#let me interview brennan!!!

[applebees4prez]

i really wish we got to see more behind the scenes of dimension 20. i want to see every character sheet before vs. after the every season. i want the dm notes. i want to watch the session zero, maybe release it after the end of the season as extra content. i want to see the one-on-ones between the dm and players. @dimension20official do you hear me?

[utilitycaster]

Do you think part of the D20 journalistic bias comes from D20 being edited? It gives the appearance of much more effortless play and lets them control the pacing in a way unedited play like CR simply can't do. They get to (potentially) hide a lot of stuff people would jump on as flaws while CR has no choice but to let it all play out. I greatly prefer CR's approach, despite it biting them in the ass a bit through no fault of their own.

Answering these both together to group cause and my opinions, and I do want to note this is specifically about journalism/press coverage, not their respective fandoms even though there's obviously some overlap.

I think there's a couple things, but I do want to note this was actually prompted by Daggerheart, not Critical Role. The response from several prominent voices in the Actual Play journalism community, whom I will not name here but whom I do not respect intellectually, really was, within hours of the open beta (which as far as I know they didn't have early access to - more on that later) "um it could be better, I don't like xyz and also it's sooooooo important to have criticism" and again, it is important to have criticism, but also you act like D20 has never had a mediocre moment and that Kollok is brilliant, so.

This...got away from me a bit. I'd say I'm sorry but actually I adore writing thousands of words about actual play and it will happen again but I'm putting the detailed answer below a cut. The short answer is I think a lot of Actual Play journalists actually sort of fell into their jobs through being vaguely involved in nerd spaces and aren't actually equipped to talk intelligently about TTRPGs and actual play as a medium that should, at its best, be a perfect fusion of narrative and mechanics. So instead they're distracted by flashy edits and bright lights and cool noises and some abstract concept of "novelty" and write only about that. Also Critical Role is the 700 lb gorilla in the AP space (though not, actually, the TTRPG space) and doesn't give them early access and that's meaaaaaan. Indeed, for all I think a lot of their coverage of D20 and Worlds Beyond Number is obsessively fawning, I also think it's extremely surface level, frequently factually wrong, and fails to get at what's truly excellent about those shows either.

I think, honestly, the biggest one is that I don't actually think a lot of Actual Play journalists watch series in full. I was looking for Polygon coverage of Fantasy High Junior Year and they have one glowing article but it's more about Fantasy High as setting and institution and D20 "changing the game" (also more on this later) to the point of outright contradicting the pull quotes they used from interviewing Brennan Lee Mulligan (also more on this later). So I started looking through their coverage and actually, quite a number of their write-ups are based on only one episode, or half a season. Clearly, they haven't read the full open beta (nor have I, but I think their complaints about the character build process belie a profound misunderstanding of what TTRPGs are, also more on this later). So editing is certainly part of it because it's really easy to see cool special effects and sound design within one episode and shit out a hacky article about it, whereas actually getting to the substance - character relationships, cohesive narrative, storytelling - requires work that I do not think they're doing. And on the one hand I do kind of get it, because yeah, if journalism is your livelihood then you perhaps do not have the time to watch 4 hours of D&D a week for 2-3 years if you're only going to get one article every six months out of it. But I don't think the answer is "focus intently on Microsoft Powerpoint-esque scene transition tricks while ignoring that nothing occurring at the table is actually fun to watch." For more on this, see this post.

The second, which is very relevant to Daggerheart but also is actually a big gap in D20 and WBN coverage in my opinion, and which I put in the tags, is that I actually don't think a lot of journalists have a solid understanding of TTRPGs nor of most genres. And I think Critical Role has a particularly good understanding of both these things, actually, if one skewed towards collaborative storytelling that is not rules-light. I think one really big example is that one person within the space is mad at the Daggerheart questions for the character archetypes because what if your character doesn't fit these. I think this is dumb as shit. I actually think that a common criticism of D&D - that you can't play ABSOLUTELY ANYTHING - is not valid, or rather, it's a valid opinion to hold but if you want to play a character who doesn't fit into the available archetypes perhaps you need to find another game. We all inherently understand that Blades in the Dark characters will be members of a criminal organization in a relatively low-magic setting, correct? That you can't show up to BitD and play a lawful good wizard prince because that's not the story being told? Or like, how in Honey Heist, you are a bear and you are trying to get honey, and you cannot play a human child investigating the old abandoned house at the edge of town, but there's a cool game called Kids on Bikes that will let you do that? Great! Why is this suddenly so hard to understand in the realm of heroic fantasy, that you will fit into specific archetypes? Why do people's brains, if they have them to begin with, vanish suddenly? I know I just did a big old rant that included this within it but genuinely I think a lot of people are deeply ignorant of heroic fantasy, or don't like it, and either is fine, but then they get mad at the heroic fantasy game for having heroic fantasy archetypes when the answer is "maybe this will never make you happy because it's not for you." (Frankly, I think this is also why they love D20, because it doesn't really do straight-up heroic fantasy, and that's fine, but they do keep acting like doing a Game of Thrones pastiche is equivalent to the invention of the wheel.) Like...I remember in the Midst Q&A that Xen said they tend to not like playing typical D&D classes, but their solution was to, you know, create Midst instead of sitting around going "actually, because D&D doesn't support cyberpunk narrative and the character archetypes within very well it is an utter failure." (I could go on forever about how actually TTRPGs are not a showcase for your already extant OCs to prance around but that's a totally separate post).

Mechanics and story are inherently intertwined, is what I'm trying to get at (sorry I'm really tired and have a lot to do but I'm passionate about this answer, it will be rambly, she says like 3 pages in) and I really don't think most actual play journalists get this. At all. And I do think that CR, and Daggerheart, and the people working for it, and especially Spenser Starke, Rowan Hall, Matt Mercer, and Travis Willingham, get this more than almost anyone else in the field. I also think Brennan Lee Mulligan and Aabria Iyengar get this, and the thing is, for all the praise showered upon them, much of which I think is deserved and most of what I think is undeserved is not because they are lacking but because the person writing about them is an idiot crediting them for things they (Brennan and Aabria) would never claim to have invented, their mechanical prowess is rarely if ever written about well. Fantasy High Junior Year's downtime mechanics actually fill in a famous gap in D&D, namely, downtime, and provide an excellent marriage of story and mechanics in my opinion, and I haven't really seen any discussion, because that would require watching the part of the TTRPG show where they play the TTRPG, and knowing the vague word on the street about D&D criticism that isn't just "*nods sagely* capitalism is the BBEG."

And finally: related a bit to the edit but Critical Role used to not be able to provide any early access to press, because it was literally a live show, and I suspect they never broke the habit, and I think that is for the best. As discussed a lot of D20 coverage actually feels like they watched the press screener and then never returned to the show. And I do not know the politics about them, but given that several of these publications (notably Polygon, but some others) have been shitting on Critical Role for several years, and just generally given the way CR's leadership vs. how D20's leadership respond to fandom pressure, I suspect Critical Role does not give these journalists a ton of early or increased, if any. Honestly, why should you, if you're getting interviewed in Variety? And I think the journalists are mad, because they think they're special and should get treated as such.

I do want to wrap something up, and I want to thank @captainofthetidesbreath for talking a little about this in game design/ttrpgs and giving me the idea, but in story, you should be challenging your audience, expanding their horizons, and being new and interesting. In the actual playing of TTRPGs, especially a new one, it is vital to be inclusive and easy to understand and patient and provide points of reference. I really feel like many Actual Play journalists and some TTRPG ones as well have this equation flipped and are looking for challenging concepts that most people will never be able to get a group to be willing to play, and bells and whistles in production, but leave story as an afterthought. Critical Role designs games to actually be played and to be used specifically to tell good stories, and puts story before production, and I think that undercuts those journalists' whole deal.

[rosemarysage]

Hello everybody! I’m trying to compile all the information we got about Onyx storm so it's easier to find. So below I have written everything Rebecca has said at recent events that I think could be relevant to OS or the next books. I left out the stuff I didn’t think was relevant like the T.V. show and personal questions about Rebecca. The links are at the bottom. The first two are from an audio recording. Many thanks to Tumblr user Skyfallscotland for posting the audio. I haven’t been able to find recordings for the Perth show and some of the other dates from these so if you have any information from them please let me know and I can update the post. I intend to add the older interviews later but I wanted to get this one up because we got lots of juicy details from the panels.

Fourth wing and iron flame spoilers

Sydney panel 6/22/24 Saturday

She has deviated from the Synopsis she made for the series

She knows what the last scene of the series will be

We will see more of the world in OS and the following books. The map is representative of what Violet knows so it will expand as Violet learns more.

Jack Barlowe is around and serves a purpose. He likely won’t be a main character. Rebecca likes bad characters to have a reason for doing bad things. Jack has always wanted power.

The interviewer asked her not to do a redemption arc for Jack and Rebecca said “Noted”

Dain represents the love you thought you wanted when you were younger

When Dain says, “If you had just told me none of this would have happened” in the interrogation chamber he’s not just talking about the interrogation but also Liam’s death and everything else.

Violet is completely disconnected from her magic in the interrogation chamber. She can’t reach out to her dragons or Xaden. Rebecca said that Violet's mind summoned Liam because he was her protector.

The interrogation scene ending with Dain and Xaden was the driving point of the writing process. There is a scene in OS that elicits similar emotions and Rebecca said we aren’t going to like it

Q&A

Jack likely won’t have a romantic relationship. He’s also probably not “the real enemies to lovers arc”

Garrick's signet is in book three

A rider doesn’t necessarily have the same traits as their dragon's color, sometimes they have the opposite and need their dragon to counter them. Brennan is a tactician and needs unpredictably and Imogen is a wild card. The dragon rider bond is kind of like a marriage.

Her editor got her to add Andarna. She is there to balance Tairns' massive power.

Someone asked if we would hear more about the first six and Andarna and she said “Maybe” is a funny voice

Violet’s dad is not Malek.

Sgaeyl is pissed at Xaden and is not speaking to him at the moment. She also mentioned the bond between them.

Someone accidentally asked if Xaden dated the prince instead of Violet. After they figured that out she said, “I think you should read the third book”

Sydney panel 6/24/24 Monday

She deviated from the plan for OS concerning a character's death.

Jack is an example of the hunger for power and what happens when you aren’t selected for the power you think you deserve

She expected us to figure out the second signet. Her editor asked her if it needed another line to make it clear and she said no they would get it.

The Taylor songs that describe OS are Who’s Afraid of Little Old Me and So It Goes.

Someone asked,” Have you considered doing a prequel on the first six or how the empyrean came about or will this be revealed in further books?” and she skipped it

Melbourne 6/25/24

The interviewer asked, “Do we already have a reference to Onyx that will reveal the title's meaning to us” Rebecca passed

The interviewer asked if we would get another POV from Xaden or anyone else and Rebecca said that she has established a record of showing a little bit of what Xaden is thinking.

She that we have already learned Violet's second signet

The interview asked if Garrick would realize Imogen is into him and Rebecca asked what makes us think he doesn’t know

When asked if we would learn more about Father Sorrengails research about feathertails she said “Maybe” again in a funny voice

Onyx Storm is very Rep coded. She listened to So it Goes a lot while writing OS.

