#still posting this primarily for me and for everyone else second

[art-from-the-juice-box]

gen loss dump part 2 :]

i have a gen loss playlist so the last two was me hitting randomize and drawing a pic based on the song before it finished. the second one technically isn’t that cause charlie’s inferno isn’t on apple music cause they hate me so it’s way more of the song out of spite because they wouldn’t give it to me.

[raven-at-the-writing-desk]

One thing that irks me when playing the game is how silver’s sleeping disorder is reacted to by the other characters, especially the teachers. I mean like, I get on some level that they’re all based on villains so they’re not going to be the nicest, but you’re telling me you see a kid just passing out out of nowhere constantly and the first thing they do is say that he’s lazy and berate him for something he obviously can’t control? Even if his condition isn’t a medical one like narcolepsy and is part of his curse/blessing, it’s still debilitating and affects his daily life. I don’t expect twisted wonderland to have like, disability protection but give the kid a break man he’s trying his best 😭. It also bothers me when other students are like “yeah man I get it schools boring I get sleepy too”. Like, yall have seen him suddenly fall asleep standing up and in random places on campus, it is so obviously not the same thing! And then Silver apologizes for it like every time! no! stop it! don’t apologize for something you literally can’t control

Sorry for the rant. It’s just been something bugging me because its so similar to how real world disabilities that aren’t physical are often brushed over by people and it gets me feeling heated 😭

Oooh, that's an interesting analogy 🤔

Before I talk more on the topic, I want to open with a few disclaimers: I will be discussing various characters’ reactions to Silver’s blessing/curse-induced narcolepsy (for lack of a better term), which may parallel real-life reactionary behaviors related to persons with disabilities or disorders. Know what you are reading, and please skip this post if you do not feel emotionally equipped to take it in.

Additionally, I want to make it clear that I am NOT defending any of those behaviors in this post. I will be attempting to offer in-universe explanations, NOT excuses, for why characters may act the way they do in regard to Silver’s condition. This doesn’t make the behavior any less unacceptable.

That’s all! If you’re all set, feel free to proceed below the cut.

I think, from the perspective of the students, it may be difficult to know what's going on with Silver?? Of course, that doesn't make their reactions or their behavior okay, but it's more understandable where they're coming from. Many young adults (unfortunately) aren't educated on and don't have experience/knowledge of how to handle situations where a peer displays abnormal behaviors. This may be especially true at Night Raven College, where the students are described to be very prideful and primarily concerned with themselves, or, if they help at all, they expect something in return. Many of Silver's classmates may not know him on a personal enough level to be familiar with his affliction or care enough to intervene if he falls asleep standing up. I doubt that most students at NRC would think of a peer beyond how they initially present, much less even consider factors beyond their control.

Additionally, others may not feel a need to step in due to the "bystander effect", a psychological phenomenon in which people are less likely to offer aid if there are others present. The theory goes that everyone just assumes someone else will do something about the situation, which has the unintended result of no one doing anything. Since Silver often falls asleep in public places, this could, in part, explain why so few bother helping.

I guess another component of it could be that some of his peers have simply gotten used to it by now?? (Several characters, even first years like Ortho, indicate that they anticipate he will fall asleep like 80% of the time.) Silver's a second year, so maybe NRC students did notice and attempt to assist in the first year, only to become annoyed with it when the symptoms persisted and so it could have led to peers thinking it's a "normal" thing for him.

I get the sense that Silver doesn't exactly go around telling everyone and anyone about his condition in detail (not that he has to, but I'd imagine that this lack of communication probably doesn't help his classmates' perception of him). He tends to describe his condition as "a personal problem" or blames himself or a lack of diligence for his symptoms. And honestly, I don't blame him for that; he didn't learn about the origins of his curse until book 7, and no doctor Lilia took him to could help. What else could Silver feasibly believe when all else fails? It must be his own doing. Silver has numerous voice lines apologizing for dozing off again and actively seeks out ways to "correct" or counteract his sleepiness. When this is how one presents their own condition, it may naturally cause those around him to believe that the sleepiness is "his fault"/due to his own actions. "Maybe he stayed up late last night," Ruggie suggests. Even Kalim, someone I'd consider Silver's friend, makes similar assumptions.

I will say that not every character is rude to Silver about his sleepiness. Vil might berate Silver for "playing the part of a sleeping princess" and Floyd might tell him, "People walk here. Find someplace else to snooze," but Ruggie appears to show some concern/shock for Silver when he shows up in the school store barely being able to stand, Jade tries to wake him up gently, etc. I'm not sure if the writing being inconsistent here was on accident or not, but I do think that some of the... less than desirable... behaviors may be because the narrative treats Silver's condition like a charm point most of the time. Like... Silver's sleepiness is often used to "sell" his appeal to fans ("Look at how cute he is! Eepy boi!"), or used for comedy in-universe (like when he uses Sebek as a pillow or when Silver blatantly falls asleep in a conversation or in the middle of an important event like the race in White Rabbit Fest). Because of this, rarely is his condition actually treated with the seriousness it would get if this were a real-world disability.

I think there’s a debate to be had about these kinds of impolite comments coming from Sebek though. Sebek is Silver’s childhood friend, so Sebek must be accustomed to the narcolepsy at this point and we’d normally expect him to be most sympathetic about it. But nope, Sebek actually frequently criticizes Silver for letting his sleepiness get the better of him. The majority of other students’ harsh comments towards Silver actually come from Sebek. He drops lines like:

“Don't you dare tell me you're falling asleep again, Silver!”

“His blatant snoring is infuriating.”

“Wake up, Silver! You're blocking Malleus's path! It's absolutely disrespectful!”

“If you don't cease at once, I'm leaving you on the side of the walkway!”

“It’s not as if you've been enchanted by a fairy. You’re just lazy!”

This all sounds horrible and mean, doesn't it? And they definitely are. But hold on! Sebek also says things like, "You're nodding off while walking AGAIN? A proper retainer of Malleus should hold his head high! High, you hear me?!” and, “Please, don't [volunteer yourself for this task]. You'll just end up nodding off. You must accept this is beyond your capabilities and let it go.” The former can be seen as telling Silver to do his best as Malleus's retainer and the latter is advising Silver to back down rather than push himself past his limits. That's not just me being optimistic or giving Sebek the benefit of the doubt just because he's a character I happen to like--Sebek has a known history of phrasing compliments and encouragement in a very rude manner. It's a trait of his that earns him endless ire, and something that Silver often finds himself apologizing to others for. Sebek is also a person who values constant self-improvement both in himself and in others; his cold attitude towards even his childhood friend can be interpreted as his own way of wanting Silver to do his best in spite of his condition. This… isn’t always a good thing though, as this thinking is ultimately ableist and runs the risk of pushing people—himself included—into dangerous situations that may out their wellbeing at risk.

This isn't to defend every single thing Sebek says about Silver's condition though; some of them are definitely too much, even if Sebek is granted as much leniency as possible. Do his comments come off as ableist? Absolutely. Is it his intention to be ableist? I don’t believe so—but that doesn’t negate the fact that his words are needlessly cruel, even if Silver doesn’t perceive it as such or take offense to it. Oftentimes Silver agrees with Sebek’s assessment, which again loops us back to how he already blames himself for his state and could parallel real world disabled peoples’ guilt and shame for just… being the way they are. Us, as the outside onlookers, are of course more likely to perceive Sebek’s words as rude because we’re projecting our own experiences onto what we’re seeing. Of course we don’t want to see a friend saying these awful things to another friend—but between Silver and Sebek, they seem to be mutually okay with this dynamic of pushing one another to “be better”.

I understand that it can be frustrating watching Silver have to say sorry for something that he can't control, but this is most likely a deliberate writing choice for his character arc—and depicting that flaw isn’t bad in a vacuum. Silver is someone who struggles with his self-worth, something we very much see come into fruition in book 7. He worries that he's not doing enough to "repay" his father back, and that it will be too late for him once Lilia departs from NRC. Silver frequently apologizing for his "shortcomings" (ie his constant drowsiness) is probably an extension of that lack of self-worth. He blames himself for his lack of alertness and actively tries to "be better" for a reason. It feeds into the ever-so-ironic cycle of "Silver is sleepy" -> "Silver thinks he must work hard to not inconvenience his loved ones and prove his worth to Lilia" -> "Lilia loves him anyway and he just doesn't realize it yet". (The whole reason Silver is even here right now is because of Lilia's love for him; he would still be sleeping were it not for Lilia.) Perhaps they'll be able to formally reunite in the waking world and wrap up this arc with a neat little bow... with his father telling Silver that yes, he is enough as he is now. Maybe Lilia will even say something along the lines of, "Never apologize for what--or who--you are, Silver. You're my son, after all! You should be proud of that."

This makes me wonder if Silver’s curse will ultimately be lifted in the end or if it will persist…? Because if it does get lifted, then it loses some of its strength as a parallel to irl conditions (since some don’t just poof away). Within the meta of the game, Silver then also loses some of his “appeal”, since sleepiness is a cute trait associated with him. I can see why it would happen from a narrative perspective though—ridding him of the sleepiness could be the ultimate “proof” of Lilia being able to truly love him, which is the condition the blessing requires to be dispelled

What really baffles me, however, is how some teachers are depicted interacting with Silver. The asshole students of NRC, okay. I'd believe they'd be callous towards one of the few nice guys at school dozing off. BUT THE TEACHERS????? 💀 Usually it's not that bad (they tell Silver to keep his eyes open or to wake up), but MAN. In Silver's Labwear vignettes, Crewel berates him for nodding off in class again, grants him a makeup assignment, and says, "If you like sleeping so much, [formulating a sleeping potion] should be right up your alley." He even withholds Silver's credit for Potionology until he receives that sleeping potion. Crewel also berates and punishes Silver in other instances, such as his Dorm Uniform vignettes: "Naughty pup. You think you can sleep through my lesson? [...] What a quick apology. Are you actually sorry? [...] You don't look remorseful to me. Hmph. As punishment, you must collect the reports everyone is turning in at the end of class. Do not miss a single one, and you are to bring them straight to me. Is that clear?" It feels a little… much, especially considering that it’s not like Silver chose to fall asleep midclass, especially as a second year. Then again, Crewel probably doesn’t know about Silver’s condition either so he most likely attributes the behavior to laziness, as Silver does himself. I’d say that Crewel should still at least know a little better as an adult but 💀 many adults have no clue themselves, especially without a formal diagnosis.

Does NRC not have a, like... Disability and Accessibility Center to coordinate with teachers and give certain students assignment/exam extensions??? Therapy, healing potions, and medical mages + regular doctors and dentists exist in this world, so why wouldn't they also have disability support??? 😭 That seems like a HUGE oversight to me. (Get on that, Crowley/j) In all seriousness though, this may be the result of differences in culture?? It might be expected in western countries to have some disability accommodations, but from what I understand, there’s a loooot more stigma in Japan so these services may be lacking (not to day that western countries have perfect accommodations though). Yes, NRC is based on a British boarding school, but ultimately the game is Japanese in origin and therefore might be running off of Japanese notions of what constitutes as “appropriate” support for the disabled. (The way seating in classes are arranged in-game already derive from Japanese schools; alphabetically by last name.) Maybe that’s why Crewel didn’t seem to be willing to make exceptions for Silver…? But even so, this could mirror how western societies also have trouble identifying and adjusting to those with disabilities. It can be hard to get treatment or even mindfulness from peers, especially if you don't have a formal diagnosis (which is the case for Silver; no medical mage knows what's up with him).

Those are my thoughts on the topic ^^ Again, I completely get why seeing the staff and students reacting this way to Silver’s condition makes you (and others, I’m sure) upset. There’s many uncomfortable parallels with how people irl are insensitive to “invisible” disabilities or disabilities in general. It also doesn’t help that Twst tries to both present the condition as a serious matter while also using it for comedy and marketing as Silver’s major “cute quirk”. Getting mixed signals here!!

I hope that this was at least able to grant you some new perspective about why the characters behave as they do. Some of it does seem to be the devs struggling to balance the tone of the stories they want to tell, but some of it also feels like intentional characterization (whether of individuals or of a certain dynamic between a duo) or setting up for an arc.

It would be interesting if we got an event where we explored more of the health industry and attitudes about like… magic-induced conditions, illnesses, etc. Silver is one obvious case of this, but we also know medical mages are A Thing. I’d love to learn more about these!

[eightdoctor]

my eda recs :) for anyone interested in getting into this series

i am prefacing this post with the note that i am an avid completionist and generally dislike telling people to skip certain books unless it's a john peel novel or placebo effect. however i understand telling people to read 74 novels is not at all accessible and i need you all to read. these books. please. please

this post is going to be long as shit i know it so i'm putting it ↓ here. books that can be skipped because theyre a bit shit will be colored red, ones that you Can Skip but are good/have some important character or plot bits in will be orange, and ones that are sooo good and necessary and the best books ever will be green. unfortunately i think a lot of the ones colored orange should be colored green but i know restraint. i can stay my hand. kind of

also i should say that i primarily read these for the characters - the plots themselves come second. so lots of my opinions come from the standpoint of which books have good characterizations. basically some of the ones that i color green would probably be skippable if any normal person were reading them but i'm insane!! and this is my list so fuck you!!!

The Eight Doctors by Terrance Dicks: ah my color trichotomy has bitten me in the ass on the first book. because truth be told i still haven't finished this one (nor have i really felt the need to yet), yet it introduces the first companion in the series, sam jones, and contains some other entertaining parts like the doctor getting caught with cocaine. as far as introductory books go it's meh

Vampire Science by Kate Orman and Jonathan Blum: this book. i truly can't sing my praises any louder than i already have. orman & blum took the character of the eighth doctor as portrayed by paul mcgann in a few measly minutes of screen time into a fully fleshed out, compelling and complex character. if you're a fan of the eighth doctor but aren't interested in reading all of the EDAs you have to read this one at the Very Least. it begins, as all good stories do, in a gay bar. it features vampire squirrels, the doctor with kittens, and the doctor infodumping on the beauty of science in a speech? conversation? that still touches me to this day, four years after i first read it.

