#opportunities in russia

[studentofshinto]

Breaking my rules to post this. Don't go to Russia under any circumstances. Tell everyone you know, if you go, you will end up pushing up sunflowers in Ukraine.

[mac-ann-cheese]

obama cheese sandwich

[ciderbird]

On the topic of alexander depictions in film or tv, do u have a favourite ? might be difficult for you to properly answer as he usually appears only briefly, but :)

He does mostly appear briefly in movies so it is hard to pick a favorite… in my opinion no version encapsulated him in all his… ‘range’ to put it nicely) He left quite contradictory impressions on people so it’s no surprise his on-screen portrayals are all over the place but I think they all have good aspects.

The 2023 Napoleon movie probably has my favorite appearance of the tsar so far. Everyone’s so eager to make him bald by 1807, it’s nice to see a version that shows why most of Europe was so charmed by him. He nailed that look of boyish innocence and I think he could have really shined with a better script.

I already wrote extensively my thoughts on Toby Stephens so I won’t repeat myself, but there’s this tendency (mostly with soviet movies) to portray Alexander as vain, weak, petty and kind of stupid (which… is not UNTRUE but he was not only that). But all bitchy versions of Alex get a point for sass

So notable exceptions to this are weirdly two Russian series from the early 00’s: “Poor, poor Paul” and “The Northern Sphinx” that portray Alexander at very different stages of his life but feel like organic extensions of each other because they really lean into that ‘sensitive tortured idealist’ part of his personality

“Poor poor Paul” in my opinion absolves Alexander of any sin a bit too much (and his relationship with his wife was WAY too perfect for how quickly that went downhill) but it’s still one if the few versions that attempts some deeper understanding of his personal conflict and actually takes him seriously

And finally the Northern Sphinx! The series picks up at 1818 after Alexander is already disillusioned with power, tortured by his past, and drawn to mysticism. I have only watched the series halfway through, but this might be the most complex analysis of him on screen so far. It shows him deeply disappointed by life and already past his prime, but it makes him no less compelling to watch. You really understand why people are so drawn to him despite everything.

Now this series is pretty obscure even in Russia and the quality of sound and footage are a bit… subpar (low-budget russian tv, duh) so the chances of finding a subtitled version are pretty slim. But if you are interested I recommend at least scrubbing through it, the main actor is quite good.

[boysareouttonight]

about mac and dennis breakup podcast ep, i feel like we got set up by meg's absence. her being there is just a huge part of why the podcast works so well and we all know that she should've brought up many points about macdennis if she was there. so honestly the podcast ep wasn't even that bad considering she's always the one who encourages them to talk about macden.

i appreciate all the things charlie said, like this is the direction they took both characters for the rest of the show (s16 airing rn so there's smth to think about), saying mac was in love with dennis after rob saying mac was very straight in that ep, talking about how we got a glimpse of mac and dennis' intimate relationship and peeling away a curtain we haven't seen before, the "lets do it" after rob said they belonged together even tho idk if rob meant this about glenn and him, that despite everything they were close and belonged together or if it was about macdennis but still charlie's mind went somewhere.

and the glob self insert in macden is so fucking funny to me. rob comparing macden making up vs them making up irl and "i know what u need and u know what i need" okay? macden are roommates just like glob were, they fight like glob fights, it's soo funny.

a highlight also is when glenn says "a guy just wants to watch a movie" and rob replies "but not really. what you really want..." like he's giving glenn the opening to say smth funny or gay and then glenn choose to say "yeah i want someone to watch a movie with, a friend, a companion." but it did seem like rob was starting smth and glenn just replied with smth more tame.

there's so much i wish they talked about like dennis needing mac and not being able to function without him. it's not like i expected them to discuss macden's whole dynamic and where they're taking them now but. u know, this is THEE macden episode and it just feels a little disappointing and AGAIN, meg being there would've made a lot of difference.

[etoilesombre]

Never have I ever game-- you're known for playing with the source material in ways that don't change canon's outcome, but would you ever do a non-canon Black Sails take? An AU that is entirely different setting from pirates, mod au, fairytale au, space au, cowboy au, etc?

