#just some dudes hanging out nbd

[haxxydraws]

hanging out

[eddie4bat-president]

I'm not a writer but i had this thought so- bear with me, yeah?

For months Eddie hears all about how cool and badass Steve Harrington is, yeah, but you know what he also hears about? How Steve and Robin are made for each other and how cool and pretty Robin is and how stupid it is that they're not a couple for some dumb reason, like Steve not wanting to be with a band geek and still clinging to high school hierarchy. And in all of the things Dustin says about Steeeve Harrington, that last part is the only thing that fits into the Munson Doctrine, so obviously everything else Henderson is saying is what's skewed in his little shrimp world view.

Steve Harrington thinks he's better than a band geek and that's why we won't look twice at a girl that would be perfect for him (according to Dustin Henderson, so... still questionably trustworthy information). Eddie probably assumes Dustin is talking up how close Steve and Robin actually are, just how he's exaggerating how close Dustin himself is to Harrington (like that would impress Eddie and the rest of Hellfire??? He really doesn't know how to get through to the little sheep that his worship of Hawkins' most notorious square is a detriment to his character and not something Eddie would find impressive. If it was real. Which it obviously isn't. Anyway-)

Turns out? Steve Harrington? Actually a cool dude. Not cool as in popular but cool as in "holy shit did he just bite that thing's head off???? Oh and he's not even gonna brag about that, it's just nbd, yeah sure, cool cool cool be fucking cool Eddie, oh god he's talking to me why is he talking to me" and just, chill to hang out with. After the whole shit show went down. Who would have fucking thought, huh? (except for Dustin Henderson, yeah yeah yeah, shut up)

So now Eddie has to reevaluate some other assumptions he made. Maybe Dustin was right and Steve actually is cool and badass, and he and Buckley actually are as close as he had said (and they really fucking are! He has seen them give Keith eerily matching bitchy looks for trying to schedule them on opposing shifts and basically bully the guy into changing the schedule around so they can spend as much time as possible in each other's presence. It's enough to make a guy question his own friendships when sometimes a few hours of band practice are enough to make him want to never see any of those chucklefucks again. Of course, that feeling abates but seriously, how are those two never sick of each other??)

So if they're as close as advertised but not a couple (and after meeting everyone Steve cares about and they're basically all nerds so the "Harrington thinks he's too good for a band geek" thing can't actually hold true-) what is the hold-up? Why aren't they a couple? And somehow, somehow Eddie comes to the conclusion that Steve is in love with Robin. Steve is a serial romantic (emphasis on romantic) and while his love life isn't the talk of the town post-earthquakes as it would have been before, people do still talk about the fact that he hasn't taken out a girl since it happened.

Which brings us to a day in summer, maybe fall, after Eddie has seen Steve look wistfully at a young couple with a baby, that he shows up at Robin's door step.

"Eddie? Hey what's up?"

"Good, good, how are you? Uhh can I... can I come in?" There's a nervous energy around him that is immediately infectious and she leads him to the living room where he immediately starts walking back and forth in front of the couch. She watches him for a moment, hands fluttering through different motions trying to find one that might calm him down before giving up on that. Instead Robin swerves around him, clambering onto the couch and wrapping her arms around her right leg, putting her head on her knee. She follows Eddie's path with her eyes and decides to wait before quickly realizing that she can't, actually.

"As riveting as it is watching you walk a groove into my parents' rug, do you maybe want to say something? I mean I can definitely talk enough for the both if us if that's what you want it's just that I have the slight suspicion you've got something you need to get off your chest" Eddie stopped walking halfway through her monologue and starts nodding.

"Yeah. Yeah yeah yes you're right it's just- I haven't a hundred percent made up my mind about saying something", Eddie has one arm wrapped around himself and uses the other to alternately play with his hair and gesticulate at her, "because on the one hand it's a little bit driving me crazy, maybe, but on the other hand this is none of my fucking business" And Robin who was worried at first just because Eddie is nervous, then for a second because she was scared he was going to confess to a very ill-advised crush on her, is stumped. What the fuck is this about and why did it bring him to her of all people?

"Just say it you weirdo", is what decides to comes out of her mouth but it doesn't even matter because half of her sentence is layered with his "Are you aware Steve is in love with you?"

[here we're facing the issue of me not actually being a writer and pretty much running out of steam but we also haven't reached the part that sparked this whole thing yet, which is wild - let's just pretend I wrote a very funny dialogue between those two in which Eddie confronts Robin for stringing poor Steve along ]

There's a moment when they're both silent and there's a moment when they're both talking and then there are steps coming down the stairs. They make a smirk grow on Robin's face that is starting to worry Eddie when not a parental figure but Steve Harrington steps through the doorway. He's wearing sweatpants and a shirt that might be Robin's and there's a headband pushing his hair away from his face.

"Don't yell at me for coming downstairs, you took forever and the first layer... is... dry....", he stops in his tracks the moment he looks up from his bare toes and sees Eddie. Then he very quickly rips off the headband and slings it somewhere to his right into the unknown of the hallway.

"Hi Eddie. What's... up" Eddie is going to sink into the floor and never come up for air again.

In the meantime Robin stood up on the couch to sit cross-legged on the back of it for a better vantage point and is steepling her fingers in front of her face. Eddie is getting the distinct impression he's missing some crucial information here.

"Stevie, babe, platonic love of my life-", Steve nods for her to go on, "you know how we decided I get a veto on your romantic life because we realized droves of suboptimal dates actually make you miserable so we're going for quality over quanity for the first time in your small-town Casanova life?" Steve has that cute little crease between his eyebrows while he's looking back and forth between Eddie and Robin, trying to figure out what's going on but he rolls his eyes at the end of her sentence, back in familiar territory. "Yes, Robin-"

She interrupts: "And you know how I also reserved the right to give a shovel slash molotov cocktail talk to anyone we deemed worthy of being a potential future partner?" Steve's face somehow shows an emotion that can only be encapsulated by "?!" as he glances to Eddie before shifting back to Robin with just the "?" remaining.

"First I have to say I'm personally very pro, I loved this experience; Eddie here really made a fool of himself, very worried for your delicate sensibilities and how I'm breaking your sweet little heart." "...what...?"

"So: what's the verdict on a potential future partner giving me the shovel talk?"

[phoebehalliwell]

Hear me out tho ... Phoebe/Yen Lo.

wait no you're absolutely cooking.......

1.6k under the cut

okay like an au where yen lo thru his practice of frequently slipping in and out of limbo ended up messing with his magic granting him immortality so as a way to combat that the charmed ones cursed him with a physical empathy so any blows he deals he will feels type deal. we can accelerate phoebe's empathy timeline to really sell that if we want. so yes he can kill someone, but he would go through as close to you could the process of dying, failing to actual die because you're immortal. and yen lo is so unbelievable annoyed by this. he's soooo offended like dude what is your problem. but he's like whatever this is fine this is nbd.

anyway some former student of the zen master's hears that yen lo killed him and is going to avenge his death, so yen lo gets in a fight and aah ouch oof ow!! and he kills the guy and it so terribly fucks him up. and he's like no!!! so he rolls up to the charmed ones like undo this now. and he gets phoebe who's like no no way asshole and he's like you don't understand and phoebe's like don't understand what and either phoebe empaths it or just simply deduces that it's all he knows how to do. clearly the fighters & zen masters have some innate magical quality, like yes they can all levitate which i love as an homage to traditional wuxia movements i literally remember my dad telling me as a kid whenever he would put on his kung fu movies as a selling point he's tell me that in these movies when someone became skilled enough at kung fu, they because able to fly.

ANWAY. yen lo came from a family where he was trained to be an excellent martial artist bc in this world the wirework stunts are not a thing just anyone can achieve through training it has to come with magic / a magical bloodline. so he's born into the warrior family and then what? was passed up? became their flop child? no. so he had to redeem himself in their eyes. so he had to kill the zen master and idk maybe an ling too (something he does not admit but phoebe deduces later) in order to return w honor or continue in exile. and phoebe's like too bad buddy i'm not gonna do that !! so he's like fine i'll just annoy you then. and phoebe's like what no but yep!

just always kind of lingering around with unhelpful commentary and you know he has the water/portal thing idk after phoebe fucks up her job interview or whatever yen lo's in a sprinkler puddle ready to make some dumb zinger when oh no a demon! and he jumps out and saves her by killing the demon so now he's in his mortally wounded phase so phoebe idk gets him to safety maybe using her power (premonition or empathy) and feeling how it works and yen lo's hand she gets him to the manor and just idk leaves him in one of the rooms. and then she's getting a glass of juice or whatever and yen lo just pop's up like you brought me back here. and phoebe's like yeah i mean i could leave the guy with the gaping wound in his chest on the street and yen lo's almost happy for a sec and then phoebe's like i mean, it might looked like i killed you. not to mention you can't die. that's also gonna be a tough one to explain. and yen lo's a lil mad then he's mad that he's mad bc like no that is the obvious answer?? like why else would she? and phoebe's like what were you doing anyway? saving my life? and yen lo's like yeah. who else is gonna undo my curse. and phoebe's like right oh. and yen lo is like well hey now that you owe me a favor..... and phoebe's like no!!!

anyway he still keeps hanging around and he and phoebe become sparring partners because he's like ur form wrong! boo high kick to low! pullback not fast enough! and phoebe's like okay you know what you shut the fuck up! and yen lo's like no >:) if i were to attack you like this and he goes to attack her and phoebe just blocks. and he's like fine but i i were to this. and then she blocks. and then he does like a combo of moves, she blocks and does one swing back. which he dodges. no they're sparring. boom boom boom boom. ooh it looks like phoebe's gonna win. she's got him pinned, she's smiling. but no!! yen leo is back in the game. more sparring boom boom boom boom boom. now yen lo's got her pinned! and she's smirking. through some use of her enviroment (probably the basement) or some use of her powers, it's actually phoebe with the winning move. yen lo realizes this and is like fine. ur high kicks still need to be higher.

so now they're like training together he's teaching her like traditional swordfighting and phoebe's teaching him the more mma style she practices. training montage training montage maybe bc they're so accustomed to how the other fights that they become incredibly good in fights against the demons they face and like. SIDEBAR. when they spar he doesn't feel the blows against phoebe. maybe like the first three total. but in their battle's his curse somehow doesn't seem to be activated. he finally realizes and askes phoebe about it. phoebe shrugs and says because of the wording of the spell, it must only transfer acts of malice. since he's not doing this to hurt her, he doesn't feel it. OKAY. so maybe phoebe usually takes the vanquish bc let's be real it's very difficult to get ur ally home when their organs feel like they've just disintegrated in flames. but there's some battle where oh no sneak attack! and yen lo has to kill the guy rather than let him get phoebe, and phoebe whips around expecting her backup to hit the deck, but no, he seems unaffected, that's weird. (yen lo def knows because he was moving to defend phoebe not attack someone. but like. know he made that move purely out of protection? just a lil too much information you know?)