The Bodysnatchers by Mark Morris: this book is Gross, and i mean that positively. mark morris held nothing back when describing how disgusting and putrid london was in the 1800s (he's primarily a horror writer, and that comes through rather clearly in this book). i genuinely enjoyed this novel a lot, but i know it's not for everyone because again, it's quite gory and disgusting

Genocide by Paul Leonard: don't you just want to see the doctor in a sun hat? being tortured for weeks on end? don't you want to examine his morality in termsof what species he thinks needs to be saved or doomed? jo grant is there

War of the Daleks by John Peel: fuck john peel all my homies hate john peel. for some reason all his books in this range contain daleks and it’s like…why. get some creativity. everyone else did. bitch

Alien Bodies by Lawrence Miles: this novel is So Good. it introduces faction paradox, the war in heaven plotline, humanoid tardises, and a couple of the most interesting & fun side characters in the whole range (homunculette and marieeee <3 cousin justineeee… aaaaaaahh). I shan’t spoil the entire conceit of the story but just know it’s. insane and fucked up and so so funny

Kursaal by Peter Anghelides: this is just a solid doctor who story, really. i wouldn’t call it imperative to the overarching plot of the novels (as tenuous as it is early on), but it’s an enjoyable enough read. it’s about an ancient race of alien werewolves underneath a theme park. what more can i say

Option Lock by Justin Richards: i recall enjoying the doctor and sam’s characterization in this one, and the story is like doctor strangelove meets, well, doctor who. it’s skippable, but i had fun reading it, and that’s really all you can ask for

Longest Day by Michael Collier: this is the start of the arc where sam gets separated from the doctor. actually the most tense and stressed i’ve been reading the edas was reading this and the next three books. it’s so dire, but it’s so so good, with incredible character moments from sam and the doctor. plus you have anstaar, nashaad with his metal legs, and some really fucked up body horror involving Time messing with people’s existences and driving ppl mad and stuff. people tend to either love this one or hate it from what i’ve seen, and i’m solidly in the former category. would definitely recommend 

Legacy of the Daleks by John Peel: ughhhhhhhh… ughhhhjhhhhhh i guess you have to read this one. i guess you have to. it’s definitely an improvement on his last book but still. daleks again john? really? whateverrrrr.. some important stuff happens to susan is in this one though. and the master as well. so if you care about either of those characters you should read this i suppose

Dreamstone Moon by Paul Leonard: a general rule of the edas is paul leonard always writes excellent books (in my opinion, anyway), and this is not the exception. sam and the doctor are still separated, but they’re in the same place and keep missing each other and its like UGGHHHH!!! UGHHH!!! but you have interesting commentary on capitalism’s exploitation and effective revolutionary action and all that stuff. also aloisse is an incredible character and i love her

Seeing I by Kate Orman and Jonathan Blum: HOLY SHIT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! FUCK!!!!!!!!!!!!! GOOD LIRD!!!!!!!!!!! kate and jon do it again, those crazy bastards. you know how every author loves torturing the shit out of eight? these guys take that and run with it in the opposite direction, asking the question what if the worst thing the doctor could go through isn’t agonizing torture, but rather just a lack of enrichment in his enclosure? what if he had to stay locked up in one building for three years and couldn’t escape for the life of him? meanwhile sam, now a refugee with no social support (as she technically shouldn’t exist in this time and location), has to deal with homelessness, and has to decide whether it’s better to have a stable, yet soulless corporate job - or do something that’s meaningful and benefits society. she’s at her best in this book for sure

Placebo Effect by Gary Russell: throws up. don’t read this because it is actually rhe worst book in the whole range and i’m not joking. sorry gary you’re a nice guy but i thought the arguments against evolution that went on for like 3 pages were extremely egregious and also plain wrong. you may look at this book and think “oh cool! Stacy and ssard from the comics are in this one!” well they’re there for like a paragraph and don’t do shit. so

Vanderdeken's Children by Christopher Bulis: really fun novel that’s pretty much the epitome of the classic doctor who question “wouldn’t that be really fucked up and crazy?” it also established the fact that the doctor told sam his real name which is really fun and awesome

The Scarlet Empress by Paul Magrs: much like paul leonard, paul magrs Never disappoints. this book is just so fucking fun. in essence, it’s a road trip story. they drive across a planet listening to abba and visiting lots of kooky places and picking up lots of wacky characters. it also deconstructs gender and self-identity and what it means to be an individual. a cyborg and a giant spider get lesbian married. aewsome 👍

The Janus Conjunction by Trevor Baxendale: i really debated on making this one skippable, i did. because while it doesn’t continue any of the established plots or themes or whatever, it does show the doctor breaking the laws of time to save his companion’s life, and that’s really cool we love that. there’s a lot of fun body horror too if you go for that sort of thing. and more giant spiders but these ones are different 

Beltempest by Jim Mortimore: ok honestly? i didn’t vibe with this one. i know some people really liked it but i felt as if the characterization was Off. some wacky wild stuff happens to sam though

The Face-Eater by Simon Messingham: <-doesn’t remember much of this one cuz i was high while reading it. i think it was a solid story though? 

The Taint by Michael Collier: yayyyyyyyy fitz is hereeeee my babyboy… lots of people don’t vibe with this one but i do. because i love fitz and everything he’s in and him and the doctor are such bastards to each other in the beginning it’s great. their repartee is genuinely so entertaining and really elevates the book for me, even if the plot itself is a bit mediocre. either way even if you don’t like it you have to read it because it introduces fitz. so there

Demontage by Justin Richards: telling you to skip this one would be a disservice. because technically it Is skippable, but it has some absolutely hilarious moments that really drive home the fact that fitz is Cringe. they’re on a space casino called vega in the far future and fitz dresses in a (from everyone else's perspective) old-fashioned tuxedo. he smokes indoors and everyone gives him nasty looks because he’s in the future and no one smokes inside. he asks for his cocktails shaken not stirred and the bartender fucking hates him. and he also accidentally gets involved in an assassination plot. but i suppose if you must skip it then go ahead… 

Revolution Man by Paul Leonard: mr leonard does it again. this is an excellent novel for both companions that begins with sam and the doctor engaging in leftist discourse with an anarchist and ends with the world almost ending. it happens.

Dominion by Nick Walters: you have to read this one just for the doctor’s first gay kiss. sorry i don’t make the rules. also it  just features a neat concept imo and has a great moment where the doctor punches a pillow in frustration and then sadly apologizes to it

Unnatural History by Kate Orman and Jonathan Blum: this book is one that i think every doctor who fan who’s ever gotten mad about canon not making sense should be forced at gunpoint to read. it’s a novel that’s essentially one big metacommentary on doctor who canon & why it Doesn’t Matter At All, Actually; the doctor was birthed and he was loomed and both are equally true and untrue. also features the iconic paragraph calling the doctor a (verbatim) “backrub slut”, as well as wrapping up the ongoing arc with sam jones hinted at in alien bodies and a few other books in a way that’ll have you side eyeing moffat very suspiciously

Autumn Mist by David A. McIntee: this one’s pretty good and has a couple great moments (fitz calling himself james bond, for one), but is, i think, ultimately skippable unless youre a world war 2 buff

Interference Books 1 & 2 by Lawrence Miles: nothing i can say will adequately put into words what these two novels made me feel, you hear me? absolutely nothing. good fucking god. jesus christ. holy fuck.. if i sat here listsing all the important and iconic moments in these books we’d be here all shitting day and this post is already obscenely long. read these 2 books. then read them again. 

The Blue Angel by Paul Magrs: ok i know i just said this but HOOOOOO..WHOA NELLY! the blue angel is easily in my top 5 edas. it literally heavily features a canon domestic au wherein the doctor is a “middle-aged gay man”. fitz says he wants to get laid by the doctor. the doctor’s mother is a mermaid. there’s off-brand spirk. someone turns into a giant squid. literally this book is so good they wrote a screenplay adaptation of it and a spinoff short story that you should also read

The Taking of Planet 5 by Simon Bucher-Jones and Mark Clapham: you’re going to be hearing this a lot from me but we Are entering the part of the series where it really takes off and gets sooo fucking good. anyway this novel is sooo fucking good and quite important to the plot and establishes stuff about the war in heaven and gallifrey so. read it. also there's ELDRITCH BEASTS!

Frontier Worlds by Peter Anghelides: i can’t tell you to skip this one because it’s so good. fitz goes by the alias frank sinatra & also talks like him for a solid portion of the book. we get excellent compassion moments. great doctor moments (including that Hot and Sexy dream he has about the tardis!) and all in all it’s a wonderful story

Parallel 59 by Stephen Cole and Natalie Dallaire: lots of stuff happens in this one, especially to fitz. by that i mean it gets referenced quite a bit later so i would recommend if you want to catch all the references. also a woman worked on this one so you already know eight is going to be written phenomenally and very sensually. 

The Shadows of Avalon by Paul Cornell: rather important development happens to compassion in this book (understatement). but it’s also a really good story in general with lots of memorable bits - paul cornell wrote one EDA and did a great job and then vanished from the range. it also has the BRIGADIER and his ROMANCE with MAB the BIG BOSOMED CELTIC QUEEN so like.. read it?? 

The Fall of Yquatine by Nick Walters: a pretty important thing happens to compassion in this one too (another understatement). also withnail & i references galore, fitz has a bad time (has he had a Good time for the past few books? questionable!), and the doctor spends time with a gay baker/contraband parts dealer

Coldheart by Trevor Baxendale: you could skip this one but why would you even want to? it’s literally one of compassion’s best stories and has plenty of excellent doctor and companion moments. it’s just fun and engaging and an outstanding doctor who story. and, as always, fitz is effortlessly cringe as ever <3

The Space Age by Steve Lyons: this one’s just boring and kinda stupid. nothing big or important happens and you can tell steve lyons didn’t care for writing compassion at all. skip it

The Banquo Legacy by Andy Lane and Justin Richards: Big Plot Developments in this one - mostly in the beginning and end. also the only (?) mention of irving braxiatel in the whole run! it’s written from the POV of two Normal people not on the tardis so it’s interesting to see how they perceive the doctor and fitz, and how this contradicts the way they define themselves in other books where we’re privy to their internal monologue 

The Ancestor Cell by Peter Anghelides and Stephen Cole: AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAGHHHHHHHHHH AAAAGHHHH AAAAAAAAAAAAAAUAAUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUU HFHOA8U8OIA AOUIY4P98 YT39 7UGHYIB3!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! FUCKKKKKK!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! this one drives me insane and there are parts of it i reread nearly every day. because i’m CRAZY. it’s a controversial novel in the doctor who fandom because of how it handles gallifrey and faction paradox lore but WHO FUCKING CARES? FATHER KREINER IS BACK BABY

The Burning by Justin Richards: this is the start of the Earth Arc, so it’s the first portrayal of the doctor stuck on earth without any of his memories. it’s a bit slow at the beginning, and as a normal doctor who story i would consider it subpar, but the characterization of the doctor really carries it i think. you see how losing his memory impacted his restraint with things such as hypnosis and Other Stuff I Shan’t Spoil

Casualties of War by Steve Emmerson: this has the first appearance of the Note, so it’s especially important for that reason. but it’s also just a neat story that has way more elements of a fantasy than a sci fi and again, seeing how the doctor acts now, stuck on earth without his memories, and juxtaposing that with how he acted before, super fun and neat

The Turing Test by Paul Leonard: if i could graft this book onto my DNA i would. i already KNEW the circumstances surrounding alan turing’s death and yet i still cried about it while reading this!! paul leonard’s portrayal of turing as both a gay and autistic man (though the latter is never explicitly stated) is INCREDIBLE and i really can’t recommend it enough just based on that. but the story itself is amazing and really delves into the doctor’s Differences and his desperation to leave earth after being stuck there for decades. 

Endgame by Terrance Dicks: people really like this one and i guess i had fun with it but i just can’t really get into terrence dicks’ writing style. that being said it features the doctor listless and just so sad and depressed so you kind of have to read it. if that’s not reason enough there’s a fat gay alcoholic spy who absolutely rocks

Father Time by Lance Parkin: i hate that this is green. i hate it. i hate this fucking book. i hate lance parkin also. but this is where miranda (the doctor’s adopted daughter) is introduced so alas, you must read it and imagine a version of this book thats infinitely better in your head. sorry! 

