#or an attempt to establish a power structure. (It IS kind of a power play but it's just like. courtship peacocking rather than

[dottowos]

mea ventus foraminis.

synopsis: You always love running experiments on Dottore’s segments. The prideful and arrogant Omega is just another victim of your very important research.

includes: dottore w/ gn! reader

notes: You finger fuck Omega’s eye hole and he comes in his pants. If you don’t know what I’m talking about, just look up Dottore no mask. See this for wholesome thoughts instead. This may be kind of weird but we embrace that. Established relationship, finger fucking, licking, bondage (Omega is tied up), teasing, sub Omega, dom reader, reader uses no pronouns, there’s really not much to say here, it’s just freaky in another way. Minors DNI.

Instead of the usual red eyes you peered into with Dottore and his other segments, Omega had a very different facial structure. His whole upper face had been replaced by a metal plate. He had no proper forehead to kiss, no eyebrows to stroke, no fluttering eyes, and no eyelashes to brush against. Instead, you were greeted with cool metal, having to trace the fancy blue lines instead. And of course, more interestingly, a wide circle in the middle that held a curious glowing gem. Behind that gem was yet another hole, although it was mostly obscured from sight by the gem.

It had you completely fascinated. Although others probably found it unnerving, you loved it. Omega was still a very handsome segment, even if he lacked typical human features. And of course, with fascination eventually came curiosity which you just had to indulge in - playing with his mechanical upper face.

There were times when you got to briefly kiss Omega’s glowing gem, but coincidentally enough, he always managed to maneuver your direction somewhere else. The first time you thought nothing of it, the second time you raised an eyebrow, and the third time, your Omega radar was sending alarm bells at this discovery. You didn’t know what it was about that part of him that had him so guarded, but you’d find out.

… Which was why you currently found yourself smiling at your hard work, having tied the segment to the bed, although Omega seemed completely unfazed and relaxed.

“My, when you said you wanted to test something on me, I didn’t expect you to go to such extreme measures,” Omega hummed as he observed his current bindings, arms and legs immobile and restrained. “I would have stayed in place without all of this.” You only giggled, seeing as the poor man was not yet aware of your plan.

“I know, I know, but trust me. Without it, the results of this experiment could be heavily affected,” you nodded your head firmly.

“You are aware that if I wanted to, I could break out of these right now?” Your smile quickly turned into a pout as you immediately lectured him.

“Well, I know that,” you huffed. Obviously, there was nothing you could find that could manage to hold back someone with his power level. “But, do remember your promise! You said,” you then tried to deepen your voice in an effort to match Omega’s, “Who am I to deny a fellow researcher an opportunity, especially one of your caliber? Do what you please, darling. I look forward to seeing whether your attempts can garner the result you desire.” Omega chuckled when your voice turned slightly bitter at the end. 

“I still stand by those words, of course,” the segment reasoned, although it was obvious that his gaze bore into you, eyeing your attractive body. Oh, he had a little plan of his own - after you were done with this game of yours, he’d make sure you’d receive the same treatment ten times harder. Not that you knew that, of course. Omega preferred to let you have your fun first.

“Hmph… I know you will,” you sat on the edge of the bed, faced with his cocky smirk, his head tilting almost innocently. Omega watched as you crawled onto his chest, purring in satisfaction at the view. He may be tied down, but at least that meant he could focus on your pretty self. 

You scooted upwards and leaned down, pressing a chaste kiss on the segment’s cheek, a far cry from what your true intentions were. Yet you couldn’t help kissing Omega some more, running your fingers through his fluffy, blue hair. At least that was a feature all the Dottores shared. He seemed pleased, but as usual, he started up with his teasing again.

“I wonder, are you being so kind as to prepare me for what you have planned, or have you already lost to your self-indulgence? Or perhaps you like getting off track so easily?” Irked yet unsurprised, you pulled back. Omega was an expert at manipulating his words, managing to tease you in a way no other could pull off.

“I’ll make you regret that,” you declared, wasting no time pulling his mask off, revealing his radiant red gem. At your statement, Omega only grew more excited, sharp teeth gleaming.

“Well then, do walk me through your thought process, darling.” You smiled as you traced one of the zig-zagged blue lines on his face.

“I simply figured it was time to get you back for everything you’ve done to me,” you shrugged off the memories of all the times he’d fucked you to the point of tears. “But I figured no matter how much I touched you, I would never get a good reaction out of you,” you sighed in partial resignation. After all, Omega was an arrogant man, bowing down to no one - it would be hard to take control from him. The segment listened on with amusement, interested in what you would do next.

“So then naturally, I had to find another way to get you to submit. It was hard, you know. But then, it hit me,” your voice lowered to a whisper, thumb hovering over Omega’s eye gem. “Maybe this little thing could be the answer. After all, you seemed awfully defensive over it. Something quite unlike you, since you always like having me all over you,” you laughed as you gently stroked the glowing star, though it didn’t elicit much of a reaction from the segment.

“Is that all?” Omega drawled, as if unimpressed with your discovery. “If you were so interested in my face, you could have come out and asked instead of resorting to all of this.” The scholar appeared composed as ever, seemingly trying to make you rethink your hypothesis, but you would not be deterred.

“Oh, but that’s not all. However, I’ll save the rest after I finish playing with you.” You pressed down on the gem, not missing how his smirk faltered for a split second. “Hmm… I wonder, do you like it better when I go slow or fast? No matter, we have a long time to figure it out together,” you punctuated the last word with a smile. With that, you used two fingers to stroke the gem, moving up and down, carefully observing Omega’s reaction.

“For you to be so caught up with this, I have to assume you’ve been staring at me for quite a while, haven’t you? I would have never thought you’d be-” Before the scientist could finish his taunting, his breath hitched at the sudden change in sensation. Now, your fingers were edging along the curves of his gem, rubbing them back at forth.

“I think it would be more accurate to say I’d never thought something like this was hidden in plain sight, right in front of me this whole time…” you murmured in awe at how the segment’s teeth gritted. “I have so, so many questions Omega. Are the curves of the gem more sensitive? Or maybe these?” You moved your fingers to rub against the four pointy ends of the star, marveling at how his fingers dug into his hands. And of course, there was the circular dip in the middle of his gem that you traced.

“Ah, well that’s something I’ve also never seen before,” you observed. The red light from his gem was fluctuating in a way you’d never seen it, perhaps as a response to his gem being touched. To accompany it, was a quickly recovered Omega with a reassured smile back on his face.

“I suppose I have to admit that I am surprised. I didn’t expect you to go this far,” Omega’s breathing had returned to normal. “But do you think something this meager will get you anywhere? Although I do have… sensation there, I don’t believe it’ll give you what you want,” the segment easily bluffed his way through.

“Hmm… are you sure about that?”

“Quite positive, my dear. But, if you decide to be good, I can certainly give you something far more pleasurable. After all, your dedication is commendable, and you seemed to have enjoyed yourself already,” his voice held the promise of a mindblowing reward, one that usually you’d be happy to receive - but today, you wouldn’t let him tease his way out of this.

“Sure, I’d be happy to do that… but after I finish this up.” At that, Omega felt something soft press against his sensitive gem.

You were kissing it.

The segment would have gasped were it not for his excellent control over himself. Your warm breath added more pressure to the star, not to mention, your whole body was pressed against his as well, sometimes grinding against him. With a content sigh, you kissed the star again, murmuring praises which sent vibrations through the gem. 

“You…” Now that it was obvious you wouldn’t listen to him, Omega’s ploy of flustering you had come to an abrupt and unfortunate end. Still, he tried not to fidget through the restraints, remaining as still as he could.

“Relax honey, your secret is safe with me,” you reassured him, although it was of no comfort to Omega.

“When I am done with you-” Before Omega could finish his threat, you darted your tongue out to kitten lick the gem, effectively shutting him up. The heat from your tongue enveloped a good portion of the glimmering gem, and it was going to drive him mad.

“Come on, ‘Mega. Where’s your voice? I miss it,” you teased, fervently lapping and sucking at the bright gem. To be honest, these actions weren’t really giving any direct pleasure to you, but seeing Omega like this was starting to get you aroused. More importantly, seeing him underneath you like this was too good to pass up. The segment didn’t have a response for you, more so focusing on keeping his breathing steady - you could feel his chest fluttering.

After you were suitably satisfied, you pulled away, content with your work, although you were face to face with someone who felt the complete opposite. With a scowl, Omega’s previous calm demeanor had melted away into a somewhat of a mess.

“When I am done with you,” he repeated himself, “you’ll be the one regretting this,” Omega attempted to regain composure, although, with his reddened cheeks, it didn’t frighten you much.

“Oh, don’t say that. Just look at you!” You moved over a bit to give him a clear view of his bulge, hardened cock straining painfully in his pants. “I’m not the only one enjoying myself, clearly,” you cooed at his obvious excitement - well, between his legs, not so much with the glare he was giving you.

“Aww, don’t look at me like that either. I’ll make sure you come, darling,” you purred as you cupped his cheeks with your hands, placing kisses on the black metal. “Speaking of, if my prediction is correct… I could squeeze an even more delicious expression out of you.” At that, your hands got dangerously close to his gem again, and Omega unwillingly inhaled in anticipation.

“Relax… that’s not my target this time.” Your finger barely rubs against the edge of the star, moving farther back and running along his circular walls. It doesn’t do as much as prodding his gem did, but it has him wondering what you could possibly do now.

“Ah, here we go,” you perk up as you see your goal. The circular walls with lines all met in the middle of a black wall, and in the middle of that wall was another smaller hole hidden in the back, a blue circle outlining it. It was hardly noticeable without careful study, and you just had to examine it further. As your finger neared the entrance of the hole, the segment tensed up, prickles of pleasure already coursing through his body for some reason - and that’s when he realized exactly what you were going to do.

“D-Don’t you dare-”

“Oh? Was that a stutter I heard, Omega?”

And so, without any warning, you pushed your finger into Omega’s hole, making the formerly prideful man let out a loud hiss. You paused as his neck arched, making your finger sink in a bit more into his eyehole, the sensation going straight to his cock. Sure, Omega had known his gem was sensitive, but he was unaware that the hole had similar sensitivities, having never ventured back there himself. Even though he loathed to admit it, he had been outplayed. He wondered, how long had you been eyeing him up to do this? Still, Omega had decided he’d had enough of your game. He refused to let you continue to have your way, just because you happened to get a big head from finding his sensitive spot.

At the unfamiliar yet arousing sensation, the segment lifted his arms as if he was going to break out of the restraints, before you quickly placed your hand over his.

“Are you going to go back on your word, and intervene while an experiment is ongoing? That’s quite unbefitting of a scholar, Omega. Of a researcher,” you clicked your tongue in false disappointment, shaking your head while your finger had just barely entered his hole.

Unfortunately for Omega, if he stopped you, he would be going back on his word as a scholar, and if he let you continue, you would witness him whining, pliable to your every desire - meaning his pride would be knocked down a peg either way. It was a clever trick you had him caught in, and it was clear you put a lot of thought into this…

“So, my dear, what will your choice be?” You questioned your lover as you continued to work the tip of your finger in and out of his hole.  It was obvious that the intention of the hole was not to stick anything in there of course, but the tip of your finger managed to sink in rather easily. However, it was as if Omega was struck dumb by your fingering. Opening his mouth in an attempt to shoot out something cocky spilled out as noises you’d never heard him make. Pitying him, you pulled out for a few moments to give him time to recollect himself, heaving chest speaking for itself.

“I’m waiting… unless this is your way of admitting you don’t want me to stop? Is it, Omega? Too proud to admit it still, so I have to fuck you dumb instead?” Still, the scholar did not protest to your words, only looking at you with flushed cheeks.

“… Well then, seeing as you chose this rather than your precious dignity, you must be enjoying it quite much. Now, stop trying to fight it, and let me hear some more noises of yours.” You plunged your finger back into his eyehole, making him let a choked noise of pleasure. Trying to fit the rest of your finger in was more of a challenge, however, but you’d make it fit. Omega, however, was seemingly struggling to accommodate you in his poor hole.

“You can take it,” you said, words identical to what he’d always sing to you. “I know you can. But perhaps next time I should use some lube… but then again, maybe you like the tight fit.” Slowly, you pushed your finger deeper each time, trying to fill Omega up completely, and he responded to your every movement, as if he could feel every drag and twitch of your finger. He probably could actually, seeing as how complicated and intricate this part of his body was. Soon enough, he suddenly bucked his hips, catching you off guard.

“Ah ah! You should know better than to push me while I’m so… deep inside you. Wouldn’t want me to accidentally mess up whatever goes on up here, hmm? But this is rather cute of you, Omega. In fact, go ahead and tell me how much you want me to touch your cock,” you paused, patiently waiting as his walls kept your finger warm. His metal plate was usually cool to the touch, unlike the other parts of his body, which he could control the temperature to his whim (often used to cuddle you). But now, the metal had become hot as it squeezed your finger.