blah blah blah we're talking about it and we bring up the wrong thing done for the right reasons is still the wrong things (which? do i hate morality bites for this specifically? yes. but the episode eats idc i'm not going to ignore it in canon.) and phoebe gets to talk about her fear that she's not strong enough to not go evil (where's cole in this storyline? maybe she has already accessed dark phoebe. maybe not. who knows?) but yen lo just scoffs and is like no. i've seen you. you're not evil (it's a phoebe character theme!). they leave it on awkward terms.

phoebe's on a date maybe the cole thing ended when in season three when the source killed him idk. oh that would be go brutal for phoebe. go to the underworld to save ur boyfriend, succeed in saving him, but then immediately having both ur sister and your boyfriend die bc of said saving. i don't think i could put her thru that. Anyways. she's getting back in the dating game. it's three dates with this guy and he's fun he's fine i mean she likes him but it's just kind of missing this spark? you know? oh but maybe it's just her because she's holding back and piper's like well why are you holding back? and phoebe thinks and for some reason yen lo pops up in her mind for some god unknown reason and she says that her just last couple relationships have ended up so poorly and she's afraid to put herself back out there and it definitely has nothing to do with her sparring partner with cheekbones that could cut through steel who keeps slipping into her dirty daydreams instead of boring mcwhatever she's currently seeing whoops.

and yen lo's so pissy in this era bc what does she even see in that guy. fuck that guy. so they're arguing even more than usual even while sparring the mouths move almost as fast as the fists and they're getting genuinely pissed at each other because yen lo won't keep mcwhatever's name out of his mouth and phoebe's like dude shut up about him and yen lo's like i'm sorry i don't like to butt in on a boring life and phoebe's like then don't butt in and yen lo's like no and phoebe's like god ur so damaged what do you even care and yen lo's like oh i'm damaged i'm not the one dating someone so devastingly lame because you're too afraid of finding something real you'd rather stay in the shallow end then find something that actually makes you feel something. lowkey kind of you're marrying a man fathoms beneath you because you don't want to risk being betrayed type beat lowkey. and phoebe's so almost speechless like what? i feel things? and yen lo's like that's bullshit and you know it and the worst thing is it is and it makes phoebe so mad that she slips up and yen lo pins her. a beat. they're panting. that was a lot of fighting, in both meanings of the wo- oh. oh they're making out sloppy nasty rn.

[verdantglow]

asking you some easier questions. (or hopefully)

who's your favourite troll or troll pairing to write/think about?

also whats pearly up to in this au?

(also to be abundantly clear its still me, your loyal asker, ive just changed my username, i have not abandoned you i promise)

The Mummbo-Griann-Scar combo/group is probably the one I think about the most, though I also have a lot of love for my other disaster trio, Cleaoh-Eethos-Bedubs. Which is funny because I’m not a huge Clethubs person generally (nothing against it! I don’t think poorly of it or anything, I actually like it, it’s just not Ver-bait.). But there’s something about these two blue bloods that everyone finds scary & their blustering but generally amicable bronze blood quadrant mate, & the fact that if you dare touch their low blood, they will completely fuck you up. (They consider themselves in a stable 3-way auspistism, but, because this an AU made by my queer ass self, they tend to drift around the quadrants a bit. Nothing as…. Intense as Scar & Griann, but sometimes one of them will be feeling pale or flushed towards another & they just roll with it like it’s nbd. & occasionally, Bedubs lets Eethos & Cleo drift a bit more pitch. You know. As a treat.)

Relatedly, I personally subscribe to the thought that an auspistism can be either two or three trolls: you’ve got dynamic auspistices, where they generally act as this meme for each other

& then there’s stable auspistisms, where one party is consistently auspistizing for two others. I can’t back this up at all with Homestuck canon, but it was a fairly common head canon for a bit back in the day & I like it so in the AU it goes!

Anyway, back to the question. It’s really funny, because I’m sooooo hype for so many of the characters & spend so much time thinking about all of them, but I just keep drawing Eethos instead of any of the many other trolls I still need to make art for. I think it’s because his cartoon moose antlers delight me so. (Also there’s just something about characters with pale/white hair that gets me every time. Every single ship I’ve ever been properly feral for has included at least one pale haired dude & I still cannot figure out why. Also they all have red eyes. Fuck.) (Note: I’m not including Scarian in that because while I am devoted to Scarian, it’s not like how I am over SmallEtho. I am unhinged about those two lol.) (Nevermind, my fiancé just pointed out that my first ever ship— Zutara—didn’t include a pale haired dude with red eyes, just every single one since then.)

Okay, so Pearle. From what I’ve got figured out, she starts out on the same ship as Scohtt, Jimmie, Martyn, & Wrehnn, as she & Scohtt are moirails at that point. Post-Double Life, Pearle ends up a bit sour about how Scohtt acted towards her, & winds up deciding to spend some time on another ship. For a while she hangs out with Bigbee on his tiny transport ship, but it is, you know, tiny, so Bigbee introduces her to Gem, a defected Alternian military officer who is currently wandering space doing piracy. Pearle & Gem hit it off & Pearle joins Gem on her (slightly) larger ship.

After Limited Life, they both move on to the Tangoh-Impuls-Skizzl ship for a variety of reasons. For one, they want to be more connected to Pearle, & eventually Gem’s, VLARP friends & honestly the crew of that ship has the least amount of nonsense happening out of anyone. But also, Gem’s ship doesn’t have the speed that Impuls can make happen, & the Alternian military isn’t taking too kindly to Shiny Duo’s piracy & connections to the resistance. So, when Gem’s ship gets burned (as in it is no longer capable of going undetected), it’s the last straw pushing them to join up with another group. As of post-Secret Life, the five of them are all still living harmoniously on the ship together, though they sometimes have additional guests (mostly Jimmie but Bedubs as well).

As for what Pearle is doing outside of where she lives, crime, mostly. She helps Gem with piracy for a while & once they properly join the resistance, Pearle runs a lot of operations type stuff.

A fun fact about Pearle: She is actually also a mutant like Griann, though hers presents as moth wings she keeps hidden & secret.

[ohnotheybombadidnt]

WELL. THEY DID THE DOGGONE THING.

Met Rings of Power's Tom Bombadil. I wrote a blog post, so needless to say, I ain't happy.

As a reminder, Tom Bombadil has been called, "...one of the most enigmatic characters in J. R. R. Tolkien's novel." He was there. They raised a couple of questions. He was a weirdo in the woods. Not my charming Tom. Anyway. Let's dive in, shall we?

I am trying not to be big mad but I am all-around displeased with this representation of one of my absolute favorite characters in all of literature.

I've been racking my brain trying to figure out how to make a live action version of Tom palatable for me.

I came to this weird realization that if they were going to interpret him in this medium and give him this vibe that I wanted so badly to like because IT'S TOM, I could have possibly accepted Squirrely Dan from Letterkenny (actor Trevor K. Wilson) and probably actually had a DRAMATICALLY SHORTER LIST of things to grumble at.

But instead, we got this presumably nice man, Rory Kinnear, a Shakespearean actor. To look him up he is very clean-shaven, in several James Bond films, and honestly, that's it. Nobody knew what to do with this character. Same dude below on either side. Nothing in that face says ENIGMATIC and UNFORGETTABLE TO THE SEASON to me. He must have come cheap. That's the only thing that makes sense.

The dialogue they gave him was so lackluster too. His singing has no wow factor. He's barely mumbling tunes under his breath. Just. Ugh. Do they not want people to fall in love with him because he's a momentary side character and then poof, he's gone? In the trilogy, he is featured in book one a few times. During one of these reunions, the hobbits meet Tom and take off all their clothes and run around in Tom's field, chasing each other and just guys being dudes. Just dudes being guys. Nothing weird happens. I know Gandalf had ties to the Hobbits, particularly the Bagginses, but TOM WAS RIGHT THERE THE WHOLE TIME. I know he didn't volunteer or want to get involved, but this dude's powerset is unreal. HERE'S HIS WHOLE SCHTICK:

1. He's older than dirt but still a pretty sprightly fellow. Always singing and doing his thing, dancing, hanging out with his hot wife (which I think they're implying is some kind of sentient water being or something weird in the show?), living in his awesome house on this beautiful piece of property that's all his. He's doing pretty gosh darn well for himself. But let's just call him old, excuse me, "The Eldest," and leave it at that, Rings of Power.

2. Oh, he's immortal. Nbd.

3. "Master of wood, water, and hill." I'm just going to take this metaphorically since it was spoken by Goldberry, River Daughter. Tommy B is the OG Clarence Carter. But real talk. Bro lives in a forest. He's around all those things that he has mastery over and he can weaponize it at will? Sweet power, but I don't buy that THAT GUY we just met can do it. I want to, but I just don't feel it. Now Galadriel during that one battle this episode- HOT DAMN! Slay while you slay, girl!

4.  "He is impossible to capture or imprison." WHY ISN'T THIS GUY DOING SO MUCH MORE?! Why WOULDN'T we want a Houdini?!

5. Ordinarily described as whimsical/nonsensical, but he could be serious if the need arose.

6. THE RING HAD NO POWER OVER TOM. But Tom was just a guy who sets things down and then immediately forgets where he left them, like most of us. Gandalf recognized his "organized chaos" and recognized that TB didn't have as much order as he thought he did, had a 99% chance losing the ring, and our favorite wizard went Shire-bound. Not what I would have done, but whatever, Gandalf, go off.

7. Tom's greatest revealed power was in his singing. With song he exercised authority over Old Man Willow and the supernatural Barrow-wights. He did it LIKE IT WAS NOTHING. What are the true extents of his powers? Who all could he take on and wipe the floor with? We'll never know. Because poor lil powerless Frodo got suckered into the task thanks to Bilbo and Gandalf. Tom could have been majestic.

Moving right along... what could have been: IMMEDIATELY WHEN ISILDUR SAYS HE WON'T DESTROY THE RING, ELROND NEEDS TO TELL GANDALF, GANDALF FLIES TO TOM, EAGLES ARE HAILED, RIDDEN TO MORDOR, DROPPED THE RING DOWN THE VOLCANO, AND WATCHED IT BURN. BOOM. CREDITS ROLL.

Okay. I admit that's a much less entertaining story, but don't give me a God-man like Tom and then not use him, then give me a gorgeous show like Rings of Power, put him in, and make him meh-looking and kinda mysterious but people who know about the lore and the endgame know he's not really going to do anything. They could have at least made him more, I don’t know, ENIGMATIC, cooler, and a little more magical. (Entwives and Barrow-wights were *chef's kiss.*)

Really miniscule and bland beginning for old Tom. Hopefully it improves. The one thing I liked: he raises goats. However, that is not enough, so still he remains, #notmytombom

[hideyseek]

suddenly gripped by the need to blog about the experience i just had ok. im watching youtube, i get a phone call from an unknown number, i pick up. its some chinese uncle type calling his doctor, and im like, pulling formal phone-answering chinese out of my ASS (like i have not said "请问这是哪位?" in like, the last FIVE YEARS probably, tbh i probably only know this from listening to my mom answer the phone as a kid) and telling him he maybe has the wrong number, and then he hangs up and texts me to apologize and im like (paraphrased and translated:) genuinely nbd my dude ive been there, since im an abc its actually really nice to have a chance to speak to someone in chinese. and then he !!!! texts back asking if i wanna chat some more and i say yes omg and then we just have an extremely pleasant convo in mandarin for like 10min about where our families are from and daylight savings time!!!! he kept saying how fateful (he said and i quote "缘分") it was that the number he mis-saved in his contact happened to be a person's number and not a 空号 (meanwhile im internally like: the more fateful thing to me is that the person on the other line also spoke mandarin) but like wahhhhhhhhhh truly so!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! truly so!!!!!!