Oh that is a great question. I don't generally do AU, and especially not modern AU, because for me personally it is hard to put them into a high enough stakes environment to explore the elements of the show I'm interested in. HOWEVER. There is one that I started to consider a while ago and have pretty thoroughly fleshed out, and have a serious plan to start once other projects are finished, and that is: Russian Revolution AU! Ok. Stick with me here. [Or don't. I'm going to put this under a cut, it is a lot, and may not make very much sense if you don't already know something about the historical period.]

So, I love the idea of using the Russian revolution as a way to explore some of the same dynamics as the show because it is a period in which there was a lot of righteous idealism, and then it all went very wrong, which naturally brings up questions of ideological commitment vs survival, what are you willing to sacrifice, how do your ideals hold up in the real world, etc. It is also a time when how queerness was treated was very in flux, fitting well with 'we care if its politically convenient to care.'

Basically, we start in the early 1920s right after Lenin dies. Flint is a general, old guard party member, was a commander in the civil war. He is known for doing Really Heinous Flinty Shit during that period. He is sort of revered but also feared, and very ideologically motivated, and so of course he is about to get his ass purged when Stalin starts to consolidate and bring everybody into line.

Silver (10ish years younger) grew up during the upheaval of the 1905, WWI, 1917. He's his survivalist trauma bundle self, and ends up working as a low level NKVD (early Soviet intelligence) guy. He gets sent to keep tabs on/gather evidence against Flint - there is immediately a Frenemies attraction spark there. For Plot Reasons they have to do something together and become Reluctant Allies. I have some of the actual plot worked out but I'm not going to get much into it here, but there is absolutely a parallel conflict in values to the show, and choice that has to be made at the end.

IN THE MEAN TIME interspersed through all of this, in flashbacks: back sometime in the years right after the 1905 revolution, Flint is a promising young military guy who came up from nothing, and has a Hennessey parallel benefactor who sends him to school to be educated. He falls in with Thomas, who is the son of a minor prince, very queer and getting away with it, and is a radical in the Christian anarchist Tolstoy model. Flint gets radicalized through him and his friends, they spend happy years abroad in exile with Thomas writing and Flint being a tactician and doing direct action stuff. They come back in 1917, the civil war starts, Thomas is basically murdered by his family because he sided against them, and he is still set to inherit. SO, that is why Flint goes all Darkness and gets especially nasty during the civil war.

There is a Miranda proxy as well. I believe she disappears and her disappearance is what sets off Plot Events.

It's also set in St. Petersburg, if anybody is wondering. Moscow, with the level I have Flint at, would involve too much interaction with Actual Historical Figures, and while I know a fair amount about this era and am totally committed to research, but still, that gets to be Much.

So, there you have it, Russia AU! My delusional long-term goal is for this to be different enough from canon that it could be published. Thanks for the ask, it's helping me get excited about that project again!

[ravencat35]

Typical Ukrainian experience is to refuse projects due to the presence of Russians there, who don't give a shit about their citizens committing genocide

[sailorsally]

.

[magistralucis]

Zultanekh/Djoseras snippet

(Alright I'm doing it. Since I am showing no signs of recovering from The Twice-Dead King anytime soon, I guess I'm making this into a fic 🤣 This is a snippet of something much longer. Most of it is post-biotransference, but this bit is specifically from their necrontyr years, when the Ithakas-Ogdobekh war had not yet ended and none of them were the people they ended up becoming. The two princes discuss the kingships they will never take. More below cut.)

--------------

Though the orbuculum he sees Djoseras unmoved. "Better to die than to merely live."

"What, better to die like a dog? Are you that afraid of Zultanekh?"

The Crown Prince chuckles. It is a fine quality of Ithakas, their laconicity, but they leave too much room for interpretation. "If this one is so much of a threat, I hate to imagine what you think of Anathrosis! Or perhaps it is not that. Perhaps what you want is a written oath of your safe passage?" He follows this with a wink, for they both know such a document could only be part of a surrender. According to the hekatic past of the Ogdobekh, it is entirely correct for them to demand this of their neighbours, since Ithakas should never have seceded from their kemmeht in the first place. "That could be granted easily. Why, Zultanekh shall commission the finest scribe among the five dynasties, the lead archivist of the Nihilakh, and will have it engraved in gold if Djoseras demands it. Is it the least you deserve? I suspect it is."

