#my sources aren't stellar for these

[besiegedhunter]

So if I am correct right now we know about Sui siblings

1 - Combat Arts(Chongue)

2 - Pottery(Evil brother)

3 - Poetry(Ling)

4 - Law( Unknown sister)

5 - Calligraphy (Jie, somehow dead)

6

7

8

9 - Metallurgy (Nian)

10 -

11 - Art(Dusk)

12 - Culinary(Unknown brother)

We also know known Agriculture(Shu) and Medicine(Unknown brother)

So we left with two siblings whose sphere we don't know, and do you have ideas what could it be?

Also this person from new online-event(?) seems to carry sewing tools, could it be another brother?

You've opened a can of worms with this so I hope you're ready lol that said, I've lots of thoughts on it and I'd make it it's own post but I'm not that knowledgeable about Chinese culture (apologies if I get anything wrong) so I'm not confident in it.

That said, these are the thoughts I have.

So yeah, I think that the only one you're wrong about is 4 since the Law Sister is only implied to be younger than the Second Brother iirc and referred to in the same way as Dusk:

But for my own musings I've been basing my theories off of this image:

And I and I believe others have noticed a pattern with the Sui that we've been getting, which is that so far the only playable Sui have been Odd numbered.

Chongyue | 3. Ling | 9. Nian | 11. Dusk

While 2, 4, 6, 8, 10 and 12 are all not yet playable. The only Odds that aren't are Jie the 5th and then the 7th.

Seventh:

So, I think this is how they're ordered (for instance Nian is 9 so top row is accurate I do so believe) and if we look at the close up of 7:

There's quite a bit going on but two things is 1. There's a plant in their background, likely meaning either their art or perhaps job is related to gardening. And 2. Their hair is likely light, as the only other Sui with light hair in this image is Nian who also has white hair:

As this pv came out alongside Chongyue's event, they may have already known what Shu would look like (notice that all but the Second Brother of the siblings to the left who are Evens are practically all silhouettes) they may have known to design the 7th like that.

I also looked into Chinese numerology, which'll come up a bit for others, particular for the other Sui sibling in this event but for Seventh this is what I've found and points towards Shu being the 7th:

So the number seven in Chinese: 七 is pronounced like: Qi, which is one thing but there's a surprising amount of words which when pronounced sound like Qi and a lot of them seem to fit with Shu.

The most important is Qi itself which is a vital force or life energy that humans, animals and even plants have. It's likely what allows Shu to be so good at agriculture and in the animated pv and Spring Festival animation, how she brings plants back to life and makes them flourish:

Another word that sound like Qi is "Even" which I think is hilarious actually relevant because as said before, so far we've only gotten Odd Sui besides the 7th and 5th siblings. I of course theorize that Shu is the 7th but Jie, the 5th, is missing and if she is alive I think it'd be too big of a reveal to happen in the next event. So Shu being the 7th, Qi, Even,

Well it'd just be fun.

There's another one that it can mean, which is: Rise. My main point about this is in regards to what types of Dragons Shu is inspired by, though I'm just taking this as a chance to talk about my Shu Dragon Theory.

So, the reason it's relevant is because it's possible that the Sui siblings could be inspired by different dragons from China. I think Nian being the Nian is the most obvious but like Dusk is based on a variation of it that appears at dusk, maybe with a bit of Shen a sea creature that makes mirages. Ling could be a Panlong "Coiling Dragon" which is a lake dragon also. And Chongyue, being the most like the full Sui being the Dragon King.

For Shu, I'm thinking about Tengshe "Rising/Soaring Snake) and Feilong (Flying Dragon) because of how it's depicted in the event's image, the pv and maybe E2:

So from these, it's a flying dragon particularly among/made of clouds. I think in the top right of her E2 it appears like clouds also.

To me this very much appears like the Tengshe and Feilong. The Tengshe being a wingless dragon capable of flight and the Feilong known for flying among the clouds. There's also the "rising" part of the Tengshe's name.

Which about the Tengshe in particular, there's also the Te "Plant Pest" which is one of various insects like Lotus who eat plants and farmers had problems dealing with. The reason I mention this being:

The boss.

Also the enemies.

The entire event mechanics revolve around farming, such as contaminated water and of course: pests. With mice and then those rods that appear like locusts being frequent.

The boss not only makes me think that the depiction of the dragon present in the event image and pv is somewhat represented in the event's story but I think that this boss is also representative of Shu herself in some capacity.

Maybe we're seeing something like how Chongyue sealed his Feranmut power within a sword and she did the same with the cube in the pv and this is what's inside of it and a part of her or what but I don't think it's the second Sui for instance.

The reason for this being that while they share much of the same colours, there a theme with the Sui that we get one who has a light colour palette then one with a darker (Nian > Dusk > Ling > Chongyue > Shu). And this dragon being white appears would fit her moreso than her brother.

So she would be the Tengshe but this boss is the Te. Which I find fun.

Also, there's this practice called Cloud Seeding wherein substances are released into clouds to make it rain. It's used for farming and the country that does this the most is China.

So you have this dragon in the event that's depicted either in or made from clouds, for this agricultural dragon that's depicted later in the event working with the pests threatening the land.

It feels fitting and with her dragon likely being one known for flying and associated with the sky, it feels possible it's tied to "Rise" "Qi" though I also just wanted to talk about this theory.

Though one last thing is there's a Shu animation added into the Spring Festival livestream that depicts Shu rising into the sky and making where she flies flourish with greenery and it's very reminiscent of a dragon and possibly relevant to what they're doing with this.

Anyway. I have one last point to make with Shu and I'm segueing into the Brother who's also being introduced in this event or who I believe will be:

The Fourth Sibling

Here is the second Sui introduced in the latest Sui event. We know very little about him besides the fact that he's a shopkeeper in the event. He appears in the event image and the pv for the event.

Also that the item in his left hand appears to be a weaving shuttle which I believe is very likely. For instance it's possible that they're introducing a second Sui alongside Shu because of the connection between agriculture and textiles in real life or the idiom: 男耕女织 | Nán gēng nǚ zhī | Men farm women weaves. That's supposedly rather famous.

But I think there's another thing that Shu and this Brother may represent that are closely linked and that is life and death.

Here's where 4 comes into play.

See as is quite famous: the number four is considered the unluckiest number in China and that's because in Chinese it sounds like Death as they both sound like Si.

So:

Shu > Seventh > Qi > Vital Force

Him > Fourth > Si > Death

But that's not all I have, see to some people in China, particularly with other dialects the number four sounds different and has other connotations such as in Teochew where it's quite lucky because it sounds like the word for silk...

Yes... silk.

I just learnt about that and I'm taking it as a point and! If he's ever revealed to have a Teochew dialect, now you know why. In fact if his name ends up as Zhi it's because that's the word for weaving.

But my other point and what got me on this train in the first place is because I looked up whether sewing is considered bad luck, because with how widespread four being unlucky is, I thought that'd be a good place to look.

And needlework is considered bad luck to do on new years supposedly. From what I gather anything that can make you bleed, such as scissors are considered bad luck and those similarly can lead to arguments with friends and family. And remember the "men farms, women weave" ? Well needlework being unlucky may be connected to that as it's thought needlework in the new year meant a lot of it throughout the year for women.

I also think it's fitting that if we're to start having even Sui operators starting from new year that the most famous number would be the first one we see or become an integral role going forwards if not.

In conclusion:

Chongyue | Warfare

Second Brother | Pottery

Ling | Poetry

Unknown Sui from this event | Weaving

Jie | Caligraphy

Unknown

Shu | Gardening

Unkown | Music

Nian | Metallurgy

Unknown | Dance

Dusk | Painting

Unknown | Cooking

As for which are the Doctor brother and the Law Sister... Maybe the Eighth is the Doctor Brother?

Looks at these: 樂 藥

The first character is associated with music while the second one is with medicine. From what I can understand, the character for music is also for happiness and the bit at the top for medicine represents herbs.

I'm also seeing a connection between Chinese philosophy with it's five elements, five major bodily organs and the five note Chinese pentatonic scale and how music can be used with these for healing.

Though I'm not finding much on these to have much confidence on it.

That said, the Eight in Chinese sounds a bit like the Chinese word for prosper and is considered the luckiest number and synonymous with happiness which if the reason that the Eighth sibling is a musician is because Eight > Happiness > 樂 as happiness > 樂 as music.

I wouldn't be surprised then if they tie prosperity not only to happiness but one's own health and therefor medicine as well.

Which idk how sound all that is but there's my Doctor Brother theory.

Law Sister I don't know where to begin. Like by my theory she'd either be 6 or 10 but it's difficult to narrow it down to just one of them.

But let's see! The first of Feb! Am I going to be right about Shu and the unknown brother?

[blarefordaglare]

Happy Birthday Warrior(s)!

"Today is my birthday." The sharp, yet compassionate chime of the captain bounced through the damp forest, "I should expect gray hairs soon enough."

The announcement, the casual voice in general, was enough to surprise the heroes. Silence felt heavy, yet not intense, until the rancher spoke up, "Today? Well why didn't ya tell us?" His head tilted slightly in confusion as he looked at the man, the tips of the electric blue on his wings sparkling despite the lack of sun.

"I sort of forgot," his laugh was light-airy even, "I haven't celebrated since I was in my teens. With rough years and war, you don't really get a lot of time." The look in his eyes felt bitter, a contrast to the poised attitude he typically held.

This wasn't uncommon, the sailor skipped his special day at sea, Hylia, the champion didn't even remember his own date of birth. Even the hero of Legend quit celebrating his own birthday. He wasn't sure why just another string of information was so staggering to his family.

His mind was quickly seized to a halt with another chime perking up, "At least let us fix you a good supper." He would never admit it, at least not now, but the attention was stellar, filling the confidence in his soul past the brim.

Be nonchalant, don't act like you expect much, repeated through his mind. He had to humble himself, he was getting a good dinner after all, "I suppose we all could do for a good meal tonight, you have my thanks."

...

Whatever he just bit in to, that was not meat.

The taste was sweet, the texture light and airy. It felt fluffy, like a soft, moist piece of bread, yet held the sweetness of the caramels he used to like as a child.

