#postal 2 is so fun what the hell

[sillygoose1503]

dude dump😁someone kill this man already@

[elodieunderglass]

I am absolutely wild and feral over HDM (legit like, daemons fit SO well. I'm watching dunmeshi wondering where Laios' dog went) and super curious if you do plan a sequel or other fics following this AU??

(In reference to the His Dark Materials / Dungeon Meshi fusion fic)

thank you so much for this question I love this question god!!!! Thank you thank you thank you

God sorry about HDM being delayed, I’m going through hell over it at the moment. It’s meant to end a little after the dragon, then a timeskip epilogue, with special coding so that you can read it two different ways, depending on whether you want spoilers for the manga/season 2. (My idea is that you’ll click a button to reveal/hide it, and the spoiler-free epilogue will be like found poetry.)

Firstly, if you or anyone else would like to take the concepts/characters in His Delicious Materials forward for themselves, you must do this. You don’t need my permission (but I’d love a link! so I can read, scream, reblog, comment, link to it, etc. there is also the “inspired by” setting on ao3 so we can link works directly to HDM, forming a collection for anyone who reads one and wants more.) I don’t own any of it! We are all just having fun! YOU can be the sequel you want to see in the world! If your heart feels a way forward, then follow your heart!! A daemon AU is really about revealing character and I find them really inspiring, like adding a whole engine to a story idea.

If I were to write something to follow up, I do know what the sequel WOULD be! It would be a sort of Discworld novel about the slow social revolution occurring in the half-foots as a chain reaction to Bee settling as a weasel, all occurring behind Chilchuck’s oblivious and unhelpful back. Pushed into a sort of bottleneck of sparrow- and mouse-souls, and marginalised to the very edges of society, half-foots are precarious and endangered. Chilchuck is mostly eating a ham sandwich unhelpfully in the foreground, and at the end of the story looks back and sees to his bewilderment that his people have found a way forward (they don’t have a Shire or a Chosen One, but they do have a goddamn functional worker’s union and their own collective dignity.) kind of Discworld-commentary-comedy, kind of a loving argument with Tolkien, kind of Sharpe hostile-and-awkward-protagonist-POV-doesn’t-know-and-wouldn’t-believe-that-his-men-genuinely-love-him, kind of about the experience of parenting, and kind of gently warmly political BUT FUNNY so it would be ok. but feel it would be too much of a stretch of people’s patience and the original materials’s intentions to call it fanfic. Too many OCs needed to carry the weight, too little reference to the other Dungeon Meshi characters, almost too little “payoff” for what would be a full 70k word work. So maybe to let the story breathe, it would be better worked up as original fiction?

(Plus, that is actually an actual novel: if people write their own novels and manga about orc coffeeshops and dnd parties, I could just write my own too: wait but how do you know if you should?)

Anyway, that is an entirely separate kettle of weasels and my own cross to bear! If your heart cries out for a sequel the best way to manifest it in the world is to write it!

If you feel that A Weasel Heart In Defiance feels like it would scratch that itch, here is a bit that is mildly relevant to Dungeon Meshi, which is Chilchuck and Bee starting to work away from home while the girls were still small. You’ll probably see what I mean from it.

About seven of the village children, including his own three, had a snake in a wooden bucket. They didn't look up.

The reappearance of a random guy who functioned mostly as a postal service and occasionally shouted at them about bedtime - in a way that could be easily blanked out if something more interesting was happening - simply could not be expected to compete for attention with a snake in a bucket.

Chilchuck could recognise this on some level, but as his own children ignored him, he felt very hot and angry, in a way that he had never wanted to feel about children, especially his.

Bee, also rigidly pissed off, growled, "Easy, boss."

This was where Chilchuck did the only thing so far that he was proud of, in this day. He did not start shouting, even though his temper was going something like What the fuck, kids, but worse. He stopped, took a minute, and remembered he'd had this whole thing where he'd wanted his kids to love him. He rubbed his nose, said, "Remind me," and his daemon reminded him: "What do we want them to actually do?"

And he said, "The bare minimum fucking acknowledgement would be nice."

And Bee said, "Have we explained that to them? Do they know?"

So Chilchuck and Bee, hot and tired and cross and still on the job apparently, sat down on the ground with the kids and looked in the bucket. The snake, poor bastard, looked very limp and tired. Chilchuck could relate.

After a while, Chilchuck said, "Girls?"

Or more accurately, something like, "Girls! Girls. Meifleurpatti-I mean Puck-PUCK. Listen up. Mei! Fleur, I'm talking - thanks Fleur - Puck. (Ryeland, stop the baby.) PUCK. Mei, Fleur, Puck - PUCK, eyes on me - thanks, Ryeland - PUCK. EYES," which condensed in parent-speak to a single roar of "Girls!"

When he had them more or less listening, he remembered to set his voice to the more singsong cadence one used for children, instead off the deeper version of his natural voice that he used for shouting at the top of his abilities at tall people; making the choice to be patient and gentle, or at least pretend to be someone who was; and in this manner he said reasonably, "Now, your dad's been away for a very long time and missed you all very much. What do you say? What do you say when your dad comes home?"

Six children stared at him blankly, and the baby toppled gently into the bucket. He fished it out, stuck it sideways under his arm, allowed the snake to escape in the confusion, acknowledged someone's grievously injured finger, stopped Fleur from pinching, took out his pocket handkerchief and wiped Puck's nose in essentially one continuous motion.

To be completely fair, now that he'd let go of the initial anger, he could see that the kids had absolutely no idea what he'd wanted of them. Kids had practically no social instincts at the best of times. Chilchuck coming home was remarkable, sure, but beyond their influence; how were they supposed to react? What do you say to a comet? What do you say to a hailstorm? What do you say when daddy comes home?

He repeated the question, as the children had universally drawn blanks and devolved into staring vacantly.

"Good morning, Daddy!" A child chirped helpfully, setting off the rest in an automatic drone of "good morning, Daddy," in the strangely universal dreary tone of all children saying that.

"So close, Fernwise! Is it morning? What else do we think?"

Bee, fighting for order among the kit-daemons, was simultaneously washing Fleurtom's daemon, Pantoufle's, face; receiving a long rambling report of a grievance from three incoherent witnesses; and minding the baby's chick-daemon; up to her ears in parenting. She said, around a mouthful of Pan, "Speed it up, boss, you're losing them."

"Where are your spots, Daddy?" Pan asked him. He was in the form of a young ferret and scrabbled against his mother's grip on his scruff.

"My what?"

"Your freckles," Bee said grimly, and seeing he'd been temporarily disarmed - and being a valiant beast in her way - charged in to her human's defense, "Is that nice, Pan? We don't want to make people feel bad about their looks, do we?"

"Yes we do," said Fleur.

"Fleur! We've just - we haven't seen much of the sun, that's all," said Bee, taking charge, the best and most loyal soul a man could have. "They'll come back, and they're not spots."

"Mei has spots."

"Freckles."

"Grimbob has spots."

"Yes, and you shouldn't notice," Bee said. "Think of Grimbob's feelings."

"I do, I think he feels spotty."

"I'm thirsty," Puck said flatly.

"Stick to the point, kids," Chilchuck said, recovering from the fact that his usual face was apparently indistinguishable to children from Grimbob's, who had been taking puberty hard. This was surprisingly difficult to do.

Ryeland, a mildly bright spark who was older than the Chils girls, connected two dots and suddenly roared "WELCOME HOME DADDY," so six children all repeated that automatically, and Fleur added sunnily, "I missed you Daddy!"

And just as a very small piece of Chilchuck's heart was finally allowed to melt, she added, equally sunnily, "Mei didn't."

"I did a little," Meijack said vaguely.

"That's great kids, well done, we got there in the end," Chilchuck said. "Remember it for next time, okay? It makes Daddy feel better about his stupid life. Now, next time, let's remember that it's traditional to do a hug."

He realised his mistake instantly, as six children and their daemons all bore him - and the baby he'd forgotten he was holding - to the ground.

___________

[blackenedsnow]

Haaaiii can I ask you to write headcanons about Postal Dudes dating chubby Reader??🥺👉👈

totally not a self projection I swear...

postal dudes with a chubby s/o; headcanons

WARNING: None

PAIRING: Postal (1) Dude x Reader, Postal (2) Dude x Reader, Postal (3) Dude x Reader, Postal (4) Dude x Reader, Postal (BD) Dude x Reader, Postal (Movie) Dude x Reader

NOTE: Thank you so much for the request! I hope you enjoyed these headcanons. My bsf wanted to help with this one as she is chubby as well! (she wrote most of these)

P1 DUDE

You won’t hear many compliments from him, but he’s definitely protective.

P1 is quiet, constantly sizing up the world with distrust, and you can bet he’s sizing up anyone who even looks at you sideways.

He doesn’t care about physical appearance; someone’s body type is the least of his concerns.

What matters is that you’re still here with him.

You catch him staring at you sometimes.

It’s hard to tell what he’s thinking, but there’s a strange softness in his eyes when he does.

If you’re ever insecure about your body, his reaction is blunt and to the point:

“You’re here. You’re alive. You're perfect. That’s all that matters.”

It’s not a sugar-coated answer, but it’s honest.

He doesn’t express affection with words, but in actions.

If someone says something about your size, they’re probably not going to make it through the day.

P2 DUDE

P2 is pretty laid-back about most things, including your body type.

He’s seen everything from people exploding to Gary Coleman running wild, so a chubby partner?

No big deal.

In fact, he kind of likes it.

He’s not the type to make a huge deal out of compliments, but he’ll throw in a casual,

“You’re looking good today,” or “Damn, you’re hot.”

He’s genuine guys

He’ll crack jokes about anything, including your size, but it’s always playful and never mean-spirited.

If anyone else tries it, though? Yeah, they’re getting a shovel to the face.

He’s also not opposed to being the one who makes sure you feel good about yourself.

If you’re ever feeling down, he’ll throw some crude humor into the mix to cheer you up:

“Don’t listen to anyone else. They’re all idiots anyway. You’re sexy as hell.”

P3 DUDE

P3 is kind of a mess

But even in all his dysfunction, he appreciates that you’re there with him, and your body type is just another thing he enjoys about you.

He’s more of a wreck than the other versions, so he tends to be clingier.

Loves when you hold him, your softness making him feel like things are going to be okay.

He’s a lot more verbal about liking your body, but it’s mixed in with his awkward, over-the-top compliments:

“You’re perfect! And I don’t care what those assholes say! They can… choke on it!”

If anyone insults you, his reaction is unpredictable.

He might try to defend you and end up hurting himself in the process, or he might have a sudden outburst of violence, completely losing it.

Either way, he hates anyone making you feel bad.

P4 DUDE

P4 is laid-back and full of even stupider humor.

He doesn’t really care what you look like as long as you’re with him.

He’ll definitely make jokes about your size, but it’s all in good fun.

He’s not super vocal about his emotions, but when you’re alone, he’ll say something like,

“You know I wouldn’t trade you for anyone else, right?”

He just wants you to know he loves you.

No matter what.

He doesn’t mind that you’re chubby—in fact, he likes it.

He’s been through too much to care about societal standards.

If you ever feel insecure, he’ll just shrug.

“Eh, screw ‘em. You’re awesome the way you are. Now, let’s blow something up.”

BD DUDE

Chaotic energy through and through, but surprisingly sweet in his own insane way.

He’s all over the place, but your body type is something he finds absolutely fantastic.

“More to love!”

He’d say, grinning like a maniac.

Super protective of you, especially if someone makes a comment about your size.

He’ll go from laughing and cracking jokes to a full-on rampage if anyone makes you feel bad.

Loves cuddling up with you after a long day of bullshit.

It’s the only time he’ll calm down, nestling into you and just enjoying the warmth and comfort.

He’s definitely the type to enjoy your softness after all the stupid bullshit he goes through everyday.

MOVIE DUDE

Movie Dude is a bit of a regular guy caught up in ridiculous, over-the-top situations.

