#midst appendices

[midstpodcast]

Season 3, Episode XIX Finale Appendices 🔎 | Lark's Final Journal Entry #MidstSpoilers

[bookshopsbizarreblog]

Midst Appendix Master Document

To the best of my knowledge, there's not a convenient way to see all of Midst's appendices laid out next to one another. While they're all publicly available at https://twitter.com/midstpodcast, it requires digging back through their old messages to access them. Hopefully this will make reading them much simpler. Episode taglines are pulled from https://midst.co/episodes/.

Each one corresponds with a specific episode, and they do reference major story spoilers for Midst, so be aware of that while looking through each season's postings.

Credit and thanks goes to Third Person ( @midstpodcast ) for the incredible universe they built, and for the fantastic story they told within it. To support them, or to access episode transcripts, go to midst.co.

[SEASON 1] [SEASON 2] [SEASON 3] [MOONWARD ART]

[UNEND ART]

[arcanisfrog]

Appendices searches

tee hee i founds a thing

If you want to help me and others find secrets in appendices join this google doc:

[wardensantoineandevka]

This was so incredibly and hilariously petty of Spahr, a Top 10 Jonas Spahr Being Extremely 30ish Moment to me:

[jestersloverre]

Moc Weepe, the boy who would be mayor.

[ghor-dranas]

Teletheric Transduction Pocket Guide - Table of Contents!

So, the appendix for Season 3 Episode 2 of Midst [link] is a pocket book, opened to its introductory pages, but I noticed that if you look closely, you can see the text on the previous and next pages! It's a little hard to read [to say the least], but @captainofthetidesbreath quickly flipped and edited the image which made it much easier!

And to make things even easier still, I am going to give you a full transcript.

Table of Contents Actual Adventure is All Around - 4 Transducer History - 6 Priathic Impulses - 7 Tele-Aetherics - 7 Transduction - 8 Bocular Energy Transference - 8 The Stymie Prototype - 9 Teletheric Transduction: The Modern Standard - 9 Building and Tuning Teletheric Transducers - 10 Building a Teletheric Transducer - 10 Recommended Retailers and Parts List - 10 Tuning - 11 Where to Buy Teletheric Equipment - 12 Common Models - 12 How to Evaluate Controls and Material - 13 Teletheric Science - 14 Broadcast Standards - 16 Upper Un Signal Boost Equipment - 16 Forbidden Broadcasting - 18 Safe Harbor Hours - 19 Teletheric Licensing - 20 License Tradition - 20 Study Guide - 21 Index of License Posts - 22 Shorthand Signals - 24 Teletheric Communication Codes - 28 Distance and Signal Strength Maps and Overlays - 32

The other page shows a variety of signals, with the only text reading "FIG. C: SIGNAL STRENGTH IN IDEAL CONDITIONS"

[utilitycaster]

The answers Marisha gave in this 4SD felt a lot more realized than in the past, which is good! But it still makes me feel like this character concept is incredibly ambitious and when juxtaposed with the various "I don't want to think anymore"/"go with the flow" statements I'm not sure she realized that.

The biggest example is that Laudna has two conflicting traits: she is extremely sensitive to betrayal, and she is very quick to trust even after experiencing a number of betrayals in her life. And when I say "conflicting" I mean that they are in conflict with each other, not that it doesn't make sense for a character to be a complicated person with traits that frequently work against them; in fact that's in my opinion a fantastic way to create a compelling character. But it feels like the why is only just starting to get explored in any capacity, and because of that even good choices raise more questions: why is this only coming out now; why so young a regression; why has it peeked out so weirdly and inconsistently in the past; why haven't the repeated betrayals in the past two months affected her mindset and made her more closed off. It once again makes me really wish we'd gotten a sustained outburst after the party reunited, because that would have made far more sense - a fool me once shame on you, fool me twice shame on me situation.

I agree with the opinion that Laudna conceptually just fits far more with being an actual child herself - her desire to befriend children frankly comes off slightly weirder (not line-crossing or anything, just a little off) than it would had she died younger, as does her approach of dolls, and her failure to do anything with Delilah would make a lot more sense if she was at an age to be much more reliant. It would also make her inability to just blend into a city much more reasonable; no one is going to rent to a lone 11 year old. It really does feel that when the creepy child idea was rejected - which is a valid choice - it wasn't reworked sufficiently to fit someone who died in her late teens or early 20s.

