#no. 1; 2; and 4 (especially 2 and 4) are basically the same character type. so i guess this says something about me lol

[icewindandboringhorror]

recent things and such~

[gellavonhamster]

Tagged by the lovely @mushiemellows to post four characters that make me say "my man, my man, my man." Hehe.

Quincey Morris. THE Gothic horror cowboy ever - not that there are too many Gothic horror cowboys, which must be because most filmmakers can't handle his sheer power and don't include him in the movie adaptations of Dracula (and the adaptations that do include him don't do him much justice, though they get a cookie from me for trying). Brave, compassionate, a "rough fellow" and a "gallant gentleman" at the same time. Tells a girl who rejected him he'll be okay with just remaining her friend and then actually proves himself a great friend, wow. Would totally die for his friends, would totally speak exaggerated Texan slang just to make Lucy smile. Super hot and ~manly~ according to Jack "Bisexual Disaster" Seward and pretty much everyone else. There's a post of mine gushing about him in the Dracula Daily book, which is a tiny bit embarrassing, because I've made plenty of much smarter posts about this novel, but you know what, that tracks.

2. Porthos from BBC's The Musketeers specifically. I'm kind of a fake Three Musketeers fan, because I've read the novels and enjoyed them a lot, but when it comes to the main characters, I highly prefer them in this historically inaccurate, book-inaccurate show. The original musketeers are much more complex as characters, but they're also quite shitty as people, and while I appreciate their complexity, their significantly-less-shitty working-class versions (or rather, three working-class ones and Athos the class traitor) are dearer to my heart. And Porthos, well, damn. BBC really knew what they were doing when they took Howard Charles - a very attractive man per se - and gave him leather clothes and those puffy shirts and a pirate-y bandana and an earring and a cool scar. Porthos is actually my favourite musketeer in the books as well, but the one from the show completely won my heart with his loyalty, kindness, and commitment to justice. And with being hella charming, too 👀

3. The currently inevitable One Piece part of the list! Look, I'm a simple woman, I'm not immune to gruff but secretly kind men who are built like a brick shithouse (and buy ice cream for random kids, and tell their corrupt superiors to eat shit). So I would let Smoker do unspeakable things to me. Who said that.

4. Caleb Brewster from Turn: Washington's Spies is one of those cases when I laid my eyes on a character and immediately thought "I guess this one's gonna be my favourite" and was absolutely right. To quote another character from the show, "he's unshaven, he's insane". Also loyal to a fault and extremely funny and reckless to the point of piloting an 18th century submarine. An absolute madlad. Every time there's some kind of a "who's hotter" poll in that fandom, I end up convinced that people understand nothing. But then again, most people probably were either Legolas girls or Aragorn girls, and I've been a Gimli girl since the age of nine.

Tagging @jennathearcher and @murphmurphthejerk - I know what one of the answers is going to be, but I'd like to hear the other three as well ;) As always, feel free to ignore if you don't want to answer, and so on, and so forth.

[meichenxi]

The known-ish words of intermediate Chinese, or: What does it mean to know a word?

We all have this intuition, especially in languages like Chinese, that there are words we 'kind of know'. These are the known-ish words. In the case of Chinese, most people would recognise at least three axes:

1) Do I know the meaning? 2) Do I know the pronunciation? 3) Do I know how to handwrite it?

You might answer yes to some, but no to others. Voila! You know the word - ish.

And then you can also add the dimension of passive and active knowledge:

1) Do I recognise this word passively? 2) Can I use this word actively?

Great. Even more ways of kind of but not really knowing a word. But that's far from all. There's also the different domains of listening and reading, writing and speaking.

So passively, that looks like:

1) Do I know the meaning when listening? 2) Do I know the meaning when reading? 3) Do I know the pronunciation when reading?

Once we add in the active dimension, it all starts to get a bit more complicated. This is far from an exhaustive list, but consider the follows ways you could define 'knowing' a word:

1) I can read the word out loud (but I don't know what it means, and I can't use it in a sentence) 2) I know what the word means, and I can use it in a sentence (but I can't handwrite it) 3) I can use the word in a spoken sentence (but I don't know how to type it, or which character it uses) 4) I can recognise the word when reading (but don't know how to read it out loud, and can only guess at the meaning) 5) I can use the word in a written sentence (but not a spoken sentence) 6) I can type the word and recognise the word (but I don't know how to handwrite it) 7) …

Okay. What else?

Chinese is a compounding language.

Have you ever had the experience that you can't recognise a character individually, but as soon as you see it in a familiar compound, you know what it means? So:

1) I can recognise the word individually 2) I can recognise the word as part of a compound 3) I can recognise the word as part of an unfamiliar compound

Chinese is also a language with a long and storied tradition of writing in Classical Chinese as a literary language and a lingua franca across the whole of East Asia - even two hundred years ago, people were writing in Literary Chinese. 'Mandarin' as a concept did not exist.

So often the meanings of familiar characters can be quite different in formal language or chengyu in the modern language, which uses more classical / literary structures and grammar.

Take, for example, the character 次. The first layer of meaning in modern Chinese - the most foundational layer - is its meaning as time, like 'I have been to Ghana two times'.

But its second layer of meaning is secondary, or next best, or just next. For example:

1) 次货 - substandard goods 2) 次子 - second son 3) 次年 - next year

And so on. Many common words have this kind of polysemy.

So we can add another dimension:

1) I recognise this word's common meanings 2) I can use this word's common meanings 3) I recognise this word's less common meanings 4) I can use this word's less common meanings

Add in the reading and listening dimensions, and things get even messier. I am familiar enough with this basic secondary meaning of 次 to fairly quickly be able to understand that it means 'next' or 'second' rather than 'time' if I see it in a written unfamiliar compound or chengyu. But I am most definitely not quick enough to do that every single time whilst listening to the news, for example!

And what about pronunciation? Once you know a fair amount of Chinese characters, you can often guess the pronunciation of new or unfamiliar characters. How?

Because of phonetic components.

For example:

请

清

情

Notice how these all have the same component on the right? This tells us that these characters belong to the largest group of Chinese characters, phonetic-semantic characters. That is - some part of the character gives a clue to the meaning, and some part gives a clue to the pronunciation. In this case, we know they are all pronounced some variety of qing.

But it isn't always that easy. Some phonetic components tell you the tone and pronunciation - some tell you the pronunciation, but not the tone (like qing above). Some phonetic components, to go even further, are only really decipherable if you have a particular interest in phonology or historical linguistics, or learn the patterns. Consider:

脸 - lian3 (face)

险 - xian3 (dangerous)

验 - yan4 (test)

剑 - jian4 (sword)

签 - qian1 (to sign)

捡 - jian3 (to pick up)

There are far more. If you look down the whole list on Pleco, they all show a similar pattern of variation. You can see some patterns, but also numerous exceptions - most end in the -ian final, except for those that are yan of various tones. All begin with l, x, y, j, q. Most are pronounced jian3, but that is far from a rule.

All this to say - you can see a character, and know vaguely how it is pronounced. If I know that a character is pronounced qing definitely, 100%, but don't know the tone - does that mean I know the pronunciation? Or would you only say that knowing it 100% means knowing it? And in that case - how can you account for the fact that learning a character when you already know 90% of the pronunciation is significantly easier than not knowing it at all?

Let me add just a few more scenarios. Bear with me!

1) A character has more than one way to be pronounced. For this word, you read it incorrectly (but you usually know it). 2) A character has more than one tone. Some people pronounce it always with one tone, and some alternate between the two pronunciations. You only knew it with one - but you're half right? 3) You make the same mistake that a native speaker would make with tone or pronunciation of a rarer character.

In some way, these are all more knowing than not knowing anything at all.

And none of this is even taking into account different writing systems, traditional and simplified.

Here are some more scenarios:

I recognise the character in traditional (but not simplified)

I can type the character in both, but I can only hand-write in simplified

I know the Taiwanese pronunciation, but not the Chinese

etc

And of course Chinese characters are used across multiple different languages.

So you could conceivably have these kinds of situations:

I know the pronunciation and meaning in Cantonese and Mandarin

I know the pronunciation and meaning in Cantonese, and the meaning in Mandarin

I know the pronunciation and meaning in Mandarin and recognise it in Cantonese, but know it means something different

I know the pronunciation in Mandarin, but don't know what the whole word actually means in Mongolian (Chinese characters used to transliterate Mongolian words)

Plus there's handwriting and calligraphy!

Personally, I can't read a lot of calligraphy and have accepted my happy illiteracy in many styles. All Chinese learners and heritage speakers know the feeling of sitting in a Chinese restaurant or museum and having a well-meaning friend say, 'Oooo, what does that say?' It's depressing! So let's add some more nuances to our known-ish characters:

I can read this character in common fonts

I can read this character in less common fonts

I can read this character when handwritten

I can read this character when handwritten quickly / by a child / by a doctor

I can read this character in grass script / seal script / etc

Then there's the question of naturalness.

I frequently add words to my Anki decks that I would be able to understand, no question, if I were reading or listening - but I probably wouldn't have thought to say it in that way. So:

I recognise this word, and would have said it exactly like this

I recognise this word, but would never have thought to say it like this

I can use this word, but didn't know you could use it in such a metaphorical way

I can use this word in a metaphorical way, but didn't realise it corresponded so closely to English / was so different from English in its meaning

And finally there's the simple question of memory.

