#literally the most interesting part of the book for me

[notnowmandoline]

fic idea: sentryagent garage sale au (because i surrendered my weekend to, you guessed it, a community garage sale)

bob is participating in the twice a year community garage sale in his neighborhood, in the house he lives alone in (he inherited it after his parents died or smth similar) and is selling a bunch of nerdy vhs tapes and action figures and things like that

john is browsing through the houses hosting sales and not finding anything he likes, but he takes one look at bob, in very small jean shorts and shirtless, sitting in a lawn chair by the various items for sale in his driveway, staying in the shade sipping a soda, and parks his car in the middle of the street not giving a flying fuck about other cars needing space to drive around him because that man is the most beautiful man he's ever seen

he gets out of his car and tries to casually peruse what bob's selling, his interest genuinely catching on some 70s mint condition star trek paperback books, but his eye keeps wandering to bob without a shirt, looking just the right balance of arousingly tan in the muscled chest/biceps and adorably pink in the nose from too much sun that's working on john. oh god is it working.

bob sees him browsing for a while, the hot sun slowly getting hotter as the day goes on, and he smiles invitingly and says, "see anything you like?"

john blurts, "yeah. you. how much are you going for?"

bob gets completely flustered, blushing like hell, and says, "sorry, what?"

john says, "i will literally buy everything you're selling if you go on a date with me."

bob opens and closes his mouth a few times, speechless, because what the fuck do you even say to that? who asks someone out at a community garage sale?

john must see the bewildered, fish out of water look on his face, because he backpedals fiercely. "hey, man, don't worry about it, sorry to bother you, please pretend i never said anything–"

"pick me up on friday at eight," bob cuts in smoothly, winking playfully at john once he's processed what he said.

(they do go on a date on friday, john picks him up at eight sharp, and by just shy of three years later, they're married.

oh, and john actually did buy everything from bob's garage sale, and he keeps it all pristinely on display in a spare bedroom in their house, refusing to part with a single item. bob could not love him more if he tried.

john, for obvious reasons, is the sole participant of their neighborhood's twice a year community garage sale from then on.)

[awakefor48hours]

I'm begging all of you to do me a favor. It's so important.

When the H**** P***** remake comes out, DO NOT GIVE IT ANY ATTENTION.

I'm not kidding. Don't give even the slightest bit of attention, pretend it doesn't exist.

This is quite literally the most effective way of stopping its popularity.

At this point, one of the things that's keeping HP popular is the fact that it stirs up controversy. It's even more effective on social media platforms. It's been well documented at this point that algorithms will actively push something that make you angry. Meaning, if your algorithm notices that you hate HP, it will only push more HP on your page, encouraging you to comment about it more, and therefore pushing more HP posts on other people's recommended pages/timelines/whatever the fuck.

There's also the matter of social media spite. There's literally people out there who are only buying cybertrucks to "trigger the libs" on Twitter and anyone willing to drop $72,235–$102,235 will obviously be more than willing to drop the $10 dollar a month subscription is takes to use HBO Max's streaming service.

Therefore, going on a long-ass tirade about why it's bad to watch it will only make people who already agree with you continue to agree with you and make the people who already disagree with you cover their ears even tighter and watch it just to "trigger the libs."

We even have proof that controversy is what sells HP at this point. When that bullshit game came out, most news coverage was about the backlash and while one might think that's good, it still gave the game free attention/advertising. Once the controversies died, the game's popularity essentially died with it.

(Before anyone says it, I'm also aware of the fact that it's a single-player, single storyline game which pretty much means that once your finish the game, there's no reason to revisit it. But, the media's negative attention still played a big part in it.)

The hate also does nothing to Joanne. She loves to revel in the hate comments she gets because it keeps giving her attention and therefore makes her voice louder.

This is why I'm saying it, please do not give it even a crumb of your attention. Don't acknowledge its existence. Don't post about it and if someone asks you about it in real life, just say you're not interested in it. Silently block people who talk about it/still put their Hogwarts house in bio. Don't even make an anti-HP post.

Just move on with your day as if nothing is happening. If the view count/popularity of this show goes down the toilet, it shows HBO that it's not profitable and therefore not worth it to continue pursuing it.

If you can't do that, take that energy you have and diverge it somewhere else. Get educated about Jewish history/holidays. Talk about something you like. Make posts that show your support for the trans community. Donate to a local trans or queer organization. Shout-out a book, movie, tv show, etc that supports trans folks.

