#masterclass of story telling

[uraandri]

"you know there's a time window when the power is out in the electrical substation, when you can go in and do repairs? yeah, well, couple of days ago a guy walks in later that scheduled and forgets that the switch is timed. and well, uh, let's say that he wont forget anything ever again."

[1296-very-good-year]

Here are a few characters that Vi never spoke to ONCE all season:

Ekko

Sevika

The chembarons

ANYONE from Zaun except that one guy Cait wanted to beat. Hell, she doesn't even speak to ISHA

I wonder why that is?

(Cuz the writers would have had to write more dialogue for her justifying joining Cait as a chemical weapon wielding enforcer lmao)

No instead she ONLY talks to Beasty Vander (who can't really speak), Viktor (only about Vander), Jinx, Caitlyn, Ambessa once, and a couple of nobody enforcers. All season. She doesn't speak to Jayce. She doesn't speak to Mel. Even in scenes they share.

That's our main character everyone!!

[romainlettusdinnerparty]

it’s suddenly desperately important for everyone here to be aware of my coffee table book selection

[miharuhebinata]

you guys really weren't kidding about how fucking good lake mungo is

[jheselbraum]

Another thing I'll say about oot ganondorf is that I underestimated the bones of that man.

I came into botw having only played albw, which I loved but didn't really have ganondorf in it at all, just ganon and even then he was kinda the 11th hour power up for the actual villain of the game. I knew of Ganondorf but I'd never played the games he was in, at least not all the way through. So when he showed up in totk I was like "oh neat, hope they're not racist about it" (we all know how that turned out) but I didn't really have context for like... what people who had played oot and tp and ww all the way through were really expecting, if that makes sense? And when the game first came out and all the "holy shit totk retconned oot?" video essays followed suit I looked at oot ganondorf and totk ganondorf and went "no there's no way they're the same person, any more than zelda and sonia are the same person" and I still think that's true but for a different reason now.

Cause as someone who quit their first run of oot halfway through the shadow temple because I have no nostalgia for that game and the revelation that on top of all the bullshit link was going through, the royal family you were helping put back in power used to black bag people they didn't like to be tortured in their torture dungeon before ganondorf's coup proved too high a cost for 17 year old me to justify the time spent slogging through the dated gameplay.

And at that point in the game, you haven't been to Gerudo Valley yet, and you haven't seen what Ganondorf actually looks like now, and I think those two things are really important.

Cause, the orientalism of the whole concept of the 'save the carpenters' sidequest aside, the first thing you as a player learn about the Gerudo now that you've actually gotten to interact with them is that they're... actually pretty chill. I hate the stealth sidequests in the early zelda games because they're fucking difficult and the Gerudo Valley one in particular is fucking racist as shit (other people have explained why a lot better than I ever could but having your society of all brown women suddenly start respecting the white male protagonist after he proved himself in combat is fucked up) but they never actually hurt you unless you're in direct combat with the guard minibosses and, connotations aside, I think that given the context it's important to note that. Because your fight is with Ganondorf, yeah, and he's a Gerudo, yeah, but as far as we can tell, the Gerudo don't have any particular ongoing beef with the Hylians, and if I had to ascribe real-world terms to it, I feel like the implication buried under the orientalism inherent to the situation is that the Gerudo view the Hylians as citizens of a vassal state that is ruled by their king, and not as enemy combatants in an ongoing war. To them, Ganondorf assassinated the Hylian king, took control of Hyrule, and that was that. They're not allowed in en masse but if they can prove they have a half decent resume then they're fine, it's whatever.

Additionally, there's the part during the Spirit Temple where Navi is a racist little shit. When you enter the room with the giant Sand Goddess statue as an adult, she says that the face of the statue looks "evil." And you've already seen this room as a child so when I got to that dialogue I expected her face to actually be different in the future and it wasn't. She was still just sitting there, minding her business. Nice one, Navi. And what that line of dialogue is in a Doylist context is a hint that you're supposed to desecrate the Gerudo's temple in order to progress. Nice one, Link. (Side note, were Koume Kotake and Nabooru just... locked in that back room until someone came in and desecrated the temple? Cause like. There wasn't a fire exit or anything that I could see). But what it is in a Watsonian context is a reflection on the general Hylian view of the Gerudo and their gods, despite the fact that Navi is a fairy and not a Hylian.

So in the Gerudo Valley, the Gerudo aren't really all that hostile towards you, and you endear yourself to them pretty quickly. Link and Navi are more hostile than the Gerudo as a whole. And most of this interpretation is buried under implications and orientalist writing, but it's still important context for later.

