#not only in terms of visuals but the characterisations

[vamphorica]

MellodraMattic and Queerness: An Essay

Before I begin, I need to make it clear that my thoughts on this subject are directly inspired by this post by overkeehl. I not only recommend but insist that you read it before continuing, as I am going to be exploring a small component of the greater idea that they have already established. Essentially, I am taking the idea of Mello's character being queer-coded and developing it in regards to how MellodraMattic becomes a very validating ship in the context of marginalised sexual and gender identities.

I am also going to touch on internalised queerphobia, so consider this as a warning if that's not something you fancy reading about.

Anyway.

Mello is a distinctly queer character. I don't say this from an entirely projective approach because I think there are plenty of examples throughout Death Note where Mello's visual presentation and characterisation signifies it. His androgyny is the most explicit indicator of nonconformity in relation to traditional gender expression. I fondly remember when I first read Death Note, aged ten, and was convinced that Mello was a girl for several pages. Suffice to say, Mello's appearance is rather ambiguous, making him an adaptable character for one to project queerness onto. We will go into more depth on this later on.

It is also worth mentioning that Mello's style is quite camp. I love the way he dresses and only wish I had the confidence to pull off his outfits, but they are also very ridiculous and inconvenient. One of my Top 10 Mello Moments Ever is when he tails Mogi and Misa, wearing this:

Those sunglasses are doing absolutely nothing to keep him out of sight, but I appreciate the fact that he obviously thinks otherwise. He simply must serve cunt to the detriment of the task at hand.

If I have not convinced you that his style alone is a good hint that he is a queer character, even in the most general sense of the term, there's plenty within Mello's character context that isn't exactly subtle in how he is portrayed as evidently nonconformist. I do think you have to be careful not to equate certain traits with queerness when it may not be appropriate to do so (after all, there's many characteristics relating to neurodiversity that can be identified in those who originated from Wammy's House, and while I won't get into the whole discussion about the overlap there because it's not my place to do so, I also think it would be an interesting subject to explore).

However, it is completely understandable why a lot of queer people see themselves in Mello. As a child, around the age that I think many begin to explore their sense of self, Mello's identity is ultimately threatened by L's death. He is confronted by the prospect of working with (accepting) Near in order to catch Kira. Instead, he runs away, and the narrative that follows is of a man tied up in complex feelings relating to his identity as a 'runner-up'. To put it simply, it conveys queer grief very well — Mello struggles with the fact that who he is as an individual does not align with the expectation that Wammy's House instilled in him from a young age. Similarly, some queer people may find that they must contend with accepting an identity they had been discouraged from exploring as children.

I think for many queer people seeing themselves in Mello, this sense of shame that can be identified as internalised homophobia or transphobia is unfortunately a common experience. It can take a long time to recognise, let alone challenge the societal standards that have been deemed 'normal' or 'correct'. Mello encapsulates this disconnect well in the sense that his goal to defeat Near as a means to prove himself as a worthy successor to L is doomed from the beginning. He was never meant to be the one to become L, and yet he runs straight to his demise in his desperation to receive recognition from an institution that he could never succeed within. I am not suggesting that all queer people go through this level of intense self denial when exploring their identities, but I think it ought to be appreciated that through Mello, there are a plenty of parallels that reflect the complexities of discovering your sexuality and gender identity.

Additionally, if you'll excuse me posting two rather grim examples of objectification in the manga, it is worth noting that Mello, in close proximity to two naked women, does not seem remotely interested in their bodies, which might suggest a queer identity on a very shallow level. I do think, given how misogynistic almost all the male (and some of the female) characters in Death Note can be, Mello is notable in the sense that he doesn't actively discriminate against the female characters. He treats both genders like shit. Feminist icon.

Mello is very easy to project an assortment of queer identities onto. For what it's worth, I headcanon him as bisexual and FtM, but I know you are not reading this essay for my personal projections. You can consider Mello as MtF, asexual, gay, nonbinary — all of these identities can easily be validated within the canon context because Mello is so versatile while still being a developed and nuanced character. His story mirrors so much of the struggle that queer people contend with, and while I think it is a massive shame that it isn't resolved, I think that in itself only exemplifies the complicated nature of identity.

So, where does Matt come into all of this?

It is important to remember that Matt as a character was created for Mello. In the main series, it isn't even mentioned that Matt is a Wammy's kid, this information only being revealed in 'Death Note 13: How to Read'. However, this is crucial knowledge because it conveys the very essence of what makes MellodraMattic so great.

I love Mello, I really do, but he is cruel and selfish, in addition to being arguably one of the most dangerous characters in the series. For those who might relate to him for any of the reasons I have given thus far, it is still important to understand that Mello is not a decent person. He is deeply flawed, and as much as I like to joke that his crimes are perfectly fine actually, I can still appreciate that he is not meant to be regarded as an 'good' character, even if he is on the right side as far as Kira is concerned. His behaviour is very much correlated with his sense of inferiority, so in this case, his identity struggles do not excuse his behaviour, but they can explain it.

Yet, despite all of this, Matt remains by his side, regardless. While there's a general consensus that the two were separated for some time after Mello ran away, they eventually reunite and work together. In these brief moments, we can still gain a good insight into their relationship dynamic from the way they speak to one another. For instance, Matt is cheeky in a manner that the reader would not expect Mello to tolerate. Yet the patience in how he responds to Matt's insolence almost appears uncharacteristic. I am of the belief that Mello is not a highly reactionary character, despite how the series tries to portray him as such, and this calm composure he is capable of can best be seen through his interactions with Matt.

There is a real familiarity between the two men that I don't think is comparable to any other relationship in Death Note. For example, in the image below, Matt is complaining about a task Mello has assigned him, one that isn't exactly difficult, and yet he's already distracted. Rather than get frustrated, a response we would expect from Mello, he answers Matt gently.

I appreciate these moments are few and far between (for fuck's sake, there's only two panels that feature the both of them) but I don't think I'm reading into it too much. I think they're genuinely suited for each other, which is, of course, because Matt was written for Mello. Their chemistry is dependent on the latter canonically.

Matt brings out the more approachable side of Mello because Mello does not see Matt as a threat that he must remain guarded around. If we as readers have become acquainted with Mello through his act of cruelty, albeit as a means of survival, we must assume Matt is familiar with this side of Mello, too. However, it doesn't deter Matt, nor does it scare him. Matt is completely loyal to the very end, and while such writing is perhaps a little superficial, I think it does emphasise the point that Mello has someone who will put his life on the line for him and God, I don't know. I think you have to read that as love to at least some extent.

Mello is a complicated character, with plenty of attributes suggesting that he is queer. This only further contributed to his plot line that centres an identity struggle, which speaks to those who fall outside of cishetnormativity. Unable to reconcile his sense of self with the expectations placed upon him, Mello becomes ruthless. Yet, in spite of these flaws, he has Matt. He represents a kind of hope, I think, that those who connect to Mello through his queerness and subsequent struggles can gravitate towards. A hope that there's someone who will accept every aspect of your identity regardless, that there will be someone you can be yourself around.

To me, MellodraMattic is my favourite ship because I love Mello and Matt, and the way in which they interact with one another. It is also that initial identification with Mello, that makes Matt's character and their relationship more meaningful, an example of the fact that there'll always be someone who not only accepts, but loves you, regardless of the mess.

I think that's beautiful. 🍫🎮

[cucumberteapot]

I feel like people aren't as open to discussing E-42 Prowle because there is so much about the character we don't know or the films haven't explicitly told us yet. However, I'd like to think writers have presented us with enough information that we can make a strong assessment as to not to what kind of role they'll serve (I think it's fair to say Miles G is going to be an antagonist later-turned hero or anti-hero in BSTV), but what kind of character this is and how they challenge Miles as the main character.

I'd like to discuss one crucial aspect of piece of body language and physical characterisation. This right here:

This is our first proper shot of E-42 Prowler and it closely parallels Aaron Davis in then first movie when he's watching Miles run away.

Now I want to pay mind that in deliberately holding off the plot twist of Aaron being the Prowler, the audience is given no key identifiers as to the Prowler's true identity. He doesn't even have any lines of dialogue until Miles is hiding in his apartment and we after we get the reveal. In every sense of the term, Prowler is a gun for hire. Except he doesn't use guns. The point is he is a hitman. He consistently does what he's told by Kingpin - "You can count on me, sir. I don't ever quit." But then when he's confront with the reveal of the kid he's been hunting is his own nephew and he must choose between his identities as Aaron and as Prowler, that loyalty is severed and it costs him his life.

Which leads us to this specific visual of E-42 Prowler dangling from the rafter before dropping down to face Miles. The camera doesn't cut away from how he drops. Instead we're put entirely in Miles' perspective as to this guy's every move. Between us and Miles, the crew don't want us to miss anything. So what are we seeing here?