He’s not violent for the sake of it, more like an average guy who’s just trying to get through the day in a world that’s gone crazy.

Why would he care about you being chubby?

He’s definitely laid-back when it comes to your body type.

To him, it’s not a big deal at all—he’s more concerned about surviving tomorrow.

You’ll catch him giving you silly compliments like,

“Hey, you’re my favorite person to have around when the world’s on fire. Plus, you’re cute.”

It’s playful, never mean-spirited, and always said with a grin.

He’s big on humor as a way to deal with life’s madness, so he’ll throw in light-hearted jokes about your size, but they’re always sweet.

“You know, if we ever have to run from the apocalypse, I’m hitching a ride on your back.”

If anyone makes a snide comment about your weight, Movie Dude’s reaction is more like an eye-roll and sarcastic retort.

“Oh, cool, another jerk with a mouth. Got anything new, or are you stuck in 7th grade?”

[lunatic-pudge]

Postal Dad Headcanons

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

(Requested by Gojifan1962)

HAPPY POSTAL 2 DAY!!!!! Can't believe Dude is finally old enough to drink. Homie is going places and I'm proud of him!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

-Aight, so I'm turning this request to a pregnancy/dad headcanons cause why not. Kill two birds with one stone and might as well start from the beginning, breaking the news that you're pregnant

-Now, Dude doesn't seem one to want kids. But since these are my headcanons, too bad. I'm sure he's thought about it before, but never really took time to truly consider it, especially with his deteriorating mental health and a marriage that has lost it's meaning long ago

-He's always had Champ to look at as his baby. His spoiled little baby at that. But now that he isn't with his ex-wife anymore, and is now in a happier relationship (with you, dear reader) having a kid or two might be something for him to start considering, might

-The pregnancy was definitely unplanned. A little "oops" if I may. It was nervewracking to tell him. How would he react? Does he even like kids? Could he handle being a dad?

-So, after some pep talk, you finally tell him. It doesn't register at first. KInda goes in one ear and out the other. It takes a few seconds of him blankly staring at you for him to finally understand what you said. And, surprisingly, he's ecstatic! Pick you up, swing you around, give you some smooches. Maybe some tears even shed

-But then the hard part starts, the big thing is that there's gonna have to be some changes (the crack addiction). After years of doing it, it's gonna be hell to quit. But if he kicks it now, it won't be a problem later when the baby is born. So be ready to have a cranky Dude around. You're both gonna be taking care of each other during this time. He's gonna need a lot of support during this

-Once the rough part of withdrawls is over, and he starts feeling better, he'll be already coming up with ideas for the baby's room. I'd like to think that his trailer has two rooms, one the guys you sleep in, the other is probably where he keeps his weapons. So he's gonna have to find a new place to put all his weapons cause we can't have the new baby trying to use the Napalm Launcher... yet

-At some point, he's gonna question if staying in Paradise would be the best choice. He doesn't want his kid to get hurt or deal with the consequences of being his kid, so you guys might pack the trailer up and start anew somewhere else, let's just hope the chaos doesn't follow

-As the months go on, Dude will start to get anxious. He worries that he won't be a good dad for the little one. He never had a good relationship with his Father's, one's dead and the other he basically has no contact with. He knows you'd make an amazing parent, no doubt about it. But he will need a lot of reassuring that he'll make a good dad. Plz help him

-He's ready to deal with anything and everything you throw at him. Morning sickness, cravings, he will go out at 3am to get you whatever you're craving if it means making you happy. He'll let you lay around and do nothing while he takes care of the place. Hell, even Champ will be loving on you as well. Staying by your side during the whole pregnancy (Dude gets a little jealous)

-When it's baby time, he's in full panic mode. Speeding to the hospital and refusing to leave your side. He'd be ready to fight the doctors and nurses if they don't listen to you or are even slightly rude. By the time the baby is born, he's gonna have a broken hand by how hard you were gripping it and he almost got kicked out of the hospital three times

-So now baby is born and Dude now has a new best friend. He just met his kid and he's already planning all the fun chaos the two will have. He's so excited to finally be able to hold his baby. He already knew he was gonna spoil the fuck out of them

-He's a lot more of an active dad than you'd think he'd be. He's rather a night owl so he doesn't mind being the one who's getting up to take care of the baby, he wants you to get your rest.

-Is the type to get the baby onesies that say things like, "I can't fucking read". He thinks it's hilarious. And if you don't stop him, he'll be trying to teach the kid how to swear and flip people off.

-The type of dad you'll catch sitting at the tiny kids table with your kid, wearing a tiara and getting his nails done by your kid. Yes, he will wear a dress if his kid asks. How is he supposed to say no to such an adorable face?

-He can't help but spoil them. Again, he struggles to say no to them. He would kill for his kid. He would steal toys for them as well. He will shank a bitch for an American Girl doll, he doesn't care. His child NEEDS this doll, and he will stop at nothing to get them what they want

-He will teach his kid how to defend themselves. He doesn't trust people and he wants to make sure his kid is safe. He'll be gifting his kid weapons once they turn 13. The kid will have an alarming knowledge about different types of weapons

-He doesn't want his kid seeing him killing people. He knows how traumatizing it can be to see such a thing. He'd feel so horrible if he was the cause of his kid's trauma. But he sees his kid kill someone, he's helping with hiding the body. If they're killing someone, then clearly that person was in the wrong cause his kid can do no wrong

-He really do be a dad that is chill and you can tell everything to. If his kid is in deep trouble, they know they can call their dad to help. Very rarely will Dude ever be mad at his kid. They have to do something really horrible for him to be upset with them. He's also the type of dad who wouldn't care if his kid smokes and/or drinks. He'd smoke with his kid if it didn't make his schizophrenia worse

-So to finally end this long post, Dude would be a good dad. He wouldn't be perfect, but he's trying. He would want the best for them. He does get overprotective of them as well. He'd be a content man in life with his family. Ain't nothing gonna ruin it <3

[facetsofthecloset]

What order would you suggest reading Discworld in? :0

Oh my friend you have opened an entire Amazon warehouse of a can of worms, which is going under a cut because I'm so sorry, you've activated my trap card

1: Preamble

First, a caveat: I have not read ALL of the Discworld books yet. There's a bunch of the short stories and sort of "bonus content"-y stuff that I haven't got round to, and the last two books he wrote before he passed, (I Shall Wear Midnight and Shepherd's Crown) but I have read everything else!

So!

Ok, there are lots of “recommended reading order” lists out there for Discworld, and what they generally do is group books into subcategories based on the protagonists.

These are fine as a base structural framework to work from, but if you're asking me I'm guessing you want a more personalized recommendation, SO

It really depends on your interests! When I started Discworld I'd already been pilled on tumblr, seeing posts cross my dash every now and then (probably due to the Glorious 25th of May actually, which I'm spamming right now) about how great it was and how many books there were.

So I picked up the first book (The Color of Magic) even though everyone said don't start there, and I stuck to it because I'd kind of already decided to like the series, or at least be incredibly open-minded about it.

Listen. The Color of Magic was published in 1983, it was one of his earliest novels, and it's definitely a bit rough. But! Full of personality and chaos, from which stars will be born later on.

You can think of it as the primordial ooze, full of nutrients and ideas and things that could evolve, but kind of formless and a bit confused at the moment

2: The List

So if you're not a bit naive and desperate for a new fantasy series to be obsessed with as an adult and trusting wholeheartedly a lot of strangers online that things get really really good, and you want some proof upfront, this is my list of potential starters:

Reaper Man (Death subseries #2)

Witches Abroad (Witches subseries #3)

Feet of Clay (City Watch subseries #3)

The Truth (Industrial Revolution subseries #2)

The Amazing Maurice and his Educated Rodents (YA standalone that takes place in the Discworld)

Going Postal (Industrial Revolution #4 or Moist von Lipwig subseries #1)

You'll notice that I've picked almost none of the "first book" in a subseries and I have good reasons for that! I'll talk about each book individually, but my main reason for starting you off a little ways into each subseries is that the Vibes(tm) of the very first book in a subseries are very different to the actual overall Vibes(tm) of the subseries generally, once it's had time to fill out and ripen a bit.

The books I've picked are the "early but recognizable" stages of most of the series', because I think you can go back to read the first ones as a sort of prequel treat for yourself later once you've started to run out of books in the series, which happens faster than you think given there's 41 of them.

But I'll go into more detail about that with the individual books! Again, I am so sorry this is so bloody long. I'm having coffee as we speak

3: List Breakdown

Reaper Man (Death subseries #2):

“What can the harvest hope for, if not for the care of the Reaper Man?”

Protagonist: Death (the anthropomorphic personification)

Summary: Death is fired from his job for caring too much, and has to go live as a farmhand. In his absence, things start to get weird, leading to zombie wizards and sentient shopping carts.

Why start here: Death as a character shows up all over the place in Discworld, and he's wonderful. This is the 11th book in publishing order, and one of the first that had me almost crying at the end. A lot of the earlier books had me kinda going "ok that was fun but I feel like I'm missing something, why is it people keep going on about this series?" and while this book doesn't quite yet answer that question, it gave me a hell of a lot of motivation to keep going.

The Death subseries book before this, Mort, is also good! If you want to start there, that's fine. But to me, it's a prologue, and doesn't give you an accurate picture of what the Overall Vibes of the series are. Reaper Man is still also kind of a prologue in that sense, seeing as Death is not even the protagonist for all of the Death books, but I still say it's a good place to start. It sets the groundwork for future books but also...

...man that quote about the harvest, and yes the summary sounds absurd and it is because it's not just fantasy, it's parody and comedy, but in the same book you'll have moments where you just have to stare at the wall for a bit unsure if you're going to reach enlightenment or burst into tears.

Reaper Man is a very wholesome, funny, and casually profound place to start your Discworld journey. It's early in the timeline of the Disc, you get a taste of the Wizards subseries as well, and you can see how important settings like Ankh-Morpork, the main city, start out. One thing I love about Discworld is how it grows, so starting out earlier in the in-universe timeline can be nice to get the full effect of seeing that.

A later Death book, Hogfather, is one I would recommend someone read if they were under some kind of curse where they could only ever read 3 Discworld books ever, and of course you could jump right to that one.

But if you want a bit of build up and additional context, you can start with Reaper Man.

Witches Abroad (Witches subseries #3):

Lily: You'd have done the same. Granny: No. I'd have thought the same, but I wouldn't have done it. Lily: What difference does that make, deep down? Nanny Ogg: You mean you don't know?

Protagonist: The Witches/Granny Weatherwax

Summary: Magrat Garlick, youngest of Lancre's witch coven trio, inherits a fairy godmother's wand, and thus also a fairy goddaughter, named Emberella. Unfortunately, Emberella lives very far away in Genua, and none of the witches really know how to make the wand work, and hardly any of them have left Lancre much at all before, let alone gone all the way to fantasy New Orleans. And Magrat's the one who got the wand, so she really should be the one taking point on this, but Nanny Ogg and Granny Weatherwax can hardly let the youngest, soppiest, and wettest-behind-the-ears witch of their coven go off and make fairy tales on her own, can they? They've got a happy ending to make, and a bad witch to find...

Why start here: More into witches and fairy tales? Like a good Cinderella parody? Want to know how to stop spelling bananananana daquiri? Well, Nanny Ogg actually can't help you there, but you can get the other stuff.

Granny Weatherwax, along with Samuel Vimes of the City Watch subseries, is the beating heart and deeply, calmly furious soul of Discworld.

She is THE Witch. Witches don't have leaders, but Granny is the First among equals.

You can meet her earlier in the series, in Equal Rites or Wyrd Sisters, but Witches Abroad are when things start to come together in terms of tone and style for the Witches subseries, at least for me. Like Reaper Man, Witches Abroad is fairly early in the in-universe timeline as well as #12 in the publishing order, right after Reaper Man. Between the two, you can get a decent idea of the early form of the Disc, though I'd add in Guards! Guards! to complete that picture.

