#unless you like shlock. then you will like it

[samipekoe]

*unmagicals your pokaan*

[falmerbrook]

Going through the wiki pages and in-game books for all the critters for the phylogeny thing, I've tried not to fall into the "ugh eso lore sucks it shouldn't be canon" vibe, because there's really no reason to feel that way about the stuff added to or presented in the game, but I keep finding myself irritated by eso's creature lore. Despite the fact that I love the environments of the game (so far). And I think I've boiled it down to a few reasons after some reflection:

They tend to put the same creature in multiple provinces, which is fine because obviously that happens (some species are generalists that can be anywhere, species aren't going to respect arbitrary man-made borders, etc.) but is kinda lame when it comes to species that really feel like they should otherwise be unique to a place or when they put the same species in very different environments on opposite sides of the continent. (Please keep morrowind creatures in morrowind only, I'm begging you zos). I can't be too upset about it because I get that it's a symptom of game design that I don't want to fault the game designers for just because it cheapens things for me personally, but I do find it kinda lame, to be frank. I also don't really know whether to include the eso ranges of species or go with my own ideas for them.

Some of the pet and mount variations make it so there's like, 20 versions of one clade of animal (e.g. horses, dogs, wolves, cervids, etc.) but we know nothing about them as actual animals outside of a little blurb. While the blurb usually indicates something about their evolutionary history or natural history (which is nice), I'm still kinda hesitant to include them because once again they feel like they sort of cheapen things. Some of them are also those colorful mmo shlock too, which I personally think don't fit tes's aesthetic very well. But I also don't want to pick and chose which ones I include. So I'm not sure how to approach those. Right now my policy on it is to not include mounts/pets unless they also show up somewhere else.

[amber-management]

Day 3

Date Night 🍾 / Creepy Cookies 🍪

(Featuring my OC's Buttercup, Bailey and Muffin)

Buttercup waited eagerly as Bailey worked the cork out of another bottle of wine. There was already an empty bottle discarded on the floor, and Bailey’s face was flushed red from the booze.

Though the date night was Bailey’s idea, she didn’t really have much to do in the way of planning it, was happy to laze around all day and shove treats into Muffin’s hungry, waiting maw while Buttercup ran around all day trying to organize everything: getting enough booze for Bailey, scrounging enough food for Muffin. It was hard, to keep her pets satisfied, but Buttercup was used to it now, and she had this practice down to a T.

“I can’t,” Bailey slurred, squinting at the bottle of wine like it had personally offended her. “Can’t get it open…”

“Don’t worry, kitty,” Buttercup reached across the table to pluck it from her limp grasp. “I’ll get it for you.”

At her side, Muffin watched eagerly over the top of his large, three-tiered chocolate cake covered in gooey frosting and chocolate shavings. It was smeared all over his chubby cheeks and blossoming double chin. He was using his hands, at Buttercup’s behest, and licked the crumbling cake from his fingers with obscene sucking sounds. His soft belly was firming up in his lap, and she couldn’t wait until he finished the cake, he was wheezing and whining, pinned to his chair and begging her to rub his belly and soothe the pleasant ache.

The cork came free with a shlock-pop! and Buttercup handed Bailey the bottle. It took her two tries to wrap her numb fingers around the neck and it sloshed loudly inside the glass bottle as she settled back in her chair. “Hic- thanks,” she hiccupped as she brought the bottle to her lips.

Buttercup smiled at her. “How is it?”

Bailey offered her an unsteady yet genuine smile, but it was Muffin who answered, voice muffled by the food in his mouth. “So good,” he muffled, mouth full. “Did you make this?”

“I did,” she smiled. “I made it extra special just for you.”

He was wearing clothes that were already too small for him, and his underbelly was peeking out from under his shirt to rest on his thighs, soft and furred with delicate, grey fur. Buttercup reached out and gripped it in her hands, squeezing it tight and giving it a little shake. It shook a burp free from the recesses of Muffin’s belly and he moaned into his cake, his face buried within the moist desert.

She glanced away, hand still on the side of his belly, to see Bailey tilt the wine bottle back and guzzle down the white wine within, liquid pouring out of the corners of her mouth to catch in her long whiskers and fuzzy chin. Her eyes were half-lidded, and her breathing was laboured, almost as laboured as Muffin’s were as he double-fisted his cake, and when she finally pulled the bottle away, she gasped and hiccupped.

When Buttercup had first brought them home, Muffin had been so thin, with defined muscles and a six-pack, wouldn’t even touch a treat unless Buttercup begged him, and over time he learnt to accept having treats after every meal, and then he would sneak treats even between meals too, without being prompted. Now, he had mounds of soft, sagging flesh, with plush moobs and a drooping underbelly and a jiggly double chin, swollen and glutted and hungry all the time, happy to be stuff his face at every opportunity, craving the feeling of fullness. And Bailey had been so combative and refused to listen to a word Buttercup said, but once she had gotten some catnip into her, replaced her water with booze and swapped her treats with edibles, she grew to be much more agreeable. Now, she was happiest when she was drunk or high, with a bottle of alcohol in one hand and a tray of edibles within close reach. They were the best pets that Buttercup could ever ask for.  

She loved getting a front-row see of their hedonistic decline, losing themselves to gluttony and allowing Buttercup to do whatever she wanted to their bodies, moulding them into the perfect little pets.

With one hand, she reached over and squeezed Muffin’s moob, a perfect little handful that fit in her palm like it was made for her, and with the other hand, she reached over and tipped the end of the bottle up to make the wine pour faster into Bailey’s mouth, causing her to swallow more and more until Buttercup told her she could stop.

“That’s right,” Buttercup said as she drummed her nail on the base of the bottle and squeezed his sagging breast, causing them both to moan. “Finish it all for me. You want to make this date night the best one yet, right?”

[wonderfulworldofmichaelford]

About Me: Favorite TV Shows

I'm gonna be honest with all of you: I'm not much of a TV show guy. I'm just typically not one who likes sinking a lot of time into something unless it's a video game with a lot to do in it. This is why I review movies; they're typically the perfect length for my easily-distracted ass to take in.

But still, there are plenty of shows that have broken that rule and managed to keep me engaged and coming back for more. Some of these are favorites from my childhood, while some of these are more recent shows I finally decided to watch. It's a nice mix, but the main thing here is that all of these shows are something truly special to me considering I took the time to watch them all.

There's a few honorable mentions to go over. The four biggest ones are The Simpsons, South Park, Family Guy, and Rick & Morty. I love all four of these shows... for the most part. My issue with all of them is that despite having stretches that are some of the greatest ever in TV history, they also have huge chunks of absolute dogshit to the point it is debated to this day at which point the shows fell off, or if they even managed to get back on. And sure, every show has bad stretches, but with most of these shows being long running programs and all of them being massive cultural phenomena, it sticks out a lot more. Rick & Morty in particular was hit really bad by this. The reason these shows don't get on while I have other long runners with bad stretches on the list is simple: When these shows are bad, they're offensively bad. Like the middle seasons of SpongeBob are bad, but at least they don't have his giant sperms come to life and impregnate his sister's egg to create a giant incest baby or have an overly long sequence in which he vomits after finding out he fucked a trans woman.

Other honorable mentions include: Batman Beyond, Chowder, Catscratch, Codename: Kids Next Door, Fraggle Rock, Good Omens, Malcolm in the Middle, Heroes, Cardcaptor Sakura, Invader Zim, Ben 10, Gargoyles, and The Mandalorian.

30. Captain Planet and the Planeteers

I had to find a way to squeeze one "so bad it's good" show on the list, but how? Making a show that's pure camp is more difficult than making a movie like that... but they somehow found a way by giving us the adventures of racially diverse eco-warriors fighting against pollution with the held of an absolutely ripped planetary avatar with a green mullet who spouts an endless stream of cheesy puns and one-liners that would make even Schwarzenegger's Mr. Freeze take pause. Every time this show is on, you bet your ass I'm sitting down and watching; it's the most beautiful cheese there is.