Omega had never been restrained like this, unable to touch you, unable to touch himself, unable to tell you what to do…

… And yet his cock was pulsing at your smug expression.

“The faster you’re honest, ‘Mega, the quicker you can come…” you hummed, tracing his jaw.

“[Name]...” Your eyes flicked up at the call of your name. “Continue. Continue now,” it was aggravating for him to admit that, but he could not stand another moment of idleness from your finger lodged in his eyehole.

“That’s not very nice, considering you’re at my mercy,” you chuckled. “I could just wait here until I force a ‘please’ out of you, but…” you leaned into his gem one more, making him shiver, “seeing you fucked silly would probably be more fun.” With that, you fucked your finger in and out of his hole and sucked on his gem. The pace was so fast it was dizzying even for Omega, considering he’d never been touched here before.

“Slow… down…!” He forced out a plea, one that he never resorted to. Not only was the throbbing between his legs growing unbearable, his mind had become fogged and unable to focus, seeing as you were literally mashing up the inside of his head.

“Slow down? But you’re responding so well! Hey, I wonder if Prime even knows about this feature of yours. It has to be an oversight on his part. Who would have guessed that his genius creation would have a cute little fuckhole up here? Imagine that, the most advanced and strongest segment reduced to a moaning mess just by a little prodding!”

“You- you, ugh, ah-” Despite how hard Omega tried to bite down on his lip, incoherent words slipped through. His lewd moans were foreign to you and served to make you throb with need. You had to hold onto his shirt to keep yourself steady as he kept bucking his hips, wishing he was buried in your hole instead. He wanted you badly, but instead, he was here getting fucked in the most unconventional way, and he was enjoying it to top it off.

“Hah… you always talk about the other segments, but you’re just like them, aren’t you? A whiny brat who acts all confident, but loves getting humbled. What would all the others think if they saw this was the guy who bosses them around?” Your sharp laugh paired well with Omega’s moans, and he could not even construct a witty response to that, only spewing out your name as if it was some sort of prayer, begging for release, preferably sooner rather than later. Not to mention, his red gem was glowing furiously as if it were a warning sign for what was about to come.

“You’re close, aren’t you? I can’t believe you’re really going to come from getting your face fucked like this. Hardly even tried to resist,” you sneered, picking up the pace of your finger fucking and stimulating his gem as well. “Go ahead then, Omega, come untouched just by-” Before you could finish, his hips bucked one more time, letting out a strangled moan. His eye gem flickered from a blaring red to a soft glow now, and the metal around your finger had grown in temperature for a few seconds before it began to cool off.

Gently pulling out your finger and giving his eye gem a break, you turned around to finally unbuckle Omega’s pants. You couldn’t help but grin widely at the wet spots on his underwear, pulling it off to reveal his pretty cock dripping cum. Omega himself, although he had endless stamina, seemed a bit dazed - but that was only the start of things.

“Oh Omega, I am going to have so much fun with you. Can I use this vibrator on you next?”

[cynthiav06]

Percy's amnesia in SoN gave him the perfect excuse to build his confidence to where it should be and break up with Annabeth, with very few consequences, and I will always stand by that. Annabeth may be easier for the Greeks to back due to her history there, but she has nothing at Camp Jupiter, where he quickly and firmly established himself as a powerful, capable and trustworthy entity, getting promoted to Praetor within a week. I honestly believe that, after his SON quest and the "greeting" Annabeth gave him on their reunion, Percy should've broken up with Annabeth, stayed with Camp Jupiter and thrived there.

Not only would the structure help him long-term in the way it canonically did in the (maybe) three days we saw him spend there, but he has a proper support system without biases in favour of Annabeth. It would also provide a fun narrative contrast to Jason, which RR was trying to push in-story, where they thrive in the other's camp despite the shadow of a figure they kind of feel they have to live up to. Jason does better in the looser structure of CHB due to his having picked up many wolf-ish traits from Lupa, while Percy almost *relaxes* in the strict routine of CJ because it helps with his ADHD symptoms.

And this confidence he very clearly has in SoN, and the way he almost romanticized the possible relationship between him and Annabeth when he didn't have his memories, would lead to a very jarring experience when his memories are settled and he reunites with Annabeth. Because, woah, that was not just a subconscious bias from preferring his new friendships/camp structure, but she actually is like that.

Boom, he now has recontextualised memories and perspective of Annabeth, and a place where she doesn't have a stronger reputation than him, and he can fairly safely break up with Annabeth and escape attempts at retaliation.

He might wait until after the quest the Seven go on, so that he can immediately cut her out of his lfe, but this new perspective changes how he approaches her.

The canon would never, but fortunately for us, there are fic writers. If I get enough time somewhere in this month or next, I might end up writing this, but I will have to see, no promises.

Back to your point; you have covered mostly everything so I don't see what I should be adding to this exact scenario but yes it is one of the few perfect pit stops for a percabeth break up to happen. I am going to go down a slightly different avenue for this one as my thoughts vary a bit from yours, so bear with me. It is going to be long, but I need to recap and clarify a few things for others; I will get to your specific questions near the end. [Everything's numbered, so if you are in a hurry, just scroll to the final four points]

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

The breakup could have been mutual, too, if Rick had written it well. If we follow the proper timeline, Annabeth was still hung up over Luke up until the end of BoTL and had just started to get over him at the start of Last Olympian. Percy had just been informed of the Prophecy and under massive stress between end of BoTL and start of TLO and was obviously arguing with Annabeth over it as she repeatedly got angry at him for reasonably freaking out over his then "assumed death" prophecy. To find some relief from all this, he was dating Rachel, who he really liked, had a kiss with, and overall a good relationship with.

Then the whole plot of the Last Olympian occurs in what can be considered to be a few months at best. Then both Percy and Annabeth get together but to recap the events leading up to this:

Rachel breaks up with Percy despite their good relationship due to understanding the role she needs to play in saving the Oracle.

Luke who had previously visited Annabeth to make her join him and who Annabeth was somewhat hung over still, dies.

The war ended up killing a lot of close friends and companions and was a generally traumatic event for everyone involved.

Percy is very high on mixed emotions, reeling from everything that's happened when he gets together with Annabeth, so neither of them have had any time to process anything that's happened properly enough.

They have their one month anniversary on September 18th[The Staff of Hermes short story], and Percy disappears in October. [Riordan.wiki has years and dates of important events].

So they have barely been together for two months, and Percy's already missing.

This is Annabeth's thought process when they do reunite. It implies she has been doing a bit of thinking about their relationship and might not be as sure about it anymore.

She also seems to heavily dislike Percy's initial idea of settling in New Rome and seems to have no intention of taking a break from quests like Percy does.

She also seems to dismiss Percy's unwillingness to go to NRU after the news of Estelle's birth and the events of CotG.

Those were a few key points of contrast between them both on their future plans. Not small ones either.

Now, back to their reunion and the events following; here are a few things:

She judo flips him in front of the Argo II and almost entirety of Camp Jupiter.

If Annabeth didn't know that Percy had lost the Curse of Achilles then she was judo flipping him on the small of his back where his mortal tether was located ; which she knew about and therefore would have killed him in her anger and hyper emotional state.

If Annabeth did know that he had lost the Curse of Achilles then she was still judo flipping her boyfriend who had been missing for six months after surviving an already very traumatic event where he barely managed to survive and was then put through kidnapping, six months of amnesia, and brainwashing against his will by a goddess and then thrust into an unknown land with enemies on his trail.

Further, she blames Percy for disappearing for all of the things HE suffered through against his will and HAS THE AUDACITY TO MAKE HIM APOLOGIZE FOR IT.

Annabeth says and I quote that she likes keeping Percy on his toes.

She also agrees with Piper that Percy needs to be leashed and controlled.

Then Percy's side gives us a few more concerning tidbits:

Percy repeatedly notes that he is scared of Annabeth or thinks she might hit him

He also says that she often brings up Rachel to make him uncomfortable.

Percy also doesn't feel comfortable confiding in Annabeth about Gabe or past trauma.

He repeatedly feels he isn't good enough for Annabeth, and obviously Annabeth's behavior consciously or subconsciously on her part enables his thought process.

He ends up almost killing himself because Annabeth makes him promise not to use his specific ability despite it being used in self-defense by Percy, which ended up saving them both because she was afraid of Percy's powers.

Yet another thing to point out is that Annabeth's fatal flaw hubris and her abandonment issues feed too much into her behavior, and until that is fixed, nothing can be helped.

Annabeth punched Percy in ttc just because he didn't ask her to dance like she wanted him to. She also gave Percy a very hard time just because he knew another girl (Rachel) and immediately acted controlling and toxically possesive towards Percy over Rachel and Calypso despite her and Percy not being in a relationship at any of those points. In fact, despite her supposed crush on Percy, she defended Luke all the way till Botl, despite his repeated attempts at murdering Percy, and even went as far as to say Percy was unreasonably angry at Luke. She also displayed rude and downright awful behavior when interacting with Rachel; and Rachel, being the better person, handled her with class and grace. This all is not even including her demeaning remarks against Percy's intelligence and condescending behavior.

We can conclude from all this that Percy and Annabeth are not compatible, with different future goals and clashing perspectives and most importantly due to lack of proper communication, terrible misunderstandings, and Annabeth's consistent toxic behavior.

But neither the characters nor the author and not even most of the fandom acknowledge any of these glaring issues, so nothing can be done, but their break up can go several ways:

1.

Percy and Annabeth both break up amicably with Annabeth apologizing and understanding the gravity of her behavior and her mistakes and consistently making up to Percy for all the things she has been doing terribly. This is only possible for pre Tartarus or pre MoA situation.

Annabeth could have had a good arc in overcoming all of her problems while Percy too dealt with his self esteem issues and past trauma and they could have given their relationship a shot again in the future; they are both too young right now.

2.

Percy confronts Annabeth on her behavior and breaks up with her. Things get ugly, and it ends up being horrible for both of them. This is a traumatic situation on both ends, but the reason why this is unlikely is that Annabeth and Percy have a case of trauma bonding, and there's hints of codependency more on Annabeth's end. Which makes Percy mask Annabeth's toxic traits easily and for Annabeth to ignore Percy's devolving mental health and self-esteem issues that she has been enabling unknowingly.

3.

The other likely option is third-party intervention. Sally or Poseidon/Athena or other campers.

I also disagree that the camp half blood would back Annabeth. Percy's their [CHB] unofficial leader and a good friend to all of them plus he is the reason the children of other non-Olympian gods have cabins and get claimed early so he definitely has a higher status than Annabeth does in both camps. Camp Jupiter also does respect Percy more than any other Greek, and he is the only Greek to ever be made Praetor. So in social or reputation terms, Percy's winning.

But I don't think other campers would dare meddle in Percy and Annabeth's business. Maybe the seven would. [Leo and Frank would never. Jason probably doesn't understand the whole situation. Piper’s misguided and would probably feed into Annabeth's behavior, so either Hazel or Reyna? Hazel would definitely help Percy understand, and Percy would totally hear Hazel out. Thalia, hmm, I don't really know what Thalia would do, but I don't think she would blindly back Annabeth. She does seem to care for and respect Percy just as much. Nico isn't touching it with a 20-foot pole, plus I don't think he is over his Percy crush at all, so he's not an unbiased party either. ]

4.

Last option and what probably is the most likely is that things continue as they are and Percy eventually snaps due to endless pressure and his mental health issues and Annabeth can't deal with it and then all their other issues which they have both ignored come spilling out and then it's just a clean break but it's going to be the most excruciating way out and given their luck definitely happening.

[nostalgebraist]

There's a particular quality to early-to-mid Homestuck that I really loved when I first read it, but which I tend to forget when thinking about the story retrospectively.

This quality of like . . . taking pre-established elements, and building larger structures out of them. And then repeating this recursively, as these larger structures now become "pre-established elements" unto themselves.

A camera zooming further and further out from the same central point, "Powers of Ten"-style.

----

Homestuck is initially about the process of playing "Sburb," a fictitious base-building computer game.

The vast majority of comic pages in first 4 Acts are either about a character doing something in this game, or (if they are not yet a player) attempting to obtain and install it.

Everything else is secondary, at least formally, to this core activity. The main characters are always playing Sburb (or at least trying to), no matter what else they're doing. Dialogue is presented as a temporary side-stream overlaid onto the game; the characters play in silence unless they need to talk, and when they do talk, it's usually about the game.

This quality appears in the mechanics of Sburb. It's a game about combining things you have to make new ones ("alchemy"); about constructing a building by continually extending it at the edges; about making a tower that gets taller and taller, building on a pre-established foundation, using new components made from earlier ones.