In the interrogation scene, she is cut off from her magic so her mind “pulls” someone who protected her

The interviewer asked if Xaden and Sgaeyl were still bonded and she said, “Next time on fourth wing”

She was asked if Xaden and Violet are endgame and she passed and then said “I write romances”

Her favorite thing about Violet in OS is that she has one goal and she doesn’t care what stands in her way.

Seattle March

Sgaeyl is pissed and not speaking to Xaden

Xaden won’t get more POVs until he quits keeping secrets. His problems with Sgaeyl will be explored externally. The interviewer said that Xaden keeps secrets about things other an Aretia and Rebecca said, “Naturally”. Violet is way better at keeping secrets in OS. She’s in her reputation era.

A lot of things were set up in Fourth Wing that didn’t come into effect in Iron Flame that will in the upcoming books.

We should expect about the same amount of Xaden’s POVs in future books, namely end chapters and bonus chapters.

Rebecca said, “There is a correlation between less and less dragons bonding  and more and more dragons saying what we are doing is wrong”

We will learn Violet’s father's name and more about him.

Xaden’s mom’s story will come up in later books.

The other three quadrants can drop out or change quadrants. Only the riders don’t allow this.

Miscellaneous

Rebecca said in an Instagram comment that she wrote a line referencing Xaden and the boys moving Violet’s armoire in OS.

Links

Sydney

https://www.tumblr.com/skyfallscotland/754271162361577472/it-took-me-far-too-long-to-realise-i-could-just

Melbourne 6/25

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=8FrFupBTVgY&pp=ygUOcmViZWNjYSB5YXJyb3M%3D

Seattle March

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=v0yTEZBtpVQ&t=6s&pp=ygUOcmViZWNjYSB5YXJyb3M%3D

[parsnip-problems]

I just know that if ever got to meet or interview Brennan Lee Mulligan sadly I would throw in so many references and hints to Strong Female Protagonist but never outright say “when are you gonna finish it” cause I would stay on point but he would know he would know FOR EXAMPLE:

“Brennan I gotta say what I love about your stories they have a lot strong characters with a lot of good stories that always have perfect endings and like a lot of strong women characters too who end up being main characters. I really gotta commend you on all these strong female protagonist that have really good endings”

I KNOW ITS STUPID BUT LET ME HAVE THIS

[fillingthescrapbook]

Let's Talk About: Fantasy High Junior Year and Stress Tested

Brennan Lee Mulligan is an evil son of a genius.

I have been waiting for this episode forever--like, a whole week--and it did not disappoint. Starting with a return to assembly. Confirming the conspiracy that the Rat Grinders were setting them up.

Side note: I really do think the Rat Grinders are working for something or someone who is (or who are) also meddling with Interim Emergency Back-Up Principal Grix.

The mandatory drug testing at school that IMMEDIATELY netted the kid who called out Aguefort Academy becoming a police state in freshman year was a deliberate choice that I feel like Brennan, knowing how easily distracted his Intrepid Heroes can be, planted for the viewers to pick up on. And unleashing this after a "speech" from Agent Clark that ended with an extra distracting "until doppelgangers burn your nest!"? Yeah, I smell Brennanigans.

Quick break: I just want to say that Murph plays Riz's paranoia so well. Ally's quick moves to shenanigans is on another level. And Zac immediately taking a stress token for Gorgug feels extremely correct. That said, I feel like there should be a mechanic where Gorgug gets stressed so much that he channels the tokens into a rage that impresses Porter.

Also: the rolling graphics on the left side of the screen, for the tracks that our intrepid heroes are rolling for, look so cool. The stress levels on the right look great too, but they are stressing me out.

Now; I am really liking Yolanda Badgood, the cleric professor. I am not liking, however, the fact that Brennan is making her so likeable. And so friendly. And so helpful. Because I am now fearing for her life.

Emily's bits about Fig not knowing where to go rings differently for me, having seen the pre-season interview where she admitted that she wanted to play a new character. That she wanted to keep the happy ending Fig already got in Sophomore Year. I have to confess: I also actually really like this new aimless track for Fig, and it's showing in Emily's gameplay how she is also realizing new things about her character as Brennan showers her with more choices to make.

The one bad thing about the downtime episode, in my opinion, is that the time we spend with each character feels so little. Especially with how much time is passing in game time. I wanted to see more of Adaine's relationship with her sister, and maybe see a friendship blossom with Oishyn. But Siobhan is, rightfully, concerned about Adaine's finances so she has to prioritize her job and her academics. I needed Gorgug and Riz to get more updates about Frosty Fair before it happened--but, obviously, the had personal stuff they needed to deal with first…and Frosty Fair is already happening next episode--

Honestly: Brennan did a wonderful job with the down times for everyone. And every member of the Intrepid Heroes utilized their down time well.

I just wanted more because I'm very greedy and I love these characters to bits.

Speaking of bits:

With two Nat20s in a row, I would say that Gorgug really is the greatest wizard of our time.

"Get your best pair of Badidas and we'll see what that body does" is an s-tier Brennan-liner.

Riz using the celestial spy stuff he got from his dad is AMAZING.

And Brennan is enjoying handing out the stress tokens too much. Zacky even points it out.

Can't wait for next week!

[three-headed-monster]

brandt/luke: a primer

i'm gonna be super honest, there's nothing that's prompting this. it's quite literally self-indulgent for me to archive their interactions before i forget them all!

so hello ! welcome ! if you're here, i presume you're clicking because you're like 'what the fuck is this, luke hughes and who now?' and yeah that would be me too if i didn't know the background information

but it exists!!! and it has spiralled far beyond my wildest dreams and become an actual Thing that i would consider one of the ships i ride the HARDEST for!!!!!! that i have somehow convinced my closest friends to also ride for, which is the biggest accomplishment for a ship, as we all know

here's who the ship consists of:

luke hughes!

(sorry he looks cursed but this is not a post about how attractive he is)

he was the 4th overall pick in the 2021 draft or smth, no big deal, just comes from an extremely talented hockey family and plays with his brother in new jersey now. used to play at the university of michigan, which unfortunately is an important setting for many, many rarepair ships. don't know if there are really any fun facts about him but he used to model for american eagle and got made fun of for that

anyways here's the second person in the ship, brandt clarke !

(did i choose a significantly better looking photo of him for this than with luke? yes, absolutely, because it's important that you think he's attractive)

8th overall pick to the la kings, former don mills flyer with shane wright and brennan othmann, former barrie colts captain, friends with jack quinn, etc etc. you may actually know him from that time he tried to jump the glass and fight a fan in the stands, i think that video went p viral on hockey twitter. the most important thing you know though is that he has more attitude and swagger in his pinky finger than the majority of people have in their whole BODY

so let's venture back to 2022, and how this all started, with a conversation between me and @fifthovertime about the greater toronto area and its hockey connections

toronto, as many might know, is considered a hockey hotbed, due to its abundance of minor hockey teams. it's where a lot of nhl players come from, and where a lot of players call home and return to in the summers.

luke, prior to moving to michigan with his parents and brothers so quinn could play with the ntdp, used to live in toronto while his dad worked for the leafs. at this time, there were a lot of other young budding stars in the area, brandt clarke included. he'd moved down from ottawa to play on a minor midget team in toronto, the don mills flyers, which was rival minor hockey team to luke's. however, since the toronto hockey scene was so tight (and because brandt's older brother was playing with luke's on the same team), they would periodically see each other and play pond hockey together. as kids do.

don't believe me? hear it from brandt himself. timestamp from about 2:55 of the video to about 3:55.

this is what i like to call interaction #1. of course, it's really just brandt retelling a story, but it's the first time i heard about any sort of friendship between the hughes brothers and the clarkes. very wholesome, you can tell brandt really has a hero complex for luke and jack, it's frankly adorable.

and if you go back, you can even see that brandt was a really supportive friend! he commented on luke’s commitment post to umich and luke liked the comment, at the time

but they’re not friends. no, i’d call them far from that. because slowly....you can start to see that hatred is building........because brandt starts to know he's good enough to go fourth overall. and he would love to go to a team with his brother on it.....but there's another brother standing in the way of that.

he doesn't speak about luke in particular in this interview, but he definitely talks about njd as if he doesn't think it's a realistic option for him

at this point then, the narrative is pretty clear. it was once a friendship, that slipped away from both of them because of distance, and although brandt once had reverence for it, he’s soured on the idea. he wishes he could be good enough to play with his brother too. he hates that luke hughes is good enough at hockey to do it. luke to him is less so an extension of his brothers, but an obstacle for brandt to overcome, an obstacle that stands in the way of everything he wants.

but so far it’s been pretty one sided…right? it’s all kind of just been brandt’s feelings toward luke, right?

behold, the glorious moment that lives entirely rent free in my mind, every. single. day.

i soooo wish i had the video for this (screw tsn for wiping their archives so often) BUT TRUST WHEN I WATCHED IT FOR THE FIRST TIME I AUDIBLY GASPED.

he said it with so much fucking snark, and an EYE ROLL. the inflappable luke hughes, who has seemingly never let an opponent get in the way of him and his friends having fun and kicking ass at the same time, is bothered by a dig from brandt clarke. that didn't even mention him directly! that was more about techniques of the game than it was about the usa players! "he can say what he wants", but he didn't even say anything about YOU

genuinely, i will thank mark masters for bringing this up with luke forever, he's so valid for that, he knew we needed this narrative.

what's even better is that THE NEXT DAY during the semi-final? guess who scores the game-winning goal. and guess who just happens to be flopping like a fish on the ice during it, trying to prevent it from going in.

and thus brandt/luke is born! as taylor describes it as, it is bitch ass cunt (luke) for cunt ass bitch (brandt). they are each other's equals and opposites. they're both cocky and sure of themselves and can give it as good as it gets, and what they like about each other is what happens when that is stripped away. they are undoubtedly MY favourite luke hughes narrative, and the only one i feel truly captures his narrative essence, away from his brothers. sure, others are cute and i can see where people are coming from, but nothing gets luke as much as this gets luke.

this is luke, unfiltered, and it's only brandt that can bring it out of him.

[crepuscular-girlthing]

Rewatching sophomore year, there's a moment in Spring Break! I Believe in You! Part 1 where Kristen revivifies herself using her own pinky bone, and Brennan says the tip of her pinky finger glows with starlight forever after. That's never acknowledged again.

I might be mistaken, but I'm pretty sure Kristen still has the staff of doubt in Junior Year. She didn't use it once in the Night Yorb fight. And Siobhan didn't once use the bonus action divination spell + dodge action from the Sword of Sight in that fight either.

Fig's birthday being christmas is based on a bit where Emily misremembered that the infaithable bass was a christmas present, said that in character to Gorthilax, then ran with it.

Brennan said it in the BTS interview: it's hard to remember all the pre-established canon. "I can't just make something up, I actually answered that 4 years ago. What did I say?"

The Quangle is almost certainly a plot-point. But it's also a de-facto explanation for all the biggest fuckups Brennan and the crew might make forgetting years of established continuity. It can be both.

AND it won't be able to explain player or GM mistakes like forgetting items, spells, abilities, relationships, lore, characters, etc. They're all friends playing a game, with various levels of obsessiveness about the details of it. Some (Ally) are pretty much just there for the vibes. I think the crew would much prefer an audience who can go with the vibes and let the show do what it's gonna do. This isn't an epic fantasy series written by one person over years where they rewrite and edit each book before publishing, making sure to reference their notes so everything is properly foreshadowed and paid off and stays consistent.

