#plus some of the themes be relevant

[constantvariations]

It would've been hilarious if ShawLuna had tried to cover their asses from the early volume transphobic jokes around Jaune by making him a trans woman. It can't be transphobia if it's ☆~foreshadowing~☆

[the-clock-of-the-time-dragon]

[Wicked: For Good speculation/predictions]

[obviously spoilers + wild conjecture + musings]

Okay so I have many thoughts about what we might get in the second film, and decided to put them all in one place; so here we are.

1.) I've heard a lot of people mentioning that the movie might choose not to jump straight into Thank Goodness, and instead opt for some sort of buffer opening to establish the time-skip and whatnot. I think it would be amazing to actually see Elphaba flying around Oz saving Animals and being harbored as a fugitive and stuff; maybe we could even get reintroduced to Brrr briefly! He's obviously able to speak, so maybe that implies Fiyero took him to an Animal resistance group or something for safety? The map of Oz shown in Something Bad does imply that there might be such groups around, plus of course Doctor Dillamond mentioning protests. Maybe we'll get to see some of that on-screen; I think that would be fascinating. Maybe as kind of a soft adaptation of Elphaba's domestic terrorist phase in the book. This is possibly all supported as well by the shots we've seen of the Yellow Brick Road under construction; presumably this will be early in the film, since obviously it must predate Dorothy's arrival, so I suspect these might be the opening scenes before we get to see how Oz is reacting to Elphaba's activities at the start of Thank Goodness.

2.) I suspect we'll find out that Madame Morrible is not only the one who brought Dorothy to Oz, but also the Wizard — and maybe even more interestingly, caused the Great Drought (which I think is quite heavily implied to be the Dust Bowl, based on the time period and a scrawling on one of the chalkboards in the background; which I think is meant to be Dillamond's research). (My current headcanon is that Morrible accidentally caused the formation of the Impassable Desert (since it is also mentioned on the same chalkboard), which caused a ripple effect out into Kansas and started the Dust Bowl.) If we do get more background on Morrible and her earlier magic experimentation (and maybe even the Grimmerie), I suspect we'll learn that her heart's desire was always to be the prophesied magical savior of Oz, and the Grimmerie based on those vibes (since it seems to read the hearts of the ones using it and flip to pages that will give them what they want, like how it heard "birds" and went straight to relevant pages) brought the Wizard (and by extension, Elphaba) and Dorothy into Oz. In a way it feels like the Grimmerie is sort of the dark magical inverse of what the Wizard does: they hear the desires of people's hearts, and "grant" it in a deceptive way. The Wizard "grants" wishes through bullshitery and spectacle (and the people who come to him for help always end up having to get what they wanted themselves), while the Grimmerie "grants" wishes using real magic (and so can actually give things that the wisher didn't already possess) but always in a fucked up way that they'll end up regretting. I've already made a post about the theme of "the heart's desire" and how it's explored in the original Wizard of Oz and in Wicked — and maybe at some point I'll do a longer analysis of that (for instance, the fact the Wizard was in possession of the book and got his heart's desire to be a father in the most catastrophic way imaginable) — but it's really interesting if we consider that Morrible's desire seems to be to essentially be the Witch of Oz, and the answer given by the Grimmerie might basically have been the giant magical backfire that brought all three of the most plot-important characters into Oz in the first place. It's possible this won't actually be explained and will remain in headcanon territory, but with the way they've been focusing more on Madame Morrible I think we'll probably get at least a little something exploring her background and connections with the Wizard (and it would be really interesting if we got more stuff relating to the Grimmerie in the process).

3.) In the frames we've seen of Dorothy, the slippers are still silver! Not ruby! We know from interviews that the production team read the original Wonderful Wizard of Oz and took heavy inspiration from it, so I assume keeping the shoes silver was an executive decision on their part. But it has some really interesting implications about what sort of changes might've been made to Part 2. We already knew that we're getting major alterations to Nessa's narrative — groundwork for that was already laid in the ways they changed her in the first movie, particularly surrounding her relationship to Elphaba and her agency regarding movement, which I think is great — but regarding this I've heard some people asking if this means we might not get Nessarose standing. Marissa Bode who plays her is capable of limited standing and walking, so I doubt that part will have been cut entirely; but I'm really curious about the ways in which Nessa's story might have been rewritten. The point of her independence has been emphasized a lot thus far, so I think we might get some tweaking (or outright cutting) of the "hideous chair with wheels" bit; and with how we got the lines about Nessa wanting to make a new start and Elphaba getting in the way of that, I think it's likely we'll get less of a focus on "why haven't you used your powers to help me walk Elphaba?" and more on "wow, you ruined my life again Elphaba". I am curious about whether Nessa will still be able to read the Grimmerie (which always felt a little like a plot hole/contrivance in the original show, so it would need a proper explanation at the very least), or if perhaps — since I believe it's being set up that the Grimmerie can "read" people around it and give them a fucked up version of what they think they want — Nessarose's dark desire at that moment is to not have a heart (kinda like that line from the 1939 movie: "As for you, my galvanized friend: you want a heart. You don't know how lucky you are not to have one. Hearts will never be practical until they can be made unbreakable") and gets Elphaba to read it: but neither knows what it will actually do until Boq's heart starts shrinking away into nothingness. (Also I'm fairly positive that the still we got of Elphaba below is from the Colwen Grounds scene with Nessa and Boq: I've heard some people presuming it's from No Good Deed, but the background, her expression (which seems to me to be obviously her trying to get Nessa/Boq to calm tf down), and the fact she seems to be in the same costume as in the Yellow Brick Road scene, tells me it's almost certainly from Wicked Witch of the East.)

4.) We're told to expect two new songs from Stephen Schwartz! I'm extremely curious what these might be (and naturally, Gelphie simp as I am, would like at least one one of them to have some more good ol' gay goodness from our girls), but we don't have a whole lot to go on for clues yet other than (as far as I can tell, unconfirmed?) reports that one is an Elphaba solo and the other is a Glinda solo. This is very exciting of course, but until we have more insight it's still too early to make deep predictions. Although as for hopes, I'd obviously like for a new Glinda number to involve her grappling with her feelings more — a much-needed addition — and for Elphaba to perhaps get some of that as well (it would help the lead-up to Wonderful make a bit more narrative sense, if nothing else). And if it turns out they aren't Glinda or Elphaba songs, then I think Fiyero or Boq deserve to get a little bit more to sing. All Schwartz has said thus far is that the new music was made to meet the needs of the story: so (since the two songs DON'T seem to just be reworkings of existing ones, and are actually all-new, film-only material) that further supports the fact we'll be getting fairly major changes to the plot.

5.) The Glinda-Fiyero wedding seems to either happen or very nearly happen??? Extremely interesting expansion on the original material, I can't wait to see what they do with it. I've heard some people saying it might just be a fantasy sequence or something — and I suppose it could be — but I don't think so; the style of filmmaking and writing is deliberately "grounded" to make Oz feel real, and the first film didn't have any imaginary scenes. I think the wedding scene will happen at the same time as (or directly before) Wonderful, and will probably be interrupted: maybe by the release of the flying monkeys, the Wizard rallying the guards after Elphaba, or — scandal! — even by Elphaba herself! (No, I don't think we'll be getting the "I object!" sequence out of Shrek, even though it would be hilariously apropos, lol.) We've seen an image of what looks like Elphaba back in the Emerald City (maybe right before Wonderful, perhaps sneaking into the Wizard's palace to free the Animals; or perhaps just after Wonderful, after finding Doctor Dillamond and deciding to remain the Wizard's enemy?), and judging by when these events would have to line up based on the story of the musical, I think these are almost certainly within the same section. It seems like the wedding sequence might be a decent spot for some of the new music: or maybe a beefed-up version of Glinda's I'm Not That Girl, if she got left at the altar or something.

6.) We've seen this image of Glinda running up a staircase (with the Grimmerie in hand, and in her Bubble Dress): this seems very likely to be immediately after For Good and the Melting — I suspect Glinda is heading up the stairs to see the aftermath, recover Elphie's hat, and receive the green bottle from Chistery. OR, it could also be related to the Wizard — the wood reminds me of the tower in the Emerald City palace where all of Oscar Diggs' old stuff from Omaha was stored at the end of the first film, so I'm wondering if this is Glinda going up to confront him after realizing that he's Elphaba's father, maybe.

EDIT: I realized after reviewing a better quality image with higher contrast and saturation that the latter possibility I suggested is more likely than the former — behind the wooden beams are the emerald blocks we see in the Wizard's palace, so this frame seems almost certainly to be from the scene where Glinda confronts the Wizard in his tower after returning from Kiamo Ko. And what a brilliant way to do that scene, if indeed that's what this is: the Wizard isn't just sitting despondent in his throne room, he went up to wallow in his old mediocrity — and Glinda doesn't just fly up to him, she ascends the same path she once went up with Elphie, processing her grief the whole way up. The painnnnnnn. It makes her ordering him to fly away in the same balloon that he arrived in — and that Glinda and Elphaba NEARLY escaped in before everything — all the more bitter and ironic. Can't wait to see Jeff Goldblum sell the Wizard's descent into the mother of all midlife crises, fiddling with his old sideshow props in the attic as he comes to know the true despair wrought by his hand.

7.) Will the ending be changed?? It seems all but confirmed that the cloaked figure riding away out of Kiamo Ko at the start of Part 1 was Elphaba: this costume concept for the second film looks identical to what we saw the rider wearing. Add to that (as I've talked about in a prior post) the fact the Scarecrow is shown alongside Dorothy on the Yellow Brick Road, implies that at the very least the events of the last few minutes of the musical have been revised. My earlier post listed four different possible alterations (from Elphaba leaving Oz alone, to her still meeting with Fiyero somewhere else after everything, to her somehow letting Glinda and/or Fiyero know she's alive before leaving, or (hope against hope) that she takes Glinda with her), but it's still far too early to tell what they might've gone with. I just hope that at least wrote it better than it was originally. The image of Elphaba riding out of Oz on horseback across the desert would certainly be striking, no matter which option they chose.

