#radical highway always fucks

[sonic-adventure-3]

DNB IN THE TRAILER FUCK IT IM HYPE. AMEN BREAK!!!! REAL HOPE WE SEE SHADOW BEING REPPED BY DNB AGAIN!!!!!!!!

[rederiswrites]

I want to talk about my health journey over this last year, improving my function and getting better with fibromyalgia and chronic fatigue. But talking about chronic illness is so incredibly difficult. Look at the backlash people get for saying that exercise and sunshine and regular sleep really DO help depression. What I have to say is in many ways the same thing! It's an incredibly delicate issue, and very often, talking about solutions you can implement yourself sounds like blaming people for their own suffering. On the other hand, if all you hear is the conventional medical line that there's nothing but some medicine that sort of helps, that's where you're stuck. I was stuck.

I didn't want to hear that learning to fucking relax was going to be a huge component of my journey. That sounded like exactly the same shit the people who said "have you tried yoga" and the doctors who told me it was all in my head were saying! It's not, really. Not at all. It's missing far too many critical components. But uh....learning to relax is in fact incredibly important.

For example, yes, the pain is in my head. Pain is ALWAYS in our heads!! That is where the brain decides to interpret data received from the nerves as pain! It is ALWAYS heavily influenced by factors well beyond the objective experience. Science has thoroughly demonstrated that we can feel pain without an injury--indeed, that we can feel pain when the sensory input wasn't even on our body! And in the inverse, we can have injuries and not experience pain. Pain is not nearly as reliable a signal of injury as we believe it to be.

And yes! Yoga might help! It helps a lot of people! But if you go and do yoga with, say, a teacher who is not trauma-informed, or without at least some understanding of what your nervous system is up to, or the strains and trouble points in your body, you'll get little benefit and might experience harm.

The nervous system is our body's OS, in a very real sense, and for me as for many people, addressing that turns out to be really important to healing. But the nervous system isn't really designed to be user serviceable! So if it's being overreactive, constantly on high alert, keeping you in a stress response that physically blocks healing, feeling pain where there's really only a light and innocuous pressure, or maybe just a runaway inflammatory response that, like a highway traffic jam, is literally just creating itself-- well, fixing that is hardly a matter of just "oh silly goose you should stop that! It's all in my head!" But there are ways. Mindfulness techniques. Visualization. Meditation. I almost mistyped medication but it's actually true--a lot of the time fibro and ME/CFS patients get treated with antidepressants! It does help, for a while, but it doesn't change the underlying problem much.

For me, while I've tried and gotten benefit from some of those--actually, come to think, ALL of those things--pure information is my medicine of choice. Just exposing myself over and over to the message that you can get better, that people have, that there's nothing detectable mechanically wrong with me, to the science of physiology and the nervous system and pain. Books, TED talks, youtube videos, research papers, articles...

And most importantly, I had to commit. I had to reach a point where I said, I will do whatever it takes. No comfort, no habit, is more important than getting better, and I believe I can get better. No doctor ever told me that--I had to find survivors who had recovered online, largely by accident. Once I believed I could get better, working to achieve that goal became vastly easier. So I radically changed my diet. I restructured my days massively. I spent hundreds of hours consuming information that reinforced my hope and commitment and my understanding of the problems. I worked incredibly hard to get my sleep under control, and it's an ongoing process but there has been progress.

Today, I got out of bed before the second alarm that tells me to get off my phone and get up. Because getting up wasn't so crushingly hard. I didn't have a perfect night's sleep, but it was enough. Yesterday, and the day before, I worked steadily through the day, I accomplished my goals, and I didn't end the day crushingly drained OR bubbling with adrenaline from pushing myself beyond my normal limits. I don't need to recover, today. Because I didn't do more than I could sustainably do, and yet I made progress. I did laundry. Had great conversations. Planted three dozen tulips. Pulled weeds. Attended a webinar and learned how my state legislature works. Took care of the chickens. Ate a really healthy lunch that I enjoyed, and made the family a really healthy, delicious dinner. Caught up on the news with the family and then read a thought-provoking book. Made beads.

I still have a long way to climb on this spiral staircase. Probably the cold weather and midwinter will really challenge my ability to regulate myself and stay functional. I still have to incorporate regular exercise as a critical pillar of ongoing good health. I'm still struggling to find resources on meditation and mindfulness practice that I resonate with. (Three books in on that subject, one of which was interesting but annoying, two of which I actually quit in exasperation.) But I do really feel like I'm making progress that's not just luck or the usual fluctuation of symptoms. I am, in quiet ways, doing Pretty Okay. And that's a lot, when you've been bedbound.

[big-cheesy-productions]

SXSG SPOILERS

Okay, I finished Shadow's story. And I have thoughts. Mainly:

More thoughts below:

Overall, I enjoyed it. I think as a way to catch everyone up on Shadow's story and who he is as a character, it did great. It was heavy on exposition, but it's assuming most people haven't played SAB-Heroes-STH '05. Fair enough.

It just felt short. I just wish the cutscenes were longer, and I wish there was more Maria and Gerald and Shadow. The interactions we got with Maria were very similar to what we got in Dark Beginnings. It felt more like a refresher rather than a much awaited closure, but I'll take the closure we got and the reestablishment of Shadow's character.

I think I just would have liked if the story had a few more cutscenes dealing with Shadow, Maria, and Gerald's relationships rather than them trying to figure out what was going on and Maria repeating things said in Dark Beginnings. But that's just me.

I think Dark Beginnings was so amazing and it set my expectations very high, set a specific tone, and had threads that Gens wasn't planning on continuing. I think Gens also set up threads that it dropped too though, like, you know, the whole "maybe I can save them from their fate" thing that got mentioned, forgotten, and mentioned again that was only otherwise minimally discussed in the little snippets of conversation in the over world.

Why was Big there and those two robots? There weren't any other characters relevant to Shadow that could be there? Like Abraham? Or, hell, toss Silver in since he wasn't in the original.

Gameplay wise, it was super fun. It felt very clean. I like the direction Frontiers has set for future gameplay. I think it was a little easy, but maybe that's just because I'm an adult and just played a bunch of old games that have old game jank lol.

Would have loved to see more Rouge and Omega, but I'm glad they're setting up for Team Dark to return in future installments. I'll fucking take that.

I've said it already, but the use of Radical Highway and the symbolism of it was probably my favorite part. I don't know why they had Frontiers level though??? Like, why not one from HIS GAME? Instead of one from a game he's not even in??? Odd choice. Maybe they could have done one of the flashback ARK levels? That could have given us some juicy cutscenes.

Also just want to appreciate the fact that the first time Shadow defeated Black Doom it was as Super Shadow. This time is was all Shadow, no emeralds required.

I also like the confirmation that Shadow was not meant to be a weapon originally. I don't think that's always been super clear. Doom wanted a warrior of course, but Gerald going insane was the nail in the coffin. I would have liked to see more of Shadow's feelings towards Gerald on that, though I did like when Shadow first sees Gerald up close he backs away, and almost looks a bit frightened, until he realizes this is Gerald from before the ARK incident.

I think they could have added a bit more. I think that's my overall opinion. Hopefully DLC will add a smidge more? Maybe?

I really did enjoy it. I just wanted to jot down all of my thoughts!

Edit: I don't want this to read as super critical! I think I had very specific expectations for it and I'd like to replay it without those expectations now. I really think it's great overall!

Anyway, SEGA, remaster SAB2, Heroes, STH '05, and Sonic '06 and my life is yours.

[itz-pandora]

Watched a playthrough of SXSG

How the fuck do I start this

I kept saying "YOU CAN HOMING ATTACK RAILS?" to myself. Joy

WHY DID THEY GIVE SHADOW CHAOS ISLAND??? LOL??? him and Tails always gotta have something. Mf stole his island.

unfortunately, his ass is NOT driving. Squid too small

MARIA MARIA MARIA MARIA MARIA MARIA MARIA MARIA MARIA MARIA MARIA MARIA MARIA MARIA MARIA

Maria is so pretty and I am sad they didn't do more with her.

If Maria Robotnik has 100 fans I am one of them. If Maria Robotnik has 1 fan it's me.if Maria Robotnik had no fans I am no longer on earth.

Maria how were you so chill with your baby brother actually becoming a demon. I think she should've been more baffled LOL

Every flashback cutscene had me on my knees btw

Why the fuck did Shadow flirt with Sonic exclusively with callbacks. I love this bastard

I KNEW THE PISS ROCK WOULD COME IN HANDY!!

Sorry Gerald calling Shadow "son" didn't do shit for me LOL. Ty Sonic team for trying

My Radical Highway hype can not be understated btw. I love you Radical Highway.

Dude I was so disappointed when my finale theory didn't come true. You know how Gerald said Black Doom would either try to mind control Shadow or body snatch? Yeah, I truly wish he got mind controlled. Want to know why? SO MARIA COULD'VE SAVED THE DAY! SO SHE COULD PLAY A ROLE!!!! I would've died out if joy.

Anyways the final cutscene where Shadow cries made me shit myself I actually had to rewind. IM FUCKIN OBSESSED. SONIC TEAM YOU COOKED. I'm sorry I think that's the best way to close it off while showing how much he cares with it being as subtle as he is. I'm fuckin dead. Someone go write my obituary.

