#like that usually leads to the sub ending in the other versions which at least gives a clue as to whos on the murder spree.. sorta

[destinysbounty]

I'm literally so sad that Cole wasn't in Seabound. Like isn't he the master of Earth? Isn't the seafloor like the deepest place to be? Wouldn't he be closer to his element if he went in the deep sea? Man.

I'm not the first person to bring this up, and I probably won't be the last, but it is a bit odd how Wildbrain feels so intent on splitting the team up all the time. Don't get me wrong, I don't mind a good split-up in theory - hell, seasons 4 and 9 are some of my all-time favorites, and overall I think the concept of splitting up the team gives us the chance to explore unconventional dynamics in similarly unconventional situations. There's just one main problem with how Wildbrain handles split-ups: 1) there usually isn't a particularly strong narrative reason for it to happen.

Now if I list off every arbitrary split-up and exactly what made it arbitrary, we'd be here all day. But seriously, next time you watch Wildbrain, try and pay close attention to this sort of thing. Once you notice the way they love to split everyone up at the barest hint of provocation, you can't ignore it. It's everywhere. Obviously there are times where they do have narratively satisfying reasons to split up (s13 is an example of this done well imo), but the sheer volume of arbitrary split-ups kinda sours things a bit - for me, at least.

Which brings us to Seabound. I genuinely don't understand why Cole and Kai couldn't have come along for Seabound. They give this argument that "oh, we need someone to stay behind and hold down the fort while everyone's gone", but...first of all, when has that ever been a pressing issue for them? These assholes leave Ninjago City unattended all the time. And even if they did finally decide to make that a priority after all these years, why is Kai staying behind??? If you ask me, not only would Kai realistically want to be involved in the quest to fix his beloved sister's powers, but Kai also would have been way more effectively utilized by the plot, by actually being part of the plot. Y'know, in the submarine with everyone else. Not only because we'd get the chance to see his fear of water get some resolution, but the whole narrative about Nya's childhood trauma would pack a lot more weight to it with Kai present (for obvious reasons).

And as for Cole...y'know what, up to this point I'd never really thought of a good way to give Cole something to do in Seabound, but you present a great point. Maybe there could be some scenes between Cole and Nya, talking about how overwhelming it can feel to be completely surrounded by your element. In this version of events, maybe Cole takes on an almost mentor-like position as he tries to help Nya connect with her element as he had done at the end of season 13. And for maximum angst, perhaps at the end of the season she takes his lessons and puts them to use - but instead of simply connecting with her element like he taught her, she's becoming one with it. This isn't perfect, of course, but at least now we've found a way to make Cole and Kai feel more relevantly involved in the plot.

Don't get me wrong, as much as I'm criticizing it I absolutely adore Seabound. BUT if I were given the task of rewriting it, personally I'd have the whole gang accompany Nya down to Merlopia. And as for having a land crew to watch over Ninjago in the meantime, I'd throw in some supporting characters. The ninja go "oh hey we need someone to hold down the fort and look after Ninjago while we're away", so they round up a ragtag crew of support characters from past seasons to sub in for them. Y'know, Skylor, Dareth, Karlof, and other characters of that caliber. And then we occasionally cut back to this reserve team, whoever they are, as they get up to all the adventures Kai and Cole would've been up to in the original canon version.

(Or if we want to create a lead-in for the next season, then perhaps they get the mayor or commissioner's help in recruiting a reserve team to look after things in their absence, and then this reserve team becomes the New Ninja during Crystalized).

Again, I don't want anyone to mistake my criticism for dislike - Wildbrain holds a special place in my heart, and I do enjoy it a lot. But I also have to admit that this relentless and at many times painfully arbitrary team-splitting is starting to get a bit annoying.

...oh wow, that was a long rant. I'm not entirely sure if any of that made sense, but either way just know that I agree with you 100%. Thanks for the ask!

[sparklingmusicofstars]

hello my friend, I'm just an ordinary teenage girl, I quite like the reverse harem sub-genre. So I want to ask you, usually the reverse harem sub-genre mostly doesn't have a good romantic ending, the protagonist usually doesn't choose anyone to end up with, so is it possible for that to happen in a hamefura story?

Hi,

I really love reverse harems too so I can see what you mean but unfortunately the protagonist usually doesn't choose anyone only in the anime version (generally it's when the original version is an otome game to make us want to play the game). In all the reverse harems that I read so far the protagonist always ends up choosing the man lead. And for people who are used to watch reverse anime (it can also be obvious) we know almost instantly who is it.

But I think hamefura is a special case, the original story is a novel which was then adapted as a game, manga and anime and all the adaptations follow the plot of the novel. I think Catarina won't choose anyone in the anime but will probably in the novel version. And we all know that the man lead seems to be Geordo (generally it's the one who first kiss the heroine). And in reverse harems which original versions are novels, I think she always ends up with someone in them. And most people are watching reverse harem stories to know who the protagonist will end up with, it's part of the plot. So I think that if Catarina doesn't end up with anyone the story will seem incomplete.

But it's also a possibility that the author will just drop many hints to make us guess who she will end up with and then stop the story on that to not make too much fans unhappy. After all Geordo has almost the same number of people who love him and hate him. So it will make a lot of fans happy but also unhappy if she ends up with him. And of course there's also the fact that the author really love Geordo...

There is also the important part : How much the other harem members are in love with the protagonist and that's why hamefura is a special case. All the harem members are too much in love with Catarina so it will make a lot of fans disappointed if she doesn't end up with the one they love. (At least it's the case for me).

So, to answer your question, I would say that if the author cares a lot about how her fans think it's a possibility but it's most likely that she will end up with someone at least in the novel version. And in this case too it's most likely to be the man lead, Geordo.

[third-half]

2023 Self Check

Honestly, having an overall middling year where most of my troubles were my brain’s fault was kind of a breath of fresh air. Being out of commission for most of last year with a fucked up knee at least got me thankful every morning I can get up and walk around without a brace or cane. I don’t really agree with the doctors and my Dad that I’m “young” but I’m apparently still young enough I can heal. That said, I’m kind of let down in myself for letting depression and laziness get the best of me like, worse than usual this year. It hit kind of hard when sitting back and going through old archives of content and realizing that:

Sketch-A-Day was 2015 Eishi and Dixie was before that Revolver Knight ran from 2005-2008 or 2009

Meaning I’d basically failed to really deliver on any of the series/game/etc ideas I’d pitched from 2016 onward with the arguable exception of the dungeon crawler card game’s first version. If anyone was curious as to whether I’d touched on some of that stuff in the meantime the status of my Things right now is:

Angel Dust (The Gatty Thing)- Pretty much axed, as much as I love the character, it was kind of turning into edge for edge’s sake. The thing about Gatty Ling is I’ve had the idea of an erratic, destructive but adorable and well meaning character kicking around for ages but she’s kind of just a blank slate beyond those traits and I’ve tried to plunk her into like three completely unrelated settings with different origins. I was also attempting to kind of do a distinct art… sub…style with her stuff closer to a moe VN look, really pump up the cute to make the dark stuff pop, but well, Madoka already exists and the last iteration was basically Madoka with Robots. I probably wouldn’t rule it out forever but I’ve kind of been using some bits and pieces of the setting to flesh out the Plane Girls Thing

Revolver Knight Reload- I got like three pages into drawing a complete remake of my old webcomic, but kind of got cold feet from a combination of things. I didn’t think I was ready to take on another gigantic long form story, though I promise that the new version was *MUCH* more refined. Like Gatty, I wouldn’t say it’s *impossible* I mess with this, but I think I might look into something closer to a light novel with spot illustrations than a full on comic in the interest of like, finishing before I die.

Critical Heaven (The plane girl thing)- Still active, but having a bit of an identity crisis. It began as a ‘skirmish’ tabletop wargame then I got to thinking about it as more of a shmup-inspired duel game. The format of tabletop/print is also kind of iffy because I know people would be more likely to play it digitally and I have like, zip experience putting a substantial game project together. There’s also a more or less complete ‘campaign’ jotted half in my head and half in my notepad (putting it in a game with multiple endings would save me from deciding which ending to give it, hmmm.) But in short, yeah this is still being picked at.

Irrgarten (The Dungeon Card Thing)- I know I lead off with kind of the downer limbo thing but I’ve actually not totally abandoned this, definitely not the setting. Surprise, Radona is from this world! Really, I could probably bring this back pretty easily by revising the original game rules, the biggest issue we ran into play testing was that items didn’t ‘feel’ very valuable- characters were strong enough on their own not to need them. Maybe I can bump this up in priority.

There are probably other story ideas I’ve mentioned over the years and not followed up on, but characters from axed stuff do tend to surface in other projects if I’m attached enough to them. If there are any particular things that you enjoyed my work in or reading about in the past, do let me know. I’ve had a hard time motivating myself, so a nudge wouldn’t be a bad thing about now. Next year, I would really like to put more effort into having a regular “thing” to work on, maybe I’ll bring back some gag comics. Definitely plan to do more drawing in general because drawing one decent thing then going radio silent for two weeks leads to needing to de-rust like, every time. I’m a creature very vulnerable to inertia.

So, no promises here, but my goals going into 2024:

Put some time into practicing more ‘dynamic’ content like simple animation and game design since I have like three game making programs sitting around

Regular art posting, with a focus on improving quality and speed

Minding my health more since it’s easier to be active when there’s less of me to move

Establish a more regular streaming schedule since it helps me trim down my backlog

This kind of turned into more navel gazing than I had planned to be doing, but I thought this was a good time to touch base on some things since I’m back to posting here… well, okay, ‘regularly’ is a stretch, but there are a lot of things I’ve brought up before and not followed up on in a long time. If anyone has still been reading this- thank you, truly. I hope that with a bit more focus and less dwelling on the gnawing darkness in my gut, we can have some fun here again.

