#rare human drawing jumpscare

[juukai]

finally finished my side of an art trade with @baby-bloos!! she wanted her sona and sun with something fluffy, so here you are watching a movie together. or you are, sun might be watching something else.

a couple close ups under cut!

[frillsand]

Bodyguard Jumpscare

Quick question. Should his name stay Max?

So his story isn’t that deep, he had trouble getting hired at a good paying job because he looked “unwelcoming”. He’s been a bouncer before but he decided to move away from that for something more stable. Wally offered him a job as his security guard after he saves Wally from a group of thieves, thinking that Wally was a child. The man declined the offer.

Wally kinda followed him around that week, “discreetly” if you asked him. He watched as his future guard gets turned down, job after job. He found this man very strange, for how scary he looked, he didn’t feel intimidated.

He literally annoyed this guy so much, he agreed if Wally promised to shut up.

I should mention that this was also early in his career before his whole diva act even started. Wally was a lot more nervous especially with the stress of having an upcoming show. He’s been meaning to hire a guard, he just couldn’t find anyone suitable until he met him.

They both argue with each other frequently but they have this strange bond. He’s the first human Wally can trusts with his life and the only one that gets to physically handle Wally( carry him, pick him up, throw him aside)

I wish I could express their dynamic better

I’d been hoarding his design since the beginning of July, I’ve been hoarding a lot of art actually. He’s so different, it’s hard for me to draw him, so I’ll rarely do it.

These are also old. Don’t look too much into any writing, it’s not something I’m good at.

If no one says anything, his name is staying Max ✨

[rainbow-wolf120]

MORE ABOUT VIVEO ALL ABOUT VIVEO TELL US MORE NEOWWWW !!! GO ON THE LONGEST RAMBLE YOU’VE EVER RAMBLED !!!!! 🔫

Ohohoho. You’re in for a real treat asker >:]

Okay, since I have so much about the TV twink, I decided to lore dump about Viveo and Rayman’s relationship. More importantly…

In College!!

Yes. And they were roommates

Me lore dumping under cut. I know not everyone cares for my OCs or ideas lol:

So, the story is that when Rayman first migrated into America, he was struggling to settle down. People didn’t like him and never really gave him the chance for… anything really.

Then, he heard about this one college (I don’t have a name for it atm), but it was very big on being “accepting to both humans and hybrids”. This was super rare for a college in what? 1950s?? 60s???

Whatever, it was a chance for Rayman.

Sadly, college was nothing like the advertisements, cause when he arrived, he was very much bullied into the ground. Turns out the college may be accepting but the students were not.

However, he wasn’t alone.

This leads into Viveo.

Viveo was harassed, yes, but not as much as Rayman. He is technically an “alien”, but he’s “human” enough to spare a beating.

Also, he’s buff

I do make jokes about Viveo being a twink, and he is. But he has jumpscare muscles. Like, when he flexes you can tell he works out.

(This is a reference to him being based off a JD coach and that burns calories and stuff idk it makes me feel buff </3)

The two met when Rayman was getting bullied. He would’ve fought back, but when last time he did he got in really big trouble because he broke someone's nose and the school sided with the bullies cause like, this is still the 1950s.

Viveo stepped in and scared them away with his tall frame and jacked body. Maybe a bit of psychological manipulation to get the point across.

(I may draw a comic about this, depends on how much y’all like them lol)

That’s how they officially met. Viveo may have heard of Rayman through rumors and drama (cause he’s a sucker for that), and Rayman heard of Viveo through reputation.

It turns out that they shared the same room! They were roommates yay 👏

They both pursued entertainment, so they shared a lot of the same classes which only made their bond stronger.

When Rayman is not trying to get a gig or in class, he takes a job at the college as a desk assistant and soon a CA (the people who patrol the dorms and tell people to shut up). Although it was only late at night, it was the only thing hiring.

Rayman doesn’t really know what Viveo does when he’s not partying, so he lets him stick around until he’s free again.

Although Viveo technically shouldn’t be there when he's on the job, let alone talking to him, it’s the only way people would actually go up and ask Rayman for assistance (even if they only talk to Viveo)

Also, it gives Viv something to do

Rayman doesn’t want to get fired, so when a boss or something comes along, Viveo acts like he’s there for help. Gotta use that acting class for something

As you know, Viveo is popular among the campus, and that popularity comes parties.

He’s a riot at these things. He’s fun, entertaining, and can sing really really good

Viveo is invited to all the dorm parties, but Rayman is not

Since Rayman is a CA, he technically works for the college and is able to rat people out

And partying is forbidden at this one

Even if Rayman is invited, he’s seen as a “stick-in-the-mud”. He tries his hardest to be “fun”, but he’s a bit too "good" to do anything crazy (unless Viveo nudges him too)

So, when Ray works, Viv parties.

(I know it’s a modern phone. If they had flying cars and fully interactive holograms in 1992, I’m sure this is likely)

Viveo is still lowkey selfish, but if he likes you, he’s a bit more lenient.

Being best friends and dormmates with basically one of the security guards, it gives Viveo a lot of power if you think about it

When he gets bored or tired of a party, he hits up Rayman to shut it down so he can leave with a "bang"

Is it unnecessary? Yes. Is it fun to see everyone’s night get ruined because you thought it was boring? A little.

It’s a benefit for them both, though

Rayman gets praised by his boss and coworkers (mostly his bosses), while Viveo gets to party with little to no consequences

Power couple at it finest

When Eden eventually becomes sort of a big name, Rayman takes Viveo with him to his job application as moral support. Viveo stands in the back supporting him, spicing his performance with sound effects, and helping him remember his lines if he slips up (Perks of a TV face)

Rayman does get the job, and he’s super pumped to tell Viv about it (Keep in mind that this is like, senior year of college). Viveo is obviously happy for him, but also a tad bit jealous.

Y’know, until Rayman drags him along.

In Rayman’s mind, he’s nothing without Viveo and vice versa. It’s a little different for Viveo, but that’s not important.

At the end of the day, Rayman gets himself a place as “Eden’s mascot”, and Viveo’s given a place of “Eden’s voice” per Rayman's request. Two aliens against the world.

That’s enough of me yapping, I don’t know who even bothered to read this far. If you did, thank you. You either really like Viveo, or have nothing better to do.

I might do more lore-dumping. This was fun. But it depends if people want to sit down and listen

Thank you for coming to my Gay Talk, hope to see you next time <3

[officialcreepypastareheated]

Let's Go Hiking

A Creepypasta based survival horror game CONCEPT

Part 0 - lol

Part 2 - Items/Collectables

Let's Go Hiking is a similar style to Doors and Pressure with the obvious difference being that it's Creepypasta based, aimed for an older age rating, and has the goal of not being full of microtransactions.

As of now, this is simply a concept I've had that I decided to draw/write out for my portfolio, fun, and practice. Do not expect this to become a full actual game any time soon or ever, unless you can get the eyes of Roblox devs that share my sentiment and are willing to develop this game for free or for Robux if we can get people spending on it.

1. Basic Premise

The player recently moved into a small house outside of the city that was listed at a ridiculously cheap price. Within the first few weeks strange happenenings occur from figures lingering in the woods behind the house and lurking around your house. You report it to the police but they suggest that what you saw was just woodland critters curious of the human who just moved in.

You believe it until the first night when someone trespasses and peeks into your window. From there on the trespassings become worse and the police continue to do nothing about it. This continues on up until the night a rock is thrown in through your window.

Tired of it, you contact the police one last time with the clear evidence only to then blame it on rowdy teens. Afterwards you decide to get unrefutable evidence by heading into the woods with a camera since surely whoever is out there must live somewhere nearby or left some sort of evidence behind. Little do you know that what roams out there is nothing you'd expect.

2. Main Gamemode

The main gamemode is inspired off of the template Doors and Pressure goes by but with the goal of adding some more to it, giving it more replayability and making the multiplayer mode feel more like you're playing multiplayer with teamwork and not just playing the game with friends on the side.

An average run is like so: The player(s) start off with pretty normal surroundings, just your average hiking trail maybe a bit unkempt, overgrown, and scattered about are a couple starting items. As they continue the sun begins to set and everything begins.

As the run continues on the dangers increase and the items become more rare but not to the point its all RNG based.

I plan for there to be multiple endings, not 20 of them ofc just a few for fun and replayability.

I'll go more into other little aspects of the main game I plan to add in the next part that goes over items and collectables.

3. Other Gamemodes

Endless Run - Both this mode and the other is inspired off of Spooky's Jumpscare Mansion. The Endless Run doesn't offer all of what the main gamemode has, it lacks the multiple endings of course, some enemies, and collectables. What it does have are special enemies, mayhaps references to Spooky's even, and collectables than can be found.

DBD/Pillar Chase 2/Forsaken Style - Players are put into a escape room situation in an enclosed area where they must unlock the exit through puzzles, teamwork still being a large gameplay aspect. Once the exist is open the survivors must run down the path and to the end of the path, giving the killers one last chance to try picking off anyone weak or working together to pick them off.

That's all for now! I'll yap more about the concept later once I've drawn out the concept art.