I also don't really get the idea of her childlike nature being without malice. A pretty consistent theme for the various traumatic childhoods the characters of Bells Hells (and, tbh, past parties as well) has been the cruelty children are capable of - Ashton even says it in 3x78. Delilah being stuck with someone without malice would honestly lead to a situation in which Laudna was very trusting of her, which isn't the case, which again goes back to the conflict of betrayal as a trigger vs. being so quick to trust. Given that Laudna was frequently bullied and rejected as a kid, one would think she'd be aware of this. The specific example of Delilah calling Ashton a child and Laudna making him a doll still works wonderfully, but the overarching theme falls apart in places.

I think things have been on an upswing as of late, but ultimately we're at a point where, without some retcons I don't think Laudna will ever truly make complete sense because it's just such an intensive concept that did not get the work that required, and still feels reliant on a now-rejected premise.

[essektheylyss]

What are the Midst appendices? I’ve been vaguely meaning to listen but that sounds super interesting conceptually

They're REALLY interesting! Basically later in the day after every new episode, Midst puts out some kind of found document(s), often related to the episode, but also sometimes not!

The range of these is pretty broad, from magazine covers to the contents of someone's desk to excerpts of textbooks on different aspects of the universe, so you get a really interesting set of perspectives on small aspects of the world, and the worldbuilding for Midst is utterly buckwild in the best way, so it's SO fun. (This week's was a public transit map, and I had some delightfully punctilious conversations about the weird nuances of how transit even works in that particular location.) There's weird stuff about megafauna! The timekeeping is wild! This society has its own version of Teen Vogue and Jonas Spahr is the sexiest man alive!

Midst is such a delight of a show because the attention to detail is painstaking and astounding and if you like lore and worldbuilding, it is really phenomenal and a master class. (Genuinely, I will keep saying it, but it makes me writhe with envy.)

Also, if you do listen, I gotta plug the episode coverage over on @encyclopediacr which now has all of the appendices linked on their episodes list (and in individual episodes' infoboxes)! Which is much easier than trying to sort through the hellscape that is the twitter feed.

[aanarres]

god midst has been SO good so far, the structure of having it be semi improvised plus the triple narration is so cool, and each main character is flawed in ways that are super interesting, plus the music and sound design are fantastic, and the world building is horrifying in both subtle and overt ways

[acaptainbyanyothername]

The Midst cosmos is weird, right?

A gravity that spans the entire cosmos, allowing someone to theoretically drop from the Un to the Fold? An ocean of darkness with a mono-directional current? What is the gravitational source? Where does the current come from and go? These questions are not answered with the current cosmic hypotheses you may have seen illustrated in appendices. What if there was more to the cosmos that explained these questions, something that our lovely in-canon scientists have no way of knowing?

(All the credit to @druidposting for churning out these thoughts with me and teaching me about marshes. These theories are as much their brainchild as mine).

Bernhard and Gottle, this is my pitch to join your research team. Say hello to the Theorized Diagram of the Complete Midst Cosmos (a 2d vertical cross-section of the 3-dimensional cosmos):

You may be surprised. You may be off-put. “What the fuck is this?” is the scientific inquiry you may be posing. Never fear— explanations and mad ravings to be found under the cut

The Three Components of the Cosmos

The three components in the cosmos you see represented in the diagram are the Un, the Fold, and a theorized Un-like space below the Fold monikered as “????” for convenience’s sake.

The Fold’s Gravity

The Fold is the gravitational center of the cosmos— the reason why if a Phineas jumps from the Un, he is pulled down toward the Fold

This is because the Fold is a large enough body of matter that its center of mass has a strong enough gravitational pull to affect the Un

The Fold orbits its center of mass in an ellipse, which explains a) why denizens on this cosmos see its surface as something akin to a flat ocean (it is so massive that it would appear that way without the full perspective) and b) why light and the horizon seem to break down in a location such as the Delta, the point of the greatest bend in orbit

With the Fold being an ovoid, that then creates a hypotheses for an Un-Fold space to exist all around the Fold! After all, the “Un” is simply where the Fold is not. The Un therefore is not just above the Fold, as we already know from Midst-canon, but also below it (above and below are of course relative terms when dealing with gravity, but for ease of communication “above” refers to the top of the diagram and “below” refers to the bottom). This “below” space is referred to as “????” in the diagram.