And it appears, less literally, in the mechanics of the story. An element is introduced -- casually, weightlessly, accidentally -- and once introduced, it sticks. It gets brought back again and again, in a series of bigger and weirder riffs.

(John lived in a house, which we spent some time surveying. In the process, we learned about his father, who was his only caretaker. So now everyone has a single caretaker, and everyone lives in a house which we spend some time surveying. But with every iteration, the houses get bigger, the surveys grander, the caretakers more bizarre.)

Whimsical elements introduced very early on, like the "kernelsprite prototyping" mechanic, end up very deeply baked into everything. There's a palpable joy to the way the comic handles these things. A joy in doing something on a whim, and then committing completely to the bit, indefinitely; a joy in making mountains shaped like molehills.

This kind of dims away in the later, more "plot-heavy" portions that loom larger in my memory. There's a similar vibe to the way the plot elaborates upon itself, even much later on, but we lose this dynamic on the micro-level.

[thesiltverses]

Hey Jon! Looking for a bit of writing advice since you seem to be pretty good at this- How do you write metaphors without being too on the nose? It’s something I’m struggling with at the moment. Thanks!

I'm probably not the right person to ask this question because I have very strong and specific opinions.

When we talk about metaphors being too on-the-nose, I think we're really saying one of three things.

It's too obvious in the sense that it's been done before (e.g. an oppressed fantasy race being used as a catch-all metaphor for real-life marginalised peoples)

It's too obvious in the sense that it's offputtingly reductive and over-simple, either in terms of making the story and characters feel real, or as a tasteless misrepresentation of the issue it aims to address (e.g. an oppressed fantasy race being used as a catch-all metaphor for real-life marginalised peoples).

A century's worth of establishment critical analysis attempting to make sense of modernism and post-modernism has made us all hopeless idiots who believe an allegory is invariably no good unless it's buried deep in complex referentiality and can only be retrieved with months of study. (e.g. a very timely example - J.B. Priestley's An Inspector Calls, where the author uses the format of the detective mystery to address the role of the super-wealthy in social murder and make the case that it is every bit as real as lawless murder, is extremely on the nose! It's taught in schools because the message is very clearly spelled out! But that's exactly what it needs to be and it would not be better if it was subtler! Being on the nose means you've landed the punch!)

So for me there is no broad-brush answer, it depends very much on the position and role of your metaphor in the story (and so this answer is probably useless, again, without knowing the specifics). I'd begin by asking yourself the same question on two fronts: where does the metaphor take me next?

As the writer, does the metaphor give me more to play with, or is it entrapping me into an over-familiar structure or tropes? A much-discussed 'bad metaphor' right now is horror movies where the monster is Trauma...which then blocks the narrative into a predictable corner where the hero inevitably has to cathartically overcome the Trauma or it'll send the wrong message.

Correspondingly, as an audience member, once I grasp the metaphor, what am I going to feel other than 'oh, I get it?' Children of Men is too direct and on-the-nose to even be considered an allegory. Its extremely unsubtle and one-note depiction of a monstrous near-future Britain that's forcibly rounding up refugees fills me nonetheless with powerful emotion - with terror, with unease, with anger, with a faint hope in the kindness of strangers. But that's in the immense strength of its characters, its careful observation, and its tense action to make me care. By comparison, when a fantasy story has human bigots locking up impoverished nomadic elves or what-have-you, I usually feel absolutely nothing, not because it's too fantastical, but because the writer doesn't have any genuine insights or depth of empathy for the issue or the (in)humanity involved, and is instead just using the metaphor as a piece of worldbuilding shorthand to signal to the audience who is good and who is bad. (Some writers will then attempt to gussy up the metaphor by introducing moral complexity - oh, no, the elves have stabbed a random innocent human! - but this doesn't actually improve anything, it only makes the parallel ever more tasteless.)

[genderliquid-witch]

Do flowers bloom from walkers? (Radical optimism in The Walking Dead: The Final Season)

I remember playing The Final Season for the first time way back in October of 2022 and immediately being blown away by how polished the game was in comparison to its predecessor. I mean I had always loathed the visual style of A New Frontier, so this comic-book inspired look was a nice change of pace, especially once combined with the expert use of lighting that is present throughout the game. But what really took me off guard, more so than anything else, was the opening credits.

I mean, obviously; these games had never done anything like this before. And while I'm fond of the whole FADE IN TITLE ACCOMPANIED BY OMINOUS MUSICAL CUE, this was a welcome change. But there was one specific image that stuck with me throughout my playthrough: the decomposing walker (pictured above), painted in greyscale, with the only colour being the stark red background and the yellow flowers blooming from its corpse. I like to think that it was an intentional decision that ties into the game's themes and not just "Oh this looks cool, let's do it", but it weirdly never came up again. So I was kind of just left to play the game while it loomed in the back of my head, waiting for its moment to shine.

It wasn't until almost a year later where I'd figure out what the image represented, or at least my interpretation of it, and I settled on this conclusion: this decomposing walker is supposed to represent this apocalyptic world, and the flowers symbolise the people that attempt to build from it, in this case the Ericson's kids.

I've had this opinion for a while that if the first three games show the attempts and failures to re-establish the old world ideals of order and civil society, then The Final Season serves as a rejection of that idea. From the walker-ridden fortress of Crawford in Season One to the bureaucratic nightmare that was the New Frontier, it's an accepted fact that these attempts at returning to the methods of days gone is ultimately futile and will result in total collapse, largely due to the decisions of its rulers. While we could argue about which of these groups is truly the worst, they all originate from the same basic principle: a desire to return to normality. Crawford, Howe's, the New Frontier; these groups were formed by people who, while cruel and monstrous in their own ways, all had the admittedly noble goal of attempting to return order to this ravaged world, but failed due to their leaders' cruel and selfish actions.

Or did they? (Vsauce sfx)

There's this interaction Lee has with Katjaa in the very first episode of Season One that has stuck with me for a while. It's an optional dialogue so it's very easy to miss (I did on my first playthrough), but when Katjaa hopes that things can go "back to normal", Lee has the option of expressing resentment for this old world:

"But they weren't before? The banks, the politics, the--the crap--those things are gone. Hell comes in a lot of different colors."

Usually this "fuck the old world" sentiment is expressed by sociopaths who are excited to enact their sadistic desires onto other survivors, but Lee's resentment for society feels a lot more justified. The fact that Lee is a black man who's specialty is American history makes his criticism of wanting to go back to how things were feel more warranted; he's someone who understands how corrupt and unjust the societal structure of the past was, so of course he'd feel conflicted about longing for its return.

And while this is just a small interaction, I feel it plays into what I've been talking about. Crawford, Howe's, the New Frontier; did these factions collapse because of their evil leaders, or because they were emulating an inherently unjust and corrupt power structure? Their desire for order and stability allows them to see past the cruelties that came with building these hierarchical societies, to the point where they begin to mimic governments of the old world (Crawford, discrimination and the outlining of "undesirables"; Howe's, prison labour and terror; the New Frontier, imperialism and state corruption). So these failed factions force us to ask the question: is a return to order possible in this world?

It isn't until the The Final Season that the games give us an answer to that question: no, it isn't, but that doesn't mean you can't start something new.

When introduced to Ericson's it's made immediately apparent how different they are to any other group we've met before. While there's the obvious homage to Lord of the Flies with a group being made up of entirely children, I think this is more than just a "well it's the final game, best do something interesting". Children are a symbol of hope and optimism, but also of potential and, in a more abstract sense, the future. They are clay that has yet to be moulded, with infinite potential, a luxury most adults don't have. So I don't think it's a coincidence that the main group in this game, and the one that Clementine eventually settles with, is comprised entirely of children: it feels like an intentional choice to highlight how this group will be the one to survive on account of how they have the potential to create something new.

And it's not just their age demographic that makes Ericson's so distinct from the other groups in the series, but also their power structure. Following Marlon's death, their is no one person in control of the group. Sure, there are leaders (Violet takes the chair once Marlon's out of the picture, and upon her return Clementine becomes the one who's advising the group), but they feel like role models and advisors more than anything. When Violet takes the reigns it doesn't seem like anyone truly acknowledges her authority, and she doesn't even seem to enforce it either. Same goes for Clem; she doesn't really express any desire to control the rest of the group, instead preferring to make decisions in a more democratic manner as to include everyone's individual skills and expertise.

Ericson's vision of society more closely resembles that of an anarchist commune than any government that previously existed, and it manages to be the only group left standing by the end. It's through cooperation and an altruistic attitude that keeps them alive in the end; their concerns for the survival of the group far outweigh any desire to create "order". And I don't think it's a coincidence that a majority of the game's antagonists (Lilly, Minerva, and even James) are people who represent the past. Lilly is obsessed with the cruel lessons her father taught her and prides herself in her attachment to the militaristic level of discipline that she inflicts upon her subordinates. Minerva is essentially a ghost of the past, with her whole arc with Violet and Tenn serving as a lesson on the dangers of holding onto the past. James, while good natured and mostly kind, can't bring himself to accept the fact that the world has changed, and its these beliefs that either kill him or sever the only connection he had made in years.

To conclude, while Telltale's The Walking Dead is a series that is rife with conflict and tragedy, I also find it to be a story that is ultimately about hope. I always considered that Lee's greatest lesson to Clementine wasn't how to shoot a gun or to cut her hair, but instilling within her a radical sense of hope, the idea that things can be better, and you should always try your damnedest to make it happen. That even in the most desolate of circumstances, something profoundly beautiful can bloom.

Or maybe I've been wrong this whole time and flowers growing out of a walker just looks really cool.

[wutheringskies]

Jin Guangyao and Wei Wuxian aren't the same.

Jin Guangyao is one of the best written characters I've come across. A villian that doesnt look like one, doesnt act like one, is likeable, has strong motivations and a defined personality and extremely fun to read fanfics about. But what I dislike is the role that fanon gives him; specially his role in the story with allusions to Wei Wuxian, casting Jin Guangyao as someone similar to Wei Ying. The "poor children turned to forced villains" trope. This meta is about WHY that's NOT true.

The humiliation of his mother didn't give him the right to burn down an entire brothel. (personally, I found it satisfying but). The desire of acceptance from his father was a motivation for his crimes, not a factor that validates those crimes. Often, Jin Guangyao is treated as the counter part of Wei Wuxian. They both share only three similarities, however:

1. Both came from low backgrounds and struggled a lot in their childhoods. Meng Yao had food, but witnessed constant humiliation. Wei Ying had nothing, and then got tangled into the fucked up dynamics of the Jiangs.

2. Both were found to be much different than what people believed them to be. Wei Wuxian was supposed to be evil, hateful, a murderer who kills just to satisfy his blood thirst and need for power, a monster. Jin Guangyao was supposed to be the guy who worked hard and rose to the top, humble, kind, honest and pure of heart.

3. Both had their reputations destroyed from targeted rumor mill.

That is all.

Other than that, Jin Guangyao is NOT at all similar to Wei Wuxian by any measure. He had to do bad things because he desired power, and to gain, power in a corrupt world, you need to be even more corrupted. He killed all those who looked down upon him (not bodily harm him). He clenched his teeth and killed everyone who protested against him or questioned him. He silenced everybody before they could silence him. He isn't SOLELY responsible but he only played the cards that would bring HIM benefit, not the cards that were righteous, or good, or kind.

Wei Wuxian never desired power, was willing to give up a limb for the safety of his sect. When has he ever raised his sword or his flute if not in self defense? When has he ever attacked first and when has he ever killed an innocent? The only innocent he's most directly responsible for is Jin Zixuan and that was too, in an ambush, where he was asked to back down.

Not just that, everyone is always talking about the Nightless City massacre but never about the Burial Mounds Seige 2.0 where all of the cultivators WOULD have DIED, if not for Lan Wangji and Wei Wuxian.

If your reasoning behind justifying Jin Guangyao's actions and murders is the "intention" then you come across as hypocritical if you condemn Wei Wuxian for the Nightless City massacre, ignoring everything that led to it. His prowess in cultivation, his natural genius, and his terrifying powers that he built himself even after losing a core are not crimes that he should be punished for, but he was. Because he's supposed to be just the son of a servant. How dare he be so powerful? So many attempts on his life were made and he survived them all. So many attempts to summon his soul, and they didn't work.

Is surviving a crime? For the Jiang Cheng stans who always thrust the survivor narrative onto JC, this is a question for them. Was Wei Wuxian wrong to have survived incidents in which he was being attacked? Should he have died for doing absolutely nothing wrong, other than having a different voice? For standing against a structure that always prioritizes one being above all, being the ultimate voice that cannot be questioned?

Here I'm going to quote some parts from the ExR translation of Villanous Friends:

He Su, “What was the irresistible trend? What was stirring up trouble? Jin GuangShan wanted to establish the position of chief cultivator only to imitate the QishanWen Sect in being the only ones at the top. Do you think all the world is ignorant? You frame me like this only because I spoke the truth!”

