#like this is a leap in logic a bit lol but it would be CRAZY if a reason juto and kuukou were on a team in mixed up

[akkivee]

actually lol it’d be really cute in that kuukou brand way of his if the reason he wants to beat up his dad all the time is bc not only does he want to best him but also bc he’s ‘training’ his father lol he’s trying to keep him healthy and alive as long as possible

[schro4444]

About the Kaito keeping his secret ID through Refuge In Audacity do you think Conan stuck with his first guess that KID was younger than 20 or later dismissed it as KID wearing a mask? (Ik this isn't relevant to the kuroba sitcom but I had Ditto in the brain haha)

I personally hc that he logicked it away as "he can't be THAT young, learning all those skills he has would take time" and then Kaito TOLD HIM his mom was Phantom Lady who did crazy gymnastics so she couldn't have been very old and dissappeared a scant 20 years ago and Conan went "welp"

Ik that Hakuba figured KID's age through DNA and then compared to highschool databases across the country, but first that's not how DNA tests work, the length that tells how old someone is changes from person to person, and second, I'm not familiar w Japanese laws regarding privacy and DNA databases but I'm fairly sure that what Hakuba did was like. Super illegal. Probably why Hakuba hauled ass back to London after that case actually, I bet he only got away with it bc nepotism (IT'S SURE ILLEGAL IN THE UK)

I still rlly want to know if Hakuba sat KID down w an optometrist board and an IQ test though, HOW did he get that data. Like I bet Toichi and Chikage never even got Kaito tested bc they thought it funnier to keep people guessing just HOW smart he was, plus Kaito wanted to share class with Aoko and Nakamori wanted her to be in a class where she could make friends her age, and that was the end of the topic

(oh man this ended up long, MY BAD)

first of all, omg im honored, tysm for reading ditto :D <3

GREAT QUESTION I think conan kept it in mind, but became less sure of himself over time. conan/shinichi has a pretty skewed idea of what kids are capable of doing, and I think he knows this about himself, so it’s reasonable for him to think “...nah, it would be insane if a high schooler was doing all this… right?” and if he was basing his original age guess off of what he could see of kid’s face and body shape, well, he learned very quickly that kid can change any of those traits at any time. who’s to say that kid wasn’t wearing makeup/a mask/anything else that might change his silhouette? …left to his own devices for long enough, conan can become a victim of his own overthinking, lol.

aaaand then kaito dropped the Phantom Lady tidbit. that, if anything, seemed to me like a peace offering of some kind? possibly meant to even the playing field between them? as always, it’s hard to tell what shinichi and kaito actually Know in canon, though I’m of course personally a fan of them knowing the least amount of information possible while still being as intelligent as we know they are. because shenanigans >:D

if we want to have fun with it ;) , I think the phantom lady reveal only narrows down kid’s age to,,,,, younger than 30? ish? it mostly gives conan an upper limit, since he doesn’t know whether kid was born before or after her retirement, and she easily could’ve retired in her early 30s. what it Does confirm is that this kid isn’t the original one, but that only narrows his identity down to “probably a protege of kid #1.” from there, the biggest bit of provable evidence against kaito is that his father died right when the original kid disappeared, but that’s still a pretty big logic leap to make when you aren’t around kaito all the time (like hakuba is). and toichi had students, too! who knows who else he taught besides yukiko and sharon? who is more likely to be kaitou kid: an undercover protege of toichi’s, or his teenage son who has an alibi for multiple heists?

best I can tell from some brief research, in Japan, DNA collection isn’t regulated for law enforcement, but hakuba isn’t law enforcement, he’s a consultant at best. I think other DNA tests for ppl age 16+ require consent of the person, and 16 or younger require the consent of a parent. hakuba has NEITHER. hakuba was saved from being a juvenile criminal by nepotism and the fact that nakamori laughed in his face instead of charging him with obstruction of justice or something. and yeah, that’s Absolutely Not How DNA Tests Work adjfksjdj

FR THO!! now I’m imagining hakuba chasing kid through a museum yelling “WHAT NUMBER LOGICALLY FOLLOWS THE SERIES ACCORDING TO THE GIVEN PATTERN” while kid answers with, like, extremely confused perfect accuracy. “400 iq” honestly sounds more like something hakuba made up to explain the fact that kid could answer the iq test questions while rappelling down a skyscraper lol. and I totally agree, kaito’s probably never been officially tested—it’s important for kids to be with their peers, especially when you’re already likely to have child prodigy syndrome. also because kaito and aoko get along so well, they would run the risk of never making other friends (cough shinichi cough). plus, the kurobas probably like to avoid official records as much as possible, and scoring even in the 160+ range would gather attention that their family of internationally-wanted criminals does Not need

[burnmywholelifedown]

[This is dracereads] you went from boyfriend material to for real. You are a brave soul that is a heck of a leap content wise!

Lol yeah that was a wild jump. I was put off by the summary (particularly the age gap part because that does not typically work for me) but Boyfriend Material was so carefully thought out that I trusted Alexis Hall to pull through for me and made the leap despite my apprehension.

I am so glad I did too because after I finished For Real I felt like I had read Boyfriend Material again. That might sound crazy but I actually think those books are quite similar. They are both about a prickly MCs that hurt the love interest a lot but the love interest continues to come back despite that prickliness. They also both have the trajectory of "wow MC has issues and needs to deal with them" to "oh boy MC is a bit more functional interpersonally but now love interest has some issues they need to deal with" which made both books super effective reads because the plot kept moving. Surprisingly when I made what most would consider the logical leap from For Real to the Arden-verse I was let down because we didn't get to see Caspian's emotions as much (as opposed to Boyfriend Material and For Real where we got to see how emotionally affected/invested both characters were and as a result I had a plethora of emotions as well). So yeah I'm so happy I did because now I have a new favorite author 😊

Also - can we talk about the Austen and Shakespeare references in For Real? Cause the almost English major in me was filled with joy whenever a reference appeared.

[jeannereames]

Writing Historical Fiction (Well)

From an anonymous ask:

"What advice would you give to someone who wants to write about Alexander?" Sorry I didn't clarify, I was thinking of writing a fictional novel (but do not plan to publish it, lol)

If you’re just writing for yourself with no plans to publish, you don’t have to worry about constraints like wordcount and publishability. Unfortunately, it’s difficult to sell mainstream historicals. Selling a genre historical is easier (historical fantasy, historical mystery, historical romance). But there’s a reason it took me 30 years to get Dancing with the Lion into print. Yes, some of that time I was actually writing it, but much more was devoted to finding a market for it, and notice that I did, finally, have to sell it as genre even though it isn’t really. (It was that or shelve it forever.)

Yet if you’re asking for my recommendations, I assume you want to write something that’s marginally readable. Ergo, what follows is general advice I’d give anybody writing historical fiction.

For historicals, one must keep track of two things simultaneously: telling a good story, and portraying history accurately enough. It’s possible to do one well, but the other quite badly.

First, let’s look at how to write a good story.

There are two very basic sorts of stories: the romance, and the novel. Notice it’s romance small /r/. A romance is an adventure story; in romances, the plot dominates and characters serve the plot. A novel is character-driven, so plot events serve character development. Dancing with the Lion is a novel.

Once you’ve decided which of those you’re writing, you have a better handle on how to write it. You also need to know where you’re going: what’s the end of the story? What are the major plot points? Writers who dive in with no road map tend to produce bloated books that require massive edits. That said, romances will almost always be faster paced, in part because “what’s happening” drives it. Whereas in novels, the impact of events on characters drives it. Exclusive readers of romances are rarely pleased by the pacing of novels. They’re too slow: “Nothing is happening!” Things are happening, but internally, not externally.

Yet pacing does matter. Never let a scene do one thing when it can do three.

You will want to pay attention to something called “scene and sequel.” A “scene” is an event and a “sequel” are the consequences. So let’s say (as in my current MIP [monster in progress]) you open with a fugitive from the city jail racing through the streets with guards following: he leaps the wall of a rich man’s house and ends up in the bedroom of a visiting prince. That’s the scene. The sequel is the fall-out. (House searched, prince hides fugitive, prince gets fugitive to tell him why he’s running.) Usually near the end of the sequel(s) to the first scene, you embed the hook to the next (a slave of the rich man has been found murdered outside the city walls). The next scene concerns recovering the body and what they discover (then fall-out from that). Etc., etc., etc.

That’s how stories progress. Or don’t progress, if the author can’t master scene-sequel patterns.

It also means—again—you need to know where you’re going. Outlines Are Your Friends. But yes, your plot can still take a sharp left-hand turn that surprises you…they almost always do.

When I sat down to write Dancing with the Lion, I knew three things:

1)     I wanted to write about Alexander before he became king.

2)     I wanted to explore his relationship with Hephaistion.

3)     I especially wanted to consider how both became the men they’d did.

With those goals in mind, I could frame the story. Because I always intended Hephaistion to be as important as Alexander, the novel opens in his point-of-view to establish that. And because I didn’t want to deal with Alexander as king, the novel had to end before he became one. History itself gives a HUGE and obvious gift in the abrupt murder of Philip. Where to open was harder to decide, but as I wanted to explore the boys’ friendship and its impact on their maturation into men, I should logically begin with their meeting, and decided not to have them meet too young. From there, I spun out Hephaistion’s background, and his decision to run away from home to join the circus, er, I mean Pages. 😉

IMO, Alexander’s story is Too Big to do in a single novel, or you get an 800+ page monstrosity like Chris Cameron’s God of War. The author must decide on what piece of the story she wants to tell. (Or, like me, view it as a series.)

So that’s (in a nutshell) how you construct a story.

As for the historical side, there are three levels here:

1)     What the world looks like (details).

2)     The events that take place.

3)     How people living in that world understand life, the universe, and everything.

Number two is probably the easiest. Numbers one and three require deeper research on all sorts of things. Sometimes historical novels spend all their time on number one and completely forget number three exists.

The past is a foreign country. Just as you wouldn’t (or at least shouldn’t) write a novel set in Japan (if you’re American) without learning something not only about the physical country but also the customs…same with stories set in the past.

This is why the Oliver Stone movie failed. He put modern people in a costume drama. He didn’t understand how ancient Macedonians (or Greeks or Persians) thought. So he committed crazy anachronisms like the oedipal complex between Alexander and Olympias. Freud may have named his theory after a Greek hero, but it’s largely a foreign idea to the Greek mind. (Whether it’s valid at all is a topic for another day).

The author has to let ancient people be properly ancient.

Problem: what do you do when they’re SO foreign they’re impossible to understand for modern readers—or their attitudes are outright offensive?

Well, if you don’t plan to get your story published, you don’t have to worry about that. Or not as much. But if you want to share it with others, you might still want to consider it.

There are two basic approaches:

1)     Introduce your world through a “stranger” who enters it.

2)     Spread out more “modern” views among various characters in the story, to give modern readers something familiar to hang onto.

The first of those is by far the most common. So in Diana Gabaldon’s Outlander, Claire Randall—quite literally a modern woman—introduces the modern reader to Jacobite Scotland. As she learns about her new world, so does the reader, and in Claire, the reader has a voice to express both their fascination and their horror of that world. In Judith Tarr’s Lord of the Two Lands, she uses Meriamon, an Egyptian priestess, to enter the Macedonian world of Alexander. Judy can then contrast Egyptian and Macedonian cultural values in order to explain them. Meriamon asks questions the reader wants answers to—or Niko (or Alexander) ask questions of her about Egypt.

The second choice (which is what I did in Dancing) is to identify cultural mores likely to offend modern readers: indifference to slavery, glorification of war and conquest, Greco-Macedonian attitudes towards women, and Greco-Macedonian attitudes towards sexuality. Then to assign one of the characters to voice a more modern view. Alexander gets to be a proto-feminist, and I gave points of view to two women. One of those women, I made a slave. Hephaistion gets to express a more modern view regarding the horrors of war. Sexuality was a bit tougher, but I used the boys’ atypical relationship—that the younger is the one of higher status—to illustrate Greco-Macedonian assumptions about what a male-male relationship should look like.

That approach presents more hurdles, but for my purposes, I preferred it.

I harp on this because it’s the biggest problem for historical fiction: not having historical characters! It wrecks what might otherwise be decent research into the details. No matter how much you look up what they ate, how they dressed, the way their houses were laid out…if you have them behaving anachronistically, it’s a bad historical. Or if you have circumstances that just wouldn’t occur.

Let me give an example. I’ve said before that, when I started writing the novel in December of 1988, Dancing always began with a run-away boy (Hephaistion). But in my initial version, he showed up in Pella incognito. The more I read about Macedonia, however, the more I realized that was virtually impossible. There just weren’t that many Hetairoi. He’d have been recognized, and probably sooner rather than later. So I went back to the drawing board and, instead of having him try to hide, he comes right out and says who he is, and that he wants to join the Pages. It might take away the “mystery,” but set up more interesting dynamics: would Philip let him stay? What would his father do? Etc.

That requires the author know enough about the culture to know what’s possible, probable, and impossible. It also requires the author to be willing to change original plans in order to reflect reality, not insist on doing ___ anyway.

