#the music video even works too in multiple parts weirdly enough

[turtleblogatlast]

“Triple Baka” but it’s Leo, Mikey, and Donnie whenever Raph is forced to be the voice of reason

[kinktae]

beyond the story: bitchin’

Hi friends! I hope you are all staying safe and healthy during these tough times! I really wanted to put something out there as a thank you to just how much support Bitchin’ got. You guys really are incredible. So, although this story has come to an end, I wanted to properly close the Bitchin’ chapter by giving you all a behind the scenes look at Bitchin’ and everything that went into writing it. This includes hidden easter eggs, backstories, alternative plot-lines, and a short drabble of the Bitchin’ cast 10 years after the story’s end.

Without further ado, please enjoy and thank you again for all your love. You have all of mine.

CHAPTER ONE – PARTNERS

Ah, yes, the start of this whole wild ride. I’ve always loved the whole nerd/popular person trope in fanfics, so it was only a matter of time before I tried my hand at it too. One thing I was adamant about was not making this a “popular person turns nerd hot/confident/better” fic as its kind of one of my least favorite cliches. With that in mind, and knowing that I was going to allude to TATBILB’s contract, I decided that I wanted Y/N to gain as much from the deal as Jungkook did. No blackmail, no just agreeing for the hell of it – Y/N was going to further herself and her dreams given the opportunity.

The beginning of the chapter is where the two are most separated and dissimilar throughout the whole story. It wasn’t that they were fundamentally different, it was that they approached life differently. Y/N was frustrated at how superficial Jungkook seemed, because she believes there is much more to life than just kicking your feet up and cracking jokes.

On the other hand, Jungkook didn’t understand why Y/N was so tense and on guard. To him, life was meant to enjoy and not take so seriously. Which makes sense, given that he grew up with minimal rules and minimal worries (bare minimum partners wassup !) 

“So, do we have a deal? Partners?” There was mischievous timber to his words, the kind that made you feel as if this would all later come back to bite you in the ass.

Pushing that pestering thought away, you took his hand into yours, holding his eyes as you gave it a firm shake.

“Partners.”

God, this bit. I knew from the minute I wrote it that I was writing the ending of bitchin’ along with it. I knew this was exactly how I was going to end this story, bc the word partners has multiple means right? In chapter 1, this meant business partners, but in the final chapter… it means life partners. Idk, I’m just still really happy with this writing decision :D

CHAPTER TWO – THE CONTRACT

Dearest Yara. We meet her in chapter two don’t we? Yara is completely based off of my irl best friend Yara who is a writer and who helped me A LOT with this story. She was my biggest supporter throughout figuring out this crazy plot. It was initially only about seven parts, but with her help I managed to bump it up to 10! Everybody say thank you Yaraaaa.

You were angry, that much was evident to her. Yara was sat in your shared dorm’s living room, a thick blanket engulfing her small frame. You briefly glanced towards the TV, it was tuned into MTV, the familiar music video of Every Breath You Take by The Police playing, before directing your glare back onto the copper-haired girl.

The song reference is a direct allusion to writer Yara’s fic, which is one of my favorite fics by her. She was actively writing it around the start of our friendship so it only felt right to pay respects to her. The introduction of her character felt necessary imo bc I wanted to make sure Y/N had a life outside Jungkook. Plus, I got to use the scenes between the two girls as a way to reference the music and culture scene. Yara is especially a fan of the powerful women in the music industry at the time, i.e., Madonna, Annie Lennox, Cyndi Laupner, etc.) Yara is a raging feminist and believer in sexual freedom and libery for women, we do in fact have to stan.

“How old do you think your sister is?”

“Hey, don’t sass me. For your information, Lyanna still has all her Care Bear tapes. She threw a hissy fit when my mom tried to give them away last Christmas.” Yara recalled.

Lyanna is one of writer Yara’s past pseudonyms. She always used to joke about how whenever she read it, it was confusing because there was Y/N, Yara and Lyanna, which were technically all her lolol.

FUNNY STORY ABOUT THE CONTRACT I INSERTED INTO THIS PICTURE… Twitter found it and made it into somewhat of a meme because no one knew it came from a fic rip. I was actually rly embarrassed and even wrote some posts about how much twitter scared me on my blog LMAO. but THEN weirdly enough, I actually stumbled upon a small community on twitter who actually found my fic and would TWEET ABOUT IT!!! LIKE REACTIONS TO EACH UPDATE!!! I wish I could go back in time and remember how giddy I was the first time I found a tweet about my fic. The fanfic community on twitter gave me a new love for the site (which I had previously had removed myself from because of its toxicity) and I have met so many wonderful people because of it. People even made themselves a little twitter group chat to talk about my fics, and now we are all friends! I miss posting a chapter of bitchin’ and refreshing my twitter feed as all my mutuals would post memes and live tweet their reactions. God that made me so fucking happy.

CHAPTER THREE – THE ROLLERSKATING DATE

I love the bickering in this chapter, because unlike the bickering in the first chapter, it’s actually less hostile and more playful. Y/N is slowly letting her guard down to the very persistently charming Jungkook.

“Woah. Family of six, huh? So you have siblings then.” He noted.

“Yep. Three.”

“Tell me about them.”

Looking up from where you were slipping on your second skate, you met Jungkook’s eyes, surprised to see genuine interest in them.

I actually originally had Y/N brush him off here. I was going to wait until the drunk party scene for Y/N to open up about her family and relationship with her sisters. But then I kind of thought to myself… Why? Y/N made peace with it and doesn’t hold onto those insecurities anymore. And objectively, Jungkook hasn’t proven himself to be a bad person so… I let Y/N open herself up to him.

“Then there’s the twins, Rosa and Lia.”

“Hold on. Twins? Wait… did they go to our high school?” Jungkook asked, his interest in this conversation doubled.

“Yep. They were two grades above us.” You confirmed.

“Oh shit, yeah, I remember your sisters, they were mad hot.” Jungkook let out a low whistle, before stiffening, flashing you an apologetic look. “Uh, in a totally non-meathead way.”

You offered the scared-looking boy a small smile, shaking your head.

Some of y’all notice but, Rosa and Lia are a blatant homage to my name: Roselia. ACTUALLY some form of my name can be found in every one of the rewind series fics, including upcoming ones. I’ll give a cookie to whoever can find every single mention hehe.

“I told you it was dumb.” You laughed nervously.

It wasn’t that you cared much about what Jungkook thought but you had a feeling a guy like him, who was popular and carefree, wouldn’t be able to sympathize in the way you would like him to.

“No, I’m just… surprised, that’s all.”

Jungkook certainly was surprised. You had built up quite the impression on him from the very moment you two met. It was hard to imagine that the girl who was so unapologetically herself was ever unsure or insecure.

Somehow, the idea tugged at his heart, as if he understood you more if only just a little.

From the get go, Jungkook was extremely drawn to just how confident and secure Y/N was in herself. I knew I wanted Y/N to be unapologetically sure of herself and in her abilities. Something I didn’t want, however, was for frat boy!jungkook’s only personality traits to be liking sex and being a cocky bastard (although I am a big consumer of that trope heh). Jungkook is actually canonly incredibly insecure. He lacks a real sense of self, which is why he is so desperate for Kiri back. His relationship with Kiri at that time was a big part of what he thought was himself. He has somewhat of low self esteem tbh which is why he’ll go back to a woman who treated him unfairly. That’s why he comes off the way he does in the first chapter and why Y/N thinks he has a big ego... he’s overcompensating. He finds it so endlessly fascinating that Y/N, in all her confident glory, was actually once super insecure. He admires her all the more once she opens up about her past.

“Oh, Rosa is an intern for our hometown’s newspaper but between you and me those assholes don’t even let her write. She does coffee and burger runs for men in charge. And Lia sells ice cream at the mall.”

“What about your brother?” Jungkook asked.

“He’s training to be a cop just like my dad.”

“And your mom?”

“She works at a convenience store.”

All their careers resemble people in the latest Stranger Things season (Nancy, Steve, Hopper, and Joyce). Fun Cameo there.

“What’s wrong?” You wondered, following his eyes.

“October 16th, 1985. 6:48PM.”

“Yes. That’s today’s date and time. What about it?” You pressed, growing confused.

“Remember it.” He warned.

“Why?”

“It’s when I fell in love with you.”

This iconic line I actually got from the real Jeon Jungkook himself. While Jungkook wasn’t actually in love with Y/N here, it certainly was a cute way for him to express his admiration for her.

OH HERE’S A FUN FACT: the hickey scene at the end of this chapter where JK and Y/N kiss for the first time was actually supposed to be Yara giving Y/N the hickey like the best friend she is. Ultimately I went with JK giving it for... smut purposes... ≖‿≖ 

CHAPTER FOUR – THE HALLOWEEN PARTY

The decision for Y/N to be Freddie Krueger came from me planning to be him for Halloween. And I was! JK as Glen Lantz just followed naturally. I’ve seen some great edits of him as the character. Truly chef’s kiss.

I really liked that Jungkook came over to the girl’s dorm to get ready. I didn’t want a scene where Y/N was thrown into a situation she was uncomfortable with which is how much Nerd At A Party Scene go so made sure Jungkook stayed by her side throughout the part, going out of his way to introducing her to the people he cared about.

Tae’s character came in when I realized I needed a way to actually put Y/N’s event in motion. He was the missing link and BOY did you guys eat his character right up huh. Love that for me.

Another thing, the confrontation with Kiri was so hard to write guys, I reeaaaally struggle with girl conflict. GIRLS SHOULD SUPPORT GIRLS. However, not everyone gets along in real life so I went with Kiri being more along the lines of petty rather than outwardly a cunt to Y/N. Realistically, Kiri is popular and well liked among the greek life so being unkind to someone she hardly knows wouldn’t make sense. There’s definitely tension between these two but I tried my best to steer away from the typical cat fight/revenge porn/public humiliation trope most movies seem to follow.

CHAPTER FIVE – THE FIRST TIME

Introduction to Erik!!!! It was really important to me that Y/N had a life before Jungkook. That's why I wrote in Y/N having a fiancé. She’s not opposed to love, she just has reshifted her focus. She knows what she wants and is choosing to focus on that, which why when she realizes she’s falling for Kookie she’s so hesitant to admit it because she’s fallen down that road before. Even though Jungkook treats her with respect and acknowledges the parts of her she’s most proud of, she just isn’t willing to possibly give up her passions for love. Which is why she doesn’t immediately confess to him, even once she’s sure she loves him.

“I’m serious, nerd. You’re like… um… the sun!” Jungkook marveled, eyes growing full as the realization dawned on him.

“The sun?” You laughed.

“Yeah, like… you’re this bright, beautiful thing that seems like it’s here in front of me but is really light-years away.”

Jungkook was drunk, and although you were sure he was making more sense in his head, you couldn’t help but feel your face grow hot, unsure of how to react to his drunk analogy.

“You’re the sun, Y/N. You make the world turn for you. Never orbit for anyone else.”

And suddenly, you were kissing him, for no other reason other than you wanted to and that it felt like the right thing to do.

No real commentary here. Just love this bit. It’s probably my favorite interaction between them two ‧⁺◟( ᵒ̴̶̷̥́ ·̫ ᵒ̴̶̷̣̥̀ ) 

“Also… She’s, uh, currently dating Eunwoo.” You told Yara.

Your best friend blinked, silence falling over her.

“Yara?”

“Good for her.” She perked up almost forcibly. “Let her put up with his annoying ass.”

Yara could see the way your expression had turned dubious as if you didn’t believe her nonchalant act.

Yara turned up her nose defensively, “What?”

Ugh yes, some character development from Yara.... the flavor ! Yara (much like Y/N and JK) also struggles with love. She has a real fear of commitment and if far more comfortable with casual sex than relationships. She did develop actual feelings for Eunwoo, she just wasn’t ready for that kind of commitment so she cut him off. Fleed the scene if you will. Typical gemini smh my head.

"I don’t think the contract mentioned orgasms.” Jungkook smirked as you released his thumb.

“I say we let it slide.” You shrugged, leaning into him casually.

“You think?”

“Totally. Think of it as… a bonding activity.” You joked, resting your chin on his shoulder, peering up through your lashes.

“Damn, we’re really committed to this fake dating thing, huh.”

You laughed in the way that you hated, but Jungkook loved; it was loud and abrupt, but it genuine, and it was you.

“What can I say, I’m a method actor.” You sighed dramatically, causing Jungkook to grin before pressing a kiss to your nose, simply because he liked the way it always seemed to make you smile.

GOD THEY’RE SO WHIPPED FOR EACH OTHER ITS DISGUSTING!!!!!! I’m really happy I decided not to make sleeping together a big deal and I got a lot of feedback from you guys agreeing! I had a lot of fun with these two’s sex scenes knowing they could do it whenever they wanted.

CHAPTER SIX – THE STEM EVENT

I started the scene with smut BUT I wanted to point out that much of their time spent together is at Y/N dorm, Jungkook either napping, hanging out or doing work as Y/N would study like she always did. I liked the idea that Jungkook would get bored and would want attention from Y/N because she was so focused. Idk, I just wanted to write a love story about two people spending time together and figuring out how they fit in each other’s lives as opposed to some dramatic I mEeT HiM aNd mY LiFe bEcAmE cRaZy. There’s nothing wrong with that plot line, I just didn’t want that for these two dorks. I wanted Y/N to interact with JK’s scene and crowd but not give up her own which is why most days JK and her just lounged around in her dorm studying.

Also, I don’t know how the teacher/student roleplay made it into the smut, it just did, no further questions (ʃ⌣́_⌣́ƪ).

Then the event scene.

“You’re whipped, dude! Seriously.”

Jungkook felt his face go red, “Shut up, no, I’m not.”

“Hey, I’m not judging. I get it. That’s your girl.” Taehyung shrugged. Jungkook placed a hand on the fold up table in front of him, staring down at the information pamphlet you had worked so hard on.

“She’s just… so fucking driven and passionate about everything she does. Sometimes I look at her, and I’m just like… holy shit, what am I doing with a girl like her? I feel like she’s totally out of my league and being with me is holding her back but— I dunno, man. I just… really like her.” Jungkook revealed, voice growing small.

An unexpected wave of tenderness fell over the two boys, Taehyung throwing an arm over his little brother’s shoulder.

“I’m happy for you, bro.”

Jungkook didn’t know it just yet but dude was talking from the heart and, is in fact, totally whipped :’c

I loved the confrontation scene between the boys and Eunwoo because the boys standing up for Yara really did make everyone feel like a friend group, not just some character who happen to exist at the same time. It wasn’t just Y/N and Yara and one side and the boys on the other. They would all become friends, which is ideal to me. A boyfriend who likes your best friend and considers her a friend so you can all hang out??? Yes please.

Initially, irl Yara and I had noooo clue if Yara would end up with Eunwoo or not. That was actually the original goal actually. But after this chapter four, you guys made it ABUNDANTLY clear that you guys wanted to see Taeyara, despite the two never even meeting! Honestly, it wasn’t until this chapter was written that we decided for sure that Eunwoo was out of the picture for Yara. Part of me really wanted to keep Yara single, but irl Yara insisted on dick and frankly, she’s right. Bitchin’ Yara deserved a shot at love. She definitely has her own story outside of Bitchin’ and will experience a lot of growth in the future.

“God, I know. I do not miss that temper of his.” She chuckled, her words piquing your interest.

“Temper?”

“Oh, yeah. Have you seriously not experienced it yet? He’s got some gnarly anger issues. Not to mention all the lying…” Kiri paused suddenly, straightening up as she flashed you an apologetic look. “Yikes, I’m sorry. I totally should not be telling you this. I’m not trying to be that gross girl that shit talks her ex to his current girlfriend.”

Miss Kiri, Miss Kiri. She really acted up this chapter didn’t she. There was a lot of discussion about whether or not those things she said about Jungkook were true. Which was exactly what I wanted hehe. We come to find out that Kiri had definitely stretched the truth. She really is good at manipulation and understanding how people think and it’s why she is in the role that she is in. Messy queen.

CHAPTER SEVEN – THE ROOFTOP DATE

This entire chapter was inspired by High School Musical with Troy and Gabriella’s rooftop garden scenes. This was my shortest chapter and honestly, probably not my strongest. I definitely went into writing this with zero concept of what I actually wanted to happen. Usually when I write my chapters I have a 4k long outline of it beforehand that I go off of. Not this one though. I really just winged it and I tried my best to write a chapter that really showed off (dialogue wise) just how this couple bounces off each other. I do really like some of the banter they have in this chapter.

You had taken note a little wooden popsicle stick poking up from the soil of the yellow flowers. Acacias, they were marked. Pulling your knees up to your chest, you considered his words.

Yellow acacias stands the value of true friendship and can indicate a secret love! I thought that was very appropriate given these dummies' relationship.

“So, you probably know why I brought you here.”

You nodded.

“You’re proposing, right?”

“Yeah, I– oh, shut up.” He laughed, the serious mood shattering as you joined him.

Even though I knew they were going to have a semi serious talk, what with Y/N asking about what Kiri had told her, these two dufuses realistically are just too comfortable with each other to stay serious for too long.

“Hey, I said that out of frustration, I didn’t really mean it. I’m sure she’ll come crawling back soon.” You attempted to comfort him, hoping to sound sincere.

“Even if that’s true, I’m not entirely sure I want that anymore.”

“What?” You blinked. Jungkook shrugged.

“What about us?” He met your eyes, causing your breath to hitch.

“What about us?”

Jungkook stared at you for a moment, noting the way the timber in your voice had become higher pitched as if panicked.

MORE FUN FACTS LMFAO: I typically do this thing with unplanned chapters where I just go for it and write and usually it works out. But when I wrote this down I remember stopping and being like ??? WHY DID I JUST WRITE THAT ??? I don’t like deleting my writing so I had a serious think to myself about whether this was going to be the moment Jungkook confessed or not.

Canonly, I decided that Jungkook did in fact mean ‘us’ in a romantic sense, but because of the way you perceivably panicked at that possible meaning, he decided against taking the conversation in that direction, instead speaking about ‘us’ in a platonic sense. Poor kookie :(

“Stop. Listen to me, Jungkook, you’re a fucking great guy, okay? You’re charismatic and funny and care about your friends… sure, you almost ruined my event, but it was mostly to defend my best friend when Eunwoo got too pushy, right? You’re a good guy, meathead. I know I joke about your ego, but I really believe you’re capable of more than you think you are. Seriously, Kiri is so lucky to be the object of your affection.”

Jungkook watched the way the sun’s orange light kissed your face, a bittersweet feeling growing in his chest as he contemplated the object of his affection. Just a couple of months ago, he would have had no doubt about who held his heart, but as you held his stare, he found himself unsure and yet, entirely sure all the same.

“Jungkook? You okay?” You frowned, catching in the sadness in his eyes.

“Hm? Yeah, yeah. I just… realized something.”

“Oh? What’s that?”

“…It doesn’t matter.” He smiled, the gesture hardly reaching his eyes.

It’s in this moment that Jungkook decides that there is no way you hold the same affection towards him that he does to you. He mistakes your words of comfort as you pushing him away. You are so kind and encouraging and Jungkook loves you so much that hearing you insist about him ending back up with Kiri hurts him so bad.

But you are still unsure about your feelings and genuinely believe that's still what Jungkook wants. You’re just being a supportive friend!! :( It isn’t until the end of this chapter when Y/N has her talk with Yara that she realizes, oh man, she’s in deep.

CHAPTER EIGHT – THE MISTAKE

BLAH. This chapter is so BLAH, you know? Having to write this chapter was SO HARD. I texted irl Yara complaining about how much I hated having to put my characters through this and that I wanted to just end the story on chapter 7 and keep them happy forever. BUT ALAS! I had planned for this to happen from the start.

You tasted like the mint of your favorite brand of toothpaste. He imagined if he had caught you any later then the mint would have been accompanied by the taste of coffee, knowing the way you rarely started a day without a cup.

God, he had missed the taste of you.

What you guys didn’t see is Jungkook spending the night with Kiri, and immediately kicking her out, freaking out as the weight of guilt washed over him. He knew he had done nothing wrong, that you weren’t his real girlfriend, and that getting back together with Kiri was exactly what he had signed up for. It was what he should’ve wanted. But it wasn't… because you were what he wanted. And that was exactly what he was going to tell you as he marched over to your apartment.

But he panicked. His mind already decided that your answer to him would be no– that you didn’t feel the same. So he kissed you. He had you in the only way he was allowed to. He was selfish and impulsive and so incredibly scared that he ended up hurting the person he loved the most.

Initially though, I had Jungkook get back together with Kiri, not that he slept with her right before sleeping with Y/N. But I decided TEEHEE let me just make everything erupt into flames. However, I didn’t realize just how angry with Jungkook you guys would get. I remember thinking DAMMIT WAS THAT TOO SCANDALOUS?? I knew I was going to have to work hard for Jungkook to redeem himself to my readers.

“She wants to get back together.” Jungkook swallowed dryly, eyes wavering between yours as if to gauge your reaction.

“…Oh.”

You shook your head.

“I mean, wow! That’s… That’s great!” You smiled, something tearing apart inside you as the words left your lips.

“Y/N–”

“Seriously! This means it worked, right? This is exactly what you wanted to happen.” You enthused, turning your head so that he couldn’t see the way your eyes had welled up.

Jungkook’s heart was pounding in his ears, fighting the urge to wrap his arms around you.

“Yeah… yeah, no, you’re right. We did it.” He replied monotonously.

GOD THIS PART IS SO UNBELIEVABLY FRUSTRATING! JUST ADMIT YOU LOVE EACH OTHER YOU MORONS! This entire situation is so convoluted because there's so much information missing and not being expressed, I seriously want to ring my own neck rereading this bit.

“Are you mad?” He called out cautiously, a heavy feeling falling onto his chest.

“Why would I be mad?” You quipped back sharply, causing Jungkook to flinch. He shifted in his seat uncomfortably.

“I just thought… I mean we’ve been fooling around a lot lately, so I didn’t know if—”

“If what? I had feelings for you?” You scoffed. “Please, as if I’d ever fall for you.”

And there it was— everything Jungkook already knew but had been so afraid to hear. Of course, you didn’t feel for him what he felt for you. How could he have expected anything different?

IDIOTS!!! THEY'RE BOTH IDIOTS!!! I don't know how y'all put up with this for so long. Forgive me.

CHAPTER NINE – THE BREAK

Okay I actually love this chapter. And for many reasons. Let me break down the three scenes for you guys.

Scene one: Kiri confrontation

Kiri is definitely an opposing antagonist. She is constantly working against Y/N because of their interests directly conflicting. BUT. I would argue that the biggest antagonist to this story is the inner ones – Y/N and Jungkook's lack of ability to admit their feelings constantly holding them both back from their happy ending. That being said, a confrontation scene between Y/N and Kiri was MUCH needed. While I suppose I can understand why Kiri doesn't like Y/N, that doesn't change the fact that she has been disrespectful and catty. So miss Y/N had to put Miss Kiri in her place (•̀ᴗ•́)

Scene two: Yara and Tae at the library

Fanservice. That is all. LMFAOOO y'all reallllyyy wanted it to happen and who am I to deny my people what they want. It was really fun getting to explore my side characters and develop them through interactions outside the two main characters. IRL Yara also mentioned giving bitchin’ Yara and Tae their own chapter as a joke and I was like LOL BET. I fully was going to but then I got the idea for the next scene and was like ahh ok maybe not the whole chapter.