When you really succeed, all of the world of cultivation would see the true face of the LanlingJin Sect. Do you think killing me alone would put you eternally at ease? How wrong you are! We, the TingshanHe Sect, teem with talent. From now on, we’ll unite and never surrender to you Wen-dogs of another skin!”

Sounds familiar?

After a few laughs, he continued, “Sect Leader Jin, let me ask you something else. Do you think that, because the QishanWen Sect is gone, the LanlingJin Sect has all right to replace it?”

Wei WuXian added, “Everything has to be given to you? Everyone has to listen to you? Looking at how the LanlingJin Sect does things, I almost thought that it was the QishanWen Sect’s empire all over again.”

Wei WuXian, “Did I say something wrong? Forcing living people to be bait and beating them up whenever they refused to obey—is this any different from what the QishanWen Sect does?”

These were voices that questioned the greater powers. This is what happened to these voices:

Jin Guangyao: That’s not the way to go about things, is it? The TingshanHe Sect rebelled and schemed to assassinate Sect Leader Jin with all its forces before it was caught red-handed. How could that be called without a reason?”

Flashback to Wen Chao, asking if the disciples in the Xuanwu Cave were rebelling when they protected Mianmian who was asked to be the live bait of a monster.

Also, flashback to Wei Wuxian standing up for the Wens and being called a rebel when he stood up for the Wens who were being used as live baits to strengthen the Jin.

The ones over there cried, “Brother! He’s lying! We didn’t, we didn’t!”

Flashback to Wen Ning "losing control" at Koi Tower probably due to Xue Yang's invention. But the point to be taken away is that Sect Leader He Su's younger disciples, who are harmless, are framed as murderers. A position similar to what Wei Wuxian was put into.

He Su, “Utterly nonsense! Open your eyes and fucking look! There are nine-year-old children here! Old men who can’t even walk! How could they rebel against anything?! Why would they assassinate your dad out of nowhere?!”

Funny how the evils of society comprised of old grandmas, uncles, a toddler, a doctor, a fierce corpse, and a cultivator with no status, no core, no money, no voice living in a cave with a pool of blood, digging the Burial soil to grow some potatoes.

And not those who were sitting on their thrones, reveling in riches and ordering people around.

Jin GuangYao, “Because you made a mistake and committed murder, Young Master He Su, while they refused to accept Koi Tower’s conviction of you, of course.”

"A mistake" reminds me of the incident at qionggi path. Even if Jin Zixuan hadn't died that day, they would've kept cornering Wei Wuxian until he'd have no other choice but to go on the offensive (which is what he did.)

Turns out even being sooo powerful that he could shake mountains, he eventually died.

Yet, at such a place, nobody would listen to his protests. Sitting before him were two villains who already treated him as though he were dead. What they enjoyed was precisely his dying struggle. Smiling, Jin GuangYao leaned back, waving his hand, “Hush him up, hush him up.”

"You shut them in live?"

Xue Yang turned around, curling his lips, “Wei WuXian never used live humans, but I wanna try.”

So, Xue Yang is an actual demonic cultivator who's protected by the Jins, murdered 2 entire clans and this is the third one and godness knows how many more. Absolutely very few people give actual fucks about what cultivation methods to employ. The one who really cared was perhaps, Lan Wangji.

Jin Guangyao as you can see isn't being "forced" to kill people because he's of lower birth and nobody accepts him :(

He's killing people to silence those who speak against his and his father's (and they both are one and the same entity. he's acting on his father's orders which he could've disobeyed and run away but he would lose his sect reputation and standing.)

Why does his reputation and standing mean more than the lives of all these 70 people ?

Were they trying to kill him? No.

Did they attack him first to the point he would lose his life? No.

Would they have thrown him into a whore house? No.

Let us please not compare Wei Wuxian and Jin Guangyao.

MXTX wants us to know what's said and told may not be right. Wei Wuxian isn't fond of the techniques that are used to confirm Jin Guangyao's demise. He's critical of how nobody else is concerned. He's unsure of what NHS's motivations are - does he now want complete power? or did his plan only extend up to his revenge? He's critical of how only yesterday people were all over this guy and today they hate him. Critical of how society works on what is favourable and not what is true.

But he's not SUPPORTIVE of Jin Guangyao. He's sympathetic to people turning onto you, but not empathetic towards Jin Guangyao. He believes Jin Guangyao to be a cruel man.

Those are two different things.

Nobody knows better than Wei Wuxian how it feels to be set up at every step:

1. Firstly he was used as a punching bag for Madam Yu and an emotional one for JC throughout his childhood

2. The Wens completely played him up, setting him as the cause of LP's fall.

3. Then, he was played by the Jins and the cultivation world until his death by validating JC's jealousy against him, by villianizing him and estranging him, by setting up the ambush, by sending JZX, by making false promises, by not checking for validity, by controlling Wen Ning, by setting up the seige parade, by getting JYL there, and finally the seige. (even after his death disrespecting his all)

4. He was brought back to the world on the revenge plans of NHS and tossed like a tennis ball from the plans of NHS and JGY. Yi City arc? children would've died -> NHS. Burial Mound seige 2.0? everyone would've died -> JGY. if LWJ wasn't with him at every step of the way, Wei Ying would've once again been in such a spot. Without any status or authority he would've gotten no help, no aid, and been villianized once more. He would've been stabbed and captured with nobody to save him. He would've made himself the bait without anybody to fight the monsters off.

Each of us have individual capacities and also, each of us have the one thing we cannot let happen:

1. Wei Ying can't let injustice prevail and sit by the side doing nothing

2. Jin Guangyao can't take in being stripped of power and being a lowlife again.

Those are two very different things. JGY made every decision he could to escape his grand fear, which was personal. I don't condemn his motivations personally cause I find them hot. Similar to how I find his character hot. Yet, he's not the hero on the opposite spectrum. He's not the lowlife who was killed because people can't handle people from lower birth statuses being on the top chairs for making decisions - but that is also true - but is not the reason behind his tragedy. Not the sole reason and also not the most important reason.

The most important reason is as it is said: he believes himself to be different and values his life over others, similar to Xue Yang. Their personalities vary greatly, yet his "true" friends were Xue Yang and Su She. (He showed glimpses of the truth and of his reality to LXC. So, he's hiding the truth and LXC doesn't wish to dig deeper anyways thus not a true friendship.) One wished to take revenge in extremely unfair shares, a clan for a finger. A clan for a son. The entire cultivation world could die but he couldn't be badmouthed or put on trial or killed. The other - Su She, wished to be recognized by those who he equally hated, despised and considered arrogant and also was jealous and envious of. So, these two traits - great desire for revenge onto everyone who's ever said anything mean about him, and the desire for power. You may argue how this developed from his childhood trauma but you can't argue that this justifies his cold blooded crimes because it doesn't. Another thing I'd like to add is that, his friendship with Lan Xichen also shows his personality; not wanting to take the messy, big path (such as showing up to your own death planning party, or planning a death party) and his relatively calm nature. Yet just like the friendship it is fragmented and fake; a composure that is stuck onto the cold, and hot brimming desire for power.

There was one character who had to kill a large number of people or would have no other option left and it wasn't Jin Guangyao. There was one character who was hated by society solely because of his background and his desire to protect people and it wasn't Jin Guangyao. There was one character who had to give up everything for what he believed in and it wasn't Jin Guangyao. There was one character who ended up being the indirect reason for the passing of loved siblings due to the unjust society.

and it wasn't Jin Guangyao.

(but there were two characters who had confirmed sex before marriage. one of them was Jin Guangyao)

[blackblooms]

Irredeamable Developpement Retrospective Part 5: Project watchmaker

So before we begin this part, i will reiterate the previous warning that this part will contain some spoilers for the actual game, so this is your last chance to go download and play it. For everyone who already have played Irredeamable or dont care about spoilers, lets begin. ----------

Project Watchmaker was another attempt at creating a global setting for my stories, but unlike The Fountain which was all about about a wide fantasy world, full of strange lands, stranger races, and reality-altering magic, this one takes a more vertical sci-fi form where the focus was instead on an extensive timeline. Early ideas involved a time-traveling story, where one would take control of Excalibur, a superweapon with control over time. The character would travel through a series of timelines in a Metroidvania structure, using time gates and timewarp keys to reach different locations at different times. These timelines included a medieval/cyberpunk utopia, a post-apocalyptic snow wasteland, an ancient jungle, a cyber-totalitarian future, the end of times, and a forgotten prehistoric age. This story also included a bunch of characters based on Arthurian mythology. Such as a post-apocalyptic Lancelot (riding a motorcycle), an artificial intelligence lady of the lake, an evil totalitarian king Arthur, and Merlin as a deathless troll sage that can be encountered in all timelines.

I used to have more details about this one, but then i realized that i dont really have any pictures of it. Still, i wanted to talk about it since a lot of this story did make it into the game themes and characters and it makes a nice buffer for the actual spoilers. So we`ll leave things here as we move onto some transitional maps that took place in the transition between this form of the project and the next.

What eventually cemented the setting current form is the namesake watchmakers. It's based on the old flawed argument from Christian fundamentalist apologetics that posits that in the same way we can determine that a pocket watch on a beach is man-made because of its complexity, we can do the same with the universe. What ended up inspiring me through, is the rebuke to this argument. The idea that if the universe was indeed designed, how did you manage to distinguish the pocket watch from every single grain of sand in the first place? I wont really linger on these debates as i never was fond of arguing, especially about religion, but while i havent believed in gods for a very long time, i always have been fascinated by the concept and all the ethical questions they bring forth. In this very specific case, what is it like to live in an entirely artificial world? What would that world even look like? What kind of creature would even do it in the first place?

...and that brings us back to fairies, the little gods hiding in plain sight. Back in the fountain, they represented infinite potential, and here it`s much of the same, except rather than beings of pure magic, they are simply creatures that have access to technology and knowledge beyond understanding. They are not literal god, they would say so themselves, but they have evolved past a point where neither time, death, or even reality has any grasp upon them. They are only limited by their own mortal flaws and incomplete understanding.

They are all meant to be equal, a group of disparate individuals united by a common goal of figuring out how it all went wrong and use their power to fix it. But Morgan, the purple fairy, was always the focal point of the story, the antagonist hiding as the support character. (back in the Excalibur story, they would be revealed to have been leading you into defeating Merlin and the trolls so Fairies could take over the timeline and establish their utopia)

As the fairies were fleshed out, pocket worlds were designed in their image, connected through a central realm and some other junctions, kind of like an ant-farm. Much of the idea behind the world was that it was both a place of research and a prison. A cosmic-sized panopticon that the watchmakers could use to study some of the most dangerous sapiens species and learn how to tame them.

The realm came through many other iterations, and ultimately some of the stuff had to be dropped to reduce scope. Most notable here was the removal of the elves and suhagins, their roles being merged into the Uris and trolls respectively (trolls even took the name)

There was also a brief attempt at having the entire game take place in the city of new eden. Both the Uther and Ursula boss fights were conceived in this version of the story and new eden remained a central figure of the game story and world. Aniway, we`re almost at the end of this part. We only got some progress shematics left. These includes areas and boss concept. Some made it in the game in some forms, other have been scrapped or pushed for later projects.

Anyway, thanks for following this retrospective so far. The next and final part of this retrospective will be about the project as it was during the 2 years i officially developed it on Tumblr. A little game known as Irredeamable.

[highly-important]

Thoughts on the Venture Bros Movie

I absolutely love this series and periodically get obsessed with it. The last two seasons were especially some of my favorites. I enjoyed the movie, it really felt like an episode. Any complaints I have are really in the "I loved it but the portions are too small" category.

I love that Shoreleave and Dr. Girlfriend are friends. I think this was kind of established earlier. It just makes sense.

I like how Brock - who knows Rusty better than anybody for better or worse- went to the bat defending Rusty to the OSI. And that Brock's shining moment isn't him being super kill guy.

Along those lines, I like how Rusty's entire arc this show is realizing to some degree or another that he isn't a failure. His father was able to present an idealized image of himself to the public, and it meant Rusty growing up under a shadow he could never live up to. But the reality is Rusty isn't as incapable as he or others believe he is.

We’ve kind of gotten this growth with Rusty during the show so we don’t need it as much in the movie. But it’s very interesting that he can use his brother’s robot to save not only the building but “restore” the destroyed Venture compound. I think it’s Rusty really earning his own legacy.

Plus his attempt to build something Jonas Jr-ish just made something super Science-y. Maybe he’s returning to his true calling

I like how the movie represents Dr. Girlfriend's powers. Yes, she is good at fighting, and is intelligent enough to build super science tech, but her strength is also in her diplomacy and the loyal connections she builds. Part of that is that when she is in trouble, others come to her aid. And her challenge in the movie is a test of her negotiation and diplomacy. I like that the movie takes time to give her this moment.