29. Bluey

My wife and I caught this on TV during a Disney vacation and we ended up loving it! This turned out to be a blessing, because a while later we had our first kid and she's obsessed with the show (she's going as Bingo for Halloween this year). It's such a cute, charming children's show with relatable messages for both kids and parents, as well as a shockingly good score. It genuinely is one of the best pieces of children's media out there, much better than shlock like Cailou or Peppa Pig (are those shows even still on?).

28. Jackie Chan Adventures

Cartoons based on celebrities tend to suck balls, but maybe they were picking the wrong celebrities the whole time. Maybe instead of MC Hammer, they should have picked everyone's favorite homophobic, PETA-supporting Chinese nationalist action star, Jackie Chan! This show is literally the Saturday morning cartoon. It really had it all: Wild animated action, mystical artifacts acquired through Indiana Jones-esque adventures. all sorts of crazy monsters and supernatural entities, and memorable characters like my man Tohru, who walked so Prince Zuko could run.

27. Sailor Moon

I think everyone remembers their first anime, and this was mine. My mom loved the show, so I ended up watching it a lot back when it was airing on the early iterations of Toonami, and it has made me a lifelong magical girl fan. Maybe Cardcaptor Sakura and PPMM did that whole thing better, but neither show had Sailor Mars, my first anime crush. All that aside, the cheesiness and the sheer earnest power of love and friendship that managed to solve every problem is just peak fiction... I just wish it was nearly as good as the manga.

26. Green Eggs and Ham

If you told me way back when that someday there would be an adaptation of the Dr. Seuss book famous for containing a very limited number of words that expanded on the story, added drama, and threw in a villain who is a blatant spoof of former president and eternal idiot Donald Trump, I think I might have stared at you in utter confusion. And if you told me this show would actually be good, I'd be doubly confused. Thankfully, the show is really damn good, with an impressive cast and good humor that manages to capture the whimsy of the wubbulous world of Dr. Seuss perfectly.

25. Inhumanoids

I think everyone has a soft spot for an 80s toy commercial, but where most would pick Transformers, My Little Pony, or Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, my favorite of the lot was this obscure gem of a show. It's such a fun introduction of horror and Lovecraftian abominations to a young audience, and a lot of it is still unsettling and dark to this day. D'Compose will eternally haunt my nightmares between that raspy voice and the gruesome transformations he inflicts on his victims. Good shit!

24. Danny Phantom

Forget that stupid fairy show, this right here is the best thing Butch Hartman ever put his name on. It's a loving tribute to comic book superheroes in the same way Ben 10 was, but I think this show is ever-so-slightly better due to its blend of supernatural and sci-fi working really well (and also it doesn't retcon all magic as being alien energy or whatever the fuck they did with Gwen in the sequel series). The only thing holding it back from a higher spot is how hilariously bad the finale is and the rather scattershot quality of the final season in general. Too many loose plot threads hanging for my taste.

23. The Boys

Seth Rogen has seemingly made it his mission in life to adapt all of Garth Ennis' work in a way that makes it not suck ass, and boy am I here for it. Adapting one of Garthy-boy's most repulsive and spiteful works and turning it into a genuinely great superhero show that satirizes celebrity culture instead of just taking a huge shit all over comic book superheroes was really the way to go, and watching Anthony Starr and Karl Urban command the screen every time they take center stage is a blast. Sure, it's still gory and lowbrow, but it's done in a way where it's honestly appealing as opposed to whatever the fuck Ennis was doing.

22. Mystery Science Theater 3000

I mean, it should be pretty obvious that I love this series, right? If you ever had the misfortune of watching a movie at home with me, you'd know I just do not shut the fuck up and spend a lot of the runtime either pointing out trivia or cracking jokes, and it's mostly because of being inspired by this show. It's also partly because I'm annoying, but that's neither here nor there.

21. Batman: The Animated Series

No fucking duh this is on the list. This is pretty much the definitive portrayal of Batman for a lot of people, one that truly encapsulates everything the character is all about. Kevin Conroy truly owned the titular role, as did his costar Mark Hamill when it came to the Joker, and as if that wasn't enough this is the show that spawned one of my favorite comic characters, Harley Quinn. There's no denying the impact this show has had on Batman as a franchise, but even beyond that it's just a damn good show with really good writing. I sure am glad one of the guys who made it never went and flushed all the good will he garnered from creating this by constantly having Bruce Wayne lust after one of his teenage proteges!

20. Courage the Cowardly Dog

This show is pretty well-regarded for how it showcased some truly weird and fucked up imagery, but I don’t think any of that would be as resonant without the moments of tenderness and heartfelt emotion, the genuinely amusing slapstick, or the often clever writing. When it comes to episodic shows, variety is king, and this show has that in spades.

19. The Grim Adventures of Billy and Mandy

This show seems to be an answer to a question no one asked: What if they made Family Guy for kids? The black comedy, the negative continuity, the numerous pop culture references, the grossout humor, the musical numbers… it probably wasn’t intentional, but it sure adds up. The biggest difference is that this show is way more consistent in quality and has Jeff the spider, making it the superior show by a mile.

18. Digimon Tamers

What do you get when you cross the silly monster battles of Digimon with the writing of the man who brought us Serial Experiments Lain and a heaping helping of Lovecraft? You get this show, of course! It’s darker and more psychological than the goofier seasons before it, and while normally I’d balk at a series shifting tone like this, since this was my first ever Digimon cartoon I watched from start to finish I embraced it with open arms. Hell, this show is probably where my love of psychological and allegorical horror came from. And of course the show gave me yet another childhood crush, and if you’ve read the Rhine City stories I co-author you’ll know exactly which character it was.

17. The Twilight Zone

The brilliance of this anthology series is just the incredibly wide range it has with the supernatural and sci-fi stories. Sometimes you’ll get a resonant and hard-hitting allegory on a social issue, and sometimes you’ll just get a cool, fucked up horror story where some evil little kid can warp reality and holds an entire town hostage to his maniacal whims. I’ve enjoyed every revival they’ve done over the years, but the Rod Serling original just can’t be beat.

16. Stranger Things

I’ll admit that it’s really the first and fourth seasons carrying this show to #16; seasons 2 and 3 are wildly uneven, with 3 in particular veering close to the shark-jumping ramp with its cartoonish Red Scare stereotypes. But even in the show’s weakest moments, the characters and how they interact with each other have managed to keep me invested. How can I be too mad at season 3 when it gave my boy Steve (the best character) a new BFF, Robin (the other best character)?

15. Elfen Lied

I think it’s easy to write this show off as overly gratuitous because, well, it is. Everything here is turned up to 11, from the gore and nudity to the drama and tragedy. I kind of feel the same way about this show as I do for V for Vendetta, where if they cut the crucial tragic backstory it would make the work as problematic as the haters say. But with Lucy’s heartbreaking backstory left intact, it definitely elevates the story into something greater. The manga is still (mostly) better, but I have to give the show credit for introducing it to me, and also cutting out the character who constantly pisses herself.

14. Smiling Friends

Sure, the wacky shitpost humor and the black comedy are great, but can we just stop and marvel at how uncynical the show is? The core concept is a cheerful optimist and a bitter realist work together in a business that helps people be happy, and despite all the hijinks they get into they typically end up succeeding in one way or another. In a world where so many adult animated shows seem to revel in pessimistic nihilism (cough Rick & Morty cough), it’s nice to see a comedy with similar humor but a more optimistic outlook.

13. Ed, Edd n Eddy

This is one of the absolute funniest shows ever, making great use of the cartoon world to pull off the most wacky slapstick you'll ever see. But I think what truly pushes this series this high is the absolutely fantastic sound effects and music it utilizes. Like, holy shit this show is on another level. It all goes a long way towards making up for the living sexual assault joke that is the Kanker sisters.

12. SpongeBob SqaurePants

This show dropped almost nothing but bangers for three seasons, gave us one of the best show-to-film adaptations of all time, generated a near endless supply of memes, and was generally just really fucking funny. And sure, it dipped in quality a bit in its middle seasons, but I think the first three to three four seasons are good enough that they can fuck up as much as they want.