[thebibliomancer]

Essential Avengers: Avengers Annual #16: The Day DEATH Died!

October, 1987

Fifteen Avengers battle the warriors of DEATH!

Being superheroes sometimes means you have to fight a bunch of dead dudes to save the universe. NBD. Except its a very big deal due to the aforementioned fate of the universe.

Is that fucking Norman Green Goblin Osborn in the mix? How is him being a warrior of the DEAD going to gel with him actually founding a cult in Europe those years he was assumed dead?

I’m counting the “fifteen Avengers” and for one thing, we’re definitely honorary-ing Silver Surfer and Moon Knight to get a round number, huh? BUT ALSO, Tigra is the one actual Avenger who doesn’t get on the cover. Oof, no respect.

Last time on West Coast Avengers Annual #2: the East and West Coast Avengers are having their annual baseball game when the East Coast Avengers drop dead. The West Coast Avengers go to the Collector on Silver Surfer’s advice and on the Collector’s advice chug poison. This lets them find the East Coast Avengers in Death’s domain. Then the two teams fight because the Grandmaster and the Collector told them conflicting stories.

BUT TWAS ALL A RUSE. The West Coast Avengers winning the fight... uh... well, something is going on and Grandmaster has taken Death prisoner and says the universe is his.

More explanation, please.

The two teams of Avengers don’t wait for an explanation. On Captain America’s command, they all rush forward and try to attack the Grandmaster.

Thor claims that even an Elder like the Grandmaster can’t stop them all but he effortlessly brushes them aside, explaining that he has absorbed Death’s power.

Oh. That’s not good.

What is good is that as a villain, he feels compelled to exposit what happened.

IT ALL BEGAN when Korvac murdered the Collector so he wouldn’t narc on him to the Avengers.

For all their other foibles, the Elders of the Universe are a pretty loyal lot to each other so Grandmaster set about finding a way to bring the Collector back to life. Eventually, he settled on a wager with death - the Contest of Champions.

And the Contest of Champions was such a spectacle that it gave him an idea. An awful idea. A wonderful awful idea.

Step one was to throw the Contest of Champions wager so that the Collector was brought back to life but Grandmaster’s life was forfeit.

Step two was to just hang around Death’s realm, studying her.

Um. Do dead people just get to hang around peeping on the big boss? Is that really how death and Death work in the Marvel universe?

Anyway, step three was to contact the Collector on the downlow to set up his plan.

Step four was that the Collector is the one who killed the East Coast Avengers and dunked them into Death’s realm. And when he helped the West Coast Avengers kill themselves so they could go to Death’s realm, the intentionally conflicting stories each Elder told an Avengers team guaranteed they’d fight.

And a big, exciting happening right on her front door drew Death’s attention and while she was spectating, Grandmaster seized her. Which is something he can do. Shut up, yes he can.

Anyway.

Death earned some respect back from me. Its not great that such a simple plan hoodwinked her power from her. But at least she didn’t gamble her power on a superhero slap fight.

But with his greatest game won, Grandmaster has decided he’s bored of this universe. What’s left to challenge him? Nothing, that’s what.

Grandmaster: “I belong to a race of beings which first gained sentience in the wake of the Big Bang -- the cataclysmic event which began this universe! For countless eons, I have watched the game of life played out on an infinite number of worlds! I am bored, and desire a new game! Behold the life-bombs I have created with the power of death! Scattered to the five most distant corners of the universe, they will start a massive chain reaction which will result in -- A NEW BIG BANG!! Think of it! The universe will begin over anew! We’ll have a new game of life to play -- one designed by me!”

Hey!

I don’t think the universe has five corners or corners at all!

Also, hey! That would kill literally everyone!

Captain America doesn’t like this one bit. And a straightforward assault having failed, he instead challenges Grandmaster to a game! A sporting chance!

Luckily, Grandmaster prepared such a challenge ahead of time.

Oh no, its Swordsman, Nighthawk, Skurge the Executioner, Terrax the Tamer, Hyperion, Green Goblin, Korvac, Death Adder, DRACULA, Bucky Barnes, Black Knight I, Captain Marvel I, Baron Blood, Drax the Destroyer, and Red Guardian!

Several of these people turn out to not actually be dead but that kinda thing always happens whenever someone uses a bunch of dead characters as a team to fight a superhero team.

And there’s a handwave for it later.

Anyway. The game is this.

Grandmaster will transport some Avengers (+ guests) and some of the Legion of the Unliving to the location of one of his life-bombs.

Team Avengers will try to destroy the bomb before it goes off, Team Legion will protect the bomb and try to kill the Avengers.

But Grandmaster tells Death he’s actually stacking the deck.

Grandmaster: “This should prove very interesting -- even though the Avengers are destined to lose! In the past, my fascination with skill and chance has often affected my judgement and overwhelmed my desire for victory -- but not this time! I will not allow my love for the game to interfere with my ultimate goal! I am determined to win this contest at any cost -- to seize the greatest prize of all -- THE UNIVERSE ITSELF!!”

Holding unfair games? You really are a villain, Grandmaster!

MATCH ONE: Hawkeye, Thor, and Doctor Pym VS Swordsman, Skurge the Executioner, and Nighthawk!

Hah, wow. Swordsman was Hawkeye’s teacher, Skruge was a fellow Asgardian and died for Thor, and Nighthawk is... some guy? Hank got the short end of the stick here in matchups.

Also, the Grandmaster put the first life-bomb in Hades. Literally sent these three Avengers to hell.

... Is Hades/Hell part of the universe? I mean, it would have to be since the universe is all the everything. But usually its treated like a separate dimension. But I guess you can have a lot of dimensions that all make up the 616 universe. I guess?

I also like Dead Swordsman calling the Avengers a “stupid team.” Sounds like sour grapes coming from a dead guy who once begged to join.

Nighthawk makes the first move, jetpacking at Dr Pym, yelling about what a lousy superhero he is not having powers or a costume.

Dr Pym responds by pulling a gas grenade launcher out of his pants and blasting Nighthawk with it.

The ability to pull whatever tool you need right out of hammerspace IS a cool superpower, no matter what that Nighthawk chump says.

Thor squares off to fight Skurge. But less fight and more attempt to talk with. Because Skurge recently sacrificed his life for Thor and Thor feels weird about having to fight him, even if its for the sake of the universe.

Skurge cheap shots Thor and mocks his hesitance.

Skurge: “’Tis a pity that honor paralyzes you! I have no such weakness -- no honor -- no loyalty -- nothing -- save a savage desire to crush you -- to make you pay for having caused my death!”

Meanwhile, Hawkeye fights Swordsman.

He doesn’t have a problem with the concept even though he has a personal connection to this dead man. Its just the dick keeps cutting his arrows out of the air with his sword.

(Also to note, despite She-Hulk destroying Hawkeye’s bow and quiver last issue, he has it back now. Mighty kind of the Grandmaster to replace it for him?)

As the heroes are all stymied by their opponents, the life-bomb starts glowing, getting ready to explode.

Dr Pym is pinned down by Nighthawk firing wing lasers at him. That is, lasers that come from the tips of his wing-like cape.

Pym enlarges a shield and bounces some lasers back, destroying Nighthawk’s wings but the lasers also cause a cave-in.

Dr Pym enlarges a brace (because he really does have everything) to hold up the roof but Nighthawk breaks a stalagmite and uses it to impale Hank while he’s distracted.

The collapsing roof collapses, burying both Nighthawk and Dr Pym, but Nighthawk accepts this since he’s already dead.

Oof.

Well. One hero and one opponent out of the fight.

Meanwhile, Thor realizes from Skurge being a big ol’ dick that this isn’t the Skurge that sacrificed himself for Thor.

Thor: “You are not the god I once knew! For all his faults, the Executioner was a man of honor! A warrior-born! You are only a nameless shade in his guise! A grim phantom conjured up to torment me -- and I shall suffer you no more!!”

And once Thor starts trying, he knocks out Skurge in the very same panel.

Meanwhile, Hawkeye knocks out Swordsman. Now that he has Swordsman knocking every fired out of the air, it was simple to sucker him with an arrow that electrifies when struck.

But the delay in beating their opponents, the bomb is about to go off. And neither Thor nor Hawkeye can defuse it in time. Thor fears the universe is doomed unless --

Unless he swings his hammer REALLY fast. It solves a lot of problems. But in this case it solves the problem by creating a vortex that surrounds the bomb and Thor. The bomb does go off and eradicates Thor but the universe is saved.

Hawkeye takes a second to realize that Thor disappeared in the contained blast. And then realizes Dr Pym is gone too.

His two companions are dead.

SCENE CHANGE!

Wow, these groups are not evenly broken up at all.

Group 1 was three people. Group 2 is four: Captain Marvel, She-Hulk, Moon Knight, and Tigra. Cool that its two from the East Coast Avengers and two from the West Coast Avengers though.

Captain Marvel doesn’t waste any time, she immediately nyooms toward the bomb to see if she can figure out how to defuse it. But the Grandmaster handpicked suitable opponents to stymie the Avengers and guests. And unfortunately, despite Captain Marvel’s usual difficulty to harm in light form, the Grandmaster selected Captain Marvel (Mar-Vell) and Drax the Destroyer to oppose this group.

Drax claims that he and Mar-Vell both have the ability to absorb energy. That’s true for Mar-Vell but I’m not seeing anything about that for Drax. He might be just making shit up.

I guess even if its just Mar-Vell absorbing energy out of Monica, it’d be bad enough.

She-Hulk throws a tree and interrupts Drax and Mar-Vell’s attack on Captain Marvel.

Drax immediately comes after She-Hulk but she knocks him away.

Green Goblin shows up as opponent number 3 and starts attacking Moon Knight. He gloats that though Moon Knight is fast, Green Goblin tangles with an even faster opponent. But as Moon Knight points out as he decks Green Goblin in the jaw, Green Goblin lost to said opponent.

(Dunno how Moon Knight knows that.)

While Tigra tries to decide which of her friends and acquaintances to help, opponent number 4 shows up. Death Adder pops out of the lake and drags her underwater. Just one slash from his claws and she’ll be lethally poisoned! Also, she’s underwater! She may have cured her cat soul problems but this is still a less than ideal situation!

Captain Mar-Vell flies around trying to blast Captain Marvel with his photon blasts. Wait, she can absorb those. Why is she dodging? Dammit, Monica! Drax lied that he can absorb energy and you forgot that you actually can do it! You did it last issue!

Anyway, Captain Mar-Vell berates her for resisting the inevitable so hard.

Captain Mar-Vell: “The universe is doomed! You have about as much chance of saving it as you do of avoiding my photon blasts!”