Scene three: Meeting with Erik

So. This was a SUPER last minute decision. Like, it wasn’t until I was writing this chapter that I planned on Erik making an appearance. I saw a tweet with someone saying their bitchin theories and they mentioned Erik appearing out of nowhere and I was like,,, HOLD ON!!!! That could be kind of spicy ≖‿≖ 

I knew for a fact JK was NOT going to be forgiven in this chapter; I needed a way to lay the situation out between the two dorks without trying to seem like I was trying to sway my audience in a way that didn't make sense to the story. Y/N was rightfully angry. But she wasn't only angry about the timing of the sex. She was angry that Jungkook went back to Kiri at all and there was no way she was going to admit that. So who better to lay it all out than calculated, unbiased third party Erik. He deserved some character development after all.

I also liked the idea that Y/N had, in theory, “romantic options.” Losing Jungkook didn’t mean the end of her life. Having my female lead stand on her own was very important to me.

CHAPTER TEN – THE END

RIGHT OF THE BAT I needed Jungkook to suffer. So that whole scene where he tries to interact with his old group only for his presence to make everything awkward MMMM yes, sweet revenge on my part.

You were surprised. His hair was no longer shaggy and long like you remembered it. Instead, it had been freshly cut, looking healthy and neatly styled for the first time since you met Jungkook.

THE WAY SO MANY PEOPLE COMMENTED ON THIS LINE “but Y/N liked it long?!?”  IS SO FUNNNYyyyy. So let me clarify a thing. Jungkook had always wanted to cut his hair right. The only reason he didn’t was because Y/N told him not to. With Y/N no longer in the picture to convince him out of it, he cut his hair. That’s really all there is to it skfjsjf.

You know, I had written this part around the time I had just finished up the third ch believe it or not. And it was COMPLETELY different. I had it planned that Yara and Y/N ignored him throughout class and Yara had gone back after the bell rang to go verbally assault JK. And as the two hashed it out, only then was that when Jungkook would realize that he liked Y/N after Yara literally spelled it out for him.

“You like her, dumbass!” Was what I had written Yara saying. I really had written him in denial for ten chapters, I was a whole sociopath (╥﹏╥). But ultimately, I decided that Jungkook came to that conclusion on his own and the decision to apologize to Y/N would have been made over winter break.

“You said Kiri came over asking for you back, yet you still came over and slept with me the next day. Even though the two of you had sex the night before. Do you understand how that makes me feel?”

“I’m—”

“Like garbage!" You emphasized, the white paint of the door somehow irritating you further. "I felt like I was something you threw away and picked back up whenever you felt like getting your dick wet.”

Your chest was rising and falling rapidly, and you tried your hardest to not let your emotions get the best of you.

“Not to mention to everyone else, it looks like you cheated on me. Which makes me look like a fucking idiot." You scoffed.

Jungkook said nothing in reply, which somehow made it easier to say all you should have said that day in your room.

“It just sucks to realize that someone you once cared about sees you as nothing more than a toy. It fucking sucks.”

Man :( writing this hurt my heart. I really, really, love bitchin!y/n and writing her hurting freaking stinks. But she had to speak her mind. She deserves the chance to get everything off her chest with the way Jungkook hurt her.

Your heart and mind were in constant paradox, torn between wanting him back and wanting him to know just how much he had hurt you. Your mind ultimately won the battle, of course, but as Jungkook stood just a few inches of drywood apart pouring his heart out, it was hard to say which major organ was responsible for your next words.

The creak of the door being pushed open sent Jungkook's eyes wide, revealing your hesitant form. You had your arms crossed over your chest as if to guard the contents inside of it.

You looked like an angel underneath the bathroom's blue fluorescent lights, beautiful and lovely, a stark contrast from your next crushing sentence.

“I slept with Erik.”

Hehe. Ofc my girl Y/N had to have a rebound!!! She knows that life goes on. However, as I wrote in, she definitely regretted it. It was kind of the same situation that Jungkook was in where he pursued something just because it was familiar and a distraction and not because he really wanted it. Both Y/N and Jungkook are flawed characters but that’s okay! If anything, Y/N’s mistake of sleeping with Erik is what allows her to forgive Jungkook. Knowing first hand how complicated their entire relationship really was.

“I don’t need you… but I don’t think I want a life without you.” You finished shyly.

Your eyes were locked with his when suddenly a small noise escaped him, eyes pulling away from yours as his head moved to attempt to hide the way his eyes had grown wet.

I got this line from one of my best friends after her ex broke up with her. It made me physically sad and really sympathize with her so I quickly wrote it down into my notes app to save for later LMAOOOO. Knowing that you are your own person and life will inevitably go on after losing someone, but that your heart still wants and is pleading for the one person you can’t have. SO SAD. I’m happy I got to use this line in one of my fics.

The note Jungkook wrote Y/N,,, imagine him not being able to sleep one night over winter break so he just writes down everything he should have told Y/N while he still had the chance…. I’ll for real cry dude, he’s so cute. Also, the line about him buying you fluffy Halloween socks for Christmas went over people’s heads I think but HECK I THOUGHT THAT WAS SO FUNNY AND SWEET (because Y/N bought Christmas socks when it was Halloween teehee).

"Are you two dorks done crying?" Yara’s voice rang out suddenly, causing both of you to jump apart.

"Yara, you creep! Privacy, dude! Ever try knocking?" You sniffed, wiping at your face hurriedly.

"What? Like you were peeing with Jungkook in the bathroom? Please." She waved you off, walking back into the living room to give you two some privacy. She did say Jungkook had 15 minutes before she’d have to come back in after all. "Anyway, Tae will be over in 10 minutes for the Saved By The Bell marathon that’s on so you guys are more than welcomed to join." She called out from her newly seated position on the couch.

I included this scene with Yara because things were getting too serious for my liking ngl. Plus the idea that the four of them would all come together at the end for a much needed reunion made my happy bitchin heart soar.

Jungkook let out a laugh, his palm finding your cheek, eyes locked on your lips. You were preening for his kiss, mouth parting slightly as you anticipated it.

“Partners?”

The question took you by surprise, eyes widening at your not so pretend lover.

Idiot.

“Partners.” You smiled softly, eyes shiny and brimming with tears as he kissed you for what must have been the millionth time, but still somehow felt like the first.

UGH I LOVE THEM I REALLY DO. I was so happy with how this final scene came out :( They’re partners, they really are I miss these boneheads.

AND NOW, I PRESENT THE CANON FUTURE OF THE BITCHIN UNIVERSE...

10 YEARS LATER

Let’s be honest, Jungkook popped the question the day of graduation, he can’t imagine a life in which you wouldn’t be beside him

You said yes (shocker)

Cue Jungkook being the most wonderful partner and respecting your wish to finish your residency program before having the wedding

You absolutely kick ass at being a neonatal surgeon

Also, Jungkook started a film company! It’s small but he loves what he does and works with colleges and helps out the film majors with resources and equipment <3

SO IT'S THE DAY OF YOUR WEDDING RIGHT

Yara and your sisters are helping you get ready, with your best friend as the ever so reassuring maid of honor

And by that I mean you’re as calm as a cucumber and Yara is one wrong move away from having a stroke

“Y/N… Don’t freak out....The catering company put in two orders of shrimp instead of chicken and steak.”

“Yara, it’s okay.”

“NO ITS NOT???? THIS IS YOUR WEDDING DAY AND YOU’RE GETTING CRUSTACEANS.”

Y/N making Yara take a seat and practice some breathing exercises so she doesn’t upset the baby

Oh yeah, Yara is 10 weeks pregnant

Taehyung is the dad lol

Yara and Taehyung have been together ever since that day at the library hehe <3

They moved in together and adopted a cat and everything (sweet boy Tae wanted a dog but Yara’s afraid of dogs and Tae would do anything for that woman so Yeontan the cat it is)

Yara refuses to put a label on their relationship even after all this time, and Tae doesn’t ask for one. They’re happy and dedicated to each other and don’t feel the need to put pressure on something that’s already so perfect

Yara is actually violently in love with Tae but still scoffs when Y/N tries to bring it up

“Oh my god, you’re so in love with him”

“Huh??? you must be sick or something. Get well soon, damn :/”

Yara likes to come up with different labels for Taehyung every time she has to introduce him. Among her favorites are roommate, rent sharer, baby daddy and penis lender

Speaking of Taehyung, he’d have a hand on Jungkook’s shoulder as he tries to calm down the panicking groom to be

“JK, breathe.”

“What if she doesn’t show up? What if she doesn’t want to marry me? What if I pressured her into this and— and I’ve freaked her out and now she hates me?”

“Dude, you guys have been engaged for eight years. She’s had her opportunity to run. She’ll show up.”

Taehyung scruffing up the younger man’s hair reassuringly, which only flusters him more because DAMMIT he wants to look perfect for you and now his hair is messed up >:(

(You like him no matter what his hair looks like though)

Jungkook literally swallowing down a sob as you walk down the aisle and he lays his eyes on you for the first time

You having a dumb smile on your face the entire walk over because your husband to be is crying and you haven’t even exchanged vows yet

The entire audience going all sobby when you finally do exchange vows because they’re so beautiful and real

The ten years together has not been easy— from financial struggles as you tried to support yourself through med school, to personal conflicts when Jungkook wanted to start a family already

But you guys figured it out

You always do

He’s your person. And you are his.

Y/N’s sisters Rosa and Lia are a WRECK— even your dad is tearing up

Your family loves Jungkook and have been counting down the days until you guys married, let’s be honest

“You may now kiss the bride.”

Jungkook punching the air with a “FINALLY!” before kissing the hell out of you

The cutting of the cake inevitably turning into a food fight

The shrimp entrees turning out to be pretty damn good

Yara catching the bouquet and wagging her brows at Taehyung suggestively

Jungkook pulling you aside to take photos of you outside the venue because you look so so pretty and he loves the way you smile when he’s the one behind the camera

The party is in full session, your siblings tearing up the dance floor like the extroverts they are

You and Jungkook are sat at the head of the room, hands intertwined underneath the table as you watch a tired and painfully sober Yara swing her bare feet onto Taehyung’s lap, requesting a foot rub

Watching your pregnant best friend and her lover together, you turned towards your own, smile impossibly wide

“What?”

“Let’s have a baby.” You’d grin, so stupid happy

Jungkook’s eyes going round and immediately jumping up from his seat because god that’s all he’s ever wanted

Being tugged out the room by a giddy Jungkook, one of your heels flinging off somewhere behind you.

“What’s happening? Where are we going?!”

The two of you find yourself in a storage room somewhere on the hotel floor

“Jeon Jungkook, what the hell—“

His mouth find yourself, kissing you in a way that couldn’t at the altar

You kissed him back without questions, arms wrapping around the man you now called your husband

“I love you.” He’d sigh into your neck, his hot breath causing you to shiver

“I love you too.”

“Let’s make a baby.”

“Yeah let’s— wait, right here? Right now?!”

Jungkook merely nodding as his mouth found the exposed skin of your chest

“Meathead, we can’t just ditch our wedding to have sex!”

“Why not? We did our marital duties. Now it’s our guests' job to get embarrassingly drunk and make a fool of themselves on the dance floor. No one will even miss us.”

“Isn’t baby making what our honeymoon is for?”

“Screw that. I’ve done my waiting. Let’s start our family, nerd.”

Jungkook kissing your protests silent before you inevitably give in and let him take you right there and then, your wedding dress hung around your hips

Husband and wife coming together with shaky breaths and hushed moans as they promise the rest of their lives to each other, making every argument, struggle or moment of uncertainty leading up to now totally worth it

Walk of shame back into the party with nervous hair fixing from you and a proud grin from Jungkook

Yara figuring out exactly why you two had sneaked off to, flashing the newly weds a knowing smirk

The night of your wedding, Jungkook surprises you with a present

You unwrap it in confusion, only to see that it’s a glass frame and inside of it is the wrinkled and worn out lined paper the two of you had scribbled on many many years ago

Jungkook hangs up the contract right above your bed as per your request, smiling as he does and jumping on him the moment he puts down the hammer bc dammit it you’re too heckin excited to make love with your sentimental loser of a husband

And yes, by the next month, you are pregnant and incredibly happy

And of course, your daughter and Yara’s son grow up to be best friends, not a family holiday passing by where they aren’t told the story of the totally bitchin’ way both set of their parents got together

[noeliareads]

Penpals? Chapter 2

Chapter 2: 

November, 2017 

After about 2 weeks of preparation (waiting for a paycheck) Arizona had almost everything ready for her box. All she had to do was write the letter. 

*Dear Jinho, I don’t have words to express how grateful I am for everything you sent me. I actually feel bad because I don’t send as much. But here are a few of my favorite things from America. I really hope you like them. The SNSD mug? I use it everyday for my morning coffee. (she printed out a photo of the mug on her side table) The tea is incredible! Jinho, everything is incredible and I can’t thank you enough! 

By the way, how are you? How is South Korea? I hope you’re doing ok as well as your friends. I am ok, just a little bit stressed with school. Our final exams are in about a month and believe me I am not ready. Oh! I haven’t introduced myself. As you already know my name is Arizona, I am 20 years old and I am a music major in college. That’s something we have in common, music. I wanted to become a music major because I would love to be a music teacher in a university. I feel like my acquired skills would be exploited there. I really don’t know what to say about myself. My favorite colors are moss green and beige. I cannot write with normal ballpoint pens. I know. It’s weird. Fountain pens are a blessing and they are the best thing in the world.*

***

Bang Chan was in his room working on some mixtapes when he heard Jisung yell. 

“YA! We got a package for Bang Jinho. Who is Bang Jinho?”

Bang Chan threw his laptop on his bed and almost slipped on the wood floor, running to where Jisung was.   

“Nae goesida!” It’s mine! He said. He yanked the… box? A box? And ran to his room, locking the door behind him, leaning on it as if one of his band mates were to break it down. It has happened before... 

He clutched his chest regaining his breath. He took a seat on the floor and curiously examined the box, it had the typical shipping label. He didn’t spare a minute so he opened the box with his bare hands. Inside the box were a variety of American sweets. He found a mug with the american flag on it, post-its of the american flag… There were a lot of things with the american flag. Very.. touristy. Still, he thought it was cute. He saw a light blue envelope and grabbed it. It was time to read what she said. 

Dear Jinho…

.

.

*I have no siblings, sadly. I am an only child so I grew up alone sometimes. But that’s ok. I don’t mind being alone sometimes. I find comfort in being alone. Oh! I listened to the songs you sent me. Ok, let me gather my thoughts. 

Likey: It’s so catchy and I watched the video as well and now I can’t stop doing the hand movements from the beginning! My best friend Nick, laughs and teases me because I will do it without realizing it. I will have to check out more of Twice’s music, they seem very promising. 

You Are by Got7: I have heard of them but never got into their music yet. This was until you told me to listen to this song. I like this song. It’s has a beautiful melody. I like how it builds up and I didn’t expect the chorus to sound like that! I know kpop involves a lot of rapping but that “IT’S A BEAUTIFUL SKYYY” Dude. That buildup. Wow. 

Matryoshka: I don’t even know where to begin. Who are these people?? I mean, I downloaded Soundcloud because you mentioned it and I was blown away. They are amazing! The first rapper has such a chill flow. It’s like he’s not trying but it sounds good either way! The second one? He’s good, too good. And the third one? Oh Lord. I really hate you right now. Who the hell has that type of voice? I figured it was him who accentuated the MAAAAAAAATRYOSHKA. And wow, just wow. Thank you for showing me these amazing rappers. I have to look into them more! 

Lastly, Be Lazy. I have like 2 things to say. THE BASS. THE BASS. Thank you. I like them so much. THE BASS.*

The letter was two pages long and Chan enjoyed reading all of it. She seemed like a very animated person. She seemed to be happy about the simplest things and that weirdly made him smile. 

FAST FORWARD TO DEBUT ERA. Chan and Arizona have exchanged a few letters (shipping time and Chan’s schedule). But they became great friends in the short amount of time they’ve corresponded to each other. They kept trading on songs, Chan loved or dislikes the ones she sent and same went for her. In future v-lives, he would play some of the songs he told her to listen to. But, one thing was for sure. Chan converted Arizona into a newer generation K-pop lover. Chan told her that 3racha were actually part of a survival show that basically consisted of working hard to be able to debut together. He also never told her that he was Bang Chan. But, he did tell her that he was working hard in order to get a job as a backup dancer for idol groups.  

March:  Chan to Arizona (They just debuted)

*Zo, I am so happy! I GOT THE JOB! I wish I could tell you all about it but I can’t!*

Arizona to Chan

*No way! Jinho that is amazing! I am so happy for you! I know how much you worked for this! Whenever you get to dance on stage let me know so I can watch you.* Chan sighed as he read her response. She will see him, but she won’t know who he is.  

Fastforward

Months go by and Stray Kids have won multiple rookie awards. Thanks to Chan, Arizona has gone head over heels for them. She will rant about them in her letters and fangirl with him.

*Jinho… I know I sent you your letter and you probably received it yesterday or a few days ago but this is an emergency. SKZ DROPPED ANOTHER VIDEO!  BTW, You have to see the street version of  Insomnia. THEY WERE IN THE US I MEAN WHAT THE HELL! This is why I hate being a college student. No money. And, 10 days later they release the street version of Question? Do they want to kill me. Changbin and Hyunjin body rolling killed me! They all killed me. I really can’t thank you enough for introducing me to them. #PROUDSTAY*

For the release of their album I Am Who, Chan sent her an album. He wanted it to be autographed but he couldn’t explain how he made that possible. Either way she has his handwriting in paper so that counts? The boys knew about her, not much but they did know he was corresponding with a girl from America. Either way, she has his handwriting. Arizona in return, sent him an ASAP Rocky album! That made Chan very very happy. 

Life suddenly was brighter for Arizona. She always had a hard time seeing the bright side in life and being positive was extra effort. But corresponding with Chan helped her breathe with ease. He was her escape room. She could tell him everything and she knew that he wouldn’t judge her. He would always offer words of comfort and advice. There were times where she would vent about how hard her classes were or how her  mental health deteriorates day by day.  Chan wasn’t bothered by this. He wished for her to be happy and free in her own mind. He would occasionally send her various letters in the span of a few days or less. He knew she wasn’t expecting it and he hoped it made her smile, which it did. 

They were so used to corresponding to each other that friendship slowly and silently became something else. Arizona once debated about it but she brushed it off. It can’t be possible and it won’t be. Letters were romantic and that is the stigma that is around it and that’s all. There is nothing more to it. Chan thought of her constantly when he wasn’t busy with producing, practicing or anything related to the group. He knew he liked her, did he have the opportunity to ask for a picture? He did. But he didn’t ask. He would feel obliged to send her one of himself and he couldn’t do that. It was enough with lying about his job. 

FEBRUARY - 2019 

“I am soooooooo tired.” Arizona complained as she walked into the same coffee shop she frequented with Nick over the course of their college years. Both were seniors now, graduating in May! 

“All nighter?” Nick asked? She just nodded and smiled at the barista giving her their order. 

“You’re a master procrastinator. What were you doing?”

“Working on my senior project and portfolio.” She mumbles taking a seat and resting her head on the table. Nick didn’t miss how she avoided his eyes. 

“And probably writing J’s letter right?” Arizona looked up at her best friend and smiled. It was true, she was working on less than 2 hours of sleep, writing the letter and working on her project. “Zozo, you like him don’t you.” It wasn’t a question. It was an affirmation. 

“Nick, stop.” She wasn’t ready to face this topic yet. Like him? Pff. She’s never seen him before. “We’ve never met and probably never will. Ok? Drop it.”

“You don’t have to like or love his looks.” Arizona knew that and she knew what danger she was in of falling harder and faster for Jihno. She just wasn’t ready for it. 

Arizona arrived home after her evening lessons and collapsed on the couch. She was just dozing off when her mom threw some papers on her stomach. “You have mail” She said. The sleepy girl sat up and flipped through the envelopes. Phone bill, student loan information, a postcard?  

“Australia? I don’t know anyone in Australia.” She turned the postcard around and smiled when she recognized the handwriting. 

*Hey Zo, sorry this is going to be short. But, I am in aussie visiting family. I won’t be able to read any of your letters until I get home but I will write! Just make sure to send your responses  to my normal address. I am so happy to see my family again, I actually came with a few of my friends and we are just touring around. I also heard Stray Kids are going to be here! I’ll see if I can go to their concert or spot them at the touristy sites. If I do, I’ll send photos. Take care. 

Jinho.*

Her heart fluttered. He knew how much she loved Stray Kids that he would even look for them for her! The days flew by and she received an envelope. It contained a post-it and multiple photos. The note said, ‘Found them.’ The photos were of Stray Kids near the Sydney Opera House. Wait, he found them? The photos seemed to be taken from afar and the boys were with cameras? Filming a video? Arizona died right there. He went all the way to find them, take their picture, develop them and send them to her. 

Chan’s Perspective

Chan asked his manager to take photographs of them as they filmed and as if they were fans who spotted them. Manager Kim (let’s say that’s his name) agreed without asking for a reason. Chan quickly developed them and sent them before going back to South Korea. He was dying to tell her who he was. After all, he was her bias. Not that it made any difference. Sadly he still couldn’t, Stray Kids were going to be extremely busy in the next month and he feared not to have time to write so he made sure he had conversations planned out so she wouldn’t feel lonely. He also had the feeling that this comeback was going to be important for their careers. 

His last letter ended with; ‘Zo, I won’t be able to write as much because I will be dancing for a group for their comeback so we will be very busy practicing. But, I will try to write as much as possible. Don’t miss me.” 

.

.

.

Hey guys this was more of a filler chapter. I hope you get an idea of how the story is going to go.  There will hopefully be two more chapters, I still don’t know how I will space them out. Next chapter is going to be about the Miroh and Yellow Wood era. Arizona also graduates college and there is a big surprise that will lead to the last chapter. 

Playlist?

Adios - Everglow

Teeth - 5 Seconds of Summer

Wanna Go Back - Day6 

Mirror - Stray Kids

These are the pictures Chan sends to Arizona.

[constantlyirksome]

Review: Euphoria’s First Season Finale was Aesthetically Stunning but Narratively Clunky.

Going into the Euphoria season one finale we had a lot of questions: Would Fezco get arrested? Would Maddy and Nate get back together, or would he finally get what was coming to him? Would #Rules make it? Unfortunately, due to the episode's reliance on non-linear storytelling, we left with more questions than answers.

The Halloween episode used a similar narrative structure, the party was the centre of it and all the other scenes were flashbacks, in the end coming together in a satisfying way. Unfortunately, it didn’t work well at all this episode, while the core of the episode is the school dance (a classic hotbed for teenage drama) it’s not clear when all the other scenes occurred in relation to it, end it ended on multiple cliff-hangers.

Let’s talk about Nate and Maddy first. I have praised Jacob Elordi in the past because getting people to like a character is one thing, but to create and act out a character as loathsome as Nate takes talent. His key scenes with his father, Rue, and Maddy all had an incredible intensity and heat, he’s so convincing as a brute you wish that Rue’s fantasy, lighting Nate on fire and shooting him, was real.

He continues a lot of his patterns; first, he bullies Rue in a tense faceoff. Elordi and Zendaya have incredible rival chemistry, and as Nate sowed the seeds of doubt for Rue and Jule’s relationship, Rue threatened to burn his whole family down. He abused Maddy verbally and physically. The question of his and his father's sexuality popped up and honestly, that’s a thread I’m a little tired of. Internalized homophobia on that level, if they are gay, isn’t something I as a gay man care to watch.