Though it is important to note that the Un is not empty— it has breathable air, as does the Fold! The primary difference are the microscopic Foldlet molecules that make up the Fold, causing it to be slightly denser than the Un and therefore more amassed around the core

Think of the Fold almost as like a gas-giant planet! A huge source of gravity comprised mainly of a gaseous substance that has huge influence over its surrounding area!

Therefore, to continue this analogy, the Un is essentially the gas giant’s outer atmosphere

The ???? Area

So to recap, ???? is a theoretical area of the cosmos that no one within the canon of Midst knows about. It is similar to the Un in that there is a lack of Fold there.

What is the ???? like? Does it have mica? What does it look like? The unfortunate answer is I do not know. Your guess is as good as mine. Here’s what questions I CAN ANSWER THOUGH:

Why don’t the scientists of the Midst-canon know/theorize the existence of the ???? space? Well, imagine it this way: if you were in the Arctic, and the only way you could get to Antarctica was by tunneling through the Earth’s core, you would probably not know of Antartica’s existence either.

Anyone who would attempt to travel from the Un to the ???? would be forced to go right through/by the core of the Fold, aka its gravitational source. That intense of gravity is not survivable! You’re a pancake now, a pancake who doesn’t know there’s anything beyond this. The red dotted line of the diagram demarcates the known cosmos of Midst-canon.

(Side tangent, this is why the Fold is perceived as something more akin to an ocean in Midst-canon: there’s no way to go through it and see the whole picture that it’s a sphere. Even though the gravitational pressure drastically increases the further down you go into it, that is confused with the Midst-version of deep sea pressure!)

If you WERE to travel to the ???? area, you would still perceive the Fold as below you! That is because the perception of “down” is relative to the direction of gravity, and the direction of gravity is still pointed towards the core of the Fold

The Delta’s Cosmic Purpose

Here is where I ESPECIALLY gotta shout out my amazing co-researcher @druidposting. Mirrorhawk dip’s on me for this amazing cosmological thinking.

The Delta acts as a marsh to the greater ecosystem of the Fold! In essence, the marsh accumulates muck and detritus, but due to their good water outflow they end up serving as an excellent water cleanser— the water comes out on the other side remarkably clean!

That’s what purpose the Delta serves, but instead of water it filters tearror systems

The Fold’s Current

So the Fold flows from the Fount down to the Delta, mucking itself up in the process. The Delta accumulates the sediment of old tearror systems, but also filters the Fold so that it runs pure and clean out the other end

The current essentially orbits around the core of the Fold— once the Fold is purified by the Delta, it circles around until it’s on the ???? side. This newly purified Fold fresh from the Delta therefore acts as the Fount for the ???? side. A reverse Fount, if you will.

The process rinses and repeats on the ???? side— the Fold flows from the reverse Fount, mucks itself up, then is purified again in the reverse-Delta, where it then makes its way up to be the source of the Fount as the Midst-canon characters know it!

Therefore, it only LOOKS mono-directional with no end or beginning from a top-down view— really it makes a full circle loop!

That’s all I’m willing to type out today! There are still so many things to be explored— what is this theoretical ???? space like? How do measly isletary gravitational pulls overpower the much larger pull of the Fold? How do things float in the Fold?

Bernhard and Gottle, if you give me grant money more research can be put into answering these questions. Bernhard and Gottle please give me grant money. Please. Please. PLEASE—

[midstpodcast]

Season 3, Episode XV Appendices 🔎 | A Central Vault Schematic

[bookshopsbizarreblog]

Midst Appendix Collection: Season 3

All of the appendixes from Midst's third season, along with the tag associated with them. From Midst's twitter. Click for higher quality.

[Master Document] [Season 1] [Season 2]

Episode 1: Imbalance - "Don't be suspicious."

"We the Barons United"

Episode 2: Breakfast - "Bready or not, here they come."

"Teletheric Transduction Pocket Guide"

Episode 3: Change - "Going through the motions."

"An Unfortunate Headline In The Unlight Herald"

Episode 4: Foundation - "Lightbulb moment."