So, progressing on to Ganondorf's castle and the final fight, we the player see that Ganondorf looks different than he did in the child timeline, and even looks different from the phantom version of him from the forest temple, before he put on his mask. And you see that his ears are pointy now. And I don't put a lot of stock into the ear racist in Castle Town in the child timeline, I don't think Hylians have pointy ears literally to hear the voices of the gods. Maybe that's just me, because I came from botw where the plot was Zelda the Hylian woman with pointy ears who is literally the incarnation of a goddess cannot hear gods despite her pointy ears, and totk where Link is the only one at Lookout Landing who can speak to the Bargainer, and only Link and Jerrin are able to hear the voice of the Horned God, both of whom are gods and despite the fact that Lookout Landing is crawling with pointy eared Hylians, so obviously whatever's going on with all that it's got jack shit to do with ear shape. But I do think the ear racist guy is, dev intended, just spouting racist bullshit the Hylians came up with to make themselves feel superior. So the choice to make post-triforce-acquisition Ganondorf's ears pointy is an interesting one, because the only thing about Ganondorf that we know changed in the past seven years was that he went into the sacred realm and acquired a piece of the triforce. And I'm not the first person to say that the triforce gave Ganondorf divine madness. Hell, I even knew about that interpretation going in to the game, but what the choice to alter Ganondorf's ears in the future does is it implies a reason for why everything just started getting bad in the adult timeline recently.

Cause you can go back to the child timeline in oot and everything's... fine. Like Ganondorf is in power, we haven't gone back to before that happened because the Deku Tree is still dead af and Zelda isn't in the courtyard, and occasionally the people in Castle Town will mention some sort of commotion at the castle that happened recently, but he didn't gain the Hylian throne and immediately start freezing Zoras and terrorizing Kokiri and genociding Gorons.

And none of this is ever touched upon directly by the narrative, it is entirely within the realm of implications, but at the very least it was enough to change my opinion on oot era Ganondorf from "Look at how he's designed, how compelling can he be?" to "oh, wait, actually there is something really interesting in here under all the racist writing"

Oot ganondorf is not a character that is particularly well written, Nintendo dropped the ball from his inception to the present day, but even if I don't necessarily share that disappointment, because my expectations were different, now that I've played oot and know what the quality of this character's bones really is and have a better picture of what kind of character people were expecting I can at least understand why people were disappointed when totk ganondorf was nothing like oot era ganondorf.

[touhoutivations]

dear miss himekaidou,

i unfortunately have not been employed. so, i’ve been working on a few journalist articles, mostly as practice for my skills in case i ever decide to go into the practice and im worried that the articles i’ve been making aren’t of high quality.

how do you manage? i know such insecurities might be common in a profession such as yours, so…. any advice?

yours, eientei’s favorite kon-consultant

"Trust me, to start off- a great journalist is one that already is thinking about the quality of their work and doesn't shut their brain off for ideas. So I think you're off to a good start! It's hard, because while it's a job- you aren't gonna like, be able to push for the great caste system revolution-  I mean hard-hitting journalism all of the time. Sometimes you're gonna get stuck with 'Pick your favourite wagashi and we'll tell you your personality!'" "Buuut, I think there's something to learn from each article you write- even if you scrap them, you need only look. For example, I- loathe as I am to say it- did do such pitiful writing as that article- but the person that requested it also offered a coupon for a senbei stand… 'Dorayaki lovers are hot headed and there's more to them that meets the eye- but they can get caught up in their own world, so they should try some senbei!' 'Senbei lovers go with the flow, but don't pursue their own wants, so they should buy some more senbei!' I'm kinda curious, if I ran that article a week later, would I get a different result? There's a buncha conclusions and thoughts you could ask about the journalism even in such a 'low-quality' article."  

"I've been talking with that outside world human, and everything down to 'memes' and 'tagging systems' can show different sides of a story and the intentions of an article. Liiiike, there was this one time this crazy village man, Yoshimoto- he started raving about 'how there was some chemical the yamawaro were putting to turn the frogs into youkai'- and some newbie that wanted a week off just handed him a typewriter for him to start his rantings. But then when I actually used my thoughtography to check that river…well, he wasn't wrong? Sorta. The frogs were having extra legs- but when I wanted to write about it, up top said 'It's already been covered'. But it hadn't been. Not properly." "So how could I word it? I mean, 'Yamawaro machinery production found to have linkage in extra limbage of amphibian population'- bo~ring! What about '3 ramblings of Yoshimoto- Number 3 is suprisingly true!' and I slap a couple memes on it? Would that draw eyes? Is Yoshimoto actually concerned, or was this coverage intentionally from a crazy old geezer to discredit a potential problem?"  