11. Invincible

Gee Amazon, how come you get to have two of the best superhero shows around? Where The Boys is more of a straight deconstruction of superhero tropes, Invincible feels like something of a reconstruction. We still have an evil Superman and morally dubious good guys, but Invincible himself is utterly unyielding in his desire to be good to the point he manages to break down his evil father’s emotional walls and save the world (for the moment) simply by being a loving son. Unwavering goodness even in the face of genuine horror is badass as all hell.

10. Full Metal Alchemist: Brotherhood

Not to be a stereotypical weeb, but this show is simply a masterpiece. Now I will admit, the first half of the show was honestly done way better in the original series, and that one also had some interesting takes on some of the characters once it started diverging from the manga. But this series has a much better finale with way better character moments, with stuff like Envy's final fate hitting harder than anything the original show could muster. There's a reason anime fans suck this show's dick so much; it genuinely is that good.

9. A Series of Unfortunate Events

I’m sure I wasn’t the only one disappointed that the original movie never got a sequel, so my hopes were high going into the Netflix series. Needless to say, I ended up extremely impressed; considering how they managed to incorporate the VFD plotline from the very start instead of throwing it in later in the series, I might even go as far as to call it an improvement on the books. I think the most surprising thing here is that despite expecting NPH as Count Olaf to steal the show, it’s actually Patrick Warburton’s portrayal of Lemony Snicket himself that brings the whole show together.

8. Peacemaker

I think this one speaks for itself.

7. Futurama

I love all of Matt Groening's shows, from the loose family sitcom shenanigans of The Simpsons to the great overarching plotline of Disenchanted. But it's really not surprising that the middle ground between tightly-plotted continuity and great humor is my favorite of his works. The best part of the show is no matter how many times it ends, it always comes back and finds new ways to bust your gut and tug at your heartstrings.

6. Gravity Falls

Disney has had many great TV shows in their time, but quite frankly nothing compares to this animated supernatural mystery series about a pair of twins having their summer vacation at a shitty scam shack. The episodes are mainly episodic with hints at the bigger lore, and it doesn't really ever feel like it's dragging its feet. It also didn't overstay its welcome, telling a fantastic story over the course of two seasons before gracefully bowing out while on top. Very few shows can say they ended in top form.

5. Jane the Virgin

One fine day I came home from work to find my wife watching this on Netflix. Curious, I sat down and watched it, not expecting much... and then proceeded to become so emotionally invested in the show I spent the rest of the series shouting at the screen as if the characters could hear me. It's sweet, funny, and absolutely ridiculous, a loving tribute to the telenovelas that inspired it, and a blessing unto this world for giving us the gift of Rogelio.

4. Avatar: The Last Airbender

Yeah, real bold and daring of me to say this is probably the best Western animated series ever, but it’s hard to deny that it’s true. With a rich world, excellent characters, and a strong story it’s to the point where the worst episode would be perfectly fine in any other show, and the best episode doesn’t even feature the titular Airbender at all. It’s just that good.

3. Breaking Bad

You know me, I love character studies of awful people, and few fictional villains are as awful as the egotistical meth manufacturer Walter White. Watching his rise and fall, the numerous moments where he goes further beyond the pale than before, is endlessly gripping, and the fantastic cast of characters helps keep things just as good even if we aren’t following Walt. Mike, Jesse, Gus, Skyler, the Salamancas, Hank, Saul… all of them are fantastic in their own right and could easily carry their own show. Speaking of which, about that last guy...

2. Better Call Saul

As much as I think Breaking Bad is objectively the greatest show ever, I prefer Better Call Saul. In hindsight, you can kind of tell Walter was bad from the start, but Jimmy “Saul Goodman” McGill? We watch him go from a morally dubious but ultimately well-intentioned man into the sleazy bastard he was in the original show, and it is genuinely heartbreaking. This show makes you truly dread the moment Jimmy fully becomes Saul, and considering how beloved the funny lawyer man was that is no small feat. The story of a good man falling from grace only to ultimately claw his way back to ultimately reclaim his humanity in the end… it’s beautiful.

1. JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure

I don’t think I could possibly overstate the influence this series has had on me and my writing. The personalized superpowers, the meaningful names, the numerous musical references, the unashamed embracement of even the most ludicrous elements of the stories… If you read the Rhine City stuff you can clearly see where I’ve let the JJBA influence seep in. But even outside the influence, it’s just a damn good action/adventure series, with no part being truly bad (4 - 6 are my favorites, though). It’s never a dull moment watching what sort of insane feats the Joestar family and their allies will pull off against the increasingly deadly forces of evil; here’s hoping we get to see Steel Ball Run sooner than later.

[connecticutsfinestconfessions]

Alright it's time for some controversial hot takes because I keep seeing the same points brought up over and over again and its kind of frustrating to me personally

>Epic of Remnant wasn't edited right?

What we do know about Epic of Remnant was that relatively little oversight was given to the writers. Nasu wanted to see their unique ideas take form. What a lot of people have interpreted this as being is that the chapters went completely unedited, and that the chapters we got were almost surely just the final draft just directly injected into the game.

But like think about that for a moment. That makes no sense. That's not how you would handle a massive property like this. Remember, making a chapter takes time. You have to know who the characters are in order to commission the artists to draw them, the graphic design people to make the sprite work, the game designers to make the stages. It makes no sense for the writer's to have gone completely solo.

What's more likely is that Nasu gave over most of the writing process to the writers, giving them rather limited or even no real expectations about what he wanted them to write. There was likely still some editing: there has to be for the sake of like, readability and character consistency and what not. Writing doesn't strictly happen in a back room and nobody else knows what's going on.

Agartha was likely Minase's original idea, rather than being something that was workshopped before hand. I don't think editing is to blame here.

>The good bits of Ooku were Nasu and the bad bits were Minase

This is maybe the worst possible opinion I've seen? This is just wrong. This just flatly isn't how collaborative writing works. At its most charitable, you might be able to point to specific chapters and go "oh, Minase wrote this one, I can tell from the style of the writing in this chapter." Authors working on separates parts is not necessarily wrong, but Nasu and Minase would have liked, worked together. It wasn't two separate scripts that somehow fit together like jigsaw pieces. The bad parts of Ooku, very likely, on both of them, as were the good parts.

The fact that nobody can really even point to any specific place that seems like Minase writing, because each of the authors does have identifiers that mark their writing as unique, suggests this is also not a real criticism. We know LB4 was written by Minase, his writing is distinctive. It points to the fact that Minase could have possibly not even written the script, or maybe vise-verse, that Nasu didn't write any of the script and that Minase was the primary writer.

The unfortunate truth is that unless Nasu or Minase goes into more detail about the creative process, we're never going to know for sure. We can make guesses based on what is typical for writing processes in companies, but to be honest, we're never actually going to know, and I think trying to claim specific pieces of writing for one author or another doesn't really do either author any good.

Minase writes some truly shit shlock, but also some very thoughful writing. Nasu is generally a great writer, but I'm sure a lot of people have complicated opinions on Tsukihime. We are not merely good or bad writers: we are defined by our works inherently. Until we know how Ooku was written, it has reflect on both of them; both its positives and its negatives.

my ultimate hot take is that Minase needs to decide if he's going to be a good writer for FGO or not!!! Minase is like. this fucking enigma of a person when it comes to the quality of his writing in FGO like. he's the script writer for the Prillya anime and co-wrote the Prillya event for FGO, which was so badly received Hiroyama never wrote for FGO again. he was also responsible for Agartha, which is universally hated. so it should stand he's just an awful writer and we should just expect everything he writes to be bad right.

but also he's done most of the Valentine events which are hit-or-miss but usually decent. and then the dude writes Yuga Kshetra and Paper Moon, arguably some of the best FGO content not written by Nasu. like what the fuck. it's like the dude decides every time he writes for FGO "i'm either gonna put actual effort into this or half-ass it until the deadline comes" and it's so!!! either just consistently be a good author or not stop making it a guessing game whenever we know you're gonna write something!!!

Yeah it's REALLY bizarre innit. On one hand I enjoyed LB4 so, so much more than I enjoyed any of the previous LBs. It's a thoughtful lostbelt that really felt like it got to the core of what Fate is. It's got great emotional moments, good twists, and is generally written as if the reader is a bit intelligent but not necessarily cryptic.