"Family Documents of Phineas Thatch"

Episode 5: Acculturation - "Power is a potent cocktail."

"An Invitiation For An Audience With The Tripotentiary" (sic.)

Episode 6: Switcheroo - "Finally on the right track."

"A Highest Light Rail Transit Guide"

Episode 7: Tempest - "A force of nature."

"The Loxlee Kitchen's Evening Menu"

Episode 8: Fault - "These roots run deep."

"Arraignment Hearing Documents"

Episode 9: Baron - "Unorthodox negotiation tactics."

"Notes on a High Mall Bill of Sale"

Episode 10: Bedrock - "Tonight we wear black."

"A Phosphorfest Band Poster"

Episode 11: Resolve - "It's complicated."

"A Hastily Scrawled Note On A Napkin"

Episode 12: Interest - "Things are finally coming together."

"The Parable of The Investor & The Notary"

Episode 13: Machinations - "A calculated risk."

"A Letter to Hieronymus"

Episode 14: Shindig - "Life is a cabaret, old chum."

"A Heartfelt Drawing" (incorrectly labeled under Episode XVI on their twitter)

Episode 15: Breach - "Trickle-down economics."

"Central Vault Schematic"

Episode 16: Trustfall - "What goes up..."

"An Advertisement For Scrumptious Canned Mirrorhawk"

Episode 17: Ghosts - "The show must go on."

"Minutes From A Stationary Hill Town Meeting"

Episode 18: Home - "A hill to die on."

"The Journal Of Phineas Thatch"

Episode 19: Balance - "It's time."

"Lark's Final Journal Entry"

[illusion-of-death]

Midst merch I think they should make:

- Mirrorhawk sticker pack

- Literally any of the episode art/appendices as physical prints/editions of whatever the appendix was (e g that Zoolog book from 2.6)

- FULL OST CD PLEASE

- Landlord’s bandana

- Black Candle Cabaret crew t-shirt; like the circus ones I grew up with

- Random stationary (e g the Delagney Hotel notepads from the 2.17 appendix)

- Bocs. Just bocs.

I also have been told by more than one person that they should just hire me to make more mirrorhawk plushes, but I’m not the one who said it!

[wardensantoineandevka]

god, Costigan is AWFUL but in a way that FASCINATES me, I love her as a character and hate her as a person, her entire deal and influence on this mess is just SO fascinating

[tookishcombeferre]

The Redemption Arc: Fantasy Literature Edition

So, I recently had a song by The Crane Wives pop up in my song rotation again ("How To Rest" for those interested), and it has, for whatever reason, given me strong Éowyn grieving for Théoden at various points of their journey vibes. (Final verse very much sends me to thinking about her looking towards new romantic love with Faramir while grieving the loss of her dead pseudo-dad/uncle. It's so angry, but also, somehow, hopeful?) But, I love that song because the "love" being discussed is very open ended in terms of type. Is it friendship love? Is it parental? Is it romantic? Never specified. Each verse also seems to be directed a little differently too, so it's just lovely to listen to.

But, anyway, I was listening to this song, and I was thinking about Lord of the Rings. (I'm sort of back on a mini-LotR kick right now.) And, I realized that the fantasy genre post-Tolkien really likes to do one particular thing when redeeming characters, and there's kind of a way to spot them if you're watching fantasy media.

Are they lacking hope, and does their villainy come primarily from despair?

Do they have a younger character (bonus points for a child they either raised previously or are helping to mentor currently) who they have attached themselves to and would quite literally die for?

Because, this happens TWICE, at least, in LotR.

BOROMIR

In the Lord of the Rings Trilogy books, Boromir and Pippin's relationship is pretty strong. However, there isn't like an explicit swordfighting teaching montage like in the movie. Instead, we get this lovely little piggy back ride sequence in Fellowship in the chapter "The Ring Goes South" where Pippin "marveled at his strength, seeing the passage that he had already forced with no other tool than his great limbs. Even now, burdened as he was, he was widening the track for those who followed, thrusting the snow aside as he went." (293, 50th anniversary omnibus copy).