Escape Velocity by Colin Brake: this one’s mid but it’s the end of the earth arc and fitz and the doctor reunite and ANJI KAPOOR IS HERE!!!!!!!! FINALLY!!!!!!! so if you read this and get a lil bored just know it’s about to get so fucking good you guys

EarthWorld by Jacqueline Rayner: genuinely can’t say enough good things about this one. it’s funny. it’s angsty. it’s all in all just a really fun book. and it’s the shortest one i think so like you have no excuse to not read it

Fear Itself by Nick Wallace: this is technically a PDA because it was written after nine was announced, thereby making 8 technically a “past doctor”, but who give a shit. read this one are yoyu kidding me. read it read it read it read it READ IT. there’s a twist in it that rendered me absolutely catatonic for about a week 

Vanishing Point by Stephen Cole: don’t skip this one even though it’s orange. are you listening to me? don’t fucking skip it ok!!! steve cole is the #1 fitz/eight shipper and this really shines through here. also maybe i’m just easily entertained by reasonably accurate science in my doctor who books but i liked all the genetics references

Eater of Wasps by Trevor Baxendale: trevor you sly dog you did it again. you mad bastard. not only is the storyline in this one soo gripping and also Quite horrifying but the characterization?? hoooooo boy. this is the book where “you really love him, don’t you?” “well, i like to think we’re just good friends.” comes from and so even if it was dogshit you’d have to read it just for that like cmon

The Year of Intelligent Tigers by Kate Orman: holy. fucking. shit. good grief. the doctor has a boyfriend and they go on picnics and drink chocolate martinis together. the doctor becomes a catboy for a few months. this story takes place on a colony world whose culture is predominantly centered around music, so you have the doctor playing his violin (hot). you have scientifically accurate zoology/xenobiology. you have a Mysterious lost civilization. most importantly you have fitz’s song he wrote for the doctor

The Slow Empire by Dave Stone: this one’s just FUNNY okay. dave stone has such a characteristic way of writing prose it’s just kind of a joy to read. if you get the hard copy all of the bits from a side character’s pov is written in comic sans. while some of the characterization is a bit meh and anji didn’t Really live up to her full potential in a couple scenes i’d still recommend it. there’s footnotes

Dark Progeny by Steve Emmerson: this is another one i colored orange even though i whole-heartedly recommend it.. it’s a commentary on corporate apathy and greed and how it destroys entire planets and just a really engaging story besides. not to mention we get a “fitz fitz fitz fitz fitz!” bit from 8 <3

The City of the Dead by Lloyd Rose: i can’t even talk about this oine lest i lose my mind… not joking when i say lloyd rose writes some of the best and juiciest angst in the whole series like some of the scenes in there made me feel like i was being helplessly entrapped in flowing grain for a month

Grimm Reality by Simon Bucher-Jones and Kelly Hale: i really do sound like a broken record at this point but this is another one of those books i could never say enough positive things about. there are two novels in this series that genre-hop and this is one of them. the tardis lands on a world where everything runs on logic straight out of the brother’s grimm (hence the title). there’s magic cloaks and evil stepsisters and giants, and the doctor, fitz, and anji all have their own separate adventures so it’s super interesting to see how each character deals with being in a fairytale. not only that but there are parts of the book written in the style of those old fairytales and i really do get a good kick out of  gimmicky stuff like that 

The Adventuress of Henrietta Street by Lawrence Miles: buckle the fuck up everyone and get out your highlighters and sticky notes because this one is so fucking dense you’ll have no choice but to annotate and take notes, sorry! it’s written in the style of a historical nonfiction which occasionally falls flat (where’s the fucking works cited, lawrence???), but the story is fucking crazy. you got arcane rituals, prostitutes doing sex magic that summon great apes, sabbath is here, the doctor is weak and sickly (always awesome), sabbath is here, the doctor gets married so he can save the earth, sabbath is here,

Mad Dogs and Englishmen by Paul Leonard: this is the petplay book featuring multicolored poodles that have human hands. need i say more? 

Hope by Mark Clapham: not the best book but it’s got some pretty crucial anji moments in, and we all love love love anji so much so we’ll read mediocre novels just for her!! (but we also see the doctor struggle with only having one heart so that’s fun too)

Anachrophobia by Jonathan Morris: literally my top 3 book in the series EASY. it takes place on a planet ravaged by a time war (as in a war that fights with weapons that fuck with time. not like That time war), yet despite that particular futuristic conceit the entire atmosphere of the book feels like something out of the 40s or 50s  - almost like the aesthetics of fallout, but instead of nuclear radiation it’s Time. most of the story takes place in this sealed off bunker that’s doing experiments to try and develop time travel, and while they’re successful in going back in time the guinea pigs who volunteered for the trial develop an illness that fucks up their personal timelines so bad they literally turn into clock zombies. and it’s contagious. but no one can leave because theres fucked up time outside uh oh!!! if you liked the themes of war profiteering from boom in the new season you’ll LOVE this book

Trading Futures by Lance Parkin: fuck you lance parkin i can’t stand your ass! you can’t fucking write for shit!!! i’d recommend this book if you want to see anji referred to as ‘the asian woman’ more than her actual name :) and a southeast asian character with a name that might as well have been taken right out of a book written by  jk rowling. really the only good part of this book is when anji almost calls the doctor an otter-fucker

The Book of the Still by Paul Ebbs: this book is a WILD fucking ride. this book is fucking insane in the most positive of ways. paul ebbs writes an absolutely top tier eight that manages to encapsulate all the development he went through in the series as well as evoking the characterization from the 1996 movie

The Crooked World by Steve Lyons: this is the second book that does a genre-swap, but instead of fairytales this time the tardis lands on a planet dominated by saturday morning cartoon physics and logic. but the doctor & co being there begins to introduce Real Life concepts such as death and sex and swearing, so all these wacky cartoon characters who’ve spent their whole lives doing wacky cartoon things like blowing each other up with sticks of dynamite or hitting each other with big hammers suddenly find that these actions actually have very very serious consequences, which really kicks off when this story’s equivalent of tom rips off this story’s equivalent of jerry’s head, killing him instantly. idk i just watched a lot of saturday morning cartoons as a kid so seeing the parodies of wacky races and scooby doo was very enjoyable. to me

History 101 by Mags L Halliday: to put it simply this book is about leftist infighting. to put it more complexly this book is about the spanish civil war and how differing opinions and principles can alter one’s perception of history - and what happens when history actually starts being changed in accordance to these differing principles. there’s also the subplot featuring fitz’s homoerotic, yet very traumatizing, travels with a guy named sasha as they journey to guernica so they can watch it be bombed

Camera Obscura by Lloyd Rose: this is where sabbath and the doctor’s relationship really reaches it’s peak. this is The Esteemed Toxic Old Man Yaoi Novel. but also remember when i said lloyd rose writes the best angst? this holds especially true here. i won’t spoil it for you but Something Crazy Happens to the Doctor! haha. haha

Time Zero by Justine Richards: this is just quantum physics: the novel. while fitz goes on his doomed siberia expedition with the geologist boytoy george in the 19th century, the doctor investigates some strange readings in siberia like a hundred years later, and some crazy confusing hijinks ensue! the events in this book kick off the arc that’ll continue for the next few books until sometime never where the multiverse is collapsing and the doctor has to fix it. even though he doesn’t know how. ALSO TRIX INTRODUCTIONNNNNN!!!!!!!!

The Infinity Race by Simon Messingham: this one’s whatever. the sabbath characterization is wack but there are a few good moments. you think it’s going to be mostly about a cool boat race but sadly that comes secondary -_-

The Domino Effect by David Bishop: this book is ASS, both plot-wise and characterization-wise. it also just seems like the author was trying to be needlessly edgy when he developed the setting, and there are just some baffling moments where characters say and do things i frankly think they would never say 

Reckless Engineering by Nick Walters: the events in this one center around a tragedy that is fucking batshit insane. the universe this takes place in features a post-apocalyptic earth. i shan’t say what this apocalypse was because finding out what happened is all apart of the fun guys. i can’t spoil everything for you

The Last Resort by Paul Leonard: what if a corporation discovered TIME TRAVEL and set up RESORTS all across human history? what if there was a mcdonalds in ancient egypt and advertisements for microsoft in the original version of the bible? also what if something just soooo fucked up happens so many times <3

Timeless by Stephen Cole: anji’s last book. sobs.

Emotional Chemistry by Simon A. Forward: idk what it was but i just didn’t really vibe with this one. it’s not awful by any means and there’s a bit of plot carried in from the last novel that continues into the next but the actions that surround it don’t really matter i think. honestly i’d just read a summary of this one and continue on 

Sometime Never... by Justin Richards: the culmination of the multiverse stuff. i liked it - miranda makes a reappearance, and the fact she’s written by someone other than lance parkin is already a plus. my only qualm is i don’t really like how it handled sabbath but that’s sort of how i felt about all the books post camera obscura… sigh

Halflife by Mark Michalowski: ANOTHER EASY TOP 3. i’m simply obsessed with all of the concepts and tropes in this book, not to mention it’s where fitz’s infamous Ass Dream can be found. there’s commentary on racism, colonialism, and religion, and it also features cannibalism as a metaphor for love :D

The Tomorrow Windows by Jonathan Morris: another case of me coloring a book orange even though i think you should read it anyway. it’s positively saturated with so many interesting alien planets and creatures and societies you’d be missing out if you didn’t read this one tbh. it’s also the first novel ever to feature the ninth doctor!

The Sleep of Reason by Martin Day: this one ok. it’s another book written from the pov of an outsider and her insights into the doctor, fitz, and trix are interesting (and their characterization when they show up is outstanding!) but it feels like they’re rarely in it & this close to the end of the series i just want to see more of my guys you know...

The Deadstone Memorial by Trevor Baxendale: i loved the atmosphere in this one. it’s more of a ghost story with sci fi elements, and the stakes involved aren’t Bigger Than Ever like they tend to be nowadays, but instead surround the wellbeing of a family of a single mom and her two kids which i appreciate - the doctor isn’t saving the Whole Universe and World; just a family from a small town; it’s effective in getting the point across that the doctor thinks everyone’s important and worth saving 

To the Slaughter by Stephen Cole: this one’s fun and goofy and steve cole wrote it solely so he could fix an error from a fourth doctor serial in which the doctor got the number of jupiter’s moons wrong. that being said the reason it’s not colored orange is because the last book of the series is written by lance parkin and i want to help you procrastinate reading his godawful prose for as long as possible. your welcome

The Gallifrey Chronicles by Lance Parkin: fuck you lance parkin

[wolfes]

NEW EDITOR 101: A GUIDE FOR GIFMAKERS by v @shangs

Hi friends! I know I said I would do this way back in April/May when this change was announced but I've been massively busy lately so thank you all for being patient with me :)

Based on the results of this poll, I will be trying my level best to help make a guide for gifmakers to best deal with any problems that have been present with the new editor. However, it's worth noting that I have personally not experienced any of these problems myself and I have no record of any problems from other people that I could send to staff and get guidance on, so for some of these issues I will unfortunately be a broken record.

That being said, I have been using the new editor for a few months now and it hasn't been too bad. So don't be discouraged by the new editor if you still love to make gifs and share them. You may need to adapt a bit, but it's doable!

This is meant to be comprehensive and will be explanation and image heavy. Full guide under the cut.

CONTENTS:

What is the new editor?

Steps to take before posting

Making a post

Troubleshooting

01. WHAT IS THE NEW EDITOR?

Some of you may be asking yourselves what the point of the new editor even is and why it's being implemented in the first place when we already had a (mostly) functional editor. My very limited understanding of it as a CS student is app compatibility and flexibility. I'm not totally clear on the details nor am I 100% certain this is the case, but NPF posts (basically, posts made with the "new editor") first started with the mobile app. I'm unsure if the different post types were simply too unwieldy to transfer to the app - having to make a whole bunch of post types when with the new editor you can now have posts with any elements you want without the rigidity of a set post type - or if it was simply not able to be implemented, but the apps have always used NPF. The majority of Tumblr users are coming from the mobile apps. Then it became a case of having the legacy editor for the web users (which were fewer in number) and the new NPF editor for everyone else. That takes resources to keep around and it's pretty inefficient. Naturally the older editor that was used by less people was going to get the axe, especially since you couldn't tell on mobile that there was even a difference between NPF or legacy posts.

So now here we are and the posts are NPF. This means they're in "Neue Post Format." Basically, every post you make is by default a text post, containing "blocks" of other media - as gifmakers we will primarily be dealing with photos.

I understand that it's frustrating to many to see "our gifs are now rendered as text posts" and ask WHY it's happening when photos should logically be rendered as photo posts - but the fact is, there's now no real delineation between a "text post" and a "photo post." The reason NPF posts are now "text posts" is because that's how they are rendered for desktop themes, not because everyone is going to see your post as text and your gifs are going to be compressed into the quality of a potato (though I know some have seen this issue - more on that later.)

02. STEPS TO TAKE BEFORE POSTING

The long and short of it is that you may have to update your theme. More detail here for those who are interested, but check that your theme supports "new editor posts" or "NPF posts" AND that this is true for original posts (you can read more about why in this ask and, although this may be a bit time-consuming, test it out on your blog). I can say with certainty that my second theme Cygnus supports original NPF posts. This is NOT true of my first theme, though.

You can try to add the NPF Fix by @glenthemes to your own theme (beware if you don't know HTML/CSS) or try this tip by @burningblake for original posts.

Feel free to add theme makers with fully NPF-compatible themes in the notes! I have been happily using my own theme so I can't say to what degree others' themes are NPF-friendly.

03. MAKING A POST

If you're sticking around to post on the new editor and you have trouble ordering your gifs around, here's a little guide on how to post.

If I click on "Photo" from web and open up the editor, here's how it looks:

I went ahead and added three full-width gifs and the editor put them in like so:

You'll most likely also have to order your gifs around in the way you want them. You can go ahead and hover over your gifs to see the button to orient them (the four dots in the top left corner) and the button for an image description (the three dots in the bottom right corner). I've attached images of all three below:

If you hold the orientation button, move your gif around until you see the blue line that shows where your gif will end up in the spot that you want it. For example, I wanted to move the second gif below the first one, so I oriented it so that the blue line would show the marker between the two gifs:

Now my gifs are oriented nicely! Of course, this is a simpler layout, but the principles still hold.

If you save your gifs as a draft and reopen them or you just notice a large gap like this in between your gifs when you're in the editor, don't worry.

This will not show up in dash view or on a desktop theme that supports original NPF posts. For example, this is how the gifs' gap (without modification) looked in my desktop theme:

With your gifs ordered, the final step is to add alt text. You can read more about alt text and why you should use it here. (Feel free to ignore the sections about the captions on the legacy editor since it is no longer relevant. It's also unnecessary to clearly mark descriptions if they're not in the caption of your post because they will clearly show up under "ALT" on Tumblr.)

If you click the three dots in the bottom right corner as seen above, and click "update image description:"

You can add the description you like and click "update." Your photos' alt text will show up under the "ALT" bubble on Tumblr. This is generally a good practice to get into to make your content more accessible, so I hope you guys will consider using alt text regularly :)

Also, I've noticed that in the editor, if you go back and edit something it will take some time to show up. You may have to refresh the page or load it again after some time, but your edits should be there. I would not go back and edit posts again if you see your posts haven't shown up. I also advise against editing your posts on mobile because it's easier to make a mistake.