Whatever you do, don't give it attention.

[pavuchokk]

I believe that El was never really in love with Mike, bear with me.

In season 1, she didn't even know what a friend was, likeee a couple of days before their kiss? And... Wow. Shocker, obviously, she didn't know what love was either. Their 1st kiss gets turned into an inc3st joke (just like any other their "romantic" interactions in the show, it's not taken seriously).

El first learns about love in Hopper's cabin while watching the tv in season 2 , this is the moment when she realizes that Mike wants them to be lovers, and she gotta play into that lover role. Writers sort of fraimed it as a lavender marriage without making El gay. She's just too unsocialized to understand what love even feels like. My girl hasn't even experienced family love yet (which she WILL in season 5, cause that's her real arc).

After their reunion, her first intention was to kiss Mike, but its clearly not because she's head over heels for him, lol. It's just the only thing she knows so far, and she knows Mike supposedly likes it (so we see her performing and comforming to society [and Mike] as early as season 2).

In season 3, we are introduced to them "swapping spit." Mike is showing sort of "I'm uncomfortable" body language, dude pulls her hands away and starts singing to get over himself, i guess. El did NOT like him singing, and later, we learn that singing together is a sign of love [Dustin&Suzie and Lumax, both couples had a moment where they were singing together]. The only thing she wants is to keep kissing, which is lowkey giving: "I'm a toddler and found something i like, so I'm gonna do this thing until i throw up." They don't really talk with Mike, don't share common tastes and interests. (Moreover, Mike is embarrassed about being a geek, he doesn't want to show her this part of himself ). So there's actually nothing to connect with each other besides being physical.

Then we have the breakup, and El says that he's her FIRST boyfriend??? Soooo she doesn't even see him as something permanent? That's not how you think someone you love, idk. Ik the beakup itself has been milked hundreds of times already, but yeah, my girl didn't gaf at all when they broke up, and neither did Mike (yeah, so endgame couple behavior).

Then there's the mall's "crazy together 1.2" dialogue, where we see that El doesn’t have that "crazy" feeling for Mike, she doesn't pick up on what Mike is trying to tell her (one lil funny thing to me is how Mike freaks out at the word 'boyfriends', yeah dude we get it, you're not gay, chill).

Even tho the goodbye kiss is talked about a lot, it is not talked about ENOUGH. Idk why people purposely ignore El's facial expressions, girl is literally cringing hard at herself. And no, it's not because she's aware that Mike doesn’t like her, cause umm she literally begs for his attention and love in s4 lol.

Heading into season 4, we see El's performance in its full colors: cheesy love letters and a sort of altar for Mike lmao. Looks like an obsession to me, not love. We don't see any characters doing bs like that, bc, well, it IS weird, and she clearly learned this shit from books and tv. The most important "couple thing" for her is to say and write the word 'love.' Well well well, sounds like somebody likes to read/watch romance😭.

The airport and the Rink-o-Mania oh yeahhh, both El and Mike are soooo fake here. Once again, we are reminded how different their tastes are. They argue about food choices like 2 times here???

Untill her rescure I personaly see El just being upset with Mike lying to her (and i guess she heard Mike and Will aguring in the Rink-o-Mania + later she most likely saw the van scene on top of that).

Now the pizza scene, it was giving "the last laugh," both are so ready to break up, and i believe they would've if Argyle hadn't come up.

The monologue, it just made her mad tbh, we see that with vines tightening around her neck and her facial expressions... girl is crying inside and out: "bitch Mike, why tf are you lying again? god i wanted to end this bullshit relationship".

After the whole Vecna thing, the season ends with her being mad with Mike once againnnn and Mike has no clue why ("but.. but.. i- i- i said "the thing" why is she mad, damn these species😒") , oh okay😅

In conclusion, it's just crazy to me how dependent all 3 characters are on this love triangle.

Mileven being endgame:

Makes Mike a shitty friend and boyfriend.

Will ends up as yet another poorly written token gay guy that has to suffer.

And El becomes just another ass written woman among hundreds of ass written women in media.