Oh, yeah, by the way- also been kicking around a top X games list I may get to posting soon, but may save for New Years Eve.

[abqbox]

Bubble hockey!

But I didn't play that, instead I played regular hockey, or at least our slower, low skill version of hockey.

We were missing our team captain who is also one of our more dangerous offensive threats. And we were playing against the most consistently good goalie in the league. It didn't seem like a good situation.

But we started out playing alright, even had more shots in the first period, though it was a low amount for both teams as the play was mostly not threatening to either net for most of the period. We got kind of lucky very late in the period to get a solid shot and get to the rebound first and put it in for a goal right before the intermission.

That was a great result and gave us a nice lead. But the other team seemed to pick up their game slightly in response and I felt was the better team the rest of the game, though not by a great deal.

I was playing well though and making good saves until about 3/4 through the second period when I had my stick down in front of me to block passes to two of their guys being covered by our weakest defender. A pass came in towards those skaters but it was much harder than I had anticipated and bounced off my stick and into the net. That was frustrating but I kept playing well after and the period finished tied at 1. We nearly took advantage of a goalie stick handling mistake very late in the period, it even looked in from the other end where I was but wound up hitting the post of the completely empty net and staying out.

The third was pretty even for the most part aside from a few periods where they controlled and made good chances for a while, but I was able to stop everything and the fewer chances we made on the other end all resulted in saves too, some of them pretty darn good. The regulation time ran out with the score still tied.

So we went to overtime, 3 on 3. It creates a few more chances to score but with our skill it's not nearly as many scoring opportunities as the pros have when they do it and the ot ended with me making more saves than the other goalie but no goals.

Then we went to a shootout, our first shooter was stopped. Then I should have poke checked their first but didn't and he scored. Our second shot off the post and out. I stopped their second shooter and then our third missed the goal for a final shootout victory for the other team.

The official shot total was 30 for them to 20 for us. I noticed the sub score keeper was even worse with the shot count than usual so figure I probably actually had more than 40 shots faced, which certainly felt about right for how tired I was after the game. It was also frustrating to play so well personally with not much offensive support in front of me and then come up so close to stealing a win.

But oh well, it was still fun and I played well and was happy with most of my game so that was a good thing.

[ajdrawshq]

But anyways the Syringe ending thing is that if you go through Door 3 while playing the mobile novel version then instead of going through Door 2 and getting the Submarine ending what happens is that Clover immediately takes Junpei's behavior to mean he killed Snake for some reason, she runs off, Junpei goes after her, she sneaks up on him and injects him with soporil because there was more apparently and pushes him into the water flooding the lower decks, they reuse a cg from the axe ending which is silly because she has her hand out and they could have just used the one of him drowning, and that's really it idk. This all happens immediately after everyone sees the body for the first time, so like, you don't even get past the last set of doors. Idk out of all the shit that came out of additional material this is probably the least hopeless one and I'm surprised that absolutely no one cares, not that they're wrong I too don't like to acknowledge stuff outside from the game proper, but alternative version endings like this usually get talked about more in fandom I thought

holy shit?? i mean i also kinda get why ppl wont acknowledge this one much but. theres a lot going on here but there isnt but there Is? i wonder why theyd change it in one later version, but its not even in the.. other one? i dont remember what console its on but yknow the one im talking abt. or was that released before the mobile version?? idk but i Can see where they were going with it, kinda weird they used that axe ending art for it tho?? theres just. a Lot

[entamesubs]

hello!! i was wondering if you actually had some translation notes on the openings and endings? also i dunno if you ever mentioned this but what do you think of the dub changing 'providence' into 'creativity' for Neil? also how is it working on the subs basically by yourself? haha

"i was wondering if you actually had some translation notes on the openings and endings?"

I don't think we ran into much trouble with the OP or ED, so it was fairly straightforward. Besides some minor stuff with standard Japanese lyrics lacking a subject, so you kind of have to infer from context.

"how is it working on the subs basically by yourself?"

Usually my role would be split amongst 3-4 people in a fansub group — translating, typesetting/timing, and distribution. I have to do all four jobs because there's no one else.

I have thought of trying to recruit a timer so I can stop doing triple duty at least, but my standards for how our subs are timed are rather strict. I've had timing help in the past, but I always end up spending at least an hour or two going over their times and changing/editing them a lot.

This is just my hubris.

"what do you think of the dub changing 'providence' into 'creativity' for Neil?"

I have a lot of feelings on this actually. Not of the good kind.

Neil in the Japanese version is very interconnected with the concept of gods and divinity, especially as it relates to Shinto. After all, his word is "providence" (摂理, setsuri), which in Japanese is heavily meant to imply divine providence.

Then you have his whole Garden and the path leading to his inner sanctum, which in the original Japanese summary of ep23 is referred to as a 参道 (sandou). This word is specifically used to refer to the path leading up to a Shinto shrine, sometimes translated as a "visiting path".

Then you have his first, initial summoning chant of Yggdrago. As he recites the words "Why is the sky blue? The mountains tall? The sea vast?", each beat is accompanied by the pounding of a taiko drum. The pattern of the beat is something akin to the sound of a god descending. It's the sound that heralds the appearance of a god.

There are a lot of other things with how heavily Shinto Neil is coded, but I'd be here all day listing it.

So you have all of this heavy religious theming to go along with Neil's very modern, futuristic, and sci-fi-like vibe. And I think it's a really great thing because it showcases such an interesting dynamic. Stuff you wouldn't normally see together, but seem like a perfect fit for Neil.

By changing "providence" to "curiosity", you remove all of that.

He feels... a little colder. Not as personable. Like he's all about the data and numbers, which he is also in the original, but it's not balanced with the religion.

Neil’s idea of providence is at once so strict and yet so fluid. "Curiosity" doesn’t have the same feeling. Providence for Neil is both an ideal and a way of life.

Why is the sky blue? Why are mountains tall? Why is the sea vast? Neil isn't asking those questions because he doesn't know the answer to them—it's because he does. It's because of providence. Yet, this idea that everything can be explained by divine intervention is both romantic and pessimistic. It is both strict yet fluid. Neil is someone full of contradictions.

With these contradictions, Neil alone proves that there is more to life than providence. Yet he puts his whole faith into it. This balance in him provides so much deep character that we can draw from him, especially if you know a lot about how Shinto beliefs work in the modern era.

Dub!Neil just seems like an extremely pessimistic atheist. And like, I mean, the extremely loud ones that seem eager to get into fights online.

That's just my take though.

[absolutebl]

Quick pitch:

Seven Days (2015) 

Japanese BL Seven Days comes in two parts:

Seven Days: Monday - Thursday

Seven Days: Friday - Sunday

You can usually find it eng subbed on YouTube, just do a search or sometimes Drama Cool or some other grey site. If I knew how to get it legally I promise i would tell you. The rips are pretty poor but the subs are okay. It’s old and hard to find and the hair is terrible, but that’s really the only thing wrong with it. Otherwise IT IS MY BABY!!!!!! 

It’s one of the best Japanese BLs (live action manga) ever made and that’s because it has a lot of the breezy style of the later Thai BLs, without quite losing its yaoi roots or getting camp. The leads have an unexpected comfort with each other which yields up excellent on screen chemistry, and they are both extremely charismatic. It has a low heat level but there are some sweet soft kisses (which is a lot to ask of this kinda BL from Japan). 

Popular first year Seiryo (Seryou) has a policy of going out with any girl who asks... for one week. 

On a lark, third year Yuzuru (Yusuru) tests to see if that policy also applies to boys. Seiryo agrees that it does.

Yuzuru is very pretty and attractive but so brash and honest that girls always end up dumping him because his personality doesn’t match his looks. 

As the two boys date it becomes clear that Seiryo really likes the blunt side of Yuzuru, and Yuzuru starts to fall in love with Seiryo because of this. He’s so happy to be liked for who he really is. Seiryo thinks it’s all just a game to Yuzuru, but he’s falling hard too. They both want it to last more than a week. 

Seiryo is young and reserved but yearns so much to be loved and give love, while Yuzuru is the best possible version of an obtuse tsundere uke without being immature or a brat. 

Their miscommunication comes to the story honestly and is sourced in their characters. The actors put these personalities into their physicality too, with Seiryo moving in an elegant if cautiously stilted manner while Yuzuru is relaxed and sprawling. 

It’s fucking adorable. 

I promise you will love it. 

Someone asked for the hard sell on this BL so here it is: 

For me, literally the only hang up was the awful hair and if you can just convince yourself to watch their faces...

It's such a sweet soft story. It starts out with Yuzuru who is so pretty and popular but also super blunt and outrageous and just always says what's on his mind and he just doesn't fit into the Japanese worldview because of it. He keeps getting dumped because girls want him to be as sweet and as gentlemanly as his pretty face but he just isn't like that.

So he really just wants to be liked for who he really is. But mostly people just mock him for his outrageous personality.

While Seryou, on the other hand, is the mot popular boy in school. He's so nice (too nice and too much of a gentleman) and he wants to be in a relationship so badly that he'll date anyone who asks him for a week. He's not biased about appearances or (as it turns out) gender. He's just really lonely and wants to be loved. But he also has a hard time trusting because his heart has been broken badly in the past.

So what we end up with in this show is two lost souls who blunder into each other.

Yuzuru thinks Seryou is only dating him because Seryou is kind and will always give anyone at least a week. But Seryou's kind open acceptance is what Yuzuru comes to love most about him.

Seryou thinks Yuzuru is only dating him because Yuzuru is bold and cheeky, and playful. But that's also what he really likes and comes to love about Yuzuru - how open and honest and bright he is. And protective. Since Yuzuru is older, he comes to Seryou's defense socially a few times, because his honest nature won't allow Seryou to be bullied.

Seryou is so quiet and gentle, but he's wildly attracted by this crazy bold colorful boy. And he likes being ordered about. He likes knowing someone cares about him enough to push him for his own good. Also he's fragile, but really good at flirting.

