desire the utter elimination of allthings throughout all of existence—is honestly terrifying. He is a characterwhose evil isn’t marked by any singular action (again, as Dave mentioned), butby a relentless drive. To be a bit obtuse here, Caliborn is basically theLacanian ‘lamella,’ especially in the sense that the lamella “doesn’t exist,but persists.” Caliborn suffers beyond life and death, as a half-dead creature(I mean, to really put the point explicitly here, the lamella is a half-dead,abject excess of life, and Caliborn is a skull monster who through the sheerforce of will ensures the necessity of his continued existence): he is evilincarnate, and I’ve never seen such a radical evil presented in a better waythan through HS. This is honestly one of the biggest literary achievements ofHS, and that’s why I’m dwelling on it at length. But let’s continue 

Coherence.This may seem like an odd category, since I believe that many see HS asexcessively chaotic and unstructured. I thoroughly disagree and thinking thatthe overwhelming coherence of this nearly decade-long story is part of whatmakes it so good. This is apparent in the many jokes and themes that arecarried through the comic, even at a distance of thousands of panels (twoimmediate examples jump out at me: the joke about how Sassacre’s text could‘kill a cat’ that’s realized after about 4500 pages, or the ‘bleating like agoat for ironic purposes’ gag that’s realized in about the same span). Further,this coherence is built into the overall structure of the comic: the fact thatthe first half of the comic takes place within about a day’s time whereas thelatter half takes place over 3 years (punctuated at the end by a lot of actionat the end) shows that the general structure of the comic follows the patternof pacing mentioned above. There is a lot more I could point to that would showjust how wonderfully coherent the whole HS story is, but I’m not sure if that’sa useful exercise upfront. It’d be more useful to talk about coherence inresponse to a dispute over whether some aspect of HS was coherent or not—absentthat, there doesn’t seem to be much of a point in detailing such here, otherthan to note that I do believe that the comic is generally very well puttogether (with the ending being a big bit of punctuation on this point).

Characterization.Andrew Hussie did two primary things with characterization that I appreciateand find worthwhile in the comic. The first thing he did was give a lot ofspace for characterization. We end up knowing a ton of information about thecharacters in the comic and a good 90% of it is relevant in some way to theplot (some of it is just interesting details, which is more or less fine whenyou have a character driven story where the characters are likable). Thesecharacters are dynamic and fully fleshed out in almost all cases (Nepeta is probablythe one major exception to this, though she even got a bit more development inthe end that pulled her away from just being a lolcat meme). Sure, any goodstory should have characterization like this, but I think the length ofhomestuck allows it to happen in really supple and subtle ways: the majority ofcharacters in the story are multi-faceted characters who develop in believableways over time that come into conflicts that sometimes just aren’t resolved.There’s also the willingness to have characters that are just irredeemablyhorrible people, without trying to shoehorn some kind of redemption arc in(Eridan is a nice example of this: he’s a thoroughly detestable and horribleperson, and there is no possible way to see him in a good light in a fairreading of the text [the HS fandom, which is not on trial here and should beexcluded from most all of these statements, has tried to make him into asympathetic character time and time again, and this is only possible becausethey’re reading the comic badly]). Further, and lastly on this point, due tothe depth of characterization, there’s also a lot of great between-characterinteractions in the comic: not great because they’re funny or witty orwhatever, but because they show the depth of character and work and a mutualrecognition of that depth between characters. The speech that Dirk gives aboutRoxy before their session’s versions of Derse and Prospit were destroyed is agreat example of this (and one of the greatest tragedies of the comic, from areader standpoint, is that Dirk never gets to tell Roxy any of that directly,at least not in any manner that we see).