[shima-draws]

Hiya!! I saw you were having a hard time, so I'm here to distract you from the things!! >7<)/

Who was your first OC? What did they look like, mayhaps try to redesign/redraw them side by side!

I hope things get better for you soon!!

Aw thank you!!! 🥰

My first OC was either Shima or Riku, I can't remember for sure who came first but they've been with me the longest

And yeah I've redesigned them both lots of times already! I have a habit of redesigning OCs once every few years lol

First art I EVER posted of them? I had to dig into my old DeviantART account to find this, this is from 2011 holy SHIT?? Have I really been on the internet for that long? Anyway old art jumpscare warning

Aww. Baby Shima art <3

This was before Riku actually got a human form, he actually started out as a Pokemon OC that was like. A weird genetic mutation of Pikachu? Uncreative little me called him Rare Pikachu LMAO or RP for short. Neat bit of lore, when I eventually repurposed him to become Riku I kept those same initials. Riku Promethera = RP :") Just a callback to his origins <3 He's always been Shima's partner tho since the beginning which makes me really emo honestly

Anyway here have 10+ years of Shima and Riku art

Shima's hair has gotten noticeably pinker but her actual hair style has stayed relatively the same after the very first redesign. God it used to be so DARK and way browner but I think the pink fits the palette very well :"D

And Riku...I used to strictly adhere to the black color scheme but I think the new one with the earthy tones suits him perfectly since he's a land elemental!

Also I need to draw him pathetic and covered in blood again. Tbh.

[ahyesthesufferingoftvteens]

Hi again! :3

Before reeve's reveal in the fic and once moon fever was mentioned in the fic and how it affects those who have it, I had (and still do kind of have) this little theory where not only can moon fever mess up with you and throw in hallucinations at you, but can also affect your physical appearance as well... here it is!

fun fact: when I finished doing the silly on the left I called it a night and went to bed. Then the next day i finished putting on my uniform then came here and check the latest in the hollow tag, only to be jumpscared by a depressed old man that looks like he could die from sleep deprivation at any moment XD

(it also BRUTALLY debunked my theory but let me be delusional for a bit if you don't mind)

The reason why they have galaxy-like spots is pretty obvious, because it's MOON fever, I took it literally and got carried away. moon fever is of course related to jackawock but it could also be related to the moon and stars......and galaxies..... ye

the spots act kind of like vitiligo but not really since they follow a pretty specific pattern before making their entrance

sometimes and entire limb or more can be full of these spots, but it's not that common :p

they also have horns, because yes, horns are pretty cool B) (I have a little hyperfixation with horns if you could not tell)

jackawock shapes the horns for those who are bound to be cursed, if you get a set of horns that is like on the side of your head or prevents you from sleeping in a more comfortable position.... then it must suck to be you I guess xd

there are very few times the horns can be perfect to sleep with and not be a burden, but it's very rare

jackawock can make a human's appearance as fucked up as he wants it to be if he feels very silly one day, but a beautiful kind of fucked up

because of this, those who are cursed use illusion stones to help cover up their appearance in order to not scare others

the only downside to these stones (that I can think of atm) is that their effect only works during daytime, and wears of at night

because of this, it's best to sleep during the day since that solves the issue of being stuck with an unfortunate set of horns and help them to at LEAST get some sleep, it's like the horns were never there to begin with! :D

the patterns will also be covered

by the looks of reeve's design, I'm just gonna assume those who are accursed with moon fever all have eye bags under their eyes and look like they haven't slept in a g e s XD

the galaxy spots can morph into weapons like the example in my doodles, because it's cool B)

although I said the lil guy on the right's horns might be what reeve's horns could look like, I feel like the appearance of the guy on the left is what reeve would look like without the illusion stone, just a bit more fucked up looking..... just a small portion. A part of me wants to believe this theory could come true in later chapters (i'm delusional :3 :heart_emoji:)

alright enough of me rambling, after thinking about how cool and terrifying of a concept moon fever can be, at what age does it usually develop? cause if remember correctly, reeve's case started when he was still a teenager or when he became an adult (speed reading is bad for your memory guys), if that's the case then MAN he's been tormented by hallucinations for a long.. LONG time.

why do I always wait till last minute to start doing things like drawing?

reeve needs a hug, lots of love and affection too! Vanessa will be there, right? :[

speaking of her, are they like..... engaged?... married??.... are they dating or hanging out??? I'm confused :""v

I'm sorry if this is too much for you to answer or give your honest thoughts and opinions on, I'll get out of your hair now GOODBYE!!! i'm going to bed :3

YOU HAVE NO IDEA HOW TOUCHED I AM I'M LITERALLY CRYIIIIIIINNG?!?!

You don't understand how little The Hollow fandom engages with each other. Someone drawing things for my AU? A dime a dozen! This is the highest order of a compliment to me!!! Please do this more often?!?! I don't care if this was just debunked theories I literally love all of this and I'm debating if I should add some aspects to this in the fan-fiction after all! Your art gave me an idea for Reeve having hallucinations of having a monstrous appearance. It would fit his issues perfectly!

To answer one question for you and those on my blog. Vanessa and Reeve in Realm of The Forgotten are not necessarily dating. They are friends with benefits. RTF Reeve and Vanessa are both very sad 30-year-olds that hold immense guilt and shame and disgust and feel they share a responsibility with what happened with Adam and what happened after Adam was comatose. They view themselves as Lilith and Brutus. They're both very stuck in the past. They drink mead and get together every family gathering and then mostly write each other letters otherwise. They do care for each other, it's just...very much closely platonic, but also they are "comforting" each other. Plus Vanessa really really really wants a child and Reeve is willing to help Vanessa achieve that goal; He heavily isolates himself in his temple. He's a man that wouldn't mind relieving some stress.

I'd be willing to answer some other questions, but that requires Mutual Access, which comes with the added benefit of knowing some of the non-revealed plotpoints...so @shadowx16 hurry up and become my mutual already! You're so coooooool!!! I wanna be your tumblr buddy! ^O^

[wilted-woods]

Just some drawings of my Narrators and some facts/headcanons uvu

I'll be making more soon because these are fun to do! ^-^

Lovebug! Narrator:

Likes cutesy things (ex; Sanrio plushies, collectables)

Human name: Valentino

Hates anything horror related (ex; gore, jumpscares, sudden loud noises)

Hates loud noises (sensory overload)

Prefers calm love songs instead of the new generations' love songs (for specific reasons asides from most of them being obnoxiously loud)

Loves music boxes (helps him fall asleep when his Stanley isn't around)

Does tolerate some of the new generations' music (His Stanley introduced him to some with bass that can help stimulate his brain whenever he's overwhelmed)

Loves romance movies

Almost anything related to REAL love and romance

Can be a HUGE baby sometimes

Loves sweet and savory foods (not overly sweet and savory or he'll have an outburst)

Not a big fan of candy but would eat a Twix if he wanted as he does tolerate chocolate

He likes to show Lovebug! Stanley his new swimsuit during warm weathers and wearing matching sweaters during cold weathers

Favorite season: Winter (because hot coco be hittin' different in his opinion also because he gets to be with his Stanley)

Original! Narrator:

Loves historical documentaries and movies

Human name: Woodhaven

WILL lecture about any topic of his interest when given the chance (ex; The History of Chernobyl)

Rarely sleeps

Likes to read and write poetry

His favorite poet so far is Edgar Allan Poe (his favorite works are "Annabel Lee", "The Tell-Tale Heart" and "The Raven")

He rarely sketches anything

He prefers classical music but would attempt to listen to some of Stanley's suggestions (so far he tolerates Deaftones and Nirvana)

He mostly listens to Beethoven, Mozart, Chopin and a couple of other composers

Loves historical paintings

He likes mostly savory foods

Enjoys a nice cup of tea in the morning and before bed

Tries to understand modern slang terms but miserably fails as he can't get himself to understand a majority of them so he always tend to ask Stanley for some clarifications (ex; "Stanley, what do they mean by 'Side-eye, bombastic side-eye and criminal offensive side-eye'?? Why are bombs and criminal offenses involved?? How does that relate to the conversation?? What is the purpose of that???")

Stanley would sometimes mock the "Toodle-pip" since it was so unexpected but did find it somewhat cute-

He prefers "The Happy Room" that's located at the Zending to relieve overwhelming emotions

Stanley's presence makes him feel better sometimes, he just won't admit it

He can get upset pretty quick

Prefers calm and cool weather

Favorite season: Fall/Autumn

Hanahakai! Narrator (also the one who was in the chain lmao and his Stanley is still trying to find him because this is the longest he hasn't been able to find him- he never meant any harm lmao):

A complete softy

Has an unknown memory disorder

Human name: Willow

Sometimes forgets who his Stanley is

Forgets the simplest things (ex; his tie)

Ends up in strange places and situations (ex; he got stuck in a tree and has no clue on how he got up there)

Loves watching the sunset

Loves stargazing

He's an oldies type of guy

His usual favorite songs are "It's A Long Way To Tipperary" by John McCormack and "We'll Meet Again" by Vera Lynn

Sleeps a lot (even to the point where it's unhealthy and his Stanley has to try and keep him awake)

His Stanley has to keep a very close eye on him or at least keep an ear out (metaphorically)

His Stanley is basically like a caregiver

Wonders off a lot (hence how he ends up in said situations)

Prefers calm and breezy weather

Makes desserts from naturally grown ingredients and has only one (1) Cow and one (1) Goat for dairy

Favorite season: Spring and warm breezy Summers

I also added a good amount so it wouldn't be so empty and I'm already invested with these ideas of mine-

[darker-overlord]

My OCs from different fandoms!

thank u @kindan-no-kanojo for the tag i'm about to be INSUFFERABLE for one full post <3

i wasn't the type to make ocs until last year so it's like 20% actual old ocs and 80% unintroduced dl charas :D it's my personal acc anyway someone HAS to see them before i go insane (they have lore drops tho so just look at the pretty pictures if u don't wanna know (?))