But then you run into a Valentine's day event and its "oh no men who don't get chocolate are an oppressed class" and I greatly reconsider the act of being literate.

[argylemnwrites]

Settled

Pairing: Bryce Lahela x MC (Cassie Vanderfield); Roomies (+ Bryce and Rafael) friendship also featured

Book: Open Heart (~5 weeks post book 2)

Word Count: ~1400

Rating: PG-13 (rare language)

Summary: A long standing bet is about to be settled.

Author’s Note: Inspiration for this piece comes from a real experience in my undergrad dorm. It also works as a loose follow up to my pieces “Enough” and “Some Definition.” Also written for Day 28 of the @choicesfebchallenge - Closure.

Bryce felt his eyes getting heavy in spite of the early hour and the movie playing across the room. He had just come off a night float block, serving both as the senior resident overnight for the three gen surg wards and completing any ED surgical consults that came in from 5 pm to 7 am. Even though he’d only had to work 18 shifts over the past 28 days, each shift had been frantic, often with barely enough down time to inhale a sandwich. On top of that, he’d basically hadn’t gotten a chance to see the inside of the OR at all. The senior carrying the trauma pager usually got all the overnight cases, since there weren’t many non-traumas that went to the OR in the middle of the night. For the few remaining cases, unless it was a particularly complex case, the attendings usually prioritized letting the interns covering the wards overnight gain some experience. As an intern, Bryce had loved that culture in Edenbrook, but now that he was on the other side, he felt a bit jealous, even if he knew it wasn’t fair.

He was just kind of burnt out, if he had to put a label on things. He’d felt more like an internal med resident for most of the block, something Cassie had teased him about endlessly. But he just didn’t find the work as rewarding as actually operating, the shifts were exhausting, and now, almost a full week off of that block, he was still working to adjust his sleep schedule back to days. Hence him falling asleep in the middle of an action movie at Cassie’s with her roommates and Raf at 6 pm.

“Is he out?” he heard Sienna hiss out, obviously whispering in case he was asleep, forgetting that fact that her voice was far quieter than the explosions currently happening on screen.

“No, he’s not,” Bryce whispered back, drawing a chuckle and a little elbow nudge from Cassie. He dragged his eyes back open to find her turned to face him on the sectional, so he gave her a little grin before he dropped his head to her shoulder and closed his eyes again. “But he might be soon.”

“Seriously?” asked Raf, his voice drifting up from the floor where he and Aurora were lounging in front of the coffee table. “I didn’t think you’d be one to sleep through the latest Tommy Phelps blockbuster.”

“Lahela is a little baby who is still whining about the fact that he was on nights a week ago.” Jackie’s voice was the next one to fill the room. “Or maybe he has the right idea and is done with this dumb garbage. Why did I get up early for this again?”

“Because we only have one year left where we are all going to be in Boston for sure, and times where we are all off for a movie are rare!” Sienna cried out. Bryce felt Cassie shift slightly, presumably reaching over to hold Sienna’s hand or rub her back, but she didn’t move so much that his head was more than slightly jostled on her shoulder.

“Yeah, but that doesn’t mean we had to watch this. Elijah, you don’t get to pick for movie night ever again.” Jackie added.

“Hey, I know my selections aren’t always the most popular, but this wasn’t me!”

“Alright, then who is responsi-”

“It was my pick,” said Aurora. Bryce squinted an eye open at that, glancing down to Aurora, who had twisted around to face Jackie. “What can I say? Sometimes I just need to turn my brain off and watch some shlock.”

“It’s better with a beer,” Raf said with a shrug, before lifting his bottle to his lips and taking a drink. 

“Well, I have to head in for a shift in a couple of hours, so that’s not an option for me,” Jackie said, “so I might have to take a page out of Bryce’s book and just nap.”

Bryce swung his foot towards her as he let his eyes close again, nudging her shin. “Shut up, Varma.”

“What? I’m not mocking you.”

“Sure.”

“I mean, there is plenty for me to mock you for always, but right now I’m not. Avoiding this movie and using Cassie as a pillow is one of your smarter choices.”

“I’m not using her as a human pillow. This is just part of boyfriend privileges, right Cass?”

“Absolutely,” Cassie said, but the room got suddenly very quiet as the explosions and gunfire came to an abrupt halt.

“Why’d you pause the movie?” asked Cassie, but no one answered her. Instead, Aurora asked a different question.

“Elijah, you still got the calendar?”

“Yup, lemme pull it up. I’m pretty sure everyone’s date has already passed, though.”

“What are you guys talking about?”

The room was silent for a few moments, so Bryce opened his eyes and dragged his head off of Cassie’s shoulder, glancing around the room and taking in everyone aggressively avoiding eye contact with him and Cassie. “Seriously, what’s going on?” 

“Oh, for fuck’s sake, it’s not that bid a deal,” Jackie said with an eye roll. “We had a bet on when you guys would officially be together.”

It took Bryce a couple of seconds to process what she’d said. “Wait, seriously?” he asked with a chuckle.

“It was Elijah’s who organized it,” said Raf, earning him a pillow in the face from Elijah.

“Hey, man!”

“What, it’s the truth?”

“When did you guys start this?” Cassie asked. She was twisting her fingers over each other in her lap, so Bryce slid his right hand in between hers, tugging her left hand over into his lap.

“Elijah took my bet the day after the Hopeful Hearts Gala,” said Aurora, “and I think I was the first one to pick a date. After Elijah, obviously.”

“Wait, this has been going on for months?” Bryce asked.

“Well, you two have been all over each other for years,” said Jackie.

“And you were all in on this? Even you, Sienna?” asked Cassie as she glanced around the room from person to person.

Bryce leaned forward to peer around Cassie. Sienna cheeks were flushed, but she didn’t shy away from looking at the two of them.

“I mean, I was rooting for you two! Plus, Elijah had a PowerPoint which made it all feel so official! And, I don’t know, we’ve all been waiting for you guys to-”

“What she means is we’ve all had to put up with your obnoxious flirting for far too long to not have a bit of fun,” Jackie said, cutting off Sienna’s ramble. However, one thing Sienna said stuck out to him, and apparently to Cassie.

“Elijah, you made a PowerPoint?” she asked, her free hand coming up to her cheek.

It was Elijah’s turn to have his cheeks darken, but he just gave a little shrug. “Like Jackie said, this has been a long time coming. And I was bored in allergy clinic.”

“It was quite the presentation,” said Raf.

“Yeah, we’re gonna need to see that,” added Bryce, shooting Cassie a wink as she shook her head lightly.

“I don’t know if I still have it.” Elijah answered just a little too quickly, making Bryce think he very much did still have it and had no intention of showing it to them. But before he could push him on that, Jackie asked Elijah another question.

“So, quit stalling. Who’s the winner?”

Elijah just shook his head. “Like I said, we all lost. Brittany was the last date, and even hers passed last month.”

“Wait, you got the gen surg residents involved in this as well?” Bryce asked.

“We’ve all been subjected to your prolonged and public teasing,” said Jackie, raising an eyebrow as if daring him to fight her on that statement.

“I mean, I know we’re a good looking couple, but this level of fascination is beyond what even I could have expected.” Bryce’s statement drew groans from almost everyone in the room and pillows chucked at him by Raf, Aurora, and Jackie, but all he could do was squeeze Cassie’s hand before snuggling up against her again, settling in for the end of the movie… and likely a little nap. Their friends could tease them all they wanted. They were happy, and that was all that really mattered.