For nerds like me who WANT it to be consistent, who relish all those little details and get upset when the crew forget about them, we can write fanfic to indulge in those things. But the crew wanna keep the ball rolling uphill. They're improvisers, and they're going with the flow. Continuity is most important in improv when it hightens the bit, and when it doesn't, it usually gets dropped.

[mercurygray]

First One In

The 100th's first mission - the submarine pens at Bremen. First for the crews in the air - and the crews on the ground.

**Warning for non-graphic depiction of a civilian air accident.

June 25, 1943

The view from the tower was the best of everything.

Cord took a deep breath and let the wind ruffle her hair, listening to the birds and the soft whine of the weather equipment on the roof. This was the best part of her job - the wind and the quiet, and the green fields, and the view.

Downstairs was a hive of activity - the weather monitors on the floor below, taking their measurements, and the intelligence section below them, the huge blackboards mapping out the whole wing, squadron by squadron and plane by plane, the telex and the typewriters. But up here she was in her element, earth and sky in equal measure. It wasn’t flying - but damn if it wasn’t close.

She was glad they’d been some of the first crew here on base, and that the pilots had come later. It had given them time to settle in and really make the place theirs - and she didn’t mean the pictures Mae and the others had put up in their hut, or the curtains, or the flowers on the windowsills. She’d watched the laborers putting down the new tarmac, and watched the engineers putting in the new huts and barracks, and smelled the paint drying in the enlisted men’s mess halls and the Aero Club. This was her tower now, her radio and her field. She’d bicycled it and driven it and charted its wind patterns and read its weather reports and knew it now just about as well as it was possible to know a place.

But aren’t you scared, Cord? The question had been asked, more than once, before she packed herself off to Iowa for basic training. There’s so much you don’t know.

Well, sure, Cord had allowed. I don’t know heavy bombers, or England, or what to do in an air raid. But I know airfields. I know the Army, as much as they’ll let me know. And I know me, what I can do. I can learn everything else.

A true statement - the truest there was. She’d needed to learn a lot - how to drill and march in formation and shine shoes and salute, but once she’d gotten here, and been shown the tower, and how the radio worked, there wasn’t a thing she needed after that except the airplanes she’d be directing in, and the men to fly them. And the man who was going to lead them through it, of course.

She hadn’t known what she’d find, stepping into his office for the first time. Colonel Harold Huglin was something of an enigma. Had he worked with women before? Would he care? Captain Brennan didn’t know his name, and she’d been in longer than any of them, and Cord could tell, just by watching the older woman, that these were questions they would have to ask, and whether they liked the answers or not they’d have to live with them regardless.

She remembered thinking that his desk was exceptionally neat. It was something to focus on for a moment while she collected herself - the man had a face like a hawk, and as she’d saluted and sat down in the wooden chair opposite his desk she’d had the feeling of being prey. “You have quite the list of credentials, Lieutenant Callaway. There’s any number of things you could be doing - ferrying squadron work, for starters. Why apply for overseas duty?”

It had been a strange way to start an interview. Cord had shifted in her chair and taken a breath. Would it have been better if she’d lied, or worse? No, sir, I’ve never seen an airplane in my life, I don’t hold a pilot’s license, and I’ve never won prize money in an air race. I didn’t grow up on an airfield and I don’t know the first thing about the Army Air Corps. But her father hadn’t raised her to be a liar. “I’ve spent my whole life at Wright-Patterson, sir. I just wanted to do my bit, same as everyone else.” When you’re almost one of the boys and then all the boys start going overseas, it starts to wear a girl down a little.

“And you didn’t think ‘your bit’ was training new pilots? You’ve got more flight hours than some of the men who’ll be coming through here.”

Well, it helps if you start when you’re about fifteen or so and you’re a good student and the flying officers like you. “With respect, sir, I’m not a teacher. But I’m calm, and level-headed, and I know how to handle a plane, and that makes me just the sort of person you’d want on your tower. Flight control is just as important as any other job - and sometimes more. If a guy’s engine is on fire, he’s going to want to hear someone who can talk him out of it, if he needs.”

And then the man had smiled - actually smiled - and leaned back in his chair a little, obviously satisfied with her answer. “You can relax, Lieutenant. This isn’t an interview - you already have the job. A good commanding officer likes to know his crew before he gets started somewhere. And we’ll hope no one needs to be talked out of engine fires.”

But someone always will, sir. That’s the nature of airplanes. How many crashes had she seen at Wright - or even at the air shows? She knew all too well what a burning engine smelled like, a flamed out cowling. She hadn’t said that, of course - she knew when to keep her mouth shut. Witness Lieutenant - what was his name now? Brady, that was him, belly-landing his fort straight in from Greenland because he’d had some electrical failure and his landing gear wouldn’t engage.

They would hope there wouldn’t be any of that today - Lemmons already had something of a sour look after a noisy (and successful) campaign to rename that plane Brady’s Crash Wagon. Pilots thought they were funny, doing things like that, but crew chiefs could be superstitious about names.

Someone cleared her throat next to her. “You thinking of turning into a bird? You’ve got this look on your face like you’d like to launch off the balcony.”

Cord had to laugh. “Just admiring the view, Mae.” A jeep carrying a familiar bi-colored flight jacket came rolling around the corner, its owner whistling loudly. “Well, most of it.”

Mae laughed. “He’s the air exec, Cord. You can’t exactly get rid of him.”

“But I don’t have to be friendly, either.”

Her friend rolled her eyes. “One of these days you’re going to tell me exactly what he did to piss you off so bad.”

Where would I even start? “If it were exactly one thing I’d tell you, Mae. It’s more his entire state of being.”

“Lieutenant, you’re gonna want to come back inside.” Becky Holbrook was outside the glasshouse, binoculars in hand. “It looks like someone’s coming back early.”

Cord and Mae followed the Sergeant back inside the glass-walled observation room, and Cord took the binoculars and her position next to Anita Young on the radio, focusing on the plane on the horizon so she could try to read the numbers and assess condition. “That’s Major Veal’s plane. Looks like he’s on three engines.”

“Green flare,” Mae reported, though everyone with eyes could see it, arcing into the sky. “No need to send out the fire squad or the ambulance.” On the ground below, they saw a jeep peel out from one of the hardstands, three men clinging to their seats. “Looks like Lemmons is already on his way out.”

Another jeep joined them - the one that had only just parked at the tower. “And there goes Major Egan,” Cord said, sourly. “What the hell is he going to do?”

“Anything he can, Lieutenant.”

Cord immediately put down her binoculars and saluted, feeling foolish. “Major Bowman. There’s been nothing on the radio, sir. It looks from here like it’s just engine one that’s out.”

“As it should be,” Bowman said with approval. The intelligence officer wasn’t a physically imposing person, but Cord had spent enough time with him to know that he knew his business, and the slightly fading red hair that had given him his nickname was covering a first-rate brain. “Germans monitor all our radio traffic - Major Veal knows that. It’s different procedure here, compared to an airfield back in the states. They won’t radio in for landing instructions.” Cord looked down at her service shoes, feeling foolish. “But you’ve got a good eye about that engine, Lieutenant,” Bowman added, a gentle compliment to cover up her mistake.

“Thank you, sir.”

“Our first returned plane!” Becky said with a grin, nudging Anita and Mae. “We’re in it now!”

Beside her, she heard Bowman breathe sharply through his teeth. “We’ll get a report from him and the crew about when he turned back, and Egan will need an update on that plane’s operations status,” the intelligence officer stated, hands on his hips as he watched the plane touch down and turn down the taxiway. “Make sure no one stands down - fire teams, ambulances. We’re still waiting on the rest of the group.”

“Of course, sir.”

Bowman paused, turning away from the front of the glasshouse and stepping to the side, motioning for Cord to follow him. “You ever seen an airplane crash, Lieutenant Callaway? Apart from Lieutenant Brady’s ...unorthodox landing the other day?” He pursed his lips. “Colonel Huglin mentioned you grew up near Wright-Patterson. I want to know - if you know what we might be expecting back.”

Cord looked at him, really looked, and realized what he was asking. You mean do I know what’s waiting for the ambulances, sir? Or what a burning plane smells like? I watched a woman pancake on a pylon at Bendix, once. Took the turn too quick. Wasn’t anything to bury afterwards - just a burning wreck. I’ve seen pilots miss landings and I’ve seen gunnery practice go bad. Maybe I haven’t been in the war just yet but I know what a plane can do to a body. “Pretty frequently, sir.”

Bowman nodded. “This one was easy. The rest of it won’t be - you understand me? They may radio in to let you know what’s coming.” Manage the others was the last unspoken command. The rest won’t be pretty.

Cord fixed her eye on his and nodded, feeling the weight of his expectations and his stare. “Yes, sir. Of course, sir.” When the others come back, then we can say we’re in the war. But not before.

“Calm and steady, Callaway.”

“Always, sir.”

“And we’ll be grateful then that Major Egan’s doing everything he can, all right? Because we’re all doing everything we can, always.”

Cord swallowed the knot in her throat, knowing that at the heart of it he was right. Even she couldn’t say that Major Egan didn’t care about his airmen - and he was always doing everything he could, even if it sometimes made him a nuisance. “Right, sir.”

He nodded, and stepped back outside the glasshouse so he could go back downstairs. Cord took a deep breath, and returned to the radio, and the view out the front window. “Make a note of the time, Mae, will you? Captain Brennan will need that for the daily report.”

One plane back - nineteen more to go. She surveyed the airfield, wondering just how it would look in an hour, or two, or how the siren to call out the ambulance would sound behind the glass, and her hands tightened on her binoculars. I know airfields. I know planes. And by the end of today, I’ll know something else, too - something about war.

And aren’t you scared about it? She thought about that burning plane at Bendix again, the sound of the announcer’s voice, the collective gasp from the stands as the plane burst into flames and the flyer behind only just swerved to avoid it.

Well, my father didn’t raise a liar - so I’ll tell you: I’m damn terrified.

Read more of Cord here at her masterlist.

[bloodyshadow1]

I think Brennan went too far in nerfing Fig being a bard this season.

I get Fig/Emily made a deal but to make nerf her entire class without explaining how, it's not really fair. Brennan is a great DM, but I don't think anyone should be free from criticism, Emily seemed to like it according to her interview, but it's still something bad DM's do. Brennan is a good DM and friend so I don't think he is being malicious, I think he's doing it to tell a better story that he knows Emily will enjoy in the end so it is okay for them, it doesn't change that it's an overreach of what a DM should be able to do in my eyes.

As a viewer, my opinion does not matter, because the game is not for me, but also as a viewer I am allowed to criticize what I watch. I get that Brennan is trying to do something cool for the story, but at the very least to me, he went too far. Right now, Fig/Emily are afraid of their bardic inspiration, it's poisoning her against the class. Bardic inspiration is a huge part of the bard class, one of it's staples. It's like if a barbarian lost their rages or monks lost their ki abilities, that alone is too far without talking to the player first and explaining how the mechanic has changed.

The mall fight in episode 5 was the most egregious example, I see people talking about how it was almost a TPK and the bad kids were only saved because of Brennan, but I disagree. They were only put into that situation because of DM overreach. Yes, Brennan let them live in the end, but they were only in that situation because of an unfair and insane Diabolus Ex Machina specifically targeted against Emily/Fig. a Fire elemental that did not exist before that turn, appeared out of nowhere with a tray of shrimp and it getting knocked away with one of the shrimp somehow landing in Cassandra's mouth, and being something that she a goddess is somehow allergic to and resulting in her getting knocked out, all because Fig gave her a bardic inspiration.