A good example of jettisoning history in favor of “what I want to do!” can be found in David Gemmell’s Lion of Macedon. So many, many things wrong with that book, starting with his choice to make Parmenion a Spartan for no historical reason whatsoever—but (I assume?) because Spartans Are Sexy. Parmenion likely belonged to the royal house of Upper Macedonian Pelagonia. Although even if he didn’t, absolutely nothing suggests he wasn’t Macedonian, and quite a lot says he was. The whole duology (with included The Dark Prince) was essentially Blue Boltz ™ Epic Fantasy Does Greece. The fact he actually included a bibliography in back, and got weird, isolated details right only added insult to injury.

Yet Gemmell was a best-selling British fantasy novelist who knew pacing and how to spin a good yarn. For a reader with zero knowledge of Alexander, it would stack up as a predictable but tolerable fantasy set.

Remember that as an historical fiction author, your job is to practice the art of getting it right. If that isn’t important to you, please God, write something completely made up.

At the spectrum’s other end is Showing Notecards on Every Page. You’ve done ALL that hard research, and you’ll be damn sure the reader knows it!

Um, the reader doesn’t care. The reader wants to be transported to another world. How locals in that world shoed horses (or if they shoed horses at all) is irrelevant. It matters only if your main character’s a farrier. And even then, it matters only if said-farrier is having a conversation with someone else while shoeing a horse.

If people want all the little details of history, they’ll read a history book.

Now, how much detail is “too much” can vary from reader to reader, and often has something to do with the genre.

Regular readers of historical fiction are fans because they enjoy history. So they’ll expect proper world-building. But they don’t want the Dreaded Information Dump. Weave in details. The Dreaded Information Dump is a common beginning-author error across the board, but especially bad in certain genres, such as historicals, fantasy, and SF.

What’s an “information dump”? It’s where the author provides details the reader doesn’t need at that point in the story. What the character looks like, is wearing, their family background, what they had for breakfast….

As mentioned, details should be woven into the story organically. What your character had for breakfast matters only if, later, it’s giving him/her gas: “Damn those beans in my breakfast burrito!” Some details may be useful to set a scene and prevent characters from walking around, having conversations in a void, but again, a light touch.

Similarly, One scene, One head. We do NOT need to see everything from each character’s point of view. No, really. We don’t. And dear God, please don’t “head-hop” inside of scenes (unless you’re writing omniscient, but be sure you know what omniscient IS). Drives me BUGGY.

Anyway, back to the Notecard Showing Problem. As noted above, genre expectations and reader preferences often dictate what IS “too much detail.” Generally, historical Romance (the genre) and historical mysteries go lighter on detail than historical fantasy or plain historicals. That’s because the former two have genre conventions that work against it. Romances preference the love story front-and-center at all times, and mysteries have a mystery to unravel. E.g, they’re plot driven. By contrast, historical fantasies tolerate more world building because world building itself is a feature of fantasy (and science fiction too). And the appeal of mainstream or literary historicals IS the world building, so you get massive novels like Ken Follet’s Pillars of the Earth.

I’m blathering now, but hopefully this gives pointers not just about writing Alexander, but writing fiction period, and historical fiction in particular.

[olivieblake]

Sorry I haven't detailed my Friendship breakup ask earlier, managing life is taking too much time these days!

It's a bit hard to summarise but I have been soulmate-type friends with this girl, K, for three and a half years and really good friend with this guy, R, for two and a half. We all work together and our triangle friendship worked well. K and R fooled around a few times after parties, K developed feelings, R didn't and thought it was a friends with benefits thing while K hoped it would become more but it never did. Big problem was the lack of communication between them, both thought the other knew what they wanted but we know that things don't work this way.

I've been there for all of it, particularly for K who had been hurt by the lack of emotional intelligence R indeed displayed along the way. But I also felt, and I think R knew it herself, that she had been getting her hopes up almost all along and was setting herself for heartbreak, but life needs to be lived and sometimes we make mistakes just so that we can learn from them and K and I talked a lot about that, as I was myself getting entangled with another colleague.

Fast forward to last November, where, after months of horrible things piling up 2020 style, R and I spent an evening together watching movies, eating pizzas, drinking English cider and talking about how fucking sad we all were and fuck 2020 and family members dying of cancer way too fast, both in his and my family, and work being hell because the government is doing shit for making schools safe and everything going wrong all the time. At some point during the night there was a moment when I felt that R was offering more than just sleeping together in the same bed and I had a moment of hesitation but decided to not give in to it and to the the confort it might bring us both, mainly because I was sure it would hurt K if she ever heard about it. So we just slept, read books in the morning while drinking tea and there was no awkwardness because we both knew that it came from the fact that we trust each other enough to ask for comfort and even if it would have been a possibly stupid way to get it, it might have made us feel better in the moment. (even though we both think we'd have burst into tears 30 seconds in and not done it in the end)

I wondered whether I should tell K or not and decided to do it because nothing had happened, really, and if I didn't tell her when we told each other most things, that's when it'd have become suspicious and dishonest. So I told her that there had been a weird moment between R and I, that nothing had happened in the end, not in the best way in retrospect because it felt too casual to her, confirmed that had it happened it would have been weird for her and thought that was that since the next few days went fine. But at the end of that week she sent me an audio, saying that if I had feelings for R, I had a lot of time to tell her, that she needed people she could trust and who respected her in her life and that we weren't friends anymore. And that was it. Since then, she has refused to have a conversation to clear things up and has avoided me several weeks but has kept talking to R as usual.

I should have told her in a different way and I understand why she felt hurt imagining that R and I had spent a night of passion together but I told her, and then explained more clearly, that nothing had actually happened, that I wasn't into R and he wasn't into me, we were just both very sad and a bit too drunk.

The thing is, he's not hers, they haven't been in a relationship, he's not her ex either. Even if we had slept together, it wouldn't have had anything to do with her; people don't belong to people. But what's really hard is that we've been really good friends for several years and she was so quick to assume I would be cruel to her on purpose and that her feelings didn't matter to me when we've been there for each other a lot. And that putting an end to our friendship via WhatsApp was apparently so easy to do. (I don't really think it was, but it sure feels like it.)

And I've been asking other friends' opinions to see how in the wrong I was really, since maybe I couldn't see the situation clearly enough from my position, and the general consensus is that since I didn't do anything with him and was honest with her right after the nothing happened, she's being a bit extreme when the only actual thing she could reasonably resent me for is the way I told her. We're adults, we should be able to at least talk about it but I've offered several times and she says she doesn't need to or want to. But we're in the same friend group, we're supposed to spend time all together at some point and us not talking has an effect on the whole group dynamics, not just on us, and my awful need to make sure everything is balanced for everyone is going crazy.

It's been a long few months and my already sad and stressed out brain is having a hard time dealing with it and I hate that we're in this situation for something as futile as boy problems. I think there are issues of jealousy and self-confidence that stem from something else and that she's projecting it all onto this but it still sucks a lot, especially since she's refusing to talk about anything, even if we're at least back to saying hello and she has stopped fleeing every room I am in.

Anyways, friendship breakups suck, they can be as stupid as romantic breakups, and 2021 has better be nicer too everyone than 2020! Sorry for the novel-lenghth ask/story, my life is a succession of ridiculous plot points.

I hope you and Baby and Mr. Blake are doing well in these weird, weird times and I've started your book and I have loved your last video, especially the part on jealousy/possesiveness which was really well-put, as usual! Oh and thank you so, so much for your book recs on my last ask, I've added them to my To read-list <3

Okay, Love you, bye!

I feel like my last ask was a little bit too detailed to give a general answer/launch a large topic so I'm guessing it's mainly about how to deal with a lack of closure when people end things without the possibility to talk and get/give explanations. And I guess it goes for romantic relationships as well as friendships.

Love your big sistering, love you !

WELL I actually did not get this ask until a few hours after I had filmed this week’s video so not to worry lol I wasn’t able to address this specifically. but I think that’s the thing about the generality of grief over losing a friend—we don’t necessarily have to know the specifics of your story to understand it’s something we probably all relate to. and in this case I most certainly relate! I think this is one of those things where your friend had some personal things to work on and it put you in a difficult position, wherein you made the most logical choice. that’s the problem: you are looking logically at what is for her an emotionally fraught situation about her self-worth and your loyalty, which is why the math on your end isn’t adding up. (for the record I am much more likely to be in your position than hers; she sounds like a water sign but WHO’S TO SAy)

anyway, I don’t think you’re in this position over boy problems. a boy appears to be the subject yes but in fact he is the object; the subject is your friend’s feelings about herself and your—forgive me, but your compulsion to force her to get over it. I may not be completely right about that, but it does appear to me that you could have said nothing about the “nothing” that happened but chose not to because, ultimately, part of you wanted her to know. I don’t think this is sinister of you; I have a lot of friends who really need to just get over it as a general rule and sometimes it does feel like shocking them into it with new information might do the trick. but I think most likely she feels or intuits that in some way, and I suspect the root of her anger isn’t really about him but the “betrayal” she feels from you: that in that moment, you weren’t thinking about her* despite the fact that you would probably have known she would hurt if you had been (I’m sure you did know this to be true, and in my opinion are rationalizing your part in it; which is fine because you’re the main character in your life and not hers, but it is what it is) and of course she’s thinking about her, so what seems like a lot of pain on her end that she has no healthy method of dealing with is straining your relationship. I hope she can bring herself to deal with it, but she has a lot of work to do on herself before she can reach the pinnacle of what’s really bothering her. until then, it’s easier to blame you.

* edited to add: I know you said that you decided not to move forward sexually because of her, but I think what actually hurts her is not the possibility of sex, but the intimacy you had with him in that moment, which even you know is something she craved; perhaps delusionally. you don’t have to acknowledge whether this is a reasonable thing to be upset by, but I think the entirety of the situation is probably hitting her much differently than it hits you.

anyway my answer was not about this situation specifically but about why friendship breakups hurt so much, and I don’t think knowing the situation changes my answer. I hope it does help, because I think there is some part of this that is always true: one person needs to do something on their own before the friendship can be repaired, and it may not have been a problem at all if not for an issue of very specific timing. but trust me, whether this specific thing had happened or not this would still be true about the two of you, and about the ways your personal dogmas differ, and perhaps it’s better to see if she can take this leap now. maybe she will grow from it; maybe she won’t. either way, this is the part-grief, part-guilt formula I’m talking about, where sometimes you have to admit the breaking point happened, whether it could have gone differently or not, and now it’s out of your control

but I hope it helps to talk about!

[makeste]

Hi, long time follower, first time asker! When you say that Shigaraki will be 'redeemed', what exactly does that mean? While I do believe that he might have a change of heart, I don't think he will or even deserves to leave freely after what he's done. Having a sad backstory doesn't make his crimes stop being crimes. The same goes for all of the LoVs. I love them but they can't get away with what they do.

hey there! well, when I say “redeemed”, I basically mean exactly what you said – him having a change of heart. realizing that he doesn’t have to follow a path of destruction. that maybe it’s too late for him to become the hero he once wanted to be, but that doesn’t mean he has to continue being the monster, either.

with Tomura, I don’t expect him to just do a 180 and become a total nice guy and start helping people out, although god that would be great. it wouldn’t kill you to be nice, Tomura. really! he’s not inherently bad, he just has no idea how not to be completely fucked up. that has just never been an option for him before. but it doesn’t mean he can’t learn. he’s already come leaps and bounds from where he was at the start of the series. just look at how he gets along with the other members of the League now. he trusts them. they have this whole mutual support thing going on. contrast that with the Shigaraki Tomura from chapter 68 who pretty much tried to kill Dabi and Toga on sight just cuz. it’s crazy how much he’s already grown as a character. I see no reason why he can’t continue to do so.

and as far as his crimes go, yeah, that is true. he’s killed people. other bad guys, mostly, but also some police officers in chapter 160 at the very least. and probably some other people I’m forgetting too. and he can’t just undo that. none of them can undo what they’ve done. and they’ll probably do other things too.

but, as far as redemption goes, it’s not a process of undoing so much as it is a process of changing. what’s done is done. what’s more, unlike with some of the other characters, I have a hard time picturing Tomura actually ever feeling a lot of remorse for most of his past crimes. and that does make it difficult if not impossible for him to do a Full Redemption Thing, because it’s very tricky to do if the person doesn’t even want to try and atone. a lot of redemption is about personal choice and taking responsibility and such and such. I’ve written a few essays about this before in regards to Bakugou and Endeavor. and I can’t picture Tomura ever getting the same type of redemption those two are striving toward, because for me at least I just can’t picture him really caring about it to that extent.

but what he can do is make the shift from chaotic evil to chaotic neutral. and maybe even, eventually, to just plain old neutral. why not? it’s a story. for that matter, I honestly can’t say I agree with “they can’t get away with what they did”, either. because I kind of want them to. I admit it. I’m not cool with the whole destroy-the-world thing, or the probably-going-to-murder-All-Might bit, or Dabi demanding the heads of pro heroes like he’s ordering from fucking Uber Eats, etc. but I am cool with them just being a bunch of bad dudes who ride off into the sunset together. I’m sure it won’t actually be that simple, anyway. these guys all have a lot of pain ahead of them still. and while being run through the gauntlet doesn’t automatically earn one redemption any more than having a sad backstory does, going through lots of painful stuff in a shounen manga does have a tendency to, more often than not, build one’s character more effectively than just about any other method. the same logic doesn’t always apply to real life, sadly (I wish), but in a manga more often than not it does the trick well enough.

and as for whether or not he “deserves” it, I’ll be fully honest here and say that I don’t really care whether or not that’s the case. well, firstly, I think Gandalf said this best, when he was talking to Frodo while they were holed up in the Mines of Moria: “many that live deserve death, and some that die deserve life. can you give it to them? then do not be too quick to deal out death in judgement. for even the very wise cannot see all ends.” this is a very poetic and diplomatic way of saying that even people who’ve done bad things may still have good things they can do as well, and that ultimately no one can change the past. but the future, now that we can change. so yeah. there’s that.

but also. if I’m really being honest. I frankly think that what Tomura deserves is to give AFO a taste of that Decay quirk magic, and then get another dog, and try and find some of the peace that he’s never, ever had before in his life. it’s admittedly easier for me to be all carelessly forgiving like that because Tomura isn’t a real person, and the people he’s killed aren’t actually real people. so yeah, maybe I’m letting him slide when I shouldn’t. letting him get away with simply saying a few hail Marys and having that be the end of it. because I love him now. because Horikoshi fucking played me like a fiddle. so yeah. maybe that is what I mean by “redeemed” too. and if that’s the case, it is what it is. it’s weird, but sometimes the options that are more morally grey are oddly enough the ones that sit better with your conscience, though.

anyways, so yeah. I guess this is all just a very long-winded way of saying that yeah maybe he’s a fucked up guy but I still want to pat his head (carefully) and give him cookies, and I don’t feel any guilt over that because at the end of the day it’s fiction and it doesn’t mean I’m gonna go start a murderer’s rights club irl or anything lol. anyways. those are my feelings on it.

