#like with the other songs i dont really go for the 2019 version? but with skimble im all about the 2019 movie

[skimblestrap]

really says something about the Power of skimbleshanks when his song in the 2019 movie is actually like. really stellar and great and amazing.

[okifyouinsist]

tagged by @killerandhealerqueen (i just keep forgetting abt this one SIGH but i have free time rn and im committed)

1. why did you choose your url?

growing up, i just wasn't a social media girl purely bc of the fact that my parents were super strict and I assumed they wouldn't allow me to have it and I just never really saw the appeal anyways. Then later a few friends basically forced me to make my first account and because i wasn't very creative and thought i was the funniest bitch ever i made my first user 'ifyouinsist' and it just kinda stuck ig

2. any sideblogs? if you have them name them and why you have them.

nope. i fear if i had a sideblog id end up neglecting it and forget abt it or make it my new main blog and neglect this blog and this blog is literally my baby

3. how long have you been on tumblr?

well i've had an account since like end of 2019, beginning of 2020???? (im pretty sure) i didnt like use my account tho i just had it to look at other ppls blogs not my own, i only acc recently made up my blog up properly and started posting this year when it was like 2 am and i was on holiday to visit my home country and my mum and my aunts were gossiping and i was like whatever who tf cares how late i am to a fandom and the rest was history

4. do you have a queue tag?

nope, my drafts are a terrifying place and if they ever saw light id die

5. why did you start your blog in the first place?

to reblog pretty art and to compliment writers on ao3 AND on tumblr bc they deserve everything and more

6. why did you choose your icon/pfp?

logan sargeant. need i say any more???? hes my bsf in spirit

7. why did you choose your header?

loscar. LOSCAR. loscar. i am very much totally normal abt them i swear (lying through my teeth rn). they're just my everything unfortunately and sometimes i like to say the fist bump is their version of intertwining their fingers together

8. what’s your post with the most notes?

ik this bc it was the first i myself made and it was abt loscar obviously and i thought i was SO funny (im not) and its lowk still such a flop post but its MY flop post so here it is :)

9. how many mutuals do you have?

idk man im shy (scared of rejection) so i dont have a lot, like genuinely let me go see acc, oh ig its me and my 14 moots against the world i love you guys fr

10. how many followers do you have?

BYE my 26 followers are my 4 lifers fr (im such a flop this is hilarious)

11. how many people do you follow?

37 (sigh need to follow more ppl RN)

12. have you ever made a shitpost?

im gonna be so real idk what defines as a shit post but most probably yeah

13. how often do you use tumblr each day?

idk im acc really inconsistent like ill be MIA for 2 whole days and the next week ill be on tumblr like for most of my day when i can its very confusing like today ive not been on it a lot im academically locking in and all that

14. did you have a fight/argument with another blog once?

ummm no. like. if i see someone i follow getting hate ill send them a supportive ask and then at the end of it be like anon ur such a loser get a life but other than that. nope.

15. how do you feel about ‘you need to reblog this’ posts?

im very much neutral abt them, like idc if i need to reblog it yk if i want to i will if i dont then i wont

16. do you like tag games?

YES (said in a very normal voice)

17. do you like ask games

YES. i love getting asks id cry if someone sent an ask (i have one rotting away from a moot rn i WILL answer it i swear)

18. which of your mutuals do you think is tumblr famous?

can i say all my moots. i wanna say all my moots they're all famous in my eyes guys, i start tagging its gonna end with all my moots being tagged but like @killerandhealerqueen and @dwarvenchords were the first 2 ppl to come to my mind theyre both just the coolest fr

19. do you have a crush on a mutual?

nah. i have FRIEND crushes on literally all of them tho. wanna be their friends SO bad

20. what is the last song you listened to?

Mamichula- Bizarrap

21. what are you currently watching?

in my docuseries era rn watching breakpoint (STILL)(i only have time on the weekends rn SIGH)

22. sweet/ savoury/ spicy?

sweet. im such a 'lets skip the dinner and just get dessert' kinda girl

23. what is your current relationship status?

this is SUCH a complicated question to answer but heavily leaning more towards single

24. what is your current obsession?

sports. like just sports in general. like ive always been a casual fan of sports but i never used to take a deep dive into it but this year i decided to dive, and i dived VERY deep, so like motorsports, tennis, football, cricket, trying to get into hocky rn im collecting them atp. also. documentaries. like when i get time ill be binge watching like 5 documentaries i just love them sm

25. what are nine albums/ songs you've been listening to lately?

wish i could tell you fr, i mean, rn im re listening to SOUR by Olivia Rodriguez AGAIN bc thats the way my life is going SIGH, Olivia is my favourite basic artist fr, nothing compares to listening to SOUR for the first time in 2021

ANYWAYS, thanks again for the tag i really appreciate it, im gonna tag @ezisregrettinglifedecisions @fabeong @whatssthepooiintt

[what-if-nct]

hiiii today's reminder is can we talk about Sabrina carpenter because like i don't go here i didn't even know she existed until feather exploded last year and even now i only know the hits but i CANNOT get "that's that me espresso" out of my head for the life of me

Hiii, yes i heard nonsense like two years ago and i have been obsessed with that little blonde lady ever since. Taylor was talking about putting narcotics in her songs which i wanna talk about miss swift later. But Miss Carpenter also puts some kind of drugs in her songs cause i cant stop listening to espresso. i listened to it like four times in a row while i was blow drying my hair. My hair came out so cute too. i also added little pink bows to it. there is magic in that song, i knew the lyrics after three listens. I randomly say my honey bee come and get this pollen. Im really trying to refrain cause i don't wanna get tired of it but its just so good. And shes so cute and shes my fashion inspo. I just love her.

Now to Taylor another one i can't get out of my mind also everything she does is so kpop coded hear me out cause one she releases albums in multiple different versions, shes been releasing so much music since 2019, she now has given us photocards which im putting my Taylor and Jisung photocards beside each other in my photocard album. So mother and son can be together. But people who dont get it are critizing it. And everything taylor does is for the obsessive fans, the mentally unwell girls, the girls who spent half of their 20s being in an off and on situationship with a little rat boy who couldn't care less about her and has absolutely lost their mind over him. People were saying they wanted the album to give English department but its giving psych ward honey those are the same thing. Also as someone who has been to the psychward three times i appreciate this album and im hoping for a Sabrina album by summer.

[real-reulbbr-band]

the queen herself, victoria (character ask)

Oh, the most wonderful girl thank you!!

Why I like them

Her solos are some of the most mesmerizing parts of the show for me, and I would love to see them live. There's just this softness and grace about her that's very comforting.

Why I don’t

The entire 2019 Mr. Mistoffelees number was unbearably cringy for me as much as I like the film but particularly when she started singing. It was giving disney zombies....

Favorite episode (scene if movie)

I have three.

One of my first favorite scene is actually from Warsaw where she's dancing with the stars. It really goes back to her connection to the moon that nobody else seems to have.

Alternatively, I love this scene where Jemima wants to approach Grizabella and brings Victoria along with her, and Victoria hesitantly looks back but decides to go along with Jem. They both scatter off when Jenny forbids them from touching Grizabella but I love how it nods back to how they're two half's of a hole.

And of course, one of the softest parts in the show for me and in my opinion one of Victoria's best moments.

Favorite season/movie

I Like Victoria in all versions of cats' media!! even when she's less prominent like in shiki. But for favorites I'll say standard version, 2019 film and broadway revival.

Favorite line

We're doing 2019 for this since Victoria doesn't have any solo lines.

"But at least you have beautiful ghosts."

I know a lot of people don't like this song and the criticisms for it and Victoria's character are fair, but I do think this sort of naive condescend-Iness works as a flaw for her. She doesn't mean harm, she want's to cheer up Grizabella and show that they're similar but ends up making Grizabella still feel isolated just like the jellicles.

Favorite outfit

I've grown to like the white / gold Victoria costume quite a bit but here's some designs I'm fond of:

OTP

Ah, ok so I've been convinced a little but don't be mad please. 2019 verse and standard stage verse is with Rumpleteazer but revival verse is with Plato. I don't why or how that happened either but yea I hope that makes sense.

Brotp

Mistoffelees recently, but mostly with Jemima. Again, two halves of a whole.

Head Canon

She worries a lot about injuries since she's aware about how delicate bones are and how a significant injury could hinder her dancing. So, she tends to watch her surroundings and positing more carefully than others.

Unpopular opinion

Hypothetically, I wouldn't mind if more non-reps went the warsaw/shiki route and didn't have Vitoria do a pas de deux but instead had a different solo involving the stars/moon.

A wish

More non-replica's to go all out with her design. Really emphasize the ballerina part of her look.

An oh-god-please-dont-ever-happen

probably losing her connection to the Jellicle moon, if she can't feel it at all she'll probably panic and assume something's wrong. If you want to look at it from a monochromatic sibling's angle, then she would've lost the one thing that made her "special" in comparison to her brother.

6 words to best describe them

HER WORDS they're perfect

Innocent, Romantic, Unselfconscious, Young, Inhibited, Inquisitive

My nickname for them

Again, I don't use character nicknames. But Vic<3

[olberic]

games ive played in 2022, ranked from least to most favourite:

11: hollow knight (2017)

(i cant find a good gif for this one sorry 🥺)

i tried so hard to like this game. i should like it. its got bugs. its got atmosphere. its got worldbuilding and multiple endings. but god i hate platformers. i hate metroidvanias. this was painful to play and i will not be playing any more.