And there you go, you've successfully made a post with the new editor!

04. TROUBLESHOOTING

I'm sure you've all been waiting for this. Unfortunately I am probably going to be extremely unhelpful if the editor hasn't been refined in the last few months for those experiencing issues. I'm going to go in the categories that I listed out in my original poll, but keep in mind that I haven't personally seen any of these issues on my end so I haven't been able to contact staff with any evidence that this happened other than my poll.

Dashboard view quality issues: I haven't noticed this issue. I'm not sure if this has been fixed since the original poll was posted. If you're experiencing this issue, this is not something I know how to fix so I would contact staff with screenshots of the issue.

Desktop theme side padding: As noted before, this is a theme issue. If you change themes to something that is NPF-compatible with original posts, there shouldn't be any more issues here.

Small gifs on mobile: In my experience this was happening regardless of what editor was used; it's a bug that seems to have been fixed since this poll was created. If you're still experiencing it, at the risk of sounding like a broken record, I would advise contacting staff.

New editor doesn't accept gifs of size 9.8MB < x < 10MB: I haven't experienced this issue so I would say the only workaround would be to either trim the size of your gif so that it is under 9.8MB or whatever threshold seems to be the cutoff or contact staff (I am so sorry for constantly having to suggest this 😭 unfortunately there's no trick I can offer because the new editor has been taking all my gifs just fine)

Logistical issues ordering gifsets: I hope this guide has been able to answer the majority of questions and shed some light on some of the more buggy behaviors of the new editor, but if you have any more specific questions you can feel free to shoot me an ask!

HTML issues / colored text: Unfortunately it seems colored text may be deprecated entirely? This could be for accessibility purposes because I believe screen readers would read out every single letter of gradient text in captions which I imagine can get quite frustrating for users of this technology. I recommend just using the normal rich text editor. If you want small text, you can highlight and click the <s> button!

Other: If it seems like something I may be able to answer, please feel free to ask me. Otherwise... hound staff 😭

Here's where you can hound staff, btw. If you're having major issues I would advise you guys to submit support tickets. That way if there are any widespread bugs, staff will hopefully be able to fix them.

I hope this guide was helpful to you guys in dealing with the new editor, and happy giffing <3

[becauseimanicequeen]

Timelines and the Color Red in 4 Minutes

(I've already published this in a reblog of my timelines post. However, since I know not everyone has the energy to read through all that (since it's basically three long-ass posts so far), I've decided to add this in a separate post as well.)

First, let me summarize my thoughts on the timelines so far so that you have an idea of what I've been thinking these past 4-5 episodes. (Also, I've highlighted my theories in purple so that you can choose to ignore them if they want, lol.)

I still believe there have been at least 3 timelines present so far:

The present timeline.

The 4-minute timeline (which is Great's do-over timeline).

The real past/Tonkla's timeline.

I also still believe that both Great and Tyme are having OOBEs (and a possible third character), and that we will now get to see Tyme's perspective on what's happened. In other words, I will most likely add another timeline to my list at the end of this post.

How I've been able to see/notice the different timelines so far, has been primarily through:

The clocks/watches and the times they display.

The difference between Great's environment before vs after his 4-minute phenomenons (4MPs).

Details that change throughout the scenes (like items and their positions, lamp colors, etc.).

I won't go into detail about these two aspects in this particular post because I want to focus on something else this time. However, we did get to see the clock move to 11:03, first on Great's wall:

And then on the news:

There was also the way Great's mom talked to him before vs after he had his vision of her getting shot. Before he was sent back, she was almost pleading for him to apologize to his dad, while after he was sent back, she was more commanding. Also, as he came back, the gunman was ready to shoot before Great even had a chance to leave his mom and drive off, the way he did before his visions.

(This moment of precognition was very different to his previous ones, btw. This time, he only saw the things happening rather than "living" them.)

There also continue to be the smaller details that tell me there are different timelines/realities at play. Like the things on Chanin's desk in the scene where Samarn went behind Korn's back vs in the scene when Korn is scolded by both his dad and Great's mom:

The lion figurine is facing the wall behind the desk in the first scene while it's facing the room in the second, and the framed family portrait is on Chanin's right-hand side in the first scene and on his left-hand side in the second. (Those two items in the second scene are placed in the same positions as they were in the 1st episode when Korn walked into his dad's office to talk about his new position at the company, btw.)

In other words, this episode was also consistent with the time, the differences in the before vs after Great's precognitions (even though this one was different than the 4MPs), and the other details to show us that different timelines/realities are at play.

With that out of the way, though, I want to focus on something entirely different in this post. It's still related to the timelines, obviously.

I want to see if a theory I have about a specific color is true or not, and if that specific color can help us figure out the backbone of the story (about the core events of the story). In other words, I have a theory that may (or may not) tell us which of the events we've seen in Great's 4-minute timeline so far also happened in the real past.

So, in this post, I'm going to go back for a moment before I make some predictions of where we might be heading in the next episode and onwards.

But, first, I need to emphasize Den's research, and especially what he reiterated in the 5th episode: What people go through during their cardiac arrests varies because of their experiences.

In other words, if what we've seen so far has been Great's OOBE (which I believe), then it means that (most of) what we've seen so far was his interpretation of what really happened (as well as filler content of stuff he might've wished had happened, but I won't focus on that here). And now that we're going to get Tyme's perspective (at least I believe we will, in one way or another), that will be colored by his experiences and be his side of the story (and possible filler content from him as well).

We've all heard the saying that "there are two sides to the story", which is true. But that doesn't mean either side is completely forthcoming about what really happened because the truth is usually somewhere between those two (or more) sides. But that doesn't mean there isn't at least some truth in the two (or more) sides of the story.

I want to focus on that middle ground in this post. Specifically, if the color red tells us which scenes are the backbone of the story. So, let's get into it.

Does the Red Reveal What Happened in the Real Past?

I think we all know that the color red is often used to indicate the red thread of fate (mostly in Asian media). Where I'm from (northern Europe) we also have a red thread saying, but it's used more as a synonym for theme. For example, an essay can have a good red thread if the theme throughout the essay is clear and concise.

Red is also a great color to use to capture attention (which mine was as soon as I saw the trailer). So, I've been tracking the red (and other colors) throughout the show so far to figure out if it had a specific meaning. (I even made posts for the red in episode 1 and in episode 2.)

It might.

And, it might not.

But, let's go with Great's idea and start connecting the dots with the red...

My theory as I go into this is that the red shows us the things in that middle ground I wrote about above. Those scenes/events might be the backbone of the timelines that are at play. Let's see if that's a hit or miss (or somewhere in between).

I will only focus on a few major scenes from the currently released episodes and mostly focus on Great and Tyme's part of the story (because I only have 30 images to play with, which is giving me a headache, btw). So, let's start from the beginning and go through it in chronological order of the episodes.

When Tyme is shot in the first episode, there's a red light behind the shooter:

And when the patient is flatlining in the same episode (whom I believe is Great), red lights are blinking:

Whether everything we've seen so far was triggered by these events or if these events were triggered by something else, Tyme being shot and that patient flatlining is at the core of the story.

Then we see Great and Korn's dad wearing red when he gives Korn the responsibility of managing the illegal gambling sites:

That surely happened in the real past as well, right?

Chanin also wears that same outfit during the family dinner later on in the episode. And while I don't believe Manee survived in the real past, I do believe the dinner happened, it's just that the conversation would've been different.

Then we have Great, who hit Manee with his car, where the seats have red lines on them:

So far so good, right?

Then there are red roses when Tyme gets home and jokes about Coachella:

He and his grandmother also eat from porcelain plates with red flowers on them when we find out Tyme's motivation for becoming a surgeon (to make a better life for his grandmother and himself), which I'm sure was part of the real past. (Unless Great, in his OOBE state, made up the story about Tyme's parents being murdered by his dad...)

Then we have Lukwa, who carries something red the first time she enters Den's office to talk about her own cardiac arrest experience.

She clearly has an important role in the story since she's the woman in that gallery with the red lights where Great saw her. (Perhaps it's the red from that gallery that spills into the story to show us what the key events are?)

I will forego the legendary Tonkla by the lighthouse opening of the 2nd episode where he has blood splattered across his face because I feel like that's the future from our current vantage point, and right now I'm more focused on looking at the things that could've happened in the real past.

Dome clearly saw what happened between Title and View in front of that red trashcan (with a 4 on it, btw):

Which led into this scene where we have the red lights from the car plus the red blood when Title kills Dome:

Considering I think that most of Tonkla's timeline (at least in the beginning) is the real past, Dome was definitely killed.

There are also red folders on the desk Win is leaning against when Tonkla comes in to identify his brother's body:

Which is probably how they met in the real past as well.

And then we have the red Aston Martin Great parks as Title barges in and accuses Great of betraying him:

Now, what's interesting about this scene is that it only seems like Great is in the timeline where he saved Dome while Title isn't. First of all, Title already had that bruise on his face when Great got into his car that night he killed Dome:

The other side of his face doesn't even display any evidence that Great clobbered him with the rock. That's why (apart from the red) I believe this scene happened in the real past as well. It's just that, in the real past, Title was pissed at Great for betraying him about something else rather than saving Dome.

Then we have the hacker attack, which turned their screens into a multitude of reds:

Then we have the shareholder with the red umbrella who was, more than likely, shot in the real past as well. What impact he may or may not have on the story remains to be seen. But I still wanted to mention him here (even though I'm saving on the image limit with this one, lol).

Then there's the red tea Tyme gave to Great:

Which he might've given Great in the real past to get closer to him (due to his family) rather than telling him to check his wound at the hospital (which might not even exist in the real past). Great might've taken that as a sweet gesture, which might've been why this scene popped up in his timeline.

After that, we have Great in the red gallery with a mystery woman (which we know is Lukwa):

This is where things might get a little wonky. But, I think this is meant to highlight a connection between Great and Lukwa that happened in the real past, which is why they are both in that (subconscious?) gallery together. That's why I've included it here. (Also, like I mentioned before, what if it's the red from that gallery that spills into the story to show us what the key events are?)

Then we have Great driving Tyme home after their claw machine date in his red car:

I don't necessarily believe they had a claw machine date at the mall in the real past, but I do believe Great drove Tyme home after a possible date at some point.

Then there's the red light as Tyme walks out of the operating room:

That leads into the scene outside where Tyme tells Great to get out of his sight (before the 4MP changes things). The way Tyme acted in that scene (before the 4MP) was a lot more like the Tyme we saw in the 1st episode than Great's rizzless version of Tyme. So, that might've been the real past Tyme bleeding through in that particular scene.

Then we also have Tonkla's red cat collar, which goes even further back in time as he buried his cat while at Uni, but also now that he's thinking back to that time when he and Korn started their relationship/situationship:

Both those scenes (burying the cat, which leads to his thing with Korn, and looking at that collar after having a fight with Korn and fucking Win) could've happened in the real past.

Why do I think this matters to the story, though? And why do I believe it's part of the backbone of the story? Well, I'm basing this off my theory that Title is Fasai's brother. If that's true, there's a chance that Title knew about Dome's brother (Tonkla) being Korn's "toy" (as Fasai put it). That could very well be the reason Title clearly hates Dome as much as he does. And it all started with Tonkla burying that cat at Uni.

Then there's the blood around Nan as she's held captive and is beaten (and later shot):

Which, in the real past, might've led to Great and Korn fleeing town in Great's red car:

And considering we still haven't seen the scene from the trailer where they're lying in a boat out on the water (which I think is at the same glamping site as at the beginning of the 5th episode), they're probably going back there again in Tyme's timeline. And if they're going back there, there's a big chance it happened in the real past as well (since both characters are imagining it).

The same goes for when they returned to the city in Great's red car. They likely returned to different circumstances in the real past, but they must've returned either way.

Then there are the red features on the news as they report about the accusations against Great's dad and his company (which can be seen in an image above).

I'm sure the evidence Tyme had gotten on the illegal gambling sites leaked somehow in the real past as well (it might've been Tyme who did it, which might've led to Great and his mom being shot).

Then we have the sign on Tyme's place saying "House for rent" in red letters:

Whether he (in the real past) left because Chanin bribed him or because he just wanted to take his grandmother somewhere safer is up for debate.

But at least I'm pretty sure Great was shot (and, most likely, his mom too):

Just look at that red splatter.

This is as far as we've come in the show right now.

So, does it make sense that the red tells us what happened in the real past and/or which events are the backbone of the story? Yes.

Do I think I cracked a code or something? Not really.

But it does make me eager to keep tracking the red in the remaining episodes to see if it will keep being the red thread of the real past/the backbone of the story or if any pitfalls will come up.

Now, let's move on to my predictions of what might come in the coming episodes.

Jewelry, Clothes, and Bruises

At first, I was going to write about the jewelry after the 5th episode because I've been tracking them (besides clocks/time, numbers, and color, to name a few things) since the start, and I think it will play a role now that the show is moving toward Tyme's perspective instead. But, @yakdee wrote amazingly about the jewelry in this post, which means I don't have to. I recommend you read that post first.

To that post, I want to add that the 5th episode ended with Tyme wearing the clothes he was wearing when he was shot in the 1st episode (he also doesn't wear any jewelry in the scene when he's shot):

Is he still in Great's timeline here, running towards his own death so he can have his own OOBE, or is he in the real past?

Or, a third option, perhaps he's in both at the same time, which could be indicated by the bruise on Tyme's nose that he had in the 1st episode when he was shot (image above), which also showed up every other time the lights flickered in the last scene in the 5th episode:

Perhaps the spinning of the camera in that last scene was to show these two versions merging together. Perhaps it showed one Tyme ending while the other Tyme beginning. Or, perhaps it just showed that everything is upside down.

Now, whichever version of Tyme it is that gets shot, I believe that will be the trigger that moves the show into Tyme's perspective of whatever happened in the past. Because I do believe we will be sent back into the past again (somehow) since there are scenes from the trailer that haven't yet shown up and yet would've chronologically happened in the past from our current vantage point (I'll get back to these in a bit).