Well firstly I think it's clear this is something the Prowler we know wouldn't do because this is a merge of personas of Miles as the Prowler and as a 15-year old. This reads to us as something a lanky kid would do on a jungle-gym, and the fact E-42 Prowler doesn't take his eyes off Miles not only demonstrates curiosity but almost an invitation to play. Not literally, but I believe this Prowler is someone who likes to toy with their victims (which he see a bit of towards the end). And in this case, Prowler is definitely testing Miles from the moment he starts talking about ideas counteractive to his reality - That Aaron Davis could be a "good guy" and that the Prowler identity is something detrimental to the E-42 dimensions' existence. Granted, Miles is speaking from the experience of someone who's Prowler didn't provide income for their family and represent a symbol of strength like the Spiderman identity, so it's a no brainer E-42 Prowler views Miles as antithetical to his state of being. Another thing is that this is how Miles hangs from his webs throughout the movie (under the clocktower, before going through the portal to mumbattan, etc.), so it's a nice consistent characterisation between the two.

But that only leads us into what separates them. After keeping their focus directly on the other, they have their first exchange:

Prowler: Your dad is still alive? Miles: What? Prowler: Your father... You said he's still alive. Miles: Yeah. Prowler: Oh.

Okay, let's dissect this. Specifically Miles' confusion at to why Prowler's asking this because the audience is in the same boat but for very different reasons.

Now I don't want to make assumptions but even before Prowler unmasks, Miles already knows it's his counterpart and his question isn't so much as not knowing but a request for confirmation. However the reason why Miles is confused here is because he expected that same curiousity about identity from his counterpart - not about relatives. Prowler doesn't ask who Miles is even though he doesn't really know, and when he gets his answer that, yes, Jefferson is alive in the other universe, his reaction is played off as dismissive, separating his identity and priorities from Miles. Whatever it is, considering it's the first thing he's asks, this is a vital piece of information for Prowler but his reaction removes any possibility he can be negotiated with... which Miles continuously fails at.

Miles: Who are you? Prowler: My name is Miles Morales. But you... You can call me the Prowler. Miles: If I don't get home, our dad is going to die. Prowler: Your dad. Miles: Please... You have to let me go. Prowler: And why would I do that?

That then leads us on to Miles' question because he's not only asking for his kidnapper's name, he's asking for who this person is. And in turn who we see isn't particularly angry or vindictive - we'll get to that. Instead, Prowler's expression is complete desolation.

It's only when Miles further insinuates they are the same by referring to Jefferson as "our dad", does he shoot back with "your dad". It's quick because this Prowler is still separating himself from this version of himself and the idea he could or would've been or had anything like his life. Finally Miles accepts that they are separate and ask Prowler to let him go, but Prowler has another rhetorical question which implies although he considers this Miles separate to himself, he still has use for him somehow. Which honestly if you had this strength-is-all mindset, it might feel rewarding to have captured this part of yourself that you considered weak - which for all Prowler knows, Miles is just this inferior version of himself who got decked in one hit.

And then lastly we have these two shots here where Prowler raises his "claw" beside Miles' head and sizes him up.

If Aaron can scare Miles by punching the sand out of a boxing bag while Prowler only has to put his fist on it, you tell me who's more terrifying?

But truthfully this last non-conversational exchange before Miles stares Prowler back down is evident that not only is Prowler going to beat the shit out of Miles, but that Miles' "flippy, little sassy jokes" as Spot puts it, is not going to help him here. Because if he wants to survive, he's going to have to match Prowler's energy. This film has a bittersweet ending not because Miles is captured but because Miles has internalised what he's been fighting against the whole movie - The emotional desolation of being Spider-man that lets them deal with or appear indifferent to the harm or death of people around them and it's exemplified when he applies Peter's first lesson of being Spider-man:

"Don't watch the mouth. Watch the hands."

[zahri-melitor]

Why did Red Robin fail as an alias that Tim was transitioned into? Did it ‘fail’?

I don't have any special insight on this one, but I can give you a bunch of reasons that made it unpopular.

The main one however? It's heavily associated with n52 Tim, and people don't like n52 Tim.

(Heads up going in - I will be using cover dates for all of this, because working with cover dates over publication dates is simpler for me)

Tim used 'Red Robin' as a name between August 2009 and July 2018. This splits up as follows with the major titles he was appearing in:-

2 years, 3 months (August 2009 - October 2011) in Batman Reborn pre-Flashpoint as Red Robin (Red Robin vol 1):

5 years, 1 month (November 2011 - November 2016) in n52 as Red Robin (Teen Titans vol 4 & 5, Batman Eternal, Batman & Robin Eternal):

2 years (August 2016 - July 2018) in Rebirth as Red Robin (Detective Comics):

I wanted to put the photos up to help clarify the differences between each of these versions.

Yes, there's overlap between the last two, because Teen Titans vol 5 finished several months after the start of Tynion's Detective Comics run. The two characters are essentially separate - switching over to Rebirth was a messy process that took several months depending on the title

The majority of appearances of 'Red Robin' as a character are of n52 'Tim Drake', who doesn't have the same backstory, parents or history as Robin as the characters either side of him. He's the one that most long term fans of the character would rather not talk about or think about.

Tynion's Detective Comics run between 2016 to 2018 was about taking the characters therein back to their pre-Flashpoint characterisation, as much as possible. And you can tell from the costume, Tim was 'Red Robin' in name only. He was wearing a Robin costume that simply happened to have an extra R on the crest. He looked like a Robin, acted like a Robin, was doing Robinlike work for Batman, and when Young Justice 2019 started he got a costume update that dropped the extra R from the top and he's been using Robin again ever since (less the attempt at using 'Drake' as a code name in 2020).

So why did it fail? Here's a bunch of reasons:

People don't like the cowl design on Tim: even Marcus To, the artist best associated with Tim as Red Robin before Flashpoint, perpetually draws Tim with the cowl down and often with part of the costume off for commissions and artwork.

People don't like the new 52 version of Tim.

Red Robin was a costume that Tim put on back in 2009 as a punishment to himself while was was doing 'unRobinlike' things looking for Bruce, and once that circumstance was over, there wasn't that much time during Reborn to really cement it as Tim's adult persona due to the universe getting cut off and rebooted.

New 52 Tim was largely not associated with the rest of the Bats for various editorial reasons, making him an outsider that's unusual compared to the rest of his characterisation since 1989.

To show the difference for Tynion's 'Tec run and convince all the fans that new 52 Tim was gone, they decided to make a very clear visual distinction between the characters. That visual distinction essentially was making Tim into a Robin again.

If you're looking at character storyline for Tim Drake, son of Jack and Janet, the story arc effectively goes: Batman Reborn, Convergence, Detective Comics, Young Justice 2019. Which is a story of Tim transferring himself back OUT of the Red Robin costume as he healed and no longer needed it as a temporary measure, and regaining his memories and history.

I mean, why would DC want to use Red Robin for Tim? It's got the difficulty that Jason has taken over effective ownership of the colour red for identification in the family purposes. It's associated with times of grief in Tim's life (because Tim explicitly wears red for loss: for Kon and for Bruce) and with storylines they've excised from his history. It's explicitly a form of self-flagellation.

It could have been Tim's Nightwing, but it's effectively ended up Tim's Grayson period. Something that happened and is referenced, but there are good reasons not to return to.

[that-ari-blogger]

Critical Role's Previous Cameraman

I put up a post the other day about critical role's new animated introduction and I couldn't help but notice a sudden spike in the analytical stuff that I don't really understand. A more tech orientated friend of mine informed me that this was a good thing, actually. So, I thought I might capitalise on that and examine the previous campaign's opening sequence through the same lens and do some more analysis.

Let me explain.

SPOILERS AHEAD

One notable thing about this song is when it starts. Exactly eleven seconds in. That's eleven seconds of wait before the final payoff. You catch glimpses of what's happening above, but nothing else.

And that is a key theme of this campaign. The unseen. The Mighty Nein was a party characterised by trauma, and a lot of the time, you don't see that, you only see glimpses. A flash of a fight they told you about, and the sensation of drowning.

But then we meet Fjord.

He's falling, and I'd like to point out the direction in which he is falling. You will notice the scars on his back, signifying he was probably in the process of running away, or was betrayed by someone, and he is falling towards those scars. Backwards. There is also a neat thing of falling away from the light, into the darkness, into the unknown. THis is someone out of control, leaning into the pain. And what is it that sees that?

There is a reason Uk'otoa's design looks so much like a leach. The creature is a parasite, it doesn't find someone strong to break down, it found someone weak, and at its mercy, and brought him under its control. What this shot does is highlight that creature's opportunistic nature, but it also associates it very clearly with the visual of that eye.

And it's that eye that carries through. When Fjord washes up on the beach, when he is finally safe, he carries with him a little piece of Uk'otoa, a little piece of that trauma.

It's also notable of that it is an eye. It's obvious, but it colours his vision, and changes how he views the world. Its effects aren't physical, but mental.

Beaureguard Lionet is a fighter. Not in the sense of class, because she isn't but in the sense of personality. Beau is a fighter in the sense that her first reaction to any problem is to punch it.

This transition is a wipe transition, but its important because of what it uses. It uses the opportunity to show off the uniforms of Beau's attackers, because otherwise the shadows of the rest of the shot make them hard to make out. These are wearing the same robes as her. Whoever they are, they are part of a team of some kind with her, they are people she should be able to trust, but look at how much damage they have done to her. Look at how heavily she is breathing. And look at what Beau does in response.