(also using the dividers on the oc blog i'm too lazy to find a cute one >:D)

Diabolik Lovers OC/s (introduced)

Komori Kayo x2 (human and fiend)

we have the babygrills of the blog, kayo and edgy kayo. jk but for ocs i only made like? january of this year i have spent WAY too much time thinking about and drawing them. hunter came first and the loser meowmeow drenched in milk pathetic loser one came after actually :p

i can go on and on about how i designed her appearance in specific but that's for another day :D just know that her blue/yellow color palette is literally a forget-me-not, and hunter's red/yellow color palette is a forget-me-not drenched in blood :D

hunter kayo's "species" is actually called a fiend (a term i just stole from csm LMAO) which is a very rare set of humans that are able to successfully be transplanted with a demonic organ. yes, yui is technically a fiend too in this case.

Lilith

mother <3

in terms of power levels, she's karlheinz on steroids (bc their powers have the same origin but u didn't hear that from me) but she's on another level of psychopathic. was she a demon before she was banished, or did god make her a demon? who knows.

kayo, seiji, and yui's relationship closely mirrors lilith, god, and eve's relationship.

Cecilia Lune

like spring, gone too soon. all that's left are the ashes she left behind.

Jumpscare warning: G*nshin Imp*ct OCs

i censored it bc i can't believe my first ocs were for THIS GAME...

i have a love-hate relationship with the game don't mind <3 i still think back to these three fondly and i'll talk about their lore for a bit cause this is probably the only time they'll see the light of day.

the two sisters are inazuman-mondstadter(?) in blood, but in nationality they're both inazuman, and their visions have inazuman casing. however, maya lives in fontaine and miya lives in sumeru.

Mikoshi Maya (Wandering Princess)

players complaining about too many sweet girls? here's another one!

from the last name, maya is a descendant of mikoshi nagamasa, the human son of the oni chiyo that served the raiden shogun. that part of her backstory doesn't matter to her as much as it matters to her older sister.

maya's a spoiled and lazy child of one of richest businesswomen of fontaine, and she's also a huge hermit. but she has the power to dream of the future, and it always involves someone needing help. even though she's spoiled, she's very kind in nature, so even as a hermit she often travels to help those she finds in her dreams. she's a dancer and has a very pretty appearance so 'wandering princess' is the title she got from traveling the other nations.

ironically, her nickname in fontaine is actually the rumored hermit, from her tendencies to almost never show up. people see her so little some are convinced that she doesn't actually exist.

her future dreams come into play in an interlude quest.

Mikoshi Miya (Transient Swordsman)

mommy. her name's miya bc i wanted it to match with maya

on the surface, she's a kshahrewar graduate who specializes in mechanics, and she specifically works on machines that can bridge the gap between vision holders and non-vision holders. she's pretty relaxed and sisterly, but at first she seems almost drawn in on herself.

in her past, she was trained as a swordsman by her father, a mikoshi himself. she was considered the greatest prodigy for her time, and she was 'destined for great things'. this was for a specific job that would need way too long to explain but related to this job is the fact that they're a bit of a problem for the fatui. this, and her mother's relationship to the fatui, culminated in someone attempting to subdue her mother with a very special fire made from delusions. however, they mistimed the mission, and instead caught a young miya and her father in the crossfire, which lead to her father's death and miya's hatred for the fatui and for visions.

no matter how much people told her that she was a once in a lifetime swordsman, and how her skill was almost completely unmatched, miya gave up swordsmanship. her skill never saved her father.

miya is intelligent, and always liked making gadgets (her first creation was a mechanical train set at the age of seven), so she instead focused her efforts on helping non-vision holders, including herself, by studying at the akademiya.

miya only gets her electro vision in her story quest, where she confronts her father's killer. she also decides to take up a sword again because of the quest :D

Irina (Witch of Thorns)

mother. that's my name yes but it kind of fits her. i go by yna anyway so i don't really see myself in her JFKJFSD if miya's past seems like a lot this woman has a whole document just about her lore......

to summarize, she's actually gold/rhinedottir's "accidental" creation, something too long to talk about but trust me on this. she's her first child in that regard, and rhine actually tried to raise her like a regular daughter.

they got separated in the cataclysm and irina ended up in mondstadt, which lead to her considering herself a mondstadter. fatui shenanigans happen with dottore and she changes her original appearance to become the witch of thorns, a witch specializing in an artificial flower with medicinal properties. she changes appearances every other decade and pretends she's the daughter of the last witch of thorns, all the way to the present.

miya and maya are her very real daughters though. maya resembles her true appearance more, while miya resembles how she was when she was younger.

(i also have two men who work under irina, yuuya and a runaway adeptus but their lore is like wayyy shorter than the three and these gi ocs are already taking up way too much of the post...)

Diabolik Lovers OCs (unintroduced)

HUGE LORE DUMP AHEAD.................... bc i need to vomit it out

Lunar Clan

the descendants of lilith's eldest, nyx.

while all demons are descendants of lilith, there is one uninterrupted line of daughters that are genetically clones of lilith herself. while their appearances do have variation, they all one defining trait: pure white hair. in my lore, white hair is a trait impossible to have if you're a pure founder. the only founders to naturally have this hair color are these clones, who are called lilith's avatars. makes you wonder how carla has white hair, though not purely white. doesn't that make him special?

there can only be one avatar born from a previous one in every generation, and any other child ends up as a regular founder. back then, this line of daughters were the royal family of the founder clan, then known as the lunar kingdom when all kingdoms were comprised of founders rather than the subspecies that arose from evolution.

they were overthrown in an event known as the fall of lunacy, a coup d'état arranged by the final queen, scylla's adviser. despite being overthrown, their connection to lilith and scylla's own sacrifices continued to keep them in an important noble position. their estate is located the closest to lilith's tomb, lilith's resting place, a garden of forget-me-nots the size of a town.

another special trait of the avatars is the ability to control and summon butterfly familiars, all with a unique appearance. they can also take up the butterfly's form.

all avatars are assigned epithets at one point in their lives. in their time as royal family, they were usually assigned their titles post-mortem, but afterwards their epithets tend to be assigned some time within their lives.

in order of appearance and birth.

Lilith ; Queen of the Night ; Lilith herself wasn't technically part of the Lunar Clan, as it only began upon the establishment of the Lunar Kingdom, long after her supposed death. Still, she was given the epithet due to her reign on Old Eden, characterized by her absolute control over all territories, like the all-encompassing embrace of night.

Queen Nyx ; Lunacy's Founder, the founder of the Lunar Kingdom and the first to take on the last name Lune. Lilith's eldest.

Queen Raikou ; The Silent Queen, the longest-reigning queen, second to only Lilith herself, ruling for 700 years compared to an average of 100 years. Her rule was characterized by its stability, though quickly overturned when the event known as the War of the Fallen occurred.

Queen Scylla ; The Children's Princess, the shortest-reigning queen, Raikou's daughter, and the final ruler of the Lunatic Dynasty. Becoming queen at a young age after her mother's death, she followed her adviser's ill-meaning advice due to the widespread famine in neighboring kingdoms, earning the peoples' ire and contributing to the successful coup d'état. That adviser's family became the reigning royal family up until Giesbach.

Zarya and Krone Lune ; The Dawn and the Dusk, a pair of identical twins. They are the first and only case of two avatars being born in one generation. Due to magic being the focus of the Demon World, Zarya's interest in medicine and biology was seen as a disgrace, especially compared to her twin sister, who excelled in magic and swordsmanship. Zarya was later exiled from the kingdom, though was reluctantly brought back upon the beginning of the spread of Endzeit. She managed to quell the disease's spread all the way until her disappearance, just before the War of Prophecy occurred, which trapped all Founders within the Pandemonium and allowed Endzeit to spread rampantly.

Cecilia Lune ; The Spring Bloom ; Zarya's daughter, the end to the line of avatars. Founders' eyes don't reflect light, and merely glow. Cecilia's eyes sparkled like stars. Hated, then loved by the people, who grieved her death for centuries.