That's not fair, I don't care how cursed or unlucky Fig is because of the deal she made, that's a crazy amount of bad luck to correlate to a single bardic inspiration. That's like 2 nat 1's in a row bad, not a d8 or bardic inspiration bad. That's one of the worst rolls possible on the wild magic surge table twice bad.

This is not saying that Brennan is a bad person, a bad friend to the people at the table, it's not even saying he's a bad dm. But it is a criticism for that moment because it was unfair. I might be in the minority here, but I personally don' think a dm is above the table, I think they are another player with a different rulebook. They have their own rules that they cannot/should not break just as any other player at the table.

[halevren]

FHJY Spoilers || my live thoughts as I watch episode 11

three hours. three hours along. this might take me a bit to get through 😭😭 I might not note every little thought because that's. A lot. But definitely a good portion of the normal random stuff

THE CONTENT WARNINGS ARE CONCERNING ME.... BODY HORROR??? GORE??? THIS ISN'T A HORROR SEASON. I THOUGHT THIS WAS GOING TO BE A FUN HAHA SEASON???? WHAT??????????

HELLO ONE AND ALL

Ally Brennan Beardsley Mulligan

"What if just shows up for the interview" well I guess that means riz and fig have to create a

PETE WENTZ IS WANDA'S (RECENT) EX BOYFRIEND

"Cause if I say it to Brennan, I'll just be wrong"

CANCELLED 😭

im showing my emo autistic friend this session because they know literally everything about emo bands and apparently Pete Wentz has drank piss multiple times before. Hm.

"Let him sweat"

Mommy/baby time??????

"You are my little baby"

Sklonda embarrassing Riz to Fig is so real and accurate

spys tongue

spy's tongue or spies tongue

Very Humanoid Animals 😭😭😭😭😭😭

AN ORANGUTAN

NAT ONE BECOMES 23 🔥🔥🔥🔥

19 steal orangutan tho

VOMITING

NAT 20 MURPH

BROKEN CRYSTAL??

BLOOD SPLATTER?

oh goodness

Something happened here

CONFUSED?

STABS HER HAND?

Copperkell

Riz asking his mom to see dead bodies

omg did Kalina say Ragh Barkrock because she wanted them to investigate everything that she did back then in reference to him specifically (like the killing clone Lydia / destroying the house, etc.)

Emergency meeting. Even you Fabian.

CARBONIZED BLOOD?

rage kills

CRRRRRRIT it's a 7

IDENTIFY SPELL!!!!!!!

oh no. Brennan why you asking the state of emotions

"Fuck"

TWO IN ONE ONE IN TWO

Identify spell is overwhelmed

ATTACKS ADAINE????

NAT 20 PERCEPTION CHECK

The rot of dead gods??

INTERIOR OF A BODY?

gross gross gross gross

"gorgug..... very good....."

"You have to tip me this time" "nah"

building a God??? oh my...

The daymare queen

Bobby Dawn.

Asking what would make Kristen angry is such a loaded question. So much stuff

"My president!"

gorgug just grabs the angry shard

"I did not tell you I shit." "No, the whole school knows about it"

ADAINE HAS A SCOOTER?

AELWYN ASKED THE SHELTER FOR ALL THE UNWANTED CATS 😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭

AND SHE'S ALLERGIC TO CATS 😭😭😭😭😭😭😭

"I have so much love to give exclusively to cats"

Camaraderie in toxicity

SHE HAS NO FRIENDS 😭😭

omg aelwyn and fabian boned

"Fuck you. Bitch"

Malarkey

"Tell Kristen to not come back."

zac's little shrugs hehehehe

"I drive down to bastion city and do crimes."

"I shall steal everyone's bones"

THE CATS CAN SMELL THE WARD AND THEY WON'T TAKE THE MEDICINE

aelwyn my beloved I love her so much

FIG DISGUISED AS KIPPERLILLY COPPERKETTLE

Ruben is just constantly being terrorized by fig in the dreamscape

devil's nectar Gertie infodump

KRISTEN AND GERTIE KISSED

"Okay, well let's go out sometime. I'm painfully single, uh, and none of my friends wanna see me naked anymore." Kristen Applebees you are so fascinating

LOCAL FOOD TRUCKS? THE FUCKING FOOD TRUCK FEST

KRISTEN MAKING OUT WITH GERTIE TO DISTRACT HER FROM FABIAN

"Kristen, you know that's my nemesis right?"

KRISTEN GOT HER KISSES IN 🎉🎉🎉

RIZ IS ON THE SCHOOL STAFF?????

LET FIG BECOME THE CLERIC TEACHER

LET WANDA CHILDA BECOME THE CLERIC TEACHER

A CV OF WANDA CHILDA

A WICKER PAPER??????

"I pooped right now."

Adaine over break research paper of curses

RUBEN IS HENRY'S NEPHEW

NAT 20 GORGUG PERCEPTION

He leaves the motherboard.... I worry that it might be stolen by someone else

"Seems suspect." "What do you mean suspect?" "Seems Suspect" their sibling dynamic is so real

THEY BROUGHT ZAYN!!!!

how did they get Zayn through TSA

TELEMAINE HAS A LITTLE THING THAT SAYS GORGUG'S NAME 😭😭😭😭😭

YAK BAK

GRAPE NIP

Hillariel is so pretty

GILEAR IS SO STRESSED

GILEAR SAID FUCK

Gilear is the only person who has made the fig curse the main priority

"I want the yogurt back on my shirt"

ALL THE MONEY GILEAR IN THIS SITUATION MAKES GOES STRAIGHT TO ADAINE

"HE GRABS ME?"

RIZBERT

"TELEMAINE STOP BULLYING ME"

(High pitch voice) "how did she bring winter?"

I heavily fw gertie x tracker

THEIR PLAN B IS SHRIMP JUMP

CRAW FATHERS

GORGUG CLEARLY PISSED OFF

oh fig.... I feel so connected to you

"Who's Wanda Childa....?" "She's my alter emo"

Sandra is so true. I often ask my friends how they percieve me so I can understand myself better.

"What if I punished this man to eternal rock"

"I don't want to see that." Sandra grabs fig's cigarette and takes a hit instead.

SPY'S TONGUE LORE

Kalina with the Spy's Tongue........

I love this lore and conspiracy theories talk

they're annoying but have great record keeping

GORGUG PUT HIS HEADPHONES ON THE SECOND THEY ENTERED THE CHURCH

NAT 20 INSIGHT

Narnia burning man

Fig and Fabian are living it UP

tracker............. i can't say I like her very much after that phone call. So I'm not the most thrilled to see her.

GORGUG PUSHING EVERYONE OUT OF THE WAY TO THE HOT CHOCOLATE

WORLD STAR

Half the party is living it up having hot coco while the other half is experiencing / witnessing a very emotional moment

RUNES RELATING TO GIANT DEITIES

GIFT EXCHANGE

PIPES OF THE SEWERS

CHA CHA CHA CHA CHA CHA CHA

THE RATETTES

EAR WORM?

"PUT ME IN YOUR BRAIN"

A PULL UP BAR!!!! IMMOVABLE BAR

BRACERS OF DEFENSE

"Oh shit they're so practical. I have to wear bracers. What can I do? They're so tactic?"

RIDDLER RIZ?

FIRE GIANT JUICE

"Is this legal?" "It's Not."

WOODEN ORANGUTAN MASK

SO MUCH HOLE

HE SENDS A TEXT TO MAZEY THEN PUTS HIS PHONE ON AIRPLANE MODE

KRISTEN NOOOOO

THE BAR

assisted pull ups 🔥🔥🔥

Naradriel is actually so sweet

Hillsong / wolfsong close enough

NAT 20 INVESTIGATION CHECK FOR MURPH

SCORTCH MARK?

LIST OF NAMES??

WEDDING CONTRACT

OH MY GOD OH MY GOD

RUVINA MAID OF HONOR

THE MASK

"PUT THE HOLES AWAY AND MAKE THEM"

WHAT'S THE NAME. WHAT'S THE NAME. WHAT'S THE NAME. WHAT IS IT. WHAT IS THE NAME BRENNAN

OH GOD

ANKARNA

GLOWS RED? OH MY GOD FIENDISH ENERGY

ADAINE BROUGHT BACK ARKARNA AND LYDIA'S CHEST CRYSTAL

OH MY GOD IF LYDIA DIES I'M GONNA PUNCH MY WALL /HJ

negative one initiative........

SAVING ROLLS FOR FIG? WHY

PRIDE ARMOR

THE MOON BEGINS TO WHAT?

TEARS HER FLESH? OH GOD

BRIDE ARMOR

CASSANDRA IS PROTECTING THEM 😭😭😭😭😭😭😭

SEVERAL DIVINE INTERVENTIONS ARE HAPPENING SIMULTANEOUSLY IN CONFLICT??????????

FIG INTO THE BRIEF CASE JUST LIKE GILEAR WAS

SIX LEVEL COUNTERSPELL

COUNTER SPELL CRIT!!!!!!!!!

FIG WAS ALMOST KILLED?????????????

RIZ JUMPS AFTER FIG

BARONNNN FROM THE BARONIES

ROËMAENCE PARTNÆR

FABIAN DIDN'T JUMP INTO THE BRIEF CASE. GORGUG, FIG AND RIZ HAVE SO FAR

okay thank god fabian did jump in

DIVINE INTERVENTION ROLL

DEATH WARD ON AELWYN 🔥🔥

BARON IS WARNING KRISTEN?

DID WE JUST WATCH GILEAR FIG DIE?

NAT 20 DEX THROW FOR KRISTEN

what dimension are they in. What is riz's briefcase

ENDING OFF ON A ROLL FOR INITIATIVE??

I DON'T KNOW HOW TO FEEL WHAT

[wetcatspellcaster]

Writer Interview Game

thank you so much for tagging me @eraserspiral !!!!

When did you start writing?

I wrote a lot of 'original fiction' as a teen, including a couple of TERRIBLE novels, that were essentially just a grab bag of all the books i was reading at the time. School (and in hindsight, grief) stopped this around 16-18, and then a very high pressure degree at a high profile university seemingly killed off my love of writing entirely.

I got back into writing at 26... weirdly?? just before the panini?? (january 2020, did past-me feel something in the water and know i'd need to hold onto any crumb of serotonin for dear life??) I had just finished my PhD applications, and after sinking so many hours and so many words into the most joy sucking series of forms I've ever encountered, I decided I wanted to write something fun for a change!

Are there different themes or genres you enjoy reading than what you write?

I don't write smut. I read a LOT of smut.

But in terms of themes, I tend to write in worlds/fantasy settings where we can all pretend that capitalism doesn't exist, or that if it does exist, the protagonist is winning at it. I really like speculative fiction (sf and fantasy) that tackles capitalistic themes/poverty well - this has been on my mind recently bc of an arc in a D&D game I've been playing, where my wonderful DM has essentially gone 'capitalism bad' but then let us do something about it <3

Is there a writer you want to emulate or get compared to often?