Permatag: @choicesficwriterscreations @walkerswhiskeygirl  @octobereighth  @kimmiedoo5  @mom2000aggie

Open Heart: @mskaneko @omgjasminesimone @debramcg1106

Bryce x MC: @lahellacute @weaving-in-words  @anotherbeingsworld  @chaotichuman0090 @fortunatelywaywardsandwich   @dreaming-of-movies  @choicesarehard  @srta-give-me-my-jax-rl  @sunnyxdazed​

[cassatine]

under cut: some disorganized thoughts piggybacking on the teen vogue weighing on fic fandom vs actual thoughtful critique whiplash i mentioned earlier

imo there are two different conversations about fic fandom and critique and whereas they’re not unrelated they’re sometimes conflated in all kinds of bad faith takes

there’s a (getting old) conversation around so-called concrit that’s really about commenting etiquette - do i, random fic writer on the interwebz, have to take some random stranger’s so-called, unasked for criticism on my fics and thank them for it because they think it’ll help me grow or whatever? unless i’m posting on a platform where that’s the culture (the pit of wolves or wherever) or i’m straight-up asking for it, no. i really don’t. there are plenty of posts going around on why it’s entitled and rude to do troll concrit and i’m not gonna rehash that.

obviously you can’t really have the conversation around troll concrit without accounting for the fact that an entitled reader bitching because you don’t write good the way they want is not the same thing as someone pointing out your fic is filled with racist tropes. or for the fact that some of the aforementioned entitled readers are not above dropping all the -isms either. or for the fact that short of truly heinous pieces that are obviously heinous, what looks like exploitation shlock to me might be someone working through some shit or something, what do i know. point is, you can’t have the troll concrit convo while pretending the line is clear-cut, or that all critical comments are troll concrit.

but. it’s still really a conversation about commenting etiquette. it doesn’t (and shouldn’t) have any bearing on criticism of fic fandom and its trends as a whole, -isms and more covered. the actual thoughtful critique. i’m not going to go over why ‘this is a hobby and i’m just here to have fun’ isn’t a bigotry pass because it’s been done better than i could by others, but yeah it’s bad faith to use the arguments against troll concrit like that. it’s also bad faith to pretend every fic writer tired of random strangers telling them how to write gud or what to ship is really arguing for their right to be a bigot on the internet or to lead the youth to moral degeneracy because why not conflate everything since we’re at it.

and as far as bad faith goes there’s another kind of criticism of fic fandom trends i do see ‘this is a hobby and i’m (we’re) just here to have fun’ leveled at more and more as an answer - and when i say criticism i mean anything that’s not gushing positivity about the power of transformative fandom (and associated hot takes). correlation isn’t causation and there’d be plenty of other factors to consider, but i don’t think it’s completely coincidental that the arguments against troll concrit cross over into ‘don’t say anything bad about the magic of transformative power ever’ territory, and i really don’t think people’s right (including mine) to post fanfic on the interwebz without others being dicks to them should translate to no one being allowed to say fanfic isn’t actually the end-all of literature or even that good as a whole (like literally any genre out there) and that a lot of it is formulaic and/or so removed from the og canon it might as well be original pieces, etc, etc.

in conclusion i don’t have a point but nuanced conversation is where it’s at and teenvogue really went the other way

[xenosgirlvents]

Dawn of Fire - Structural issue

Dawn of Fire is the new series of books set in the ‘contemporary 40k timeline’ (actually set before it since it’s set during the Indomitus Crusade which the 8th Edition Rulebook already was set at a latter date than). It’s been compared officially by GW to something of a ‘mini-’Horus Heresy series but for 40k.

However, it has a serious structural issue to it which means, I fear, that we are only going to see an intensification of the Imperium-centric nature, and consistent victories, of the lore.

To be blunt: BL has an issue writing anyone winning anything except for the Imperium (and even then mostly just Loyalist Space Marines). However, for all it’s faults (and I am no fan of the series) what the Horus Heresy did do is force the authors to at least sometimes allow the villains to win. They couldn’t simply follow the standard BL and GW pattern of ‘Space Marines win everything’ because they needed Chaos to approach a point where it was on the cusp of winning before ultimately losing, they needed to let the Chaos Primarchs at least show some competence.

They still did this badly, don’t get me wrong. Even a brief perusal of the list of detailed battles in the Horus Heresy will show that Chaos, from the very start, loses FAR more than the Loyalists do, simply because, again, a BL or GW writer is so instinctively driven to let the Imperium win everything that even when they are trying to write a conflict which, for a good portion at least, should be going in Chaos’ favour...they still make the Imperium actually win more overall battles.

BUT! The Heresy being framed as a narrative of TWO perspectives did mean that Chaos at least won sometimes, it also made the narrative more balanced than the traditional GW or BL shlock. Not very balanced, mind you, but more.

Dawn of Fire doesn’t have that. Dawn of Fire doesn’t pretend to be a story of two narratives, let alone (being set in 40k not 30k) of all the factions in 40k. Dawn of Fire is a Horus Heresy-like series for contemporary 40k which is set from one perspective, the Imperium, and does not even pretend as if any faction or group has a stake in the story.

The result is a Horus Heresy-esque series where there will never be any feeling of obligation on behalf of BL or GW to let anyone achieve anything except for the Imperium. Which will, in turn, contribute more and more to this sensation that despite a ‘grievous blow’ supposedly having been struck against the Imperium, it has no tangible ramifications because the Imperium seems eternally triumphant on all fronts, and all it’s narratives are one of consistent expansion, success and achievement.

In Horus Heresy the writers knew they needed to let Horus win enough to explain how he could get to Terra. Dawn of Fire has nothing like that. They don’t need to ever let anyone win ANYTHING except for Marines.

And if BL and GW have shown anything it is that, unless there are incredible factors involved, they will happily let the Imperium (Loyalist Marines) win everything.

So what we have here is a new series designed to set the ‘tone’ of the contemporary era, to act as it’s primary ‘interlocuter’ with those invested in the lore side of it, which simply doesn’t even pretend that anyone or anything but the Imperium and Imperial characters matter.

We have a Horus Heresy in 40k but no-one but the Imperium matters, so there is no reason to expect this series will be anything other than a constant string of victory after victory for the Imperium. 

And I will sit here, on the side, and just marvel, marvel, at the fact that, for so many people, the consistent plot point of ‘Space Marines better than everyone, win everything,’ repeated again and again and again and again and again and again never becomes boring or tiring.

[adreamingofguns]

🔥🔥🔥 fandom/writing/dealer's choice

people are always like “things must be exact and perfect” when it comes to writing, but I’m of the mindset that as long as things are understandable, as in, comprehensible as speech, it is okay. I’ve fought several times abt this and abt death of the author w my english professor so like, oof. i get that grammar is important but also grammar is a racist/classist construct and should not matter as wholeheartedly as we make it matter, because as long as people are ***understandable***, what difference does it make if they use a period instead of a semi colon. what does it matter that their sentences are fragments!!

fuck you grammar is fake! it’s an invented concept! grammar is never gonna fuck you dude.

This also applies to the idea that capitalisation is necessary, because everything at the end comes down to aesthetics rather than necessity. What purpose does capitalisation serve? besides to denote proper nouns? nothing? the start of a sentence? no, thats what punctuation is for. punctuation serves a purpose, that is to say that is where one would pause to breathe if reading it aloud. though, one could, instead, use / the way poets do to denote a short or long pause. However my opinion entirely changes when it comes to fandom stuff, like rp or fanfiction, but also somehow stays the same in some aspects. Say you’re writing something and are not using proper punctuation or capitalisation. This is different because you are brought to a standard that everyone else is using. Capitalisation i’m not quite as stringent about because it’s an aesthetic choice and doesn’t ultimately mean anything, except for when using Proper Nouns, but even then, fuckin go hogwild capitalise Everything Important like a medieval saint. it’s when people don’t fucking know how to use a comma, and like i understand it is classist/racist to call it out, because i admit that some people have never learned where or when they’re supposed to put certain punctuation, but the thing is!

if you are posting things in a forum or area full of other people using proper grammar and capitalisation, learn a thing or two. this especially applies to on ao3 or in roleplay servers. if you’re surrounded by other people who are held to a higher standard, and whose standard is 100% obvious and visible, fucking cooperate with that standard my god. like, do you know how many people have learned english through the internet alone? If you were raised speaking and writing english, and have eyes to see, and are more than capable of seeing and replicating the grammar of other people around you who know what they’re doing, what is your excuse? This also applies especially to like, a specific server i am in where one of the people not only cannot hold themself to the standard of the rest of the server but this ineptitude was rewarded by them becoming admin. I’M SORRY, IF YOU CAN’T FUCKING USE PUNCTUATION THAT YOU ARE SURROUNDED BY DAILY IN THE SERVER why are you being given a role that requires you to be The Standard things are set to? I mean, i get why because favoritism but also this is an emotional why. Also fuck ellipses in writing. i HATE using ellipses except for in dialogue. Ellipses have 0 reason to be in narrative unless you’re fucking writing a comic book style shlock film, like something intentionally campy and cheesy. In dialogue it is okay, because it is to denote a long pause the way speech is irl, or like if it’s in someone’s internal monologue or pov. In writing narratively, though, just end it in a period and make a new paragraph holy fuck. you’re not aunt suzy talking about her day and ending things with an LOL just, stop. the sign of a bad writer is using ellipses during narrative unless they’re using it in one of the pre-explained ways. a set of ellipses denotes a specific feeling, a slow trailing off. you do not want that in a narrative unless it specifically fits the story and theme.