And then there was the voices. Flowing in harmony like an ocean breeze.

"Happy birthday to you,"

"Happy birthday to you,"

"Happy birthday dear ourfavoriteandonlybutstillthefavorite captain,"

"Happy birthday to you!"

Looking up to the source of the sound, he noticed the eight people he's grown to know and trust, all standing in front of him. Their hands were holding up something, holding the same sugary scent that was in his so-called 'meat'. In the middle stood a pale white candle, its flame flickering and dancing in the air.

"Well aren't you gonna blow it out?"

Well, he couldn't refuse that request.

"Happy birthday, Cap."

[nalyra-dreaming]

From Reddit:

The show wasn't performing on a stellar level in S1 when Lestat was in every episode. The fact of the matter is this show had a lot going against from inception. For one, the source material isn't all that relevant today if I'm being brutally honest. That's why it took as long as it did for an adaptation to come to fruition after being scrapped and passed up on other networks. No disrespect to Anne Rice, she did set the path for all these other shows to tread, but vampire media has become a tough sell in recent years and it's popularity is no where close to where it was in even 2010. Fox's The Passage was a wonderful show that was canceled the first season. Morbius was a box office failure, The Strain-canceled, NS4A2- cancele, and Dracula (NBC) - canceled. Now throw in a show centered around a melodramatic gay vampire relationship? Very tough sell because queer shows often have their own set of struggles appealing to a wide audience (RIP Our Flag Means Death, and Good Omens was very lucky to be revived for one more season after being canceled).

I for one love the relationship aspect of the show, but it made IWTV that much more niche. The movie back in 94 was controversial because it was so niche, luckily it had the start power to make it successful but it messed up Tom's career for years. Even if every book reader did show up for this show (and they didn't) it still would have been too small of an audience. And I say this as an avid fan of Rice and a book reader.

I have watched nearly every person who has reacted to the show on YouTube who wasn't a book reader and guess who is their favorite regardless of race, age, or sexual orientation? Lestat. And guess which episode they all have liked best? Episode 5 because it was an escape from all the melodrama and actually had some action. Despite my favorite parts of the show being the Loustat romance, I can admit that most people aren't tuning into AMC, home of The Walking Dead, for that. I hate to say this, but the show would probably have performed even worse if Lestat was not made as extreme and off the wall as he was. You either love him, or love to hate him.

Unfortunately, we live in an age that quality shows such as this don't make it very far. Hence why television is so weighed down with police, medical, and firefighter dramas at the moment (yawn).

Nalyra, it sounds like the show really will be cancelled based on this. Do you agree with this comment? I know AMC owns the intellectual properties. What is stopping them from cancelling the Immortal Universe & selling those rights if it’s not making money & people aren’t watching?

Alright, Nonny, sorry I needed a moment.

cracks knuckles

Let me take that one apart :))

“The show wasn't performing on a stellar level in S1 when Lestat was in every episode. The fact of the matter is this show had a lot going against from inception. For one, the source material isn't all that relevant today if I'm being brutally honest. That's why it took as long as it did for an adaptation to come to fruition after being scrapped and passed up on other networks.”

Nope. It was passed on and from network to network because Christopher Rice wrote the script and wanted to start with “Wolfkiller”. Now, as has been detailed here by @cbrownjc (for example), that wasn’t a good idea, because it would literally give all the story away. And THAT is why it was likely passed on. Note also that when AMC finally acquired all the rights they scrapped that script immediately, and Anne and Christopher likely signed NDAs, because though they were/are Executive Producers… there is no statement, whatsoever. Which MIGHT have to do with Christopher’s rejected script. 😬

Also, I think the show has more than proven how just slight twists can make this source material immensely relevant for today. Their social commentary and color-conscious casting is top notch. Not seeing that… well. What do you want me to say to that? 😅

Fox's The Passage was a wonderful show that was canceled the first season. Morbius was a box office failure, The Strain-canceled, NS4A2- canceled, and Dracula (NBC) - canceled.

… Okay I did not watch “The Passage”, but the other ones. And apart from The Strain’s first season they were all very sub par. Like the first season of NS4A2? Intriguing!!! Second season? I wanted to bash my head against the wall!! The Strain I actually bought, and the initial setup was awesome… and then it just went downhill. Dracula… lol, yeah. I wasn’t surprised. And let’s not even talk about Morbius. (I think I was very drunk by the end of that one, lol)

Imho - it’s not the “vampire media” but the quality of said vampire media. And, let’s not forget - this is the Vampire Chronicles, the very basis for a lot of these re-inventions. It’s a very different kind of beast. And a very distinct universe, imho.

Now throw in a show centered around a melodramatic gay vampire relationship? Very tough sell because queer shows often have their own set of struggles appealing to a wide audience (RIP Our Flag Means Death, and Good Omens was very lucky to be revived for one more season after being canceled).

Yeah well, from what I heard OFMD killed of one of the very beloved characters there in very bad writing and… well. That didn’t go over well. (So I heard.) And Good Omens was never supposed to be more than three seasons afaik (after that initial ONE season).

It's not the gay or queer - it's the quality and setup, imho. It's why the rating is at friggin' 97% this time round. And why there is a whole universe being set up. There is just SO MUCH you can do with the VC.

The movie back in 94 was controversial because it was so niche, luckily it had the start power to make it successful but it messed up Tom's career for years.

WHAT. What are they talking about. Niche??? I was there, in packed theaters. WHAT??? Also Tom's career. Niche... yeah it was controversial, but not because of niche, but because it was very gay for the mainstream 90s!!!!

Even if every book reader did show up for this show (and they didn't) it still would have been too small of an audience. And I say this as an avid fan of Rice and a book reader.

🙄 To be honest (forgive me but), they sound like one of those hardcore book fans who stop after QotD because it’s “not the original trilogy” after. SMH.

I have watched nearly every person who has reacted to the show on YouTube who wasn't a book reader and guess who is their favorite regardless of race, age, or sexual orientation? Lestat. And guess which episode they all have liked best? Episode 5 because it was an escape from all the melodrama and actually had some action. Despite my favorite parts of the show being the Loustat romance, I can admit that most people aren't tuning into AMC, home of The Walking Dead, for that. I hate to say this, but the show would probably have performed even worse if Lestat was not made as extreme and off the wall as he was. You either love him, or love to hate him.

That one… is probably true, I guess. Or at least in parts, I don’t think that everyone liked ep5 best, nor wanted to escape “the melodrama”. But there is a reason why Lestat is the main character of the VC, and why he is so iconic. And Sam…. manages to conjure him, on possession-level, lol shrugs

Unfortunately, we live in an age that quality shows such as this don't make it very far.

At least they acknowledge the quality :)) … this is why it’s so good we’re on AMC. They have experience with shows like this. And they own the books.

_____

Okay. (I think it’s clear I don’t agree with this comment^^)

Nonny, the show won’t be canceled because of takes like this, or through takes like this.

You ask what is stopping AMC to cancel the IU and sell it all?

Well, for one - who would like to buy it if they fail to develop it? They would NEVER get the money back if THEY fail to monetize this. And they did pay big bucks to get all of it.

There is a whole universe in those books. And I mean, Mark Johnson only said just the other day, at the fan premiere, that they’re developing Talamasca and more. Why would they put money into an adjacent show, if they were planning on cancelling the IU?

And, trust me, this IU… is built on the VC. There is a reason why Rolin Jones is on record saying AMC wants to do 10 seasons. They are going to milk this thing, for all it’s worth.

Also - people are watching. It has its audience. I have no idea where this is coming from - from the cable ratings? The show is #1 on all streaming sites. What do you mean people aren’t watching? :)

IWTV has been adapted before, and so I do agree with the OP wrt to some people biding their time. Which is something I low-key understand, even though I do not agree, because they’re missing out big time, and ultimately only hurt themselves with it.

But … trust me - when the truly “new stuff”(*) will happen?

I bet then this show will take off.

(* Mandatory disclaimer: IWTV is brilliantly reimagined, but some people seem to be stuck in the book structure mentally, even though we are far from “only on one book”. Still, for all intents and purposes we are on IWTV for the majority of the story, and (a lot of) that HAS been told before. However… we will enter never before seen territory soon. Have actually already gotten to see a revenant?!!!

Let’s… just wait.

But I actually, sincerely doubt this show will be in any kind of danger.

[ur-mousey]

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The Coffin of Andy And Leyley Should We Really Care About the Incest? !!!

Plot Summary: A water contamination scheme keeps the brother-sister duo, Andrew and Ashely Graves, locked in their apartment on the verge of starvation. They discover a way out through demonic shenangians. Can these two grow past their childhood identities? Or are they destined to be each other's demise?

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Overall Thoughts:

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*Warning* These are my thoughts. Do not take them seriously. You can disagree all you want in the comments below. Enjoy!

First hearing about The Coffin of Andy and Leyley left a sour taste in my mouth. And it's probably for the same reason most people refuse to engage with the story being told by creator Nemlei. The notion on Twitter (or X, ew) dubbed this media as just the 'incest' game unfairly and failed to appreciate the themes being showcased by the siblings.

I believe that The Coffin of Andy and Leyley will grow in popularity by the release of the third episode. And this game will be a cult classic in no time, setting new records for storytelling in future indie projects.

I deep-dived into Nemlei's gameography, and dare I say, those other projects walked so Andrew and Leyley could run. There's only praise that should be afforded to Nemlei based on their improvements.

Watch or play through No-Good Noelle, which had come out three months prior, and see the differences. I also recommend Divilethion for those yearning for Nemlei's storytelling/art style.

But what those two games have in common, is that there's less to do for the players. While Andy and Leyley have the mechanics within its gameplay to be 10x more interactive for audiences. No wonder it had grown in popularity.

Now, to address the incest.

You do not have to like taboo topics. You do not have to engage with media that showcase it or be a part of a hate campaign because you don't like something. And as a society, we should bring awareness to media forms that encourage/promote dangerous ideology. Which in most cases does include incest.