[literary-illuminati]

2025 Book Review #29 – Navigational Entanglements by Aliette de Bodard

I got this book knowing essentially nothing about it – literally just the title on the list of best novella nominations for this year’s Hugo’s (having read it, I have finished them all and can now actually give an informed opinion!). I’ve read one or two novellas of de Bodard’s before and they’ve generally been good but never in a way that made me fall in love with them. Which is about where this one ends up as well – nothing that took me by surprise or really moved me, but well-ploted, well-executed and fun with an enjoyable evocative setting. And, reading this directly after Someone You Can Build A Nest In, a core romance that’s actually engaging and has a bit of dramatic conflict to it.

In a broadly sketched science-fantasy worlds where clans of Navigators use the carefully cultivated powers of their Shadows to lead spaceships safely through unreality, those same clans chafe against Imperial authority and its infringement on their privileges and autonomy. After a series of security fuckups leads to one of the dangerous, thought-eating Tanglers slipping out of unreality and into populated space, the four clans each nominate a representative to serve under an imperial agent tracking it down and destroying it. Confusingly, every one of them seems to be treating it less as an urgent issue requiring their best, and more as a great excuse to fob off a troublesome black sheep for a while.

Viet Nhi and Hac Cuc are two of those – of the Rooster and Snake Clans, respectively - and both painfully, acutely aware of their own shortcomings and those of their peers. Despite the instant connection between the two of them, the whole group more or less instantly starts bickering and avoiding each other – at least until their (insufferable) Dog Clan imperial overseer dies of poison just as they find signs of the Tangler. Lacking any other choice, the four of them must rise to the occasion – and discover just why their elders chose them to begin with.

So this was a fairly plot- and action-heavy book, but the plot was not exactly intricate – it would actually translate quite well to a punchy feature film, I think? The big twist is pretty easy to guess, but not so easy that it feels like the characters are idiots for not having seen it before, or that the narrative is treating you like one. The action scenes are well-done, if hardly poetic or likely to stick with me, and the resolution manages to work and give everyone a more-or-less happy ending without feeling forced or saccharine. The view of politics and every established institution is grubby and cynical enough to feel real to me, too.

Nhi and Cuc’s romance is the book’s b-plot, and a major part of both of their arcs. A major part but not the entirety of either, which I appreciated. The narration shifting between each of their POVs was well-used to get across some enjoyable tension and misunderstanding, though both of their internal monologues was a bit heavy on just explicitly laying out exactly what their driving issues and insecurities were. Still, both very fun characters with enough spikes and rough patches to come across as whole humans and be interesting to watch. The other two of the juniors who were theoretically our main cast clearly got much less attention and come across as a bit painfully one-note, but not offensively so.

The setting is only ever broadly-sketched, and hardly the most original thing in the world, but is still quite fun. Strong visuals and sense of aesthetics, and it’s fun to see imperial vaguely-space-vietnam instead of any of the usual standards for once. For all that our protagonists are the archetypal righteously angry YA protagonists who refuse to sully their hands in it, all the intrigue over trading privileges and the boundaries of imperial authority was interesting enough that I wish there was more of it.

All in all, fun couple hours worth of reading for an airport waiting room and flight. But as with de Bodard’s other stuff, I can’t say any of it really struck me or feels like it’s going to stick with me. Still, decent popcorn read.

[sunnibits]

potentially hot take but this is a pet peeve of mine

[elftwink]

blocked some stranger on some randos post because in the replies they said "oh sweet summer child". not to me and they weren't even being condescending i just felt such a primal rage i blacked out. i kinda think if you call other people sweet summer children you should be beheaded in the town square

[minweber]

Belisarius Cawl, hiding for his life, his ass kicked, ship crashing, friends in mortal peril: I am such a smart boy, he-he-he =)

[dayurno]

[lexalovesbooks]

Reading ACOD and the priory duology has made me realize that I’ve put literally zero thought into the worldbuilding of my latest fantasy world so I’ve been working on that the last few weeks… it’s been really fun. Right now I’m thinking about history and all the different religions across the different nations hehe

[tyrantisterror]

When I was 3 years old I went to a preschool that had this little green crocheted crocodile finger puppet that was my absolute favorite toy to play with of all time. I named her Chelsea, because Chelsea starts with C and crocodile starts with C and more often than not wild animals in fiction aimed at kids have names that start with the same first letter as their species. I played with Chelsea every day, because she was my favorite toy, and because the other kids weren't really interested in her, and also because I eventually started to hide her in a special secret spot in the room so no one else would find her before I did. She was so beloved by me that when I graduated from preschool, my teachers gave Chelsea to me permanently, because it was clear no one else would ever love that little crochet crocodile as much as me anyway (in part because I hid her). They waited a few weeks after I graduated before doing it, too, and sent Chelsea with some post cards as if the crocodile had been on a whirlwind "travel the world" vacation before deciding to come live with me.

