#that's for the nadir bullshit

[asleepinawell]

my aunt just dosed february lolol and lmao

[advancedlupineurology]

everybody talks about abeds face during the troy and abed hug in geothermal escapism but when are we going to start talking about abeds face during the jeff and abed hug in intro to recycled cinema

[amber-angel]

Hey quick trobed enjoyers I need some of your headcanons. Literally anything, just fill my inbox with any thought you have about them, please

[safert0fu]

and in between us, we create the definition of heat.

.

i've not a lot of energy to draw anything more than sketchy scribbles these days but the brainrot is still going strong. praise be.

[florentium]

Fic Rec: The Hard Way Every Time

Title: The Hard Way Every Time Chapters: 19/19 Fandom: Stranger Things (TV 2016) Rating: Explicit Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings Relationships: Billy Hargrove/Steve Harrington/Eddie Munson, Billy Hargrove/Steve Harrington, Steve Harrington/Eddie Munson, Billy Hargrove/Eddie Munson Characters: Billy Hargrove, Eddie Munson, Steve Harrington, Eleven | Jane Hopper, Jim "Chief" Hopper, Joyce Byers, Robin Buckley, Nancy Wheeler, Lucas Sinclair, Dustin Henderson

Additional Tags: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Everyone Lives/Nobody Dies, Or do they?, Comes Back Wrong, Post-Season/Series 04, Eddie Munson Lives, Billy Hargrove Being an Asshole, Billy Hargrove Tries to Be a Better Person, Does He Succeed? You Decide, Recreational Drug Use, Smoking, Drinking, Period-Typical Homophobia, Bisexual Steve Harrington, Gay Eddie Munson, Gay Billy Hargrove, eldritch horror, Copious 80s Culture and References, 80's Music, Angst, Smut, Oral Sex, Suicidal Thoughts, Homophobic Language, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Dom/sub Undertones, Spanking, Anal Sex, Unsafe Sex, Threesome - M/M/M, Coming Out, Voyeurism, Light Masochism

Summary: Despite it all, Hawkins, Indiana is a hell that Billy Hargrove keeps waking up in.

Hello everyone, it's self-promo o'clock.

Here's a long, weird metalsandwich fic that I've been working on for about a year. I always manage to finish and post fics right as interest in a fandom is at an absolute nadir, and love uncommon tropes, so if this mess piques your interest then I encourage you to take a chance on my bullshit.

[tobiasdrake]

hi! i like your dragon ball analysis. question: how do you feel about super saiyan as a narrative device/mechanic within the original series? i've always, across the board, preferred every single saiyan's base form over their super saiyan designs except for like, kale. especially goku. my excitement shrinks when a character goes super saiyan. again, especially goku. it's really unfortunate lol. i feel like every single character that has it becomes less interesting once they transform, and goku's journey of self improvement became massively less interesting once he focused more and more on transformations, which of course started with super saiyan (and this approach was used best back then, with goku optimizing that form ironically ABOVE persuing higher transformations) and persists today . it had a negative impact on my personal enjoyment of the series. was your experience at all similar?

For me, it was fine in the original series. Goku achieves Super Saiyan and then takes the next logical steps. Okay, how do I master this, how do I utilize it, how do I amplify its benefits and mitigate its drawbacks.

Goku's approach to the Super Saiyan in the Cell arc is really interesting, and I especially like the way he actually starts out with one idea and then goes, "No, no, that works actually but also it's kind of bad. Let's go back to the drawing board and do something else."

Goku reversing course on breaking the Super Saiyan limit and settling on a different form of training instead is really neat.

Goku and Vegeta getting Super Saiyan 2 (and naming it thus at the same time) did feel kinda bullshit. I've always felt that form, which is initially presented as Gohan's full hidden power unleashed and channeled through the Super Saiyan, should have remained exclusive to Gohan.

Goku and Vegeta do not have Gohan's hidden power; They should not be able to achieve Ultimate Hybrid-Saiyan Might. The pair of them cannibalizing Gohan for inexplicable power-ups was the beginning of the end for Gohan as the new series protagonist.