However, art forms can get away with handling these taboo topics because they turn them into tools for driving a theme forward. And they aren't inherently romanticizing dangerous ideals. With that said it can be tricky for creators to handle these topics with care. You can hold the opinion that The Coffin of Andy and Leyley didn't utilize the concept of incest effectively in its narrative.

But, most people who've 'criticized' the game, dog pilled it because of the incest without understanding its importance to the themes. I get it, okay. It's disgusting that these siblings are down to bone.

Yet, as a writer, Andrew and Ashely are stellar characters with unique relationship dynamics. The theme of codependency is heightened by the pair's familial ties. Here's a little exercise:

Imagine Andrew and Ashely weren't siblings... They become slightly less interesting. Mainly due to the fact, they cannot uphold their OG purpose.

Episode two has two endings, Decay and Burial. Both hinges on the siblings making a choice to either let the past go or hold onto Andy and Leyley, their childhood nickname, now a source of resentment. Ashely idolizes the past while Andrew strives towards the future. On paper, they are foils of one another. These characters can work while not being related.

They could've been childhood friends if Nemlei wanted. But, then the plot would need to change.

Episode 2 wouldn't have worked to flesh out these characters equally because it was a murder scheme against their parents. Both Andrew and Ashely's interaction with their mother and how the events of the murder played out, heightened the themes of willingness to change or the lack of. And subsequentially, the codependency of the siblings.

At the end of the day, creators should be encouraged and pushed to create narratives through uncomfortable lenses. Sometimes a story can only stand out with that unique perspective. Nemlei's rap sheet as a game developer has never been taboo-free, however, it was this game that got them hated, bullied, and doxed.

Because of implied incest -from what I'm concerned. Aside from the dream stuff.

I'm not shocked, just disappointed that people took to the internet to be hateful about a game with merit.

I hope Nemlei takes this in stride and comes back to the platform with the release of episode 3. I am in love with The Coffin of Andy and Leyley. There are many unanswered questions. And I can only see a bittersweet ending for these characters.

Join me next time, when I give my thoughts on Andrew and Ashely Graves. I will deep dive into episodes 1 and 2 as well in the future.

⚰️🔪⚰️🔪⚰️🔪 Thoughts on Ashely Graves:

LOADING.....

⚰️🔪⚰️🔪⚰️🔪 Thoughts on Andrew Graves:

LOADING.....

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Thank you for reading! Request rules are here! Follow my ig = lil.thoughts.xo! Do you agree or disagree? Comment down below! Future fanfics are in the works so follow me. 🥹

I recommend checking out my character thought pieces on Okazaki Kei and Shiraishi Kageyuki from Collar X Malice.

[tarokro]

I finished watching the Yakuza Amazon Prime series. I'm really interested in hearing all of your thoughts now that the series is fully out.

for those curious, here is my review:

I wanted to like this series. I am a lover of a corny, well-intended but poorly-made media and clumsy adaptations. But I'm really not a fan. All the positive reviews citing negative reviews being from "angry gamers" fail to take into account the sheer number of people who aren't familiar with the games and still disliked this series, because it manages a feat which should be impossible for something of the yakuza genre: it is really, really fucking boring.

you have so many plot threads and characters introduced rapid-fire in a way that don't let you connect with anyone or anything in a series this short. Interesting moments aren't lingered on at all, with stiff, almost insultingly dull fight choreography and stilted, inauthentic one-on-one character moments. Boring plot threads like a road trip to find someone's sister and the Florist's backstory take up far, far too much screen time. The inclusion of the satanists is as entertaining as the violence in this series gets, and yet anyone familiar with the wider yakuza film genre that forms the foundation of this series' source material and serves as its inspiration just ends up bewildered as to why that's the main connecting thread throughout the whole thing. The camerawork and editing, especially in the final episode's giant brawl, is poor. Nothing is dynamic. Lighting and sound design could also be a lot better. Especially the sound design, the squelching stabs in the final episode are very funny. And I cannot stress enough how disappointed I am in the fight choreography in this show. For the yakuza genre it is breathtakingly boring.

Other minor details leave you baffled. They keep calling Kiryu oyagoroshi, which means patriarch killer, but never translate it or tell you what it means. You keep reading it in the subtitles and hearing it, but you're just meant to infer its meaning. The romantic conflict is just as shoehorned in as it is in the game. Kiryu and Miho's platonic interactions had more on-screen chemistry than anyone else shown. Saejima and his horrible wig are allowed to pop up for a few minutes before he dies-not-dies in a comically short gunfight. That the satanists are given more screen- and general punch-time than anyone else depicted is a baffling choice for a show like this and does nothing to generate interest in who the Satanists are beyond "why are they in this show?"

the invention of Aiko to serve as an older sister to Yumi and a mother to Haruka is baffling. A friend said it seems like she really was just created to load all the possible bad traits any of their group to have onto one person. I don't understand her purpose. To someone unfamiliar with the source material, she comes across as the friend group's load-bearing asshole.

Kento Kaku's performance as Nishiki, for what they've given him, is stellar. However convoluted the plot behind it was and how clumsily it was revealed, it was nice to see Nishiki's younger sister Miho given screen time and a personality so that you can experience some amount of connection to the grief felt by those she leaves behind.

I'm also really confused by the end. I assume that, if the second season they seem to be anticipating comes to fruition, they're going to drag the cult details forward. but my friends reminded me: if Nishiki has known about Kazama being the guy who killed their parents for this long and has been running around like a glorified El Tigre slashing and stabbing people for years, why is Kazama still alive? Surely he would have killed him?

I don't feel any need to be super positive about this series. as someone who's a fan of jank and clunky creativity, none of this series really comes across like it was made by someone having fun with it, and I think that's what makes me really disappointed in the whole thing.

@draayder I told myself I wouldn't check this blog again until I got the chance to watch the next batch of episodes, so sorry for my lack of reply! I hope you can forgive me. this sums up my thoughts.

[centrally-unplanned]

Something I struggle a bit with a sort of disconnect with the current leaders of "professional-quality anime discourse". We live in the sakuga era, where groups like Sakugabooru & Full Frontal Moe are doing really stellar work on peering behind the curtain at the realities of anime productions. They aim to give you the "animators look" at how it all happens, what people are thinking, what studio conditions are, the works. They command the heights from a respect standpoint in my opinion right now, and sort of "drive" analytical discourse.

But they aren't really what I find interesting. I love and need a ton of their work, but in the end the sakuga era is the animator's era; it centers anime-as-art, the people who create, their techniques, etc. That isn't actually my thing! I care about cultural history & casual history, "otaku studies", and consumers of media always outnumber producers of media a hundred to one. They of course exist symbiotically with each other, but the creators side is only ever going to be a part of that. And its not the load-bearing part of questions around why this or that media product succeeded, what it meant to audiences, how it reflects people's relationship with individual media & wider identity norms, etc.

And ironically I think the "peak" of this discourse in western spaces is coinciding with its decline in relevance in Japanese spaces. This is a whole other topic but in earlier eras the telos of technological progress, its intensity and directionality, created a parallel momentum in cultural identity - "new, better anime" seemed always around the corner and people responded to that via identity formation around the momentum. But now, even though technical improvements occur, from an audience perspective the telos is gone. Audiences would actually get a bit wrapped up in things like the digital revolution back then - now its more like trivia, it doesn't shape as much.

There is of course people out there who touch on the cultural & historical topics, I'm no island or anything. But its very diffuse, and other sections of the discourse space are struggling. Great YouTubers exist but imo overall this is not a great time for AniTube, the intensification & legibility of financial success has not inspired that kind of work. Obviously the blogosphere is bleeding heavily. Academic works have gems in there but media studies as a discipline is shackled with awful theoretical concepts and compositional norms, its like pulling teeth with their output every time. And also are generally interested in western fandoms as befitting western academics (and while I do use Japanese academic papers sometimes, the legibility barrier is...its tough).

Beyond just "feeling alone" its an issue because right now I am quite demotivated on this area; I feel in-between ideas, with any potential project seeming dim in its payoff. The default source of inspiration normally is the works of others! Every time I get politics-burned at some point someone else puts out a really good analysis, or even just a good question. Proposing good questions is underrated, its the fuel that powers research. Not to mention "shit keeps happening", you know? Fukuyama may hold an iron grip on the ruleset still but within his bounds the game keeps on playing, which results in flurries of activity that are inspiring. I really lack that for media discourse stuff right now. I can't remember the last time I read a work that I loved. Liked, yes, sure. But you don't get out of ruts with a like.

80% of this is explained by "I am going through a depression episode" lol don't worry I'm not an idiot. But hey, what is Tumblr for if not to rant...

[deltaengineering]

Winter Anime 2024: Payday

Metallic Rouge

Metallic Rouge hasn't ended yet, but I am quite certain that at this point it's unsalvageable. I can give it one thing: it's going for a specific ~vibe~, and nails it. Why anyone would want to evoke the ~vibe~ of "deservedly forgotten 2000s sci-fi seasonal" is beyond me (I won't provide an example, because if I could remember it it wasn't forgettable enough), but there you go. Truly, Bones have outdone themselves with this celebration of their 25 year legacy.

It's hard to even start, but the one thing everyone is certain about is as good as any: The plotting and structure of this show is a complete mess. Some consider this "ambitious", but I don't think an ambition of "let's throw in every half baked thing we can think of and try to glue it together with proper nouns" is worth celebrating. We've got insipid and illogical worldbuilding that ultimately goes nowhere, brave political statements on the level of "slavery sure is bad but don't be rude about it", metaphor bombshells like a character who schemes behind the scenes and styles themselves the "puppetmaster" and constant plot twists that explain things long after I've given up on even trying to make sense of anything. That's where the ~vibe~ comes from: everything that has ever vaguely annoyed you in a mid anime is somehow in this one all at once.

This wouldn't be so bad if it had characters that are entertaining on their own, but here we meet the most bizarre creative decision: the one thing it has going for it is the Diet Dirty Pair banter between Rouge and Naomi, which elevates a few episodes to "decent", but of course they spend half the show seperated. And by themselves, Rouge likes chocolate and is as dumb as a brick with charisma to match, while Naomi is sassy and mysterious and that's it. The rest of the characters (and naturally, there are far too many of them) are either irritating or at best just bland.