She fights back. This is how the animation gets across this character. She isn't complex, she doesn't need a great explanation, she doesn't have different sides to her, she just hits things until they stop being a problem.

I will also point out her eyes again. They are blue, not an unnatural eye colour, but they are the same blue as her robes, and the robes of those who are attacking her. Once again, the has warped the vision of its recipient, and in this case, it's creating a cycle of violence as all she knows how to do, is hit things.

We don't see Nott The Brave for a while in this animatic. We instead see, once again, the eyes. But I also want to point out that this was made before we knew about Veth. So we were just seeing the scared goblin.

This is as close as we get in this scene, and its Nott actively hiding from the light. The warmth scares her, and for good reason, its the same heat that we see emanating from her eyes. Once again, the trauma that has contaminated a character's vision is changing their reactions to the world.

And with that, I would like to talk about Jester, and I would like to do that in context.

The term "foil" in the context of a character was actually popularised by William Shakespear, who handily explained the metaphor for us.

"And like bright metal on a sullen ground, My reformation, glitt'ring o'er my fault, Shall show more goodly and attract more eyes Than that which hath no foil to set it off."

Put in English, I shine brighter when you have something to compare me to. And this is what a foil character is, a character who brings about elements in other characters that can easily be missed, or who shows off by contrast their personalities.

Jester is one of the two characters in the Mighty Nein who is not a child of trauma, and her introduction shows that. She reacts to her life by laughing, and contrast that with everyone else. Fjord reaches for a sword, the item of his trauma; Beau tries to fight her trauma despite that approach clearly not working; and Nott hides from it, unable to reach out for help.

And it is notable that the first time we see an adult Jester, she looks normal (if a bit over cheerful), then is immediately contrasted with the rest of the Nein.

This not only shows just how different her demeanour is from the rest of the crew, but it shows her effect on them. She makes them all smile. Jester and Caduceus are very much support characters in the truest sense of the word. They support others. Jester shows genuine kindness towards everybody else, and it reflects onto them.

This shot is neat but not too special. Its a tracking shot on the hat of all things, because thats what important here, and it shows the traveling dynamic of the group. It's a tiny bit of tension in an otherwise calm scene, so the camera is steady, but speeds up slightly to match the movement of the object, then comes to a stop when it is caught. There is very little stress, but there is a sense of comradery.

Similarly, this shot establishes some stakes with a rising pan to show the scale of the threat and to show some more information, but it is hardly a monster, so the camera isn't really in a hurry.

Enter Caleb Widogast, born in fire. I don't think they could write a more thematic entrance if they tried. An abrupt cut shows the night, then it is entirely consumed by fire, only to reveal Caleb.

There is no motion here. The camera is stock still. This is the exact same thing with Ashton and FCG in the Bell's Hells. Caleb is disassociating from the heat in front of him, and there is a fascinating reason behind that. Caleb has two characters that need to be introduced to better understand him, the man, and Bren, the boy.

The flames consume the screen again, and then part to show a boy, staring at the screen, in horror. This is what you need to know about this character, this is a character forged in flames, born from the Ashes. Bren is dead, Caleb Widogast remains.

And this shot, with Caleb, Astrid and Eadwulf silhouetted against the fire, shows what kind of trauma we are talking about, and what effect it has. This is guilt, and in contrast with the rest of his party, this guilt is paralysing.

Yasha, however, is introduced in a calm way, in contrast to everything around her. The camera shows you a woman, meditating, and then pans backwards to reveal this:

This is a woman surrounded by bloodshed, who has made a concerted effort to look away from it, and to look to the Storm Lord for guidance. This is a woman looking for healing, in comparison to everyone else, but that looking doesn't change the fact that that trauma is still there.

The next few scenes are cool, but don't really add anything to this analysis and I only have a few more images I can show here, so I'm going to skip to Taliesin's characters.

Caduceus has two introductions. One is this shot, which is a cool action shot of him casting an epic spell and vanquishing a crowd of enemies. But instead of the incredibly animated (in the sense of exaggerated poses) nature of his companions, Caduceus clay is calm and collected. He is unquestionably the anchor of the group, and where Jester contrasts them emotionally, Caduceus does so on a philosophical level. Caduceus is a gardener of fungus.

Mushrooms and other fungi are recyclers, they grow on dead trees and creatures and give a forest new life. They clear out the debris and make way for new things to take hold. That's what Caduceus does for the Nein, he helps them get through their trauma so that Jester can help them improve and become better.

Caduceus's actual introduction is muted, and there's a point to that. He's not trying to be the main character, you don't need to understand his family life to understand him. You need to understand that can stand in a graveyard and see the light, that he is at peace with what has gone before him and helps people to get past it, and that his entire mission, to regrow the grove, isn't to bring back what is lost, but to help regrow something new in its place instead of the blight that lingers there.

Mollymauk is introduced as a weapon transformed into a grave. That is what this transition is and I think that's really important. Mollymauk is, very clearly, a repurposed soul. He isn't the first person to inhabit that shell, and he isn't the last. I also want to point out how this character is represented here, not with a heroic memory, but with a quiet moment or remenicing on times gone by. He is a shadow that haunts the Nein.

This is by far the simplest shot in the entire video, and that's because it isn't telling you anything. You bring your own emotions to the table here, you bring the memories to the grave, that's how grieving works.

Once again, there is more to this video, but I'm only allowed to put 30 images in a single post. So I leave you with a quote from Niel Gaiman.

"Fairy tales are more than true: not because they tell us that dragons exist, but because they tell us that dragons can be beaten."

DnD likewise, and all TTRPGs for that matter, are powerful because in them, with a little bit of help from friends, any monster, no matter how personal, can be defeated.

[whencyclopedia]

Interview: Bodies in the Middle Ages

In the Middle Ages, attitudes to the human body were rife with contradictions: Glorified, oppressed, cared for, and chastised. A new temporary exhibition at the Swiss National Museum in Zürich – coveted. cared for. martyred. Bodies in the Middle Ages – re-evaluates the ways in which medieval Europeans saw, conceived, and imagined the human body. In this interview, James Blake Wiener questions Curator Christine Keller about the exhibition's finer points.

JBW: Dr. Keller, many thanks for speaking to me on behalf of World History Encyclopedia (WHE).

We tend to think of the Middle Ages as an era dominated by faith. However, we should remember that those living in medieval Europe also participated in secular society and non-religious activities. With that in mind, how did you decide to showcase the rich interplay between physical presence and secular interests and pursuits?

CK: In selecting the themes and exhibits, we have tried to show not only the medieval Church's view but also the secular attitude to the body by means of excerpts from medieval literature – such as erotic novels – profane art, and themes such as sport. We try to show that although the Church propagated certain ideas about physicality (in particular the Christian concept of human sexuality as sin), many testimonies from this period, such as popular erotic literature, reports by secular doctors, and obscene badges in the form of personified genitals, speak a language contrary to church morality.

JBW: While the Catholic Church posited the body as the seat of desire and sin, visual representations of the body of Jesus Christ and the femininity of the Virgin Mary were omnipresent. So too were those body parts that believers worshipped as holy relics, which could heal the sick, bring victory in battle, and cure infertility. What can you tell us about the reliquaries and other objects of devotion on display? What secrets do they reveal about medieval body image?

CK: The exhibition includes a reliquary from Limoges from the late 12th century as well as figurative reliquaries such as busts and arm reliquaries from the 14th and 15th centuries. They bear witness to the great veneration and power of the relics of saints. Figurative reliquaries such as busts, arms, legs or feet bring to life or embody the bones or secondary relics stored in them (such as hair, contact relics, etc.). As so-called 'speaking reliquaries', they thus make the abstract, sacred powers more visible. It is relevant for the medieval image of the body that the relics simultaneously reflect death and life and that the saints venerated in the relics were regarded as mediators between this world and the afterlife. The wooden bust reliquaries from the 14th century (for example the Ursula reliquary) were painted in such a way that the surface appears flesh-like, the eyes animated and alive. In these busts, the saints met the viewer as the 'living dead'.

JBW: Death was an immediate and looming concern to our medieval predecessors. Average lifespans were lower than they are today and disease was rampant. How did the concern of death and the belief in everlasting life – on the day of resurrection – shape conceptions of the body during this era?

CK: Death and mortality were omnipresent and a major topic in the Middle Ages. In view of the resurrection, care was taken during one's lifetime to ensure that one's own life remained as free as possible from sins and vices or that these could be redeemed during one's lifetime. In terms of the body, this meant among other things: no gluttony (gula), no lust (luxuria), no vanity (superbia), no indolence (acedia). The concept of bodily resurrection was characterised by the statements of one of the early Church Fathers, Augustine of Hippo (354-430): according to his interpretation, the physical condition at the time of death was irrelevant for the resurrection. For example, if a dead body was mauled by animals or burned, it still emerged from the grave on the day of resurrection intact and at the age of 30 or 33, the age at which Jesus died. In this sense, depictions of the resurrected show them with their intact, naked bodies.