[atopearth]

Steins;Gate 0 Part 4 - Kurisu Ending and Leskinen Ending

Kurisu Ending Although I’m not sure why there’s a Kurisu ending, I do appreciate seeing all the lab members gathered together, and then changing time lines to the future! I’ve always been curious about more of Suzuha’s life “back then”, so it’s cool to see the devastation of the future, and how everyone was doing. I like how the VA for Luka really seemed to sound a bit more masculine but still retain some feminity, but I guess the saddening thing is we can only hear it in Luka’s dying moments. It was so sad to hear him say that he finally felt like a part of the group only after he used what he learnt from Okabe to protect Mayuri and Faris from the enemies. Luka was always a part of the group! It’s saddening that he never felt that way for the whole 25 years Okabe was asleep (since his mind was broken and Daru and them needed to find his memory data they stored for Amadeus to get Okabe back). It’s also saddening that the battle for Kurisu’s time travel paper and her memories is what caused all this, but I guess it’s also because of it that they met Maho and she could recreate the PhoneWave for Okabe to change things again. Okabe saving Kurisu by releasing [Kurisu] from Amadeus huh? It’s been too long, it’s about time Kurisu’s memories and everything stopped being fiddled with I guess. Kinda sad that we didn’t get to a bit of the 3000 time leaps he had to do to get back to 2011 though, I think it would have been nice to see a bit more detail in the changes of the world and his emotions but oh well😭 We know how he feels through Luka’s death and all the rotting and dystopian feel 2036 had, so I guess it’s fine haha.

I guess with so many time leaps and everything, it was hard for Okabe to bear and think of himself as human anymore especially with the digitised memories, but at least Maho has kinda taken over Kurisu’s role to help him out with his troubles in her own way haha. It was really nice to finally see Okabe understand through his first hand experience how devastating the future is, and how he has finally picked himself up to do what he needs to do. It was cute to see him tell Suzuha to punch him so he could finally force himself to take on everything again, and as expected, it’s pretty nostalgic to see Hououin Kyoma back lol! Lmao when he started calling Maho a loli hahahaha. I love Maho’s deadpan expression towards Okabe’s weird chuunibyou “ceremony” to get himself back together, I also loved how he said El Psy Kongroo in a funny way hahaha. It’s saddening to delete Kurisu’s memory data, but it’s for the best and really unneeded since what Kurisu is will always be within them, and considering Kurisu’s personality, she’d definitely want them to delete it so that her memories wouldn’t cause wars and have so many people die.

It was obvious that Kagari would get caught, but it’s saddening to know and see more of the extent of her brainwashing. As usual, Reyes likes to ramble on about her cliche for the good of the world military antics on making intelligent and specialised AI soldiers, but I think a nice thing to see was Okabe finally vehemently denying that he would want Kurisu’s memories inside Kagari, and finally understanding that even if she has Kurisu’s memories, she can’t become Kurisu. And… I’m not sure how I feel about Reyes downloading “emptiness” (since Daru deleted the files right when she downloaded it into her brain) into her brain when she tried to put Kurisu’s memories into herself instead of Kagari last minute, I found it to be a really silly decision from her perspective.. But I did like the uplifting and more “complete” ending this time around. It was definitely nice to see the past and see a glimpse of how everyone was like (even though they were pretty much the same lol), but I think what I enjoyed most was seeing Okabe’s change in attitude by experiencing all this and then making the decision for himself to save the world and head to the world of Steins;Gate in a different way from the original. So yeah, definitely my favourite ending haha.

Back to the beginning! Not surprised Okabe wants to stop being a tester, especially when he’s starting to just think of Amadeus as the real Kurisu. But it seems everything is moving quite fast, especially with Kurisu’s mother’s house being burnt down and these dodgy people pretending to be the police collecting info etc. Well…that guy that tried to kill Leskinen, Okabe and Maho was pretty hardcore.. But anyway, Suzuha catching a cold! That is definitely something rare and nice to see, mainly because it was really heartwarming to see Mayushii, Yuki and Daru pamper her and take care of her. She’s always on guard and stressed, I guess her body can finally take a break for now lol. I felt so sad for her when she said she felt bad that she wanted to live the life of a normal girl. Suzuha really is the toughest one that has too many burdens tbh… Props to Daru for being a good dad haha.

Lmao at Maho’s first experience at the maid cafe, Faris’ language is definitely Akiba exclusive with how she makes up stories on the fly hahaha. I really liked how Okabe apologised to Amadeus Kurisu, it was really cute and nice of him to so earnestly do that. Christmas party for everyone!!~ Too bad everything gets ruined again by the changing world lines! It seems that people are catching on to the Reading Steiner thing, and it’s becoming more prominent in others too! Kinda crappy that Fubuki and them are stuck in hospital because of this Reading Steiner “disease” though, but it’s kinda weird to think about everyone having it now lol. I feel so bad for Suzuha though, she carries the heaviest burden, the future is relying on her, Mayuri and them in the future all believed in her and want her to change it all. So, it’s not weird for her to get desperate after Okabe told her that Russia is most likely experimenting with the time machine now, and that’s why the world line changed and reverted back. It’s always nice to see Suzuha and Daru bond, especially when she ended up being able to sleep peacefully for once after talking to him.

Lmao at Maho’s face when she kept losing at the crane machine, reminds me of when I try hahaha. It was so sweet that she wanted the stuffed toy because she knew it was something Kurisu held dearly in America, so she wanted to get it to give to Kurisu’s mum (because it probably got burnt along with the house), Maho is really kind and cute. The fight for Kurisu’s laptop is still up and going I guess lol, I’m surprised that she willingly gave it to Okabe, but I guess it couldn’t be helped.

Leskinen ending Maho and Leskinen went back to America and half a year just passed like that?! Okay, lmao at Maho keeping the stuffed toy (for now apparently) and snuggling it to sleep hahaha, can’t blame Amadeus Kurisu for teasing her about Okabe all the time tbh loll. I’m surprised that Leskinen really does seem to be a part of this “conspiracy” thing with Reyes… Anyway, Mayuri in her school uniform really resembles the original game art and stuff, it’s so nostalgic seeing her like that. Honestly though, hearing Mayuri talk about the Rainet Kakeru movie makes me kinda miss the story of it from the original, it was pretty detailed, it could have been an anime itself haha, if only they continued the Kakeru story here too…

Well, that was weird. Anyway, Maho discovering Leskinen and Reyes collaborating was expected, her kinda being like “brainwashed” was expected too, but I have to say, out of all the times Okabe chooses to explain everything that happened to Maho, I personally thought the time in this ending was the least…realistic? Like, oh no, she’s crying and going ballistic over it, so I should tell her everything so that she won’t do the same thing as me, it just felt so…forced? Like, if you know they’re so unstable over it, you know they would do crazy stuff over it, I honestly thought it was a bigger reason to not tell her. But okay, for the plot, he tells her, she tells Leskinen and Okabe gets captured blah blah. Honestly, Leskinen’s thoughts and stuff for being a part of Stratfor etc was a chore to listen through, just like Reyes one in Maho’s route lol. On the other hand, Maho’s breakdown was uncomfortable but understandable considering the magnitude and consequences of what she had done. However, I do feel like Maho exploding on Mayuri and telling her everything about Okabe sacrificing Kurisu to save her was “logical”, but at the same time, it felt weird. I don’t know how to put it, but the whole interaction was just weird, maybe because, once again it was all a plot device to the ending so everything the characters did “makes sense” to an extent, but it just really doesn’t feel that much like “them”. Or maybe it’s just me not liking this game loll. 

Anyway, Kagari trying to kill Maho for hurting Mayuri was so refreshing tbh in this stagnant story haha. However, them skipping the whole “last fight” thing where Maho and Kagari go to save Okabe was very…interesting? It’s like they didn’t want to bother about that part even though you really have to question their capabilities etc especially when they need to save someone, but I guess even if we did get to see it, it would have been similar to the Maho ending but swapping Moeka with Kagari. Aaand then after they risk everything to save Okabe, he just thinks, well, after all this, he definitely can’t muster up any energy or fighting spirit within him to go against anything anymore and will just continue as is even though everyone is like gone and never to be seen again, including Mayuri. It’s like, this was a bad ending in both senses. Bad ending for the world, and bad ending for me because the writing, the flow of it and everything killed me because I literally took days to read it. But I guess a lot of this game is like that, it really likes to heap on unnecessary slice of life stuff that is nice, but totally neglects the plot points leading to the ending and just haphazardly slaps everything together in like a “finale”. It’s just so…boring tbh. Like, the things that happen are “understandable”, it’s just how the whole process went to getting there was just sometimes either so illogical or tedious that I just don’t “feel” it happening. Mayuri is like my favourite character and I have to admit, I hardly care about her anymore…

[joyofcrime-elinorhigh]

Watamote Review: (Oh, The Cringe)

"Beware that, when fighting cringe, you yourself do not become a cringe lord yourself.. for when you gaze long into the abyss. The abyss gazes also into you." - Friedrich Nietzsche: 1886 -(Probably) -(Don't Google it)

 Hello there, everybody. My name is JoyofCrimeArt, and the word "cringe" is definitely thrown around a lot these days, to the point where some say that the word is starting to lose all meaning. "Oh, you like some band or movie that I don't like? That's so cringe, lol." No, Damn it! I'm sick of all of it! I'm looking for true, unadulterated cringe, in it's purest form! The type of cringe that makes you unsure if you should laugh or cry. The type of cringe that makes you question if our species evolutionary process is going backwards or forwards. That is why I am on a quest to find this cringe, for the good of science! So today in my journey to find the most cringe thing ever created (other than myself, obviously) we will be diving head first into the deep end of the cringe pool, as we head to Japan once again to talk about the 2013 anime series Watamote. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PWOTQRduHeA