She was known as the human among demons.

extra fact: the divider icon is the lunar clan's family emblem:3 it used to represent the lunar kingdom as a whole, but upon the fall of the dynasty it became associated with the former royal family instead.

anyway that's all this has gotten very long <3 thank you again for the tag ;w;

[bluepoodle7]

#Courage #FreakyFred #SillyIdeaIHad #Househuntedgame #MyThoughts

If my art style was good I would draw Freaky Fred as a Realtor trying shave Regular Guys and other people just for kicks.

You know the weird thing about this character is?

Why doesn't Fred shave his own hair?

I wish he wasn't a one off character.

I imagine Fred's house body being similar to the Bob's Burger's house.

Like the bottom is the barber shop area and the top is just a normal house.

My favorite image of Fred.

Courage The Cowardly Dog - Freaky Fred (youtube.com)

I know courage aired in Japan.

I wonder what Fred's voice sounds like in Japanese?

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

I would also draw John Doe Five Nights at Freddy's Foxy jumpscare Timmy the Tooth.

Have Wally Darling from Welcome Home meet Cousin Skeeter.

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

I would also draw Freaky Fred as a villain in Bobobobo as a hair hunter wanting to shave hair and not caring about the money but wants the thrill of cutting random people's hair.

My guess is that Bobobobo would trick Fred into shaving his own hair which would be his weakness.

Maybe making Fred's hair clipper be alive and talk to him like a lover while making the episode super weird.

Images not mine but links are there.

Freak Fred | Antagonists Wiki | Fandom

Does anyone else wonder about Bobs house? BTW, Teddy is in the attic! 🍔 : r/BobsBurgers (reddit.com)

Foxy/Gallery | Vesterandfriends Wiki | Fandom

Vintage rare 1995 Dakin Timmy the Tooth plush toy doll with tags 10" Dentist | #1822774316 (worthpoint.com)

Cousin Skeeter - Rotten Tomatoes

Wally Darling | Sexypedia Wiki | Fandom

Bobobo-bo Bo-bobo (NPC) - Granblue Fantasy Wiki (gbf.wiki)

I would also draw Todd Ingram from Scott Pilgrim trying to lure Maison Talo to get eaten even though Maison wants to eat Todd since he eats humans.

Todd would figure out Maison is a plant man and want to eat him.

Got a cartoon Tom and Jerry like thing going on.

Also there is a small chance these two might be a thing since Maison Talo is Pan but is more focused on buyer hunting and his rankings to date.

Maison Talo also has ex's and descendants.

I wonder if Realtor's lure and house body are vegan?

I mean they are fleshy, can sweat when nervous, and can bleed like people but are like trees or plants.

Todd Ingram | Scott Pilgrim Wiki | Fandom

I mean Realtors are plant mimic living house people with sap that looks like blood similar to these trees.

So can you eat a Realtors lure body before they eat you and get away with it or do you get arrested?

What does the uncanny valley jails look like?

SCIplanet - Dragon Blood Tree (bibalex.org)

[theelfmaiden]

Eyyyy, @nonbinarywardenamell 💛💛💛 thanks for tagging me!!! Lez gooo 🌟

Were you named after anyone?

Yes, after one of Mom's friends,

when was the last time you cried?

Any day when I make my OCs suffer... could be yesterday...

Do you have kids?

No, and at this stage of gay marriage/adoption/IVF stuff in the country, I'll likely become a gay auncle too,

do you use sarcasm a lot?

Nah 😉

What’s the first thing you notice about people?

Them 🤣

Current/favorite fandoms?

I'll always be a Tolkien fan 💯 BUT I'm starting to love Star Wars more and more (mainly thanks to fanfic writers, Mando and OG trilogy (I love the OG trilogy 😍😍😍) and them GAMES!!!) 🌟 I enjoy Dragon Age and Elder Scrolls, Detroit: Become Human is so good too! And some fandoms like W.I.T.C.H. I follow from pure nostalgia and cuz they're just THAT GOOD... there're so many fandoms I'm technically part of but rarely follow anything lol 🤣

What’s your eye color?

It's a weird mix of green-grey and yellow in the centre... dk 😁

Scary movies or happy endings?

Happy endings, I hate getting scared (tho I must say I love thrillers and mystery films... I just hate jumpscares),

any special talents?

Dk... I'm a fast learner despite having problems understanding stuff (tho depends)...

What are your hobbies?

Drawing, reading, gaming, music (both producing and listening to it), I play D&D (with you natur 😅🌟) sometimes and I love learning new stuff (is that a hobby???) 💖

Have any pets?

Not anymore.

What sports do you play/have you played?

I used to play volleyball and lil of table tennis and I swim! And do a quite a bit of cycling too.

How tall are you?

Enough to be called a giant,

favorite subject in school?

Practically any. Even maths that I hated was sometimes fun.

Dream job?

I wanna be a Jedi... like fr.

Tagging @armenelols, @noldorinpainter, @thenookienostradamus, @grapenehifics, @renlyslittlerose, @wigilda, @yellow-faerie, @crysdrawsthings, @prastevnik and @mostvaliantandmostpround!!! No pressure tag as always 🌟

15 questions

Tagged by @iicarys thank you 💜

were you named after anyone?

my birth name, yes, my chosen name is literally just the first letter of my birth name so kind of?

when was the last time you cried?

During an emotional breakdown last week, I'm a Pisces so I cry a lot

do you have kids?

Nope, I plan to be the cool auncle one day, though

do you use sarcasm a lot?

Sometimes

what’s the first thing you notice about people?

Whatever the most prominent feature catches my eye. Usually eyes or smile.

current/favorite fandoms?

Dragon age and Critical role are the only fandoms I currently actively participate in but I prefer to just consume a media and appreciate fanart and fanfic without actively participating in fandom

what’s your eye color?

Blue? Though there's shades of green and gray in there too

scary movies or happy endings?

Happy endings, I don't like being scared

any special talents?

I don't know if it counts as talent but I can wiggle my ears

what are your hobbies?

Playing guitar, gaming, embroidery, D&D, archery and playing basketball with my brother

have any pets?

No, but I would love a hairless cat

what sports do you play/have you played?

Tennis when I was like 4 but my joints are too bad for all physical running sports, I do enjoy archery, swimming and playing pool, though (basketball with my brother doesn't count as a sport for me, it's more of a performance art)

how tall are you?

170 cm (5'7) perfectly average height or so I've heard

favorite subject in school?

Biology, theater, physics and music, I also always liked math

dream job?

I don't dream of labor, but since I must participate in capitalism, being a biomedical engineer (which I am studying for) doesn't sound half bad

I am tagging @theelfmaiden @stillout2lunch @motherofmabari

No pressure though💜💜💜

[llamagoddessofficial]

Oh I am incredibly interested In a zoo/research facility au for the siren boys

... 👀

The facility is legally a zoo, it’s how they get a lot of their funding, but it also doubles as an incredibly important centre for the study of sirens. Sirens actively hunt/prey on humans, and having three adult males of different subspecies’ is invaluable to research on how to defend against them. The guys draw loads of visitors, being huge and dangerous and the like... but they also have a lot of scientists keen to examine them.

Sans: An orca boy. His lower half resembles an orca (he’s nowhere near the size of an actual orca, he just has the tail and markings of one), and some of the black markings travel up his bones too. 

... ‘Apathetic’ is the best way to describe Sans...  He’s very intelligent, even by the standards of his own species, but that means keeping him in a tank has left him painfully bored no matter how high the quality of the tank is. He’s so bored and unenriched it’s lead to him becoming... slightly sociopathic in nature. He’ll find any way he can to torment staff, visitors, even his own food when given the chance; it’s been noted that he has a clear preference for living meals that he can chase to exhaustion around his tank. Staff get bitten and splashed, visitors get jumpscared or ignored, and as soon as he’s done he goes back to swimming in mindless circles to pass the time.

... Mc, the cute little new staff member, visibly fascinates him. When she’s around, he’s more friendly, he’s more active, he seems far less bothered with psychologically tormenting any human near his tank. He gets this playful side to him that nobody knew existed... and fortunately for him, nobody gets suspicious of.

Red: His lower half resembles a tiger shark. C’mon, with those chompers? It wasn’t exactly a surprise. Unlike Sans, Red’s actually brilliant with kids, especially younger ones- when schools bring children on supervised ‘educational’ visits to see the sirens he finds himself the natural focal point, given the fact that he’s not only a big cool shark but he’s also the only one of the three who seems to enjoy engaging with visitors. Kids will flock to see him, and he absolutely revels in the attention; spending too much time in a tank has made him desperate for interaction and there’s something about the way their eyes light up when he grins or taps the glass that helps him keep going. 

... His issue is that he’s very aggressive with staff. Anyone he perceives to be part of the group keeping him in the tank get the foulest edge of his temper and often become closely acquainted with those teeth of his; Sans may be smarter than him, but Red’s jaws can do much more damage upon impact. 

When Mc’s around, he just... turns into a dope, like he’s been turned onto his back; he clearly totally adores her, and he doesn’t care if the zoo uses it as an easy way to get him to do what he’s told. If he gets to see her face and spend time with her, it’s worth it.

Skull: Deep sea siren, the kind that barely get any media attention but account for quite a decent chunk of the siren-related deaths, especially at night. His lower half...? A black giant squid.