[thewertsearch]

@manorinthewoods asked: Vriska and Eridan have now killed one person each. Tavros and Feferi's respective moons have been destroyed; as such, they cannot be revived via dream selves or the moon-crypt slabs. What do you think will happen now? ~LOSS (18/5/24) @manorinthewoods asked: Welcome to Murderstuck, aka Homestuck's version of Canaan House. Who do you think's going to survive this? ~LOSS (22/5/24) Anonymous asked: tavros and feferi are D----EAD! do you think they'll stay dead? you've already stated your opinion that there are death flags like crazy all over vriska, so do you think anyone else will die? if so, who? Anonymous asked: Now that the bodies have started to hit the floor, what's your prediction for who's gonna survive to meet the humans?

I'm actually doing to do something a little different this time, and analyze the situation primarily from an author's perspective, rather than an in-universe one. I had a lot of fun doing that with yesterday's Kanaya post, so I want to try it again.

Let's enumerate the remaining trolls, in ascending order of how likely I think they are to kick the bucket (😳) during Murderstuck.

There's no chance whatsoever that Sollux will die. His Doom prophecy is fulfilled, and if he were to die a third time, it would break his long-established duality theme. Plus, he'd have predicted it, and would have been complaining about it since Hivebent. He's fine.

Death flag score: 0/10.

We just got Aradia back. She's not even involved in Murderstuck, seemingly travelling to the Furthest Ring after being resurrected, so none of the murderers can touch her anyway.

Aradia is a powerful time manipulator who can freeze even the most dangerous enemies. It would take a lot more than Eridan and Gamzee to defeat someone who can stalemate Perfect Jack, and I predict that she'll survive the rest of the Act with ease.

Plus, killing her again so soon would feel really cheap. Been there, done that.

Death flag score = 0.5/10

Karkat and Terezi are too important to die.

This doesn't always guarantee a character's survival - A Song of Ice and Fire comes to mind - but ASOIAF kind of proves my point, doesn't it? Martin can throw all the Red Weddings he likes at us, but everyone still kind of knows that the really important characters aren't going to die until their arcs are complete. If A Dream of Spring ever actually comes out, Daenerys will still be around, and you can take that to the bank.

So no, I don't think Karkat and Terezi will be going anywhere. Now that Kanaya appears to be dead, they're undeniably the most important trolls remaining, alongside Vriska. And we'll get to Vriska.

Death flag score: 1/10.

I know it's weird to predict that an already deceased character won't die, but I wrote an entire post last night about why I believe this to be the case.

tl;dr: it doesn't make narrative sense for Kanaya to stay dead.

Death flag score: 2/10.

Now, we're onto the characters who I think might actually die.

Gamzee's still alive at the end of the countdown, so he'll at least survive the next couple of hours.

Certainly, his position seems rather precarious. His stated intent to wipe out the entire Veil will make him a lot of enemies very quickly - and based on the image above, he clearly gets into some sort of trouble. That scratch almost looks like it could be the work of Jack's sword.

However, I have a hard time believing the Most Important Character In Homestuck is going to die less than halfway through Homestuck. He's been saying all sorts of cryptic nonsense lately, and he strikes me as someone whose role in the story will expand even more than it already has. Gamzee is the one character on this list we know will stay relevant for the entire comic.

I don't think he's going to achieve his murder mission, of course. I think he'll probably be 'defeated' somehow, and expelled from the Veil by the surviving trolls, only to pop up again sometime later. There's still a chance that he'll be killed - but if he is, I'm 100% sure that he'll return in some form. Gamzeesprite would be even worse than Calsprite, in my opinion.

Death flag score: 3/10.

Yes, I still believe Vriska will die - but I don't know if she'll die in Murderstuck.

Scratch positioned her as someone who will perpetuate a monumental, large-scale mistake, and I don't think there's anything she could do on the Veil that fits the bill.

However, Vriska is more imaginative than I am. She could easily pull a trick out from up her sleeve that I didn't see coming - some terrible, horrible idea that earns all of Scratch's foreshadowing in one fell swoop. Vriska is known for her Incidents, and you never know when the next one is on the horizon.

Death flag score: 4/10.

There's not a lot tying Equius and Nepeta to the Veil, is there?

They don't have strong relationships any of the remaining trolls, and even among the B-team, they've barely had any prominence since we've left Alternia. Killing one or both of them would up the stakes of Murderstuck without introducing the narrative issues that, say, a dead Karkat would cause.

Plus, if one of them dies, then the other would immediately gain an incredibly strong motivation, and become a more prominent character overnight. I already like Nepeta - but a heartbroken, vengeful Nepeta hunting Eridan down across time and space? That's a fucking arc.

They could also both die, and return to the story from another direction. It hasn't escaped my notice that almost all the 'important' trolls are Prospit Dreamers, and the two Furthest Ring explorers are Derse girls. I've been wondering for a while now if the solution to the Veil's bloated cast is to split the trolls back into the Red and Blue Teams, with the Red Team joining the kids outside the session, and the Blue Team joining Aradia in the Ring for some secondary mission. I guess that implies Tavros will be resurrected, but there do seem to be hints that that might happen.

I don't want either of these two to die, but... well, killing them would raise a lot of interesting possibilities.

Death flag score (both of them together): 6/10

Death flag score (one of them) : 7.5/10.

Eridan is screwed.

Neither the story nor the trolls can allow him to ally with Jack and lead him to the Veil, and they'll do anything they can to stop him. I don't think anyone's inclined to show him mercy, either - Kanaya and Feferi were very popular.

I don't really see any way out for him. He has no allies, he can't Hopesplode everyone at once, and he's never shown himself to be particularly resourceful. I think if there's one troll practically guaranteed to be Murderstucked, it's him.

Death flag score: 9/10.

[evilkitten3]

#i think mdr also doesnt rlly care abt younger ppl's opinions sdffggfds#he's like. old man shakes his fist at a cloud#he is so OLD and i think he believes that its part of why he must be right#like ... he has all this experience. he has lived an extensive life#tried and failed to make 'teamwork' (cooperation) work#so for him it is. it seems naive probably of naruto to believe that this would work#(it is notable tho that he SEES that the shinobi villages are cooperating. he mentions this Twice actually the other time is#right after his edo tensei resurrection. its the very first thing he remarks upon being faced w the alliance#that theyre all wearing the same headbands but they seem to be coming from different villages#this kind of .. does blow his mind. but its too late for him to take on a new ideology Now ^_^#he has to go thru with it. he's so smart and so sexy after all <3 he has to be right. and they must be wrong#bc he has lived and seen that any alliance will just fall apart at the end and so thats why theyre 'pathetic' at the end of the day anyway)#it is very funny tho i think asfgdfdgd#bc obt is like out there screaming and arguing with everyone. and mdr is like ummm who the fuck cares. LMAO#lets beat the shit out of each other and whomstever wins. that one's the one that has rights. and IS right w their ideology#i also do think its notable that team 7's 'teamwork' doesnt actually manage to bring him down BUT#their teamwork does lead to the defeat of kaguya. so. i feel like at the end of the day#u can still say that the teamwork/cooperation ideology is the winner here#bc they get to have a future and konoha continues to exist. whereas mdr fucking explodes and then dies. lmao#so the narrative does. still prove him wrong albeit indirectly

1000% true he only cares about opinions of the youth (hehe) when said youth can shatter his ribcage. and even then he's still more interested in getting kicked again

alternatively i think he might find it somewhat amusing that the way to get everyone to cooperate turned out to be. having them all be really really really about-to-shit-themselves scared of him (obito but that's that same thing as far as he's concerned). moreover, if the only time they can work together is when they have a common opponent, then as soon as that opponent is defeated (entirely hypothetical ofc bc he's perfect and about to become the second sage and can't be stopped ever) then they'll just. go back to fighting each other. which just proves his original point (it in fact does not, but since he never tells anyone anything there's no one who can point out the itty bitty teeny weeny gaping massive gloryhole flaws in his logic such as that. while they can't prove that that's not true. he also can't prove that it is.)

your logic concerning the narrative is technically correct but unfortunately madara operates on his own crazy caveman logic, and while team seven can do. basically jackshit to stop him, as soon as kaguya takes over, they manage to beat her, which i think madara could easily interpret as black zetsu sacrificing madara to bring back someone weaker than him (did kaguya survive maito gai? no. did she survive a living full-power hashirama? no (neither did madara but pointing that out will just make him hard again). as far as he cares, all kaguya did was show up, steal his body via black zetsu hax, and then get pummeled by three teenagers, some corpses, and obito's ex. all of whom tried and failed miserably to stop madara).

now, technically, madara is crazy so his own potential thoughts on All That should be irrelevant.... if that had been the final battle. but the final fight of the series is naruto vs sasuke, and whoever is stronger is the most correctest, ultimately just. proving madara's power-over-all stance to be the correct one (i guess you could argue that naruto worked with kurama? but. idk kurama still doesn't really have the ability to just. leave. so i would at the very least have an asterisk there, personally)

wait so, as the holders if the most and 2nd most insane naruto characters, what did madara and obito have to say about team 7 dynamics ??

As a past memeber of team 7 Obito's opinion doesn't count cause he thinks kakashi's gremlins are the only normal people in the world. I don't remember Madara saying anything on the dynamics of team 7 but I'm not an authority on the matter so I turn it over to my resident Madara Scholars @evilkitten3 and @narutoenjoyer5000

[theresattrpgforthat]

hey what are some good zero-prep for players and good for one shot systems?

Theme: Zero-Prep Characters / One-Shots

Hello friend! I have some really fun games here that I think just produce straight-up Vibes for you to check out, although I also recommend checking out my Games To Run With Strangers recommendation post for some more great options.

Android Outbreak, by Munuxu.

Android Outbreak is a quick, skill/luck-based TTRPG that will have players taking the roles of escaped androids racing and battling their way towards an evac point on the other side of a megacity that is raised high in the sky above a burning miasma that's taken over the planet. 

Character creation is sleek, requiring one choice and a a roll or two to determine what your strengths are and how you are unique. Your goal is simple too - you just are trying to get out and get away. The game page itself is part of the rolling mechanics, with the lines on the page used to help measure at what distance you are throwing your dice onto the table. The GM is responsible for creating androids to pursue you as well as other obstacles such as weather events or events obstructing the streets. If you want a game that combines throwing skill with random chance, I recommend Android Outbreak.