They're both such complex charming characters.

It's a pitch perfect opposites attract, and there's no real angst over being queer at all, just first love and crushes and this kind of pure joy in finding a person who really fits you. You get to watch them fall in love with each other because they balance each other, and they like the parts of each other that others don't/won't understand. It's pretty rare in BL to find a narrative where it's the outward flaws that are inward strengths for the relationship.

It's one of the few BLs where we really understand and see the reason they like each other, it's not instalove, or some magic attraction. It's wholesome.

The kisses are sweet too, and really emotion-packed.

Seven Days is not just a romance it's loving. Kindly even. It's the BL equivalent of lying with your head in someone's lap while they gently pet your hair.

(source) 

[izzyizumi]

Digimon Adventures ~ Taichi Yagami & Koushiro[u] Izumi {A.M.V. Out-lining/Timeline} for Koushiro x Taichi A.M.V.: Tsuki no Uta [#Tri Spoilers, #Kizuna Spoilers, #Digimon Adventure: Spoilers]… This is the current initial ‘previewed’ look of a mostly-finished A.M.V., but with sections I can easily jump around and edit in if I ever go back to it in the future.

... And this is what a full version/outline of 100~ clips may look like!

With this one, starting from after the big Kizuna moment leading into an OWG clip of Taichi, the editor was starting to bug up and lag, and it was honestly amazing this one didn’t crash for some odd, unknown reason before I could finish & save it (when I’ve had many others crash by 40, even just 17~20 clips on a bad editing day)

So this one managed to work out in the end, but I was concerned I wouldn’t be able to fill in the ending with much, and thus I started using some longer sequences by the end, since using longer ones seems like it’ll crash less than if you use a ton of clips at once. I still managed to convey the feel of what I was going for at least (including within the original psuedo-plans), I think, though also the psuedo-outlines had the ending move a lot faster with many shots (that’s usually my wishful thinking though, so I made do with this instead.)

All clips with a series of squares in the corner has effects (sometimes multiple fade-in to fade-out sequences) on.

Also, sometimes the previews on clips will glitch oddly, and then fun things like this may happen:

^ (BlackAgumon Appeared!)

{It Knows.}

(OK, but most of the time it just glitches the main charas in previews and you can barely see them, which means yeah, kinda hard to see on the timeline.)

This took almost 6~ hours of editing total, spread across two evenings. (I think I finished just under the 6 hour mark on this time, but these ‘totals’ also include a lot of boring loading of files, audio etc. & waiting. So it’s actually a bit less time than even that, but hard for me to keep track of.)

I didn’t even have a full-on psuedo-plan for this one, honestly? (Like, I had an initial overall 'concept’/idea in my mind, including for ending, but I always have trouble when it comes to fitting in the most scenes I’d love to use if possible. I couldn’t even add in 2020!Koushiro’s ep with Gerbemon + Chuumon [/Tyumon] here yet! Maybe in the ‘finished’ version, if I can attempt to go back in, fix those few things & add in subs, sometime hopefully...)

A.M.V.s take a lot of time to make, too! And as much as I’d love to produce them quickly like this, no, I can’t actually manage this kind of attempt every single time without being supremely wiped out mentally afterwards, but this one was a lot of fun to work on too, since it didn’t crash AS much for me this time around...

I’d like to be able to improve my focus to finish them slightly more quickly in time for when character or O.T.P focused events I’m interested in roll around, since it’s way harder to finish a series of A.M.V.s in this quality 7 days in a row, for example when it comes to weekly events, but we’ll see! (Also because I’m typically not the type to {personally} join in events much anymore either... well, I sometimes do try for any Favs though, we’ll see!)

[Note: replying/Tags that are Positive/respectful are OK!] (If you re-blog this, please out of courtesy tag ‘Tri Spoilers’, ‘Kizuna Spoilers’, and ‘Digimon Adventure: Spoilers’ for your mutuals if you feel it’s necessary!)

[blackswaneuroparedux]

Patton and Monty at War: Unbelieving the unbearable rivalry.

Monty is trying to steal the show and with the assistance of Divine Destiny [Eisenhower] he may do so.

- General George S. Patton, on the Sicily Campaign, private diaries 16 July 1943

So every week I play my usual game of chess over a glass of wine with one of my neighbours in my Parisian apartment building. He’s a retired army general but remains active as a military historian and speaker. He’s curmudgeonly but one warms to him quickly as he doesn’t suffer fools gladly. He’s not a fan of women in the military but reluctantly concedes he would make an exception for me (besides who else could he play chess with?). We get on really well now because of the Covid lockdown this past year. We often have long discussions about military history and current politics until the bottle of wine is completely drained.

On one occasion he invited me to watch the 1969 classic war film, Patton, about the life of one of America’s greatest iconic World War Two generals, George S. Patton. It’s been years since I’ve seen it and I almost had forgotten how great the movie is with George C. Scott as Patton and Karl Malden as General Omar Bradley. We watched it in English and then discussed many things that came out of the film.

Hollywood and history usually do not mix. It is quite common for  filmmakers to take a historical subject and to distort it for their purposes and to dumb it down for entertainment purposes. In the case of the movie, Patton, there was no real attempt to distort the story of Patton. It was a fantastic and stirring Hollywood movie. Moreover it was an excellent study in character given Oscar worthy heft by the great George C. Scott as the crusty General George S. Patton. Francis Ford Coppola’s script was severely under-rated.

However there remain glaring inaccuracies such as Patton’s opening speech in the movie - admittedly a an iconic bit of cinema - but even this was based on his statements and captured the character of  the man, something even acknowledged by the Generals’ family.

Much  of the details of his role in the defeat of Germany are true. The only real omission was the lack of focus on Patton’s Lorraine Campaign, where he distinguished himself. There are some exaggerations in the movie and some minor distortions such as in the weather-prayer scene. In general,  the movie managed to produce a great overview portrayal of the  character and career of an extraordinary American leader.

The film does accurately relate the leading role played by Patton in the  liberation of Sicily. His daring use of armour was crucial in the defeat of the German army on the island.

However long after the film had ended I did think about one thing that irked me. And this was how the movie seemed to linger on the belief Patton was motivated by the desire to do better than General Montgomery, the victor  at El Alamein. Indeed the film probably reinforced the accepted conventional wisdom that these two driven and ambitious men hated each other.

There was a great personal rivalry between the two men.  They were both driven and wildly ambitious. The movie suggests that the rivalry between Montgomery and Patton was the main feature of the Sicilian Allied campaign and was perhaps a factor in why it ended so quickly with a  decisive Allied victory.

The rivalry was not as intense as the motion  picture suggests and the two men worked together when needed for the  good of the Allied cause.

Born two years apart, both were commissioned within a year of each other  and both were wounded in France in the First World War. Both men  encompassed very different but very valuable characteristics in combat:  Monty-careful and meticulous, Patton-dashing and diplomatic.   Despite  the differences, both generals demonstrated striking similarities:  commitment to their careers, a ruthless egotism, interesting when you  consider neither held superior command. This did not impede their desire  for the limelight and fame in warfare, arrogance and the manipulation  of colleagues in high places to advance their careers.  Both were  machiavellian in their own affairs and self-interested in their own  personal progression.

The great rivalries amongst the Allies that made a real imact were Marshall and Brooke over war policy, Nimitz and MacArthur over resources, Eisenhower and Montgomery over strategy; and then between Percival and MacArthur for incompetence,  Patton and O'Connor for aggressiveness, MacArthur and Clarke for vainglory,  (and possibly  Clarke and Wavell for the stupidity of letting defeated enemies escape),  were the issues that defined the war for the Western allies.

The idea  that a competition between Patton and Montgomery was more important is cute, but naive. I am not even sure where the idea comes from. 

Much is made of the bet between Patton and Montgomery over reaching Palermo in Sicily first, but in practical terms that was the only time in the war that Patton ever appeared on Montgomery's radar.

For the rest  of the war Monty was so much higher up the food chain than Patton that  he was unaware, or disinterested in Patton's opinions. Montgomery  was, by 1944, an experienced general who very successfully fought extensively in both combat and staff roles for 4 years throughout World  War One. (Patton got a combat command for a few weeks when the Germans  were already collapsing.) Montgomery led a division very successfully  through the Battle of France, and a corps through the crucial Battle of  Britain training and rebuilding years. He led an army in combat for two  years, through many successful battles both on defense and in attack.

By  1944 Patton had led a corps for a few months, and an army for a few weeks. For the very brief period of the Sicily compaign they were  theoretically equals in command, but probably only in Patton's mind. Montgomery saw Patton as an enthusiastic if amateurish old man but respected his aggressive boldness. Montgomery saw his HQ 'betting book' as a bit of fun (and was delighted when bet a  B17 by someone who should have known better).

When he and Patton met  and co-ordinated the Sicilian campaign Alexander seemed not interested in co-ordinating, Monty saw Palermo as a similar bit of fun to pursue, no bigger or smaller than the hundreds of other bets in the book.

Patton saw it, as he saw anything relating to his persona, as the most vitally important challenge of his whole life...up until the next one.  Montgomery lost a bet and moved on to the next challenge. Patton won but  didn't. (Or at least that is what bad writers have tried to suggest. I  think he moved straight on to the next challenge anyway.)

That  was the last time Monty and Patton were in direct competition, no matter what revisionists or romantics would say.

The next time Patton was  allowed in the field he was one of half a dozen army commanders in  Monty's Normandy army group, and, familiarly, he did not arrive until  the Germans in Normandy were already collapsing. Very soon afterwards Eisenhower split off Bradley's army group, and Monty had no control, nor much interest, in what Patton was up to thereafter.