10: project diva future tone (ps4) (2017)

its a rhythm game so it really cant go any higher. i like it more than megamix (plus using the playstation is better than the switch i think) but yknow. i cant say its got great characters or story yknow? but the songs are good and its fun

9: final fantasy x (2001, switch remaster 2019)

i wish i liked this game more… its good but so watery. such old graphics. idk i just couldnt get into it even if the ending was really good

8. tales of phantasia (1995, gba version 2006)

very surprised at how well it holds up. its a tales game so it ranks higher than it probably should for me, but the characters are fun, the gameplay is fun, and its the first game in the series, so its iconic as hell. the old graphics and lacklustre combat knocked it down a few points (as did the goddamn mines…) but the enjoyment i got from it won out. good game. i played the gba version

7. splatoon 3 (2022)

sorry for not playing the other splatoon games this shit is FUN. salmon run is so good, yall. i put more hours into salmon run alone than most other games ive ever played. stream deep cut

6. ys viii (2017)

im actually still playing this one but MAN is it enjoyable. killer soundtrack. cool time mechanics. challenging combat. nice well rounded cast of npcs (and theres like 20+ regular ones!). makes me wanna try the rest of the series. even tho im kinda peeved that theres like no content for this game here but WHATEVER its good. play ys viii.

5. pokemon scarlet (2022)

yes it had bugs & ur correct to say i shouldnt have bought it. but theyve really perfected pokemon games with this one. open world is the way pokemon is meant to be played. the new pokemon are really good designs. the story was actually riveting at the end, the rivals are up there with sun and sword for how well done they are, koraidon’s one of my new faves, and holy god the soundtrack is good. the literal only thing that would improve it would be if it had a bigger dex and wasnt made in such a rush. i wish this game had come out next year or the year after bc then itd be perfect.

4. triangle strategy (2022)

this is the first strategy game in the genre that ive played, and i enjoyed it! i played it 3 times in a row to get all the endings + ramping up the difficulty made it such a good challenge. npcs couldve been a bit better developed, and the roland/benedict endings were bad to play, but the overall enjoyment of the gameplay and different paths puts it so high to the top.

3. pokemon legends arceus (2022)

i know i said scarlet perfected the series but whatever. ive always preferred catching to battling and arceus did a better job of that. between that and the way your character could actually get involved in things its probably my fave pokemon game ever ehehe 😅

2. tales of arise (2021)

i dont care what anyone says this was a REALLY good entry to the series. i liked the story and the twists. i loved the characters. combat was excellent (law main ↖️) and exploration was more fun than other tales games. might not be my favourite tales game but its better than (almost) everything else from this year!

1. tales of the abyss (2005, 3ds version 2012)

I LOVE THIS GAME. IF YOU HAVENT PLAYED THIS GAME YOUR LIFE WILL BE IMPROVED BY PLAYING THIS GAME. its about identity and tragedy and legacy and remembering the past and respecting the present and growing to care for yourself and your loved ones. its about herding rappigs and falling out of landships and going WHY ARE YOU ME. IM ME. it made me cry. its one of the best tales combat systems. why are you still reading this go play tales of the abyss.

[mindisinmars]

Who's your fave in dear evan hansen and why?

HIII THANK YOU FOR THE ASK OMG !!!

i dont know if you mean character or actor so ill answer both!! Actor wise, im tied between Andre Barth Feldman (Evan Hansen on Broadway 2019-2020) and Sam Tutty (Evan Hansen on Westend (2019-2022)

Andrew Barth Feldman because he was SIXTEEN when he got the role which is so crazy impressive to me, and because i just love the way he acts. Hes very expressive in both his expressions (obviously) and his voice (see: his cover of Michael in the Bathroom from bmc) He also starred in a movie with Jennifer Lawrence instead of going to Harvard which is just so iconic to me. Overall he is SUUUUCH an inspiration to me, hes only 21 and has done so much.

Sam Tutty because i just am so inlove with the way he sings, specifically that one version of Words Fail where he like "growls" the lines? "Before i lead with the worst of me." I dont even know how to write it out, but i loooove the way he sings that entire song. And the whole musical, really. He is also in the musical Two Strangers (Carry a Cake Across New York) which has been so high on my musical listens this past month its insane

Character wise, though, is predictable to say Connor Murphy? I really enjoy the whole depressed teenage boy characters i have to say. Specifically in the book though when we get his point of view it really solidifies how much i love him though. I think he's more fleshed out than some of the other characters we see (which makes sense, we only really see Evan and Zoe). But I do also love Evans mom. I think shes just great and did everything she could for him, even if it wasn't much/enough for him.

sorry this is so long! this probably isn't what you were asking for i just love talking about Dear Evan Hansen so much <3

[youngshiney]

how i would run sm: Red Velvet edition

back to the series with the next logical group, Red Velvet. sm's first group after Exo and my ult girl group, similarly under a cut as per last post

triple debut (2014-2015): so to start, i actually dont mind Happiness as RV's debut and that its ot4. Yeri was really young, so i wouldnt really change those first two eras (Be Natural is my beloved but its a single and a remake so it doesnt count as their first cb in my eyes). what i would change is the schedules and some promo.

firstly, like Exo i think RV would have benefited from some sort of webtoon or lore comic starting at the second debut for ICC bc thats when we start to get hints that something in Cake Land isnt right. i have a lot of thoughts on RV lore/storyline which we will cover in the upcoming kwangya post (after nct and aespa posts bc they are integral to my version of kwangya).

second, Seulgi should have solo debuted in 2015 between Dumb Dumb and the lesbian christmas song (Wish Tree was iconic and we love Lee Jooyoung). shes been RV's ace since pre-debut, everyone knew and loved her and acknowledged her talents, and she was in multiple mvs of her sunbaes (Henry's Fantastic was the best). Seulgi being the first solo RV member feels right in every way, and while it would be very different than what we got for 28 Reasons, i think that might be partially a good thing.

the start of the success era (2016-2017): Russian Roulette was perfect and i have nothing to say about it. The only thing I would have done differently for them in 2016 was pushed for more solo/unit content, like station songs, vlogs, arts and crafts vids? like just stuff where theyre having fun and hanging out with no pressure. the main 2017 change tho is Joy solo debut. sm is so fucking stupid for NOT capitalizing on the attention Joy got from The Liar and His Lover, a show all about how perfect and amazing she is as a singer! like have her prepare and record between Red Flavor and Peek a Boo and have Peek a Boo pushed back a week or two. the concerts were a good idea, but they really should have capitalized on Joy's performance more. im still annoyed she hasnt properly debuted especially bc clips of her singing from TLAHL was what made me look into RV in the first place and why Joy is my girl ult of ults

Bad Boy (2018): id push Bad Boy back a little bc the time between PaB and BB feels too short, especially going by my plan. other than that, no major notes since the eras were pretty good and the concerts were a good idea. maybe a bit more of a rest after RBB bc of the short turn around time between that and the Japan cb + NA tour

ReVe Fest pt.1 (2019): the Ellie Goulding collab was amazing. ReVe Fest day 1 was a mess, and i say that as a Zimzalabim supporter. the styling was horrific and it all needs to go, the mv should have been more circusy and less performance vid imo, and the song is fine but maybe a less chanty chorus? ReVe Fest day 2 was good and idk why people hate Umpah Umpah bc it was cute and summery like it should have been. and then the Finale, Psycho was one of the best eras taken from us too quickly. i mean the only thing to change is to stop wendy from falling bc that killed the whole momentum and their careers for a hot minute.

the hiatus (2020): now to be clear, i am not blaming wendy for her injury or suggesting she should have come back early. its good she rested and healed properly and came back slowly to make sure everything was okay. every idol should do that. that being said, we should have gotten an ot4 album even if it was just a mini. the girls basically did nothing for a whole year waiting for her and it really did hurt them/their momentum. they should have had more solo content through the year alongside the like two group things, then Seulrene debut in june like originally planned, and then and ot4 album in fall or winter.

back on track? (2021): ot5 being at smtown was great and got everyone hyped to see the group after a full year of hiatus and they teased a cb at the performance. and then wendy killed the hype by doing her solo debut 4 months later with a ballady slow song. and she had the audacity to be like "omg i feel so bad for making everyone wait and then doing a solo" like girl wtf?? anyway gripes about her aside. Queendom was cute, but it felt lackluster after the long wait and felt more like a b-side than a title. also the mv/concepts teased all this magic and powers and a whole universe only to give us literally nothing after the first minute. why were they in a post office when the teasers were about the antique shop?? i would have changed the mv a lot to either expand on the magic or fit the teasers better.

ReVe Fest pt.2 (2022): sm cancelled the concert (rightly) bc the girls got covid but then never rescheduled bc there were "no venues open" even tho the same thing happened to dream and they got rescheduled in like two weeks so what the fuck is that about? um anyway they should have done a concert after Feel My Rhythm but also not named it ReVe Fest bc theres no point and they arent connected. ALSO FMR was beautiful and all but what happened to the ballet concept which wasnt in the mv and why did they not expand on the weird half story with Dark Queen Seulgi and the garden etc? also also FMR felt like a b-side too which was disappointing especially after queendom. and im skipping ahead to birthday bc that was actually the biggest let down of the year. the concept/teaser photos had literally nothing to do with the mv or song, the song itself was easily their worst title and did not sound good in any way, the mv styling wasnt great for pretty much everyone, the cake ver selling out before preorders even ended and before they showed us what it was/what was in it was super annoying. birthday is the biggest let down era imo and ESPECIALLY after the beauty of Wildside. Wildside was the only release in 2022 for RV that i actually 100% enjoyed from the style to the mv to the song to the plot in the mv. like it was perfect and exactly what we should have gotten as a Korean title and era. i would have absolutely done something similar for birthday, especially with the grunge outfits/concept

future plans/ideas: Yeri and Irene solo debuts, Seulrene cb, Joy actual debut this time, more solo schedules especially for the actresses, more Yeri vlogs, Seulgi cb with a better song, my highly indulgent KaiJoyYuta trio, an even more indulgent trio of Seulgi/BoA/Yunho, i think thats all i have off the top of my head.

next week nct u and the way nct overall would function before we get into the actual units

[yeetthedragon]

>:)

- the 1975: i guess they’re electronic pop but they have songs of different genres. they’re my favorite band :)

- 4TH WALL by ruel: his latest album, i love it so much. my favorite songs from it are I DONT WANNA BE LIKE YOU, SET YOURSELF ON FIRE, MUST BE NICE, and END SCENE but honestly the whole album is so so good. ruel just has really good songs, i also like younger and face to face, and his remix of golden hour. i like that song better than the original. trust me, it is better than the original