Nate singlehandedly wins a football match but his father still berates him for not doing enough as a captain. Nate does what he does best, gets in his dads face, but his dad doesn’t back down and when they get into an uncomfortable physical confrontation where Nate is overpowered and breaks down completely. Like a child in a supermarket, he cries and thrashes and then begins hurting himself in his rage. This is a man who has gone through some serious emotional abuse, repression coupled with a genetic inflated ego, arrogance and violent misogyny. He was bound to explode, and he does so in such huge way I just have to applaud Elordi again. But the question is, was the tantrum before or after the dance?

Maddy did a lot of growing after being covered in the human manure that is Nate and decides she’s had enough.

“You’re abusive, psychopathic, and I hate the way you make me feel…” she says as they slow dance. I love Maddy, and this is an aspiring thing to see, a girl in the grips of an abusive relationship, who until now knew how sick it was but couldn’t leave, make the decision to cut it off. And props to her for trying to assure Nate that It’s Okay to Be Gay and that sexuality is a spectrum while he was screaming in her face. What an icon.

Cassey deals with her decision to terminate her pregnancy, weirdly McKay isn’t in the episode at all. At the dance, she says she never wants to fall in love again (honestly what a mood,) meaning they split up after she had her abortion, meaning either he is as shitty as every other man on the show or the show just didn’t know what to do with him. During her procedure she tunes out and listens to music, imagining herself ice-skating instead. It’s a beautifully shot moment, her on a blacked-out ice rink, completely alone, no McKay cheering her on. She does have her sister though, and at the scenes, for the dance they sit and laugh at other people which is always fun.

Kat got probably the only “happy” end to her story arc, finding Ethan on the dance floor, she realizes she can be the bad ass, confident, empowered woman she wants to be without being cruel, or shutting herself off emotionally. She finds a good middle ground and it’s very sweet to see her open up after so many episodes of her being so stoic.

Ethan delivers possibly the most romantic speech ever: “This is high school, will we last forever? Probably not. Someone will probably get hurt, but I’ll do my best to make sure that person is me.” What a cutie!  Mazel Tov to the happy couple.

Fezco and Ashtray (just learned that’s what the little kid's name is) don’t get arrested, but he is still in trouble with drug dealer Mouse, whom he owns money to. His solution is to put on a ski mask and rob some guy, I’m unsure if this man is narratively relevant, or if he’s just rich. He’s got stacks of cash and prescription pills in a drawer so Fez gets lucky either way. When the guy pulls a gun, Fez proves how hard he really is, that Nate should be worried, and beats the guy in front of his kid. Fez has been toted as the best man on the show and it’s sad to say after that scene he probably still is. There’s something so likable about Fez and Angus Cloud that has you blaming the guy getting robbed for trying to be brave instead of blaming Fez for robbing him. Audiences perceptions around men these days are so warped, and standards are so low that characters like Fezco, who seems genuinely okay deep down, become the ones we’re drawn to. It’s weird, but I’m guilty of it too, because while he gives Mouse the money, Mouse spots blood on the bills and grabs his gun, leading the question, “does Fez get shot?” and I hoped to god he didn’t.

Finally our heroes Rue and Jules. Jules does Rue’s eye makeup, in a very similar way to how Anna did hers the last episode, and sings Anna’s praises, casually letting slip that she did sleep with the other girl. Later that night at the dance Rue finds her taking selfies and sending them to Anna. While Rue and Jules aren’t in a relationship, while Jules isn’t Rue's keeper, her sponsor, or her girlfriend it still came off kind of dickish. Jules deserves to be as free as she wants but she has never been good at communicating. She tells Rue that she loves her, and she wants to kiss her, (they do, it’s very steamy), and that she doesn’t want Rue to change… But when a sloppily planned escape to the city between the two of them falls through, Jules ends up leaving Rue behind, going back to Anna essentially.

Rue and Jules were connected and were in a lot of ways perfect for each other, outsiders with the same sick views of the world, but in so many ways they weren’t right for one another, between Rue's addiction/sobriety and Jule’s lifestyle there were few ways were you could see it working out but it was still sad to see, and the way it happened didn’t make a terrible amount of sense. Jules escapes with Rue, but ditches her even though it was Rue’s plan? And the worst part is that that’s what Nate predicted would happen when he was fighting with Rue.

We end on a mishmash of scenes with Rue, Jules and her family, good flashbacks, and a flashback to a fight with her mother that was so bad Rue was kicked out of home, but when did this all happen? One flashback clues us onto the fact that Rue’s red sweatshirt was actually her dads, but other than that the scenes are confusing. Back in the present Rue puts on her dad's hoodie and snorts a line of something, officially falling off the wagon. The question, made less clear after the coming scenes, is did she die? Many people believe she’s only able to know everyone’s business every episode because she dies. 

Then, bizarrely it turns into a music video of sorts, if not a trippy one. You think Rue is revisiting more memories as she stumbles in a drug-induced state (Zendaya’s physicality here was fantastic) as her family ignores her, but then her dad is there, and then suddenly she’s in a sea of dancers and she’s (Zendaya) singing Labrinth's All For Us. (I already have it saved on Spotify talk about a BOP.)

It’s beautifully shot, choreographed and performed. The whole episode was beautiful, from the girls dance outfits, to the makeup, Cassey’s skate scene, and then the end dance. But it speaks to one of the biggest issues I have with Euphoria, which is if you take away the cinematography, great acting, the costuming and the killer soundtrack, Euphoria is narratively up and down. This episode was confusing, highlighted by the absurd ending. With season two confirmed more focus needs to go into planning for the future and making sure everything lines up. Speculation is Rue might be dead, or near dead but she only did one line of something so I think she’s fine, but alive or not the finale might have been so much more satisfying if things were a tiny bit clearer.

[palenoface]

DEH YouTubers AU

Personal channels

Jared is the first to really be active on YT : he doesn’t have a big community until he starts streaming for eight hours straight ; he becomes unexpectedly popular.

his fanbase makes memes out of his ragequits or his ridiculous winning poses. 

He called his fans “children” one time and it stuck with them.

Every now and then he posts tutorials on how to fix tech junk, pretty much like that one guy he saw doing a big “FUCK U” to apple 

His channel’s name is TheInsanelyCoolJaredKleinman but it’s kind of a mouthful so the internet shortened it to TICJK. His intro is “*spinning chair* SUP FUCKERS THE INSANELY COOL JARED KLEINMAN HERE AND TODAY-”

Connor accidentally uploaded an unedited video and the algorithm pushes him in the front of the scene maybe six months after he posted it.

Most of his channel is just him sitting at his desk, often high, ranting about everything that is wrong in the world and how one can get better on a personal level.

His most popular vid is the one where he talks about beating depression and prevening suicide. He almost cries on camera.

His channel reeks of chaotic energy and people are here for it.

His channel’s name is murphyrules and his intro is “Okay so.”

Alana does pretty much the same thing as Connor, but in a more calm,  collected way. Her channel is all about feel-good activism.

A lot of her vids are recorded outside. She usually writes what she wants to say before she turns on her camera and checks multiple times that her arguments are fair and valid.

She’s very LGBTQ+ oriented and talks a lot about feminism and racism, and just equality in general.

Her fanbase is pretty small and chill, so she hosts a discord where her fans can talk together and reach out whenever they’re in need.

He channel’s name is just Alana Beck and her intro is generally a quote from someone probably famous followed by “Hello everyone, you’re in the good place.” She likes the Good Place.

Zoe starts later than the rest of the team, but really gets into it when she sees how much it helps Connor and wants to try it for herself.

She mostly posts covers of Frank Sinatra and Ella Fitzgerald‘s songs, but occasionally makes book reviews.

She’s probably the least connected to her fans, because they aren’t all that numerous and barely comment, but she always gets an excellent ratio views/likes.

Her style is a little messy but everyone sees how much potential she has and is encouraging her to impose herself more.

Her channel’s name is Soul’s Pulse. She doesn’t have a real intro, but she fingerguns more often than not.

Evan didn’t plan to become a youtuber at first.

He’s mostly in the background of the other’s vids, like sometimes he’s listening to music in Jared’s room during a livestream, or how he sits on Connor’s bed when he decides to film anything, because he’s often high and Evan doesn’t want him to get hurt while setting up his stuff, or he goes on walks with Alana and holds the camera for her when she vlogs outside so she can have her hands free, or sometimes he and Zoe discuss about a particular line in a song or a book and try to understand why it works the way it works.

But one day Jared edits out twenty seconds out of one of his streams and it’s just Evan rapping at the speed of fast on Guns and Ships and the internet basically exploses.

He’s not sure at first, but then under the insistant demands on his instagram and twitter he finally makes his own channel : turns out he’s very good at beatboxing, rapping and singing acapella, so he mostly does that for a while, but then branches out a little and starts doing his own rant videos about ecology and mental health.

His channel’s name is Ev Rants and his intro is “Today is a good day and here’s why.”

Collabs

Jared is, as often in their group, the first to be asked to do official collabs with his friends, and not just Evan or Alana walking by in the background.

Jared & Connor sometimes play together online on random games, and eventually get kicked out of their respective teams because they keep targeting each other no matter what the main goal is. They often end teaming up and beating everyone else’s ass.

Jared & Alana play strategy board games. It usually take them a whole day to get through a single game because they keep trying to one-up each other with ridiculous yet very effective tactics.

Jared & Zoe collab very rarely on Jared’s channel, but there are one or two videos of Zoe describing very cool mods she found for Skyrim.

Jared & Evan don’t really collab, it’s more like Evan tags along at some point during livestreams and acts like an unhelpful second driver, trying to give Jared directions. It’s very frustrating for both of them but very funny for the public.

Connor never titles his videos as collabs, and his thumbnails are always a black screen with the title on it, so it’s generally a surprise whenever there is someone else on screen.

Connor & Jared made a short series of videos where Jared looks at stuff on the internet and Connor has to tell if it’s true or made up.

Connor & Alana team up on subjects like white/male privilege or capitalism and make a lot of historical researches to understand where it comes from and why it still exists.

Connor & Zoe’s collabs are the more frequent as they live under the same roof. It’s always less-than-a-minute videos recorded with a phone, where one of the siblings does something stupid or weird, like accidentally setting fire to a frying pan.

Connor & Evan are both present in most of Connor’s videos, but Evan doesn’t always speak up. When he does, it turns into a question-answers kind of game about a specific topic until they both know enough about it to write a whole thesis.

Alana puts all the tags possible on her collabs, because she wants to make sure everyone knows that, yes, she actually has friends in real life.

Alana & Jared once tried to host a DnD night with the gang, but ended fighting over technicalities of the main quest. It’s probably the longest video on her channel to this day.

Alana & Connor vlog together when she finds a way to lure him outside of his house. They go to museums where Alana plays the guide and Connor makes snarky comments about everything, but they overall enjoy themselves.

Alana & Zoe decided from the start that their collabs would never be heavy themed, so they do a lot of challenges - or at least the non-dangerous or stupid ones - and tags and asks videos.

Alana & Evan love to record their treks in the mountains or in the forest, because Evan has an impressive memory when it comes to trees and plants, and Alana is always eager to learn.

Zoe gets more important once the others include her in their videos, but there is always the idea that her subs are here for her and her only.

Zoe & Jared make vine compilations. That’s it, that’s all they do.

Zoe & Connor made one (1) cover together on a random song and for some reason it’s now a daily thing.

Zoe & Alana talk a lot about music theory when they are together. Sometimes they also do wholesome memes and satisfying sped-up videos of the two of them cleaning a whole room.

Zoe & Evan sing a lot acapella when they have the time, and if they don’t they just review cartoons. (Zoe has a thing for Steven Universe, but shhh.)

Evan & Jared come up with game theories when they collab on Evan’s channel. The most popular video about it is the one where they realized the theme songs of the characters in Undertale are always connected to one another.

Evan & Connor make sure to film together once every five videos. They don’t always know what they will be talking about, but Evan just hit the record button and they spend the afternoon together, after what he edits it out and keeps the important parts.

Evan & Alana do yoga on saturdays, sometimes with Connor as a special guest. It never goes as planned and always ends in laughter when one of them inevitably slips and falls.

Evan & Zoe’s collabs are kind of messy when it’s on Evan’s channel, but it’s always wonky DIY and weird cooking recipes they found online. They sing together while working.

Group channel

Alana is the one who thinks of it, because she’s been asked multiple times on her Discord if she would do a Q&A, and most of the questions are about her relationships with the other members of the team.

They call the channel Dear Unholy Five after the first meme to come out is all five responding “porn”at the same time at the question “what did the internet brought you that you would never have learned in school ?”

Zoe does most of the group challenges on this channel instead of her own, like making everyone’s makeup - this one was a disaster, they had no idea what they were doing - or watching terrible movies and commenting it.

Connor uses the channel as an excuse to play ouija. Evan is lowkey the only one enjoying himself, weirdly enough. Jared jokes that Evan has a supernatural kink on top of the tree one. “Ghost tree kink” becomes a new meme within the community.

Jared just loves being asked stuff.

The community

Because the group is close-knitted and is used to read each-other’s comments, Zoe quickly notices that some of their fans are starting to shipping them. While her and Alana’s relationship isn’t a secret - they hold hands in various vlogs and sometimes even kiss on camera, and no one really made a big deal about it - Evan isn’t officially out of the closet, Jared’s SO prefers to keep their identity private and Connor isn’t the most comfortable around feelings.

As it starts happening more and more often, Connor and Evan figure out that whatever is between them doesn’t need to make it on the internet, so they don’t confirm nor deny anything.

It only fuels the fanbase more, but because they’re such a small community based on each other’s respect and privacy they don’t pry too much, and when anyone starts to be too nosy the rest of the fanbase quickly shut them down. There are however the occasional shippers who never miss anything on screen and notice whenever Connor makes heart-eyes at Evan, or when Evan becomes flustered by Connor’s proximity.

Zoe is the one unexpectedly confirming the theories when she records the two boys singing Marianas Trench at two in the morning, and Connor suddenly kisses Evan in the middle of Here’s to the Zeros and resumes on singing like it’s nothing. The bad quality of the video doesn’t stop it from trending, before Zoe finally takes it down on Evan’s request.

The fans stay respectful of their wish for privacy, and after the first wave of hype it just becomes common knowledge that they’re together. (It doesn’t stop Connor from killing his fans a little whenever he and Evan swap clothes, though.)

[poppytheorist]

Me Laughing

must’ve been one hell of a joke

Preamble

So, I was in the middle of writing a piece on [redacted] when Poppy released a 27-minute video of herself laughing. Naturally, that took priority. Sorry for my absence, this post took some time. And by “some time,” I mean “45 hours.”

This may be the best thing I’ve written, but it’s also the most insane thing I’ve written. In fact, I would label this post as ‘maddening.’ It’s possible you won’t be able to look at Poppy the same way again. I know I don’t. You can’t unread this, readers beware, [other dramatic warnings], etc., etc.

Descend when ready.

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I thought “Concrete” was pretty #wild, but “Me Laughing” takes the cake. This video is pure lunacy, and I mean that somewhat literally since Poppy does laugh at what appears to be nothing for almost half an hour.

Due to the sheer insanity of “Me Laughing,” I’ve put together a handy little collage to help readers follow along. Behold: my barely passable Paint skills!

the pic for Section 4 basically explains everything

Before we begin, I need to address a few things. There’s at least, like, nine people who read this stuff, and while I can’t say that I envy you, I can say that I appreciate you. Thanks for sticking around.

However, there’s a funny thing that happens when you know you’re writing for an audience. You feel pressured to adapt your style. I feel the need to be a little more careful about some of the things I say, but that’s probably for the best. Hopefully this extra care will result in more coherent posts, but I doubt it.

This post will be long. Partially because “Me Laughing” is long, partially because I’ve padded this out with shaky theory about how the world works. Guess that’s no different than my other posts, but still, feel free to tune that out if you’re just here for the Poppy stuff, though maybe you’ll find some of it interesting.

I tend to write authoritatively, which may be misleading because I’m not always confident about what I’m saying. I simply enjoy taking things to their natural conclusions. Typically, there’s something interesting at the end. Or, at least, a premise insane enough to make writing about it enjoyable. See, for example, my post on “Concrete.” This post won’t be much different, maybe just a little crazier.

Now, I’ve got a funny feeling that some people may think I am “reading too much into this” or that Poppy’s work “isn’t that deep.” Hey, I get it. Those objections are completely understandable. I was once there myself, but now I’ve moved away from thinking that way. I’ll do my best to explain why.

From what I’ve seen, aesthetics (roughly: the study of art) is a total battlefield. Nobody agrees on anything, everybody thinks that only they can ‘properly’ understand art and that everyone else is wrong. There’s people who think beauty is objective, there’s people who think “no, that’s stupid, beauty is obviously subjective,” and there’s even the people who outright deny that aesthetics exists. Recently, we also had the pleasure of witnessing the aesthetics debate become another facet of the everlasting culture war. Think a line from “Play Destroy” sums my thoughts about that up: “oh boy!”

Needless to say, it’s a massive shitshow.

Despite my rather war-torn depiction of modern aesthetics, it might be a good thing that we can never ‘understand’ art. I hear that’s, like, part of the point. If art was ever ‘solved,’ well, we’d be faced with the idea that there is nothing ‘special’ about being human, that we’re just sacks of meat bumbling around with no purpose. Then everybody would, like, die or something. Truth hurts, art heals, let’s stay alive.

Anywho, I mention all this because there’s no rigorous way to determine how ‘deep’ a song (or any piece of art) is. You can’t just take a stick, poke it into some art, and say: “yep, this Poppy song is 75 [metres/fathoms/hands/whatever nonsense unit] deep!” Besides, nobody even agrees what ‘artistic depth’ means, and most attempts to define it flounder. If you listen closely, you can just faintly hear Goodhart laughing.

This is also why people who think they can ‘objectively’ analyze art are dogmatic blowhards. Any amount of rigorous thinking reveals that our standards for what make art ‘good’ or ‘bad’ are entirely baseless. No, seriously, it’s a case of channeling your inner Socrates and repeatedly asking ‘why’ until the other person throws their up their arms, leaves, and stops answering your texts.

We don’t even know what art is, so thinking you can ‘understand’ art and judge its ‘depth’ is pure arrogance. At least, until someone finds a way to math that shit. “Sounds solipsism.” Well, ya gotta start somewhere.

Now, does this mean we should also throw up our arms, say: “screw it” and return to binging Netflix and eating foods that you know aren’t good for you but you eat them anyways because they make you feel good and that’s what you need right now? Well, no, actually.

Even if we aren’t 100% sure what art is, or what we should do with it, there are some theories on art that I would call: “pretty not-terrible.” Some people have spent their entire lives thinking about these things and their insights are fascinating. However, I’m not here to talk theory. If you want to learn more, go pick up a book or something, nerd.

Anyway, one time this German guy said: “without music, life would be a mistake.” He also said that looking at things from multiple perspectives is pretty neat, so that’s what we’re here to do. Turns out art is kinda fun and spending a bit more time thinking about it pays dividends.

See, art just wants to be understood and so does Poppy. I want to give her and Titanic the benefit of the doubt and take them seriously as artists. While I don’t think everything they produce is God’s gift to earth (see: [redacted]), I do enjoy the majority of their work. Plus, the abstract and absurd nature of their content means writing about it is a blast.

Whether I truly believe any of the interpretations I come up with is irrelevant. Hell, I’m not even sure half of what I say even remotely resembles what Poppy and Titanic envisioned. But, that’s not the point. Shallow readings are a dime-a-dozen, see: Genius; I’m here to provide something better. To show that Poppy’s work, or any art, really, can be a whole lot more fun if you spend even just a teensy bit of time analyzing it. Hopefully I can also provide some of the tools to do so.

Enough rambling, let’s get into it.

Intro

At first glance, “Me Laughing” seems like Poppy doing cute ASMR for 27(!!) minutes while simultaneously trolling anyone who expected a video titled “Me Laughing” to be about anything different. Sure, but that reading gets a ‘B’ for ‘Basic.’

Yes, Poppy and Titanic often troll their audience. See: “A live Interview with Poppy.” But the trolling is both part of the delivery of their message and part of the message itself. So while “Me Laughing” looks like a simple ASMR troll video, I’m going to argue that it’s not.

Previously, Poppy released videos like “Delete Your Facebook” and “I’m Poppy.” Fun vids, but they’re made of looped clips. Thirty seconds in and you’ve watched the whole thing. Consider: “Me Laughing” is 27 minutes, but no parts are looped, it’s all original. As always, I’m just here to ask: why?

Since “Me Laughing” is not made up of looped clips, but is instead all original content, there is an inherent progression to the events. Each segment is unique, and when considered sequentially, pieces from each section build on each other to produce an artistic whole.

Yes, that’s a fancy way of saying it has a ‘story.’

Also, if you’ve watched the video, you’ll know that something just feels ‘off.’ If “Me Laughing” was ‘just’ Poppy ASMR, why does she constantly focus on a single point in the distance? What’s with Poppy’s frequent stares into the camera? And why the fuck is she wearing latex?

Clearly, something else is going on.

Detailed Summary

Let’s recall what actually happens in “Me Laughing.” Hopefully this recap will convey a sense of what ‘else’ exactly is going on and make the insane claims later on in the analysis a tad easier to swallow.

“Me Laughing” starts off pretty normally. Sections 1 and 2 are mostly Poppy laughing, as promised. Even in these early sections, however, we can still pick out some peculiar things.

In Section 1, and throughout the video, we see Poppy looking upwards as she laughs, as if she was remembering something funny that happened. Or as if she was thinking about something for a while and suddenly found it hilarious. “Maybe Poppy just looks upward when she laughs.” Doubtful. Try doing it right now. Feels weird, right? Whatever, moving on…

Next oddity: there’s a strange transitioning shot at the start of the video and between Sections 1 and 2 where the camera sweeps over Poppy’s latex-ed body. “Well, maybe Titanic just thought it would be cool to do it like that.” Yes, but why did he think it would be cool? Why that transitioning shot, out of all the possible ones? What purpose does it serve?

Also: Section 1 was a very steady shot, probably filmed using a tripod, or whatever fancy word camera-people use. However, the shot for Section 2 is shaky. Like, weirdly shaky. Maybe even too shaky. And this isn’t the only section filmed this way, half of “Me Laughing” is too. “Well, maybe Titanic can’t hold a camera steady.” No, that doesn’t seem right. We know Titanic can, in fact, hold a camera steady, or, at the very least, he possesses the means to take a steady shot. See: literally all Poppy videos. No, the shaky-cam is intentional. Again, I’m just here to ask: why?

Now, I don’t mean to tip my hand too much here, but to me, the camera’s sway resembles the unsteady gaze of a curious observer. Perhaps one who is timidly stepping around the beheld, drinking in all the angles. Recall my post on “Touch Poppy.” With steady camera shots, it’s easy to forget someone is on the other side, but with unsteady shots, it’s downright impossible to ignore, e.g., “wow, that shaky-cam is really noticeable. What is this, a shitty sequel to the Blair Witch Project?” Perhaps these sections were filmed this way to emphasize the presence of an observer. As for why such a thing would be emphasized—well, we’ll get to that.

Around the 3:30 mark, Poppy shakes her head and clearly utters a, “m-mm,” as in, “nuh-uh, no way.” This gesture is repeated throughout the video. I’ll let you think about that one.

The video continues, and at 3:52 the camera lazily pans down, focusing on Poppy’s body and cutting her head out of the shot for several seconds, similar to the transition shot from Section 1 to 2. Thirty seconds later, the same thing happens. Guess this isn’t just Titanic diversifying the shot composition. It’s also about this point where attempts to pass “Me Laughing” off as anything resembling a ‘normal’ video start to fall apart.