(Yes, I'm using the ending credit song here. I know people love the shows opening, and while I think that the song on it's own isn't that bad and the visuals are really nice, the heavy metal doesn't really match the show in my opinion. Couple with the clever lyrics here, I find this song a better representation of the show, and much catchier.)   Watamote (Aka: No Matter How I Look at It, It’s You Guys' Fault I’m Not Popular! Aka: No Matter How I Look at It, This Series Really Needs a Shorter Title.) is a twelve episode anime series based off of the manga by the same name written by two writers who both go by the pen name Nico Tanigawa. The series follows the misadventures of main protagonist Tomoko Kuroki, a very socially backwards teenage girl who's about to enter her first year of high school. Being unpopular in middle school, Tomoko decides that high school is going to be a fresh start for her, as she decides that she will not only become the most popular girl in school, but will also get a boyfriend as well. Things do not turn out that way and hijinks ensue. Seems like a fairly standard, if not somewhat bland premise, right? Well you might assume that at first, but what if I were to tell you that this show handles the subject in such a unique and creative way, that it was actually able to became one of my personal favorite animated series of the decade so far? Why is that, you ask? Well, let's dive in and find out.  Let's start by talking about our main character, Tomoko Kuroki. Tomoko is a first year high school student who dreams of becoming popular and getting a boyfriend. However, there are two big things that makes this hard for her. The first thing is that she is not a very friendly person. She's bitter, cynical, and even a bit demented at points. She has her soft moments, but in general she tends to assume the worst in almost anybody, and holds a lot of resentment for people who are more socially skilled than she is. The second thing is that Tomoko is HEAVILY implied to suffers from a surprisingly fairly realistic depiction of social anxiety disorder. At the start of the series Tomoko is completely unable to talk to anybody outside of her own family. These two facts, particularly the latter, are what makes Tomoko's goal of becoming the most popular girl in school such an enormous challenge, and Tomoko trying to break out of her shell serves as the main arc of the series. Social anxiety disorder is not a topic that I've seen covered very much in other forms of media, and I can't think of any other series that covers it in the way Watamote does. But I'll get to that a bit later.  There are some other side characters, but honestly there aren't that many. There's Tomoko's younger and stoic brother Tomoki, who has to put up with Tomoko's annoying antics. There's also Yu, Tomoko's only friend from middle school who now goes to a separate high school. While she too was unpopular in middle school, unlike Tomoko she actually was able to reinvent herself when she entered high school by dying her hair blond and hiding her love of anime. She acts as a good contrast to Tomoko as a reflection of what Tomoko wants to be. There's also one other character who comes in near the end of the series, but I can't really talk about her to much without getting into mild spoiler territory. All of these characters are good in there own right, but other then them the show is mostly about Tomoko. This is clever as by keeping the cast of side characters small, it helps drive the point home about how lonely she really is due to her social anxiety. Resulting in about eighty five to ninety percent of the shows "dialogue" to actually be Tomoko's internal dialogue, as she talks to herself about whatever situation she is in. I've never seen a show do something like this before and it's really an interesting thing to do. It ties the audience much more into Tomoko's struggle by truly making the series her story, and her's alone. However, this means that the entire series does rely on you liking Tomoko as a character. If you don't than there isn't much else to latch on to.    Episodes of the show are pretty formulaic. They almost always center around either Tomoko coming up with some kind of hare brain scheme to get more popular or involve her being forced to act in some kind of social situation. Often times the plots do not act as much of a "linear plot" as much as a series of short vignettes that center around a theme. Like episodes four, where the plot is that "it's raining" and we get several different segments of Tomoko doing stuff while it's raining. Or episode seven, where the whole plot is just Tomoko doing several things during her summer break. It's a pretty unique format that I haven't seen many other times before and makes the episodes feel less like a coherent stories and more like just moments of Tomoko's life. I really enjoy this way of storytelling, as it makes the stories seem a lot smaller. That might sound like a bad thing, but I think it helps ground the world and the characters, and makes it feel more relatable. It makes the stories feel like something that could actually happen in real life.  Now despite how depressing this show might sound from my description of it, it is still a comedy. It's just that it's a very dark comedy. Most of the jokes in the series coming from Tomoko's failure to understand the way that people are suppose to act socially, or the leaps in logic she makes when it comes to her schemes to become more popular. This often results in what is known as "cringe comedy" or as what I like to call it "Oh God, please stop." comedy. This is a style of humor that this show has perfected to a t. Every situation that Tomoko finds herself in is uncomfortable to watch, in the best of way. It's actually a great show to watch if you are socially awkward, cause then you can say, "Well hey, at least I'm not THAT bad." Unless of course you are that bad, in which case you really need to question your life decisions.

THIS IS THE STUFF WE'RE DEALING WITH, PEOPLE!  Tomoko's plans are always doomed from the start, to the point where failure is an inevitability. This actually provides an interesting viewing experience in a strange kind of way. Most of the time in good stories a character will think of a plan that is just crazy enough to work. You as the viewer will be unsure of whether or not the characters plan will work or not and that's how the series builds suspense. But Watamote's plot structure doesn't work like that. The plots of Watamote function less like conventional stories and more like a car driving into a brick wall. What I mean by this is that whenever Tomoko comes up with any kind of plan to become popular you know form the very beginning that it's going to fail. The schemes are so disconnected from any kind of reality that it's obvious to anyone who isn't Tomoko that the plan won't work. An example of this in the episode six where she tries to become more attractive by playing dating sims game, due to the fact that she believed that by being aroused by these games, her body would create more feminine hormones, and those hormones would make her more attractive. And that's not even her dumbest plan she has in this series! You know from the start that this plan makes absolutely no Goddamn sense, but then you have to sit there for the next six to ten minutes and watch it fail. You have to watch the metaphorical car crash unfold. The show definitely has a niche style of humor that won't be for everyone, but I personally can't get enough of it.  Now, while the show has gotten mixed to positive reviews from fans and critics, those who do dislike the show site a major problem with the series being how it deals with the topic of social anxiety. Many say that the show does not tackle the topic with much tack or grace, as the series is basically about laughing at how miserable Tomoko is because of her illness. Not to mention the fact that pretty much no adult in the series tries in anyway to actually help Tomoko through her problem. Not even her parents. Many argue that this show is taking the subject to lightly. Honestly though, I disagree with this analysis, and honestly I have no idea where they would get this idea from.

Oh, Tomoko! You're so CRAY CRAY! Ha Ha! You see, it's funny because social anxiety is hilarious!  Okay, in all seriousness, I can get that complaint. Heck, now that I think about it, I honestly don't think this story would have been able to air if it came out in America due to the way it handles the issue. So the question becomes "is this show offensive to people with social anxiety disorder"? Well, I don't think so. The show does play a lot of the social anxiety stuff for laughs, but it is also played for drama as well. Tomoko's whole character arc is about her learning to cope with her condition while also trying to conquer it. And while I don't have social anxiety disorder (Though I am EXTREMELY introverted, so take of that what you will.) I think that the story would be very inspiring for someone who does have it. Watamote is a lot like an TV-MA rated version of the comic strip Peanuts, (hear me out, here!) Like Charlie Brown Tomoko is a character that the world is just out to get. She tries her hardest, but from the very beginning we know that failure is inevitable. But Tomoko never stops trying. And when she does have even the smallest of victories it feels all the more satisfying. Because Tomoko does change over the course of the twelve episodes. The change is very gradual, but as the series goes on she does become more and more confident speaking around other people, and it feels like a real accomplishments, even though it's clear at the end of the series that she still has quite a way to go. Even her motivations change over the course of the series, going from "Wanting to be the most popular girl in school and having a boyfriend" to "Just wanting a boyfriend" to "Just wanting to have a friend." It shows the struggles that comes with anxiety, but it also shows that with hard work you can rise above it, even if it's only one step at a time. For a comedy driven show it actually has a lot of heart behind it. And it's this heart that I think keeps the show from being just a show that uses social anxiety as a punchline, into a series that really treats the issue with the respect it should be treated with, albeit in a comedic way.

 The show treads a careful line into dipping into "torture porn" territory (Which, for anyone who is not aware, is a term often used to describe a show that features one character suffering over and over again for no good reason. BTDubz, we also learn is one of Tomoko's kinks.) What I mean is that as an audience member you want to watch the main character succeed in there endeavors. However, Tomoko fails ninety nine percent of the time. The series could easily dip to far and end up becoming too depressing and mean spirited. But luckily there able to carefully avoid this my making almost of Tomoko's suffering is caused by internal forces, not external. No one actually bullies Tomoko for her condition, or anything. it just that most people don't know she exists. If Tomoko could actually just talk to someone instead of overthinking things she wouldn't have a problem making friends at all. This stops the series from coming across as overly mean spirited. Because it is Tomoko, or more specifically her condition, that makes her life hard. Not anyone or anything else. Tomoko life is separated from all of her peers, and the show cleverly illustrates this by having a lot of the background characters being drawn without faces. Because, to Tomoko, there just a faceless mob. That and it probably helps cut cost on the character design budget-

 Also, the fact that Tomoko is such a jerky character also helps the series feel less like a torture porn. Cause while obviously you don't want Tomoko to suffer, it is a lot easier to watch a lovable jerk suffer compared to someone who did nothing wrong. I mean seriously, look at the way Tomoko talks about her only friend Yuu in her internal monologue!

She's such a jerk!  But because we know what she goes through it stops her from becoming to unlikeable...For the most part.  That leads me into some of the flaws with the show. While I do really love this show a lot, I believe that everything has pros and cons to it, and it deserves to be talked about. Just keep in mind though that many of these flaws are kinda nitpicks, that don't distract too much from the series as a whole.  Sometimes Tomoko can come across as to mean spirited and unlikeable. The bit before the train scene in episode four is probably the worst of it, though there at least she does learn that she was wrong. The show also has a tendency to reuse music from previous episodes, which while not that bad does get fairly noticeable as the series goes on. The series also has a lot of references to both Japanese pop cultural references and references and Japaness culture in general. For some reason a lot of the Japanese brand names or anime series that are names dropped in the series are censored out in the sub? It's weird because there not removed like they are in the dub, but they'll have one or two letters blocked out. I don't get the point. But yeah, a lot of those jokes went over my head, and would probably work better if I knew more about day to day life of a Japanese youth.  Also the ending of the series is kinda lackluster. I'm not going to go into spoilers, but Watamote is based off of a manga. A manga that is still running today, so they didn't really have an ending they could adapt. And it's kinda clear from the feeling of the finale that the people behind the anime didn't really know what to do when they got to the end of there twelve episode run. The finale isn't really that bad to be completely honest, but it does feel like a very abrupt end written by people who where just kinda guessing what the ending of the manga might end up being like.  Also, while I don't see this as a flaw, this show will not be everybody. This show will make you feel uncomfortable. A lot of scenes are really hard to watch, just due to how intentionally awkward they are. I kept out A LOT of the really cringy moments from the show out of the review as not to spoil them, but trust me. It gets truly hard to watch at some points. This is Butch Hartman's YouTube channel levels of cringe! (Okay, that's a lie, nothing is that cringe. Sorry Watamote.) It's both the shows greatest strength and greatest weakness. The humor is both very unique but also very niche, which is why while this show was fairly successful when it came out, I would find very few people other than myself who would call it one of there favorite anime series.  Now, it's time to talk about the age old debate. How should you watch the series, Dubbed or Subbed? Well, honestly, I don't really care. It's your life man, As long as you're not hurting anybody what do I care? But if you wanted my opinion, I'd be happy to share it with you! Since most of the lines come from Tomoko she'll be the big deciding factor. For the sub we have the performance of Izumi Kitta. Ms. Kitta nails the role of Tomoko in my personal opinion. She has such a meek and high pitched voice that it really sells the emotional scenes in the series. When Tomoko is forced to talk to someone in the sub her voice is at a near inaudible whisper, which really does help give you the sense that Tomoko is truly unable to communicate with most people. In the dub Tomoko is played by voice acting legend Monica Rial. Her take on Tomoko's voice is less cutesy and is a lot more nasally, which does work as an interpretation. She captures the comedy moments really well too. However, I feel like she isn't as good at capturing the moments of anxiety as well as Kitta, and due to Kitta managing to pull of the comedic and the touching side I think her take is the better version.  No offence to Monica Rial though. I do love the fact that her version of Tomoko sounds like a cross between Renge from Ouran High School Host Club  (Who she also voices in the dub) and Peridot from Steven Universe. THAT'S A MATCH MADE IN HEAVEN I TELLS' YA!

 So in the end, should you watch Watamote? Well, I think it depends on who you are. The series won't be for everyone. It's brand of humor is very unique, and will likely turn a lot of people off. But I think if you're the type of person who likes weird, uncomfortable humor they'll be something for you here. ESPECIALLY if you're shy or introverted. There will definitely be a part of you who will be able to relate to the show, even if you're not exactly proud that you related to it. The series is also only twelve episodes, so it isn't that much of a commitment. It's really a shame that it's only twelve episodes though, as they only ended up adapting about three and a half volumes out of the still ongoing ten volume run. They could of done more if they wanted too. But then again, leave them wanting more as they say. (That way you can force them to buy your manga set...) The series can be found subbed on Crunchyroll for free, or on Hulu if you already have an account. Unfortunately the only way to find the series dubbed legally is on DVD or blu-ray sets, and those are about thirty bucks on Amazon here in the US. However, depending on your financial situation it may just be worth it...(But God knows I don't have that kind of money!) If this review got you at all interested consider checking the series out.  So that's my review of the anime series Watamote. What do you think of the series? Which moment was the hardest to watch for you? Tell me all that in the comments down bellow. I'd love to start a conversation, even if you don't necessarily agree with all of the points I've made. Please fav, follow, and comment if you liked this review, or if you have any suggestions for any other reviews in the future. Have a great day. (Interesting fact. Whenever I'm at work during my lunch break at work I will either go to the bookstore that's right by my work establishment or I'll just sit in the break room reading my volumes of  Watamote mangas by myself while trying to make it so my co-workers can't see what I am reading. THIS SHOW IS SO ME AND THAT'S NOT A GOOD THING-) (I do not own any of the images or videos in this review all credit goes to there original owners.)

https://www.deviantart.com/joyofcrimeart/journal/Watamote-REVIEW-Oh-the-Cringe-698766244 DA Link

[everydayanth]

I greatly enjoy the satire and sarcasm of this show as it attempts to make us better humans through humor-coping and exposure to broad ideas. This episode, specifically the interview with Rob Delaney, is so incredibly important. 

We have created a very sad and very false dichotomy between emotion and thought, we say it’s the opposite of logic or rationality, but it’s a key motivator in everything we do. The conversation around emotion - how we discuss and process, how we interpret or understand, how we support and encourage - is hopefully just beginning. 

Rob shows immense compassion and understanding of how to start a discussion and Russel does a great job letting him speak vulnerably and asking about how to be a better friend. This show is constantly about finding understanding and growing as a person and I greatly respect that. It allows us to talk about emotion in a safe place - Rob is aware of its necessity, has developed the tools to discuss emotion effectively, and is so reflective that we can empathize without the pain becoming a contagious anxiety. 

I hope this is a beginning. I hope that we as a society learn to value emotion as essential to existence, and not as a trope for crazy artists or dramatic relationships. I think we have different capacities and communication styles as individual people, but that we can learn tools to do better and adapt to the world around us. I think that being aware of how much our culture tells us on a daily and subconscious level to keep it to ourselves or not feel at all, is a huge leap in the right direction. 