- chloe moriondo is a great artist, i really like her style

- i’ve been getting into lizzie mcalpine too, specifically erase me feat jacob collier, give me a minute, and doomsday

- ribs by the crane wives: ugh i found this song recently and fell in love. it has such a hadestown vibe, and hadestown is my favorite musical. great song, good band

- declan mckenna: specifically rapture (great song to blast through headphones), brazil, make me your queen, and in blue (fucking banger i love this song)

- sleeping at last: does good covers, i like you wouldn’t like me, looking at the world from the bottom of a well, and saturn

- vincent by don mclean: one of the songs i can repeat forever. love it

- briston maroney: YES YES how could i forget about him. freaking out on the interstate, rose, under my skin, and fool’s gold are my favorites

- alec benjamin: saw him in concert with a friend almost a year ago, it was honestly surreal because no band or artist i listen to ever tours in my city so to have one of my all-time favorite artists come to my hometown was a night to remember. too many of his songs i love to list, just go listen to him. one i highly recommend is paper crown, specifically the youtube version from 2015. i was addicted to this song when i was younger

- state champs: a band i liked a lot my freshman year of high school. their cover of real world is great, better than the original in my opinion. losing myself, all you are is history, secrets, and our time to go we’re favorites of mine back in 2019

- goodnight moon by go radio: another of my all time favorites. also great to blast through headphones. my brother doesn’t like this song for some reason. probably because i play it too often idk

- I DONT KNOW HOW BUT THEY FOUND ME: great band love them 100%. clusterhug is an all-time favorite and i wish i could belt that final high note. it’s really not that high but i can’t belt. oh also razzmatazz. banger

- this too shall pass by danny schmidt: found this song from the welcome to nightvale podcast. good song

- in bloom by neck deep: love it love it love it

- call you up by viola beach: great for driving late at night

- i’m this close to just dropping my spotify

- jackie onassis by sammy rae and friends: literally in love with her voice please

- cherophobe by the royston club: another favorite :)

- i know that he loves me by autoheart: such a good vibes song

- acolyte by slaughter beach, dog: good for sunny days

- holy by PVRIS: vibes i love it. overall great band

- malibu 1992: something about it gives october vibes. also i have an october-themed playlist that i love

- persephone by the tragic thrills: gives off the vibe of like a dark green, i love it

- out of time by the weekend: i don’t wanna say it sounds ethereal, maybe other-worldly is a good word? idk i like this song a lot

if i keep going i will be typing forever so i’m cutting it off here. i already have way too many suggestions, and this was just from one playlist. granted it’s a playlist compiled from three years of my on repeat playlist that spotify puts together so. if people are interested i’ll drop the spotify and we can be spotify moots :D but yeah there’s that for now

i wanna branch out in my music taste so if you guys want you can start a chain of songs/artists/albums you recommended and we can call listen to new music yk <3

[mstrchu]

Ok so do you know the White Horse the Tang Sanzang ride on from Journey to the West? He's exactly called The White Dragon Horse (hope I got that right). Why is there the word "Dragon" in the title?

Well that's because his true title and real name are the West Sea Third Prince Ao Lie, yes he's Ao Bing's Cousin,yes he's a dragon prince of the sea royal family and he can transform into a horse apparently

This is uncertain due to many versions but yeah that's the gist of it

Also Ao Lie is literally the White Horse Prince OMG-

I wonder if we would see him in New Gods Nezha Reborn though

Another thing: Wonder how the rest of the sea dragon family in the last three directions thought about East Sea Dragon King being this evil CEO guy lol. That man has many versions and in Nezha Reborn, he's the worst I've seen so far

pre-emptive apologies for this rambling ☠️ i sincerely hope i dont come off as like. utterly insufferable

i know of ao lie! honestly props to him for being so cool about being a horse 95% of the time because if i went from being a dragon to being an animal that couldn't lie on its side for more than like 45 minutes without suffocating i would not have handled it as graciously as he did. also if we had a nickel for every time a dragon king's third prince that's commonly depicted as a white/silver dragon befell some disaster or disgrace we would have 2 nickels. which isn't a lot but it's weird that it happened twice..

i'm also not sure if the dragon kings are brothers in the regular sense or just brothers in the way that they all sort of belong to the same.. clan (? for a lack of a better word) but it is funny to think of ao lie and ao bing as cousins svdsjkndv especially since ao bing would have died before the events of jttw but in more recent adaptations if ao bing survived (a la 2019) or came back (a la 2021) i think it would open a door of very funny possibilities.. i think i've read a few nzr fics where it's kind of a touchy subject for ao bing bc ao run will not stop bragging about his son at family gatherings ☠️

unless he pulled a sun wukong, i don't think we'll be seeing ao lie in new gods :( but i would love to be wrong..

(on a side note, if they're going to be featuring more people from fsyy, i would love to see their take on huang tianhua, leizhen zi, ji fa, and jiang ziya ;-;)

based on ao guang's menacing monologue to ao bing (lol) the dragon kings seem to have a somewhat tense relationship with a lot of past baggage, but it's not so bad that they didn't put it aside to help ao guang get revenge on nezha 3000 years ago ovo i've also been assuming that the other 3 families mentioned in nezha reborn (li/shun/song) belong to the other 3 dragon kings, and if so then ao bing and the yecha's comments about them when they first appear makes it sound like they've all got a really intense rivalry going on about control over their cities which makes me think the other 3 ALSO have CEO mob boss vibes?! but they don't have the same resources or the iron-grip control that ao guang has, and so ao guang is still the Big Boss in the family.. so i guess i would say that their thoughts are that they wish they could do it like him!!

what i would also love to know is what ao jia and ao yi and/or other siblings have been doing this whole time or at least what the public thinks they've been doing?? ao bing is publicly acknowledged in "modern day" donghai as the san gongzi so.. there has to be at least 2 other older gongzis out there... maybe kasha knows what the goss is..

also ur so right. 1979 ao guang may have been eating children but 2021 ao guang invented capitalism which is way worse 😔

holy shit sorry circling back to ao lie again he's kind of funky isn't he!! i don't know jttw as well, only from like cultural/childhood stuff, but iirc he did turn back into his human and dragon forms a few times when he felt like he needed to, which kind of makes it seem like he could have done that at any time and he was just. choosing to be a horse. which is dalfkdnvlknva because i feel there were quite a few times in jttw where it would have been helpful for him to be a dragon and/or person instead of a horse. also the song about him slaps.

[spagheddiesquash]

okay actually im gonna go on a little ramble about the later half of the 2010s (2016-2019, commonly referred to as just 2016 if I remember correctly because everybody lumps the years together. not saying im not guilty of doing that too sometimes though!) alr so I actually really liked it back then??? though thats probably because I hardly had anyone to talk about Undertale with irl and I was just super happy that somewhere out there in the world there were people who wouldn’t think I was weird for liking that stuff 💀💀💀

anyway back then I was unto Undertale, cuphead, BATIM, baldi’s basics, ddlc, hello neighbor, you get the idea, but mostly UT. I also was really into gravity falls!! I would make gacha life stories all the time and id listen to those stronger than you Undertale things, which by the way I honestly think we should just call what it is, that being an Undertale song because imo it got made a lot more popular from Undertale parodies, but thats just from my perspective because I could never really get into SU lmao

this is what my phone looked like in I think 2019?? the last year in the era but it still says something about me back then. I had a dinky lil iPhone 6S I believe?? I remember getting it for Christmas I think. I also had an iPad mini for pretty much this whole era, but i dont think I have any good screenshots of the Home Screen.

(the reason I even have these us because I screen recorded myself playing Minecraft and also was getting receipts that I was being picked on relentlessly via Snapchat)

as you may have noticed, I had framecast! (I was UTforever67 if any other former framecast users find this) and I was on it frequently back then! I continued using it until the shutdown last year but less frequently. anyway, another sorta interesting thing I guess?? I used to use ÚwÙ and OwO unironically. As well as aua, eue, qwq, ;-;, UnU, OnO, :3, :P and just about any other sort of those emoticons you can think of, and id say stuff like “im a smol kawaii potato :3 dont touch mah cookies ÒwÓ”

another sorta interesting detail! so I had this 2DS, which I still have, I just need to buy a charger for.

and now, on this 2DS I had YouTube. I would plug my headphones in and watch some Undertale videos, top 10 videos (not like watchmojo, think trendcrave and planet Dolan), and the one that I think of the most looking back on this time; gravity falls amvs to edgy music.

the one I remember watching the most was to a song called my demons by a band called starset. I loved the song so much that I would plug in my headphones, make my 2DS screen face down on my bed so no light peeked out, and I would go to sleep to the amv. if you were to travel back in time to then and find me sleeping, chances are you’d very faintly hear that song playing.

sometimes I would also look for 10 hour versions of Undertale songs on YouTube and put them on my tv in my room. I would always wake up to the video still playing obviously, since I sleep for like seven hours, not ten. man, that was always fun waking up to a song like Undertale, home or quiet water. I would always watch Undertale as vines on that tv too, since I liked vines and Undertale and I always thought it was funny to see what vines people thought the characters were most like.