The  romantics like to suggest that thereafter Monty railed against Patton's supplies, and that Patton railed against Montgomery's caution. The truth is less foolish for both of them. In fact Montgomery railed  against Eisenhower's broad front strategy regardless of which of the  other sub-commanders was benifitting (to the point of Montgomery making  an offer to serve under Bradley as long as someone got single control to  pursue a single strategy). He railed against the diversion of resources  anywhere not at the main point where a thrust might have achieved early  victory.

Leaving aside whether that victory could have happened,  Montgomery's beef was with Eisenhower first, his appalling chief of supply Lee second, fellow Army Group Commanders who couldn't control the excesses of their subordinates like Bradley (and to a lesser extent) Devers third, and only then with the several army commanders who each tried to do their own thing.

In practical terms Montgomery seemed more appalled by the negative effects of the incompetence of Hodges (1st US Army,) and  the obnoxiousness of General De Gaulle's orders to 'his' army (French First Army), and perhaps even  the ineffectiveness of his own subordinate Crerar  (Canadian 1st army) , than he did by Patton's enthusiasms. There is  hardly a mention of Patton in his diaries through this period, compared  to several comments on Bradley and De Gualle, and endless ones on  Eisenhower.

Patton too is being maligned by the pretense that his  war was taken up with a vain competition with Montgomery. Patton, like  Montgomery, was totally concerned with the main issue of defeating  Germany. But unlike Montgomery, he did not have Brooke  -  the Chief of Imperial General Staff - to rely on for support against  Eisenhower's broad front strategy.

Patton too was convinced that this was the wrong way to go, but to get his version of a thrust (with him at  the front) happening, he had to be a bit more manipulative than Montgomery.

Every word Patton used to wheedle and manipulate  support, or at least a blind eye to what he was doing, was designed to  get more resources from his superiors. Indeed, if he couldn't get them from Eisenhower, he was willing to steal them wherever he could, and  then get Bradley to pretend to not know what he was doing. In this he was quite willing to encourage Bradley's inferiority complex in relation  to Montgomery, and to happily manipulate Bradley into tantrums to get  what they both wanted, but it seems likely that Patton was more  interested in getting his way by making his superiors compete with  Montgomery, than in competing with Montgomery himself.

Patton is  actually a more complex and clever character than the romantics give him credit for. His 'kill them even if they try to surrender' speeches in  Sicily were part of his stage management of troops, not part of his innate personality. HIs 'us against the world' propaganda was more  manipulative, not so much like Bradley's inferiority complex. He wanted to win, and he would use anything to get what he needed to win, even  ramping up his superiors to distrust their allies. But his genuine competitiveness with Montgomery at this stage was less about him and Montgomery, and more about him and how he could maneouvre others to  support him. He would have shown the same level of competitiveness, and  the same willingness to undermine, any competitor at this point, British, French, Russian or even American.

Montgomery on the  other hand only saw Patton as one more junior general syphoning supplies  from an inadequate source. Montgomery was in competition with  Eisenhower for control, and possibly with Bradley for resources. Minor  army commanders in other people's army groups only registered on his horizon if he could get their armies assigned to his army group.

Just for amusement, it might be fun to consider how Montgomery and Patton might have worked together?

Montgomery was notoriously superb to serve under, no matter what your nationality.  British, Australian, New Zealander, South African, Indian, Canadian, French, Polish, and American troops who served under him  were all very happy to do so. So were their generals. Bradley certainly learned more  about being a field commander from a few months of Montgomery's distant mentoring than from anything Eisenhower ever did for him in their much closer relationship.

There is no doubt that Montgomery preferred effective subordinates to ineffective ones, and it seems possible that Patton would have made a preferable subordinate to Crerar or Bradley in his mind.

As for Patton, he would have served anyone who got him what he wanted. Had Montgomery offered him the chance to spearhead the attack into Germany, there is virtually no doubt that Patton would have  jumped at the chance.

Patton was not the racist that Bradley or Eisenhower were, and was happy to have black troops. He was not the American supremacist that Roosevelt or MacArthur were, and worked well with others (as long as they let him have enough lime light).

Had Montgomery been left as land forces commander, there is little doubt that he would have used Patton's aggression in a way that would have  made Patton much happier than Eisenhower's broad front strategy ever allowed.

It is fun to imagine Montgomery as land forces commander using Patton's 3rd Army in conjunction with British 2nd to leapfrog ahead at top speed into Germany. The best British tactics were never the  broad front strategy that the worst American's like Marshall and Eisenhower fancied. They were always the 'hold the enemy, crumble the  enemy, breakthrough the enemy, and pursue with as much force as fast and  far as possible' skills that had worked since the development of  mechanised warfare in 1918. (As demonstrated by the Germans in Poland  and France and Russia, the British and Germans in North Africa, the  Japanese and British in Asia, and the Russians in Eastern Europe.)

Montgomery would have used his traditional two corps up, one back, one resting deployment, adapted to armies, to keep up the momentum. Patton's preferred tactics were almost exactly the same, and he and his 3rd  Army would have fit it like a glove into Montgomery's thrust strategy.

Personally  I think that the limited reality behind their competitiveness paid trumps in Sicily, and I wish that it had been repeated in France. Patton could not have been a worse Army group commander than Bradley was, and would almost certainly have been better.

It is amusing to think of Patton and Montgomery effectively conspiring to destroy the broad front strategy while they got on with winning the war in the best spirit of competition. Although I have a sneaking suspicion that one of Patton's biographers was right to suggest that by 1945 he had suffered a few too many hits on the head, there is little doubt that he would have been almost as valuable to the Allied cause in Bradley's place against Eisenhower's policies directly, as he would have under Montgomery's army  group. That might have been a useful version of rivalry.

[blackgirlsuperherorants]

With more articulation, I'm ready to talk about why the push for Lokius simply bothers me, and this can be said for other m/m or w/w ships that fans push to be canon so hard just because they ship it.

It's the framing. The framing that if Marvel doesn't do it (or whatever the brand is), it's because homophobia, and if other fans don't like it/ship it, it's because homophobia (even if they ship other queer ships and are queer themselves.) And the biggest problem with that is that it overshadows the REAL issue of lack of queer representation on screen in mainstream nerd media, especially from big things under the Disney umbrella (Marvel and Lucasfilm/Star Wars, especially.)

It makes it bad that your ship isn't canon instead of bad that there haven't been any queer romances on screen in the MCU.

And like, as a writer myself, I find myself dissecting the stories of other media all the time. I can watch an MCU movie or series and pretty much assess what direction the story is going in by the narrative points they're hitting. I knew Sylki was basically gonna happen (even if just a kiss) because narratively, that's what the show was doing as soon as they had that "what is love" conversation on Lamentis-1. It didn't mean I liked it. But I knew it was happening.

Similarly, there's no romantic undertones to Loki and Mobius. None. For Marvel to make them a couple, it would mean they'd be doing it simply because the two present as men and it would make stans happy. And while there's something to be said for fan service, it would be annoying to watch them cram two guys together who aren't romantic in the slightest. I'd much rather see Loki meet some guy and have the same type of undertones they were giving to Sylvie and form a real bond to where the kiss feels earned and warranted. Not just put him with the nearest man because "he gay lol."

And how you guys are claiming it's being queer that makes you want this is beyond me. It's not being queer that makes you want this. I don't want queer characters that fuck everyone of whatever gender(s) they're attracted to even when it doesn't make sense for them to. I want real love stories. I mean, yeah, sometimes we can have a slut character, because that's fun, too, but that's not even what y'all think Lokius is. You seem to want them to be in love. But why? Because he's the first friend Loki made that isn't through Thor?

I hate that, too, because I hate this idea that queer people cannot have friends of their same gender without wanting to fuck them. IDK how y'all are, maybe y'all are like that, but I almost never have wanted to fuck any of my friends. The only few exceptions have been when I tried to befriend someone I had a crush on (in which case, usually the friendship can't work, really, because I have a crush on them.) I also think it's okay if you can have casual sex with friends, or if you have a friendship that develops into romance, but Jesus, do you people not have friends that you don't want to fuck? I am bi, maybe more pan (gender kind of doesn't matter to me, I guess) and I'm friends with people of all kinds of gender identities and like... I love them as people, which is why they're my friends, but I DO NOT want to fuck them. Especially my closest friend. I talked about her, before, here, but she's like my sister. The thought of fucking her is gross, to me. Not because she's gross, but because it feels incestuous.

Loki shouldn't want to fuck Mobius just because they developed a friendship. And that's very much how it's written on the series. They almost dislike each other (or Mobius is at least indifferent to Loki) and then they become friends.

That's not to mention the power dynamic that exists, there. And I know some of y'all are subs, but yeah, it's a bit gross to imply a sexual relationship with Loki's captor.

But on to Sylki. It sucks that I feel like most of y'all hate Sylki because Sylvie is a girl, and not just because it's bad in other ways. Like, the reasons Sylki is bad have less to do with "it should have been Mobius" and more to do with it being a lazy 1980s action movie plot that should have never happened. I'm not as creeped out by the selfcest (as many of you wouldn't have been if she was a he, I'm almost positive), but what's bad about it is that they couldn't have a strong female lead character without her being the love interest of the main guy. She didn't need to be, especially because she was a Loki variant, anyway. There was no need for it to have romantic undertones, and there was no need for them to kiss. It was sexist more than it was homophobic (and I can't help feeling like y'all are kind of being biphobic in this case. Maybe I'll talk about that, later, but yeah.) It was sexist bullshit. And there's valid criticism that Sylvie is underdeveloped. She's just angry and something for Loki to project affection onto.

I was also hoping they'd do a "found family" type of thing with Sylvie and Loki and let her be like the sister he never knew he needed, but no, they had to go trope and make her the love interest. It was lazy and bad and basically went "If Loki girl, main Loki want bone!"

Basically, having the main character fall for a character just because of their proximity and gender is bad and I hate it (and it would have been bad with Mobius, too, but yeah.)