If you put all the people you know and interact with on a daily basis into a pot and mixed it up (lol), what would be the average reaction to vulnerability? Do you feel like you are confident in your ability to be vulnerable and mature? I definitely don’t, and the reaction-average I see is aversion. It can be very discouraging, but I’ve been working on getting better at understanding myself and learning tools that help me progress into being more capable of empathy for myself and communicating that vulnerability to others. We’ll see how that goes, but seeing people like Rob talk openly, using humor and self reflection to buffer themselves a bit, it helps. 

[josephfrancismazzelloiii]

Okay, sorry, I had to go return some video tapes (make cookie dough) before I write an incoherent essay.

Off the bat, Ravenous is my favorite movie, so I can definitely appreciate humor and wackiness and tonal shifts in horror-- but I also think this movie would have been better if kept simpler, bc the writing is just not there to carry it. Anyway, problems:

The tone of this movie is like, dismally noncommittal. I get the vibe that the writer worries you won't take it seriously in the scary moments, so it undermines itself with over the top visuals and gags-- the baby bottle, the mother leaping through the air, or crashing through a wall LIKE A CAR. This keeps it from ever really being scary for me, so idk what other folks are responding to.

This is aside from the larger tonal dissonance that Justin Long's character brings-- he's way too cartoonish to fit in with the rest of the film.

On the other hand, the comedy isn't focused or funny enough for it to go the other way as a full-on comedy horror (but Long's delivery of WHAT'S UP FAGGOTTTT did get me both times lmao, and it's a fun "punchline" to his character setup, as much as I think his character writing sucks and is bad)

The writing largely just doesn't feel fully thought through, politically, logically, logistically. The inclusion of Detroit's housing crisis/poverty feels a little trite and underexplored. The stuff going on under the house just. doesn't make sense (sorry to be that guy). A lot of the things the characters do doesn't make sense. It doesn't feel grounded, even within its own fiction.

My BIGGER ISSUE is the uh, sloppy politics of the film. I genuinely would not usually center this criticism, but this movie feels so so so distinctly Written By A Man to me. Soapboxing throughout about women's pains and fears and The Evils of Men (bc see, you're one of the good ones, of course), and then you're really going to have the main scare factor of the film be a naked, ugly, unfuckable woman. And we're just not looking the hypocrisy. Okay. (No, actually see, it is okay, because despite consistently using her gross naked body as a horror device, she was a victim in the end, which means something, I guess, and erases the entire framing, definitely.) This is obviously a bit of a trend, I guess an evolution of the oversexualizing of women in film, and horror in particular-- where you subvert the audience's expectations that nudity is to titillate by showing them shocking images of untitillating bodies. They did it in X, for instance; and both of Ari Aster's films; def others I'm not thinking of rn. But it felt SO stark in this film because it dedicates so much of it's story to the ways women are harmed by men. How can anyone write this obliviously?? It makes me feel insane LOL.

I'm cutting myself off there because jfc, I can get deeper (trying to translate the politics of the breastfeeding scene alone is giving me hives), but I will just sound crazy and I have things to do rn, but. yeah, I think it's a bad movie. I might not be articulating myself perfectly, but I think it was stupid and not scary.

Ooh what did you hate about barbarian?? I've been dying to hear from someone that thought it sucked lol

OKAY SO, god. I'll get into it, but let me try to list the things that did work for me first, bc that will be a lot quicker:

The first third was overall good, the night with the two tenants had some good building and tension, and I particularly liked the "reveal" with the house/street in daylight.

I like the big editing jumps, at least conceptually

That's it? I think? Yeesh. Okay, gimme a sec to type up the rest of my thoughts in a reblog.

[chaoticneutralwriter]

Playing with Fire | m.yg

So you summon a witch, not prepared to get burned.

firewitch!suga/yoongi short/drabble?/oneshot?

genre: some comedic aspects and idk loll

word count: 2.7k

A/N: In spirit of Halloween lol??? 🎃 I just thought he looked the part from this picture 😆

This was a horrible idea. Awful, horrendous, stupid, idiotic and every word in the dictionary that expresses ’no one should do this unless you’re that dumb’.

Or maybe a little crazy. You certainly are questioning your sanity at this point as you make your way down this back alley, alone, and not to mention at night. You’re very close to bashing your head against the brick walls, comically thinking that you would be doing any potential killer a favour as well as yourself (if you’re going to get killed because of your own stupidity, you’ll smash your own brains against the wall on your own volition, so no Jason, you’re not interested in getting dismembered and stuffed into a garbage bag, thank you very much).

But then that begs the question; why are you not turning back? You still had a chance; to turn tail and run the hell out of this shady ass, potential murder scene, and horror movie of a cliché alleyway like a smart person. So why haven’t you? Well… you know what they say, desperate times calls for desperate measures. And safe to say, you were really desperate…and maybe two percent curious because who started this rumour about a witch haunting this specific alleyway? A ghost of a murder victim would’ve been more plausible but a witch. The idea makes you scoff and admittedly makes you feel better about yourself because clearly, there’s someone out there who’s more idiotic than you are until you think, but who’s the one about one hair away from ending up on the 8 o’clock news chasing said witch rumours?

Whatever, you’re halfway down the alley now and just about two steps away from the supposed ‘hotspot’. So you hurry your pace although still keeping the sound of your steps to a bare minimum. The faster you do this the faster you can be out of here and if this doesn’t work, no one will know you were ever here.

You spot the markings on the brick wall, looking very much worn and faded and to most people, could’ve been brushed off as just random graffiti done by some delinquent. Thanks to some deep, digging in the cult side of the web however, you’re knowledgeable enough to not think such things.

Okay….  You think, glancing down at your watch: midnight. Time to do this thing.

From the inside of your bag, you brandish the necessary items that would supposedly summon the witch. First was a single black rose, one, which, from the instructions you found, you needed to burn. So with the rose in one hand, you brandish a lighter in the other. Flicking it once, a flame ignites and as you held the blossoms of the rose in the small flame, it has no trouble catching fire soon after. As the rose burns, you carefully set it on the concrete and let it work its course. Once the flower is completely reduced to ashes, you sweep the remains up as best you can to form a decent pile. You wet your fingertips a bit from the water bottle you brought and taking a bit of the ashes; turn it into a somewhat pasty consistency to complete the faded markings on the wall.

As you complete the drawing, you see that it actually forms a pentagram (of course) with smaller symbols at the five corners. You take the chance to gulp; you’re halfway through finishing the process. All that’s left was to prick your finger, swipe the blood across each fingertips and press it over the pentagram…. Oh yeah and say a bunch of mumbo jumbo. So as you smear the blood on your pricked finger to coat the rest of the other ones, you pull out your phone to where you bookmarked the magic words.

You draw in a breath and let it out before slowly, you pressed your bloodied fingers so that they were touching the markings on the wall.

“Fire in thy blood, I summon thee. From my ashes, I offer myself in exchange for your flame. Fire in thy blood, I summon thee!”

You freeze, waiting for something to happen after you said that final note. It was so quiet that you would be able to hear a pin drop and all around you, the street lamps continue to cast ominous shadows.

A beat.

And then the lights start to flicker, making you gasp as you shoot your gaze up to them. For a moment, your hand remains glued to the wall as you pray vehemently for the only source of light to remain strong because like hell you’re gonna stay here in total complete darkness.

Unfortunately, your prayers weren’t answered.

The lights dim till they die out completely, plunging you into darkness and your heart just about leaps to your throat. You don’t dare to breathe as all your senses go into hyper drive, trying to discern whether or not you should stay or get the hell out of there in a split second notice. You listen but hear nothing, not even the sound of the streets at night and you’re not sure whether that’s comforting or worrying.

What were only mere minutes felt like an eternity to you before the lights spring back to life, illuminating your surroundings and it took you a second to adjust to the sudden brightness. Your head whips around you, body pressed against the brick wall as if willing it to swallow you if it meant protecting you from whatever oncoming danger you weren’t aware of. But from what you gather, nothing had changed. Time seems to have resumed, you faintly hear the passing of cars, and you were still very much alone.

You breathe out and whisper to yourself, “Thank God… “ Before you straighten yourself up, shaking the nerves out of your system. “Well,” you continue, more to yourself as you inspect your dirtied hands begrudgingly, “that was a total waste of ti— “

A loud crash causes you to let out an equally loud yelp, making you jump and nearly crash against the wall from the force of it. Your eyes dart to find the source in panic, mind going into fight or flight mode once again until they settle onto the dumpster where something black emerges from behind.

 “Oh my God!” You wheeze out, hand clutching your chest at your pounding heart. “Seriously cat! What the hell!”

 The black feline only stares at you blankly with its topaz eyes, clearly not bothered by the fact that it gave you an almost-heart attack. You’ve just about had it with the events of tonight, you’re ready to just go home, fall onto your bed and forget about how stupid this had all be— 

 “I’d appreciate it if you didn’t yell at Smokey, he’s sensitive.”

 “GYEH!” Another undignified yelp and you vaguely hear a muttered, “Aish you’re loud…” but that’s the second almost-heart attack of the night and you’re sure if you get another one, that’ll make it a complete heart attack that you would actually die from. Immediately you spot a mop of red just a few steps in front of you; so glaringly red that you could swear you would’ve noticed even if you were close to pissing yourself scared at the moment. You trace the red down to a face and double take because…. wow what a face. Skin as smooth and pale as porcelain, completely void of any blemish with a pair of sharp, dark eyes that… were currently staring at you.

 Oh…. You’re staring…

 Or more like straight out gaping at this man that appeared from out of nowhere. He’s watching you with a really bored, unamused look, face resting against one hand propped up on a knee from his current seat on a curb by a set of stairs. He’s dressed to impress and rightfully so because you can’t help but notice that the design on his button-up matches the colour of his hair (which is really impressive).

 “Are you just gonna stare all night or can I go?” His deep timber breaks you from your thoughts and you’re left floundering for words.

 “Uhh….” Your eyes glance around, unsure of what to make of this turn of events. “…Who are you exactly?”

 He raises an eyebrow at you in disbelief. “Seriously?”

 When your shifty gaze was his answer, he sighs and mutters more things under his breath before shooting you a piercing look. “You’re the one who summoned me, so would you hurry and spit out your wish? My pasta is getting cold.”

 It takes a while for what he says to sink in and by the time it does, you’re absolutely flabbergasted. “So… You’re saying… You’re the witch?” You enunciate the words slowly as if you’re not even convinced of what you’re saying (spoilers: you’re not). The red head in front you sees it too because he rolls his eyes before getting up.

 “You know what, never mind. I’m going home.”

 “No wait!” You spring into action as he begins to walk off. Logically speaking, you should’ve let him but you’ve already come this far and if he really is the ‘witch’ rumours has it then you still need your problem fixed. He stops and shoots a look over his shoulder that clearly says you’ve got about ten seconds before he loses interest again. 

 “Sorry, I’m just…caught off guard.” You say, “I wasn’t expecting…. well actually I didn’t know what I was expecting when I did this but when people say ‘witch’, it’s usually— “

 “Some old hag who cackles over a cauldron, wearing all black and a pointy hat and rides around on a broom. I get it.” He cuts you off like he’s heard this a million times (probably has). “So are you gonna state your business or can I go home?”

 You steel yourself before mustering up the courage to say, “If you’re who you claim to be,” The man in front of you rolls his eyes again. “Then I wish to know my future.”

 Silence; all he does is stare at you with a look you can’t read and as you’re starting to feel self-conscious under his gaze, his monotone cuts through the stifling air. “That’s it?”

 You blink, “…. Yes?” 

 “And what would you offer me in return?”

 Oh crap…. Didn’t think that one through… 

 You gulp; you’re so gonna regret this. “Whatever you see fit.”

 That causes him to raise an eyebrow, this time out of intrigue. “So anything?”

 “…Anything.” You confirm, squaring your shoulders and hardening your stare to show that you meant it. You see a glint in his eyes as he turns to you fully, eyeing you like a cat who’s just spotted its next plaything. And then he’s striding towards you in languid steps, slowly making you feel more and more like the cornered prey he’s about to pounce on. But you hold your ground; you need to show him that you’re not afraid, willing to commit and that you’re serious. Still, it doesn’t stop the breath from hitching in your throat once he’s stopped just mere inches from you, so close you can actually feel his body heat and you had to tilt your head up to meet his unwavering gaze.

 You stiffen as you see him raise a hand to brush the hair along the side of your face. Your eyes wants to watch what his hand is doing but they were automatically pulled back to meet his, as if some invisible force willed them to. And you’re easily sucked in; eyes like the darkest of nights that hold so many secrets to the world and so frigid, like you’re drowning in icy waters that are only pulling you deeper, deeper, until—

 “Ow!” 

 The stinging pain effectively snaps you out of your trance and it takes you a minute to realize that the man with bright red hair had yanked out a few strands of your hair. He steps away from you, strands in hand and a rather pleased look on his face.

 “What was that for?” You hiss, rubbing the side of your head but all he does is hold up a finger to shush you in response. You watch him bring the strands of hair to eye level and right in front of you, they catch fire. You can only gawk as you watch the flame burn, engulfing the man’s whole palm and yet there was no signs of burning flesh or pain. He watches as it flickers with immense concentration until he ultimately smothers the fire by closing his palm.

 “Three questions.” He abruptly says.

 “What?”

 He holds up three fingers. “You have three questions to ask about your future. That’s it.”

 “Hey that’s not—“

 “Three questions or none; up to you.”