Captain Marvel: “Wise up, mister mouth! Avengers don’t quit! We never give up -- no matter what the odds!”

Drax has been getting his shit kicked in by She-Hulk but he channels the Drax the Destroyer single-minded obsessiveness (aimed at She-Hulk instead of Thanos due to Grandmaster) and shatters her spine with a surprise attack while She-Hulk is distracted looking at Tigra’s plight.

Meanwhile, Moon Knight is having a bad time. Even though he can go toe to toe with Green Goblin, Grandmaster didn’t replace all of Moon Knight’s gear like he did for Hawkeye. So Green Goblin is able to keep out of reach and bombard Moon Knight with his own goblin gear.

Moon Knight dodges the pumpkin bombs but isn’t so lucky when Green Goblin throws a gas grenade full of hallucinogenic gas. Overwhelmed by grotesque imagery, Moon Knight can’t dodge when Green Goblin blasts him with his finger sparkle gun.

Green Goblin: “Is something troubling my friend? Don’t despair! The Green Goblin can put an end to all your worries -- for all time!!”

Dick.

Meanwhile also, Tigra manages to break away from Death Adder and get out of the lake. She climbs a tree and baits Death Adder to follow her. When he does, she suddenly wheels around and slashes him, figuring either the disembowelment geez! will kill him or falling from the tree will. But Death Adder lashes out with his tail and the toxin on his spines paralyzes Tigra and she falls to the ground too.

Captain Marvel manages to dodge Mar-Vell long enough to reach the bomb. She has to use the rest of her strength but she busts the force bubble around it and then safely detonates the bomb.

Hooray!

Except...

Lying broken on the ground, She-Hulk and Tigra die, a mere inch from holding hands. Moon Knight is dead nearby. And since three of the opponents weren’t beaten, they all gang up and kill Captain Marvel.

Because the match doesn’t end until one side is completely out of action, even if the bomb is stopped.

Geez.

What a PG bloodbath.

So we go from a group of three to a group of four to just one dude?

How are you deciding these divisions, Grandmaster?

Location three for the Grandmaster’s life-bomb is just the middle of space. Luckily, the Silver Surfer is well-equipped to nyoom to the bomb. Unfortunately, the Surfer’s chosen opponent is Korvac. And with his vast cosmic power, he has surrounded the life-bomb with an invisible barrier.

Korvac is also still in his casual phase so he’s kicking back in a recliner, with a drink, in his sitting around clothes while he tries to help destroy the universe.

Korvac: “I am Michael Korvac. There was a time when my name was known and feared throughout the entire universe. You see, I possess the power cosmic on a scale far greater than even you can imagine. Let’s be civilized, shall we? Since there’s no possible way for you to defeat me, we might as well enjoy a drink together while the universe goes bye-bye. What’s the matter? Don’t you care for champagne? Maybe you’d prefer a nice hot -- COSMIC BOLT!”

Silver Surfer no-sells a bolt that could destroy a world because he “has basked in the glow of a thousand suns!”

You’d think that Korvac would know that, considering the origin of his cosmic contender powers were from draining the computers from Galactus’ ship.

But then again, we’ve established that the people Grandmaster summons to fight for him aren’t quite the actual people they were.

Real deal or no, Korvac doesn’t fuck around. He magnetizes Silver Surfer and lets him be crushed by enough meteors to form a small planet.

 Silver Surfer manages to bust free with his own POWER COSMIC. A stray rock knocks Korvac on his ass and distracts him long enough that Silver Surfer also manages to break the barrier around the life-bomb.

Korvac intercepts Silver Surfer as he’s making another pass to destroy the bomb and melts off Silver Surfer’s silver protective coating, killing him as unprotected his body can’t survive space travel.

But Norrin Radd’s last act is to aim his board so that it slams into the bomb, destroying it and killing both Norrin Radd and Michael Korvac.

Grandmaster snarks that he’ll call that match a draw. And then gloats to Death that he’s already arranged things so that the heroes have “virtually” no chance to win.

And we’re back to big groups!

Iron Man! Mockingbird! Black Knight! Doctor Druid!

Again, two East Coast Avengers and two West Coast Avengers.

Also, kind of a team made up of fuck-ups. In later years, Black Knight learns that his sword is powered by how much of a fuck-up he is. Its a truly cursed sword.

The location this round is the ruins of an alien civilization. Unlike the previous rounds, the bomb isn’t immediately obvious so Iron Man proposes Lets Split Up Gang So We Can Cover More Ground.

Nobody realizing that this is how you die in a horror movie, they all agree.

But this apparently is a horror movie because Dr Druid gets attacked by ACTUALLY DRACULA moments later.

I guess that’s his chosen opponent.

Mockingbird meets her opponent not long after: the Red Guardian.

She immediately starts destroying his self-esteem.

Red Guardian: “Mockingbird, I am truly disappointed that you are the one I must face! The Red Guardian would have preferred a greater challenge!”

Mockingbird: “Why? Do you like being dead? Considering your current state, I can only assume that you blew it the last time you were in a real fight? A lot of men are like that -- they just can’t deliver when the pressure’s on!”

Red Guardian: “SHUT UP!”

Mockingbird: “The truth hurts doesn’t it, Mr. Macho?”

Iron Man also meets his opponent: Terrax the Tamer. He has control of rock and earth and is an ex-herald of Galactus. That’s not a great level of power to have to tangle with.

Speaking of tangle, Terrax wastes no time in tangling Iron Man up in a stream of debris to hold him in place long enough to throw a chunk of rock the size of Manhattan at him.

Iron Man has no time to block it and repulsors won’t be enough, so Iron Man rockets straight into it, destroying the rock.

Huh. This is one of the feats used by Death Battle to figure out how strong Iron Man is. Fun to see the feat in the wild, just like its fun to see memes in their original context.

Black Knight hears a rock the size of Manhattan exploding and reasonably assumes the world is ending. But his opponent shows up and tells him never to mind, its time to swordfight.

And his opponent is... the original Black Knight.

Sir Percy: “I am Sir Percy of Scandia  -- the rightful wielder of the Ebony Blade, and a knight of the Round Table of King Arthur Pendragon!”

Black Knight: “You’re also the original Black Knight, and my former teacher! But, what are you doing here?”

Sir Percy: “Though my spirit once served as your mentor, and instructed you in the arts of combat, the Grandmaster has sent me here to challenge you... to the death!”

Black Knight: “No! I won’t fight you! I can’t -- !”

Sir Percy: “Then you shall die!”

Dr Druid’s fight with Dracula goes badly. Dracula can just turn to mist and be entirely unphased by any of Dr Druid’s martial arts. So Druid instead decides to try to use his MIND POWERS to win a battle of wills with Dracula.

Dracula is incredibly amused by this and agrees that a battle of wills is what they’ll be doing.

Meanwhile, the two Black Knights are stalemated in perfectly symmetrical violence with identical super cursed swords.

Also meanwhile, Mockingbird finishes mocking Red Guardian so thoroughly that he makes a careless mistake and she bonks him unconscious upside the head.

Mockingbird: “His biggest mistake was listening to the Mockingbird.”

Also also meanwhile meanwhile, Iron Man could shatter a rock the size of Manhattan by flying at it but the attempt badly drained his armor’s energy. So he pulls off a desperate hail mary gamble to beat Terrax.

Next time Terrax blasts energy at Iron Man, he absorbs it instead of dodging and fires it back at Terrax.

It works and knocks Terrax out of the fight but it destroys Iron Man’s armor.

Mockingbird finds the life-bomb and brings Tony over. Its complicated but with his mighty Tony brains, he starts figuring out how to defuse it.

Unfortunately. The dominoes fall.

Dr Druid loses his battle of wills against Dracula. The vampire breaks Druid’s neck and moves on to where Mockingbird and Tony are trying to defuse the bomb.

When Mockingbird sees Dracula, she lies to Tony that nothing is happening to get him to stay focused on the bomb. But her screams as she’s murdered by Dracula distract Tony during those last crucial seconds.

Boom.

One-fifth of the universe is suddenly gone.

A fact that Grandmaster glorifies in to the captive Death.

Grandmaster: “Fascinating! A full fifth of the universe has suddenly ceased to exist! So many galaxies... so many inhabited worlds... erased in an instant! In its own way, I find such devastation to be... startlingly beautiful! Can you feel it, my friend? The entire cosmos ripples with terror! The end is near! The end of all life -- and death!”

Oof.

I’m almost certain there’s going to be a reset button. Not so much for one-fifth of the universe being wiped out as all these characters. Pretty sure Tony Stark Iron Man has a lot more comics to be in.

But still. Feels bad to see a big fraction of the universe and Tony Stark Iron Man blow up because of Draculas.

Well. There’s one more fifth of the universe to protect from a bomb.

Captain America, the Wasp, and Wonder Man (so two East Coast Avengers and only one West Coast Avenger, to make up for when the first match had two West Coast and only one East Coast Avengers) appear in a frozen hellscape.

Unlike the previous round, the bomb is in plain sight. The heroes just have to get past Nazi vampire Baron Blood, Hyperion the Not-Superman, and GODDAM BUCKY BARNES to get to the bomb.

Bucky Barnes: “How’s it going, Cap? Kill any partners lately?”

God damn, shade or whatever of Bucky. Are you the real Nazi vampire in this group? Because you just went right for the throat.

Wasp winds up facing Baron Blood. He’s too tough for her Wasp stings. Despite her Wasp stings being powerful enough to knock down a small house. Well, maybe Wasp is dealing with a handicap. She says that its so cold she can barely move.

Anyway, like many times Wasp fights a dude too tough, she just finds a way to attack where he’s softer. In this case by flying into his ears and blasting his sensitive ear drums.

Damn, Wasp.

And Wonder Man winds up fighting Hyperion. They’re both the powerhouses. Although, Wonder Man’s last fight with a caped really tough guy didn’t go so well.

After an exchange of punching, Hyperion manages to belt Wonder Man twenty miles away. Wonder Man is surprised to learn that he can be hurt so badly anymore. One of his arms is broken. As are most of his ribs. But fate of the universe, et cetera, so he uses his last arm to fling giant chunks of ice at Hyperion. Who easily blasts them with his ATOMIC VISION.

Thiiiiis isn’t going well.

Captain America jumps in to help Wasp against Baron Blood so she suggests a CHANGE PARTNERS. Cap is having trouble fighting Bucky due to history and grief and whatever so Wasp will fight him.

It turns out to be a mistake.

Bucky takes advantage of how the cold is slowing her to flip behind her and crush her tiny body with a punch.

=(

They nerfed her and then they killed her. Where is the justice for Wasp?

Cap sees this but can’t spare a moment because Baron Blood is still on his ass. But Cap is a master of judo. When Baron Blood latches onto Cap to try to drink him, Cap is able to use his better footing to flip Baron Blood.

And since he’s treated as defeated by this and since he screams and since there’s a conveniently positioned sharp spike of ice in the panel, yeah, I’m pretty sure Cap flipped him onto a spike of ice. In essence, staking him.