I know I've seen this word before, but I can't remember it right now and I want to drown myself pathetically in the vast uncaring sea

I know I used to be able to use this word actively, but now can only use it passively

I can still type it, but have forgotten how to handwrite it

I can still use it in writing, but I wouldn't be able to use it in speaking

I can recognise it in set expressions, but wouldn't remember how to use it on its own

I can remember the simplified character, but not the traditional

…

So how many ways do you know a word?

I often feel embarrassed to post my vocabulary lists, because I feel that people will be surprised that I don't 'know' certain more foundational words. I think they will be confused as to why I have very 'advanced' vocabulary alongside 'simple' vocabulary. I feel a lot of pressure to be 'advanced' because of the amount of followers I have, but there's a lot of more basic characters I still don't fully know in a holistic way.

And the truth is that all of those characters and words are in Anki for different reasons. I might have a vocab list that looks like this:

略

松懈

星光

缕缕

薄雾

博览

I don't know any of these words in exactly the same dimensions as I know the others! Let's look at my reasons for including each in detail.

略 - lve4 - slightly. I have this word here because although I know it well in set expressions like 略有耳闻 'have heard a little about'，略有受损 'has suffered slight losses' etc, I wouldn't remember the pronunciation if I saw it alone or with another verb apart from 有. I would still know the meaning - but I wouldn't remember how to pronounce it. So even though I 'know' this word, it's still there in Anki.

松懈 - song1xie4 - to relax, lax, slacken. This is a rare example of a totally 'new' word - most of my Anki words aren't. I know 松 already well, but have never seen the character 懈 before: I didn't know its meaning, or pronunciation.

星光 - xing1guang1 - starlight. I know both characters, pronunciation and meaning, and I can easily understand this word. I just never would have thought to say it so simply. I want to use it actively, so I put it in Anki.

缕缕 - lv3lv3 - fine and continuous (i.e. rain, drizzle). I know 缕 already on its own as a measure word for sunlight, thin hair, gossamer, mist, smoke, fine threads etc - I often forget its pronunciation, but I know its meaning reliably when reading. But together the compound 缕缕's meaning isn't quite extricable from just knowing 缕, so I put it in here.

薄雾 - bo2wu4 - mist, fog. I know 雾 well, but hadn't come across 薄 before (or wasn't sure if I had or not). This is an example where I knew its pronunciation, because of phonetic components, but I didn't know the meaning of the character.

博览 - bo2lan3 - to read widely. I know this word very well. So why is this in there? Literally just because I remembered the pronunciation and meaning of 博览, and when I was racking my brains trying to see if I knew the 薄 in 薄雾, I thought it might be the same character. I looked it up, and it wasn't. So even though I know the word, the meaning and the pronunciation, I had to put it in - because I didn't remember which character was used for the bo2.

When you acknowledge all of the different ways of knowing a Chinese character, it makes sense that your learning after the beginning level is going to be full predominantly of known-ish words.

Accept this! Form your own relationship to it! For me, a huge part in my motivation to return to learning Chinese after a year-long break was just to accept that I was likely never going to 'fully know' most of the characters and words that I partially know.

But that's okay. Think about your native language.

If your native language is English or you speak it very well, consider a word like monadic. Could you say you knew this word? Fully knew it? Like me (I learnt this word in the context of Linguistics yesterday), you might have an idea that it has something to do with one - mono, monorail, monotropism, monologue, monolithic etc. But would you be able to use it in a sentence? Would you be able to explain it to a child?

Or let's say you're learning two new English words: lithology and dreich. (The latter is a Scots word, not English - you would hear it in Scotland frequently.) Neither word you completely know. Which one is going to take you longer to learn?

It's likely going to be lithology. You can form connections with words like monolith or paleothic or maybe even lithium - even if you couldn't say for sure what the Greek element lith means, you're passingly familiar with other words containing it. You also know -ology, and you know how to pronounce the word. If you learn that it means 'the study of rocks', that is probably quite easy to remember.

Dreich, on the other hand - what is there to tell you a) how to pronounce this, or b) that it means 'dreary' or 'bleak', as in, dreary weather? You can't form any connections with similar words at all, and the [x] sound at the end - like in German or Hebrew - might be unexpected to hear if you don't live in Scotland.

That's what Chinese is like in the beginning. All words are like dreich. But the more you learn, the more words begin to be like monadic or lithology.

Learning ten new words a day like dreich would be very difficult. But if you've seen monadic a few times over the last few months, know vaguely when to use it, know how to pronounce it - it's not so hard to imagine that you could learn ten of those a day.

I find all these known-ish words very overwhelming.

And I also find recognising the potential for overwhelm in the Chinese language - because of its unique properties - very helpful in letting me feel less guilty about my current known-ish words. I do know them - ish.

But when I finally get around to properly learning them, all that ish-ness will make them that much easier to remember!

Now I try not to stress out about these types of words. I recognise that, in many ways, they are inevitable. Unless you're a poet who composes out of thin air, you're not going to ever say a literary word for emerald green as frequently as you'll read it in descriptive passages in novels.

It's natural to know certain words in a spiky profile: to know them very well in some ways, but not at all in other ways.

The more you read, the more pronounced this can become.

So here's what I've learnt, and here's the message of all this big, long, rambling post:

Putting 'easy' words that you feel you should know into Anki isn't regressing. It's adding another dimension of knowledge to your understanding of the word. You shouldn't feel ashamed or frustrated when you find you don't know one aspect of an otherwise 'easy' word. I'm still trying to learn this.

Because -

Having lots of known-ish words is not a unique failing on your part. It's a reflection of Chinese as a language and its unique complexity -

And it's part of what makes it so uniquely beautiful.

Have a nice day, everyone. meichenxi out!

[umahumahumah]

How do you recreate the Hetalia artstyle so well

ok so.. .uhhhhhhhhhh honestly i dont even know how. which is why i am obviously qualified to make YOU, yes you, the person reading this, a tutorial

i psoted an incomplete tutorial on the hetalia art style some few months back and when i look back at it now, some things are just straight up wrong or need clarification (also its the same post where i accidentally sent multiple death threats to a random sex worker thinking they were just a porn bot oopsies) so if you guys still remember that, forget about it! all of it!!! this is a brand new, more accurate guide on how to draw himas style!

(quick warning though im just a weeb not a professional teacher by any means so dont take this as gospel and dont get mad if i got something wrong or something is confusing)

himastyle tutorial! (the better one) part 1

(link to part 2 here)

ok lets start off with the

HEADS

this is just the way i start drawing my heads personally. if i had to describe it, its basically a simplified stylized version of the loomis head method. proko has a good video on it! just give that a quick watch then take a look at my step by step guide

but besides this, there are some important things about the head that you should remember

the shape of the head is generally rectangular

compared to more typical ikemen styles, hetalia characters have a more rectangular head. HOWEVER their chins taper off to a very triangular shape. rarely do the chins flatten out like the guy on the left.

2. shorter face = younger/more feminine appearance

well... self explanatory. you can see in the diagram how changing the length of the face gives a character a more feminine/childish look.

if you feel that something looks kind of off, feel free to change it, but if it looks okay then lets move onto facial features!!!

NOSES:

ok so this might seem a little weird but i like drawing the nose first. its right in the middle of the face and is generally the easiest to get right. it also kind of acts as a divider between the eyes, especially useful when you're drawing in a 3/4 angle

which kind of look something like that i guess.....

or that if you want something less extreme

anyways while hetalia noses are kind of inconsistent they generally have the shape of these three lines. feminine/childlike characters have a smaller and subtler nose though

noses also never face fully straight ahead, so when drawing a front view, the nose slightly faces right or left (tbh himas characters rarely face the camera head on, so id refrain from drawing frontal views altogether but thats just me)

anyways lets move on to my second favorite part of the hetalia art style

EYES:

the eyes are the most important part of himas style. if all else fails, you can always recognize the style by the eyes. luckily for you, the eyes really arent complicated compared to other anime styles :D here is how i do it:

(feminine and childlike characters have bigger eyes)

you have probably noticed this but the pupils hima draws now has a more squiggly teary-eyed look compared to the pupils he drew then...

i subcounciously do a mixture of the two because i got used to drawing the old type, but if you wanna draw the new type of pupils just take note of their squigly shape and that they have one dominant highlight in the upper-middle area. uhhh.. or if youre like me just draw the old eyes as if you have parkinson's

anyways heres a step by step guide

and some fun eye variations!!! you can try using variants if youd like to give an oc a more unique look (you can also try making your own variants too but be careful of straying too far from the style)

so now about the eyebrow and the eyelid.... uhhh the eyelid doesnt really have a consistent length so just draw it however. feminine and childlike characters have thinner eyebrows but even then eyebrows should never be drawn as just a single line

we are close to finishing the face!!! now we can move onto

MOUTHS:

if you know how to draw a typical anime mouth, then hima mouths is easy peasy!

for closed mouths just draw a curved line with two dark blots for the corners of the mouth

i think that giving them a shaky look makes them look more expressive

open mouths are just random blobs, dont close off the bottom though, and theys till have those dark blots at the corner of the mouth

now then i'll move onto the

EARS + CHEEKS:

i decided to combine these two since these are probably the easiest parts of the face

hima's ears are pretty round and don't really vary in shape. inside the ears though....

it isnt very consistent, so don't think too hard about "getting them right". above are some ear variations i drew from one of the latest chapters of the manga

the cheeks are just a bunch of lines that can appear fully, or only on one cheek, or don't appear at all. i think it depends on level of detail, angle, or the character's emotion

these lines do not appear on rendered pieces

also if a character feels especially displeased they will gain heavy eyebags

so yay! we're pretty much done with the face!! look forward next time to where i cover hair, the body, and other stuff idk... i'll link the other parts to each other when i complete them

[halfnekoslair]

My dolls)

Photo by ig @gray_valet

Hi guys) The package with the previous mouse group order arrived in the US. The rest does not depend on me. So I'm making a post to show everything I can offer. Shipping from Russia is quite expensive, starts from about 70 USD for EMS, which I usually use. So it makes more sense for foreigners if someone organizes a group order to share the shipping cost. This has already been done twice. And I believe there is a discord group about this. But I will give you approximate numbers: This is about 70 USD for up to 1 kilogram 90 USD for up to 2 kilograms and about 105 USD for up to 3 kilograms.