On its own, it's a fun romp full of recognizable parodies and interesting twists, a good old fashioned road trip. And it punches you in the face later about the nature of morality and how people think, about identity and choosing who you're going to be.

It won't make sense unless you've read it, but I think about a scene towards the end and the line "This one," all the time. Start here, read the other Witches books, have a Granny Weatherwax permanently etched into the back of your mind, reminding you about the difference between thinking and doing.

Feet of Clay (City Watch subseries #3):

“You couldn't say 'I had orders.' You couldn't say 'It's not fair.' No one was listening. There were no Words. You owned yourself. [...] Not 'Thou Shalt Not'. Say 'I Will Not'.”

Protagonist: Samuel Vimes

Summary: Commander of the City Watch, Samuel Vimes, now officially a Sir and married into the ranks of Ankh-Morporks elite, must have a coat of arms made. Thank gods there's been a murder for him to focus on instead. Someone's poisoning the Patrician--Lord Vetinari--too, and something strange is happening with the city's golems...

Why start here: This is it. For me, this was the book that made me go "Oh. That's why everyone loves this series." Every book up to this point had been interesting, funny, engaging, but as yet a little underbaked compared to the hype--until here.

Feet of Clay was the point of no return for me as a Discworld fan. This is the start of Sam Vimes, the man who IS Ankh-Morpork in many ways, the character you think of first when someone says "Discworld" (or boots. The "Sam Vimes Boots Theory of Economics" seems to travel outside of Discworld circles sometimes, from what I've heard.)

The City Watch books prior to this are all important to the formation of Sam Vimes as we know him mainly, which is why most people tend to start you off with Guards! Guards!. Totally legitimate place to start, but if you're going into it after being stuffed full of hype on tumblr and elsewhere, you're going to go "Hm. Is that it?"

Feet of Clay is #19 in publishing order, around midway through the series and part of what I've seen referred to as the "golden age" of Discworld books. As far as in-universe time goes, it's a bit farther along than Reaper Man or Witches Abroad, but not hugely. Things are established and the swing has been grasped, and Sam Vimes in freshly fully baked. (I keep using the word because it's relevant to the story lol) He'll go on from here to even greater heights, but this is a damn good start into Vimes being Vimes.

Now I will caveat this with a warning that if you are so ACAB that even seeing the word "cop" makes you break out in hives, then you probably shouldn't read City Watch books.

But I will say, policing as Sam Vimes does it is different from the modern American police. Obviously. This is fiction, it's based more on older English policing, it's a fantasy world, and Sam Vimes would be the first person to tell you that a cop who isn't a bastard is a liar, which is just another type of bastard.

It isn't pure uncritical copaganda, it's closer to Brooklyn 99, not CSI Miami, but if your stance is that making the protagonist a police officer we are meant to relate to at all is irredeemable, then yeah, this isn't going to work for you.

But so much of the Watch series--arguably all of it-- is about asking the question How do you be a good copper? What is a good copper? What is good? How do you be 'good' when you know that inside your head you're a messy, problematic bastard who thinks he knows better than everyone and has authority to abuse?

Who watches the watchmen? Sam Vimes. He watches himself, all the time. Maybe you won't agree with his conclusions, and I've heard people say the later Watch books where Terry's Alzheimers was progressing were too White Savior, but that's something you'd have to decide for yourself if you decide to keep reading.

For me, the City Watch books are the heart of Discworld, and they are absolutely worth engaging with.

Feet of Clay is a pretty classic and fun murder mystery, coupled with serious discussions of personhood and slavery, and has a plotline dealing with a lot of gender stuff that is expanded on in later books. It's far enough along in the series that the basics are established, and early enough that there is a lot of interesting development to look forward to.

I haven't reread it in a while, but it will always hold a special place in my heart for being the book where Discworld clicked home and became a permanent part of my psyche.

The Truth (Industrial Revolution subseries #2):

“The truth has got its boots on,” he said. “It’s going to start kicking.”

Protagonist: William de Worde, standalone

Summary: Printing presses were not allowed in Ankh-Morpork. Alas, times were moving on, and brought with them The Times, Ankh-Morpork's very first newspaper. William de Worde finds himself falling into the role of the Disc's first journalist. It starts with innocent stories of humorous vegetables and debates over when the coldest winter was, and ends with an attempted assassination (several, in fact), a shadowy conspiracy, a dog's testimony, and daddy issues (doesn't it always).

They say a lie can run around the world before the truth has got its boots on, but William's got a shoehorn and is prepared to tie some laces.

Why start here: Drop into an almost fully-established and stabilized Ankh-Morpork, watch a new technology drop into it and see the ripples. The Truth is categorized as an Industrial Revolution book, but it's also a standalone. You can know nothing about the Discworld and still have a damn good time.

It's honestly one of my favorites, possibly the favorite, owing to the presence of Otto Chriek, vampire photographer (called iconographers on the Disc) to The Times and also my favorite Discworld character ever number 1 no contest hands down don't talk to me. (Are there "better" and "more important" Discworld characters? Of course. Doesn't mean jack when it comes to personal favorites though, does it. Otto Chriek my beloved my darling my heart and soul this is his first appearance and after this he only gets mentioned in passing in the background of other books although he occasionally does get a whole scene and some dialogue I'm Normal About Him)

Ahem. Anyway.

If you want a good taste of what Terry Pratchett's writing is like overall, just one good sampler, this is a pretty decent choice. It's neat and contained but also has a lot of ties to the rest of the series that you could easily pull on if you wanted to. It's sometime after Feet of Clay, timeline-wise, but is really the start of the Industrial Revolution of Discworld proper, and you can make an argument for it starting off a second stage (maybe a silver era?) of Discworld books, in terms of publication order. There's Ankh-Morpork pre-newspaper, then there's Ankh-Morpork post-newspaper, and this is obviously the dividing line.

Because of that, it's possible that it would be slightly disorienting to read this first and then go back to an older pre-newspaper Discworld, because the dynamics are different. But that's one aspect of the series that I love, how it has its own historical eras. "Ah, this story is still in the Century of the Fruitbat, before the introduction of printing presses in Ankh-Morpork" or "Oh, this is from the post-clacks society," stuff like that.

It's a huge part of what makes Discworld feel like a real, entire universe, and how different books in the series feel like snapshots of their history. And history can be funny, profound, horrific, ironic, fascinating, and above all, human.

Even if "human" in the Disc doesn't cover nearly everyone. Barley anyone, you could argue. They have a lot of different species.

The Amazing Maurice and his Educated Rodents (YA standalone):

“People were people, even if they had four legs and had called themselves names like Dangerous Beans, which is the kind of name you gave yourself if you learned to read before you understood what all the words actually meant.”

Protagonist: debatable but I'll say Maurice (a cat. standalone)

Summary: The trouble with magic is that you never know what it'll do. Sometimes, it turns a bunch of rats (and one cat) from dumb animals into The Clan and Maurice, who work together with a human boy named Keith to run a Pied Piper scam.

Keith is human, and talks to other humans, offering to rid them of their town's rats, and The Clan pretend to be charmed by his flute and make a show of leaving town. Maurice--well, he's the brains of the outfit and makes sure no one grows too much of a conscience over the grift, and that he they get paid properly. And everyone likes cats.

One of the towns they come across, though...something is wrong here. There are no rats, or...are there? What is a rat, anyway? What's the difference between a rat and a Clan rat? What's the difference between a Clan rat and a human? Or a Maurice?

That was the problem with thinking. Once you started, you went on doing it.

Why start here: Similar to The Truth, a good way to get a decent, well-rounded sampling of Prachettian writing. You've got the parodic element in the Pied Pier story, some genuine horror in the antagonist of the story, existential questions on the nature of sentience and personhood, puns that you won't even realize are puns until you come across an explanatory post on tumblr, as well as the puns that hit you in the face and kick you in the fork and make you go "Fucking hell. More please!" Just because it's YA doesn't mean it's any lesser, it's just a slightly different tone of voice.

I don't remember exactly what era of Discworld it takes place in, but it's later in the publication order and I think timeline-wise, definitely after The Truth? I'm pretty sure newspapers exist at this point. It doesn't matter as much, since most of the story takes place outside of Ankh-Morpork. Either way, it's very accessible, a decent one-and-done. There's a rat named Dangerous Beans, who was voiced by David Tenant in the recent animated film. (Not a good adaptation but you could watch it. It's. Well not the worst, as Discworld adaptations go, but it's like. Fine. Kinda weird. Kinda boring. Read the book.)

Going Postal (Industrial Revolution #4, or Moist von Lipwig #1):

“Raise the stakes! Always push your luck because no one else would push it for you.”

Protagonist: Moist von Lipwig

Summary: Professional conman Albert Spangler is hanged for his crimes, and reborn as Moist von Lipwig--his actual birth name. His new lease on life comes with the caveat of resurrecting the long-defunct Ankh-Morpork Post Office as Postmaster General. As a consummate liar and career criminal, he's a perfect fit for government service.

And he's just in time--The Grand Trunk clacks company, under its newest management, has been plagued by enshittification. Once able to relay messages across the continent "at the speed of light," now it's expensive, breaks down constantly, and runs on the blood of its workers. But messages still have to get through, and you can't send a package by semaphore. The world needs the Post, and the Post needs Moist von Lipwig.

Him? He needs a new name. And a way to get rid of his golem parole officer...

Why start here: Moist von Lipwig is a late addition to the canon and only stars in 3 books (one of which is distinctly different in style, owing to the advancement of Pratchett's Alzheimer's at time of writing), but he is just about as crucial to Discworld as Granny Weatherwax, Sam Vimes, and Lord Vetinari. He's a grifter who's all about style, and holy shit is he good at it.

To me, Going Postal is a perfect book, and the sequel Making Money is somehow even better. I got my friend hooked on Discworld by reading a passage out of the sequel to her and subsequently read her the entire book and Going Postal after. Get past his name, and Moist von Lipwig is all you've ever dreamed of in terms of entertainment.

The Moist books (lol) are formatted a little bit differently to the others, as it's one of the only Discworld books to have formal chapters and sort of chapter summaries? I'm not sure why this is but I think it has to do with Moist being, well, Moist. Everything in his life is a show and so his books also have a bit of extra set dressing.

I think if you read Going Postal and Making Money and those were the only Discworld books you ever knew about you'd still be obsessed madly in love and fanatic about the whole series. Moist comes into things when Ankh-Morpork is already pretty much fully-fledged, and he could have been the beginning to a new era. As his presence inclusion in the Industrial Revolution series implies, he brings about a lot of huge structural/technological changes to the Disc and it's amazing to watch it unfold.

Going Postal also has the distinction of having one of the only decent Discworld screen adaptations (look I haven't watched all of them and I'm really sorry if there's a BBC version or something that you really love, but the ones that I've seen so far are mostly...either really low-budget and weird or just boring). I'd say if you watched the movie version and liked it, you'd like the book even more but not in spite of the movie, you know? Charles Dance is in it as Lord Vetinari and aside from his hair not being black he's fucking perfect. You cannot go wrong here.

4: Conclusions

I'm sorry this got so LONG AHH

But! What you choose to read as your first Discworld book imo depends hugely on what your interests are and why you're interested in the series to begin with.

If you just want a quick way to see what all the fuss is about, I'd say any of the standalones or Moist books.

If you want a sample of how it unfolds and grows and are willing to put some time into it, start with Reaper Man and maybe read down the list I made, then go back and read the other books in their respective subseries. Or pick one that you liked a lot and follow that subseries first!

If you're really willing to put in the time and want to understand the series as a whole, do what I did and start with The Color of Magic and go by publication order. You're going to need a bit of patience and be generous at first, wait for things to develop, but for me it's been worth it. Again, if you have the time though. I mean, it is 41 books.

Or, if you're into a bit more chaos than that...use a random number generator and read whatever it tells you. Honestly, even books in longer subseries's are self-contained and pretty readable on their own, you just get more context if you read it "in order." The roulette approach is perfectly viable.