So if this is Bones pulling out all the stops, at least you should expect the production values to be high, but even that is a mixed bag. Metallic Rouge looks quite mediocre for the most part until it's time for a dedicated Sakuga Cut™, which might be a fight or alternatively just a random one of the dozens of boring hallway conversations (that Crunchyroll of all things is treating this as a joke really says it all). And even the fights aren't all that great, because this show somehow manages to have bad sound mixing and music beds that I'd call interesting in theory but don't work well as a score. At least it has a stellar OP, but even that seemed a lot better before the show actually came out.

I might bump up the score a point if it ends exceptionally well (which it won't), but even in that case... it's still bad. Please go back to sourcing your deep plots from Weekly Shounen Jump, Bones. ~3/10

Bucchigiri...

Bucchigiri..., on the other hand, has the exact opposite problem: While Metallic Rouge is a convoluted tangle of inconsequential plot, this show is just happy to phone it in. It almost feels like a rerun of fall 2021, where Metallic Rouge is the new Fena and Bucchigiri... is the new Takt:Op. It leaves an agreeable first impression, with a bold, colorful look, unusual setting, expressive direction and kinetic animation – but everything not entirely superficial is an excuse, and a "dog ate my homework" level of excuse at that. If all you want is bromantic burly brettyboys going through the motions, get your fanfic pen ready, but don't expect the show itself to provide significantly more than character designs. It doesn't help that the main character is particularly bad, with his gimmick being "annoying disinterested horndog". These non-characters keep going in circles slapping each other's asses and being not very funny for two thirds of the show, until a very generic "sensitive best friend is tempted by evil" drama plot appears because even yaoi shippers realize that eventually something has to happen, which boils down to Matakara going around slapping everyone's asses again, but now it's supposed to be sad. And then that doesn't work at all, because for character drama you need characters. Who knew.

Of course the funny bit is that this is pretty much what I asked for. I gave SKOO shit for only being good at the wacky parts while the heartfelt drama and more fleshed out characters fell flat. Well, now the director's followup work is just the wacky bits and feels completely hollow for it, and then the exaggerated drama lacks anything to back it up. Maybe just do better, I suppose. Oh yeah, and this also hasn't ended yet but with how completely predictable it is I feel like I've already seen the final episode. ~4/10

Undead Unluck

You can take the Shounen out of the Jump but you can't take the Jump out of the Shounen. I don't usually touch the Weekly Shounen Jump brand for good reasons, but Undead Unluck definitely had one of the strongest first impressions for one in a long time, if only because it has leads that aren't Goku and Vegeta again. But it also had a flashy, devil-may-care attitude with absurd nonsense happening left and right, a bonkers setting that is actually interesting in its own right and production value to back it up. In short, it was Fire Force with arguably better characters. When it's firing on all cylinders, Undead Unluck is a very fun time.

The problem is that Undead Unluck is firing on all cylinders about as often as a Cadillac V8-6-4 with a flaky ignition distributor. Primarily it has a massive padding problem: The amount of recapping and flashbacks to things that just happened is patently ridiculous and I say that as someone who has watched two seasons of My Hero Academia. If you include things like OP and ED, I feel like calling roughly a third of this show's runtime literally repeated content is not a wild exaggeration. And that's only literally repeated content – since this is Weekly Shounen Jump, there is also a lot of restating of facts and tedious explanations. I can't even blame this just on Jump Editorial, because a lot of the time it seems to be in service of hitting the right cliffhangers – but if both source and adaptation have severe pacing issues, it all compounds to the worst pacing in any show I've seen a considerable amount of.

And then, even in the coinflip of time when it's actually doing anything, it's obviously not always at its best either. This is honestly acceptable from a show that goes wild – with these you have to take the bad with the good. I didn't care much for the lazily metafictional final arc for example, but it would be perfectly fine if it didn't (quite expectedly at this point) do its core statement twice in as many episodes in a row, only with more screaming the second time. It's good when it's good, sure, but it would have to be outstandingly brilliant to make the whole thing worth it – which it isn't, so it's not. 5/10

Mahou Shoujo ni Akogarete (Gushing over Magical Girls)

My standard line regarding any extra spicy fanservice anime show has always been "you know you can find real porn on the internet easily, right". Gushing over Magical Girls (which is, aint gonna lie, a genius title translation) is a pretty good example why: Even though it is pretty damn explicit, it still isn't on the level of actual porn, and then the extended moaning and wriggling sequences just take up so much of the time that it gets tedious pretty fast. And a lot of the "other" content of the show is just blatantly an excuse to make the porn happen. There's some edgy comedy too, but I think characters like Kiwi are more annoying than anything, so that didn't do much for me either. Then the middle section of the show is an excursion where our protagonist villains go sex up a couple of more villainous villains, which feels like it's missing the point even by its own standards. Also, be aware that with hentai content come hentai production values, and this one is definitely below average. None of this is particularly unusual.

However, I kept watching this one, and the reason is pretty simple: I don't actually object to spiciness in principle, and in the beginning the show did a pretty good job of portraying Utena's awakening to a bunch of fetishes. That she then started an awkward on-and-off anonymous BDSM relationship with an actual magical girl was even better. I honestly have to say that this is a brilliant concept, even if it wasn't executed to a level where I was certain it was intentional. Also, while it's arguably the "main plot", it's a fairly small part of the show and when it didn't show up much in the middle I was sure the show had lost me. I do have to admit though that against all odds, Gushing does stick the landing, with a final episode that really pays off that plotline in the best way you could reasonably (see above) expect. It's a bit of a rough ride, but this show delivers.

So I'm two minds about Gushing over Magical Girls. If you just consider it a hentai OVA that somehow escaped to television (which is not an unreasonable standpoint), it feels surprisingly ambitious and well thought out. But as a regular TV show, it just has too many weaknesses to ignore. Still, even though I can't call it good, I still think it's a more interesting curio than the score might make it sound. 5/10

Hime-sama "Goumon" no Jikan desu ('Tis Time For "Torture", Princess)

Oh no, this has "torture" in the title, what could it mean? Yeah, I think at this point everyone knows that it's a joke (one might even say... The Joke) and let's leave it at that. It feels like every season there's some fluffy and cute comedy that I quite enjoy for no profound reason. The Alleged Torture here simply doesn't do anything wrong, manages to find just about enough angles to its one joke to not get boring, and features nice designs and enough production value to deliver a smooth ride all the way to the end. It occasionally does something beyond its one joke, and that tends to turn out cute and chill as well, like Tortura's modest OL home life. Really the only thing I don't like about this is the manzai reaction antics of the sword – explaining the joke is always questionable, but it's especially so when there is exactly one punchline that never changes. In any case, this one is hardly essential and there are many others like it, but sometimes you just want something sweet and inoffensive that still puts the effort in. And this is definitely one of those. 6/10

Kusuriya no Hitorigoto (Apothecary Diaries)

I feel like I should like this show a lot more than I actually do. This is because it is made of great ingredients: Very nice looks, a setting with tons of potential, mostly interesting characters and in particular an amazing main character. Maomao is just great, she has tons of personality and a funny oddball charm that is tempered by a smart and stoic attitude. The beginning of the show, where Maomao plays the streetwise intruder into the stilted world of court intrigue and manages to cut through the bullshit like nobody else could, is pretty excellent.

However, as the show went on, it became clear that I just don't agree with the direction the plot takes. Of course it turns out that Maomao is actually deeply involved into the court drama in half a dozen ways (without ever telling the audience about it, which smells of retcon). Of course the focus shifts to other characters like Jinshi or later on Lakan, who are far less interesting. Of course there is a romance with Jinshi on the horizon. I don't want to be that guy that is mad that a show doesn't turn out to be what they had wished it to be, but it's still a letdown.

And that's not mentioning that the daily business of the show, various levels of detective work, is hardly solid gold either. It's just bad at mystery writing – most "cases" turn out to be massively contrived and then Maomao walks in and just guesses the solution out of nowhere. The large-scale mystery (who is Jinshi, really?) is not much of a mystery at all but Maomao can't figure it out because apparently she has to solve these complicated and tiny problems before she can realize the simple and obvious large one. And then there's the drama, which is effective enough in the moment but seems to be mostly built on a foundation of allegedly smart people acting much more stupid than they should.

So overall, I think this is still a good show simply because Maomao is fun to watch no matter what, but I just don't think the writing can quite hold up its part of the bargain, and that is kind of a bummer. 7/10

Yuuki Bakuhatsu Bang Bravern

Bang Bravern arrived with a simple, but quite amusing thesis statement: What if you had a tacticool, Armored Core-like mecha setting but then everything changed when a super robot show invaded. That's pretty funny. It also just so happens that Masami Oobari knows that the likes of Top Gun tend to have a certain undertone, and also made Bang Bravern explicitly homoerotic. That's even funnier. Add to this the fact that the epic super robot action genre is inherently hilariously over the top, and you have the makings of a very amusing show. Now, I could just leave it at that, because that's what Bravern is. An over the top and self-aware love letter to the super robot shows of old, with a couple of additional comedic angles.

In other words, it's like all super robot shows that have been made in the last two decades. Yeah, Bravern is undeniably quite entertaining, but I also don't think it's anywhere as unique as people seem to think it is. The "super in a world of reals" joke in particular doesn't really come into play that often, apart from when that side of the show keeps introducing dozens of characters that then proceed to not do anything apart from standing on the sidelines. The gay love affair does matter more often, but seems to run into diminishing returns because once you've done "come inside me" (which it does in like episode 3), you really have nowhere to go. And besides those two, well... it's charmingly exuberant and features all the goofy tropes, but it lacks the absurd hugeness of a TTGL or the meaningful subtext of a Gridman – and that's only shows that I have actually seen as a non-fan of the genre. I suppose fans will gladly take it anyway, because the genre is somewhat rare nowadays, but Bravern doesn't exactly blow me away. Still, you can't deny the fun. 7/10

Sousou no Frieren (Frieren: Beyond Journey's End)

So here we come to the big dog. The show that's pulling Doraemon numbers on Japanese TV, has been riding a comfortable #1 spot on MAL for months, and has inspired an unfathomable amount of porn. And the real surprising thing is that it's the first show in a very long time that I think comes even close to deserving that level of hype, especially early in its run when it absolutely isn't the kind of show you'd expect to do this – apart from the production values being about as good as TV anime gets, naturally.