JBW: It was during the Middle Ages that a number of first steps in public health were undertaken: the practice of quarantine; the establishment of hospitals; and the provisioning of medical care and social assistance. There was, as a consequence, an interest in health, hygiene, and hospice, which is delineated throughout the exhibition. I wondered if you might share with us some details about bathing and cupping during the Middle Ages. I suspect many readers would be surprised to learn how commonplace these and other practices were in actuality.

CK: The medieval theory of health is based on the 'theory of the four humours' and the four elements. If the humours (blood, phlegm, black and yellow bile) are not in balance, the person becomes ill. In order to maintain this balance, an excess of substances must be equalised. Bathing parlours (with sweat baths), cupping, and bloodletting – or the application of leeches – were used for this purpose. Numerous health guides, which were particularly widespread in the late Middle Ages, describe the appropriate time for these methods and use illustrations – the so-called Vein Man – to point out the suitable body parts and the appropriate time for bloodletting. Health care was a major topic throughout the Middle Ages and was widespread.

JBW: Bodies in the Middle Ages underscores that while medieval attitudes to the human form and body were contradictory, much has remained the same across the centuries. Whether through the quest for physical perfection or a preoccupation with health or illness, we are not all that different from our medieval predecessors. What do you hope visitors gain from a visit to the exhibition? Moreover, what would you like the public to learn about the Middle Ages as a result of your work?

CK: A survey in the exhibition revealed that the exhibition on the body in the Middle Ages inspired the majority of our visitors to think about the body in the present day. We hope that with this exhibition we can show a somewhat different view of the Middle Ages and that we can break down the often still prevalent stereotypes of a rigid and anti-body era.

JBW: Dr. Keller, thanks so much for sharing your expertise with our audience. On behalf of World History Encyclopedia, I wish you many happy adventures in research.

coveted. cared for. martyred. Bodies in the Middle Ages runs at the Swiss National Museum in Zürich, Switzerland until July 14, 2024.

Christine Keller is an art historian and curator at the Swiss National Museum.

Continue reading...

[boinin]

Kaiser's characterisation and the flashback's position in the timeline

Chapter 243's official English release is available, and it's the most insight we've had into Kaiser (and Ness's dedication to him) since they've been introduced. So forgive my rambling.

My initial impression of Kaiser in this chapter was that Rin has a rival for the mantle of edgiest teenager. Did that little diatribe cut his tongue on its way out?

More seriously, have a lengthy analysis of both the timeline and Kaiser's character under the cut, featuring references to Christianity. Years of Catholic upbringing are finally paying off /s

Timeline

I always get hung up on event dates when it comes to Blue Lock (cos I write post-canon stuff and like to keep the lore consistent). It seems like the Bastard Munich try-outs took place not that long before the Neo Egoist League started—maybe as little as a year beforehand?

I believe the flashback takes place around April 2018, or the year before at the earliest. Here's my reasoning.

The panels of the outdoors in chapters 242 and 243 give spring vibes. More tellingly, Kaiser and Ness don't seem all that much younger than they do in the NEL. The main indicator of time elapsing between the flashback and the present manga setting is the addition of Kaiser's crown and thorns.

There's no legislation underpinning the legal status of tattooing in Germany (same as Ireland). But the industry tends to self regulate in the absence of law; another source mentioned that in Germany, people aged 16 or 17 may receive a tattoo only with the consent and/or presence of their legal guardian.

Did Kaiser have anyone in his life willing to accompany him to get a neck tattoo before he turned 18? My hunch is not, based on what he's hinted at in this chapter. So maybe he is 18 in this flashback... or maybe he got a back-alley tattooist to do the rose for him while underage. 🤷‍♀️

In any case, he was likely 18 by the time he got the sleeve done, putting him at either 18 or 19 during the Neo Egoist League. I like @echari3's theory that he's a Christmas baby for reasons I'm about to touch on; that would put him at 19 as of 25 December 2018. He can't be any older; otherwise, he'd be playing in the regular men's league, not at U20 level.

Ness is outwardly quite impressionable and childlike, so he strikes me as being younger than Kaiser or even Isagi—maybe 17 during the NEL? But who knows.

Strange trinity: Kaiser's characterisation

Anyway, back to Kaiser. This is something echari3 has already talked about, as have others, but this chapter further supports the allegories around how Kaiser is perceived (or portrayed) as a Christ-like figure.

The way he offers his hand to Ness—someone in despair, who lacks camaraderie and vision—gives strong Jesus vibes. At least visually; in terms of dialogue, Kaiser speaks like a kid who's decided swearing every other sentence makes him sound tough. But I digress.

Furthermore, Kaiser is capable of "miracles"... at least in a footballing sense. The way this scruffy kid drives a reversal of fortune in this game defies expectations.

His strong kicks and positioning sense are awe-inspiring to Ness, who looks at Kaiser like he's his personal saviour by the end of the match. Because he is. Through Kaiser's intervention, Ness is able to leave his cruel family home and pursue "magic" as a professional footballer. He becomes his first follower.

Kaiser goes on to get thorns tattooed around his arm, as well as a crown on his hand. A crown made of thorns is heavily associated with Jesus Christ (another nod to echari3, who made this connection in her post 💙).

If I had more time to re-read the NEL volumes, there's further similarities between Christ and Kaiser that I'd like to delve into. For one thing, as of the Ubers match, Kaiser is close to being persecuted by Isagi and his teammates, who seek to establish their own dominance over Bastard Munchen. His role as the "king" is being questioned, as Christ's claim to be the Son of God was. It'll be interesting to see how that pans out. Will Kaiser punish the non-believers... or will he be betrayed? Will he appear to die... only to be resurrected at a future date? *cough* the U20 World Cup

Anyway, that's a post for another time. The Christian symbolism doesn't end here though; it just takes a swerve in later panels.

Anyone familiar with the Bible will be aware Kaiser is overtly connected with that mythos: he is named after Michael, a high-ranked archangel. The name itself can be interpreted to mean “who is like God?” (a rhetorical question, since there are none like God according to scripture), or alternatively “gift from God.”

The Biblical angel has many roles and associations, but he is primarily regarded as a warrior, acting as the leader of Heaven's army. Furthermore, Wikipedia references a source which states: "He is viewed as the angelic model for the virtues of the "spiritual warrior", his conflict with evil taken as "the battle within"".

This all tracks in respect of Kaiser's characterisation. He is a strong, tall player with incredible strength, endurance and accuracy. He has a weapon (Kaiser Impact) and appears both omniscient (due to MV) and omnipresent (due to his good playmaking and positioning sense) at the start of the NEL. He's exceptional in every sense. He also has some... issues, psychologically. There's definitely a struggle going on under that ridiculous mullet.

But Kaiser's dialogue in the blue rose panel is interesting. He states that the rose symbolises "making the impossible possible in a rebellion against God". This wording brings to mind another Biblical figure: also an angel, but, er... on the opposite side.

This verbal allusion to Satan tracks with Kaiser's rather villainous aspiration to cause his rivals despair. It fits well, being that the Devil is said to reside in Hell, a place that is almost always depicted as being deep underground.

In conclusion, Kaiser's characterisation is multifaceted. He has the ability to inspire and lead others; he is capable of miracles; he is comparable to a god among U20 league footballers; he is waging a war on behalf of Bastard Munchen against his Japanese teammates; and he desires to send all his rivals to metaphorical hell. God, Angel and Devil, all in one. He's his own strange Trinity.

Without further information about his backstory and the reason for his desire to overcome "God", it's hard to draw conclusions. But he's certainly a fascinating little jerk.

I have some theories on what Kaiser's life looked like before meeting Ness, but that warrants its own post another time.

[nanomooselet]

Visual Motifs: Tesla

So, one of the benefits of an adaptation like Stampede - a retelling, rather than just lifting from the page - is that they know where it's leading, and they can add context or foreshadowing. For some characters, they can even add presence. In addition, Stampede is required by the limits of the medium to do some streamlining. From all I've heard about their consultations with Nightow, their concern was with themes first.

But there an issue arises in Tesla. What is there to say or do for her? She isn't a presence; she's an absence. There's not much you can add without undermining the gutwrenching horror and thus the thematic impact of her character.

But Orange found a way. In fact, they found multiple ways.

Tesla can never let anyone know what she wanted because she was so thoroughly stripped of action or speech. While she lived no one cared to listen to what she had to say, and she's forever silenced by death. Nightow had to bend the rules to give her a last, ambiguous word.* Memories and assumptions are all that's left. Those are all undoubtedly themes in Trigun. I think it's all still true in Stampede, with an obvious exception.

After all, silence is a statement.

Congratulations to Orange on making it even more horrifying. Though I'm at least reasonably sure that she wasn't conscious in suspension... I hope she wasn't. I suppose it adds to the argument to suggest her fate in the manga was kinder.