His tank has a cave in it, for his comfort, which he rarely ever leaves. Occasionally you might a see a tentacle reach out to grab food that’s drifted to the enclosure floor (if you’re lucky) or the flash of an eyelight, buuuuut... that’s about it? All attempts to lure him out of his hiding place end in slightly embarrassing failure. He was popular when he was first caught and brought to the zoo because of the mystery factor, but the fact that he never leaves his cave meant people got bored of him pretty quickly. As such, his darkened tank room is often empty... and it conveniently provides a nice, scenic place to study, work in private, or even just sit down for a bit.

... That’s how Mc met him- she had her back against his tank’s glass after hours, doing some boring paperwork, and it was only when she realised there was a strange red light on her page that she turned around to find that he’d not only left his cave, but he was right up against the glass, his hands and tentacles curling around her as if trying to break through the enclosure and grab on.

Someone left a little treat out in the open for him...

[mysticetus]

Alright hi it’s me I wanted to talk about analog horror! Specifically the Walten Files because it’s the only analog series that I’ve enjoyed somewhat.

The issue with analog is how old it gets so quick. I remember getting startled by the first few jumpscares in TWF and then it was just expected. (That’s not just an issue with analog, rather horror based in jumpscares overall)

Another issue is how easy it is to tell what stories are. Now, not everything needs to be cryptic. But mix up the puzzles! Pull out something different once and a while!

Now with the Walten Files I really want to talk about the episode Bunny Farm. I really want to talk about the character Sophie here. What was so off putting with this episode wasn’t anything close to the jumpscares.

It was the cluelessness with Sophie. I as the viewer new what and who she was recognizing. But she realized so fast. Too fast. I think the Walten Files would have much bigger of an impact on me if that hadn’t have happened. I think having Sophie almost completely confused throughout almost the entire episode would’ve made it so much better.

Not everything needs to be slowburn. Not everything needs to be nondependent of jumpscares. The issue with analog in these things is that it almost never is done correctly. With TWF, for me it’s easy to see these issues. The jumpscares aren’t very scary because they’re really predictable and almost always the same. And with what seemed like attempted slow burn, it didn’t work.

It’s like 4 in the morning sorry about my babbling nonsense.

hi there. im not sure who "me" is as i get a lot of anons is this the same person who sent the lina ask ?? im not sure. im also not entirely sure how to respond to this but ill treat it like a socratic seminar

ive already talked at length about my thoughts on the walten files here but im glad to elaborate more on how i feel abt bunny farm

i feel like the story of the walten files was really rushed and unplanned and tried to do too many things at once. i think it shoulve asked itself what it wanted to say and what it wanted to make the audience feel. bunny farm specifically feels like the creator just wanted to make a petscop episode.

and this is where i wish the creator took more notes from petscop outside of simply the concept of a creepy game revealing your family secrets to you. like. petscop wanted to do something with that, it had things to say about it, and its ultimate goal was not horror, i feel. it had things to say about humanity. the walten files in my mind is pretty focused on the horror element. its main draw is its scary faces .....

i feel no connection with sophie, no sense of who she is as a person - we were never given time to sit with her and experience her charisma or grow attached to her. thus, i honestly dont care about her or her dismissive girlfriend or the mystery pills she took that magically gave her amnesia. the game lacks cohesiveness or subtlety. the episode wants so bad to tell you about the scary horrible things that happened that it rushes through any sense of buildup or development just to show you the scary face and sophie remembering things.

i dont want to imply everything has to take after petscop or treat it as this pinnacle of good storytelling, but im sorry if you make something like bunny farm im just gonna be thinking man i wish i was watching petscop right now.

you mention analog horror rarely doing things correctly, i think a better way to put it is its rarely done well. the entire genre is built upon extremely specific conventions and thus theres very little wiggle room to explore new ideas. or at least, barely anyone has explored new ideas. it feels like a template at this point. and i think thats partially driven by the nature of the internet: people witness something thats successful and seems easy to make, they make it, it blows up, cue the cycle. it makes the works extremely predictable and they lose their potency rapidly. it becomes grating.

[asterbi]

so I finished sally face

SALLY FACE SPOILERS (INCLUDING EPISODE 5) AHEAD

I played through the entire game two days ago (i had already watched both jacksepticeye's and gloomgames' lets plays for the first four episodes) and yeah, I know I'm a week and a bit late late, but I have some thoughts

Also I’m so sorry for how long this is, I know no one cares but I just started rambling and I couldn’t stop

First of all, criticism:

I'm getting real fucking tired of "ooOOooOOOoo a native american myth so scary and otherworldly" like dude shut the fuck up that's disrespectful as

Also (and please correct me if I'm wrong) I'm like 99% sure that the native american myth in question isn't real which. is somehow even worse

He buried his gays (tbh I wasn't that annoyed at this one because 1) at least one of the gays lived and 2) he buried pretty much everyone else too but I feel like it had to be said)

Now. Let me preface this by saying I loved travis' redemption, which I'll get more into later. However, I really didn't like the fact that travis' character played into the whole 'homophobes are gay' thing, which is a uhhhh vaguely problematic trope

The ending was unsatisfying. I'll get more into it in a sec

Larry was one of my favourite characters, and I know he's a fan favourite too. Considering the fact that he is a main character and he's been given a lot of attention and development, having him disappear at the end without any explanation and barely a reunion or a goodbye was an asshole move.

I would have loved to see some more worldbuilding and lore, especially getting into what exactly the red eyes plague did, why the cult wanted to summon red eyes, how the whole replacement thing worked, what happened with charley, and what exactly the whole mother tree thing was with larry

Ash's extremely triggering and graphic suicide. I understand this is a horror game. I understand that this sort of thing is expected and normal in horror games. But showing players imagery like that without so much as a content warning? That's not okay.

Some of the characters were left really underdeveloped. Sal and larry were great, and ash saw a lot of development in the last episode, but todd, neil, and travis, who were given a fair bit of attention as well, were pretty 2d (not so much travis, but still)

And now for things I enjoyed:

The entire game

Despite everything I said earlier, this is still one of my favourite games, and I really really loved it

Sal was a f a n t a s t i c character. 0% toxic masculinity, 12/10. I love the fact that he was so kind and calm towards everyone, even those who were rude to him, but still knew where to draw the line and wasn't a total pushover. I especially love the fact that even though he likes feminine things and wears pigtails and whatnot, he is a cishet guy. While more lgbt+ representation (particularly trans people and wlw) would've been great, I also like that the game shows that you don't have to be lgbt in order to be gnc, especially since the gnc person is both a man, and the main character, which is really uncommon. Also disabled representation!! That's really fucking awesome

Larry was also brilliant!! Loves metal, loves art, has a criminal record, cries during sappy movies, does drugs and dabbles in illegal activities, wants to go to college, is openly and unapologetically affectionate towards his friends and unafraid to tell them he loves them

Ash was not one of my favourite characters but I really love how she developed from sceptic to believer and the way she changed and faced her own problems, and to some extent had her own story (although it did rely fairly heavily on sal’s, which was :/ but then again everyone’s story relied on sal’s)

Okay so back to travis - I loved his redemption arc so much, because he was a redeemable character. I see so many characters who get redemption arcs that absolutely do not deserve them, but travis was a good person born into a horrible situation, and I’m glad they explored homophobia and abuse (although I’m not happy about the homophobes are gay thing like I said) and made him a hero at the end. I’m also glad that we got foreshadowing that it would happen, and it didn’t come totally out of left field

Speaking of which, props to steve gabry for not pulling an endgame and just throwing things in for shock value. Sal coming back in ep 5 was hinted at, travis’ redemption was hinted at, and of course the events of the first four episodes were hinted at because they were memories. Even ash and neil’s involvement in fighting the cult despite being a sceptic and someone totally ignorant about it respectively made perfect sense, and though the parallel universes thing and larry’s reappearance was a surprise, it still sort of fits with how the lore of the game works

The different game styles in episode 5 were absolutely out of this world. All of them were fantastic (although fuck you 3d sal you were Not fun to play), and I thought that was a really cool interpretation of the parallel universes thing

The writing was consistently really good throughout the whole game, and it genuinely makes you so attached to all of the characters, which makes the ending all the more upsetting

This is more personal but I really loved like. The Aesthetic of the game? It was so grungy and out there, and little things like the necrolight guitar and the super gear boy just added to this whole vibe of teenagers-trying-to-do-good-in-a-messed-up-world and I can’t explain it but it was great

The game really didn’t shy away from any aspects of horror, but it also did it in a really well written way that creeped you out without relying on random jumpscares, which was awesome. I mean they had e v e r y t h i n g - mass cannibalism, demonic rituals, cults, prophecies, murder, human sacrifices, suicide, nudity but in the creepy way not the sexy way (the random gory scene in ep 5 where neil and maple were hanging naked and dead upside down really startled me because I just didn’t expect it from this game and it just freaked me out more), aliens, creepy puppets which reminded me of dhmis, the list goes on

The main part in episode 4 where larry and sal are working together in different dimensions?? Poetic, amazing, 12/10