What we readers kind of know/ come to learn through the rest of the story is that Boromir is really struggling with hope that things in his country will come right. We learn much later (in The Two Towers) that he has/had a younger brother who loved him, and his brother grieved for him deeply after his death. After a quick refresh, there is a bit that can be learned from the Appendices about Boromir and Faramir. Boromir was 5 years older than Faramir and he helped him out and protected him. However, what exactly Boromir helped with and what he protected Faramir from is unknown. We know the people of Gondor also loved Boromir. We know his father loved him deeply and put a lot of stock in his ability. We come to find that Boromir was sort of the true "last hope of his nation" in many ways as he set out for Rivendell.

In coming into contact with the One Ring, Boromir is constantly tempted to use it's power to aid his country. He wants to use The Ring against Sauron, and he cannot accept that The Ring cannot be used against Sauron because Sauron made it.

In the midst of all of his uncertainty and his internal struggles with what to do about The Ring being so close to his grasp, he does try to take it. HOWEVER, as soon as he realizes what he's done, he repents by protecting the two youngest members of the Fellowship (one of whom is not yet legally of age/ is a teenager per the legal customs of his culture.) The very youngest member of the Fellowship is Pippin who Boromir carried on his back through the snow. He also has a few other brief, but favorable interactions, with Pippin before the Fellowship scatters and breaks apart.

Boromir sacrifices his life for Pippin and his cousin, Merry, and says to Aragorn "‘I tried to take the Ring from Frodo,’ he said. ‘I am sorry. I have paid.’ His glance strayed to his fallen enemies; twenty at least lay there. ‘They have gone: the Haflings: the Orcs have taken them. I think they are not dead. Orcs bound them.’ He paused and his eyes closed wearily. After a moment he spoke again. 'Farewell, Aragorn! Go to Minas Tirith and save my people! I have failed.'" (414). This is followed by Aragorn's forgiveness of Boromir, Boromir's death, and Aragorn, Legolas, and Gimli running off to try and save the (to them) unknown number of hobbits.

Now, unlike in the film, that quote is technically from the beginning of The Two Towers. But, that is the end of Boromir's story. Yet, he dies a redeemed and peaceful man. Aragorn, as his King, has forgiven him and granted him peace. It is important to note that, when forgiving Boromir, Aragorn states "'No!' [...] 'Few have gained such a victory" (414). (My beloved duo. UGH! I LOVE THEM!) My personal thought on what Aragorn meant by this was that Boromir conquered the thrall of The Ring, repented of it, and then loved so deeply he gave his own life in sacrifice for Frodo (the Ring Bearer's) two cousins. So, truly, Boromir atoned for his wrongdoing by literally throwing himself in front of several arrows to atone for the attempted theft.

A Brief Detour and Aside: In many ways, spiritually, Boromir's younger brother picks up his task of looking after Pippin (the youngest hobbit) when he is taken to Minas Tirith. There's a spot of foreshadowing in this because Boromir reports that the two brothers shared a recurring dream that Faramir actually had more often than he did. So, in many ways, all of the tasks that Boromir left unfinished, Faramir completes.

THÉODEN

My. Beloved.

So, to summarize, when we meet Théoden in Lord of the Rings, he has basically been possessed by the wizard Sauroman. Sauroman used to be good. Now, he's bad. Théoden is basically in charge of the care of both his nephew and his niece and has been since they were children because (I think?) their family died in a battle of some kind? That part of the plot has always been really unclear to me.

(I'm fairly certain they're related to him by way of his sister because he calls Éowyn "sister-daughter" immediately after Gandalf cures him of the spell he's under. Which, I'll infer by way of Tolkien being a linguist, is short form for "daughter of my sister.")

But, anyhow ... Under this spell, Théoden has basically gone straight up crazy because his advisor, Wormtongue, has helped this evil wizard possess him. He has imprisoned (?) his nephew, hard to say exactly what was going on there. However, I know for sure he was no longer allowed to serve in the military force under Théoden and it seemed like he might have actually been wrongfully imprisoned. His niece, Éowyn, is basically the only person who is still having any success trying to help him not get completely lost in the spell placed on him by Sauroman.

So, in other words, Rohan is not doing well. Sauroman is stripping it of its resources. He's pillaging cities. It's all gone to poop.