And Chelsea remained my favorite toy all through my childhood. There were others I loved nearly as much, like my Imperial Godzilla and the big red T.rex from the first Jurassic Park toy line and my tiny knockoff plush Charmander, but Chelsea always held the place of honor in my heart. She was my absolute favorite toy.

I kept a lot of my favorite toys through adolescence, even if social pressure eventually got me to give away a lot of them (and some, y'know, broke). That's obviously not surprising to you if you've followed my blog, since I still collect toys into my adulthood. But it's important to note because while I know I made a conscious effort to never throw out Chelsea every time I pared down my collection... at some point, she went missing.

I became aware of it when I graduated from high school. I was feeling really emotional about leaving that stage of my life and, y'know, becoming an adult and shit, and in that state I decided to find Chelsea to reassure myself that I hadn't entirely left childhood behind. But Chelsea wasn't there. No matter how hard I looked, I could not find Chelsea anywhere.

And that was, like, devastating, because the only explanation was that somehow, at some point, I had accidentally tossed her out with some other "childhood junk" while trying to grow up and be responsible in my teen years. I had literally thrown away my childhood in a careless attempt to be more grown up.

Of course I knew she was just a toy - nothing more than some yarn twisted together in the loose shape of a crocodile, lifeless and soul-less and more or less worthless in the objective light of day. But she was also Chelsea, my best friend since i was three, my stalwart little pal, a source of comfort for most of my life at that point, and I had just... tossed her out! Like garbage! What kind of person was I becoming if I could do that to my best friend?

I was very visibly distraught, and my mom noticed. Being very crafty, she tried to find the pattern for Chelsea so she could crochet me a new one. The problem is, she had no idea where to find said pattern. She checked all her books of crochet patterns, and when that failed she tried the internet, but no matter how hard she looked, she found nothing.

So my mom found the next best thing.

The original Chelsea was a tiny finger puppet, and I had "met" her when I was three. Well, I was eighteen now - shouldn't Chelsea have grown too? And as has been established, this crocodile was fond of whirlwind vacations. My mom found a pattern that looked as much like Chelsea as possible while also being a much bigger crocodile, and gifted her to me before I left for college - to show that while we can't stop the flow of time or how it changes us, that doesn't mean we have to leave it behind.

And yeah, I decided to believe it. That's Chelsea now. Yeah, I know that in reality it's a completely different set of yarn made by my mom rather than... whoever it was that crocheted the original Chelsea, but then, Chelsea was never really the yarn. She was the feelings I put into the yarn, you know? So that's Chelsea, all grown up, and still my most prized toy.

...

Flash forward... Jesus, eighteen years, holy shit. A few weeks ago I saw a post trying to identify a different crochet crocodile pattern, and thinking it was cute, I decided to try and look for it on ebay and etsy, just to see if maybe I could find it. I didn't, but do you know what I found instead?

A very familiar crochet crocodile finger puppet. An intensely familiar one, you might say. Of course I bought it. And of course I asked the seller if, perhaps, they might have the pattern for it or know where it came from (they did not, alas). And after a few days, she showed up at my house.

She's not Chelsea, obviously. For one thing, she's far too clean and fresh looking - Chelsea was very well loved, and looked the part, while this crocodile finger puppet has definitely not endured years upon years of a child's affection. And, more importantly, she's not Chelsea because we've already established that Chelsea grew up into a bigger crochet crocodile. This has to be Chelsea's younger sister, Cici.

And if I could find another of Chelsea's kind after all these years, then maybe, with a bit of luck, I might find the pattern for her, and be able to make more of them. Fill the world with Chelseas.

[wardenbeag]

hated the flashbacks so bad ngl. concept good exciting. execution sad.

[psychopompian]

why is dolly the character of all anna karenina. jk i know the answer tho

[loveydive]

paper menagerie and other stories was mid

[allpromarlo]

looking back on it i’m glad i watched dune 2 in german both times bc if i had to sit there and hear one of them mfs say “atreydees” idk what i would’ve done

[inthelittlewood]

Questions about Eyes And Ears AU

I had somebody ask for a brief interview regarding my storytelling for their university project and thought I'd lend a hand.