I do like Super Saiyan 3, though. Specifically in the context of the Buu arc, where it ultimately serves to show the limitations of over-emphasis on transformation. Goku, who's only ever used the form in controlled circumstances, overestimates its utility and underestimates its drawbacks - but those drawbacks swiftly undercut Gotenks and later Goku himself when they try to put the form into action against Buu.

Much like the Graded Super Saiyan forms that Vegeta and Trunks had, Super Saiyan 3 ultimately turns out to be another dead end. It sounds cool on paper but it cannot survive contact with practical application.

The problem is that these are the nuances of narrative, while "New Super Form is SO FUCKING COOL" is the vibe. Especially in the anime where every transformation is given like ten straights minutes of the entire universe erupting from overwhelming awesomeness while all the nearby spectators scream and goes "OH MY GOD HE'S SO COOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOL!!!"

So. Enter the various sequel series, where new transformations and even Super Saiyan 3 itself are just... uncomplicated ways for the characters to pull off eleventh-hour turnarounds without having to invent any new ideas. They're all, every single one of them, just various tiers of "I'M NOT HOLDING BACK ANYMORE well okay maybe a little more."

Super Saiyan God, at least, actually had a neat idea in that the form itself doesn't have any drawbacks but Goku feels dirty about using it. He doesn't like the form because it's all just power borrowed from others, and instead he wants to match Beerus with his own strength. That could have gone somewhere interesting.

But it did not.

The absolute nadir of pointless transformations is Ultra Instinct. Which is a really cool technique. We're told that this is a skill that anyone can master, and it's the ultimate skill of the gods where your body simply reacts autonomously to incoming attacks. Users of Ultra Instinct have an automatic flawless defense. That's neat.

But when Goku uses it, it's a Super Saiyan form. No, I'm sorry, it's two separate Super Saiyan forms.

For no reason. No one else become Super Saiyan Silver Grade 2 when they use the technique. Just Goku. Because arbitrary transformations are neato.

(Though I guess Vegeta's Super Saiyan Blue But It's More Bluer In Some Way That Makes It A Different Form is also up there too.)

I actually do really like the regular Super Saiyan form. I think it adds a lot to the series. But it's been out of control for a long time, and it's a sign of Dragon Ball's decay from the interesting choreography and meaningful choices of the original manga's action into an approach that's more spectacle over substance.

[borisbubbles]

Eurovision 2023: Last Place

34. 37. ISRAEL Noa Kirel - “Unicorn” Third place

Decade Rank: 109/116 [Above Theodor, below Nadir] Edit: As per the update of 30 December 2023, this ranking has been revised. Noa now ranks between Brividi (#113) and Victor Vernicos (#111)

People complain about the jury vote hither and yon, and how it denied Käärijä his rightful crown, but the truly VILE result was Israel’s third place. This song? THIRD? REALLY?? DisGUSting.

Let’s not waste time here: “Unicorn” is a horrible, disheveled mess of a song. It has an orchestral start, a downbeat beginning, a weaksauce blackpink chorus and then an utterly SCUFFED dance break. None of its many parts work, standalone or put together. Everything about it is a shameless honeytrap for the undescerning gay or gay ally. It’s the absolute culmination of Israel’s Pinkwashing dream. I DESPISE it.

and don't get me started on this bullshit.

So um yeah, of course there were folk out there who saw a queer-coded party song they could unleash ~their inner fag~ towards (which I honestly get - i ranked SloMo second for the EXACT same reason!) and not a mercenary, insincere, off-puttingly cunning trainwreck with a horrendous meme choreography. Good on you, if you’re one of those easily satisfied people I guess. I am not one of them.

Israel have always had a tendency to weaponize LGBT rights and current woke trends (see also: Toy and #MeToo) for their own politcial purposes, and “Unicorn” is perhaps the most shameless example of that at ESC yet? This might ultimately be what offends me the most. Noa's top five was planned since the beginning, in the form of the most obsequious fan service imaginable and they were rewarded for it! How is Unicorn different from any Azerbaijani attempt to game the system during their top five streak at the start of the 2010s?

Its journey honestly feels very similar to “Tattoo’s” victory rly. Noa was immediately fawned over because of who she is even before her song’s release and it just sorta snowballed from there. However, unlike Sweden who fully lucked into Loreen's comeback, Israel have deliberately exploited both the televote and jury voting quirks for their benefit. That Rest of the World 12 points? Not a coincidence. 🙂 (my opinion on RotW: bin it immediately.) You may not like Loreen's victory, but thank fuck she was there to prevent this tomfoolery from getting EVEN MORE points.