I know animation memes were a super big thing back then, and I remember making three of them: higher, wonderland and close up. besides that I didn’t watch too many of them actually, apart from the occasional compilation.

another thing that I talked about before like a year ago, there was a short period of time where all I listened to was Undertale music and royalty free music. yknow, like the stuff they play in YouTube outros. and I used to save as many monstercat albums as I could to piece together the lore (for those who dont know, there were 30 monstercat albums that had pictures on the covers that told a story of sorts. I only made full sense of the lore just a few weeks ago actually! Id be happy to explain if anyone wants). I loved the Undertale fan songs and lyric covers and remixes a lot! I would always sing the tokyovania control lyric cover whenever I was outside in my backyard. so cool that tokyovania is apparently a mashup of megalovania and Tokyo teddy bear. had no idea sharax was a vocaloid fan!

ok so that was kind of a lot I think. ramble over lmao. if anyone has questions about anything I mentioned ask away! I know a lot about everything I mentioned heheh 😅

[mu-qingfang-stan-account]

i have been having... A TIME... this week, but i am FINALLY on desktop which means i can answer this!!

relationship status: practicing cultivational purity <3 (aroace)

favorite colors: HASHTAG PURPLE LIFE

favorite food: a while back at work we were having a conversation over lunch about which food you'd pick if you could only eat one thing for the rest of your life, and it's gotta be burritos for me. (to elaborate: carnitas, black beans, spanish rice, fajita veggies, roasted-tomato salsa or salsa verde, and, if i'm feeling like some kind of decadent child king, guacamole.)

song stuck in your head: for the past few days i've been listening to The Rocky Road to Dublin on loop, so currently it's that. (other songs that have been stuck in my head recently: bellowhead's version of Roll the Woodpile Down, the high kings' Step It Out Mary, the trials of cato's Bedlam Boys, and anaïs mitchell's Willie's Lady. i'm going through a phase rn dont @ me)

last thing you googled: the actual last thing i googled was anaïs mitchell because i dont remember the ubuntu shortcuts for diacritics, only the vim ones, but immediately before that it was "what to do with mobile deposit checks" (boring) and "norwegian tablet weaving" (i need a new hobby like i need a hole in the head and i already have some woven bands i bought in setesdal for if i ever get off my ass and make a bunad. HOWEVER,)

time: 13:00 on the dot

dream trip: for ages i've been rotating in my head a road trip up from california to seattle and back, hitting everything in the list of historical mechanical engineering places on the west coast. as i originally planned it in 2019 the goal was to visit the living computer museum in seattle, which is unfortunately now closed indefinitely due to covid, but i'm sure there are other, less exciting things in seattle. another key stop is powell's bookstore in portland (this is a primary motive for it being a road trip: i intend to LOAD THE FUCK UP).

if we're talking pipe dreams, i really want to go to the kubinka tank museum with the besties @transbionic-shieldmaiden and @combat-epistemologist, because @transbionic-shieldmaiden infodumped to us about tanks for a solid half hour when we were at the aquarium and i want to see her in her Final Form (ascended autistic). this is probably not going to happen, though, because it is in russia and all of us are queer and trans :/

my other Unnecessarily Profligate Pipe Dream Vacation is to take six months off work and travel around the world experiencing trains and cool architecture. i fly to london, i wander around the british isles looking at castles and gothic cathedrals, i take the train to france, i visit the notre dame in paris and probably also rheims cathedral, i take the train to germany, i wander around berlin for a while because i've never been there, i take the train down to munich my beloved and thence to switzerland when i'm done looking at castles in bavaria, i go hiking a bunch in switzerland and attempt to understand swiss german, i take the train to austria, once i feel i can read dutch with a straight face i go to the netherlands, eventually when i'm done taking trains in europe i fly to japan, etc. you get the idea.

last thing you read: currently rereading this wangxian bodyswap fic (usually i dont read much mdzs fic but i felt The Urge after finishing vol 5), but according to my ao3 history the actual last thing i read was this because i randomly remembered it existed

last book you enjoyed reading: this, a translation of a delightfully unhinged late-Ming guide for avoiding scams

last book you hated reading: usually i dont bother to slog through books i hate but i was really frustrated by Move Fast and Break Things by Jonathan Taplin, probably because i've been so Cory Doctorow-pilled (HIGHLY recommend reading Chokepoint Capitalism if the topic of making a living as a creator under tech platform dominance is of interest). mr. taplin is, like, SO CLOSE to getting it! i'm nodding along with 80% of his arguments! and then he always concludes that copyright law needs to be stricter and the DMCA didn't go far enough.

wait i forgot about this until i flipped through my book tracker but i also genuinely hated Gold Fame Citrus by Claire Vaye Watkins. it's technically well-executed but it contains both major character death and deeply annoying PoV characters, two of my least favorite things.

favorite thing to cook/bake: i normally do not cook because i am terrible at remembering to eat until i'm already too hungry to function, so it's a very good thing @combat-epistemologist meal preps for me. once in a blue moon i'll make, like, these cookies or sugar cookies or lefse or something.

favorite craft to do in your free time: i'm the mayor of Weird Hobby City and i live there full-time. my latest obsession is bookbinding (usually of danmei and fanfiction) but i also knit, crochet, quilt, sew, restore antique sewing machines, oil paint, and sometimes do woodworking (no pictures of that, sorry). i also used to build robots in my dad's garage but now that i have a full-time robot job i don't really have the energy for additional, extracurricular robotics :p

most niche dislike: coworkers with SLIGHTLY different opinions about how to represent three-dimensional coordinate transforms. quaternion haters dont even fucking speak to me

opinion on circuses: i constantly look with yearning at the circus arts classes at the san francisco circus center, because as a kid my primary sport was gymnastics and, like, i miss it terribly but i also want to do a different, adjacent form of exercise where the ghost of my judgmental twelve-year-old self isn't constantly looking over my shoulder.

do you have any sense of direction: somewhat, but i definitely have to live in a place for a while and build up a mental coordinate system first -- in boston/cambridge/somerville i referenced the charles river, mass ave, and the red line, and if i got out of range of all of those points of reference i relied heavily on google maps to get me un-lost. in the sf bay area as long as i'm on the peninsula and 101/the bay/the santa cruz mountains are visible i can usually triangulate, and i grew up in the south bay so the 85/101/237 triangle is pretty familiar, but i get hopelessly lost in the east bay (580? 880? 680????); google maps is the only reason i've ever managed to arrive in berkeley intact.

tagging: @verycharismaticdragon, @owldork1998, @ilthit, @blondejaneblonde, @wolffyluna, @ghostly-squid (usual rules apply -- feel free to ignore, or consider yourself tagged if you like)

Tag 10 People You Wanna Get to Know Better

Tagged by @bishounen-jump <33. Prefacing this by saying I have terrible memory.

Relationship Status: A toxic relationship with my college who I hate very much but I need for the money.

Favorite Colors: Black and Purple.

Favorite Food: I can't pick man. I'm awful at these questions. uhh Ramen. All of them.

Song Stuck in My Head: Funnily enough I've never had a song stuck in my head.

Last Thing You Googled: "dunce cap" ; It was an image search. Highly recommend.

Time: 1:42 pm

Dream Trip: World trip. I absolutely hate travelling and have insane motion sickness. I wish I could just teleport places. But to one day be able to (and have the funds) travel around the world just sounds fun.

Last Thing You Read: Currently trying to read Mo Du.

Last Book You Enjoyed Reading: I was re-reading Liu Yao and it's honestly such fun (skip the island obviously). I adore the characterisations and interactions.

Last Book You Hated Reading: Good Omens. I can't explain it but there's something about Neil Gaiman's writing that makes it feel like I'm slogging through it. His books always have such interesting plots though.

Favorite Thing to Cook/Bake: (;o;) I'm awful at both (;o;)

Favorite Craft to Do in Your Free Time: I need to learn how to sew and all those handy hobbies. For now I just doodle or write words in the hope it'll improve my handwriting.

Most Niche Dislike: People being incessantly insecure on main. Please by all means go ahead. I just need to block and move on. Wish tumblr had a mute function.

Opinion on Circuses: Never been to one. I think clowns are a necessity in this world in general. They're also a sign that you can really just be whoever you want in this world. Yet another reason to hate capitalism. How many people do you know who would've become clowns if they didn't need money?

Do You Have Any Sense of Direction: Yes, I can actually read a map and if I go through a route at least twice I'll remember the turns.

I tag thee: @katie-altman @anqelbean @oscar-mildes @missveryvery @mu-qingfang-stan-account @cum-villain

[kellyvela]

Has GRRM ever said in any interview or on his blog that he hates Sansa's complete storyline after 4th season? I dont really follow all of his fan/media interactions but from what I can recall he has spoken abt how LF in books wont give sansa to ramsay or how noone had issue when Jeyne was given the Ramsay storyline in books etc. Asking this question to you bcs you rightly point out how ppl misunderstood his interviews/posts ( sansans/targ stans etc) & I cant recall him ever saying he 'hates' sansa's story in the later seasons of the show ( not s5 in particular but even s6 to s8).

Capclave 2013:

A change that has repercussions for season 4 is Marillion’s tongue removal from the first season. Martin said that the change was made (from an anonymous singer being the victim of a de-tonguing) because they wanted Joffrey to maim someone the audience would recognize. He believes this is an issue because of the part the singer plays in Sansa’s storyline, how he affects her interactions with others in the book, and he doesn’t believe another character will be fulfilling that role on Game of Thrones.

—GRRM talks season 4 & beyond - Winter is Coming - October 13, 2013

2014 Fan Reports about Capclave 2013 (*):

In a convention panel this year, George said on the record that he had no idea what they were doing with Sansa or where they’re taking her storyline, which now makes sense perhaps. He was not pleased when he was talking about it, so who knows what’s going to happen with her! Knowing GRRM, that could mean they’re going off the canon reservation, and/or that they’re going to be making a lot of shit up

I have notes I’ll be responding to (thanks!) but enough people commented about Sansa that I thought I’d share that tidbit, since it happened back in September iirc (was the same panel where he criticized the exclusion of Tyrell brothers)

—starkalypse - June 3, 2014

GRRM’s comments at capclave about Sansa (which I was in the third row for, for those asking about legitimacy) were among others during the panel that had a general theme of dissatisfaction with show changes. He was not in good spirits for that con and didn’t really have anything positive to say regarding the show. So take it with a grain of salt; there are deviations away from the books in the episodes he gets writers credit for, so maybe they’re doing something stupid or they really don’t have a gameplan!

—starkalypse - June 4, 2014

(*) These reports were posted in June 2014, during the airing of Game of Thrones Season 4, about Capclave 2013 that happened in October 2013.

Just after the rape episode:

How many children did Scarlett O’Hara have? Three, in the novel. One, in the movie. None, in real life: she was a fictional character, she never existed. The show is the show, the books are the books; two different tellings of the same story.