Secondly, and this is heavily relatedto the first point, the depth of characterization that Hussie gives to theplayers in HS allows him to start with kind of obvious and one-dimensionalstereotypes of characters and morph them into something fully fleshed. And hedoes this not by simply inverting the roles of those stereotypes of something(which is common in a lot of ‘ironic’ pieces of media that try and overturn themajor tropes working within a given genre) but by fully fleshing outcharacters. I think this may be most apparent in someone like Dave. He beganthe comic by being a stereotype of some kind of hipster-bro, and almost all ofhis jokes, interactions, and conversations revolved around this stereotype. Itwas even folded into his personal mythology: because he’s the coolest, the mostcapable, etc., he’s the one that’s ‘meant to’ take down LE when all is said anddone. Slowly though, through confronting the stupidity that his mythologyforces him into (like having welsh swords as key items, for some reason) andalso confronting the death of his ‘bro’ and the feelings that stirred in him,he comes much more of a fully fleshed character. And by the end of the entirecomic, as he’s confronting issues of cross-cultural exchange, his ownrelationship to his abusive upbringing, his conflicted feelings about how tosituate his sexuality, etc., Dave has easily become one of the most thoroughlyrealized characters in the entirety of HS. That’s a hard thing to do when you’restarting with stereotypes of characters (which, it should be added, wasnecessary given the types of stories and games that Hussie was trying to riffoff of in developing HS) and end up with something thoroughly real, and HSshould be commended for being able to do such on many different fronts.

[I was going to add another piece aboutthe nice temporal dynamics of the comic, taking place originally over a day andthen over the course of three years, but this is already long enough and I’vementioned this part of HS a bit above, so I’ll let it be.]

TheEnding. I had a literature professor onceremark that the most conservative part of novels is the ending, because itforecloses on all of the openness and contingency at work during the otherparts of the novel. This is true for most pieces of media, and is why theendings of most things are bad (I’m replaying Mass Effect right now and it’sreminded me of two of my least favorite endings in media ever: that game, andBattlestar Galactica). I think HS, in many ways, gets around this problem.

To celebrate the ending of HS iscontentious, I know. It was mostly hated among the fandom. But I really thinkthat the ending is one of the most flawlessly executed pieces of the wholecomic. Many people were mad at the ending because it ‘left so many questions’open—but this is precisely why it’s good. It allows us to see that thecharacters continue to exist in some form or another, that their relationshipsdevelop, but it doesn’t answer every question that the comic poses, nor does iteven attempt to give us a rubric for evaluating those questions in anydefinitive way. Further, the ending is *genuinely surprising.* In a comic that’srevolved around a plot point of a ‘final boss’ that must be faced andvanquished, the comic surprisingly ends without this boss being defeated in anysimple manner. Instead, the main characters simply escape the confines of the ‘game’that they’ve been playing: a game that has brought them isolation, tragedy, andendless fear. The major resolution of the story comes through the charactersjust being allowed to live for a while, to enjoy their lives. That’s why theending text for the story isn’t “and they lived happily ever after” (or somesimilar cliché), but “Thanks for playing”—a sign that the worst is in the pastand that the lives of these characters is now truly beginning in a way that’s totallyup to them. That’s why, in the afterward,we get a snapchat story that shows various pieces of the lives of these characters,up through John’s 21st birthday. It was the best solution to such acomplex, diverse, and nearly decade-spanning comic: to allow the characters tohave some space to actually live on.

It was also the single best way ofdealing with this ‘final boss’—Lord English. In his form as Caliborn, as quotedabove, he’s a character that’s willing to suffer forever if it means that hehas complete control over the existence of the whole of reality. The best wayto ‘destroy’ such a character isn’t to have them killed (that would simply markan endpoint to their terror, but LE wouldn’t experience it as anything bad, torturous,etc.), but to have them trapped within a dimension all to themselves. By theend of the comic, LE is trapped in the game, with no means of escape, and isbound to the rules and logic of such a game. Sure, he’s omnipotent within thatsphere of influence, but all the characters have moved on to something else.This assigns him to a fate worse than death: to suffer forever without, throughthat suffering, attaining control and power over others. In this sense, I feelthat the ending that Hussie designed for HS is the only reasonable ending: andpulling off such a wonderful ending to such a long and complex comic is quitean achievement—especially since, as I’ve mentioned, this ending didn’t simply ‘tieloose ends’ or anything. It resolved the central tension of the story while(intentionally) leaving other tensions and questions unresolved and unanswered.It was—and this is rare for most any piece of media—a fully realized,thoughtful, and incredible ending to a story that I find to be one of the bestI have read in very many, many years.

And so that’s it. I was going toinclude another section about how HS is at least not-bad where I list common reasons that the comic is seen as badand show that they miss the mark, but this is long enough as is (9 pages inword). So I’ll leave this here. This isn’t a total justification of why I likehomestuck or why I think it’s worth paying attention to, I haven’t addressedmany of the major points, but I think I’ve made the case, at least partially,for why I think the comic might be worth taking a look into. Beyond that, I don’treally know what I can do, given that I’m only working with the message placed inmy inbox. But considering that most don’t care….that’s probably more thanenough, lmao.