In conclusion

THE RANKING

[got-into-worm-by-mistake]

“It’s all been a ploy from the start,” the Eidolon-clone said, his aerokinesis carrying his words to our ears, “Every single one of you were deceived.  For every one of you that bought your powers, there were innocents who died or became monsters for the sake of that formula’s research.  No matter what good you might do, it will never make up for that.  And the rest of you?  Conned, brought in with promises of ideals and saving the world.  You’re fools.”

I mean, *gestures at Scion*

Fucking christ Echidna is just such a contrived and absurd package of bullshit powers, cheat abilities and then plot armor.

Strictly speaking, it's not the same sort of slog that Arcs 12-13 are, but Arcs 18 and 19 definitely are the nadir of the work for me so far. Jesus christ I hope this gets better.

[racefortheironthrone]

What are your thoughts on Woodrow Wilson? It seems like depending on who you ask, he’s either the intellectual father of the current international system, or the man who brought American race relations to their post Civil War nadir by segregating the federal government.

As someone who primarily studies U.S domestic policy, I don't hugely care about Wilsonian foreign policy.

Yes, yes, international law and the roots of the U.N, but at the end of the day the League of Nations wouldn't have been fit for purpose even if Wilson had managed to get the U.S to participate, he got massively steamrolled at the Paris Peace Conference by Clemenceau and Lloyd George on everything from imperialism to anti-German revanchism, and you can't get away from the fact that his liberal pronouncements on national self-determination were sharply limited by his racism when it came to the self-determination of insufficiently white people.

When it comes to domestic policy, it gets harder for me because a lot of important and good stuff happened in his Administration - the income tax, the Federal Reserve, the Federal Trade Commission, the Clayton Anti-Trust Act ("labor's Magna Carta" according to Samuel Gompers), the Commission on Industrial Relations, the passage of the Suffrage Amendment for women, etc. - but most of that happened thanks to other people. Wilson was more of a cheerleader and promoter than a policy wonk, so I think any Progressive would have done as good a job.

On the issue of "American race relations," I think Wilson's impact was largely symbolic, but his impact was absolutely on behalf of segregation. The Jim Crow agenda of black disenfranchisement and discrimination had mostly been completed between 1890 and 1910 - by the southern wing of the Democratic Party that he came out of, I should add - and Wilson's personal contribution was to extend the latter principle into the Federal government as a final thumb in the eye to lingering Republican sentiment on civil rights. At the same time, between McKinley and Theodore Roosevelt, the leadership of the Republican Party had basically already surrendered on black representation in Federal employment (just as at least the Executive had on anti-lynching laws, civil rights, and voting rights), so the damage had mostly been done.

His public support for Birth of a Nation - whether or not he actually said it, the tagline "like history writ with lighning" was a useful boost to the film's marketing - was probably more impactful in the long run. His Administration's inaction during the Red Summer of 1919 was most impacful of all, and even if you buy the bullshit argument that the Federal government didn't have the power to do anything in most cases, Wilson absolutely had the power when it came to Washington D.C and it somehow took him four days to send in the Army to stop white mobs from making war on the black community.

[8bitsupervillain]

Higurashi When They Cry Hou Ch. 5 Meakashi pt. 21

Alternate title: Satoko Houjou's bad day pt. 2

Alternate alternate title: Ch. 2 Watnagashi pt. 24

Rika Furude, expert assassin!

I can't help but wonder, if Kimiyoshi hadn't been led to mention anything about Satoshi do you think he might have escaped this chapter alive? I'd wager as soon as Shion latched onto this idea of a revenge mission Kimiyoshi's life was forfeit.

I give a lot of these characters guff over the whole "Rika would never do that" stuff they keep spouting, but honestly Satoko is the only one who I feel could say that and genuinely mean it. They've been friends for most of their lives, so I think she's knows a lot better what she's capable of than the cop who met her two hours ago, and Shion the murderer who knew her for five minutes.