You can really see how Hank got a lot of his personality from Debra.

Debra’s tech was really cool and I love the scene on the train platform. Its a little frustrating that we don’t get more, but I think Venture Bros is very good at building expectations and then letting your imagination fill in the gaps.

I think this is partially because Venture Bros often ends at the climax and skips over the resolution. The building tension makes you want answers. And often the end-credit sequence gives us the pieces to put the puzzle together without handing it to us. It creates a sandbox and asks you to play in it.

Gary is just living his best life. He got a grappling gun and got to co-pilot a giant robot.

Hank's multiple personalities was never something I'd imagine getting conclusion on, but I'm glad they did. It kind of reminds me of Return to Oz, where at the beginning Ozma is free to wander around the real word, but is trapped in a mirror in Oz. And at the end that reverses. Hank doesn’t destroy these pieces of himself, he just puts them in a place where they can’t control him.

Dean's plot was kind of interesting, there was rumor that one of the brothers would be a protag and one would become an arch. Dean is so worried that his negative life experiences are going to ruin him and prevent him from having the type of life he wants to have. But sometimes things aren't as bad as we think they are. And I think it suggests he can stay with his brother and not be damaged by the experience

Hank and Dean are both controlled by vivid imaginations in different ways. Hank imagines how good things could be, and Dean imagines how bad things could be. Meeting his mother is never going to be as good or cathartic or as healing as Hank imagines it, just as reality isn’t as horrible as Dean imagines it.

I really like the story structure of this show where an emphasis is put on something - like who is the mother - and then the mystery is eventually dropped. But the reality is that who is their mother isn't as important. Hank didn't need to find his mom, and finding her wont give him what he wants. He needed to reconnect with his brother. But it’s also fun that we can solve this puzzle on our own, it’s just not the point.

Of course, I think it does mean Dean is heir to the guild.

I wasn't expecting the twist with the Monarch at all, and in retrospect I think I should have ? Its really interesting how well it fits with Rusty's arc the entire show. Rusty turns his hatred inwards and blames himself for not being his dad. Now that Malcolm understands his unconscious thoughts, it shifts his relationship to arching from an impulse to a choice.

[thecryptidzenith]

11 for the fic game ask!

11. Bonus: recommend your favorite fic

Okay, you're getting two answers for this one because my real answer isn't a D20 fic, and seeing as that's my fandom at the moment, I'd be remiss to not rec something from it.

For the past... Jesus, four years, my favorite fic has been The Prestige by black_feather_fiction (also @black-feather-fiction) No contest. I don't do MCU fic or fandom anymore, but this is the one exception. It's just. It's so good. It's demonstrates the best use of the medium of fanfiction I've ever seen (yes, I'm of the opinion that fanfiction is its own distinct medium, but I'm not going to get into it now.)

Now the conceit of The Prestige is similar to a lot of MCU long fics: what if the plot was... good? Between the California-in-the-1840's/50's amount of untapped gold in the movies and whatever any given writer wanted to pull from the comics, there are so many elements to play with when rewriting a truly epic version of the story presented in the Infinity Saga, or even just a small segment of it. There are a lot of these, and I've read a lot of these. It's exactly my kind of thing, I love a good Plot.

The thing that's special about The Prestige is the way it incorporates the conventions of storytelling in its worldbuilding. To put it simply, an all-powerful God does exist in this universe, and he's three old women who terrorize innkeepers. The Norns/the Fates/other Mother-Maiden-Crone mythological archetypes, are real, and they control the threads of fate, so to speak. The entire universe exists as their plaything, and given the chaos and entropy of the universe, they pull stories from it. The laws of storytelling are just as influential, immutable, and important as the laws of physics in this universe. And just like the laws of physics, they can be manipulated towards a particular use.

This is how the fic opens: with Loki attempting to tell the universe a story so perfect and beautiful that the Norns cannot help but let the tale play out in real life. He doesn't quite succeed. However, the rules of storytelling are never forgotten, by the characters and by the author. Having the conventions of storytelling being a part of story's universe is a brilliant move that I have not gotten over after three years. Obviously, real life doesn't play out like a story, so when telling a story there's always some suspension of disbelief involved, because real life isn't that neat. Having an in-world explanation for the existence of story structure is something I'd never seen before and it's brilliant. And it's perfect for a story about two liars, image-crafters, storytellers, whatever you want to call them.

The story structure being built into the world is incredible, but so is the way the characters attempt to manipulate it in their favor. Even beyond the opening tableau, characters work to push the narrative in directions that will serve them. And the narrative pushes back. Every time I think about how the Fall of the Giant plot beat plays out, I fall more and more in love with it. It's the perfect blend of expectation subversion, expectation fulfillment, and effective character beats. It's fucking incredible.

Besides the rules of storytelling, The Prestige also makes reference to a lot of stories in the cultural zeitgeist in a way that's as delightful as it is earnest. The primary benefit of fic as a storytelling medium is that the audience already has a shared set of knowledge. We know who the characters are. We know how canon goes, and authors already have prepackaged tools to tell their stories with. Less needs to be established in fanfic compared to other kinds of fiction because the audience has a shared knowledge base. The Prestige takes this intertextuality further by pulling from more than just the MCU canon, but from works as varied as Mystery Science Theater 3000, Gremlins, and Alice in Wonderland. These cultural touchstones are in meaningful conversation with the contents of The Prestige and efficiently add depth in a really interesting and engaging way. Hel, even the title is taken from a Nolan movie. This fic is so deeply tied to the culture it's a part of, and I adore it.

Beyond the elements of the story that are inseparably tied to its in-universe use of narrative, the plot is very well put together. I find the bit with Ozymandias (yes, like the Percy Shelly poem) particularly clever, but it's all very good. Despite it's length, I find The Prestige compulsively readable, its writing is excellent. The characterization is excellent, the worldbuilding is engaging, the character dynamics are delightful to read about and devastating for the characters involved. I think this fic may genuinely have everything: Plot, romance, action, adventure, whump, angst, parent/child relationships, (explored from both sides) familial trauma, sexual trauma, self-destruction, sibling relationships, eating disorders--I'm really just listing tags here, but there's So Much, and I love every bit of it. I have loved every bit of it for years, and I don't care how long updates take, I Will Read It. It's the only MCU fic I've been able to read in years, and honestly? I'm not that mad about it, it's fucking incredible.

Now with all that being said, my favorite D20 fic is a lot harder to pick. I've not been in the fandom that long, I haven't read a ton of fic, and my tastes skew towards the Epic, Plot-focused, and Looooooong. Which is a bit difficult to come by (as is time to read.) There are, however, a lot of excellent fics, out there, though I think I have the most to say about The Properties of Adaine by Tangerine_Blast (also @20dimensionsoftangerine) (and by extension its predecessor, but we don't need to get into it.)

The conceit is that because of Oracle reasons, Adaine gets kidnapped by Kalvaxus as a kid and grows older thinking of him as a great paternal figure even though he sucks because her only points of comparison are Arianwen & Angywn. The interesting part is only really discussed and addressed in The Properties of Adaine, which is that she's technically an object! Legally, magically, an object--a dragon's thrall to be more specific. It's a fascinating exploration of the ramifications of DnD worldbuilding, as well as an exploration of identity, security, trauma, etc. It's a bit of a thorny subject to tackle, but so far as I can tell, it's handled with grace and sensitivity. It's doing a lot of very interesting things with the Themes, plus Aelwyn is absolutely insane (she's adopted/kidnapped by Aguefort.) which I get a kick out of. Overall, a striking story (and also one that's still being updated, which is probably why it sticks with me.)

[houseofpurplestars]

"At the core of ‘anti’ debates is a foundation of beliefs rooted in conservatism that what a person consumes in fiction determines their real-life behaviours. Thus, an anti-shipper who is against those viewed to be pro-shippers is already deemed more morally pure."

"...no kind of communal fandom restoration can begin to occur until those targeted by such anti-shippers are viewed as human beings (not sub-human) and a universal understanding of fiction, reality, psychology and human behaviour based in science is established."

Further reading:

"Antis' foundation is the belief that fiction affects reality, in that any problematic behaviors or topics in media, fictitious or not, will cause people to normalize those behaviors, resulting in people (specifically minors) thinking that such actions are acceptable in real life. This is a common argument used by conservative groups to enact queer censorship, who argue that children who see LGBTQIA+ characters in television or books will "turn gay.""

"Ex-antis' responses indicated that antis compartmentalize media categorized as good versus sinful in order to feel powerful and in control."

"Antis attempt to glorify their ideology by rebranding it as antipedophilia and anti-incest, but it is actually a loose ideology of disinformation, virtue signaling, and legitimate abuse. Similar to the QAnon cult phenomena, which began in 2017, anti dogma is designed to promote paranoia and play off people's fears and emotions to spread disinformation."

"The overt misuse and oversaturation of the term "pedophilia," to the extent that it loses all significance from its original context, is arguably another method of desensitization."

"Since the primary creators of transformative fandom are women, people of color, and LGBTQIA+ people, it becomes readily apparent how the anti movement seeks to limit the voices of those who are already vulnerable, thus promoting further isolation and violence against them."

"Instead of being given the tools and resources to make safe and educated decisions on a case-by-case basis, teens in anti spaces are called to arms and encouraged to engage in recklessly abusive behavior toward themselves and others over topics they do not yet fully understand while simultaneously spreading troubling ideologic misinformation."

"Environments where authoritative figures go unquestioned and where fear is instilled to coerce obedience are precisely where many abusers are able to thrive."

"The cult structure of antis sets individuals up for failure; the extreme variance and overreach in individual antis' standards means that their ideology becomes impossible to live up to. Real-world harmful effects have been documented in adults and minors alike regarding the mental, physical, and emotional well-being of fans subjected to anti rhetoric, demonstrating just how vital nuanced research is needed in these areas."

"What truly marks a cult is the control attempted over behavior and thought. Participants in anti circles perpetuate a climate of fear, shame, and trauma in fan spaces. The most common targets of such abuse are women, people of color, teens, abuse survivors, and members of the LGBTQIA+ community. Fans who are already marginalized are further deprived of safety, anonymity, outlets for growth, self-expression, and relationships. It is therefore vital that we closely monitor hate speech in fan spaces and study these behaviors. Our failure to do so may open doors for bigotry, violence, and disinformation."

[kenjakus-frontal-lobe]

Shin Sekai Yori Ep15,21,24,25 -- General Thoughts and Analysis

Hello once again! I honestly started to enjoy this anime much more around the final episodes.

What becomes fascinating with these episodes is that we come to sympathize with the monster rats moreso than the humans. We notice that the rats have begun to become more like humans; they build organized structures and democratic communities, rely on capitalistic product (I believe it was cement?) and take up a fairly peaceful society (at least, within their organized community). However, the secretive backbone the rats keep is that in order for them to maintain their communities and not feel like worthless slaves, they must contain and "neutralize" their queens/mothers via essentially making them braindead baby-producers, locked away from the public eye. This causes distress in both Satoru and Saki, and although Satoru shuns it as horrid, Saki tries to explain it off that animal morals are different than human morals and therefore they shouldn't project their morals onto it. Satoru counters that the rats have essentially begun to take up human morals, likely in an attempt to replace humans, so they can project their morals.

Well, the rats rise up, claiming that they don't want to be subservient to humankind anymore, and utilize a human girl raised to believe she's a monster rat to behave as a living weapon. The humans retaliate, burning knowledge they deem forbidden to rats, mass slaughtering their kind, and then torturing their leader endlessly for treason.

The irony here is that there's this odd relationship the humans begin to present with the rats. They're like humans in some lenses, and they're reduced to animals in others... humans can project their morals and laws onto the rats because they're human enough, but they can slaughter the rats guilt free because they're animal enough.

But to return to Satoru's idea, the rats essentially by the end of the show become an exact mirror of humans (think Animal Farm, almost). Their systems of democracy, cooperation, and enterprise rely on the background torture of their own mothers... in a way, this mirrors exactly the way the human society slaughters youth they deem to be "wild children" without question or deeper inspection, which in the end punishes the parents (note those from episode 1, I believe? Who's daughter vanished like the rest of their children). They attack indiscriminately the other tribes that don't play by their rules, which distresses Satoru and Saki, despite that being a mirror of how the humans treat the rats. And then, of course, it's finally revealed the rats were the original humans all along, the ones that suppressed the humans with power (note the cycle of uprising of the oppressed established here).

We come to this conclusion that if we can make an "other" of those we deem dangerous or frightening, that we can punish and control them (note the book burnings!) them guilt-free. I think this ties into the reading, where AI systems meant to denote possible school shooters gains fault... the rule system in this universe punishes those who hurt their fellow humans, but if one can mentally other humans into rats, then it becomes okay, the same way that if an AI program can other a human into a shooter, even if (especially if) they're actually innocent, then humans will have no issue turning on them and punishing them. We essentially turn to needless violence and punishment instead of working to solve the issue, in our pursuit of peace.