[krafterwrites]

Just beat Shadow Generations and I need to talk about it (spoilers for the entire game under the cut)

I really was convinced that every level would swap to a different level from the same game midway through, but apparently the place you get sent to is Radical Highway every time, and it doesn't happen in every level. The reality warping stuff is still cool every time it happens though, so I don't really care

Another surprise, every 1st act is fully 3D, while every 2nd act is fully 2D. I didn't expect them to actually do that, although maybe I should've

I love the Biolizard dialogue, Shadow feeling pity for his poor fucked up monster brother who got brainwashed even harder than he did is so good

Seeing Metal Overlord rendered in a modern game and picking up entire ships to throw at Shadow is sick as hell

Kingdom Valley :) I don't have anything to really say about it I'm just happy it exists

The Sunset Heights remixes are great, I also like the visuals of both acts

Seeing a lot of the recognizable landmarks from Chaos Island in the format of a traditional boost stage was really interesting, and of course it was fun getting to squid around the place

The Mephiles fight. Oh my god the Mephiles fight. What words could I even use to capture the joy that it brought me. It was absolutely everything I was hoping for, his little freaks AND his monster form returned, his dialogue was fantastic (I lost it when he said "Did you forget about me AGAIN?"), and he has a new voice that honestly fits him extremely well imo. Mephiles' original voice will always be iconic, but whoever voiced him here is definitely a worthy successor

The final boss also rocks, I love that in the spirit of Shadow getting all these fucked up powers, Black Doom decided to reached new levels of fucked up-ness himself. I love when Sonic makes grotesque creatures

Seeing Big shocked me, because I semi-jokingly predicted that he would be one of the characters a little while ago. I was also surprised to see Orbot and Cubot. Speaking of them, I need to get back into the game to figure out what their rocket does, I'm dying to know)

I thought for a second I was actually going to fight Sonic as Shadow, I'm a little sad that didn't happen

I'm not sure why Gerald's journal pages are obtained by shooting down drones (?) but it's a fun way to get them, so I'm not complaining

I think that's everything. In conclusion, the game is short, but it rules. I'm going to try and grab the rest of the journal pages and help Orbot and Cubot with their rocket, then I'll see what's up with Sonic's story and make a post about that once I've finished it

[randomthefox]

https://randomthefox.tumblr.com/post/767413827551772672/i-like-to-imagine-that-carnival-night-was-always-a

>People can accept Hydrocity Zone and Lava Reef Zone and Sky Sanctuary as feats of the native inhabitants of Angel Islands creation, but they can’t accept that Angel Island dwelling Echidnas might have wanted to have a carnival?

It seems like highly advanced technology is just a common occurrence in Sonic's world. Regardless of time or place. Sci-Fi tech is simply the norm.

The ancients from Frontiers made spaceships, laser canons, pinball before it was even invented, and an entire dimension.

The echidnas somehow created Hydrocity Zone, Sky Sanctuary, and Carnival Night Zone.

The space colony ARK is over 50 years old but far more advanced than anything our real world had 50 years ago.

All the courses in Sonic Riders look like they're from a futuristic utopia.

Emerl is an advanced robot that was created by an ancient civilization. Emerl was so advanced that Gerald struggled to analyze him because the gap in technology was that wide. (If my memory is correct)

There's Music Plant and Toy Kingdom from the Sonic Advance series.

Newtrogic High Zone from Knuckles' Chaotix is basically a bunch of Sci-Fi theme park attractions. And all the weird stuff in that place existed before Eggman discovered it.

There's all the logic defying casinos. Radical highway has police who drive hovercars.

Then there's all the weird stuff on Little Planet. The landmarks there weren't made for Sonic nor created by Eggman. The planet has just always been like that. Sonic and Eggman were simply visitors.

Sonic's world is naturally bizarre. Sonic fans just have a hard time accepting that fantasy settings have fantastical elements.

They constructed a fully functional and inhabitable space colony 50 years before the first game even takes place.

Like. Get fucked lol. What else needs to be said?

[hopefulqueer]

Solitude, Solifugids, and the Ten Percent Chance

(Author's note: this is about despair and radical hope and you are not alone, there's bugs. Please note that this story contains content involving heavily implied suicidal intentions and serious illness. Also, more than heavily implied bugs.)

A cloud of dust billowed up behind my car, tinging the blue desert sky with orange. It left a trail off into the distance, back towards civilization, getting fainter and more spread out and less easily detectable the further back I looked. I once heard a guest lecturer who studied theoretical physics say that no information in the universe could ever be truly destroyed. A drop of ink mixed into a pool of water might seem uniform and untraceable, but the movement of each molecule held the proof of what came before it. In that way, the motion of every particle that had ever existed could, in theory, be traced all the way back to the beginning of time. My dust cloud would eventually disappear to the naked eye, but once those particles had been disturbed, there was no going back.

My destination appeared as a tiny black dot on the flat horizon. There were very few man-made structures in this barren landscape in Eastern Oregon. This tiny church, lovingly built by pioneers on the Oregon Trail who thought it was their God-given right to take and take and take and leave their fingerprints on every corner of the planet, was the exception. This place had already been desecrated. I wouldn’t be staining anywhere new.

I pulled off the highway and onto the dead, scrubby grass and sand and rocks that surrounded the little stone building for miles in every direction. The ground crunched and groaned under my wheels. When I turned the key to kill the engine, something deep and powerful struck my ears.

Silence.

I got out of the car. The door slamming behind me was like a gunshot into the still air. A real gunshot might be even louder. I’d find out soon enough.

Apart from the occasional creaks as the heat in my car dissipated and it settled, my breathing was the only human sound for dozens of miles. I knew that there was no such thing as real silence in a city, but experiencing it like this for the first time still came as a shock. It was like putting on the best pair of noise-canceling headphones ever invented and then some. People were throwing away so much money to develop better and better technology. All that was ever going to do was add more noise to the world. Pointless. Arrogant.

Speaking of arrogance, an American flag hung limp, dusty, and tattered on a metal pole next to the church. That wasn’t part of what the original settlers had left behind. Somebody else had come along over a hundred years later and decided it was a good idea to put a flag there like a mark of pride, like an animal peeing on the scratches it left in a tree, like the church wasn’t bad enough. I opened my mouth and I screamed.

“There’s no one to hear you scream” is always that point in a horror movie where the character knows that they’re well and truly fucked. My piercing, wordless scream rose up and was lost into the hot, dry air. If a man screams in the desert and nobody’s around, is he really dying?

It felt like something was reaching down into me and tearing that cry out. Its claws ripped through my stomach and slit my throat, and the scream just kept pouring out of me like blood and smoke and water.

I was on all fours without remembering how I got there by the time I ran out of breath. My palms were stinging from pieces of gravel that had embedded themselves into my skin. I pulled dust and heat and oxygen into my lungs and stared down at my hands with dry eyes and a little bit of saliva on my lips. My body heaved into the returning silence. How long would it take someone to find me? A few hours? A day or so? A week? This dirt road was so infrequently traveled that scrappy little leafy plants were growing up around the wheel ruts. I wondered if I should walk further out into the desert and make life more difficult for somebody. I could make my impact just a little bigger, a little deeper. It felt unrealistic to me at that moment that more people didn't go missing. It was unbearably tempting, and there was just so much space out there to become lost in. This was more space than I had ever seen in my life. Why had it taken this to get me out further than a couple of hours from where I had been born? I'd never thought of myself as a coward before, or a shut-in, or even particularly sheltered. Now I was looking back at my life with this horrible fresh perspective and realizing how pathetic I had always been.

A gust of wind blew more dust into my face and I blinked hard to keep it out of my eyes. The sudden sound of a rhythmic dull tapping sent a burst of fear ricocheting through my body. It sounded so much like quick footsteps that I sprang to my feet and whipped around to look back over my shoulder, certain that I would see another person there. A reasonable thought would have been that it was a hiker, maybe, or a hitchhiker. But I had a strange expectation that they would be wearing the clothes of an Oregon Trail settler, or a pre-colonial Native American. I didn't believe in ghosts and I never had. Even so, when I heard that sound, I knew with every fiber of my being that there was a ghost behind me.

There wasn't any ghost. The ragged, faded American flag had caught the wind and was up and blowing, flapping and fluttering against itself. Some metal on its tether hit the flagpole and chimed weakly like a bell. 

I put a hand to my chest, actually shaking with adrenaline. Trying to get rid of some of that nervous energy, I kicked a rock that was a little too big to kick. It sent a shooting pain up through one of my middle toes and the rock only skidded along for a yard or two.

As I began to curse and hop on one foot, something on the ground caught my eye. In the dark leftover shadow where the rock had been, something was moving. A spider, or something like a spider, scuttled a few inches and froze in the sudden sunlight. I had disturbed its hiding spot.

I felt the need to get a closer look. I only knew a little about spiders and bugs. They had never captured my interest like the bigger animals had when I was a kid. I had always been enchanted by whales and dolphins and sharks and giant squid. This little thing, though, two inches long and tan and leggy with oversized mouthparts, was just as strange and alien as any deep-sea fish I'd seen in a documentary. I kneeled down and let my shadow fall over it. It tensed, and I leaned down closer.

Its body was a bit dull and its head shone a brighter orange. The shape of its abdomen was unlike any spider I had ever seen, bulbous and elongated at the same time. It had eight legs, like a spider, plus those long feeler-type ones in the front. As far as I could tell, it only had two little black eyes on top of its almost teardrop shaped face. 

I couldn't move. I was entranced with this odd thing. My eyes traced the gradient of colors down its long legs. I noted the hairs bristling out of it and the creases separating the segments on its back. It was beautiful. Beautiful.

As if finally recovering from the shock of having its home kicked away from above it, it darted off into a nearby bush almost faster than I could track it. With the spell broken, I sat back on my heels and sighed.

How long did a little creature like that live? A year or two? And how many of the babies of this species would live to whatever passed for a ripe old age? How many would live a full life, a full year? Less than ten percent, I was almost certain. 