I find it hard to know what my writing 'is like'... not bc it's wildly unique or anything, but just bc I don't think I can see my own influences that clearly (if anyone wants to drop me some comparisons in the askbox, go for it, I'm curious!)

But in terms of writers I want to emulate, at the chatty/colloquial end it's T Kingfisher and Sarah Rees Brennan, who have a good handle on when to hit emotionally or on high fantasy register, and then when to have really grounded/human moments that make their characters incredibly relatable (and often very funny). At the high fantasy end, it's Shannon Chakraborty, Ann Leckie, Nghi Vo, Silvia Moreno Garcia. They write haunting and engaging narratives!

And, of course, I'm always trying to muster an ounce of whatever the fuck Howl/Sophie had going on.

Can you tell me a bit about your writing space?

I use my desk for work/thesis and want to exclusively keep it that way, so my writing space is actually just on the corner of the sofa in my living room, with my legs crossed, a blanket, and a cup of tea. No music, pure autistic silence (but also bc my laptop speaker is broken). Scotland gets dark for a long time in the winter, so it's usually pretty cosy vibes. It's probably not good for me, as I get a LOT of leg cramp.

What’s your most effective way to muster up a muse?

Honestly, not to be tsundere about it... but maybe ignore the muse a little? If you've burned out or you're trying to brute force a scene, all you're doing is guilting yourself into being productive. With fic writing, especially, you should be doing it to have fun, not bc you feel like you have to. So if the words aren't coming, do other things for a bit. Go on a day trip, hang out with friends, do chores or read something. In my experience, my brain doesn't stay quiet for long, and ideas for my current project will come to me when i'm not trying to squeeze them out of myself like toothpaste.

Sometimes the well runs dry! Rather than feel terrible about it, be kind to yourself, and wait for rain x

Are there any recurring themes in your writing? Do they surprise you?

Hahahahaha, let's not talk about how I keep placing people into the worst versions of themselves and then have them improve and earn love anyway, regardless of if they deserve it. Or how I'm interested in characters who feel a wealth of emotion they hide from everyone behind a mask of either performed indifference, wilful charm, or simply bc they can't articulate it in the socially correct way. Or women who think 'if I cannot be beautiful or loveable, I will be competent', and the men who-

Anyway, introvert x extrovert pairings, amirite? Everything else is shown to me in a vision (my therapist reaches a dead end in my session as I insist nothing is wrong, asks me about my fanfic, and then delivers me a laundry list of the stuff I'm currently coping with. Lowest point: being told im IDing through the fucking DARKLING, on one project. That man is a war criminal, and I dont look like Ben Barnes).

What is your reason for writing?

In the beginning, I think it was pure comfort. I'd just come out of a period of extreme depression, and wanted to hallucinate some characters in love.

But recently, and going forward, I think it is a genuine exercise in proficiency. I thought my writing was so terrible that I said 'I couldn't write', for so fucking long. I now genuinely think this is something I'm good at, and that is something it has taken me so very long to believe, and even longer to say. I am a very self-deprecating person. I have so few things I feel good at, or that I think bring something worthwhile to the table. As academia delivers me blow after blow and the world leaves me feeling worthless, I am going to cling to this until my hands bleed.

Is there any specific comment or type of comment you find particularly motivating?

focusing on the 'motivation' part of this question... I think the comments that happen to land on the one specific thing that matters to me, those are the ones that hit hardest. It happens rarer than you'd think. part of the joy of fanfiction comments is the wealth of different reader interpretations, with people seeing things in your own work that you've never noticed. All interpretations are amazing, especially the ones that show you a blindspot you never considered. But when a reader hits the nail fucking on the head (gets a 'gold star in reading comprehension'), that's the most motivating, and makes me want to open my document and write the next chapter. Because I know then that at least one person out there 'gets it', and is fully on board with the story I want to tell.

But that is a very selfish, specific feeling. All comments are motivation, and all reader interpretations have value!

How do you want to be thought about by your readers?

Idk if this seems weird or a disingenuous answer but... as a person?? Writing a story for fun? Pieces was a very cool and special experience, but it was very unexpected. I wasn't and never considered myself to be a 'big name fan'. I never want to enter any kind of popularity contest, and I never want to be beholden to people who are reading a story I am writing for fun. Very funny to have a story blow up when you have weird feelings about attention lmfao. Like don't get me wrong, absolutely amazing to ride such a huge tide of support, but this was meant to be my silly introvert hobby :')

I also hope they think my writing is good!! obviously!! i know it can't be everything everyone wants all the time, but you know!! i think it's neat!! I hope y'all think it's neat!! plz and thank!!!

What do you feel is your greatest strength as a writer?

lmao eraserspiral's reply to this question was a fucking mood. (just deleted it in my template to make space).

I guess... I know how to flesh out a character, and a character voice. I think I can establish a character's personality, their strengths and their flaws, and have them consistently become the vehicle for both progression and some very real, understandable mistakes. I think chapters from different perspectives feel distinct, and that when development in either direction (bad or good) happens, it feels earned.

idk man, this is a hard one to answer when depressed :')

How do you feel about your own writing?

At the end of the day, it's a lifeline. Sometimes I keep very much to myself and I protect it fiercely, because it's one of the only things that kept me going at certain points in the last few years. At my lowest, I've often wondered for what, if anything, I'll be remembered for or what I'll leave behind... and now I actually have things! 12 whole stories, where once there was nothing! Sure, it's fanfic! But some people's favourite fanfic. None of it is perfect, but it all matters to me, and we're now at the point (4 years in) where I am starting to slowly realise how it has changed me as a person, and will continue to change me going forward.

I want to start on some original ideas once my thesis is over, vivaed and done, but I don't currently see my writing as anything something I can make into a career, bc I need to keep the joy in it as the joy literally keeps me alive :')

tagging: @imscissorbladez, @pricemarshfield, @blarfshnorgull, @violacae, @dededrabbles, @brabblesblog - no pressure, just trying to share this tag game to more groups/social circles! :) x

[bookgeekgrrl]

My media this week (21-27 Jul 2024)

it is objectively 50% more hilarious when alex comes for someone's neck. them deciding to kick izzy's character when she was down was *chef's kiss*

📚 STUFF I READ 📚

🙂 Look sometimes you just wanna spend a hot Sunday reading porny omegaverse crack. The heart (or whatever organ) wants what the heart wants. I went thru 3 Lacey Daize KU offerings (all novellas): Team's Omega (Gimme MMMMMore #1) [15K] & Neighbors' Omega (Gimme MMMMMore #2) [18K], both porny omegaverse poly crack and Breedable Boys from Outer Space [20K] which honestly? not enough breeding of Boys from Outer Space! like, girl, we're here for one thing!

🥰 (i'll keep) my tongue behind my teeth (greatunironic) - 40K steddie modern AU where they both move back to Hawkins for their 2nd acts in life - REALLY LOVED THIS - loved the backstories! loved the supporting characters esp Heather (hilarious). You can see the miscommunication/angst coming but it's so right for the character I wasn't mad about it! (miscommunication done badly is one of my personal bugbears). The reconciliation was equally believable. And the sex was super hot: visceral, wet, messy.

🥰 from love, obviously (bizarrestars) - 52K drarry - very funny, great characterizations, stayed up too late to finish which is always a compliment to a fic

😊 The Queen of Poisons (The Marlow Murder Club #3) (Robert Thorogood, author; Nicolette McKenzie, narrator) - still loving the characters - I am fully 75% of the way to becoming Judith tbh. didn't love the fatphobia element, even as the text made an attempt to rebuke it. like. just don't. but wasn't enough to spoil the experience entirely.

😍 I'll Light Your Way Home series (BeaArthurPendragon) - 61K, no powers Vietnam era au - just fucking love this series; both characterizations are incredible, their journey together is great -

💖💖 +174K of shorter fic so shout out to these I really loved 💖💖

Frost Caught Fire On Our Lips (the1918, author; kocuria-arts (kocuria), artist) - MCU: stucky, 7K - short, hot, Bucky works at a diner, Steve comes thru on the regular

in the heat of the summer (you know that you should be my boy) (greatunironic) - Stranger Things: steddie, 17K - LOVED THIS - rockstar Eddie thirsts on main for Olympic swimmer Steve

the valentine experience (greatunironic) - Stranger Things: steddie, 15K - "In which Mike and Eddie have a bet, Steve is the victim of circumstance, and he's not super mad about it."

baby what's the scene? (carbonbased000) - Stranger Things: steddie, 8K - great fic! - "Horny in Indy. 5’11’’, long hair, tats, Top wants bottom, 20-30. Into athletic types, good boys, roleplay, bondage. Tell me your fantasies & let me hurt you just the way you like. Write to: Ed, Box #2177 . Or: Steve responds to a personal ad and has an extremely casual hook-up."

Savage God (LenneWithMilkAndHoney, PottersPink) - MCU: stucky, 36K - absolutely fantastic alt timeline AU where 2014 WS Bucky spends 3 days in 1936 with preserum Steve

Let Me Be Your Good Night (indelicate) - Stranger Things: steddie, 9K - "Or, Steve interrupts Eddie’s hookup and comforts him through a subdrop after. That's how it starts." (OMG they were ROOMMATES)

📺 STUFF I WATCHED 📺

Taskmaster - s12, e6-10; s13, e1-2

Make Some Noise - s3, e3

Dropout Presents: Bigger! With Brennan and Izzy

Thousandaires - s1, e5

D20: Never Stop Blowing Up - "Double Death Doggy Style" (s22, e5)

D20: Adventuring Party - "Ziggy Zany Yeah" (s17, e5)

🎧 PODCASTS 🎧

99% Invisible - The Power Broker #07: Sec. Pete Buttigieg

Overinvested - Ep. 302: AMC's Interview with the Vampire

Consider This - 'Twister,' 'Twisters' and the actual practice of storm chasing

You're Dead to Me - LGBTQ Life in Weimar Germany

Re: Dracula - July 22: Rough Weather

NPR's Book of the Day - Griffin Dunne's memoir chronicles fame, art and tragedy in his Hollywood upbringing

The Atlas Obscura Podcast - Meet the Man Who Sets America’s Living Rooms on Fire

The Sporkful - Cookbooks That Need ‘The Grandma Disclaimer’ (Live)

Imaginary Worlds - Fantasy and Fascism & Fantasy and Fascism Part II: When Democracy Fails

Short Wave - Outer Space Changes You, Literally. Here's What It Does To The Human Body

Pop Culture Happy Hour - Three great karaoke songs

Switched on Pop - Is country the new hip hop?

The Atlas Obscura Podcast - The Arrow Stork

Re: Dracula - July 24: There Will be Some Trouble

Vibe Check - Hold Onto Your Wigs

Short Wave - Dancing Yeti Crabs, Morphing Cuttlefish, Other Stories From The Deep Sea

⭐ Code Switch - The return of the U.S.'s oldest drag king

⭐ It's Been a Minute - 'Cats: The Jellicle Ball' gets 10s across the board

99% Invisible - The 2024 Olympics Spectacular

NPR's Book of the Day - Khushbu Shah's cookbook 'Amrikan' honors the Indian American diaspora

Pop Culture Happy Hour - In The Decameron, the Black Death makes for black comedy

The Atlas Obscura Podcast - Our Lives Through Hollywood’s Eyes

Shedunnit - Christianna Brand's Impossible Crimes

You Are Good - Do the Right Thing w. Ify Nwadiwe

Our Opinions Are Correct - Dinosaurs and Furries, with Riley Black

Re: Dracula - July 26: Just Starting for Home

What Next: TBD - Is Silicon Valley Trump-Vance Country?