if it is omniscient third person narrative what are you doing don’t fucking use ellipses unless your narrator is, like, a movie trailer narrator or like, the genre is intended to be shlocky and hard to take seriously. if it’s limited third person, that’s a little better, especially if the person whose pov in question does the ellipses thing in their dialogue as well, because then it portrays their inner voice much more easily, but if it is someone who does not do these things why W H Y

but also having multiple characters have the exact same vocal patter and style is sloppy, unless there is a specific reason for it. but even then it is few and far between that there is a reason for that narrative and dialogue choice. plEASE please please please vary your characters’ voices in dialogue. if it sounds like it is all one person with the same vocal tics and mannerisms it’s BAD, harold. please for the love of jesus practice your characters’ dialogues. make them sound like real people, flesh them out (unless your genre and specific characterization calls for otherwise). ANOTHER BAD SIGN is first person narrative. that shit is trite and over-fucking-done if you want something like that to have emotional punch, use second person narrative or like, limited third person my fucking god. like, holy shit. if i see something in first person, i will 100% just shut down and not be able to read it. Especially if it’s fucking.. present tense first person, like I’m not doing these things in story, your experiences are not universal, karen. tl;dr - grammar is a myth, except for when being specifically requested and normalized in-group like in a forum or website specifically for Properly Written Grammatically Accurate pieces of writing. don’t be a shitty admin for a writing forum if you can’t fucking write. ellipses and first person pov are sloppy and boring. PLEASE practice writing the way real humans speak (unless intended to be otherwise by the narrative/characterization). oof this got long.

[tarajenkins]

And then there's the matter of the crap people have brought to my yard in the tags they put on my art and errant vagueposts, and my need to no longer smile and nod silently like the WoL. GANGWAY, IT’S THE DISK HORSE

When I was posting a lot of art with the Chais and Vauthry, it didn’t take me long to notice there was a distinct double standard at work in the tags of the reblogs. People who lovingly cooed over rat grandpa would tag my art--why they reblogged it in the first place, I wish I knew, I started blocking ones who did this--they would tag my art about how ew Vauthry is, how they were triggered by Vauthry, how they DEFINITELY WEREN'T REBLOGGING FOR VAUTHRY, etc. 

Even though there is a very good case Vauthry had no choice in his behavior at all, as perhaps the Ascians didn’t. Even though what he did do is a fraction of the atrocities the Ascians have done, the breaking point for these people was literally the lesser of two evils. Rat grandpa is afforded an amazing level of sympathetic theorycrafting, Vauthry is just dismissed as a “bloated parasite” (interesting choice of adjective to the person who made that comment). Despite all in-game evidence the Lightwarden corruption rat grandpa forced on him before he was born likely twisted both his body and mind. Despite all in-game evidence Ascians took full advantage of their newborn pawn.

When @kasunshine​ pointed out that vaguepost in the Vauthry tags aimed at me, I saw a second one by the same person--it seems to be gone now?--calling me a "Vauthry Stan" who had gall to talk shit about rat grandpa for what he did to an unborn child.

Why does it take a “stan” to find what was done to him monstrous? Oh--right. Because rat grandpa. I probably would’ve made it under the radar if Lahabrea had done it.

No matter how much people may say it’s because Vauthry did bad things (that was sort of the point of rat grandpa corrupting him), or that he had no character development (hi Zenos), the fact remains that somehow, fat jokes are the preferred method of mockery. 

Creating, liking, reblogging, not speaking out against (unless confronted), fat jokes. Fat jokes, imagine that. 

Fat jokes even got defended in this recent round of discussion, under the guise of "concern", of course--even though it’s been thoroughly documented that shit is bullying and helps no one but the bully to feel better about themselves. Imagine upskirting Dulia-Chai’s model and laughing at her body, because haha, fat people are fat, gross! Imagine laughing at Dulia-Chai for eating because haha, fat people eat, gross! I’ve even read so many comments elsewhere about how Vauthry is absolutely a sexual predator, although nothing in-game backs that up. Yet when rat grandpa practically brags about all the kids he's had with unwitting partners, there is only silence from the same people. Silence, or excuses.

But haha, fat people would totally be predators, amirite? They’re gross!

I've dealt with this attitude before when drawing big guys in other fandoms.  I’ve seen this phenomenon happen with them too. It’s always the same. Tumblr will gleefully reblog a fat woman for progressive brownie points (like my Dulia-Chai art), then will point and laugh and otherwise dehumanize fat men like kids on a playground (see disclaimers for EW VAUTHRY in the tags of the aforementioned Dulia-Chai art). If Vauthry had been a woman, or if rat grandpa had Vauthry's model, I am pretty sure most of this argument would not happen. In fact, if Vauthry’s model were reversed with rat grandpa, I would bet money people would all share my pain over the injustice of the Eulmore arc and all its poorly thought out shlock.

Square played the fat hate themselves, to the hilt.They used nothing but fat bodies in the trailer to represent the evils of Eulmore. Vauthry's introduction made sure to begin with a long, slooooooow pan from the stomach up. In German, Alphinaud straight-up called him a "fatass", apparently. Implications of cannibalism because we’re back in the Austin Powers days, I guess, even though meol made absolutely no sense if you bothered to do the math. But why bother to do the math? “Get in mah belly” haha fat people would totally eat people, amirite?

And finally, in the end, Square elevated the man who did this to Vauthry to a hero, because it seems they guessed correctly--not a lot of people would give a shit what was done to the fat guy, they’re too busy blaming the victim (and everyone else rat grandpa killed) because rat grandpa is just soooo tragic and

ah

"aesthetically pleasing". (Modding rat grandpa into bed for screenshots is just a coincidence, it’s all about his character.)

I've read long discourse on how rat grandpa is innocent of all things he's done because Tempering, though rat grandpa's dialogue sounded like the Ascians expected to be Tempered ("of course" Zodiark Tempered them, "it was only natural".) It would be tragic if it pans out the Ascians were puppets, but before they were, there was a choice made -- of free will and immortal wisdom -- to commit to this bloody course. I don’t really buy the bullshit rat grandpa was selling about looking for other ways to achieve their goal. If there was really a less tragic path and they could choose it, why didn’t they choose it in the first place? They’re immortal. They have all the time in the worlds to achieve their goal. Yet they went headlong into the murder of billions of sentient creatures. Made a game of it. Oh, the WoL was being tested? Why does the WoL need to pass a test, when if they disagreed with the Ascians’ methods, it was stated plainly that the Ascians would then kill them anyway? Why does anyone on the Shards need to pass a test for the right to exist? Yeah, yeah, “moral relativism”, I know. Cool motive, still murder, and by rat grandpa’s own admission they freely chose to become the thralls of a primal, apparently fully aware of the monstrous things they may do in Zodiark’s name. Of course, rat grandpa said he’d do it all even if he weren’t Tempered. Hm.  And I thought Raha was a shitty actor, lmao. BUT ASCIAN HUBRIS AND GENERAL JACKASSERY ASIDE

For all the mental gymnastics to excuse the Ascians of the deaths of entire worlds, the people I've countered about Vauthry go through comical, armchair-psychologist lengths to claim Vauthry was ABSOLUTELY aware and responsible for everything he'd done since rat grandpa corrupted him before he was born (corrupted him with Light, which the latest patch implied was very much like Tempering). 