It also opens the question of what happened to her in the Fall, but helpfully (?), Nightow had already introduced a means of resolving it. It tidily both suggests a possible future plot point and further characterises Knives in the way he protects what he loves. He says her discovery was to him "but one grain of sand", and he's a fucking liar. (Also, note Dr. Conrad in the picture on Tesla's file. Nai had to learn he was involved somehow.)

My trash boy never disappoints.

Personally I do believe it's jumping the gun to assume Knives actually bears her consciousness, but she had a profound effect on him, much as red geranium petals are now foundational to Vash's identity. While the icon of the Eye of Michael represents a number of things (I'm gonna talk about them too, if I ever get around to it), the variation on it used in the Windmill Village isn't so ambiguous. The arrangement turns up over and over.

Behold the single most obvious way Tesla's made more "present" in Trigun Stampede. (It's sure beholding you.) The motif of Tesla's eye is as central a symbol in Knives as geranium flowers are in Vash. Tesla might not literally be a ghost, but she haunts Knives anyway. He's determined that she'll haunt everyone else too, though they may not know it's her. In his mind, he's her avenging angel.

But he isn't the only one who holds onto her.

And a certain panel in Maximum...

Though those particular eyes actually represent the eyes of humans. Eyes weren't prominently linked to Tesla in the manga, but this may have been the inspiration.

Speaking of the manga... what about Rem? Though we know it or something like it occurred, in Stampede we don't see the confrontation with Vash where she confessed to her anguish over failing their sister, and how far she was willing to go ensuring he wouldn't be hurt. I understand feeling that it flattens her. The narrative is being dictated by Knives in that moment, who wasn't there to witness it and had a vested interest in removing Rem from the story.

That doesn't mean there's no sign Tesla haunted Rem. If Tesla hadn't suffered what she suffered, maybe Rem would have served an uneventful term as Navigation Officer before going back into cryosleep, while the SEEDS fleet peacefully continued on its journey. It was still because she failed Tesla that Rem adopted and raised the twins. Knives's anger/fear at the perceived betrayal by both Rem and Vash still led to him crashing the fleet, Rem's death, and all that happened in its wake.

It's an interaction we never witness - it may not even have been a direct encounter - and yet Tesla, through Rem, instigated the plot. And that's also still true.

Comparing the discovery scenes in Stampede and the manga directly, there's a change. The flower Rem left as a memorial for Tesla in the manga (looks like a white lily, which represents innocence and purity in the Japanese language of flowers and is often used for funerals) is instead a red geranium.

I'd chalk it up to reinforcing Rem's connection with the flower and minimizing the 2D background painting budget, except...

Almost every time the twins as children are together on the screen with Rem, a geranium in a glass dome is there too. The only time it's not present somehow is when they're visiting the Plant room at the start of ep twelve.

And when they find Tesla, there's a shot where this happens:

The red petals are almost invisible in the darkness... and then pop out when she's revealed, like a wound. As if they emerged along with her.

The geranium, to Rem, represents Tesla. When she can, she has it accompanying the twins. The presence of this small, red, glass-bound thing - suspended, mute, so easily stripped of its petals - is perhaps an inadequate gesture, just as Tesla herself never grew to be what she could have been, and adopting the twins may not make a difference. But Tesla can be with her family in spirit and her baby brothers will get a chance to grow. That's all that Rem can do for her now, a regret she bore until the end of her life.

In Stampede, Rem and her successors are positioned as Knives's most direct ideological opposition in a number of ways, and I think one of them is in how they honour the memory of Tesla. Would the twins' older sister have wanted the vengeance Knives wreaked in her name? Or would she have had the grace to hope the humans would learn better? Would she have been happy those who came after her were given the love and the choices that she wasn't?

She can no longer choose. No one will ever know.

And that brings me, finally, to how Tesla haunts Vash.

Unlike the manga, in Stampede it's not as though Vash has any reason to fear being abused, or dismembered, or consumed, or exploited. In the manga he very much feared all those things, and accused Rem of raising them to continue the experiments. He was very angry and frightened to realise he was surrounded by humans and he was "not like them". But in Stampede Vash might as well be a human.

That's definitely a way Stampede thematically diverged from the manga. Nai's the one who's perfect and more like a Plant, because of his powers. Right?

It's Vash who tends to be physically closest to the geranium.

In the SEEDS database, Vash and Tesla are in the same folder, while Nai has his own. There are all sorts of potential reasons, but in my mind it'd be because their colouring matches (yellow-blonde hair, blue eyes). It's Vash (his hands on the left) who notices there's an extra file and starts scrolling through them. He unlocked the database, and he caused the jars of what was left of Tesla to be revealed.

He wears red. Specifically his outfit is red over black - his shirt and pants. And his eyes are the first ones in which Plant patterns are highlighted.

Ever noticed that Tesla's missing both arms?

But it's hardly as though Vash is in any position to understand what Tesla felt, or what she wanted.

And it's not as though Knives, in his loneliness and fear and denial of responsibility, would puppet his sibling for the power to take revenge.

Right?

* Don't get me wrong. Nightow's relaxed approach to worldbuilding could have made her reveal in Maximum a plot hole, but it's not. Plants really are weird enough that just about anything seems possible. Nightow created the impression that discovering her remains was so painful for the twins they came to a mutual, unspoken agreement to avoid mentioning it, let alone using her fate as a rhetorical tool. When Knives finally does bring her up, it's just before trying to meld with and then imprisoning his brother aboard the Ark. To me, it feels like his declaration of total war.

[katy-133]

Whose Skeleton Is Who? (TF2 Comic #7 Preview)

Regarding the issue 7 preview for the Team Fortress 2 comic, I know I joked a while ago that we as a fandom are trying to figure out which skeleton is which merc like we're reading and analysing that one page from The Castle of Fear by Patrick Burston all over again, but I wanted to take a moment to actually go through each skeleton and tell you the observations I've made, since I've noticed others' interpretations have sometimes been different, which I think is very interesting as someone who likes to compare art interpretations for fun.

Team Fortress 2 pays attention to art principles like colour theory, strong silhouettes, and invoking art history, and that also includes the comics, not just the games, and invites you to draw parallels between things.

So without further ado...

Miss Pauling ^

The preview script we get to read notes that the first skeleton we see (before the wide shot) is Miss Pauling's skeleton, which is in a crawling pose. It's meant to parallel a pose she does with a group of other vultures in an earlier part of the comic:

(Image: Comic issue 6, The Naked and the Dead)

Script transcript of the image below:

PANEL 2 We pull back to reveal a SKELETON, half-baked from years of wind-blown sand. The skeleton looks like it was crawling AWAY from something. It lifts a single skeleton hand out to nothing. VULTURES lurk. Let's try as best we can to mirror the position of the body and vultures from the opening of Issue #6, so it's clear we're insinuating this is MISS PAULING.

(Image: Script preview by writer Jay Pinkerton)

Additionally, her skeleton has two vultures above it, squabbling at each other (I assume over who gets to eat the skeleton marrow), which parallels Redmond and Blutard (the owners of RED and BLU, respectively) fighting each other over land and Miss Pauling "playing both sides" by pretending to only work for one of them.

Scout ^

The skeleton is in a running pose, representing Scout being characterised as the faster runner. The skeleton also has a brown shoe, similar to a pair Scout wears in Expiration Date to impress Miss Pauling.

(Right image, above: TF2 Official Wiki, Argyle Ace)

Soldier ^

The skeleton has the right arm up, similar to Soldier's pose when he's carrying his rocket launcher.

(Right image, above: TF2 Official Wiki, Soldier)

Pyro ^

The skeleton with the missing hip bones (or are hidden in some way by the sand and tree branches). In anatomy, the hip bones are one of the easiest ways to identify the sex of an adult skeleton (owing to the width of the hips being different if there is a birth canal). Pyro is gender ambiguous. The legs are also crossed, which is seen as more feminine body language when a person is sitting. This matches Pyro's body language, since Pyro's canonically done foot popping (a term coined by The Princess Diaries) which is associated with women film stars during the Golden Age of Hollywood.

(Image: The Jungle Inferno Update, Day 3)

Demoman ^

The vulture is pecking out the left eye socket of the skeleton, which is the eye socket that Demoman got cursed upon by reading the Bombinomicon. This creates a kinda visual parallel to Prometheus from Greek myth being cursed to have a bird of prey (an eagle) feast upon him as punishment for giving the forbidden knowledge of fire to humanity.

(Image: Bombinomicon comic)

The left leg is also missing at the knee, or majorly separated from the rest of the body, and Demoman can have a peg leg on his left side in the game:

(Image, above: Weapon Demonstration: Bootlegger, video by OfficialTF2Wiki)

Heavy ^

The skeleton with the largest ribcage, fitting Heavy's body silhouette. The skeleton also dwarfs the skeleton to the right of it, which invokes Heavy's size compared to the other mercs (he's the tallest merc in a lineup).

Engineer ^

The shortest skeleton. Note that the forearms are either missing or hidden in the sand, which invokes the image of Engineer being an amputee (missing his right arm at the forearm) and being the shortest merc when they're all A-posing. The skeleton is also wearing boots, which Engineer wears.