(I would personally argue that the Tyme with the bruise is the Tyme from the real past. I also believe it's that version of him we'll see get shot in the next episode like we did in the 1st episode, and that will be the trigger that sends us into his OOBE timeline.)

In other words, this is where I believe we're headed.

Tyme's Timeline

I've had the theory for a while that Tyme is having an OOBE as well because there are times when the thunder has broken through into the events we've seen, which I think is his real present reality bleeding through (the thunderstorm at the abandoned place where he was shot in the 1st episode).

So, what can we expect from Tyme's timeline? Or, what will I keep my eyes open for when (if?) we get Tyme's timeline?

Again, considering the things Den commented about in his research, it's obvious that the person from which perspective we're seeing is coloring the narrative.

We might be getting a completely different vibe going forward when seeing things from Tyme's perspective. And just like @yakdee wrote in that post, there's still the scene at the bar from the trailer as well as the sex scenes Great had visions of. The vibe in those scenes is very different (in my opinion) from what we've seen so far from Great's perspective.

There's also this scene of them lying in that boat out on the water:

Which I believe is at the same countryside/glamping site they were at in Great's timeline.

We know that these scenes will show up at some point and we'll likely get to see them from Tyme's perspective, which will be an interesting contrast to Great's.

Also, from a color perspective, Great's OOBE timeline had him in white and Tyme in black for the most part (that might not change very much in Tyme's OOBE timeline, but it's definitely something I'll keep my eyes on). Just look at that image of them in the boat, though. Great is wearing primarily dark clothes with a white jacket while Tyme (who has basically only worn black clothes excluding his doctor's robe, his gray clothes when visiting Great's Uni, and the clothes he wore when he was shot) is wearing a black shirt and white pants... (Also, look at the yin and yang they're creating lying there in that boat. It's just so visually stunning.) That's super interesting to me.

I will keep tracking clocks/time, the color red (and other colors), numbers, more tilting camera shots (which also appeared in this episode, but I don't have the brainpower, or the images left, to write about that right now), and more as the show continues.

So, if I'm to summarize the major timelines right now, they would be:

The present timeline (where Great and Tyme are dying).

The 4-minute timeline (which is Great's do-over timeline).

The real past/Tonkla's timeline (which may be the same timeline or have diverged into separate ones as the show has progressed).

And the addition I think we'll get in the next episode: Tyme's timeline (which may get another name if he also develops a supernatural ability).

I can't wait to watch the next episode and see how wrong I am.

Is it Friday, yet?

[bcdrawsandwrites]

(Please reblog if you want to, do not repost! Do not post to Pinterest!)

[ID: A Team Fortress 2 fanfic cover featuring a render of Pyro and Spy standing back-to-back in profile, with Pyro facing left and Spy facing right, standing against a dark purple background. Spy is smoking. Both characters have a yellow/orange rim lighting. Above them is the title of the fic, Flickering, glowing the same glowing yellow/orange. /end ID]

Fandom: Team Fortress 2

Rating: K+

Genre: Hurt/Comfort, Friendship

Characters: Spy, Pyro, all the other mercs, and Miss Pauling (primarily Spy and Pyro, but everyone else has important moments too)

Warnings: TF2-typical violence, PTSD, panic attacks, trauma in general (none of these guys are okay)

Description: After the events of the comics, the mercs try to go back to how things were, but it's never that easy.

Spy can see his teammates going through their own struggles… but something seems to be very, very wrong with Pyro in particular.

And since no one else seems to be doing anything about this, Spy makes it his mission to get to the bottom of what is troubling Pyro. For no particular reason.

Beta Readers: @mechmolar, @gonturan0, @junuve (Teeth (mechmolar) also did the render for the cover!)

Notes: This fic is legit like around 80% complete already because it takes me forever to actually post anything these days. I'll be posting new chapters as I feel like it. It'll be around 10 chapters in total. Also, Pyro is nonhuman and uses it/its pronouns in this fic. Okay? Okay.

---

Prologue

They were pretty sure they knew what awaited them when they got to Gray Mann's base. Or, Spy was sure, anyway. Mann was after the same Australium they were, and they'd be interrogated for what little they knew. And he wasn’t going to get that information out of them easily.

Spy’s tongue nudged one of his fake teeth. The time would come for that eventually.

His suspicions were confirmed when Demo, still distraught from the loss of Sniper, was dragged out by a couple of the enemy mercs, who snickered over the ways they could "make him talk."

That left him, Miss Pauling, Soldier, Zhanna, and Pyro, all of them chained up in a tiny room, waiting out their fate.

Well, until that thing entered.

It was the other team's pyro. Their Pyro perked up with an interested hum when it saw the other, only to jump—as much as it could with its feet chained to the floor—when the enemy pyro removed its face.

Spy had, admittedly, been caught off-guard, but rolled his eyes immediately after. This was not like their Pyro. This one was a human—a woman, her face scarred with old burns and one eye missing, her hair pepper gray with half her scalp scarred over. The fact that she was human had startled him more than any disfigurement could have.

Of course, he had to remind himself that his team was the exception, as always. They'd become so accustomed to the incredibly strange nature of their comrade that it felt eerie to actually see a human behind a similar mask.

Pyro must have felt the same, with the way it tilted its head with a hum of consternation.

The woman stared at it in turn. "Hm. This one seems promising."

Miss Pauling's head shot up, but Spy nudged her and subtly shook his head.

Unfortunately, Soldier was not on their wavelength. "That one? HAH! If you need a building burned to the ground, maybe! But Pyro doesn't talk!"

One of the woman's eyebrows raised in interest. "Really."

Spy shut his eyes, imagining himself flipping open his butterfly knife and driving it through Soldier's throat.

"Nope! It's completely incomprehensible! It can’t tell you anything! The rest of us won’t, either—we will not yield under torture, especially not me. Though I'd love to see you try!"

"Soldier, no!" Zhanna cried. "I must be tortured first!"

But the enemy pyro did not respond to them—likely still staring at their Pyro. "It doesn't, eh?" she said, putting a heavy emphasis on the pronoun. "Good. I like a challenge."

Seconds later, several robots filed into the room, immediately heading for Pyro and unlocking its shackles from the floor. Pyro mumbled something at them.

"Wait, no!" Soldier cried. "Pick me, pick me! I'm a good challenge!"

But the robots paid them no mind as they escorted Pyro out, and Spy cracked an eye open to see it showed no signs of worrying about what was about to happen. The door slammed shut, and he let out a sigh, tipping his head back. "Soldier, you are going to get us all killed."

"We're gonna die anyway!" Soldier protested. "We can at least go down fighting!"

"We are not going to go down fighting, you imbecile. We are—" He stopped himself there, deciding he didn't particularly want to reflect on their fates with someone who wasn't going to care anyway.

"Poor Pyro," Miss Pauling murmured. "What are they going to do to it?"

Spy shrugged. "Better it than us." He lowered his voice. "With luck, they'll waste several hours trying to get information out of it before they realize Soldier, idiot that he is, was more-or-less telling the truth. That may buy us some time."

"You think we can still get out of this?" she whispered, hope edging into her voice.

"Not likely. We're probably delaying the inevitable." His tongue nudged one of his molars.

"We'll have to hope.” Miss Pauling sighed, staring at the door. "I guess Demo or Pyro could break out."

Spy barely resisted the urge to snort. "The drunkard? Not likely. Pyro? Who knows."

"I still can't imagine what they would do to it."

Spy tipped his head back to regard the ceiling for a moment. "Who can say? Waterboarding, perhaps?” A random guess, and he snorted at the absurdity of it. “Though I struggle to imagine what could break that creature."

"Neither could the Administrator. That's one of the reasons she recruited it." Miss Pauling shook her head. "If that's the case, maybe it'll find a way to break out. And break us out of here."

"Unless it decides to burn down the whole base with us inside. Regardless, resisting torture and breaking free are two different things. But we shall see."

Soldier groaned. "But when's it gonna be my turn to get tortured for information?"

"Will be our turn soon," Zhanna reassured him.

Spy heaved a sigh, and Miss Pauling shut her eyes.

They sat in uncomfortable silence (save for Soldier and Zhanna's chatter) for some time, Spy keeping an eye on the door while Miss Pauling stared at the floor, lost in her own thoughts.

The minutes ticked on. For how long, Spy was uncertain—he couldn't reach his watch to read it, and the feeling of dread in the air was not helping with their perception of time. Next to him, Miss Pauling occasionally muttered to herself, and every so often he could pick up phrases.

"...and we could go back to Australia, and..."

"...if Scout or Heavy are still out there..."

"...and Sniper could... wait, no..."

Sighing, he almost considered tuning her out, but it was a good distraction from his nicotine cravings, at least.

At some point, she raised her head. "Where is it?"

Spy raised an eyebrow. "Hm?"

"Pyro. They've been keeping it for a long time."

"Yes. Demo has been gone for some time, too."

"Yeah, but... they can get information out of him." She turned to face him again, and an unspoken question hung in the air.

Spy returned her gaze. "Miss Pauling, if you are under the impression that we are in the hands of anyone other than violent sadists, I do not know what to tell you."

Before she could react, the door burst open.

“I VOLUNTEER!” Soldier cried, straining against his manacles.

But instead of their captors, Pyro stumbled into the room.

Spy would have hoped that it had indeed broken loose and come to rescue them had it not been for the fact that its hands were shackled behind its back.

The robots escorted Pyro to the end of the bench, where they shackled its feet to the floor. Meanwhile, the enemy pyro stepped into the room.

"Finally!" Soldier exclaimed. "You've had your turn, Pyro. Now it's mine!"

"Our turn," Zhanna corrected.

With an unfriendly smile, the woman turned to face them. "If you insist."

While the robots got to work escorting the two least intelligent people out of the room, Spy and Miss Pauling looked over their recently-returned companion. "Pyro?" Miss Pauling whispered. "You okay, buddy?"

Pyro said nothing, sitting still on the bench and facing forward.

"...Well, it looks okay, anyway." Miss Pauling shrugged. "Guess the Administrator was right."

"Hm." Spy's eyes narrowed as he continued to look Pyro over. While it was true that it looked more-or-less uninjured—the suit was a little roughed up, but that was it—he couldn't be too sure that it was unharmed. The enemy wouldn't have just done nothing with it, and the way Pyro did not answer them, nor even respond to its surroundings, was not encouraging.

Nor was the fact that it was trembling.

But before he could analyze Pyro's behavior any further, the doors burst open again, and this time a barely-coherent Demo was practically dragged into the room.

In the whirlwind of events that followed, the torture that their fellow mercs had endured was nearly all but forgotten.

But it would not stay that way.

[crystaldoodler]

A very long post of doodles relating to @theminecraftbee ‘s smallishsona AU (sorry for the tag again). I think of this AU while wandering Tartarus, so, I’ve had a lot of time to think. This post is really long and has a lot of rambling so, I’m putting it all under the cut. I’m sorry world I have too many words and rambles in me

First up, character designs!

I used primarily their mc skins for design, with only a few rl things thrown in. But, I didn’t bring them up so the colors are off a bit.

Starting off with Joel:

He’s following the persona protagonist tradition of mostly wearing the school uniform correctly, but with some minor embellishments. I’m still debating whether or not to add more, but w/e. His signature color is green.

Then Skizz and Impulse:

The greatest dichotomy of time to design, Impulse I knocked out on the second go, but I’ve done many iterations of Skizz and I still am not satisfied with this design. The ripped sleeves looked too out there (to me, at least) but nothing else seems to work so I settled for the shirt under uniform shirt look. Something I struggled with that these two emphasize is making them look like teenagers, and what they look like, and also keep to the anime style, and also my own incompetence with drawing facial features so It’s something all of these lack in. Impulse is yellow, and Skizz is blue.

Scar and Grian are next up, Scar’s facial Scar is from summoning his persona, because he stabbed himself in the face lol. Not much to say about these guys, I settled on orange for Scar and red for grian, which I am still struggling with beacause mumbo:

is ALSO red. So I guess they are just, both? red? If you look at the party select screens in persona though, the characters have pretty strong color coding, so I guess I’ll figure something out. If anyone is still reading: help. Anyway, mumbo wins the award for wearing the uniform the most normal (except for the tie)

Last but not least, Gem!

She’s wearing a longer skirt than the usual uniforms and also some big-ass boots. Also, she’s a sea monster thing? So, I was thinking, staring at SEES cool new uniform things and thinking about the Phantom Thieves and how cool their outfits are and realized the persona games have at least some design change to separate their daily looks from shadow hunting. Even if it is only glasses in p4 lol. So, I thought maybe weapon holsters? but, that seemed a little too generic. So! I decided to combine how I normally draw the hermits (and a lot of the fandom does) as having non-human traits as the big things setting their combat looks apart. It is both a) fun to draw, b) creates an eye catching and distinctive design for combat and c) is really funny. I thought it was funny so I drew a comic about it:

and here’s a sketch of what everyone looks like and also the transformation gives them very distinct eyes, for no reason other than I think it looks cool:

mumbo is a normal human btw (or at least, he appears to be)

Welp,that’s all I got. If I look at these drawings any longer I will hate them so here they are, yippee. Also, Bee/OP, sorry for exploding; I am into persona and hermitcraft right now so this AU is like a perfect storm to give me brain rot.

[tookishcombeferre]

So, I wanted to expand on something I wrote about in a past post about "In Cedric We Trust" because I was coming at the episode from Cedric's POV. I was, primarily, doing this because I didn't want to completely derail the conversation - hence this separate post. I think this conversation/ topic belongs in it's own thread.

I've realized I'm starting to become a children's media/parenting blog? Which, accurate to my state in life. I still sometimes post about stuff that I enjoyed before having a kid. But, I want to apply some of my old analytical skills to this moment because I think this episode is one that is especially important for parents of kids on the older end of toddlerhood/ being school age because it's a really good ep. for teaching perspective taking. (One of the few in Season 4 that actually teaches lessons relatively well and doesn't just rehash stuff from past seasons.)