Operation Final Monarch, by poorstudents.

A one-page espionage TTRPG in an alternate history 1940's. Assassinate Aleksander Von Korte on his opulent airship, The Watchful Luftrahmer.

Operation Final Monarch is a one-page Tabletop RPG for 4-6 players. One player will act as the GM, providing obstacles, portraying passengers, and describing the Watchful Luftrahmer. You play as Infiltrators, spies from the fallen countries around Arstarkan. Your final mission is to kill Aleksander Von Korte.

When situations get risky you gamble with danger and can always push your luck to try to succeed in any situation. Be careful not to roll a 1 though, as a devastating consequence will soon follow. Use can also use your leverage over the passengers of the Watchful Luftrahmer, asking them questions they don’t want to answer or enacting your special abilities.

Operation Final Monarch provides you with playbooks, which is one of the easiest ways to make the game little to no-prep for the players when they sit down to play. It also gives you a very specific goal - that of assassinating an important political figure while aboard a blimp. The setting is semi-historical, giving the players a frame of reference, but spices it up with elements like Machine Priests and steampunk technology.

Mechanically, the game uses a gambling mechanic that involves the GM rolling 1 dice publicly and 1 dice secretly. Players have to judge whether or not they can beat the total difficulty, and decide whether to Push or Call. Pushing gives you an extra dice but worsens the outcome should you fail, while Calling leaves the outcome up to chance, but minimizes consequences. One of those consequences may be revealing a character secret, which makes your character vulnerable, but also provides other characters the opportunity to help. I think the succinct way the game allows you to dive into character backstory as you are playing the game makes this a prime candidate for one-shot play.

CBR+PNK Core, by Emanoel Melo.

In CBR+PNK (Cyber plus Punk) you play as a team of RUNNERS—mercs, criminals, activists living on the edge and running in the shadows of a gritty, ultraviolent world.

In each game we play an entire new cast of characters making their LAST RUN.

CBR+PNK runs on a super-condensed version of John Harper's Forged in the Dark system, specially tweaked for action-packed ONE-SHOT sessions.

CBR+PNK is well known for its friendliness for one-shots, stripping away a lot of the mechanics that give Forged in the Dark games weight and length. The game is packaged into pamphlets, which means you can hand out only what is relevant to each person at the table: the GM pamphlet for the person running the game, and the character pamphlets to folks who will be playing characters. There are additional supplements that you can add to the game to alter or edit your experience.

The player pamphlet has two columns where you enter all your information, one column for character creation instructions, and a number columns with help and player instructions that you can use as a reference when you come across the relevant rule in play. The GM pamphlet takes a little bit more time to familiarize yourself with, and I think this game will be a lot easier to pick up if you’ve already played other Forged in the Dark games. That being said, this game has won a lot of awards and recognition for how concise it is, and I think it’s definitely worth checking out.

MotherFucker Stole My Baby, by Brabblemark Press.

MOTHERFUCKER STOLE MY BABY! is a quick-play roleplaying game inspired by Cradle 2 the Grave and other action films. 

You're a jewel thief - and you and your crew just nabbed a bag of black diamonds for a mysterious employer. You hand the jewels over to your fence for appraisal and kick back for a well-deserved party. Then comes the unexpected double whammy…

Gangsters robbed your fence and swiped the diamonds - and your only child has been kidnapped by the billionaire that you stole the diamonds from! Can you retrieve the diamonds and make the exchange - and how many bodies will litter the streets on your path to victory?

You can only wonder, as you stand in the rain and scream to the sky… MOTHERFUCKER STOLE MY BABY!

The genre and tone of this game are immediately understandable, and it shouldn’t take any time at all to communicate to your players exactly what’s going on in this game. Character creation is very simple - one of my favourite parts is that you circle three items from a list of possessions on your character sheet, and also that your character sheet looks like a Wanted poster.

The game itself is styled after Lasers and Feelings, with a single number representing your strengths, and your successes depending on whether you roll above or below the number. The game also comes with some d6 tables to help the GM craft scenes as you play. There’s also some very succinct but very helpful pieces of GM advice in the GM section, that I think will help you deliver a short but sweet experience for your players.

The Fall of House Prosh, by NotWriting.

The Emperor Hakkan VI has died without an heir. The Imperial throne world Lecatom Rex is empty. The previous Stewards of the throne, House Kotar, are leaving in shame. Their rivals, House Prosh, have ascended the other noble houses as new Stewards of the throne and the Imperial palace. 

Humanity lives on a thousand worlds. Star Witches fold spacetime to navigate the cosmos. Noble houses settle conflicts through duels. Prophecies and portents guide politics and religion. And now noble houses whisper of war and secession.

A thousand years of peace are in jeopardy.

The Fall of House Prosh is a sci-fi tabletop RPG about noble tragedy and melodrama inspired by stories like Dune, Shakespearian plays, and Game of Thrones. Players take on the role of characters within 3 factions: the powerful House Prosh, the maligned House Kotar, and the servants of both these houses. 

The Fall of House Prosh is a narrative guide through a story of tragedy and politics, where only one house can survive. You cannot decide who falls; you can only decide what that fall looks like. Players can choose to embody the members of House Prosh, House Kotar, or the servants of the two, with at least one character from each faction required to play the game. Each faction has their own special moves, half of which can be employed in the Day phase and half which can be employed in the Night phase. Over the course of the game, you add tokens to each houses’ tragedy pool; those tokens are then spent to carry out moves against each-other.

If you want a game about tragedy and epic stories of loss, you want The Fall of House Prosh.

The Family Rat, by V2S Games.

ONE OF YOU IS THE HEAD OF AN ORGANIZED CRIME FAMILY.

The rest of you are 'friends' or members of the family, who will be forced to decide where your loyalties lie. Who can you trust? Who'll be left standing? How will the family survive?

The Family Rat is a Tale of 21 and a hack of The King's Poisoner. It's a one-page tabletop roleplaying game for 3–8 players, which can be played with a deck of regular or virtual playing cards OR two ten-sided dice (2d10).

The Family Rat uses blackjack hands to navigate a story that carries the themes and vibes of the Godfather movies, setting up one player as the The Boss and the rest of the players as members of the Family. I think this game could be classified as GM-less, because even though the Boss has a different roll from the rest of the family, they’re still a solo character, which I think is an interesting format in which to couch this story.

Over the course of three acts, the family members will decide to make requests, moves, and suffer the consequences of their actions. The Boss enters each round with a significant advantage with their Blackjack Hand (having one card hidden from the others, and winning ties), and uses special mechanics at the end of the final act to dictate the actions they’ve taken for the good of the family.

This is a game with a winner and a loser, but I feel like it oozes with the same charms as the original movie. None of you are great people, and all of you have chances to pursue personal goals and leverage favours or debts against each-other, but at the end of the day, you’re depending on the heart of the cards to decide who comes out on top.

24XX - The Deep, by Chaosmeister

ONE DAY THE OCEANS DROWNED THE WORLD. Humanity survived below the waves. The sea birthed leviathans. Your crew owns a dingy old sub. Odd jobs, salvage, leviathan hunting and a few merc gigs keep you afloat and breathing.

I’ve played 24XX games a couple of times and all of the ones I’ve played before are definitely one-shot friendly and require minimal prep. Players choose a character class or type, and get everything associated with it, along with a few key choices like gear or background to flesh them out a little bit. All in all it can take as few as 5 minutes before you start play. The games also usually come with a bunch of roll-tables that give the Game Master interesting encounters, obstacles and goals without having to do a lot of prep. You can also easily condense an adventure into a couple of hours, making these ideal low-prep one shots.

What I like about The Deep is the setting. It’s an excellent example of how you can bake in unique setting elements in just a few roll-tables - for example, are you working for a genetic research & development group or a mining corporation? Does your submarine have giant claw markings from various dives, or a mural of a sea god that has importance to you? If you have a repelling electric net, what kinds of animals are you repelling? These kinds of details infuse the setting with flavour, which I think can really inspire and entice the people at your table.

Other Games I’ve Talked About Before…

Something Is Wrong With The Chickens, by Elliot Davis.

Faewater, by A Smouldering Lighthouse.

The Children of Saturn, by Dan John Crowler.

Subway Runners, by Gem Room Games.

Gay Crime: Sapphics Against Capital, by Evey Lockhart.

Spirit Line, by Jhryne.

Cryptid TV, by yahahn.

Lady Blackbird, by John Harper.

[learnastrowallura]

💚The 10th house in astrology💚

The source if this information is The Astrology Podcast (Chris Brennan) on Youtube and I will add a personal example plus some of my own thoughts as well

10th house: career, occupation, profession, work, enactment, achievement, reputation, intention, choice, actions, public image, visibility, exposure, rank, position, demand, duty, reward, honor, MC, legacy, bosses, power dynamics, angular

The sign and planet(s) in the 10th house can show us the image that is apparent or visible to others within a professional context, what we do exactly or how we take action toward achieving what we desire, what is the vision that we have and the contribution that we make (within the 6th house it is more... well what you HAVE to do, whereas with the 10th it is more end result based aka what impact will I have in the world), what is my role to play here etc, technical abilities and talents, career potential, our tendencies or even enthusiasm pertaining to taking action (or in the opposite case hesitation toward it) during work, which type of career the individual will take on, what we are known for

Looking at the ruler of the 10th house can, of course, give us more detail on career/reputation matters.

The midheaven in hellenistic astrology may not always fall in the 10th house, so for example if it falls in the 9th house your career may involve spiritual and/or religious matters, teaching people perhaps in college, and if it is in the 11th house then it may involve friendships so maybe there is an overlap with the coworker and friend relationship, or if you pay attention to the talks that you have with your friends there might be a certain theme that comes up that may be a good fit for you in your career, etc (use whole sign house system for this)

Personal example: Leo in 10th house, no planets

Right well this one is a bit tricky to delineate, to be honest

Starting with Leo I definitely make... a statement, I suppose? See the thing is with the 10th house it is something that becomes easier to analyze and figure out in adulthood. I would say I am known for being a certain kind of provocative and bold at my school for sure. Leo is all about shining and self expression and I do not shy away from being authentic and presenting myself as I am, yk? Not many people like it but yea

The reason why I mention college is because I do believe the way I behave there is close to how I would behave in jobs as well since it does count as 10th house work for me but that is my own perspective on it so take it with a grain of salt <3

Right now I am doing an internship which is as close as it gets to a job as of now and I would say I am all fired up to get shit done and I am also quite focused on doing the things that I have to do in a good and proper way (fixed sign quality; stability is prioritized) even though the situation rarely ever demands it; I would say I have good work ethic personally.