[captainfawful]

It’s the end of the year, know what that means? It’s time for my second annual “Nobody Cares” Awards! Click the post if you’re super bored and have nothing better to do!

So.... 2017′s been a year, huh? Personally, it hasn’t been as bad as 2016 for me, but it was definitely.... A different kind of shitty, I guess. But hey! There were a lot of games that came out this year; many of which were really damn good. I’ve sorta been enjoying the whole mass writing thing, so I plan on this being more writing than last time. Get ready for my 9 paragraph essay on why I think Nier: Automata was the most overrated game of the year! (Just kidding, I would never make you suffer through that. God forbid I anger that fanbase.) I also tried coming up with different categories, so I don’t end up completely ripping off Giant Bomb (at least at the time of writing I haven’t, for all I know they could have the same categories as me and I’ll eat my words). That said, Best Music will always stay, without question. Now let’s start the show!

Best Title Screen

Persona 5

Atlus are geniuses. They kept churning out Persona 4 remakes, adaptions, and spinoffs like there was no tomorrow. It went so far that many people, including myself, were convinced Atlus was focused entirely on milking this cow. A few teasers came and went, and my thoughts of 5 just being “Persona 4: 2″ had not waned one bit. Then they showed the first real trailer. The trailer that would end up being the games opening music video. It was at that point that I realized “Oh wait, I actually had no reason to doubt them at all.” Everything about that trailer showed me the error of my ways, and convinced me that Persona had not lost its’ edge one bit. The game simply oozes style and creativity, and I believe the title screen to Persona 5 is a perfect representation of that style. I have more to say about this game later on in the Top 10, but I’ll say for now that the opening movie and the title screen give off an amazing first impression.

Runners Up:

Nidhogg 2

Sonic Mania

Best Game To Watch

Yakuza 0

I’m not a big fan of Beat-Em-Ups, Brawlers, Hack-N-Slash, Character Action Games, whatever you want to call them. I often find them repetitive and kinda boring. I’m not saying they’re bad or anything, I can totally see why people enjoy them. They’re just not for me. That’s one of the lesser reasons I believe Nier: Automata was one of the most overrated games of this year. My point is, I never got into the Yakuza series for that reason. A couple of my friends would tell me the ridiculous or silly things that happened in the games, and I was interested, but never enough to actually give one enough of a shot. When Yakuza 0 came out, I remember seeing it on a Giant Bomb Unprofessional Fridays, where Mary Kish played the first 45 minutes or so, including a karaoke song. That’s when I got hooked. I knew that Yakuza had a ton of weird sidequests, and over the top action, but I never knew that it also had legitimately good drama. I was fascinated by how good the cutscenes were. A little while later, Giant Bomb East did a playthrough of the whole game, and I watched every second. The quirkyness of the series is obviously a big selling point, but the amazingly well done cutscenes were what tipped me over into becoming a Yakuza fan. That being said, if I had to play the entire game on my own, I don’t think I would have finished it.

Runners Up:

Playerunknown’s Battlegrounds

My Summer Car

Best Music

Pyre

This one’s a surprise. I went into 2017, and got a lot of the way through 2017, thinking there would be no way Persona 5 wouldn’t have the best soundtrack of the year. Pyre’s soundtrack is really great. Darren Korb has a knack for making fantastic music, but the real reason I ended up liking Pyre’s OST more isn’t just because the songs are good, but also because of how they’re implemented. The game is structured mostly like a visual novel, with character portraits standing over their dialogue box when they talk. Depending on the character currently speaking, the instrumentation goes through very slight changes. If a larger character starts talking, the drums and/or bass become more prominent. If a more calm or quiet character starts talking, the song goes into a more acoustic arrangement, so on and so forth. Also, there’s a thrash metal song that is hype as fuck. That being said, while it’s not in the runners up, SteamWorld Dig 2 has the best music track of the year.

Runners Up:

Persona 5

Sonic Mania

Best Hand Drawn Animation

Cuphead

Here’s a trend I hope keeps up. It seems like this year brought more hand drawn games than years past, many of which look spectacular. Cuphead was first shown in.... 2014 I believe? It was just a random clip in an Xbox One Indie games compilation shown off at Gamescom, and it made a huge impression from just a couple seconds. The animation quality is flawless, and the attention to detail is extremely deep. They replicate that 1930′s cartoon style perfectly, on their very first shot.