First thing I want to address: I don't think Roland is a villain in this episode. I think his perspective is valid. However, just because he is justified in what he does, it doesn't mean that he doesn't hurt people with his justified actions. We can be totally in the right to feel a certain way about something and still hurt people because we can't get past being "right."

I love Roland in this episode. He's so human. But, as such, you know the guilt he feels about what happens runs deep. He didn't understand. He acted according to the information he had. He is the king of a country that was nearly conquered by Cedric! His hackles are up.

Yet, this moment opens the entire line of months and years of grievances that Cedric has placed before him. He finally sees clearly in an instant everything that has happened. He understands the misunderstanding. And, he realizes that his words do, and always have, mattered. BIG REVELATION for him.

So, that's one perspective.

Second thing to address: Cedric is also super hurt. It's not necessarily Roland's fault that he feels this way, but that's how Cedric feels. (Though, I did find it weird that Sofia turned on him. Though, as I've said in a past post, it makes sense narratively.)

In Cedric's perspective, he's completely and utterly alone. Sofia's on Roland's side of this argument. Wormwood has left him. He's going back to prison. There is nothing left. It's not that he feels *betrayed.* It's more that he's just broken. I think apathy is probably a better word.

But now, instead of turning apathy to villainy, Cedric turns that brokenness to sacrifice.

As I mentioned in a past post. The three thoughts I think Cedric has are:

I'm an adult. Sofia is a child. I'm closer. It makes sense for me to take the shot meant for her. Also, who is this woman? Why does Sofia know her? What is going on in this Kingdom?

My safety doesn’t matter to anyone anyway. So, it’s silly to justify this.

No matter what I do it probably won’t change anything.

So, he's shocked when people care about him in the end. Hence, why he offers himself back to go to the dungeons.

Cedric gets it. He understands Roland's perspective. He might even, in his own guilt, agree with it.

However, it's Roland's turn to take Cedric's perspective. Not because Roland was WRONG, but just because no one really has before. Roland and Cedric are rebuilding their friendship, and friends take each other's perspectives. Now that trust has been rebuilt and Cedric has proven himself, it's Roland's turn to show that he can also see Cedric's point of view because, historically, Roland hasn't been great at that.

Final thought before I conclude: I don't even think Cedric was bitter about this. I think he might have been sad. I think he might have been confused because Roland might have been overly nice after this because *Roland* felt guilty.

But, I don't think Cedric was mad.

Maybe reclusive. Maybe still guilty about "Day of the Sorcerers" because he seems like the type to carry that guilt forever even after he has proven himself to everyone else.

But, mad? No. I don't think so.

If anything, things were just awkward between Cedric and Roland in the way things are awkward when two people both want a close friendship they once had, but they haven't communicated in 20+ years would be awkward.

I imagine things are just kind of like: "Soooooooooooo ... what are you up to? Do you still have the same interests you had when you were like .... um ... seven? Oh ... no? You like other things besides what you liked when you were a child? Oh ... that's cool. Wh-What do you like now because all I really know about you is what you wrote about in your thesis/ what I see from my tower and at feasts, so that's probably ... wow ... that's probably super inaccurate to who you are as a person."

You can imagine a lot of things have changed for both of them in 20+ years. Now that things have been forgiven, there's this whole new awkwardness to broach. But, there has been healing, and they have the opportunity to rebuild from there. (Like the repaired terrain.)

As a parent of a small, I think this episode is important because it's nuanced! No one is 100% right or wrong. It's a misunderstanding. That happens in real life all the time. And, in misunderstandings, people are rarely careful in how they talk.

However, when we don't have all the facts? That's when we should be MOST careful in how we talk so that we avoid making people feel like they don't matter no matter how right we might be to feel how we feel.

On the flip side, we (kinda) have to think about the words we use and how they will come off to others. Cedric was *not* careful in how he spoke to Wormwood when getting the crown back. His speech was super easy to misinterpret. Also, in general, holding back all of our feelings until we're about to break isn't a great idea, and Cedric totally has a tendency to do that. People don't live in our heads. They don't understand how we feel just by standing next to us. We can't ESP(N) our feelings to them. (Something I've learned from the show even as an adult.)

So, like, please don't villainize Roland. He's trying his best. He's my beautiful King of the Himbos and I will defend him forever. He's just not the best at choosing his words, and I can't fault him for that. Just because the man talks like a Skyrim NPC doesn't mean he's a bad person.

[curioussubjects]

After spending the whole weekend grumpy and ruminating about Burning Shores, I think I finally figured out what has me so bothered about Aloy and Seyka's relationship. I wasn't gonna post anything about it beyond the one salty post because nobody needs to hear me go on and on about what's essentially an "I don't wike it" complaint. But the more I thought about the more I started to realize that my problem with Burning Shores is tied to the one big problem I have with Horizon as a whole, which is that Guerilla really seems to struggle with balancing Aloy's position as the protagonist and letting companions shine as characters of their own who can go on quests with Aloy without being useless or getting in the way (or both! too often both!).

I care about the gameplay mechanics less than the writing because the gameplay stuff seems more like level design growing pains than anything else. And we have examples of it being done quite well to (Varl in the tutorial portion of Forbidden West) annoying (here's looking at you Cauldron in Frozen Wilds) or, well, useless as combat support (always, in my experience, with the exception of how it was handled in Zero Dawn's final battle). However, I wouldn't have as much an issue with this gameplay fumble if it wasn't for the impression that the narrative wants me to believe Seyka is somehow immune to it. Or more of an equal to Aloy in terms of ability and responsibility than anyone else, which is just not the case. Everyone plays third fiddle to Aloy because Horizon doesn't actually have a party system! There's nothing special about Aloy and Seyka taking turns with a ballista, or whatever. Seyka was still surplus during combat, or straight up in my way, just like everyone else. That said, I don't know if the experience is different in higher difficulties because I play strictly on story mode, so make of that what you will.

So the writing. It actually pains me a little bit to write this because I love Horizon's story so much (and this should tell y'all something because I detest what if AIs were people plots). I love the characters and I absolutely am bonkers for its worldbuilding. No other game has made me cry as much or be as angry (fuck you, Ted). Yet, sometimes the characters do fall a little flat when they interact with each other. Conversations between Aloy and NPCs often don't flow well from one topic to the next, and they can end abruptly too, in a way that goes beyond the Aloy's conversational skills. The pacing is a bit wonky, too, in how quickly bonds develop or transition. Not that this is always the case since there are some great characters moments, and I also think introducing the Base was a solid step in making everything feel more cozy and believable. I guess what I'm trying to say is that too often I feel I'm being presented relationship concepts, but not being given the time to let those relationships develop organically. Perhaps also a case of growing pains; it just sucks that a game so well put together narratively can struggle with something so central to its interests.

But anyway, this post is actually about Burning Shores and why the whole romance subplot with Seyka and Aloy was so...bland to me. The problem lies primarily with how Seyka was conceptualized as character-- or, well, how it comes off: she really seems to have been created to be Aloy's love interest first, and a character in her own right second. It's like Guerilla just asked themselves what would make a great love interest for Aloy and, though the answer was someone who can keep up with her, they ended up careening straight into Aloyx2 with a Seyka veneer, and not much else.

Seyka is a great hunter and warrior, she bucks tradition to stand for what's right, she's kind of an outcast now, she has sister issues! She got herself a focus she wasn't supposed to have and it made it really hard for her to fall in line with the Quen's social structure! They even rappel the same! But who IS Seyka outside of Aloy and wanting to be with Aloy? How IS she affected by so suddenly stepping outside of her social role? She seemed to have been quite comfortable in it before, so how much is she struggling, really? How is her experience different from Aloy's since Seyka wasn't actually ever an outcast (and I mean the Admiral was in her corner the whole time). Did she have other ties to the tribe beyond her sister?

I don't know, guys, for a character that was meant to be so central to Burning Shores, I came out of the game knowing precious little about her. And as a result, there's a complete lack of tension between her and Aloy, and it'd be so easy for it not to be the case! Even their banter is more like stock competitiveness than anything interesting, which was a missed opportunity because there was an alternative to that was just begging to be leaned into more: Aloy didn't have to be the serious one for once! Their banter as the player explores Pangea Park was such a fun variation of usual commentary. Plus, Aloy's "miss me?" line when she comes back from exploring on her own was super cute. But to make their relationship compelling, Seyka would've needed to be her own person first, rather than a collection of Things She Has In Common With Aloy.

To make matters worse, what the narrative tells me is special about Seyka and Aloy's relationship isn't so special after all when it's echoed across Aloy's relationships with several other characters. How many times to we see characters be more than capable to hold their own in a fight alongside Aloy? How many characters are also shown to be smart enough to keep up with her? And how many characters are trying SO HARD to share Aloy's burden with her? Or who could share common ground with some of the things Aloy struggles with? And all the while, these characters are all very distinct not only from each other, but from Aloy herself and their dynamic with her. If Seyka is more successful than they are, well, why is she? And why aren't they? Because the plot demands it isn't really enough of a reason when you're shooting for character-driven storytelling.

Of course, it just adds insult to injury that the whole relationship develops in the span of what a month? At most? So that scenes like Aloy comforting Seyka halfway through the DLC don't seem like's it's been earned. It might have been a better bet to have swapped Seyka and Alva's introductions to the story. It's worth noting, too, that I only care so much because I'm not convinced Seyka is just a summer fling, so she really did deserve more than a speedrun of finding love during summer camp.

On a much much smaller note: I do feel a certain way about how other potential love interests kind got exited pursued by bear during Forbidden West too with Telanah (bisexual people exist, do not come to me talking about comphet) and Varl getting love interests of their own, and Nil becoming even more of a side character lolsobs Nil HZD you will always be famous to me.

I very much hope H3 does more for Seyka because as it is I'm so not invested it's not even funny. I also live in fear that the line from the Pangea movie about coming back because the love interest is home is gonna feature in some way in their reunion and it's Not Gonna Be Convincing. Incidentally, let nobody tell you writing romance is easy.

Secret good Seyloy that exists in my head save me, etc.

And, frankly, I know people like to rebuke some criticism of Horizon with "this isn't a BioWare game," but Guerilla could do a lot worse than taking point from Dragon Age and Mass Effect in how they handle companions.

[post-punk-revival]

I hate binaries I hate binaries I hate binaries

[OK, full disclosure, before I posted this I had a drowned screenshot of part of a post, but I decided I didn't want to blast someone who wasn't actively having that bad of a take (I just got annoyed by phrasing) or accidentally be disingenuous in cutting off the rest of the post so instead I'm just going to explain: it was an informational post about the different experiences with labels and my frustration with it was the given examples of — paraphrased —"some alterhumans don't like the word nonhuman because they're still partly human, some nonhumans don't like the word alterhuman because they don't like the word human, some beings don't like the word person because it implies they're human."]

"It implies they're human" is not ever a true statement. Please understand the difference between how you or another person feels about a word and its definition and "this word implies/means/says/etc. this." I will not ever complain about those who don't like alterhuman or person for themselves due to their experience of dysphoria, but I am annoyed by the subset of that group who makes sweeping statements like "Alterhuman/person implies you're human!" because

I'm alterhuman and I'm nonhuman. I'm alterhuman primarily BECAUSE I'm nonhuman. I am physically not a human and what makes me dysphoric, personally, is half of the community suddenly deciding that alterhuman/person is for humans and nonhuman/being (or equivalent to being) is for everyone else so anybody who considers themself alterhuman is declaring their humanness first and everything else second. I like alterhuman. I consider myself a person because I'm a thinking being with complex emotions, not because personhood is inseparable from humanness. The alterhuman community is my community. I'm not gonna "ok we will make our own place" anymore. (I also hate having to say upfront I'm physically nonhuman otherwise I'm one of those annoying human therians yapping about misanthropy again amiright but wtvr.) It upsets me when alterhuman is talked about like "word for if you're 'kin but still consider yourself human" because I don't! I do not consider myself a human and I don't want that to dictate what labels I'm supposed to use. I do not want to be seen as a human at all, without having to abandon alterhumanity! I'm sorry for wanting to have my cake and eat it too, but this is a semantic divide, not an ontological one.

TLDR "I'm NOT alterhuman because I'm NOT a human!" Good for you! I AM alterhuman because I'm NOT a human! How cool is the subjectivity of experience? Don't project your dysphoria onto me!

I love the word alterhuman because it is up for interpretation. It is open-ended, and has space for everybody who considers their relationship to humanness or species or embodiment etc. abnormal — "alternative." I love it because my own identity is vague, inconstant, complicated and indefinable, and it can't be separated into niche distinct parts for convenient labeling. Alterhuman isn't just a catch-all umbrella term, it's a word you can use if no other words work, because it doesn't necessitate definitions. It implies nothing about identity inherently; if you have personal implications for it, those are yours, not the word's.

I like "alterhuman" for the same reasons I like "queer." Maybe my identity isn't anyone else's business, maybe it isn't even my own a lot of the time. But I always know where I belong. I find it funny how often both of these words have someone else's personal discomforts projected onto their individual users.

Btw did anyone else notice the word human is also part of "nonhuman." Scary stuff. What else is the government hiding from us

[snek-panini]

It's been ages since I had a new book to post, but I finally got through my art block (craft block?) and finished some of the ones that have been languishing, cover-less, on my desk for months. To everyone who liked my last post about the copy of The Machine Stops that I made, thank you! But that was my first book ever, more than two years ago, and I make much better books now! Here, I can prove it:

See? This is Wine Fraud and Other Worthy Pursuits by ImprobableDreams900. It is (unsurprisingly, to anyone who knows me) a Good Omens fic that I asked to bind way back in February. It's a short-ish fic (14k, no slouch but on the short end for this size book), very well-researched and very in character all the way despite being an AU. Though if you're primarily coming from the TV fandom it will be a bit of a departure, as this is a book fic and predates the release of the miniseries. It's not overtly romantic and everyone has more bite than in TV!fic, more in line with book characterization. I love the romantic stuff but there's so much of it, and this was refreshing in comparison.