This post is going to be huge so I'll put the prices on top:

15cm mouse. 73 usd for standard colour. +7 usd for extra colour.

25cm turtle. 230 usd.

28 cm 1/6 boy doll. 110 usd for Eirwyn 120 for character heads cause of their hair/ear parts.

MSD Eirwyn. 180 usd.

Speaking of group orders I would prefer not to go above 1000 USD in one box because I don't trust US Customs one bit. And if something bad is destined to happen - I would prefer it not to be a terribly large amount of money.

I can change the prices over time. I most likely will. I'm just groping for a while. The difference in price is more due to the amount of manual work I have to put into the doll than to the size. Turtles are far and away the most complex. And human dolls are less time-consuming. If I make a few and feel that it is more difficult or easier than I thought - I will change the prices. As you can see, so far I have only sold mice.

So what do I offer?

I'm obviously offering mice.

This is around life size mouse doll. Almost 15 cm standing tall and including ears.

I use ABS-like photopolymer resin for these dolls. Because it is easier to work with and looks more polyurethane-like. Mice have a lot of small delicate parts that would be harder to make look good with a harder resin. So it's a tradeoff. I prefer aesthetics over durability. I am not saying that ABS-like resin is too brittle. Many people use this type of resin for dolls. Especially small ones. I am just explaining why I use different types of resin for different dolls. I might consider printing a mouse with the tough resin I use for my larger dolls but that would cost more because it would take more time to post-process.

The colors "from the can" are gray and white. I can also print beige and chocolate at any time. Because these are the most basic colors and I can cut the leftovers. (Beige and chocolate may differ slightly from time to time because I due them myself. White and gray are constant.)

I can mix any color (green, purple). But there must be 2 or more mice of this color in the order. Otherwise it will be counted as an extra color because I will have a lot of leftovers that I will not be able to use.

There is also an option to add pink paws or tail or both. If the doll has 2 colors in it, it is counted as an extra color.

2. Turtles.

Photo by ig @gray_valet

Yes, I finally decided to try and start selling them.

They are 1/6 size. About 25 cm. A little shorter than Barbie. But wide and heavy.

There are 4 sculpts. Each of which has an individual head and some differences in the body.

Officially I name the sculpts by numbers, not by character names. but I think the characters are pretty obvious.

So #1 (Leo)) He's my princess >W< Lol. Sorry. This sculpt is quite beefy. But has the most delicate face and front shell of them all for my taste.

№2 (Raph)

This one the widest and most monstrous of them all. He was actually designed to be a little shorter than the first one, but he refused and ended up the same height.

№3 (Don) He is a little taller and thinner than the others. I tried to make him more human in proportions and face.

№4 (Mike) He's the baby of the group. I still wonder if I made him too small. But I like him as is.

Each of them has 3 faces on magnets. Neutral, angry and happy.

For turtle dolls I use a tough resin. Because they are actually big, even though they are short. And they have quite a strong elastic tension. It's a little less pretty than the ABS-like. But it's really tough. I have a video of me throwing it on the pavement.

Turtles have 3 colors. For the skin, plastron and shell. You can send me a picture and I will try to dye the resin as close as I can.

I will add 2 pairs of the chosen color eyes and 1 pair of white to the doll.

I can also print basic katanas and sais in a size suitable for the doll. In a random color.

3. 1/6 youth doll.

This body is about 28cm and is sculpted to represent a teenage boy in a Barbie-proportioned world.

This can go with my original Eirwin head and resin hair

Or an anime head with a hairstyle representing a character from the Genshin Impact game.

(Keep in mind that 1/6 of the sculpts has sculpted eyelashes) At the moment I have

Tighnari with magnetic ears (It's my friend's doll)))

and Cyno

Lol I even made his hair articulated.

I also tried to put a Barbie head on this body and it wasn't terrible)

I print these dolls with tough resin as well. Even though they are small they aren't very detailed so it's just nice to have a little more durability.

I can try to dye the color you want. But I can't promise 100% accuracy because one is the pictures on the screen and the other is the resin and pigments. And also I do not recommend dark skin colors. because this resin is very thick and it can reject the pigment while printing. With dark colors it can lead to a slight difference of the color between parts in one doll.

And last but not least...

4. MSD Eirwyn.

The MSD version of this sculpt has some differences from the 1/6 version. It has a wider neck, smaller eyes, and no sculpted eyelashes.

Eirvin is 45cm tall and is adjusted to fit into my company MSD doll group. (Photos with Dollzone and Resinsoul)

10mm eyes, 55mm feet. The only non-standard part of him is his butt. It's quite wide for a MSD) But I like the silhouette.

I print my dolls with full infill so it weighs the same as the cast doll.

Obviously I'm printing such a big doll with tough resin. And with such a size of parts I'm mostly calm for this doll. My cat has already given it a couple of test falls from the table.

For color - I also do not recommend dark here. For large parts and almost 10 hours of printing it can give a big difference in color.

I don't mind answering questions and taking additional photos if needed.

Congratulations) You survived my longest post.

[communistkenobi]

ok my brother and I rewatched all the mission impossible movies and our new ranking is

1 > 4 > 7 > 2 > 5 > 6 > 3

2 is a lot more fun and good than I remember it being on first watch, and 5 was way more mid. Honestly 4 could take the top spot despite Jeremy Renner being in that one. There are a lot of fun physical props and gadgets and doohickeys in 4, and there’s a specific type of whimsy to the direction style that’s not in any of the other ones. You can tell the director had only worked on animated movies prior to MI4, there’s a specific type of fixation on small props and their specific trajectories and positions throughout each scene that is hard to describe but reminds me of how animated movies tend to be shot. Like there is a physical awareness of objects in space that makes sense for an animated director to have a preoccupation towards, and I think he pretty effectively translates those preoccupations to live action.

the first one has the Hollywood 90s charm, which is just firmly lodged in history now, like we are not getting that type of movie back probably because of 9/11. I kind of don’t really have anything to say about it other than it’s straightforwardly good and has some very funny horror-movie-style dutch angle shots in them. De Palma also uses split diopter shots a lot in that film, which I didn’t know much about but is basically when you split the lens of a camera to get two distinct focal lengths in a shot, but at the cost of essentially having a blurry line down the middle of the shot. It makes me wonder if that’s part of why they made the room Tom Cruise wires into all white, because they use a lot of split diopter shots in that scene and the white would conceal the middle blur well. Anywayyyy

MI2 is an undeniably John Woo movie, complete with motorcycle jousting and insane combat stunts, and also captures a bit of that same 90s charm. Also kinda don’t have a lot to say about this one. Nyah is definitely one of the best female leads in the series though, her actor is soooo good in this movie. Shame she never came back MI7 is also a pretty fun movie, you have now-geriatric Tom Cruise driving a motorbike off a cliff and fun car chase scenes. He is really hot in this movie also. And “evil AI that takes over the world” is such an awesome stupid action movie plot, especially because it’s not tied to the more rancid tendencies some of the other films have (eg with 6 explicitly being about an anarchist who wants to nuke the world after defecting from his country’s government, etc). Like it’s goofy enough to easily shut your brain off to and accept.

6 and 3 are arguably the worst, with 3 edging out the bottom spot because of the amount of heterosexuality in that one. It’s not at the level of the spn blurrywife, but it’s close enough that Julia (Ethan’s wife) can easily be categorised as a blurrywife, just a smear on the camera meant to move the hero along and then scream and cry when she gets captured (although Tom Cruise is very good at screaming and crying on camera). This is also the beginning of where they tank Luther’s character, he used to be this Gucci-wearing hacking wizard guy and by the end of the series he’s just like a guy who’s on the computer. Like after the third movie we don’t get a line from Luther anywhere as fun or charming as “that punk put a hole in my Versace!” Simon Pegg is fine. I have no thoughts about him at all, he’s the comic relief and that’s as deep as it goes.

6’s plot is hard to stomach, it has fairly poor pacing, and they basically waste the HALO dive too early in the film, so there’s not really any big tension/plot stakes associated with it. The final act is extremely good though, and upon rewatch I like Henry Cavill’s acting a lot more, which is why I think it should be ranked above 3. Also 3 has like no stunts basically ! It’s so generic.

what is funny is that MI tends to become more “interconnected” as time goes on wrt returning cast members, but it’s mostly only dudes with like one or two exceptions, so there’s the funny undercurrent of like misogynistic disposability of women leading to intense homosocial bonds between men because they’re the only constant in the story. Like it’s Ethan Benji and Luther and that’s mostly it, just three dudes having fun. Unfortunately the dialogue/banter writing between them tends to be quite mid-to-bad in these movies, so they essentially are just really long time coworkers who constantly almost die in front of one another.