 You huff. “Fine…. Will I find my dream job?”

 His eyes wander upwards before he says, “Yes.”

 “Okay…” You breathe, “Will I be happy?”

 His eyes trail back down to you, face void of any emotions, as he says, “No.”

 The answer causes you to recoil a bit but you were determined to remain steadfast as you ask the final question, “…. Will it get better?”

 It comes out in a soft murmur that even you’re not sure if he’s heard it. He’s staring again with eyes threatening to drown you once more and you felt like he’s seeing past you, right into your soul. You hate it; with just a single look he’s able to make you feel so bare in front of him. You suppose that’s what being a witch is about…along with igniting random fires without being burnt apparently (so you guess that’s out of the question if you ever wanted to get rid of him).

 “It depends on how you look at it.” He finally says.

 “…. That’s not very helpful.” You reply, bemused. 

 “I didn’t say it was gonna be.” He retorts plainly. “Now a deal is a deal. I did my part so you’ll do yours.”

 That causes you to straighten up, bristling a bit in preparation of what he’s planning on making you do or give up. Would it be years off your life? Your soul? Can witches even do that? Or maybe he wants a part of your body like an eye?! Or a whole arm?! Oh my God, you really didn’t think this through— !

 “Hello?”

 You jerk at the sound of his voice, shoulders involuntarily hunching up in a defensive stance. A glance at the witch in front of you lets you know that he doesn’t look about ready to cause bodily harm to you. Actually, he was looking at you like you just did something really stupid.

 “W-What?” You stutter.

 “I said, you’re going to follow me and do exactly as I say.” 

 “That's— “ You immediately begin to protest because this just screams stranger danger, momentarily forgetting who you’re dealing with exactly.

 “A deal is a deal, Y/N. And I don’t think you would want to know what’ll happen if you cross a witch.” The tone in his voice shifts dangerously in warning, it’s low and he speaks with a calmness that belies what he’s truly capable of, that there are far worse things that will happen to you than following him and doing what he says.

 For once you’re not curious enough to find out.

 You swallow hard and just numbly nod. At your affirmation to comply, the man’s demeanor eases back into the lethargic air he had when you first met him. He turns away to walk off but not before gesturing with a quick nod of his head for you to follow after him. You don’t have to be told twice. You trail a few steps behind him and amusingly, you spot the black cat from earlier trotting alongside (Smokey was it?)

 “Yoongi.”

 “Huh?”

 Your head snaps from the cat to the man in front of you who only keeps walking at a leisurely pace, hands stuffed into the pockets of his dark washed jeans.

 “My name; it’s Min Yoongi.”

 “Oh…” You stop yourself from replying with your name in kind, seeing as how he already seems to know it. The silence that follows envelops you but shockingly; you don’t feel as afraid as you should be. Maybe it’s Yoongi’s undeniably easy-going attitude or perhaps just another form of his witchcraft coming into play to make you feel that way, who knows.

 Whatever it was, you welcome it. 

 Because undoubtedly, this will be the last time you’ll ever get to feel at ease again.

[vaguely-concerned]

Some Uncharted 3 feels

- My sister and I just finished up Uncharted 3: Drake’s Deception, and let me tell you… she chose the perfect fucking game to introduce me to the series because a) parental substitute stories are my ultimate narrative Jam and I will eat it up with not one spoon, not two spoons, but every spoon made available to me, b) the early parts of the game with Chloe and Charlie are  g e n i u s  and I loved all these treasure hunting weirdos (Charlie’s interspersed British History info dump while Nate was doing his own Francis Drake info dump was golden) and c) the moment I had to control tiny little bb Nate scrambling over the rooftops every protective instinct rose up in me and I adopted him as my son. He just feels so vulnerable in this one, even as an adult, I want to slap Marlowe’s filthy British gaslighting hands away from him and keep him safe. (‘Sullly hasn’t come back for you yet’ how D A R E you monster)

- I feel a deep eternal spiritual connection with Sully, because we both took one look at this disaster child and went ‘...well nothing for it I must now protect him for as long as I live’. (There were frequently hilarious moments when I was cottoning on to what kind of insane leap the game/Nathan ‘No Trace Of Impulse Control’ Drake wanted me to do next and I was like ‘oh no… no baby child you’ll break your neck I hate this’ and one second later Sully would be like ‘...you sure about this, kid’ and I was like ‘THANK YOU SULLY THIS IS MADNESS’ and then of course Nate would do it anyway while I turned my head so I wouldn’t have to look at the craziness I had wrought with the dual shock controller)

- It’s perfectly understandable why Nate marries Elena in the end and I am very happy for them, but with all objective truth in the universe we must all come to accept that no one in this game is more Marriage Material than Salim. Always there with a freakishly durable horse and a perfectly timed rescue to sweep you off your feet — literally, because you’re an idiot who routinely jumps from your horse onto trucks at breakneck speed and yet he lets you sit behind him on his horse until you find yours again; a Gentleman. Beautiful eyes. Excellent sense of dramatic timing, maybe good hair under the coverings, could immediately feel the cosmic vibrations of hurt puppy, I-am-doing-the-best-I-can-I-swear-everything-just-keeps-happening-to-me energy around Nathan Drake and chose to protect him… truly, the perfect man.  

- I sort of got the thing they tried to do at the end with the Talbot/Marlowe bond mirrored with the Nate/Sully one, but I feel like it would have been better if it was built up more before they reach the city? Like at this point your distaste for Talbot is so strong that you’re like ‘well GOOD your mother figure sucked anyway, choke on quicksand assbutt’, and it could have been more gutting if he was just a tiny bit more likeable. Marlowe had some really good indirect characterization going on though, like the fact that after twenty years she STILL hasn’t figured out that the reason Sully suddenly ‘stabbed her in the back’ was that she fucking hit a kid in the face in front of him. (It wasn’t subtle, Katherine, he’s standing there like D: D: D: right behind you)

- GOD the damn shipyard stuff dragged on FOREVER and for no narrative reward whatsoever — if you think about it it could literally be removed from the game completely and… nothing at all would change except Nate would maybe have a few more ribs still intact — and also the gameplay was tiring, but it was tremendously effective in making you feel what Nate feels and so I forgive it. I felt fucking harrowed by the time he wakes up on that beach, enough so that I didn’t even bother to go ‘uh. Sure. sure he washed ashore safely from what looked very much like the open ocean. That’s… likely’. I was just happy he was okay. Ssssh it’s psychological storytelling okay let’s not question it. Also being on a sinking cruise ship was admittedly some of the coolest level design I’ve ever seen, so there’s that.

- On an unrelated note I wonder what the hell Marlowe was paying her goons for them to keep trying to murder me after their employer had set fire to the chateau with them still inside it with no way out and while a plane was getting torn to pieces around them. That’s dedication, I’m actually impressed.

- No one wears a henley shirt quite like Nathan Drake. Like my feelings for him are more parental than anything but damn that boy sure knows how to pull off a Look.

- Talking about parental feelings, who else melts every time he starts expounding on a special interest? He’s such a ditz about everything else and yet… is it English renaissance and/or connected to Francis Drake in even the vaguest possible way? My boy will talk your ear off about it. God bless this ADHD poster child.

- They really did some cool things with his characterization otherwise too — this game feels a little like a coming of age story, despite the fact that he’s like… thirty five, because there’s this childlike quality to him, that slight manic brittleness of an abandoned, hurt child that is both tremendously endearing and slightly unsettling. (He… kills a lot of people in this game, u guise, and while most of it is made out to be basically self defense he, uh, doesn’t seem all that broken up about it) Marlowe revealing his real backstory so off-handedly and leaving you to puzzle together the fact that he has made himself into his own escapist character worked so well and might have hit me even harder if I’d played the first two. From how strongly he reacts to Elena’s comments about it he must realize on some level that Sully is getting older and that would trigger that fear that he’s going to leave the Adventure and by extension him behind, taking the one stable thing he’s had in his life since he was like fifteen away. (Thank you, Sully, for staying alive like a champ even though you’re the resident mentor and Nate’s terrified imagination murdered you like… four times in this game, this is the kind of dedication and survivability I like to see in a father figure)

I love that in the end what lets him heal is feeling safe in the fact that these people love him and won’t leave him even though he’s pulling the most insane shit and that is all that hole in him he tried to fill with adrenaline and Adventure really needed and he can let go enough to have real emotional closeness. Aaaand also he needed to sink a fucking city into the sand in the process b/c of who he is as a person, I guess. Let me reiterate: god bless him.  

-  Most difficult parts: when they try to make you shoot hallucination!Sully (I’m such a wimp, I couldn’t lol) and when you have to fight Charlie. I failed that fight thrice because I didn’t want to hit him back. Also when they make you think Charlie’s about to die, that was straight up mean

- “*deep sigh* This is why we can’t have nice things” I am Sully and Sully is me. Really though, that man is the true hero of this story. He’s been saying ‘Careful Nate’ and ‘Nate find another way so you won’t fucking die’ and ‘HOLY SHIT KID’ for twenty years and it has never worked and yet he still tries. Inspiring.

- The voice acting was amazing — I have never understood the hype around Nolan North before, he’s just everywhere in games, it would be like noticing the presence of air, but then I heard the way his voice went tiny when he said ‘Sully?’ and everything inside me went !!!!!

I get it now

- My one real complaint: I hope whoever’s responsible for all the ‘running towards the floaty camera’ scenes steps on one Lego annually for the next decade, those parts took years off my life  

- Marlowe is a class act on the good old Villain Stuff — I burst out laughing when it turned out she was a member of an ~*ancient secret society*~ because… of course. Of COURSE she is — and I deeply respect that. Quoting T. S. Eliot at you while you’re dying in the desert? They just don’t make ‘em like that anymore, guys.

- This game is the ultimate proof that if you successfully create emotional connection with the characters, your plot can be as openly silly and full of holes as you like and people will roll with it. I mean that ending made no sense whatsoever but I was too busy whimpering through Nate’s hallucination panic attack thingy to care and that is… no one should have that kind of power, Naughty Dog, why u hurt me this way and make me forget what logic is

- Most brilliantly funny and understated moment: baby Nate casually reaching out for Sully’s beer and Sully being like ‘lol no kid’ in the most knowing, already fond way. The physical acting in these games is just phenomenal, which I guess is the upside of all the mocap stuff? (also makes sure they’re quite short and streamlined tho ha ha)

- We got ‘The Lost Legacy’ with the PS4 too so I’m going to start that — I think I will miss Nate but I also love Chloe and her cynical yet caring ass with the passion of a thousand suns so it’ll be okay ha ha  

[valeriianz]

helllooooooooo. dis one. "i haven’t thought of you since we broke up in college, but we just matched on a dating site and huh i guess that spark is still there"

i wanted to write something cute and flirty but instead its kinda ehhh but i hope you like it anyway! lol from this prompt list

Tinder was weird. Like, not as vain ashumpR, still full of guys who just wanted random hookups, but therewas definitely more options for a relationship to start. Althoughwhen you could just swipe left or right based on one photo, vanitywas still a thing.

Oliver would always check out a man’sbio, never judging on looks alone, because he wasn’t looking for aone-time thing (though a lot of the men he matched with wanted that).He’d been on a few dates, most going really well, friendly, but nevera spark really. And if there was a burning interest on Oliver’s endto take it further, it never happened. Oliver blamed his poor socialskills for that one, wondering if he came off too needy or nervous.

As a man nearing his thirties, Oliverchastised himself enough for sinking so low as to use a “dating”app, but it is what it is. And he’d feel embarrassed about it later.

One particular Friday night foundOliver in his apartment, drinking alone and absentmindedly browsingTinder while Netflix played in the background. Being a little tipsywhile he chatted with strangers was always a little easier, likebeing at a bar, without the awkward fidgeting and giggles he stillhadn’t grown out of.

Swipe, swipe, swipe, take a sip of hisrum and coke, swipe… then a familiar face made Oliver pause, therim of the glass pressed against his bottom lip. On his screen was adevastatingly handsome man, lips pulled up in a half smile, haircombed back, scruff well-maintained, wearing a suit jacket sharpenough to cut. He was posed on a sidewalk, as if someone just stoppedhim on the street and asked for his picture. Oliver swallowed,looking below the picture to confirm his obvious recognition:

Connor, 27.

Oliver rolled his glass along his lips,staring in contemplation before clicking on the picture, readingConnor’s short bio.

I’m not big on talking. Send mesomething nice.

Oliver chuckled, shaking his head.Guess his playboy ex hadn’t changed in the past five years. He swipedthrough the pictures Connor had, recognizing one with Michaela at abar, a selfie of him sweaty and rugged in the woods, hiking, and onemore with him lounging against a brick wall, looking like a modelstraight out of a men’s magazine.

They hadn’t spoken since Oliver brokeup with him, after Connor admitted he had cheated on him. It had beenrough, humiliating, and broke something in Oliver that took a longtime to mend. Curiosity and drunken logic found Oliver swiping right,his heart leaping into his throat after he realized what he’d done.

But then immediately after, the screendimmed, and a message flashed up: “It’s a match!”

Oliver’s breath hitched. Connor hadfound him too, and apparently also swiped right.

Now what? Oliver waited, watching hisphone in gross anticipation. He set it down, trying to focus onwhatever show was on his TV, taking another sip of his drink.