"These are like, the hard stuff that comes with our industry- especially if you don't get the freedom to go independent. But I know that by asking, you're off to a great start. You have to be asking questions, every time- how can I see this differently? How can I write this differently? How are -other- people writing stuff differently? What's language that's 'hip', what language is alienating? Seriously, can Aya stop using red circles and arrows in her articles like [Mii]Tube thumbnails?!"

"Not everything is gonna be a magnum opus, and not every wagashi listicle is gonna be the lynchpin into your socialist uprising theory deprogramming toolkit- and that's okay. As long as you put questioning and engagement- actual encouragement of media literacy- at the forefront of your own work and viewership, I think that's more work than a lot of other grifter sheeple are doing. There's more than meets a camera's eye, and as long as you keep collecting, I know you'll become someone that will paint a better landscape for Gensokyou- so get your brush, and crow all you want, mmkay?"

[wanderingguest]

do I add Anthony bridgerton, lady danbury, and queen charlotte?

[kaldurahmen12]

Pompeii stands.

I’m still here.

You’re still here.

twi | ins

-

+Close up 

-

[juniette13]

Genshin Rewrite Heads Up

Just a heads up I will be posting about what I’ve jotted down for the Mondstadt arc of the rewrite plus a ref of Venti! So be on the lookout!

[emberphantom]

Being mentally ill about Black Sails again. Don't text.

[norrisainz33]

Bittersweet || LN4

☆ summary: you, lando’s long time partner, attend the 2024 hungarian gp and have some strong feelings afterwards

☆ pairing: lando norris x reader

☆ fc: none

☆ warnings: slightly suggestive - you control the content you consume.

୨୧┈୨୧

yourusername made a post

liked by landonorris, oscarpiastri, maxverstappen1, and 670,897 others

yourusername: date night before hungary

view all 457 comments

landonorris: my gorgeous girl 🤤

yourusername: my handsome man 🤤

user1: i want you both

mclaren: looking forward to seeing you in Hungary y/n!

lilyzneimer: marry me

yourusername: i’ve already got the rings 💍

landonorris: whoa whoa whoa

oscarpiastri: landonorris no point fighting it anymore mate

user2: lando is gonna COOK in austria

oscarpiastri: where was my invite

yourusername: we had dinner with you the night before oscy

oscpiastri: so ???? instagram post or it didn’t happen

user6: OSCY?! NEW NICKNAME ALERT

User7: i love how y/n and lando keep making up new nicknames for oscar

user3: ln4 domination

landonorris made a post

likes by yourusername, mclaren, oscarpiastri, and 709,856 others

landonorris: Pole and P2 for Osc. Babaooooom

view all 670 comments

user2: LETS GO LANDO

user3: THATS MY GOAT

yourusername: you are incredible lan. let’s get that p1 tomorrow baby

landonorris: gonna get that win 💪🏻

yourusername: LANDOSCAR FRONT ROW LOCK OUT LETS GO

user11: y/n is the president of landoscar nation

user3: LANDO AND OSCAT SUPREMACY

oscarpiastri: there’s gonna be a front row lock out tomorrow too 😉

mclaren: so proud of you both 🧡

yourusername added to their story

[story 1: woke up excited for a lando masterclass 🧡]

view story replies

landonorris: oh i wanna get back in that bed with you

yourusername: you’ve got a race to win first 😈

landonorris: ok 😔

landonorris: btw get your butt over to the garage i want a kiss before the race

yourusername: on my way 😫

lilyzneimer: cheer on our boys for me 🧡

yourusername: i wish you were here but i’ll cheer enough for the both of us 🧡

lilyzneimer: i have a good feeling about today

yourusername: im crossing all my fingers

logansargeant: don’t forget about the incoming logan masterclass

yourusername: how could i forget! you’re gonna do great too rahhhhhh 🦅🇺🇸🦅🇺🇸🦅🇺🇸🦅🇺🇸

yourusername has made a post

liked by logansargeant, maxverstappen1, lilyzneimer, and 890,746 others

yourusername: lando, i am so unbelievably proud of you and the man that you are. you consistently give it your all and give this team everything even when they don’t deserve it. you are an unstoppable force - i love you

oscar, congratulations on your first of so many race wins. you’re going to be champion one day, i know it

