#mostly bc the only way i can cope with what ive experienced is knowing i am flawed too

[thedreadvampy]

sometimes I forget that my experience has been. um. not 'your experiences are not universal' vibes but more like 'your experiences are EXTREMELY atypical'

[bunnyboy-juice]

honestly actually ik the "ride or die, you can have complex feelings about these people who harmed you but i HATE them, you're never wrong" type of friendship is super common n praised n i even can understand why that form of unconditional "love" is appealing, but i genuinely think its the most suffocating form of friendship ive ever experienced

[oflgtfol]

sorry i feel like after every single migraine i have i need to do a self reflection afterward

holy shit so i woke up. at 2am like i said i would and my migraine is gone im still kinda weird so im gonna go back to sleep to make sure its entirely gone bc being on my phone again is making me wary of it returning but like. my 2am estimate was spot on LMAO

But anyway uhm my real holy shit moment is the fact that. this was the very first migraine ive ever experienced where i never got sick. which kind of made it miserable because i normally cope with migraines by, uhm TMI + emetophobia warning, but i normally cope with the pain because puking makes the pain stop for a few minutes, and thats normally when im finally able to fall asleep, so i normally spend the entire migraine mostly sleeping and then just waking up briefly to puke again and then go back to sleep, and then over the course of the next 6 hours each time i wake up the pain gradually weakens until its gone. but when i dont puke its just pain and pain and theres no relief it took me two entire hours to finally fall asleep today and i was even like rocking bakc and forth trying to make myself nauseous to puke to get some relief but it just wouldnt happen im surprised i even fell asleep within two hours but i did and i slept right through until 2am and now my migraines gone.

this sort of happened with the last migraine i had except if i rememeber correctly i did puke, but only once, and it was after that one time that i was able to sleep the rest off, and that happened about an hour into it but it was still a miserable hour. and again even just getting sick only one time is an outlier for me

i did take excedrin right at the beginning of my migraine today, which my mom has been using for her own migraines, and she also got me to take it last time as well, so im wondering if the excedrin is whats making my migraines less intense in terms of getting sick. and also the pain hasnt been as bad as it normally is, but again its still a migraine so its still Bad, so i still kinda wanna get sick just for relief. bur when the pain is its normal level then i like NEED to get sick so i can get relief. so i guess in exchange for not getting sick, i get less pain as well, but its like, it kinda makes it more of a miserable experience than a normal migraine because i dont get any relief. so i dont know i have mixed feelings about excedrin if its gonna make it harder for me to sleep off my migraines which is my main way of coping with it

bur then the other part of me is wondering, this frequency of migraines is really new and abnormal. im normally on a strict 2 year schedule, my last on-schedule migraine was in fall 2021 i wasnt scheduled for another migraine until fall 2023, but then i got one in october 2022, i think i got one again sometime a month or two after that, and now here i am again in march 2023, like three migraines in a row in a year that i wasnt even scheduled to have a single migraine in. some part of me is worried it might be an effect of accutane but hopefully since im off it now and its getting out of my system i’ll make my way back to my old schedule (if it even is a side effect of accutane) cuz like it sucks getting one this frequently, although its still not as bad as people who have like actual chronic migraines like my mom who gets one every 2-3 weeks, or others who get them even more frequently than that. but it still sucks yknow lol

the only other thing i can think of that might be causing migraines more frequently is that like. either my chronic sleep deprivation is catching up to me, or like. shits so bad im seriously wondering if every little thing wrong with me lately can be like a physical side effect of having severe depression like im seriously about to google if depression can make migraines worse cuz i dont know anything anymore. especially because i was in such a shit ass fucking mood this morning and then lo and behold migraine

so anyway im also wondering if maybe just the fact that these migraines are off schedule might be making them weaker than my normal ones. like my 2 year schedule ones are the mega migraines the things that last 6-8 hours, the ones that cause the huge entire, UNMISTAKABLE auras that cover my whole vision (rather than my wimpy ones lately that have me doubting if its an aura at all until its already almost over), the ones that have me bedridden within minutes of the aura ending, the ones that have the worst pain of my life and make sick like every 20 minutes, etc. And then maybe these off schedule ones, since theyre off schedule, might be weaker, have me sick less offen and with less pain, and tend to be slightly shorter than normal, etc? but i dont know it probably is just the excedrin causing the difference

[asotin]

what're your thoughts on castlevania (the netflix show, not the game, ive never played the game) what do you like, what don't you like? make it as long as you want. i don't care if i have to scroll for 5 minutes. go feral (personally trevor is extremely hot and i would like to date sypha. i'm not really into alucard's whole sickly victorian child aesthetic, yknow?)