Runners Up:

Sundered

Wonder Boy: The Dragon’s Trap

Best Bat-Wielding Motherfucker

Goro Majima (Yakuza 0)

What else needs to be said? There’s almost nothing more fun than smashing the shit out of things with a baseball bat. Granted, Majima doesn’t smash a lot of things, but more often people; luckily, I never was one for semantics!

Runner’s Up:

Mae Borowski (Night in the Woods)

Chloe Price (Life is Strange: Before the Storm)

Coming Soon

Listen, Iconoclasts is coming out in less than a month. That’s reason enough to be excited for 2018. On top of that, we have Dragon Ball FighterZ, Griftlands, Ni No Kuni II, Full Metal Furies, Wonder Wickets, and maybe Crackdown 3 also coming in the first quarter. However, there’s not a ton of 100% confirmed 2018 releases. Games like Valkyria Chronicles 4, Wargroove, Megaman 11, Indivisible, UFO 50, and mother fucking Spelunky 2 are all games that are allegedly coming out next year, but I have a feeling most of those will end up pushed back. Also, I can’t wait to see the glorious train wreck that will inevitably be Detroit: Become Human.

And maybe Mother 4 (name pending) will come out this year? Probably not. But here’s hoping!

And now.... The Top 10!

#10: What Remains of Edith Finch

I’ll cut straight to the point: Edith Finch is my favorite walking simulator (or as some might call it, stroll-playing game) I’ve ever played. Perhaps I’m a bit biased, as my personal favorite movie is Big Fish, which was definitely a source of inspiration for this game. I will say, however. that Edith Finch’s ending is nowhere near as good as Big Fish’s.

#9: Pyre

#8: Gorogoa

#7: Mario + Rabbids: Kingdom Battle

You know what I love? The combat in XCOM. You know what I hate? All of the base building garbage in XCOM. Mario + Rabbids puts a few interesting spins on XCOM’s combat, while also removing all of the boring bullshit in between. While there are several issues I have with the game, like not being able to take Mario out of the party, overall Ubisoft did a very good job creating this very... bizarre crossover. Disclaimer: I do not, nor have I ever had a hatred for Rabbids. I think they’re fine. In fact, if I had a source of income when I was 16 and Rayman Raving Rabbids came out, I would probably own a piece of Rabbid merchandise right now.

#6: Sonic Mania

Sonic Mania is pure fan-service, and I am a fan. I wasn’t expecting a whole lot when Mania was originally announced. As you know, Sonic hasn’t had the... Best reputation. Especially when they say they’re going back to his roots, Sega always manages to screw up one way or another. I’m not even that big a fan of Sonic Colors! So while I was into the way the game looked, I was still very skeptical. The more I learned about the game, however, the more interested I became. Finding out Christian Whitehead was front running the development, Tee Lopes providing the music, and seeing posts from people pointing out little in-jokes and references from the original trailer, all of this made me more and more excited. I figured even if the game wasn’t that fun, it would still be worth it to see all the little details they added to it. I got the game, loaded it up, and the intro began playing. I got shivers all over from the pure joy of that opening cutscene. Maybe this will actually be good? Shortly after, I got to the first Special Stage, where everything went all 3d. Okay, this game is kinda good. I played it a little more, and found myself in a boss fight where I had to play a round of Puyo Puyo against Dr. Robotnik. This game is amazing. While the Puyo fight was definitely the highlight of my excitement, but the rest of it didn’t fall off too far. Sonic Mania is an experience that I don’t think can be recaptured; a sequel would be fun, but I really doubt it could affect me the same way this game did.