Final opinions: I absolutely loved the characters, the story, the general aesthetic of the game, and the art style and writing. Episode 5 was probably my least favourite episode, because I found the ending really vague and unsatisfying, although I absolutely loved all the different game styles. I also found that a lot was left vague and unanswered, and not really in a good way???? Also the representation and stuff was great (especially disabled rep, because that’s rare), but there were a few things that rubbed me the wrong way :/ Still, sally face is one of my favourite games, and I’m so sad that the series has come to an end :(

[sweetsmellosuccess]

Sundance 2020: Day 2

Number of Films: 5 Best Film of the Day: Never Rarely Sometimes Always

Zola: Back in 2015, a Twitter user named @zola began a long, outrageous thread concerning a wild road trip she had been on with a woman she had just met at the restaurant where she worked. The plan was for the two of them to go down to Florida for a long weekend to dance at strip clubs and make a bundle. What followed was an absolutely insane odyssey of horror, involving pimps, guns, gang bangers, and someone jumping off a balcony. Directed by Janicza Bravo, with plenty of snap, crackle and pop, the film stars Taylour Page as our long suffering narrator and Riley Keough as the brazen, hopeless Stefani, who leads her newfound friend into the depths of hell. At its root, it’s a funny, if not sporadically chilling sort of chaotic joy-ride, with Zola’s commentary peppering the proceedings, along with a bevy of social media pings and whooshes (as another critic pointed out, the tweet whistle is half the soundtrack). Bravo pulls out a creative bag of tricks and gags  —  including a propensity for Scorsese-like screen freezes, while she describes one character or other  —  all of which gives the film a zany, madcap quality that imbibes the film with plenty of zing. Riley, a trashy southern drawl in her back pocket (just hearing her call Zola “beech” endearingly never ceases to be amusing), takes to the character like James Franco took to his role in Spring Breakers (a film with which Zola shares a certain Florida-crazed DNA), and Page makes an adroit straight person, taking in the insanity all around her, but despite these amusements, it’s really only skin-deep. There’s no deeper sense of anything, which, while in league with its source material, also puts something of a cap on just what the film can achieve.

La Llorona: if the source of all horror, cinematic and otherwise, is, essentially those elements that make up the human condition, than guilt is one of the more powerful evocations from which to draw. Jayro Bustamante‘s horror film is a timely political allegory set in Guatemala, as an aged and deposed former dictator general (Julio Diaz) is being tried for genocidal war crimes, his family, wife (Margarita Kenefic), daughter (Sabrina De La Hoz), and young granddaughter (Ayla-Elea Hurtado) are all forced to huddle up in the general’s mansion, as throngs of outraged citizens hold a neverending seething protest outside. What’s more, the General, now a slightly shriveled old man, seems to be coming unglued, hearing someone sobbing in the house whom he is convinced is a Guerilla assassin. When his mainly indigenous staff catches wind of this  —  the crying female spirit  —  they quit en masse, leaving the mansion badly understaffed, until a young, new woman (Maria Mercedes Coroy) arrives, leaving the General further discombobulated, as the nightmares and visions he and his wife endure begin to coalesce into an unnerving climax. Apart from everything else, Bustamante’s film is about the searing power of empathy  —  the General’s wife starts the film as a racist, uncaring mouthpiece, but gradually gets her layers of denial stripped away from her  —  and the powerful idea that one’s actions, even if unpunished in the material world, still have dire consequences.

Never Rarely Sometimes Always: Eliza Hittman has made a trilogy of sorts with her first three films. In 2013’s It Felt Like Love, a young teen woman in Brooklyn convinces herself to pursue a callous and contemptuous boy in order to lose her virginity; Beach Rats (2017) follows the trevails of another Brooklyn-based teen, as he attempts to pursue his interest in men while continuing to maintain his bro-heteroness. In her new film, she has moved the setting to a hardscrabble town in rural Pennsylvania, but her characters remain familiar. Autumn (Sidney Flanigan), a dour-faced high schooler has discovered to her horror that she’s pregnant, and too far along to get an abortion without her parents’ cosign, something she wants to avoid at all costs. Enlisting the aid of her cousin, the feisty, resourceful Skylar (Talia Ryder), the pair head off to New York, where Autumn can get the procedure without her parents’ knowledge. With little money and no earthly clue about the city, the two young women are forced to endure a vagabond lifestyle, spending the nights on train platforms, or endlessly going from station stop to station stop, until Autumn can be properly treated. Hittman’s eye for detail and emotional complexity  —  her characters can rarely articulate anything their experiencing  —  is incredibly acute, and she pulls tremendously understated performances out of her two leads. In the film’s most searing scene, Autumn goes through an exhaustive intake interview with a sweetly caring counselor. Shot in a long single take, the back-and-forth covers the most basic details of Autumn’s life and also some of her most buried pain and trauma. The camera stays fixed on her face, as she is asked to finally unpack some of the misery she has worked so hard to tamp down, and the result is one of most devastating sequences you will see this year.

Black Bear: What to make of Lawerence Michael Levine’s meta-within-meta film in which the first half is a specific sort of indie drama in which a young couple (Christopher Abbott and Sarah Gadon) living up in a glorious lake house away from New York get visited by an actress-turned-director (Aubrey Plaza), there to work on a new project; and the second half is, essentially, the Noises Off-like behind the scenes riff on how the trio (now with the actresses’ roles switched) worked together to produce a variation of the film we were just watching? In part one, dubbed “The Bear in the Road,” Plaza’s character is territorial and coquettish, instantly attracted to Abbott’s lonely musician, and enticing him into disavowing his care for his pregnant partner. In Part two, “The Bear by the Boat House,” Abbott is now the film’s director, and Plaza is his wife, also the star of the film in which she is now the clingy partner, as Gadon arrives from the city on a visit. There is a lot to unpack here  —  or, alternatively, there isn’t terribly much at all, depending on how you see it  —  it being the kind of film that begs for further viewings to untangle its many layers. Whether you will want to put that sort of work into it is unclear. Still, the leads are all tremendous  —  Plaza, light-years removed from her “Parks & Rec” days  —  is a revelation of ferocious, billowing emotion, and Levine is clever enough with his structure to keep things rolling along.  

The Night House: The Midnight slate at Sundance, as with most such designations at other festivals, is by nature a roll of the dice. Some nights, you’ll find something absolutely brilliant (The Babadook, The Nightmare), many other nights, something a good deal less so. David Bruckner’s ghost story isn’t close to one of those conceptual masterpieces, but does offer some serious jumpscare thrills en route to a far too explicated finish. Rebecca Hall plays Beth, a grieving widow, whose architect husband just left their modern manse overlooking a lake to shoot himself in their wooden rowboat. Obsessed with trying to find why he might have done such a thing, Beth slowly begins to unravel his dark, secret life, even as her dreams become waking nightmares of visions, blasts of music from their downstairs stereo, and seeming visitations by either her husband or another dark force from behind the veil. With a sadistic sound design that periodically shocks your system, and a beseeching performance from Hall, who carries this film from first frame to last, Bruckner’s effort dutifully serves up enough genuine creepiness to earn your attention, even if the story slowly devolves into something out of the Final Destination franchise.

Tomorrow: Utilizing a slightly more sane pace, I start the day with Dee Rees’ Shirley; check out the much lauded doc Boys State; get my ‘80s on for The Go Go’s; and finish up with Miranda July’s long-awaited next film, Kajillionaire.

Into the frigid climes and rarefied thin air of the spectacular Utah Mountains, I've arrived in order to document some of the sense and senselessness of the 2020 Sundance Film Festival. Over the next week, armed with little more than a heavy parka and a bevy of blank reporter's notebooks, I'll endeavor to watch as many movies as I can and report my findings.

[tisthewoman]

Why You Shouldn't Let An English Teacher See Movies: a reaction post of IT:Chapter 2

Okay, so I finally saw IT Chapter 2, and I have some thoughts. Some of these thoughts might rub people the wrong way, which is okay, but be warned that I'm not going to hold back here.

As a whole, let me preface by saying that I loved this movie. I will go to see it 3 more times, and I will enjoy every moment. However, objectively… this is not a film that I can recommend to people as a “great film” artistically speaking. Is it fun and Good™? Yes. Did I enjoy it immensely? Yes. Were there some very odd and disruptive writing/direction choices? Yeah. This isn’t a masterpiece, as fantastic as I personally felt it was, and honestly I do not think it topped Chapter 1 in terms of flow, total presentation, or scriptwriting.

I’m going to break down my thoughts by category:

1. Story elements

2. Visuals & Horror

3. Tone

Starting with Story Elements:

I am incredibly torn on this. I LOVED aspects of this film, and was wildly confused by others. As a whole, I think the film began strong. 

The re-introductions to the characters were fantastic, though taking the “historian” thing from Mike in Chapter 1 definitely made Chapter 2 weak in regards to his characterization. He’s a hard character to get right, but it honestly feels a little like they didn’t try, and just used him to progress the story. I could continue, but that is a whole separate Mike Essay. Bev, Ben, Richie, and Eddie were all fantastic. Eddie in particular was taken in a slightly more aggressive angle than traditional for his character, but it worked very well with the way he was established in Chapter 1, thanks to Jack’s interpretation. Bill was a little bit weaker in some ways, but still at his core Bill Denbrough. I unapologetically LOVE adult Stan, and only regret that due to the story, we don’t get to experience him as much as he deserves in the film.