Dear Prudence - My Brother-In-Law’s Girlfriend Wore A Transparent Dress To My Wedding. Help!

Dear Prudence - Prudie Plus: I Came Home From Errands and My Fiance Got A Dog. Help!

Pop Culture Happy Hour - Deadpool & Wolverine and what's making us happy

It's Been a Minute - Olympic hurdles for women athletes; plus, big trucks and big questions

Today, Explained - Breaking the Olympics

Endless Thread - The American Lean

Re: Dracula - July 27: No News

Hit Parade - The Bridge: Getting Hot in Herre

Re-Creative - Tanya Davis and Dirty Dancing

🎶 MUSIC 🎶

Shaun Cassidy Radio • Upbeat

Soft Rock Ballads

Rob Zombie

Rock Sugar

Iron Maiden Radio • Popular • Familiar

Reinas

Old-School Reggaeton

The Go-Go's

The Donnas

[samusique-concrete]

My favorite albums of 2023

This is not a list of the ‘best’ albums of the year. These are just my favorites. However, i need you to understand something: I don’t have the time and/or brain bandwidth to listen to and forge a bond with every single album i’d like to get to in any given year. Thus, my disclaimer is twofold — the following are my favorite records of the year, among the selection of records that i did have time to get to. I’m sure i would’ve loved many others, but i just don’t wanna be someone who’d listen to an album for the first time at the end of the year, decide it’s ‘great’, and rank it shoulder to shoulder with my favorites. It would be disingenuous.

I will now present my ten favorite records of the past year, but there’s another catch: i will only talk about four of them, and they won’t be precisely my top four either. Instead, i’m going to talk about my tenth most liked album, and then my third through to number one. It’ll make sense as the read goes on.

Let’s begin.

IN TIMES NEW ROMAN…

Queens of the Stone Age

I’ll just say this right now: there hasn’t been, to me, a better mainstream rock act than Queens of the Stone Age since at least 2002. They represent what i would say is ‘as good as it gets’ in the genre. Even now, in 2023, when frontman Josh Homme is older and naturally starting to slow down (although tracks like Paper Machete would suggest there's plenty of gas left in the tank,) he still manages to unabashedly follow his own musical compass, that which was forged decades ago by his own design. 

In Times New Roman… is not one of the group’s best albums. In fact, i probably would prefer pretty much any other album in their catalog before this one, but therein lies the thing about this band: it doesn’t have to put out a mindblowing achievement of a record for it to be at least pretty good. Queens’ magic trick here is being consistent; if we were to buffoonishly rank their albums from worst to best, we’d find that the distance that separates the peak from the bottom is not at all Everest tall. That’s a hard trick to pull off.

Another point in favor of this album is its vulnerability. Infamously conceived as catharsis following a rough and tumultuous period in the frontman’s life, it was his interview on Neal Brennan’s The Blocks Podcast that really opened my eyes about this whole thing. In case it wasn’t made clear earlier, i’m a fan of the band, and as such it’s been always obvious to me that the guy’s had a complicated relationship with substances. You’d have to be deaf not to notice that. I’ve watched many interviews over the years, and i’d become accustomed to the certain type of way in which he carried himself. This is why his appearance on Blocks kind of stunned me. Here he was, nonchalantly going into a lot of detail about his drug abuse and how it has affected him and how he clearly sees how it has hurt others and also himself. Now, i don’t know the guy personally, i don’t know how he approaches these sorts of topics with people when the cameras are off, but what i do know is that that’s not the Josh Homme that he himself had constructed for years for the media to consume. The questionable performance seemed to be put to rest. This unceremoniously matured persona was refreshing to listen to: it made me appreciate the record a lot more, because he truly allowed himself to be vulnerable for once (although this feels like the next step in a process that began with 2013’s …Like Clockwork and continued with 2017’s Villains.) I’ll touch upon this a bit later, but that is, at least to me, very brave. The days of the emotionless tough guy are over, but that doesn’t mean that a very healthy dose of anti-establishment aggression has to be left by the wayside.

LIVE AT BUSH HALL

Black Country, New Road

Music isn’t movies. Therefore, it isn’t often that we get to say ‘you need to listen to the album that came before to understand this new one.’ This is the case for Live at Bush Hall.

Now, i would genuinely hate for this to add to the ongoing conversation in which the band’s past keeps taking center stage. I would much rather talk about the present and whatever the current work’s merits are. However, context is needed.

BC,NR quickly rose to indie fame thanks to the painful relatableness of their 2022 sophomore album, Ants from Up There; a beautiful, longing follow-up to their esoteric debut. The song’s lyrics were deeply personal and told what read as fictionalized autobiographical accounts of the band’s frontman’s love life. Shortly after releasing the record, however, he left the band. Paired with these news, the band announced that they’d keep making music without him, but that the old songs would not be played live in the future. This left fans and curious bystanders alike wondering about what they would sound like moving forward, who was going to sing now, how would the new lyrics meld with the pre-established themes of their past work, and so on. I think Live at Bush Hall is in equal parts a beautiful and thoughtful response to all of these propositions, which obviously the band worked towards answering first and foremostly for their own sake.

The fact that the group is a six piece ensemble containing piano, violin and saxophone on top of more conventional guitar music instrumentation notwithstanding, it is my opinion that Live at Bush Hall represents the present of all of rock music. What better way to capture this than with a live album? The idea is multilayered in its ingeniousness, since it wouldn’t be held to the audience’s expectations of what a studio album could bring in this new phase for the group. It’s also a gamble, though, since it’d be nearly fifty minutes of entirely new material played in front of a crowd, and also they’d have to nail the performances for the recording. Luckily, and to the surprise of no one who was already familiar with them, they proved to be excellent musicians who were very much up to the task and the gamble paid off in spades.

The fact that this is a live album also placed constraints on the compositions; these are the now canonized versions of new songs that couldn’t, by design, count on studio trickery or embellishments to stand out. It’s just the musicians, their instruments, and the arrangements. And it sounds amazing.

In a lovingly nodding manner, the opening track sees the band screaming “Look at what we did together / BCNR, friends forever”, in a way that seems to look back, but also look forward. Even more than in their already ambitious Ants From Up There, they take advantage of the instrumentation in very clever ways, adding to the performance and staging aspects of the album. Certain passages feel like they’re out of a play (with songs like The Boy explicitly being divided into chapters,) and it is obvious that this is very much the intended effect once you look at the video recording of the concerts that make up the the album: it was a whole mise-en-scène, purposefully directed, and well rehearsed. The band played three times at Bush Hall, and before each set they handed programmes to the attendees. They then hopped on stage dressed in deliberate costume design following a particular aesthetic. These ‘plays’, and their respective items (except for the setlist), were all different those three times. The movie intercalates takes of all of the three nights, so we get to see the band wearing all of their costumes, all of the sets, and all of the programmes.

This clear love of performance is evident in the songs themselves. Not to spoil the ending, but the album closes with a reprise of the first track (a real exposition-conflict-resolution move on their part,) and pretty much all of its themes are present and brought back, sometimes literally, in many of the songs. Even now distributing singing duties among several of their members, male and female voices alike, drama still emerges; not missing their vocal might after the departure of their lead singer, the band’s lyrics are still painful and their wails still resonant. Some of the performances are so good as to even elicit the sense that what they’re singing about isn’t just some story that somebody’s recounting; they’re happening to you. In performing arts that’s about the highest praise you can give.

PETRODRAGONIC APOCALYPSE; OR, DAWN OF ETERNAL NIGHT: AN ANNIHILATION OF PLANET EARTH AND THE BEGINNING OF MERCILESS DAMNATION

King Gizzard & The Lizard Wizard

King Gizz have many times before come very close to having what could’ve been my favorite album of the year. It’s ok, though; i’m glad they can occupy that Scottie Pippen spot in my heart.

Petrodragonic Apocalypse; or, Dawn of Eternal Night: An Annihilation of Planet Earth and the Beginning of Merciless Damnation is the band’s second full-fledged metal album, which is a genre that even before Infest the Rats’ Nest (its spiritual prequel) had popped up here and there amongst their numerous tracklists. Just in case you didn’t know already, the long story short is that KG has made a bajillion records and each of them has a unique concept and/or aesthetic. Sometimes some of those concepts reappear, making some of the records share a narrative and be in conversations with one another. 2019’s Infest the Rats’ Nest was the first time the band indulged completely in what was, inevitably at that point, a sound that needed to be explored comprehensively for the span of a whole record, after several songs in their discography having served as teasers of sorts. It proved to be a success (even being nominated for an ARIA Music Award for best metal album of the year, along with other, actual self-identified metal outfits,) pulling inspiration mainly from the thrash metal side of the spectrum and being always as vocal as they always have been in this particular common thread of theirs: we’re fucking up the planet. That's, like, their whole thing.

Petrodragonic Apocalypse feels like an evolution of Rats’ Nest in basically every regard. Its music is heavier, mathier, proggier, more dense, more environmentally minded, lengthier and, frankly, seemingly more difficult to perform. Being this not their first stab at heavier sounds, they complemented the album with one other area of expertise they possess: self-referencing musical passages.

Although their first record came out in 2012, it wasn’t until 2014 (which in retrospect isn’t that much time after) with I’m in your Mind Fuzz where they started to heavily introduce into their work the concept of melodies or refrains reappearing all throughout a single record. Maybe the first track would start out with a particular riff, which would later develop into a different melody for a couple of bars, which we soon would find would be used as the main riff for the following track, etcetera. This concept was then taken to its maximum exponent in 2016’s Nonagon Infinity, a record in which every track flows seamlessly into the next one (with even the last one looping back to the first one,) making it feel like one huge song. This would later culminate, at least narratively, in 2017’s space opera staging Murder of the Universe (that’s my favorite one!) but that way of making music, or albums specifically, seems to have become a habit of theirs, with fans now uploading countless videos on YouTube cross-referencing melodies from different albums to present as some kind of King Gizzard ‘lore’, regardless of what the main concept of each particular album ends up being. Petrodragonic Apocalypse harvests this skill and runs with it, adding some much needed cohesion to the madness. The drumming is insane, the guitar riffs are insane, the whole thing is insane! Yet, it is focused.

DESIRE, I WANT TO TURN INTO YOU

Caroline Polachek

Caroline Polachek made realize something very special: pop music is being vulnerable.

Now, we could dig into that statement with a hundred caveats, but that’d just suck the fun out of it. Here’s what i mean.

For many years i’ve thought of mainstream pop as something that didn’t, or couldn’t, contain me. It was very hard for me to relate to mainstream pop, probably because of its often rigid and spotless production and sound identity. Much of it sounded sterile to me, and i guess i sort of tagged that prejudice onto the entirety of the genre. I wanna be clear, though: i still think that about a lot of it — i just don’t think it’s all the same anymore. This type of change of mind would i’m sure seem inevitable to anyone that has simply sat down and listened to any given genre for long enough; pop music is simply an example in this case. It happens just like that; something unlocks inside your brain, and you get it. Heck, it’s happened to me with many other genres already.