Less than a ten percent chance to live out the year. It had resonated in my chest as such a hopeless figure when I drove out here. But that strange arachnid was so alive. It didn't know its odds and so it kept living, and because it kept living, it was still alive. It all seemed so simple now. That information, like all information in the universe, would never be undone.

[sonicasura]

Ok hear are the stages we know so far for Shadow

- Ark

- A twisted combination of Westopolis and Radical Highway

- Rail Canyon

- Kingdom Valley

- Chaos Island

- Resistance Base, Sunset City ?

Trainer's stages will be

- Isle Of Armor

- Mt. Coronet

- Sky Pillar and The Surronding Islands

- Split-Decision Ruins and The Dynamax Tree

- Citadark Isle

- Poni Island with the focus being on Vast Poni Canyon and the Alter Of The Sunne And Moone

Mission Structure

Select Stages

All stages will always begin with only one of the Main Trio being able to enter, when one of the Main Trio reach the end it will allow all of the Main Trio to enter

These Will Be 1 Act

Trio Stages

The Main Trio will form a team of 3 with choosing one of the Pokemon to accompy them. Shadow will lead with Omega and the selected Pokemon at Shadow's side as they traverse the stage Sonic Heroes Style

These Will Have 2 Acts

Battle Stages

These stages are a brawlers with there being swarms of both Sonic and Pokemon Remnant enemies. Everyone of the Main Trio will be there, Trainer will send out 3 Pokemon to fight alongside Shadow and Omega as they advamce through the stage

I imagine these stages being like Kingdom Hearts styled fights from like 2 or 3 if you ever played or seen gameplay of that.

These Will Be 1 Act

Rivals And Bosses

Since the full game is still a ways of this will be speculation for some of Shadow's fights

Shadow Bosses

- Biolizard

- Metal Overlord

- Egg Wyvern or Egg Emperor

- Dark Gaia

- Hyper Eggrobo

Shadow Rivals

- Infinite

- Emerl

- Any ideas for the third rival?

Trainer's Bosses

- Cyrus

- Lusamine Nihilego Fusion

- Eternatus

- Greevil

- Ai Professor Sada

Trainer's Rivals

- Paul

- Bede ( This would be N, but the story of Black and White has yet too take place or maybe I should add N and change up the timeline a bit?

- Kieran

Boss Stages

The Stage these fights take place on is unstable so all Heroes may enter too fight the boss, same goes for the rivals. Each fight however will be drastically different as the Bosses and Rivals are controled by the remnants of The Time Eater and Black Doom, teamwork between the Main Trio will be the pathway to victory

This will be a big adventure for the Main Trio, as they face the remnant of The Time Eater and Black Doom. A lot is at stake and it will force our Heroes to face the one that brought Shadow's world to the brink and the one who tears apart Space-Time too stop both from fulfilling the end goal of the plan

Thankfully Ultimate Lifeform, The Most Powerful E-Series Robot, and The Frontier Brain will fight back this catastrophe and at the end find out quite a lot about the others past

Any Suggestions or Changes?

Shadow's third rival should be Mephiles as it's perfect for a mirror match between the two. For N, I say the clash is wrought because Trainer has the Black Stone. This enemy actually belongs to the Pokemon that been slumbering beside our unaware heroes: Zekrom.

An illusion bringing out a twisted form of Reshiram which causes the opposite to awaken in fury at the duplicate. Plus it further expresses Trainer's character to our Team Dark members. They are a person of ideas who doesn't care about the dark truth behind their companions, only who they choose to be.

So what if Eggman made Omega or Shadow is part Black Arms? They chose to follow their own paths and are Trainer's friends. A powerful heartfelt sentiment that convinces Zekrom to fully help the group without a required battle(like in Pokemon White game).

Plus it gives Trainer reason to explore the Unova region as to learn more about their newest companion.

Completely unrelated but I also thought about Zekrom awakening in the KN8 crossover. Why not give the cast(especially Kafka) a fucking heart attack than to witness Trainer battling a Legendary Pokemon as they want to test their strength. I won't be surprised if Zekrom been watching them while slumbering in Black Stone state.

Or for the Defense Force's jaws to drop when the Pokemon bows afterwards and Trainer catches them. The shock value would be immense if this is before the Tachikawa Base invasion. Like imagine their faces seeing a big dragon disappear into a tiny ball?

Although it might put a target on Trainer's head that No.10 could change his attack plans. How mean would it be if he goes for Reno's house instead? Or Trainer on their own during a night outing because that's Mina and Kafka's worse fear right there.

[lowpolyshadow]

15 and 28 for the sonic ask!! :D

omg tumblr user fernsnailz .... im ur biggest fan (flushed emoji) ............

15. Favourite Sonic level(s)?

ok with my expert knowledge of having personally played two (2) sonic games but seen MANY playthroughs and speedruns .... i really liked final rush (sa2), white jungle (sa2), honestly probably every sonic stage from sa2 except for the desert one only bc it wasn't too memorable to me for whatever reason,

stardust speedway my beloved + radical highway like conceptually is really sick but idk i think i haven't replayed it enough yet . i still need to nail grinding down the golden gate bridge to truly embrace the experience but fuck that one badnik right in front of the goal ring (hilarious)

28. What do you like about Sonic? (the character)

ohhh my god he's just such a the dude ever .... how he . how it. it doesn't matter now what happens etc etc he just truly does not give a single shit except he DOES he does a lot he has a lot of love and care for the world he just thinks there's so much beauty in being alive and experiencing the moment .... he's so happy to just wake up and see a new day and what new adventure awaits him

so simple. he wants for nothing bc all he wants is to have a good time (and therefore he's always having a good time) and just he's just so FUCKING SPHERICAL !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

i get very emotional over sonic "what you see is what you get just a guy that loves adventure!" "every world has its end, I know that's kinda sad but that's why we gotta live life to the fullest in the time we have" "it won't change how he feels inside, will it? his heart will still remain in turmoil and his anger just won't vanish!" the hedgehog

[highly-opinionated-art]

Third batch of album of the week art for 2024! Been listening to some really, really good music lately

(2024 part 1 )(2024 part 2)

Lyrics, albums, and commentary:

Week 27: "Run, run, with the fury of a saint in your eyes", from the song Highway Unicorn, from the album Born This Way by Lady Gaga. The gel pens didn't work out for me the way I wanted with this one... believe it or not, this is Speed Racer fanart

Week 28: "You gotta celebrate once in a while", from the song Carnival of Souls, from the album The Surrealistic Roadhouse by Northern Gloom. Yes, it's Homestuck. I'm friends with the guy who does all the sound mixing for this band- they're local to my state and just starting out so I figured I'd give them some views. Their music is decidedly not my thing, but if you like cosmic post punk, consider giving them a listen!

Week 29: "Here's to another better year", from the song NJ Legion Iced Tea, from the album Homesick by A Day To Remember. I like that song a Lot, good album even though it's a little screamier than I usually listen to.

Week 30: "Dors, le mal est passe, il te rattrapera pas", from the song Fondu au Noir, from Coeur de Pirate's self-titled album. Translates to 'sleep, the worst is over, it can't get you'. I listen to lots of non English music pretty regularly, but the French music scene (French Canadian, in this case) is something I've been wanting to get further acquainted with, and this album was soooo fun and cute and I loved it. Worth noting that between week 29 and 30's illustrations, I got hired for a new full time job after a few months of searching and freaking the fuck out about money, haha

Week 31: "Anxiety, suppress it if you can", from the song Anxiety, from the album No Control by Bad Religion. I like how this one turned out, it looks like the song sounds to me. Every track on that album is so fast that all of them are like 2 minutes long max!

Week 32: "In your skin, in your hair, I'm tangled up. In my head, in my mind, I can't get out. When you twist and you turn, teach me to run. I grab and hold on, I grab and hold on tight", from the song Hold On, from the album Come Out. You're Hiding by Flor. LOVED this album, especially this song!!!

Week 33: "You never know what you will get, you never know what you'll forget" from the song She Walks On Me, from the album Live Through This by Hole. By contrast, I HATED this whole album. All I can think about is that New Radicals song where he calls Courtney Love a poser, because. Yeah, that's the vibe I got from it, too.

Week 34: "Midnight is where the day begins", from the song New City, from the album This Too Shall Pass by The Fold. Yes, the band that did the Ninjago theme song- very glad to have dipped into some of their other music, I liked it

Week 35: "I will survive", from the song Touch of Gray, from the album In The Dark by Grateful Dead. I've been sorta aware of Grateful Dead's existence for a while, but this was my first time doing a dedicated listening of any of their music- It's a Vibe, honestly, recommend

Week 36: "Everything almost fits together right. But in the end, I don't belong inside a normal life", from the song A Normal Life, from the album Haven by Marianas Trench. I'm a huge fan of this band and this was a new release. The album is GREAT- I'm seeing them live on Monday, as well, I'm so excited! Acrylic paint continues to frustrate me, though

Week 37: "The moon upon the ocean is swept around in motion, but without ever knowing the reason for its flowing. In motion on the ocean the moon still keeps on moving. The waves still keep on waving and I still keep on going", from the song Anywhere Is, from the album The Memory of Trees by Enya. I LOVE ENYA. I have always loved Enya. This was a treat for myself, I love Enya.

Week 38: "Fire", from the song (you guessed it) Fire, from the album Paragon by Floor Jansen. This one was recommended to me by my dad- I really like and respect the musicality of it, but a lot of the lyrics were kinda unexciting to me. Not totally unexpected considering English is her second language, I believe? Overall I give this one like 3/5

Week 39: "The baffled king composing Hallelujah", from the song Hallelujah, from the album Various Positions by Leonard Cohen. Cohen's lazy diction and grating voice aren't my favorite, but man oh man does that man write good songs. Very glad to have spent a week with this one, for sure.