[divinekangaroo]

Im rereading your Anders/Hawke/Fenris fic, Surrender, and I'm once again Thinking and was hoping to pick your brain, if you'd be so kind.

I'm so interested in the dynamic on display, the way they each navigate the relationship and how they cope with The Situation. I feel like I very much understand Fenris and his motivations, and on rereading I'm really getting more about Anders and what he's exemplifying. I won't share my interpretations because i feel that's presumptuous, and I'd much rather hear about your intent with the fic and how it stacks up.

I think it's obvious the fic is about the navigation of BDSM dynamics and the different ways people can engage with kink, specifically these characters and what they can get out of it. Would you consider this fic more of a character study, from the outside looking in, or more cathartic in nature? Did you relate personally to any of the characters and their struggle in the fic? I find myself accidentally working through things with my fiction all the time; is this or any of your writing like that? Some of your work is so raw and real and true to emotions i deeply understand, so I've found myself thinking you must have been writing from the same place. Is this true, or is it simply a painfully accurate and moving character study?

And while I understand Fenris and Anders' motivations and reactions, Hawke's are a little further outside my grasp. My reading is one of a man conflicted by his desires; he enjoys the power play, but takes issue with the morality of it, and when he doesn't get the aftercare/reassurance he needs (being kind and doting to Fenris), he feels cruel and immoral and that brings him pain. What i dont understand is the scene with the chamber pot, where he's afraid Fenris is leaving. He coaxes, and then orders Fenris to use the chamber pot and humiliating himself in a way that Fenris wouldnt find gratifying. Is he attempting to do as Anders does, but lacks the inherent understanding of Fenris to know when not to push? Is he upset Fenris rebuffs his kindness and understanding and need for comfort and connection and so seeks to hurt him with the power dynamic they've established?

I know some of these questions can be quite personal and intimate, but please don't take this as a desire to draw anything out of you you're not willing to share! I feel like I am interviewing a beloved author, as since i found it on AO3, I (and my partner) have been enraptured by your work. Anyway all this to say that whatever insight you share I'm grateful for, and don't feel any pressure to answer questions that cause discomfort.

Thank you you are the coolest thank you

I am so so happy this fic delivered so much interest! I both want to answer your queries, but also sort of *don’t* want to just in case I ruin the fic experience – everyone brings their own lens to reading something, and sometimes the writer's voice is the most accidentally obnoxious take. I mostly try to write in flow / instinctively, without a lot of intrusion or construction around the story itself. This all sort of means I have very half-baked, malformed and incomplete Idea Statements about what I was trying to do in a fic.

But at the same time it’s also an unfinished fic and I’m like, ohhhhh I should answer somewhat! So, I’m going to disclaimer the below with, please ignore it if it doesn't fit your mental map.

You mention BDSM dynamics: I don’t actually know all that much about BDSM. I’ve had a few scenes and they were all right, maybe two really memorable ones, but nothing that really left the moment in time in which they were happening – and I never really picked up much of the vocab, structure, rules, lifestyle. Where I’ve read BDSM, the only time I find it resonating is if there’s something larger going on and the approach to dynamics that involve sadism, masochism etc is a piece within that puzzle that serves to get deeper into the characters. But I also don’t want to seem flippant, as if I was treating the BDSM layer as purely that lens for character study, because it’s not – there’s so many ways to do a character study, but this sexual dynamic was what felt really right to me in this instance. Sex and its methods and manners of articulation is such a huge part of identity AND how cultural/societal structures police sex/identity and shape sex/identity. I do think these characters resonanted with me in part because of how they do/don’t/can’t approach their identities, how parts of their identity (and/or how they are perceived) is forced onto them rather than self-defined, and the limits of what can be self-defined; the layers of BDSM and kink around that (and the roleplay associated) in particular just felt really right, as that intersection of identity, perception of identity, the roleplay of identity and the broader context.

With that in mind, it is so very interesting to me that you pick up on Hawke and the Chamberpot Scene. It was one of the first scenes that I thought needed to happen in this fic, but I was also Not Happy At All with how it turned out. Something is not quite right in it, and I think that’s why this fic hit a wall that I couldn’t find a way to move through despite having more scenes in my head ready to go. Part of this is that the broader context around why Hawke does what he does in that scene is shaped very much by things that have not happened in that room, and I don’t think I successfully embedded that in the fic enough to feel like I could move forward.

In this AU fic where Hawke stops Anders before the Chantry boom, the particular deeply intimate and sexual dynamic going on is interconnected with:

what this Hawke did to Anders in taking away Anders’ agency when he ‘saved Anders’ from committing the Chantry boom

the power Anders holds over Hawke by continuing to choose to abide by Hawke’s strictures/umbrella of safety, even though Anders could, in turn, completely destroy Hawke’s reputation, status and this life Hawke has carved out of nothing, entirely because of how Hawke has offered himself to the Authorities as surety for Anders

the mirroring distortion that occurs when Fenris puts himself in the middle of Hawke and Anders’ pretend Happy Husbands play; that surrendered offer that nevertheless has Hawke deciding to accept it and then acting on that in increasingly boundary-broaching ways

that this Hawke, who has lost pretty much everything and everyone, will do anything, including take away (via offer or force, and with constant crossing of boundaries) the agency of those he cares about, to keep those people alive

This fic was trying to do something interesting by exploring Hawke moving from that trauma state of crafting this “life” around him where “all is well [because I took control] and everyone is being satisfied [because I am satisfying them even though I cannot give them control back],” even though that is false; the story was going to be a slow destruction of the appearance of all-is-well-ness, and in that, a slow destruction of Hawke and then a reconstruction. That you notice Hawke is harder to understand was deliberate, if I remember my thinking correctly, because I was consciously trying to foreground the more active show-and-tell/push-and-pull of Anders and Fenris, while Hawke’s processing of that deep trauma and movement towards…something…was happening in the background. (The fic hopefully shapes this better than me trying to explain lol)

The chamberpot scene was Hawke wanting to do that to Fenris, to humiliate, and in that moment, without concern, because he could. The recoil upon himself, and then the assertion of a new type of control (shut down the games, so to speak), occurred because what Hawke did instinctively and how Fenris and Anders reacted didn’t fit his mental construct of why he does what he does; Hawke wants to play this role and require these acts because it makes him feel good/safe; gratitude is not required but that his aftercare (what you noticed as his ability to offer comfort and ‘make the act of me taking over good because we're soft together again’) is; the chamberpot scene threw back in his face that his reasons for doing these things are not entirely about the role he’s tried to frame himself in, in his own mind.

Where specifically I was going to take Hawke from here, I genuinely can't remember; the next (unwritten) scene was a Fenris-Anders one and then I hit that blank wall of 'now what?'

So, was it a character study or was it cathartic, was it personal, was there a personal relation to the characters? I think it was all a little bit of this? I mean, I only find certain characters and contexts interesting, and that is usually because there is a level of personal resonance, of contextual framing or certain character presentations or reactions that I see something in that speaks to me, and gives me the shape and space to write stories with themes and experiences that I explore repeatedly. If I were to pick one consistent thing, the more I look at my back catalogue, the more I start to recognise it’s because of a recognition/resonance with a certain anger in the characters in their source material, in combination with a type of context and identity articulation/shaping -- but also, a very specific, resigned persistence they also have. Fenris I have often written in many places where his true strength is his resignation, not his rage. This is an unpopular take: survival being committed by those able to tolerate the intolerable. But Hawke has this, too; Anders who commits the Chantry boom does not, yet Anders in this AU has been forced unwillingly into that role of the resigned.

Personal experiences – I do apply personal experiences to stories, in a ‘transferrable skills’ kind of way. That sex was a theme for a lot of my DA work was 1) because of the canon (sex/identity/perception intersects are threaded throughout DA:II) but, 2) yeah, this was a time in my life that I was being particularly out there. That I was personally participating in much of this and then found a connection and an "in" to both a canon and fanfic writing lens via sexual dynamics makes sense to me, because why care if it wasn't personal, I suppose.

If my interest in certain themes, characters and contexts defines what canonical source I’m interested in engaging with, then my deeper focus on the themes and scenes I like to explore shapes the narrow band of fanfic I’d be interested in writing. And then I have this library of sensations or emotions that I shuffle through to help inform what any character is feeling at a point. Sex, too. (I mean, in many ways being overly female-bodied, I kind of feel sex as a part of identity is forced on me and so I have to take it and shape it; I do particularly like it when I find male characters, more traditionally represented as sex/uality-neutral or non-sexual default icons, who have that same kind of sex/uality either forced on them via how the canon source material represents them, or how the canon context around them perceives/partitions them.)

But -- I couldn’t point at Hawke, or Anders, or Fenris and say, he’s closest to me in this fic, because it’s more that they’re all me, but only those parts of me that serve that specific character in that scene and that specific fanfic story at that time. Nor could I point to any scene in this fic and say, that happened to me, it’s more that every scene borrows a tiny part of something I know, or am deeply interested in knowing.

There was a time I tried to write fanfic that was just entertaining without putting that part of the self in, but wow was it boring to write. I write mostly for the process and pleasure of the act of writing, not so much the product. And yeah, I guess it's that question of, why would I even bother to write if there wasn't something deeply personally resonant about both the source material and my particular take on that source material in a fanfic; I don't think I "project" myself onto a character, but I definitely pour parts of myself into the ficwriting experience overall.

(And I am sure all of this reads as amazingly pretentious for what the fic is: a kinky sort of erotic many-scened fanfiction...yet honestly, that intersection of sex/uality, identity, cultural context boundaries, perception, is my genuine sweet spot. I could not write the porn if there wasn't the other stuff going on to make the porn interesting to me. It does make for strange sex writing, though; I want the story to be about sex and kink, but having it be hot probably is secondary to me compared to having the sex and kink be meaningful to the broader context? And that's the rest of the framing that is just as important to me: if Hawke, Anders, Fenris weren't caught in that particular point of time of a thwarted Chantry boom and all else that surrounds that as a canon divergent fic, the sex and kink dynamic would not be what it is represented as; a canonical Hawke x Fenris x Anders (pre or post Chantry boom) would not be what I explore in this fic.)

I hope that was something interesting to read, not too much navel-gazing, and particularly that it hasn’t soured the fic – it's ten years old! This is absolute joy! I’m so very, very moved you find the story deeply meaningful and thank you so much for reaching out to let me know.

[johnny-wins]

Initial Thoughts on Jojo's Bizarre Adventure part 7

For context as to the kind of JJBA fan I am, my favorite parts are:

#2

#6

#4

#1

#3

#5

What can I say, I like Joseph and dislike the parts that end with a fight the protagonist wins by sheer fiat.

Anyway! Part 7 seems great so far. I've read up to chapter 9, so if you don't want spoilers make sure you're caught up to there. Oh also there will be incidental mentions of details from previous parts but I'll try to keep it light since it seems part 7 is really disconnected from them.

So first I'm gonna give my serious thoughts and then I'm gonna attempt to transition smoothly into dumbass ramblings.

We start this part by getting introduced to a native american named Sandman who has been rejected by his community because he possesses books produced by white men, including the holy bible. His peers are enraged, calling him a traitor to his ancestors. He eventually explains to someone who cares for him that he has learned a superior running technique from the white men, and is going to use it to beat them at their own game and win enough money to buy the land that his community has called home for time out of mind, and therefore make it theirs within the structures of the ideology of those who would otherwise take it from them.

Shortly after, in the next issue, we're introduced to an African American man named Pocoloco who dreams of the easy life. He believes he's going to be unbelievably lucky in the next two months, and that no matter what he does things are going to go his way. Therefore, he's simply watching the clouds and spurning his work. Another African American man laboring in the fields argues this is foolish and shortsighted, that "People like me and your dead father... were freed from slavery 25 years ago. But life hasn't changed one bit. We will never live the easy live."

Even afterer than that, we're introduced to the protagonist of this part, Johnny Joestar. Due to some tragic events in his past, his career as a star horse jockey was ended when his legs were severely injured and he was left unable to walk, needing to use a wheelchair.

Everyone I've mentioned ends up making the decision to join a horse race across america, from the west coast to the east, with a fabulous cash prize. I mention all these people so I can say that this story is positioning itself to engage with the idea of the mythical american frontier: A place where anyone could strike it rich if they had skill (like Johnny), determination (like Soundman), and luck (like Pocoloco).

But very deliberately, the characters we're given to engage with are the kinds of people who were actually exploited or left out of that optimistic vision; Native Americans, African Americans, and handicapped people.