I don’t think there’s a bad performance from Tom Cruise in these though. He says a lot of dumb lines and does stupid plot bullshit but he manages to make it work basically every time. He seems to have pretty good chemistry with most of the female leads as well, which is the only time where there’s interesting verbal sparring/flirting/characterological tension in scenes. And then obviously he does all those insane stunts, which is a significant part of how much we enjoyed these films. I quite like the way he portrays Ethan during them too, as like this dude who is perpetually pushed to the brink to do insane impossible shit and is basically always having a bad day because of it. it gives the character a really nice human grounding and makes the stunts feel more believable because the character doing them is having the worst day of his life the entire time. He also frequently fucks up, falls, misses ledges, gets hit and almost dies, smacked around, etc. very fun to watch, great balance of cool action hero and guy who gets the shit kicked out of him for a living

anyway these are really fun movies. I feel like if you needed to fill a weeks worth of movie nights with friends these would be really fun to watch. I had a great time yelling at the screen with my brother. A very fun drinking game also is taking a shot whenever Tom Cruise starts running in a scene. That dude is just fucking zipping around everywhere, it made me realise how rare it is to see actors run in films because he does it fucking constantly. And like not short shots either, there are takes where he’s running continually at full speed for like 45 unbroken seconds. I know also from watching some behind the scenes videos about how they did some of the stunts that he always does like 10 takes for action sequences so he’s running an absolute shitload. Anyway these movies are good

[floristjimin]

charles and edwin's enneagram types

ok so I’ve been seeing a lot of really good analysis on charles and edwin’s internal motivations and how they tend to react to difficult situations. I’ve also had a deep interest in the enneagram for several years, and I just started reading a book about it, and my brain immediately connected it to DBD. so here are my thoughts on what charles and edwin’s enneagram types might be, how this influences many different aspects of their personalities, how their types complement each other really well, and how they’ve supported each other to be the best versions of their true selves.

What is the Enneagram?

More than just a personality type, the nine types of the Enneagram describe the “basic archetypes of humanity’s tragic flaws, primary fears, and unconscious needs.” Most Enneagram authors agree that we are born with a dominant type, and that this type “determines the ways we learn to adapt to our early childhood environment.”

The types are not static — there are different “levels of development” that describe how each type behaves when they are psychologically healthy or unhealthy. There is also something called the direction of integration/disintegration — each type behaves like another type when they are under stress or in growth (e.g. type Nines behave like Sixes when they are stressed, and Threes when they are in growth). So two people with the same type may not behave the same way as each other, and a person throughout their own life may grow and change, but they will still align with that dominant type.

All this to say, the Enneagram is a really useful tool for self-understanding and for having empathy for yourself and others, because it gives a lot of insight into a person’s core fears and underlying motivations.

charles - type nine

A big part of Charles’s character arc in season one was the repression and denial of his own anger. This was the biggest clue for me that he might be a type Nine.

There are so many examples of this, especially in episode 4:

the scene with Charles and Crystal on the lighthouse where they talk about the events of the devlin house (Crystal: Charles, could we just for one second talk about what happened? Charles: Crystal, I don’t have anything else to say. yes, that guy was horrible. yes, my dad was horrible. yes, I got angry. now I’m fine. Crystal: you don’t have to keep things bottled up)

the scene (1) when Charles is upset that Edwin hid the fact that he saw the cat king again, Edwin directly asks “why are you getting so angry?” and Charles immediately falls quiet

the scene where Charles attacks night nurse — he can no longer hold back his anger, and his friends are shocked (2). It is unusual for him to express his anger like this.

Ok, so why do Nines tend to be out of touch with their anger? Type Nines are “the peacemaker”, described as easygoing, reassuring, and agreeable. The basic fear of the type Nine is of loss and separation (3), and their basic desire is to have inner stability, peace of mind. “They want everything to go smoothly and be without conflict, but they can also tend to be complacent, simplifying problems and minimizing anything upsetting.” Nines want to avoid conflict; they have seen from past experiences that anger can be a huge source of conflict, so they learn to repress their anger.

This could also be part of the reason why Charles decides to stay (4) with Edwin when they first meet. Going with Death would mean having to fully accept the fact that he is dead, and that’s upsetting to him. Nines are also known as “chameleons” and tend to mirror/blend with those they are around (a way of avoiding conflict) — “being a separate self, an individual who must assert themselves against others, is terrifying to Nines. They would rather melt into someone else or quietly follow their idyllic daydreams.” So it makes sense that staying with Edwin feels like the safest option to Charles.

Some other scenes that make more sense through the lens of Charles being a type Nine:

Any time Edwin tries to initiate a serious conversation, Charles’s immediate reaction is to downplay things, and give a lighthearted response in an attempt to minimize tension (ep 6 (5), ep 7 (6)). There’s also that flicker of emotion on his face before he promptly represses it and tries to present a more reassuring reaction (ep 6 (7))

“Every (8) day, I’m fuckin’ smiling. ‘Cause who else is gonna be the one holding it together and keeping spirits up? … What good am I even doing? I couldn’t stop Devlin from murdering his family over and over, I can’t stop Crystal from hurting, I can’t stop whatever it is that’s going on with you, I can’t stop anything! I sure as hell couldn’t stop my dad from beating the shit out of me. No matter how good I was.” — This directly points to his desire to create harmony in his environment (and taking on way too much personal responsibility (9) for it)

The scene in ep 5 where Charles admits he is afraid (10) that he’s like his dad, and Edwin’s response (11) — this is a really important moment where Charles finally allows himself to acknowledge his feelings, and Edwin learns to respond with patience and mirrors the reassurance that Charles himself so freely gives.

edwin - type one

One of the things we learn about Edwin in the very first episode of season one is that he deeply cares about solving cases and helping others.

“Our (12) deaths didn’t matter. No one ever solved them. Now you are sharp and fun, but this is not a game. We are solving cases that would never be solved. Police don’t know what to do with a fucking witch! We didn’t matter. He and I. So these cases matter. They have to matter!”

Type One is “The Reformer”; they are described as principled, purposeful, and self-controlled. The basic fear of the type One is that they are corrupt, evil, and defective (which makes it even more devastating that he spent 70 years in hell), and their basic desire is to be good, have integrity, and be balanced.

This description above reminds me a LOT of the conversation he has with the cat king in episode 4:

Cat King: Why do these cases of complete strangers matter to you so much? Edwin: Not that you would understand, but I help ghosts whose cases would go unsolved. I right wrongs. [after Cat King forces him to tell the “truth”] Edwin: I’m also doing as much good as I can, so that eventually if I have to go back to hell, I can make my case for leniency … I’m ashamed. It’s selfish.”

A lot of Edwin’s repression definitely has to do with the time period he’s from, but I think it also points to that type One desire to be “good”.

Does this not perfectly describe Edwin’s entire journey (13) of self-discovery in season one? See also, his remarks about emotions (14) and human connection (15).

Lastly, I’ll link to this post (16), as well as the fact that it took me a lot of thinking to figure out that Edwin was a One — he does not fit the usual stereotype of a One. He’s not overly perfectionistic or highly critical, he’s not afraid of making mistakes. Instead, we see a One at a healthy level — principled, a person of integrity, who is able to see that imperfections are part of perfection, who is able to work on undoing those patterns of repression. Additionally, type Ones tend to look like Sevens when they are in a direction of growth — Sevens are described as spontaneous and playful, constantly seeking new and exciting experiences. We definitely start to see this side of Edwin, and I think part of why he is able to grow in this direction is because his friendship with Charles has given him an environment where he feels safe and comfortable.

charles & edwin - the relationship between Ones and Nines

Even more interesting, there is a section on the Enneagram site that discusses relationship dynamics between different Enneagram types. This part highlights how the One and the Nine have different ways of reacting to stress and how they express (or don't express) anger:

For Edwin, this perfectly captures his prickliness and snippiness in the first few episodes towards Crystal.

And for Charles, this lines up with his emotions (17)/reactions starting from episode 3 in the devlin house and how he tries to ignore his emotions and repress his anger

Lastly, on a more positive note, this part really describes their partnership and synergy perfectly:

I also think this ties in to Charles’s direction of growth — as a type Nine, Charles would look like a type Three in his direction of growth. Threes are described as adaptable, driven, and energetic (as well as attractive and charming). I think he exhibits all of these traits -- being friends with Edwin for the past 30 years has definitely supported Charles in this direction of growth.

Overall, I think all of this really speaks to how realistic and complex these characters are. If you read this whole thing, THANK YOU. I would LOVE to hear your thoughts on this, if you agree with these types, if you have any more examples you can think of in the show, if you think they fit better with a different type, etc.!! And if you’re interested in learning more about the Enneagram I’ll leave some sources below.

The Enneagram Institute website

The Sacred Enneagram by Christopher L. Heuertz

Sleeping at Last podcast feat. Chris Heuertz, about type One and Nine

One by Sleeping at Last

Nine by Sleeping at Last

references: 1 - @that-ineffable-devil 2, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 14, 15 - @mellxncollie 3, 7 - @homoquartz 4, 13 - @nikossasaki 9 - @asidian 16 - @abeautifulblog 17 - @melefim

[izvmimi]

HOW SELECTIVE IS YOUR 2D FAVE ROSTER? (updated for 2024)

Fandom is so exciting! It’s a blessing to be part of fandom and to get to simp for your faves with other people who share similar lists, especially since there are so many to pick from! 