My midheaven is in my 10th house so there is not much to talk about there it is the most common case

My Sun which is the ruler of my 10th house is in 1st house placidus and I do resonate with that because my career, my legacy is of priority to me and I take that shit super seriously like it is this huge like goal of mine

Whereas with WS my Sun is in my 2nd house and to me that manifests in being very financially driven so while I do have a good work ethic if I find myself investing my time and energy into something long term that is not going to give me a financial ROI then I will look for something that does idc

My Sun trines my Saturn in the 9th house which does make me feel like that slowly but surely success in career vibes are relevant to me and that hard work and leaning into spiritual studies is going to be quite beneficial

My Sun is also square my Uranus in 4th house and I am not in a stage within my life in which I can quite explain that, however, I do think that shit constantly happening within my private life and home could potentially make me lose my focus and weaken my resolve at times butttt I always bounce back so it's oki

Thank you for reading <3

Masterlist

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[narcolini]

white room - pt. 3

johnny davis x gn!reader, 18+, canon typical themes and language, 4k words, 3 of ? part one | part two a/n: if anyone's curious, the fics named after the song white room by cream, which was both relevant enough, and playing on spotify at the time, to be chosen for such reasons skskssk gif credit to @hausofmamadas mi amor

Friday, well, that one turns out to be a movie. Not in the romantic feeling kind of way, but in the real movie theatre with a bucket of popcorn and everything else kind of way, and you would’a never expected that from a guy like Johnny. 

Really surprised you at first, caught you so off guard that you made him say it twice when he picked you up, but then he said besides riding and racing, movies are his favourite way to spend an hour or two, which really warmed you up to the idea. And you know, he wasn’t lying, neither. Everyone likes movies in some sort of way, sure, but Johnny? He loves them. Really really. His eyes lit all the way up when he told you which one he’d picked out for you, and you didn’t mind anywhere near enough to complain or choose something else, so that’s what you ended up doing.

And on the way there, he asks what your favourite thing is, for passing time and stuff, and you tell him, well, you suppose that’d be writing. So he says, books? And you says, yeah, stories. Adventures. 

“You ever think about writing a movie script?” he asks.

And you shrug, cause you ain’t never thought about it really. “I could do.”

“Bout some guy who starts a bike club?”

“Yeah, and he thinks he’s the coolest guy around, til he meets someone cooler, that is.” 

He smiles. “Oh, yeah?”

“Yeah, someone they call Lips.”

Then he’s laughing, and not looking at all where he’s going, eyes all sticky to yours, but the road's straight, so you figure it’s alright for a little while. “It’s good,” he says, “but, ah, I don’t think it’ll make it. Won’t get the audience, you know?”

“Sucks,” you tell him, “I had a real good feeling bout that one.”

Oh, and he picked you up in his car this time too, which you ain’t never seen before. With the bikes and the trucks, you thought you had his wheels all covered, but then he pulls up in this thing—real neat looking, all black and low to the ground, but not too showy, like something he could still put his girls in, when it’s his turn or something. And you know as much about cars as you do about bikes, which is nearly fuckin’ nothin, so you couldn’t tell him anything about it, other than it looks nice, and that he was in a real surprising mood today. Keeping you on your toes, you said. 

His reason was something about not wanting to leave his bike someplace he can’t get to in a pinch, and apparently that’s the movie theatre. So, you’re sitting next to him this time, instead of clinging on like a second jacket, and talking all that crap about movie scripts while he drives you there.

You figured you’d be feeling a sort of way about the car thing, cause you were getting real used to having him in front of you, really enjoying it, you know, but side by side? Well, that’s a whole other drug. Spent the whole ride so far just looking at him. At his face, his hands. His thighs in those washed out jeans of his—cause he sits the same in a car as he does on a bike, would you believe it, his knees all spread out like that. And sure, maybe it’s not polite to eat him up so much with your eyes, but you’re listening too, and talking when he needs something from you. 

Plus, you only caught him a couple times, but he’s been looking at you as much as you’re looking at him. At your jeans and thighs as well, you reckon. Between the both of you, you’ve made the car feel like one of those Swedish sauna things on wheels, or maybe it’s just you thinking that way, but your neck is hot, real world hot, and even your brow’s a little damp too. God, if he notices the sweat on you, you’ll be opening that door and rolling out onto the road before he can shout at you to stop. 

At one point, he says, “You like the bike or the car more?”

And you say back, “Well, whichever one you like driving, Johnny,” cause the real answer is that one makes you dizzy and the other makes you act like you ain’t never seen a man before. You’re not precious neither, about what he thinks of you, but you’re not gonna go and say something that’ll make you sound like that now, are you?

By the time you’re finally getting out of that thing, you’re thinking thank God, cause you don’t know how much longer you could’ve survived without taking one of his hands off that steering wheel just to feel some part of him. Not in a freaky way, you know, just something to stop you thinking all crazy like. Some little bit of him to hold on to, like you have on the bike. 

Who would’a known that was the lesser evil of the two, right? At least when you’re pressed up against him like that he can’t look at you, all hungry and curious like he has been doing—and you can’t look at him neither, but you can feel him. All big and strong and warm. Then you don’t gotta sit and wonder like you were just then, going all crazy thinking about how it would be, how it would, well, you know. With his hands and his face and his lips and stuff. Thinking bout that, you know. 

So you get out the car, and for a few minutes you’re free, feeling normal, and he buys the tickets and the candy, and the soda that you need dowsing with, and you think, yeah, sure, you can play nice. You’re chatting and laughing just like last time. And he’s letting you go in first, cause he’s a gentleman with things like that, so it’s easy to feel like you’re a respectable person still. 

But then you’re sitting next to him again, and this time it’s in the dark, and his knees are touching yours, actually touching, cause your seats are closer in the theatre and he’s still spread out like he’s got a damn engine under him. 

Like, fuck, you feel altogether insane by the time the movie’s going. 

No other man’s ever got you like this, right? Sure feels that way at least, like you’re fifteen again, and letting the kid next door take you out for the very first time. All heart hammering and sweating like you ain’t never kept a guy’s company before. 

Johnny don’t notice of course. He’s watching the movie with both hands on his lil’ pouch of M&Ms, and every time he laughs, he’s no idea that his knee’s rubbing up on yours or that his elbow’s bouncing right into your arm. You don’t tell him though, cause these are perfectly normal things to happen on a date, right, and you wouldn’t want him to stop, you only want your brain to quit thinking all these things you ain’t got the right to know yet. 

Like how his lips are so big and pretty looking. Like they’re made for kissing, carved out just for that one thing, but they don’t make his face any less handsome, right, and you certainly wouldn’t call him pretty allover. Just, rugged, you know. Good to look at. And, Jeez, you can’t even go five minutes without something like that. Wondering what his lips are really like to kiss, or whether he’s got any more tattoos any place you can’t see. 

It’s a good thing you ain’t supposed to talk in here, cause the way this is going, something might slip out that you really shouldn’t say. So you just keep looking forward and watching the movie that you’re already losing track of. 

_____

Turns out, biting your tongue is worth it sometimes, cause about half way in you get the answer to one of those crazy questions of yours.

Only a little something, but it gets your heart going all over again. Out of nowhere, his hand goes right there on the arm rest between you, and it’s not just resting, it’s inviting, cause the palms up, you know, waiting for you. And when you don’t move, like you might not’ve seen him do it, he reaches and puts his fingers through yours until, yeah, you’re holding hands, and he’s sitting them both in the middle right where he wanted them.

Before, you’d been wondering if his hands were as rough as they looked like, and well, now you know. And they are. But that bird tattoo, that swallow by his thumb? That’s smooth as anything, and once you start feeling it, you can’t stop. Running your own thumb all over it like you’re in love or something. But his hands are a little cool, you know, compared to yours, and you guess you got some habit you can’t help, about warming things up by rubbing them all sweet like that. 

You guess you’re also feeling like he’s sort of familiar already, and that’s what you do when you hold a hand and it’s one you’re used to, right?

But how’s he got you feeling that way after doing so little? Like he’s got you holding hands and tracing swallows and thinking about his thigh against yours, when really, you’ve seen him three times and that’s it. Which is next to nothing, you know? You haven’t even kissed him properly yet. The other night, when he dropped you home, you got a peck on the cheek and a mouthful of cologne and that was that. Which you’re not complaining about, course not, it sent your heart scattering like a mouse across the kitchen floor, but normally you got a real hold of yourself at a point like this. 

Instead, here you are, acting like you know who he is and what he looks like under all the layers. Acting like maybe you wouldn’t mind so much to one day marry a sort of guy like him—if you were to marry anyone at all, that is. You figure one like Johnny wouldn’t be too bad. Quiet when he needs to be, rough looking, but nice still. Someone you couldn’t bring to your mother but would bring to an office party. It could work, you know, if you were ever really wanting something like that to work. 

Boy, you’re almost making yourself sick thinking about it. You barely know the guy and you got no interest in marrying, not any time soon, and God knows Johnny ain’t wanting that either, so what does it matter to you? You’re just thinking all sorts of things for the sake of thinking them—just to avoid thinking about all the other things that you’re trying not to think about and, yeah, you’re really going round in circles about it. If he could hear you now, he’d be leaving you right there in the dark. 

Then he breathes by your ear, and he’s whispering about the girl on screen looking like his Aunt Tina in a hair piece, and you laugh so loud the people in front turn round to shoot you with their eyes—until they see Johnny, that is. Cause then it’s right back to the screen again like they didn’t see nothing. Even in the dark, when all you can make out is what the light off the screen gives you, that jacket of his means something. One look at the leather and the patches and, whoosh. Suddenly nobody’s got the guts to say anything about it.