Frieren starts out as an uniquely focused narrative that explores as many angles as it can out of a complicated mess of legacy, memory and regret through the lens of a pretty simple and generic RPG trope. It achieves this almost entirely through one of the best casts I've seen in a long time – Frieren may not be quite as charming a protagonist as Maomao, but she has much more depth and more importantly, every character that matters in her show is almost as good, and their relationships are even better. In its first-cours adventure mode, when we're just wandering around having more or less episodic encounters and plot points that drift in and out of focus with a wistful tone but splashes of goofy comedy, Frieren is quite excellent and would have been my show of last year if I had considered it eligible.

But then it slams in a new gear with the elegance of a tractor driver who thinks clutches are for pussies. Suddenly we're doing a proper Shounen Exam Arc and we're getting a lot less of this and a lot more of this. Now to be fair, this is a long running manga and it probably could not have kept doing flashbacks to Frieren being too dense to realize that Himmel was hitting on her 80 years ago forever. But still, the mage examination arc just really isn't Frieren at its best. It's not even that the content is particularly bad (maybe apart from the really quite rough beginning), and I do understand the long-term benefits of introducing a bigger cast of characters for future use, especially when they turn out to be quite good eventually... but it all just takes way too long. There's still great moments here, but that's usually a small segment of the established good stuff or, failing that, Frieren dropping a sick ass spell. Yeah, I won't even blame this on the action, because said action is incredibly well done and still quite brief, but you really didn't need a full season of theorycrafting and skill discussions to get those explosions. In short. Frieren temporarily turns into Full Metal Alchemist with better leads, and while this would be high praise for almost any shounen manga, it isn't for the one that has demonstrated it can do far better.

There is one real upside to this distraction arc though: Unlike, say, the plot problems of Apothecary Diaries that are here to stay, none of this irreversible, which Frieren immediately makes clear by snapping back to its best behaviour the second they leave the designated raid zones. The ending is as good as any part of the show, with the skillful writing and great tone we have come to wish for. Frieren may not be as consistently excellent as it first appeared, but it is still pretty damn good – and not on a purely superficial level either, because it obviously can have outstanding writing when it wants to and the fundamentals are rock solid too. 8/10

Yubisaki to Renren (A Sign of Affection)

And the top spot of the season goes to... a show that may not be the most ambitious, but does absolutely nothing wrong. Yubisaki to Renren is a fluffy romance where a very cute girl meets a very nice boy, and then no drama happens because not everyone in the world is a fucking idiot. I think my delight with this says more about the absolute state of romance anime than it does about the show itself, but I also have to say that while the plot of this show might be simplistic, it takes great care to set everything up in such a way to get away with said simplistic plot.

Obviously the core of the setup is that Yuki is deaf. But, quite smartly, the author doesn't make the story about Yuki's problems with not being able to hear, but rather about how her world is just... limited. And Itsuomi is a dude with an uncommonly wide worldview and experience. Opposites attract, and there you go. The show basically gets all the grounding it needs from that simple setup for free, then throws in a bit of complicated history among the larger cast. Then just make Yuki incredbly cute and Itsuomi an uncommonly levelheaded adult who will take measures to prevent any pointless drama before it gets out of hand, and you have a show that's just 100% a good time all the way through. So the leads (i.e., the thing that matters way above all else in a romance) are great, and the rest of the cast is more than fine too, even those who would instigate such drama – it can't get annoying, because they never succeed.

Really if I had to say something negative about this show it would be that it's still superficial compared to a show at its skill level that does go hard. I mean, it's about two nice people falling in love and nothing goes wrong, which isn't exactly a lot. There is maybe also the idea that Itsuomi may be a bit too perfect, but I'm just more than happy to see a male lead in a shoujo romance that is neither an abusive jerk nor a bland cardboard cutout. In a perfect world, something like Yubisaki to Renren should feel a bit bland and generic, but in the real one, there just isn't much like it. 9/10

[mydaroga]

So what did you think of Tune In as a whole? Did you feel that Lewisohn was somewhat biased in the way he chose to frame/ present certain events?

That's the recurring topic of debate, isn't it? And, I think, an important one. I'm glad, for example, that AKOM is doing their series outlining their issues with the book, because I definitely have become concerned about how, in certain quarters, this book is lauded as the ultimate testament of Beatles history.

And not without reason. It took me a few tries to get hooked, but I really did enjoy reading it. I loved all the context and detail, and the historical research Lewisohn has done is tremendous and so, so valuable. Early Beatles history was covered by pop critics and journalists, and it's high time we started holding this story to historical standards.

(I'm sorry, this is gonna get long, but you knew that if you're asking me.)

But I do have qualms about this book. (Don't get me wrong--I think sometimes, especially on Tumblr, those arguments can be overdone. He's by far not the worst.) I am not a historian, or an expert, but I know that no one is without bias. And ML's constant refrain that he's free of such things and totally objective is belied not just by his being a human, but by other statements he's made in public. The danger here is less the fact he's biased, and more the fact he's convinced himself he isn't. He seems to have decided that his opinion is actually verifiable fact, and if only we were as keen observers as he, we'd know it, too. And that is worrisome.

I don't think it's necessarily conscious, which is even more dangerous. And I don't think any one instance of this in the book is that egregious--you could talk me out of caring about any number of them. It's the aggregate that creates a picture that comes off as less than objective. Off the top of my head, this arises in a few different ways. 1) He picks and chooses what to include, even from the sources we know he is already using. 2) He mashes quotes up from different sources, making context blurry and inherently creating new contexts via juxtaposition. 3) He misapplies quotes from one subject onto others, which may be useful when you don't have a quote for a specific thing but is spurious at best when you're using a reference about someone's character in one instance to a totally other instance. 4) He seems to have taken certain statements at face value and applied them to an overall picture of a person, such as when he uses Paul's statement about "looking like a poet" or whatever and applies it to numerous statements about Paul just sort of faking being arty, or when he applies John's reference to confronting the Maharishi to John taking control in every single situation ever. He's using quotes to support whatever he wants, and he's doing it without cluing in the reader that we're now in the realm of analysis.

Essentially, I think his research and notating and all that are stellar and super important. I think his prose is, if not highest quality, quite readable. But I have no doubt at all that he also is making assumptions, judgments, and leaps that aren't there and passing them off as factual, not speculative or interpretive. And I think that's dangerous given that he's currently lauded as the foremost authority on Beatliana.

But what do you think? I'd love to know.

[coldgoldlazarus]

Oh! Sorta responding to the "responding to sexualizing woman. Don't." post. What are your thoughts on Smash Ultimate altering Zero Suit Samus' design? Personally not a fan of it compared to Smash 4. I liked her bigger boobs. 😔

I don't really pay that much attention to Smash, honestly, (fighting games just aren't my thing as is, and I'm not attached to 95% of Nintendo's stuff the same way I am with Metroid (even if I am curious about Zelda and Splatoon)) so I don't really care that much one way or another. But I guess my take is, on one hand I respect the attempt to dial back on Samus's sexualization². On the other hand, as the full un-blackouted version of that post said, focusing on boob size to do so instead of other elements of design, both doesn't really address the actual problems, and kinda carries some dubious implications¹.

But on the other other hand, I remember the ridiculous blowback and controversy from Those Kinds Of Gamers™ being just, embarassing to watch, and I wish Samus hadn't been stuck at the center of that, but I kinda support the move on that front, catering to the assholes that much less, even and especially when they made a huge overblown fuss about it.

So it kinda balances out to a net result of "ehh whatever" either way.

---

¹The interplay of boobs and sexualization is of course it's own complicated topic, honestly. In an ideal (but hopefully attainable) world, the nipple would be free and breast size would be culturally sexually neutral - as with really any aspect of appearance. Particular people might have particular preferences, but it would be a purely personal thing without an established cultural yardstick to literally measure oneself up against. Unfortunately, we don't currently live in an ideal world, and that yardstick does exist (which is why all the Gamer Bros were so Big Mad over the Smash Samus breast reduction in the first place) and has to be contended with, so it's kind of a catch-22.

I do think breast size shouldn't be tied to sexualization, and unfortunately reducing one in the name of reducing the other, does just kinda serve to reinforce the base assumption of their tie being inherent. At the same time, while a real-life person having giant G-cups might have my sympathy for the back pain involved and little more thought than that, a character designed that same way would definitely have me questioning the creative intent behind that. So I do think there is kind of at least an upper limit to boob size in character design, past which it's hard not to assume sexualization is at play; even if I personally try to set that upper limit a bit higher than some people, and put more stock in other contextual aspects of the character design and source media before jumping to conclusions.

---

There's also a larger discussion to be had around like, what sexualization even is, types of sexualization and appeal, whether or not it's even a bad thing and when and why it is or isn't, and the cultural yardstick stuff surrounding that, but I don't quite have the brainpower or desire to get into all that right now. The distinction between why 2B from Nier Automata being sexualized can be criticized but is also mostly fine, whereas the gal from Stellar Blade being sexualized in a similar way is more dubious; and how the culture they both exist in impacts things, compared to if they existed in a vaccuum or a completely different zeitgeist. I guess a summary of my feeling there is that once again it really just depends from case to case; and the context of creative intent, execution, impact, and just how much narrative sense it makes, are key.

---

²Which brings me back to Samus. I'm running out of steam so I'm just gonna do a quick lightning round.

- Do I have a problem with the broad idea of her being sexualized? Not necessarily. It doesn't make a whole lot of sense for her role as a bounty hunter, but it can serve well as part of her personal characterization, and metanarratively as part of the subversion of gender roles and stuff that she can be read as. (Though that in of itself gets into some thorny bigger topics around gender I also don't have the energy for rn.)

- Do I take issue with the specific way most of her canonical appearances do it? Yes, and I've talked at length in other posts about how I think they should do things instead.