More pics under the cut!

Endpapers have vintage novelty corkscrews on them. I saw this Florentine print on the Hollanders site while looking for something else and knew I had to have it for this project, it's perfect. And because it's a small book I have tons of it left. The actual front cover is lokta paper, which I hadn't worked with before and am not sure I liked. It's super soft and doesn't seem like it'll be very durable, and it didn't like folding around the board edges. It seemed to get very feather-y as it was handled, shedding little fibers. Though I also experimented with waxing and burnishing the paper to make it waterproof and that might have had an effect. The black spine is book cloth, and the title was done with heat transfer vinyl. This was only my second experiment with HTV and I feel like I still have a lot to learn.

Spot the oopsies! I got the book cloth misaligned and didn't notice till after it was glued down. It's straight but overlaps much further on the back than the front. You don't really notice it unless you look from the top down like this though. In the second photo, you can see where the text block slipped while I was trimming it and I ended up with one signature slightly shorter than the others; it's the last one on the right. Remember to glue before trimming, I guess. It doesn't really bother me; I actually forgot it was there until I took this photo.

Interior photos, title page and first page of text. The artwork was a free download from rawpixel, turned out very nice. I couldn't find any chapter ornaments I liked for this one, so I kept the typeset simple and I think it suits the story well. Understated. Elegant. Exactly what you expect to be there, like a good forgery.

I enjoyed working on this, and it's wonderful to have finished projects to post about again. I can't wait to share the next one.

[anivirus]

Andy the Mouse - Meditation (+Personal Status Update)

(For now I will keep this post exclusive to Tumblr)

Howdy, fellow followers and those who are just passing by. Today I would like to address the long break I have taken and try to self reflect. In fact, this art depicts my overall state as of now the best. Foggy and thorny.

Initially I was planning to get back into work in second half in July but a bunch of things happened. I have started feeling exhaustion in a lot of aspects in my life. I have left the communities, projects I was working on, primarily because my OCD forces me into giving all of my energy into them in expense for physical and mental health. By July 3rd I was weighing 46kg while being 183cm tall. Things needed to be changed. I am currently on medication, a healthy diet I couldn't build and sustain ever before, and trying to build up a daily schedule which also contains regular fitness. Currently I am almost never falling into panic and despair which had been draining all of my life force. After 2,5 months I weigh 58kg and still aiming for better results to be the perfect femmmmmm boyyyyyyy!

However... Things are still not perfect, I need more time to adapt and overcome the fog of my mind. However I have a bunch of plans. Let me inform you.

1. I will differentiate some of my social networks

I love you all, my cutest and fluffiest furry boys, girls, enbys and everyone else. However I know that you might not be interested in some other stuff I might do - like composing music, sowtware engineering, or even femboy fashion. The solution for that would be creating multiple blogs on social networks. Like, for example, my idea for Tumblr is making two extra blogs - for bottomposting and software engineering. I still don't know which one would be my main, probably, this one - for furry art. Anyways, I will make a poll in that regard since I'm not sure about the idea

2. Updating my social networks

I have left Twitter because Elon Musk is a literal nazi I will never support. That said, Threads is the lesser evil, which is also connected to my Instagram account. By the way, my social links are down below!

UPD: Reddit is ass, i won't be able to post there. Thinking about using Lemmy instead

3. I will be discontinuing Patreon subscription

In heat of creativity I have gone greedy and decided to try taking money from people. No more! For now my content will stop being paywalled just as it should have been since the start. It will simply act as a hub for all of my content.

P.S. I don't think I'm ready to continue my furry art journey yet. But I am trying my best to come back soon.

Cya! >.<

[sincerely-sofie]

One thing I will say is that saying you "disagree with the term queer" Is Not A Great Look, but that could easily be a me not getting the wording as intended thing - The above assumes you mean just, queer in general though it feels more like you might've meant in reference to yourself? (Which is entirely fine - I'm of the opinion that any given label should be opt-in to anyone who's genuine about it rather than mandatory.)

Really, the main important thing I appreciate is being able to accept others where they're at. Being able to just say "Yeah, sure, ok" and go along even if I don't personally understand is honestly one of my core beliefs* too, and with minimal disrespect it's nice seeing this from a Christian. The little I actually know suggests something worth looking into, and the notion of an eternal soul is something I find fairly agreeable (if not strictly the outcomes of that.) Then again, I'm someone whose personal experience with religion can be described as a tangled web of jokes that ran too long and accidentally became character traits, so, maybe not the best judge of anything here. Also, wow, this post got away from me quickly. Originally meant to just put in the first paragraph and call it good.

*I draw a hard line the second that personal belief starts meaning harm to others. Believe what you want about yourself, but anyone saying someone else needs to change their ways (bar the very beliefs this targets, primarily meaning bigotry/racists) because of a thing YOU feel a certain way about simply can't be tolerated.

Thanks for the critique! Looking back, I definitely should have written “disagree with the term queer FOR myself” (which was actually the original wording I drafted) rather than “disagree with the term queer myself”. I was trying to cut down on my wordiness as I edited my response, but I ended up just making it a confusing sentence to read. Curse my proofreading anxiety. 

I'll try not to get into it too much here because it'd probably derail this entire response to your ask, but I've got a lot of mixed feelings with most labels, especially ones that were formerly derogatory terms. My church has worked hard to pivot from being called “Mormons” because among other (honestly more important) reasons, the term was basically used as a snide and condescending way to refer to my church, and it quickly became the default phrase for addressing us. The fact that members of my faith were basically referring to themselves with an insult as I grew up in the church never really sat well with me, even if we took pride in it. I'm super impressed by those who can take once-painful words and make them into badges of honor, but for me personally, it's a real emotional minefield. Hence, in part, why I don't agree with using the term queer for myself. It's a matter of preference and personal implications.

Agh, I really rambled on for a while there. I hope that made sense.  

For your second paragraph— it's sad to me that so many people have had such disheartening experiences with Christians. I swear, most of us are loving people. There's just an unfortunate amount of very vocal bible-bashers who forget that God's greatest instructions to us were to love Him and love others. 

If you're interested, there's a lot of resources on my church’s website if you'd like to learn more about what we believe (though there's no pressure from me to read up on it!) I just felt like I should share because we don't believe in a Hell where people burn for all eternity. 

We believe in three different “kingdoms” that everyone will be sorted into, with interaction between them being possible so families and friends can visit each other if they end up divided. The least glorious kingdom (for lack of a better term) is still an absolutely amazing place, full of light and happiness. There is a sort of Hell called Outer Darkness that I guess anyone reading about could see it as a form of eternal punishment, but people choose to go there themselves— it's a form of willing separation from God that happens when people who have an absolutely perfect knowledge of the gospel still choose to go the opposite direction. It's not somewhere you go because you drank coffee or swore in life. That'd be ridiculous.

… I opened my mouth and a missionary came out. Oops. 

Anyhoo, that last paragraph is a big deal, Anon! People need to be able to choose for themselves what they'll do in their lives— any forced change is not change at all, and the second you do harm to another person that isn't in the defense of yourself or others, you're in the wrong. As you can probably tell from my tangent above, I'm an advocate for missionary work, which could be seen as telling people they need to change their ways, but the type of missionary work I stand behind is the kind that invites people to learn more— never forces— and respects when they say no. Always honor agency is my motto. Invite, don't incite. That sort of thing. 

Thanks again for the critique! I appreciate your willingness to send it in and share your thoughts. I'll add a link to this ask in my original post so that if anyone else is confused by my wording, they'll be able to see this and get some better information. 

[spectralstitions]

oc thoughts and goals for 2025

Posting this here because it feels like the most informal place to dump some thoughts.

First of all I thought I'd mention that I change stuff about my ocs so often and post so infrequently that maybe like 95% of what is on this blog is outdated. So. That's great.... I'm truly using this blog to its fullest potential....

Second of all...... 2024 was a fantastic year for me in terms of unraveling my artistic mental blocks, but the problems I have with my ocs remain more or less unchanged. These blocks are difficult to describe, but they stress me to the point of being unable to draw my little guys or develop them much at all. Nor have I been able to make new ocs, as I feel a need to "complete" the pre-existing ones, as if they are each individual projects. As a result I've felt frozen; I'm not able to do much with them, and I can't so much as talk specifics about them with my friends because it stresses me out so much. The blocks exist not for a lack of trying to unmake them, and overall, you could probably say I made some progress this year as a byproduct of working through my art issues. But like with those, my oc problems are enigmatic and figuring out the root of them will be just as difficult as solving them. It took me over a year to identify and rewire the mentalities that rendered me unable to draw much, so I figure the timeline for my ocs will look similar.

The extent to which I get worked up over my fictional people is very silly and I'm well aware of this, especially because it's completely invisible to everyone else. And I wish I could get it through to myself that It's really not that serious, they're just ocs, they're supposed to be fun, because it works for the few characters I have that AREN'T story related. But when I was a kid I placed so much importance on having clearly defined characters with a structured, set-in-stone story to the extent that it felt like the only point of my life. And now I realize, I don't have much capacity for creating stories or characters in that specific way, but the pressure remains -- because honestly, what else do I do? I love drawing characters, but I only get emotional fulfillment from drawing the same ones over and over again. Which is a way to do it if you can create stories and/or find ways to invest other people in them, but that's always been a weak point of mine, and my motivation to work on it is very low because I'm not even really interested in doing that anymore. I keep revamping and changing things about my characters because I'm trying to come up with a structure that singlehandedly fixes what's happening in my mind and lets me fully engage with my characters again, which I realize now is never going to happen. Even if my structure is to have no structure, that's still an expectation of something that I put on myself that doesn't much affect my thought process or workflow. And although I can recognize this, I can not emphasize enough how difficult it is for me to break out of a system-setting or structure-making mentality like this. It's just completely unnatural to my character. It took at least a full year of trying nearly every day to rewire myself for my art, and this problem is far more relevant to my ocs than it was to art.

So.... what do I do then? Well, that's kinda what I want to figure out in 2025. OCs used to bring me more joy than anything else and I miss that. Like I mentioned before, there are little things that have improved this year, even if only marginally. I've been able to draw a few characters consistently, giving me something of a reference point to study. Those characters being -- my human AU of Jesper and Lily and, primarily, my sona. In both cases, allowing for vagueness and exploration of ideas to the point of lore/story contradictions has been extremely helpful. My sona in particular is a good example of the type of character I think I need to start making more of; they actually have a good amount of lore to them, but I sort of just pick and choose what pieces I care about for any given drawing so that I'm not stressed about depicting them "perfectly" -- because there is no perfect version of them, there's practically like 5 different versions of them. But I think of them as just 1 character, because their core concept, personality, and design motifs remain. Importantly though, and what makes this mindset very hard to follow for pre-existing ocs, is that I cannot LITERALLY pick and choose what lore to follow for a given work, or else the problems happen. It has to be unintentionally thoughtless, which is incredibly difficult for me, especially when I've already artificially placed so much importance on "making something" with my ocs. How can I treat them thoughtlessly when they're supposed to be so important?? Well, somehow I need to walk back a lifetime's worth of conditioning, so that I can realize, or rather, so that my body can realize, they're not actually so important.

I think my favorite way to have characters is to base them around a concept or topic that I have fun exploring many facets of very deeply (whether exploring an unconventional relationship type, untapped potential for particular symbolism, or something else) and to give them a core personality and set of design motifs. And then doing whateverthefuck with everything else. These allow me to fulfill a touch of my desire for structure, give me the means to express myself, and the means to form the emotional bond I need in order to get the dopamine hit that I need in order to draw anything in the first place (this is a whole nother problem and why I rarely make non-character art, though hypothetically I'd love to; it's just mentally hellish). And because of the vagueness, I get the dress-up doll aspects that keep me motivated to do things with them and have fun exploring things in new ways. But it's not without drawbacks, the main one being that communicating the point of my ocs or their deal to other people becomes very confusing and not super possible, and I can never make any consistent functional story with them, which is somehow both incredibly freeing and also really hard for me to grapple with for previously mentioned reasons and makes me feel bad about myself and my life.

It's almost pointless to include any ideas for solutions I have right now, because more than likely I'll drop them after a week when I realize they don't hit right, but... I'll talk about my newest one, since if I go through with it, it'd be more of a tangible example. Going into '25, I'm considering letting go of the idea of a strict world setting / species categories / specific lore etc. entirely and instead create a sort of vague, implied world through isolated artworks of characters and scenes. This way, any implied setting or lore is just the result of what was in my heart the day I drew the thing, causing development to happen more naturally and allowing me to retract, reinterpret, or reorganize things very easily. Not to mention this would coincide very nicely with my 2025 art resolution and inherently get me to draw more, because the art itself would be the "world", and everything would only exist so long as I drew it. It would also be easier to tie into my identity, which is a big motivator for me when it comes to making art and characters. My characters and lore would essentially just become part of my art style, whereas they currently feel separate in my mind. And It's a possible way to trick myself into doing non-character illustration, since I will have an emotional bond to the world, where I can draw things that aren't just the same characters. Is this making any sense to anybody?? It'd be the caspar cinematic (artistic?) universe. Straight from my soul. Imagine it... Reading this back, this is probably just how most illustrators naturally work actually, which should tell you how bad my brain has gotten....

As for what any of this means for the blog, I don't really know? I'm so anxious when it comes to putting any of my character's information on here because I know it'll just change and then the 2 people who read it will have the wrong idea of my characters and I hate that.... this is why I don't use it much. But now that I'm thinking of it, maybe making myself do it anyways, even though I do not want to, could be part of the solution. Getting myself used to posting stuff even knowing it probably won't remain true for very long, and not putting disclaimers on everything apologizing for it... could maybe help rewire my mindset a bit. I need to revert to my middle school days of making ocs to random songs and throwing them all into a universe with no rhyme or reason. I used to have the time of my life sharing them with other people.