I mean, I do have Discworld books that I'm not as fond of, but none where I'd say you should never read it.

Even my least favorite (Interesting Times, part of the Wizards series) has a lot of redeeming qualities and I reread it a couple times before I decided maybe I didn't like it as much. (It's mostly because they go to fantasy East Asia and it's a bit Asian Monolith-y. Look I love Pratchett but he was a white British man who started writing in the late 70s/early 80s y'know? He's good but not perfect. The Wizards series has a lot of traveling around the Disc and a lot of like, racial stereotypes involved. Which is a shame because I do love the main protagonist of the series (Rincewind), it just personally makes me a little uncomfortable.)

That said, I don't hate it.

There are no Discworld books I regret reading. There's just ones I enjoyed even more than the others, and ones that have been permanently absorbed into my soul. You really can't go wrong.

This concludes my Starter Discworld dissertation I'm so sorry but you did ask 💦

[mellohd]

Postal Model

hi sorry ive been neglecting my tumblr because im working on a stupid postal 2 dude model(so sorry if ive been late to replying to stuff and posting art :3), heres some screenshots(the textures are temporary i literally just drew the alien right on I SWEAR ITS TEMPORARY)

More information on the model below + some extra earlier screenshots at the end

this model is more advanced than daniels's(my first model) because it:

has a face instead of a 2d texture with a semi functioning mouth(working on the mouth and eyes cuz its new to me and idk what the hell im doing)

better anatomy(though the choice for a simpler look was for aesthetic reasons for daniels model)

Ears!(except my first models hair would have hidden the ears so take that as you will)

actual clothes apposed to just being melded on to his body(except for the pants cause i didn't care for adding physics to the pants) So the trenchcoat and shirt are seperate piecies, yay!

Heres whats coming next:

Im hoping to add actual eyeballs that will hopefully work, which will be hard because i have never modeled and rigged eyes before(or really rigged anything w/o mixamo)

posable eyebrows

physics on the clothes

uv unwrap (shudders cause i have no idea how the actual fuck to do that without the blender automatic unwrap)

trying out shaders cause that looks fun(hoping for some bright cell shaded cartoonish look)

then rigging and posing everything

Let it be known that this is only my second actual model and like day 2 of progress so if it looks ass IM TRYING MY BEST i know i cant do something super realistic yet, and truthfully i dont WANT to, so im trying to go for a more cute look.

Heres some extra screenshots I have from earlier in his development:

These are his og refs, I knew from the beginning i wasn't gonna really follow the head design because i wanted to have a similar look to my first model, but i added the head like that anyways just so i could experimen with it(which i did and i didn't like it)

this was when i was really struggling with the hair so i had to make another ref

for the eyes im hoping for it to look similar to Daniels, but yk 3D

[qwuilty]

How Postal 1 is a playable Tragedy and how Postal 2 followed with a Comedy after it. - A semi formal essay about the narrative and story beats of the beginning of Postal

That's right! This was not an april fool's joke! The only april fool here is me! It's an idea ive been brewing on for a while and it's probably very rambly, but such is life, i hope you enjoy it regardless <3

Before I begin this essay, I would like to clarify a few things. 

One, I want to address right away that while I do try to be critical and non-biased on these sorts of discussions, due to my own personal attachments to specifically Postal 1 Dude, I don't think I will ever be able to make a fully unbiased view of him. Again, I will try my best to, but I hope pointing it out here will make it so you can decide if that’s something you’re okay with. 

Secondly, while i will try to reign myself back a little and not just spew words at you here, i do tend to ramble a little and have trouble connecting points to other points, so if i do please forgive me there. This is meant to be a semi-formal essay, but still I am not a professional writer. Additionally, while i do this analysis of this series, i do not think it is what the creators intended, please do not take this as full canon and all. This is simply for fun and to recollect on the first two games of the series. 

I hope you will understand, and with those disclaimers out of the way, we can begin with the essay.

We begin this essay with Postal (Which I will be calling Postal 1 for the sake of clarity, by the way), a PC-Rom game released in 1997 by the company Running With Scissors, originally published by Take Two Interactive before publishing moved over to Ripcord Interactive. The game was marketed to be intentionally provoking and intense. One example is through fictional interview quotes talking about how he seemed to be fine before the events of the game with a simple question below.

What went wrong?

With little more than that, a picture of an M-16, an invitation to find out at their website below, and a short talk about how to get the demo, it leaves a striking impression on the viewer and a burning curiosity to find out what did go wrong. Other advertisements for the game are similar in nature, being very eye-catching and intense to draw in the reader to want to see more. 

Described by the studio as “The game every gamer wanted and no one else dared to make”, it’s very clear their intention was to bring you in with its more intense subject matter as this game that dared to go where no game had before, to either acclaim or great critical disgust. It is described by the promotional material as a psychological thriller, preparing the incoming viewer for the expectation this game would be intense.

From the advertisements though you can already get the idea there may be something else to this game, introducing Paradise as a town where everyone is out to get you (or are they?), and that whether it is Conspiracy or Insanity, you have no time to question, only to act. This narrative carries over to the game itself, as there is no formal introduction to a story given to the player unless they actively decide to read the manual included in the game’s case (or chose a higher difficulty in the remake, Postal Redux), you are more an outsider to what happens after you press play guiding the Dude through this hell.

However, I think to truly enjoy Postal 1, it is important to consider the journals themselves to get the inner perspective of your player character. Those who do not choose to may take the game at a more surface level with the “dark” cutscene texts and gorey gameplay then simply leave it behind, but the hidden story adds a whole extra level of depth and truly establishes Postal 1 as a tragedy. 

To explain where I am coming from at that point, I would like to establish what makes a tragedy, specifically with Postal 1 being a Domestic Tragedy. (A tragedy in which the characters are middle-class or working-class people instead of nobility or rich people) 

Aristotle’s tragic plot structure starts at the beginning, goes through action, leads to the realization of error, then goes through the falling action and emotional impact of it, eventually releasing the emotions of pity and fear through to the catharsis as the story ends and fear is removed.

While the game does not give much of an actual explanation of what happened in the Dude’s life before the events on October 17th, 1997 even in the diary entries that show his viewpoint, it’s easy to infer there was a rise even before then that he was not doing well mentally. He describes a rising paranoia, belief that the people there are sick, how “I hear gunshots, screams after dark. Now the phone calls, sayin’ i’m being thrown outta this house. My house.”, constantly arming himself with a sidearm and kevlar vest preparing for the incoming perceived impact that he ultimately makes reality.

From there we have our beginning, the game’s levels acting as the actions through the story that lead him on this journey through Arizona. Though initially he tries to find help and contact a sheriff, because he is seemingly so far gone, those efforts are in vain and his belief that everyone else is infected is reinforced. It separates him further from the people around him, believing that he is the only one who can save them from this sickness and that though the journey is bloody, it is for the good of mankind. 

It’s likely at the beginning he intends to save them, but after a while, comes to the conclusion that the area is simply beyond saving, and that he needs to leave a scorched earth behind so he can warn those outside. His condition worsens the further the player goes, covered in blood, bullet wounds, body aching but unable to stop until he sees this desired resolution. As quoted from The Industrial Complex journal, “Too far to quit now. Whatever waits at the Base, I’m going to see it with my own eyes.” and from the Air Force Base as he tries to resolve himself to finish what he set out on, “Me or them. Can’t delay, can’t risk infection.”

Notably in the game’s manual there was no journal given for the ending cutscene in the original game, though I think the one for Redux is also fitting. “I’ve been here before. I know it. But… Something’s changed. Will they understand me? Forgive me? Is this where I find salvation?” One of the main things you’ll probably hear about relating to the differences of Postal 1 and Redux is the ending being changed. 

In Postal 1, the game ends with the Dude making his way to an elementary school in a haze, the player no longer in control as he desperately tries to take aim at them, but nothing he does seems to affect them. Considering unfortunate tragedies in real life, this ending was changed for Redux, where instead the Dude walks up to the end of a church, watching as a coffin is lowered into the ground either alone on Easy to Medium or with two mourners on Hard to Nightmare, and the hostile count goes down from one to none as soon as it’s in the ground. 

Either way, it ends with the Dude collapsing down to the floor, and the game finally ends with pictures of Dude in a hellish confinement and a voice speaking over top. The final speech talks about the stress of modern life before further mentioning how he had perceived himself as a hero against impossible odds, but in reality will now only ever be seen as a mad man who hurt hundreds, if not thousands of lives.

Some may say this ending is an anti-climax or a bad reward for the game, but i think through the lens of a tragedy, it is a perfect ending. Our ‘hero” through the entire game has kept himself standing because he thought he was doing the right thing, that his actions were horrible, but it would be justified by the good he was doing. He does not want them to writhe and suffer, the journey is a horrific nightmare, and there is no sense of pride or that he’s finally getting some kind of vengeance on those who wronged him. But he persists, he moves onwards because he so desperately wants to end this and stop the madness, one that only he sees as reality.

That is where we get the action, right after the Air Base is the Recognition, the point of realization that it was all for naught. In Postal 1, it’s likely this comes at the moment he realizes that he’s not doing anything to them, and unable to simply destroy this ‘threat’, he is forced to stop and think if he’s even been going against any threats at all. How far has he gone to the point he was going to harm innocent children? How many more innocents has he harmed? With Redux that realization is more up to interpretation, whether the casket is where he’s in after he dies and realizes that there’s no recognition of him after his death, or if it’s the last hostile he has to kill, only to realize even with them dead, the world around him has not gotten any better, only worse because of his actions.

The pity and fear comes from the moment inside the cutscenes, and from there the "catharsis", when he is ultimately institutionalized with no seen trial, no fanfare, and is given an analytical view from an off-screen doctor before the game ultimately ends. And again, I think for the game that Postal 1 is, it’s the perfect ending. Because truthfully, was there ever going to be any good ending for him after his collapse? The player either knows or discovers along with him that his journey was for nothing, he killed countless people including potentially civilians who had just happened to get caught in the crossfire, and the grand threat he fought against did not even exist. There are no heroes, there is no triumph, it was all for nothing, and now he is confined to a cell as several hundreds of families have to cope with the loss.

With all of this, I think Postal 1 Dude (and subsequently Postal Redux Dude) is a great tragic “hero” figure, as deep down he wants to do good for the world. If you take the advertisement interviews and hints from others as a sort of semi-canon, it’s implied he was doing good, he was kind to others and liked well enough, but likely due to an untreated and ignored illness began to fall in on himself into a paranoia so deep he could never crawl out. I hear a lot of the notion that he “snaps out of nowhere”, and that he’s just “crazy”, but I think that’s a gross oversimplification of his character.

Even in the moment of it all, he initially tried to go to a higher authority for help but found himself all alone to try and stop this ‘sickness’. His journey is his own personal burden, taken to try and stop anyone from being hurt, at the cost of his health and potentially his own life. But it’s also important to not just consider his intent, but the action caused afterwards. 

Because while he did mean to save others, he still hurt hundreds of people. There are hundreds of families who will never see their partners, their siblings, their children, their friends, all because of one overzealous man who decided he was going to be humanity’s savior. Perhaps it is not just conspiracy or insanity, but instead the poor judgement of a man who truly believes he is doing right being guided along by an outside force who makes him see it through to the end.

In Postal 1, you are the audience to a grand scale tragedy, bringing a man on a journey through hell to a shallow grave where no one is saved, no one is cured, leaving you back on the title screen to think about what you’ve done to him and the people of Paradise.

In Postal 2 you can smoke crack and piss on people.

Okay, sorry for the whiplash, but I had to transition somehow. 