Poppy’s sitting position in Section 3 is both clever and hilarious. It shows her whole get-up, highlighting how absurdly tall her platform shoes are. She also flip-flops her feet back and forth several times as if to further emphasize her mega-shoes. Why would she wear such crazy shoes for a simple video of herself laughing?

That’s not all that’s ‘off’ about Section 3—this is also the first section where Poppy stares at a spot in the distance for a prolonged period of time. In several instances, she quizzically tilts her head to the side, not unlike a faithful dog trying to decipher commands from her master. At 6:23 we also get a clear “huh,” a noise of acknowledgement, of understanding. Further, Section 3 has several stretches of silence where Poppy is no longer laughing. She just sits there while you watch. It’s… unsettling.

Section 4 is shot in a similarly shaky-style to Section 2, but this time with Poppy sitting down. Also, we see instances of Poppy focusing on something off in the distance both when she is laughing and when she is not, as was the case in the previous sections. However, there are some weird things about Section 4 that set it apart from the others and further develop the video.

Around the 8:38 mark, Poppy utters a “mm-mm-mm” sound while shaking her head and staring off into the distance. It’s fairly clear that she is communicating with something off-screen. Perhaps entities that are invisible to us. It wouldn’t be a stretch to say these off-screen entities are the things making her laugh.

We will see more evidence of Poppy supposedly communicating with invisible beings later, however, this is bordering on fetishizing Poppy’s lore as opposed to analyzing her artistic message. If you’re half-learned on Poppy lore (which, you better be, considering the fact that you’re reading this), this would be like focusing on the identity of ‘They’ instead of the significance of ‘They.’ Another example would be focusing on the ‘origin’ of Poppy, e.g., is she an android? Who is her creator? Etc., instead of asking why someone would create the artistic work of Poppy in the first place and/or considering the implications of said work.

If you’ve read anything else I’ve written, perhaps you’ve noticed that I try and stay away from acknowledging that Poppy even has lore. I want to take Poppy seriously, not literally. Or, in “pretentious asshole” terms, to consider her work artistically, not canonically. There are many reasons for this and I didn’t just get here randomly overnight, but that’s for another post.

Edgy ranting aside, there’s another part of Section 4 that I’d like to point out. Before this section, there was only a single instance of Poppy looking into the camera (happened in Section 2), but in Section 4, she frequently looks into the lens, acknowledging that an observer is present. She shoots this observer a flurry of dark and mischievous glances. Then she laughs.

Section 5 features more head shaking, distant staring, etc., but it is also a relatively sad section. Poppy laughs very little, and frequently looks down. Yes, a pun. Poppy has been laughing for most of the video, so why, all of a sudden, does she seem so sad?

Section 6 is shot shakily and close-up. I mean, really close-up. Like, right-in-her-face close-up. To the point where the camera is often out of focus. We’re also given a blatantly voyeuristic sweep over Poppy’s chest as the camera shifts position around her. Further, there are several instances where Poppy looks deep into the camera, with what I refer to as a “model pout,” where she slightly parts her lips and opens her eyes wide. Recall my post on “Computer Boy” where I talked about the fan-idol relationship. That lustful look? It’s for you, except everybody knows it’s not.

Quick note: I will elaborate on this when I talk about “You’re Too Close,” but it’s important to stay mindful and know that despite some uncomfortably voyeuristic shots in “Me Laughing,” it doesn’t necessarily mean that the video, or anyone who worked on it, is, y’know, perverted or something. Depicting the voyeuristic nature of idolism is how we talk about the voyeuristic nature of idolism, the same way that depicting racism is how we talk about racism.

The problem is that nowadays, we are trained to think quickly, not critically. Your initial response (also called your ‘knee-jerk’ response) to Poppy’s work shouldn’t be your final response to it. It’s important to consider context and think carefully. Ask yourself: why would Poppy choose to show you this? What does she want you to think about? What is she trying to tell you?

Section 7 is where things start to get really fucking weird.

Previously, I said that there was something darker lurking in “Me Laughing,” and Section 7 is where this darkness begins to manifest. The segment starts with Poppy having another one of her imaginary conversations with demons or whatever where she nods her head and gives some “mm-hmms” in agreement. Shortly after, she looks right at the camera and laughs in your face. Not only is her laugh absolutely maniacal, but it seems completely sincere too. This section really relates the feeling that you are not in on the ‘joke’—maybe the joke’s about you.

Section 7 also provides a sense of violent foreboding: a creeping feeling that something is going to happen to you, but you don’t know what that ‘something’ is, and you have absolutely no power to stop it. What really drives this sense of helplessness home is the way the scene is shot. At one point, the camera spends a few seconds just looking at Poppy’s hand. This emphasizes your lack of control. You are completely at the mercy of the camera’s whims. You only see what is shown to you. Then, as the scene closes, the camera is put down in front of Poppy, and, after a few tense seconds, she slowly reorients her body and starts crawling towards you. Luckily, the camera is picked up before she reaches it—you were saved, but what if you hadn’t been?

Oh, right, I forgot to mention: Poppy didn’t laugh much in this section.

Section 8 is a more amped-up version of Section 6. We get Poppy staring deep into the camera for almost the entire scene’s duration. Her lustful gaze relates a feeling of vulnerability, like you are spying on a defenseless little girl, but at the same time, it feels like she is giving you one last dose of what you want before she brutally murders you.

Section 9 is fairly straightforward. We have Poppy staring at a fixed point in the distance as if she is receiving orders from her alien overlord. We also get several rapid glances toward the camera, as if her orders somehow involve you, or as if she and someone else are sharing gossip about you right in front of your face.

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…And then Section 10 happens.

Poppy says: “goodbye.”

In Section 10 we have a bit of a climax. No, not that kind of climax. Well, unless this essay is really doing it for you.

The first interpretation of Section 10 is fairly basic, Poppy is waving goodbye because you’re about to die. Obviously, whatever scheme she and her invisible monster friends cooked up is going to be carried out, and it’s probably going to result in the destruction of everything, yourself included. This is sad, probably, but she seems to find it highly amusing. Again, I’m not a fan of obsessing over canon or lore, so I’ll tackle this one slightly differently in the analysis, but I do think this reading of “Me Laughing” is at least semi-faithful to Poppy and Titanic’s vision. This interpretation also serves as a very nice teaser for P3. I mean, if “Do you disagree?” has told us anything, P3 will have a lot of destroying.

The next reading of Section 10 involves the objectifying nature of idolism. Yes, the $5 words are starting to come out, brace yourself. Anyway, in this section, Poppy giggles as she waggles her hands around, back and forth then forth and back, as though she is using her hands for the first time. Almost like a shiny, new automaton discovering its motor functions. It’s cute, but silly. And by silly, I mean overly silly. You have to remember that Poppy is played by a woman in her mid-20s. Reminds me of some lines from “Hard Feelings”: “my arms and my legs are so stiff / Is that the way you wanted it?” Or, rather, is this how you want her to act?

At the end of the section, the camera moves right up to Poppy’s face and she looks at you and just… stares.

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And stares…

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And stares…

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She knows.

Finally, we get to Section 11, which would be my main argument against the totally boring ‘Poppy communicating with demons’ reading. Poppy is seated, again, with her arms wrapped around her thighs. Note again the sense of her smallness and vulnerability transmitted by her sitting position. Also note the way the shot is filmed, with the camera looking down on Poppy and frequently swooping in for close passes.

And then, in the last two seconds, something really bizarre happens. For a brief moment, some foreign object enters the shot, just in the very corner. Now, I’m about to make a weird argument, be wary of it. Other than the random piece of equipment entering the shot, “Me Laughing” does not end off on a noteworthy moment. Just Poppy sitting there, looking up at the camera. Plenty of instances of that. The video could have easily been trimmed by 2 seconds and nothing would have changed. We can also (probably) assume that somebody carefully reviewed this video before it was uploaded.

We’re left the possibility that those last two seconds were left in the video for a reason. And that reason is—

Hey, wait a minute, was that a mirror?

Analysis

“Me Laughing” is a really interesting video, and you can have a lot of fun if you spend some time looking into it, so that’s exactly what we’re going to do. We’ll tackle it from several different angles, watch for the switches.

Quick words of warning here: I’m about to use the words ‘parody,’ ‘satire,’ and ‘sarcasm’ interchangeably, a practice some would refer to as: “really fucking lazy.” Frankly, I don’t give a damn, I’m not a professional, I’m going to type my silly words anyway and you can’t stop me.

As content loses any sense of shame in attempting to draw your attention, nuance withers away and it becomes harder and harder to differentiate parody from parodied. For example, is “Old Town Road” criticizing the state of the music industry or embracing it? Now, I’m positive that Lil Nas X has the self-awareness of my pug when he’s lapping up his own boogers, yet I personally couldn’t write a song that so perfectly encapsulates everything wrong with modern music. So, is “Old Town Road” a parody or not?

This is where someone ripping off Westworld would say: “if you can’t tell, does it matter?” to which I would answer: “yes, yes it does.”

Context may be fleeting, unreliable, and arguably nonexistent, but I still believe it’s possible to differentiate parody from parodied, it just takes a little more effort. See, I think “Me Laughing” is satirical as hell, especially considering its context within Poppy’s body of work and how it compares to mainstream internet content.

First, consider that the frankly-titled video “Me Laughing” was hyped up for three days before it ‘premiered’ on YouTube. Hilarious, but also incisive. Who waits three days to see someone laugh? “Well, I did.” Ah.

The sarcastic nature of the video also shines through in the description, which reads: “A motion picture starring Poppy.” There’s a tired, yet necessary, statement here on the continuing degradation of internet content. What won’t people eat up?

We all know Poppy’s no stranger to sarcasm. See: “Bleach Blonde Baby” or “Poppy loves Politics.” She will often refer to her videos as “high quality internet content,” while uploading videos of herself eating cotton candy or ‘ooo-ing’ at things. With “Me Laughing,” a video where she laughs for 27 minutes, Poppy further questions where the line is regarding what content people will happily consume.

Fun story: I’ve seen people call “Me Laughing” ASMR. In fact, I think I did, at some point. Huh, I should probably change that. This isn’t totally wrong, but know that “Me Laughing” takes so many shots at ASMR you’d think the video shared a set with Sicario. And, if that’s the case, they could have saved some money and just filmed the video in my neighborhood haha… hah… ha… (seriously though I’m in danger)

Considering “Me Laughing” as a genuine ASMR video would obviously be antithetical to Poppy’s entire body of work. Recall lyrics like: “Poppy is an object.” No, “Me Laughing” is much more than simply Poppy recording cute ASMR.

Poppy has been questioning the nature of people’s ASMR obsession since her first YouTube video, “Poppy Eats Cotton Candy,” where she had the mic uncomfortably close to her throat so her little gulps and coos were clearly audible. What leads to people wanting to hear these things?

Zoom out: many of Poppy’s videos are about obsession. Forget that and the point will fly right over your head. Let’s now reframe the question: why would people want to hear such intimate sounds from Poppy? Answer that and “Me Laughing” will make a lot more sense.

What I’m about to say next will be very dense because it will outline the thesis of a large part of Poppy’s work. Sorry, hopefully it’s still readable. I’m still developing my interpretations of her work, and I promise to expand and explain them more in the future.

I’m also sure some fans will want to stab me in the neck with a rusty spoon for this post because it’ll appear like I am directly criticizing them. In reality, I am actually insinuating that Poppy is criticizing them, but nuance is dead, knee-jerk reactions reign supreme. Whatever. If you react that way, it means you’re so eyeballs deep in obsession that you fail to realize why Poppy courts your obsession in the first place. Poppy’s work entices fans to obsess over her, but it also berates those who do so.

Note that this is all as a means of criticizing the status-quo. And guess what: fans are part of the status-quo. It stings when you realize your idol’s criticisms are actually about you, but I’m not convinced Poppy is malicious. She wants you to be a better person.

This is my best estimate of her thesis: the nature of the objectification of celebrities is rooted in a sexual obsession—that is, a desire for their bodies. Pun intended. Objectification stems from fantasizing over what the celebrity shows you, which is almost always physical, or at least results in the fantasy manifesting itself as a physical representation.

In other words: “everybody wants to be Poppy.”

Poppy recognizes the inherently sexual obsession with figures in the ASMR community. She wears latex in “Me Laughing” to draw attention to this. It’s as if she was saying: “this is what you’re here for, right?”

Note that obsession is inherently progressive. It grows and grows, eventually leading to fans voyeuristically observing the objectified person’s intimate bodily functions. This culminates in “Me Laughing.” Poppy knows what you want, but as payment, she’s going to leave a nagging feeling in your brain that somehow you have done something wrong. That you shouldn’t really be watching this video, but she knows you are.

Recall Titanic’s comments about making people slightly uncomfortable. Consuming is harder with a lump in your throat. The key to understanding Poppy’s work is to ask why she wants you to feel uncomfortable. What about your behavior does she want you to realize?

Earlier in the post, I mentioned that I’m not a huge fan of the whole ‘Poppy talking to demons about destroying the world’ reading because it comes dangerously close to obsessing over her lore. Lore is like history without the usefulness, so I’m going to ignore it. Regardless, I said I would use that interpretation for something more interesting, so I’d like to ask:

What makes someone want to destroy the world?

Throughout “Me Laughing,” Poppy shoots dark glares at the camera. There’s something sinister in her eyes, something genuinely evil lurking in her gaze. We know she obviously has an immense disdain for the status-quo. What else would lead to lyrics like: “down, let it all burn down / burn it to the ground”?

Preceding any cries of “viva la revolución!” or “apocalypse, now!” is an implicit judgement that what is left of the world is either not able to be saved, or not worth saving. That tearing everything down and beginning anew is preferable to salvaging what remains. To reach such a mindset, one would need to see modern society with such disgust and be so disenchanted with our current world that it no longer appears worth preserving. One would also need to have given up hope on the ability for people to come together and solve their problems. To have lost hope in humanity’s ability to adapt and overcome. To think that perhaps our problems have become too big for us to solve, that perhaps we have finally dug too deep a hole to climb out of.

Again, people don’t reach a hopeless mindset overnight; it takes many steps to descend into the darkness. But, the numpties on r/GetMotivated tell me, “every journey begins with a single step,” so let’s take one together.

In a tweet, I mentioned that “Me Laughing” was also about absurdism. No, that wasn’t a typo for ‘absurdity.’ I may write ridiculously deep-dives into Poppy lyrics and lore, but I try not to waste words.

Anyway, let’s play a game. I call it the “imagine something real quick because I need to prove a point” game.

Imagine being stuck in a system. Yes, it’s cliché to use the word ‘system,’ and any time you do, it carries the connotation that you are some conspiracy nut, e.g., “you can’t trust the system man!” I understand all this, please just bear with me and let me use the word, it’s useful. Anyway, you don’t like the system because a lot of the system is bad and it’s slowly, but surely, getting worse. The cracks are starting to show and the whole thing is poised to come crumbling down. Okay, that’s not good, you want to tell people about this. To warn them. However, in order to obtain a sizable audience for your message, you need to first succeed within the system, and to do that, you need to play by the system’s rules.

Okay, no sweat, you release some pop songs. There’s a couple of them that people really dig. Unfortunately, the songs people like don’t contain much of your message. They have a watered-down version of it at best. That’s a little sad, but oh well, at least you’re getting some sort of message out there. Hey, maybe if you make the music video really weird, people will realize there’s something more going on! Hm, that didn’t seem to work either.

So you release some YouTube videos too. Some of them are pretty biting, especially that one on politics. Should get people thinking, right? Hah, no, wrong. People like them, yes, but not for the reasons you want. They like them because they’re “weird” and “addictive” e.g., “its 3 AM on a school night and I’m still watching Poppy videos why can’t I stop lolol.” Imagining that the videos contain some sort of Illuminati-esque hidden message to decode is preferable to examining the real-world implications of the work. Plus, like, there’s experts for that, right?

Anyway, a couple albums and hundreds of videos later, you have a sizable following, sweet, now you can transition to doing what you’ve always wanted to. Change the persona to something a little truer to yourself. Make your message a little clearer. Finally, you have the power to change the world like you always promised you would.

Uh-oh, Houston, we’ve got a problem. Your audience listened to you for X, but now you’re giving them Y. It’s not a total loss, though. You have a lot of loyal members in your audience, and they like your new stuff too. Doesn’t matter what you make, they’re loyal, they’ll watch/listen/whatever to it. Their dedication has become investment which has become even more dedication. In fact, they’ve been following you since the start, when you were first trying to get big. “Yes, but I was trying to get big because I wanted to spread a message and to do that I had to make compromises to grow an audience so people would liste—“

They also have their own ideas of what you’re saying, plus, like, they make neat art, here, check this out, please give this a listen, look at this, read this, please, please? “Hey, nice article. Wait, the next one is how many words?!” And you keep every piece of fan art because it really does mean a lot to you. “Wow, I appreciate it, that’s beautiful, thank you. Oh, what? There’s even more?” Hey, if you have spare minute, could you give a shout-out to my friend? It’s her birthday. “Sure, hold on…” It’s also my birthday tomorrow, could you give this post a like? “Um, okay, just give me a minut—“ Also, could you answer my DM on Instagram? It’s important. And after that there’s only 100 more to answer! kk thanks! “Wait… one second… whoa!”

Now you’re releasing Z, hopefully that will get your message across…

…

…

…

Wait—what was your message again?

…

…

…

Oh no.

…

…

…

Somewhere along the way, probably between performing [this] and signing [that], the essence of your message was lost. Whatever remains has been drowned out by the noise of the system. If we’re talking decibels, notifications are loud, problems are whispers, and these days everyone’s got ear plugs.

Thinking about problems is hard, thinking about them for too long is sad, being sad is uncomfortable, hey, look, Taylor Swift just dropped a new album, that “Lover” song is dope, let’s look at memes.

So, you want to change the system. But to change the system you need power. To get power, you need an audience. But the only way to get an audience is to make content that gets rewarded by the system. And the content that gets rewarded by the system is that which is easily digestible for a large audience, i.e., devoid of substance. I mean, I don’t know about you, but I don’t think “Turn Down for What” resulted in much positive social change. “Well, maybe the system should reward content that is creative, challenging, and conscientious instead!” Ah, yes, I see what you mean. So, you want to change the system…

Pass the mic, Camus, I’ve got a real knee-slapper for ya. Oh, right, guess I’ll just grab it myself.

These days, we’re faced with a new kind of absurdism, one which involves recognizing that societal systems are getting worse and need changing, while simultaneously recognizing that you are chained by said systems, and thus, powerless to change them.

This new absurdism describes the maddening exercise in doublethink where people wrestle with the knowledge that they should be Making The World A Better Place but also the knowledge that they cannot possibly live in a way that satisfies such capitalized phrases. The end result is a mental tearing fueled by impossible societal expectations and the inevitable guilt of failing to live up to them.

After a while, people stop fighting. They give up. They give in. When enough people throw in the towel, all that’s left is to hold on tight and enjoy the ride, e.g., the trajectory is set, all aboard, no, there aren’t enough seat belts for everyone, must have been one of those damn cost-saving initiatives.

“Yeah, that definitely sounds absurd. So… what do we do about it?”

Well, sometimes all you can do is laugh.

[suenala]

BTS-imagine ; You falling asleep

Makanae line

masterlist

[genre] ; fluff + smut

[fandom] ; 방탄소년단

[⚠] ; #makanaelove

-I do not own any of these gif's, credit to original owners-

====================================================

| Jimin |

You and Jimin were having a movie night in the dorms with the other guys, you were sitting on the couch with Jimin's head on your lap, you loved it when he laid on you, you got to play with his hair and tease him with kisses. Tae had an idea of instead of watching a couple movies it was watching as many movies until you fell asleep, it was the fourth movie and Yoongi, Jin, and Namjoon had fallen asleep after the second movie. Hoseok being weirdly interested in romantic movies chose the Notebook. You didn't really ever had the chance to ever watch it so at first it was interesting but then half of it started to get boring that's when you slowly drifted off to sleep.

"Hey, babe, are you tired?" Jimin whispered noticing you jerking your head back up when you fell asleep.

"No.."

"Yes you are" he chuckled and sat up straight

"Lay here" he patted his lap and picked up the blanket that he was using

"Jimin, I'm not tired" you started to blink multiple times to try and stay awake. Jimin took your hand and gently pulled you down so that your head was on his lap, he places the blanket on you and tucked it in. You had to admit that after he did that there was a greater chance of falling asleep and slowly you did.

"haha, your so cute~" he moved your hair from your face and pecked your lips.

A couple hours later you and he were snuggled on the couch asleep together while Jungkook and Hobi were on their seventh movie soon enough it was 4 am and once the movie was finished they also fell asleep, nobody slept in their room that night.

====================================================

| V / Taehyung |

Tae was in your dance studio watching you and the other members in your group practice a dance to an upcoming song. You had been working all day, interviews, writing lyrics, recording, and then practice. You were exhausted but you had another hour of practice, you always pushed through all the work and did your best but you were also the makanae so everyone was worried that you were pushing yourself too far and sometimes you did, it would get to the point of you fainting during recording or practice, no one wanted that to happen and took extra caution on you.

"Hey! Y/N babe, take a break!" the song finished and Tae walked up to you with a bottle and a towel. He was worried you would faint like last week. You just nodded and took the bottle.

"Are you okay? Your breathing so heavy Y/N...im worried" he turned you around and tied your hair into a messy bun and grabbed a tiny hand fan from his coat and fanned you.

"I'm okay, don't worry." You managed to drink the whole bottle and gave it to him, he frowned and crushed it.

"Y/N! Come on!"

"Yes Unnie!" You ran towards your other members and waved at Tae he just sighed and started to fan himself, he was curious of how much energy and strength you have from your still busy day.

"She acts just like Jungkook, I swear sometimes I think they're siblings" he rolled his eyes and mumbled to himself, the most catchy part of the song was about to play so he quickly took out his phone and started to record you. Putting the caption ;

'Whaaa! She's working so hard!'

Since the song isn't out yet he sent it to his members group chat.

About 30 minutes passed and you were at your limit without passing out, you were breathing heavily and sat next to your boyfriend.

"Here, you're not practicing more are you?" He handed you a fruit bowl and another bottle

"I cant. I'm exhausted." you took a gulp of water and started eating, a staff member came up to you and said that you were okay to go, they didn't want you to overwork again. You sighed and finished eating and started to pack.

"Are you sleeping in your dorm tonight?" Tae said grabbing your duffle bag and wiping the sweat from your forehead.

"No, I want to cuddle with my TaeTae" you gave him an eye smile, he patted your head and laughed

"But sweetie you're sweaty...." Tae put the towel on your head and skipped through the hallways as you exited the studio

"Ugh, Hey! I won't sleep with you at all then!" He quickly turned around and pulled you into a hug.

"No, no, no, my bed will get cold!!" He looked at you and pouted, grabbing your hand and intertwining it together with his

"Whatever, I can't resist that face"

Soon enough you made it to his dorm and went straight to the shower turning it to cold

"Babe! That's too cold!" He said walking in and testing the water just before you started to strip down

"Babe! It's too hot in here!" You said mimicking him

"At least turn it a little warm, I don't want to sleep next to a corpse" you rolled your eyes and turned it warmer

"Thank you." After placing a kiss on your lips he left and closed the door behind him

You finished your shower and plopped onto the bed, you pulled the covers over yourself and fell asleep.

"Wow. Not even a goodnight kiss? I'll let you off this time since you worked hard today." he then joined you, pulling you into a hug and kissing your forehead.

"Ah, new shampoo? Haha" he also quickly drifted off.

====================================================

| Jungkook |

You were in America and Jungkook was in Seoul, you were there visiting your family and only had one more day left until you go back to Seoul. You had been staying for two weeks, you and Jungkook facetimed/called everyday so you wouldnt miss eachother so much.