Meanwhile, Hyperion is tired of Wonder Man throwing rocks at him.

So he decides to kill him. Wait, not just kill him. Overkill him.

He tackles Wonder Man THROUGH THE ENTIRE PLANET and then INTO THE NEARBY STAR.

Yeah. I don’t care if he’s ionic energy now. That guy is dead. Super dead.

And do we even need the Sentry if Hyperion is going to throw people in to the Sun? That’s basically the only thing Sentry brought to the table. Just sayin’.

So everything is down to Captain America and Bucky. Bucky stands between Cap and the life-bomb which has just started glowing to explode.

Captain America: “You used to be like a son to me, Bucky. I loved you. I have always loved you! But I won’t let my personal feelings for you stop me from doing my duty! Too much is at stake! Too many lives are counting on me! I cannot fail!! Please forgive me... son.”

And Captain America launches a no-holds-barred beatdown on Bucky. Bucky doesn’t even get a chance to react before Cap leaves him facedown in the snow.

So let that be a lesson. Captain America will definitely beat up a dead child to save a fifth of the universe. Even if he feels immense personal guilt for that specific child’s apparent death.

With nothing standing in his way, Cap smashes the bomb with his shield.

Huh. Luckily that’s all it took. Captain Marvel and Silver Surfer had to put a lot of effort into getting through the shield around the bomb. Then again. When Captain America throws his mighty shield, all who oppose his shield must yield. Yeah, he didn’t throw it this time. But its the principle of the thing.

Also, Hyperion bodyslamming Wonder Man into the star has created an immense solar flare that’s glaring brightly in the sky. Cap wonders if he stopped the bomb only to die by solar flare but he gets teleported away.

Captain America and Hawkeye find themselves back in front of the Grandmaster.

As they realize that no one else has returned with them, the Grandmaster informs them that they are the only survivors of round one.

Captain America: “Round one -- ? What do you mean round one?!”

Grandmaster: “Hmm, only need four bombs this time... Surely, Captain, you didn’t think I would allow our last game to end so quickly. No, no, no, I fully intend to keep on playing and playing -- until I win!! You will please note that the Legion of the Unliving has added -- a few new members!”

A.k.a. every Avenger (plus guest) that died is now on Grandmaster’s team.

Hawkeye flips out seeing Mockingbird (and also his other friends) dead and mind controlled onto Grandmaster’s side. He shoots a bunch of arrows at the Grandmaster, although to no effect.

Hawkeye: “You miserable, stinking -- ! You killed my wife! Murdered her!! You slaughtered my friends!! Used them all as pawns! Playthings!! Why? Why? WHY?!”

Grandmaster: “Because I make the rules... and that is how my game is played!”

Captain America slaps some sense back into Hawkeye and tells him to get his head in the game. They need to think of a way to beat Grandmaster. Because clearly playing his game until they both die isn’t the best course of action.

Sometimes slapping your friend is good actually, I guess, because Hawkeye does come up with an idea.

He pulls out his last two arrows and proposes something more interesting.

Hawkeye: “We all know how your old life-bomb game is gonna end, so why bother going through the motions? What I’m proposing is a new contest! A simple game of chance!”

Captain America: “Are you insane?!”

Grandmaster: “A game of chance? Go on...”

Hawkeye: “Choose an arrow. You get the one with the head, you win.”

Grandmaster: “Captain America is right. You are insane. Why should I risk certain victory to participate in this whimsical contest?”

Hawkeye: “Why not? You’ve devoted your entire life to playing games of skill and chance! You’ve always lived for the love of the game -- and the challenge! Just think of all that’s at stake! All that’s resting on a simple choice! A whim of fate! How can a gamesman like you resist a challenge like that?!”

Hah. Its the perfect bait. Even though Grandmaster rigged the game this time to make absolutely sure his love of games wouldn’t screw him over here... Well, the Elders of the Universe are monomaniacs. Grandmaster was probably thirsty for a stupid game like this after sitting through a rigged game.

So even though Captain America hates that they’re leaving the fate of the universe to blind luck, he concedes Hawkeye picked a good stratagem. Even if the Grandmaster wins the pick an arrow game, it may distract him enough for Cap to try to attack him.

But he doesn’t pick the right one.

Hawkeye rigged the game. When Grandmaster picked the arrow with the head, Hawkeye just snapped it off in his palm. You can even see the sound effect in that panel.

Seems only fair. A rigged game for a rigged game.

I like that the Grandmaster didn’t even agree to release Death if he lost. She just broke free because he was distracted. Kind of like how she didn’t agree to anything, he just took advantage of her distraction.

Anyway, Death is tired of all these dead people fucking up her life and ejects Hawkeye and Captain America from the afterlife.

They wind up back at the Houston Astrodome and all their friends are back to life!

Captain America decides this was Death rewarding them for stopping the Grandmaster. Which means that Grandmaster may still be out there somewhere but Mockingbird and Hawkeye tell Cap that that’s a later problem. They should unwind with some BASEBALL.

As a punchline to Cap’s astonishment with Hawkeye cheating the Grandmaster, he tells Thor to keep an eye on Hawkeye during the ball game. “He cheats!”

Hah hah!

Elsewhere, in space, Grandmaster crows that Actually He’s The Real Winner Here, If You Think About It.

Death was so pissed at him, she exiled him from her realm permanently. I.e., he’s immortal now. Uh, more immortal than he already was, which was conditional and he could die if killed.

Grandmaster: “The entire universe was within my grasp -- Everything could have been mine! The Avengers will pay for what they’ve done to me! They’ll... they’ll... What are they playing down there?! Baseball? Hmmm...”

AND THEN HE GETS DISTRACTED WATCHING THEM PLAY BASEBALL!

I love Grandmaster when he’s a wacky space guy, obsessed with every game. THere’s just so many ways you can use him. Usually its for superhero fights, as seen here. And in his first appearance. And also in JLA/Avengers.

But what if he decided to stake one of his tricky wagers on the Avengers playing baseball with each other?

I’ve said I’d love one of those stories that start with baseball to simply play a whole game through and you could use the Grandmaster making a wager with someone as an excuse for why its important enough to get to be a story.

Also, almost everyone on both Avengers teams experienced dying and seems pretty chill with it. Superheroes are weird.

ALSO ALSO, wait did we just leave La Espirita in space with the Collector?

Follow @essential-avengers​ because its good times. Do you see this good times? So good. Like and reblog too, please. It motivates me.

[jonathanbiers]

Dude I think you are so endlessly cool. Like I remember when I saw you first pop up on the timeline and I had to hold back from spam liking your posts after I first followed. I love your opinions on things and hearing about your gig experiences and life in your tags. I love how you take fandom to be your own, to make YOURSELF happy with what you see on your dash etc and what you write. Idk man, I just really admire you and love being online at the same time as you, feels like I’m ~hanging out with a cool mutual~

Anyway!!! Hope you’ve had a nice day so far and thank you for being a constant source of good music and argyle 😌

I AM SCREAMING? this is so nice 😭 i’m so glad that you can appreciate my presence and that you like what i post and write. that makes me so happy you have no idea 🖤 i am constantly restating this but i am not as cool as some of you think i am, istg, i just don’t know how to shut up kdjskdjfj

i’m just casually tearing out my heart and presenting it to you nbd. if we’re mutuals i promise i think you’re just as awesome because i am so picky about who i follow, taking curating my dash experience to. ridiculous levels lmaooo

[storiesofsvu]

Hey hey, another Thursday!

Starting off with OC, ive seen the promo pics and tbh, im excited.

Jet looking amazing in green.

That was the WOOORST job putting a necklace on EVER. Like, not only was it over the hair, but it was not properly lined up for the reveal…

Just casually walking around the streets of nyc with a severed hand.. nbd

Are you seriously telling me that dog devoured that hand in that little time, bones and all?

How and why is it that these hardened career criminals always fall so fucking hard and fast for the UC cop!?? Like, you should have your guard up a little bit shouldn’t you??

Okay, so…. Can we talk about ayanna’s nails for a hot second? She clearly a pillow princess with those claws… LOL

 THANK YOU JET. THANK YOU for fucking calling out that stabler has done SO much worse than KISS someone while UC.

Man this whole sending an agent cop into the field UC to be the romantic interest of a perp/mob/mafia and the cop ends up crossing a line or two, fucking things up and falling for said perp… all while the guy playing Doyle is the main mob boss?? Hmm… this is a little too familiar, like even jet’s wig…

Is she faking this?? Okay, yes, she is. Called that.

This ep is super Ayanna jet heavy and im LOVING it thank fucking god

Also loving ayanna’s apt

Okay the wig coming off would not be that big of a deal in today’s day and age, tons of girls wear wigs all the fucking time. ALSO, why was it not wigcapped, pinned down and secured??

Welp. Cant say im not surprised by the ending. But I am glad that jet’s getting to do more.

As of right now I am paying ZERO attention to mothership. We’ll see if that changes when sam pops up or not.

Okay, the black & tan number Samantha has on close to the end? It looks like it’s a two piece outfit with her midriff hanging out… good job wardrobe…

Ooo..od’d… yeah… called that…, also Nolan that was some of the worst cpr compressions ive ever seen on tv.. cmon

OKAY. Paying attention now!

We REALLY had to watch that machete attack again!?? WHY

Jfc that opening…did we have to go that graphic?? Is this gonna continue to be a new thing?

I cant figure out if they’re trying to test out muncy/Velasco with the fandom and see what way we go, or of they’re teasing the relationship, or if they’re just playing on the brother/sister vibes, because all im getting is muncy being a brat, which is accurate. Also that scene would’ve been a lot less awkward if there was any kind of background noises/music, like when there’s elevator dings on grey’s, you know what im saying?

Loving the purple on Velasco tho

“you wanna keep a stray puppy?” “you got to keep one!” LOL

So bruno’s here to stay?

#1: wtf is this bucket hat.

#2: why is it pulled down so far over her eyes?

Bro those crutches are way too short for this dude

“A funk?” carisi then gives the “who’s this guy” look to liv. LOL.

Man the writing this ep is great.

I appreciate that we’re getting more into muncy’s personality aside from being a lil teasing brat, like, there’s gotta be a lot of grief in there, knowing that her mom died and im pretty sure it was when grace was young, so she’s probably been bottling shit up since then. Also still and always really hoping that they don’t push her & Velasco, let the brother sister bestie vibes win please.

Glad we’re getting lots of muncy this week

Bruno is growing on me….

“sometimes though it’s hard to make a u-turn” IS THAT THE ONLY FOLLOW UP WERE GONNA GET?! (I say that as someone who is 100000000% NOT an eo shipper, but I do think it’s strange that *that* happened last week and like, fin didn’t even ask how noah’s drive back to the city was kinda thing. Yeah, sure there was enough going on in both episodes, but like, there was literally ZERO follow up to everything. Jeeze.)

 Joe looking hella cute in that toque

Man this just keeps getting worse…

Okay… hold up.. grace says “a great one” about Velasco being a liar and liv just flies right passed it AS IF THEY ALL DIDN’T FIRST MEET HIM WHEN HE WAS UC AND NONE OF THEM BELIEVED HIM. Like homeboy WAS working majorly UC for how long??