I thought those of you that follow the story might like the insight too, so here ya go:

When you first introduced the Listeners in Evo SMP, did you have a broader narrative or concept in mind, or were they more of an atmospheric element at that point?

The honest answer is that I didn't want to write too much about somebody else's character(s), that being Grian's Watchers. If I could write the conflict from the side of the Listeners then we could continue the narrative with a pre-designed opposing force but have them be relatively mute for the most part. Partly to build anticipation of when they might act or retaliate but it also worked for behind the scenes purposes too. If the series hadn't slowed/stopped as suddenly as it did, I definitely would have poked Grian to pick his brain about what story elements fit his original imagining of the Watchers. So it was mostly narrative reasoning but they also served a mechanical behind the scenes purpose of transporting us to a new area which was necessary due to bugs we'd encountered with world gen etc.

What inspired you to flesh out the Eyes and Ears AU more in recent years? Was that mostly a personal creative decision, or was it influenced by fan interest?

Honestly I hadn't premeditated too much their reintroduction into anything that I was working on. Sure I'd seen a little chattering here and there about the Watchers but I honestly just wanted to write an individual story beat (albeit a tropey one) of c!Martyn snapping and turning on Ren but that never came to fruition due to Scar taking us out. The plan was always to backstab Ren then say a cool line like "Red Winter is over, Red Spring has begun" or something else punny. Seeing the fevered reaction of the audience though gave me some confidence that I could try my hand at some layered or entirely post-production storytelling, so heading into Last Life I was all guns blazing.

The Eyes and Ears AU is quite open-ended — do you intentionally approach it with the idea of leaving narrative space for fan interpretation?

It really is right? Yes, it's a very mindful decision to leave it open-ended but not so much for the audience's benefit or interpretations, but to give myself creative freedom to take the story wherever I'd like to. Committing to too many power scale, multiverse or narrative shackles early can really strangle stories I've noticed (from reading comics and manga) meaning back pedalling or aggressive retcons are required to explore certain paths, which is rarely a good experience for the reader. I do enjoy their versatility and capability to be applied to any Minecraft or adjacent story too. Some might call it too broad, I call it malleable.

How do you feel about fans expanding the lore through headcanons and theories? Have any fan interpretations stood out or surprised you?

I think it's brilliant! People inundate my inbox on Tumblr seeking permission to write stories or create characters / AUs but I've literally no authority on that. I suppose it might be a different conversation if they were profiting off of those works, but 99% of people simply want to write for fun which I highly encourage!! I'll be honest that I haven't read a great deal of AUs or headcanons, my exposure to them is mostly via chat messages during lore talk streams or questions that come through regarding the Eyes And Ears AU. As a general rule I try to avoid reading too much of other people's works on the topic because I worry I'll accidentally regurgitate it in some way then stumble into plagiarism, you know? It's why I focus more on digesting stories outside the fandom whether it's manga, Sanderson books, reading old Japanese folk tales and the like. I can source inspiration from those on how to weave narrative and execute plot twists without having to glance in my front yard.

Has fan content (art, theories, animatics, etc.) ever influenced how you think about or approach the AU?

Oh for sure they have. It's literally why after every season we'll do a sit down stream and talk about the lore in detail. Figure out the puzzle and potential trip wires of plot points from the episodes and how we can neatly pack them into the pre-existing story. A lot of people wouldn't do that as they'd be precious about their work and believe their opinion is th only correct one, but I looooove soundboarding with the audience on it. I also take that mindset in game and sometimes think about the scenery of an impactful moment whenever I'm able to control / design it. I'll have little quips or quotes cooked in my mind for how I'd ideally deliver a blow or plot twist, buuuuut given the nature of the Life series you very rarely get to execute things how you'd like haha! I definitely wouldn't have done as many of the poems had their not been such a positive reaction to those. I often see individual lines or entire passages make their way into art pieces as typography or highlighted in animatics which is really gratifying. It's why I also put such an emphasis and priority on audio production in my editing. If I can craft something that feels atmospheric, driving and punctuating with music, staggering vocals or sound effects then the auditory portion is already done, they can focus solely on the visual aspect of things. I try and be as cinematic / TV like as my skillset allows for that reason.