- Does her presentation in Smash matter nearly as much as her presentation in the actual Metroid games? Ehh, mostly not, but it would be nice if she was represented better there.

- Do I think her breast size matters all that much? Generally not, barring of course the aformentioned upper limit of reasonability; the problem is more in other aspects of the design. Again, I didn't have a problem with the original boob size or the reduction, so much as Zero Suit Samus's overall design in the first place.

- How should they actually fix those in Smash, then? IMO there are two different approaches there. The simpler way would be to redesign Zero Suit Samus from the ground up to be less of a latex-clad barbie doll. Dread's buffer ZSS model is a pretty good show of how to accomplish that without drastically altering the design; though I also think the Zero Suit itself is in need of a moderate rework, to feel more like the astronaut's undersuit and conduit with the Powersuit that it's excused as in the lore.

The other option would be to address the whole weird thing of Zero Suit Samus for some reason being counted as a completely separate playable character from (Powersuit) Samus, and coalesce them together back into one thing. (Possibly with the option to switch modes at will, or being forced into Zero Suit mode on her last life, or something like that.) This would definitely more significantly impact her place in Smash and would probably cause an uproar that would make the boob controversy look like nothing, but it would be worth it for the greater character accuracy IMO. Honestly of the two options... Well, I'd just prefer they do both, but I think if I had to pick, I'd want the full redesign more.

[beevean]

Really enjoy reading your analyses of Netflixvania. Makes me feel like I'm not crazy for disliking the series, since it seems most people really like it. I'm not a huge Castlevania fan (I wasn't even aware of any Castlevania manga until I read your posts), but the fight with Dracula at the end of season 2 just felt really off to me. Like every single character came out of it ten times worse than when they started. So I'm curious, what do you think of how Dracula was defeated?

I'm glad you liked it! <3 And I completely understand. The show gets praised to high heavens from everyone, and while I can dismiss the occasional "god i want to smother myself in alucard's tiddies" post, the long articles gushing about the stellar animation and carefully woven characters leave me more at loss... And like I said, it's not even a matter of being a fan of the games, the writing itself is seriously flawed.

Anyway, the Dracula sequence has me conflicted.

Pros:

Dracula is appropriately shown to be an absolute beast in combat. Three against one can barely scratch the guy. And Godbrand says in an earlier episode that Dracula hasn't been feeding regularly, meaning he's also in a weakened state. It is, in theory, viscerally satisfying to see.

The animation finally reaches the standards that the general praise attributes to it. That is to say, it's really fucking cool. I appreciated the focus given to his giant Hellfire attack, since it's his most iconic one (although I don't think it should be touched with anything, but eh)

The "my boy" sequence is the most heartwrenching scene in the show, both because it's simply well written, because I like the poetry that a monster like Dracula can only be put down by his own human emotions, and because Graham McTavish's back must have hurt so bad, carrying the show like that. Seriously, he's leagues above every other voice actor.

Cons:

Dracula being an absolute beast only makes me angrier in retrospect because the rest of S2 painted him as a Depressed Old Man™ slumping in his chair and being too Tired to properly supervise the war he started. "Carmilla has made her move" no shit you absolute dumbass, you and your lackey Isaac allowed her to do so! You were aware that she was dangerous and you didn't care!! Where were you all this time!!!

(and don't give me "well drac doesn't lift his own ass until the very last possible moment in the games either, it's lore accurate". that is a sign of arrogance and power. like drac doesn't need to lift a finger to stop intruders in their tracks, his legions of hell can do all the work. only if you actually, physically reach him, then he starts to fight. In the show he was so apathetic, that I almost lowkey agree with Carmilla's frustrations... and that's the point. It was artificial conflict for the sake of propping this OC.)

Dracula no-selling every attack paints the heroes as weak. Especially Trevor, who after making such a scene of the Morning Star in a previous episode can only piss him off with it.

Trevor punching Dracula, and him recognizing him as a Belmont because of that. The sheer lack of respect towards Trevor as a character and the source material cannot be contained :^)

(and this is minor, but I don't like how Sypha is the one getting scarred by the encounter. Alucard also got scarred by his father way back at the beginning, as he loves to flaunt. Meaning, Trevor is the only one who wasn't impacted by him, which boggles my mind - the scars that game Trevor has on his face and chest aren't there for show! They mark him as the Legendary Belmont who first survived against the Dark Lord! Why do y'all hate this guy so much?)

Alucard steals the entire glory. In a vacuum, it makes sense because they have the closest, most interesting relationship. Lore wise, this should have been Trevor's moment and once again he gets deprived of it. The Belmonts just don't have a legacy in the show.

Overall, For Love is a very well written emotional payoff to a huge waste of time. I don't care that Alucard is setting to kill his father because we barely know how he feels about that. I don't care that Trevor is finally about to fulfill his own legacy because the show kept spitting on it. Sypha is just there to be OP I guess. Their entire "arc" in S2 was them getting cooped up in the Belmont Hold, and Alucard and Sypha having fun being the biggest dicks to Trevor. They didn't even train! The most they did was to conveniently find that the castle uses an engine to move.

dracula doesn't even turn into anything :< where's my giant goat/bat monster form :<

... so I have more negatives than positives lmao. I agree with your general assertion that everyone looks worse than they should. However, there are genuine aspects to praise. I guess the scene is beautiful if you're a fan of Dracula and Alucard, and really disappointing if you're a fan of Trevor :P

[manyothermusingsofmine]

Masquerade of Units || Chapter 2/5

Prev: Chapter 1 Fandom: Xmen

Warnings: Uh, none, let me know. Smoking, I guess.

Wordcount: 2390

Summary: Gambit figures he should probably do something about the AC units not running problem. Unfortunately for him the dice gods aren't happy with him as he keeps rolling either "off by one" rolls or nat ones. AN: does tremblement de terre actually mean earthquake in french in this context and set up, idk maybe not, is that accurate to Cajun French, idk probably not, am I going to use it anyway and pray no one uhm actually's me about it, yeah. Just... Look just pretend it means earthquake in the sentence it's in for both our sake, okay? Help a sister out here. Smoking's bad for your health btw dont do it your lungs will be very :( if you do ------------------------------

Cooling the whole room down was definitely something that needed to happen as well. While it didn’t bother Gambit that much all things considered, and a bunch of other mutants around the place were equally fine with the humidity and heat because they were either southern like him or their powers helped them out in some way… Roughly half of them wouldn’t last it through the night safely if this heat remained or got any worse. The best gamble he could take was to at least find some way to get the AC running properly, and if all else failed look for an ice mutant to manually cool down the entire room. He hadn’t seen Bobby around for the time being, but Forge was over in a corner talking to- Shadow.

Of course Shadow had to be talking to Forge, the only one he knew well enough to ask on a less then stellar or legal endeavor to get some machinery running. She seemed incredibly excited and fascinated by the mechanical prosthetics on him, running her mouth a mile a minute with no doubt a million different questions that he patiently answered; while it took Gambit everything in his will power to not facepalm so hard to leave an imprint of his own hand on his face. Watching them talk for a bit longer, he noted that despite her enthusiasm Shadow was one of the people struggling in the heat of the room, and with that he let out a deep sigh and decided to take the matters of the evening into his own hands after all. Going over to them as best as his legs allowed, he tried vehemently hard to ignore how being closer to her made the heat just as unbearable to him; smoothly sliding his way into the conversation. He hoped it was smooth, anyway.

“Quite the atmosphere we’re having in this room tonight, mes amis; Volatile, if you catch my drift. Forge, you agree with me that the AC units are doing absolutely nothing to help, right?” Forge just nodded, half looking at Shadow who had turned her attention away from him as soon as Gambit entered the conversation and trying not to chuckle at how instantaneous that was while Gambit explicitly held his red eyed gaze on him. These two really were something else entirely; incredibly obvious for starters.

“Agreed. And let me guess, you plan on being a hero about it, but you need my mechanical expertise to actually get these units running?”

“… Something like that,” Gambit agreed, clearly not liking that Forge immediately had him figured out only to Forge’s further amusement.

“Count me in. Where’s the maintenance room?”

“Pardon, the what?”

“The maintenance room?” Forge asked, eyebrows raised in amused disbelief, “what, you think the main unit running these things would just be chilling out- no pun intended, in the main hall way where we flick a button and all is fine or something? No, my friend, you’ll have to find out where they actually keep the main source, and your best bet is the maintenance room.” Gambit just looked at him, wheels and cogs turning in his brain as the idea and allure of the night had completely distracted him from knowing any such location- and it was still too hard to focus on thinking of any place that he could label as the room Forge needed with the radiant presence of Shadow right next to him, while his eyes kept flicking to her and back to Forge as soon as she looked his way. He had no idea where that damn room could be, but then his mind brought up someone who very likely would know exactly where it was. Snapping his fingers, he slightly pointed at Forge

“Hold that thought for a minute.”

As soon as he had entered the conversation, he left; slipping through the glass doors that Fred had left crooked for anyone who wanted to get out and get some much needed fresh air- And Gambit swore he had seen Miranda slip out this way as well for some reason or another; he figured because she couldn’t handle the humidity either. He bellowed her name across the garden for as much as he could project his voice outwards, only to get a disapproving, deep huff from someone on his right hand side.

“Must you do that at 11 pm? Careful, buddy, might get yourself a noise complaint that way.”

“Good evening to you too, Monsieur Alvers. What are you doing out here all by your lonesome, mh?”

“How’s that any of your business? … This Miranda you’re looking for, what, ran away from your dashing allure or something?”

“If you being out here is none of my business, my looking for a female friend is none of yours, tremblement de terre.”

“I still don’t speak French, Rem.”

“Cajun French, and that’s fine, Lance; whatever you’re saying is all Greek to me, anyway.”

It got a genuine amused huff from the brunette as he plucked another cigarette out of his pack, calmly reaching it over to Remy in a move clearly asking him to do the honor of lighting it up; maybe even in trade for information on if he saw Miranda or not. He turned, leaning his side to the wall instead of his back like he had before, almost lazily but expectantly looking at the Cajun. Remy just sighed.