[dfnkt]

So the "green revolution" is just gonna be neolibs destroying South America for lithium as it becomes increasingly uninhabitable huh. It looks like the game plan is basically, fuck those mountains and those forests and the HUGE carbon sink potential it has if we'd stop deforesting it. The Panama canal is gonna dry up? Guess we'll just build a highway across the fucking continent like we always wanted to anyway.

Can't wait to see how America treats all the climate refugees at our southern border that WE created. 10k people a day or more some days at present. Picture hundreds of thousands and then millions as crisis looms and remember how our government handles people in need, regardless of whether its the red dictator or the blue dictator. Consider how both parties already weaponize fears about immigration using "displacement" or "loss of culture" or lack of available resources aka artificial scarcity. And then fucktuple that and tell me that genocide Joe is gonna make things better. Tell me that the American nation can get exponentially more radical and survive. We will be at full scale war and brazen occupation of South America probably by 2040 if I had to ballpark it, but we'll see. South America will basically resemble USNATO prison camps and military states. I can already imagine the justifications we'll offer about making trade possible in the region, curbing "terrorism" et cetera. Basically we'll do exactly what we did and are still doing to the middle east.

Gonna be fascinating. I get more sure that I'm going to witness the fall of modern civilization in my lifetime every year considering we cannot survive a 2C+ climate, but we can't avoid that climate without such extremely rapid degrowth and rewilding that it is only theoretically possible in human manpower. Like, our best case scenario is basically "if the whole global economy shifted overnight and everything was severely kneecapped especially for the most gluttonous capitalists corporations by a really huge factor then we have the *chance* at having a habitable planet for humans by 2100, albeit at a reduced population and with a smaller habitable zone for the foreseeable hundreds of thousands of years." And every single day is a case of "we should have done this a day/year/decade/century ago". Meanwhile emissions are rapidly increasing at exponential rates. The political will does not exist to save the planet. Even if we made all the right changes now, we are already locked in to changes that will reduce the quality of life of everyone on this fucking planet in the lifetime of every Gen Z and younger, and most millennials, even in wealthy nations. We may well already have signed the commitment for as much as 4C or more degrees of warming by 2050. Guess what doesn't exist at +4C? The global capitalist economy. New iPhones. Oh, or vertebrate mammals. That's you. Your mom. Your dad. Your best friends and future children. All the food you eat and everything you've ever loved. Why are we not acknowledging that we are being thrown off the cliff like Disney's lemmings?

I feel like I'm insane, living in a parallel reality. We should be shutting everything down. Nothing matters more than this. We should, quite literally, be shutting the world down in order to save it. Nothing else will. You can thank neoliberals for pushing this disaster off of capitalism and onto people's "personal carbon footprint". None of my friends can talk about this subject because they are just all too afraid, which I always respect. I don't know anyone else familiar with the science of things either, so I have no one really to commiserate with about the profound grief of watching the world end. Even if I get to live out my natural lifespan, I will witness some of the most horrible atrocities that mankind has to offer. We all are witnessing that right now. If you don't think climate change could be an extinction level event in your lifetime, then you should really seriously evaluate what kind of life you want to live and then live it while you can. That is all any of us can do anymore.

[xxdashiexx]

songs + their feelinz

party in the graveyard ghost town

halloween parties, getting high, shrooms, hypersensitivity, not recognising yourself, but not caring to do so anyway, seeing everything in neon colors, dancing like there's no tomorrow, because there probably isn't.



no mercy pvris

anger issues, 5 am rage, wondering what they did wrong, screaming, driving fast through an empty highway, bloody knuckles.



how to disappear completely radiohead

anxiety, late-night walks at 12, oversized sweater, chapped lips, white bike, black earbuds, wanting to stop time, melancholy, grey blankets, tangerines.

Keep reading



tithe menomena

panic attacks, 9pm wallowing, fluctuating mood, feeling calm for a couple moments, taking deep breaths of relief and sorrow, soft soughing of the wind through the trees.



can't get you out of my head johnny goth

lovesick, stays up at 3 am, beanies, always wears that one hoodie, eyebags, hangovers, trust issues, love letters, sleeping in, fragile heart, oversharing or staying quiet, stargazing, laughing randomly, writing in a diary.



scissorhands maggie lindemann

sweet revenge and the sweet feeling after revenge, paranoia in being stared at by other beings, feeling of being watched in an empty alley, running away on impulse, sudden and radical changes in their appearance and personality, learning not to give a fuck. 



i was all over her salvia palth

learning that the world isn't as bad sometimes, a pure longing for reliving nostalgia, happy feelings that you can't put into words, so it ends up sounding sad and empty, smoking a cig on a rooftop, realizing that your soulmate has been them all along, but you were  too late.

[mooshs-crack-headcanons]

Shadow's characterization

Now, this is a subject I've discussed a few times on here but I would like to make it another post going into more detail on the matter and going fully on exactly what made his original character work and why it resignated (at least with me personally) so much and exactly what the fuck Sega has been missing about the certain important aspects of his character since 2006. Yes, 2006.

2001-2006, 5 years, 4 games, and a whole character saga revolving around identity. This was Shadow's peak era and my personal favorite era of any sonic game, yes with a few downsides (06. We'll get there.) but even with a few glaring issues this is the point of time I was personally introduced to Sonic and I couldn't have fallen in love with it any more than that period of time and yes the game with the "edgy" hedgehog with a gun was the catalyst to that.

Anyway, let's break down this character saga game by game. Everything shown in game or just taken from easy subtext and in between lines speculation.

Sonic adventure 2

Shadow the hedgehog is a very angry vengeful person. Being trapped in stasis for 50 years after just watching your best friend, your sister figure, your one person connecting you to humanity - shot down before your very eyes and saving your life from the governmental slaughter by shooting you down to the tiny blue marble you two had always dreamed about going down there before succumbing to her injuries? Yeah that will tend to do it.

He remembers that moment, however, it's only partial of the memory. He remembers before being shot down to earth her making him promise something... but for the love of him he can't piece together entirely what it is - but given context and her being shot down as he dragged her through the halls of the ARK to escape and then ending up in that chamber... it has to be for revenge right? They destroyed everything, they shot her and ultimately made them forever separate without even a proper goodbye? Just felting words of a hazy promise before shooting him down to earth. They - GUN, government agents from that blue marble earth did all this. Humanity did this.

This is the "promise" Maria made him take - is what he convinces himself - this is his mindset for the beginning of the game. Not even a minute after he's awake and is met with Gerald's (and Maria's) kin he's already hatched a motive to go with the Doctor's plan as he sees fit with deeper intentions behind the scenes. Afterall he doesn't care about Ivo's plans to build his "Empire of Eggman" - he just wants to see everything burn.

Then he meets a blue hedgehog.

Sonic has been excused of Shadow's crimes and is on the run from GUN, during the end of his run he meets Shadow who has a Chaos Emerald. Shadow at that moment has the opportunity to potentially just use Chaos Control and teleport away at that very moment but he doesn't, he just stands on top of the mech amused at the inferior blue rodent's words and calls that he's been excused for Shadow's crimes. Then the blue rodent dares to calls Shadow a "fake hedgehog." This strikes a very heavy nerve, and thrashes against a sudden pelt of insecurity. Fake? Him? He could leave right then and there but something deep in him feels the nerve to show this pest off and uses Chaos Control a few times just to show off just how much power the Ultimate Lifeform has over Chaos energy just to make a point who is the ""fake"" one here. Then he leaves Sonic behind to deal with not only the GUN squad that were originally chasing after him during city escape but also the ones trailing Shadow during radical highway with puts him behind bars at Prison Island.

Their second encounter is a bit different than the first - one they actually get to fight instead of Shadow just showing off and Controlling away when the blue blur throws the "fake hedgehog" calling at him - this time it doesn't bother him as much in fact the blue inferior one makes a utter fool of himself with the name calling ("I'll make you eat those words!") however he does in fact very much surprise him with just how well he can keep up - call him surprised even. But the interaction is cut short when the Doctor's radio cuts end with the news the islands about to blow up.

Things in Shadow's mind remain mostly the same at this point on... that is until he gets a call in from the treasure hunter Rouge that she's locked in and stuck with the Chaos Emeralds in the GUN facility security hall that with the rest of the island is about to blow up.

This is the first moment out of three distinct moments his facade begins to break down.

Up to the point him and Rouge have only had very few interactions with one another. Yes, their both working with the Doctor for very both different reasons but... while she may be a thief and he has suspicions that she may be a government spy he's heard of passing she doesn't deserve to just die as gruesome like this. Maria didn't either. He isn't sure why exactly in those moments he makes that comparison but once he did his mind just clicks and his feet are already moving as he curses himself that this might bite him back in the ass if that bat woman is actually a spy.

After the fact he tells himself he did it for the emeralds - not out of compassion. Hell he even tells Rouge this when she comes to confront him about it. But deep down they both know the truth. It's both kept unsaid but Rouge is very much grateful for this save and this with fuel their loyality Team Dark dynamic in upcoming sections.

The second crack happens when he runs into that blue hedgehog again, Sonic, for the third time. It's much different from the last two times - less insecure than the first encounter, less prideful and arrogant than the second, no this time Shadow's more... curious of his rival. He didn't die in the capsule, he used a fake emerald to Chaos Control, there's more to him but exactly what? What the hell is he? "Just a guy that loves adventuring." What the hell does that even mean? He isn't sure. But it sticks with him.

The third crack in his facade comes when the Eclipse Canon is on track for earth. He did it. He fulfilled his promise to her. He watches out the same window where he and Maria used to stare out into space and daydream about what it would be like on the blue marble below. He did it, while he is more than sure he'll die as well in the extinction level impact but that's okay to him. He fulfilled his promise... that's all that should matter, right? But something still feels... off. He isn't sure what that is until a pink hedgehog comes into the room.

