#not even just music but most art in general

[dorkus-mcdingus]

Can I also add on that even the EVENT CHARACTERS that we see on Halloween have such brilliant writing that it makes heavy impacts on the fandom even if we see them just one time?

Rollo was the very first playable Halloween NPC that had such a huge impact on the fandom and is still so loved to this day. I swear though, Glorious Masquerade was a cultural reset in the TWST fandom in general especially with how HARD they cooked on not just the story, but also the outfits, the music, also Rollo himself with him having his motivations be more in line with how Frollo is in both the book and the musical! There's a reason why the event is a major fan favorite and it's for a good reason.

Say what you want about Playful Land and the execution of the ending, but that event was the closest thing we've ever had to a true horror event but you all remember when we first saw Fellow and how A LOT of us were drooling over this guy? I mean hell, the guy was I think #36 in the Yume polls in Japan in 2023! Plus with Gidel being the cutest little nugget, we all were screaming

"OH NO HE'S HOOOOOT!!!!!" and "OH NO HE'S CUUUUUTE!!!!!"

Respectively.

And then there's Skully. Oh freaking boy there is Skully, the skelly boi himself. The man had such a HUGE impact on the fandom that even outsiders couldn't look away! He was EVERYWHERE! Even now when I go around the internet, I will always see fan art of him and now even fan made plushies of him! I mean Rollo's got some fan made plushies of himself and I know Plush Wonderland has a poll open for Fellow and Gidel to get dolls made of them but Skully is so loved, so adored that HE WAS THE SECOND MOST POPULAR CHARACTER TO BE YUMED WITH BEATING OUT THE LIKES OF GOJO SATORU!!!!

And to think, these characters have only been introduced to us once. They've served their purpose, they take a bow, but we still adore them so much

How it feels being a player of the niche game Twisted Wonderland, whose overall quality is stable, when you see players of mainstream games complaining about powercreep and shit storytelling and gooner fanservice

Because the gameplay and monetization practices are already dogshit from the beginning we don't really have expectations lmao. But the one thing we have against everyone is that the story actually has depth, has a message it wants to convey, and the cards are always beautiful except for a few odd ones. Every new release only fuels our love for the boys.

I'm the number one twst shill, but if you're even a bit critical of writing styles, you'd know it tops majority of the long-winded, pretentious storytelling word slop the other gacha games have lol.

Comparatively, twst is simple. Simple, but really gets its point across in the least amount of words possible while still keeping the execution engaging. Schools teach us KISS (keep it short and simple) for a reason lol.

[tagarilaghost]

Hiya you three :>

I did a little something :D The short version is that I really like the content you create <3

The long version and me literally pouring my heart out is under the cut :> oopsies my apologies for it even getting so long!

From left to right:

Darcy & Pearl belong to @neferirkarekakai

Just Darkrai & Anne belong to @anirritant

Ark & Twig belong to @sincerely-sofie

So two of you might already know, but I will say it again either way. I had a really rough time around the end of September 2024 with stress that left me almost no free time and meant constant work to do. It was one hell of a month that I had to power through and your content and fanfictions were like the only things that kept me going and powering through it all. I remember the days when I scrolled through Irri‘s blog reading all the silly ramblings and looking at all the cool content and art that you created <333! Then continued to check ao3 and found Sofie‘s fanfic filling the little breaks I could give myself at the beginning of all that stress. Once I finished it all I still remember it giving me such a push to finish one of the many huge things I had to complete in that time. And during the peak and end of it all Nefer‘s fic helped me carry the burden of everything coming together and trying to swallow me whole.

I must say most of these days are just such a blur cause I don’t remember anything else than working and reading, but I know I once laid there on the couch in the middle of the night, pmd music playing in the background and reading Avol. It was one of those moments that happened with all three of your works where I could just drift off and unwind free from the stuff I had to do. So yeah :) I finished everything, am still here and kicking! I think not a lot of people actually speak it out loud when someone encourages them, helps them through a rough time or just in general makes them happy :) I always wanted to let others know when their work is just amazing, so thank you three.

Thank you so much. From the bottom of my heart. Keep being awesome <3

also here's a silly extra:

[chaifootsteps]

Hey can I rant about a random topic?

Im in the art community and let me fucking tell you, HOLY SHIT IT'S SO BAD, OMFG.

it feels like every week there's a new "draaamaaa" about a 'scary wery pwedator'. And then you click on the vid and it's about some 15 year old who had a nsfw rp/art trade that they regret, or just a simple falling out, with another 16 year old. Suddenly that person is a horrid monster that should be locked away forever. And funnily enough, the video ends up getting far more views than both the teenagers followers combined. So now you have people who had never even heard about either teenager weighing in with their opinion.