You’ve mentioned trying not to fully canonise the AU, but still referencing it consistently — how do you balance telling your own story effectively, while trying not to involve other creators, particularly on the Life Series, when a lot of your time is spent in a group?

The easiest way to do this, is to not do it. For the most part the only storytelling done with the AU is done in post-production. I never name drop the Watchers or Listeners in world (believe me, I was as surprised as all of you when I saw that Secret Keeper statue in Secret Life!!) and in recent seasons they haven't even reared their head as an influence whatsoever. They're on holiday, they deserve it. But when they do whisper in my ear, they're motivated decisions that I would likely make as a player/character anyway because the win objective is always the thing I'm striving towards. I can just pepper angst around it to make things seem more manipulated rather than selfish ha. I think that's why the open ended nature of the Watchers has served me well because as much as they have a singular motive which is to feed on negative emotions, that can be achieved in so many ways ranging from bloodlust to deception, heartbreak to panic. It's versatile for storytelling. It can be in your face, or a slow burn.

What do the Watchers and Listeners represent to you, symbolically or narratively? Do they serve a specific function in the stories you tell?

The Watchers used to represent the audience when Grian first introduced them, but after departing EVO I've definitely breathed more of an egotistical and sinister air into them. They're very much a unique entity / faction now, they in some ways represent gluttony, selfishness and neglect in achieving their goals. The Listeners on the other hand, are a lot of the opposite traits, but I'm still wanting to explore how being the hard end of most conflicts can be dangerous. I want to explore that at some point, whether it be with infighting or failures. They shouldn't be seen as simply bad/good, they're just, different. It shouldn't be too hard navigating that nuance but I want it to reflect elements and motives that we find in our own lives.

[nenoname]

It's still interesting that TBoB called more attention to Stan's control over his mindscape (And if you go with the interpretation that the lost pages are partial truths that are heavily influenced by Bill, then he's the one insisting that only someone with training should be able to have that much control over the mind.)

Meanwhile we have a memory!Stan. Someone who apparently knows too much and is rather aware for being a simple memory.

From the Wheel of Shame, we know Bill was able dig up all kinds of dirt on Stan but... that wasn't why he was there in the first place, was it?

Bill couldn't find the code immediately despite a memory of Stan opening the safe being a few hours old at most and decided to have Mabel try find it for him (The original concept of the ep had it far more hidden but this was likely cut because of time constraints)

Ford did experiments on Stan's mind which likely meant using Project Mentem and actually looking around his mindscape, and his only reaction was to comment on his jokes-- despite what little we the audience know being enough to render us sobbing wrecks

(yes I refuse to shut up about this part cos the book's intro is extremely underrated)

Stan was able to replace his memories of Ford with the swingset instead and managed to hide Ford in his Bar Mitzvah memory. And that's not even mentioning the lack of visible Portal and Stan o' War which noticeably show up in Ford's dreamscape (the broken swingset manifesting anyway pains me tho)

He subconsciously has misdirects for his secrets that are both silly and manages to disturb everyone too

And while Bill-as-Soos being bored by the vending machine memory is a joke that's basically the crew's way of going "hey remember the thing way back in the first ep that's going to show up in the next one?" and in-universe appears to be Stan slipping up, it's interesting that they had Stan input the wrong code when it's consistent literally every other time its inputted (especially when it shows up correctly in the very next episode)

It's even possible that the safe code that Bill found could have been a misdirect too but we'll never know since the safe got blown open by dynamite.

Stan was able to buy time by making his mind blank despite being genuinely terrified when Bill enters his mind (to the point that he breaks character and uses his own voice to yell), and could conjure up his living room (in colour opposed to his mind's regular greyscale) to make sure Bill didn't have enough room to flee, slamming the door in his face before the effects of the memory gun kicked in.

(EDIT: Random door analysis here)

And maybe the twins eventually told him that Bill had already been inside his mind after their W3 reunion, but all we know was that his conscious self was left in the dark for ages and wasn't really aware of Bill until Weirdmageddon.

TBoB showing McGucket's dreamscape also brings up the idea of the effects of the memory gun manifesting differently to each person. To Stan's mindscape, the memory wipe manifests as blue flames which immediately brings to mind Bill's powers but it's a far lighter shade (maybe to more closely match the memory gun and its eventual fade to white?)

The end of TBoB and the website poem also firmly reminds us about Stan's connection to fire but there's also the question if Stan himself is actually aware of it...