Though we DO know a tidbit about his previous gang involvement… so I honestly don’t know what direction theyre taking this… it’ll be interesting to see.

[mettywiththenotes]

320 bits I wanna talk about

Iieda looks like he’s doing the *inhale* before the BOI IF YOU DON’T- meme. Something along the lines of “BOI IF YOU DON’T GET YOUR ASS BACK TO UA-” kind of thing lol.

He holding something in definitely. Maybe charging up for an attack? Idk but he sure seems concentrated

Actually, Iieda seems kinda considering. Maybe he’s weighing up if he should join in the fight, as if he’s asking “Will I have to fight Midoriya, if it comes down to it? Or can the others handle this?” Something tells me he doesn’t want to have to weigh in on the fight. Maybe tear into Izuku verbally, but fight? No I don’t think he wants to do that

But also, I find it interesting that that black panel of text is under him and then it cuts to Bakugou yelling at Izuku. I mean, it could very well be Bakugou thinking that, but if that’s so, then why is Iieda the first person we see?

So, I think it’s Iieda thinking that. Tensions are rising, it seems. I’m expecting his turn to be full of a lot of emotion, or at least trying to get across to Izuku that he feels betrayed but mostly just wants Izuku to come back home.

I don’t really know what’ll happen with Iieda exactly, but I’m totally interested to see what happens

I know Bakugou has problems with his emotions and words and stuff, but I also think here he’s trying to anger Izuku in order to get him to fight back, maybe so he’s more angry than flexible in a fight, so the end result would be Izuku getting too angry to predict anything and eventually tripping up, and that’s when 1A could capture him.

The one thing to remember about Izuku is that allowing him to think is going to be the opponent’s downfall. We saw in the Kacchan VS Deku 2 fight that Bakugou knew this and so kept attacking as much as possible so Izuku wouldn’t have time to think. Which worked, because Izuku is great at analysis, so making his “Win” attitude [getting competitive therefore putting more energy into attacking than strategy] come out over his “Save” attitude [you’re my friend and I want to help you] is kind of a weakness of his. That’s kind of one of the reasons he lost that fight.

Then again, maybe Izuku has improved since then? I don’t really know but I think enough time has passed for him to have maybe improved more on that so idk we’ll see

I really love Bakugou’s expression in that bottom screencap lol

His wound!! All bandaged up!! I wonder if there’s a scar there or smthg :O

LET’S GET READY TO RUMBLEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE

I know Enji or Bakugou probably gave them details about the multiple quirks but I still find it wild that everyone just knows now

KOUDA! MY SWEETHEART! I’m glad he’s getting a part in this too, along with Sero. Two of them who didn’t really hang around Izuku but still want him to come back :’)

Sero and Black Whip! Finally! I mean it’s not much but it’s still better than nothing

Also, seems like Sero is trying to taunt Izuku to get him to attack him maybe [same as Bakugou feeding into Izuku’s competitive side] soooo idk Sero following Bakugou’s lead? Maybe :)

Look at how,,,, innocent Izuku looks,,,,, *head in hands* AND SERO TEACHING HIM!!

I knew this lil moment would come bite me in the ass at some point, I knew and yet I’m still tearing up goddamn

That “I thought she was going to tell me its a useless hobby” bit really drives home how Izuku’s friends are 1A, that he loves them and they were the only friends he’s ever had [except Bakugou but he was a bully at the time so I’m not really gonna count him for back then]. HOW many people before UA had gone around and told Izuku his taking notes hobby was useless? SHOW me the people!

I, mettywiththenotes, will NOT allow anybody to slander one of my own!

I know it’s like the only moment Izuku and Ojiro shared, with the sports festival thing, but it’s still really sweet that Ojiro sees that Izuku stood up for him

*head in hands*

Shouldn’t this kid be more worried that he’s likely going to get kidnapped?

“Yeah this super evil villain guy has decided he wants to kidnap me and take me away, but like nbd guys really, that’s why I left in the first place! So I wouldn’t be a burden!” Somebody get this kid a fucking therapist or some shit

This is kind of a chilling and pretty scene though. The rain falling above Izuku and him looking down with these piercing green eyes likely being the only light between them. Good stuff.

Satou! Aha I like how he’s pulling all the stops, such as “I WON’T LET YOU BORROW MY INGREDIENTS FOR ERI!”

Also let’s appreciate that Satou caught Ojiro and Jirou and managed to land on a freaking traffic light. The balance on this kid! Very well done

Kaminari putting Izuku in a headlock! How cute :)

Be cuter if they weren’t trying to subdue a martyr-complex cryptid from killing himself, but still

Does Shouji have some kind of support-item?? Or could he always do the stretchy thing?? Or I guess maybe he’s just stretching his arms out like branches [like he usually does] and using them as more like a capture weapon rather than his usual stuff. I don’t think we’ve ever seen him use his heteromorph body and quirk for anything other than the 5 senses, though I could be wrong

Also Shouji remembering what Izuku said at the training camp, I’m so glad! Shouji always seems like the kind to be so protective over his friends, so I’m glad he remembered that. Then again, Izuku did compare them to freaking ALL MIGHT, but if the nice analytical kid in your class who knows your limits and strengths says you could basically beat A GOD, then that’s definitely one for the memory scrapbook lmao

“It’s nice and dark here, Dark Shadow.” Who said that?? Kami or Izuku?? I just have this mental image of Izuku being shrouded in darkness and trying to keep his eyes open from falling asleep haha

Tokoyami remembering that from all the way back then!! It makes me think that not only have Bakugou and Izuku been watching each other, but that Izuku has always had everybody’s eyes on him! Which is true, he’s inspired everyone! It goes both ways; Izuku loving his friends, and them loving him back :’)

Kami telling him to take a bath lmao I love it. Finally somebody said it

*ugly sobbing noises*

This kind of segment, with a mask falling, a space in-between and a reveal, reminds me of Compress’ reveal :) In that, the person is hiding their identity and then when the mask comes off, they reveal who they truly are underneath

While Izuku is of course determined to go after AFO and is quite the fearsome powerhouse, I really think when he takes off that mask, he’s showing who he really is underneath - a scared little boy who just wants everyone to be happy

JESUS, SHOUTO REALLY IMPROVED HIS QUIRK HUH!! LOOK AT IT, IT’S EVEN HIGHER THAN THE SKYSCRAPERS!!

“The burden placed on you... it doesn’t allow for tears, right?” He sounds so sassy here.

Kind of like saying “Oh you look upset. But that’s weird, I thought Heroes weren’t supposed to cry.” Lol it really shows here how pissed Shouto is at Izuku

But then he relents from that snark and is like “Hey, come on, we’ll share this burden. I’m not letting you go it alone, remember that we’re all here.” :’)

I love when Shouto is sassy and passive aggressive but I also love it when he shows that soft side of him

Okay, this is something I really love.

Tsuyu didn’t join the Bakugou Rescue Squad because “they would be just like Villains breaking the rules”

But here she is, learning from that regret of hers and coming right back to make sure Izuku isn’t the one struggling. She wants to be a part of this rescue squad and pick up where she left off :)

Tsuyu has always struggled with her regrets. It was shown after Kamino when she cried, but for me, I only realised this fully during the Joint Arc when she had her regrets about not making better decisions and not being quick enough [I think that was it].

“I won’t cry in such a flurry” reminds me of “I want to live a life without regret” and so that’s what she’s saying here. This won’t be another regret of hers. She wants to do her best to save her friend

“When scared, you’re allowed to tremble when it’s tough, you’re allowed to shed tears. That’s how you become a Hero like in the comics.”

I feel like that quote piggybacks off of Shouto’s “Heroes cry too”, in that, this is now 1A comforting Izuku. This is them fully coming up to him and telling him that they can help, and that he’s allowed to feel sad about his situation. Shouto’s quote was the teaser, while this entire chapter [and the rest that come to follow] is the main course.

And this is exactly who Tsuyu is. Reassuring, comforting, someone dependable. It says a lot that she’s come from not going to help in Kamino, confessing her feelings and crying about it, then coming back in a similar situation and offering her help - that she’s not willing to just let an opportunity go to better herself. I think I remember reading a few posts on her crying after Kamino and saying it was “performative” or that she just “wanted attention” or smthg like that, but I think she’s really just quite an honest person, and here she is making a great show of how she won’t let something like her guilt slow her down from being the hero she wants to be.

[A part of me feels like this is also a little more evidence with the whole People Not Caring About Bakugou’s Feelings Of Helplessness but like. I digress. It kinda counts but at the same time, it’s not what is going on at the moment.]

Seeing everyone try to reassure Izuku was lovely, and I can’t wait for the rest. I’ve seen a lot of people waiting more for Bakugou’s portion of the battle [AND YEAH DUDE ME TOO] but I really feel like Bakugou’s won’t come until like 2 chapters later or something.

Cause, if this chapter is anything to go by, we’ll probably get through Mina, Mineta, Kirishima, Hagakure and Aoyama next chapter, and then we’ll move onto the “more important” conflicts which will be Iieda and Uraraka, and if their segments are chocked with tension drama and tears, then Bakugou will have a whole chapter to himself hopefully.

Which means we’ll probably have to wait 2 more chapters until we get that sweet, sweet Bakugou chapter :( I hope I’m wrong and it comes sooner than predicted but whatever

I know for some people, that’s all they want, but personally I love these little bits that reflect on the background characters. As someone who isn’t really obsessed with the background characters but also likes them enough to appreciate their development/the little moments they have, I gotta say I really liked this :)

[just-absolutely-super]

I personally headcanon that Lan is extremely good on his rolleskates, but people don't seem to realize it because they don't know how hard it actually is, and Lan doesn't actually brag about it.

Lan makes it look so easy that people don’t realize how skilled he actually is

One day he and the gang are just hanging out and he’s suddenly like, “hey guys watch this!” and just BLADES OVER TO THE NEAREST TRASH CAN AND FLIPS OVER IT AND THEN LANDING PERFECTLY ON HIS ROLLERBLADES LIKE NBD

And that was when everyone realized Lan Hikari is not just some dude who casually uses rollerblades

[crystalkleure]

🤝 my man

Quon Kimidori and Jin Aizawa!

Ah, the s1 snek boys. The Viper Who Flies In The Sky and The Viper Who Crawls On The Ground. Only one of them has pointy teeth and neither of them has Actual Classic Snake Fangs, somehow. They both like to wander around aimlessly and somewhat recklessly and manage to not die. They are both Supremely Chill by default. Would have been cool to see them interact with eachother even one single time onscreen, I think they've got pretty sympatico personalities. These guys would like, casually get along with eachother just fine.