I don’t feel any shame in admitting my teen-like stupidity. If you’re a teenager right now you won’t get this, but you have to be fifteen before you’re twenty-five. Any adult could tell you: it’s not that you have to go through adolescence — you have to live through stupidity. I didn’t say it, nor did i really think about it consciously in these terms, but when i was fifteen i took a certain kind of pride in not listening to pop music. I liked rougher, heavier stuff. That was my ‘whole thing.’ I would years later shift into the perspective that much of what i liked then was, actually, just as shallow, disingenuous, and, musically speaking, thought-murderingly conceived as the stuff i disdained and didn’t choose to listen to. However now i find that my favorite 2022 and 2023 albums have both been pop albums.

At some point i stumbled onto Queens of the Stone Age. Here, i found a band that, for lack of a better term, got it. Their "don't care if it hurts, just so long as it's real" attitude towards music, towards art, and by extension towards being a person in general, helped me. It’s not about the genre — it’s about what you make of it, and how you make it, and about it grabbing you by the shoulders and shaking you. Years later this same ethos would aid me in making my mother understand that it’s not that she disliked all westerns or musicals, it’s that she didn’t like shitty movies.

The opener to QotSA’s 2002 mainstream rock masterpiece Songs for the Deaf could, potentially (though it hasn’t been scientifically tested, i’m pretty sure,) blow your head right off. Though in it, amidst hellishly screamed vocals, then-bassist Nick Oliveri mellows down his voice just the right amount in order to sing the following sentence:

Metal heavy, soft at the core.

This sentiment, purposefully or not, defines the band. It also crudely puts into words what i crave most about music, and the reason why they’ve been my favorite rock band ever since i listened to them for the first time: aesthetics are nothing if they’re not backed up by true emotion. You can tap into this true emotion by allowing your self to shine through whatever you’re doing, whatever that means to you. Façades are just that: 2D images that say nothing about who’s behind them, and it’s thanks to some real insecurity that you start depending on them, deploying them and taking cover. If you’re a teenager right now you probably won’t get this (or maybe you will and i got real old real fast and grew to misunderstand the youth,) but being yourself is the coolest thing in the universe because it requires of you a certain kind of vulnerability that is, more often than not, really hard to come by. You just have to be brave enough to do it. Motomami shares with Desire, I Want to Turn Into You that same vulnerability. I’m sure that had Sakura not been the closer to that album, it wouldn't have topped my last year’s list.

With Queens of the Stone Age’s refrain serving as my thesis statement, i will now use it to rephrase my opening statement: being yourself is being vulnerable, and being vulnerable is one of the coolest things you can be.

Caroline Polachek knows very well who she is.

During the brilliantly unorthodox set piece premiere performance of her single Dang, Caroline acted out screaming her lungs out at millions of americans watching live on a highly popular late night TV show. This isn’t regular ‘popstar’ stuff — she went and became a popstar at age 34 after already having recorded and released many different albums across many different projects, many of them not being really pop at all. She even dropped an entirely ambient album under the CEP moniker at some point. You might not get it right now, whatever age you are, but that’s fucking cool. I checked out Pang, the predecessor to Desire, I Want to Turn Into You (a sweetly elusive example of a punctuation mark deftly incorporated into an album title) right when it dropped, not really knowing who she was or what her ‘whole thing’ was. I figured she might as well have materialized right out of the pop aether. Well, i was wrong. Caroline has been very carefully crafting her musical presence since 2005, and i am as convinced that Desire represents the peak of her ‘herselfness’ just as i am, now knowing her, that whatever comes after will naturally surpass it in that regard.

Something interesting arises when thinking about her aforementioned premiere of Dang, or for example her NPR Tiny Desk Concert as well: she loves to perform. I can relate to this. There is a clear desire to display her art in striking ways, to set up these intricately rehearsed sequences that etch her everything into your brain with a tingling, instead of just letting the music stand on its own. It very much could, mind you, but by God, does she achieve the full effect. She’s a bespoke, partnerlessly designed whole package.

I could go on about how talented she is, but that’d be stating the obvious since it’s easily noticeable just from listening to any of her stuff. I particularly love how it’s evident in how she uses her voice that she’s not just a singer but also an instrument player (you will get this if you’ve played an instrument for more than a couple of years.) She even does all of the weird vocal stuff from her albums live, with her own vocal cords, instead of using effects or manipulation. That’s also so, so cool. But more than talent, i mainly wanna reflect on how Desire makes me feel. From its album cover (another example of her being on her own lane: the album clearly takes inspiration from early 2000s music, even bringing Dido on board for one of the tracks, yet the cover emphatically does not go with a generic Y2K aesthetic, even at the time of its release, when it seemed to be so in vogue,) it looks like there’s an unquenchable thirst powering her every movement. I interpret this as passion.

The music on the record is great, and i feel it's a step up from Pang. Each song has the right amount of space, and the harmony keeps the listener interested. There is more screaming (yay!) right from the beginning of the first track, Welcome To My Island, and i don’t know how to explain it, but the song itself does kind of sound like an island. I like how, as i alluded to earlier, it seems like the whole of the compositions are informed by her voice being thought of as the main instrument first, and how the songs are constructed around ideas that you could only have come up with after ‘noodling’ on your own vocal chords. The melodies become instantly super gratifying as she picks ear-pulling intervallic relationships to leap to or jump off from, or when she just makes interesting stepwise runs (some passages from the closer, Billions, remind me a bit of Morten Lauridsen’s Dirait-on, though i’m not necessarily inviting anyone to think she must’ve taken inspiration from it.) Her words can go from playful (like in the opener: “Welcome to my island / Hope you like me / You ain’t leaving”) to yearnful (from one of the slower numbers: “Starlight in a tunnel / Kind of familiar / Hopedrunk everasking / How does it feel to know / Your final form?”) But most of all, they are beautiful. Take the chorus of the single Sunset, for example:

No regrets

Cause you’re my sunset

Fiery red

Forever fearless

And in your arms

A warm horizon

Don’t look back

Let’s ride away

The words alone are gorgeous, but when you hear her singing them, it’s… Man, it’s something else. I’m lucky, and grateful, that a record as good and soulful and loving as this one could come along, reach out, and awaken something deep inside of me.

[anthrofreshtodeath]

Plz inform us of sports adjacent nicknames Jane would use for Booth. I feel since Jane’s only context of Booth professionally being Brennan saying “Booth” in *that way* (you know), it would do that thing where the name feels too personal/loaded. I almost feel like he’d let Jane call him Seel, if she dared, but the Cam option of “big guy” is also a solid option. Also brennan would be the type to blurt “oh his grandfather calls him Shrimp, because it is humorous to suggest he is small” and Jane would be deeply amused -Miz

Jane and nicknames might literally be my favorite thing to think about in life. Mostly as a way to show her Italian/Bostonian identity.

Obviously they'd meet under less than friendly circumstances, and she'd view Booth as a threat to *her* case, so she'd start with the basics: a derogatory this fuckin' guy ("Oh christ, here comes this fuckin' guy"), foreigna ("of course they send me a foreigna. All the way from Philly? C'mon"). Cool kid might get dropped in there a time or two ("You don't say, Cool Kid" after he makes an essential or obvious statement).

Then, as they create a tenuous truce to work together, she moves to the more neutral guy ("that'll be the last interview of the day, guy"), or Bobby Orr simply to annoy him because he's such a Flyers nut ("Hey Bobby!" or "Hey Oah! Come take a look at this!" hunched over evidence). He takes his lumps because when was the last time he could talk sports with a colleague?

When they finally break through and become friends, I think she mostly calls him Booth the way Hodgins or Wendell does. When he shows up at a scene, this fuckin' guy turns to endearment. She might give him a Seeley here or there when she needs him because he's a sucker for that ("Hey Seeley, take this one? I gotta make sure Maura's good"). Kid is mostly reserved for Maura, but might come out if he's being particularly vulnerable or emotional ("It's all gonna turn out with you and her, kid. I know it." as she pats him on the back).

Anyway that's my dissertation on how Jane would become obnoxiously Bostonian when he comes into her life 😂 (Maura is turned on by Jane's real accent but would never deign to let her know lest Jane lord it over her forever).

PS - Jane would most definitely cackle at Shrimp but never use it because what if he finds out about Roly Poly Rizzoli? Or worse, frog face?

[bardic-tales]

OC Interview: Brennan Draig

Thank you so much for the tag, @blind-the-winds. I really enjoyed reading your answers. I also think the interview style for this was brilliant. I've already did this for myself.

Rules: Answer the following questions for an OC of your choice.

I did something like this many years ago for Cyras, the protagonist of Cold as Ice, and I loved it. It helped me really sink into her character.

I decided to do this with Brennan, the love interest of Flight of the Dragon. Brennan is a 1200-year-old silver dragon who is also one of the rulers a city-state in the Olessan Region.

Please be aware of the following triggers: talks of death. Flight of the Dragon is set in a dark fantasy world, so very dark themes apply to it.

Knight-Errant Brennan Draig

1. Are you named after anyone?

In the world, Brennan is not named after anyone. I had debated whether he would be named after a relative or not, but ultimately decided that he wouldn't be.

As Flight of the Dragon was originally wrote to be low fantasy and exist on our planet, Brennan was originally written as King Arthur. I got his name from the Irish name Brennan (sorrow) and Welsh word Draig (dragon).

2. When was the last time you cried?

Brennan never cries. He believes that in order to make changes in the world that action is required. This is why he rushes to the cathedral to protect a newborn Alystin and her mother and agrees to train Alystin in martial and ranged weapons in FOTD.

There was one pivotal moment when he did cry. After he confronts Jhaer and his clutch is completely destroyed, he is running on pure adrenaline. The chief god appears before him and tells him that in exchanged for his freedom Brennan needs to fulfill the promise all silver dragons pledged to Amés. He vows to live his life for Amés and free all of the dragon souls that Jhaer is using to fuel her blood magick.

After the adrenaline wears off and he is far away from his castle / lair, Brennan breaks down and cries. He mourns the mate and children that died in Jhaer's siege.

Interesting that Jhaer was originally Morgana from the legends of King Arthur.

3. Do you have any kids?

Brennan lost his mate, Beatrix, and children in the siege let loose by the Enethian necromancer, Ellarian Jhaer. The only ones that are left are the twins named Aldrien and Palar. He sent them away to learn from the golden dragon: Kalzeruth.

He also has one more child who survived the seige named Kanderth. Kanderth becomes corrupted, raised as a great draconic lich, and works with Jhaer. Brennan is the one who lays Kanderth to rest.

He and Alystin will become the mother and father of Flame. They have two hybrid children together. These children are the ancestors of modern men and drakl. Drakl are dragonmen and are at war with men.

4. Do you use sarcasm?

Although he is considered a wise wyrm, Brennan can't help but use sarcasm on occasion. He tries to lead by sincerity, integrity, and candor, but those sarcastic moments tend to shine through when he is dealing with Jhaer or her cult.

5. What's the first thing you notice about people?

The first thing that Brennan notices about people is their eyes. He is fond of saying that the eyes are windows to the soul.

Brennan has a draconic ability that allows him to see auras and determine if someone is friend or foe. This ability is triggered by looking into the eyes of the target. The world around him becomes ghostly grey hues. The Wraith, the anti-hero protagonist from Cold as Ice, has a similar ability from her draconic ancestry. Some could say that this comes from the father of the modern dragons.

6. What's your eye color?

From my notes in Flight of the Dragon.