Seeing your list of faves lengthen, shorten and develop over time is exciting, but when was the last time you really looked at your list and decided how much of it is truly based on your interest, or if you’re just a victim of the dash? 

Just how basic are you? Are you a flavor of the month type or is there a healthy amount of diversity? Are you selective? 

This game is easy. I’ll give you a bunch of fandoms, and you’ll simply tally how many you get at the end. There are some special conditions at the end, so make sure you read to the very bottom if you play!

I recommend you be familiar with at least 4 of these fandoms to play! The fandoms mentioned are BNHA, JJK, HQ, Tokyo Revengers, Blue Lock, Demon Slayer, AOT, One Piece, Genshin Impact, Honkai Star Rail, Naruto, Hunter x Hunter and a few others.

Tag your friends and please don’t take it too seriously!

(^^ and I mean this last part, please do not take this too seriously, it's for fun! Nobody is judging you and if your score is high, it's really just because you have a lot of love to give, I'm literally just teasing!)

BNHA

Bakugou - 4

Deku - 2

Todoroki - 3

Shinsou - 3

Dabi - 3

Aizawa - 2

Hawks - 2

Shigaraki - 2

Mirio - 1

Denki - 2

Sero - 1

JJK

Gojo - 5

Yuuji - 4

Sukuna - 4

Nanami - 5

Toji - 3

Getou - 3

Yuuta - 3

Choso - 3

Megumi - 1

HAIKYUU

Kuroo - 4

Atsumu - 3

Ushijima - 3

Bokuto - 2

Iwa - 2

Daichi - 2

Osamu - 2

Kita - 1

TOKYO REVENGERS

Mikey - 3

Baji - 3

Draken - 3

Ran - 3

Chifuyu - 2

Sanzu - 2

BLUE LOCK

Either of the Itoshi brothers - 10

Nagi - 3

Michael Kaiser - 2

Kunigami - 2

Barou - 2

Bachira- 2

Reo - 1

Chigiri - 1

Isagi - 1

DEMON SLAYER

Sanemi - 4

Tengen - 3

Rengoku - 3

Akaza - 2

Tanjiro - 2

AOT

Levi - 4

Eren - 3

Jean - 2

Reiner - 2

Connie - 2

ONE PIECE

Zoro - 4

Law - 3

GENSHIN IMPACT

Childe - 5

Diluc - 4

Neuvillette - 4

Wriothesley - 4

Zhongli - 3

Xiao - 3

Itto - 2

HONKAI STAR RAIL

Jing Yuan - 5

Aventurine - 5

Dan Heng - 4

Dr. Ratio - 3

Blade - 3

Sampo - 3

NARUTO

Kakashi - 4

Sasuke - 3

Itachi - 3

Obito - 2

Madara - 2

Gaara - 2

Any other Akatsuki member - 1

HXH

Hisoka - 4

Chrollo - 2

Illumi - 2

MISCELLANEOUS

Dazai (Bungou Stray Dogs) - 3

Ichigo (Bleach) - 3

Aki (CSM) - 3

Vash (Trigun) - 2

Wolfwood (Trigun) - 2

Knives (Trigun) - 2

Aomine (Kuroko no Basuke) - 2

Kagami (Kuroko no Basuke) - 2

Kyo Sohma (Fruits Basket) - 2

Literally anyone from Fire Force - 3

Special considerations:

If you have more than 5 faves with the same hair color, add 10 points.

If you like more than 5 blonds specifically, add 10 points and seek help. If one of them is Bakugou, add 15 instead of 10.

If you have more than 10 faves (even if they’re not mentioned on this list), add 20 points to your score.

If you liked both Atsumu and Osamu, add 3 points.

If you polyship with Gojo and Geto, add 10 points.

If you polyship with Bakugou and Deku or Bakugou and Kirishima, add 5 points.

If you liked both Kakashi and Gojo, add 5 points.

If you stopped talking about Nanami after he died on air, add 5 points.

If you like Gojo but have at least 4 additional ships, add 5 points.

If you like Zhongli, Childe and Diluc at the same time, add 5 points.

If you like anyone from Date Tech, subtract 5 points.

If you liked one person from every category, add 5 points.

If you liked greater than five characters from one category, add 5 points.

If you’ve watched Haikyuu and simped for none of those people, subtract ten points. I’m so proud of you.

If you pick any three people with a 4 or above ranking, get help..

If you only like Gojo, get help.

SCORING: 

< 10: What is it like only liking side characters?

11 - 30: This is healthy. Here is good.

31 - 50: I mean you’re a little basic but like this is fine. I’m proud of you.

51 - 70: I mean, it’s nice to be selective once in a while. Consider it.  

70-100: Hm.

100+ : You alright there? My inbox is open. I am here for you.

[nicks-den]

Episode 6 of Hidamari ga Kikoeru is now subbed and up on my site!

Actually, there was a lot I wanted to talk about because of this episode, but for now this will do. I might make another post about it later.

You can find me talking about what it means to have a physical disability in Japan below the cut. I also talk about Maya's character and note taking.

First off, let me talk about some note taking tips they talked about in the episode.

Underlining a phrase or a word is common in Japanese note taking and using a line with an arrow means the same thing repeats, so this can help save time, especially if it's harder to write.

You can see it clearly here:

The line "Using oblique lines and careting is good practice." was actually difficult to translate well and I had to consult that with a Japanese person because the word the Japanese use (吹き出し) for this means "speech bubbles" like in the manga and I don't think it fits this context, so I went with carets as that was the closest translation I could think of. You can see it even in this episode. These speech bubbles are used to insert information you forgot to include. Some people prefer using straighter lines, while others do it like in the screenshot.

Alright, now I'll talk a bit about disability.

Physically disabled persons (in Japanese: 身体障害者 - shintaishougaisha, lit: physically disabled people) in Japan can (it's not mandatory) apply for a certificate of their disability, in this case it's the physical disability certificate (in Japanese: 身体障害者手帳 - shintaishougaishatechou, lit: certificate of a physically disabled person) that we see Taichi holding at the end of episode 6.

In Japan, physical disability is graded based on severity into several grades (1-7) and these grades (級) are separate for each body part or organ / body system afflicted. Note: Grade 7 is never used for a single disabled organ. This doesn't mean that every physical disability type has all these grades, but they always have some grade within 1-6. Each disability (or a sum of them) also falls under a type (種) based on the grade it is allocated, either Type 1 (第１種) or Type 2 (第２種). In the case of hearing impairments (聴覚障害 - choukakushougai), there are 4 grades. Grades 2 and 3 which fall under Type 1 (more severe disabilities / disabilities requiring more assistance) and Grades 4 and 6 which fall under Type 2 (less severe disabilities / disabilities requiring less assistance). For multiple physical disabilities, the rules are a bit different as the numbers of grades get added up and the resulting type is based on that number.

The description of the grades for hearing impairment is if as follows:

Grade 2 - Severe disability (basically deafness) in both ears, hearing threshold starts at 100 dB or more in both ears

Grade 3 - Hearing threshold in the interval of 90-99 dB in both ears (someone who cannot understand loud speech unless they're close to their ears)

Grade 4 - Both ears have a hearing threshold in the interval of 80-89 dB or clarity of normal speech understood is less than 50% for both ears (not sure how this one is measured)

(someone who cannot understand normal speech unless close to their ears)

Grade 6 - Both ears have a hearing threshold in the interval of 70-79 dB (cannot understand speech from distance of more than 40 cm) or one ear has a hearing threshold at 90+ dB and the other ear has a hearing threshold at 50 dB or higher (assymetrical hearing loss)

In Maya's case, you can see the screenshot below.

From her certificate, we can see she falls under Grade 3 and Type 1 which is the more severe type of disability. It also means she's not fully deaf yet, but has a very significant hearing loss in both ears.

To illustrate some decibel levels:

Whispering - 20 dB

Quiet conversation - 30 dB

Normal conversation - 50 - 70 dB

Loud conversation - 70 - 80 dB

Screams from 30 cm away - 90 dB

Screaming next to ears - 110 dB

Holders of physical disability certificates are elligible for several discounts, material and non-material benefits based on their Type (Type 1 or Type 2). Usually it's 50 % discount for public transportation, reduction of different taxes, medical subsidies, provision of medical equipment required for daily life, discounts / free entry to public facilities such as museums, zoos, acquariums, etc.

Naturally, there's also the associated stigma related to showing your certificate to get a discount (this is especially true for people with intellectual disabilities, but those have a slightly different certificate).

[cinnanamii]

Ganjis 3rd year birthday letter and the heavy mischaracterization of the characters in game 3/just ranting about the birthday letter

(⚠️⚠️‼️THIS POST WILL BE DISCUSSING LEAKS/SLIGHT SPOILERS FOR GAME 3 OF IDV!! IF YOU DONT WANT TO BE SPOILED ON GANJIS 3RD YEAR LETTER OR GAME 3, SCROLL AWAY PLEASE! AND ALSO KEEP IN MIND, I AM NOT A GAME 3 EXPERT! IF I GET ANYTHING WRONG FEEL FREE TO CORRECT ME!!‼️⚠️⚠️)

Ganjis 3rd year letter was leaked recently (you can probably find post about it on tiktok and on discord servers) and I am so far beyond unimpressed and disappointed.

To start out this yap session/rant, I’m going to list the characters serial numbers, so that you can know who I will be talking about so that you can get a grip on what I will be discussing.