#5: Horizon Zero Dawn

#4:  Persona 5

Persona 5 had the potential to be my game of the year. The aesthetics, style, music, color schemes, story revolving around punks and rebellion, creating a group of master thieves, and potentially off heists are all things that very much resonate with me. So what happened? What caused this game that should have turned into an all time favorite end up being a “I guess 4 is a good enough spot”? First of all, too many of the game’s segments go on for way too long. The dungeon designs are poor, with uninteresting puzzles that get extremely repetitive. Unlike Persona 3 and 4, however, this game does not get the excuse of randomly generated rooms as an excuse (despite how bad an excuse that may be.) Most of the later dungeons just straight up drag near the end, with a couple of them not having save areas for oddly long stretches of time. It felt like they just needlessly extended the dungeons to double the length of what should have been a 30-40 hour JRPG. I thought the characters overall were interesting enough, but their confidant links felt kind of same-y. The story didn’t feel nearly as important as in the previous games, and the big twists were either confusing, full of plot holes, or needed a half hour for the game to explain itself to you. But, at the end of the day, it’s still a Persona game. It may not be the best Persona game, in fact I would probably say it’s the fourth best (behind 3, 2, and of course 4) but overall Persona 5 managed to deliver an enjoyable experience. 

#3: SteamWorld Dig 2

#2: Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild

#1: Super Mario Odyssey

I’ve been trying for weeks to write up a big thing about why I love Super Mario Odyssey so much. And really, there’s not a whole lot to it. It is a joyous game. My entire time spent with it was fun, and I constantly had a smile on my face. Much like the intro to Sonic Mania, the Festival segment of Odyssey also gave me shivers from how happy it made me feel. And really, isn’t that what we need most in 2017? The biggest gripe I have about this game is that there isn’t enough of it. I would have liked to see a few more worlds, or have a bit more variety so there’s not, say, two water levels or two jungle levels. Which is a much better problem to have than with Persona 5, where I thought there was too much of that game. Hell, I played a lot more of it after the end credits, which is something I very rarely ever do. Overall, Odyssey is a splendid game that excels in almost everything it does, and makes the exploration of each world something I actively want to do. Odyssey, ya see?

Hey, hi! You made it to the bottom! If you read all that, or even a little of it, then you have my appreciation! Hell, even managing to scroll past all that to get down here deserves a pat on the back in and of itself. Well, that just about wraps up my pointless little awards ceremony. Due to the influx of big important games to play, plus some personal issues that ate up too much of my time, I didn’t make much progress in beating Kingdom Hearts II.8, or the Zelda games I missed out on. Oh well, there’s always next year? There’s always a next year. Even after humanity collapses in on itself (soon-ish?), there will always be a next year.Hope you all had a good holiday, and have a better 2018! Toodles!

[osakasshitpit]

My adventures with my PS4 and Night City

Here is what nobody asked for, my thoughts on Cyberpunk 2077.

Well well well. This certainly is a hot button topic right now. The game’s out, everyone is playing it and a fuck ton of people are complaining about it. Me as well. Playing it I mean, I spend the majority of this weekend playing it, actually, and I haven’t lost a word about it online. Full disclosure, I am playing on PS4 because I don’t have a PC that can handle it, let alone a PS5 (those fucking things are almost as rare these times as graphics cards, swear to god). I also could not play right on launch day, for a whole bunch of reasons. First, my Tabletop RPG group plays Thursdays and I’m the game master, so I can’t just drop off of the face of the earth and play Cyberpunk. I know, what a fucking nerd I am. Anyways, if that wasn’t enough, the fucking delivery service was fucking with me. My package didn’t get delivered on Thursday, for unknown reasons. Friday, it was finally due to arrive, but the mailman just didn’t think he should deliver my package. I only found out through tracking that he apparently was there and I wasn’t, despite the fact I was. Fuck that guy. I went to the post office to complain later. It turns out due to the ‘rona and the game being rated for mature audiences only, they could not deliver my package and I indeed had to pick it up from the post office, so I could verify I am of age. Usually, when this sort of thing happens and you gotta pick it up, earliest date you can pick it up is the next day, 10am... which would’ve been Saturday. Luckily for me, I was able to pick it up on Friday, despite the fact I shouldn’t be able to. Well, lucky me I guess. After coming home from work, I put the game in the console and had to wait pretty much the entire rest of the day for the fucking thing to install and patch, so that was a fucking bitch and a half. I played

After all that, I was finally able to at least make a character and play through the tutorial before going to bed.

Saturday and onward, I played roughly 20 hours, I got through the game’s story a bit and did a looooooooooot of side jobs. I played most of that time on version 1.04, the tutorial was on version 1.02.

So after explaining my situation, here are my thoughts.

The short version is, it’s a really good game that is sadly a little rough around the edges.

The long version... weeeeelll.