If Quon were to spot Jin just staggering around in the park one day, I think he would notice and think "Hm. That guy's Not Right. Sir are you okay over there" and like, do something. Approach the Potential Drunk Hobo and ask if he perhaps requires any assistance. And Jin would babble delirious nonsense at him and pass out on the nearest available surface, which is probably the ground. Quon would promptly freak the fuck out with a perfectly blank expression on his face, fold up his jacket and put it under the Possibly ODing Guy's head, and then call Xhaka for advice instead of emergency services in a moment of panicky brainfart. Xhaka advises Quon to put the dying guy on a bench instead of the ground because the ground has ants, so that is what Quon does. <5 minutes later, Jin wakes up, sits up, and right about then Quon finally blinks and says "...An ambulance. I should have called an ambulance. Xhaka is not an ambulance." and Jin is like "wtf who's dying holy shit" and confusion ensues and Jin laughs it off and completely casually explains that "Oh lol nah I'm totally fine, I just take Accidental Naps at inopportune moments multiple times a day because the ghosts in my brain don't let me sleep like a normal person. It's okay because they protect me and do not let me get mugged or eaten by ants while I am unconscious. Sorry for drooling on your jacket btw."

Quon says "...Okay. nbd." and takes the crazy person's psychobabble with a grain of salt because what else are you supposed to say to that.

Hyperspecific comedic scenario aside, I do think Quon would in fact be alarmed by Jin at first because Holy Shit Clearly This Dude Is Fucking Dying, Uhh Shit What Do I Do, because you KNOW he is gonna see a Narcolepsy Attack happen because those happen so often, and then he would just...not try to question it when Jin is awake enough again to explain what's actually wrong with him and Why You Should Totally Not Worry About Him Because He's Fine And His Ghost Friends Make Sure Of That, because okay even if this person is not actually dying, or THINKS he's not dying, he is clearly insane or at least temporarily still delirious. I also think Quon would stick around and just Casually Loiter nearby for awhile, just to observe Jin a little longer to make 100% sure the dude is not still gonna keel over dead any minute now even though he insists he doesn't want him to call for medical aid.

And I think they would just, like...casually hang out and chat. Quon would do some Skateboard Tricks and Jin would be both Impressed And Alarmed because damn dude that seems dangerous, you go up So High, isn't that A Little Bit Scary [says the guy who sees nothing wrong with falling flat on his face unconscious in a ditch], Quon says nah, Quon asks Jin if having ghosts in his brain and randomly passing out on the floor is A Little Bit Scary, Jin says nah, and they just chill and talk about skateboarding and hallucinating while Jin proves he is Definitely Not On The Brink Of Death Here. I think, most importantly, that in spite of being pretty sure that Jin is just A Bit Psychotic and the shadows at the edge of his vision probably aren't suddenly ACTUALLY moving weirdly now, haha, Quon would have the tact to not try to insist to Jin that the Ghost Friends aren't real. Or to appear outwardly skeptical at all, because his expression is so static and his voice is so flat. And he obviously wouldn't make fun of Jin or be all judgmental anything. He'd just listen attentively while Jin tells him about his 323 Guardian Ghost Buddies, and would just nod and say things like "Hm. Woah, sounds intense." and lament on how "Man, Life Sure Does Get Unpredictable Sometimes, Doesn't It. Life Is Weird, Bro. Crazy How Shit Happens. Hey, you want something from the vending machine over there? I'm gonna go get a soda." etc., and they'd both leave the encounter with solid respect for eachother and a newfound Snake Bro Bond. They're both just so fucking chill and Generally Unshakeable and Casually Fearless lmfao.

[sydnam]

Back and Back and Back to the Future, with Mom

3rd and final episode of the day. She’s into it. It’s pretty great. BACK AND BACK AND BACK TO THE FUTURE

They are good people, taking in random survivors from a random ship even though 5 minutes ago they were getting invaded by randos and 5 minutes before that they were boarded by Peacekeepers. They’ll learn.

D’Argo is smitten with this strange and clearly creepy woman. D’Argo remains a foolish young man.

Pilot does say arns this episode.

Mom, on the Ilanic prosthetics: “Wonder if those gave him a headache” which is a good question. They are hanging off his forehead and they do look heavy.

‘Just gonna get some air.’ ‘We have air in here. ’‘What’s the matter with him?’ ‘He is Crichton.’ An iconic exchange.

Mom, on Matala: “Is she a demon?” Me: “I mean…she’s pretty creepy.”

Mom is NOT enjoying Crichton’s flashforwards. “Wait is that what his headaches are. You keep making those faces. I feel like I’m making breakthroughs and you are ignoring me!”

I cannot WAIT until Harvey shows up and Crichton starts losing it in season 2 Mom is gonna be a riot for that. Zhaan has noticed that something is wrong. Because Zhaan is the best of them. Why is Matala doing weird dance moves while sparring? That’s a waste of energy. Zhaan very calmly and succinctly warned Matala off Crichton. Because Zhaan is the best.

Aeryn is so proud of herself for figuring out Matala is Scorvian. And so confused by Crichton’s babbling about the future. Which is reasonable, Crichton makes no sense most of the time. NBD, the ship is just carrying a tiny black hole. ‘It is the ultimate weapon.’ WAIT UNTIL YOU MEET WORMHOLE WEAPONS, MY DUDE! Except you won’t. But. I ought to be tracking deaths on this rewatch. There are so many in this episode alone. Ooh the drama of Crichton telling D’Argo he knows that D’Argo lied about why he was imprisoned.

I forgot a LOT of this episode. It’s been a WHILE. “Wait, so who is the supreme badass in this?” “We-ell…” “Not the demon lady” “No, she blew up” “Not the blue lady! She’s not a badass” “She IS a badass. We LOVE her.” “But she’s not evil.” “No!” “Now, the girl with the abs…” “Aeryn?” “She’s not a bad guy.” “No, she’s aligned with everyone else on Moya now. She used to be a Peacekeeper.” “And not the Muppet! So who is the big villain?” “We-ell, it’s Crais, who is the guy who kicked Aeryn out of the Peacekeepers and wants to kill Crichton because Crichton accidentally killed his brother and the reason that everyone is running around is because Crais is chasing them.” “...okay.” I can’t wait for her to meet Scorpy it’s gonna be great. GREAT.

[frecklef0x]

Mass Effect 1: Playthrough Masterpost

At last, I have finished Mass Effect 1!

I have heard some mutuals say they wish they could play it again for the first time, and you kind of can--through me! I’ve been posting little “episodes” of live-tweet-stream-of-consciousness as I play, and now I’ve compiled them into one post to make my life easier.

Anyway, here’s the first one, the rest are under the cut. :)

frecklef0x plays mass effect: (ME1) episode one

My ass looks great in this uniform, first of all

Impaled robo zombies, yikes

Cheap shot, Saren, smh. How will I pass my spectre test now?!

Why does he have robot eyes? Is he like, Geth-Turian? Why? Is he a robo zombie also? Was it the beacon???

Cool beacon nightmares, I'm sure this is fine

This Kaiden guy has implants? ORTEGA?!??!?

"Call me princess again and you'll be picking your teeth up off the floor" lol obliterated

The citadel elevators are very realistic, five minutes of tense silence huh

Ya girl got a PROMOTION and a DOPE SQUAD time to catch a TRAITOR

frecklef0x plays mass effect: (ME1) episode two

First things first, gotta go find the blue scientist to join the gang

This galaxy is HUGE! How many of these places will I actually be able to go?!

Only two friends at a time????? D:

Ah, a distress signal, let's see wha--A DESERT CENTIPEDE NOPE ABORT ABORT

Robo aliens? In MY Theronian mining facility? Its more likely than you think

Running over dudes in my Mako is extremely satisfying tbh

*runs over geth troopers* *runs over geth armature* *runs over geth colossus* ... *backs over geth colossus*

Working elevators in the ancient ruins ✔

Oooooooh man hope this nerd is gay

Wrex, a friend of yours? Nope, not a friend, too murdery

"ShAaaAame about the ruins Shep, sOooOo much collatoral damage, SHEP" stfu Council, "ruthless" was in the resume when you promoted us, 10/10 would shoot lasers through archeological digs again

When Kaiden calls us "ma'am" I am, uh, into it

frecklef0x plays mass effect: (ME1) episode three

Time to talk to the gang! Gotta meet the fam proper

Oh dear seems we got a shmee of racism on board, compatriots

Wow Raina, good foot-in-mouth moment with Wrex there huh...sorry about the eventual extinction of your race, lost this round of Pain Olympics

OH SHIT OH SHIT BLUE HOTTIE BIGENDER? THIS IS NOT A DRILL???

“hi I’m Kaiden wanna hear about my last crush ;)” “hi I’m Liara wanna hear about Asari mating rituals? ;)))” damn we really slidin right into the DMs no chill

Garrus: fuck rules and red tape amiright Raina: oh u right ;)

Guess I’ll actually do a mission now LETS GO LESBIANS LETS GO

Honestly rolling out with Tali and Liara is a mood, squad goals

Raina @ every corporation on Noveria: I would sell you to satan for one(1) corn chip

This reactivation puzzle is some shit

I see some Mistakes were made

We already killing moms at this stage damn BioWare

FUCK FUCK BENEZIA KILLED ME AND I LOST A FUCKTON OF PLAYTIME

THERES LIKE NO AUTOSAVE IN THIS BITCH FUUUUUUUUU

fuck fuck fuck god damn it gotta shoot a bunch of deranged baby bug people again god DAMN IT

Okay we killed Liara’s mom in front of her hope that’s fine

And we let mama bug go free because after talking to Wrex, Raina’s like “this galaxy is a little trigger happy with the genocide, good luck out there bug mama ❤️ be cool please”

I have literally watched the scientist in the hot labs get killed three times now

So far the debreifs with the council have not gone very well

“You let bug mama go?! How many generations until they take over everything???” “My money’s on two :D Place your bets now assholes or stfu :DDD”

Asked Liara if she was okay and she seems pretty Cool With It

I hope to one day return to Noveria and Death Star it into oblivion

frecklef0x plays mass effect: (ME1) episode four

Talked with Tali and this situation with the Geth and the Quarians is giving me an existential crisis

You “inspect” my beautiful ship? You got somethin’ to say about my crew??? Talk shit get hit, bitch I will kill you

Yoooo my old earth gang, yeah what the hell, I’ll help ou—oh nope nvm he’s a xenophobe, you hang him and I’ll shoot his friend in the face, thx for your time

Went to the citadel to finish some assignments, left tasked with twice as many

“dOn’T cUt CoRneRs” fear not dear Kaiden, I have a permit: this piece of paper that says I do what I want

Still with the elevators, I really cannot with this

“You make it all sound so...dangerous...” ;) ;))))))

frecklef0x plays mass effect: (ME1) episode five

Headin’ to Virmire to rendezvous with the Salarian team

A cure for the genophase?!?!?! :D

Oh wait oh no are we for real gonna talk about destroying the cure like Wrex isn’t standing right here omg

SHIT GUYS NO NOT LIKE THIS WREX PLEASE

Phew for a conversation that basically started with guns drawn, it went pretty well... “What Saren has isn’t even a proper cure, he’s just fucking with the Krogans at this point. Are we gonna stand for that? Or are we gonna murder?” “Damn Shep, you right, we gon’ murder”

Okay Ashley, go join the aliens, try not to die

Shadow Team!🎵 tearing through the base 🎶 disabling all the     defenses 🎵 (you gotta sing it to the tune of the Trogdor song)

We free the prisoners!!! :)

We shoot the prisoners??? :(

“Raina? How can you shoot them where they stand?” So it’s more merciful to let them explode? NAH FAM

This scientist is responsible for the mind control stuff? For Benezia? Fine     I’ll let her go but I hope she explodes

We did not learn our lesson concerning beacons I see

Wait if even Saren is worried about his mind control ship does that mean there are larger forces involved here?