• 3-1-2 is anne

• 3-?-1 is aesop

• 3-1-4 is ganji

• 3-?-3 is Victor

The fact that netease decided to fill the letter with shock value racism, ruin annie as a character, and just ruined Ganjis character arc, and basically made Victor useless is so BEYOND me. This is a a lot, so I wanna start by talking about the blatant mischaracterization of annie and ganji in this letter.

To start off, they made annie so unnecessarily, hateful and racist towards ganji. It would make sense for annie to be afraid of loud noises, as they did introduce her as a timid woman, but making her afraid of ganji and becoming violent to him because of his accent is so beyond me. The whole reason why annie attacked ganji was originally because aesop manipulated annie into hurting him, not that annie got scared of the way he spoke? Plus, due to her timid and sweet girl type personality i could never see annie physically fighting/attacking ganji, it’s just not something that would happen. How could she ever have the confidence to do that, when she was literally scared of ganji? Then, on top of that, annie wouldn’t be provoked by his accent so easy? In her trailer, she was literally described to be like her mother, who was very nice, that being a trait annie had. So for her to just go attacking him so so EXTREMELY out of character for her.

Then, next screenshot I’m showing right now is the shock value racism randomly put in this for god who knows why?

“unfavorable impression” caused by 3-1-4’s accent? This is so ooc for annie, it feels like a poorly written oc/au. The antagonization of annie feels so unnecessary and just not needed. Game 3 might not have had a Hunter, but it did have an antagonist, that being aesop. The whole antagonization doesn’t feel right for her at all.

Then now, I wanna talk about Victor. One of the main things in game 3 is that they were not able to talk or communicate with each other. if they were able to do that, what’s the point of him even being here if they could already speak verbally? His writing was already kinda not the best, but this entire letter takes whatever relevance he had to the plot away. He needs to get something consistent, or else in this case his character is just useless. It’s completely unfair that aesop is able to get clear motivations and goals, but the other characters goals and aspirations just get handled horribly.

Game 3 was so unique in the way it functioned, and with the characters that were so similar, but so different at the same time. What could have been a group of compelling a deeply well written characters now feel like a dumpster fire or mischaracterization and the severe lack of coherence. All just from one letter too. This feels like a big fat slap in the face for me as someone who loved game 3, and all of the characters for game 3, ESPECIALLY annie, and if you loved game three, also this should feel like a slap in the face for you too.

**im aware that this is a leak, and it could be potentially false, but this has been on my mind practically ever since I heard of it, and everything is just so absurd.**

edit: the letter was updated and changed, a few things did change (examp; annie isnt racist anymore) but that dosent mean I don’t have issues with the letter, I’ll probably make an updated post eventually if people r still interested in this

[alevolpe]

Hello! I plan on doing a Sailor Moon rewrite later on next year (bc i have a lot of shit to do in the entirety of my 3rd year of university) and I'd like to know what issues you have with each season of sailor moon. You don't have to name all of them, just name the biggest problem(s) you have with each season!! I hope I am not troubling you :3

Hi! You're no trouble at all! Thank you for asking, I'm humbled you're interested in hearing my opinion.

Ok, let's see. Before I start I wanna say, these are MY opinions based on also how I'm doing my own rewrite AU thingy, so don't take it personally if I don't want to include elements or characters you love. (Most fo the time it doesn't even mean I don't like those characters in canon, I just don't think they'd fit with the specific narrative I have in my mind)

I'll say for Season 1, my biggest issue is the amount of time it takes to get everyone in the cast. By the time we get Mina it's like what, over 3/4ths of the season in? I like that the show takes its time introducing everyone and giving the girls some organic bonding time in the filler, but there's better ways to do it imo. That's why I have Usagi be the last to awaken and meet an already tranformed Ami and Rei, so we don't totally break from Usagi being the center at first. We can use her as a vessel to get to know these new people and this crazy new identity at the same time she does, letting us know more about her too in the process, while not slowing the pace of the story to a crawl. As we get to know more, you can introduce the rest of the girls and break from the main group to catch glimpses of Mako and Mina, to later unite them. But that's my fix, there's other ways to fix the slow introductions, just.. don't maybe go manga style and spend only one ep per girl and immediately move on to the next, give them time to breathe.

My main issue with Season 2 is the time travel. The show does NOT know its own rules and that is a recipe for disaster, once you introduce an ally that is able to time travel, you got a LOT in your hands. Everything in the show could be solved with one travel through time, but they never do. Why? Cause otherwise the show wouldn’t exist. It leaves too many possibilities and questions that is not ready to answer. Idk how one could fix it, I'm sure there's many ways you could, I just have 0 interest in incorporating time travel in sm.

With Season 3 I'd say it's the introduction of the whole Pharaoh 90 or Mistress 9 thing. I don’t know, I know they are the main baddies, but like.. just make Saturn the main threat, she already basically is. That's my problem with it, I'm sure a ton of people disagree, but I'd rather the season just focus more on Saturn, Haruka, Michiru and Pluto, I don't need another "queen Nehellenia" type villain that gets introduced 2 seconds before the end. And I lovee Eudial and Mimete, but we don't need 5 of them. I'd just make those 2 Tomoe's assistants and that's that. Too many villains, especially if you're not going to do a motw format.

With Season 4.. uff where do I even begin. Tbh I scratch the whole season and do a ground up rebuilding project, but if I HAVE to stick with the canon structure I'll say make Nehellenia more present. She's THE BEST part of SuperS, make her more present and more threatening. Give her that mirror power from the get go, make her appear in mirrors, reflections, show her subtly , in the background, give the season a subtle but palpable atmosphere of unease, make her scary. I WANT TO BE SCARED of her! Also unrelated, but get RID of the S*A metaphor with the 3 eyes.

With Stars the whole pacing the season is a mess. The start is way too slow and the end is rushed as fuck. Introduce Galaxia as a present threat earlier, again idk how you'd do that exactly while keeping the episodic tempo of the show, but my solution is. Don't! Lol

[codingquill]

JavaScript Fundamentals

I have recently completed a course that extensively covered the foundational principles of JavaScript, and I'm here to provide you with a concise overview. This post will enable you to grasp the fundamental concepts without the need to enroll in the course.

Prerequisites: Fundamental HTML Comprehension

Before delving into JavaScript, it is imperative to possess a basic understanding of HTML. Knowledge of CSS, while beneficial, is not mandatory, as it primarily pertains to the visual aspects of web pages.

Manipulating HTML Text with JavaScript

When it comes to modifying text using JavaScript, the innerHTML function is the go-to tool. Let's break down the process step by step:

Initiate the process by selecting the HTML element whose text you intend to modify. This selection can be accomplished by employing various DOM (Document Object Model) element selection methods offered by JavaScript ( I'll talk about them in a second )

Optionally, you can store the selected element in a variable (we'll get into variables shortly).

Employ the innerHTML function to substitute the existing text with your desired content.

Element Selection: IDs or Classes

You have the opportunity to enhance your element selection by assigning either an ID or a class:

Assigning an ID:

To uniquely identify an element, the .getElementById() function is your go-to choice. Here's an example in HTML and JavaScript:

HTML:

<button id="btnSearch">Search</button>

JavaScript:

document.getElementById("btnSearch").innerHTML = "Not working";

This code snippet will alter the text within the button from "Search" to "Not working."

Assigning a Class:

For broader selections of elements, you can assign a class and use the .querySelector() function. Keep in mind that this method can select multiple elements, in contrast to .getElementById(), which typically focuses on a single element and is more commonly used.

Variables

Let's keep it simple: What's a variable? Well, think of it as a container where you can put different things—these things could be numbers, words, characters, or even true/false values. These various types of stuff that you can store in a variable are called DATA TYPES.

Now, some programming languages are pretty strict about mentioning these data types. Take C and C++, for instance; they're what we call "Typed" languages, and they really care about knowing the data type.

But here's where JavaScript stands out: When you create a variable in JavaScript, you don't have to specify its data type or anything like that. JavaScript is pretty laid-back when it comes to data types.

So, how do you make a variable in JavaScript?

There are three main keywords you need to know: var, let, and const.

But if you're just starting out, here's what you need to know :

const: Use this when you want your variable to stay the same, not change. It's like a constant, as the name suggests.

var and let: These are the ones you use when you're planning to change the value stored in the variable as your program runs.

Note that var is rarely used nowadays

Check this out:

let Variable1 = 3; var Variable2 = "This is a string"; const Variable3 = true;

Notice how we can store all sorts of stuff without worrying about declaring their types in JavaScript. It's one of the reasons JavaScript is a popular choice for beginners.

Arrays

Arrays are a basically just a group of variables stored in one container ( A container is what ? a variable , So an array is also just a variable ) , now again since JavaScript is easy with datatypes it is not considered an error to store variables of different datatypeslet

for example :

myArray = [1 , 2, 4 , "Name"];

Objects in JavaScript

Objects play a significant role, especially in the world of OOP : object-oriented programming (which we'll talk about in another post). For now, let's focus on understanding what objects are and how they mirror real-world objects.

In our everyday world, objects possess characteristics or properties. Take a car, for instance; it boasts attributes like its color, speed rate, and make.

So, how do we represent a car in JavaScript? A regular variable won't quite cut it, and neither will an array. The answer lies in using an object.

const Car = { color: "red", speedRate: "200km", make: "Range Rover" };

In this example, we've encapsulated the car's properties within an object called Car. This structure is not only intuitive but also aligns with how real-world objects are conceptualized and represented in JavaScript.