There have been differences between the novels and the television show since the first episode of season one. And for just as long, I have been talking about the butterfly effect. Small changes lead to larger changes lead to huge changes. HBO is more than forty hours into the impossible and demanding task of adapting my lengthy (extremely) and complex (exceedingly) novels, with their layers of plots and subplots, their twists and contradictions and unreliable narrators, viewpoint shifts and ambiguities, and a cast of characters in the hundreds.

There has seldom been any TV series as faithful to its source material, by and large (if you doubt that, talk to the Harry Dresden fans, or readers of the Sookie Stackhouse novels, or the fans of the original WALKING DEAD comic books)… but the longer the show goes on, the bigger the butterflies become. And now we have reached the point where the beat of butterfly wings is stirring up storms, like the one presently engulfing my email.

Prose and television have different strengths, different weaknesses, different requirements.

David and Dan and Bryan and HBO are trying to make the best television series that they can.

And over here I am trying to write the best novels that I can.

And yes, more and more, they differ. Two roads diverging in the dark of the woods, I suppose… but all of us are still intending that at the end we will arrive at the same place.

In the meantime, we hope that the readers and viewers both enjoy the journey. Or journeys, as the case may be. Sometimes butterflies grow into dragons.

—The Show, the Books - Not A Blog - May 18, 2015

Report about the last Game of Thrones Script that GRRM wrote:

No Wedding for Sansa and Ramsay: Without question, one of the most controversial changes the show made in trying to streamline the books was by slotting Sansa into the role of Ramsay’s wife and rape victim in Season 5. In the books, Ramsay marries and assaults Sansa’s best childhood friend, Jeyne Poole—who is being forced to impersonate Arya—instead. (You can actually see Jeyne briefly sitting next to Sansa in the show’s pilot.)

At the time Martin wrote this script, though, substituting Sansa for Jeyne was not yet the plan. Martin has Roose Bolton tell his bastard son: “We have a much better match in mind for you. A match to help House Bolton hold the north. Arya Stark.” It should be noted, however, that in Martin’s script, Sansa isn’t free from menace either. At his own wedding-day breakfast, Joffrey still threatens to rape the older Stark sister—once he’s “gotten Margaery with child.”)

—Game of Thrones: The Secrets of George R.R. Martin’s Final Script - Vanity Fair - December 7, 2018

A month before the Game of Throne S8 Finale:

Sansa’s story, in particular, has really deviated from the books. Ramsay Bolton — that marriage obviously was with a different character. When they start deviating like that, did you initially have any emotional reaction, even though you worked in Hollywood for many years yourself?

GRRM: Well, yeah — of course you have an emotional reaction. I mean, would I prefer they do it exactly the way I did it? Sure. But I’ve been on the other side of it, too. I’ve adapted work by other people, and I didn’t do it exactly the way they did it, so ….

Some of the deviation, of course, is because I’ve been so slow with these books. I really should’ve finished this thing four years ago — and if I had, maybe it would be telling a different story here. It’s two variations of the same story, or a similar story, and you get that whenever anything is adapted. The analogy I’ve often used is, to ask how many children did Scarlett O’Hara have? Do you know the answer to that?

I know it’s different in the book and the movie …

GRRM: Three children in the book, one by each husband. She had one child in the movie. And in real life, of course, Scarlett O’Hara had no children, because she never existed. Margaret Mitchell made her up. The book is there. You can pick it up and read Mitchell’s version of it, or you can see the movie and see David Selznick’s version of it. I think they’re both true to the spirit of the work, and hopefully that’s also true of Game of Thrones on one hand, and A Song of Ice and Fire on the other hand.

—George R.R. Martin on the Stark Sisters and Ending ‘Game of Thrones’ - RollingStone - April 22, 2019

James Hibberd’s Book:

GEORGE R. R. MARTIN: Jeyne Poole was included in the pilot—she’s shown giggling next to Sansa—but she’s never seen or referred to again. I actually wrote Jeyne into “The Pointy End,” my first script, when Arya killed the stableboy. I had some stuff with Jeyne running to Sansa being all hysterical and dialogue in the council chamber with Littlefinger saying, “Give her to me, I’ll make sure she doesn’t cause any trouble.” That was dropped.

DAVID BENIOFF: Sansa is a character we care about almost more than any other. We really wanted Sansa to play a major part in that season. If we were going to stay absolutely faithful to the book, it was going to be very hard to do that. There was a subplot we loved from the books, but it was a character not involved in the show.

GEORGE R. R. MARTIN: I was trying to set up Jeyne for her future role as the false Arya. The real Arya has escaped and is presumed dead. But this girl has been in Littlefinger’s control for years, and he’s been training her. She knows Winterfell, has the proper northern accent, and can pose as Arya. Who the hell knows what a little girl you met two years ago looks like? When you’re a lord visiting Winterfell, are you going to pay attention to the little kids running around? So she can pull off the impersonation. Not having Jeyne, they used Sansa for that. Is that better or worse? You can make your decision there. Oddly, I never got pushback for that in the book because nobody cared about Jeyne Poole that much. They care about Sansa.

—Fire Cannot Kill a Dragon: Game of Thrones and the Official Untold Story of the Epic Series by James Hibberd - October 6, 2020

GEORGE R. R. MARTIN: My Littlefinger would have never turned Sansa over to Ramsay. Never. He’s obsessed with her. Half the time he thinks she’s the daughter he never had—that he wishes he had, if he’d married Catelyn. And half the time he thinks she is Catelyn, and he wants her for himself. He’s not going to give her to somebody who would do bad things to her. That’s going to be very different in the books.

—Fire Cannot Kill a Dragon: Game of Thrones and the Official Untold Story of the Epic Series by James Hibberd - October 6, 2020

I hope it helps you.

Thanks for your message.

[sagencoffeebeeenswitchcraft]

Meet the witch tag?? ig??

So here goes, I striked-through some corrections and whanot but all of it is there, feel free to send an ask if you have any questions! Here's the link to the og post which I found on @knockaines 's blog uwu

Fair warning it’s LONG so like, open at ur own risk lmao

Link to questions is here ↘︎

Do you use runes as a written language? I used to back in the day, but not so much nowadays!

Do you feel you have natural gifts such as (premonitions, and hearing spirits) and if so do you think this is what led you to this path? I believe my divination is a gift, it's just how it is and how I learned it.

What deity do you work with if any and why? Hades, Persephone and Hermes. I do like working with other gods on behalf of others and figuring out who is what (I call it deity telephone) so I end up invoking and briefly working with a bunch of gods, pretty cool!

Have you always worked with this same deity? I've worked with Hades since 2019, Persephone joined us in 2020 and Hermes in 2021! It's been wonderful working with them.

Do you use any personal items in your practice, (blood, semen, tears, urine, etc)? I don't, but I am not wholeheartedly against using them.

Do you do past life readings or have ever had one done; who were you or how did you die? I never really dwelled into it, but I know of one instance I saw in a dream before.

What is your favourite magical tool? Tarot and Oracle cards are my favourite!

What is a song or type of music that gets you into a witchy mood? Music that gives you power, I know that's super vague but that's how I explain it lol.

Where is the most magical place you have ever been? According to my mum, she's brought me to some kind of ritual with fairies when I was young, that must've been pretty coolio.

What animal is your familiar if any? - N/A

If you have a familiar, did you choose them or did they choose you? - N/A

What in the craft are you best at (tarot, spells, ritual,) etc? Definitely Divination!

What in the craft would you say you are weaker at? Ritual making or spellwork, I have a hard time following a recipe lol.

What is your most favourite part of your craft (spell writing, divination, etc)? I wanna say divination, but that'd be way repetitive, so I'm gonna go with worship? That aspect is pretty cool!

What was the first tool you ever purchased? Purchased, was a Tarot Deck I believe. Otherwise probably candles or something?

What was your first homemade tool for your practice? You're gonna think I'm annoying, but it was a tarot deck of only the major arcana!!! XD

What are your feelings on raising kids in the craft? I think that so long a child can consent and is aware of what they're taught and given the choice to pursue it, it's okay! Anything culty where there's no consent, awareness or general choice I think is absolutely wack tho!

If you were a goddess or god, who would you be? Anderou or Andras, god of a pantheon from Sorcèllerie, with aspects focusing on gender, kindness and divination.

Do you use astrology in your practice? In what ways? I have a great focus on astrology as a hobby actually! In my practice it's present in spellwork when it includes other people and symbolism!

What if any ways could you practice dark magic and still respect the beliefs of Wicca? Technically I think I'm a 'Death Witch' which goes into dark arts(?) and I do not follow the rede (heck I wrote my own version of it lol) but I personally do not believe in Light & Dark Magic dynamics.

Do you have any witches in your family? I consider my mum a witch in certain aspects and I believe my grandmother was yes a devout Christian but she also read tarot according to my mom so I don't know lol.

What item can you not witch without? I believe that a witch can do with the bare basics and even thin air if that's all they have access to. So nothing I cant say anything on this one!

What is your favourite sabbat festival or time of year ritual? I find Samhain and Yule really nice, but I have been trying to branch out into more greek rites and festivals that celebrate my patrons!

Have you ever had a YouTube burnout? I don't do videos so nope!

What is your fav witchy shop, and do they have an online store? Sadly my favourite store closed a few years ago... I do like one of my local shops in my area tho!

When buying witchy items, do they choose you or do you choose them? I tend to choose lol, however pendulums and things of the sort I try to see which one compliments my energy best!

How do you organize your herbs/ingredients? I'm not gonna lie, most of my herbs are in little pre-packaged boxes from the store and lil glass jars haha

Do you have an interest in other deities that you don’t work with; if so, which ones? Technically, the entirety of the Greek Pantheon is cool, but I wanna say Pop Culture deities seem pretty chill!

Do you have a fav time of day to do spell work; if so, why? Night-time, it's more quiet.

Are you solitary or do you work with a coven? Technically, I'm part of an online coven but I consider myself solitary IRL :))

If you could pick a certain witchcraft tradition that fits your practice most what would it be (Druid, Celtic, Wicca etc)? I guess greek shrines and temples are pretty coolio?