And the worst part? That all makes you feel even more like you’d marry him. Or someone like him, if it came up, of course. You’re even squeezing his hand a little afterwards, like you’re thanking him for it even though he didn’t do nothin. Just sat there looking mean, you know. 

But maybe you want someone sitting there looking mean. Maybe you don’t wanna be doing it for yourself no more, and are perfectly happy to let someone like Johnny do it for you.

Who knows, but you really should be watching the movie now anyhow, cause he’s gonna ask you all about it, you’re sure, and you don’t even know any of their names yet.  

_____

“So you like it?” he says after, just like you knew he would, when you’re walking back over the lot to that four wheel surprise of his. 

“Yeah, I think so.”

“What, you only think you like it?” He throws you one of them big, crumply, frowns, with a cigarette bouncing in his mouth already. “How can you not know if you liked it or not?”

“I’m still deciding,” you tell him, cause you are, cause you were distracted for most of it. But that part you’re not telling. “I know I prefer things where I can talk to you, though. Face to face and stuff.”

He don’t smile but his eyes do, and you know before he says anything, that he’s gonna say something in a real sort of a way, just to get a rise outta you. “There I was,” he says, “thinking I was doing something good, you know. Giving you a break from all that talking, Lips.”

“No way.” There it is. “That’s not stickin, Johnny.”

“Yeah…” He nods in a sorry looking way. “I kinda think it already has.” 

“And I kinda think three dates is enough. How’s that for thinkin?”

“Oh, calling it then, are you?”

“Yeah, I am.” But neither of you are pretending like you believe it, not even for a bit of a game to play; like it’s a given that you’re lying, you know, three dates and he and you both know you’re sticking around for more. No question. “You ever gonna light that thing?” you ask, pointing to the long smoke dangling over his chin. You’re at the car now and he still ain’t touched it, acting like he’s not even thought about it since he put it there.

“Was getting round to it,” he says, making no move to do anything other than standing there looking at you.   

And you’re looking right back. 

It’s dark out already, cause that movie was longer than you thought it’d be, but there’s enough street lights round here that nothin’s really hurting by it. He’s just got a little orange on him, shoulders glowing like you’re sitting with a campfire or something. 

So you lean back against his car, right on the driver’s side, and ask him what he thought of the movie, cause you can tell he’s thinking a lot on something or other, so you figure it’s probably that. And he sets off talking like you’re right, going on about one of them cowboys in particular, but you gotta admit, you're not listening to a word of it.

Real bad manners it is, really awful of you to get a guy talking and not even hear one thing he says, but Jeez, you’re just watching those lips and that cigarette and not helping yourself in any sort of way at all. You just agree and shake your head when it feels like the right thing to do—and you know you’re making it obvious, may as well be screaming kiss me, Johnny, kiss me, but he just keeps going. Talking more than you ever heard him talk about anything. 

And right when you think he might ask you something, or call you up on that look you’re giving him, he takes the smoke from his mouth and tosses it. Never even lit, clean as the day they made it, and he throws it right into that grimy little puddle there with no warning at all. He could’a kept it you know, put it back in the box and had it later, if he didn’t want it no more.

“What d’you do that for?” you ask him.

He says, “You wanna go?” 

It’s the way his voice sounds when he asks, it makes you frown a little. Like he’s upset or something. Or maybe, and most likely, he saw how rude you were being and got worked up about it, instead of going the other way. And you wanna tell him it’s not that at all, and you’re sorry, yeah, you’ll listen better now, but all you can do is shake your head at him. 

No, you don’t wanna go. What you want is—well, you’re trying to be good about it, cause he said before that you’re the first person he’s looked at in any real sort of way since Betty left, and that’s a whole load of weird, every step of the way for him, you know—but, God, what you really wanna do is kiss him. You want to kiss him. 

Guess he’s used to you by now, cause you’ve been so quiet that he notices something off about it. Then he don’t look upset, or mad, he just looks confused when he asks, “You okay?”

 Well, then you figure, screw being nice, just for a little bit. 

“I’m thinking it’s getting real hard to look and not touch,” you say.

Slips right out of you, gone without stopping, but you said it in a dazed kind of way, so it came out sort of nice, you guess. Honest without being crazy about it. And he says nothin, no surprise right, but you do catch something—yeah, right there, he goes and does it again—his eyes drop from looking at yours, to looking down at your mouth. Bingo. He’s thinking about it too. All you can do is wait it out.

After a second that feels like a minute that feels like an hour, his head shakes halfway and he says, “I don’t,” but that’s all he says, I don’t. Then he goes and pulls you into him. 

Just like that.

Two hands, either side of your face, scratchy on your cheek and cool feeling cause you got hot real fast, and then he’s kissing you. Not quick like some other guy might, but slow and careful like a man really thinking about it. Kissing you like. Well. Like nobody’s ever been kissing you before. 

You feel yourself curling in, right up close to him, and grabbing onto the edges of his jacket a little. Letting him kiss you, not the other way around, but doing all you can to keep it going, you know, cause you can tell by his lips, by the way he’s moving, he’s still sort of worrying about it. Like he knows how to but can’t remember yet, or doesn’t know if he likes your mouth enough to forget about the last one he was used to. 

And you’re not caring about anything to do with any of that, you’re just making sure you remember every bit of this, incase he decides he don’t like it after all.

But he keeps going still, and your mouth starts tasting like his mouth, which is like a load of ash and candy, cause he’s a sweet tooth, you know, who knew, and he was tossing them back like water in there. Which you’re glad of, cause somehow it’s all adding up to taste like the best sort of thing you’ve ever had, and you don’t think he’d get that title if it was just the cigarettes on his tongue.

When he pulls back—and God, you fight him on it—you make a noise like he hurt you. Embarrassing, right? A little whimper like an animal, or something, and that makes him keep you real close for a sec, just to be sure he didn’t actually hurt you somehow. Then you’re both saying “sorry” at the same time, for some reason. Sorry, you know, over nothin. 

And that’s dumb enough that you laugh right up against his lips, and he breathes in a lazy sort of way, all heavy like he’s not had his fill yet. 

Well, you’re already standing straight again and letting go of his jacket, cause it seems impolite to be tugging on him like that now he’s waiting a little, and one of his hands moves to your neck like he’s trying to leave but can’t make his body listen to his head. 

Course, you don’t mind either way. He could have another, or he could shove his hands in his pockets and rush you into the car, and you wouldn’t complain one bit because now you know. You know what it’s like. 

You’re smiling still too, while he looks at you all hungry like, and you know it’s in your mouth and your eyes and the way you find yourself saying to him,

“Take me home?”

Which is the wrong fuckin’ thing to say apparently, because his hands drop off you so quick it almost stings. Like you were never hot, he was, and now he ain’t there holding you the cold is real sharp feeling. Then he steps back a bit, and he’s clearing his throat and rubbing his nose with his knuckles, and you figure you’ve scared all of that right back out of him again.

“You know,” he says, like it really hurts him to say it, “I—I can’t. I mean. I don’t wanna rush into nothin with us, you know?” 

“I know,” you tell him. “Who’s rushing anything?”

You watch him scratch the back of his neck—always itching when he’s trying to get outta something, yeah, you seen him do it enough times already—and he’s screwing his face up like you ain’t getting it, and he can’t think of any way to put it that'll help. “We should probably, I mean.”

“You gonna tell me you don’t wanna date me no more?” you ask him.

Which is funny, cause you said that before he kissed you, and neither of you meant it then, but now there’s a little sour guy in your gut saying maybe, just maybe, you know. 

“No, no.” He shakes his head, voice all whiny like it actually is hurting. 

“Well what is it then?”

“I know how you get, yeah…you, when it gets like that. Taking you home, staying over. I mean," and then he says, "I can’t give you a life, you know?”

You stare at him real hard. “Did I ask you to?”

“Not yet, but,” he shrugs, “I’ve done all that before.”

A part of you is thinking, God, worrying about all that already? This guy’s a real piece of work. But the sensible part thinks, yeah, you too, even if you weren’t really thinking in any serious kinda way—plus he’s got a divorce two steps behind him, so why wouldn’t he be worrying about it? He’s figuring all this out like it’s brand fuckin’ new, and all the while trying to make sure you’re not getting cut up in the process. A little early on, sure, but that’s what you gotta do, right? Clear the gutter out before the rain comes.

So you tell him, “I only wanna spend time with you, Johnny.”

And he thinks on that, looking like he don’t believe anyone could ever say it and mean it, then he says, “S’pose that’s alright then, if that’s what it is.”

And you say, “Yeah, that’s what it is.” 

And when he drives you home, he’s got one hand on the wheel, and the other on his thigh, and you put your pinky round his like you’re scared of holding it proper. Scared of touching him like you’re used to doing it, and scared of him dropping you off without saying nothing else at all. Just your pinky and his pinky, and the radio on quiet like you’re dreaming, or something. 

But then it comes to it, and you get another taste of candy and ash right under your porch light.

It’s short and a little polite, like Mrs Saccone might be watching, but that don’t matter, cause you figure it means he’s decided you’re alright spending time with him still. Not rushing into nothing, yeah? 

He’s half-way down the steps again when he says, “See you tomorrow, Lips,” and he don’t even know if you’re free for him or not. Which you guess means you haven't scared him off at all, if that’s what it is. 

_________________

part four >>>>>>>

taglist: @garbinge @drabbles-mc @ashlingiswriting @raven-black102 @lyralu91 @hoodeddreams13 @businesscalamity

[canmom]

Hello! I absolutely love your blog, everything from your festival recounts to animation analysis and programming (one of tumblr's recommended posts was the one where you made your own rasteriser, and I liked your attitude in what I've read so much that I'm gonna attempt to conquer my 3-year-long grudge against using opengl during college and do something similar now that I'm a bit older and have no deadlines :D).

But anyway, I have 2 questions (sorry if there's easily accessible answers, tumblr search is not helping): 1. During your animation nights, does the screen stay black while everyone watches their own video while you provide commentary? I haven't caught any yet but maybe someday! And 2. do you have any youtube channels or just one-off video essays that you like that also cover animation/directors? Or, even programming lol.