Variable Scope

There are three variable scopes : global scope, local scope, and function scope. Let's break it down in plain terms.

Global Scope: Think of global scope as the wild west of variables. When you declare a variable here, it's like planting a flag that says, "I'm available everywhere in the code!" No need for any special enclosures or curly braces.

Local Scope: Picture local scope as a cozy room with its own rules. When you create a variable inside a pair of curly braces, like this:

//Not here { const Variable1 = true; //Variable1 can only be used here } //Neither here

Variable1 becomes a room-bound secret. You can't use it anywhere else in the code

Function Scope: When you declare a variable inside a function (don't worry, we'll cover functions soon), it's a member of an exclusive group. This means you can only name-drop it within that function. .

So, variable scope is all about where you place your variables and where they're allowed to be used.

Adding in user input

To capture user input in JavaScript, you can use various methods and techniques depending on the context, such as web forms, text fields, or command-line interfaces.We’ll only talk for now about HTML forms

HTML Forms:

You can create HTML forms using the &lt;;form> element and capture user input using various input elements like text fields, radio buttons, checkboxes, and more.

JavaScript can then be used to access and process the user's input.

Functions in JavaScript

Think of a function as a helpful individual with a specific task. Whenever you need that task performed in your code, you simply call upon this capable "person" to get the job done.

Declaring a Function: Declaring a function is straightforward. You define it like this:

function functionName() { // The code that defines what the function does goes here }

Then, when you need the function to carry out its task, you call it by name:

functionName();

Using Functions in HTML: Functions are often used in HTML to handle events. But what exactly is an event? It's when a user interacts with something on a web page, like clicking a button, following a link, or interacting with an image.

Event Handling: JavaScript helps us determine what should happen when a user interacts with elements on a webpage. Here's how you might use it:

HTML:

<button onclick="FunctionName()" id="btnEvent">Click me</button>

JavaScript:

function FunctionName() { var toHandle = document.getElementById("btnEvent"); // Once I've identified my button, I can specify how to handle the click event here }

In this example, when the user clicks the "Click me" button, the JavaScript function FunctionName() is called, and you can specify how to handle that event within the function.

Arrow functions : is a type of functions that was introduced in ES6, you can read more about it in the link below

If Statements

These simple constructs come into play in your code, no matter how advanced your projects become.

If Statements Demystified: Let's break it down. "If" is precisely what it sounds like: if something holds true, then do something. You define a condition within parentheses, and if that condition evaluates to true, the code enclosed in curly braces executes.

If statements are your go-to tool for handling various scenarios, including error management, addressing specific cases, and more.

Writing an If Statement:

if (Variable === "help") { console.log("Send help"); // The console.log() function outputs information to the console }

In this example, if the condition inside the parentheses (in this case, checking if the Variable is equal to "help") is true, the code within the curly braces gets executed.

Else and Else If Statements

Else: When the "if" condition is not met, the "else" part kicks in. It serves as a safety net, ensuring your program doesn't break and allowing you to specify what should happen in such cases.

Else If: Now, what if you need to check for a particular condition within a series of possibilities? That's where "else if" steps in. It allows you to examine and handle specific cases that require unique treatment.

Styling Elements with JavaScript

This is the beginner-friendly approach to changing the style of elements in JavaScript. It involves selecting an element using its ID or class, then making use of the .style.property method to set the desired styling property.

Example:

Let's say you have an HTML button with the ID "myButton," and you want to change its background color to red using JavaScript. Here's how you can do it:

HTML: <button id="myButton">Click me</button>

JavaScript:

// Select the button element by its ID const buttonElement = document.getElementById("myButton"); // Change the background color property buttonElement.style.backgroundColor = "red";

In this example, we first select the button element by its ID using document.getElementById("myButton"). Then, we use .style.backgroundColor to set the background color property of the button to "red." This straightforward approach allows you to dynamically change the style of HTML elements using JavaScript.

[strawberrypillz0]

When I discovered that jirai kei was not just a style but a subculture I was very impressed but happy to finally understand why jirai kei was associated with mental illness or mentally illed characters like menhera chan or KAngel. I would like to ask, can people who don't actually have mental problems still dress in jirai kei? And what defines jirai kei clothing? Hope this reaches you!! ^^

Of course - regardless of me joking all the time about it, as long as you’re respectful to what jirai is and don’t try to invalidate actual jirais (who are mentally ill etc), you should wear whatever you want and whatever makes you happy. c: Jirai Kei is very popular as just a “fashion” right now and a lot of people who wear it, wear it just because is pretty but personally I think they are more “mass produced type (ryousangata - which isn’t obviously the same thing when it comes to the fashion, but they fit perfectly the definition or ryo rather than landmine type)” than Jirai Kei, but that’s on me.

What defines jirai clothing?

1. Color Palette

• Dominated by dark shades like black, deep purples, and dark reds, with occasional soft pinks or whites.

• The colors are supposed to give this creepy/cute vibe, mysterious and romantic.

2. Silhouettes and Layering

• Usually the coord will be a blouse + a skirt (not always tho, some jirai brands make shorts, long skirts, dresses etc, the brand that experiments the most is dearmylove imo.), they will usually just be in two colors -> one black + one lighter/dark. For example black and white, black and pink, black and red, black and purple.. but there are coords that are only black! (But it also depends on the specific item you’re wearing - some set up’s are just one colour and they can be even light blue with white, so I would say that what matters is what brand you’re wearing and stuff like accessories, makeup etc) -> it’s hard to describe the exact look of the clothes so I will just add pictures. (But there is bunch of videos on YouTube, I’m horrible at explaining this stuff but I try 😭)

3. Accessories

• accessories include chokers (or specific pieces from brands like VW) , platform shoes (especially bubbles ones), stockings, bows.

4. Makeup

• usually for someone to immediately recognise that you’re jirai will be the makeup -> pien makeup, this is the type of makeup that is supposed to make you look sad (cuz pien is facial expression that reminds of this emoji 🥺), like you’re about to cry, basically pleading face. Ofc I will post a little tutorial/reference, but there is a lot of tutorials from Japanese jirais that are amazing at it. I would say that contact lenses are also doing a lot when it comes to it!

5. Editing

It’s very much normal in jirai culture to edit your pictures heavily and add filters that are very very pink. But it’s not a thing you must do, but it nice to keep it in mind.

As I said, I’m not the best person when it comes to explaining the fashion itself so I would recommend just looking how jirai looks on other platforms and watch videos about it on YouTube! Especially to know the difference between jirai and ryo 🩷

[mx-anthropy]

Mass Effect 2 feels like a real drop in quality in several ways over ME1. I'd only played 1 and Andromeda until last week, and almost every system in ME2 feels extremely B grade, like one of those XB360 games one might buy from a second-hand shop that has like a 4 hour campaign and slides from your memory afterwards.

The story is alright, although the fact that you're essentially forced to work with Cerberus after dealing with all of their evil shit in the first game feels like a really strange choice, especially if you played a Paragon in the first game. Most of the Paragon choices in ME2 feel pretty mid compared to the first game, and in general I feel like this one really just wants me to be a renegade and Paragon was just an afterthought.

Also the combat just straight sucks. It's not like ME1's combat was stellar, but at least there was a broader range of skills you could use and your companions could use. I also guess people complained about constantly scrolling through the equipment menu to equip better weapons and upgrade for Shepard and the squadmates in ME1, but IMO they went way too far in the other direction, because the weapon choices and upgrades in ME2 kinda suck. The weapons are basically unchangeable bar the different ammo type abilities. I liked being able to min max my assault rifle into a short burst high damage weapon that overheated really quickly, or an absolute bullet hose that could spray down enemies for ages.

I think they slimmed down the ability list for all the companions (and Shepard) so that players would actually use different combinations of companions more often (instead of just Liara/Tali/Ashley which is what I think a lot of ME1 players might have done, since just specialising in one of the 3 skill tree types and taking whatever combination of companions covered the other 2 meant you had every skill at a very high level), but now all the character abilities are so limited that combat just becomes very repetitive in every situation. Standard cover shooter style popping headshots on every grunt and then using like 2 abilities to completely stomp down the elite enemies every now and then. Barrier + Mattock AR + special ammo completely wipes 99% of enemies. Although I guess the same could be said of the later game ARs with HE ammo and frictionless materials in the first game.

[thegnomelord]

was thinking about drawing Ifrit from "Hell has a basement floor" and had some headcanons on his appearance.

on one hand i was thinking to make him tall and burly, built big to store all the mana and power he has, make him built like a volcano.

on the other.... what if and hear me out.... Ifrit.... skinny. tall and gangly, long limbs, underfed, outlines of bones poking out from underneath the skin, sunken eyes for that extra unsettling factor. besides magic does have a cost. maybe it's just your body that needs to be exchanged.

now i thought of the second hc because tall and skinny isn't exactly associated with the kind of brute force Ifrit has but he's still strong even if his lifestyle is gonna put him in an early grave. now imagine when he's finally part of tf 141 they notice that he's not very well in the food and weight department for his height and the amount of energy he spends so... they start feeding him (especially Price and Soap because protect and care hoard/pack)......

i've also been getting into the trope where characters gain weight as a sign of health and living a better life. so yeah tell me what you think

and maybe share your hcs on Ifrits appearance because i don't want to butcher your creation on accident

Okay 1: you have no idea how happy it makes me when I hear ppl want to draw fan art of my stuff :DD, internally I'm like that dog video where the dogs happily tapping his paws lol bc he can't contain his excitement lol. And also yeah, I'm a huge sucker for the trope and your little idea with Price amd Soap tickles my brain.