"I require nothing from you, Crown Prince."

"But you must, dear Djoseras; moreover, your dynast must, since he has sent you here." He is serious now. Zultanekh leans in closer, his hands steepled in front, oddly nervous. "You require my defeat and my humiliation. You are not likely to receive it, Kynazh Djoseras. What was Unnas's gamble? At best his victory, at worst the stalling of the frontline - but you have fought us for many cycles of the moon, and the best you've done is merely his worst, with the unimaginable worse to come if he does not rein it in. At least, I hope he has not imagined it. It would be sad if he sent away his only heirs wishing they would die."

He allows himself a moment of glumness. Technically Zultanekh comes off worse in a headcount, as he is the sole heir to the throne; he is not worried, for he has the whole of the Ogdobekh war machine behind him, but he has never been very certain whether Anathrosis wishes him to live. Wanting him gone on a paranoid hunch would be exactly the kind of thing the phaeron would do.

"In our tragedies of yore there is a recurring turn of phrase, kynazh: inija spase, ali sebe ne mozhet spasti. Why tragedies? Because we find such a man most pitiful. A fine warrior he might make, the one who saves others but cannot save himself. He is no good as a father, a leader, or a dynast, for to damn himself is to damn the whole." And that is the difference between Zultanekh and the rest of the dynasty: he loves his life, and takes as objective truth that everyone else values their own, while the rest of the Ogdobekh would simply shrug and raise their hammers. None of them would ever think to convince their enemy that being alive is worthwhile. "Unnas has lost one son already. It is irrational you should agree to sever his every remaining limb. You know his demands are wasteful: save him, save yourself and your dynasty, and cease those advances."

Then, just to lighten the mood: "It'd be awfully hard to rule Antikef one-handed."

Djoseras does not dignify this with an answer. He glances to the side instead. "Isn't my brother wonderful?"

Zultanekh cranes his head to look outside. Indeed, Oltyx is magnificent. Zultanekh is genuinely astonished to see how much the boy has grown, easily a hand past his elder's height, his shouts powerful and unwavering in the face of the charge; whether it is war that changes a man, or if it was the simple passage of time, the younger scion has not been done a disservice. As the two princes watch on Oltyx rallies his soldiers on the ground, his sword flashing uncanny silver through the slaughter-mist, and soon they are all vanished out of sight.

When Zultanekh turns again he finds Djoseras is watching him. "Might I ask you a question, Crown Prince?"

"Might you?" Zultanekh repeats. "Ask away."

"What is a king?"

"He is the Creator beyond all." The only king (lord, phaeron, Patriarch, still years away from reinvention) Zultanekh keeps faith to is Anathrosis. Their relationship is complicated but the awe is very real. "He is the one who weaves pure gold from the barest sand. He is the one who imposes unity over the stars. Like us, they are numerous, but faint and weak while scattered; brought together, their collective light powers our foundries, while we are made masters of the universe. As a miner does to the raw vein, the furnace to the ore and the craftsman to the ingot, our king does to our will and more: he is light itself, the passion of movement, the all-consuming fire of the forge."

"Spoken like a true blacksmith." Djoseras says impassively. Clearly he meant it as an insult, but Zultanekh fails to feel offended: rather than the snarling boasts he is used to, the kynazh's words are more like skolopendrae skittering through the reeds, collecting implications like burrs in their hide. "Certainly it is a phaeron's responsibility to do those things and more, but like so many others you mistake the effect for the essence, the appearance as the truth. I dare suggest, Prince Zultanekh, that a king does not comprise a series of phenomena, but rather the foundations upon which they occur."