(Image: Reddit post titled, anyone else surprised that Scout isn't the shortest Merc? by Ok-Mastodon2016)

Medic ^

The tall skeleton that has the vulture with its beak poised over the skeleton's heart. Medic surgically removed and replaced each of their hearts, which allows them to be Ubercharged.

(Image: Meet the Medic video by Valve)

Sniper ^

The skeleton with its back lifted up by a stone, creating a visual focus towards it. The vulture is standing over the skeleton, as if it had been pecking at the skeleton's back. This could parallel being backstabbed, and I'm deducing the skeleton as Sniper's because his class is designed to counter Spy, who is the class who does backstabs. This skeleton also has brown shoes, which could be Spy's, but could also be Sniper's if he wears shoes instead of (what I had assumed before were) boots. Another vulture watches over the scene, perched on a higher ledge of rock and focused on that skeleton. Similar to how Sniper likes to climb up trees and higher ground to have a vantage point to scope areas.

Spy ^

The skeleton with a hole through the skull. This looks like a bullet wound from a headshot by a Sniper (again, Sniper and Spy are counter classes to each other).

I know this scene could be a bait and switch and that these aren't the mercs. I actually assume that's what the context is--otherwise, it'd be a pretty upsetting comic! But I think it's neat that the writers and artists went out of their way to make each skeleton characterised like this. The attention to detail is amazing, even in just this one page preview!

[muninnhuginn]

💫 Lu Guang, 4 8 6 9

Hi ^^. Sorry for the delay on thi-- wait, I only just spotted what 4869 means now. Somehow my mind hadn't pieced it together until just this second. Um, anyway. Thanks for the ask!

These asks are here for reference.

4. If you could put this character in any other media, be it a book, a movie, anything, what would you put them in?

Either a visual novel or a video game. Basically, it has to be branched, so if you're playing as Lu Guang, there are always multiple choices at any one time and what you choose can cause everything else to spin out entirely differently. Also, the idea of photos as "save points" you can return to and maybe "game over/death failstate" triggering a loop... mechanics-wise, it just really seems to slot together?

8. What's something the fandom does when it comes to this character that you despise?

Okay, so 'despise' is a bit strong here, but I'm really not a fan of the whole "Guang Guang" nickname considering the only time we hear it in canon is Qiao Ling semi-jokingly calling Lu Guang it and Cheng Xiaoshi immediately being all "heh, like he's a puppy (mocking)" (because guangguang sounds like wangwang which is onomatopoeia for dog barking). Like, I guess I could see Cheng Xiaoshi doing it to tease Lu Guang, but I see a lot of fanworks where they jump straight to Cheng Xiaoshi using it as an endearment and it just doesn't vibe with me. I guess I just think that there are plenty of other legitimate ways to modify Lu Guang's name that don't have that association?

6. What's something you have in common with this character?

Trap question! Lu Guang is one of those characters where I actively have to step back and make sure I'm not projecting too much when trying to analyse him. I need to properly think back to the source material when trying to fill in characterisation gaps to make sure I'm guessing what he would do rather than just basing it on what I would do. I don't really struggle with this for Cheng Xiaoshi or Qiao Ling or any of the other characters, just Lu Guang.

I'll just go for the most obvious common trait though, which is that Lu Guang is generally a very low energy person. Sure, he can be motivated if he finds a good enough goal (hi s2 spoilers), but for the most part, he just kind of quietly rolls along with no real ambition and gets adopted by the more extroverted characters.

9. Could you be roommates with this character?

He's definitely down the better end of potential roommates, I think. I've technically only had housemates before rather than roommates so I know it's not exactly the same, but one of the things I struggled with in terms of housemates was in terms of the whole "unspoken rules". Now, Lu Guang is great at laying down the rules. And also, he's not a super chatty person, which suits me fine. Though, I may overcompensate a bit to try and fill the silence at first, I think once I'd run out of steam it'd just be fairly chill, not much pressure.

[penddraig]

i think the way i like to describe my characterisation of howl to those who have only consumed one media or the other is : movie visuals with books personality & circumstances. like, bring on the capes and cardigans and never wearing the sleeves. there are different aspects in the book that add a lot of particular nuance to howl’s personality than how it’s like in the movie. the movie is like … so surface-level for all the characters in terms of personality, imo. like the way he’s afraid of certain things happening that never end up panning out in the movie ( wotc’s curse, his and calcifer’s contract ) that explain why he reacts in certain ways to certain things. none of that is there in the movie. also, the books completely leave out wales and the battles. not to mention i’ve reread parts of hmc so many times that he’s sort of grown beyond what we’ve been given even there. i think about him a lot, actually. :(

[candycurlsofmaddness]

Twenty Questions to Ask a Writer

1. How many works do you have on AO3?

Currently 70. Including 3 unfinished WIPs

2. What's your total A03 word count?

128,508 according to stats

3. What fandoms do you write for?

90% Star Trek. I will occasionally write other stuff, and I had wider interests when I first started writing, but all I've been interested in writing for the past year is Star Trek.

4. What are your top five fics by kudos?

First: Harry Potter and the Unexpected Ability to Socialise (Hp, gen)

Second: Breaking the Temporal Prime directive. (ST:LD x ST:SNW, gen) https://archiveofourown.org/works/49712530

Third: The Weasley Twins V/S the World (HP, gen)

Fourth: Secrets that Hide in the Light. (St:SNW, F/F) https://archiveofourown.org/works/49372045

Fifth: Rescuing Una (ST:SNW, F/F)

5. Do you respond to comments? Why or why not?

Yes always. I love having conversations and I love knowing what people think. (Sometimes I take weeks and weeks to reply. I am forgetful but I usually will reply eventually.)

6. What's the fic you wrote with the angstiest ending?

Everything in my series "To Die a Million Meaningless Deaths." (ST:TNG, 5 works)

https://archiveofourown.org/series/3684103

7. What's the fic you wrote with the happiest ending?

Most my romantic fics end happily. But in terms of the happiest ending compare to the start, I'd go with "The More Things Change, the More They Stay the Same" (ST:SNW, F/F) https://archiveofourown.org/works/49924192

8. Do you get hate on fics?

When I was on FFnet in the dark ages yes. On AO3, only from the Harry Potter Fandom.

9. Do you write smut?

Mostly fade to black or yearning but it's been known to happen.

10. Do you write crossovers?

Crossovers within star trek, yes.

Most other crossovers are usually just stories where I'm using the setting/themes of one world with the characters of another. So not in the actual sense.

11. Have you ever had a fic stolen?

Back in the dark ages yes. Plus I'm sure AI has scrapped all my words and more.

12. Have you ever had a fic translated?

Not that I'm aware of.

13. Have you ever co-written a fic before?

Yes many. One has been finished and published. "Understanding Lilith" (Owl house, gen) https://archiveofourown.org/works/54627781/chapters/138424342

14. What's your all-time favourite ship?

All star trek charcacters; Una/La'an, Christine Chapel/T'Pring, Beverly Crusher/Jean Luc Picard, Seven/B'Elanna/Harry, B'Elanna/Harry, Jadiza/Kira.

15. What's the WIP you want to finish but doubt you ever will?

Harry Potter and the Unexpected Ability to Socialise.

I started writing it to get back into fanfiction, but I didn't finished it before I divorced the fandom. I can't bring myself to write in the world of such a hateful bigot.

Also I started to write in present tense for Star trek and it's pretty impossible to switch back.

16. What are your writing strengths?

Inserting random world building and keeping characterisation close to the original when writing AUs.

17. What are your writing weaknesses?

Discribing things, remembering to add in the background details visual people expect. (I've got aphantasia lol)

18. Thoughts on writing dialogue in another language for a fic?

Good luck to those who try. I don't know know another language well enough to ever publish the attempt.

But somewhat related, I enjoy messing with the universal translator in my stories.

19. First fandom you wrote for

Either Harry Potter or Voyager.

20. Favourite fic you've ever written?

It's a tie between "Secrets that Hide in the Light" (https://archiveofourown.org/works/49372045) and "Off-putting Missions and False Alarms" (ST:SNW, gen, Una & Pelia) (https://archiveofourown.org/works/53742529)

[eziojensenthe3rd]

Midnight Gaming: A tale of Horny Furries

So I played The Crown Of Leaves past midnight, checked socials to find... Silksong confirmed to NOT appear in tuesdays games onl.

So Geoff Keighley cleared the air on twitter, letting hollow knight fans know not to hold thier breath for silksong this tuesday.

I havent played hollow knight myself but im aware that a lot of people enjoyed it and were waiting for the dlc-that-got-changed-to-a-sequel game. Send a prayer and hug to any hollow knight fans you see, y'aint all back quite yet.

So heres a lil story, I started following an artist few years back when I first saw their artwork and it enchanted me. Thier artwork contained characters in scenes just looking fantastic, different little details that were enjoyable to search, you know the term a picture is worth a thousand words? Theirs were worth a whole novel each. All of it wrapped in a world that you only get a glimpse of with each picture, accompanied with a description that tells a very short story. You know how dark souls had a lot of its lore within item and weapon descriptions? Same vibe and I loved them. It was the kind of world I wished there was some media, like a book, an animation, a game perhaps, where I could explore that world more.