The older adults on the Internet aren't helping either, their only input seems to be "Well this didn't happen in MY DAY" so now there's a whole subculture of teens who try to emulate the 2000s era Internet, which is pretty great most of the time actually - these guys are building their own websites, making sparkledog ocs, bringing back old music- but then you have teenagers who end up being complete jerks to everyone, and making revenge porn of other people's characters, because apparently one of the cool parts of the old Internet was that you could do whatever without repercussion.

It's all a big mess honestly, and since I hit my current age Im trying to stop associating myself with the general community because shoot- it has about 3 braincells to share between the whole community.

Bullying really has become a hobby, and it's incredibly fucked up.

[stars-and-soda]

Anytime I hear about a music genre being misogynistic so whoever can't listen to it, I always wonder did you try the women artists in that genre? I promise that it will help

[averlym]

@remylong :

[st5lker]

i feel like heat abnormal is starting to maybe solidify itself permanently as my favorite vocaloid/vsynth song of all time which is pretty crazy bc usually i either cant pick a single #1 favorite at all or they change all the time like when it used to be iiya. but also im remembering kimi no taion is definitely up there with my favorites like i dont know if i view it as an objective masterpiece of art the way i do with heat abnormal or rolling girl and some others but kimi no taion is just more of a personal favorite like its nostalgic for me bc it was my favorites song on project mirai which was my first vocaloid game… also it just hits a lot of my personal taste in that kind of softer jrock and is really fun to sing

[brittlebutch]

kind of astounding how innocuous conversations with my younger siblings can make me feel like dogshit... what are the good things about being the oldest kid supposed to be again??

[eri-pl]

Lots of super interesting thoughts!!! I'll probably keep rotating them in my head for some time.BTW sorry for replying to you like in an old-school email, but it's the most convenient here.

There seems to be some in-world mythological confusion about what "the end of the world" even means, similarly how "the Void" can be either the interstellar void or the void outside of Existence

Oh, yes. The void is also confusing. And think this is not wholly unrelated. Limits of time; limits of space. [Reminds me of how @eloquentsisyphianturmoil said that the Door of Night is related to the Halls of Mandos, those two discussions have the same vibe for me — oh wait, they are related!

Because if end of Ea = Morgoth jumps in = it destroys the Halls somehow (I still don't quite like it but not for factual reasons)… OK, are the Halls of Mandos Arda-specific? This feels like a moot question, because only on Arda there are Men and Elves— or are we certain about it?

There's a whole bag of worms here.

We know that Elves are bound to Arda for as long as it lasts, but the Ainur are instead bound to Ëa.

Yes, but it's a scale issue. There is still the question of what do they do when Ea ends. But yes, you are right that this may be read as separate question from the Second Music.

Also, Athrabeth is late writings, adjacent to the round-Arda-from-the-start and generally, more scientific vibe, so I guess here we're talking a bit more like "the sun dies out" end of Arda... maybe.

Also also, I need to check what are the Valar bound to, I think it may have been "various Ainur for various planets, bound to them".

OK, my Silm says "World", so… I'm not sure. BoLT is even more vague. Also I only now realized that the part where I've drawn a smiley face on my Silm and on my BoLT are probably evolutions of the same point in text. :) <3 [yes I do underline and comment on some books. In pencil! Or eraseable ballpoint pen. I did it with non-eraseable pen when I was a kid, and staying in the thematic area of this post, iirc my copy of CSL's "the last battle" had a certain sentence or couple of them underlined back in the time when I thought they were cool and not "you should have taken some lessons from John and learn what to omit"… I'm not even sure what is my opinion now tbh. anyway back to the post.]

The First Music created the whole universe, but apparently the Second Music is not played after the end of that universe, only the end of Arda

This may be a version incompatibility issue, and I think it is, because myy intuition for what Tolkien wanted says "Second Music after/at the end of Ea".

Though just like with some other ideas, I could probably make it work, as long as we throw away the "Arda is our mythic prehistory" I think I could roll with this… But not n any particularly canon way… Hmm. Needs more thought. You people keep saying very interesting things recently! <3 (Even more interesting than usual)

Which makes me think that the Second Music is not a separate thing (as in, another work of art), but an extension of the First.

I've always assumed it's more like a reprise than an unrelated work.

neither is it limited to the Timeless Halls (which would exclude not only the Elves

I think this is based on an assumption that the Silmarillion does not confirm or deny.