The game, even on PS4 with admittedly low graphics settings (the game was just not made for the thing and it shows from time to time), can look incredible. Most of that is in the lighting. By night, the city is glowing in this harsh neon tone I simply adore. By day, the city is bright and shiny, like polished chrome. The back alleys are dark, dingy and littered with trash. The city is like a maze made out of roads, alleys and underground walkways. The atmosphere this game has is what I expected and what I wanted, so A+ in that department. They also did an excellent job on the motion capture. When it comes to open world games, I’m pretty used to the shit bethesda sells you, so I was very very happy to see all the characters you meet move and emote like that. There were some rough spots, especially with everyone's favorite sleep paralysis demon Johnny, but over all the animation quality is top notch. It wasn’t all sunshine and rainbows, though. The texture quality is pretty low, at least on the environment (I think the quality on the characters is pretty okay for PS4). It is noticeable in many areas, but I guess I’m okay with that. I kinda wished the environments had better texture quality but I guess it’s a small prize to pay. What was kind of distracting for me was the visual glitches I encountered. They were not as frequent as many made them out to be, but when they occurred it was very noticeable. Bodies clipping and getting stuck in geometry, being violently distorted as they are trying to get unstuck to the ground I probably propelled them into with a shotgun blast. Things flickering in and out of existence in the distance. Light effects flickering from time to time. And of course, the odd model being rendered in low-res before blending into the high-res model. The later seems to be a major gripe for many a people, but I had this happen like, maybe 10 times? At least I actively noticed it like 10 times. It usually only took about a second or two until the game caught up. It mostly happened when I took a motorcycle to get around. After going like 200 km/h and stopping at my destination, the game sometimes took a few seconds to catch up and render the area properly and granted, it’s a bit of an annoyance but well, it happened rarely enough to bother me. My theory on why this happens is it probably has something to do with how the engine (which is the latest version of their own proprietary engine, the RedEngine) handles Level of Detail. To explain, in short, level of detail is when a game uses lower resolution models and textures for objects that are far away. They look like shit because they are not meant to be seen up close. They are meant to be seen from a great distance. At a far distance, it doesn’t matter if that model has 10000 polygons or 5, because all you see is a few pixels in the vague shape of something. Its a neat trick engines use to render more on screen without using much more power, and everyone is using it. If you have played Breath of the Wild, you might have seen this when you zoom in really close with your shieka slate towards something like a shire or a building that is far away. Anyways, my theory is that due to the way the engine handles this, the game gets confused sometimes and it takes a bit until the high res model loads in, which is why you see low res models up close. It’s bad, but probably just a thing they need to patch out. I have to admit though, that I only played it on a 26 inch 1080p screen so people with larger screens might find these graphical shortcomings more distracting.

One thing I found rather annoying in regards to graphics is that sometimes UI elements take a while to load. This happens very inconsistently so I don’t know why this happens but it does suck.

I’ll be honest though and say what was important for me was less the graphics and more the gameplay, aesthetic/atmosphere and story. I already stated that I think the game delivers on the atmosphere and aesthetics, but what about the gameplay and story?