After the release of Postal 1 and subsequent expansions, there was obviously a backlash as well as critical acclaim. The game was banned in several countries, Running With Scissors was personally given a letter by the USPS about the name, and it was pulled off the shelves of several stores. Many books about video game violence and newspapers talked about the game and admittedly got quite a lot about it wrong, like believing the Dude was an ex-postal service worker despite the game never saying so, that there was some sort of score based system for “killing as many innocent victims as possible while they begged for mercy” (Stop Teaching Our Kids To Kill, Lt. Col. Dave Grossman and Gloria DeGaetano, Chapter Two, 1990s: Video Game Violence Increases.), not to mention how many were quick to try and pull a connection between it and horrific tragedies in real life. 

(Quick unprofessional note, the amount of times i saw this one damn quote about a specific killer killing himself “JUST LIKE HOW YOU END LEVELS IN POSTAL!1!” despite that NOT being how you end levels in postal or even the game makes my head physically hurt.)

With this reception of Postal 1, it does make sense for Running With Scissors to decide to take a change of focus when they began work on Postal 2 after the cancellation of their next game, Flesh and Wire. While Postal 1 was more intense in tone and serious, Postal 2 was set to be much more parody focused and had a drastic shift in the appearance of the main character.

While Postal 1 Dude in the concept art and promotional image notably looked disheveled and scared, Postal 2 Dude felt more laid back, engaged in the chaos around him and able to dish it back just as hard. There’s a very noticeable shift even before the game came out, from a man huddled in the corner with a rifle or seemingly startled holding an M-16 (note, i'm pretty sure it is? I am not a gun person, sorry </3) to a man standing with his body facing the player, brandishing his rifle as chaos ensues behind him.

The town of Paradise goes through a similarly drastic change, from a somewhat toned down and realistic feeling environment made of cool and dark colors to a much more exaggerated parody of a small town in Arizona full of bright, warm colors. The game begins with a sweeping view of the town, passing by a road sign warning to “watch for psycho assholes”, a drunk man dancing in the streets as a cat falls asleep, a man is beat by a police officer, and the player can already see several satirical billboards on their way to Dude’s trailer.

The introduction to him is also drastically different, now speaking directly as he wakes up in his obviously run down trailer and gets into an argument with his wife about moving to Arizona to pay for his crack habit, the AC being broken (which he obviously doesn't make better by shooting at it), about chores until he makes his way out of the trailer and kicks away Champ, his car not working, and the Bitch reminding him to get her rocky road. This immediately sets up Dude in this game being much more cynical and snarky, someone who’s been chewed up and spit up by life, and now is dealing with a pretty rough morning.

The game itself follows a pretty similar tone, gone are the unsettling journals, the morality of it all, in this remodel of the series the game has effectively gone from Tragedy to Comedy. More specifically, I think Postal 2 falls under a Farce, which according to the Wordsmyth dictionary, is “a comedy that depends for its humor on quick and surprising turns of events and on exaggerated characters and situations, or the type of humor characteristic of such a play.”, which I feel is very fitting. Running With Scissors put more emphasis on physical comedy, slapstick yet still grotesque violence, bodily function humor, and of course, a lot of satire and parody of life at the time.

The game itself plays as if it were a comedy, each day functioning as a new act as the chores act as the separate jokes, returning jokes such as the Dude’s relationship with his wife and introducing new ones such as the incredibly zealous anti-book protestors burning down a library on Tuesday or the cannibalistic butchers of Thursday. The main sources of these jokes in the game come from two factors, that being the world around Postal Dude is insane and absurd but he still has to make it through each day somehow, and an extreme form of Murphy’s Law, in which anything that could go wrong will, and at the worst possible time.

The ability to make it through these insane events in one piece is what mainly separates Postal 2 Dude from Postal 1 Dude, as while Postal 1 Dude holds onto his sense of justice and morality in the horror he saw and ultimately ended up hurting himself and those around him, Postal 2 Dude is adaptable, able to keep his head above water and make it home despite it all. The game’s increase in the story’s conflict as each hate group begins to target Dude is still joking in nature, just another group of people who hate him and try to kill him on sight, but you’ve got errands to do so you just gotta deal with it.

The ultimate climax of this increasing rise of stakes leads to the final event of Friday, quite literally a full blown apocalypse (complete with a nod to Postal 1 on the newspaper about mind altering gasses and the military being involved) where cats and dogs rain from the sky and everyone and anyone is trying to kill each other, especially you. 

It’s the final big obstacle as you book it back home, this massive hysteria that serves as the big crazy finale until you finally make it home and things shift back to a mundane that now becomes comedic in its own right. Dude returns home, having made it through figurative hell only to be reminded of a joke that comes full circle from the start, the fact he forgot the Rocky Road. The final joke ends with a loud gunshot, implying that while he could make it through all he’s been through that week, having to be there even a moment more made him decide he’d rather spend the night in a hospital or a grave.

In conclusion, the drastic difference between Postal 1 and Postal 2 is incredibly fascinating to me, especially through the lens of them as a traditional Tragedy and Comedy in video game format. While the series has leaned much more to comedy after the release of 2 and Redux did not do as well financially, i think it’s still interesting to look back at the beginning of the series and their adaptation of it later on to see how the Dude began. 

From a desperate and hopeful but ultimately misguided self imposed martyr of humanity who was going to drag along as many as he needed to “save” those outside to a cynical and sarcastic man living in a trailer home making it through each progressively more crazy day to make it home and start a new day after that, you can fully feel the shift in tone from the soundtrack to the design to the gameplay of the games itself.

I do think it was probably for the best that Postal had turned more comedic as time went on, it seems to be more where Running With Scissors are able to fit their writing, however i still look back at Postal 1 very fondly and hope to see more of those tragedy elements come back for a bit in the jokes. It’s a compelling narrative and even if they say it has no story, i’ll always think the story it DOES have is very underrated.

Here’s to hoping for that Postal 4 weekend expansion?

[nightynite]

I thought this would be neat and precise, but this kind of ended up being a ramble about the Postal Dudes and how their system works. And my interpretations of them, I guess. Anyway, if you're curious to learn about Red, Dude, and Cowboy, click the read more, because I am scared as shit to post something this long without making it easily skippable.

Let's begin, shall we?

Red: Postal 1 Dude, was the host of the system for most of childhood/teen/young adult years. After 1997, he stopped. He's extremely guarded and doesn't like getting to close anyone--something that's stuck throughout the entire system and all the years they've been alive. He's quiet and doesn't like speaking often, and will avoid talking if he can really help it. Sometimes, he'll freeze up mid-sentence and be unable to continue verbally for a couple minutes. Due to how DID works, it's most likely that Red started /existing/ during childhood, and whoever was THE original kid Dude, is no longer a thing. Red formed specifically to take on everything the kid originally had to, and was hostile, reactive, and paranoid to survive. During this time as he was growing up though, along with delusions and hallucinations, he had another voice beside him. Dude, though he has been mistaken for the Demon: Postal 2 Dude, the main host of the system up until the car crash that formed Cowboy, sometimes called Green or Three (usually by mistake, or because Cowboy got too embarrassing), and after the 11 years spent in Catharsis or whatever. The Postal Dude himself, Dude, is a rather... Combustible person. He tries to play along with the people he meets and knows, but is ultimately always dragged down into a spiral of wanting to stop living this horrible life he's in. Something always goes wrong, he has nothing to live for besides Champ, and no matter what he does, he's never been able to escape the Hell that he's been stuck in for all these years. He's mostly selfish, in the sense that he's much more likely to run from a bad situation than help out someone who's in danger--unless there's something in it for him. It's hard for him to care about others, and it's hard for him to meet anyone even remotely sane nowadays. At this point, he's just counting the days until he finally snaps. And snap he did--when he shot himself in the head on Friday and ended up in a twisted hellscape of his own making. Mad Cow Tourettes Zombies are a laughing matter in the face of one million crazy and wacked out Gary Colemans throwing fucking grenades and scissors at you from every direction. I mean, seriously, what was up with that? Were those hospital attendants or just makings of Dude's mind? What the hell was happening? And why the hell were those Colemans so strong? Where the fuck did the grenades come from Anyway, back on track: Cowboy, aka Green, aka Three, aka Loser, aka Dumbass, aka Fuckwit (I'm assuming I don't need to make it any more clear?): Postal 3 Dude, a game I have not bothered playing and instead watched a longplay of because by god, that gameplay is ass. So, he formed after the car crash, and was the first one to wake up. That brain damage mixed with a nuclear blast really does something to a guy, huh? Well, once he was back on the road and fixed up, he went to Catharsis with Champ and did... Some stuff. I'm going to say that stuff was NOT everything shown in the actual game because the story is dumb to me and i think I could rewrite it and make it more fun. Haha, that'd be cool, right? Anyway. Cowboy's the most anxious of the group. He tries to be cool and act like everything's chill and like he's in control of things, when really he's usually not. He's not prone to violence--at least not as much as Dude and Red might be--but he IS going to resort to it if he can't get what he wants in a somewhat tame way. I imagine, if he and Movie dude were to meet, they would like kiss and make out under the moonlight. Who said that Anyway, if you have anything you want to know in particular about these dudes, let me know because I love talking about all my thoughts. and Stuff.

[4ragon]

any book recommendations?

Dooooooont fucking do this to me ahhhh okay. Okay. I have read 72 books so far this year and I have been having a blast so you may be unleashing a monster, let me just look through my Goodreads and see what I’ve read. I’ll put it under the cut so no one murders me.

Also. Mostly fantasy, fair warning. I like fantasy.

First!!! Since I finished it yesterday:

Voyage of the Damned by Frances White

Debut novel, it’s a magical murder mystery romance with fun characters and magic and a bisexual main character, I had a blast with it. Plenty of twists and turns, some I predicted and some that managed to blindside me.

Also it literally just came out this year so no one else is posting about it. My library only just got it this month. Someone needs to talk to me about how fucked up some of this is.

(Also, I’d rate it M if it were on ao3. Lots of sex jokes. Suicidal characters. Be aware of that.)

The Stormlight Archive by Brandon Sanderson

Okay fair warning, every book in here is 1000 pages long. That is not hyperbole. Also some heavy themes, ie suicide, abuse, slavery, murder.

But this book is a MASTERCLASS in worldbuilding. Like. Holy shit this man puts so much detail in this series. I’ve only read through book 2 (well 2.5) and while it did take a bit to get through the initial hurdle of “I’m going to introduce a million fantasy concepts to you and you have to fucking roll with it” it’s well worth it. A lush world with some amazing characters. I’m enjoying the series.

Six of Crows by Leigh Bardugo

It’s a bunch of heists in a magical gritty setting with a bunch of awful people and I loved it a ton. Though it did make me really anxious. So anxious. Heist movies make me anxious. I love these guys.

I do think it’s weird to have them be 17 but I choose to ignore that. It’s got a great cast, and it’s sooooo fun to watch a plot unfold. It’s really good at giving you just enough information to constantly be at the edge of your seat.

Here’s one a bit out of left field: The Color Purple by Alice Walker

A musical version came out and I wanted to read the book before even touching that. And guys. One of the best books I’ve ever read. But. Trigger warning times 1000 by page 1, REALLY heavy. It’s the kind of book that beats you down for a while before things get better.

But they do get better. They do.

Iron Widow by Xiran Jay Zhao

Queer as hell, angry as hell, basically mechs fighting aliens in a setting based loosely on ancient China. I was not expecting the romance to go the way it did but it made me very happy, and I’m so excited for the next book.

The Murderbot Diaries by Martha Wells

I’ve talked about this before. I love you Murderbot.

They’re all very short, action packed novellas. More serialized than I expected but that’s part of the charm! Plus Murderbot is such a great character. My favorite is the one actually novel length one but the whole thing is great.

Discworld by Terry Pratchett

This is a whole series you can read in any order. They’re genuinely laugh out loud funny and also heartfelt and beautiful . My favorites so far have been Guards! Guards!, Going Postal and Reaper Man

The Locked Tomb by Tamsyn Muir

I know we’ve all run the “Lesbian necromancers in space” thing into the ground, but also Gideon may be one of my favorite characters in anything ever. She’s so fucking fun. She’s funny and crass in a way I feel like female protagonists rarely get to be. I love her.