Brennan Draig has eyes almost the color of silver. When he uses any magick, they will glow a powder blue. His left eye is clouded a dull grey with a darker silver around the outer edge of the iris. A vertical, thick raised scar darts from right above his left eyebrow, runs down his eyelid, and stops at the beginning of his cheek.

7. Scary movies or happy endings?

During the early Age of Men, civilization told sagas instead of showing movies. That technology doesn't exist until the Age of Steam.

Brennan enjoys stories about the great battles his clutch fought and the dangerous journeys they made. These stories were to record and preserve their culture and things that the Elders thought was important for future generations.

With that in mind, he doesn't care one way or the other about the endings.

8. Any special talents?

Brennan has a knack for languages.

As a dragon, he has most of the talents that you would normally associate with an ancient wyrm. He is immune to cold and can exhale a cone of icy air which freezes most of everything it touches.

One of the special talents that he personally teaches his offspring is the ability to use body magick to shift bones, wings, and flesh into a human form or beast. This is a painful process that the dragons tend to either spend their time in human or draconic forms.

Once Alystin becomes his dragon knight, she and Brennan will often share telepathy, pain, and even something simple as hormone changes.

As a dragon, he has impressive flight. He will often tell Alystin to mount him, so they could transverse the world quicker through the skies, but she insists that she would never disrespect him like that as he is not a beast of burden. Brennan loves to soar.

9. Where were you born?

Brennan was born in the northern forests of the Olessa region. These forests are old-growth forests that was inspired by forests in England.

When he was only a young dragon, he was left in these forests and told only to survive. His father thought that this would help him when it was time for him to pass onto the Ven plane. Brennan would take over and rule after that.

10. What are your hobbies?

There are several hobbies that Brennan enjoys. when he was the ruler of Seralia, he enjoyed falconry. He enjoyed teaching the young birds of prey to hunt wild animals for food.

Brennan enjoys reading. There were many times that he could be found in Adwen ferch Afan's library bent over old scrolls and tomes.

With Eternity threatening to end the Planes of Existence, he doesn't have time to practice the hobbies that he enjoyed.

11. Have you any pets?

Outside of his falcons that didn't make it out of Adwen ferch Afan when Jhaer besieged them, he travels with a malamute named Emray.

Emray is Alystin's dog. He stands about 26 inches in height from his shoulder and weighs 95 pounds with a plumed tail that is held over his back. Emray is very loyal to Alystin, even going so far as attacking Brennan after the Huntsman is burned to the ground. However, once he realized that Brennan wasn't going to hurt his master, Emray would become his best friend.

12. What sports do you play/have played?

There were several outdoor games that Brennan would play with his flight. Most of these sports were based on his knights' warrior skills. There were competitions in archery, wrestling, stone throwing, and sword play.

Brennan engaged in running and swimming. They would play a ball game with stick and ball. In other communities, it wasn't uncommon for someone to be hurt or killed, as early Olessans tend to play rough. Women were not allowed to participate in these games, but they would gather and watch their partners.

13. How tall are you?

Human-form

Brennan stands 7 feet 2 inches. He is one of the tallest characters that I have, and his height is inspired by Johann Petursson and André René Roussimoff.

Dragon-form

As an ancient wyrm, Brennan tends to stand 120 feet. He has a 35-foot body and neck length, 50-foot tail, 150-foot max wingspan, and weighs over 640 tons. He is rarely in this form as he knows that it inspires terror in his follows. It actually surprises him when Alystin accepts him.

14. Favorite subject in school?

There are no schools during the early Age of Men. Education was provided through private tutors. Only a handful of early Olessans could afford to educate their sons. This is seen when Brennan sent away the twins to learn beneath the tutelage of Kanderth.

Brennan's favorite thing to learn would be soaring through the heavens.

During Flight of the Dragon, after Alystin asks him about a time he was truly terrified, he recalls to him the first time he spent among the clouds. He was frightened as his wings became slick with dew, sending him plummeting toward the ground. At the last moment, he unfurrowed his massive wings and righted himself at the last moment. He tells her that he could have given up and died, but he pushed forward, as she will have to during the fight with Eternity.

15. Dream job?

Despite railing against his destiny when he was younger, Brennan was always met to follow in his father's footsteps and rule his region. He once wanted to be a poet, a storyteller responsible for keeping the history and tradition of his people alive, but that quickly fell apart when his father was fatally wounded during an assassination attempt.

Now, he wishes to recapture Adwen ferch Afan, unite all of the Olessan region, and have Alystin take her place beside him.

[tafadhali]

I posted recs of 25 of my favorite fanworks produced this year over on my DW and thought I should cross-post them here! List is arranged alphabetically by fandom and is a mix of fic and vids from 2023 (that weren't created for Festivids or Yuletide, because I always rec a lot from those challenges).

The Shipping Forecast series by leupagus (Broadchurch, Alec Hardy/Ellie Miller, 23k)

Ellie Miller and Alec Hardy, drifting together.

📺 I Wanna Be Evil by lilly_the_kid (Child’s Play | Chucky, Tiffany Valentine, fanvid)

You're sweet, my dear. Prim and proper.

beneath your weary heart by waveridden (Dimension 20, Ricky Matsui/Esther Sinclair, 10k)

It’s a comfort, having a name that is right. It is a comfort knowing that she is Sorrow and sorrow is her and they are one and the same. This is who she was meant to be. It is always who she was meant to be. And yet. (Or: Esther becomes the fury of Sorrow.)

📺 Mastermind by BeatriceEagle (Dimension 20, Brennan Lee Mulligan, fanvid)

"We support you as a DM and as our friend, but also you're our enemy." —Siobhan Thompson

Not According to Their Fanfiction series by AgentStannerShipper (Dimension 20, Evan Kelmp/K Tanaka, 63k)

Five tropes that did not live up to the fanfiction, and one that did. Spring semester at Gowpenny, a lot of feelings, and a lot of growth. Also featuring Evan's shadow (my beloved), true jock Jammer, Sam being the figurative wine aunt friend, Evan being a Good Boy, and K being exactly as horny as canon made them.

your heart, love by ASongofSixpence (Dimension 20, KP Hob/Delloso de la Rue, 8k)

Rue learns about something special that happens to goblins on All Hallows' Eve, and has big feelings about the use of the word 'monster.'

📺 After All by periru3 (Everything Everywhere All at Once, Jobu Tupaki, fanvid)

It felt like a winter machine that you go through and then / you catch your breath and winter starts again / and everyone else is spring bound

Chemistry by Twilightcitysky (Good Omens, Aziraphale/Crowley, 122k)

Aziraphale and Crowley have been living among humans for 6000 years, but there have always been parts of the human experience they've chosen to avoid (like allergies, head colds, and having to use the loo). They've also never let hormones get in the way of making rational decisions, because they didn't have any hormones to speak of. That's all about to change.

come raise your flag upon me by trinityofone (Good Omens, Aziraphale/Crowley, 5k)

Aziraphale persuades Crowley to accompany him to Heaven, to be Forgiven. Things get...weirder before they get better.

Covenant of Salt by thingswithwings (Good Omens, Aziraphale/Crowley, 18k)

Aziraphale's hand slides down past Crowley's hip to fist his cock in time with his thrusts, and he bites again, and again, down to Crowley's naked shoulder, up to his earlobe, not meaning to be sexy, just biting like he's eating, tasting the salt on Crowley's skin, like he might consume Crowley entirely if given enough time. "Talk to me," he gasps, between thrusts, between bites, his voice shaking. "No," Crowley grits out, just before he comes.

📺 Hate Me by killabeez (Interview with the Vampire, Lestat de Lioncourt/Louis de Pointe du Lac, fanvid)

“I love you with my whole soul, and I will always love you,” he confided to me. “You are my life. I have hated you for that and love you now so much that you’ve been my instructor in loving." —Blood Communion: A Tale of Prince Lestat

Bones and Blood: A Jurassic Park Survivor’s Story by avocadomoon (Jurassic Park, Billy Brennan/Alan Grant, 10k)

Billy was still staring at him. His face looked narrow and shadowed in the spotty kitchen lighting. Alan always thought about geometry when he looked at Billy: angles and rays and points and transversals. He was beautiful in the way that math was beautiful: like an equation that was beyond Alan's abilities, too complex for him to handle. But there, nonetheless. Holding all the secrets of the universe, if only Alan could figure out how to solve him.

Extended Disconnection by lick (Murderbot Diaries, Ayda Mensah, 91k)

Dr. Mensah's perspective from Chapter 8 of All Systems Red through Exit Strategy.

📺 They Don’t Care About Us by avg (Murderbot Diaries, “Human One” Refugee, animatic)

The story of a refugee.

Friday Keeps Coming Next by rattyjol (Nine Worlds, Artorin Damara & Cliopher Mdang, 38k)

Cliopher and his Radiancy break time. Again.

Embers by alfgifu (Nine Worlds, Cliopher Mdang, 126k)

A novel-length prequel to Hands of the Emperor about Kip's early years in service

A Most Restful Vacation by Quasar (Nine Worlds, Jemis Greenwing, minor pairings, 106k)

Jemis is invited to attend the investiture of the Viceroy of Zunidh, which promises to be a delightful trip with Almost No Adventures along the way.

An Officer and a Gentleman by cedarboots (Persuasion, Anne Elliot/Frederick Wentworth, 47k)

“Eight years changes a person, but not beyond all recognition. Fred Wentworth and Anne Elliot, years after a final break, find that they are more alike, in some respects, than they thought before.” (Butch4Butch AU)

first base by octothorpetopus (Sports Night, Casey McCall/Dan Rydell, 118k)

Dan Rydell was born in 1969 in Hartford, Connecticut. He came to life in Minneapolis in 1988. When he met Casey.

Sugar in Your Hand by WerewolvesAreReal (Star Trek, James T. Kirk/Spock, 13k)

Kirk meets a Vulcan, marries a Vulcan, and apparently outrages the entire Vulcan government in one day. He's an overachiever like that.

📺 Hate to Say I Told You So by findmeinthealps (Taskmaster, Alex Horne, fanvid)

Alex Horne being Alex Horne.

home is where by oliviacirce (Ted Lasso, Trent Crimm/Ted Lasso, 6k)

“Ted learns that sometimes when you ask people what they want, you (just might) get what you need.”

in the cards by jedusaur (Ted Lasso, Roy Kent/Jamie Tartt, 4k)

Whenever he says he's not feeling anything, that's when Dr. Sharon pulls out the fucking cards. Roy can't fucking stand the fucking cards. They're plain white with plain black text, each displaying the name of a different emotion, and he's supposed to go through them and decide whether he's feeling each thing or not. It's fucking stupid, it makes him feel like a fucking toddler, and worst of all, it fucking works.

Second Nature by MoreThanSlightly (Ted Lasso, Keeley Jones/Roy Kent/Jamie Tartt, 27k)

The first time they switch, Jamie’s fucking Keeley. It’s amazing, best sex of his life, and he wonders what it feels like for her—good, by the sound of it—and then a second later, he’s looking at his own face. He’s lying on his back staring up at himself. “What the fuck,” he says in Keeley’s voice.

📺 Cockroach Motherfuckers by eruthros & thingswithwings (Multifandom, fanvid)

A celebration of all the queer characters you can't bury. Or, if you do bury them, they don't stay down for long.