What was the most creative spell you have ever done? What did you use? The curse I did to my friend's ex, I used an old zucchini lol.

What do you prefer for divination (tarot, oracle, runes, etc) and why? I'm quite fond of tarot!

What are some ways you keep yourself grounded? Journalling and rational thoughts mostly!

Have you ever had a spell go horribly wrong? NOt yet! HOpelly none of my spells go haywire haha!

What are your opinions on initiation rituals? I think it has its time and place in certain practices? But initiatory rites that give off cult or sorority/frat vibes are absolutely wack lol. I would also veer off anything that has weird dynamics.

Have you ever had full contact with your deity; if so, what happened? Not yet, I assume it's something tho that's for sure!

What about you is un witchy? My use of modern technology I guess XD

For the dating witch, how do you tell a new love interest that you are a witch? I'm upfront about my practice, it's an aspect of me that I feel is important to share and it's my religion. I take no shit and if you don't feel comfy with me practicing that's your problem I'm just gonna leave haha :) Who is a past witch that has inspired you, famous or not? I can't say anyone really, except maybe my best friend who no longer practices but who gifted me her entire set of tools! <3 How do you handle rejection from a fellow witch that refuses to do a reading or spell for you? So far it's not happened, but I understand consent and I think unless it's a life or death situation I should be okay haha! Do you think it is necessary to cast a circle when you do spell work or any magical working? I like to do my own circle, out of habit. I don't think it's necessary but it's a nice thing to do in my opinion! I think my circle is probably more of a symbol of my power than protection haha If Steven Spielberg called and wanted to make a movie of your life, who would you want to play as you? NGL,,, I would want to play my own role lol there is one actress who I believe played arya stark who could play younger me though What is some advice that was given to you that you pass along because it made an impact on your path? There are no rules when it comes to personal practice, reclaim your power in the forms that it feels comfortable and just do what you wanna do in the measure of consent, respect and security! What is some advice you would give someone who has not found their diety? Sometimes it takes time, not everyone works with deities, don't rush it and if it happens, it does :))

Where do you buy your herbs? Esoteric shops or the grocery store lol--

How did you feel casting your first circle (silly, scared, stumbling, etc)? Powerful I believe, I felt very in touch from what I remember!

What was your first successful spell? I'm gonna be honest, I don't remember! Probably a playful jinx of something though XD What is your general practice for meditation? Journalling my feelings technically, otherwise I just focus on a yoga sesh!

Are you a day walker or a night comer? Daywalker, I love the night, but I also love the comfort of my bed lol

How and when did you know you wanted to be on this path? I think I always kinda knew? But if we wanna speak numbers I wanna say when I read my first book about witchcraft in 2012!

What type of witch are you (Pagan, Wiccan, eclectic, hedge, etc)? oh boy you're in for a spin-- I don't have a specific one-word term in English, but I do have one in french! It's "Sorcier". The full name is:

Solitary-Grey-Neo-Wiccan. But I also identify as a Hellenic Pagan, A Diviner and a chaos-death witch! (Sorcier just means male witch)

What candle colour do you use most? Currently, emerald, I bought a big pack of them at the thrift store lol

What area would you like to see your craft grow in? I'd like to see my worship get some growth!

What is your preference, to buy or make your tools? Generally buy, but it really depends on what's the tool!

What fictional witch book/screen inspired you the most? The Series "Witch" by Cate Tierman, (which I mentioned somewhere above!)

With your first spell were you alone or in a coven? I never really joined a coven-coven, although I take part in an online coven, so I was alone :))

What is your favourite candle, or incense scent for magical purposes? I'm a big fan of Patchouli and everything woodsy! But most of my spells use unscented candles and cedar(?) or cinnamon to cleanse! :))

Where is your favourite place to go to reconnect with nature? Any place outside, although there used to be a creek close to my hose where I go every once in a while! :))

Do you believe in fantasy creatures (unicorns, gnomes, elves, fairies, etc)? To an extent? I believe that some of these are spirits, that some are beings with otherworldly or alien forms and some I think are completely unphysical as far as our reality goes! I do believe in some cryptids tho

Do you believe in ghosts/spirits? Yup, I'm assuming in this context we mean something that has died/passed on and has ties to our world still, yeah definitely.

Would you ever teach the craft? I wouldn't say I'm a mentor, but I've definitely taught before. It' something I take pride in when I do.

What if any legal herb do you use for moods? 🌿Mary Jane! Canada babey, it's legal here!!!

What is the most recent spell/ritual you have done? The most recent like full-on thing I've down would be a cord-cutting I did a couple months back?

Do you have a happy place you go to during meditation? Not really that I know of! 🤔

What is your favourite witchy book? I don't really have one tbh!

Do you have a ritual to get ready before a ritual or spell? Yes! I cast my own circle every time, it's a mental boundary that generally sits on the ground under me.

Do you always use your own spells or do you tweak others? Depends, I wanna say it's a mix of both most of the time! :))

Do you prefer spells/rituals inside or outside? I love doing them outside! However I rarely get to...

If you are coming from a Christian/catholic background. Did you find the transition hard with family and the whole going to Hell thing? Basically leaving all you've been told was right? - N/A

What are your totem animals? - N/A

What are some things you reuse after spells/ritual work? Jars, Ribbons, Crystals, and sometimes offerings, depending on the situation.

Who helped you most when you started on your path? My best friend gave me motivation, and books really helped too UWU...

Do you know any good witchy phone apps (like moon phases)? #Self Care, Labyrinthos, apparently there's also Moonly!

What is your favourite magical study? Asssocitaion research!

Outside of the YouTube and Facebook community, do you have a lot of witchy friends in the physical world? No sadly only a handful, but some friends have started to practice which I find pretty cool!

Do you feel that the deities we work with are a force from one higher power and that all beliefs and religions are from the same one God/place? I think they're sperate per se! I kinda vibe with the egg theory for every thing human but I consider gods separate from us, but their energy works the same way ours does just on another scale, ie we are the same because we are all atoms, so theres probably every entity ever and theyre part one and part another, it's complicated but I'm not paid to figure this out lol

[sanstropfremir]

So I have opinions on the other stages but like most of us I can’t stop thinking about the SF9 stage. Hanya said it really well in her response but I think we have to break up the members into the ones who tried to emulate Taemin’s androgyny and those who just flat out didn’t try. So in order I’d put it Taeyang, Jaeyoon, Zuho. Those three stood out to me the most as really pushing into more feminine ways of carrying themselves and dancing especially Jaeyoon-like where did that man come from it was very unexpected. Then Chani and Inseong were both more neutral. I can’t put Chani in the first category mostly because of the contrast between his dancing and style with the female dancers that made it obvious that he was still trying to be more masculine despite having certain moves that definitely lend to a feline style like all the hip movements(whether consciously or unconsciously). And last Hwiyoung, Youngbin, and Dawon. I think this is the distinction that some people were making with “sexy” and “Taemin sexy”. Like everyone just associates him with sexiness but opening your shirt to show off your abs doesn’t fit with Taemin’s usual sensuality. Taemin seems to be more focused on movement (throwback to your post on his dancing style) so in order to emulate him there a certain attitude and way in which you carry yourself through movement is necessary. Also youngbin’s rap part did not fit with the concept either-it was too energetic and chill (too much swagger?). Like the way he moved compared to say Zuho was more in line with his usual stuff rather than fitting the way he moved to the stage and song. It’s also interesting to see that the outfits seem to also keep in line with this. Zuho and Taeyang have their midsections showing in a way that’s more common in women’s fashion then in men’s, Chani and Inseong are almost completely covered (so neither in one direction or the other) and Hwiyoung has his arms bared to show off his manly, manly biceps. And of course there’s Dawon. It’s fascinating to compare the members with the more revealing outfits. Like they all have their midsections uncovered but to be more feminine it’s only just a crop top and to be more masculine you open the shirt up completely. It makes sense. Also I’ve been obsessed with Jaeyoon and I can’t exactly pinpoint why he stood out so much especially when Taeyang is RIGHT THERE (though I don’t really think Taeyang got a solo scene but rather was center on the group dances which kind of dilutes his parts). Like his outfit is pretty plain but I love the cutout and the fact that he has long sleeves but they aren’t mesh. It’s simple but effective. I kept thinking this was the Hetero man’s Move especially during Youngbin and Dawson’s parts.

ok this took a really long time because honestly i changed what i was writing about like four times in the middle of the process and i changed my mind like four times because this is a very complicated topic and i could not settle on what the best way to come at it was. tbh i dont think i did the best job even though this is over a thousand words but i have no clue how to make this any more coherent without re-reading all of my flatmate and i's gender theory books and that's just way too much. but here we go.