Zultanekh feels like he needs to say something, but he suddenly feels lost. Inwardly he follows the motion of those same skittering legs, while the kynazh carries on. "You say you do not understand why I should want to die. I hold in contempt your desire to live. Are you not yourself on the battlefield, subject to the same risks as my brother and I? Our presence here was requested to Unnas, and agreed after his deliberation; your speech implies to me you made no such agreement with your sire. Perhaps he has made a plan to lose you already?"

Zultanekh hopes he didn't see how he clenched his fist in that moment. Djoseras smiles thinly. "You wish to know what I think of Anathrosis?"

Do I? "Yes."

"He is inconstant. He struggles to lose the smallest things, lands and bagatelles, in pursuit of his grandiose delusions, yet he feels no remorse sacrificing the greater things which hold his kemmeht aloft - his one heir the greatest of them all." Djoseras tilts up his chin then, his dark eyes aflame with something far from hatred. "I suggest he ought to be honest about wanting to sacrifice everything, if he truly values his dynasty, and not his feelings. A true king is neither the fire nor the forge, but the earth upon which they dance and fall; he is not the weaver nor the gold, but the sand from which it is crushed, at once lower and stronger than any of us will ever be. An all-consuming fire will eventually burn down the foundries, but the stones will always endure, and it will befit Anathrosis to take their example."

Zultanekh lets out a quiet hiss. "You are happy to be slaughtered."

"The flesh is ephemeral. I am ephemeral, as is my brother. Unnas is ephemeral, and so are you, even Anathrosis whom you fear so greatly."

There is a hefty pause. Zultanekh thinks he sees something like pity in the other's expression, which seems contrary to this message of indiscriminate sacrifice he's been espousing. Just the first of many Djoserasian contradictions that will fascinate the Crown Prince in the eternity to come.

"If I should fall, my brother will take my place. You have seen for yourself how much he has learned. Anathrosis nurtured his own foe, poor creature, and he did not even realize it; you are the best among the Ogdobekh, Prince Zultanekh, but you are only one, and you do not understand what you are fighting for." Djoseras smiles. "You are a just man, a reasonable man. It does you no good to assume Unnas's intentions, for Oltyx and I fight not for his person but our legacy, and all of Ithakas stands behind us. I pray you will reassess your intentions swiftly, or else prepare for the ice of eternal night."

All tension leaves Zultanekh like an arrow. He chuckles - first hollowly, then with legitimate mirth, that he is still capable of surprise - and strokes his hand through his coppery beard (a redhead, of course he was a redhead, he forgets this often) as he sits back on his chair. "So that's what it comes down to in the end! In any case, I suppose we must destroy one another, as expected. Yet have you spoken admirably, kynazh? You have. Why, that's the nearest thing to a love-speech that was ever made to Zultanekh."

It is Zultanekh's personal policy to break the ice after frosty words have been exchanged. Officially, it's because he wishes to avoid things escalating at a poor moment's notice; in truth, it's an excuse for absurdity. "Do not be concerned that your judgement falls incongruent with ours. Is your Oltyx a remarkable fighter? Certainly. He strikes me as a worthy scion, and he brings fresh blood to the fight, better equipped than us elders." Soft stone, fluid steel - flyting, or flirting, there need not be much difference. Zultanekh grins. "But your brother, he is too young for me, is he not? Zultanekh will not reckon with him. If you desire to petition a peace-match between ourselves, it is not his praises you should sing - but your own."

He expects Djoseras to ignore him then, or give him that look of insane violence he showed when Zultanekh last threatened Oltyx's life. What he did not expect was for Djoseras to stare at him in silence, neither dismissive nor angry, nor even as if Zultanekh has said anything asnine. The kynazh often keeps a blank face in conflict, but this is not like that, in that it is not deliberate. The best way to describe his expression is transparent. Regrettably Zultanekh is not given more time to contemplate it, for he is briefly called away to receive a report. When he comes back a mere five minutes later, he finds Djoseras is no longer there, the orbuculum smooth and empty once more.

"The stones will endure," the Ogdobekh prince mutters, resting a hand atop the smooth crystal surface. Djoseras meant bedrock, but Zultanekh ends up thinking about a pebble instead, skipped merrily across the surface of a long and silver lake; leaving wide ripples upon it, then sinking into its heart, its gleam white and secretive under the surface. "Well, then."