Amy of course mistook him for Sonic during their first meeting but not this time. Everyone is doing so much and she knows she has to do her part too however she can.. she pleas him for his help knowing how strong he is and talks to him about how she knows there is good in people, humanity, and that saving them is the good and right thing to do if he only can give them a chance to. Her words sound so familiar to Shadow the further he searches to remember from where.

Then he remembers - the fog from his last moments with Maria fade away and he remembers word for word the promise she made him take. Not revenge on those who took her away from him. A better feature. A better feature for all those on that blue marble they spent their days gazing down at, the purpose she told him he was made for. To make people happy.

It's an earth shattering revelation.

Everything he's done up to this point has been devastatingly wrong, he has to make up for it. And he promises both Maria and Amy that as he runs out the room. Make this right.

Live and learn.

This is exactly what Shadow does, his super transformation is visible personification of his swoop of redemption. At the start he was so angry and vengeful all for the loss of his sister and wanted the whole world to burn because of it, his justification placed on mis misremembered probably brought due to his 50 year stasis. Now he fights side by side with his rival to take on his prototype - the Biolizard, what was originally supposed to be him - taking his past in a way head on.

With the Biolizard defeated then all that's left is the ARK that is still falling on course to Earth.

Gerald Robotnik made this plan in his grief for Maria before he was executed, what was supposed to be against the Black Arms he turned to humanity. This plan that Shadow also in his grief was more than ready to let go through. Now he was stopping it, he knows now it's exactly what Maria wouldn't have wanted - the opposite in fact. As the ARK falls further and further he and Sonic struggled to prevent it from continuing it's course and then in one burst of Chaos energy Shadow teleports the whole thing far away from earth. With consequences.

Sonic reaches out to try to save him as he falls (we know from one of the past Twitter takeovers) but is to late as Shadow shutters out of super form as all the energy being too much to handle leaves his body and he plummets to earth. But he's okay with it, unlike that moment in the window room where he had thought revenge was Maria's promise when he felt off and unfilled, here he doesn't. Here he feels he made the right choice and his actual promise fulfilled.

That's what makes Shadow a redeemed character.

But as we know that doesn't end his story, and while the choice to bring him back and seemingly erase his mentioned redemption is controversial to some fans. I don't think entirely so, mostly because exactly the set up the next game brings.

-

Sonic Heroes

After SA2 and pre Heroes is a very foggy blurry period. However, given a certain subject in the next section I think to a certain degree it works. For now that's important is to first establish the Shadow in this game IS the Shadow from SA2, Eggman literally confirms it in the final fight of the Shadow 05 game but this is something we'll come back to but what's important to remember this IS the real same Shadow from SA2.

Shadow is freed by Rouge from one of Eggman's bases and was guarded by E-123 Omega, who has spite for Eggman for trapping him in here for all this time. This creates the (family) Team Dark.

Shadow has amnesia - this is very important to note - with absolutely no memory of what or who he is or anything that happened in the previous game. He is a blank slate and his motivation for this game is to find out exactly who he is.

But Rouge knows who he is! Kind of... going off the little time see got to know him and exactly what all the government files said about project Shadow, but most of that was about the Biolizard so it isn't exactly much help there anyway. However, Rouge is still very appreciative of Shadow saving her from the explosion on the island and given he's straight up supposed to be dead right now she's more than willing to help her friend out and get behind all this mess for some answers and now they have a trigger happy robot to accompany them and help them out as they all set out for Eggman.

Sonic Heroes given it's a game revolving around four teams which each of their own campaigns, each story campaign unsurprisingly isn't as fleshed out as it could be so of course Shadow doesn't really get to say all that much in the game, however but probably unintentional, that works. Like I said Shadow here while bits of personality does peak through at times he's just seems... lost. And given context, again, I think that works. He's a blank slate, confused, zero idea who or what the hell he is... and this becomes more ever impactful once his major conflict comes up.

The Shadow Androids.

Now a lot of people hate them, I get it. But they do have purpose and they leave the ending if this Shadow we play as in this game is real or not (REMEMBER THIS I'M COMING BACK TO IT LATER) Now, given Eggman's confirmation in the 05 game and the Twitter takeover question it confirms either way the Shadow we have right now in canon IS the one from SA2 so he DID survive and that's why the one in Heroes IS the one from SA2 and while we do know this still that just a period of time post SA2 pre heroes of after Shadow fell is still... hazy and could definitely be touched more upon. (Maybe a future movie might cover it 👀)

But the Shadow Androids kick off what I call the "Identity crisis arc" in Shadow's story. The question in heroes is never answered at least in that game and the rest of Heroes story doesn't matter with the other team's campaigns its the fact this identity crisis AND his memory loss pin points in this game is the most important part of this game when it comes to Shadow's development.

-

Shadow the hedgehog 2005

There is an important fact about this game I can't stress enough:

The last story and it's ending with The. Cg. Animated. Ending. Is. The. Canon. One.

The one Sega PURPOSEFULLY put more money on to animate? THAT ONE IS THE ONLY ONE THAT MATTERS TO CANON.

The other endings? And how you get to them I see them as hypotheticals.

People go on and on about Shadow's character in THIS game with the different endings being very inconsistent. THERE SUPPOSED TO BE. THEY'RE DIFFERENT ALLIGNMETS AND OUTCOMES.

This game builds off the fact Shadow is a fucking blank slate for his character given his amnesia in heroes that its your choices and how you play the game effect his character and how he molds to be who he is with each different ending you get. ITS ON PURPOSE FOR THE ALIGNMENT MECHANIC.

Everyone hates the Shadow Androids endings and this is why I call them "hypotheticals" right now in canon its confirmed Shadow is the same Shadow from SA2, but the Shadow Android endings are clearly IF the Shadow from heroes was an Android. Making it - say it with me - a hypothetical. It's not canon. None of the endings except the fancy one with the fancy animation of a HERO ENDING are canon therefore they should not matter in the scheme of Shadow's portrayal. Only the canon one should.

Sorry this argument gets me heated, anyway.

Shadow works perfectly as how he was at the ending of Heroes - confused who and what he is with only flashes of memories now here and there. Then suddenly the sky turns dark and a shadowy alien claiming to know who he is appears out of nowhere and offers to tell him if he gets the chaos emeralds for him. Is it a foolish decision? Probably. But he has no other choice but to follow this guy because he's that desperate to learn about his past and himself.

Then, following the canon ending, he does slowly and slowly relearn who he is and further learning details about his Black Arms heritage and further about his creation. He relearns about Maria and the true promise they made.

The CG ending is basically SA2's all over again - except this time he can overcome it on his own and this time he comes to let go of everything holding onto him of the past and live for the future, a better future he's determined to make himself and seeing Maria's promise through as he uses his full power of his super to stop the comit.

Is it somewhat a rehash of his redemption in SA2? Maybe. But I think it's proof that no matter what there is good in Shadow that wants to fight for the side of humanity - no matter how many times he looses his memory or whatever of the sort always he'll eventually find his way back to its defense even if he stumbles back into the "dark" a bit. And that's an extremely important part of Shadow's character.

-

Sonic 2006

Bet you weren't expecting to see this?

If there's one good this 06 did, one thing at all, it would be Team Dark's story. And unfortunately this is the last of Shadow's character development that isn't.... "modern" Shadow.

Shadow is working for GUN, which in of itself is a development but however given circumstances in 06 (this one I'm less memorized on and refuse to replay it so stay with me here)

Mephiles forms himself to look in Shadow's image and tries to convince Shadow to join his side, using the information Shadow becomes a large threat in the future and believes to have awaken Iblis (which is also fueled by the... shenanigans Shadow got up to in the 05 game if I remember correctly) as fuel for his convincing and to "take revenge" but Shadow sees through it immediately, stating even if the world fought against him he would still fight to protect it - while he let go the bitterness of his past he still is determined to keep his true promise to Maria in protecting humanity.

After all of this new information comes to light, Omega is tasked to "stabilize him". This is certainly... for Shadow and Team Dark but Shadow brushes it off saying he'll fight like he always has and Rouge pops in saying she'll stick by his side no matter what happens (true family goals) and while he doesn't say it out loud he acknowledges it and you can tell it means a lot to him.

And my God just the scene where he fucking absolutely wrecks the hoard of Mephiles' after taking of his Inhibitor rings is one of the most fucking hype cutscene fights I've ever seen in a video game and just... how he and Team Dark carrying themselves in it - hell in this entire game - is just one of the most satisfying things to see and you can practically FEEL their comradry.

It really sucks this is one of the last truly good moments we have of all of them together being truly well written, for the rest of the game and the rest of the series to this day.

And sadly given the context of the ending of 06 you can sadly forget about this last section with the whole erasing of time where the whole game didn't happen thing... it's very unfortunate given Shadow and Team Dark's story was like one of maybe a very very few things good about this game.

-

Conclusion

Shadow is a complex character that goes through three character arcs: his grief to his redemption in SA2, his identity crisis and learning exactly who/what he is (both literally and figuratively) and how he comes to accept and move past his trauma in Heroes and the 05 game, and finally from 06; his dedication thrive to his new purpose in maintaining his promise - he doesn't want to be a hero or a villain, he just wants to keep his promise to his sister with doing the right thing and protecting and defending the future of humanity no matter what it takes or what opinion humanity, what he's promised to protect, has on him.