His eyes shifted down to his phone,wondering if Connor would message him first, or at all. Maybe he alsodrunkenly swiped right. Oliver couldn’t even know when it happened…he hadn’t had Tinder for long, maybe a month or so, Connor might nothave found him tonight… not on a Friday.

Most likely Connor was at a bar,chatting up a nice looking stranger to go home with… then walk outbefore the other guy even thought of going to sleep.

A notification flashed on Oliver’sphone, he had received a message on Tinder.

Downing the rest of his drink, Oliveropened the app and attempted to calm his erratic heart as he openedConnor’s message.

Fancy meeting you here

Oliver laughed to himself.

I could say the same thing. Thoughtdating sites weren’t your thing

Immediately after:

Tinder is a socially recognizedhookup app, c'mon Oliver, you know this.

Is that why you’re here?

A long pause. Oliver pulled his legs upand brought a throw pillow into his lap.

Kinda, humpr gets boring

Oliver stared at the words, tapping hisfinger on the phone.

Are you dating?

Another pause. Oliver wondered whatConnor was doing, where he was.

I’m trying

Oliver rested his chin on his knees,watching the screen. It had been so long since he’d spoken to Connor,this should be awkward; they ended on such bad terms but… allOliver could feel was familiarity and warmth. So Connor was trying todate, did that mean he wanted a relationship now? Was he trying to beserious, monogamous?

I miss having a boyfriend… for howmuch I whined and deflected on it, it was good with you

Oliver pulled his lips in, guardinghimself. Connor sent another soon after.

Really good.

Sighing, Oliver shut his eyes, tuckinghis head lower so his forehead rubbed against his knees. Connordidn’t get to do this. Giving Oliver and amazing 3-year friendshipand then the best 6 months of his life as “lovers” beforesleeping with some other dude, admitting it a month after ithappened, and then offering nothing but radio silence and now this.This… unconventional meet-up with Connor basically admitting hemissed Oliver.

Stop that, Oliver sent, sighingloudly.

Sorry

Oliver rubbed his hand down his face,abandoning his phone for the time being and taking his glass to thekitchen for a refill.

When he came back, Connor had sent himanother message.

What are you up to?

Trying to play it casual.

You mean right now?

Sure.

Oliver looked around, shouldersslumping.

Home alone, drinking and Netflix.

So same ‘ol same 'ol, huh?

Oliver couldn’t help but grin at that.

Well you know what they say, allwork and no play…

That was the rum talking. Oliver stillfelt the need to be careful, but the alcohol brought out his oldfondness for the easy, flirty banter Connor and him used to exchange.

Have you been seeing anyone?Connor sent after a few minutes. Oliver wondered if he’d resistedresponding to that in a dirty way.

Eh, a few here and there, nothingserious.

Silence.

You?

More silence. Oliver reminded himselfto ask Connor what he was doing right now.

Same. Nothing substantial, justscrewing around like usual

Oliver could practically hear thesarcasm dripping off that reply.

That’s what you’re best at.

Oliver flinched at his own words. It’sbeen years, he really should back off. But before he could apologizeor amend that, Connor responded.

… are you drunk?

Oliver quirked an eyebrow. I said Iwas drinking.

Yeah but, you’re always so much moresassy when you’re actually drunk.

Oliver huffed, but he was smiling.

A long silence followed after that.Oliver knew it was his turn to talk, but he didn’t know what else tosay. Well, he had a lot to say, a lot he wanted to ask. He wanted toknow how Connor was, did he get his dream job, was he still friendswith that doucheface who crashed on their couch that one time…

Mostly he wondered if Connor thoughtabout him as much as Oliver did. A part of Oliver always hated thathe never gave Connor the chance to explain himself further, that hejust pushed Connor out and never responded to his texts and calls.And how quickly Connor moved on, seemingly angry and forgetting aboutOliver.

Oliver always questioned if they wouldhave ever worked out… they were both irrational and impulsive, itworked as a crazy friendship, but it was dangerously unhealthy as arelationship. They never talked about their problems and had a lot ofangry sex… it was intense and amazing. Connor had been the best sexOliver ever had, hands down. Their sexual chemistry was always insynch and on fire… it made talking not seem that important.

But they had both been young, reckless.Oliver had been Connor’s first boyfriend and he had admitted duringtheir short relationship that he wasn’t sure if he was “doing thisright,” but he always tried, for Oliver… and it seemed sweet atthe time.

Was it though? Had Connor grown andmatured at all from the experience? The fact that he never triedspeaking with Oliver didn’t help much… though Oliver couldn’t blamehim, since it was himself that acted so dramatic about Connor’sregretful confession.

Oliver was just thinking about bed whenhis phone alerted him to a message from Tinder.

Why did you swipe me?

Oliver was very drunk now. He shouldprobably wait til morning to respond to anything further, but afamiliar ache in his chest resurfaced as he clutched his phone tight.

Why did you? He countered.

Just hopeful, I guess. You?

Curious… I guess. And drunk.

I’m drinking too. Wouldn’t have theguts to message you otherwise.

Oliver smiled, touching the phone tohis forehead. When he brought it back, Connor had sent anothermessage.

I know it’s been forever, and i’mnot asking you to forgive me, but I really am sorry about what I did.I’ll never get over how much I hurt you…

Oliver sank back into the couch,clutching the throw pillow tightly to his chest. He waited forsomething more, Connor defending himself or rambling about whathappened, but nothing followed.

He swallowed, tapping out his responseslowly.

I forgive you

Thanks

And then:

You’re still too good for me

Oliver sighed.

Well I don’t know about that… it’sbeen a while, why don’t we catch up?

Instantly: I’d love to.

Oliver bit his lip, his heart wasthumping again.

Busy tomorrow morning?

Nope.

Let’s have breakfast.

A short pause.

Sounds amazing.

Oliver grinned. He’d be nervous aboutthis tomorrow, but right now, drunk off rum and high off oldmemories, good and bad, he couldn’t wait to see Connor.

[badnovels]

Hey Jessa! I hope things are going well. Have you ever considered writing any fan fic for the hating game? I've just finished re-reading it and I need more but there's nothing out there 😭😩 I'm not brave enough to attempt it myself lol

I thought about it so many times but I was always too afraid to mess with the perfection of that book. But here’s a little drabble because I was feeling inspired! I hope you like it. 

—

The sound of the door opening made my whole body perk up in an absolutely Pavlovian response. After multiple toddler temper tantrums and zero adult contact all day, I was so ready to see my husband that it took everything in me not to rush him like a linebacker.

“Honey, I’m home,” Josh announced in a mocking voice straight out of a 1950’s sitcom. He’d laugh if he knew just how much I looked forward to this moment, and I had no intention of giving him the satisfaction.

“Help,” I said instead. “And quit taking your merry time with your primping ritual.”

I didn’t have to look in the hallway to know he was methodically peeling off his suit jacket and sliding off his immaculately shined shoes before lining them up just so. If there wasn’t a 16-month-old screaming straight into my ear, I’d have heard the tiny clink of cuff-links hitting the silver tray we’d picked up at an antique sale during one of our lazy Sunday drives.

A pre-baby Sunday drive. Not that I missed the days before we had our daughter, but I was really looking forward to the moment when she was old enough to appreciate road trips, because at this current stage, she was a crying machine during long car rides.

“What’d you do to Tilly?” Josh asked with raised eyebrows, rounding the corner in his trouser socked feet. 

If I weren’t so tired, I’d be offended that he only sounded halfway joking. Instead of arguing, I watched as he knelt in front of us and held out his arms. The small hellion in my arms promptly leaped from me to him.

“Other than feed her, play with her, and love her unconditionally?” I shook my head when the tiny traitor immediately quieted when Josh hugged her to his body. “Nothing, really. Our child is the devil, Josh.”

“Lucy…” He gave me a mildly alarmed look and held Tilly tighter, and if I wasn’t mistaken, discreetly checked her arms and legs for pinch marks.

“I was kidding,” I muttered, shamed by his expression.He sat Tilly on the edge of the couch next to me and ducked his head to peer into her tear-stained face. “What’s wrong, pumpkin?” Josh asked in a perfectly reasonable tone, low and logical.

She babbled something back just as seriously, and then it was as if they were in their own little Templeman world where I was merely a visitor. I took it as my cue to leave and stood on exhausted legs, knowing I was being dramatic but unable to contain the flare of emotion after such an especially long day.

Josh’s fingers tangled with mine, making me pause.

“Don’t take it personally, shortcake.” The sympathy in his eyes was enough to make me flee the scene. Then I tottered to the bathroom and sat down hard on the toilet, put my head into my hands, and cried.

When I emerged fifteen minutes later like a particularly haggard butterfly from its cocoon, Josh was coming out of the nursery. His eyes were bright, his hair perfectly coiffed, and the pushed-up sleeves of his starched white shirt revealed his tan forearms. He looked like an ad for a hot dad while I looked like a homeless woman with lanky hair and a shirt stained with toddler throw up.

I stopped in my tracks. “Is she asleep?” I whispered incredulously. “Already?”

He nodded and shut the nursery door very quietly before turning to scrutinize me. “You’re giving me crazy eyes. And your face is all blotchy.”

“Do you know hard I tried to make her go down for a nap today? I’ve begged, bribed, and done everything but a ritualistic sacrifice to do what you did with a few minutes of daddy magic.”

Josh quirked his lips. “You’re worrying me with all this talk of devils and sacrifice, Lucy.”

I turned away, the burst of frustration-infused energy seeping out of my body. “I need to do laundry.”

“Wait a minute,” he said, his voice changing. He reached out a hand but I evaded his grasp, walking quickly toward the laundry room. “Lucy, let’s talk.”

“About what?” I reached for the detergent, which of course was on the top shelf. Josh moved to help me, but I slapped his fingers away and jumped a few times before I grabbed the bottle.

He sighed. “About how miserable you are,” Josh said, matter of fact.

I dropped the detergent on my foot and cursed. “What?”

His arms boxed me against the washing machine, and he leaned down to peer at me much like he had Tilly. “I think…you need to go back to work.”  

I felt like the worst mother in the world when my heart jumped joyfully in my chest at the thought of his suggestion.

“But Tilly- we both agreed I’d stay home with her until she starts school,” I stammered.

“I agreed because you insisted. I’ve wanted to say something for a while now.” His big hands moved to my shoulders and he gave me an even, steady look. “Look me in the eye. Tell me you’re not ready to leave a tiny, Lucy-shaped hole in the wall while you run straight back to your old job.”

“It’s been that obvious?”

“Only because I love you and I’m obsessed with your every thought and feeling.”

“I married a bit of a psycho, huh?” I asked thoughtfully. I laid my head on his chest and felt the weight of the world lift from my body as I accepted the truth of what Josh said. “Does it make me a bad mother? Not wanting to spend every waking moment with Tilly?”

“Of course not.”

“Because I love our daughter, Josh. I’d die for her.”

“Of course you would. Not today though. And stop talking about death and demons and sacrifices.” He rubbed my back in comforting circles. “Your career has always been important to you. And you’re so…social.” The word is tinged with tender disdain. “I always knew it would be a challenge to stay at home all day without a million people to chat with. I’ve worried about you falling madly in love with the mailman in my absence.”

“Fred’s a million years old,” I mumbled into his chest. “And he never wants to talk to me.”

Josh laughed. “Point is, it’s time to make a change. We’ll put Tilly in daycare. Hire a nanny.”

“Daycare. I’m not letting you fall in love with a nanny.”

“Okay,” he agreed, stroking my hair. “We’ll hire Fred’s mom, then.”

“Don’t touch my hair.”

He held me away from him, his expression startled. “Why?”

“It’s greasy. I need to take a shower.”

“Oh.” The relief was palpable in just the one word. “I thought you didn’t want me to touch you.”

“I’m dying for you to touch me.”

Josh’s gaze grew heavy and deliberate as he looked me up and down, and though I was a nasty mess, I felt beautiful under his stare.

“Well c'mon then, sex eyes.”

And then the best husband in the world led me to the shower.

[lizacstuff]

Anon asks

So as not to clog any of your dashes, fandom wank under the cut

beka1820 @beka1820  I’m confused how she said that TvLine and Deadline contradicted each other and that they’re crazy or whatever. Didn’t they say the same thing essentially. Especially about the specific 4? That whole post would be so entertaining if it wasn’t so insulting to JMo.

I saw that!!  I suppose it exposes her complete lack of reading comprehension? The stories were pretty much identical to me.  

However, she is one of those people who posts something, it turns out to be completely wrong, but then she comes back and says “look how right I was.”

Very Trump-esque. 

Anonymous said:The one thing I’d love to come true from that dumb post is for Jen to be made a producer.

I’m sure the reason that the producer thing is part of this pretend narrative is because it’s kind of an obvious guess at this stage of the game. Often in contract re-negotiations actors get producer credits and JMo is clearly the actor from the show who is the most collaborative with the creatives and she’s also the one who is most interested in things behind the scenes.  It’s not really that bit of a leap.

Also, I think it would be fabulous.

Anonymous said:That post was hilarious! I love how she took Jen’s pics on Instagram as clear signs of her planning to leave. I bet if I had the willpower I could go through Lana’s thousand selfies with her super deep captions and come up with all kinds of “signs” that she’s leaving as well.

Oh that was the best!  However, that fandom in general has been reading “coded” messages that their fanon ship would be “endgame” for years, I suppose it’s not a leap for them to read coded messages sent from actors to networks in random photos. 

Delusional.