mclaren, i’m in your walls 🧡

view all 1,256 comments

user14: admin about to throw y/n’s phone out the window between this and her tweets

user15: YOU TELL THEM Y/N

landonorris: i love you 🤍

yourusername: i love you more 🤍

user16: your honor y/n is an icon

user18: never thought a mclaren 1 - 2 would feel like this

oscarpiastri: thank you, y/n 🧡

mclaren: y/n, please answer your phone

yourusername: no 🧡

user14: oh she’s about to get cooked

user16: free my girl she ain’t do nothing wrong

yourusername posted a story

୨୧┈୨୧

☆ a/n: today was bittersweet so i decided to write about it. don’t get it twisted tho i am so happy for oscar!!

☆ likes and reblogs appreciated!

୨୧┈୨୧

© norrisainz33: please do not rewrite, translate, or copy any of my works posted here on to any other platform

[ravencromwell]

Yes, there is absolutely! a comment period, and it has been extended to June 12th! As far as I understand: you can make public comment here. I think it's crucial to note that while this encompasses negligence around broken and mishandled equipment, and people with those sorts of horrors should absolutely submit comment! it by no means limits itself to that. This rule also concerns itself with enforcement of improper transfers, ala the grueling, humiliating ordeal of Charles Brown. Which I'm frustrated more people aren't emphasizing, as it matters so fucking much to get voices who've been dehumanized in similar fashion into the comments, too. There's a brilliant list of Do's and Don't's linked as a list on the comment page. Per that list's request, I'd urge you to peruse the full regulation before commenting

As a disabled person who's loved LEVERAGE and LEVERAGE REDEMPTION since the beginning - for the characters but also the whole ethos of performing acts that help people against crap systems, it's wonderful to be reminded that it springs from reality.

[spuffybot]

Someone asked me why Buffy is my favorite show and I had to stop myself from writing more than this but this is what I said…

1. Despite its complicated history (the creator turned out to be an abusive asshole) it’s one of the first mainstream successful examples of smart feminist genre tv and it laid the groundwork for everything that has happened since.

2. The show is brilliantly written and uses metaphor so successfully they teach college classes on it. Every episode / monster / dilemma Buffy and her friends face are a parallel for the real life struggles of teenagers.

3. Sarah Michelle Gellars performance across the 7 seasons of the show is a masterclass in acting.

4. It featured one of the first truly fleshed out lesbian relationships on network tv in the US and THE first wlw kiss between committed partners on prime time network TV. I remember the news covering it right after it aired.

5. Season 6 is to date the best depiction of depression I’ve ever seen in any media ever. It’s unflinching, raw, uncomfortable and hard to watch. And having that to watch when I was 13 was really crucial.

6. The way the show built pop culture references into its DNA had such a cultural impact that it’s responsible for turning “google” into a verb.

7. The makeup, fashion, and hair was simultaneously trend setting and a deliberate part of the story telling. You know what’s happening with certain characters based on the colors they are wearing for example.

8. The musical episode was one of the most successful musical episodes of a tv show at the time and it started a trend that tv shows still follow today.

[tgirlranting]

okay so i saw some of the discourse ajout Emilia Perez and wantes to see it for myself.

TL;DR: dogshit movie. masterclass in transmisogyny.

the opening song tells us this is a story about violence and love, and it delivers on that promise: in this movie, masculinity is violence; a violence which Emilia (Karla Sofía Gascón) wishes to escape through transition. the film firmly states that Emilia's wish is a doomed one. she was born violent and violence will always be a part of her.

this is an idea inherent to transmisogyny: male bodies are violent, and therefore transfem bodies are violent. "abuser-bodied" is a term used to other us and justify our exclusion from queer and women's spaces. the film Emilia Perez sets out to repackage this idea in a veneer of shitty music, crime and family drama, and toothless takes on too many social issues to count.

the film is apparently interested in many topics; drug trafficking, kidnapping, murder, corruption, sexism, ineffective justice systems, etc. it takes time out of its two hour length to mention all of these, but not to say anything about them. midway through the film, lawyer Rita (Zoe Saldana) sings a #deep song about how all these corrupt politicians are "going to pay, to pay, to pay, to pay"—the implication being that they are going to pay for their crimes—but Rita has no intention of making then do so. the reason she's in this ballroom with them is to ask for their money for her and Emilia's charity—shes not making them pay, she's asking them to. the film wants to act as if it's commenting on social issues here, even though its completely uninterested in doing so. instead of highlighting social issues, it unintentionally paints Rita as a corrupt, hollow sellout. she knows these people, knows where their money comes from, but gets into bed with them anyway. her performative rage at the system is a hollow edifice that appeals to liberal Academy voters, and no one else.

considering what the film is interested in saying, i almost prefer that approach. in a widely (deservedly) memed-on song, Rita is introduced to the world of gender-confirming surgery in a spectacle meant to elicit the macabre, the exotic amd erotic. a doctor sings "man to woman, penis to vaginaaaaaa" while Rita excitedly dances and asks for more. The doctors voice is made robotic, calling to mind cyborgs and robotic women; robotic women like Emilia is soon to become.