Sorry for the long ask have a nice day!

hiii! i'm very touched that you like my dorky eclectic blog <3

For the Animation Nights, I just stream the video over Twitch from local sources on my computer, typically by playing the video in mpv and recording it in OBS. This is obviously not ideal from a video quality perspective, but it's the easiest way to watch video in sync without making everyone download files in advance. Then we all chat in the Twitch chat box (in large part to crack stupid jokes, it's not that highbrow lmao). I've gotten away with it so far!

As for youtube channels, I can recommend...

anime production/history (i.e. sakuga fandom)

SteveM is likely the most sakuga-fan affiliated anituber. He makes long, well-researched and in-depth videos on anime history, usually themed around a particular director or studio.

Pyramid Inu might be my fave anituber - very thoughtful analysis of Gundam, obscure mecha anime and oldschool BL and similar topics. tremendously soothing voice too.

The Canipa Effect does excellent deep dives into the production of specific shows, both western and anime. I appreciate the respect he gives to the Korean animators of shows like AtlA in particular!

Sean Bires's 2013 presentation on sakuga is pretty foundational to this whole subcultural niche, and a great place to get an introduction to the major animator names to know and significant points in the history of anime. unfortunately a couple of the segments got slapped down by copyright but the rest holds up!

animation theory (for animators and aspirants)

I'm going to focus here on resources that are relevant to animation in general, and 2D animation. if I was going to list every Blender channel we'd be here all week :p

New Frame Plus is one of the best channels out there for game animation, describing in tightly edited videos how animation principles work in a game context and analysing the animation of various games. highly recommend

Videogame Animation Study is similar, examining the animation of specific games in detail

the 'twelve principles of animation' (defined by Disney's Ollie Johnston and Frank Thomas) remain the standard approach to animation pedagogy; there are various videos on them, but Alan Becker (of Animator vs Animation) has quite a popular series. I haven't actually watched these but many people swear by them! Dermot O'Connor expands the list to 21. Note that some of the terminology can be a little inconsistent between different animators - c.f. 'secondary motion'...

Dong Chang is an animator at Studio NUT, who produces a lot of fantastic, succinct videos on standard techniques in the anime industry, timesheet notations, etc. etc. Studio Bulldog, a small anime studio, are a good complement; they focus more on douga than genga and are generally a bit more traditional.

programming

big topic here, I'm going to focus on game dev and tech art since that's my field. but also some general compsci stuff that's neat

SimonDev - graphics programmer with a bunch of AAA experience, fantastic explanations of advanced optimisations and some of the more counterintuitive aspects of rendering

Acerola - graphics programmer who makes very detailed guides to a variety of effects with a very rapid and funny 'guy that has seen monogatari' editing style. When he's good, he's really good. His video on water is probably the best one I've seen (though I can recommend a couple of others).

TodePond - the most charming, musical videos about recursion and cellular automata you've ever seen. less programming tutorial and more art in themselves.

Ben Eater - known for his breadboard computer series, a fantastic demonstration of how to go from logic gates up to the 6502 with actual hardware. worth watching just for how clean he puts the wires on his breadboards like goddamn man

Sebastian Lague, Useless Game Dev - both do 'coding adventure' style videos where they spend a few weeks on some project and then document it on Youtube, resulting in a huge library of videos about all sorts of fascinating techniques. great to dive into

Freya Holmér - creator of the 'shapes' library, makes videos on mathematical programming, with gorgeously animated vector graphics. Her video on splines is a particular treat.

There are definitely many more channels I can recommend on these subjects, but I'll need to dig into my history a bit - unfortunately I need to rush out right now, but hopefully that should be good to be getting going with!

[asteriass]

Till’s “All-in” cover & Round 7 parallels

Something I’ve told myself since yesterday is if Till is truly to die in Round 7, “wouldn’t the team go all-in? Why did they not?” & That line of thought brought to mind Hyuna’s All-in song lol… but then Till’s cover of All-in came to mind because of that… & then the I remembered the tape on that song’s cover art, exactly where Till’s wound is in Round 7….

One thing to also note about the song is its clear themes of rebellion and going against all odds, & how even if victory seems slim to some, the resistance will push back against the cheers of the aliens.

“Step all over me but I'll rise again It's you who's in the wrong, bet you had no idea”

Of course this lyric showcases that too, but what I’ve seen theorised is that the last line of the lyric (amongst a few others in the song too) could also be referencing Luka as well (due to Luka’s potential role in Hyuna’s personal life)

Generally who is chosen for which cover doesn’t SPECIFICALLY reference their canonical standing. But changes are made to the delivery of the lyrics to fit each characters and their dynamics and positions. Thus I do find it interesting that a song like this was chosen for Till.

Even the cover image almost directly references Till’s position in Round 7! Plus it’s interesting that a song that references rebellion and resistance against the aliens’ expectation as they are cheering, a song that potentially references Luka’s methods, also aligns with Till’s position in Round 7!

The aliens are cheering against him towards the end of the round, they’ve voted for Luka’s win, stepping all over his ambitions and being.

(Note: the purple glow sticks, the aliens’ cheering isn‘t in support of Till, but rather against him)

Additionally, Till was able to break away from Luka’s impact on him in the last moment (because he saw Mizi), he proved Luka’s tried and tested method wrong

Perhaps the cover carries a greater relevance to Till’s role in the final round?

Even if it seems that by this point “There's no point fighting back”, he’s lost, he’s done for - his rebellion has been snuffed out, perhaps even in such a bleak moment, Till’s resistance will “rise” above the attempts to step over him.

“I'll create a fantasy in this crazy world And change it all, I'm going all-in”

If it means to survive and see his ambitions be realised, he’ll go all-in, even if hope seems bleak in that last moment, even if he’s been trampled on.

Which thus brings us back to the tape covering where his wound is, and thus blocking him from bleeding out (like the aliens would want cuz he’s lost).

Food for thought I suppose lol

[sineala]

I subscribe to the newsletter of an author I like who wrote a book about 9/11 and the War on Terror and the security state in the US and how it led to the election of Trump, and it's all very serious but apparently the author is writing an Iron Man comics series. I don't read the comics, and a lot of what I know about them comes from your fic, so I'm honestly not sure how much fanon vs canon knowledge I have. 😂 But the series sounds like it might be interesting I think? The author talked about it in his newsletter today. (This link should work. Probably.)

https://www.forever-wars.com/iron-man-how-to-blow-up-a-pipeline-succession/

I am actually really excited about this run! I try not to get excited about new Iron Man runs because chances are high that my hopes and dreams will be crushed, and I know that just because someone writes, say, stunningly excellent non-fiction, it is not a guarantee that they will be great at writing fiction at all or superhero comics specifically (cf. Ta-Nehisi Coates on Cap), but judging by everything Spencer Ackerman's been saying in interviews, his run sounds like it's going to explore a lot of interesting themes.

The post you linked links to an AIPT podcast that he was on a few days ago to talk about his new Iron Man run. For those of you who don't listen to podcasts (this is also me), the Iron Man subreddit has what seems like a fairly comprehensive summary of the interview, and I am really looking forward to the run. Issue #1 apparently hits stores on October 23.

But I will tell you why I am actually now really excited about this run. It's not relevant to anything about the comic itself. I am nonetheless very excited.

Last month, after he was announced as the new Iron Man writer, in order to hype up his run, he posted an offer on his blog: if you add the run to your pull list, and you email him proof that you're pulling his run and include a snail-mail address, he will mail you some cool Iron Man stickers.

I eventually got around to doing this last week. I was assuming he didn't actually pay attention to any of these emails so I dashed off a couple sentences about how I was looking forward to his take on Tony because he'd posted a photo of the Iron Man comics he was reading for research and several of them were among my favorites. And then I went off to get bagels.

By the time I had come back with bagels, twenty minutes later, he'd written me a very nice reply substantively engaging with the content of my extremely off-the-cuff message -- geez, if I'd known he was going to be actually reading them I would have put a lot more thought into it, you know? It was very kind and I was not expecting it.

He spelled my first name wrong in the reply, despite it being in the email header and also the name I had signed the email with.

This happens to me a lot. I have a first name that is very common in a lot of languages, but none of those languages are English. I'd say there's a 50-50 chance that a native English speaker will spell or pronounce my name wrong. This is unfortunate, because I live in the US and mostly interact with native English speakers. (My wife @lysimache immediately knew how to pronounce my name. I mean, it wasn't why I married her or anything, but I feel like it was a big plus on a personal level.)

If I have to give my name for something, I will reflexively spell it. The second-to-last time I voted, they'd switched voter lookup to you giving them your name rather than you giving your street address, which was a surprise that filled me with dread. My wife was in line ahead of me and she was completely finished voting by the time the poll workers had finished correctly spelling my name. (The last time I voted, I just handed them my ID, which is not required in my state, but I really wanted this to go faster.) I went to the doctor last week, and when they called my name in the waiting room, they said it wrong. I corrected them. They said it differently wrong a couple minutes later. I corrected them again. They said it wrong again. At that point I gave up.

(If I could think of a name I liked better that I was absolutely sure that most people could spell and pronounce, I would change my name. I still have not found one.)

So, you know, I'm used to it. It happens. Frequently. I was not at all surprised that he spelled it wrong.

He then emailed me again to apologize for spelling my name wrong. Like, immediately. One minute later. He said he was sorry and he knew a lot of people with a similar name.

Dude. Nobody does that. Nobody actually apologizes. Especially not in an email to a rando like me. He did not need to do that. At all. I was not expecting him to do that. He did that. I was honestly touched. No one bothers to do that. But he did.

I got my stickers in the mail yesterday.

I have redacted the portion of the note that has my name in it, but he absolutely spelled my name correctly.

Mr. Ackerman, sir, I hope your comic sells a million copies.

[hongluboobs]

ok i was cooking up another hong lu analysis thing bc i noticed SEVERAL things in his base id art the other day and wanted to share with the class but they just dropped a new one in the canto V trailer and i have some stuff i wanna talk about that one:)

My Hong Lu knowledge and interpretation is very heavily influenced by reading Dream of the Red Chamber, which may not be the best because I don’t know how much Limbus will pull from the book because it’s Long as fuck but I think it’s given me a deeper knowledge of Hong Lu.