So I followed this artist for a while, got excited for every new bit of art they posted, and over time they changed some things. About their characters, about the world. It was gradual so I paid no mind at first but eventually it got to the point where I realised I enjoyed their art less than I did before. The art was still good, the quality was still fantastic, I just dont feel as interested in them as I did before. They changed their characters and world so much, it just didn't do it for me. I could show you two images of what looked like two characters and hear me explain to you that they're infact the same character, ones just a more recent characterisation.

Now let me make this clear here, this is purely my personal opinion here. If the artist is happy with thier changes, then thats fine, more power to them. Its their world and characters to do with, my thoughts do not override that. I am not demanding they revert those changes just to suit my taste, i'd rather they didnt do that and just do what appeals to them. To make art for themselves. And if you happen to figure out who I'm talking about, please keep it to yourself. I do not want this artist harrassed on my behalf so please dont, this is a me problem.

Now as I said, I loved the look of their world that I wanted something like a game to explore it. So one day as I browsed the steam store, I managed to stumble across this game that had me shook. The screenshots, the characters, the enviroments. It looked a tad similar to the artist I followed but it was an entirely different world, tho it carried the spirit of what drew me in with that previous artists work in the first place and I checked to be sure, that artist's name was nowhere in the credits so they werent involved at all in this. Needless to say I picked it up just on that principle alone and... didnt play it until last night. Funny how that works.

So The Crown Of Leaves is a visual novel/point and click hybrid with following different routes and talking to folks like a visual novel and collecting items, solving puzzles like a point and click. Your just following a simple day as roui, trying to get by until some weird shit happens. And thats all im gonna say on the story without spoiling it. Listen, when I started playing, it had me hooked. The art just gut punched me right in the very place I felt was missing. It drew me in like the art I used to study with that old artist. Clicking on various objects just to hear little snippets, grabbing lil pieces of lore about the world I was in, seeing the characters and hearing them talk, their personalities just fleshed out and fascinating. Man, I was practically in love all over again.

In fact, im just gonna fill the rest of this post with some of this games art just so you can see what I mean.

Now, I do recommend this game but there is one thing you should know. The game isnt done, so far theres only two chapters with chapter three in progress but bare in mind it is a small indie team so take my recommendation with a grain of salt. Regardless you should definatly pick it up.

Maybe 18th century furries that live in a fantasy world that have a sort of gothic/mystical vibe do be one of my favourite genders.

See you all tomorrow. Feel free to leave game suggestions and feedback. Anons are currently on.

[divinekangaroo]

Fav season of peaky? Why..

Best gal for Tommy? Why..

Is death the best end for Tommy? Why..

Thank you 😊

Fav season of peaky?

Season 5, season 6 close second, because of Themes.

In an interesting outcome, S5 is better for what then happens in S6. Tommy's experiencing the emotional/moral trauma/consequences of the deferred traumas of all his other seasons' worth of activity by S5 and yet still pushing forward, because it's all he knows how to do (all about action) and it's what he thinks needs to be done (do good things that can only be done by a 'bad' man because of what/how he has to do it), and the ego aspect is thinking only he is capable of doing it and what that then means for him/everyone around him; putting himself into an even worse pressure cooker (British politics stretching into global impacts) for which he is blatantly unprepared and honestly, feels like he's floundering, compounded by the class/sexual/political/ethnic attacks imposed by Mosley all in one aristocratically snarly package? So interesting. The dynamic between him (good man doing bad things for good reasons and perceived as a bad man) and Mosley (framed as evil and righteous and all things accepted by British culture as proper) is insane. That sense of creators creating a situational pressure cooker and watching to wait for it to go bang...

I do struggle to rate the plotline in S5 / S6 - so many coincidences, so much happenstance, so many things that even on detailed rewatch and script reading and headscratching I grapple with. But thematically wow. S1, S2 and S3 were better written/plotted, S4 felt like huge amounts of fun and was dramatically and visually great, but S5 and S6 for thematic emphasis.

Best gal for Tommy?

IE, who would be the most healthful? Jessie Eden. Ironic how it ended with her, because that was the one relationship where I was like, this woman who, in and of her characterisation only, is someone who could work with him as a partner and who would recognise and navigate his traumas without adding to them or taking them on her own shoulders. Everyone else, there were huge swings and roundabouts in power dynamics, blame, self blame etc. If he'd married Jessie between S4 and S5, he might have actually been equipped for S5's confrontations. Although that would have created a very different story XD.

I do love watching/writing Tommy x Lizzie for multiple reasons, and I do think there is love and care there, but they have a conflicted and complicated relationship which makes it difficult to say "this is best for Tommy".

I don't believe May would have been good long term for reasons explained before. May also wasn't love, it was just...fun. And sex, and interest. I don't think May could have ever accepted who he was. And I don't believe Grace would have been good long term because Tommy immediately put her on the most insane pedestal, and I think he was too immature to recognise that; I imagine they would have divorced, or similar to my thoughts on May, he would have had a diifferent kind of (and much earlier) breakdown through forcing himself into a mould he didn't fit into. And I know there's this thing about "only you see me" with Grace after he beat a man to death; but that was one act only, his violence, and it was a reachout to balance Grace's own violent act which was also scaring her right then. But that didn't get anywhere near his lying, his deceiving, his dealing - in S3 it was immediately obvious Grace was unaware of the extent of what Tommy does for business; I think it was represented that he did definitely love her, but he was also putting on a front for her no matter that line or his love, and I think that would have backfired at some point.

Is death the best end for Tommy?

Nope. Get old, live, suffer, live, learn, go to prison, still have to live, actually change, actually grow, etc. Also more storylines if he lives!

Plot and theme wise, I think it would be SUCH a cop out to have him die in any closing movie. There's nothing very appealing about this idea of repentence through death-sacrifice. There's also too much religious connotation to that to be of purpose with who Tommy's character is, slipping into a saint's martyrdom or a jesus-like sacrifice feels too easy.

Plus, they've now effectively done a death (and subverted) in S2 (brilliant), S5 and S6 (very good for very different reasons to S2), substituted Arthur's death in S4, and had a few representations of 'little death' in S3, so if they repeated that? Like how many ways can they do this?

I mean, repentence through death has always itched at me though, because he doesn't seem repentent? He does have a sense of wanting to balance bad acts with good, but he doesn't exactly regret those bad acts...only their consequences if they bounce back at him.

I suppose I could buy into a cool shock-value death sequence if he dies through pure incidental mischance in the first fifteen minutes of the movie and the rest is about how his brothers/family have to pull their shit together for revenge, but not a death-as-repentence sequence.

[anticutes]

general rant: i don't like the anime adaptation. (surprise!)

ah yes, danganronpa 3. love it or hate it, the anime adaptation was extremely impactful to the series in terms of the information we learnt about the characters and certain events. (on a tangent, i personally loved human chiaki, even if it doesn't make thematic sense for her character... i hate to love her i do...) but when it comes to the adaptation's characterisation of junko... i think that it leaves much to be desired. not even listening to jamie marchi's top tier voice work for her was enough to save her, and i genuinely believe jamie marchi's voice is a perfect westernised interpretation of junko's character.

there are two main points of contention when it comes to junko that stops me from truly enjoying the installment- firstly, her characterisation. secondly, her impact.

first of all, junko's characterisation did a complete 180 when you compare her in the anime to the games. in the anime, she has a blatant disregard for people around her. in the games/light novels, junko held a lot more restraint. i can't get over how many of the key events in the tragedy were experiments done by junko in preparation for the events of trigger happy havoc, which, to her, was the climax of the tragedy. but, not only that, a lot of what junko did during her school life was done inconspicuously. in danganronpa zero, the e-mail sent to the reserve course students was sent by a redacted sender that only the combined efforts of a software engineer and a spy could uncover. junko spread awareness of the tragedy of hope's peak through word of mouth before leaking the video- and not many people knew that she was the one who spread it, much less the person who "discovered" the event. she also erased her memory with yasuke's help in order to evade suspicion from both the school and the student body (specifically, survivors of the killing game), and, not to mention, she got interrogated by the school- and this wasn't a simple interrogation, either- yuto claims that they analysed her brainwaves and did a non-verbal communication (kinesic) analysis on her! and they let her go free and closed the investigation into her!

when making junko, kodaka said that he wanted to create a cute, visually appealing character who was just irredeemably evil. i believe the dichotomy he wanted to establish in her character influenced junko's in-universe reception: her ability to evade suspicion was a result of her nonthreatening appearance. because of her innocent, cute look, virtually no one but her victims suspected her.

so, with that in mind... her literally blowing up a car with mukuro in her first appearance? getting juzo to write her off on paper by threatening him with his secret crush on munakata? mocking ryota in front of a crowd? i just don't think these would be things she would do, unless she was intentionally trying to provoke them. and who knows, maybe she was- but, like she said in danganronpa zero, all of this was just to set up for the events of trigger happy havoc.

when junko says that things were "moving along exactly according to her scenario", the implication i got was that no one noticed what she was doing. most of her outrageous behaviour would take place behind closed doors.