And 2: man you did some mind reading bc your hcs are actually very close to what I've made up for the lore of the whole au. While I want to overall leave Ifrit's body type ambiguous to give readers some space to imagine themselves in Ifrit's place, Ifrit is 100% underweight with more of a volleyball/basketball player type build, as mages focus on stamina and endurance rather than raw strength bc that can be augmented with magic. Also has stretch marks because their weight fluctuates a lot lol

Okay lore spoilers so if y'all want to find out through the story skip this-

Okay so— magic is increadibly taxing on the body, not just by eating away flesh and creating mage marks as a Mage's power grows, but just by simply existing inside the body magic stresses the body. Because fundamentally magic is toxic to humans, and even mages who have the needed adaptations to utilise magic are no better than our ancestors when they were first learning to stand on two legs.

The best metaphor I have for magic is chemo drugs. They're used to kill a cancer but they also damage healthy cells. Magic, similarly, damages the body by existing inside it, but also is used by mages to heal the damage as soon as it happens. This uses a lot of calories and also why mages have really irregular weights, losing 10kg in a week isn't an uncommon thing.

Someone possessing even half of Ifrit's capabilities would need to eat 3x that of a regular human of the same height and weight. Mages are literally Shaggy from Scooby Doo lol. And that's only to get the bare minimum their body needs, caloric need becomes much bigger if they're active like Ifrit is. So you'll find that many mages, but especially military ones, are underweight and need to regularly get Iv fluids and nutrients to help their body recover from using magic. They also need to eat a lot of highly caloric food, which isn't easy when one of the most common side effects of magic use is puking your guts up.

Most military mages don't reach 30. The average life expectancy is around 25, with active duty (i.e. constant missions and daily magic use) mages lasting on average 3-4 years before their body basically breaks down, but they can last longer depending on how conservatively they use magic.

Now, knowing all that, Ifrit has been actively using strong magic on par with military mages since they were 14-15 years old and while they're not the healthiest, they're healthy as a horse when compared to most mages. The reason behind their continued survival — their mage marks.

[armythings-love]

I’m gonna cry… I had an entire analysis for this typed out but my wifi is shit so it refused to post😭😭 anyways, this is based off of the @ladybugout-au permanent superhero team. I decided against doing Luka’s Cadmeancio suit because I 1. Didn’t want to draw him in orange and 2. I was already pushing it with making a purple/red Neurofoxin. Only reason I made her purple is because natural coloring obviously doesn’t mean shit to the character designers if Juleka gets to be a purple red tiger. Anyways, here’s my take on their suits!

Hecattack: I wanted to diverge from the furry/bdsm influences Chat’s suit got, so I gave him looser fit pants, a hood and combat boots. His suit was lowkey inspired by Red Hood’s design because, dammit, DC may be super dark, but they know how to design characters well (something MLB could stand to learn from ಠ_ಠ) anyways, along with the hood and paneled top+cargo pants+combat boots, I gave him cat-shaped knee pads, similar to Ivan’s turtle shell knee pads. You will also notice a trend with a lot of my hero suit designs, which is fingerless gloves. Yes, this’ll take away from the cat claw thing Chat had going on, but I’m ok with that. To go with his punk/rock band aesthetic, he got combat boots with the signature cat paw steel toes. His tail is pretty much the same along with the ears. His mask is also different, covering the bottom half of his face. This also takes away from the cat sclera thing the original Chat had, but Luka isn’t a furry so… also, the mask covering his mouth alludes to his calm nature and quiet personality, not feeling the need to play around, especially during a battle,which was where the original Chat erred most often. Luka also has very expressive eyes, so I wanted to push that, like, even if he doesn’t talk much, he’s still a good communicator. Plus, when cats are hunting, they’re quiet! Which the original Chat cannot relate to!

Ladybug: ok, so her suit is still pretty basic, since I wanted to stick with he AU’s canon description of her suit. The main bodice/legs are similar to the season 4 suit after she calls on the lucky charm, but the sleeves are slightly different. I also got rid of the “reverse” polka dots cuz they just look ugly imo. Her gloves are also fingerless, since I feel like that would 1. Lend better to doing yo-yo tricks and 2. They just look better (u_u) anyways, her hair is still the same, as well as her mask. It’s pretty basic but eh…

Neurofoxin: her design is also super simple, but I also wanted to veer away from the gaudy orange normally associated with the fox miraculous. If she can make her tiger suit purple and red, I can make her fox costume reddish purple!! She’s goth, she’s not gonna walk around in *o r a n g e*. And I stand by that. Anyways, like I said her suit is relatively simple, the panels of the suit modeled after Volpina’s actually, because despite how I hate Lila and her stupid sausage link hair, her volpina suit was pretty cute. Instead of giving her a jacket w/coattails or a belt/sash to be her tail, I decided to make it her hair, cuz even in civilian form it’s pretty long. I also decided that instead of a dark grey/black to purple, I’d make the tips the same cream as her “underbelly” panel, as I wanted to incorporate the cream in more than just that singular spot. I also pulled her bang back because even if she’s goth, she still needs to be able to see properly as a superhero. Plus, I like Juleka’s eyes, and I feel like Trixx would like her to show off more. Anyways, besides the morph suit and her hair being a bit longer than normal+a different color, she has a cropped leather jacket,same color as her suit. There’s also paneling on the side/back of her thighs/back that’s a darker red/purple color. Again, to go with her rockstar/alt aesthetic, I gave her combat boots as well, though hers are knee high, plus I forgot to draw the laces, but eh. Fun fact: I headcanon the Couffaine twins as being super tall for their age, but Juleka is taller than her twin for now+her boots are heeled.

Fukiya: for Kagami’s suit, I pulled inspo from someone else’s LBO AU fanart, although I can’t remember who’s it was. Originally, I was gonna go for a suit similar to Kagami’s fencing gear, but decided to go w the suit she has now so it’d be more reminiscent of a bee. I gave her a sleeveless, cropped kimono, the bottom of which has a honeycomb pattern and an ombré going from dark yellow to black. Her obi has two layers, the bottom layer being a bright yellow and the outside layer being black. Her sleeves are similar to Queen Bee’s, but with an added black line. Her legs are completely black with the exception of her knee pads, which are a bright yellow and octogon shaped. I wanted her to look more bee-esque than Queen Bee or Vesperia (her character design is 🤢) so I gave her the yellow torso with black limbs, than made the kimono collar thick to look like a neck ruff or smth. I honestly struggled with her design a bit but it looks ok in the end so I’m happy with it :) also, Kagami is the shortest because I said so!

Heavy Matal: oh, Ivan, you absolute teddy bear of a guy. I adore the Iván of this AU, he’s so sweet, a gentle giant, so I wanted to focus on making him look slightly softer than the rest of the heroes, despite being the turtle holder. I gave him his signature cargoes, although they’re pants instead of shorts when he’s transformed, a sleeveless hoodie, and “turtle”-neck compression-esque undershirt, the sleeves long enough to be, you guessed it, fingerless gloves! The only reason Kagami is the only one with full gloves is because I wanted to giver a more serious/conservative look. Mari’s been ladybug so long she deserves to have cute, fingerless gloves! Anyways, back to Ivan! His hoodie is two toned, like a turtle’s shell, with the front being a light green. It’s patterned to look like a turtle shell underbelly, with a nice big pocket to hold whatever. He wears elbow- and knee-pads, which are shaped like little turtle shells. He wears regular Vans-style tennies, and his mask is similar to Carapace’s, except it cover the majority of the front of his face (think Kid Flash), and is colored/patterned similarly to a box turtle, with red accents along his cheekbones and his little tuft of hair is his usual blond with an ombré to that same red. (Ignore the ear I forgot to color in plz, I don’t feel like editing anymore T-T)

Ok, so that’s it for today’s character designs! I’m working on redesigning pretty much everyone’s civilian and hero costumes. I haven’t mentioned on this blog, but on pretty much every Gabe!Salt fic I’ve read, I will tell you, whoever the hell designed most of the characters in MLB, you deserve to be fired and then arrested. I’m so sorry, but there’s no way ur gonna convince me Fashion Designer™️ Marinette Dupain-Cheng walks out of her house every day, wearing ugly ass ballet flats+”denim” jeggings in that shade of pink. No way. And don’t even get me started on Gabriel’s candy-cane, red pants and duck hair headass, because omg… that man is supposed to be a world renowned Fashion Designer™️, one of the best in Paris. IN. PARIS!! No fucking way. No way. I get, you want ur characters to be simple and easily recognizable, but that doesn’t mean they have to be ugly!! And I get it, Adrien’s supposed to have a model-off-duty look, but wth are those shoes? Plus, why does he never change for his photo shoots? He’s a MODEL! I get it, you can’t even spend money to change the transformation animation to whatever the characters are actually wearing but wtf??? If you were gonna have any kid’s show where we get to see a lot of different clothes/outfits, this would be the show!! Two of the main characters are fashion designers, one of the minor antagonists is the daughter of a fashion magazine owner and your other main character is a model. IN PARIS!! A city known for its fashion and “romance”. And ur telling me you can’t add a few more outfits to the show??? That’s called lazy writing/animation.

Ugh, sorry abt that rant, but the character designs genuinely piss me off. It’s bullshit.

I digress.

I’ll be releasing the main 4 kids’ redesigns probably on the 15th!!