Keep in mind this ego is NOT out yet so i could be totally off base depending on what the full animation/corrosion/sin affinities are like and this is totally theorizing but I wanted to have a go at anyway!! And this got totally out of hand so reading is appreciated :)

One of the first things I noticed here is this Hong Lu seems VERY Bao-yu. We still don’t know for sure what Hong Lu is within the context of Red Chamber (i don’t think it’ll be straightforward considering how that book works) but it’s important to note!

He has this little hat on (this is the best pic i can get atm to show it’s not a fancy hair tie, unfortunately the footage we have rn is a little scuffed)

and Bao-yu is ALWAYS depicted with a hat like this.

This could just be because that’s the appropriate outfit for Chinese nobility (I unfortunately have little to no reference point here, feel free to correct me, but from some quick searches hats aren’t ubiquitous and ESPECIALLY not ones of this style.) I think it’s worth noting because it comes up in nearly all modern depictions of Bao-yu.

There’s also the pearl Hong Lu is wearing on his neck/chest area, which is where Bao-yu wears the magic jade he was born with. His jade is translated into Limbus as Hong Lu’s jade eye, but this plus his hat and the abno’s themes REALLY makes me think we are dealing with some Bao-Yu stuff here.

Speaking of the Abno’s themes, now i can actually go over them! All we have for Walking Pearl right now is the MD event (as well as general observation), but there’s a few things that are relevant.

Just based off design, the abnormality seems to be mostly about the precious (the pearl) and the filth (the muck) intermixing. which makes sense with the EGO being named “Effervescent Corrosion” and our holders being Hong Lu and Rodya.

There’s some symbolism around greed/wealth (the offspring filled muck desiring the pearl and fighting for which one will earn it? the muck tarnishing the pearl? ) and I think we should read into that because it’s Hong Lu and Rodya who have this one and they’re both very tied to their financial status. Those two sharing an ego makes me insane for a bunch of reasons but that’s probably for another analysis piece! But duality is REALLY important for those guys and that’s a theme they’re emphasizing here with both the pearl and muck within the clam.

There’s also some elements of shelter/protection/potentially entrapment with the clam’s shell which are HUGE for Hong Lu, especially with his egos so I think those may come up.

But mostly it’s about the mixing of the precious (likely “wealth” here) and the unsavory, which works very well with what we know of the Jia family. The design likely referencing Bao-yu and thematically dealing with the Jia family makes me think each of those individual readings are more likely because they’re deeply tied together!

And now onto the MD event! I did not write this in order so I may repeat stuff here but. I realized I had to cover the design first so here we are!

First thing that stuck out of me is this portion when you choose to sample some of the clam’s slime.

Sibling/family infighting is very Jia family. It reminds me a lot of this line base Hong Lu says.

You could take this a step further because the clam is something that would typically offer shelter from the rest of the world, and even though it protects, its offspring continue to kill and eat each other.

It seems fine, the offspring have this lovely shell for protection, and they have the precious pearl held within, but even as they are sheltered and wealthy. They are still getting killed and eaten by one another! Reminds me of someone I know:)

It reminds me of some bits in the later half of Red Chamber, where family members more obviously start acting behind each other’s backs or turning on each other, some even killing other family members.

Another part of the MD event that I got something out of was the beginning portion.

using specifically jade as the color for the seawater is a Hong Lu thing. I may be reaching with this bc it’s more than likely just flavor text BUT when taking this color with the fact that there’s nothing in the water it makes me think of an important scene in Red Chamber where Bao-Yu is described as an empty shell, so I wanted to mention it. We know Hong Lu has TONS of water motifs, especially when relating to his family (see his base ego)

The main reason I brought up this section of the MD event is because of the question brought up by the last portion.

If you take one thing from Dream Of The Red Chamber into your perception of Hong Lu as a character, it should be the themes of ambiguity, duality, and being between binaries. Because he sure as hell does that a lot!!! (and i’m not just talking about his gender) He is both genuinely curious and sheltered with an urge to learn as much as he can, but he also plays dumb frequently, backpedals and asks a lot of stupid questions on purpose to maintain others’ perceptions of him. He is CONSTANTLY walking the line between truth and illusion and it can be hard to tell which is which and precisely how much is fake or real, which is why I find him such an interesting character to think about.

Tangent about Hong Lu's characterization aside, it's really easy to read this line as about his family's perceptions of him.

Hong Lu (or rather, Bao-yu) can be read as being the source of the contamination in that he is the heir of the Jia family who is just an absolute fucking failure of everything you’d want in an heir for that time period.

The clam containing the filth can be read as Hong Lu’s lies (whether conscious lies or otherwise) to himself and others about the true “filth” of his family. Really good example of this is with another bit of window dialogue, but these lies and half truths come up quite a bit if you know where to look. (what happened to cohort of kin looking to stab each other in the back at every turn???)

We already have Hong Lu’s assorted water motifs (his feet make ripples on the water in his base id, land of illusion has so much water theming and shows the Jia mansion is surrounded by water) so I think this is a reasonable analysis to make :)

There’s some other sections to the MD event, but there’s nothing of note that triggered the Hong Lu sleeper agent in my brain & also this has gone on long enough that I wanna talk about predicting some stuff for the ego!

I am manifesting Gluttony/Gloom/Wrath for this ego!!

Gluttony and gloom are in the MD event’s skill check already and I think tie in nicely with the themes. Gluttony works with the offspring in the muck killing and eating each other and themes of greed with the pearl (plus the ego is primarily green and that’s a pretty good clue) and then gloom comes up a LOT with Hong Lu’s family (Liu Hong Lu, the only one that remarks on his jade eye, is also the only Hong Lu with gloom. land of illusion requires 5 gloom resources and also relates a lot to red chamber/his family) Gloom’s also generally a stand-in for water which exists here.

Wrath in Hong Lu generally manifests in him going “yeah, maybe my family was a little fucked up actually” internally, instead of manifesting as taking direct action about the fucked up things like it works for most other sinners, and acknowledging that his family was at least partially filth and killing and eating eachother (metaphorically. maybe literally) works for that

i am not an expert on sin analysis but i wanted to take a prediction bc it’s fun :)

I have a couple of predictions for corrosion and i’ll be real they are the main reason i wrote this thing because i LOVE when bad things happen to Hong Lu!!

Since this ego seems to be referencing Bao-yu so much i can pull stuff from Red Chamber too which makes it more fun :)

First one I came up with is Hong Lu taking the place of the pearl within the clam and getting locked in there! A bunch of his egos have to do with being controlled/trapped so i think it works and it also can work as a parallel for Bao-yu’s treatment by his family. Bao-yu’s name means precious jade, and he’s often treated more like his namesake than a person, heavily controlled and never allowed to leave the Jia mansion (or, in this case, the clam.) I just think it’d be fun!

My other concept has to do with more Red Chamber stuff, notably what happens when Bao-yu loses his jade. I’m not quite there yet in the text, but from what i’ve heard he becomes incredibly unstable and essentially loses his mind. This sets the Jia family’s downfall into even faster motion and from that point things get REALLY fucked up. Since the pearl here parallels Bao-yu’s jade, I think having a reference to that part of the book would be really fucking crazy for all 5 people who have read 1800+ pages of red chanber to get to chapter 94 where he loses that thing. Also i just want to see Hong Lu lose his mind i KNOW it would be terrifying and chilling. but they may be saving that for his distortion (manifesting)

In my skimming Red Chamber table of contents to find when Bao-yu loses his jade i just found a chapter where Bao-yu’s father admires a pearl but we will just ignore that for now bc this has taken long enough to type already and that is several chapters off. but there may be more analysis when this thing actually comes out!

Thank you for reading this far!! I hope you enjoyed me looking far too deep into an unreleased ego we know next to nothing about for fun! this took WAY longer than expected to type out but i’m glad I did because I loveee telling people about Hong Lu!

There is a very real chance very little of my analysis and prediction is reflected in canon BUT please remember that truth becomes fiction when the fiction’s true and even if this doesn’t turn out to be correct now u know a little more about Hong Lu and the themes he plays with :)

[crinolinecuriousity]

so glad to know that weird girl culture is alive and well every year when I see the Stuck at Prom gallery... here are some faves from this year’s gallery, all of which were not finalists. 

view the whole gallery and vote for the winners here!

Lizbeth -  there were a handful of outfits that were inspired by cultures but this one was one of my favorites, a love the color scheme, the fringe, and the bow, I think she did a very good job and I could genuinely see someone wearing this on the runway!

Elizabeth - really liked her colors, which she said was inspired by a peacock at her house I think? but what stuck out to me was the gradient on the edge of her skirt and the straps

Presley - I can definitely see why she wasn’t a finalist but she also looks gorgeous, I think it’s hard to pull off a mostly solid red dress and she genuinely looks like a Disney princess

Jadyn - genuinely cannot believe she was not a finalist. like the first picture literally does not look like duct tape, you could tell me it was a fabric costume on Broadway and I would believe you.

Catrielle - another one I can’t believe wasn’t a finalist! there are always a handful of outfits that use gold but I love what she did with it. plus the shoes and the bag?? love love love

Ava - I could LITERALLY see this at the Met Gala red carpet. the detailing is insane and the skirt came out looking really nice and even. she looks gorgeous!

Ritika - there were a couple of circle skirts but this was one of my favorites. her theme of harmony seemed relevant with a lot of the current events going on as well - the skirt is colorful but isn’t distracting and I think it’s a more elaborate dress that actually manages to pull off the busier look

Veronica - I DEFINITELY think she should have been a finalist for suits. like I think this outfit is more compelling and has a cooler background (Filipina culture) than like. the white(?) guy who just made a samurai suit. I really love how she like... feminized the suit jacket if that makes sense? I think she slayed it

Madyson - this one was so fun to look at! I love the manta ray bag and the sand dollar earrings too, I would love to see a fabric rendition of this dress. you can tell she had a lot of fun making it from the pictures, too.

Eliza - this one was inspired by a Shakespeare line if I remember correctly and it really reminds me of old 80s/90s catalogues. was really impressed by the puffed sleeves!