There are no examples in-game of Light corruption leaving a person unscathed, mentally or physically. Not Pixie Kings, not even the Hydaelyn-blessed WoL. But these people will look at rat grandpa, sigh lovingly, and absolve him of all these atrocities because Tempering--then look at his creation, his Light-Tempered corrupted from birth creation, the twenty-foot-tall Hume with the bendy straw neck and a Lightwarden forced into his chest, the guy quite clearly mad, the guy who was never asked if he wanted this and who wasn’t even born when it was forced on him, and condemn him for acting as he was made and conditioned to act by rat grandpa and rat grandpa’s pal, Vauthry’s father, because obviously Vauthry is not affected by the corruption forced on him at all, no sir. Against every bit of evidence to the contrary, Vauthry was in total control of himself, and so is to blame for everything. Because reasons. He was fully aware of reality despite being brainwashed into a bubble of lies. That uncontrollable urge to violence that was going to make your WoL kill their own friends? Nah, wouldn’t affect that kid without Hydaelyn’s Blessing, what a leap of logic that would be! Certainly wasn't rat grandpa’s fault, nope! Vauthry would’ve become a Lightwarden without anyone’s help! The Ascians just accidentally corrupted an unborn child and then saw him groomed to a “desired end”. Happens all the time.  (Yoshi-P saying he would like us to consider if Vauthry was “really just a friend of the Sin Eaters, or was he being controlled by someone” was just a really oddly specific red herring. ) The folks I’ve countered definitely don’t give a thought to how frightened his mother looked while The Men (tm) discussed what to do with her body, either. Consent is only valid if convenient when it’s rat grandpa. (”Respects women” my fat ass.) And whatever happened to grooming children being fucking gross, Tumblr dot com? Because Vauthry was a child. Just because he didn’t grow up into your dating sim wet dream doesn’t mean what was done to him was remotely okay.

These people couldn't just relent neither one may have had control. There isn't a fraction of the Deeper Understanding spared to Vauthry that they seek to give rat grandpa for genocide.

They just have to make sure the fat guy they don’t want to, uh, take screenshots with gets what he "deserves".

[jlaclassified]

 Big Box Of Valiant Book One-

X-O Manowar Volume 1: By The Sword  by Robert Venitti (writer), Cary Nord (penciller), Stefano Gaudino (inker), Moose Bauman (colorist), Dave Lanphear (letterer).  Valiant Comics, 2012.

Unless I’m mistaken, this is the first title in the relaunched Valiant Universe.  I could never get into OG Valiant back in the 90s.   Unless you were already a fan of creators like Barry Windsor-Smith, Jim Shooter, or Bob Layton, Valiant seemed like a tough sell: a prefab superhero universe built around some forgotten Gold Key characters that hadn’t been published in a million years. Plus everything was all pastel.   How the hell was this supposed to compete with Youngblood or Savage Dragon?

(Ironically, if original Valiant started today I would probably be 100% on-board, because I friggin love Magnus: Robot Fighter, Doctor Solar, and Turok: Son of Stone, and follow them through their many relaunches and reboots.)

So to me this is all brand new.  How does Nu-Valiant read to someone who has zero nostalgia for the concepts or the publisher?  Let’s find out:

X-O Manowar is crazy high-concept:  a Visigoth warrior-prince who wants nothing more out of life than to slaughter the Roman Empire gets abducted by aliens, steals a suit of Iron Man armor, leads a slave revolt, and ends up in modern-day Rome all jazzed to murder some Italians.  NOW THAT’S WHAT I CALL COMICS!

This book f**king rules.  I don’t know how close Vendetti stuck to the original Jim Shooter/ Steve Englehart concepts, but he sells the emotion believably and wrings pathos out of this frankly ridiculous shlock sci-fi concept.  Cary (Conan, Daredevil) Nord’s art is Marvel mainstream, slick in that post-Ultimates Big Two house style that you see so much in action comics nowadays. The aliens are suitably gross and insectoid, the anatomy is on-point, there’s lots of explosions and dramatic closeups. From inks to colors to letters this is as good as any other genre comic on the stands right now.

All in all this first X-O trade was a really good superhero comic.  If the rest of the new Valiant line is like this then this is going to be a fun project.

[victoriousfrankenstein]

Experiment 1: “Descend in pain, demon!” -- I, FRANKENSTEIN (2014)

You’re probably wondering why I’m kicking off this series with this shlock. Well, I’ll just tell you--it’s free with Hulu and I’m not trying to break the bank here. (Spoilers ahead, not that you care lol)

I, Frankenstein stars blandly chiseled Aaron Eckhart as Frankenstein’s monster, here conveniently named Adam, with assists from Bill Nighy, Miranda Otto, Yvonne Strahovski, and Jai Courtney. The backstory goes like this: in 1795, Victor Frankenstein brought his monster into the world (in an undisclosed place), immediately rejected him (for an undisclosed reason), and tried to kill him (by tossing him off an undisclosed bridge). The monster survived this attempted drowning and came back to kill Dr. F’s wife, then led him up north through the unforgiving arctic, where the good doctor eventually succumbed to the cold. This information is communicated to us visually and via voice over, in case we couldn’t figure it out for ourselves.

The movie truly begins with the Creature burying Frankenstein next to his wife (“It was more than he deserved,” spits a bitter Aaron Eckhart). As he does this, he is attacked by demons and immediately kills one of them. This awakens some nearby gargoyles who fly from their perches on a castle to merc the rest and save the unconscious Creature. They remark that they’ve never seen a human kill a demon before and conclude that “it” must be special; as they loot what they believe is a corpse, they find a pretty sweet journal belonging to one Victor M. Frankenstein and gasp because the rumors are true!!! Then the Creature begins to move!!!!!

The gargoyles take him back to their queen (Otto), who demands to know why the demons wanted him. She explains that the Gargoyle Order has been at war with demons since the fall of Satan, and that they were commanded into being by St. Michael himself. She also gives the Creature a name--Adam--and requests that he stay with them for protection...but he leaves and forges his own way for 200 years, before finally returning to hunt down the demons who want him for some reason.

So it’s now Modern Times, but I couldn’t tell you where this movie is actually set for the life of me. The gargoyles live in some monstrous European cathedral and all the actors are affecting that bland movie British accent, but there are few indications of what the actual, specific setting is. Unless, of course, the cathedral is real, and I just don’t know my landmarks. Sorry.

Anyway, now scientists are hard at work trying to figure out the secret to reanimating dead corpses. Dr. Terra Wade (Strahovksi), working under Bill Nighy (who unsurprisingly turns out to be Prince Naberius, leader of the demon horde), zaps a rat back to life. She weirdly measures the electricity in Joules and not volts; I am not a scientist, but this sounds wrong to me.

She tells Bill Nighy that they aren’t yet ready to reanimate a human corpse yet, and he fires back that hasn’t she heard of Victor Frankenstein? She proclaims that Frankenstein is a myth, made up to “scare children.” For me, this opens up a can of worms I’m not sure the writers thought of when they put this in the script. Just...who is Frankenstein in this universe? Does the Mary Shelley novel exist? Does it exist, but as real documentation and not a work of fiction? Is he more of a legend? She wonders why Frankenstein didn’t share his discovery with the world if the story is true, but he explains that himself in the actual novel, which leads me to believe it was never written in-universe. But then seriously, where did the myth come from?! Terra speaks as if the Brothers Grimm invented the story and it’s very odd.

She does admit, however, that if Frankenstein did reanimate a corpse, it would be helpful to study the creation. So Bill Nighy assembles his troops.

Demons attack the cathedral, where Adam is being kept by the gargoyles. The CG is absolute ass. This movie has big 2004 energy for a lot of reasons, and this is one of them. The only thing I appreciate about the fight scenes is that there isn’t an excess of shaky cam, so it’s easy to see what’s happening; unfortunately, what’s happening isn’t usually very interesting. The fight choreography is stale and repetitive. The music is incredibly generic.

However, this scene particularly has holy waterboarding, so that’s pretty good.

It also has the best worst line in the entire film!

The demons capture the Gargoyle Queen, who is then traded back for Frankenstein’s journal. Now the bad guys have the ability to reanimate dead humans, something a man in the 1790’s figured out and they could not.