In conclusion i need an audhd diagnosis.

[alicenpai]

🌟

anime north 2023 con report

finally posting this - thank you to everyone for a wonderful anime north!! \o/ this con prep season was the longest ive ever prepped for a con, and i think it was the busiest con for me ever. it makes me so happy to see people taking my art home!! 😭

so thank you for coming by anime north and chatting and supporting me! and thank you esp to the people who came by gifting their own merch?!??? - either fanart or ocs?! and im honored to see your beautiful ocs?!?? what the hell you guys are the GOAT thank you all 🥹🥹

it was so busy that i wish i had time to walk around & talk to other artists! i really wanted to get dango and onigiri at the delta too.. didnt really get time to eat so im sorry if you saw me shove 10 timbits in my mouth at the end of the con. yes i really did that .

throughout the con i kept saying "he just like me.. HE JUST LIKE ME FR!!!!!!!" every 5 seconds like an NPC. im sorry if you had to hear that more than once.

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i wasn't able to post my con catalogue for AN on tumblr and instagram... i was so busy.. dying... maybe if i do other cons this summer ill post something similar. i had a lot of new stuff this year so formatting it was rough haha. here it is! more thoughts under the cut (bc this report really is more for me, but maybe someone can find something useful)

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this is more for me honestly, so it will be really long. but i'm sharing it in case it may be helpful for others. i find that i'm always looking back at my old con reports, so typing out all of my thoughts are really useful to me. overall a great con, fellow artists and customers alike really inspire me to do better in my art.

comparisons to last year: (since i didn't end up making a con report last year!!!!!)

location: the artist alley layout was huge, and im really happy there are a lot more newcomers to the con scene. i know how much my first con experience meant to me, so i want others to join in on the fun! i don't know how the artist alley staff managed to fit so many artists in the building now! we got placed in a corner where there was a lot of breathing room, and a lot of traffic. i got lost a few times (didn't actually have time to walk around, but you know, it was to get in and out of the con centre and to the washroom/water station) because the amount of tables was overwhelming however, and the layout was super confusing. however i didn't feel as if there were any significant bottlenecks in traffic when i was taking some walk breaks.

commissions: last year it was still busy, but i still had some time to draw a handful of commissions. this year was a non stop barrage of customers! i think i may retire on the spot commissions at cons, just because ive always found it too stressful to draw right at the con, even if the traffic is slow. (and im lazy)

fandoms: last year i felt that it was... never so difficult to sell niche and old fandoms...? most people bought primarily 3 things from me at AN 2022, and not much else was touched. it was a struggle, and i even wondered if my art plateaued, if it wasn't good, if i should stop doing conventions altogether, at least for a little while. this year was so surprising with how much love there was for old and niche fandoms. two people from quebec came by and noticed the old fandoms and mentioned that if i was able to come to otakuthon, i should, people in mtl love nostalgia.. i'm gonna be honest otakuthon was pretty bad expenses-wise for me, but i heard it picked up since cons came back in 2022. it is a really beautiful city so mayhaps.. i will come for miss montreal.................

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and a separate section on the new merch i made:

the new sticker sheets i printed (one piece, baccano, breaking bad/better call saul) did so well! nts to add luffys scar bc apparently i forgot... ive seen this dumbass's face for hundreds of eps and yet i still forgot .

these are a far cry to the sticker sheets i designed in previous years. many sticker places restrict you on how many stickers you can place on a sheet due to spacing requirements... the more stickers you have + the closer they are, the higher the margin of error, which i understand is why many professional sticker printers have these restrictions in place.

the artists i worked with for my AN stickers are so genuinely nice and accommodating with my requests. I just went wild haha. the sheets with the most stickers are brba/bcs at 27 stickers and one piece at 32 stickers.

2021 (top) vs 2023 (bottom), the chara stickers on the new sheet are larger & 2x as many item stickers! the new design makes greater use of the space. my octopath 1 stickers are meant for planners but you could use it for anything!

in 2017 i could only realistically fit 6 ish stickers on a sheet (for vinyl, not cricut home printing) due to printing restrictions. these costed about $3.30 CAD per sheet from s/ticker/mule (not worth it for the price point AT ALL... but i wanted to try sheets for the first time)... and yes it's a tiny 4x7 as well. it was a hard sell for $7 in 2017. but im glad artists have been pricing them a bit higher + sheets have become much more customizable.

now on to charms:

i am so obsessed with this borderless charm look on the new charms... they look like candy... thank you guys for loving my new charms!! i tried out a new technique with designing charms. and im so happy with how they turned out. the charm manu was super accommodating and they are so much better than vograce who fucked up my order so bad in 2022 🤡👍

the soul eater charms from last year were kind of a precursor to this. last year i tried something a bit different than my usual with the transparent bgs, which require full bleed in the file setup, and that was already pretty new for me. i find that charm sales are usually pretty mid for me, so during the pandemic i took a soft break from making them, and i wanted to do research based on others' designs and really tried to improve my design sense. to me i want to design charms that aren't just a flat piece of artwork that gets printed, but something that utilizes the capabilities of the acrylic material it gets printed on 🤔

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fandoms/merch types i want to try next time i table:

more soul eater? it's one of my favourite animes and im very happy for the soul eater love this year. my partner kept selling out of her soul eater prints even though it was her first time tabling!

fma! ive been rereading AND rewatching it lately. it's one of my top 5 anime of all time so me drawing anything for it is a struggle, the bar is set so high. i never end up having the time or ideas to draw anything for it (and the aesthetics are very different from my usual taste)

shadows house has been one of my favorites recently!

dungeon meshi, the print i made was back in 2018 and i think it's time to retire it! it sold out at AN, thank you! with the way the story has developed in the last 5 years, i really want to draw something new for it if i can.

blue period needs more love!

golden kamuy.....

and many more.....

i also want to try mini prints maybe...

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administrative stuff:

next time before the con, i definitely need an organized chart i print out before the con so im not.. literally writing down each transaction... 🧍‍♀️

clamps...?

possibly new display? grids even with plastic panels are heavy... and they can be a pain to put up. this AN we had our neighbors and good friends @nappotuna & @stripeyworm helping us put the grids up, they did an absolute speedy banger job! but it might have taken way longer without 4 hands on the grid work.

if we had used tape to hold our prints up as well who knows how long it would have taken. we used magnets, apparently a lot of people were using them at TCAF. they were so easy to put up and adjustable. *jesse pinkman voice* MAGNETS, BITCH!!!!!!!

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merch i may shelve/do less of:

i really appreciate when artists talk about these kind of things behind the scenes... when products do well, when others dont, products w surprising responses, the factors that we think affect sales... the hard truth is that not everything sells, just bc the art is good =/= good sales, etc etc.

lately ive found it so fun to design sticker sheets over individual die cut stickers!! i understand now why some people only specialize in stickers!! it's also such a pain to stock individual characters and have greatly varying levels, bc of customer interest, and bc of how printing stickers works, you often get extras of random characters due to overflow 😭.. like at some point I had 7 jeannes and like only 1 of the other vnc charas bc the printer had so many extras and she's arguably less popular HDHFJSJHDJS anyways, i think i'll probably do less die cut individual stickers for my next con...

anything old that i only have 1 or a few copies left (meaning i won't reprint) i may not have for display anymore bc of space concerns... before my next con ill just post them on social media to have people claim them!

i may want to do less 3" charms in the future...? theyre a hard sell online prob bc i cant really do deals (i could but id have to be checking the stock every few hours which is not ideal), but they do a lot better in person due to deals.

it's been fun to try specialty products (I've tried scrunchies, stamps, pouches, microfiber cloths, coasters, enamel pins), but i... find they dont sell well for me... maybe my art doesnt have that wide mainstream nostalgic merch type appeal idk... maybe im just not good at designing or advertising them wahahaha. (specialty charms are still charms and i wouldn't necessary consider them a part of this)

my jojo buttons were really popular at anime north 2019 and fan expo 2019, but when the part 5 anime concluded, i noticed that interest for the interest completely moved on 😭 (or it's possible that everyone who was interested bought the buttons already?). part 6 anime didn't rejuvenate the same level of interest. it was a struggle to sell even more than a handful of these at each AN 2022 and 2023. right now they're taking up a lot of space in my con luggage that i'd prefer for newer, better art. i still love the art i did, but unfortunately, i think ill give them a go if i get into otakuthon (and maybe fanexpo too), then it'll be time to retire the jojo buttons. sometimes fandoms come and go so fast, and it's difficult to keep old merch around when they don't have any more interest and when they're occupying a lot of space.

my banana fish lollipop charms do not sell well, and i only sold 5 of them in a 3 year period, across cons and my shop. i created a bargain bin at AN, and it really helped me get rid of old things! unfortunately even in the bargain bin i could not sell a single one of the banana fish charms. maybe it's the art that's not appealing, the characters aren't recognizable, the price point for a lollipop charm was too high, i wasn't hitting the right audience, the market was slow around the time, even when it was included in my promo post... etc. these lollipops were my first time making specialty charms. unfortunately i think that's the last time making lollipop charms, and about time to recycle these charms, so that i have space for fresher and better art!

other thoughts moving on:

maybe go back to simplifying my art a lot more... if i keep making drawings like my great ace attorney tarot + zine, witch hat atelier print, and pandora hearts print, then id not only take 1 month per illustration, id also be destroying my arm 😭 i stopped stylizing my art in 2021 bc i found that my art was getting sloppy in 2020 + i was really struggling in life drawing in school. i needed to buckle down and be more conscientious when drawing poses, learning anatomy and structure... and bc getting back into anime in 2021 really helped me cope with the isolation of the lockdown, so that had a huge influence on my style. but bc of that i think it just took longer and longer to make illustrations and that's something i no longer really wish for.

i really like the period of my art in 2017 with a lot of my persona 4/5 art bc it still has structure even though it's simplified... and the style in my zelda icon... mayhaps experiment a bit more this summer if i can...

[blackjackkent]

Aight, Jaheira, tell Hector the secret you've been keeping from him about what you were looking for at Danthelon's? It's Minsc, right? TELL ME IT'S MINSC.

"I have not been overly generous with the truth. I came here to learn of the Chosen, true enough. But I set my Harpers searching for someone else too. Tell me - what do you know of a man named Minsc of Rashemen?"

Yessssssssss!

Karlach, once again, goes into fangirl mode at once, because she is the best.

"Ahhh! Oh my god! MINSC!"

<3

Narrator: The name is as familiar as Jaheira's own - a hero of the Time of Troubles who saved the city more than once.

Hector, history buff that he is, most definitely knows a lot about Minsc (and Jaheira, and Caden, and the whole pack). He had a couple of big grins here as the narrator was going over this, but I think his smileyness is primarily because Karlach is so excited, which always makes him happy.

"He traveled with you back in the old days," he says promptly, nodding.

Jaheira smiles dryly. "I sense you mean no insult, calling scarce a century ago 'the old days.' Which is considerably *more* insulting."

Hector winces, opens his mouth to apologize, but Jaheira shakes her head, waving it off and continuing, "Minsc is an old friend. Perhaps my oldest. We fought at one another's backs times beyond counting."

Her face twists with sudden pain and she looks away from him towards the floor. "And the last time I saw him, I left him to die."

(A/N: !!!!!!!!

A couple things here - first of all, calling Minsc her oldest friend is, in my mental worldstate, inaccurate but only by a matter of a couple weeks. Caden is still alive in Faenya-Dail with Aerie, but he and Jaheira met Minsc very early in their adventures in BG1, just outside Nashkel, and the three other people in the party earlier than him (Khalid, Imoen, and Rasaad) are all now dead, one to Irenicus and two to old age.

Second - why *isn't* Minsc dead? Isn't he a human? Has Minsc been an elf the whole time and I didn't realize it? Or is it like Volo and I'm just supposed to not question it? :P

Third - NOOOOOOOO. :( Left him to die? What happened? I need to be taking notes in case any of this affects the next chapter of my post-BG2 fic. XD Although hopefully it won't.)

"What happened?" Hector asks with some concern.

"Before we ever heard of this Absolute," Jaheira says gravely, "we received word of a gathering of cultists in the Undercity. What we found was the first dark seed of this plot - a circle of cultists, with mind flayers in their midst. We might have ended it there, cut off at the root. But before I could send for help, Minsc charged in alone."

(A/N: Yeah, okay, that does sound like Minsc. XD )

"It was chaos. He was overrun, dragged down beneath a mass of tentacles. I had a choice - stay, and let word of this cult die with us, or leave him and live to fight another day."

Her voice is flat, weary, sad - but determined. She still has hope for this man she has lost.

Privately, Hector suspects he is probably dead. He has fought small groups of mind flayers and they have been the hardest fights of his life - and those were not fights he made alone. But he can only imagine the anguish he would feel, faced with such a choice as Jaheira faced in that moment.

"I'm sorry, Jaheira," he says quietly. "That's a cruel choice to have to make."

She smiles tightly. "The world takes much from those who presume to defend it," she says. "But sometimes, you get to take it back. So don't be sorry, because I mean to use you if you're willing."

She looks at him questioningly, waits till he nods in response. Of course he will help her.

"Infection. Indoctrination. Eradication," she goes on. "That has been the fate of everyone the cult has captured so far. But it has not been yours. With your help, perhaps it need not be Minsc's either."

Hector nods again, slowly. "We can try, Jaheira," he agrees cautiously. "But we don't even know if he's still alive." He is wary of offering false hope, when the chance of success seems so slim. He would be glad to find this man - for Jaheira's sake, and for Karlach who is bouncing excitedly on the balls of her feet next to him - but could he truly have survived the situation Jaheira has described?

Jaheira nods soberly. "I'm not asking for promises. Just the chance." She shrugs. "The point is moot without a means to find him. Wihtout the Harpers, we shall have to find another path. I'll have a better idea of what that is once we're through the gates. It seems I need to reacquaint myself with this damned city..."