Skipping ahead, Shion starts stabbing up Satoko, who initially cries out in pain, but eventually starts choking back her cries because she wants to be strong for Satoshi and prove she doesn't need him. This enrages Shion because it makes her realize that despite all of her claims to keep Satoshi alive in her heart she didn't. She gave up on him pretty darned quickly actually thinking he has been murdered by the curse of Oyashiro.

Realizing that since she never tried to take care of Satoko Shion believes she'll never see her Satoshi no matter what she does. It's really very schmaltzy. But I do find it in keeping with Shion's character so... I don't know. Before she started just stabbing Satoko's arms until she died Shion told Mion that if she apologizes a thousand times she would be spared. Now she tells her to not even bother. At the peak of this newest despair Shion informs Mion that maybe she'll massacre Keiichi just for shits and giggles. Then when she's at the absolute nadir of her torment Shion will kill Mion. Which is simultaneously good news and bad news for Rena. She has beef with Rena, but for whatever reason she's gonna spare her, so even though all of her friends will be dead she'll still be kicking around.

Also with the revelation she failed to take care of Satoko, and engaged in a gruesome revenge campaign Shion comes to terms with the fact that she's just become a demon. (Can you tell I added this part in later? Cause I completely forgot to mention it? Cause I'm a forgetful dope sometimes?)

Then for far too long the VN retreads the same ground as the second chapter about Keiichi piecing together that Shion's behind it all, and Shion basically just laughing maniacally to herself at her clever scheme. Of course this leads back to the scene where she confesses her crimes to Keiichi and Rena.

I have to agree with the murderer here. They are being far too lenient, the bullshit about the cannibalism leading up to the killings she's committed even if it were true really shouldn't excuse the fact Shion in the present day decided to commit these crimes. I also don't think Rena could ever actually tell the difference between the twins. After all, if Watanagashi and Meakashi are indeed happening on the same timeline as each other (despite the differences in events) Rena has only been aware of Shion's existence for maybe a month, at most. Maybe roughly a week, when they saw the twins together when they were helping to set up Watanagashi. During the dessert festival at Angel Mort everyone was under the impression that this Shion was actually just Mion putting on an act. The only people at the time who knew for sure Shion existed were Satoshi, who vanished, Ooishi, and the Sonozaki family. When Shion thought Rena could see through her and read her like a book in that bus shelter, that was just a wild miscalculation, because again, Rena thought that was Mion. Maybe she got the feeling something was off about her friend, but she wrote that off as Mion being in love.

This identity crisis I feel really sums up Shion. She once again is acting like she's owed the right to be Mion, even though she isn't. If we're to accept the narration as being accurate Shion has always been Shion, the unwanted unaccepted second twin. But her jealousy, her "demon" kept growing inside of her so she started taking every slight real or imagined to heart and just fed it to her anger until this inevitable conclusion happened. She latched onto Satoshi because outside of Kasai this was the first and only real affection she believes she'd ever received. The fact he initially viewed her as Mion subtly started the ball rolling on her snapping and becoming a violent murderer. After all, he was Mion's friend, not hers. But she "loves" him, so that makes him hers, therefore she should be and must be Mion. I don't want to use the word entitled, but it's really the only one that I feel can describe her. She feels entitled to the life she believes Mion stole from her, and she is willing to utterly destroy everyone she views as an obstacle that stole away her happiness. Because Satoshi made her feel loved and accepted he unwittingly fed into Shion's demonic urge to lash out at her perceived enemies. Which is why she is so quick to violence with Satoko and why she so quickly and thoroughly killed everyone she believes is in charge of the Oyashiro curse network.

Come to think of it, I'm pretty sure this is the only time Shion ever explicitly mentions that she's the older of the two. This makes me wonder, how exactly would this situation have been different if either Shion or Mion were born male? It gets brought up in Watanagashi once, but never comes up again. Would Shion have tried to place her romantic feelings toward Satoshi onto guy Mion? I assume this was meant to imply the issue of the heir would've been less of a headache for all involved. Also, what did I say, all of this would've been avoided if Oryou had just strangled her to death right out of the womb.

And now we're back on to plan kill Keiichi because Mion fell in love with him. And because he's not Satoshi, and that's quite the grievous crime to commit apparently.

Oh I do so enjoy my armchair character analysis that's probably way, way off the mark.