And that's neat! I don't know where it's going yet but just on its own it's a great bit of novelty to focus a story of this nature on people of this nature. Johnny frames this as a story of how he "Started to walk... Not in the physical sense, but in an adolescence to adulthood sort of way." So there's probably gonna be a lot of different arcs going on, but I hope this one about exploited people winning the psuedomeritocratic games their oppressors use to justify their imagined superiority has a good one.

Speaking of games, what the fuck are the rules of this race? They seem to have neglected "You need to be riding a horse," because someone brings a camel and someone else brings their 1890s-ass car.

I mean we do learn that you can't change horses midway through so "horse" has to appear in the rules somewhere, I can't believe they managed to "no rule sayin' a dog can't play basketball" their way into this one.

Also Pocoloco seems to have the kind of luck that makes weird short people fall in love with you if you're Dio, and godbless him for it. If this turns out to be his stand power or the fortune teller's stand power, cool, but honestly it's already established that some people are just born lucky in JJBA (Dio and Kira come to mind) so I don't even need that much.

Ah, also, I gotta wonder if Araki was watching Alien before he thought up this panel:

I mean, it's only the second time I've seen someone attack someone else by stuffing a wadded up periodical into their face.

Final note for this post: It seems the unifying traits of all Dios across the cosmos is that they much be Brittish, blonde, and weirdly preoccupied with the machinations of fate.

[novankenn]

Excerpts from "Monster"

So just to kind of follow up my little rant. Like I mentioned, I have a fic where Atlas is attacked by a horde of grimm... here's what I had to do to make Atlas BE the military super-power it's supposed to be.

The below are just portions of the indicated chapters, and only focus on the battle.

The Battle for Atlas...

(Chapter 15) Word of the gathering horde sent Mantle and Atlas into a near frenzy of panic. In an attempt to stamp down on the growing unease and negativity, Atlas began to a rapid deployment of resources. The edges of Atlas and the walls of Mantle suddenly started to brim with CIWS pods. Behind the walls, SRBM batteries quickly were arranged and established. Civil and military contractors were pressed into service, and resources commandeered to start the rushed process to bolster the integrity of the wall.

Missives were sent out, requesting Huntsman and Huntress aid, while mothballed and antiquated equipment was once again brought forward into operational service. Soon, the streets and roadways of Mantle and Atlas played host to shining Paladins and T-34 Saybre Tanks. Militia units were formed, and given defensive positions, supported the general military forces.

Air defence was also bolstered as Naval command echoing the example of the Army pulled the precursors of the backbone of Atlas air superiority. Squads of P-51D Griffons and A-10 Boartusks soon appeared in the sky, and quickly began preemptive strikes against the closing mass of negativity. Twenty-four thousand five hundred feet above the paired cities, the formidable and stalwart Lancaster-Nevermores cruised in the near freezing air, accompanied by the looming forms of AC-130 Wyverns.

These older resources were limited, and those who volunteered to man them knew the chances of return from the preemptive combat operations were minimal; if at all.

/=/

“Report. Estimated Time of Arrival for the grimm.”

“With in fourteen hours, the grimm will be visible from the wall. If speed remains constant, sir.”

“Status of wall operations.”

“Work on the walls is proceeding ahead of schedule, however the ETA of the horde will supersede those completion estimates by twenty-four hours. Installation of CWIS pods is however complete.”

“Assign a Saybre and Paladin troops to each compromised segments. Status report on auxiliary perimeter defensive structures.”

“The third line of razor wire is being installed now, and should be complete prior to 20:00 hours. All pre-Vytal anti-personnel and anti-armour measures have been deployed, sir. ” 

“Deployment of knight units.”

“Eight platoons per access point. All units have been scrubbed, and fresh base operative protocols loaded. They will focus only on grimm, all other target parameters have been deleted, sir.”

“Hunter reinforcements?”

“CCT coverage is limited, but we have received responses.  Mistrel has declined, slating limited resources. Vacuo has reported the dispatch of fifteen teams, unconfirmed ETA. Vale has confirmed but like Mistrel is indicated limited vailability. Confirmed they will send five teams.”

“So we're basically on our own. Air operations.”

“Thirty percent causality rate with Griffon and Boartusk strafing and bombing runs. Five percent causality rate for Nevermore and Wyvern operations. Cruisers are in a holding pattern above Atlas, sir.”

“Effectiveness of preemptive operations.”

“Incendiary payloads appear to the most effective. Estimates put current attrition rate at about fifteen percent of estimated original total mass.”

“Cease Griffon and Boartusk operations. I want all remaining units grounded and prepped for danger close operations. Nevermore and Wyvren sorties will continue until causality rate is ten percent or the horde is with in sight of the walls. Evacuation status.”

“We are at sixty percent emergency shelter occupancy, with an estimated forty percent of the designated Mantle population having been transferred, sir.”

“Munitions.”

“Standard ballistic munitions are exceeding normal stockpiles by thirty-five percent. Dust munitions at normal stockpile levels. SAM munitions at seventy-five percent normal stockpile. Ballistic and Dust artillery stockpiles at sixty percent of base levels. Strategic ammo dumps are established, sir.”

“Chemical and incendiary agents?”

“Twenty percent of pre-Vytal levels for chemical. Non-dust incendiary at fifty-five percent pre-Vytal levels, sir.”

“I want installation of the entire chemical agent stockpile, behind an auxiliary perimeter. Rig for remote deployment, and issue counter agents, and protective gear to all on ground forces.”

“At once, sir.”

“Sir!”

“Report.”

“Observational reports indicate there is a large mass breaking off from the main, and rapidly approaching our perimeter. ETA six hours. Estimated size, fifteen percent of main mass, sir.”

“Alert all air defence batteries. Scramble all squads, and sound general quarters on all navel units. It's starting. Engage intercept operations at two thousand metres from the wall.”

“At once, sir.”

The CDS leaned forward on the rail of the command platform. Her weary eyes watching the real time Doppler showing a mass moving ahead of the main horde. Sh gave a silent prayer to the Brothers, before standing up and adjusting her uniform jacket.

/=/

“Air-defences are slowly being overwhelmed. We have reports of grimm landing in Atlas and Mantle. Ground units are engaging, sir!”

“Sir, the main mass land speed had increased again. ETA two hours!”

“Multiple reports of CIWS pods shutting down, sir.”

“Priority command. Any available personnel are to get those units operational. We must keep up the pressure. Report casualty rates.”

“Minimal, less than one percent of on ground forces. Thirty percent of airborne forces, sir.”

“And this cloud of grimm?”

“Twenty-five percent of estimated mass, sir.”

She closed her eyes. The main host of grimm was closing much faster than anticipated. Their air-defences were being overwhelmed. If they couldn't get the aerial threats whittled down, they would lose essential support for the ground forces when the main host arrived.

“Order all non-engaged armour, to switch to air-burst munitions, and to fire-at-will!”

“At once, sir.”

She knew this was going to be close. This battle was one of attrition. Would this flood of death overwhelm and outlast the might of the Atlean military. Would their technology be enough to turn the tide, or were all those brave and stout souls willing to stand against this darkness to be nothing more than sacrificial lambs. They needed to outlast. They need to decimate, and obliterate. But their resources were finite.

/=/ 

“Grimm host is with in one hour of the wall, sir.”

“Scramble all Nevermore units still capable of flight. I want them in the air now. Target is the middle of the horde, use of FAEs is authorized.” she ordered as her hands white knuckled the railing before her. “Scramble all available Boartusks. Target front edge of horde. We need to break their advance.”

“All Wyvren units in the air on standby. Standing order to engage once horde is with in five thousand metres of the perimeter defences. What are the weather conditions?”

“Stable. Minimal winds at less than one knot, sir.”

“Direction.”

“Easterly, sir.”

“Good. Status of aerial threats.”

“Thirty-five percent of estimated mass, sir. Air-defence units starting to report ammo reserves reaching critical levels, sir.”

“Order them to hold out, and keep up the pressure. Switch to small arms if required. Support units?”

“Reporting, difficulties. Grimm, starting to land and harassing lighter armed units, sir.”

“Airstrips are being overwhelmed. Requesting any available support. Grounded aircraft unable to lift off, and taking heavy damage, sir.”

“Dispatch all hunter teams. Have them clear the supply routes and hold the airstrips. Paladin units to prioritize on ground, grimm.”

She pressed her thin lips together. Their resources were finite, but they needed to hold out. Mantle and Atlas must remain standing; they would remain strong. They would break this horde, and prove the might of the Atlean forces.

/=/

“Grimm host, ten thousand metres from the walls, sir.”

“Alert all wall based units. Mortar teams prep for White Phosphorus and Chemical munitions. Activate knights. Have battleships prepare for air to surface bombardment. Status aerial threats.”

“Forty-three percent of estimated mass. Minor threats are nearly removed, larger targets proving resistant to current munitions, sir.”

They were making a dent, but considering the soon-to-be split in the focus of her resources, the end results still seemed disheartening. She offered another silent prayer to the Brother Gods. Hopefully the gambles the defence council had come up with would work. There were too many unknowns with grimm and much of what they were going to bring to bear was designed for use against human and faunus targets. This would be the greatest test of the strength of Atlas and Mantle. This would either become the shining moment, or turn into their hour of demise.

“Do not go gentle into that good night.” she uttered as her tired eyes watched the Doppler. “Rage, rage against the dying of the light.”

[eta-solution-marketing-agency]

8 Tips for Effective Digital Marketing: A Guide to Success

Master Proven Digital Marketing Tactics for Business Growth

Think about this for a moment: You are the owner of a local café that serves awesome coffee. But the best coffee lovers aren’t spotting you. In the meantime, your competitors are running busy with a roomful of people every day. But ever imagined what is the fine line that is missing?

The answer lies in your digital presence! Leveraging simple attempts of SEO, paid ads & social media has more power than you think. They can save your café to remain buried beneath the third Google page.

No matter how outstanding your product is, in today’s saturated industry, your Brand is like a sleeping giant without effective digital marketing.

Whether a corporate giant or a tiny start-up, today, every business demands a solid strategy for digital marketing growth. The right digital marketing strategies can not only enhance your growth graph but generate leads & set roots for long-lasting customer relationships. But what exactly needs to be done to reach this space?

Let’s tap into 8 practical tips for successful digital marketing that any digital marketing business can implement to get measurable + real results.

1. Optimize your Site for Search Engines (SEO)

Just say you are in search of the best coffee shop in town. So, you just type ‘best coffee near me’ in your browser. What results will you be clicking? Most likely, it’s the top 3.

Now, that’s the power that SEO holds. SEO is the key to ensuring your business is noticed where potential customers are looking.

A digital marketing in ahmedabad must prioritize SEO if it wants to drive organic traffic. Your landing page must have a quick loading time, be structured well & be focused on very relevant keywords.

If you are a newbie in this arena, partnering up with a reputed SEO agency in Ahmedabad can help in implementing highly targeted keywords. Some examples are ‘best digital marketing services’ across content, meta tags, or even image alt texts.

Expert tip: Make use of tools such as SEMrush or Google Analytics. They are great for monitoring your SEO performance & align your strategy accordingly.

 2. Leverage Social Media Marketing

The idea of social media might still be quite light to some. But social media is not just for sharing your favorite memes & pretty pictures. Today, it is unbelievable how platforms like Insta, FB, LinkedIn & Twitter are significantly booming engagement ratios & driving traffic to even moderately built websites.

But, making it work perfectly always requires some core industry insights. There’s no one better than a professional digital marketing agency that can figure out which platforms will best suit your niche. Take this for an example. If you are running a Digital Marketing Agency in Ahmedabad, Instagram & Linkedin are the platforms where you are going to find your most interactive audiences.

Most of the successful social media campaigns that we ran for our clientele included user-generated contexts, content, and interactive polls. This strategic approach resulted in a generous 30% boost in engagement within 30 days. Hence, the devil is in the details.

3. Take it or leave it – Content is Still the King!

No matter if it is an infographic, a blog, a case study, or a video, generating valuable & engaging lies at the depths of any robust digital marketing strategy. The role of content is not just to engage & inform your audiences. It plays a massive role in helping with SEO & generating leads.

Thus, it’s a simple rule. Your advertising agency must focus on developing high-quality content – The kind of content that directly targets the pain points of your audience. For instance, a great way to ensure this is to optimize each of your blog posts with the right keywords & focus on contexts that your audiences are starving for.

Expert Tip: Make full use of the power of content to establish your expertise. For instance, a website development company can go ahead & publish amazing case studies that perfectly present successful client projects. 

4. Email Marketing for Retargeting

In spite of the constant evolution of paid ads & social media, email marketing still stands tall as one of the most powerful tools when maintaining or retargeting customer relationships. A tactfully crafted email can give all your customers a quick flash of the abandoned carts, inform them about great deals, & update them on new launches.