The return to Derry was great, and I still think that the group dynamics are what make this story shine. 90% of what I loved so much in Chapter 1 was the group dynamics, and they are here in SPADES. The group makes sense together, and the cast did a great job, though Eddie’s constant repetition of the word “fuck” seemed a little unnecessary after the second time in the restaurant scene. However, one thing I think the miniseries did better is establish them as “the lucky seven” - they’re not just the Losers Club; they’re held together by fate, and there’s definitely some supernatural elements to that which are not present in the films, weakening their group connection. This is shown most strongly in their moments of conflict in Chapter 2, especially when they want to leave, because their draw to each other doesn’t seem to be present, at least not in the same capacity. It seems weird to feel let down by this considering my next point, but it is what it is.

Some may disagree here, but… I really dislike the decision to include the ritual of Chud in the movie. I disliked it in the book as well, as I think that it unnecessarily complicates things and turns this horror story into a surreal sci-fi story in a way that doesn’t always mesh well. King does both sci-fi and horror well, but I’ve always felt the crossover in IT was off somehow. Also, the lack of connection with this to the first film makes the ritual of Chud seem even weirder in Chapter 2. Mike’s characterization with this gets… odd… and its inclusion is very confusing. I actually said “what the hell are they doing” in theaters when Mike introduces this with Bill. That’s how weird it was for me. My biggest problem was that it makes Chapter 2 a sharp departure from Chapter 1, and failing to achieve the cohesion that the miniseries had is a huge downer for me, considering that the IT reboot is an improvement to the miniseries in so many other ways.

In comparison to the book and miniseries, I think that it was a bad choice to leave out Audra, as it was good closure for the Billverly plotline. Bill and Bev even kiss in Chapter 2 - and then it is promptly forgotten. I’m not necessarily looking for conflict, but Audra was a huge motivator for Bill, and it was much less significant to have his driving force be this random kid that reminds him of Georgie. I get it, but Audra helps show how Bill has grown more strongly and pushes him forward after the final battle. I also wanted a cinematic parallel between Audra and Bev in the sewers and was really disappointed that I didn't get it. I have similar feelings about Tom - yes, Bev obviously leaves him for Ben, but Tom had a huge impact on Bev and her growth. Leaving him out weakens her personal story.

I’m not going to say much about Henry, but the scene where he pops out of the sewers is FANTASTIC. I absolutely did not expect to get that scene (I figured we’d just pop in on him in the hospital), but was glad we did. However, this lost its impact the longer we went on; he was relevant for all of one (1) stabbing of one (1) Edward Kaspbrak, and then died without even putting Mike in the hospital like he was supposed to. A waste of his character.

There are other positives. The connection Adrian and Richie’s stories are great, and I think Richie’s moments of reveal are very well handled. I just wish the Adrian/Eddie parallels had been highlighted as well. Richie and Eddie are fantastic together, and Bev and Richie are also sweet as hell. Besties for the resties, man. In general, I think Richie’s relationship with the Losers is the strongest writing in terms of group dynamics. Putting aside his feelings for Eddie - which do a fantastic job of fleshing him out and showing how multifaceted his character is - he is the one Loser who has strong ties to every other character. Bev’s relationships with Mike and Eddie are weak, Ben’s most relevant relationship is to Beverly, Bill’s most relevant relationship is Mike - you see where I’m going with this. Only Richie’s writing showed the importance of all his group relationships, though some were stronger than others.

Almost every individual scene with the Losers and Pennywise are very enjoyable. The moments where their personal motivations and fears shine are truly the best in the film. While there were some design issues that disappointed me in terms of IT terrorizing them, their stories are great - the apartment scene with Beverly is still poignant, and Bill’s revelation about the day of Georgie’s death made me a little emotional. I’ve already mentioned this in general terms, but the arcade scene with Richie is fantastic.

As a whole, there is a lot of love here, and so much to enjoy. The script writers and the director worked hard on this film, and they tried to do a lot with it - just maybe too much, which caused problems with flow and tone as a whole.

Visuals & Horror

I love horror - I could go on all day about how it’s the best genre. As such, I have a lot of feelings about the horror elements in this film. 

I already mentioned how the ritual of Chud/Sci-Fi elements weaken the horror - in truth, the horror elements were already weak. As a result, sci-fi elements distract from what already has flaws. There are two major categories for this discussion: subtlety and design.

In terms of subtlety, a majority of Chapter 2 was basically hitting you over the head with a Pennywise-shaped hammer. There were jumpscares everywhere, and they were rarely impactful ones. How many times did we get a “Pennywise chomps down on somebody” moment? I was totally engrossed in Adrian’s scene at the beginning, but when Pennywise just takes a bite out of him and it ends, I was honestly disappointed. I do realize this is book canon, but there is something about the presentation in the book - the precise moving of Adrian’s arm, the bite, the smile, the cracking of his ribs - that is dulled in the movie for a lack of a better term. There is just something about this death that fails to hit home. Maybe it’s because Pennywise is more or less out in the open, or maybe because in the book, the bullies see It, too, making it a surreal moment that no one believed except those who were there.

As a whole, the movie has plenty of gore but little suspense. I think I had more interest the less I knew about how exactly people died. Eventually you get sick of the chomping - the unknown is more frightening than a monster with a predictable attack pattern. The missing kids. Betty Ripsom’s shoe and lack of explanation. Patrick’s fade to black. These things made Chapter 1 unsettling, but scenes like Victoria’s death had no other elements other than being bitten to death by Penywise, and that was predictable. 

For an example of what could have been in terms of subtlety, I can honestly say that I was more creeped out by “Mrs. Kersh” slinking around in the background of Beverly’s old apartment than I was by the old woman monster. For what it's worth, the way these monsters move is INCREDIBLE, especially so the more humanoid they are. I love the body language and movements. The earliest example is the headless boy in Chapter 1; the jerking limbs really emphasize their inhumanity, and it still works in this film (Mrs. Kersh at the end of the hall, Betty Ripsom’s legs, etc). This, with the use of humans and their subtle shift to the unnatural in the films, was much stronger than the larger monsters in Chapter 2. 

Another strength is the background details that you might miss. The librarian staring at Ben as he reads about the Ironworks explosion in Chapter 1 is a great example of this, as is Mrs. Kersh peeking her head out of the kitchen in Chapter 2. I would have rather had more small scares like this, rather than the reliance on jumpscares. The pomeranian monster behind the “Not Scary At All” door is essentially just that, and I was WILDLY unimpressed by it.

Returning to the focus of the film, Pennywise the clown is a great villain, but a lot of Its appeal is that It shifts into whatever scares you most. In the first film, this is done well - the painting lady, the leper, the headless boy, and even the way it shifts in the battle at the end. The strength in these forms is that you never know what to expect - and neither do the Losers. Each new nightmare looks and behaves differently. The flute dropping from the painting lady’s hands to announce her presence, the dropped eggs in the library scene… everything about the leper. Even the miniseries did this variety well (the werewolf, the shower scene with Eddie, Mrs. Kersh, etc)

Yet, in part 2, we get… two extra monsters. Which is fair - we already have plenty of material - but they both have the same style of warped features and aesthetic. I think creepy naked old Mrs. Kersh would have been a more disturbing visual than old lady monster turned out to be. Sometimes less is more. Clowns are creepy because they have almost-not-quite-human features… the same can be said of effective monsters (look at the leper, for example, or the painting lady). 

Pennywise in general and Its overreliance on Its clown persona weakens the effect. Eventually, Its presence becomes “oh, there’s the clown again,” especially considering that Its attack pattern has become so predictable. Is It going to drag me into the darkness? Is It going to manipulate me into hurting my friends? Is It going to do some other scary thing to me? No, he’s going to take a bite out of me. Not awesome, but certainly not the Pennywise of the novel or even of the miniseries, whose horror came from the fact that no one knew what happened when you disappeared - or when parts of you reappeared.

There were too many instances where the horror was all about jumpscares and theatrics. Pennywise is all about theatrics, I know, but It went from eldritch horror to dramatic murder clown in this film. In the book, Pennywise is extra as hell, so I wouldn’t be angry if that was the angle taken for the films - however, that is not what was established in Chapter 1, and isn’t actually what is achieved in Chapter 2. If we are going for a more serious, darker tone for Pennywise, I would prefer the eldritch horror we saw more strongly in Chapter 1.

Tone

This is the hardest category to explain well, because a lot of this is my personal impression of the film, but I’ll do my best. As a whole, the movie does not flow well, especially connected to Chapter 1, and this is largely because of tone. Some scenes shift too abruptly or push too hard, and I feel as though the writers were trying to capture the same charm and attitude that Chapter 1 achieved with the kids, but struggled because they aren’t kids anymore. The balance between gritty horror and charm is harder with adults, but this is something the miniseries excelled at compared to Chapter 2. In the miniseries, you never feel like you’re watching a new film when it switches to the present day with the adults. In IT Chapter 2, though the movie and story are meant to be a continuation, it feels more distant, like a sequel that doesn’t quite achieve the same mood.