Also. I have no idea what the fuck is happening. I think that’s part of the charm. Lots of worldbuilding going on in the background that makes no sense until the end and then you’re like holy shit. I love it.

A Most Agreeable Murder by Julia Seales

So mix Pride and Prejudice with a murder mystery novel and the ridiculousness of a Discworld novel and you have this book. It’s so fun. One of the background characters is clearly a werewolf and it has nothing to do with the rest of the plot.

The House in the Cerulean Sea by TJ Klune

I’ve already gushed about this book but it’s so found family. The absolute coziest feel-good novel I’ve read. Plus it’s queer as hell! One of my absolute favorites.

Light From Uncommon Stars by Ryka Aoki

This book was just beautiful. Another one with some heavy themes, but I loved it. Aliens and demons, queer, trans mc, about music and hope and found family. Plus it got be back into reading so! It holds a special place in my heart.

Sorry. That was a lot. That’s not even all of them but these were some of my favorites.

[strawbrygashez]

Tyler Durden x Postal 2 Dude

Donuts (Part 1)

Yes I know this is super cringe & random. I’m sorry. I love crossing over different fandoms I’m into soooo yeah. This takes place during the time Tyler leaves the narrator and uhmmm I dunno, just be nice to me please 😭 Sorry for any mistakes and whatnot.

————————————————————————

Time goes by fast when you’re having fun. Well, as much fun as you can have in the small chaotic town known as Paradise, Arizona. The plan had been to keep moving around from town to town, state to state but a certain chance incident happened that put that plan on halt for the time being.

And as Tyler laid there finishing what was left of his ‘post coital’ cigarette, on a mattress that desperately needed to be replaced, he felt the one who put a pause on his plans, move from under the sheets as they laid on top of him. Glancing down, he couldn’t help the smirk that tugged at his lips when he was met with the scowling ginger who was peaking only their head out and squinting their stupidly bright green eyes.

“Ya finally done hiding in your cocoon there sweetheart?” He teased as he plucked the cig out from between his lips before blowing a small puff of smoke right into the other mans face. It barely affected him besides the groan he let out as he lazy fanned the smoke away. “Dickhead.” Was all he muttered before resting his chin back down on Tylers bare chest.

Tylers boy-ish smirk melted into more of a genuine smile as he stared into the others eyes. It really was genuinely insane how vivid of a green shade the mans eyes were to Tyler. Out of all the men and women he has messed around with, none had such captivating eyes and not even in a romantic sense. This guys eyes just had this interesting quality to them where they looked just like gas station puddles when the light hits them a certain way… At least that’s what they reminded Tyler of anyways.

Once he focused fully back on the man and the way he was still squinting, Tyler chuckled before only just seemingly now remember something important to the other. “Oh yeah..You poor baby.” He mockingly coo’ed again as he carefully reached over to grab the discarded pair of sunglasses on the poor excuse of a side table. “Poor Dude can’t go without ‘em for five seconds.”

Dude grumbled something or another under his breath before snatching them out of Tylers hand and sliding them back on. “Yeah, yeah. And you can’t wait even a second for me to get up to turn the lights off before we fuck.”

“Well that’s on you for not turning the damn lights off before we fell asleep.” Tyler pointed out as he put what was left of his cigarette out on the side table. “If you got bad eyes when there’s light then why-”

He was cut off when Dude placed his hand over his mouth. “Shut it. I was tired and you were too.” He lazily muttered.

Under his hand, he felt Tyler grin again before the blondes mouth opened and bit down on his pointer finger, a bit too hard to be considered ‘playful’.

Dude let out a loud “OW!” before quickly pulling his hand away and rubbing his finger off onto the bed sheet to he the spit off. “Motherfucker…”

Dude had to have been one of the most worth while people he’d been around in quite a while. Not only was he witty, oddly charming, and pleasantly ‘weird’, he also could just tell Dude was at ‘rock bottom’ and perhaps been so for a while. Dude was the perfect personification of all Tyler had ever preached about from self destruction to not letting your things own you. Hell, he was doing even better than him in that regard. Instead of living in a house, Dude owned a little run down shitty trailer home and all he really had outside of that was some dog that was out running around named ‘Champ’.

Another thing about Dude he found interesting was the whole ‘Postal Dude’ name. Tyler was pretty sure even the worst parents in the world wouldn’t have picked a name like that out for their kid. So he’d come to the conclusion that Dude also decided not to let a name ‘own him’.

The more he thought about Dude, the more he thought about how if something were to happen to himself, he’d have no problem at all passing ownership of ‘Fight Club’ along to Dude. Dude would have to fight….a certain someone for that position but he didn’t want to think of that ‘certain someone’ right now. Maybe, hypothetically, it would be easier to let him in on Project Mayhem. Honestly he wouldn’t have been surprised if Dude had already been in on Project Mayhem. The first thing he’d seen Dude do was something basically torn straight out of a page of Tylers book. And what did he do specifically? What happened at their chance meeting?

Well, while Tyler had been trying to get a hold of someone on one of the phones right outside some gas station, he watched as this weirdo, fully grown mallgoth dressed man walk out of the gas station with a box full of donuts, walk around back (passing Tyler), poorly hide himself behind a bush, unzip his pants, and piss onto said donuts. This all of course before he zipped his pants back up and tossed one of them at a nearby cop.

Once the cop stopped, the pisser quickly turned around before they could tell he’d thrown it and to Tyler’s surprise.. The cop then proceeded to pick up the ground donut, eat it, and then violently vomit.

Of course Tyler had to introduce himself to this odd specimen and since then, he’d somewhat glued himself to Dudes hip and helped him with whatever daily tasks Dude had planned and what turned from just being what was supposed to be a three day stop, turned into about three weeks. Three weeks he’d spent staying with Dude in his little trailer home. What was even more surprising than that though was the fact they’d only had sex one other time before today.. and Tyler was usually the of guy to participate in ‘marathon sex’. The only reason why he assumed it ended up playing out like this this time was because Dude was just one of those people who had more to offer than a quick fuck to Tyler. He had his own unique opinions about life, morals, and just wasn’t someone you’d meet to often. Nothing usually captivated Tyler more when it comes to people like him.

~

As he was currently thinking of the fact they’ve only gotten down and dirty one other time, he realized something. “Yknow, I hardly ever fuck gingers. Especially ginger guys.” Tyler spoke as he slid his fingers into the others hair.

He couldn’t tell for sure but it looked like Dude closed his eyes at the contact. “Hmm… Am I supposed to feel honored by that fact?” Dude asked with a hint of sarcasm. It was kinda hard to tell sometimes, he spoke mostly in a monotone voice. Tyler answered anyways, “Yknow it baby”, followed by a slight tug of his hair, to which Dude whined. Not in a particularly pleased tone, one more out of annoyance. “Agh. Stop that.”

“I thought you liked-”

“Being manhandled. Yes. Just not right after you just fucked me to near death.”

Tyler rolled his eyes but rubbed the spot he’d tugged his hair from. “Lame. Must take you a while to get it back up, huh?”

Dude ignored what he just asked for now and opted just to now lay the side of his head against him. Seeing that Dude wasn’t as defensive as other people Tyler knew, he just chuckled again as he continued to play with his hair.

Tyler hadn’t been much of the type to cuddle but for some reason, he didn’t mind that much since it was Dude. Maybe it was because he could tell Dude was a loner. Tyler always found himself enjoying messing with the loner types anyways. That or despite the fact that he loved that Dude got into trouble and mischief almost every day, he knew deep down that a break every once in a while was good and to be honest..Dude wasn’t too bad on the eyes. He somehow looked really pathetic but also rugged and dangerous at the same time. It excited him.

~

It had been quiet for a while as Tyler pondered different things involving Dude until the ginger finally broke the silence. It almost made Tyler jump since he was sure he’d fell asleep.

“How much longer are you staying?”

“Huh?”

Dude let out a yawn before moving around a bit to look up at him while still on top. “How much longer are you sticking around for?”

Tyler was silent a moment before raising a brow while grinning. “Why? Want me out of your hair already?”

“No I was just wondering since I’m uh- running low on food ‘n shit. Plus I thought you said you were traveling around. I don’t know why anyone would wanna stay more than a day in this shit hole. Unless you’ve been going out and doing stuff or-”

“Have you seen me go out without you since we met dumbass?”

Dude frowned slightly at the name calling. “Well- no but I doubt you’re sticking around for me so..”

All Tyler could do in response was roll his eyes and push Dude off of him so he could sit up and stretch finally. Dude didn’t seem that offended though as he just ran a hand over his face, still groggy.

“-sounded like such a girl….” Tyler mumbled as he popped his back.

Dude frowned again, glaring at him. “What was that?” He asked. “Nothing hun.” Tyler replied shaking his head with a smile before he turned his head to look over at the alarm clock. “It’s still pretty early. Wanna go grab breakfast somewhere?” He asked the man laying next to him who still looked one minute away from falling asleep. “Mmmmgh..fineee. Just give me a couple more minutes to get up.”

[scrunchicus]

Hi! What is Postal about? These dudes look so greasy and I’m Intrigued (TM)!

ohhh man yeah theyre greasy. postal is a series of. Video Games... postal 1 was kind of a spiteful message towards people who said video games cause violence, back in the 1990s. it was published in 1997 and is just an isometric/top down shooter where all you do is kill people. it's really fun to play though. postal 2 on the other hand is just a silly satirical offensive game with dark and childish humor. it's fun as hell and the protag, postal dude, is just... a guy. literally just a guy. i'd recommend maybe taking a look at some videos about it, theres a couple good ones out there that i cant remember right now. it's totally worth it if you're into stupid shooters with dumb humor lmao

[zapsoda]

Hey.

What is Postal? I find myself increasingly attracted to the Postal Dude and I would like to know.

Uh.

Everything I suppose.

hell yeah!! based! so postal is a video game franchise (and also movie). the games are typically first person or isometric shooters (although in some of the games you are presented with the option not to kill anyone).

the games typically revolve around this fuckin ginger (some version of him anyways) and his deal is that he just keeps wnding up in situations where everyone is trying to kill him.

if ur interested in getting into specific games ; postal 2 is the classic, its a banger, everyone likes that one. lil bit cringe and edgy and dated but its a lotta fun. the deal w this game is that you can kinda do whatever the fuck you want (main appeal). like it has tasks that you needa complete to progress the game. but you can do those at whatever pace or order you want and in the meantime just fuck around exploring the map. you can pick up cats in the game :33. you smoke crack to restore health. theres a piss button and a suicide button. lotta bangin dlc

the first game (postal 1), the april fools game (poostall royale), and the third game (postal 3) are all free 2 play. the first two are on steam theyre cute lil isometric shooters. the first one has a lot of appeal with the story going on. between each level theres these little bits of text like journal entries from the dude. i did not read these the first time i played it and thus i thought it was boring. (eheh). poostall royale has a girl version of the dude (huge win for bisexuals everywhere).

postal 3 is generally considered the worst game ever made by redditors and the creators themselves, so you can only play it if you pirate it (which is endorsed by the creators lol). i cant say much about this one my only experience with the game is a russian speedrun of it.

more recent games are postal 4: no regerts, and postal: brain damaged. i have heard mixed reviews of the former, but there is a drag outfit and you can pet animals so those are pretty enticing imo

the latter is GREAT. fucking gorgeous trippy silly game. the dialogue is unbelievably cringe. love this one. 10/10. been trying to 100% it. slowly.

the movie is on tubi its. unrecommendable. but. i have a soft spot for it, it was kinda funny sometimes to me... i hate what it did to zack wards place in my brain. its like. edgy 2003 type shit. Based 9/11 humor. take this as you will (maybe give it a try?)

on tumblr you may find many people referring to a version of the dude who is ripped and dressed in a blue and white striped tank top. this is shtopor he is from some russian version of postal 2 made by a different company. its called postal: corkscrew rules by many, but thats not the most accurate translation afaik. it never got an american release, however it did get a japanese release which was dubbed in english. game itself is utter shit from what i can tell but i have heard good things about the music (banger russian indie metal). i dont think i can mention this game without mentioning that the plot revolves around sexual reassignment surgery shenanigans. idk how to elaborate on this one its a lot. lmfao.

anyways. i focused mostly on the franchise itself rather than Him, i can elaborate on him more if u want. hope this was helpful nonetheless :-)))

[blackenedsnow]

Can I ask you to write headcanons for the Dudes on their s/o being a cat person and having a lot of cats at home (probably in their 30s). Knowing how Dude treats cats in the games, I think it would be interesting to see their reactions.

the dudes having a cat person s/o with lots of cats ; headcanons

WARNING: None

PAIRING: Postal (1) Dude x Reader, Postal (2) Dude x Reader, Postal (3) Dude x Reader, Postal (4) Dude x Reader, Postal (BD) Dude x Reader, Postal (Movie) Dude x Reader

NOTE: EVERY SINGLE DUDE OKAY LETS GO

P1 DUDE

P1 isn’t the most expressive person, but when he first walks into your home filled with cats, he doesn’t seem bothered by it.