Make sure your emails are personalized and segmented for different audiences. If you’re an e-commerce company, this approach can directly increase conversions and sales. Personalized emails can lead to up to 29% higher open rates!

Example: A well-segmented email campaign for a client led to a 25% increase in sales by retargeting customers who had abandoned their shopping carts.

5. Invest in Paid Advertising (PPC)

While organic growth is essential, paid advertising can provide an immediate boost to your business, especially if you’re just starting. Paid advertising efforts, including Instagram promotions, Facebook ads, and Google Ads, target prospective clients according to their interests, demographics & search patterns.

Campaigns created by an experienced digital marketing agency in Ahmedabad will abide by your business’s short to long-term goals. Just begin with a small budget & utilize audience insights and A/B testing to gauge success. 

Expert Tip: Optimize your PPC campaigns regularly. Evaluate which advertising or keywords work best, then adjust your budget accordingly.

6. List User Experience (UX) at the top of priority

Millions of people could visit your website, but if they find it difficult to navigate or run slowly, they will go as soon as possible. Your website will be mobile-friendly, quick to load, and intuitive if it is developed by a reputable provider.

User experience has a direct influence on how long a visitor stays on your website, uses your services, or completes a transaction. Make sure your pages load quickly, streamline the navigation, and optimize the layout of your website. Conversion rates can drop by 7% with even a one-second delay!

A Fact to be noticed: Right after a poor online shopping experience, about 88% of consumers say they will not visit the site again.

7. Monitor + Analyze your Data

If you take a magnified look, every effective digital marketing strategy is built on data. Keeping your performances under constant monitoring helps you gain a clear-cut idea of what is effective & what is not. With tools like Google Analytics, Hotjar, or HubSpot, businesses can keep track of the actions of their website visitors. By doing so, they can modify their approach just as necessary.

Hence, data-driven decisions should hold importance in your digital marketing company if you want to see real improvements in your campaign performance. Every inch of data, whether it’s social media interaction, measuring website traffic, or simple email openings, has to offer insightful information about how customers behave.

A real Example: We helped a client discover that their strongest conversion rates came from mobile visitors by using an analytics-driven strategy. Their website had a about 15% boost in conversions after we made it mobile-friendly.

8. Adapt to Evolving Trends

Digital marketing trends change constantly. What worked for you last year might not work this year. Therefore, it is evident that staying adaptable & informed is crucial. Whether it’s a brand, a new social media platform, or the latest Google algorithm update, your advertising agency needs to be proactive when it is about adapting to these changes.

For example, video content, particularly on platforms like TikTok and Instagram Reels, has become a dominant force in 2024. Short, engaging videos can provide a massive boost to your social media marketing efforts.

Expert Tip: Don’t be afraid to try new trends. Experiment with formats like interactive content, influencer partnerships, or live streaming.

What’s Next: Sky-rocket Your Digital Marketing 

Digital marketing is never about posting on social media or owning a super-looking website. It is a strategic, highly detailed & multifaceted approach that demands attention in several areas – such as quick adaptation, consistent monitoring, and implementation of strategies. As a best digital marketing agency in ahmedabad, we dedicatedly help businesses execute such essential strategies to ensure long-term success. From content creation to SEO, we deliver data-driven solutions tightly tailored to the needs of your business.

If you are seeking optimal results for your brand’s success, please feel free to get in touch now!

[devin27]

10/02/2024

Formalities

Customary practice when meeting someone new is introducing yourself and attempting to find common ground or shared interests in the hopes of establishing a bond. As I find my footing with these daily entries, I figured an easy starting point would be some informal introductions. Surface level interests, basic background lore, & a few of my favorite things. The deeper dive into my consciousness, my history, & my philosophies will naturally unfold in due time. For now, let’s start small.

Legally, my name is Edward. Lately I’d been going by Eddie, but I think that was because I was panicking about my youth slipping away & wanted to remind myself of my childhood nickname. Kind of a silly meltdown in retrospect, but I have made peace with aging. Nostalgia is a powerful, albeit deceptive, phenomenon. Clinging to the past only neglects your presence in the present, consequently hindering your future.

Devin is a slight variation of my middle name, simplified & transformed into an alter ego for the purpose of this blog, just in case you were wondering. Alter egos always seemed trivial in nature, but I’ve learned they can be a powerful tool for self discovery & connecting to your innermost self. Analyzing & observing yourself from a third person perspective is a handy skill to tap into.

I was born Monday, October 7, 1996. Being born at the start of the work week is pretty dull, but it does lend itself nicely to structure & order. It’s nice to consider that playing a part in some of the traits I adopted early on in life, like responsibility & punctuality. Predisposition to certain characteristics based on time & location of birth might sound familiar, if you’re into astrology. I was briefly obsessed with it in my early 20’s. The interest has weened quite a bit for me, but I’ll always know my birth chart & what that means to me. (Libra sun, Leo moon, Libra rising for anyone who cares to know.)

Libras are air signs, often associated with freedom, curiosity, & socialization. Even though astrology relies on generic or vague descriptors, I can’t deny the validity when applied to my own identity. I value independence greatly in myself & others, but I also integrate seamlessly into social settings or large group gatherings. Conversations nourish my soul, as I truly crave knowledge & connection to others. You could say I’m an extroverted introvert if you wanted to label me.

My father is latino, a Mexican-American born in September; my mother is black, an African-American born in November. How fitting that I’m sandwiched right between them in October. I never had “together” parents, as I call it. They did co-parent me very well, though. I spent a significant number of weekends with my dad’s side of the family, whether with him or my paternal grandparents. I’m grateful that I was raised between two loving households that exposed me to different cultures & values. It fostered my empathy & understanding of others that would benefit me later in life.

The bulk of my youth was spent at my mom’s, as she was my primary caregiver. Through her I was blessed with a younger sister born in 2000 & a younger brother born in 2003. Later on down the line, in 2012 & 2014, we welcomed two more of my brothers to the family. That’s a story for another day, though. As the oldest sibling, certain characteristics became instinct. Responsibility, compassion, protectiveness, & rationality all accelerated their development within me. Those traits were positively reinforced by my family, & eventually they became a core component of who I was. Reflecting on that is interesting, knowing that if I had been the second or third sibling my life choices might have inverted or altered entirely.

Most of my time growing up was spent reading, writing, & playing video games. It’s not that I was lonely, I just thrived in isolation. Consistently being around siblings led me to cherish the rare lonesome moment. I’ll never forget the time my family was hosting a birthday party for me but couldn’t find me because I was hidden under the dinner table, playing Pokémon on my Gameboy.

Those hobbies stuck with me throughout school. I wasn’t very athletic so outside of a few short lived stints — basketball in 5th grade and soccer in 8th grade — I never joined any sports teams. My hand eye coordination is still pretty lackluster to this day, but I do wish I’d found a physical activity I could have nurtured. Maybe track or cross country would’ve worked out for me. I’ll never really know.

In school, I was the type to make good grades, stay out of trouble, & make the teacher’s lives easier. Not in the -reminding them of the homework they forgot to collect- or -snitching on other classmates- teacher’s pet kind of way, but just the general qualities of respect, responsibility, maturity, intelligence, & consideration that some other kids may have lacked in, at the time. You would catch me in a spelling bee, or submitting poetry & essays to local contests. I guess the closest archetype I really aligned with was a nerd, if I’m being candid.

Socially, things never felt bleak for me, though. The media portrays geeks as social outcasts but that wasn’t my experience. I could (& still can) get along with anyone, from the stoners to the athletes to the preppy student council kids. High school was generally a positive experience for me. (You couldn’t pay me to go back ever again though, let’s be clear.)

As I mentioned previously, video games played a significant role in my upbringing. From PlayStation 1 & 2, to Gameboy & Nintendo DS, an XBox, a Wii, & most recently, a Switch, I had a pretty varied palette. Games like Spyro, Crash Bandicoot, Mario, Zelda, Sonic, Dragon Ball Z, & most significantly, the entire Pokémon franchise, effectively functioned as my first obstacles in life. Action/Adventure based RPGs cultivated a lot of philosophies I would adhere to later on in life. My senses of justice, morality, curiosity, adventure, & wonder in the world all stemmed from the protagonists of these franchises.

The Pokémon universe was my first immersive obsession. I watched the show, played the games, bought the cards, & owned the merchandise. My birthday parties were themed with Pikachu cake & Charmander piñatas. My mom used to recite the original Team Rocket motto with me every morning before school, when I’d watch an episode during breakfast. Those are blissful core memories for me that I cherish dearly. I kept up with the games for awhile, but there’s an ebb & flow that disengages my interest every so often whenever life demands a bit more of my attention. That’s an unfortunate aspect of growing up, but you roll with the punches.

Outside of video games, I loved to read. It started with Dr Seuss books that my mom read for me, then I’d read them to my younger siblings. Then, my Tia Priscilla would gift me books for my birthdays or on Christmas. The Magic Tree House series stands out in my memory, introducing me to a lot of historically intriguing tales, notably King Arthur & the sword in the stone — Excalibur. These books lead to an immense obsession with medieval legends, Greek/Roman mythology, & Egyptian history. From that point on, anything mythological or historical caught my eye.

Movies were foreign to me. The church my mother had us attending four times a week for the vast majority of my upbringing frowned upon movie theaters. As a result the only films I was familiar with were the VHS tapes we were gifted, most often Disney movies like Lion King, Mulan, & Aladdin. Every now & then I’d catch my uncle or my cousins watching something at my grandparents’ house if I was with my dad for the weekend, but that was the only additional exposure I had.

To this day I’m still playing catch up on a lot of classic films. I just saw Titanic, Lord of the Rings, & Star Wars between 2020 & 2023, if that puts it into perspective for you. I’ve still got so much left to see, & it’s the media format I’m least familiar with. You’ll find my knowledge is currently limited, but I’m excited to continue expanding the scope of my collection.

Similarly, we weren’t allowed to listen to secular music. If it wasn’t gospel, we were sheltered from it. The closest I’d get to popular music would be through watching American Idol while mom worked her evening job through the week. There was a budding intrigue within me that blossomed as I caught my cousins watching music videos on MTV & CMT network channels. There was an entire world out there I was closed off from, but I was dying to get closer to it. I’ll expand on this eventually.

These days, I don’t get to read as much as I did as a teenager. I’d love to get back into it. I don’t play video games much either, it feels like I outgrew them. Maybe it’s only temporary, & the desire will return. Music, television, & film continue to fascinate me, though. For a brief period during & shortly after high school, I even took filmmaking courses, with the intentions of pursuing a career in the industry. We’ll touch base on that as well, but just know that visual media truly captivates me.

This turned out to be much, much longer than I anticipated. I can tell it’s going to take restraint to rein in my stream of consciousness. I want to make sure this is easily digestible for myself & others as I continue this series. Hopefully you have a foundational understanding of who I am, it will be useful as I continue opening myself up to you.

Before we part, I’ll leave you with a few of my personal favorites from the aforementioned topics.

Books - The Hunger Games Franchise, The City of Ember, And Then There Were None, Fahrenheit 451, Eragon, The Magic Tree House Franchise, The Lord of the Flies

Video Games - The Pokémon Franchise (Generations 3 & 4 are the highlights), Dragon Ball Z Budokai Franchise, Spyro Franchise, Crash Bandicoot Franchise, The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild & Tears of the Kingdom, Mario Kart, Just Dance

Animated Shows - Naruto, Dragon Ball Z, Avatar the Last Airbender, FullMetal Alchemist Brotherhood, Danny Phantom, Ben 10, SpongeBob SquarePants, Bojack Horseman, Invincible, Harley Quinn, Phineas & Ferb, Midnight Gospel, Love Death + Robots, Star Wars Visions

TV Shows - The Office, How To Get Away With Murder, How I Met Your Mother, Gossip Girl, Big Bang Theory, The Boys, Umbrella Academy, Black Mirror, Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt, WandaVision

Animated Films - Spider Man: Spider-Verse Franchise, The Prince of Egypt, Aladdin, Mulan, The Lion King, Toy Story 2, Shrek 2, Spirited Away, The Incredibles

Films - The Lord of the Rings Trilogy, Everything Everywhere All At Once, Memento, Mulholland Drive, Blade Runner 2049, Ex Machina, Sex Drive

Music - Stay tuned for an entire research paper. Spoiler alert, this has become my favorite art form to consume.

If you stuck around this far, I’m indebted a mountain of gratitude to you. I can’t always promise the posts will be succinct, but I’ll do my best to keep the behemoths few & far in between.

Love, joy, peace, & prosperity to you & your loved ones — Devin27 💌

P.S. Enjoy “Everything You Want” by Vertical Horizon. This is one of the very first songs I remember falling in love with, accompanying a few photos of my birthday cakes over the years. Felt fitting as my 28th birthday draws near, only a few days away at this point.