oh god this is way too long, but you did say to make it as long as i want, and i have a lot of thoughts that i need to inflict on the world

i played two castlevania games, both from the nintendo gameboy era, so please don’t get mad at me, gamers

details below the cut, but since i’ll be talking about season three, i need to preface this with content warnings for mentions of: graphic violence, rape and sexual violence, racism, and the holocaust

before i get into it, i usually don’t go for alucard-type characters either, but knowing that he was redesigned to be bishounen sexy specifically because the boring, middle aged man look he originally had in the games wasn’t appealing makes me enjoy him. and he’s fun with trevor and sypha

do like:

the voice acting

it’s all good. i can’t think of any characters whose voices were awkward or fit poorly. they don't make sypha’s va use the standard flat affect or false high voice women tend to be assigned, trevor sounds suitably worn out but not monotone, and alucard sounds exhausted but in a sexy way

and the spanish dub is killer, arguably superior

the animation & design

it isn’t full-on artsy, but it’s definitely got a distinctive style that’s easy to look at. the color use and effects are gorgeous. it’s a story set in the medieval era, and the mixture of desaturated and oversaturated elements works so well with that

dracula’s castle and the belmont bunker aren't revolutionary in design, but they didn't need to be. they're suitably creepy and empty, and i enjoyed them

the monsters were unique enough to have obvious different types, and the scene where a monster commits blasphemy in a church by accusing a priest of committing blasphemy was good writing

lisa

she shows up to a stranger’s spooky home and scolds him for being rude. she really looked an ancient vampire in the face, told him he had no manners, then had a kid with him. what a phenomenal woman. 11/10, no notes

“start with me, and i’ll start with you.” you know what? i’d fall in love, too

dracula

this ancient, unfriendly vampire let a human woman walk into his home and tell him he’s got no manners. and that made him fall in love with her. just like that. lisa walked in and handed him his ass, and dracula thought “oh i love her”. and when she was killed (more on this in the bad section), he raised literal hell to destroy the world for doing it

speaking of lisa being killed, it fucks me up that it happened because she convinced him to leave the castle and experience the world. he left her alone to see what she loved so much, only to come back and find that the people he’d come to like- the people lisa had loved so much it drove her to help in a way that got her killed- had burned her at the stake. i love a good tragedy, and that’s good tragedy

the way he weeps when he has to fight alucard?? during a showdown in their home?? the “i must already be dead” moment in alucard’s childhood bedroom??? when he speaks to lisa about killing their boy, her greatest gift to him??? poetic cinema.

the trio’s dynamic

three bisexuals with two total brain cells and only alucard bothers using them. incredible

i went so hard for this ot3. it's right there and so good

sypha

she initially seems to be assigned the role of the adult™️ ie she's the only woman and gets stuck being responsible, but surprise! she’s just as annoying and dumb as alucard and trevor. she dropped a castle she didn’t understand on the ground and didn’t think too hard about it. then she argued about breaking it. i love her

if we don’t get an ot3, then she needs to have a dumb gf

alucard

he's got a stupidly low neckline and lower pants. they really leaned into ayami kojima’s redesign, as they should have. his little curl annoys me, though. why the fuck does he have a random section of hair that’s like three inches long when the rest is shoulder length or longer? love that he really looks like lisa

if you say he's canonically bisexual and polyamorous, no he isn't. yes he is. no he isn't :)

trevor

disgusting. a nasty man whose appearance mirrors his state of mind. he's 50 mental illnesses in a dirty jacket and his coping mechanism is… alcohol? maybe? he’s a mess, and i dig it

him trying his trick of kneeing alucard in the balls during their fight? and finding out it doesn't work? (which…… why doesn't it……?) juvenile but suitable

hector

his love of animals makes him my favorite. normally, i won’t touch anything with this much animal death, but i’m willing to set that aside because hector loves them so much. he’s so sweet and kind, and he loves his monster pets

yes he sided with dracula and has some really fucked up ideas about what constitutes humane treatment of people, and yet i love him. 11/10, but i have a lot of notes

isaac

i support him, including his murdering and his decision to support dracula. dracula throwing him out of the castle to save him was so cruel in that it was an attempt at kindness from a man who hated the whole world, but it was against isaac’s wishes

his time with the captain was great

idk enough about islam to know if he's portrayed correctly and haven’t seen any complaints, but given the show’s track record……… i wouldn’t be surprised if it’s not great

the forging

very cool. fresh and interesting! hector creating pet friends is cute and heartbreaking. love isaac for his dedication to reducing, reusing, and recycling

season 2’s big battle with all those vampires

the new version of “bloody tears” is phenomenal

this goes back to the animation, but listen……. it's so good. i loved the smoke vampire, and alucard’s fluid wolf transformations. his flying sword looked really good, and incorporating them together? super good to watch. and trevor’s whip?