Owen - there’s always more dresses than suits entered since most of the competitors are girls. this was a suit that was inspired by the AIDS crisis quilts, I think he should have been a finalist and he looks more put together than some of the suit finalists

Kendyl - this one was insane to me - she looks gorgeous and I could see this being a real fabric prom dress or a dress a celeb wears on the red carpet. I can’t get past the detailing and the ruffles?? insanely talented

Lily - personally I think this suit would have looked better without the rectangles on the pant legs but that being said, I love this outfit so much, you can tell what she drew inspiration from and I think it’s simple but classy and it works beautifully. I could see this on the runway!

[delawaredetroit]

According to you, Bakugou doesn't have a lot of relevant weight in the plot even though he was the one who ended up with AFO and learned to be a hero? Aren't these important concepts in bnha, what does it mean to be a real hero? Besides he had even better fights than Midoriya and he did achieve his goal, horikoshi indeed treated him like a main character.

Okay, I'll break this down one at a time.

Bakugou landing the final blow on prepubescent All for One is not a theme, it's a plot point.

Yes, learning to be a hero is a running theme throughout BNHA and it applies to any number of characters outside of Bakugou including Izuku, Ochako, Iida, Shouto, etc. However, Bakugou is one of the least effective applications of that theme.

There are other characters who more effectively implemented the aspects of the becoming a true hero character arc like (1) a hero initially in the business for monetary gain (Ochako and Mount Lady), (2) the hero hopeful who didn't prioritize saving others (Iida), and (3) the hostile hero student who didn't respect others (Shouto).

Why were their arcs more effective? Because BNHA was also about going beyond expectations (plus ultra). It took Bakugou until the end of Act Three to meet society's existing definition of a hero. Saving and cooperation mattered even during All Might's time. And it's unclear even at the end of it all whether Bakugou just incorporated saving as an element of winning rather than valuing it for its own sake.

Compare that with say Ochako or Iida. Ochako always understood the value of saving in the abstract (see the entrance exam), but it was secondary to her personal financial goals. Saving became her priority as a hero after the Overhaul Arc. From the Joint Training Arc on, she went beyond the standard concept of a hero by including heroes and villains in who she believed should be saved.

Early on, Iida outright ignored those in danger in the entrance exam (Izuku and Ochako) and during the Hero Killer Arc (Native) in the pursuit of his own goals. He determined that while he still believed Stain was a terrible villain, he was right about Iida not being fit as he was to be a true hero. He worked hard to become a more selfless person. By the Provisional Licensing Exam, he was sprinting past the expectations of a pro hero by making sure all of his classmates passed the first round before passing himself.

These last few comments seem to be a dig at Izuku for some reason. I have no idea what you mean by better fights. Better by what metric? Since Bakugou is more of a natural genius character, his fights tend to be more fluid in a purely visual sense compared to Izuku's fights. But fights in shounen manga are vehicles for communication, confrontations of opposing forces or ideas. Bakugou is so self-absorbed as a character that his fights are rarely interesting in this way because he refuses to listen to others for the most part.

Neither Izuku nor Bakugou achieved all of their goals. Izuku did not physically save Shigaraki. Bakugou's stated goal since the beginning of BNHA was to become number one hero, and he was still not number one hero in the final chapter.

Bakugou is certainly written with some standard shounen protagonist tropes with the ugliest aspects of them cranked up to eleven. He's far too sequestered from most of the main plotline to be "the main character" of BNHA though.

[accio-victuuri]

April CPNs round-up! ❤️💛💚

• BJYX shows up in station sisters team building photos/videos. proving that the pairing is still very much relevant and loved 🫶🏼

• allegedly spending some time together 4/2 and 4/3 when yibo went to shanghai

• cql and xz gets mentioned in a livestream for WoF

• wyb with a beaded bracelet that seems to be a clue that he spent time with GG ; more on the initial thoughts about the bracelet and why give an obsidian one

•zsww fake rumor of their meet up

•their love for watching old cctv spring festival gala sketches

• 4/8, in the FPU douyin update, he continues on with the dog theme ☺️ he really is a puppy! gouzaizai!

• not really a cpn/candy but their name side by side for the alleged registration list for Magnolia Award. i’m just so proud and as a cpf, it feels good seeing them succeed. 👏🏼👏🏼👏🏼

• 4/8 cpns : fan used for camping that xz uses, the number 38 and us clowning about concerts

• some are comparing this interaction between wyb and hjy in FPU bts with how he is with GG. saying when he is hurt, he goes all out and shows it to GG but with others he won’t say anything. i agree that this thing is true both for GG/WYB, meaning they only show “weakness” to each other 🥺🥺🥺

* throwback post : fake rumor story during cql shoot of someone that works closely with yibo

• this side by side photo, they look alike in this profile!

• 4/16/24 zsww rumor

• the rumor that wyb visited LOZ shoot and my thoughts on it ; i know i cannot stop people from “enjoying” this material and what it potentially implies but i personally cannot condone the type of behavior that disrespects them. especially xz who has been v frustrated with the leaks happening in his project. and just to dispel the rumors, this is who people are saying is supposedly yibo ⬇️⬇️⬇️

🤦‍♀️🤦‍♀️🤦‍♀️🤦‍♀️

no shade to this guy. he was just a victim of people’s overzealous tendencies. this is not the first time cpfs have done this, in OOL and OnO we’ve had questionable video evidences too which is most likely not who we think it is. please stop. it’s not just the leaks. we have to protect them. we know they visit each other, let’s just bridge the clues with what they give us. we cpn that they visit the ST or probably even follow certain cpf accounts, there is just no universe that they will see this kind of conversations related to leaked photos and videos and be happy about it.

• DESCENDANTS OF THE SUN AU 😭😭😭😭 idk man. military/police wyb and doctor xz pairing is really top notch!

• 4/19 xiao zhan weibo post for the 6th solar term - Guyu ( Grain Rain ) and all the clowning: one / two

• 4/20 zsww rumor ; hinting at them working on a project where one will direct and the other will act

• WYB’s GQ hat could be a custom made one from Tod’s????

• A new explanation about the mystery driver and comparing it to the mask WYB uses

• There has been some conversation because of WYB’s bazaar shoot with his FPU co star/team and that it’s no longer just XZ that he has done that with. Well i have to say that no matter what people say, the bazaar one with XZ is different. just the production value and theme of it — was more romantic and WYB was totally expressive. plus don’t forget that the shoot for that was where xz called him Venus. it will always be special, cause it’s just the 2 of them. there is no use comparing, i bet you, xz will have a joint cover or spread for LOCH with the female lead. it is part of marketing.

• yibo and his rainbow necklace 🌈

• I will add this here cause i don’t think it needs a separate post with how galaxy brain it is. it’s about certain photos uploaded by YBO being 2.3 MB in size. 23 love zhan. whether this is intentional or something special. who knows. it just came up again this month because the bear photo is with the same file size. 🤷🏻‍♀️

other instances are outlined by this account on weibo :

February 3, 2:30 pm (Picture 1) // May 11 (Picture 3) // June 1st, Children’s Day, “Children are in love” (Picture 5) // August 5th, birthday composition (Picture 7)// November 22 (Picture 9)

• 4/29 zsww fake rumor

• GUCCI wall 2.0 is close to Lacoste big screen ad! oh the possibilities!

• 4/29 candies to enjoy ( includes: their promos not overlapping, jiayou parallel, double standards and the bead bracelet discussion again )

See you all next month! ✌🏼💛

<<< previous month

[desultory-novice]

New PFP? :O

Yep!

The black dahlia was always a little depressing anyway. I wanted something Kirby-themed and I remembered that gorgeous sun and moon stained glass bg tucked away in Milky Way Wishes!

(I have so many thoughts on that! Well, I say "thoughts," but mostly those thoughts are "OMG WHAT?! Why does this EXIST?! Is it relevant?! Did Marx see this and get inspired for his plan?! Did the sun and moon fight some time ago in ancient history?! Is that ancient conflict how he got them to fight again in the present day?!")

Ahem.

I was also thinking of a general re-theming for this blog actually?? Turn it into a 100% Kirby specific blog and then make a new blog for unrelated art and personal topics so y'all can be free of my moody stuff but... I'm not sure I can be bothered to do all that work yet! XD

(Plus then I might have to rename this one's url to something Kirby themed and then everyone who tagged me would suddenly be defunct and I don't like when other blogs do that so why would I do that to mine yadda yadda...)

[vriska]

i think the reason toga died was because horikoshi sensei wanted to see what we could create out of it and he knew that no yuri love story could ever be normal . he knew that he cooked up some fire yuri and went "no, no. one of them has to die."

im sorry but i gotta hard disagree, i dont think you have to have one of them die when it literally goes against the themes of 'needing to save the whole person' and building up that villains are human too, they're people and undermines both character's arcs, but Ochako's especially gets shafted when she wanted to talk to and save Himiko, only for her to fail in saving her in the end

literally every other male character pulls some bullshit out of their ass to survive by going plus ultra or whatever the fuck, but Himiko dies from some blood loss? Dabi was literal bones and he's still kicking, Bakugo had his literal heart exploded and yet he's fine, Edgeshot should've fucking died from stretching himself so small and thin, Mr. Compress had like his entire side torn off and yet all these male characters somehow survive these insane life or death situations - even ones that don't have as much plot relevance/armor like Edgeshot, but like, blood loss. really? in a show where its proven time and time again that the human body is capable of incredible things when pushed to the absolute limit, it feels heavily more unrealistic for her to have died from something so... plain (ntm Himiko was exhausted but she wasn't also losing blood, she wouldn't have even needed to give Ochako All of her blood to stabilize her)

and to top it all off the insult to injury was adding in that no one ever saw the conclusion to Himiko's and Ochako's fight, no one saw Himiko saving Ochako. Killing Himiko when she was right on the cusp of finally having a way to exist in this world - of finding love and understanding in Ochako - only for it to be cruelly snatched away? idk it just feels like the story's tossing its hands up like oh well!! too bad!! there's actually no saving any of these people that society failed, better luck next time!!! bc like it just proves that everyone was right all along to fucking reject Himiko because seriously there's no way she can survive in this world??? having her on board to help Ochako with the quirk counseling would've been way more impactful

also i just really hate like 'character is redeemed in death' trope because i dont think dying =/= redemption, there could've been other options, i know death makes it more dramatic and tragic and i get the emotional impact of it but when you put it up to scrutiny it just feels like once again female characters just aren't afforded the same shit male characters get lol