Well, it’s pretty good I’d say. Gun play is good, Cyberware is integrated well into the game, granting you new perks and abilities and the RPG Mechanics (while not being the most in depth and faithful to how the Pen and Paper Games worked) are also pretty fun to fuck around with. It works like this: You get Stat points you distribute to get bonuses to stuff and that allow you to do certain actions. Some things have a stat requirement to do, like breaking down doors or hacking into a device to collect paydata. There are also dialogue choices that have stat requirements. These are optional, but very helpful. I have to say though, it’s pretty easy to have a jack of all trades that can get past most of these things. You can see that as a positive thing or a negative thing. Outside of that, you have skills that improve when you use them. What that grants you is perk points you can freely distribute among the many, many perks you can acquire. These usually enable you to do some stuff or grand you a pretty nice bonus to something, like being able to carry a lot more shit, increasing reload speed for weapons or granting you a passive health regeneration in combat (which is pretty good). Also, pro tip, if you are playing a netrunner, get the perk that allows you to get RAM back during combat as quickly as possible. Shit is vital for you to be able to actively use your hacking abilities. Netrunning is another thing I liked. So here is the deal. There are two types of hacks: Breaching and Quick Hacks. Breaching is basically breaking into the enemies network and leaving behind malware that give you an advantage. These can be pretty strong and don’t cost you resources, but you have to do a minigame to activate the effects. How it works is that you have this grid with HEX Values. You have to hit a sequence of values to activate a malware. There was some in world explanation onto why, but I forgot. Anyways, You can chain these together to trigger multiple effects and if sequences have some overlap, you might be able to trigger multiple effects at the same time. The catch is, that you can only hit the values by going along the top most row, then the column of the value you hit first, then the row of the value you hit next, and so forth. It sounds more complicated than it is, really. As soon as you hit your first value, the timer starts ticking, so you are encouraged to first find an optimal path and then execute. It is a pretty fun and quick mini game that gives you just the right amount of challenge to make you feel like a hacker when you activate all the effects. I like it a lot. Other thing is quick hacks. These are just programs you can fire off that do any number of things. For devices like cameras, there are a set number of things you can do with a quick hack to manipulate it. I think these also tie into your hacking perks? Not sure. For people and enemies, you have programs you slot into your cyberdeck. These can do all matter of things, suited for stealth and combat. These are extremely useful for a lot of things, like blinding someone momentarily so you can steal stuff right in front of their noses, making their weapon jam so you can either run past someone or fight them without opposition, disabling their cyberware to weaken them, and plain just dealing damage. The promotional material made it sound like you have to play stealth to hack, but that's not the case at all. You can very easily specialize in shotguns or melee combat and hack your opponents to give you an edge in combat. I think it is more suited for stealth because hacking (as far as I got at least) is very focused on 1v1 encounters, but there are some things that affect a whole group of enemies, so you can still use netrunning pretty effectively in the thick of things.

The story is also pretty good. only played till chapter 2, but so far I like it. I can’t say too much and promotional material spoiled a few things about the first chapter but there were still some twists and turns I did not see coming, I’m excited to see where this goes. Outside of that, there are a lot of side missions in the game, which are also pretty good in my opinion. You don’t have dialogue choices that influence the outcome of every quest, but even the more linear quests are pretty enjoyable. At least they usually give you the ability to approach a quest your way. You can’t always solve things with words, but y’know, it is rare that you talk a gang into getting fucked over by you so it does make sense that sometimes, violence is your only way out. For those who want to play nice, there are non-lethal weapons and even guns can be made non-lethal with the right modifications. So, you can play as a pacifist, I guess. I don’t know if that does anything but there you go. What is pretty neat and sometimes challenging even, is that some quests require you to use non-lethal force. Be careful though, some quests can be failed by just walking away or doing them to late or missing dialogue options. If a dude comes to you and says he pays you to drive him somewhere RIGHT NOW, you have to get a car RIGHT NOW and drive him there. If you go away to get a car, the quest fails. I wish they told you that but I guess it makes sense. Thankfully, autosaves are usually pretty merciful and you rarely loose much progress. There was one quest that really fucked me over because apparently I didn’t talk through all the dialogue options when I should’ve. Without spoiling anything, you had to talk to a guy. After doing that, you can go to the guy who asked you to do that and get your reward, but the quest isn’t finished. If you didn’t do a thing before getting your reward, you will fail the quest down the line. You still get paid but... well, I guess you could say you get the bad end for the quest.

Sadly, Quests are also where my main issue with how the game is right now lies. There are some bugs that can render a quest objectives broken, or stuck in limbo. Some of these issues fix themselves after a while or after loading a save before the quest, but it sure as shit is annoying to do things twice because the fucking game wouldn’t let you finish the quest objective. This happened a few times for me. Two side quests got stuck in my quest log, with no quest objective. I think I even got the reward for the quest but the quest just wouldn’t register as finished. That sucks a lot. Twice or so I had to reload a save because I couldn’t progress in a quest because the game didn’t register me doing the objective. One time, during the main quest no less, I couldn’t fulfill the objective at all because the item I needed for that couldn’t be interacted with. That sucks and shouldn’t happen.

There are also the crashes. Thankfully, crashes only happened like 4 times for me in over 20 hours of playtime but still, it’s annoying.

Overall, I’d say Cyberpunk 2077 is a very good game that is plagued by some technical shortcomings, but it is very enjoyable despite all the flaws. I hope they fix these issues soon but by the look of things, they are hard at work on getting shit patched, which I can appreciate. It not as bad as some people make it out to be and it not a scam as some people have called it, it’s just another game that might have needed a bit more time in the oven.