And even with the events of 06 erased, he still has that motivation deep down, it's just Sega that's ignoring it with their bullshit outdated "sonic bible" or whatever. He's not some edgy bullshit rival character, he's had his character development and is no longer the angry vegenful person that looked down on humanity that he was at the beginning of SA2 - and he's not the lost in identity crisis he was in heroes/05 game either - Sonic 06 did a lot of hurt to this franchise both in and out but honestly? If there's ever a good way to look to where Shadow's character should at bare minimum be working off of its from who is was at the end (of his story anyway) of Sonic 06. He's not the type of person to claim himself to be a hero and most definitely not a villain, he just wants to do the right thing and protect the world that Maria loved so much and maybe have a bit of fun with back and forth rivalry with a certain blue hedgehog to keep him busy here and there from time to time.

He's been through a lot and has transformed as a person, I just wish Sega would see that. Not whatever the fuck they wrote him in Boom or in Forces.

Maybe movie 3 with help fix this.

[slinkykinkyjou]

PotN S3 Finale spoilers

I believe that SH might be THE king of the yandere archetype, but he did not do anything to warrant this violence against him (Min and his cronies see NK as a belonging of SH’s - the rape is to punish SH, and have a “good” time). In the end, SH wept. Prediction: SH might blame himself, which will drive a wedge between him and NK in S4. Thoughts?

I’ve given a lot of thought over course of the book to Min’s motivations, and here’s where I land on this. Min was a spoiled, bored noble with a clever, under-stimulated mind and too much time on his hands. I was bullied by people like Min as a kid.

But even orgies, booze, and partying got monotonous after a while. He may not know how got there, but Min can see that resident dom SH is Fucked Up with a capital F. Everyone knows SH to be radical, rebellious, taboo. He’s a comet blazing bright and destined to burn itself out young; in a conservative Confucian society, he’s a spectacle. He’s /interesting/. SH can do the taboo things Min can only fantasize about, because SH doesn’t care about the consequences he barrels towards. Min considers himself a spectator to SH’s messy demise. “Oh ho ho! How novel! How droll!”

I believe Min was motivated by cruelty and sadism, like a zoo visitor stabbing at an abused tiger stuck behind bars (the bars here a metaphor for societal expectations and filial/civic duty). Ultimately, Min got too close to the cage and the tiger tore him apart.

SH is living with severe PTSD. Nightmares, self-destructive and self-loathing behavior - he’s been on the highway to hell ever since he came limping out of Confucian Gay Conversion Therapy, and up until he fell in love with NK, he had nothing to live for. Why not waste away the days in hedonism and despair?

But now he is in love. And has someone that, (toxic Stockholm pornographic fantasy sexiness or not), loves him back. Is it too late? I think maybe... In his traumatized shitshow of a life, SH has burned every bridge he’s come across. Dangit. He’s burned bridges with: his father, Jihwa + his family, his servants are a rotating door, Heena (maybe — what do you all think?), the gang rapist nobles he killed, and InHun the Insufferable Twat. His only allies are Nakyum, who holds zero social clout, and real GOAT Mr. Kim. (Mr. Kim is fucking legend, I stg.)

It was so satisfying in the moment for SH to kill the gang rapists. They deserved it. But that’s just a temporary hit of dopamine that feels good in the moment and will come back to bite SH soon. SH has been stockpiling ill will and S4 is going to explore the consequences of it. Which I hate. I just want them to cuddle and be safe and in love. Please Byeonduck pleeeease let them live happily.

Prediction, please don’t shoot the messenger here: I think S4 is going to be torture for us. I think we’re going to see SH’s topknot cut. I think we’re going to see Mr. Kim, NK, and/or SH flogged. I think InHun the Insufferable is going to prance back in all fancy and taunt SH, and do his best to ruin his life. I think we’ll see NK more helpless than ever before, and I think SH is going to be humiliated at bare minimum. And I hate that. So much. That said, despite all my sad predictions lol, I have hope for a happy ending. I can go into that more if people want to hear my thoughts on that, just lmk.

Re: the art… wow. The angelic panels of NK’s sweet little cherub face all bruised and bloodied were really lovingly drawn. You can see she’s communicating his innocence; NK represents all things good in SH’s life, and hope for a better future. The light haloes on NK like a religious figure, elevating him to this iconic/unearthly status that I interpret as a metaphor for SH’s path to healing.

The panels with SH’s face are always a show stealer. The hurt on his furious murder face was a new variation on his usual psycho white-eyed murder look. In the past his eyebrows are usually stiff and almost blank, but before he kills Min, his eyebrows are furrowed and he looks pained. He took it VERY personally that time, there was a hint of befuddlement (“Why have you gone this far, Min? What the literal fuck is wrong with you?”) and disbelief (“Please let this be another nightmare right now and let me wake up in bed with NK safe beside me.”) I read those flavors into his expression.

The final panel of SH staring into NK’s eyes, weeping, stabbed me in the gut like the dude in purple. His eyes were that blank, shocked, buffering-in-progress stare again, but tears were just drizzling over uncontrollably. Have we ever seen him cry from sadness before? He seems like the type to cry from frustration or rage, but in this panel my dude is grieving.

Discussion questions for the class here, lol.

What do you think happened in the past with the Yoon family? (I’m still not clear on that myself.) How is that going to affect what happens to SH in S4? Where do you think Heena is, and if she is alive, do you think she’ll be a problem or unexpected ally in S4? Is there any hope for a happier ending in your opinion?

[wastetimeandtype]

A Legend of Korra AU, the setting is Detroit Become Human (summary)

Yooo so I think I’ve mentioned before that I started to write a Detroit Become Human AU for TLOK. Here is that AU, summarised!  Also since I haven’t touched this story in like two years so I don’t remember how it exactly goes, so I am making up a few plot points to make this summary cohesive. To be clear, this is an abandoned story, im just fond of a few plot points in this story after rediscovering this google doc.

To be clear I never played the game, I just got into watching the story cut scenes on YouTube... somehow. Idk. 

The basic premise of the game is that there are android servants who start gaining consciousness, called deviancy. Deviants can be permanently destroyed and killed if you destroy their memories and central programming system (situated in the head). Androids can generally have their memories transferred over to new bodies, as long as it is intact. You do not need to know the game to read this summary, it would have been a retelling of the game but making my own shit up. It loosely adapts Markus’s and Connor’s storyline. Korra was Markus, Mako was Connor (with Bolin being somewhat like Hank) and Asami had her own storyline. I also ‘fixed’ some elements of the game I didn’t like or thought were poorly explored but it generally follows the gist of the game. 

This is going to be super long, so hiding the story summary under a cut!

In a non-bending, future AU of the Avatar world, Future Industries in this universe is the creator of the androids. Deviancy is the name for consciousness. Both the police and Future Industries oppose androids becoming deviants due to being seen as a danger to humans and risking Future Industries profits.

Also to be clear, Korra, Mako and Asami are androids. Mako and Bolin are not related in this story. Bolin is human and a single child who’s parents died young.

Korra is an android who reacts violently to her owner beating her in a fit or rage. She gains consciousness (deviancy). She goes on the run because the police are chasing her.

She runs, and the next day hides in an abandoned house where she meets Kai, who is also a deviant android child. Kai mentions that there used to be an android he was friends with an android called Wan who was helping him run away to ‘Temple’ a sanctuary for androids. Wan has since disappeared.

Also from Kai there’s a general legend of ‘Project Raava’ who is meant to be a powerful android who saves them all. It’s kind of like a legend.

Meanwhile Lin is investigating Korra attacking her owner at the house. She is assigned a new super robo cop named Mako from Future Industries to help with KA cases. She doesn’t like him much and is annoyed that Future Industries so she leaves him to Saikhan and Bolin. Saikhan is the top detective, Bolin is the junior detective partner. Saikhan doesn’t like Mako either so just asks Bolin to distract him (Mako notes that the police are making Bolin babysit him).

What would be revealed in the story is that Bolin’s parents passed away, Lin was for Bolin as she was the at scene of the car crash and was a mentor figure in his life. Bolin was fostered but Lin kept in contact as a close parental figure. She helps Bolin get a job at the police station. Bolin knows he isn’t a very good detective but wants to make Lin proud.

Bolin in general thinks androids are pretty creepy, especially Mako. This is because they left Bolin alone for a bit with an android caretaker at the police station, and Bolin, an already traumatised child, found this robot caretaker uncaring and traumatising.

Also concurrently Asami is reading about the android rights movements and she’s like.. I am interested in deviants. Hiroshi tells her not to be so interested.

At Future Industries we are also introduced to Sitiak who is currently the top robotics person at Future Industries (had to be an OC). We later learn she is the head designer of the robo-cops and knows a lot about Mako.

We also learn throughout the story that Yasuko passed away from breast cancer years ago, and Asami also underwent treatment for it a few years prior as well.

Anyway back to Bolin. Bolin tried his best to just distract Mako whilst the real police do their work but Mako and Bolin realise where Korra is hiding and chase after Korra and Kai. Korra and Kai run across a highway and Mako was going to run across but listens to Bolin’s order not to do that.

Anyway Korra and Kai get in contact with some air monks who give them clues to scan around the city to follow the way to the deviant sanctuary.

Tenzin and the air nation are generally supportive of androids as a) they are not blind and can see that the androids are sentient and feeling and value all life, and b) Tenzin adopted an android child (Jinora) so they could understand androids, and Jinora deviated under their care. She pretends to be a normal android child to be safer.

Opal is a human member of the pro android rights movement. She was friendly and flirty with Bolin but stopped after the police started cracking down on deviants.

Korra and Kai follow clues hidden around the city. Temple is hidden in the mountains. Kuvira is the leader of the sanctuary! She is a committed revolutionary leader. She left Zaofu to help the deviants in Republic City (there are hundreds more in RC). She is pretty radical and an absolutist who believes in android rights and android supremacy. Re

Korra is a bit more chill but gets involved in the cause for android rights.