Oh. Oh fuck

Ugh Ashley I EXPLICITLY TOLD YOU NOT TO DIE

(so we really never found any info about that genophase cure huh? disappointing)

Oh Seren, you dumb dumb. You absolute fool. Clown man.

When Raina slings Kaiden over her shoulder to carry him to the ship—mmmmmmmmwoooow I am very bisexual

Bruh Raina takes every council call and she disconnects pissed off every time

WAIT I literally just hung up with the council, ASHLEY is DEAD, and Kaiden needs a DTR RIGHT NOW?!?!? Boy, NO, READ THE ROOM

This has been a stressful day

frecklef0x plays mass effect: (ME1) episode six

Shepard will avoid her feelings and go to Faros instead

Seeing Ashley’s figure greyed out and her locker inaccessible makes me sad

Wrex and Garrus, let’s go shoot some geth 💪 

A mind controlling planet—of course!

Shep gets all her renegade points shooting capitalists

Saved, uh, about half the colonists

If I have one more bad acid trip I stg

Oh nope here’s another one

Shep needs a nap

frecklef0x plays mass effect: (ME1) episode seven

Ah, the council. Curse your sudden but inevitable betrayal.

At least Liara is good at pep talks ;)

Joker, you cockblock

Haha DUDE we airborne, you THOUGHT

Now that I am exiled from the Citadel, guess I’ll run some galactic errands:

o   Killed corporate scientists who though we would rescue them lol

o   Destroyed a bunch of geth camps helping Tali on her pilgrimage

o   Disabled a nuke and killed some pirates

o   Shut down some evil Cerberus experiments

o   And illegally traded information!

Okay time to get back on track

So we may or may not be flying to our doom

OH GOD LIARA LOVES ME!!! RAINA, YOU DISASTER, YOU DID IT AAAAAH ❤️❤️❤️

frecklef0x plays mass effect: (ME1) episode eight

You know what I love? Being murdered by geth armatures

All these Ilos ruins be looking the same

Security panel is only kinda helpful

Oh, luckily I know Prothean now!

“CANNOT BE STOPPED” wow very encouraging, thanks

After that super motivating message and disabling security, its time to go down, down to goblin town

Vigil? Oh word?

My girlfriend is GEEKING out

I knew something what wrong with that fucking Citadel

Vigil: information is power. Also Vigil: What does it matter why they do what they do? All that matters is you stop them

“non-essential” personnel die first, huh? GROSS, VIGIL (gotta be honest that hits different in 2020)

Garrus gets it, I knew we liked that guy

Okay, find conduit, save galaxy, break millennium-old genocide cyle, nbd

Ugh Mako you gotta do me dirty one last time I see, I hate this thing

THE CONDUIT STRAIGHT YEETED MAKO

The citadel robot says we’re doomed : )

This shootout is SO fun, seriously

Saren get it toGETHER

Renegade Raina can kill with a conversation apparently, well done then

Concentrate on the Sovereign—why am I gonna save a council that hates my guts, sorry, but I have a JOB to DO that you ACTIVELY HINDERED

Great, zombie husk Saren, just what I needed as I mull over the possible consequences of my galaxy-altering decision

GO JOKER GO

Humanity-only council seems…questionable. Raina didn’t love the council but this sits wrong. Couldn’t we just appoint a more diverse council, including a human?

Anderson seems like a good enough dude, so…we’ll see.

TIME FOR WAR BOYS, GODDAMN WHAT A GAME

[littlebabycrybtch]

honestly its still so heart dropping and disgusting to continue to see aspec ppl have to put on that like. trained, overly polite, overly passive, complete Lack Of Self Respect tone that forces a sense of ‘i know i dont matter’ just so they dont get completely automatically ground into dust when they go out on a limb and ask ppl they wanna interact with; ‘hey please dont start anything but can you just let me know if you’re an aphobe or not’ and its Still met with soo much mockery and disbelief almost every time like....... bro what even is there not to understand. you’re literally being the proof of why they have to ask abt it i cannot Fathom that kind of Blindness like lmfao bitch they just dont wanna be around some1 who hates them.... thats .. normal... thats human?? thats human behaviors. its having standards for yourself. its FEELINGS like unironically rn pls tell me you’re clowning and that you do understand how fucken LOUD you all are abt normalizing aspec hate and how often we obviously run into bitches like you and have to ask this question. you know how LONG we’ve begged for basic support so you have to know that reacting to being asked if you give a shit abt somebody with that kind of mockery is disgusting and bratty and ignorant af bc bro lmao its YOUR FAULT for being a Part of the people HATING THEM....?

holy shit lol, nobody should be good with being around people who disrespect a part of them,,,, thats like a genuine personal problem if someone willingly wants to do that, so why tf would you be expecting that. bc its us? bc its us. bc its us and you feel THAT right in thinking that we’re so worthless, they we are just so Stupid for not knowing that too. its funny to you that we dont realize how little we matter. lmao its so ugly and warped like!!! god how fuckin evil can you get just calm down idiot lmao theyre asking if you respect them and you’re basically responding ‘why would it matter to you if i didnt?’ bhsejbjehg uhhhhhhjjjjjjjjj bc thats. a regular thing 2 care about. its standards like mam do you hang out with ppl who hate you. is that some normal thing to you like. avoiding the ppl who wish you werent around is sort of just . health and safety and basic emotional response and also common sense. really is. literally How dehumanizing and detached coudl you POSSIBLY be abt this to be directly asked by a marginalized identity group if you respect them or not, and actually say No, but Also be like ‘LMAO YOU REALLY ASKED ME THAT? IT DOESNT MATTER’ like. yeah it matters bc they stay existing actually, you dont have to hate them for that, and they wouldnt have to ask yall this stuff if you behaved lmfao. not to mention your reaction is literally the evidence that it apparently matters enough to You to make sure they know you dont accept them. fully, you are whats making it ‘matter’ so much bc you are the one going apeshit over a benign existence. you’re the one losing it over nothing.

like lmfafuckingo what is WRONG with your MIND dude im.... speechless like ‘dont drag me into discourse’ YOU HATING SOME1 AND THEM HATING YOU BACK IS NOT ‘’’’’’TUMBLR DISCOURSE’’’’’..............? WHAT R U DISPLAYING RN DID U NOT SPEND ENOUGH TIME IN THE GUIDANCE COUNSELORS OFFICE GROWIN UP WITH THIS ATTITUDE......... ITS THE NATURAL ORDER OF SOCIAL CONSEQUENCE......... ITS SOME BASIC ‘YOU STARTED IT’ TEE MOTHERFUCKIGN EM LOGIC...? YOU HATE THEM! FOR AUTONOMY! FOR HAVING AN IDENTITY AND ENOUGH SELF RESPECT TO STICK BY IT! THEY HATE YOU BACK I THINK THEYRE ALLOWED TO ASODLKFL;SDF AAAA DUUUDE lmaoooo and like good lord, passively existing around ppl who hate you and not challenging them isnt ‘avoiding discourse’. thats. so unhealthy sdjkf what kind of underdeveloped politics.... its toxic and absolutely batshit to genuinely ask that of Anyone. like bro stop Actually expecting ppl to hate themselves for ur comfort thats.... so weird i.... are you okay hhh nah you just need to step up and try to be a regular ass person actually and have sympathetic reasoning skills. being ace is fiiiine its nbd i dont need to to change for you, im allowed to be this, and i get to ask if you’re ok with that so i dont end up in a gross ass environment.

ace =/= discourse. you dont get a say in everything my dude. we’re not here for you to analyze, we dont give you permission and we dont need Your permission to exist, we’re not asking that of you when we send those msgs we’re tryna figure out if ur gonna be a bitch or not basically lol just seeing if we’re gonna be accepted by you or if we’re wasting our time like alksd;al its so traumatizing and unnecessary and MINDBOGGLING that u think its not fucked up ?? to feel like we are supposed to accept your hate of us as our truth?? you believe we’re that awful that its Funny when we dont Realize it or smth thats just so....... what would even make you respect us. literally absolutely nothing besides not existing in front of you. so. thats hate. thats irrational unwavering hate. beyond the fact that any group always has the right to ask you if YOU hate THEM, you cant sit there and mock the mere idea of caring when you are literally giving reason for it by trying your BEST to upset them and make them feel like they deserve to feel like shit for what they are afterwards. dfgjdfkgjdlfkgfd man the hypocrisy and like complete lack of self awareness in reg culture is like novacaine for my brain its so jarring sometimes. im allowed to have a problem with you having a problem with me bc i cant fix Being smth, you can fix how you feel abt it. balls in your court ill stay waiting. im not gonna hate myself bc you’re not right xoxo get a vaccine for w/e makes you this evil and selfish pls

[bansheeoftheforest]

Henry going to blackfog to deal with the cult (and to mostly have fun and buy stuff) only to meet a group of the logders in full cult outfit? (Which probably shows off his arm markings(I also imagine it would have a fancy cape thing purely because I like capes) there are 3 main ways I think this could 1 they question jekyll 2 they simply decide to save the questioning for later because Henry needs a break and they just invite him to hang out for the rest of the night (they also kinda think they're more likely to get answers out of him drunk/hangover) and 3 they just stalk him for the rest of the night (imagine if one of the cult members see them stalking Henry captures them brings them to Henry and Henry just let's out a sigh)

-🕐

(Also yes I'm now a time wizard in training I love that( I have a fancy time cape and staff now)

Look, look, I have so much inspo to design Henry's markings and his cult outfit and this is not helping dude /lh

Like, them just seeing Henry would certainly be a surprise for them as he literally did tell them that he wouldn't be on Blackfog because it would destroy his reputation if he was seen, now he is strutting about in full cult garb, showing up tattooed/marked/carved arms that is literally like seeing an Eldritch god having carved their name into their subjects. Like... It certainly would come as a shock, maybe they would even think it was merely a look-alike or impersonator?

also, I do love the idea of the Lodgers having no idea what to do so they just... Stalk Henry around, trying to see if it actually is Henry or trying to figure out wtf he is doing. But of course, Henry has an entire entourage of his own cultists that also are stalking him so the Lodgers would quite quickly get caught. Like imagine a bunch of cultists holding the Lodgers hostage as they try to find Henry, the moment Henry sees what's going on he just... Sighs so loudly, pinches his nose in annoyance, the Lodgers are both confused and terrified because they just got captured by cultists who apparently think that Henry is some sort of god. Like, would Henry try to explain everything?? Would he be able to??? Good god imagine that. Like Henry just going "ahah well you see I'm the son and heir of an all powerful eldritch horror and I got my own cult it's nbd".

...Would the cultists start worshiping the Lodgers, or like see the Lodgers like very high-up cultists because they are the closest to Henry?? dhdh