He’s got a soft spot for animals in his own way, especially considering how they’re often the only living things he doesn’t lash out at.

He’ll silently acknowledge them, maybe giving them a nod as if they understand each other.

The cats actually help calm him down.

P1 has a lot of internal turmoil, and being around your calm and curious cats is one of the few things that grounds him.

He finds their quiet presence soothing, even if he never says it out loud.

He won’t actively seek out the cats for affection, but if one comes over and curls up on him, he’ll stay still, letting it be.

Over time, you might catch him absentmindedly petting one of them while lost in thought.

It’s subtle, but it’s a sign of his trust in both you and the animals.

P2 DUDE

P2 has been through some weird stuff, so the idea of you having a house full of cats doesn’t exactly faze him.

In fact, he seems oddly cool with it.

But, at first he does NOT shut up about how dogs are better

He secretly loves your cats, and you’ll often catch him joking about how your house has become a “feline kingdom.”

He’s the type to start naming the cats ridiculous things like “Mr. Whiskers” or “Claws McGraw,” and you’ll often find him playing with them using improvised toys.

There’s something about the fun of having so many cats that just fits with his lifestyle, and he’ll probably end up forming a bond with a few of them.

You might find him using one of the cats as an improvised something again, but only when he’s in a pinch.

He’ll definitely give them a good pet afterward and make sure they’re okay.

It’s part of his strange way of showing love, and he’ll treat them like royalty when he’s not in survival mode.

P3 DUDE

P3 has a bit of a different energy.

When he walks into your cat-filled home, he’s not sure what the hell to do at first.

He’s unsure how to approach the situation, because usually he's kidnapping cats.

Over time, he gets used to the cats.

He might roughly try to pet one, in a loving way, looking to you for guidance on how to handle them.

P3 will eventually start trying to “win over” the cats, bringing treats or toys in an attempt to earn their approval.

You might catch him quietly whispering

“Hey, little guy, you like me, right? You like me more right? Way more?”

He’s got an endearing side to him when he’s trying hard to impress.

P4 DUDE

The moment P4 steps into your home and sees all of your cats lounging around, he’s thrilled.

“Damn, look at all these fluffy little guys!”

He’s immediately down on the floor, trying to pet as many as possible and get them to love him.

He’s the type to instantly form a connection with your cats.

You’ll often find him with a few of them on his lap or one draped over his shoulder while he's napping.

He probably has ongoing conversations with the cats, acting like they’re part of the family and sometimes even asking them for advice when you’re not around.

Because he's dumb and weird. Duh.

Expect him to start spoiling them, sneaking them treats when you’re not looking, and building elaborate little cat forts out of cardboard boxes.

BD DUDE

BD’s reaction is one of sheer confusion at first.

He walks in, sees all the cats, and probably stares at them for a long moment.

“Wait… how many cats are there again?”

His sense of reality might be a little warped, but he finds the whole thing odd.

He’ll likely try to communicate with the cats in strange ways, meowing at them or mimicking their movements.

It doesn’t always make sense, but the cats seem to tolerate him, and he finds their reactions endlessly entertaining.

Despite his strange behavior, he manages to coexist with your cats, and they oddly seem to flock to him.

Maybe it’s because they recognize the energy he gives off, but either way, you’ll often find him surrounded by a bunch of your cats, all of them staring at him like they understand something you don’t.

MOVIE DUDE

He's SO gentle when it comes to these little guys.

He respects cats in the same way he respects you—creatures that do what they want, on their terms.

He admires their independence and sharp instincts.

He’s extremely protective of your cats, much like he is with you.

If anything threatens them—whether it’s a stray dog or an intruder—he won’t hesitate to step in.

He’s oddly defensive about them, as if he sees them as part of his new, makeshift family.

Unlike some of the other Dudes, he’s quieter in his interactions with the cats.

You might find him sitting in the corner, watching them with a small smirk on his face as they go about their business.

He’s content just being around them, appreciating their quiet companionship.

He really, really wants them to like him.

But he also doesn't wanna be attacked

So he's stuck.

[elodieunderglass]

It’s a good question but not set up to be the case in the canon material! Obviously we are having fun, but it’s backed (at least in my own contributions) by the genuinely interesting public health problems and ecological implications of hobbits.

A few reasons, behind the cut because I’m conscious of having contributed TOO MANY WORDS across various iterations of this post already:

1. Tolkien provided a lot of extensive hobbit family trees, often with birth and death dates. These indicate large families produced by - this is important! - the same mother. Conclusions: mothers weren’t frequently dying in childbirth, and early deaths aren’t often recorded on the family trees. (Possible explanations you could invent for this could include things like “children only being recorded on family trees if they reach a certain age/milestone.” But then you’d be doing the same thing as making them all poly - adding your own imagination!)

One of the longest family lines is the lineage of the Old Took, who sired twelve children and was a shared ancestor of Bilbo, Frodo, Merry and Pippin. In addition to having “three remarkable daughters” including the adventurous Belladonna Took, some of his kids met such unusual fates that they were included parenthetically next to their birth/death dates. One of this generation Took siblings actually went to sea once (but came back and lived to be like 100), one never returned from an adventure, one had no children at all (!!!) and one, Hildigard, “died young.” Hildigard’s birth/death dates aren’t given, but she was clearly old enough to have been named. Dying young was clearly significant; perhaps on the same level of notability as dying childless or dying on an adventure. However, the Old Took was famous and influential, so it’s reasonable that there be more interest in his children’s fates than usual, and that Hildigard’s early death is recorded for those reasons, while perhaps working-class hobbits would have just lost children without recording them.

There is only one “working class” hobbit family tree, and that’s Sam’s.

And while it doesn’t have death dates, we do see that they all started having kids in early adulthood, around the age of 40. Sam’s parents had 6 kids over an 18-year span (!). Of those, 4 achieved adulthood as indicated by marriage or career updates. Again, there might have been dead ones left off the family tree/dying unnamed, if we use that theory I came up with. or this might genuinely be all the kids Hamfast and Bell had, and Daisy and May might have died. But we’re still seeing a general pattern of couples producing more than 2 living kids.

2. The statement in canon is that hobbits have notably “large families”, implying both lots of (living) siblings to be observed, but also something especially worthy of comment. The historical 30%-or-whatever mortality rate could certainly reduce numbers of babies like anything! but there would still have to be a LOT of siblings and cousins and big kids knocking around to create the apparently-accepted canon cultural truth of “hobbits have large families.” Then consider if they were living in a setting where it was normal for all families of all races to be affected by the same problems; they would have, say, five children, of whom two would survive early childhood. If that was expected and natural, those other people still have to turn around and point to hobbits, saying “THOSE little buggers have REALLY big families.”

Fold into that the fact that hobbits are (for their own reasons) living in extremely functional and prosperous 1700s-1800s England, with plenty of food and tea and biscuits, and a functioning postal service - while everyone else is living in various times of antiquity, and constantly getting mown down by raiders. and it seems like it should be backwards; humans should be having huge families with a few survivors, while hobbits should only be having a few kids. What the HELL are they doing over there -

3. We do need something to actually kill off the kids. We do need some cause or factor to do it. The absolute best thing is disease, especially infectious diseases! Especially since we’ve shown that we aren’t seeing family-tree indications of bearers and children dying together in childbirth, which was a formerly popular way to go - let’s go for the next best thing of preventable infectious diseases! And the tricky thing about disease is that the patterns here would have to be continually carrying off medium-sized children and young adults. This would crop the population like a mown lawn, constantly picking off people before they reproduced, while allowing the overall impression of “big families.” But this would have to be an infectious disease that somehow isn’t captured in family trees. And doesn’t stop mothers from bearing kids regularly. And doesn’t follow cycles of epidemic or pandemic (all the families all losing cousins at once in the same year etc.) so their most impactful diseases would have to be things like consumption (tuberculosis) where plenty of people can live as carriers, everyone has different levels of resistance, and they succumb to the disease at different times. I am quite happy for the Shire to have a lot of tuberculosis knocking around. Crammed full of TB. It doesn’t ever make a huge dent on the population, but it definitely hits constantly.

4. We could expect that non-infectious diseases - cancer, heart disease, stroke, diabetes, etc - should be constantly and continuously wiping out a decent number of adults - although those normally don’t interfere with reproduction and don’t solve our problem. But hobbit life histories as recorded in those stupid family trees are VERY annoying. They’re so annoying with it that in a 2022 paper intended to teach evolutionary biology to kids, authors analysing hobbits had to conclude that hobbits were probably just resistant to disease and cancer. Those stupid birth/reproduction/death dates indicate a life history slower and more resilient than humans. There probably is a decent amount of this happening anyway, but to the adults, not so much the kids. The family trees definitely and continuously imply an absurdly resilient race that really should have a huge population.

5. Kids should definitely be dying by accident a lot - drowning, falling down stairs (admittedly their architecture has few stairs) and so on. However, the culture seems to suggest that it would have to be quite a subtle continuous attrition of children. Disasters, accidents, attacks and famines are all so rare in the Shire that people literally still talk about interesting deaths a generation later. Frodo’s parents were considered completely unhinged for dying of drowning. The Fell Winter, in 2911/1311, was legendary for being difficult - in the Unfinished Tales Gandalf says:

“They (the shire-folk) were very hard put to it then: one of the worst pinches they have been in, dying of cold, and starving in the dreadful dearth that followed.”

The Fell Winter caused a drop in population, and it’s possible that they hadn’t recovered from it by the time of the books; but everyone had a lot of kids since then, and it’s still a huge legendary outlier and the worst thing that every happened to their species.

Notably there weren’t many deaths in 1311 recorded in the family trees, which is obviously due to Tolkien not matching stuff up (this whole situation is about him not matching stuff up, and us filling in the gaps). But the point I wanted to make here is that disasters are rare to hobbits.

6. A possible theory is that every hobbit even tangentially related to the Fellowship hobbits has possessed a disproportionate share of luck and fecundity, so their family trees are absurd, and everyone else is just DEAD.

7. To be fair we do see a LITTLE political impact that could be attributed to having more young people than old ones. In The Hobbit, the middle-aged Bilbo is extremely conservative and concerned with reputation and respectability; the Shire is openly prejudiced against other races. But by LotR we meet a younger generation of hobbits who are very different. Some of this is possibly due to Bilbo having changed the culture a little bit (and that’s Gandalf’s own hope and meta-explanation*) but some of it could be because of the population effect I mentioned way back - constant, ever-growing new generations being (theoretically) ever-harder to control through cultural expectations, and therefore being ever more progressive and flexible.