(Sauroman later does similar things to The Shire in the book version of Lord of the Rings because they're kind of decentralized and have no military. I have loads of thought about what he may have done with the articles of Pippin's and Merry's clothing that his Uruk-Hai stole, and why Buckland and Tookbrough may have caved so quickly, but that's a topic for another time.)

So, Gandalf comes in and basically asks Théoden if he wants help with his little curse problem with the caveat that he can't help people that *want* to despair. Théoden is healed, and he sets out to work with Gandalf. He forgives his nephew, Éomer, and decides that he's just going to suit up for war. Y'a know, as you do?

Théoden spends most of the rest of the story (as far as I remember) trying to prove to himself that he is both strong and wise after "letting" himself and his mind be infiltrated by Sauroman. He ends up leading an incredibly impressive military aid assist in the Battle of the Pelennor Field to help Gondor's capitol not get completely crushed by Sauron's forces when their steward decides to abandon them to literal death.

The hobbit, with all the social-emotional skills of a traumatized teenager, and the wizard, with the help of a random Gondorian dad, do more to haphazardly save the crumbling capital city than the dude who, hypothetically, has all the city's maps, studied military crisis policy, and is the literal leader in the absence of king after having only been there for like MAYBE 10 days. HOWEVER, they wouldn't have been able to do that without Théoden, his leadership, and his troops.

In his final moments, Théoden faces down The Witch King of Angmar. Théoden does not kill him. (He can't.) But, he tries. Instead, his niece and the hobbit, Merry, to whom he has sort of indirectly given council and kinda-sort of indirectly trained in war, fight together to try and save him. His niece, however, is the one who really does the main damage. (This is despite the fact that he thought he told them both to stay back at camp and not come.) The two of them fighting together satisfies a prophecy about The Witch King saying that "no living MAN can kill me."

Éowyn is female but of the race of man. Merry is male but of the race of hobbit. Together, they are "not man."

In the end, Théoden dies despite Éowyn's best efforts. However, he dies 1) having seen her a last time and 2) having proven his strength as a king and a general. Gondor is saved. His people are victorious, even if many of them died, they won the battle. Théoden himself died valiantly against a foe in battle, which is something that is HIGHLY prized in Rohirrim culture. He even, indirectly, got to see his wisdom and brief lessons to Merry pay off. Though, it's unclear how much of that Théoden actually *saw.* Likely, not much if anything at all, but still, it happened near him as he was dying.

Éowyn is particularly devoted to Théoden. They are incredibly close. More than her uncle, he is basically her father. Even possessed, hers is the one voice he hears. She would do anything for him, and he simply wants to see her be happy while protecting her. Yet, she doesn't want to be protected. She wants to fight. Her relationship with gender has always felt very complex to me as does Faramir's (who she marries.)

IMPACT ON THE FANTASY GENRE

Character's who have checkered pasts in the fantasy genre often end up mentoring/ being redeemed by relationships with characters who are younger than them. You can kind of spot the tropes of "to be redeemed" or "redeemed" character in a fantasy universe by who the character is surrounded by and the root cause of the issue.

As Gandalf mentions, he can only heal those who do not *want* to despair. So, characters who want to wallow, will. Once a character makes an active choice to leave their despair, they will be able to follow the path to redemption like Théoden.

Conversely, characters who are choosing power for the sake of power, no matter how good their alibi, will also never be able to be redeemed by the narrative. Boromir has to repent of his desire to take The Ring for this reason.

Yet, it is through the devotion of Éowyn and the innocence of Pippin that both characters find their way through to their final act of redemption.

But, the question remains as to how that applies to the fantasy genre as a whole.

I'll give a few examples.

In the case of Avatar: The Last Airbender, we don't necessarily *know* at the outset that Iroh would be in need of "redemption." However, upon finding out that he is The Dragon of the West, his relationship with Zuko is his atonement.

Zuko goes on to train Aang. He also befriends Toph (who is arguably the youngest of the group) pretty early on. Personally, I find that Zuko is a bit more difficult an example to use because, despite being the "oldest," he's the oldest child in a group of children. Though, functionally, Aang and Toph work the same way Pippin does for Boromir. They both allow him to separate from the toxic desires of his family as he steps away from filling his heart with a desire for power and honor, leading to despair, instead of building community and finding hope. They do this through a combination of comradery and youthful innocence. (As I was looking back at quotes, I forgot the sheer number of times Boromir would have been privy to Pippin just randomly saying things! Oh my God! He talks. So. Much.)