the type and level of violence are suitable for what it is. it would be weird for a gritty show like this to be bloodless, but i don't think it would work if it were bloody to the extent of a slasher. it's also more clean violence, if that makes sense. you don’t linger just to look at gore; you see it because stabbing someone spills blood. the games weren't about extended, gritty scenes of realistic murder, so the show sticking with quick, slice and dice type fights fit with what i remembered of them

please watch this fight if you don’t remember it or haven’t seen it (part 1, part 2)

trevor’s whips

trevor’s weapons don’t follow the physics of normal whips, and they shouldn't. they’re heavily stylized and clearly a fantasy weapon, but they still have rules that they (mostly) have to obey. his morning star-whip hybrid in particular is so good 

it’s easy to follow, too. a lot of times, speedy weapons disappear, which is an understandable effect but one i find boring because there’s nothing for me to do. i’m just sitting on my ass with nothing to do

trevor’s whips don’t disappear. they’re fast, but you can always see them. and they have weight! you can see them slow down and gain speed. i don’t need physics to be real; i want movement to be pleasing, and that’s exactly what i get with the whips

don’t like:

fridging lisa

she could have been kidnapped (possibly make dracula think she was dead bc people want to lure out her scary demon husband, idk), then s2 could have ended with her and dracula reuniting as he died. she and alucard go on a trip together to attempt to make amends for the pain dracula wrought in lisa’s name. orrrr she dies a tragic death with him and we’re left to hope that they find each other in the afterlife. do vampires get to go to the afterlife? can alucard reintegrate? can he be happy with his new friends? or will he go back to his crypt and sleep again? will he ever be rediscovered? if so, what will he do? deep questions. i would prefer to cogitate on these instead of experiencing the shitshow that is s3

season 3

they should have ended it with dracula’s death. the quality of storytelling goes down immediately. just plummets. i’m sure there were problems in the first two seasons, but this one is so bad, i genuinely can’t remember

but i may as well get specific, so here we go:

abandoning alucard

trevor and sypha leave their friend alone in his childhood home where he just killed his father. where they helped him kill his father who, as i’ve said too many times, raised literal hell to get revenge for people burning alucard’s mother to death

yt they don’t talk about alucard. they don’t make any plans to touch base ever again. trevor’s entire family got killed. sypha’s culture, from which she’s now estranged, is family-centric. if ever two people should give a shit about alucard and know why alucard shouldn’t be left on his own, it's them

so what the hell is going on?

trevor and sypha’s relationship

look. it could be good. it would be better with alucard but they could be together and it could work fine

but this……….

trevor hates what they're doing. he hates traveling around and fighting. he's clearly tired and deeply depressed

sypha not only doesn't care enough to address it (did they forget the first two seasons?? sypha is annoying partly because she doesn't stop poking people) she might not even notice? yes, she's having fun, but trevor is basically dead on his feet in front of her

racism

hector, sumi, and taka all got done dirty 

sumi and taka

i hate the way they died. i hate that i’m certain that the plot won’t bring japan back into the narrative (or if it does, i don’t trust it not to be shitty). i hate the fact that by killing them off, i’m not going to get any more of them. they were interesting!!

speaking of the japanese vampire: the biphobia, arguably, given what happens with alucard

the addition of sexual violence

i don’t need or want lenore. if all she’d done was manipulate hector, i could have lived with that. she’s a villain, so she does bad things. that’s the point. but what she did was a massive escalation. we hadn’t had any sexual violence, and then the last few episodes gave us 

tumblr feminists who love her for how she treated hector need to be quarantined until their brain worms have been cured

everything that happens to hector

what was this shit? why did i open my netflix app and tap castlevania and find them making this man walk around naked in the cold to torture him? and starving him? he got manipulated, degraded, chained up, collared like an animal, and raped. and why? to show us how bad lenore is? that the other vampires are bad because they let her do it? i didn’t sign up for this

the holocaust reference

the imagery at the end of s3 when it’s revealed that the judge has been killing people he’s decided are undeserving to live and collecting their shoes in that barn was chillingly close to images of shoes taken from victims of the holocaust. there's no reason to invoke the holocaust here. it’s unnecessary and in bad taste