I’ve said that the group dynamics of the Losers really shines in these films - however, it’s also a major problem in Chapter 2, because there are several times where the writers sacrificed the integrity and tone of a scene to fit in some banter. I love the banter, okay. I’m all about it. The banter in the IT movies is my favorite banter that I’ve seen in a fictional friend group, and yes, I’m including Stranger Things and classics like The Breakfast Club or the Goonies. However, when it’s ruining an otherwise impactful scene, it feels wasteful and disruptive. 

A good example is the scene with Richie and Eddie at the doors in the caves. This scene is fantastic - it’s funny without being a gag, and it showcases the brilliance of RichieandEddie. However - and this is a big however - every other Loser’s individual scene is dramatic and dark - tonally appropriate. Richie and Eddie, however, have their moment melding humor with some jumpscares, and though the scene is great on paper, it makes no damn sense compared to the tone of the rest of the damn sequence. There is no logical room for comedic relief here, and it was jarring, no matter how much I enjoyed the scene itself. Tonally, Richie’s one-liners in Chapter 1 made more sense, and the script of Chapter 1 did a much better job ensuring that those tiny breaks in tension do not disrupt the scene or atmosphere. I cannot say that about certain elements in Chapter 2.

The Losers work very well together, but they also have a tendency to get chaotic enough to break the atmosphere. In the book, there is a lot of quiet horror amongst the Losers Club that is disrupted in Chapter 2 by the multiple scenes where they just scream over each other during crucial moments (such as the scene in Jade of the Orient). The quiet fear and understanding amongst the Lucky Seven that made them such a dynamic group of protagonists just doesn't exist here. Every quiet moment is a moment for arguing or freaking out here, and it got tiring, especially when we went right back to individual reflection and exploration after. I use the term “quiet” here quite a bit, but I’m not sure how else to express the atmosphere I’m talking about. Hopefully the point gets across.

This may just be personal preference - I really enjoy subtle horror, as I’ve said. The moments where the Losers watch and take in the terror as it unfolds are important moments and are lacking in Chapter 2. I can’t empathize with the screaming and freaking out, but the dawning horror and realization of what’s happening puts me right in their shoes. Beverly’s slow realization when she’s staring at the picture of “Mrs. Kersh” and her “father” is a moment like this, to put it in context. 

Even more so than the Losers’ attitudes is the lack of the “dawning horror” vibe in the film at large. It is not meant to be an action film, and yet Chapter 2 is constantly go-going. The action is in places more akin to a slasher than the slower supernatural horror this story is meant to be. Chapter 1, with its slow reveals and strengthening group dynamics, hit the intended mood better, and seems further separated from Chapter 2 as a result.

Chapter 1 did a great job with balance - it knew when it was appropriate for the funnies, and how to shift that into the horror elements seamlessly. It also did a great job throwing in Richie’s one liners without ruining the balance of the scene, but Chapter 2 had several instances where it took those quick Richie moments and turns the focus entirely on him, breaking up scenes in a jarring way. An even more disruptive example is the “Richie said it best last time” bit before they entered Neibolt. The entire scene shut down for Richie’s moment, and it ruined the suspense of what could have been a really nice parallel to Chapter 1. We didn’t need the tension broken in many of these instances, and it was difficult to go back and forth. The focus on Richie is because of the positive fan response to his character, which is well deserved in my opinion. However, this could have been done better. 

Tonally, Pennywise’s script also came on too strong. The Pennywise we know and love is a lurker, manipulating humans and taking other forms rather than doing all the dirty work directly. Chapter 2 has moments of this, but more often has Pennywise as an aggressively taunting antagonist. It becomes loud and exaggerated. Part of this can be attributed to rising tension as the Losers return to finish It off, but Its dialogue is hammier than I expected. It’s become almost petty - and not to needle at the Losers, but more because It’s bitter and childish. I don’t know if it’s too much to use the term “eldritch horror” again, but I don’t know how else to describe what we were set up for with Chapter 1 and let down on in Chapter 2.

As a whole, I felt like the film was stitched together in places. After Chapter 1, I felt that I had just had an experience, but after Chapter 2, I actually looked at my best friend and said “I liked it, but I’m not sure what just happened.”

Let it be clear that I love Chapter 2, and will happily rewatch it many times in the future, but I do think that compared to Chapter 1, it is a far weaker film overall. You can watch them together for a similar experience to the miniseries, but it will be less cohesive and will feel like it fell apart a bit the longer it went on. I don’t fault the writers for this entirely, as the second half of this story is a daunting undertaking, but I think removing the sci-fi elements with the ritual of Chud and tightening down the horror aspects/tone would have made this a stronger continuation of Chapter 1. 

[tumblunni]

VR EXPERIENCE FLAILYNESS!DD!

* the staff were so nice to a newbie like me! I think i gave them a good giggle with all my over the top reactions lol!

* they have these pod things you go in and then it MOVES AROUND oh god i was just squeaking with delight and/or fear every five seconds!

* there was a spaceship tour/rollercoaster thing that was my first game. I just went WOOO and AAAA and i dont have much else to say except that! Im still going woo and aaa in my soul!!!

* the next pod experience was a horror house with a creepy mannequin clown dood calles Jinx. I am SO weak to horror so with that and the sheer OH WHOA factor of the rolleecoaster pod i was totally gasping and screeching and giving the attendant guy a great show XD afterwards he was real nice and chatted with me about how he was totally scared too when he tried it, so i wouldnt be too embarassed. There was a REALLY WHOA BIT where the game spawns the puppet guy in JUST out of your peripheral vision! He's actually riding the ride WITH you for 2 minutes but you only realise that subtle "something is wrong here" feeling is HIM when he leans forward and draws attention to himself. It was so effective cos it was a real slow long stretch of time when you were waiting for the jumpscare and then YOU DO IT TO YOURSELF by noticong something in the picture changed! So good!! The bit that the attendant got the most spooked by was a similar moment where puppet guy directly interacts with the ride later on, where he jumps up and reaches out WAY CLOSER THAN YOU WOULD HAVE THOUGHT WAS EVEN POSSIBLE IN THIS 3D ENGINE but then obviously he cant really touch you so he pulls his hand away at the last second. But then he trolls you by ripping apart the rollercoaster cart and sending you careening into a surreal bendy mirrors room! It was a really fun experience and i kinda ended it feeling like this was the spirit of vr? Like this game was literally alive, i literally just visited some mischievious yet nice spirit who really enjoys scaring people and is happy he finalky got a job where he can do it in a benign way and get paid. "Humans are the real scary ones if they enjoy this as much as i do!" Thanks Jinx i really did enjoy your horrifying doom time

* TOCH A SHARK SIMULATOR!! there was this super realistic oceab exploration and i was so sad it was a non playable tour application thing cos i really wanted to touch the shark. I was flailing my hands everywhere going OOO THIS FISH NO THIS FISH AAA like seriously man please make that one into a full game!!! It was so good even just for a short preview! It was so cool it was made from real documentary foitage!! I didnt really learn anytjing tho cos i was too distracted going WOO AAAA! And i think the shark and giant squid were supposed to be scary but i was totally DEAD OF THE CUTENESS! It was so realistic like i could really pat a critter nobody can ever pat! Please make more vr games where you emotionally bond with rare critters and/or totally imaginary animals. Give us the cuddle experiences we deserve!!!

* i was a lot worse at the actual playable games cos i was still getting used to the experience and the complex controls were hard to work while being distracted by so much sheer WOO AAA! I did the best at this shooting gallery thing, it was so fun and funny cos you had to dramatically dodge with your entire body and point your plastic guns all dramatic style! I bet i was a good advertisement to the people at the counter, cos i was totally going full ham! Felt embarassed people were watching and i had no clue lol! Oh and i liked that it had a lazer katana option for people who are bad at shooting. It had much weaker attack thk so i never got the time bonus. I made it pretty far ro stage 14 i think? Feel pretty proud!

* there were some other more complicated games with more controllers but i ended up just havibg no clue how to manage it all at once. There was this gigantic plastic gatling gun thing and a full fake car setup with gearsticks and stuff. I failed that one extra hard cos i have no clue how to drive even without complicated vr, lol! It was hilarioud to see me stuck on the same wall going back and forth and repeatedly smacking it, i think i enjoyed failing more than succeeding! XD

*and then i just messed around in that job simulator game i saw everyobe doing in the example vids. I already knew how it goes so i just experimented with breaking everything and throwing fire extinguishers at everyobe in the restaurant while shovelling infinate bread into my mouth.

In summary i think the operator dude thinks i'm insane, especially cos i turned up in a cape! But he had a good laugh and i just felt even better kbowing the people in the shop enjoyed themselves as much as i did! And i got a gift card to give to my sister so i hope she enjoys it too. (Or if its not her kind of thing, she can give it to a friend)