Disney's readaptation of Maleficent, in both of her films, follows this pattern as well where Maleficent is redeemed as the mother-figure of Sleeping Beauty.

Though not outright a "villain" or in need of a full redemption, in the traditional sense, is he an anti-villain? an anti-hero?, perhaps quite similar to the Lord of the Rings examples in that way, Dustfinger in Cornelia Funke's Inkheart also fits this trope. He atones for his past misunderstandings, at least in the eyes of his wife, in sacrificing his life for Farid, his fire-eating apprentice.

*IF* you're immortal, is everyone younger than you? Kind of kidding, but if we're talking about energies, OB, or Ouroboros, in Loki Season 2 provides the same kind of "energy" to Loki's "Fellowship" as Pippin does in Boromir's case. Also, Mobius' children haunt the narrative after the moment they appear.

This even pervades true children's media, in Sofia the First, a show for 2-5 year olds, the main villain, who is later redeemed, has a close friendship with the princess (his once childhood best friend's step-daughter.) He seeks to steal, and once does, her magical Amulet. He does, at one point, successfully take over the kingdom, but he also, at one point, non-fatally sacrifices himself to save the child he has befriended. (In a situation that, upon further reflection, is not at all dissimilar to the whole Boromir, Aragorn, Pippin thing except there were no arrows involved and nobody died because this is a show for teeny tinies.)

Honorable mentions (that are riffs on this that I can't get fully into at the moment): Puck and Alex Xanatos in Gargoyles and Demona and her biological daughter Angela in the same series.

But, yeah, there are probably loads more examples of this that I don't know, or riffs on it that I'm unaware of. But, these were the ones that came to mind right away.

[encyclopediacr]

Last month at the wiki — March 2024

Every month, we highlight significant work done in the previous month by our editing community at Encyclopedia Exandria. This one is a LONG one, so fair warning...

March 2024 saw the creation of 83 (eighty-three) new mainspace articles! A bit more on why so many later, but first here's a selection of ten of them. You can find more at the 50 newest pages report.

Zora Manning, Lightkeeper for the Circle of the Crimson Mirror

Nokari, Lightkeeper for the Circle of Tide & Bone

Isle of Serenity, island in the Glass Sea

Nymph, type of fey

Pyre, sect of the Ascendancy

Ashley Middlebrook, producer at Critical Role Productions

Ruidian glass, material found on Ruidus

Rashinna, leader member of the Volition

Gaz Tomo, member of the Volition

Vezoden Amerai, champion of the Strife Emperor

So, why so many new articles? We created individual articles for every episode of Midst! Using information we already had in list of Midst episodes, we were able to create episode articles painlessly, programmatically, and promptly with Python magic. We've also made updates to our episode infobox for Midst to document airdates for the re-releases and for subscribers, illustrators for the video versions, and appendices links. Now that we've got individual articles, the summaries on the list were made more concise to provide different levels of summarization and to make appendices links easier to see. Work is also underway on the individual articles, including more robust summaries (now that they're standalone rather than in a table), appendices summaries, and illustration galleries. You can check out the articles for Unrise, Switcheroo, and Tempest for a peek at what we're aiming for and slowly moving toward.

Character infoboxes now have a place for movement speeds, making it easier to do thought experiments about which PC will win in a race. Also, we've historically had explanatory notes for multiple stats or DCs in a hover. We've changed our best practices to instead place these into a footnote formatted similar to references so that these notes can be accessed by mobile users.

The character infobox was also updated to handle stats for systems other than Dungeons & Dragons. We've added new items for Daggerheart (we're still getting a feel for what should be included), and we have options for a full custom stat array. This allows us to better handle Daggerheart characters in the future, should we see more of them, but also to better handle PCs in past one-shots who were not well-serviced by the less flexible stat handling. We've also inserted new fields to properly reflect Daggerheart's Community and Ancestry character options.

As always, check out our Candela Obscura coverage. Newfaire has been updated with more points of interest from the core rulebook. We've also got a lengthy bibliography of interviews related to the show on top of our regular coverage for this month's continuing adventures of the Circle of the Crimson Mirror.