I generally treat the term "Music" as quite abstract, the closes thing to what actually happened that the Incarnates could comprehend. I imagine the Second Music for people living in Time to be just that - living. The whole life makes the Music.

Oh, I love the last sentence!

Not necessarily the whole construct of Arda ends → Second Music → Ea ends much later. On the other hand, I have no idea on what version Tolkien settled or would settle, and I can see where this would be coming from, also, funnily—

OK, a short summary of a large interpretational idea, which can probably be detalized in many various ways— Arda as our mythical past, but as in "our actual world [is/is made of/whatever] the Second Music".

Or, you know, like in an album (I'm not thinking about Les Mis, you're thinking about Les Mis) where you have song1, song2,… many songs and then a reprise that is like a medley of all those and, like, closes all of them.

I didn't have enough sleep, so excuse me if that's too chaotic to read. Also I'm bad at thinking about Silm canon without making a lot of assumptions. I hope other people, who are better at it, will add their thoughts about what you wrote too.

Hmm sometime later I should look at all the replies I got on this (I love them) and write a summary of our thoughts. This would be nice to have.

Let's discuss:

What do you think: what happens to the Valar after Arda breaks (or whatever it does, anyway it ends somehow)?

(Or should I say "what will happen"? But for fictional end-of-the-world present tense feels more natural to me. I'm not sure why.)

Both in the terms of "what Tolkien intended at various points of his career" and of "what makes the most sense with the Legendarium". With whatever version.

Let's ignore Morgoth (and Sauron etc), assume they've been dealt with in some way that works (if you prefer this including "Sauron is good now", ok, why not) and that no other Ainur got depressed because of it.

Whatever happened, we're discussing just the good guys now. Because it is a mess anyway so let's try to narrow it down for now. It's still a very difficult question, I think.

So, the Second Music. Where is it sung and is it material? (well as much as music is material anyway, but I think you know what I mean)

On one hand, the Music of the Ainur was clearly not material (because matter did not exist), and its being a music feels somewhat like an approximation. And took place (it's not a place but whatever) in the Timeless Halls.

On the other hand, Men are said to sing in the Second Music (and maybe the Elves too, unclear), so… will it be material? Or does this mean "the spirits of Men"? Will it be more of a literal music than the first one, or not? Where will it be sung?

(If we simply copy and paste a solution from outside the Legendarium, it still leaves a lot of questions, depending on how much do we copy)

(Also, Athrabeth Finrod ah Andreth is not an answer. It is a question (and no, I don't mean a "the answer is yes" question (though this too), but an open question. It's a discussion of two characters, not anyt sort of explanations, and it leaves more questions than it answers. but if you want to elaborate starting from this text, you're welcome.)

But yes, even with those disclaimers, "the Second Music immaterial; spirits; it reboots Arda into Arda Healed" seems like the most fitting solution. Especially if we ignore the whole "and then Feanor reboots the Trees" thing which… for me the important part of that is "Fefe gets over his issues", and that we can keep.

And generally, what do the Valar do afterwards?

On one hand, in Ainulindale chapter (or was it in Valaquenta? nvm) it seems like their being on Arda is temporary. On the other, with Arda Healed… It's still Arda, in a way.

So do the Valar still govern it (I need to remind myself that Manwë having a burnout is not canon), or… what? Do they live there, or in the Timeless Halls, or are they free to move between those (and somehow the Elves and Men don't get jealous about it).

And if the answer is "the Timeless Halls effectively get moved to Arda" – ok, this solves some questions, but why? why. All the other Ainur were not interested in material existence. Why would this be a thing? It seems quite out-of-the-blue and random.

I'd love to see your thoughts (plural "you", though I'm sure some will have more intense thoughts than others :) )

[bandzboy]

so many kpop stans on twitter are like "our fandom used to be so much better idk what happened" like reason why things are bad aren't toxic streaming culture and insane overconsumption that is been normalized on fandom spaces

[i-c-u-p]

going to start using this platform like twitter again and by that i mean posting relentlessly and going on rants in the tags

[arolesbianism]

Some stuff I've drawn semi recently

[doctorwhoisadhd]

there's a certain quality the harmonies of like... early to mid 2000s alt rock has. which i am obsessed with... like i wanna do that. i NEED to figure out how to write harmonies that sound like that

[wp100]

ahn'qiraj my beloved

[raininyourblackeyes]

On the brighter note, I also got to meet Torvill and Dean last night

[mishkakagehishka]

I guess i'm at that age where all i want to write about is commentary on society

[starpros-sunshine]

"You just need to lower your expectations" No you don't, actually. Don't let them hand you mediocrity under the excuse that your standards are just too high. Demand more.