He has been at war for too long to hazard this emotion.

[lil-gingerbread-queen]

There was an antisemitic act done in Paris last week, where a monument commemorating the Shoah was tagged. Zionists and right-wing public figures jumped on the occasion to blame Arabs and pro-Palestine folks.

Turns out, it's the Russian government that send people to do this. They already did this in October 2023, they have been doing it since then, and they are succeeding because Zionists are screaming everywhere that Arabs and pro-Palestine folks are the one behind the tags. (They call it "antisemitism couscous", which is so fucking racist)

This sounds crazy, but it's the truth. There is close to zero chance for the Parisian police to lie about this, because blaming the Arabs would benefit the French gov rn (and French cops are racism pigs that treat Arabs like shit)

[the-physicality]

tbh there was zero way of predicting the league would be such a success so quickly, and when you look at wnba salaries so many years...

The wnba from a management standpoint is frustrating beyond belief… (and I’ve only just started watching this season… I recommend. The mercs)

[studentofshinto]

Do not go to Russia

No, this isn't about Shinto, but it's urgently important the word gets out. Do not go to Russia for any reason. Only death awaits you there.

[oldtreeinanalley]

i read soviet books and i look at the posters and i hear the music preserved and the tales my mom's friend has to tell. and i sit on the edge of this collection of all the best, and i hear the hope trembling in the pages. i look back up, i read the news, i see the deaths and deaths and rot and my hands go numb with powerlessness

[ephemeriee]

now i like hannibal (bryan fuller nbc) but mads mikkleson is not doing any accent and if you've spoken to like more than one lithuanian ever the idea of that being where hannibal is from falls apart pretty quickly

[ciderbird]

Louis Constant was really like I’m not repeating this gay shit here again you already know how it goes

[qqweebird]

something about rightwingers and lots of centrists always makes them choose the weirdest fucking ideologies to side with in “conflicts” like this. they never care abt the preservation of human life or ending suffering, only about supporting whichever “side” that is already convenient for them.

they all immediately took advantage of the ukraine situation to let their beef w russians jump out. very few actually cared about ukrainians. hatred for russian civilians, immigrants in other countries, and boycotts of russian-owned businesses; which, yes, exports from russia obv benefit the government, but its… not a SUPPORT of the Russian State to buy fucking vodka. more reasonable people (like, my fairly centrist mother) were able to identify that the government & military were the problem and not the people, but it was still pretty rampant to be incredibly hateful of russia as a whole.

with palestine it was an immediate hostility towards middle eastern people, and anyone that is pinned as “arab” or “muslim,” and fervent support for the US satellite state. NOW i see 100s of people saying shit like “hate the governments, not the people 🥺” “who made the first attack… we can never know… history is just so complicated” “israel has a right to exist too!!”. very few people care to boycott companies that are SPECIFICALLY funding israel. US politicians (and im sure other countries are dealing w this too) are ACTIVELY calling for the extermination of palestinians.

and i saw a lot of people pointing this out while ukraine was the hot topic too!! that countries like the US only care about slaughtered innocents when its advantageous to them! that if ukrainians were brown and it wasn’t russia or china attacking them or if there was some oil field we would gain access to under their graves, the US wouldn’t give a shit about them.

like, obviously not all israelis hate palestinians and those who don’t are only in an unfortunate situation, but that doesnt change the fact that their “country” has specifically displaced the native people from their land and is performing a genocide. and it doesnt change the fact that many israelis DO believe themselves to be the rightful inhabitants of that land! like im sorry but if you are willingly partaking in colonization you are part of the violence and you deserve to be criticized and pushed back as much as ur government does.

you shouldnt hate israelis as a whole but way way more of them are an accessory to this violence just by virtue of BEING THERE willingly than russians are complicit in the ukraine war by just living in russia yk? and yet right wingers decided that russian civilians were villains, and that israeli colonizers are victims ??

[thenuclearmallard]

It's truly an honor. ♥️