"I get my baby back tomorrow~ I get my baby back tomorrow~" Jungkook kept saying how much he wanted to do so many things to you and give you so many hugs and kisses.

"Guess what else you get tomorrow" you picked up two small black bags and put them on your desk so he can see

"Hm? Can't you show me now? What's the point of waiting?" His face got closer to the camera to see it better not like it actually helped.

"No, what's the point of guessing if I show you now? Well, I guess you will have to wait."

"Y/N, please. You know I hate waiting." He started to pout.

"Don't give talk back then. Hmp" you rolled your eyes and set the bags back down.

"Y/N?"

"Yes?"

"Are you trying to tell me what to do right now?" He raised an eyebrow and scoffed, he was always a dom the sound of you begging and whimpering for him was music to his ears and you also loved it but sometimes you just wished he got to the point instead of teasing.

"Maybe..is that so wrong?" You let your head lay back and sighed heavily and back at him, resting your head on your arm.

"Kookie baby that video you sent me made me horny all day yesterday....you can't tease me like that. I had to masturbate to get off." You parted your hair halfway with one hand and pushed it to the other side, Jungkook had got finished a concert and performed BS&T (Blood, Sweat, and Tears) so he was still in the costume. He knew it was a big turn on for you so he purposely didn't change.

"Y/N sweetie, you should've face timed me, I miss seeing you touch yourself." He let out a soft moan and bit his lower lip

"I'm so needy right now, I can't wait till I hear you scream, ugh just thinking about it makes me hard, you see what you do to me, baby?" He put his hand on his chest, letting it trail down along with the camera and onto his highly visual bulge, rubbing himself.

"Kookie baby, please stop, I have to wake up at 7 tomorrow. I can't play with you tonight.." Said through your gritted teeth but all you heard were his clear moans. The bedroom you were in was downstairs and everyone else's upstairs so no one could hear plus you had earbuds in anyways.

"Too bad it's not you touching me.." He sighed and stood up, walking out of the dressing room ( he was supposed to change ten minutes ago but never did.).

"Kookie, where are you going?" After a silent minute of walking, he turned the camera around

"Here. 'Members only' its a bathroom hun." You scoffed and rose your bows until you realized why he didn't pause the facetime. None of the members went into there anyway as they have a bathroom already in the dressing rooms.

"Jungkook, I'm too tir-"

"Mmmm Y/N I want to touch you so bad" he flipped the camera so it showed him rubbing his bulge in the mirror, you saw him unzipping and pulling his dick out. Him earning a moan from you. You bit your bottom lip at him pumping his self.

"Y/N..."

"Yes, baby?"

"I want you to do it, with me."

"Do what Kookie?"

"Play with yourself."

You positioned the camera on your desk where he had the best view and lifted up your skirt, pulling off your underwear and starting to finger yourself. Jungkook was already moaning your name which makes you start to pump yourself too, sliding two fingers in.

time ; 10:09 pm

Jungkook ran to the toilet and aimed himself and the camera down, stroking his dick faster, moaning louder, then coming into the toilet right after you had came. Not saying anything else you fell asleep naked, he cleaned himself up and laughed when he had seen you asleep.

"PFT. adorable." Jungkook kissed his camera and ended the face time.

(If you were wondering what was in the bags, it was BTS21 pajamas lol)

-sorry if this was bad, constructive criticism is always appreciated!

[smashmusicideas]

June 25: How the Ultimate Trailer Works So Well

Amongst all the thoughts and discussion regarding Super Smash Bros. Ultimate, I don’t think any individual element of the game - even more than the confirmation of Ridley - warranted the level of adoration and excitement as not just the inclusion of every Smash character ever, but the short “Challenger Approaching” trailer explaining that.

So I decided I’d take some time and analyze it for how it works. Hoo boy, did that take longer than I expected.

For ease (and because I’m, well, lazy), I’ll be splitting this up into bullet points. I should also note that I’m avoiding a lot of stage analysis except in certain cases, largely because the emphasis on fighters is the focus. Also, this is quite long, so a “read more” tag is needed for this one.

Before the video: Sakurai adds this whole “character numbering” element, which is odd. Most viewers less familiar with this scheme (which has mostly always existed within the series) assumed this indicated the total number of characters from the start, but more than that it inherently acknowledges cut characters, something Sakurai tries to avoid as to not make their fans feel worse. No matter who is watching, it’s odd, and sets up the actual video in a way that feels odd.

00:02 - 00:15: We see Battlefield, something which since Brawl has always functioned as a focal point for the series - kind of in the way Mario does, too, which is why he appears here. Traditionally, Mario is also the character who reflects the visual direction of each game the most, so his “Brawl meets Smash For“ art style confirms it as a new game, one that will marry multiple iterations of Smash.

0015 - 00:28: Kirby, Samus, and Bowser are all Smash staples (two from the first game, one from Melee). They’re also not in numerical order, telling us to not expect things in a “normal” way. They also more clearly show a few returning stages, Castle Siege and Green Greens in particular, and Giga Bowser seems to function in a far new way.

00:28 - 00:34: Link is also one of the central Smash characters, but his drastic redesign tells us further that this will be a new iteration - one that will look to more recent games, at least in part (we also see a new Breath of the Wild stage, alongside Temple). Keep in mind that he gets a huge amount of time to emphasize this.

00:34 - 0:44: We see a lot of Donkey Kong (including a change to his Giant Punch), but it’s Falco’s appearance in 00:42 that’s surprising. He’s typically and understandably a hidden character; showing him off is kind of bizarre. For most viewers, it’ll just seem nice for a beloved character to return, but for the more attentive first-time viewers it is somewhat odd and continues the off-kilter vibe of Sakurai’s introduction.

00:44 - 00:48: Marth casually shows off the new changes to Shield Breaker, just like with DK earlier. Further indication that old fighters will have, to quote Sakurai from a decade ago, a “slightly different flavor this time around,” and that it won’t simply be an expanded port of Smash for Wii U (this emphasis will continue throughout the video and into Nintendo’s continued promotion of the game.

00:48 - 00:52: New Zelda! Not really new Sheik! Their having their default costumes implies they will remain separate fighters, and Zelda’s in particular bucks a trend of Zelda and Link’s costumes coming from the same game.

00:52 - 00:54: Our first post-Melee fighter, Villager, shows a new ability. His appearance also begins to move us from the more classic Smash fighters into a wider variety of ones new and old.

00:55 - 00:58: Meta Knight and Mewtwo. Notable for the former being the first Brawl character in general and the first one shown, and for the latter being the first Pokémon representative - before Pikachu, even. Mewtwo also looks like it did in Smash For, an indication the DLC would not be ignored.

00:59 - 01:01: And here comes Sonic - with a new version of Super Sonic and a returning Green Hill Zone in tow - as the biggest guest fighter out there, though that doesn’t confirm whether less established third party content would be joining him.

1:02 - 1:08: Peach and Pikachu, each with slight new changes in how Toad and Volt Tackle work. It’s notable how long it took to get to either of them, though their being more famous leads nicely into...

1:09 - 1:15: the Ice Climbers! Their return is such a big moment it’s hard to notice we’ve also got a returning Summit (and Living Room), and they unsurprisingly get a whopping six seconds to show off how they look in HD.

1:16 - 1:21: And from a beloved, long lost fighter to a highly desired new one, Nana and Popo formally introduce Inkling, with both a male and female design in tow. We get a good look at how diverse their weapon selection is, alongside a new Splatoon stage.

1:22 - 1:27: Pretty much the only thing we need to see with Falcon is the Punch, while Zero Suit Samus and Wii Fit Trainer show that even the less “iconic” of the cast aren’t going to be ignored. Given Boxing Ring’s centrality to Smash For, its being so prominent here makes sense.

1:28 - 1:30: here’s where things get weirder. The Ice Climbers coming back makes sense, but the Pokémon Trainer? I don’t really think it’s vague on whether the switching mechanic will return (he’s in the back, so...), but it’s out of the blue in a way none of what we’ve seen here is. That it only lasts about two seconds makes it all the more shocking.

1:31 - 1:36: Ness and Lucas. A little surprising for the former, given his traditionally being a hidden fighter, and more so for the former, who was last in the series as DLC.

1:36 - 1:41: The DLC concern becomes even more noticeable now, with Ryu fighting yet another normally hidden fighter: Ganondorf, surprisingly sporting the classic Ocarina of Time design Melee used. It implies a far greater amount of changes than what we were initially expecting, and assures the less confident of us that even third party DLC will not be ignored.

1:41 - 1:44: And look who else is looking new, but Ike, who’s reverted to the design Brawl used...except he isn’t. While the Inklings were expected to have male and female versions, this is the first indication we’ll have more pronounced alternate costumes for specific characters.

1:45 - 1:51: Cloud’s inclusion is another important one at this point, because compared to other guest fighters, the possibility of his return seemed far more up in the air. He gets a lot of airtime, space that comfortably confirms his two outfits and Omnislash, a great flashy move to send us into the big moment.

1:52 - 1:55: If Cloud’s return wasn’t a sure thing, than Snake’s was a pipe dream for fans (myself included). Having one go to the other is smart, because after him, Ice Climbers, and Pokémon Trainer, Snake‘s chances feel so much more possible. And it works so well. We don’t see an attack, or anything, because we don’t need to. It’s Snake, on Shadow Moses Island. That’s enough for us, until...

1:56 - 2:01: “EVERYONE IS HERE!” really just speaks for itself, but I’d also like to note the small feature of Snake running right after the words appear. It’s subtle, but it’s a flash of energy leading to the rest of the video (an energy that is supported by the music, which becomes far more intense up until the end). And it’s important to him be behind the words, because by this point a viewer is processing them, recognizing the totality of what that means.

2:02 - 2:04: And to prove how serious that claim is, Jigglypuff - the last of the original cast (minus Luigi and Yoshi) - brings back Pichu, likely the very fighter most people would think of after hearing that “everyone is here”: “even Pichu?” That the joke character of Melee has returned is proof of the claim, an example of how insane and wild this project is planning to be. But despite how notable it is, the two Pokémon are onscreen for only two seconds.

2:15 - 2:18: Truthfully, the next few reveals are less exciting. Roy is the fifth DLC character revealed to return, but Olimar, Diddy, and Lucario are all fairly normal. But it’s with Lucina that we get yet another oddity. She’s 21ε - an indication that something different was being done with the then-called “clone characters.” It’s yet another indicator that Smash is going to be different, and in rather unexpected ways.

2:26: It’s not a big detail, but Dr. Mario lacks the Epsilon, indicating that he’s different from how he used to be (given that he, Lucina, and Dark Pit are associated as the Echoes of the previous iteration of Smash, it stands to reason people might look for that on him, too).

2:30 - 2:32: And there’s Dark Pit literally one shot after Doc, with the Epsilon. It’s important to keep it all in mind more easily. I also think it’s notable that Palutena’s moveset isn’t shown at all in here; it’s one more thing about which Sakurai’s been coy.

2:39 - 2:42: It’s important, I think, to have the two versions of Link show up together; it highlights how they’ve both functioned as spinoffs of one of Nintendo’s (and Smash‘s) most important heroes. By this point, Young Link is the final character (again, other than Luigi and Yoshi) who came from a game before Brawl; he’s important as one more reminder of this game’s scope.

2:46 - 2:49: And if there were any fighters whose fate would seem as up in the air as any third party character, it’d be the Mii Fighters. And yet, they’re all here, too. And like with Palutena, we see no customization or anything beyond some very basic attacks.

2:55 - 2:56: Despite not being a huge surprise, Pac-Man’s new Final Smash (or new version of Super Pac-Man, technically) is fast, really fast. And that’s good because it kicks up the pace right to the finish. Like, it’s weirdly intense to watch at that point.

3:00 - 3:03: Wolf! While calls for him were probably not as loud as those for Snake and the Ice Climbers, he has remained a beloved Smash character and a fighter people really wanted. Having him here is good for a bunch of reasons - he was the last newcomer in Brawl, his style works really well for this point in the video - but probably the most is that people really wanted him back especially. And holding off on that until now helps emphasize this game’s scope.

3:04 - 2:08: Mega Man needed to be the final main shot for a lot of reasons. He’s a beloved gaming and Smash character, he’s got name recognition, and especially because his Final Smash is the best way to send off us. It’s just this huge blast that keeps up the momentum right until the end.

3:11: And we have the title. “Ultimate” really is perfect word for this, a video that is pretty much just about the history and power of Super Smash Bros. 

3:16 - 3:20: ...But it also wouldn’t be Sakurai without some goofing around, so we let the air out of all this pomposity with some silliness from Luigi and Yoshi. I think it makes sense for more reason than Sakurai often using those two for mirth. The Brawl trailer had all this bombastic, dark energy...but then Wario showed up and farted. The first Smash For trailer seemed exciting and crazy...and then Wii Fit Trainer appeared; almost all the character trailers after it had stingers afterwards, mostly goofy ones. It’s a good and important statement that Smash will always be goofy and weird. And you got that in some individual shots (Dedede and Wario, for instance), but it’s a deliberate anticlimax that mocks you, but only slightly, for all the energy you’ve hopefully gotten from what is a very long trailer, all things considered.

So, what have we learned, aside from me realizing I need to come up with shorter topics for this blog? I think it’s that you could have made this announcement any way. Sakurai could’ve just shown the character selection screen, Nintendo could’ve put it out in a press release, or they could’ve just not mentioned it entirely (though that’d be insane given that “everyone is here!” is the game’s tagline). But a video was the best way to do it. And I think this way was the best video they could’ve realistically made. Every fighter gets to show off a ton of personality in a couple seconds, and by basing the whole video around being before or after Snake, it can position the ideal fighters in a way that lets viewers slowly realize how much grander this is going to be than they realized. It’s all just great design in general, and more than just a really cool trailer that showed things off.

(Link to my writings on Super Smash Bros. Ultimate)

[coolgreatwebsite]

Cool Games I Finished In 2017 (In No Real Order)

Civilization The year is nearing its end, so that means it’s once again time for one of these. 2017 has been rough for pretty much everyone, but even divorced from the state of the world this was unquestionably the worst year of my life. 2017 was a goddamn nightmare where nearly everything went wrong for me in the most major way possible. Consequently I didn’t get to do as much writing as I would have liked, and I ended up playing fewer games with almost all of them being 2017 releases. But! The video games were very fun!! So it all cancels out!!! Everything’s okay!!!! Here’s a bunch of cool games I experienced for the first time in 2017.

Dandy Dungeon: Legend of Brave Yamada (iOS, 2017)

Dandy Dungeon is weird as hell, which makes sense given that it was made by a lot of people who originally worked on games like Chulip and Freshly-Picked Tingle’s Rosy Rupeeland. It’s a free-to-play phone game that’s sort of a cross between a puzzle game and a dungeon crawler. Guide your semi-nude hero Yamada to the exit of the 5x5 dungeon grid in a single line, trying to touch every tile along the way, gathering treasure and beating up enemies to level up. Solving the floors and making the perfect line is satisfying, the story and enemies are all very strange, and there's a ton of content. The free-to-play monetization isn’t too obtrusive either, you can either buy straight up convenience features like unlimited energy and a mid-dungeon item storage system or buy rice balls that can be used as gacha entries or continues if you die in a dungeon and don’t want to give up your treasure. I felt 100% okay with giving the weirdos who made this game money. The same people put out another game this year, Million Onion Hotel, and I barely put any time into it because I just kept playing Dandy Dungeon. I’m very much looking forward to really playing that whenever the hell I finally burn out on this.

Yakuza 0 (PlayStation 4, 2017)

Yakuza 0 is a hell of a game, and a hell of an introduction to the Yakuza series for anyone who hasn’t played it. Set in 1988, the game follows series mainstays Kiryu and Majima as they deal with the events that made them who they are in the games to follow. While I ended up still liking Yakuza 5 more if only for the sheer scope and variety of it, Yakuza 0 is very easily the second best game in the series. It has one of the most straightforward, coherent and engaging narratives out of all of them, it pulls off its setting so well that it made me sort of nostalgic for an era I wasn’t even alive for, and the localization/writing is unquestionably the best the series has had. Almost every single sidequest is funny or memorable in some way and I just can’t say that about the rest of the games. It’s not flawless. The combat unsurprisingly pulls very heavily from Yakuza 5 but with multiple fighting styles for Kiryu and Majima taking the place of multiple characters, and I mostly found myself just sticking with one style for each of them. Beast and Breaker were just too good. The story, while mostly good as previously stated, does have its stumbling points. Some characters and events definitely aren’t given enough breathing room, mostly on the Majima side of things, and weirdly enough the game holds back on having Kiryu and Majima interact for the most part. Overall though, Yakuza 0 is a fantastic encapsulation of why I love this series so damn much and the absolute best jumping on point a newcomer could ask for. Plus Space Harrier is in it! Every game is better when you can also play Space Harrier.

NieR: Automata (PlayStation 4, 2017)

I feel like every year I do one of these lists there’s a game where I start off by saying “This game is good, but”. NieR: Automata is this year’s game. NieR: Automata is a good game, but I did not have the fervent, visceral reaction to it that most other people seem to have had, and my feelings are muddied even further by the lingering feeling that I SHOULD have. I love the first NieR. It’s one of my favorite games of all time. I love PlatinumGames. They’re one of my favorite developers of all time. Yet I came away from Automata somewhat... I don’t know if it’s disappointed. I guess “left wanting” might be a more accurate description? Again, don’t get me wrong here, this is a good game. There’s a lot to like in NieR: Automata. It’s a wild ride, but for me that’s... kind of it? The game shuttles you from crazy setpiece to crazy setpiece, but the second I stopped to think about anything that happened in any sort of detail it all just got real murky. I didn’t feel connected to any of the characters, outside two exceptions, and one of those is a character from the first game that I already loved. NieR: Automata’s storytelling is much more reliant and focused on its themes and imagery than anything that really actually happens during the course of the story, and I’ve never been a huge fan of narratives like that. I need a strong connection to characters and events and places, and whereas the first NieR had that by the truckload, Automata super doesn’t. There’s also the part where a lot of what Automata does, I feel the original game did better. Automata’s music is good, but NieR’s is better. The multiple playthrough system feels like it’s just tacked on because the first game did it, where in the original it was absolutely vital to that game’s story. Same goes for the choice you make in the final ending. The most I can say as far as improvements go is that the combat, while about as mindless, certainly looks better and overall the sidequests are less tedious and grindy. It’s been a very weird experience seeing the huge, widespread positive reaction to this game essentially mirror my feelings on the first game while I’m just sort of left to grumble about how the first game did all that better under my breath. Not that I’m not glad it got a positive reception! It’s great that this game has been such a success and that so many people have finally had their Yoko Taro Moment™. Like I’ve gone out of my way to state multiple times: the game is still good. There’s some wild shit to see in NieR: Automata, and while it didn’t leave a positive lasting impression on me, I very much had a good time with it in the moment.

The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild (Nintendo Switch, 2017)

I thought I was done with open world games. I had pretty much decided I was two years ago. I was so tired of the checklists, the boring traversal, the endless swaths of fucking nothing between mission A and mission B, the heaps of useless collectible garbage littering the ground trying to trick you into thinking you’re doing something. I was perfectly content with never playing an open world game again, and when Nintendo started promoting the new Zelda with that familiar Bethesda-esque “go any direction, climb any mountain” rhetoric and showed you climbing towers to reveal the map, I for all intents and purposes checked the fuck out. I didn’t care that it was Zelda, I didn’t care that it was Nintendo, I was just fucking done with all of that... I thought. The more time went on, the more impressions got out, and the more impressions got out, the more of my individual sticking points seemed to have been addressed. Yeah, you climb towers, but all that does is fill in the topography of the map. You don’t get flooded with a million activity and collectible icons, it’s up to you to scope out what looks interesting. And most importantly, while the landmass is large, there’s always something around the corner. I decided to get Breath of the Wild along with my Switch and I’m so glad I did. If I hadn’t been whittled down by pre-release chatter I would have missed out on one of the best games I’ve ever played. It’s like Nintendo explicitly set out to fix every problem I had with open world games. The way the systems in the world interact with each other, how much of a joy it is to explore and traverse the terrain, and the fact that there really IS always something to find make for a breathtaking game. If you go in any direction, you’ll trip over dozens of neat things to do and see. If you climb any mountain, there’s a good chance there will be something waiting for you at the top (and along the way), from a simple Korok seed puzzle to a full-blown shrine dungeon. The game gives you no truly firm direction once you leave the tutorial area, so it really is up to you to explore and find what you want. You can even run straight for the final boss if you want! The traditional Zelda-style puzzles are all super smart and satisfying to solve. I even liked the Divine Beast dungeons and boss fights, which I feel like I’m in the minority about. I finally took on Ganon after about 100 hours of playing the game and I hadn’t been so sad that a game was over since I beat Persona 3. Breath of the Wild is just an incredible, once in a lifetime game. I can’t wait to do it all again next year when I do another playthrough with all the DLC.

Persona 5 (PlayStation 4, 2017)

Persona 3 will likely always be nearest and dearest to my heart, but Persona 5 is objectively the best Persona game. They’ve polished the Persona formula to such a perfect mirror sheen in this one and I’ve never seen a game so consistently and effortlessly ooze such a concentrated amount of liquid capital-“S” Style before. The plot doesn’t intimately revolve around the cast to the degree Persona 4′s does, but they’ve made another charming band of anime teens nonetheless. They’ve either restored or re-worked nearly every mechanical aspect that was dropped between Persona 3 and 4. The soundtrack is incredible, there’s actually a decent amount of non-party S-Links again, the end of the game sticks the landing in a way Persona 4 very much does not... I could keep going. Persona 5 just plain rules. It’s the only game in the series where (even though I haven’t yet) I’ve actually wanted to jump in and do a New Game+ run.

Wonder Boy: The Dragon’s Trap (Nintendo Switch, 2017)

As I may have mentioned in a certain other article from this year, I have had very little love for Wonder Boy over the years. That changed a bit when I decided to try out Monster World IV a few years ago, and I think I’m officially a Wonder Boy Liker after playing The Dragon’s Trap. A remake of Wonder Boy 3 for the Master System, Dragon’s Trap is essentially just an extremely pretty coat of paint on a very early Metroidvania sort of game, but it’s remarkable how well the core gameplay holds up. You start as a human and very early on you’re transformed into a dragon, and you explore the world until you reach a boss which, upon being defeated, transforms you into a mouse. Your mouse form has the ability to enter narrow spaces and stick to certain walls, which allows you to reach new areas, bosses and transformations. Defeated enemies drop coins that you can use to purchase new weapons and armor from shops hidden across the world. It’s fairly simple, but I think that’s the reason it’s still so enjoyable today. The controls are tight and responsive and it doesn’t really date itself in too many ways. They went to great lengths to recreate the original game, down to being able to swap between the remade and classic graphics and music with a button press. Old passwords from the original game even work in the remake. The new art and music are beautiful and the game is the perfect length to not overstay its welcome. You can tell the people who made this really love the original game, and they absolutely did right by it.

Resident Evil 7: Biohazard (PlayStation 4, 2017)

I never in a million years expected to like Resident Evil 7 as much as I did. I played the demo back when it came out and thought it was okay, and I mainly got the full game so I could play something on my PSVR. It’s kind of crazy how, after so many years of Resident Evil stumbling, Capcom managed to just get everything back on track just like that. They made Resident Evil tense and scary again. The VR is insanely effective but even playing through on a regular ol’ TV, which I did multiple times after my initial VR playthrough, they manage to capture a really good, persistent sense of dread. For most of the game, anyway. The last third definitely slips a bit too far back into action game territory, and while it’s still enjoyable it’s definitely weaker than what came before. I beat this for the first time right before the next game on the list came out, and even while super deep into that I couldn’t stop thinking about Resident Evil 7. I really need to go back and play all the DLC.