EDIT: here is hanya’s post about the stage for reference!

where i'm at right now is that i think we are overlaying taemin’s current gender antics with what the actual move was. move has transformed along with taemin, and as such we look back at it with the understanding of what it becomes, but if we take a moment to forget that context, well... let me show you. here’s the 171019 comeback stage. and the 171027. and the 171029. now, here’s the 190223 stage from sketchbook. and from almost a year later, at the 2019 mbc music festival. and now here’s it from a month ago on the tiktok stage. it’s changed a significant amount not only in how he performs it, but in how the costumes and his body affect what it looks like. the cutoff muscle shirt of october 2017 absolutely has a different connotation than the lace back and velvet princess glove and the diamonds of december 2019.

i still do believe that sf9’s cover is missing a huge dimension because it comes from a fundamental non-understanding of what people who present even the slightest bit outside of the gender binary go through, i don’t think they were wrong in interpreting it as ‘man doing non-aggressive but seductive dance moves’ because on the surface, that’s what it is. taemin has actually spent a significant portion of his solo career doing what you described as traditionally 'masculine' dressing; he did famously rip his shirt off for the first non-music show performance of danger, after all. what we associate as 'taemin sensuality' is relatively new for him, it's more prominently a post-want mannerism because pre-move (and for a lot of move itself) he was very focussed on being perceived as masculine.

if we look at sf9's costumes individually, the breakdown looks like this:

chani - skinny trouser, chiffon shirt, and a cropped wrap suit jacket with a tie back

dawon - straight leg trouser, open silk shirt

jaeyoon - asymmetric open shoulder mock turtleneck, wide leg trouser

taeyang - wide leg trouser, faux leather open shoulder crop top

inseong - silk/silk blend shirt, cropped asymmetric suit jacket with a crossover back, tailored trouser

hwiyoung - sleeveless mock neck faux leather vest, straight leg cargo pant

youngbin - mock neck asymmetric crop top with a mesh underlayer, wide leg trouser

zuho - skinny trouser, mock neck crop top, cropped suit jacket with a pointed front

taemin has worn most of these looks. cropped wrap jacket? ngda beyond live velvet suit. open silk shirt? the move album cover. asymmetric shoulder cutout? several want performances. the only exception is that he doesn’t often wear non-skinny trousers, but even then he did for his beauty and the beast moment with the jinro frog. and sleeveless was the whole costume concept for move in the first place. even youngbin’s look is very similar to this outfit from the offsick concert series. but silhouette is only one factor of a complete costume design - you have to take into account the performer’s body, and how that silhouette is perceived on that body. it’s interesting that you specify that hwiyoung’s biceps are ‘manly’ and grouped him in with the more ‘masculine’ of the sf9 members; as i showed at the beginning of this, taemin was at his most physically muscular for move promotions. hwiyoung has just as pretty a face as taemin, but we perceive him differently in this outfit because his body is categorized as more masculine because his muscles are bigger. and this is fundamentally a gender essentialist argument because bigger muscles are not actually ‘more masculine,’ muscles don’t have gender they’re just how humans move around. it’s just our societally impressed gender binary that makes us think that.

another costume point i want to make is how you describe chani and inseong as being completely covered so ‘neither one direction or the other,’ which i would like to break down a bit. for starters, jaeyoon is also essentially fully covered, but you perceived him as being one of the more androgynous ones over chani or inseong. why? because his silhouette was more form-fitted? because there was an uncommon area of skin showing? chani has a tightly fit silhouette as well, and you can see a fair amount of his skin because his shirt is chiffon. why is a suit neutral but something cut to follow the contour of a body not? the fact of the matter is, the suit is the most symbolically gendered garment in the world; it is loaded with western colonial and patriarchal implications. we just view it as 'neutral' because we’ve been normalized to see it as neutral. now neither of the suits chani or inseong are wearing are traditionally cut, and chani’s especially is quite subversive in its construction, but taemin is no stranger to using the implications of a suit for move, here’s the stage from 171105. grey double breasted pinstripe suits were the most popular style for businessmen in the postwar west, and still maintain a prominent indicator of class and power to this day.

you are correct in pointing out that the movements and mannerisms of the members don’t all match the same level, but i want to specifically talk about the intro moment with chani, because you mention him as trying to be more masculine, which i very much disagree with. chani actually does the best at retaining the body neutrality of the original choreo because the original choreo as a stand alone isn’t that seductive or ‘feminine.’ yea he doesn’t have the attitude down pat but the guy’s 20 and is clearly not as comfortable with being this kind of sexy. the reason why you’re perceiving him to be more ‘masculine’ in his movements is because the backup dancers are frankly, being pretty aggressively sexual in a feminine coded way around him. of course he’s gonna look out of place! part of what gives move its uniqueness is that the backup dancers are doing the exact same choreo as taemin, at the exact same intensity. not an altered version where they slut drop behind him.

like i said at the very beginning, i think taemin’s been tipped into the ‘feminine’ category under false assumptions, so it’s doing a bit of skewing of the responses to this stage. if i were to make a very reductivist diagram, i think a lot of responses have been (taemin) <- neutral -> masculine, with the implication that taemin is the feminine analogue, but in reality what taemin is and is aiming for is feminine -> (taemin) <- masculine. because we have been socialized to see things in such an aggressive binary, it can be very difficult to pick out what a true neutral is.

[posthungergamessyndrome]

so here’s my long overdue review of The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes that no one asked for. I finally read the book, well listened to the audiobook, coz i dunno how to read a book anymore. 

This book was everything I expected it to be and also not. Definitely the first two parts was easily predictable, we all kinda assumed that was the general arc that story would take. So while I found the first two parts enjoyable, learning more about the history of the games and learn more of Capitol, i wasn’t really hooked until the third part.

But let me say this first tho, Ms. Suzanne Collins, you never disappoint. Also I have questions and I hate that she wasn’t able to go on a book tour (I haven’t read her Q&A tho). 

I still have the same qualms as i did about the prequel as i did before I read it. While I get the early records of the games were shoddy, and the 10th Hunger Games was erased but for one copy hidden in some vault, that doesn’t matter, what matter is Snow knows.

So If Snow had that relationship with the Games and Lucy, the first victor of d12, a lot of the decisions he made in the trilogy made no sense.

I get it, he wanted to forget, it’s decades until Katniss came along. While there might be parallels, Lucy and Katniss are very different characters. But all I can think off is the reason he didn’t kill Katniss sooner, was it really because she would end up a martyr or rallying cry for the district, which happened anyways, or he was practically disassociating the moment Katniss was reaped?

Were Katniss and Peeta unintentionally triggers to so many of his hidden traumas that’s why he made so many misteps? Katniss singing the meadow song to Rue, triggered. Peeta mentioning the Valley song, triggered. Mockingjay, triggered. The Hanging Tree, triggered. 

Was he so busy crying in the shower that he wasn’t able to stop Seneca Crane from making bad calls during the 74th Games? Two winners from the same district, would Snow really okay’d that himself?

And also, I’ve always thought that anything he did towards Peeta was coz he wanted to hurt Katniss. But no, he wanted to hurt that boy. Peeta reminds him of his young self, at least the young person everyone saw him as, charming, smart, and loyal. And in a way, had Peeta been born in the Capitol and was among Snow’s contemporaries, Snow would have seen him as his ultimate rival. 

Coz Snow was smart and knows how to manipulate people, but Peeta does it a lot better and a lot more successfully. With Snow, it’s right in front of his face and he still misses it. Often he is so close to getting it. How could he not have thought of the star-crossed lovers angle? How??  When one Peeta Mellark thought of it?

Which idk if there’s fanfics of that yet, but I need to read them asap, Katniss and Peeta and teen Snow, make it happen.

(But I was looking at my notes and I wrote probably the reason Snow didn’t think of the star crossed lovers angle because it was about his survival not about Lucy’s. Lucy was at best, seen as his possession. Even at the moments he was honestly in love with her, he still saw her as someone belonging to him only. )

Snow had two relationships going on: with Sejanus and with Lucy. I did find his relationship with Sejanus more interesting, because I think it’s that relationship that shaped him more that his relationship with Lucy.

I did like and even at some points enjoyed their Slytherin-Hufflepuff BFFship going on, coz despite how Snow let us know what he really thinks versus what he actually says, he was drawn to protect Sejanus, even though he’s reluctant about it or insist that he was made to do it or it’s also to benefit himself.

And I’m not saying there’s queerbaiting in this book, but certain pairings in this book makes more sense to ship than Johanna and Katniss. 

With Lucy, i know many were wary or didn’t want Snow to have a relationship with her. For me i was open to it, at least intrigued to see where it will go or how will it be handled. 

Honestly while it is still better written than most YA romances, I found it very insta-love. Again, my sense of timeline in this novel might be different coz I was listening to the audiobook instead of reading it, but they fell in love pretty quick. 

While listening to the audiobook, i thought, if their  relationship is at this point it must have been weeks since the reaping and the games haven’t started yet, and then Snow says it’s just been five days. They were making out I think by day 3 or something. 

Maybe because I knew they relationship was doomed from the start and we know how Snow ends up, I was amused by certain moments in their relationship, coz all I can think about it is, oh honey no. 

but also, I am mad that Ms. Collins is capable of writing amazing fluff moments in the midst of a dystopian world, and she wastes them on Snow and Lucy? Where was all that for Katniss and Peeta? i was given crumbs in the trilogy, Snow and Lucy made out so many times, at one point I even thought they were going to sleep together, like how dare you Ms. Collins.

For the many years we debated the meaning behind The Hanging Tree, Ms Collins, said no hun, this is what the songs means, let me tell you it’s origin story. And omg Suzanne, that was fucked up. Thanks.

One of the things I was worried about for this prequel is that while it is set in the future, the messages in it will seem outdated because a lot has changed since the trilogy came out. 

But she wrote this book well before it was announced in 2019, before it was released in 2020, but she still made it very relevant for today and I think the messaging of this prequel would be more resonant in the future, like the trilogy is.

She touched upon how we really value children, and that immediately reminded me of school mass shootings and how we haven’t done anything about it. She lives in Sandy Hook when the shooting happened so this makes sense she makes a statement about it. And now we are sending kids to school in a middle of a pandemic for political reasons not because we are concerned about their education. 

And there’s also mentions of a pandemic in a middle of a war,  let’s say it was a whole mental experience alternating between listening to the audiobook and watching the news on January 6. 

I also loved the lines: “why do people think the only thing they need for a revolution is anger?” and “we pour money into industries not people.”

While it’s almost unbelievable that the modern hunger games was merely a student group project by a bunch of privileged rich kids and one person who thinks slavery is okay ended up writing the whole thing anyways, that’s basically how this country and our system of governance was founded. 

Dr. Gaul is also every Security and Development professor I had in grad school who teaches that war never ends and it’s not about winning it’s about control to a class of future leaders at the state department, white house, and pentagon. i mean, it’s the cornerstone of US foreign policy since end of WW2.

While also listening to this book, I am dead sure that Suzanne could write a different version of Catching Fire where Katniss and Peeta were mentors and they uncover the hidden 10 hunger games tape, and it still will be a be hella of a story.