Both the Mobius and the Sylvie thing also feel kind of racist, to me, because the show has prominent Black women who aren't even presented as desirable to Loki. And y'all, of course, ship him with anyone but the Women of Color. Y'all can pull true love with Mobius out of your ass, but he couldn't possibly fall for the Black women. lol.

Anyway. Not every show needs ships, and this show shouldn't have had any. I hate it. It's bad.

I guess on the biphobia front, I have heard some takes that it's not biphobic because Loki being queer in the MCU which hasn't shown any queer relationships, and Loki being the first openly queer character means they shouldn't have shown him with a woman presenting character. Which, I guess I get where you're coming from... but I have also been in fandoms for a long time and I see mostly girls saying this shit, which is what leads me to feel like it's simply jealousy. It happens all the time when a long-beloved single male character/celebrity suddenly starts dating a woman. Everyone hates it. And like, we haven't seen Loki be with ANYONE in the MCU, because mostly he's been doing villainy and his dating life hasn't been relevant. If the demigod says he's bi, he can kiss a woman. Especially a woman version of himself. Like I said, I hate it for other reasons, but pretending it's because he should have kissed Mobius is utterly delusional. He probably shouldn't have kissed anyone. Not in this series. There was no reason for any canon romance, especially because the show has a season 2 and we'll have time to see Loki develop earned, deserved romance with someone.

I'd much rather see them create a character just to be his boyfriend than have y'all push Marvel into making Lokius canon, which is a nonsense ship that only happened because Mobius is the only prominent male-presenting character before we meet the other Lokis.

My sincere wish is for people to remember that their ships are just ships and to enjoy them without getting all self-righteous about it. I TOLD y'all that Lokius wasn't gonna be canon like 4 episodes back, and here y'all are acting shocked and like Marvel took something from you. NOBODY expected y'all to ship Lokius. It's not even queerbait.

You can make clear arguments as to why Sambucky was queerbait. It's there in undertones in the actual series.

You cannot watch Loki and tell me you thought it was queerbait, unless you think men can't have conversations or hug goodbye without being romantically involved. Which means, in my opinion, that you need to learn about healthy masculinity.

Again, this is not a defense of Marvel. They DO need to let characters be queer, for real, and not just by saying " A bit of both". Like, let Loki be queer. Let Deadpool be queer. Let these queer characters be queer on screen. Yes.

But please stop making it about your ship. I'd rather see a flashback of Loki dating a guy and see him kiss someone he loved back on Asgard than watch y'all force Lokius. Because my queer rep is not about your crackship. It really isn't. And the fact that y'all keep calling us homophobic for not liking your ship REALLY needs to be addressed.

Like, when will y'all stop? I got on Stucky shippers about this shit in the past. All of us gay as hell, too, we just don't like YOUR ship. A lot of us like other queer ships. A lot of us like queer ships in other fandoms, too, and even have queer OCs. YOUR ship just ain't it. Stop forcing it. Literally, most of the ship wars between MCU fans have been queer ship vs queer ship, not really queer ship vs straight ship. Like, the number one Stucky rival ship was Stony. Not Steggy. People are not homophobic for not wanting your ship.

Sometimes it's because they ship something else.

And sometimes, like me, it's because they want something to make sense narratively and not happen for the sake of it happening. It's always better writing to have a character meetcute a new love interest than to magically turn a platonic friendship into a romantic relationship. Like, even when the characters are straight. Like, when Moesha dated Hakeem. It was just weird, even if he was kind of a great boyfriend. He was just supposed to be her friend, and people didn't really like it because it didn't fit narratively.

And that's why ships for the most part should be left to fanfiction, with the exception of a few where fans are right to call out the writers for not making it canon because it's clearly bait (like what happened to Destiel shippers. To see Lokius shippers compare themselves to THAT was so ridiculous. Destiel shippers had a decade of evidence only to be let down by a criminally unfair ending. Lokius shippers saw two men have a deep conversation once and lost their minds.)

Anyway, I'm not saying don't ship Lokius. I don't even hate it, really. I just think it obviously shouldn't be canon, and fans pretending like they were robbed of it is ridiculous. Literally, Ao3 exists for this reason. I will never see Steve fuck Sam Wilson, so I wrote it into my fanfic. I am not mad that they didn't actually date in the main MCU storyline.

[systemadministratorclu]

Clu

Tag: His RP posts will be tagged "muse: clu"

Name: His designation, or "full name" is Codified Likeness Utility, but no one calls him that. Even he doesn’t call himself that. His name, the one he identifies with, is Clu.

Age: According to Flynn’s notes, he was created on April 17, and he's at least 27 in User years. However, he feels twice that old. Except for Tron, he is the oldest Program on the Grid.

Program Type: He's a Utility, able to be used for any task you can think of. Personally, he doesn’t guarantee that he's GOOD at everything, but his coding gives him the physical ability to DO everything.  He's also an Administrator, meaning the only person with higher security clearance than him is a User, especially Kevin Flynn.

Powers and Abilities: Depending on the RP, Clu may be unaware of some or all of his powers and abilities, as his User blocked them from him in order to control him and keep him submissive. (us muns can talk about it more on a thread-by-thread basis)

Being the Admin, Clu is more connected to the Grid than any other program, to the point he can feel the Grid itself and sort of 'communicate' with it, as it has a form of consciousness (not quite sentience, more like awareness. It watches over its inhabitants and does its best to meet their needs, but it has no real will or agency of its own). He often uses this ability to locate people and things or to ask if something is possible. Because of his connection and abilities, Clu is sometimes said to be the personified version of the Grid itself

•He does sometimes consult the Grid for other things, and while it normally won't spell out its often cryptic answers, they're usually enough to point Clu in the right direction. On very rare occasions, the Grid is able to speak through Clu as well as responding to others who are close to him or to whom he asks it to send a "message" which is usually just a feeling to them.

He can also call up code from the Grid to create things or repair things. (Think Elsa's ice powers in Frozen, as that was a huge inspiration for this ability). Despite this, he still enjoys making things by hand, though he'll sometimes use his powers if he needs something quickly.

He is designed to be fast, agile, and strong, hard to defeat in a fight, as he is the Grid's last line of defense. This also means he can either recover quickly from injury or illness, or if necessary, he can block out pain (this is usually only needed in combat)

Location: He lives in a way-too-big-for-one-Program penthouse (more like a pent-McMansion) on top of the Admin Tower in Tron City. He doesn’t consider it a home, but it’s safe….mostly. Sometimes, it feels more like a prison.

Sexuality: It varies depending on the characters and the RP. In some he's gay, in some he's attracted to women

For NSFW threads, he's a sub, and he's into some kinky stuff (but he can also enjoy the vanilla stuff, he's not demanding unless his partner wants him to be), like bondage, blindfolds, and other things that require him to really trust his partner as he's very vulnerable. (We can DM about the details)

Bio: (it's long, so it'll be a separate post you can read here)

Personality: Unlike his canon counterpart, this muse does not seek to destroy the Users or to take over their world. He's often not even very confident in his ability to lead the Grid and will often look to others for reassurance that yes, he's doing a good job, his people are happy with him as their Admin. He loves hugs (he's been told he's great at giving them) and just being held. He's very kind and generous, yet fair and just as a leader and a person. The only thing he really wants for himself is to know he's loved and wanted. The only thing he wants to go to the User world for is to see the stars, which he's heard about/read about, but never seen. He has a gentle heart despite how he's been treated in the past, and is always ready to help a program in need

In a relationship, he's dedicated and loyal to the end, but often thinks himself unworthy of the other person's love, always thinking they deserve better than him. Again, reassurance can help here.

Trauma: Flynn was incredibly abusive to him, viewing him as less than dirt. Everything wrong was Clu's fault. He was often called stupid, useless, weak,and a mistake, among many other horrible things, especially when he made mistakes (because his User didn't even try to teach him anything). His User hurt him and starved him, denied him any medical care beyond what was necessary to keep him alive, and forced him to work through any sickness or injury. This kept him weak and submissive, along with putting blocks on him so he couldn't use any of his Admin abilities. He was also not allowed to call Flynn anything but "User", and he was led to believe that telling someone what was happening would put them in danger. He didn't get to socialize much, having to work nonstop trying to meet his User's impossible demands. When Flynn disappeared, the Occupation continued the abuse so they could use him as a scapegoat. They also blocked more of his access to things and added in torture sessions with Dyson and/or Pavel. He still suffers from nightmares and flashbacks due to his past. Just be patient with him.

Hobbies and Interests: He loves anything to do with space and stars. His decorating and creations often have a starry, celestial, spacey aesthetic to them.

He loves flying and is probably the best pilot on the Grid because of it. He spends a lot of time in the sky, especially when the Occupation is in control, as it's the only place he feels free.

He's a master of an ISO craft known as codeweaving, which is very much like the User craft of weaving. He has created a series of large elaborate tapestries that detail the history of the Grid as told by firsthand accounts from its people. It is meant to be a complete, accurate, unbiased telling of the Grid's story. No matter the RP, he will probably have a piece in this series in progress at the time. He has several different sized looms, or 'codeweavers'. The largest one, on which he makes the History of the Grid pieces, was once Radia's, which she used to teach him the craft when he was hidden in Arjia (see his Bio) and which she gave to him as a gift.

He also enjoys music and sometimes can be found singing while doing something else.