Super Mario Odyssey (Nintendo Switch, 2017)

2017 was Nintendo’s year. They released my favorite console in a good long while with the Switch, launched it with one of the greatest games of all time, and closed out the year with another incredible game in Super Mario Odyssey. Mario Odyssey has finally dethroned Mario 64 as my favorite 3D exploration Mario game. It’s like Breath of the Wild in that there’s something to find in every nook and cranny, but condensed down into multiple, more tightly designed areas. It’s an absolute joy to play. I 100%ed the game and not once in the 50-ish hours that took did I get tired of controlling Mario. The movement options all flow together so naturally and complement the spaces you explore so well. Landing a long jump > hat throw > dive > hat bounce > dive combo across a huge gap was the most satisfying thing in the world to pull off even as I grabbed the very last power moon. The variety of the worlds and challenges and things to capture kept me in a constant state of excitement about what was coming up next, and the game is consistently charming in both weird new ways and a couple of very effective nostalgic ones. My only real complaints are that I think it’s maybe the easiest Mario game ever made, and I wish more of the platforming challenges were baked into the worlds proper instead of cordoned off into their own little challenge rooms, but basically everything else about the game manages to make those minor somehow. Mario Odyssey is distilled happiness in video game form, and the world needs more of that.

Sonic Mania (PlayStation 4, 2017)

Ohhhh myyyyy Goddddddddddddd Sonic Mania. I cannot fucking believe how awesome Sonic Mania is. I love the Genesis Sonic games so fucking much and while I like Sonic Adventure 1 despite itself, there hasn’t been a good Sonic game since Sonic 3 & Knuckles. The Genesis games always were and will always be great fucking video games, despite what internet fuckboys say because Sonic’s an easy target to dunk on. I’ll take Sonic 3 & Knuckles over Super Mario World any day of the fucking week. Fight me. I’ll cut you. With Sonic Mania, there is FINALLY, fucking TWENTY-THREE GODDAMN YEARS LATER, a legitimately great Sonic The Hedgehog game again, and I’m stunned. I was INSANELY skeptical about this game from the minute it was announced until basically the moment I played it. Yeah, they brought in people from the hacking and fan-game community to work on this one instead of letting Sonic Team touch it, but I’m close enough to those communities to know that that on its own is NOT enough to guarantee the game would be good. Yeah, Taxman and Stealth made an extremely good replica of the Sonic 1-3&K engine, but they absolutely did not have the design chops to tackle anything but ports successfully. That new version of Hidden Palace they added into the iOS port of Sonic 2 was a complete trash fire. Thankfully they linked up with PagodaWest Games, a company made up of a lot of the non-insane elements behind the old Sonic 2 HD project, who as it turns out very much did have the design chops. Together they made something incredible. It obviously controls perfectly given the engine, but the levels are so fun and well-crafted. The classic levels manage to mix in so many different elements from other levels that didn’t quite make it in the game on top of there being weird twists on those on TOP of all the completely new elements, and the brand new levels are lavish with all sorts of super fun new gimmicks and details. The game looks fucking gorgeous, going for a sort of “what if they had made a 2D Sonic for the Saturn” look that it pulls off great, even going so far as to render the special stages in low-poly 3D. The music is P-H-E-N-O-M-E-N-A-L, sounding like a lost ‘90s Japanese arrange CD but without all the bad aspects that usually come with those. There’s so many dumb, great little details for hardcore classic Sonic and Sega fans littered throughout the game. They managed to fucking combine Oil Ocean and Sandopolis, my least favorite zone from Sonic 2 and one of the worst zones in the entire SERIES, and have me come away from it not hating it. It’s masterful. It’s beautiful. It’s right up there with Sonic 3 & Knuckles for best in the series. Nothing this year made me so genuinely, personally delighted. Sonic Mania was made just for me and I love it and I want another one with all original levels as soon as possible. Please let these people make video games for me forever.

Xenoblade Chronicles 2 (Nintendo Switch, 2017)

The original Xenoblade is one of my favorite RPGs of the last generation. Then they released Xenoblade Chronicles X for the Wii U and broke my goddamn heart. They tossed out nearly everything I loved about the first game in favor of haphazardly dumping as many disjointed game mechanics as they could on top of bland open world exploration and needlessly grindy progression. It was such a hard swerve that by the time they had gotten around to announcing a proper Xenoblade 2 for the Switch I had basically abandoned all hope of it being a game I’d like. But for some reason, I still decided to give Monolithsoft one last shot. And I’m glad I did! While not quite as cohesive and instantly-endearing as the original, they definitely righted the ship. There’s a bunch of weird mechanics, but in the good Xenoblade 1 way where they mete them all out at an appropriate pace and explain them and they all fit together. The cast of characters is likable, the music is great, the gameplay is engaging all the way through. They managed to pull it off, and I’m back on board for a potential Xenoblade 3.

These games were also cool, I just had less words to say about them: Splatoon 2 (Nintendo Switch, 2017): Splatoon is great. Splatoon 2 is more of that. The new weapons are fun, the new maps are cool, Salmon Run is the most fun I’ve ever had with a horde mode. I played it for like 100 hours already. Not too much else to say! Play Splatoon 2! Hitman (PlayStation 4, 2016): Hitman is an amazing sandbox. Whether I was following along with the authored ways to kill my targets, doing things my own way or trying to get out of a situation that went completely south, Hitman constantly surprised me with the variety of things I could do and options I could take advantage of. And there’s so damn much content to do it all in.   DDRMAX, DDRMAX2 & Dance Dance Revolution Extreme (PlayStation 2, 2002, 2003 & 2004): This doesn’t really teeeechnically fit on this list but I would be remiss not to bring up my rekindled love affair with DDR this year. My very good friend who I am very appreciative towards at all times Geoff generously gifted me an old Cobalt Flux dance pad back in like June and I have been playing DDR again ever since and it’s still great. I can clear some songs on heavy now. Thanks Geoff. Glittermitten Grove (Steam, 2016): A very normal game about fairies, and not about shaving. Tekken 7 (PlayStation 4, 2017): Tekken 7 is the first Tekken game I’ve cared about in like a decade. I couldn’t really tell you exactly why, to be honest, but the fact of the matter is that Tekken 7 is very fun to play and I highly recommend it. Wolfenstein II: The New Colossus (PlayStation 4, 2017): I think the gameplay of this is worse than the first game, but everything else is stronger. Hopefully they fix it up and make a game that’s great all around next time. Gundam Versus (PlayStation 4, 2017): Gundam Versus is basically a team based Virtual On. I had a lot of fun with an old version of the game at various events I went to throughout the year and I had a lot of fun with this one even though I didn’t play it nearly as much as I wanted to. Clowning on people with Guntank in 1v1 is probably the hardest I laughed all year.

And that’s it! That’s 2017! It’s done! Good riddance! Thank you all again for bothering to read my video game words. If you need me, I’ll be training to deliver many extremely savage elbow drops to 2018 until it gives me what I want.

[zoestagg]

Ironman Bintan 70.3...

**It took me nearly a month to write this, as I usually focus on the positive around here — but it’s also my scrapbook, and has been for a decade. This is worth having to look back on, and worth voicing as a female experience. The positive? I had a race crew that was willing to get on a plane for eight hours, schlep a bike internationally, and hang around waiting to cheer me on all day. They’re why while the race experience itself might have scarred me, the DNF didn’t embarrass me at all. How could it? There was still a bottle of champagne waiting at the hotel and a week left to float in the pool and explore. That’s the amazing part. Now…the rest.**

I felt rushed. I worked in the dark in my eight square inches of space to arrange my transition spot. I hadn’t eaten yet, I hadn’t found the porta-potties, and I hadn’t done one single open-water swim the entire training cycle.

That sounds like a race-anxiety nightmare, and that was only the first five minutes.

It was about to get way, way worse. 

I’ve given up getting mad that they issue the women’s wave neon pink caps. It’s hack, but fine. Frankie is delighted when they get passed down to her immediately after. In the dozen of waves that waited in the corral for their chance to swim, there was only one of women.

The Pros and younger men’s age groups started off, and I tried not to throw up as I waited in the practice area, dipping my head in the water to make sure my goggles were good. It was as promised, blessedly smooth. Nothing like the squalling Mediterranean three years ago. And even though I hadn’t had the opportunity to swim outside of a pool, this was honestly as pool-like as it was going to get. The squared-off course was pretty straight forward.

All I had to do was get around it.

The green caps launched off, and the blue caps filed in. If you’ve never been to the start of a big corporate race, it’s not for the sound-sensitive. It’s loud. Constant announcements on a sort of endless yammer, music, repeat. At the start, there’s a sort of DJ/Emcee scenario. He was working the crowd, asking people where they’re from.

“Australia!” “All right then, mate!”

“USA!” “Right. Back of the line then.”

You guys. The world really isn’t pleased.

The horn blew and the blue caps splashed in, making room for the women. The pump-up music for the women’s wave started. I would say it was a really annoying one-off if it wasn’t played at every daggone race I’ve done.

Girls Just Wanna Have Fun.

Now excuse me while I REALLY try not to barf. You’re right, I spent two hours of every day, plus most of every weekend training to have FUN. You’re SECONDARILY RIGHT that no inspiring song about the female condition has been recorded since 1982. This would make me mad enough to swear right here if this was the extent of the grief I would be given for my gender that day, but it WASN’T AT ALL so stay flipping tuned.

I’m apparently still very, very mad.

When I did the Olympic distance ocean swim in my first race, I was so scared I wasn’t going to make the time cutoff. This go around, after I kind of jockeyed for space in my preferred spot, (back of the wave and as close to the line as possible) I got kind of calm. It wasn’t so bad. I just started swimming — PROPERLY, even. This is a big deal. Last ocean swim it was too choppy for me to put my head in. Sometimes in lakes there’s too much…nature to make it possible to crawl for long without wanting to scream the whole lake in. This time, eh. It was water.

IT WAS JUST WATER. And I swam.

I didn’t even panic much, when I heard them release the wave behind me. That didn’t stop me from being the girl who was yelling “NO TOUCHIES NO TOUCHIES” as my mantra when they got too close to my tail fins. Look. It’s the terrifying ocean with WILDLIFE, if you want to pass, just go around.

NO TOUCHIES.

I was feeling weirdly good. I don’t even remember the swim being much effort. It looked like I could have just stood up the whole time, which helped too. I think I checked my watch once at the half, and then not again until I could hear the music again at the swim out. 48:00. I had 70:00 minutes before I blew the deadline, I was fiiiiiine.

I swam as far in as I could, got out and pumped some fists that I didn’t have to try to peel off a wetsuit, and heard the *beep beep* as I crossed the timing mat. (Swim Time: 1900m/54:00)

This race, given that we had to schlep a bike and suitcase and everything on multiple planes and a ferry, meant that I didn’t bring a bunch of stuff I might have otherwise. Stuff, like oh, the race fuel I’m used to. I couldn’t really bring onigiri that far in advance, I couldn’t really pack a jar of peanut butter and tortillas, I just… Improvised. I’d downed a couple of handfuls of trail mix before the swim, and now before the bike, I crammed in bites of protein cookie washed down with water like a competitive eater. I pulled on my fanny pack with more snacks, pulled up my bib belt, and yanked my bike off the rack. I was feeling cautiously optimistic and ready to ride. (Transition 1: 6:30)

I didn’t know as I pedaled out, that it would be about 45 minutes until everything turned to garbage.

Indonesia is lush. There are legit monkeys just chilling on the side of the road like wild cats. I pumped my legs and tried to occupy my thoughts and take in the scenery. It’s in those moments, that a couple of things can happen: you can look down at your speedometer and be pleasantly surprised that you’re pulling 20 mph without really trying; and you can discover that the theme song to The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air is the exact beat that makes that cadence.

I had read the race description. Something about “a few gentle rolling hills.” I had watched the time-lapse video of the whole bike course. Looked pretty flat to me!

IT WAS NOT FLAT.

The first hill hit, and preceded three hours of switching back and forth between 4 mph as I stood up and pumped in the lowest gear, and 24 mph as I tried to make it back. I struggle a little with my feet on the bike, I have to remind myself to stay off of them and wiggle my toes and watch my form so I don’t end up with knives stabbing through the balls. This amount of standing up? There’s no terrain around here that I could have used to prepare for that. But whatever. We finished a loop out of a forested road, and hit a town. There were Indonesian flags everywhere, most buildings and houses had one planted. I don’t know how much of that is set-dressing for the race, but the KIDS.

The kids, were not.

They stood outside of houses and tiny village storefronts watching and cheering. This parade of 2,000 insane people on bicycles was the most exciting Sunday morning show, and they cheered everyone who passed. I made it my mission to be a one-woman good-sport committee and gave every single group a “Good morning!!!! Hiiiii!” Some of them yelled back, “Winner!” and it was pretty outstanding. Eventually, the tiny villages in the trees thinned out, revealing violent red clay hillscapes, and the sun started to really beat.

From the course preview video -- even watching again, I don’t know how they managed to make the hills disappear, but they did. And that bridge? The “guard rail” was just the two pipes and then a 50-foot drop. Not cozy.

By the bridge, enough time had passed to thin the herd, and I suddenly found myself in Indonesia, about 25 miles from anyone I knew, and as race rules dictate (YOU WILL BE GIVEN A RED CARD DQ IF YOU ARE CAUGHT USING A PHONE OR ELECTRONIC DEVICE) without a phone.

Fun.

I pumped on, and tried to stay positive. The course wasn’t closed, it was on roads shared as the rest of the island’s life went on, and as I started to think about pulling off to stand up for a second and swap my water bottles around, a scooter passed. The man driving it slowed as he passed me and took a hard look. I watched, because as much as Japan doesn’t require you to have street smarts, I’ve lived places, okay. He continued up the road a hundred yards and turned around, riding past again.

I didn’t stop.

Another scooter revved up from behind me. This one had friends. He pulled ahead of me, while one pulled beside and another, stayed behind. They were teenagers, and started talking to me, motioning me to pull over.

“No. I’m fine. I’m riding. No.”

Sometime after the water stop that told me they were out of water after I had already dumped my hot water out to switch, a truck rolled by. The man leaned out the window and said,

“I love you.”

I don’t think he meant that in a positive and nurturing way that respects my agency as a human being.

All I wanted was to stop and spend 45 seconds getting my fuel situated. The second my speed dipped, there would be a scooter or two, appearing out of nowhere, making very sure I wasn’t going to stop for all of the Gatorade in China. About the time the man drove by making kissy noises, and I’d spent a good three hours calculating how long it would take me to get stuffed in the back of a truck on a course where the only chip mats are at 20k and 70k and it would be a really long time before anyone missed me, I started to sob hysterically.

(Let’s take a moment of brightness to know that as awful of a time I was having, Ryan and Frankie were okay waiting for me. Phew.)

Now. There were medic vans and mechanic vans on the course, I did see them periodically. But by the time I was rolling through 40 miles, I was in such a state from dealing with harassment from almost every vehicle that passed, I started to really lose it.

“DON’T TALK TO ME. DON’T LOOK AT ME. LEAVE ME ALONE.”

It’s kind of hard to ride your bike when you’re scream crying.

Eventually, I rolled though 52 miles, and another biker spun up past me. “There’s 30 minutes to cutoff! Keep going, you’ll make it.” At this point, I really didn’t even care. I was sobbing, and worried I wouldn’t be able to stop if Frankie was at the transition point. I think I rode past Ryan and Frankie at the end of the bike, and was completely relieved I wouldn’t have to talk to them right then. (Bike 56 miles/4:39:12)

This smile is fake.

I racked my bike, probably still yelling “BAN MEN,” and sat down at transition and really cried. I cried because I was slow enough that I’d been an easy target. I cried that 75% of the competitors probably had a LOVELY time on the course and in the world in general and would never know how awful it feels to be prey, and I cried because what a burden that is, what an unequal athletic playing field that is and BAN MEN.

And then I put on my running shoes and tried to find the run out. No signs. Who cares at this point, right? (Transition 2: 6:23)

I started to run. I was scared I was going to have to go out and subject myself to more unwanted attention, but the run course was protected, in some kind of weird golf course or something. The sun dipped behind clouds and I set the first goal to getting to where I thought the spectators might be. I was still entirely on edge, and when I heard a male voice behind me, I whipped around with a LOOK. He paused.

“I don’t mean to be rude, but um, is this your first lap or your second?”

I relaxed, a little. “First. THOSE HILLS.”

“I know! Okay, thanks! Have a good run.”

He jogged on, and I felt the first drop. And then the second. And then, dear reader, I found out what an Indonesian monsoon feels like. For the next hour, the skies opened.

The surface of the lake was a blur as raindrops bounced six inches off the surface. The trail filled with water, and then flooded. Eventually, it was ankle deep. My shoes started to rub blisters. I couldn’t see in front of me. Aid stations ducked under tarps as the wind whipped.

And I knew it was over.

I passed the halfway on the run, and a restaurant. Ryan and Frankie, who I was totally worried about in all of the rain, were tucked inside having lunch. I stood outside dripping, gave Ryan the short version of the awful day, and said I was checking out. I could have propelled myself the last 10k without the wet blisters. Without a time cutoff, I could have technically finished. As I neared the lap switch, the guy in charge said,

“You’ve missed it.” (Time spent running: 1:44:28)

You know what happens when you don’t make the last time cutoff in a monsoon? They withhold the giveaway towels because they say “Finisher” on them.

It’s fine.

I stood in the middle of the flooded field while those who’d had a much better day got their medals, and filed a report. Who knows if anyone got it, but now there’s a handy link to send to HQ, right? Ultimately, this race location is not suited for female athletes. I was wearing the same thing as everyone else. I’m OLD. I was still harassed for five hours. And I DNFed, my first one ever.

And I’ve signed up for another one in December.

[theanatomyletter]

here is a perfectly sane response to the climate emergency

Right so like 3 days ago once everyone found out a couple weeks too late that the literal amazon rainforest is on fire I went into a sort of anxiety/depressive spiral and it was terrifying!!! I was scared and shocked out of doing anything and kept thinking of all the bad things that are happening and how we are all going 2 die and kept thinking of how to make more ppl understand that climate destruction is part of the same racist project as white imperialism and I’m !!! Stressed !! And I was scared and freaked out!!! I remember as a kid one of my favourite things ever was the book Journey To The River Sea by Eva Ibbotson and I s2g that book made me a person it taught me so many things about what it means to love a place and to be alive in the world and how to sustain a sense of self and community in meaningful connection with that it means to be alive and here and breathing and it’s a book about the rainforest and the river and so I’ve just been,, thinking of it a lot, little blue butterfly from the cover floating thru my brain and all that. It’s hard!!! I thought I was afraid of not saving/earning enough money to do a masters next year but I was actually afraid of the consequences of the climate emergency. Pay more attention to your emotions and honour them for what they are and figure out what is at stake for you, what does it make you feel that the world is in crisis. I think that’s important

Depressing chat aside after I panicked and felt radicalised (what does that even mean?) I found this twitter thread which was basically like these are all the terrible things that can happen and here is how we stop them and at first I felt SO SCARED because there’s NO WAY we can actually organise mass strikes at this scale!!!! We have never had to organise at this scale before, I panicked and got really scared and went on a rant about how we have to use existing structures to fix things because we don’t have the time or resources to organise at this scale but like. I now think we actually do, I found this resource for organising strikes globally from 20TH TO 27TH SEPTEMBER and like, we have the Internet and we have a month to plan and prepare and if you are able to strike you absolutely should !!!!!! There are people smarter than me speaking to the urgency of this, I’m just having some feelings and writing this on my phone notes, but like. Read about strikes in your area. If there aren’t any, find resources to help organise one. Text your friends your colleagues your family whatsapp group the people you went to school with, spread the word and organise how you will sustain your community in that time

As a side note after I went on panic rants all over my social media I think I realised that terrifying people into frenzied action won’t work because it’ll often just scare them into inaction (that’s what it did to me) and I felt better only once I found that resource for actual organisation, the mass general strike felt like an impossible project until I found out it’s already being planned. So like, don’t be helplessly scared, we have multiple years to fix things, and I think this is important: REMEMBER TO BE ALIVE AND HERE AND BREATHING, it’s important to actually feel the absolute miracle that is consciousness otherwise all of the saving the world will have been for nothing. Take photos of your friends and give hugs to your pets and get drunk and go dancing and remember that what matters is that feeling of being so achingly alive and aware of your existence in the world when you look at the sky and feel dizzy with how small you are and how yet the whole universe is inside of your brain, remember to breathe and feel glorious and loud and bright and reckless.

On that note, I was having a hard time giving a shit about much but I copped on a bit after I talked to my friend Naoise Dolan (buy her book it is out soon !!!) I felt like calmer and more like I was allowed to enjoy things and write things (that’s why I finally pulled it together enough to do this) and so I LISTENED TO THE NEW TAYLOR SWIFT ALBUM ON REPEAT and I’ve decided I love it, here is my ranking of all its songs from worst to best, I have so many thoughts, the lyrics are golden, I’m so happy to be alive in the world at a time we can make things better and listen to music like this that’s tailor made (sorry) for us to forget about any guilt we may feel from bopping to boardroom produced songs about corporate feminism

18. Miss Americana and whoever the fuck

Idk what this obsession is with high school motifs (shout out Mike Dolan for pointing this out) like it’s just weird for a 29 yr old to use school as a metaphor for her love life. The “you win stupid prizes” bit sounds nice though. It’s like a low-key creepy obsessive song like why is she doing that funny voice? Is it meant to sound vaguely haunted? What’s going on

I’m also just tired of “America” (the white kind) as a cultural construct and it being used as an expression of identity in popular culture like we get it you built a nationalism out of “gas stations” and “hallways” and “whatever” but you’re still racist, Stop. Like it’s just an inherently violent construct and nobody white is reckoning with it responsibly so at least maybe stop romanticising it or just shut up. Heck yea I’m reading too much into this. I do what I want

17. You Need to Calm Down

This song is bad. It’s so bad. The lyrics are pointless, the ohoHHHH is annoying, her voice is irritating, it’s also just gross and patronising and tries to do twelve things at once (are we leading a parade to pat ourselves on the back for telling homophobes to “take several seats” or are we saying we “all have crowns” wtv that means?)