ANYWAY during the story Mako and Bolin get to know each other. Mako is programmed to have a very adaptive AI. He learns what Bolin wants. But he is committed to his mission of destroy all deviants above helping Bolin.

However one day Bolin panics half way through getting info as he missed the date and missed his parents death anniversary. Mako ‘breaks’ programming by allowing Bolin to go the cemetery to grieve. He also comforts Bolin.

Bolin is very confused by this situation and starts to wonder if Mako is deviating. Mako denies this.

(There would be two types of deviancy: gradual and shock. Korra was shocked into gaining consciousness. Mako’s deviancy would be more gradual).

And Bolin also starts to doubt whether or not he and Mako are doing the right thing by hunting deviants.

Asami meanwhile is asked again by Hiroshi to stop investigating deviants. She ignores him. She eventually learns, by looking through files of ‘Project Raava’ a very powerful android.

Korra and Kuvira and other androids break into a news tower and broadcast their demands for rights. Kuvira is badly injured in the attack, so Korra is the face of the broadcast.

Asami is convinced that Korra is project Raava as Asami thinks that Korra must be special in some way to lead the rights.

So Asami does some more digging, and then realises that something has always been very wrong with her. She cuts into her own flesh, her blood is blue: Asami is an android. And Asami is Project Raava.

FUCKING TWIST. Anyway this would be better set up in the fic as like people would make like ‘hey Wanna go eat Asami?’ And Asami would say ‘already eaten’ but we’d never see Asami eat

Basically Yasuko died of breast cancer. Yasuko was heavily involved in android robotics so she and Hiroshi and Varrick (to show up later) developed a body to house her after she died. They tried to code Yasuko’s consciousness into an AI. This failed and Yasuko ‘died’. When Asami Sato was dying from cancer, she asked to try the consciousness experiment. Knowing it would fail, Hiroshi instead created a full Artificial Intelligence version of Asami, and only coded the memories. She is not actually the old Asami Sato.

Asami was coded to have a very curious personality, but they had to code in limits to her, so she would naturally obey Hiroshi. She never eats or goes to the toilet, but she believes she does, as she basically has code telling her she does, so she believes it. Hiroshi planned to transfer (and wipe) Asami’s mind to different bodies so Asami would age, so he can pretend his daughter is still alive. However because of Asami Sato’s curious nature, Asami’s AI is very curious so Asami deviated when investigating deviants and choosing to not obey Hiroshi’s command to stop investigating them. She didn’t realise she was an android until later though because the programming was so strong and designed to be human like she didn’t see it until her AI pieced it together, she then is able to see her own programming and realise she isn’t human.

This isn’t the first time she has realised she was an android, but the first time she deviated beforehand. Because of this, when Hiroshi offers to wipe her and start over (because Asami usually accepts as an obedient daughter android when she realises that she has android parts by accident) Asami rejects this as she wants to help other deviants and knows they’re fully conscious and shouldn’t be destroyed. Basically Asami is too empathetic to allow deviants to continue to be destroyed when she knows they’re feeling like her, however Asami is also horrified by her own existence at this point.

Asami escapes the Sato Estate. She eventually find the Temple hideout and they’re like ‘wut Asami Sato is an android?’ And she’s like yep accept me, I want to help the android movement. They do. Kuvira is more cautious than Korra but accepts Asami. Asami helps fix Kuvira up after the tower fight. Asami and Korra start bonding.

Lin, Saikhan Bolin and Mako go to the Sato Estate the day after to investigate a deviant attack. Hiroshi and Sitiak inform the four of them what exactly is up with Asami. Lin is a bit freaked out but they agree it’s best to keep it a secret. Later Bolin says out loud ‘maybe we should leave Asami be and let her live her life’ and Lin reprimands Bolin for being sympathetic to deviants.

Asami is like ‘we should find Varrick to find out more about deviancy’. Asami and Korra (somehow) go to find Varrick. He’s living in a secluded house with his deviant android Zhu-Li.

He’s like ‘ah yes my greatest creation, I am your real Daddy’ (neither Asami or Varrick are pleased with his choice of words). Sitiak replaced Varrick in the company because Varrick was going to go public with the knowledge about Asami so he was kicked out and basically threatened by Future Industries to keep quiet otherwise they’d kill him.

He reveals he knows why deviancy happened: because of Asami. Four years ago when Asami activated, Hiroshi programmed a very simple piece of code to say ‘I am human’ if any androids came into direct contact with Asami, so they would believe she was not an android as well. It was an instant override. Varrick designed it to work like a virus and pass between androids. But one android had an overactive AI and the ‘I am Human’ statement warped to be ‘I am Alive’, a piece of programming that would allow the android themselves to become sentient if they needed it in a situation of immense stress or if they simply learnt and evaluated the statement. He realised this after examining Zhu-Li’s coding.

Not sure when this would be realised in the fic, but Asami would realise the first deviant was Wan, who used to be an android caretaker at the house and came into contact with Asami. He left the years ago. Wan is also the source of the ‘Project Raava’ legend, he overheard Hiroshi talking about this and misconstrued it as a android who could help android kind but not yet.

Anyway Korra and Asami leave knowing more about deviancy. They ask if Zhu-Li wants to come with them as Varrick comes across as crazy and Zhu-Li responds that she is a deviant, she knows exactly what she is doing and trusts Varrick, and that Korra and Asami aren’t offering anything safer. She has a point.

Anyway the police some time later get the same idea and arrest Varrick and Zhu-Li for suspected collusion with android deviants. By this point, after the news company hostage incident, the government under Raiko has given sweeping powers to Future Industries over the police to control the android menace.

Sitiak realises that Zhu-Li is a deviant, and electrocutes her, causing her severe pain until Varrick fesses up and complies (he does fairly quickly as Varrick genuinely cares for Zhu-Li who deviated in his home gradually). (The torture is legal as androids are not seen as sentient, they’re seen as defective and dangerous, and are property.)

Bolin watched the torture and is horrified. Bolin noticed Mako’s sensor flash red and Bolin realises finally that he has more in common with Mako and Zhu-Li than Lin and Sitiak so he resigns. He asks Mako to come with him, and Mako has not deviated so refuses, he is still dedicated to his mission of destroying deviants.

Bolin joins with Opal and pro-android movement who are getting ready for more serious action as they realise android and human relations are deteriorating. They want to avoid a full scale war between the two sides but need to get people to realise that deviants are not inherently dangerous, they’re just sentient.

Anyway Sitiak realises that Bolin is a loose end and asks Mako to ‘clean up’ and so Mako goes to shoot Bolin (and Opal who is helping him pack) and Mako can’t do it as he cares about Bolin, finally deviating. Bolin’s like whooo always wanted a brother.

So Bolin Mako and Opal run away to Temple.

(It annoyed me that barely any humans sympathise with literal sentient beings in the video game which is why they’re a larger part of the movement here).

Since Mako deviated, he sees a picture of Wan at Temple and realises what he did. Wan disappeared as Mako killed him (permanently shut him down by shooting him in the head about six months prior). Kai is horrified (because he liked Wan) and wants to kill Mako but Korra and Kuvira point out Mako was not sentient and was just doing as he was previously programmed to do, just as Kai used to be the perfect teenage son. Kai agrees. Mako feels guilty. Mako carries a lot of existential weight and dread without a mission to follow, and guilt about the past. He struggles with adjusting to deviancy the most.

However although they save Mako they are suspicious of Mako He basically hunted their kind. Even Korra with her big heart is suspicious.

Also Opal calls Kuvira out on some of her android supremacy bullshit. Kuvira was a guard for Suyin and Suyin basically didn’t mind deviants, and deviants aren’t oppressed in Zaofu, and humans have never hurt Kuvira directly. Kuvira admits that to be the truth and agrees, admits she just feels so angry that deviants are being destroyed because humans don’t want to understand them. They agree that the only way forward is to work together with humans.

Anyway the deviants and human sympathisers go on a march to town hall. The Future Industries private for hire mercenaries begin shooting into the peaceful crowd. Various attendees are arrested, including Bolin, Opal, Kai and Jinora.

Mako decides to go on the offensive and rescue his new adopted human brother because fuck you Future Industries. He recruits Lin to help him.

Lin at this point is PISSED as the government has taken away power from the police and given it to Future Industries. Lin does not trust Mako much but she made a promise to herself she’d protect Bolin and has realised that some of this android hunting is overreacting so agrees to help Mako break people out of jail.

They break into a facility that Future Industries has set up to investigate deviancy and imprison people (Bolin and Opal and other humans have not gone to trial yet but Future Industries does not work in a police station so does not have access to prisons, so they’re all in the same facility. Please roll with my bullshit).

Mako and Lin break Opal and Bolin out, rescue all of the androids.

Mako realises Varrick is in the Future Industries facility and tries to break him out, succeed at first, but Sitiak shoots him dead. RIP Varrick. They rescue Zhu-Li though. Sitiak gives Mako an evil grin heheheudh.

Anyway Lin after this realises that deviancy is not a danger and renounces her previous anti android ways and likes Mako now.

Also everyone after Mako saves androids and humans realise that Mako is not a threat and is a genuine deviant, and not a spy (maybe Mako could get shot and have a high risk to his life).

ANYWAY. Everyone regroups at Temple but they realise that androids and human supporters have been tortured at the facility and have given away the location of Temple. They realise they are all at risk and Future Industries is likely planning an assault, and there is no way to run apart from fight.

Meanwhile the general public mood is turning against gov’t and the over the top tactics especially since the androids were filmed being shot and killed whilst doing nothing.