[ourladyofomega]

Years ago I ended up in one of the worst points in life. I was in such a depressing place where to this day I won’t ever mention. It was in a post-economic crash job where I had almost no outs to leave and I was broke, so I had no choice but to stay. I dealt with a co-worker named Barney who at 40 stood at 6’3 and 350 lbs.; and who had a multitude of social, legal, and dependency issues. Money issues, too. Back then, many people suffered and became desperate to hang in there. I wasn’t the only one who was bound for money, but even more so was Barney.

Our co-worker Little Mikey was still in university and on his way in becoming an economist. He was the head ringleader amongst our staff who had his influential ways; a major troll who knew his power. He was less than half of Barney’s age and size; shorter than him, too. He was the type to play on people’s weaknesses and exploit them for his and his friends’ personal gain. It was only time before Little Mikey knew that Barney was desperate for money. Barney non-chalantly asked me before to give him a few dollars which I instantly refused, right after he swindled his manager out of $100 and another co-worker of low self-esteem for $500. So, Mikey had a proposition for Barney: he’d offer him some money (an undisclosed amount but it was in the low double digits) if he’d volunteer to be recorded rolling on the floor behind the counter. After a few days of negotiations, Barney took up on the offer.

A few days later, I helped out a customer across the counter (I was the only one doing so when the rest wouldn’t) when, to my left, a group of co-workers were standing there giggling with their smart phones out, getting ready for Barney’s roll. To my right…here he comes! As I handed my customer her goods, Barney comes tumbling down the filthy, unswept floor towards my way. I literally had to jump up in order not to be bowled over to let him through. The co-workers all saw this and they were all laughing their asses off.  Mikey’s plan worked! They couldn’t believe that our largest co-worker would humiliate himself for a few dollars. Did Barney wake up? Of course not. He willingly volunteered to make a fool of himself in a couple more of Mikey’s games because the rush of a good laugh and the dare for the money was what he went for.

So can you imagine the type of power crafty devious elves wield to take down ogres and giants? Think of the influential power this kid-wonder degenerate held over Barney who was desperate to make ends meet to support his vices, and also the power he had over some of his other co-workers and myself who refused to bow to him? (I never yielded to his unwarranted garbage. As a result, I received some of it from his privileged co-worker friends because I refused to play along.) Imagine the depths of depravity that some would stoop so low to devalue and embarrass themselves for so little?

There’s other times I put up with such harassment and bullshit I never asked for, and that’s not even the worst of it. I had no choice but ended up in a place I never wanted to be just to survive. I count my bells and lucky 7’s that I forever removed myself from a depressing nadir in my life and the various sludge I distanced myself from. I remind myself every day I’m at a better place where I can look back and scare myself to never return and be ashamed of myself again.

[my-chaos-radio]

Release: June 10, 2011

Lyrics:

Girl my body don't lie (Red One)

I'm outta my mind

Let it rain over me (Mr. Worldwide)