[seancekitsch]

Venus

A/N: warning for alc mentions, unprotected sex, some kinky slapping dom/sub stuff, my normal freak ass shit

-

Loving Klaus was easy, you found. Easy to have it open and known and free than to feel yourself wrestling with the feelings the way you had been a month prior. A month of ‘I love you’ and a month of really feeling like the two of you were a proper couple, at the very least like the two of you were real people. His siblings noticed it too, the shift. Like you were finally one of them, and it felt nice to belong. You really hadn’t ever felt that way before, not without drugs, and that was only belonging through wanting to get something out of someone else and not just the people themselves. Last week the holidays had come and gone, and you were honestly surprised his family had included you in the celebrations, despite the fact that you and Klaus had thrown them all a birthday party two months prior. Their holiday traditions were weird, donuts and eighties music and bickering, but it was nice. The week spanned on and turned to the final night, new years, finally the family happy to be seeing a year that isn’t some fucked up version of 2019 (one that Klaus has told you over and over his brother Ben was alive and absolutely cruel and you were married to your ex and clearly using) and finally ready to move on from it all. This timeline wasn't perfect, not by a long shot, but it was the one you both had together and it was the one his family fixed. Tonight was for celebrating, for dancing and drinking and forgetting your worries. It's fun, but it's only a matter of time before Klaus takes you home or to a forgotten spare room. Allison opens up her house in the city to her family and their guests. The night starts with dinner, which is a big potluck of foods that don't go together but all of the Hargreeves favorite foods. You can tell exactly who brought what, and no one is surprised by the insane amount of take out you and Klaus brought. There's cocktails which are actually made with care instead of mixed up sloppily like a child making potions out of shampoo in the tub. 

It's around 11:25 when Klaus pulls you down the hall towards the guest room, shouting, “I am but a weary traveler! My Panacea and I need a respite before we keep entertaining you all!” which was met with rolling eyes and a few flinches at the abruptness of it all, but a steady fondness as the backdrop of it all.

Klaus drops to his knee the second the door is locked, and grabs your leg to hike it up. Your back comes to rest against the wall, jamming coats out of your way to get comfortable as he presses his plump lips to the shiny toe of your boot. His breath fans out, almost fogging the shiny fake leather of your boot before he starts kissing. He presses kisses from the tip of your toe up to where the arch of the side of your foot would be, then licks the rest of the way up to the ankle, moaning as he does so. A prayer, a promise, his devotion on display. This is Klaus wanting to be used, wanting to be objectified and made yours.

“I’m going to get famous again, baby.” He kisses the toe of your boot one more time before moving up and resting your foot on his bended knee. He pushes your skirt up, all the way to where your thigh meets your hip, and his hands are all over your leg as he speaks.

“Prophets gonna rise from the ashes, and this time I’m gonna build it all in your image,” his teeth rake the sheer tights at your calf, ripping at least one hole in them. They were new. “The whole worlds gonna worship you just like I do, fraulein.”

You’re halfway between a chuckle and a moan as one of his thumbs slides up into the back of your knee and the other presses a harsh circle to your inner thigh, right below where the panties of your lingerie begins, if you could even call them panties. They were a mess of mesh and lace that you saw in the mall and you just had to get them and their matching bra, even if now they seem a little gaudy. Klaus likes them, though, and got excited when you got dressed for tonight when he saw them laid out on the bed. He wanted to tear them off of you the moment he saw them, and he would do just that. His hand snakes its way up over your clothed cunt, making you groan at the contact, before he reaches the waistband of your tights and yanks them down  with your panties as far as he can, pulling them to where your boots prevent them from coming off, essentially giving Klaus control of how much you can move during this tryst. Its now that he puts your leg down, letting you stand up straight again in front of his bent figure.

“Hit me,” he begs. Klaus’ eyes are blown wide with lust, even in the dark.

“I beg your pardon?”

“Hit me, slap me across the face,” he begs again, “Make me hurt, tell me ‘Klaus I want you to bleed for me’ I’ll do it.”

He gets this way sometimes. Arousal floods your system in the same vein as concern. If Klaus wants to be hurt, he’s usually already hurting. 

“No, Klaus we don’t have time, let's talk about it,” You say, already sinking down onto your knees to join him, to cradle his face in your hands and to make him feel better.

“Doc, Doc there’s nothing wrong. I need relief. It's like, like a cure.Yeah. I’m hard as a rock, love, I need relief.”

Purely kinky. Consensual. If it's what Klaus wants, who are you to deny him of it? You rise up onto your feet again, preparing yourself to hit him. To Klaus, even in the darkness, he can make out that you look like something otherworldly, bigger and greater than human. You wind back, apprehensive but willing to do anything for him, something he recognizes not casually. As your open palm makes contact with his left cheek, a shuddering moan makes its way up from deep inside his stomach, out through his throat and past his lips orgasmic in execution. 

“Again, please.”

And you indulge him twice more, until you're sure the hot skin on his face is reddened. There's a certain kind of thrill in knowing that your hands will leave a mark on him, that he’ll enter a new decade with your hands printed on his visage. Those three slaps are good enough to sate him for now, as he rises back to his feet, pressing his lips to yours as his hands go straight to your hair, any semblance of style you had put to it would be out the window in seconds. He backs you against the door until you hit it, then you both start to slide to the floor. He guides you down gently, taking extra care to remember the tights holding your ankles hostage, and lays you down against the hardwood, the warmth of his old faux fur trim jacket like a blanket to cushion you as he pushes your skirt back up to your waist.

He bends you in half, pulling your legs up to meet your chest; your boots clanking together on his shoulder as he pushes into you, immediately filling you to the hilt. This angle is nothing short of divine for you both, your legs pressed together making you feel just that much tighter wrapped around Klaus’ cock, and the angle leaving you mercilessly open to his thrusting.

“This is the tightest, wettest little cunt I've ever had the pleasure of serving,” Klaus whispers as he pulls out and slams back into you before setting his pace.

 He's fast, working against the clock, and against every nerve ending in your body. You don't try to stifle the moans as his thrusts rock your entire body along the floor. He fucks like a man with a gun to his head, hitting you deep each time, a staccato of his name falling from your lips as he pants and growls in your ear. You feel your orgasm coming before you can warn him, and the spasming of your body surprises you both earth shattering, convulsing waves of pleasure hit you, and all you can do is cling to each other as it ruins you. The spasming of your muscles triggers him as well, and you can feel every drop of hot white cum that he shoots into you, filling you deep.

He kisses you, muttering little ‘I love you’s as he pulls out, gently pulling your thighs off his shoulder and pulling your panties up; rolling your ripped tights up with the utmost care and dedication before you reach for him again to help you stand, shaky knees and dizzy from his affections. Love drunk as well as martini drunk, ready to face midnight.

“Klaus, Klaus I need to find a restroom before we go back out there. I need to clean myself up.” You can already feel his sticky white dripping out of you, no doubt making an irreversible mess of those panties he liked so much. It would be uncomfortable to sit, to move unless you got to the bathroom and got yourself fixed up. Klaus whips back around to look at you as his hand grasps the doorknob.

“Don’t you dare, you venus in furs, let it be a reminder of what's going to happen when we get home.” there's pure evil in his tone and in his smile, “Plus, you'll miss midnight if you run off on me.”

He pulls the door open and leads you back out into the festivities.

[the-judge-of-bones]

ALRIGHT HERE HE IS, I BRIEFLY MENTIONED REWORKING MY GRILLBY AND HIS ART IS DONE. Now it’s time for HC’s/Basic reiteration of info

- His full name is Gervaise ‘basalt’ Soot though most people call him Grillby as a nickname and he actually prefers it so few monsters know his ‘real name’

- He’s a Magma elemental which means he’s the hybrid of a fire and rock elemental, He shares many of his base traits with fire elementals so he often gets mistaken as such but unlike a fire elemental. Grillby can form hardened plates of magma all over his body in response to fear or in self defense which raises his defense stats from 100 to 200 but lowers his attack from 150 to 100 since he’s slower with full magma armor summoned.

- He’s a boss monster class elemental which was a completely random occurrence (As it often is in monster society) so while he’d been born to a poor, Hard-working couple, He did eventually become the leader of the elemental clan by popular vote and Necessity to have a boss monster leading the charge as they are of course natural born leaders though they usually are given extra training as children so grillby is a very informal boss monster. Any kids he has would be considered royalty within’ the clan.

- The elemental clan was originally composed of 100% elementals of a wide variety of types and elements (Water, fire, Plasma, Rock, Plant, Shadow, light, etc) but due to how many of them they lost in the war. (Grillby and Fuku are the only surviving fire aligned elementals and elementals of other types are severely lacking underground), So it now composes most element themed monsters such as the rock monsters, Vulcans, Pyrope, Ice wolf, etc. Though just like the spider clan. They do take in the occasional odd ball.

- Grillby has a Tenacity soul which is a soft Lilac color though it’s usually covered up by a hard magma shell to protect his soul from the internal heat of his own body, The tenacity soul trait is seen as the monster version of determination without actually being determination. A corrupted tenacity soul is Hesitation

- Grillby was equally loyal to both Toriel and Asgore during the war and still is loyal to them both despite the fact toriel had ran off after the events directly after their children’s death and though he knows it’s a false hope. He wishes for toriel to return one day because while he like anyone wants to get out of the underground, He didn’t want to do it at the cost of human children. A few have passed through his bar and he’s never harmed them.

- Grillby raised Fuku from the time she was a tiny infant, She was born not long before the war’s conclusion and her parents were among the fatalities, She only survived because at some point, Her parents had handed her off to a stranger in hopes of protecting her who’d been still holding her when he found her. (He and Fuku are cousins), She was the only other fire aligned elemental he could find and took her under his wing. Though she doesn’t call him dad and he never insisted she did. He told her plenty about her parents, Fuku lives in hotland now though she does still occasionally visit and calls him her ‘uncle grillby’

- He did use a sword when it was required but a lot of the time he relied on his fire alone to battle against humans, Known to scorch entire fields of grasses and forests to cook the humans out and give him the advantage, If you encountered him without at least one water mage by your side then you had little chance of escaping and he famously was known for his complete lack of mercy in the war. It’s not to say he didn’t give it. But he reserved it for monsters and monsters alone.

- He originally enlisted in the war after the death of his wife, She was a sub-variant of fire elementals who could fly and she was one of the first causalities in the war due to a water mage. He turned her dust into a glass heart imbued with his fire magic and he keeps it in his breast pocket when he goes about his daily business. He ranked up really fast in the war due to his strategy, Strength and generosity, Soon commanding whole units in hopes of ending the war. Even if they eventually lost.