Korra is like ‘you should lead everyone Asami you are Project Raava’ and Asami is like no, Korra, you are the hero they need. Asami is a powerful android, but is simply not the most important person in the world— Korra can choose to be there hero (and Asami can choose to step away) — free will! Korra is the ‘avatar’ for android kind.

Anyway Future Industries marches on Temple. There is a stand off. The androids tip off the media so there is public interest and the whole thing is filmed.

Korra gives a rousing speech and gears up the androids. Though they peacefully marched before, they will fight if they need to defend themselves. Future Industries hold off from firing, knowing they will look bad.

Asami meanwhile left earlier that morning to confront her ‘father’ and appeal for him to stop this madness. She goes alone because she knows the Sato Estate well and can sneak in. She meets Hiroshi and pleads for him to listen to her.

Sitiak comes and shoots Hiroshi after Hiroshi does show Asami some sympathy because Hiroshi does still Asami Sato in Asami Android. Sitiak is like ‘my company now muhahaha’.

Honestly I’m not really sure what I intended for Sitiak, I think Asami kills her after Sitiak tries to kill her.

Asami realises by looking at company PC Sitiak has activated an override on Mako that basically restores her control over him. Sitiak wanted Mako to kill Raiko, make Androids look bad and basically give Future Industries free reign to destroy all androids to maintain profits.

Asami races back to Temple as she can’t turn off the override. Mako at this poiint has left the rally, his new mission is to kill Raiko, and is in full murder mode. The deviant Mako fights from within.

Asami manages to get the cloud back online and warn Korra about the issue. Korra goes after Mako.

Mako v Korra fight, but Mako is a better fighter than Korra as he is the most advanced android ever released.

Korra is beaten back, Mako goes into Raiko’s office to execute Raiko, Korra dives in between them to save him.

Mako doesn’t actually want to shoot Korra so he starts fighting this override, so he turns the gun on himself. He plans to shoot himself in the head (horrified at what he has done and feels he can’t be trusted) but Korra begs him not to. Bolin finally reaches them and begs Mako not to. Mako shoots himself in the leg instead, basically disabling himself as he flits between maintaining control over himself.

Raiko is like ‘wow what an impressive android Korra but can I trust you all?” Asami arrives and explains Sitiak’s plan and Raiko agrees and calls off the advance on Temple. Even Future INdustries forces can’t disobey the president.

Then everyone is happy. Asami removed the chip Sitiak was using to remotely control Mako, to give everyone peace of mind. Asami is basically given future Industries (as legally she is still Asami Sato even though Asami Sato has died) and Korra keeps working with Temple with Kuvira.

Also the whole story Korra and Asami fall in love. Asami’s original unease at herself fades. She accepts her android nature and begins a relationship with Korra. They touch hands, and meld their minds together which is like, peak android intimacy.

Mako stays with Temple but also continues to work with the police. Bolin and Opal, together by this point, decide to continue to help androids. Bolin does not go back to the police, he is forging his own path. Lin is proud of him and now has a new surrogate son in Mako.

New elections are held and Raiko steps down. A new human president is elected and Zhu-Li is elected as an android official to work with Humans and Androids (feel like its a bit much to assume Zhu-Li would be elected president). But there is promise of a better future for the androids.

The Endddd.

Things that might have happened:

- Kuvira dies at some point, but i never decided if she dies of her wounds of the news tower hijacking or she dies in the last standoff. She could also survive, but her arc could be accepting that Korra is simply a better leader than she is.

- I have no clue how Korra and Asami find Varrick. Maybe they could hack into something to do with Future Industries, who’d have his address on file.

- I also have ideas that instead of Mako trying to kill Raiko, there is a clash between the military and the androids and Mako is used to try and disrupt the androids winning by killing Korra (and Asami and Kuvira). The problem with this is I don’t see how this can resolve unless the military abandons the fight in a lackluster way after Korra and Asami subdue Mako.

- I mentioned above but I really don’t know how exactly I intended the Asami/Sitiak/Hiroshi confrontation at Future Industries to go down. Who knows. Not sure if I also intended for Asami to be alone in this confrontation. Maybe she could take Kuvira and thats how she dies.

[ill-will-editions]

QUARANTINE LETTER #5: UNRECONCILED Ron Sakolsky

Stop blaming me, accusing me, stalking me. Working yourselves into an anti-viral paralysis. All of that is childish. Let me propose a different perspective. See me as your savior instead of your gravedigger. You’re free not to believe me, but I have come to shut down the machine whose emergency brake you couldn’t find. I have come in order to suspend the operation that held you hostage. I have come in order to demonstrate the aberration that normality constitutes. Ask yourselves how you could find it so comfortable to let yourselves be governed. Don’t let those who’ve led you to the abyss claim to be saving you from it: they will prepare for you a more perfect hell, an even deeper grave. Thanks to me for an indefinite time you will no longer work, your kids won’t go to school, and yet it will be the opposite of a vacation. Vacations are the space that must be filled up at all costs while waiting for the obligatory return to work. I render you idle. Use the time I’m giving you to envision the world of the aftermath in light of what you’ve learned from the collapse that’s underway. The disaster ends when the economy ends. The economy is the devastation.

                          from “What the Virus Said”

Just when I was feeling most elated about prospects for the future given the strength of the Indigenous resistance sweeping Canada in early 2020, the coronavirus arrived on the scene with whiplash-inducing force to upstage everything in its deadly path unexpectedly shutting down whatever parts of the Canadian economy had not already been intentionally shut down by the Wet’suwet’en land defenders and those involved in solidarity actions that had immediately preceded the spread of the disease. Rather than framing The Virus exclusively within the kind of nightmare scenario that is typically associated with the mainstreaming of the term “surreal” (as if all there ever is to surrealism’s critique of reality is this dark side), I want to instead illuminate the surreal possibilities for social transformation that can be revealed by creating a surreal (rather than literal) analogy between the contagion of the virus and the contagion of revolt.

Starting in February of this year the appearance of a widespread Indigenous uprising on the stage of Canadian history swiftly moved the realm of the surreal from dreams of radical transformation to the direct action undertaken to bring it about. Railways, highways and ferries were blockaded, provincial legislatures, government administrative offices, banks and corporate headquarters were occupied. For many inconvenienced Canadians, such actions as these were considered to be unacceptable even though they would prove to be only a fraction as disruptive as the more authoritarian forms of state control that would later shelter under the legitimacy of saving us from The Virus.

Though the immediacy of the COVID-19 pandemic would quickly overshadow the earlier Indigenous revolt in the public eye, it is now evident to many that the smiley-faced mask of Canadian colonialism has been pulled off to reveal a state that in spite of its professed human rights and climate change awareness rhetoric continues to have no compunctions about invading Indigenous territory without consent to build pipelines for fracked natural gas and tar sands oil because of what it considers to be in the best interests of the almighty economy. As Tawinikay (aka Southern Wind Woman) has written, “If only one thing has brought me joy in the last few weeks, it began when the matriarchs at Unist’ot’en burned the Canadian flag and declared reconciliation dead. Like wildfire, it swept through the hearts of youth across the territories. Out of their mouths, with teeth bared, they echoed back: reconciliation is dead! reconciliation is dead! Reconciliation was a distraction, a way for them to dangle a carrot in front of us and trick us into behaving. Do we not have a right to the land stolen from our ancestors? It’s time to shut everything the fuck down”.

Just as Indigenous peoples have demanded their land back in rural areas while pronouncing the false hope of government-brokered reconciliation to be dead, the systemic dislocations to the economy brought on by the coronavirus have led urban anarchists to address fundamental land issues by calling for rent strikes. But why stop there? In response to the devastation associated with The Virus, we have heard calls for the cessation of not only rent, but mortgage and utility payments, even the cancellation of debt itself, the end of wage slavery, and demands for the cessation of arrests for minor offenses, the release of prisoners who have committed non-violent crimes, or flat-out prison abolition. As surrealists we might ask ourselves what other noxious aspects of reality might be called into question and transformed by beginning to imagine what might exist in their place.

Where I live in British Columbia, resource extraction has always been the name of the game, but the emergence this year of a widespread oppositional network ranging from “land back” Indigenous warriors to elder traditionalists and from Extinction Rebellion activists to anarchist insurrectionaries has been heartening. Together, this multi-pronged force disrupted business as usual in solidarity with Unist’ot’en and Wet’suwet’en land defenders, and threatened to bring the Canadian economy to a grinding halt. This time growing numbers of Indigenous peoples were not willing to be bought off by corporate bribes or mollified by a legal system that has never done anything but pacify, brutalize, or betray them in the process of stealing their land. This time people fought back in droves against the forces of colonial law and order. This time the air was alive with a spirit of refusal and rebellion with one action building upon another in a burgeoning movement that could not be stopped. When one railroad blockade would be busted by the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP), another would spring up in its place elsewhere extending the frontlines of the battle all across the continent.

As I write, the wheel of change is still in spin. What the final outcome will be in relation to either the COVID-19 virus or the virus of revolt is unknown, especially in relation to the predatory nature of the times in which we live where the emphasis is often placed on the institution of statist forms of social control rather than grass roots mutual aid efforts in relation to the immanence of societal upheaval. Even though the pandemic has supposedly shut down the provincial economy with lightning speed, Coastal Gas Link’s pipeline construction efforts with their invasive industrial “man-camps” have still been allowed to continue to exist on unceded Wet’suwet’en territory with RCMP logistical support, thereby callously endangering the health and safety of the Indigenous inhabitants. It's abundantly clear whose lives matter to the Canadian government and whose don’t. Consequently, it will remain very hard for the authorities to put the genie of Indigenous rebellion back in the colonial bottle in the future. In the meantime, we are mourning what of value we’ve lost from the past, celebrating what we’ve created in the present, and still demanding the impossible.