For this we can see Fatty Bolger - a friend of the Fellowship hobbits, who is presented as the least brave and progressive of them all, therefore elected the one staying home as a decoy while the rest of them trot off happily on a high-risk quest. Fatty casually achieves some impressive feats without worrying at all about respectability. He agrees to be a living decoy for the Nazgûl, escapes them on foot and raises the alarm, and later is a rebel leader in the occupied Shire. The Bolgers are in a reasonable approximation of the same social class as the Baggins family, and Fatty did this while being younger than Bilbo, but Fatty is seemingly willing to go into ride-or-die mode. Bilbo’s constant personal worries and fears about “hobbits don’t do that, hobbits do this” and “is this respectable” don’t seem to form part of the Fellowship hobbits’ mental landscape, and even the most cowardly of the young generation is shown being active, brave, and taking initiative. By the time of Fellowship, a working-class hobbit openly declares his desire to observe other races (Sam’s fascination with elves), young hobbits apparently normalise far-ranging camping trips all the time, Gandalf is a frequent Disturber of the Peace, dwarves come from all over to help out with a birthday party, and Frodo’s four best friends plan a journey outside the Shire in a spirit of helpful mischief. Culturally, they’re more open and responsive than Bilbo portrayed them.

So it’s possible that the Shire is in a constant state of ongoing exponential growth and development and progress, and is just so obscure that nobody has noticed that yet. And THAT could be why they’re reasonably technologically advanced and so on. Which slightly changes the flavour - but once again requires the reader’s input and imagination and research and three different sources to bring to light. So we might as well just have whatever fun we like, right? The ultimate answer is that Tolkien didn’t think about it! and meanwhile he made so many statements of such confidence and such implications that they created huge numbers of attractive fanfic gaps, in which fans can nest, like cliff swallows.

At any rate, it’s all provocation and good fun. You might as well announce that hobbit family trees are a mishmash of kinship types that conceal a truly goofy amount of polyamorous activity, as try to work out why kids aren’t dying more, when they really should.

* in the Unfinished Tales, Gandalf tells Pippin that he chose a hobbit for Thorin’s company partly because he foresaw an apocalyptic world war coming and wanted hobbits to survive it: he picked Bilbo to be a social catalyst to change their culture and increase their likelihood of surviving it. the Unfinished Tales aren’t 100% canon, but it does seem to have worked.

Every time Sean Astin makes a statement on whether or not Sam and Frodo were indeed gay for each other in lord of the rings he’s always like “well we have to acknowledge that attitudes around sexuality have changed dramatically over the past several decades and since authorial intent is only up to speculation, the story is open to multiple readings, some of which might have different significances for different groups of people also they kiss on the lips because I said so”

[imy2]

notes longtext

2-2 oooo hi hector , didnt realize he'd be so soon •

oh damn goodbye mack. should've expected that was this ep w vasquez comin in... ughh the way murphy looks when addy's staring at him :/// •

2-3 "woahh don't be so negative; worry is poison - that's why you don't crap right." lmao random dude, too real •

"you are not the boss of me -.- she is." one of my fav murphy lines •

ok i regret not taking notes last eps so recap of what i rmbr then onward.. rc2-4 z weed lol • rc2-5 nvr noticed b4 that they call this ep aka lucy zombaby - makes sensee , but s1 zombaby is true zombaby in my heart. lucy's lucy :p ... ugh serena was so pretty this ep.. even looked cool as a zombie • rc2-6 gb4n lucy.. also cassandra :(( </3 • rc2-7 sketchy n skeezy were here again .. • rc2-8 i thiiink it was this ep that this happened but if not close enuff.. warren said to murphy, "the time is coming where you're gonna have to decide what side you're on - and when that time comes, remember which is trying to help u survive n which wants to eat ur brains." ooo i never noticed how good of a line that is bc well warren which side is which! half the zombies dont care abt murphy atp and yall r takin him to be experimented on .. hmmm • rc2-9 this is always a fun ep • rc2-10 idt docs cool aop in this ep... • rc2-11 addys hotelwoman moment :') • rc2-12 oo the zeroes.. warrens sooo pretty •

2-13 murphy savin warren, hell yeah. murphy listening to warren, helll yeahh. again warrens gorg.. hector n doc n murphy all also look cool .. el camino B) 10k w slingshot - also cool •

2-14 lmfao doc pre-z(beginning of z actually) "oh jeez, sorry, didn't mean to intrude! -- what a minute, what did i just see.. larry and his gay lover? it's funny he never mentioned him.. 2 patients wrestling on the couch? .. it's a damn zombie! hang on larry!" lol him pullin a joint from his beard .. • •interlude ... i used to say i wish i had a beard all the time as a kid 9-like12, love that for me..idt id want one now, i do wish i had more body hair tho man my arms n legs look hairless basically -.- my brother used to always comb his hand thru his thick ass leg -.- #jealous .. also hairy stomachs r so hot -.- anyways.. i also need to do smth diff w my headhair like sooo bad. its been like 6yrs since ive had a haircut its badd. i wish i cld do a cool haircut but my hairs thin n straight so.. no cool cuts look how i'd want them to w/o stylin n i cannot put stylin effort into my hair everyday.. i need a genius to tell me wtd w my hair basically! but im scared of goin anywhere..

also on subject of gender(re my feelings abt my hair) i've been kind of (aka when i rmbr to lol n when it dsnt feel awk) tryin to speak in a deeper pitch .. i hate when my voice sounds as high as it does smtimes :/ also.. well nvm 4now •

"why me? i don't want to be shit. this is all some terrible mistake. i just want to crawl off and die like everybody else. why me? what did i do? where is my mercy?" murphy n mercy (n me) i said it! •

omg pre-z murphy looks so different n cool. & postal fraud man.. he shld be pissed •

"if you were really my friend, you'd help me." "but i'm not your friend." ... "they're gonna hurt me. you know that, right?" "i won't let that happen." •

2-15 "i did not spend three years fighting my way across 10,000miles of zombie-crazed america just so i can be a blood bag for a few billionaires." hell yeah •

bye vasquez .. hey hector.. hey(almost) kaya n dr. sun :-) aww lucy.. •

•s2 done.. overall rating.. 3.5/5 .. i didnt rate s1 brb.. 3/5 .. huh kinda surprised s2 came out on top •

3-1 hi red.. hi the man... •

ooo i nvr noticed the red details -right b4 walking up there's red cloth in a basket, then - redofc, 5ks keychains, warrens bandana, 10ks socks n bandana n shirt stripes, docs suspenders n sunglasses, cassandra's jacket, addy's shirt n jacket tassels .. very obvious, cool .. then just blue murphy. interesting. enuff red down the line tho •

"got a name?" "10,000. but everyone calls me 10k." "10,000? that's a number, not a name." ... ''so what's ur name?" "red." "that's not a name, that's a color." - wait lol, "you asked me my name, that's my name" red u did it to him first •

3-2 • intros.. s1 was 3bullets, s2 was 2bullets-chomp, s3 was 3bullets+spin .. fun stuff •

now murphy got red pants this ep.. after they first reinforced blue by only showing shirt/skin/hat.. interesting •

ahh murphy wanted warren to go w him so bad :/ "seriously roberta?" .. "ttfn" •

3-3 got a fun screenshot from this ep .. terrible quality ofc.. •

3-4 10k off the bridge n merch khs .. fair enuff•

3-5 tbh the way reds been here so far(aka e1 n now) is so weird.. •

[beesmygod]

Hello, do u have any game recommendations for the steam winter sale? If not don’t worry. Have a nice day!

what a sweet question...my recommendations are going to suck so sorry ahead of time

dark souls remastered - $19.99 / dark souls 3 - $14.99 : you know what these are. i still think the remaster price is bullshit. that's a good price for 3 tho.

sekiro - $29.99 : this game took a long time to grow on me but man. it fucking rules.

fallout new vegas ultimate - $7.99 : the good bethesda game not made by bethesda. a steal for a game that i dropped a ton of time into over the years. for some reason it just kept pulling me back in! it's just kinda fun to explore, you know.

morrowind GOTY edition - $4.59 : god i love morrowind. uh, once i modded it to hell and back lol. the base game is not very playable. but once you fix all that shit my god its easily my favorite bethesda game. it has absolute faith in the player to fucking figure shit out and doesn't give you waypoints. instead you have to ask around and get directions! they have not and will never make a world this weird again. you ride around on giant insects and explore cities with bizarro architecture that's easy to get lost in. you meet living gods and dunmer who have gaping holes in their faces and empty skulls. the fauna are fucking dinosaurs. its so fucking good. AND everyone fucking HATES YOU LMFAO. EVERYONE. absolutely no one wants you to be the chosen one. its great.

oblivion GOTY edition deluxe - $5.99 : morrowind's much much dumber brother. hysterically bad at times. breaks in the funniest ways. install mods so it breaks more often. one time i walked into a village and everyone was t posing outside and slowly slid to the left through houses and barns and shit until they disappeared into a mountain. just wonderful.

dishonored definitive edition - $4.99 / dishonoured 2 deluxe bundle - $11.99 : extremely fun series where you get to teleport around and kill people. takes itself very seriously which makes it all the more charming lol. it feels good to play, you know.

opus magnum - $9.99 : i still havent finished this puzzle game because its hard but like. good hard. reminds me of the difficulty of 90s puzzle games that were geared toward adults.

two point hospital - $8.74 : this is just the base game bc the price for everything is completely out of pocket. this is a hospital sim game. run your hospital. hire your staff. build your rooms. try not to kill people. don't go bankrupt. good luck!

disco elysium - $17.99 : you know what this is.

girls like robots - $3.49 : a little puzzle game that scratches an itch ive been drastically trying to scratch. you can pick up and put down quickly. i like it

sunless sea - $6.45 : taking place in the world of the browser game "fallen london", you pilot a ship and manage your sanity, HP and food meters while out at sea. slowly reveal the map, find ways to make money by determining the best trade routes, and meddle in everyone's affairs. everyone's. the fellas at the salt lions will trade with you until the supply dries up and the fed-up postal workers have their own very insular culture that doesn't involve you and the polythreme causes all inanimate to become alive. all of them. pretty neat.

civ 6 anthology - $29.88 : ugghhhhhh 30 dollars?! in this economy?! damn you sid meiers and your stupid piecemeal dlc releases. you might as well get the full bundle bc the base game is unplayable. they shipped half a game. this pissed me off so much next time im pirating. good game tho.

pathologic 2 - $9.79 : maybe a little too close to reality right now but it is one of the best games ive ever played. feel free to play it on any difficulty option (this game is notorious for its perceived difficulty) but know that you're supposed to die and fail repeatedly. you cannot save them all. you won't save them all. maybe on the next playthrough, you can take what you've learned, try again.

planescape: torment - $5.99 : i played this ancient game this year and had an absolute blast with it lol. despite knowing nothing about the lore of the world, i managed to get sucked in to this really weird place the game dropped me in and quickly caught up on all the details.

sleeping dogs - $2.99 : neo-noir mystery set in hong kong. you play an undercover cop trying to infiltrate a gang so the game has you working both criminal stuff and police work at the same time. neat concept. funny on purpose at times. but my god the ending is disappointing lol. im telling you now to spare you the "that's it?!" feeling

saints row 4 game of the century edition - $4.99 : deeply stupid game. the johnny gat DLC is supposed to be terrible. the christmas one was a hoot. its mindless.

SOMA - $4.49 : philosophical horror game about consciousness. i dont know if there's a way to describe it without sounding pretentious. the way the player choices are utilized is the best way ive seen in a game so far since it reaches past the character youre playing to you, the player. highly recommend to play the mode where the monsters dont kill you. i fucking hate frictional games' gameplay. its wretched stuff. plus the monsters are pretty cool lol i liked looking at them

star wars knights of the old republic 1 & 2 - $3.49 : these games are worth exactly this much. the first one is one of the stupidest games ive ever played in my entire life and i dont think ive laughed so much. its like a b-movie in game form. its a riot, its just not good. the second one is made by obsidian and NEEDS!!! the patch!!!! to be a fully playable game. with the restored content its not half bad and the writing still drops into b-level territory delightfully.