This song is actually just gross and it doesnt even SOUND GOOD

16. ME

It’s less problematic than you need to calm down and that’s the only reason it’s slightly less bad. It’s a garbage song idk why it exists i’m so mad at it

15. Paper rings

IM SORRY tHe mOoN is HIGH like your friends were the night that we first met I’m sorry WHAT miss swift we get it you have been near drugs, Jesus CHRIST this song is a juvenile childish self important mess. The lyrics r awful and her voice is sneaky and weird and she does weird noises and the chorus is dumb like the “uhuh that’s right” makes me want to give CHITTAR. Also she says darling WAY too much in this album like we get it you’re dating a Brit. It’s not The Worst song because if you pay zero attention to the lyrics or her voice it’s kind of fine sounding? It’s so bad tho lol, I remember when she wrote Mine and the video came out I was like wow wild this is weird and adult and why are you pregnant but this one is even MORE weird. I also HATE every time she says dreary mondays and “baby boy” (GROSS) and I hate that she keeps repeating it lol. The I hate accidents line is kind of fine

14. I forgot that you existed

I hate the lyrics and I hate the premise (we get it you’re indifferent that’s why you wrote a whole song about it) BUT it’s such a bop, it’s very /this feels like a perfect night to make fun of our exes/ vibes and I would be LYING if I said I didn’t enjoy that. Yes we exists

We are pretending her fake laughter and starting to talk in the middle of songs things isn’t real though. It wasn’t cute in we are never ever etc and isn’t cute now

13. I think he knows

I love the 16th avenue bit, it fills me with giddy happiness, the rest of the song is shit, and also lazy. Also stop being obsessed with being 17, it was weird in starlight and is weird now

The bridge is also sort of nice but not nice enough to redeem the rest of it

12. London Boy

Im sorry I promise I know this song is bad. It is bad. I hope it’s ironic? But it’s bad. It’s a weird colonialism complex fetishisation of posh brit whiteness and its even more gross when it’s like “btw IM american, DOUBLE whiteness”, it’s icky and bad. It is a bad song. I apologise for enjoying it and I promise I am ashamed but also u know what, if you ignore the lyrics entirely and pretend you’re 15 and un-enlightened about the violence inherent to the fetishisation of an english identity……….maybe a fun tune. I know. I know. I am sorry. I promise I enjoy it only ironically

11. The man

Corporate white lady feminism? With the word HUSTLE in it? In this economy? Yes obviously

The lyrics are a bit ehhhh but some of them are quite clever and I think she’s quite honest in this song in a rare sort of way without trying to exaggerate it for shock value and it’s a very like, this is my life, here you go, sort of tune, it doesn’t do anything for women’s rights but I think it sounds nice and is probably fun to dance to, and “I’m so sick of running as fast as I can, wondering if I’d get there quicker if I was a man” and “if I were a man, I’d be the man” are fUN lines !!! Idk how wild this comparison is but like, I feel this song is trying to deal with similar things as I know places (a very privileged rant, if you will, without much self awareness) but I think The Man does it better because it’s less self important and has less ambition about it solving or expressing the world’s worst problems.

10. False God

Ok, so, what is it with the religious motifs in this album, i don’t get it, though it kinda works a lot in this song? I wanted to rank this higher but after a few listens it got slightly grating, the beginning is a bit unecessary too? Like it’s trying to create this weirdly artificial aura of glamour and sophistication, it’s quite an unnerving and haunting song and I quite like that about it and it makes me a bit surprised and startled. This thing she’s doing with like slow, building, repeating tunes i think has worked the best in this song (we might just, get away with this, religion’s in your lips e-,ven if its a False gOd) also, THE ALTAR’S IN MY HIPS, OOF, the chorus does the trick honestly and i love when she’s like slightly laughing but in a wry sort of way. Love it tbh, something about it just makes me a bit stressed though and not in an intentional way (i think)

9. It’s Nice To Have a Friend

Miss taylor who gave you the RIGHT, to shove your hand into my chest and grab my heart and step all over it. I love it and it makes me cry and it’s so soft and sweet. Zero complaints abt it it’s a beautiful song. There r just MULTIPLE EXTREMELY GOOD SONGS that’s why it’s not like my absolute fav and im confused too as to why it’s so low but like. Idk. it is a very soft and sweet song. I love it. If anything maybe it’s a bit uncreative n lazy but i think that’s slightly on purpose so doesn’t rlly constitute a criticism

8. Death by a thousand cuts

I like this song a lot a lot. The lyrics are SO GOOD IM SO HAPPY SHES DOING GOOD LYRICS AGAIN. I love the “one for the agEs” line and i’m generally a slut for any mention of chandeliers in music or poetry (dont ask), her voice is delicate but proud and wild and i’m a fan, honestly, cannot wait to bop to this. The My my my bit is annoying tho

7. The archer

I HATE the bit where she says CoMbAt but otherwise this song is soft and lovely and gentle and I love it !!!!! I love the lyrics and I love her gentle restraint of how she slowly unfurls them and then let’s go in “help me hold onto you”, there is such a commanding frankness to it, it’s an ask for collaboration, an ask for honesty, an ask for I want to do this with you

I think it’s one of the strongest tracks lyrically and she also shows like great skill vocally which has been annoyingly missing from so much of what she’s recently produced. I feel like there’s a bunch of annoying stylistic choices (the they see right thru me bit is grating) but like the song overall is lovely, I think you can feel in her voice she knows she’s created something good and it’s not the usually insufferable IM A GENIUS vibe. WHO COULD EVER LEAVE ME DARLING, BUT WHO COULD STAY !!!

6. Soon you’ll get better

Made me cry. We’re not talking about this one

5. Lover

This song is soft loving, slow whispers, careful realisations that you can build a life with whatever you like and love will save everything, I love it, I love it I love it I love it, “can I go where you go?” moves me to tEARS it is such a soft and gentle expression of care, it is such a kindness, it’s such surrendering, such reckless care, I love it so much, it’s so hopeful and also sure, it’s so frightful but also unafraid. I think this is one of Taylor’s most earnest songs ever and it does the thing of combining that earnestness with brazen daring that doesn’t turn into embarrassment only because she commands her lyrics with such certainty, and that’s rare and often I think that daring has ended badly for her (LOL most of reputation) but here it’s done so beautifully and w so much happiness and LOVE, this song is truly just a beautiful lil piece of art with so much happiness dripping thru it

4. Cornelia Street

This song. This SONG. It builds up so beautifully with this ever so slightly hesitant fascination with its own emotions, i’m so obsessed with it, the lyrics are lovely and perfect, i was expecting it to feel slightly forced and oddly specific because wtf is a cornelia street anyway, but it WORKS. I think it wants me to think of like a glowy streetlighty street and it DOES THAT, “filling in the blanks as we gooooo” sounds so gorgeous and does that thing with her voice which literally is just showing off that Yes She Does Know How To Sing and it’s so certain and sure and restrained and open and bare (again in “i thought you were leading me onnnnn”). Also, “the city screams your name” should be a tired cliche but its just an excited expression of abandon im,, in love. The song is so shaky and uncertain but completely confident and relaxed at the same time and it FEELS EXACTLY LIKE COMING TO TERMS WITH BEING IN LOVE AND WANTING IT TO LAST FOREVER, also like, when did she learn how to write good bridges again because yEs

3. Daylight

Solely for the lines “i’ll tell you the truth, but never goodbye // i don’t want to look at anything else now that i saw you” she deserves a grammy it actually pierces my emotions and makes me want 2 explode, this song is sooooo lovely and it has the vibe that makes me feel like i’ve already heard it years ago (but maybe thats because ive had the album on repeat 2 days straight) but it’s just,,, very good and it feels like sunset and glitter and i think is a perfect ending to a great album i love how it builds intensity and then strips it down and just,,, love it.

2. Afterglow

This is i think, one of the most beautiful things this woman has ever produced, one of the loveliest and most powerful songs ever made, i love it so very much. She finally learnt how to do autotune properly lol, this song is like, a crescendo of emotion, everything is falling down around it and it’s like a little haven of bare, frank honesty and complete surrender, of complete vulnerability, the whole song sounds like an act of care and an act of expressing pure emotion, it’s so gorgeous. It moves so softly and doubles in on itself and she’s sorry and sad but so proud of this love and so certain of its importance, “i’m the one who burnt us down”, it’s such a zooming in on a very specific emotion and it’s done so well, i love it

1. Cruel summer

I LOVE THIS SONG. I LOVE THIS SONG. The lyrics are flighty and exciting and shivery, WHAT DOESNT KILL ME MAKES ME WANT YOU MORE- plug that shit into my VEINS. This song makes me feel like it’s 2015 and nothing is real yet and I’m living inside a YA novel and my biggest problem is my crush being mean to me and I’m RELISHING in that freedom and indulging every last drop of emotion because being alive and paying attention to it is incredible and Extremely Cool Actually (I DONT WANT TO KEEP SECRETS JUST TO KEEP YOU, dead right gal)

That said. Organise for the climate strike. Read up on what’s going on so you can answer questions in your family whatsapp group. Field those conversation, DO THAT EMOTIONAL LABOUR (again, what even), spread the word. But take care of yourself !!!! Listen to Taylor swift and remember that we are an absolute joke of a species, we went to the MOON, we can do this, I love you

[thesinglesjukebox]

HYUNA - BABE [7.10] Baa ram ewe... baa ram ewe......

Ryo Miyauchi: Coincidentally or not, the digital breeze of "Babe" unwinds Hyuna from her more commandeering presence and returns the singer emotionally to the age of her debut -- exactly a decade ago. After 10 years of showing different ways how she can capture attention, she flexes effortlessness over stylistic flair here. While she still switches between multiple hats, the soft, toy-box sounds make all of the role changes feel like a breezy stroll. It may lack glamor for such a personality, but she has more than earned a moment to just lay back. [6]

Jessica Doyle: So last time she came out with something defiant and dance-focused and I said it sounded lonely (and Kogan disagreed); now she comes out with something more seemingly insecure and seems... much happier? As in, smiling all over her lives (and shrugging off the lip-sync even more than usual) and having her backup dancers turn the official dance practice into a Try Not to Laugh video. I do have opinions about "Babe," namely that calling it her least catchy single since "Ice Cream" is praising with faint damnation, and that Following is probably my favorite album of hers so far, and if "Tell me I'm your babeh, babeh" didn't come from the same songwriting session as "Natbodaneum bame wa" then I will eat LE's eyeliner. But mostly I'm just happy that she's happy. [8]

Nortey Dowuona: Bouncy, clinking synths slide over the both slinky and at once filling bass and cascading drums. Even the trap breakdown doesn't feel appropriative. It also helps Hyuna's a superb pop singer, swagging on her beat with so much chill it feels powerful. [8]

Patrick St. Michel: I've accepted that certain parts of my mind are practically locked in amber because of my age. Like, how I'm probably never going to hear music that truly tilts me off my axis the I did before age 25. Hyuna's "Bubble Pop!" was such an instance, one of several K-pop songs that found thrilling new angles to American-born sounds and made me want to learn everything about this world. "Babe" feels reflective, both for this younger self and for a time when Korean pop seemed decade-ahead of everything else. Echoes of global pop circa 2016-17 abound, from the pitch-shifted syllable squeaks to the whole "tropical house" tempo, yet the song never feels like something emptied out of "Shape Of You"'s grease trap. The small details add a lot, like that 8-bit glow around the chorus and the slight beat changes, but ultimately it's the feeling of twisting the conventional around -- lacking in a lot of K-pop, much of it prone to recycling. Yeah, it's nostalgia, but "Babe" indulges in it too, the subject of the song sparking up feelings that fade over time and even twisting it into a joke by the end. Hyuna time travels backwards, and finds a familiar joy here. [9]

Kalani Leblanc: "Babe" feeds the grand K-pop trope of incorporating age with femininity (see: IU's magnum opus "Twenty-Three" and Song Jieun's originating  "Twenty-Five") in the most Hyuna way possible. The xylophone might be Hyuna riding on the back of worn out trends, but it sounds uncannily fresh since it's paired with the most passioned effort in her solo releases since "Red." Shinsadong Tiger's detailed background even adapts to the singing and perseveres through that rap. If you wanna give Hyuna enough credit, the lyrics like could be a mutter of annoyance to the watchful public, who still see the bright eyed 4Minute member, hiding like E.T. in a blanket under a boyfriend plot.  [8]

Alex Clifton: Hyuna pulls a Benjamin Button in front of her crush, going from a worldly, confident 26-year-old to a "baby girl." I get the sentiment, although the de-ageing process makes me feel a bit weird as someone Hyuna's age. (What does this make me, an old maid?) Musically, "Babe" is weirdly disparate, featuring a seductive xylophone intro, chipmunked vocals I don't hate, and a hearty synthy chorus, all pulled together with a killer hook. It does get a bit grating after so many production changes, preventing me from immediately hitting the replay button, but it's a nice change of pace from Hyuna's previous solo work. [6]

Ramzi Awn: The textbook production on "Babe" fails to take advantage of its candy-coated sweetness. Hyuna's delivery is commendable, but the song falls short.  [4]

Alfred Soto: As soon as the trop house sequence and manipulated vocals started, I mourned the lost evening. Turns out "Babe" has overdubs and tricky changes commensurate with the lustrous vocals. [7]

Adaora Ede: Vintage synth gets thrown in line with the overall ageless theme, polkadotted across the entire track are subtle post-post-punky vibes, Hyuna LITERALLY coos her verses, and it all goes together in a not-mashed-up-together way. Weirdly, I am somehow reminded of early-Charli XCX's witchy house a la 2013's "You (Ha Ha Ha)". "Babe" is good because you don't know where it going to go. Sonically, it's not as deliberate and set in method and genre as other Hyuna hits (read: "Bubble Pop!"'s, well, bubbly summer jam and "Red"'s snotty trap) but it's a seamless trip into the world of space pop. [7]

Maxwell Cavaseno: A mantra-like scale of deceleration (26...) tethered to a classically nasal whine (25...), "Babe" works like a regression to childhood far (24...) from Freud's creepy insistence on some shit involving startling horses and your mom (21...), but more or less closer to Cobain's insistence that it's infants (19...) who have the ability to truly express our joy with one another. Chimes (17...) are used in gestures of esoteric wisdom but are also simple lullaby tricklets (15...) falling down alongside you as you fall further and further back alongside Hyuna. By the time the record ends, her voice moved from nag to coo to cyber-quartzed gurgling. The love is so infantile, so strange, it doesn't even feel like something human or rational. It just is. [8]

[Read, comment and vote on The Singles Jukebox ]

[aurimeanswind]

Your Favorite JRPGs—Sunday Chats (8-6-17)

Happy August everyone! The last month of summer, the heat is kicking up, and video games for some reason are coming out an entire month early again. It’s getting a little absurd, honestly, because like 12 games are coming out this month that I want and that’s just like... every month until December. Sooooooo.

Well anyway, this Sunday Chats is a bit different! I said last week that instead of soliciting questions for me from you, my lovely readers in this weekly digest of my life, I’d ask all of YOU a question, and then talk about your responses!

Well, suffice to say, you all blew me away. I said last week that I’d really love it if all of you came out for this, and I was going to start with something easy, but today I got the most responses to any Sunday Chats EVER. Over 30 responses and I am just so so so SO grateful! I love the readers of Sunday Chats as much as anything I make because, much like most things I put out on the internet, it’s very intimate and personal, and allows for a kindred connection between me and you! So thank you all so much for submitting your responses.

This week, I asked the question: in as few tweets as possible, what is your favorite JRPG of all time and why? Now, keep in mind, this isn’t a thing I’ll be doing every week from here out. I think I’ll do it the first Sunday of every month, keep it a monthly thing, and return to your regularly scheduled Sunday Chats next week, but this felt like a good thing to start off on. I am a massive JRPG fan, and I love them of all shapes and sizes. I’m working on a brand new project that is focused exclusively on JRPGs, and I wanted to know everyone’s favorite, but to know where my followers are at with the genre, and also maybe get some ideas of games to play for this new project.

With that being said, since most folks sent in multiple tweets for this (which is totally fine!) it’ll be a bit longer than a normal questions section, and I’ll talk about the games I can, so let’s get to it!

Your Favorite JRPGs

One, it’s SUIKODEN, so I guess the jokes on you, and two, it’s one of those classic JRPG franchises that I have never stepped my toes in. Though I’m not sure “it just is” is a very good explanation as to why it’s the best JRPG for you, but hey, to each their own.

Suikoden has the idea of just tons and tons of characters, kind of Fire Emblem style, and I like it for that. It was going for that army building idea in a JRPG way back when, before Fire Emblem got really crazy with it, and it’s a really cool mechanic to design around. 

I really truly love Ni no Kuni. It’s such a beautiful game about coming of age and dealing with loser, and like you said Brendan, the story is really incredible. Oliver’s struggle with kind of finding what it is and what it really means to love someone and lose them is incredibly poignant, and the turns the story takes as it goes on are really fun. I could not be more excited for the sequel and what it does with the franchise.

Ghibili’s style in that game really does set it apart too. Visual/Audio-wise, it’s unmatched in a lot of cases, with a score done by the Japanese Philharmonic Orchestra, and some of the most stylish and heartwarming designs I’ve seen in a JRPG on consoles. Oh, and most importantly, that game, and its sequel, know what’s up with a world map, and how important it is still.

Now that is quite the praise. Honestly, digging into Nier has been a lot of fun so far, and even though I haven’t played nearly as much of it as I need to, there is something unquestionably special to it.

Now to say its the best 6 hours in is definitely too early, but I’m excited to see what all the dialogue is about.

So of the three classic Final Fantasy games, Four, Five, and Six, Four is the one I have played the most of. I can confirm that the Chocobos are incredibly adorable, but I really loved the characters in FF4. Specifically Cecil was such a great protagonist for me, and his kind of camaraderie turned rivalry with Kain is awesome, and while I never finished the game, that was the crux of what pulled me through what I did see of the game.

The version I actually played the most of was the voice acted DS version, which I really loved! I remember it getting a lot of shit, but I thought it was a pretty dope way to play that game.

While I know remotely nothing about Final Fantasy 5, I know it’s got an infamous job system which, if I am remember correctly, is kind of like an extension of Final Fantasy 3′s job system? And would then continue in Final Fantasy 9? I obviously don’t know for sure, but yeah. I know nothing about FF5 of all the classic FF games (excluding the first three). 

Though I’m glad someone has it as their absolute favorite. In conversations it always seems to be Six or Seven, and to hear Five is at the top of SOMEONE’s list is a comfort to that game I’m sure.

Yeah, I mean Final Fantasy 6 is the one, right? I feel of that era of FF games, it’s the one that gets brought up the most. I’ve tried to start playing it on two separate occasions now and I just have never been able to get into it. Maybe I need to play it on its original SNES format, not the PSone version, but I’ve always just never gotten really interested in it. Folks have defended the Esper system by saying its better than FF7′s materia system too, and I don’t even know if I’ve gotten far enough into the game to see it.

It’s one of those games I want to love and just haven’t given the time really.

Yeah I mean Final Fantasy 7 is one of my absolute all time favorite video games ever, and I don’t think it’s a cliched answer at all. I think that game truly holds up, and is a blast to play. I replayed it early last year and had a great time playing it on PS4 via the PC port to the system. 

The Materia system really doesn’t get enough credit it honestly. The idea of leveling up these gems and having them give you more spells and then split off into more and more and more Materia is so cool. Plus, I loved the way Materia was just all about slotting things next to each other in simple ways to make combos, like combining “All” with “Cure” and being able to cure your whole party. The magic was just great, and things like the Enemy Skill Materia and the 2x/4x attack Materia just made leveling and grinding in that game super different, since you were leveling your characters but also the Materia on them.

I’m a massive fan of FF7′s story, and its music is just all time for me. It’s an absolute classic, and weirdly enough, I think actually looks kind of great still. It’s backgrounds are all prerendered and blurry as hell, sure, and the characters all have Pop Eye arms, but there is a charm and a consistency to that presentation that I love.

Now to answer your questions Brandon, I think Tales of Vesperia is all time as far as some of the most underrated JRPGs. So few folks have played it, and what that game does with weapon skills is incredible. It’s also one of the best JRPG stories out there too! I like it even more than Final Fantasy 7!

As for most overrated JRPG, I’m not sure. Probably for me PERSONALLY it’d be Final Fantasy 6 right now, but I know that comes from ignorance. That game is hard for me to penetrate, mostly because it hasn’t grabbed me. But it’s of a different era and I haven’t given it a true shake yet. Unfortunately, it’s the best answer I can think of off the top of my head.

JRPGs are about their systems and their characters. I love a good world and story, but I think if the systems that link together are good, and the cast of characters you have are memorable, you’re in for a winner no matter what.

Final Fantasy X is another game that I tried to play multiple times and just never penetrated. To be fair, it’s been a great deal of time since I actually tried, and I’ve never given it a shot as an adult, so I want to, don’t get me wrong. Just to find the time...

Ten-Two is one of those games that I feel like you don’t hear a lot of love for, but when you find someone who loves it, they really love it. And yeah, the whole dress-system (I think its dresses?) that replaces the jobs has a really cool ring to it. Plus, who doesn’t love pop-idol main characters?

Kingdom Hearts is one of those all time games for me. Much like my cohost Nabeshin, Kingdom Hearts 2 Final Mix is one of my all time favorite games. It perfectly does mesh two amazing things I love: Final Fantasy JRPG goodness, and Disney, and honestly makes it look easy.

If you think of the big budget mash up games, none of them have gone as far as Kingdom Hearts as far as trying to create a cohesive universe and tie it all together.

There are just so many true genuine feelings that Kingdom Hearts evokes. It tries, and I think for the most part succeeds, at being the Disney movie of Japanese Role Playing Games. It tries to teach the player about love, friendship, and the sacrifices and struggles that come from that. At least, the first one does. It takes that to another level and tries to build a universe after that, and say what you will about the later games getting away from the core concepts, it creates something magical and expansive. A world that sucked me in with characters I love and wonder to be shared for all. Its a franchise that, above most, has felt like a warm hug when I need it.

The World Ends With You is a game Nabeshin and Scott from Irrational Passions have been trying to get me to play for years. I’ve tried it out before and it’s crazy intimidating, but there is no doubt that it is one of the most original video games I have ever seen, just in general. It takes the pop/punk/hiphop style of music and art and beautifully coalesces it into a Tokyo as it is realized in TWEWY. I really respect the game, and I wish I could break into it, even though it feels impenetrable.

Just another one I need to add to the list.

Dragon Quest is ashamedly a JRPG franchise I have never touched, and it’s one I desperately need to play. With DQ7 and 8 out on the 3DS now, I feel like there is no better time to get into it, but I just don’t have the time or money. DQ11 is one that is on my radar though, and looks excellent. I feel like its really the progenitor of Chapter Based JRPGs like you pointed out Harold.

So yeah, Pokémon!

Anyone of those haters out there that says Pokémon isn’t a JRPG, they can go shove it. It totally is, and still today acts as maybe the best gateway into the genre. It’s phenomenal and I adore it. Like Nato said, there are really technical levels to the game if you want to get into them, but also like Jeff said, it’s just real good monster catching and raising.

I think Silver/Gold/Crystal and then by extension Soul Silver/Heart Gold are definitely the best Pokémon games, essentially because they refined the mechanics to a great point before you get into all the incessant mini game bullshit, and also happen to have pretty much the whole first pokémon game in them as well. 

For me though, it’s still Pokémon Black and White. 150 new Pokémon and through the run of that game you see nothing but those new Pokémon? It was like being in the OG Pokémon game but all knew, and recapturing that experience was really magical for me.

So Fire Emblem is incredible. I’ve played all the Fire Emblem games released in the US save for Shadows of Valentia, and I absolutely adore the franchise.

As a JRPG built around tactics gameplay, it’s definitely one that you have to commit to and be careful, especially because it’s a deep rabbit hole. Both the original Fire Emblem and Path of Radiance are absolutely fantastic. Path of Radiance is probably my second favorite in the series, behind Fire Emblem Awakening, which is also one of my favorite video games of all time.

Awakening is just the tactics gameplay perfected, with amazing stacking system, duos that can link up and fight together, and of course the relationship system with tons of cute Fire Emblem babies to be had. I love it.

The series has grown and evolved so much over the last few years, and I cannot wait to see the next major console release next year with all the learnings of the 3DS entries.

I have never played Vagrant Story, but if it has spies in it, and Jarrett Green likes it, then you know it’s good.

I’m sorry Kaylie, you know I hate hurting you so, but Tales of Symphonia is the gateway. For all three of us I’d say it played the same role of discovering games like that.