Rita later attempts to convince a reluctant doctor to perform those surgeries on Emilia. in a tone of profundity, she claims, "if you could only see what he's shown me."

Note the masculine pronoun. Not only does Rita continually misgender Emilia during this conversation (for which Emilia is not present), but the two of them have only had one on-screen conversation: their first meeting, in which Emilia shows Rita her boobs and says in a raspy, hyper-masculine voice, "I wish to be a woman."

So what is Rita talking about here? The only possible answer is the range of strange, wondrous surgeries she has just been informed of, or the fact that trans people exist, both of which this doctor is well aware of. I suspect the film is gesturing at some nebulous idea of the unloveable other showing us true beauty through their resilience, but frankly that is a reach. The film chooses not to say what Rita is talking about here, likely because the film itself has no idea. What we are left with in that gesturing absence is that the surgeries, the act of changing your body in a way that others find both disturbing and fascinating, is not only the sum total of trans existence, but is itself somehow meaningful; aren't the trannies brave for mutilating their bodies this way? For choosing to make themselves an artificial mockery of womanhood in order to be true to themselves? Isn't there beauty in their struggle to be recognized as something they clearly are not? It's a dismal, patronizing view of transfemininity. But before the conversation ends, a song breaks out in which Zoe Saldana, not Rita, turns to the camera and proclaims to the audience that she will always have our backs. Forgive me if I don't fall at her feet in gratitude.

the specter of Emilia's past, as a cartel boss and as a man, hangs over her constantly in a way the movie does not seek to challenge. she tries to change her ways: fake her death, become a woman through extensive surgeries, and use her money to help those affected by cartel violence. but of course, when her formee wife, Jessi, tries to move on from the husband she believes is dead, Emilia immediately sinks into her "male" voice and physically assaults her, then sends goons to beat and threaten the boyfriend's life. this results in Jessi and her boyfriend kidnapping Emilia during the climax of the film. As Jessi begins to suspect who Emilia really is, she asks "who are you?"

her reply of "Emilia," is drowned out by Jessi singing her deadname. immediately after this, we see Emilia for the last time as she is thrown in the trunk of a car, and all three of them perish in a burning wreck. Emilia cannot escape her manhood, the violence inherent in her body. everyone weep for her; what a tragic figure, the tranny.

[stupidsexygrizzop]

can yall tell i started listening to calamity again

[fromtheseventhhell]

This is really a weird take to have regarding Arya considering she's never presented to us as an "ugly" character outside of being bullied for her looks, which is far from being a reliable source. Can you explain to me how it's the "entire point" that Arya is ugly? Does that mean that we're supposed to ignore all of the times that she's called pretty, which far outnumber the times that she's criticized for her looks? Arya has self-esteem issues, even some regarding her looks, but the bulk of her inner conflict is that she doesn't view herself as a proper lady. I'm struggling to understand how Arya being "ugly" makes her a more compelling character considering that isn't a big part of her perception the way it is with Brienne. Nothing is "lost" by Arya being pretty because she still struggles with that self-perception of herself. The books already make the point that there are beautiful people that are evil and that there are ugly people who are kind so it isn't like this would be some ground-breaking revelation. Arya being a Northern beauty, which is what's written in the books, doesn't ruin that; especially considering that Northern looks are still looked down on by Southern standards. "you can be an ugly little girl and still be likeable+important" is a nice sentiment on paper, but that's not what's being explored with Arya's story

asoiaf prettycourse sucks for a lot of reasons because it’s almost like it’s the entire point that brienne and arya are conventionally ugly and still good and interesting and three-dimensional. the pseudofeminist ‘actually all girls are pretty except for girls who are MEAN which is an UGLY thing to be’ is stupid and also arya being the northern beauty standard or brienne being a supermodel by modern standards actively makes them less compelling. you can be an ugly little girl and still be likeable+important