speaking of which, a particular pet peeve i had about the despair arc was junko making mukuro sing during the killing game they forced the student council into. personally, i think that just made the scene more comedic than anything. i feel that from trigger happy havoc, junko and mukuro were not perceived as this slapstick comedy duo- they always gave me the feeling that they were intimidating in public and worked exceedingly well. yes, junko is abusive towards mukuro- she berates her, humiliates her, and tries to kill her- but she wouldn't do that when they're in front of strangers that have not yet embraced despair.

i also am just not a fan of how they simplified junko's relationship with despair. yes, i know, "but kodaka said she was supposed to be fully unsympathetic!" i think... she was already pretty unsympathetic to begin with? when you think about her ultimate analyst abilities and how everything she has done has been calculated, not to mention the antisocial behaviour she acts out... i feel that's infinitely more terrifying than the "randumz teehee XD i think despair is funsies!! random people suffering is comedy gold!!" junko that was shown in the anime. "junko's a character whose entire motivation is despair!" her motivation is still despair in the games! just because it's a bit more nuanced doesn't mean it isn't!

i have a lot of gripes about the tragedy of hope's peak academy, now that i've read danganronpa zero. i feel these are all common gripes, though- like how the anime tried to shift the blame of the tragedy off of izuru by making him only kill one person (in self-defense!), as if junko's attempt to win izuru over with her ideology meant nothing- isn't izuru supposed to be slightly more interested in her ideology than everything else? the lack of scale of izuru's involvement in the tragedy of hope's peak academy made the reserve course's reaction very disproportionate.

in general, i was just very underwhelmed by the lack of focus on the reserve course and how we didn't get to see their bubbling resentment- despite them adapting the twilight syndrome murder case as well, which, you know, was a case that involved the deaths of two reserve course students and the involvement of one main course student. i'd imagine that was the first shockwave that rippled across the reserve course student body. like, they'd lose their trust in the main course as being "pinnacles of hope". maybe even scared for their lives?

i also, surprise surprise, have a problem with how they interpreted brainwashing in the anime adaptation! as a result, i do not like ryota mitarai, as the unfortunate face of this interpretation. i don't mind writing with ryotas, of course- but i think their relationship and what they do will need to be completely replotted.

(on a tangent, i... really don't know how ryota's talent would be of help when it comes to enhancing junko's videos at all. they're "live action". if anything, an ultimate filmmaker/visual effects artist/editor would make more sense than a 2d animator. hell, a 3d animator would make more sense than a 2d animator.)

so, let's talk brainwashing. i will say that brainwashing as a concept existed in the series before dr3, but i will also say that how brainwashing's portrayed in those installments is completely different from how it's portrayed in the anime.

in danganronpa zero, yasuke said that junko brainwashed the students by taking advantage of her victims' (in this case, the reserve course students) already existing emotions of her victims and manipulating them with information. this information, as we know already, can be in the form of a video, written word, or spoken word. this is also supported by monokuma in sdr2:

not only that, brainwashing in danganronpa zero is associated with repetition. a reserve course student in the monokuma cult watched it around 5,818 times.

now, moving onto the despair video in particular- from how i interpreted the description of the video, i believe that the video was meant to look amateurish. ryoko talks about how the video looked like "obscure video art" or "avant-garde dance"- her narration emphasises it feeling like a (fictional) movie done by the reserve students:

words that take up the entire screen, colours that real broadcasts would never utilize:

mentions of completely one-coloured screens:

obscured, low quality video footage and audio:

the despair video junko sent to the reserve course was not meant to be appealing. if anything, the video should look more like a snuff film. it should look shocking- whether it's because the quality is bad or the contents are too explicit: ultimately, the video something that you can't believe is real at a glance- that you have to watch again just to make sure you saw it.

brainwashing, as described in the novel, is a psychological phenomenon rather than an actual physical event.

now that we've tackled the novels, let's move onto the games. the games don't quite expand on how brainwashing works as much as danganronpa zero does, but we know that it's mentioned in both sdr2 and udg.

in udg, there are the monokuma kids, who wear monokuma helmets that are similar to the helmets the reserve course student cult wore:

furthermore, in sdr2, there's a manga in the bio lab that talks about how the tragedy became so big. it mentions the importance of repetition (via media saturation) and inciting pre-existing emotion in danganronpa's brainwashing.

it also uses the term itself, referring to what members of ultimate despair did to spread the ideology:

sdr2 doesn't give us much insight on how junko utilised it for class 77-b, but it does give us insight on how ultimate despair utilised brainwashing for the world: by using their influence and talents. using software. coming up with new laws and policies. so on and so forth. to me, it doesn't seem like they used the despair video that junko used on the reserve course students- which implies that brainwashing is not necessarily done through the despair video. it can be done with anything- so who's to say that junko needed to use the despair video on class 77-b?

not only that, the neo world program truth bullet also mentions the term in its description, especially in relation to rehabilitating the remnants of despair. the neo world program, which was created by a therapist, neurologist and programmer- which means this is a virtual therapeutic simulation meant to assist with deprogramming victims of brainwashing- especially victims who were in a cult. and junko's ultimate despair group is essentially a cult.

now that i've laid out how brainwashing works, we can see how the anime utterly simplifies this phenomenon, turning this intensive, multi-pronged process into one magical anime video (with magical ~subliminal messaging~) that conditions you to "desire despair". it's, for all intents and purposes (and pardon mois francois), fucking bullshit. if you ask me, if you replaced that despair video with the lobotomy mukuro did to chisa, i don't think it would've made a difference at all! and i hated the lobotomy more than the brainwashing!

i know, i'm supposed to brainrot about how badly they ruined my girl- but honestly, the way they did junko dirty wasn't through characterisation- it was how they butchered her actions. the lack of attention given to both the reserve course students and class 77-b is frankly insulting to her, seeing as these two groups were key characters in the worldwide tragedy. i've done my fair share of complaining about the reserve course students, so let me end this rant on class 77-b.

i wish we got to see why junko was so interested in class 77-b. once again, nagito pulling a gun on junko was funny, but him breaking into her secret lair because he was lucky- not even in an accurate way to his luck cycle, mind you- was just unsatisfying at a second watch. i know this is probably because both future and despair arcs were being developed and aired simultaneously (if i remember correctly), but i still think that there were ways to make the despair arc satisfying, especially since there were so many existing characters in that arc.

if you ask me why junko was so interested in them in the first place: from what i can infer from the games and novels, i think that junko took advantage of class 77-b because they perfectly embodied the arrogance and contempt of the main course students. because of this, i don't really mind that junko didn't take advantage of them in a more personalised manner, although i still prefer it and want to write plots in that vein! but i think that class 77-b was used because of what they represent- the ultimate flaw in hope's peak ideology- rather than who they are as people.

...also, where the hell is my boy yasuke in all this???

[weatherwax3]

In terms of visual storytelling, Tarantino's iconic trunk shot is a very effective way to juggle things up and break up the monotony of a plot-heavy scene.

The director used it many times — in Pulp Fiction, Reservoir Dogs, Kill Bill and Inglourious Basterds, to name a few. However, Tarantino doesn't take credit for the invention of this shot, because it was used in many westerns and crime dramas before.

I believe it's a very compelling camera angle not only in terms of breaking up plot dynamics, but also for character characterisation: the characters appear bigger, more imposing and even threatening. It makes sense for these two gangsters in Pulp Fiction to essentially dominate the viewers (we can only imagine how much more effective this trunk shot looks in a movie theatre).

[light-lanterne]

First of all, I just wanna say I love your writing. It is so beautiful in everything: imagery, visually and plot wise. And so s a d- but we love angst in this household

I can’t wait for 4’33”! Such an interesting idea, hanahaki rarely shows long term effects so I think switching flowers and death with silence is genius.

Is it a common/well-known thing?

Do the silenced people learn sign language?

Is this set after season 4?

Right now these are the only questions I can think of but I shall be back with more later

hi hi ! that's very sweet, thank you ;-; i love angst~ sorry if it gets too angsty sometimes x.x

i'm glad you like the idea ! since mike didn't contact will after he left hawkins, i thought it might be interesting to recontextualise that distance~

anyway, yup, this condition is well known ! i'm still working out some details about it, but in my head this has been happening forever even if the research about it has only been ongoing for a few decades by the time the story starts. that said, people irl are not nice about disabilities so the individuals riddled with this condition have a hard time in society and there are very few resources available to them. sign language is not taught to anyone unless they actively seek (and pay) to learn it, so for the most part they tend to communicate via notepads and little noises :(

as for your other question, s4 didn't happen in this au. it was all over once they defeated the mind flayer and ruined the russians' plans, and the byers (+ hop) only moved so that the kids would get to heal far away from hawkins.

that said, the story takes place in 1994~! will has recently finished college, lives in new york, and has a rather mediocre job while he saves up to get himself a little studio to work on his art~ so there will be a few differences in his characterisation (since his s4 arc didn't happen), but not that many. mike's the one who's different in this~

thank you again for the sweet words~ hope this answered your questions !

story summary 🎻