Symphonia was my first Tales game, a franchise I love and adore to this day, I mean look at what I said above about Tales of Vesperia. It was one of those times where I went into a GameStop and said “I want an action game like this that’s long and has a lot of voice acting and cool characters in it”, and back in the day my GameStop/Babages was legit, and the guy behind the counter pointed me onto the TWO DISCS that made up Tales of Symphonia. And boy did it change my life.

It was the first time I was “aware” of what a JRPG was, why Japanese games were the way they were, and really what the game, and the genre, was going for. It was really eye opening for me.

I played the game predominantly cooperatively with my brother and my friends, and it was amazing. I cannot undersell how much fun I had with my first play through. It was also the first game I remember playing that had a New Game Plus, and though I never got into it, I was so blown away by the idea, I have always saw that as a huge plus since.

While I don’t think the game holds up as well as I’d like it too, having beaten it on PS3 just a few years ago, the game is definitely still super special for me, and I do love it.

Goddammit Roger.

Seriously, shoutout to Persona 3. Good god is that game incredible. I have a long history with that game, playing way back when in 2008/2009 and loving-loving-LOVING it. It means more to me than almost any game, and on any given day is probably my second or third favorite game ever.

It’s dark, its character driven, and as the first game to use the Social Link System, it really hits a lot of the potential the series holds. A surprising amount I’d say, only to be evolved on in its sequel.

It’s a special game and I hope with Persona 3 Dancing Moon Light coming out soon a lot of folks will consider revisiting it. Hopefully Atlus just does a proper remake like the game deserves.

Yeah y’all.

I mean, it may be preaching to the choir here, but this is the game, in my humble opinion. Persona 4 Golden is my favorite video game of all time, and I absolutely and without question, adore it. I have often described it as “the perfect game for Alex O’Neill” and I stand by that.

The game is perfect. For me, at least.

There are blemishes on its perfection, for sure, and parts of it may not have aged incredibly well, but when I think of the potential of video games and their character/storytelling, Persona 4 is it for me.

It’s approachable, its lovable, it’s got some of the best gameplay ever, and the way all the systems interlock and support one another is brilliant. I cannot say enough good things about Persona 4, and I will likely never stop.

If you have never played a Persona game or Persona 4 specifically, you should fix that. 

Persona 5 is truly, truly fantastic. It’s near impossible to follow up a game like Persona 4 Golden, and yet Persona 5 does it and honestly makes it look easy. While the game’s message didn’t hit me the same way Persona 4′s did, I think that says more about me than the game. It’s still something to behold, and I’ve written and talked plenty about it all year.

I’m just bummed Cameron didn’t feel the need to tell me why it was his favorite...

Lunar is another game, like Final Fantasy 6, where I have tried to get into it and failed on multiple occasions. I will someday though, because in a recent attempt to get into Lunar I was having a great time and then a bunch of games came out. I think I will get into it at some point, what with the pretty great PSP version of the first game out there, and I really love the loving style and design that game puts out. I really want to know more about it, but want to play it to learn it.

Wow. Those are a lot of fantastic games, and thank you all so much for sharing! My favorite JRPG is obviously Persona 4 Golden, like I said above, with Persona 3 FES, Tales of Vesperia, Kingdom Hearts 2 Final Mix, and Final Fantasy 7 being pretty close runners up. I feel I’ve touched on why all those games matter to me so much, and what makes them so good, so I won’t repeat myself here. 

But JRPGs are an incredible genre. They’re expansive, world building titles that create misfit casts of characters and send you off on your own Goonies-like adventures. The idea of a group of misfits saving the world is a classic story, and though almost all of these games mentioned above follow that same arc, they somehow all have their own unique aspects. Whether its a multilayered system of mechanics and monsters to catch, or great writing, or in depth character development, they each bring something new to the table, and those are the best things a JRPG player could ask for. Now, there is still plenty of room to go up for the genre, and I’m excited for this new project to talk about maybe the ways it could do that.

What’s On Tap

The only thing I’ve been playing is Overwatch, and while Doomfist is still great, the main draw has been getting back into playing Overwatch with people again! I convinced friend of the Chats Kaylie Woomer to buy Overwatch and seeing her get into it and actually have fun with a multiplayer shooter for the first time. Like, ever? And this would be her first multiplayer game on top of that just in general. Which is super exciting!

It helps keep pushing that idea that Overwatch is crazy accessible and fun to get into. Even for folks who aren’t super into shooters!

But it’s been fun to see someone else’s genuine first experience with the game, and shooters in general. Shoutout to Kaylie for playing with me! Also to Andrew, Cameron, Xyger, Sean, Danny and more for playing with me this week. It’s been a ton of fun!

The Checklist

There is a lot of drama going on in video games recently, so I’m just going to pimp out locally sourced projects, so to speak.

The new show from Irrational Passions: Input - http://irrationalpassions.com/the-first-episode-of-our-new-show-input/

So Jurge Cruz, Logan Wilkinson, and Jarrett Green, the editorial team for IrrationalPassions.com, have put together a new show. It’s called Input, and it’s a news-based show that discusses stories, games, and the stories of the people making games. I’m so excited about it, and you should please subscribe and rate/review it. It just launched and it would help a ton right now.

Break in Reality Podcast Episode 56 - https://soundcloud.com/breakinreality/bir56gotyw

I was on Quinten Hoffman’s podcast this week, Break in Reality, with other friend Andrew Taylor! We did our “Game of the Year Watch” talking about our top picks so far in the year, and it was a great time! Give it a listen!

4 Yanks 1 Aussie Episode 48 - http://www.4yanks1aussie.com

I was on Episode 48 of 4 Yanks 1 Aussie with the good boys over there, which is not out yet, and probably won’t be out for a few weeks, but I’m excited for you all to hear it. Well, yes and no, but it was a great fun time, and I really do love and respect those guys.

I hope you all enjoyed this very unorthodox Sunday Chats. I had a lot of fun putting it together, and we’ll be back to the normal Sunday Chats format next week, so don’t worry too much about it.

Well, I’ve had a nice long day, and it’s time to chill out with some Game of Thrones and Chinese food.

Cheers all.

Keep it real.

[dillatont]

Soundtrack Review: The End is Nigh

You hear the voice, calling clearly. "Video Game Music has lost its' way." You nod, and then wonder...but how to regain it? "The masters...." the voice continues. "Take the music of the masters....the classical music that has held up for generations. Put that music into the games of tomorrow, and all will become well once again." Sage wisdom, surely. Then, suddenly, a new voice rings out. "These are not the masters you seek out" The new voice continues, growing more demented with each word. " You seek the 8-bit masters of yore.....the full oddity of the 8-bit sound, taken to a new dimension with all of the ridiculousness that only modern sound techniques can employ." Odd wisdom, but this, too, has some sense.

The original voice begins to protest, and the voices grow louder. You try to escape them, block them out, anything, and in a moment of clarity it hits you. Why must one master be served? Why can't we have 8-bit insanity and classical music in the same game? Why is this not possible? Surely, there must be a game out there that takes classical music to a level that can only be called.....ridiculous.

Boy, have I got a soundtrack for you.

The End is Nigh released in July 2017. It's an indie platformer created by a team of 2 that includes Edmund McMillen, one of the developers of Super Meat Boy and The Binding of Isaac. As usual, I've done only a minimal amount of research into the actual game itself, so all I can tell you is that it's set in a weird, post-apocalyptic wasteland, and that the visual aesthetic is bleak and dimly lit but distinctive, in a way I've only really seen in.....Super Meat Boy. (Huh. Funny how that works.) The composers, too, also have some experience working with McMillen already. They are the band Ridiculon (yes, really), and they did the music for some of the "Binding of Isaac" games (though not the original). So, what kind of soundtrack did they decide on for the game? On their bandcamp page, they describe it as "Your trusted musical oafs, Matthias Bossi and Jon Evans (AKA Ridiculon) have punished and pulverized all your favorite classical hits. Indeed, they've ground them into dust, snorted them, and sneezed them out like the liquid magma pellets of red-hot musical fire that they are."

That's, um, accurate?

It's clear that this is not supposed to be a "normal" soundtrack. It isn't. Obviously. That becomes evident pretty quickly in the opening track ("Title Screen"), when the opening piano track, the gentle minor-key Gnossienne by Erik Satie, suddenly adds a guitar to the mix. In general, the general style of music here is classical music with very little in the way of classical instrumentation. There are guitars, drums, and electronica everywhere, and while it's true that the orchestral instruments are THERE, they often feel like they're sort of relegated to the background (save for the strings and occasionally piano). It's sort of like the Trans-Siberian Orchestra (the rock-and-roll Carol of the Bells group.....trust me, you've heard them before), but with a bit more of an edge to it and a bit heavier bass guitar sound. Add to it the serious music, and the sound is unique.

Well, okay, the "serious" music. To be fair, this is not NPR-style classical music in the first place. Some of the arrangements contain incredibly recognizable pieces, such as "Hall of the Mountain King", Verdi's "Requiem", which has been used in approximately 70,000 movie trailers, including Mad Max in recent years, and the ever present "Flight of the Bumblebee". There's also representation for the 1812 Overture and the New World Symphony, though the less "popular" parts of those pieces were used hear. In addition to the recognizability factor, there are several non-standard classical examples in here, including noted oddball pianist Erik Satie (the composer of "Three Pieces in the Shape of a Pear"), as well picturesque works from romantic composers Modest Mussorgsky and Camille Saint-Saens. The point is, this is music that lends itself well to some non-standard arrangements and interpretations in the first place.

Which is the first really strong thing I would like to point about the soundtrack: if you are going to do an entire soundtrack of arrangements, you better pick some REALLY strong music to arrange. They did. I think their choices were generally spot on, with the exception of two pieces that come across as cliched ("Flight of the Bumblebee" and Beethoven's "5th Symphony" are a little bit overdone, if you ask me), and one piece that doesn't give the composers much to work with in my opinion (Liszt's "Dante Symphony", which perhaps could have been substituted for something more rapid by Liszt....maybe the Mephisto Waltz, which feels like it would fit the style of this soundtrack quite well). The other 10 or so pieces that are arranged are really well done, and they are creatively arranged in ways that sound fresh, interesting, and unusual.

Also, they didn't just do it once. Try three times. (Nearly) every track is also given an "8-bit" arrangement, as well as a "glitched 8-bit arrangement" that further transforms the music in some other way. These 8-bit arrangements are interesting, as they use faithful instrumentations from the 8-bit Nintendo era while extending the harmonic capabilities beyond what the NES was capable of. Now, I do find that some of these 8-bit arrangements lack a little bit of the same punch as the rock-style arrangements, though that may be because I am not a terribly big fan of chiptune arrangements, despite the fact that I like the 8-bit sound. However, they are still quite well done for 8-bit arrangements, so the complaint is more one of personal preference and not that of the skill of the composers.

In general, the skill level here displayed by the composers is high. They were smart about not completely removing all of the classical elements from the music, but they managed to take some already well-designed and time-tested melodies and make them even catchier. It leads to something that, and I can't say this enough, is really unique. I haven't really heard a soundtrack quite like this before, and that, to me, is always the biggest compliment I can pay to a game soundtrack. I don't WANT it to sound like something else that I've heard before....I want it to be new and fresh and original.....even when the source music comes from the 1800s. In a way , then, re-using something so novel shows a brilliance that I can very much appreciate from Ridiculon. (Also, I can appreciate the ridiculousness of the whole idea- that's fun, too, and kind of the point. This whole sound track is insane, and I absolutely mean that as a complement.)

That's not to say that there aren't some small weaknesses to the listening experience. First, it is too repetitive. Because the same pieces were arranged in multiple ways, by the end of the 2-hour soundtrack, I struggled to enjoy the same pieces that I had heard numerous times before. I suspect that's not an issue during actual gameplay, so feel free to disregard that criticism if you're, you know, actually playing the game. Secondly, it could have used a bit more variety in the tonality/time signature of the music on occasion. One of the best pieces, "Acceptance", and arrangement of Liszt's Hungarian Rhapsody, was in a major key, but thanks to a rollicking tempo and some truly odd instrumentation and sound effects, it was one of the most fun tracks to listen to on the album, and it fit well without being "dark". More of that would have been nice, and would have provided the same sort of manic energy needed without having to rely on the same tempo/key as other pieces.

But, I am only discussing small weaknesses here. After all, this is good stuff. The composers took good music, and stayed faithful to it while still imbuing it full of fresh ideas and instrumentation. I'm sure classical purists would be horrifed, but A) I don't think the composers care, and B) Neither do I, despite my own classical training and background. Really, it's worth a listen because it is unique and interesting in so very many ways.

(Also, unrelated: the track lists are worth perusing. SO many good puns based on old-school video games!)

******************************************************************** Best tracks The Arid Flats- (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-uX4kzOs7lI) Best track in the game. Just, please listen to this. I can't explain it well enough Acceptance- (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oa7pR9WH82A) As discussed above As Above- (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z1qAjDLHZv8)  This is so weirdly orchestrated that it wasn't even recognizable as classical music. Love it! The End is Nigh (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1FfIDxdihhA) - I mean, it's 8-bit Mozart.....there's no way that comes out badly Catastrovania- (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BSAfDtxhMLY) For some reason, this piece just works so much better in 8-bit. I dunno. Wall of Sorrow - (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f64mxOOHUcc) Look, I really like Liszt's Hungarian Rhapsody, okay?

Worst Tracks Dig Dead- (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_njBxhJ_QYc_ I just don't feel like "Night on Bald Mountain" works in 8-bit The Hollows- (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fThpCLOibZk) Whereas the Dante Symphony only works in 8-bit (this is not) Mystery Castle- (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QJZ1lEC5IyM) Too cliche. Just, no.

OVERALL 8.6/10 It's not perfect, but it's interesting in all of the right ways, and it's worth a listen, even if this isn't your usual style of music or game. And, hey, liquid magma pellets of red-hot musical fire never hurt anyone, right?

[impurelight]

Tales of Zestiria - Forget Not Your Duty But Be Not A Slave To It Either

I just beat Tales of Zestiria. And wow, it is unlike any game I’ve played before. The story is gripping. The music is amazing. There are fights in this game that are so intense that after beating them you just feel exhausted. Or maybe it was because I was mashing the left mouse button way too much. Maybe I should get a controller some time. Hmm…

So is Tales of Zestiria my favourite Tales game? Well that’s a tough question. If I just stripped Zestiria down to it’s highlights then yeah, I’d have to say it’s the best. But here’s the thing. Between those highlights there are long stretches of time that you’re not doing anything.

There’s tons of backtracking. You have to complete sidequests and get 15 of these random items. There are objectives that are counter intuitive and you’ll need to Google them or you will have no idea what to do. There are unanswered questions and the story just doesn’t feel well put together. And that final boss… From what I hear it’s basically impossible unless you spam Rose’s dream slasher arte whenever he’s going to use his cheap one shot move which violates the number one rule of ending video games: don’t make the final boss overpowered.

So let’s start with the most important part first. The camera. Everyone has to know about the camera. Honestly it’s fine. You’ll just be button mashing for most battles anyways. I don’t know why people complain. To be honest it’s more funny than annoying.

There was one time I found the camera to be annoying. In a boss fight early on. With a boss named ‘Dragonewt’. Basically this guy will kill you in like 2 or 3 hits and you do basically no damage against it so you have to keep dodging until a cutscene triggered. And it was in a small room which made it difficult to dodge.

This is sort of a once in a game sort of a boss. Most of the bosses are easier but the bosses are still pretty tough. You get an option to retry a boss if you fail without having to reload a save or anything which is cool. I think I beat every boss within 3 retries with most beating them on my first try. Died a lot though. There was even this giant elephant boss that killed everyone in my party in 1 hit so I had to come back later.

In fact there are a lot of hard ‘boss’ enemies on the map. I’m not sure if this is a new thing, it feels like it could be in a previous Tales game but it’s new to me. Basically they’re weirdly coloured sometimes, although not necessarily always, huge monsters on the map. There’s usually one per map with other monsters on it. They don’t respawn. Don’t battle them immediately as they’ll most likely tear apart your entire team. Wait until you’re over-leveled, go back, and kill them for massive grade.

Speaking of grade there’s this new mechanic called the Lord of the Land. It goes with the plot of the game that you’re supposed to clear malevolence from the world. The Lords of the Land… well I’m not really sure what they do but it definitely has something to do with malevolence. The first 2 are part of the main quest and the rest are side quests. Basically they give you boosts when you’re in their land once you gain enough grade while in their land. It’s a fun little mechanic that makes you actually want more grade before the inevitable grade shop at the end.

But of course the biggest change is the new combat system. You’ve probably heard how battles take place on a modified version of the minimap rather than on a separate screen. It means no loading at the expense of the camera angles. There’s also no surprise attacks however you can get multiple enemies attacking you at once in a ‘dangerous’ encounter.

But this is just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to changes to the combat system. The biggest change are the seraphim. Your party will usually consist of 2 humans and 4 seraphim which is good because you need at least 1 human fighting for every seraphim. Don’t ask me why that’s just how it is.

The Seraphim come in 4 elemental types: water, fire, earth, and wind. And there’s also quite a focus on elements. You even unlock the ability to use each of these elemental types outside of battles to get to new areas. It’s not quite metroidvania but it’s nice.

Also the big thing about Seraphim is you can switch them out during battle and while they’re switched out they can actually heal. Plus there’s a new armitization feature. Basically a human, except Alicia for some reason, can combine with a seraph (seraphim is the plural of seraph; I beat the entire game without knowing that) to be more powerful. Some people think this is overpowered. I don’t think so because you basically lose one party member while you’re doing it which on the harder fights, the ones you actually want to be strong in, is incredibly important. But I use armitization because a dead human and a seraph can armitize which will revive the human saving a life bottle. This sort of makes seraphim feel disposable.

I feel bad saying that because the seraphim are the best characters. Especially Edna the sarcastic one. I thoroughly believe if she was not in this game the game would turn out completely different. She delivers some of the most memorable lines in the game. And her interactions with Michleo, which she gives various names to such as Meebo, are just priceless. Also she has a really good side-quest with her brother Eizen, who I’m told is making an appearance in Tales of Berseria. Definitely beat this one even though it’s right at the end of the game when you’d rather be beating the final boss. It’s a real tear jerker.

The other characters are great too, although they’re a bit stereotypical. Also there’s Alicia who everyone seems to be disappointed didn’t get a large role in the game. One of the big things in this game is that most humans can’t see Seraphim which is a really big deal in the beginning. And makes for quite some drama. But at the end it’s almost like a forgotten fact and not brought up at all.

There’s also a lot of dialogue in this game. When you fight new enemies you will get a little dialogue about them. And there’s a bit of dialogue when you’re walking around but not too much. And there’s a new skit style, but to be honest it feels a bit unnecessary and change for the sake of change when you realize to fit all the characters on screen at once some are always covering each other especially Edna and her umbrella. It actually reminds me of something a reviewer said about Dawn of the New World. See this is what happens when you listen to reviewers. Also many of the skits can only be played at save points which is weird to say the least.

Also this game must have been a pain to translate for. There’s puns and jokes everywhere. However I don’t really like the parts of the game where two people say the same thing at the same time. It just seems unnatural to me.

Back to battling. There is really a lot to the battle system here. I don’t think I can cover everything in this article because, well, I don’t know everything about the battle system. It’s really complicated. They try to explain it with the monoliths and skits but to be honest they’re not really well paced and most of the time I didn’t really care and just wanted to kill hellions.

But even if they were done better I don’t think I could have learned everything. There’s just too much stuff. But I can tell you the basics. There’s this new SC system which appears to be a replacement for MP, or whatever the Tales games called it. Now every attack uses it and it recharges really fast. You start with full SC at the beginning of a battle but as you battle more and more you start with less and less. Until you go to an inn.

By the way you now need to buy a food item from the inn to stay there. Which is weird, I had to Google it to find that out.

So anyways if you don’t go to the inn you’ll be guarding a lot during battles to up your SC. Which I guess is sort of realistic. There’s also BG but that’s just your energy for mystic artes and armitization.

Back on the inn thing. There are a few dungeons quite far from inns which is disappointing. You may want to fast travel but this takes quite a lot of gald (it’s actually % based).

Also the reason why there’s fast travel is there’s no world map. In most Tales games I’ve played there’s a world map and half way through the game you get a way of flying wherever. Not the case in Zestiria. You’re not a comically big giant next to a city anymore. The world is divided into a bunch of maps like what you’d find in other games. I really don’t like it. There’s just so much backtracking now. Don’t cheap out like me and not use the fast travel. It’ll make the game so much more bearable.

Zesteria is one of the first Tales games to be released on PC. So how is it on PC? Surprisingly good actually. I heard some people say this is a ‘poor PC port’. When I think ‘poor PC port’ I think no mouse input, having to use arrow keys for everything, and in general a terrible experience for anyone playing with a keyboard and mouse.

So by that definition Zestiria is definitely not a ‘poor PC port’. The mouse and keyboard feel just like how it would normally work. The only problem is some of the keybindings are a bit off and the right mouse button is sometimes used in place of the escape button. I think once you start moving the mouse it switches from keyboard only to keyboard and mouse controls. So for some things like adding accessories (which is separate from costumes in Zestiria), it’s better to avoid moving the mouse. Also the ‘reload’ option sometimes reloads the wrong save. But it’s not that much of a problem.

But other than that it’s a perfectly usable PC port. Although if you have a controller hanging around I’d still recommend using that. There’s too much clicking in this game. Made me feel like I was going to get RSI at some points.

But there’s a few other things that make this game not pass for a native PC game. For one the battle keybindings are on the main menu. Who does that, right?

Also apparently it’s capped to 30 FPS. I wouldn’t know, I played the whole game with a mod that ups the cap to 60. Although it’s a little weird when you get to cutscenes which are still at 30, actually they’re at 24.

Which brings me to the best thing about Zestiria. In many games there’s just that one feature you wish every game would copy. Well this is it. When you keep on trying to walk through a character you actually walk through them. This is genius and would have been so great in Fallout and Far Cry.

Also the side quests are much easier to find now. No longer do you need a wiki to find them. They’re now marked on the map. However sometimes I wish I had a quest log to keep track of all the random quests. Also quest objectives are marked on the map (only if you’re on the same map) which is sort of weird because they’re too frequent and when there’s no objective it’s really hard to tell where to go. But I guess it’s fine.

The map has also changed. A lot of locations have a lot of vertical height and the way the game chooses to handle this is now the map displays content based on your height and you can scroll to look at higher and lower locations. Also the only way to move the map is to use the WASD keys not clicking and dragging like any normal game. Oh well. The map is not quite intuitive. I wish they did it a bit better.

One thing I saw mentioned in this game are the locations look generic. Which is true. Some locations look cool but most of them fall in your generic temple, outdoors trenches location, indoor cave, and water temple. Actually I think the water temple is another case of people picking on something because it’s just fun to pick on. And it’s true, the water temple is pretty annoying. Although the wind temple is also pretty bad; it’s just so big.

So in conclusion I really liked Tales of Zestiria. Sure, it doesn’t have the trademark final-boss-that’s-really-only-the-half-way-boss and no one betrays you in this game. But it’s a really interesting and fun game which I really enjoyed playing after playing so many serious western games.

Reviewing Zestiria is hard because even though it does so much right it also does so much wrong. Especially the very mid-game that just feels like it’ll drag on forever. And the story isn’t particularly memorable. But you can’t overlook the fact that Zesteria has some really nice ideas, characters, and plot points.

OK, so maybe it’s not the best Tales game ever. But if you had a shortlist of most complicated Tales games ever Zestiria would definitely be on that list.

5.0/5.0 enjoyment + 3.0/5.0 quality -> 82% Overall.

How I calculate review scores.