It also makes sense that the two characters that could possibly tell us or Katniss the connection of Snow to Lucy were the ones who can’t talk: Mags and Tigris. 

obviously lucy ended up in 13, possibly related to Alma Coin coz where else will she get that personal hatred against Snow? 

Snow could have at least picked Clemensia or Lys, but Livia? i guess make sense since her offspring ended up being Plutarch’s assistant. 

I feel like if i read the prequel before the trilogy, it would be a different reading experience. But at the same time, Snow, while he had his moments, is an unlikeable character even as an anti-hero, and his moral stand point is something i dont agree with, coz you know, he’s basically a republican. it’s like reading a book about a young Mitch McConnell, doesn’t matter if the system hurt him sometimes, as long as it hurts others more and keeps him in control, and i gag. I don’t think i would finish reading the prequel if i started with it instead of the trilogy. 

but it does solidifies my theory that Snow’s evil is not because he is out of touch with the rest of panem, he knows suffering that’s why he knows how to exploit it. He is not oblivious to the problems, but he arrived at different conclusions or convictions, because again he supports the system that controls his enemies, even if the system is cruel to him too. Again, a Republican. Don’t be one, don’t date one. 

I do wonder tho if he made good with champagne tuesdays when he became president. 

I don’t see how this prequel works as a movie adaptation tho, even if turned into three parts. It makes more sense for it to be a series, so if lionsgate hasn’t declared bankruptcy before they can adapt this into screen, maybe with the state of movies right now due to the pandemic, they will be more convinced to make this into a series for Netflix or to launch their own streaming service.    

[ja-khajay]

2020-2021 Animation Watch(ed)list

I haven’t posted about animation in a while that I remember, and I know a lot of my followers are into it as much as me so I decided to make a list of the animated movies and series I watched on the past year or so, coupled with my short, spoilerless take on them. Enjoy!

Organized by

Things I saw for the first time

Things I rewatched

Under a cut for the sake of your dashboards! PS: I have not added any images yet. If you are interested in knowing more about the visuals of these movies, I might make an old fashion ask-prompted imageset list.

Part One: Things I saw for the first time

The Bear’s Famous Invasion of Sicily

Movie, 2019, Italian/French

9/10, a delightful little movie with amazing visuals. It feels like an animated picture book.

One of those “plot is in the title” media! I had never heard of this before but was heavily recommended it by my family members, who all loved it! It’s a sweet story, nothing groundbreaking but the unique colorful visual style alone makes it worth it.

The Castle of Cagliostro

Movie, 1979, Japanese

10/10. Reminded me of all the books i loved reading as a child

I assume its because it’s so old and the art style and themes are so different that it gets little to no love compared to other Ghibli movies, which is a shame! It’s fun with an endearing cast and as always, great animation and music

Mushishi

Series, 2006, Japanese

10/10 three episodes in I knew it was going to be my favorite series ever

One of the few things I’ve seen I’ll describe as life-changing. It’s absolutely lovely but never toots its own horn about it. Humble, calming, emotional and surprisingly mature. It’s pretty impossible to binge due to how intense the experience is. I just want to walk in the forest now...

FMA: Brotherhood

Series, 2009, Japanese

6/10 Dissapointing adaptation of a classic story

I read the manga for this when I was in middle school and remembered loving it. The animated version does an ok job of presenting the characters and worldbuilding and has some nice action scenes but overall looks really damn cheap and just. Not very good. Seeing I already knew most of the plot I did not have the element of discovery that made me marvel so much reading the original. It’s still a nice series but I really recommend reading it instead.

Code Lyoko (s1+2)

Series, 2003, french

3/10. 1.5 being for the opening song alone

This show sucks ass if I hadn’t been watching this with my bestie I would have dropped it two episodes in. The art style is ugly the stories are always the same and the first season has a (later removed thank fucking god) LITERAL “erase any consequences” button as a plot device in every episode. If you watch it for one thing let it be the nostalgia factor of early 00s Vidya Game Plot

The Legend of Hei

Movie, 2019, Chinese

7/10. Impressive visuals and a poor story

I finally watched this, peer pressured by the load of gifsets on my dashboard! It’s a sweet movie with really impressive animation, sometimes a bit too flashy for my taste (the action sequences go so ham they become not very readable...) but the story was just ok? The setting is barely explained and you are instead bombarded with vague epicspeech about powers and stuff that made me fondly remember Kingdom Hearts lol but that asides it’s a really good time! I need to watch more Chinese movies the few I know are just delightfully off the shits in how they approach action and I love that

Hunter x Hunter

Series, 1999, Japanese

9/10. Superior to the recent one!

I first got introduced to the series via the 2011 one. Comparatively, the 99 series focuses way less on action and way more on the characters, which I love because that fits my personal preferences! Despite mediocre filler episodes and some weird slight pointless plot changes, what it changes from the original manga doesn’t have much of an impact on the characters. The animation quality isn’t always consistent including a huge art style change for an arc (???) but it’s overall pretty nice. The series really shines in the last arc it adapts.

Oban Star-racers

Series, 2006, Japanese/french

9/10 a lovely surprise

This series is completly obscure despite having been created by people famous for their other series (Cowboy Bebop, Code Lyoko that i can name) and it’s a crime! It’s a kids show but without being stupid about it who tells the story of an inter-planetary race. If you liked that one scene in the star wars prequels you know what I mean. It’s got surprisingly nice animation for a TV series, and some truly great character design. The art style is a bit unique in a not for everyone sense, but I didn’t mind it much. It’s also THE most offensively 2000s series i’ve seen in terms of visuals. y2k kids assemble

The Little Prince and the Eight-Headed Dragon

Movie, 1963, japanese

8/10. Classic fairytale format with incredible visuals

Watched this for the art style because I know it inspired Samurai Jack, and it delievered! I dont’ have much to say about this one, it’s a very simply film but it’s sweet. For my pirates out there if you want to find it in good quality with english subtitles it’s VERY hard to find. If you just want to see the looks of it, it’s on Youtube with portugese subs.

We now enter the Gobelins Shorts Zone....!

My Friend Who Glows In The Dark

10/10 makes me cry each time

Pure delight...great animation writing everything. A little short about death and friendship but not in the way you imagine!

Colza

9/10

Visual treat...homely and nice :) not far from a 10 but a 9 because nothing about it is that groundbreaking

Sundown

9/10

If you’ve ever been ten minutes from failing a group project because of a single dude you will REALLY enjoy this. Loved the colors and personality

T’as vendu mes rollers?

10/10

It’s SUCH a sweet little short I loved that one so much

Dix-huit kilomètres trois

10/10

Surprisingly well written dialog. Visuals are great but the humanity of the characters carries this to another level

Un diable dans la poche

9/10

Amazing visuals and the most tense/creepy of Gobelin shorts i’ve ever seen. Chilling

La bestia

8/10

I had some issues with the pacing. Interesting story and visuals choices but I was not fond of the art style

Goodbye Robin

5/10

Confusing but predictable. Both at once??? Yes!

Le retour des vagues

6/10

Cool animation stuff but felt pretty pointless

                                                                ***

Part Two: Things I rewatched

Ruben Brandt: Collector

Movie, 2018, Hungarian

10/10. Underrated as hell

Watched this fully blind for the first time in an animated festival and rewatched it with friends. It’s a crime I never see anyone talking about it given the amount of whining I see about the lack of both adult animation and 2D movies? This film is a unique love letter to art in the form of a weird mix of charming crime story and psychological horror with amazing visuals. I recommend watching it blind and also buying it to show appreciation for how nice it is!!! WATCH THIS MOVIE...

Mononoke

Series, 2007, Japanese

10/10 Visual/storytelling masterpiece in the weird shit departement

If you can stomach intense stuff watch this. The visuals are incredibly unique and beautiful and under the jewel tones and art direction high takes it’s a really cool horror series. My only obstacle to enjoying it the first time I saw it was how dense it is - simply put, it’s so...culturally Japanese it’s not very accessible to me who doesn’t know anything about the culture? Watching it for the second time helped understanding the stories more! 

Corto Maltese in Siberia

Movie, 2002, french

9/10 but really close to ten. A great adaptation!

I’m a huge fan of the original comic so I entered this a biiiittttt suspicious it would suck but it was a really pleasant surprise! It has all the wonder and charm of the original and the animation was surprisingly good for the little budget. If you’re not familiar with the series, it’s a sort of geopolitical action/adventure movie but with it’s own really poetic vibe to it. It’s almost impossible to find online but happens to be fully on YouTube so go ham I guess?

Redline

Movie, 2009, Japanese

10/10 cinema was invented for this, actually

Every review of this movie i’ve seen gives it five stars and starts by talking about how immensly stupid it is. I’m no different. It’s a masterpiece of escalating energy with the depth of a puddle and it fucking rules. It’s free on YouTube too so there really is no excuse to not watch it. Watched it for the first time on a huge cinema screen and despite this my second rewatch on my small laptop was as/even more enjoyable. If you watch this stoned with friends you might travel to another dimension

Spirited Away

Movie, 2001, Japan

10/10 deserves the love it gets

I watched this a single time as a kid and had little memory of it! I mean it’s Ghibli you know it’s going to be good as hell but this one rly shines in how colorful and detailed it is and in it’s world! It made me remember I had a huge crush on the dragonboy as a kid. I’m gay now

Kung-fu Panda (1&2)

Movie, Usa

10/10. KFP fucking rules

Honestly my favorite franchise of the whole disney/dreamworks/pixar hydra. It’s fun as hell, doesn’t skip a single beat and has amazing animation and character designs. If something is a good time I will not care if it’s deep or not and boy I fucking love these movies

Sinbad, Legend of the Seven Seas

Movie, 2003, Usa

5/10 Some great some really bad and overall generic

I tend to hate american cinema and this includes that era of animation I have no nostalgia for. Sinbad is in a weird place because I love adventure stories and the visuals of the movie absolutely deliver but it’s very predictable and TANKED by the addition of the female character, pushed in your face as “look we have woman!!!” despite her writing being misogynistic as hell lol. The evil goddess rules tho. This movie would have been a solid 9 if instead of the girl the two dudes had kissed