I'm rising so high

Out of my mind

So let it rain over me

Ay ay ay

Ay ay ay

Let it rain over me

Ay ay ay

Ay ay ay

Let it rain over me

A billion's a new million and

Voli's a new vodka

Forty is the new 30

Baby you're a rock star

Dale veterana, que tú sabe

Más de la cuenta, no te hagas

Teach me baby, or better yet

Freak me baby, yes, yes

I'm freaky baby, I'mma make sure that your peach feels peachy baby

No bullshit broads, I like my women sexy, classy, sassy

Powerful yes, they love to get a little nasty, ow

This ain't a game you'll see, you can put the blame on me

Dale muñequita, abre ahí, and let it rain over me

Girl my body don't lie

I'm outta my mind

Let it rain over me

I'm rising so high

Out of my mind

So let it rain over me

Ay ay ay

Ay ay ay

Let it rain over me

Ay ay ay

Ay ay ay

Let it rain over me

A billion's a new million

Voli's a new vodka

Latin is the new majority, ya tú sabe

Next step la Casablanca

No hay carro, nos vamos en balsa

Mami you know the drill, they won't know what I got 'til they read the will

I ain't trying, I ain't trying to keep it real

I'm trying to keep wealthy that's for real

Pero mira que tú 'tas buena, y mira que tú 'tas dura

Baby no me hables más, y tíramelo mami chula

No games you'll see, you can put the blame on me

Dale muñequita, abre ahí, and let it rain over me

Girl my body don't lie

I'm outta my mind

Let it rain over me

I'm rising so high

Out of my mind

So let it rain over me

Ay ay ay

Ay ay ay

Let it rain over me

Ay ay ay

Ay ay ay

Let it rain over me

Mr. Worldwide, Marc Anthony, tú sabe

I was playing with her, she was playing with me

Next thing you know, we were playing with three

Oh oh oh oh oh oh

I was playing with her, she was playing with me

Next thing you know, we were playing with three

Oh oh oh oh oh oh

Rain over me

Girl my body don't lie

I'm outta my mind

Let it rain over me

I'm rising so high

Out of my mind

So let it rain over me (Over me)

Songwriter:

Ay ay ay

Ay ay ay

Let it rain over me (Over me)

Ay ay ay

Ay ay ay

Let it rain over me

Armando Christian Perez / Marc Anthony / Nadir Khayat / Achraf Jannusi / Bilal Hajji / Jimmy Paul Thornfeldt / Rachid Aziz

SongFacts:

👉📖

Homepage:

Pitbull

Marc Anthony

[spock-smokes-weed]

Re: worrying about manga/anime Sanji, here's my thoughts on Sanji as a longtime Sanji-liker:

Sanji has some of the highest highs and lowest lows in all of One Piece. His status as a romantic, a dreamer, and a gentlemen are all great, and he also has further hidden depths that haven't been touched on yet where you are, and some moments he gets in certain story arcs are big highlights of those arcs. The simplicity of his design and fighting style also make it so that Oda gets to draw him looking really really cool.

The perv stuff unfortunately absolutely overshadows that at times. Sanji hits his absolute nadir near the middle of the story and it takes a good long while for him to climb out of it. Instances of actual reprehensible behavior are rare enough that I can count them on one hand, which considering theres >1000 chapters isn't the worst batting average compared to some Jump manga, but their rarity can make it even more annoying when they actually happen. By my recollection Sanji's worst moments include one case of breast groping (while body-swapped), two cases of peeping, and one extremely annoying, too-long transphobia joke (Oda's own track record of writing explicitly queer characters is spotty and IMO trends toward the positive, but god damn that sequence sucks).

tl;dr Sanji's a big mixed bag but comparatively tame compared to a lot of perv characters and has enough good points that i can call myself a Sanji fan with only minimal embarassment. Hopefully you'll be able to do the same. Glad to see you checking out One Piece and I hope you enjoy it!

That's such a relief honestly.

I was so utterly charmed by Taz Skylar's Sanji and Sanji being a dreamer and a caretaker really endeared me to him. I also LOVE his fighting style so once I finished I knew he was my fave straw hat. Buuuut then I learned about his whole *thing* with women and got disheartened cus it really is one of the worst tropes in anime.

However, as an anime fan I have come to terms with the fact that there will always be a certain level of Anime Bullshit in any anime I like, so if Sanji is tame compared to other Jump characters he shares the trope with I will take it.

I read all of Naruto and clawed my way through Jiraiya. If Sanji is not nearly as bad as him I can deal with it.

[writ-in-violant]

Current mental image: Vivian attempting to explain to Vivi that they'll have to temporarily throw their lot in with the Revolutionaries over the Urchins by selling the Revolutionaries the location of the Cave of the Nadir so that Vivian can then use the resulting Vial of Master's Blood to upgrade their rooms at the Bazaar to somewhere deserving of a duel in the Marvellous--

-- and all the while dodging an unimpressed Vivi throwing stones at them. She doesn't care about all this adult politicking bullshit. Vivian will have to do so many favors for so many urchins to get out of this one.

[birdstooth]

Have you drawn Nadir??? I love watching Daroga deal with all of Erik's bullshit, swearing her to never help him again, but he always ends up getting him out of whatever mess Erik himself creates.

Nadir needs a vacation.

The Shah doesn't pay him enough to deal with Erik's crap.

Noooo I haven’t yet 😭😭 bc I can’t draw anything w/o a reference (even tho my cartoon figures don’t really resemble anything/anyone in particular lol) and he’s not rly in any of the adaptations so I feel like idk how to draw his character properly 😩 I will try eventually tho