[yellowhoothoot]

i think both versions of the old guard are really good and fun and i like that neither one feels overall better than the other so here's my thoughts on what i like in each version. ive only read the first book of the comic so spoilers for that ig

comic - honestly funnier. especially andy, she’s less stoic in the comic - also on the topic of andy, booker’s betrayal being for her sake as well makes much more sense bc it’s more clear that having lived so long really takes a toll on her. her depression and unhealthy coping mechanisms are a lot more explicit. even though she’s more sarcastic and funny than in the movie it doesn’t take away from her personal struggles. i think having her “voice over”/narration throughout helps show this

-also, even though it’s not explored a lot, canon bi andy. a couple of the people at the beginning that she wakes up with are women and then i believe there was also a line about her sleeping through whole populations? which in my bi opinion would not be limited to men

- andy old person technology jokes. come on. also it makes more sense for nile to figure out booker betrayed them because of him getting internet in a cave than being like “this one gun is empty so something’s wrong”

- nile lore! nile lore! nile in the comic seems much more competent and experienced. her role on the team is less of a trainee and the skills she already has come into play more. it’s really nice to hear her talk about her life before, with the different jobs and interests she had. also it’s a crime that her interest in art history isn’t explicit in the movie because the scene in the comic where she sees the rodin and the other art is so good and you only get a little slice of it in the movie

- andy and merrick have better designs in the comic. everyone else looks better in the movie but andy’s design just kinda feels more “her“ and merrick just looks cooler honestly. i’m mad that joe and nicky were both robbed of long hair in the movie

- merrick is more evil and the way they kill him is way better. like, his bravado is way more hollow and the fact that he’s just a little rat bastard coward is more satisfying. so rather than a dramatic way to save andy they all just shoot him while he’s cowering in a bathtub. and he deserves that more than he deserves getting dragged out of a window with nile.

- oh on that note, the scene where they all jump out the window is great. i mean, “so nile, read any good books lately? SPLAT” is way better than being silent on the way down

- sexier settings. mostly i’m talking about the fact that they’re not in england. imagine being british. dubai and then malta is so much better than london and then... i think still london?

- nile and andy have a better relationship. nile seems less like a protege and, again with the way the comic has more jokes and lighthearted moments, they’re a lot quicker to get to that found family level of friendship and their fights/arguments are less actual anger and more poking at each other

- the van scene has slightly different dialogue i think, and it’s even better than in the movie. i think there’s a few extra lines. and they’re really good.

- the actual results of the research! the fact that there’s nothing scientifically special about them! i mean as a science person i would love some sci-fi answer as to what their deal is but honestly i think them just being regular people who don’t die fits the setting and tone of the story better

movie - despite some nile details that i love being left out, there are scenes with her that aren’t in the comic that make her more... sympathetic isn’t the word i’m looking for because she’s sympathetic in both. but like when she talks about her dad and her mom and brother it gives a better sense of why she joined the military and makes it hurt way worse the way her friends turned on her. you kinda see it again at the end when andy mentions she would’ve let book off with an apology

- copley is so much more sympathetic and their not killing him makes way more sense. not only are his reasons and motivations more clear, but it’s also clear that he didn’t realize how brutal merrick and co. would be and actually tries to both stop them being treated so poorly and then is willing to risk his own life to make things right when he brings nile to the lab.

- i can’t decide if i like andy becomes mortal or andy is fine better. actually i think that the difference is good because each outcome fits its medium better. comics andy staying alive means she has time to address the self-destruction that’s pointed out to her, while movie andy learning to deal with mortality means it gives her more of a chance to see the bright sides of things like she says to nile about how she thinks nile’s presence can remind her what it feels like

-quynh being alive! there’s so much possibility with that and like, i guess in theory it could be a thing in the comic too? but honestly i don’t think it will be. so yeah both the angst of knowing that quynh’s out there and then the twist of her getting out of the water are really good elements

- this is more of a benefit of the medium than of the interpretation, specifically, but all the characters are so much more expressive. especially nile, i like how when she’s processing how old everyone is her eyes get really wide and her inflection is really good. also i think when different team members give each other A Look it translates better.

- ok yes comic merrick has a better overall design BUT movie merrick does look more like a rat bastard. im sorry to that actor but god he just looks so unpleasant to be around.

- the fact that dr. uhh... kozak? was that her name? gets more screen time of actually doing experiments is nice. like dr. ivan in the comics is for sure more explicitly awful but his actual mad science is all off screen. whereas in the movie dr. kozak is SHOWN doing all her stabbing and poking and prodding and it’s awful and a great detail.

both - ok the main thing i really like about both is that they’re not cowards with the found family. i know other people have said this but it’s really nice that the characters actually act like they like each other rather than it being like “this ragtag team has been together for 200 years but they have no chemistry or inside jokes and are very stoic to each other”