- When they were all being backed towards/fleeing towards mount ebott, He helped carry sans (At the time only seven) into the mountain so his fleeing parents (Mother being pregnant with papyrus at the time) had a easier time making it into the mountain.

[noethicalconsumptionunderdisney]

Hogwarts Sorting Profile: Max Russo

So, confession time: Initially, I wasn’t actually planning on writing one of these for him.  I’m sorry!  I love Max, but he’s often in the background of Wizards of Waverly Place and just has these really random plots thrown in his direction, rather than interesting character-exploration-type shit like the main sibs.  (Which, to be fair, is probably why some of y’all might be curious what I’m going to say about him.)

But I was thinking about what makes Max so odd as a character, and specifically I was thinking about him in comparison to other characters of his archetype in the Disney Channel-verse.  Because we’ve seen the messy, funny, underachieving brother character a lot, but they come in very different flavors.  Part of that for Max is that he shares some of those traits with Alex in contrast to the overachieving, overly serious Justin, but part of that is… Max often seems to be in his own little world, incomprehensible to mortals and wizards alike, and generally takes in the “real-world” around him with a shrug.  He still cares about the “real-world” when it suits him, but he’s often kind of divorced from it, and that discovery fascinated me.  Furthermore, it made his Sorting “click.”

We’ll start off easy: what does Max do?  The answer is… he’ll do pretty much anything.  He’s not a Burned Secondary, though, he just doesn’t give a fuck.  Max is every bit the Slytherin Secondary that Alex is, we just don’t usually notice because he spends most of his time in his Neutral State.

The Slytherin Secondary’s Neutral State is blunt, rough, and often unphased by stepping on people’s toes. It’s easy to mistake this for a Gryffindor Secondary’s honesty, but it comes from a different place: comfort, relaxation, and/or apathy.  It doesn’t inspire or motivate so much as sit back and do as it pleases, and the Neutral State’s honesty is there for convenience rather than necessity— if a different tactic will work better, a Slytherin Secondary can ditch their honesty and change direction far more easily than a Gryffindor Secondary.

Max isn’t exactly shy about saying what’s on his mind, even if it’s usually dismissed as nonsense.  He also does seem to charge into situations without a care sometimes, but that’s the thing: he’s able to charge into those situations because he doesn’t care.  When he tests out the zombies’ No-Fear Ring, it doesn’t work on him because he’s already fearless.  So while some Slytherin Secondaries are nervous about showing their honesty to others and only show their Neutral State when they’re home safe with people they’re comfortable with, Max lives in his honest Neutral State because he feels comfortable and safe most of the time… even in situations where he really, really shouldn’t.

Curiously, one situation where he doesn’t feel comfortable or safe has very little to do with actual danger, but about personal identity: when he’s turned into Maxine.  And in Maxine’s body, he’s a lot more manipulative.

“You know, I can’t help it if people think I’m cute.  Watch how I make it work for me.”

As Maxine, he uses his cuteness to get out of chores, to get revenge on Alex and Justin in karate, to guilt dishonest customers out of cheating his parents, and comes up with a plan to talk his “boy self” up to a girl he likes as Maxine so that she’ll like him when he changes back.  Yeah, can’t imagine why Maxine reminded Jerry and Theresa so much of Alex…

But there are Slytherin Secondary indications from Max in his usual form as well.

He has no qualms about outright lying — inventing a fake illness to get out of P.E., pretending to be “Tom Sawyer” so he wouldn’t be embarrassed by/compared to his family — but he prefers obfuscation, aka confusing people with his “Max-ness.”

“How do you get your brother to say what’s really on his mind?”

“Oh, I use randomness.”

“What?”

“Well, I just say random things and while people are trying to figure it out, they say stuff that’s on their mind.”

One example of this tactic being employed successfully is with the Genie.  While Alex fails to outsmart the Genie using her quick wits, as the Genie is every bit as cunning as her, Max figures out a way to piss off the Genie enough to blackmail her, then talks circles around her and confuses her until she reveals a way for them to undo her wishes.  Alex calls it “outdumbing” her, but in any case, he succeeded where she failed, and showed that he’s more capable than often assumed.

We get another rare moment of clarity from Max during “Alex Tells The World.”  

“Alex, you know you can’t reveal magic!”

“Oh, even I know that. That’s why I just make people think I’m dumb so if I slip up, ehh, they figure, the kid’s an idiot.  And I slip up all the time, so.  Who’s dumb now?”

Max’s admission that he “slips up all the time” isn’t exactly reassuring, but it is telling that he’s the only one who doesn’t reveal magic during both the Season 4 Premiere and the Season 3 Finale.  Perhaps it was dumb luck that got him there, but I think there’s more to it than that.  There’s a method to his madness.  There’s a logic to it, even if Max’s logic often doesn’t follow all the way through.

Which leads me to his Primary— Ravenclaw.  (LOOK I KNOW. HEAR ME OUT.)

Yes, Max is often seen as “the dumb one.”  Yes, Ravenclaws are perceived as “the smart house.”  And while I’ve just demonstrated that there’s a brain under all the Max weirdness, I’m not about to argue that he’s secretly a genius.  He misses the mark more often than he hits it, and oftentimes when he hits it, it’s through coincidence or dumb luck or Insane Troll Logic that’s impossible for anyone but Max to follow.  But I do believe he operates on logic, just his own wacky version of it.

The thing about Max is that he’s neither as dumb as most people think he is, nor is he as smart as he thinks he is.  He’s somewhere in between, and the fact that people never quite know where exactly he falls on that scale is kind of the point.

In fact, part of the reason I struggled with Max was because I was trying to figure out where exactly he did fit in:

He can be selfish enough at times to argue Slytherin Primary, the stereotypically “selfish” House, but he’s missing Justin’s protective streak.  He doesn’t feel that same sense of duty towards his family that Justin does; when Mason breaks Alex’s heart in “Wizards vs. Werewolves,” Justin turns on him instantly because he Hurt His Little Sister And Is Therefore Bad, while Max is the one most willing to give Mason a chance, because he has his own reasons for wanting Mason in his life.  Yet, he still clearly cares enough about his family to rule out the possibility that they don’t factor into his morality at all, not to mention how easy it is for them to influence him.  

His more humble ending of inheriting his father’s sub shop might make people think Hufflepuff Primary, but there’s even less justification for such a sorting upon scrutiny.  As I’ve touched on above, the staunch loyalty to community isn’t all that important to him, and he’s also not all that into traditions.  There’s no compulsion to help strangers, he doesn’t really make enemies but he kind of just ignores people he doesn’t like (or shatters them in a million pieces on accident), and let’s not forget that he unleashed countless monsters in New York City that killed all the Monster Hunters just to win the competition… even if he did do it when his Conscience was separate from the rest of him.  Not exactly behavior you’d expect from the morality system of “a person’s a person no matter how small.”

Speaking of Conscience, it’s notable that he argues with it, rather than accepting his advice. I’m still a little unclear as to how much this matters (there’s definitely room to argue that most of his brain went into Conscience as well, and that whole plotline was… weird), but even with his Conscience inside his body, he seems to lack that moral drive Alex has.  Gryffindor Primaries have this embedded sense of justice deep within their characters. Even when it’s hidden most of the time, like in Alex’s case, or when it becomes twisted into something dark and dangerous, or becomes Stripped of its certainty, there’s still this sense that there is Right and Wrong in this world, that trusting your gut should lead you to the right conclusion, and that it’s wrong to ignore it.  I have a hard time remembering if there’s really any situation where Max gets that gut feeling of Something Being Wrong at all, much less acting on it with a Heroic Plan… at least, not without convincing.

But Max can be convinced, and that’s key.  Alex often takes advantage of this to manipulate him for her own selfish ends, such as talking him into paying her for handing out fliers to her zombie prom, but more often it’s his parents that act as his voice of reason, whether it’s convincing him to go after the “deli robber,” convincing him to give his siblings a fair shot at the Wizard Competition, or convincing him to tell his girlfriend the truth… and then unconvincing him of that when he takes it too literally and tells her he’s a wizard.  

Actually, Max is prone to misinterpreting advice in this way while trying to follow it to the letter— he does this when he tries to sell fountain water with a puppy, as well, because his mom told him to “add something to it.”  I think he is, to an extent, aware of his own intellectual limits.  He knows he misses the mark a lot of the time, so he’s often willing to trust other people’s judgment over his own, so long as they can get it through to him in a way that he thinks makes sense.

But beyond that, he’s often willing to question “common knowledge” in a way the other characters don’t. When Justin tries to tell him he can’t make life out of the stuff from his room, he simply replies, “Where’s it say that?”  In season 4, when there’s a distinct possibility that he’ll win the competition, he expands the sub shop business by making the Wizard Portal into a Drive-Thru, which genuinely worked as a business plan until Jerry took it too far.  Later that season, he saves his siblings by creating a black hole and then jumping through it to pull them to safety from the black hole in Alex’s apartment.  Like, that was his idea.  He came up with that.  It was weird, it was risky, it was unconventional, it could’ve been incredibly stupid… and it worked.

And that’s what I keep coming back to with this Ravenclaw Primary sorting— that sense of ingenuity, curiosity, and the willingness to experiment.  On one hand, you have your System Claws, who are dedicated to The Rules because they’ve been convinced that living by them is The Best Way To Live, and on the other hand, you have those that are willing to challenge conventional wisdom and try new things.  It’s this willingness to question that I personally attribute to a Ravenclaw mentality, rather than inherent intellectual ability or a large knowledgebase.  While Max may not have the latter, he has the former in spades, and that, more than anything, is really what told me that he truly belongs here.

Conclusion:

Max Russo is a Ravenclaw Primary and a Slytherin Secondary.