And yes a behavioral psychologist could have a field day going through Lana’s feed. Narcissism anyone…

Anonymous said:I stopped reading the Jen hater post when she said Jen would refuse to do any interview with an smaller outlets. We saw her giving interviews to podcasts, youtubers, small websites. So when you detect something you know is a lie, the rest doesn’t even matter.

Exactly! Totally inaccurate. There are so many instances of that. “My sources say” well your sources (voices in her head) assertions are demonstrably false, so WTF are you even talking about?

Anonymous said So is it possible for a certain news person to come up with a load of crap, like pages and pages of bullshit (like that would take a really dumb long time to bullshit up) because they hate a certain actress/character. If so then I 👏👏👏 their dedication to their craft.

I’s astounding. I wonder if there is a Pulitzer Prize for Fandom Dumbfuckery?

Anonymous said:So the troll believes us Colin fans should be worried about the casting of Andrew as a possible regular next season if Colin stays… according to the trolls logic Andrew being a new pretty white face will be the new writers fav so no time for Colin… Lol I just can’t.. how can her followers still believe her crap

Simple, because they want to believe it.  They’ve lost everything.  So they cling to preposterous anti rhetoric that tries to spin everything that happens as bad for CS fans, CS, Hook, Emma, Jen and Colin.

It’s simple.

However, if anyone can’t see through every word and  buys the nonsense hook, line and sinker, then they are a total fucking moron.

Anonymous said:I think I know who that  troll you’ve mentioned is and wow! I read some of their posts and they are so stupid. Apparently JMo’s random innocent Instagram posts are some sort of message to the network! And every single thing Jen does is directly or indirectly meant to pressure the network! Are there people who actually believe this person? Because wow that’s dumb even for a S Qer.

Yep. It also shows how she doesn’t get JMo and doesn’t get how low-profile OUAT is in the “industry.”  Like I said in a previous post, her fatal flaw is she projects her own pompous, pedantic, pretentious, over-investment on to her “sources” and the “industry.”

To hilarious and scary results. 

Anonymous said:Could the troll make it any more obvious that she’s making everything up? I don’t think so.

No. She might as well asterisk everything with “this is total BS and wishful thinking”

Anonymous said:I think the relatively low amount of notes on that “industry sources” post is indicative of how far out of favor the troll has fallen. She’s been off the deep end since 5a, and doubled down on her “efforts” since the engagement ring showed up on Emma’s finger. I think the anti Jmo angle she’s been working for the last week damaged that posts impact; everyone knows she’s just got an axe to grind. I don’t think as many people believe what she says anymore. People don’t trust her.

No one should trust her. They shouldn’t trust what she says publicly and they sure as hell shouldn’t trust what she says privately.  However, at this point if anyone doesn’t have her number… boy I don’t know.

Anonymous said:Oh, is the troll scrambling to save face now that all her assertions that JMO quit appear to be bunk? What is her problem with JMo anyway? She’s been ragging on her for like 3 days now.

JMo doesn’t pander or cater to her sex fantasies by posting selfie’s with Lana so she must be stopped!!!!!! 

Anonymous said:I think my favorite part was when she added a point about Lana having auditioned for some pilots. But apparently turned down offers or something? She knew this back in January but didn’t think it was worth mentioning. Does she have a bingo game set up and whatever it lands on, that’s what those insider (voices in her head) sources tell her to say? Does anyone actually still believe her? I’m almost more concerned for the mental health of those people.

I find it hilarious that anyone believes that Lana was getting her door beaten down during pilot season.  If you believe that I have some beautiful ocean-side property to sell you in Kansas…

Anonymous said: What is the troll’s beef against JMo anyway? Isn’t she the same one who made up those rumors about Sean?

Yup, said troll was ground zero for the false allegations against Sean. 

Anonymous said:Here’s my question about that troll and others like her. There’s actually another fandom I’m in that has a vicious troll spouting off very stupid and even dangerous “insider info” that their followers eat up and take it as gospel. Are these trolls that give out all this bull making it up themselves, or do they actually have someone feeding them this info and they truly believe it is real? I can never tell if they believe it, or just enjoy the lies, attention, and drama they are able to cause.

In this case, I believe this one is making it all up, or with a small cadre of friends. She’s not being fed a line of bull by someone, her track record of lies is too long and deep.  I can’t speak to your other fandom, I guess it depends on how gullible the person seems to you. Because it is common for someone to try and find a puppet to actually put the info out there. This troll tried that with the Sean rumors, under the guise of fandom unity, making friends with CSers, O Qers, R Bers and trying to get them to spread it for her. 

Also this is not unique to OUAT fandom.  It’s happened since the dawn of fandom. People trolling, people pretending to know more than they do. etc. @counttotwenty and I had quite a cabal of false-info and false-spoiler trolls to deal with back in our West Wing fandom days. 

Don’t believe them and don’t believe this troll either.  

[bhadpodcast]

TW Ep 6.07

Okay, here we go!

The beginning was actually pretty interesting. Because it was just Theo, lol. He was hallucinating his sister ripping his heart out over and over. It was gross and kind of heart-wrenching (sorry!). He had actual tears in his eyes as he told his sister it was okay she could kill him as many times as she wanted. 

Then YIKES it turned into Malia, well, being Malia, and trying to kill him while he was out of it, with the rest of the Scooby gang standing around watching [StickyNote: So  Malia attacked someone who was incompacitated? That doesn’t sound like her at all! /intensesarcasm]. Then the One True Leader decides to finally step in and stop her from mauling Theo.

Scoot says put him back in the ground [StickyNote: So all the other villains are worth saving and rehabbing, but not the ones who actually one-upped Scott?  You guys, this world DESERVES him!] , Scrappy Doo, I mean Liam, says no way, Satomi [StickyNote: omg PLEASE let him have said Satomi and not Noshiko, lol!]  gave me the sword not you, yadda yadda yadda, who cares. (2.0 don’t listen to Scott at ALL!) Liam insists Theo is of us because he remembers Stiles and the Dread Doctors knew about the Wild Hunt, which does not follow that Theo knows as well, but whatever.  Coyote Ugly pipes up that she remembers Stiles too! [StickyNote: Specifically what he  looks like sleeping.]  And so does Scott and Lydia, so there! Do what she says or else, basically.

It went from being vaguely interesting to dead boring with a flash of Malia’s skanky claws.

Scott starts spouting things that one of the writers got off the fan pages about how can they trust Theo, because when they did before look what happened! Liam points out Scott made mistakes as the Alpha (bless him) and Scott agrees, but still wants his own way, blah blah blah. Typical TW writer recycled bs or appropriated from fan pages, so we’ve heard all that already or thought of it ourselves. Never and original thought with that crew!

Cut to the Stlinski home. Sheriff goes into the room and Dead Claudia pops up out of nowhere and tells him to come out (she noticeably doesn’t go inside) and tries to tell him he’s being cray to suppose they had a son and why don’t they just pretend the room’s not there.  [StickyNote: Also, HOW DID THEY NOT NOTICE THIS ROOM!?  IT HAS WINDOWS!!  WHAT DID THEY THINK WHEN THEY WERE OUTSIDE?!?]

We all saw the bit about Theo being walked like a dog, the stupid dialog that went with it. (At this point I noticed everyone keeps saying ‘ride the lightning’ like it means something. It probably means nothing at all because it’s TW!) Theo cannot believe how stupid they are. It was complete filler. Cody looked good, but that’s about it.  

They hook up with the rest of the McCall Fail Pack and find another secret lair in the woods which happens to have a huge ass transformer in it. They spout some bad science about how they’ll be able to trap a Ghost Rider behind a chain-link cage and some mountain ash. (We need a Hale eyeroll gift, istg.)

They should all be dead. Except Theo, who can still not believe how stuipd they are.

So then we go on to Melissa and Malia abusing Peter in the hospital even though Melissa said he was burned over 90% of his body and Malia should probably say her goobyes. Malia wants him dead, of course. Malia wants everybody dead so big surprise, but she agrees that if he helps them get back to the train station she…won’t try to make him fully dead? Her part of that deal was not clear. Again, big surprise.

Melissa said he always has a devious plan to hurt everyone around him. NOT TRUE!! He always has a devious plan to benefit Peter Hale, hurting *select* individuals around him is a side bonus!

Melissa injecta him with the SEVEN HERBS, which I guess is the magical cure all now, and Peter has a very painful recovery with the the health care professional and his daughter just standing there watching him scream with their souless eyes.  [StickyNote: So... mistletoe, poinsetta, mountain ash, wolfsbane, bleach, garlic and chocolate?]

Now we have Lydia was laying on the bed (making her boob job very noticeable) and Natalie comes in to talk. Lyida tells her about the woman in Cannan (I don't think she told her the woman was a banshee) and puts out her theory that the woman 'conjured’ her son to fill the VOID (void kept being oddly stressed, like VOID STILES, GET IT? GET IT?!!) Oddly enough, this is almost the Natalie I remember from the old days and I liked this scene.

Now comes the major stupidity - True Alpha Pack and the GR.

Scott is the worst. He lets Theo get hurt so he can steal the GR’s gun. Send Mason and his Boo (the two most vulnerable) with Baby Selena out into the woods and the storm where the other non-captured GR’s are, then Alpha roars at the GR in the cage like that was supposed to do something, which because this is TW, it did! *eyeroll* The GR sort of takes notice of Scott, which of course his crew mentions, “It must be because you’re the Alpha!” because god forbid we should forget that important point.

Sheriff has called Lydia over about the room. Said it was on the blueprints, it was there when they moved in 18 years ago, and how could they have forgotten it.  Lydia starts seeing stiles stuff in the room, which is not in the right place because it ain’t their house! (They start with the bed of course, throwing the stydia’s a bone. Ugh.)

Sheriff says, “I don’t understand how you knew this was here. If you want to discuss the possibility that I had a son, I’m listening.” I got some eye moisture at that line, Linden gave Stilinski Family Feels again. Then they ruin the emotional build up they had going but cutting back to the Idiot Squad. *sigh*

Mason apparently has special Boo-Vision where he can see Cory when no one else can because of light refraction and possibly pheremones, lol. It was adorable. They so in love. 

Then they ruin that special moment with Mason spouting some TW leap of logic about how the Ghost Rider must have been trying to talk to Parrish at the party because he was a Hellhound! Whu? They pulled that out of their ass, and poor Khylin could not pull that off.

And we’re back to Lydia and the Sheriff, where he is now starting to not believe her because that would mean that Claudia is not real, that he 'conjured’ her up, which makes sense because she was his biggest loss. Except now it’s Stiles, and he replaced Stiles in his mind with the dead wife who they both loved.  [StickyNote: But wasn’t the kid last week a trade off from the GR’s?  Does Lydia know that? Why are they going with this “made up a physical person” thing?]

Then Lydia sees his jersey and helmet, and squeezes out that tear when she picks it up and smells it, but the Sheriff doesn’t see it and tells her she cray. She tells him he’s afraid to remember because he loved stiles. Then she threw the jersey at him (in slow-mo of course) and he caught it and now knows Stiles is real. (I got wet eyes again. STLINISKIS COME BACK TO ME!! I will fight everyone about my Stilinski Family Feels!)

[StickyNote: Wait, she  remembers the  Jersey so it comes back, but it takes the sheriff touching it for it to be real? What?  Oh man this is gonna be stupid.]

The 2.0 dumb asses bring Parrish to the GR, who immediately fixates on him, which is so not a good idea, but you know, dumb asses! They ask Parrish to ask the GR how to get everyone back. Like, seriously McCall Pack? He’s going to tell you?

Peter and Malia go into the preserve, which is Hale property, [StickyNote: Didn’t they put up condos? ] which they seem to have forgotten because they show their 'preserve closed’ sign, and Malia is stupid and says that bs about Stiles being her anchor. Peter tries to apply actual logic, but Malia don’t understand that shit and ignores him.

Back to Idiot Pack, trying to question the GR. The GR is all, we don’t give nothing back! Losers! Then Scott speech-ifies in a Hero Moment about how *he* will get everyone back from them and won’t stop until he does. GR retaliates by activating Parrish, lol!

Back to Peter and Malia, blah blah blah, then Peter hears the GRs and tells her to run. Also 2.0 pack is in the woods for whatever reason. Scott and Liam wrestle Parrish to the ground outside because they suddenly have that ability and to hell with season 5!  Nazi Werewolf shows up (Hauptman!) out of nowhere and he and Theo exchange stupid dialog with Theo going, 'Are you going to tell them who you are?; and NWW basically saying STFU, Theo. Theo has also been left alone with the GR because of dramatic plot reasons! NWW hurts Theo (sticks his claws in Theo’s back and hauls him around like that, poor baby!) to make him break the mountain ash. NWW implies that he’s met the GR before and then kills him! Which, WTF?! He bites GRs brain and eats the gland and steals the GR’s whip. Parrish runs off into the woods in his fireproof Under Armor, and the GR that was about to reclaim Peter also goes WTF?! when he feels his brother GR die and gallops off, leaving Peter still on this side of gateway.

The McCall brain trust immediately blame Theo for the dead GR, but backtrack when they sort of apply logic (it takes all of them to puzzle it out), then crazy NWW either kills poor Cory or sends him to the UpsideDown.

The End.

I thought you needed all this because I’m sure a lot of this mess has to do with Will’s epic episode next week! UGH!!!

Thank you for your service, boo!