“You’ve got to quit that, mon ami; it’s a bad habit,” but despite that he used his kinetic power incredibly localized in the end of the cigarette, until the slightest of explosions set it alight. Lance simply shrugged, taking a drag from the cigarette. Exhaling the smoke into the cold night almost made him look like a dragon, or, well, like a smoldering volcano.

“Like I care. Miranda, lady in all red?” Remy nodded, glad that he had apparently seen her because he felt little for chasing her around the whole garden, while Lance shifted back to leaning his back against the wall with one of his legs propped up against it as well, “went south into the garden and then took an east turn about a hundred meters in. Or, about a hundred and nine yards; forgot I’m taking to one of the freedom unit people.”

“She with anyone?”

“How would I know? Didn’t care that much to see if she was having a private party out there.”

“Can’t you sense it? I’m pretty sure I recall you telling me once that you can sense footsteps and the like, that the ground tells you who is where. If you can sense her, which I think you can, surely-“

“So what if I can? What’s the fun in telling you? Go figure it out yourself,” and after that he spoke in his native tongue, the words melodious and pretty but utterly incomprehensible to Gambit. He rolled his eyes as Lance exhaled another drag from his cigarette.

“You’re impossible.”

“So I’ve been told before. Good luck fetching your friend,” deep brown eyes watched as Gambit made his way further into the garden. Lance just placed the cigarette back between his lips, holding his elbow with his free hand as he needed the other to keep the smoke he had under control while still smirking. Nope, not even a helping light could convince him to spill a lady’s secrets like that; his lips were sealed in both of the languages he spoke.

On the other hand, it wasn’t like Miranda hadn’t heard the holler for her name, with even Kurt reacting to it as he halted the waving of the fan he still held. She went slightly paler than she already was, as his yellow eyes quickly flicked to her and then back to the inky blackness of the night where few could make out more than the vague shapes of the shrubbery. And it wasn’t like his keen eyesight allowed him to actually look through all the greenery that looked blue in the hues of the night.

“Scheiße,” she blinked as she turned to him in confusion, never having heard anything like that out of him before, “if he finds us here we’ll never hear the end of it. And he’s clearly looking for you, for some reason. I have no idea how long it’ll take him to actually get-“

He looked down at the fan he was holding, before his eyes shot to his jacket still draped over her shoulders. Welp, if anything, both of those were incredibly incriminating to two people trying to insist there wasn’t anything going on between them, yet. Rapidly closing the fan and handing it back to her, his hand lingered on hers for a moment to get her attention to him instead of the million mile stare of a deer caught in headlights she had.

“You and I agree we don’t want him finding out about this, let alone as one of the first to find out?” she just nodded as he looked around to immediately formulate his way out as soon as possible, only to feel her gently place a hand on his other cheek to quickly press a kiss to the one facing her. He looked back to see her jewelry, the rhinestones and shimmers on her dress, the dark gloves that barely showed in the night and synthetic golden details of his own jacket where she had been sitting before, letting out a slight laugh at how clever that actually was. She came back into view as soon as she pulled away, to which he turned to her, “I wouldn’t do this if I had another choice, so please forgive me for it.”

With the grace of a stage magician, he took the jacket off her shoulders; twirling it like a cape and in one smooth move using it to vanish from the scene in a huff of smoke, landing himself somewhere in the tall trees on the premise and praying with all his might that Gambit wouldn’t see the shimmer of gold if he looked up. Miranda just stretched, slowly and deliberately, to reset herself in position as if she had been there the whole time with no one by her side, ignoring the return of the goosebumps on her skin.

Gambit didn't even show up until moments after the faint scent of sulphur already had dissipated in the breeze, but it had done little to make her skin agree with the cold air that he did immediately took notice off.

"Are you trying to catch yourself a cold death out here?" he asked, quirking an eyebrow at how obviously her skin was complaining about being exposed to the elements like this while she just shrugged.

"Better than being boiled alive in there," she answered, her green eyes betraying nothing he didn't already know.

"Yeah, about that. I need to know where the maintenance room is."

"And why would I-"

"Drifting, please, don't be playing games with Gambit now," he groaned, not in the mood to do this song and dance after already having to pull a similar thing with Lance, "I don't think I've ever seen you enter a room without immediately looking for exits and other important looking doors as long as your mind isn't high focused on a task at hand. Out here is freezing, in there is boiling; unless we do something about the temp in there this whole night is going to end in a disaster.

Look, if you need more incentive than that, Gambit may not know where our Nightcrawler has gone off to, but that man owes you the waltz he claims to excel at. He can't make true on that claim that if the ballroom is cooking him inside his own fur, oui?" Her gaze turned ever so slightly down to the ground, clearly thinking it over before she looked back at him, a very light blush on her face as she did.

"He doesn't 'owe' me anything, Remy. But you are right; having to call out a bunch of ambulances when people are inevitably going to faint from the heat is only going to turn the night into a disaster. Lucky for you I do happen to know where the maintenance room is; you've got a mechanic in mind to help us?"

"Sure do, Forge is on standby for that," Gambit replied as she got up, frowning as another cold breeze made her shiver intensely and worsened the bumps on her arms. Seemed cruel to do nothing about it, "here, let me help for a spell."

He did nothing but place a hand on the arm closest to him, with no intention other than to share the warmth his hands possessed due to the nature of his powers. She really did feel cold to the touch, and he sincerely doubted she was any better off out here than indoors despite the heat there. The warmth radiated through her cold limbs quick and easily, calming her skin and the tremors of her body.

".... Thanks."

"Don't mention it, mon ami. Can't be having you actually catch your death out here now can we?"

She nodded half-heartedly, following him back into the ballroom and out the other end into the hallway where Forge was already waiting for them to join up. Miranda took the lead, calmly leading the way to the corridors that were warm, but not as warm as the room that was also packed with a bunch of mutants trying to socialize. She took a few turns here and there, until she halted right beneath the gigantic staircase that she had trotted down from as it had been the one closest to the bedroom she had picked to crash in when the night would be over.

No, she halted because there was a new addition to the maintenance room looking door she had seen on her way down the staircase before getting into the oven of a ballroom, gesturing behind her to both Gambit and Forge to hide in the gap the staircase made between it and a wall behind it; large enough to hide a whole group of people.

“Well, we do have one problem,” she whispered, pointing at the man leaning on the door they had to get through, “he wasn’t there before.”

[msperfectsheep-posts]

for that ask game you reblogged! I'm curious how you picked the roles for the extra characters in The Thrones of Stars, or any other behind the scenes sneak peeks you have to share from there |･ω･)

Sorry for the late response!! Thank you for this ask so much :)

For anyone curious, here's the story! It's a novelization of the Hoshimeguri no Kansokusha (eng: The Throne of the Stellar) event from 2018, but I worked hard to make it so that anyone could read it without any knowledge of the event or even the source material!

Now, here's the answers to your questions: (Some spoilers beneath the cut)

For the supporting cast + ZOOL, it sort of worked out from a base of an idea that I got from @zekkun-shion's post about ZOOL in Hoshimeguri, which I felt was a good start to build off of! I obviously changed some of the roles and ideas, but having each of them split up between the four main planets that aren't Eterno and Mistero made it easier to integrate them into the world. Another take I discovered while in the middle of writing The Thrones of Stars was @ enargeia's (Ao3, not Tumblr) story about ZOOL being on the various moons surrounding the main stars, which I thought was super awesome and cool! I didn't integrate any of that into my story aside from a few brief mentions of moons surrounding the stars, but it's something that's stuck in my mind and I love all the creative ways people try to put them into this story!

Now, as for the rest of the supporting cast, it was a little more vibes-based. I went with Tsumugi being on Lama because of this piece by @umii7love, since the outfit was so cool that it felt like a shame not to (I love her in the color green; she looks great!)

Rinto got put into the role as the blacksmith from the original story, since I didn't really love how the blacksmith treated Hope in the original story when he was more or less acting as a stand-in parental figure for the month before Hope decided to look for Curse. I figured that the visual of Rinto being the blacksmith was a little funny, but his personality and ability to handle Hope felt like a good match. Also, reunite Re:vale on Eterno! That's fun!

Kaoru was put on Sirena because I was looking between Alba and Sirena and I really wanted to make it seem like Carnelian was isolated and lonely, especially because a lot of his ideas in the original story come to fruition because he has no one to tell him no or to even think things through. I also felt that putting Kaoru with Sirena was a fun dichotomy, since even on the most relaxed planet, she's still busting her ass to get things done. Lastly, it was an aesthetic choice! I felt her pink hair would go really well with the general Sirenan aesthetic of bright and colorful, so her fate was sealed there.

Aya was put with Minami on Sirena, but her origin being Lama was something I used to help fuel some of the relationships between Orion and Sardinia and their respective stars. I wanted to show that immigration between stars was something that did occur, but not very often, and that people's nationalistic (? is it nationalism if it's for a planet, not a nation?) tendencies made them feel baffled at the very idea of leaving even a civil war-torn country for one living in peace. She serves a few different roles, which kind of ties into the fact that she's a plot device in i7 proper initially, but she also definitely grew into her own character quickly.

That leaves Shirou and Banri, who I put with Burst Roar for two different reasons. Shirou doesn't like. Do Much in the story itself, but that's also sort of the point of his character. He exists passively to cover everything Fang and the rest of Burst Roar isn't focusing on so that nothing gets neglected, so while they're dealing with an interstellar crisis, he's making sure their finances are in order. It's a sort of position that I wanted to give to a character that would make a fun cameo, but for anyone that's an anime-only and doesn't know him yet, then they're not going to feel too alienated. Banri, on the other hand, was put with Burst Roar because of a few things that are tied to the ending of the story that I have not published! I explain it pretty well in the narrative itself why he's with Burst Roar, but from a meta standpoint, it just Made Sense to me, and also him being a pilot felt like a relaxed role where people can approach him for advice at any time, but his job isn't to give advice quite like Tsumugi or Kaoru do.