As a Slytherin Secondary, Max often likes to confuse and obfuscate to get what he wants, is flexible in his methods, and can even be manipulative when he wants to be.  He’s also relatively comfortable with himself, thus he often lives in a Neutral State where he says whatever’s on his mind without thinking much about danger or whether he’ll be understood.

His Ravenclaw Primary is as curious as it is undefined, and operates on a logic that only Max truly understands.  While this leads him astray more often than not, this also allows him to break from tradition and try new things, and this unconventional thinking can sometimes lead to better solutions than anyone else could’ve come up with.  However, it also comes with a set of brakes in the form of taking input from others.  It’s not always easy to get through to Max, but he can be reasoned with, which in his case, is probably for the best. 

In this combination, we find a character who truly dances to the beat of his own drum.  As the most flexible Secondary and Primary, respectively, Max is a conundrum to most who meet him, confusing even to those who know him best.  That said, being the Russo who “goes with the flow” the most often, he’s also probably the Russo that has the most fun.  He’s certainly more fun to write about than I was expecting him to be!  I’m glad I did, and it’s good to be back.

[2001kai]

Halloween - Kai Parker Smut

     Going through a haunted trail with Kai was one of the last things you ever wanted to do, but seeing as he never broke your strict 'no terrorizing civilians' rule, he was being good and rewarding him with your screams of terror was the least you could do.

Besides, he'd be there to protect you, right? WRONG! For the first half of the trail you had buried your face into the back of his hoodie and screamed when you heard the voices of the paid actors whispering in your ear as Kai laughed.

Kai was not as easily spooked as you were, obviously. He had the power of knowing he could kill everyone in the vicinity within seconds. Plus, he had decided the makeup and costumes were sub-par, he’d seen scarier looking characters in the McDonald’s bathroom earlier, he decided.

You thought he would know that leaving you alone would make you upset and still he left you in the never-ending corn maze after you had looked away for a split second.

When the usual bluff, “Kai, I’m SO finishing Breaking Bad without you and never showering with you again” didn’t work, the fear began to set in. You knew he was trying to scare you, so you just crossed your arms and waited, chewing on your lip as you looked around until he decided he was done being a jerk.

It was eerily silent save the distant screams from other parts of the park. Weakly, you decided it was for the best that you keep moving forward. Since you were expecting it, it wouldn’t be so bad.

Letting out a shaky sigh, you followed the trail valiantly, staring at the ground in case someone with a chainsaw jumped out at you or something.

Suddenly footsteps approached and you looked ahead at two of the park’s actors (a scarecrow and an unsettlingly large undead lumberjack) coming back into the maze for scares. You lunged into the tall corn to avoid them because you knew they’d inevitably try to spook you.

You knew that if you walked into the corn far enough you’d come out into the clearing leading towards the busy, amusement part of the park where you could sulk and eat a caramel apple.

The promise of it made you calm down. You were still pissed at Kai, though, and there would definitely be some major silent treatment in his future.

“Boo.” Suddenly, Kai was in front of you and you let out a scream, falling back on your booty and crawling backwards to get away from what you thought was a threat to your life for five seconds.

Kai was giggling watching you as your face changed into an angry frown and tears started glistening in your eyes. You shoved your way past him and started walking through the corn.

“Aw, c’mon, baby.” He snapped back in front of you and you ended up in his chest, trying to pull away from his forced hug.

“You’re the worst.” You huffed, gently pushing at his chest. He smiled, knowing you couldn’t stay mad at him for long.

“I’m sorry I scared your little pants off.” Kai teased you, running his hands down to grab a handful of your butt.

“You wish.” You successfully pulled away from him, determined to get to a food stand in the next five minutes. “You’re never getting underneath these pants ever again.” You sighed.

“It was just a joooke.” Kai whined, snapping back in front of you again. “Don’t tell me you wouldn’t let me inside those pants again just because of a little joke.” He cupped you’re annoyed face.

“You suck.” You let him kiss you softly, pressing his perfect, juicy lips against yours. Kai hummed, indulging himself in the feeling of your lips kissing him back.

This was his bliss, listening to your heart beat, feeling your blood get warm the further his slow tongue tunneled into your mouth.

Finally, he pulled away, smiling all fuzzy and in love down at you.

“Should we smash right now?” Kai suggested, which made you look down at the boner he was trying to push down and adjust with the palm of his hand. You smacked his arm and smiled.

“All this talk about pants was turning you on, huh?” You teased him. Kai let out a chuckle that was cut short into a gasp as you took his dick into your hands through his jeans.

“So you do like the idea of makin’ sweet love right in the corn field, cowgirl?” Kai has that dark, soft tone in his voice as he took hold of your hips, pulling you up against him.

“No...” You mumbled as he pressed soft kisses into your cheek and down your throat. Kai’s slender fingers pushed up from the nape of your neck to brush your hair away.

“Why not?” Kai whined a little bit, crouching down to pull your shirt down and let your tits out. He moaned, taking your nipple in his mouth and giving the same affectionate care to the other.

“Because...” You ran your fingers through his hair. “You’re a monster.” You almost gasped, feeling his kisses press into the sweet spots of your tummy and down towards the band of your leggings.

Kai liked when you told him he was a monster. It was almost like the weird version of saying he was an angel. It didn’t make sense but hearing you say it made it feel so endearing and beautiful. Mostly because he felt he was a monster and it didn’t seem like such a bad thing after you said it.

“There’s nothing to be afraid about, baby. Only this big ol’ dick destroying your insides.”

You looked down at him, unamused. “Really?” You giggled a little, helping him pull your leggings down. He let out an excited squeal and stood up, letting his perfect dick spring free.

“Oh, wow.” Kai cleared his throat from behind you. “Tell me if I hurt you this time.” He kissed the back of your head, taking a whiff of your strawberry shampoo while he was at it.

Feeling his big dick push inside of you almost made you scream in surprise. He was only halfway in still and he could feel you tense up, so he caressed you softly in his arms, waiting until the hairs on the back of your neck relaxed so he could slowly push again.

This kind of pain was delectable. You could feel every vein and ripple on his dick throb inside you as he slowly fucked you, rocking back in forth. His torso met your ass again and again until he couldn’t take looking down and seeing it anymore.

“I’m gonna come!” He gasped in your ear, messily thrusting inside of you until he pulled out and sighed, coming on your booty and accidentally on an ear of corn that was on the ground.

“You’re so gross.” You turned around to glare at him. He had taken his hoodie off to clean you up. “You owe me a caramel apple.”

[chernobog13]

Having properly chastised Pigsy for being fooled by an illusionary mansion in the middle of nowhere, our heroes continue their trek westward.

The group consists of:

Monkey King, aka Sun Wukong (Chou Lung-cheung).  Journey to the West is ostensibly Tang Monk’s story, but Monkey King is the most popular character.  The first seven chapters of the story tell of Monkey King’s origins, how he gained his great power, and what he did to warrant punishment by Buddha and begin the opportunity to redeem himself by serving Tang Monk.  He possesses a multitude of magical powers, and uses the magical staff Ruyijingu Bang as his primary weapon.

The Cave of Silken Web is actor Chou Lung-cheung’s first outing as Monkey King.  The role was played by actor Yueh Ha in the first two films of the series, The Monkey Goes West and Princess Iron Fan (both released in 1966).  Chou would play Monkey King again in 1968′s The Land of Many Perfumes, the last of this series from Shaw Brothers.

Tang Monk, aka Tang Sanzang or Tripitaka (Ho Fan).  He is the fictionalized version of a real monk, Xunazang, who lived in the 7th century and travelled to central Asia and the Indian sub-continent to obtain Buddhist scriptures to bring back to China.  While a very learned and holy man, he is utterly defenseless against the many demons and monsters that want to devour his flesh to become immortal.  In addition, many female demons and monsters find him very attractive and want to marry him.  Then eat him.  That’s why Monkey King and the others are tasked to assist and protect him during the long, perilous journey.

Actor Ho Fan played Tang Monk in all four films in the series.  Shortly after he left acting to become a successful film director.  Several of his films were classified as Category lll (the equivalent to films rated “X” in the US, or at least a very hard “R”) in Hong Kong.

Pigsy, aka Zhu Bajie (Pang Pang).  Tang Monk’s second disciple, the second most powerful of the group, and arguably the second most popular character from Journey to the West.  Pigsy is the comedy relief.  He is lazy, gluttonous, greedy, and constantly lusting after women.  These traits tend to lead him into trouble, which his companions usually end up getting caught up in as well.  He also ends up bickering with Monkey King a lot.  Pigsy has magical powers, although not as many or as powerful as Monkey King.  Pigsy’s weapon of choice is the nine-tooth iron rake.

Comedian Pang Pang played Pigsy in all four films.  One look at him demonstrates why he was cast in the role, and why he needs minimal make-up appliances to sell his performance.

Sandy, aka Sha Wujing or Friar Sand (Tien Shun).  Sandy was a river monster who attacked Tang Monk’s party as they tried to cross his river.  Monkey King and Pigsy battled Sandy and finally subdued him, at which point he joined the party as Tang Monk’s third disciple.  Sandy is not as powerful as the other disciples, and he is not as colorful a character.  He is polite, obedient, takes good care of Tang Monk, and acts as the peacekeeper when Monkey King and Pigsy start arguing.  Sandy is also the disciple that Tang Monk depends on to help him make difficult decisions.  He is the least developed character of the group (outside of the dragon prince, Yulong, who transforms into the horse that Tang Monk rides), probably because the author enjoyed writing about Monkey King’s and Pigsy’s antics.  Sandy’s weapon is a magical wooden staff, although in most appearances it is depicted as the martial arts weapon known as a monk’s spade.

Actor/director Tien Shun starred as Sandy in all four films.  Just like in the book, Sandy doesn’t get as much screen time as Monkey King or Pigsy, but he is shown to be loyal, dependable, and fiercely protective of Tang Monk.