With any characters I didn't mention that are part of the supporting cast, they fall into two categories: Exists in a small on-screen part, or exists off-screen for a role in one of my sequels. Otoharu falls into the first category, making a small cameo as Tsumugi's father on Lama, but his role is so small that I didn't think tagging him was appropriate. Meanwhile, Yaotome Papa and Ryo are both in the second category, with Yaotome Papa being name dropped as King Rigel, but he's never seen on screen, and Ryo's character name has yet to be revealed for a variety of reasons.

I wanted to push the narrative beyond what canon had to offer because these worlds that i7 gave me as a base allowed me to make some really fun lore and politics that feels wasteful to leave behind with just a novelization, so I'm hoping to use them some more when I write my original sequels working off of The Throne of Stars. For a lot of these supporting characters, their roles will be bigger in the sequels too, since I could only hollow out so much space in the original story for them.

As for a sneak peek scene, I guess I could allow a small piece!

Photographs like snowflakes fall from fingers onto the table, each of them a candid taken using some well-practiced tricks and a small hand mirror. Most of them depict at least one of two figures: a boy pretending to be a man, and a leader pretending to be a subordinate. Some photographs focus on other details, such as the blood under the boy’s fingernails or the dirt tracked on the floor far from the entrance. The assassin picks one, holding the photograph between his fingers as he drinks in the figures trapped inside. “Was there anyone else?” The other assassin nods with an easy smile, sitting back as papers shuffle between her well-manicured hands. The papers are handwritten, with small, sharp letters that detail the assassin’s observations. Most of the words are transcribed conversations held between the boy and leader, taking care to denote who was speaking by marking the speakers as “small” and “tall” respectively. A few rogue doodles, mainly of the leader, fill the margins in the way that ivy climbs up walls—decorative to some, a nuisance to others.  “Yes, clockmaker in the back.”  “No pictures?” “He didn’t come out.”  “Sad.” The assassins pick apart each others’ work, vultures gorging themselves on rotting carcasses until they’ve had their fill. It’s dirty work, but someone must do it—might as well have it be someone who can keep the dirty work neat.  “This is disappointing. It’s not worth a kill.” There are some things that aren’t worth killing, things that are too small, too weak, too unimportant. It’s a waste of time, talent, and resources. If death wants to bring more into her domain, she has plenty of other tools than the assassin lap dogs at her disposal. She is the queen eternal, ruling from her silver chair burning with the light of tortured souls. All will bow before her eventually.  “Probably not.” The assassin agrees. “Let’s head back to Escoria.” The assassins take their work with them as they melt into the night, disappearing into the miserable maw of earth that they consider their home. No trail of blood nips at their heels this time, nor the scent of death like an expensive perfume—they vanish like night being chased away from breaking dawn.  The boy and the leader may live another day.

[okabehk]

Title: #Doona

Main Cast: #BaeSuzy #YangSeJong

Episodes: 9

Platform: #Netflix

What a beautiful love story. I caught myself falling in love with Doona as well, what a great pperformance by Suzy. Se Jong gave an extremely emotional performance as well and honestly made me tear up a few times, his apology towards the end that Doona demanded broke my heart 😭😭😭 The supporting cast was super fun and the second female lead was stunning and genuine. I will say if you are watching this on a purely surface level without listening to the characters and what they say or aren't paying attention to some of the opening sequences and their symbolism you may be disappointed, especially with the ending which could be said is open though clearly if you see what Won Joon is wearing in the opening sequence of episode 9 you can tell that was actually the ending. Also Won Joon straight up tells her she is the only one for him and do you really think Doona would quit him after being the only source of love she felt her entire life. And let's talk about the symbolism that is the train opening sequences where they are waiting for the obstacle between them to pass and when the rails go up Doona starts walking straight towards him, absolutely stellar. A definite must see in my book!!!!

[lady-phasma]

Auntie, Auntie, Auntie! *tugs your sleeve*

You did such a stellar job of describing Aemond’s pubes that I now must implore you to tell us all about Daemon’s little pubey triangle.

Why do the carpets not match the drapes? Do you think that hair stretches all the way to his taint and up to his asshole? Does he manscape? Has he ever painfully laced his short and curlies into his breeches? What do they smell like? What do they feel like? Enquiring minds need to know.

I am so glad you enjoyed that. Daemon's situation is a bit more complex. I'm marking this mature for the gif below the cut. Here goes.

Daemon's pubes... where to begin? For those who don't know, it is canon that the carpets don't match the drapes. I made this incredibly unhinged gif for science:

you are welcome

I'll get the manscaping out of the way because I think not. Daemon is vain but not in this area. He knows that this glorious bush doesn't distract from what he's packing. He most likely has, how did you so eloquently state it, "painfully laced his short and curlies into his breeches." He certainly would if he's lacing up in a hurry.

They aren't the silvery blonde like most Targaryen pubes because of a recessive gene. Maybe it's a bit of a sore subject for him, given how proud he is of his Targaryen heritage. As "close" as these family members are he most likely knows which side of the family it comes from. Unfortunately, I can't hazard a guess. He embraces how masculine this plush carpet is even though it doesn't match his glorious mane.

Now for the good stuff. Their fragrance depends, of course, on how soon after bathing you decide to bury your face into them. Fresh out of the water they have a deep musky smell that makes your head spin. If he just hopped off Caraxes and you were lucky enough to get a whiff it would be a combination of brimstone, leather, and that sweet, sweet man stank.

While you're down there, and certainly Daemon would let you take your time to admire, you would find that the darker hair is a bit coarse. There's also the occasional grey hair in the mix, he wouldn't be a gilf without them. Thick, tight curls at the base of his majestic cock, that thin out a bit near the crease of his thighs. He doesn't have much on his lower belly but that's compensated by the amount that continues to the back.

I'm frankly surprised you didn't ask about his balls. There his hair is, thankfully, thick. Not the sparse, patchy hair that you might imagine. Although not as plush as what he sports above it's still pleasing to the touch (of your fingers or tongue). Yes, of course his taint has a lovely dusting of dark brown hair.

Perhaps unfortunately, his asshole isn't exempt. If you've read my Aemond ask then you'll know pooping isn't polite. Unlike his nephew, Daemon partakes in this unseemly act. If you are curious here are my headcanon sources: his asshole specifically and his privy habits. If I had to read them you do too. I can't bring myself to go into detail about that but I do think Daemon appreciates being clean. He may have to pay more attention to cleanliness precisely because of his hair situation. If he's just stepped out of the bath and was in the mood, he would love to have your face buried between his cheeks. There's not so much hair that it would be a distraction.

[roskirambles]

Halloween Movie of the Day: Beetlejuice (1988)

Life can be hard, with all it's disappointments and unexpected turns. Death, however, doesn't solve anything... even less when it involves bureaucracy. Something the Maitland couple learn the hard way when they crash and fall into a river, only to return home to find the "Handbook for the Recently Deceased". Then, a family from New York moves in to their once idyllic house with all the chaos of avant-garde art. So, when pushed against the wall, the recently deceased may turn their eyes to a self proclaimed freelance bio-exorcist extraordinaire.

It may be hard to imagine, but there was a time where Tim Burton wasn't the champion of the weird and creepy. In fact, having only Pee-wee's Big Adventure (1985) under his belt this was his big gamble to show his style and MY GOD, what a stellar showcase it was. Between it's use of German expressionism for the set design to the ever morbid humor, the whole package is just entertainingly off kilter. Things like suicide and mutilation aren't off the table as the source of jokes, yet, it's all so brazen and playful even body horror and violent imagery become some prime slapstick material, all while poking fun at human stubbornness, bureaucracy and modern art. Also, absurdly skewed priorities from nearly the entire cast.

If there's a noticeable wart to the movie, though, it's probably the title character himself. While many of his antics are indeed funny as hell (his maverick energy is one of the reasons this Michael Keaton's favorite role after all), others would rightfully put him on the sex offender list while still being played for laughs. Then again, he's the villain and gets his due deserts so there's that.

Frankly, I'm not sure a film like this could have been made outside of the 80's for quite a few reasons. But even with those things it's shocking how well it holds up. It's generally speaking still a blast, stylish and oh so funny.

[mlpbrainrot]

hi everypony !!!

im venus bloom, the snails collective's ponysona.

-> not an alter, a collective representation <-

main acc: @actuallyverynormalbtw

we use they/them in a plural way. i use neopronouns, but they is always acceptable.

[e/em/eir/emself and haze/hazel/hazels/hazelself]

my cutiemark was only picked from a picrew, so i will likely change it in the future, but i intend to keep the meaning the same. it symbolizes our multiplicity, resiliance, and growth. like different flowers growing together through cracks in cement. this isnt to say my special talent is just being a system, moreso to symbolize that we dont have only one special purpose and that our primary purpose is to help eachother grow.

[image id: a generation 4 my little pony picrew. the cartoon town, ponyville in the background. a pink watermark reading "Rainbott" in the lower left corner. a brown unicorn with off white hooves and a half pink/half yellow wavy mane and tail stands with one front hoof raised. im the foreground. e has green eyes and three freckles on eir nose and is smiling. e is wearing the seapony shell necklace and has three different colored flowers, yellow/blue/pink, as eir cutiemark. end id]

some things about us:

autistic with adhd

we are all queer and/or trans

we are chronically ill and physically disabled

my little pony is a special interest shared by most of the system

the alters in venus bloom's system are based on our own

we are just strange <3

some details about me, venus bloom:

i've lived in ponyville my whole life

i use a mobility aid, like stellar eclipse's

i worked at the library before twilight lived there, and opened a new one after it was destroyed by tirek

i spend most of my time at the library reading, learning, and writing. as well as offering a listening ear and a helping hoof to the ponies who stop by

i am friends with trixie, starlight, and sunburst

i have alters who aren't unicorns, and alters who aren't ponies (seapony, griffin, changeling, dragon, dog, etc)

different alters have varying interests, like astrology, magic, reading, writing, music, etc...

we have loved my little pony gen 4 since 2011 when we were 7 years old, before that we enjoyed some toys and tapes from gen 3, and now we are a fan of gen 5 as well. it continues to be a huge source of comfort and joy for us. so please interact if you enjoy pony-posting:3