Meanwhile, Adam breaks into the lab and finds a room of stashed corpses, which the demons are presumably storing to raise an army of the undead. He jumps through a window into the lab to get the journal back. Everyone knows immediately who he is because Victor Frankenstein was really good at drawing.

Unfortunately, security shows up with Bill Nighy, who chews the scenery as much as he can. He calls Adam “Frankenstein,” as “we are all the sons of our fathers.” Adam cannot accept this. He breaks out of a separate window and lands on a train, where he begins to read his life story, then doubles back to meet up with Terra and tell her all about the gargoyle/demon battle. And that she’s working for a demon prince.

Demons attack them. One of them monologues about how they will summon their brethren to possess the corpses. What does this have to do with Adam? He doesn’t have a soul...and demons can only possess bodies without soul!

 Adam is injured. Terra learns that he’s hot. Sexy Wound Dressing commences.

This is probably the most annoying part of this film to me. Adam and everyone waxes poetic about how he was rejected by his creator and humanity, and I have to wonder why. He looks and acts like a dude. A ripped dude, yes, but a dude. He apparently learned how to speak in a single winter, so it’s not like he was ever really a wild animal? His scarring isn’t even raised! He could hide his blemishes with foundation if he really wanted to, yet several people in this movie call him “it” before even learning what exactly he is. It’s about as unnatural as Ben Shapiro purposefully misgendering trans people.

Anyway, Terra tells Adam she’ll make him a companion since Frankenstein didn’t because he was a bad dad. This is a one-off line that amounts to nothing.

At this point there is a third of the movie left, but you can guess exactly how it unfolds from here. It’s hardly worth recounting in detail. Basically everyone is after the journal, but Adam destroys it before anyone can get it. That doesn’t matter. Terra is forced to reanimate the corpse of her murdered colleague without it, which sets into motion the reanimation of the thousands of corpses Bill Nighy has had on ice for….centuries, presumably?

Demons ascend to Earth to prepare to take over their new corporeal forms. Luckily, Adam is here to take them and the gargoyles, who have betrayed him, down.

I didn’t mention the gargoyle betrayal before because it lasts four seconds and amounts to nothing. They’re all fighting demons now. Bill Nighy reveals his true form!

A demon tries to possess Adam, but it doesn’t take. Our king says “my body, my choice!” He has a soul! Yasssss!

The whole laboratory sinks into Hell and the gargoyles save Adam and Terra. The movie ends with Adam vowing to protect humanity. And because I know you’re wondering, yes, the last line is this:

We do not ask for the lives we are given. But each of us has the right to defend that life. I have fought to protect mine. And when the forces of darkness return, you shall know that I am out there, fighting to defend yours. I, descender of the demon horde. I, my father’s son. I, Frankenstein.

Jesus Christ.

So, is this movie worth watching?

That is a resounding no. There are some movies that are a fun kind of bad, and others that are just boring. I, Frankenstein is the latter. Even watching it with a friend wasn’t that fun. The film has about four different colors, and the acting is even less varied. It’s the same performance all around--gravelly, serious, dull, with nary a joke to be found. Only Bill Nighy makes an attempt to do something, but even he doesn’t ascend above the generic Evil Rich Guy mold.

It’s funny because as I watched this, I thought it seemed like an Underworld ripoff. According to IMDb, the franchises were originally envisioned to exist in the same universe, but I, Frankenstein did so poorly that the idea was scrapped.

Is it any wonder? The performances are empty, and so is the world itself. A few extras in the first scenes gawk at Adam’s scarring, but none show up at all in the climax. “This city” is referenced throughout, but can it really be called a city when there is no life to be found? When it isn’t even named?!

Please stay away from this film. Its scarring runs deeper than Adam’s, and it doesn’t even have abs.

[sole-cuore-amore-e-droga]

Tel Aviv 2019: Straight outta United Kingdom to Eurovision with a blatantly non-blatant Melodifestivalen reject

Yes, obviously, Eurovision: You Decide might as well be the safest NF to ever exist. We get that you don’t want to even try, the UK, but can you please act like you’re not in Big 5 for a year and ATTEMPT to try your hardest with the song??? I doubt that, despite SuRie’s bubbliness, “Storm” would’ve pulled numbers if it were in semi, unless the anti-neo-Nazi stage invader were to butt-in there and people would then send sympathy televotes the Brits’ way or something. Unsatisfying. (The man, that is.)

And so we have gotten another safe as ever British entry this year, performed by an excited personality that got a side-dish song and now is tasked to sell the side-dish as greatly as he’s possibly able to - the first season of All Together Now winner, Michael Rice! The dish is “Bigger than Us” and I’m neither glad nor sad the song has not enough factor to eat up Michael as a whole if it’s that much BIGGER. Not even the fact that it’s a Melodifestivalen reject (yes, the title IS correct, one of the song’s co-writers, whom I’ll name later, has possibly said it at some point, and he couldn’t keep it to himself anymore so he sent it over to another country!) could help this poor number out.

If you strip the singer off, you just get a stereotypical Eurovision-y ballad you overhear when scavenging through foreign NF catalogues, wondering which kind of rent-a-songwriter-program person contributed to it. Well John Lundvik (yes THAT one) doesn’t sound like THAT kind of name you’d hear when you think of songwriters of such shtick but Laurell Barker is, so there you go. These are just the two masterminds behind this one, as there are more but icr their names and honestly idc to.

And there’s nothing wrong about these typical ESC NF shlocks. Only when you’re young and dumb enough to enjoy these kind of songs, but I had to unfortunately grow up and see just how “useful” they are... n’t. I mean, it’s great for the artists whose big dream is to taste Eurovision and NOT as a backing singer, but most of the time the singers that get these songs can’t even slightly relate to what they sing, and thus we get people like Bishara entering Melodifestivalen and Isaiah entering Eurovision.

Maybe Michael did get to experience the kind of love that’s BIGGER than him and his partner, idk. I certainly don't want to bother asking him. And frankly, it's only me overthinking this issue, because ain't nobody in the world really got time for that, definitely. Well, at least the relationship’s going on nice! (except for when Mike sings “‘cause I can heare the universe when I’m feeling you breathe”... spooky. o.I)

Anyway, time to get to talk more about the song. It's actually not THAT bad, just a little too typical and unextraordinary, where in the current times the Eurovision has to not be predictable in sound and to excite the viewer with... well, anything that can excite anyone. Be it the visuals OR the song. OR both. What's so special about "Bigger than Us" that can keep the viewer on toes? Probably just that keychange. I wish there were more things about it but not every commentator out there would have enough time to let them people know Michael works in a waffle shop, let alone the time that "HE WON A TALENT SHOW'S FIRST SEASON BUT THE SHOW ISN'T THE X FACTOR OR THE VOICE ZOMFG!!". Let alone people even listen to any Eurovision commenting these days, lol. It might be a charming little piece for some people though, but I don't see them voting for people selling their songs vocally much more than songs that draw in viewers with different ways. It's just a standart talent show winner song for a standart talent show winner that sounds like it's slightly too stuck in the mid-to-late-00s-early-10s rather than the 90s, which is warm and cool and all, but it's likely gonna not do the cool lad Michael the justice he'd need, just like SuRie's song for SuRie. Mayhaps a top 20-ish, or, in Lucie's case, even a top 15, is possible (although it's mostly thanks to the juries - they're the only ones eating up big voice ballads. And anything Maltese. And anything Australian. And anything Swedish... that only represents Sweden. Sorry Lukas Meijer), but when the British optimism levels are set in a deep deep ditch by default every year when the BBC comes with their platter of choices for EYD, what else could be there to raise them up after even Lucie hasn't done that amazing enough for everyone to believe that the UK are capable more than just always finishing last with 0 every year? Of course, a better than average song, but does BBC care about even pulling one out of a songwriting camp? These kind of songs are too shite for their taste, apparently, so with songs they send like these, it's probably yet another meander-er.

Which is a shame, because once again, it's not bad. It's just too plain Jane for Eurovision anymore. It's like everyone dressed up gorgeously for Miss Universe's National Costume event and you went with a cheap-ish designer dress that is decorated by small details that are notoriously known as the country's symbols just to count as something "national". It's like everyone brough their best baked (and dare I say extreme) dish to a dish competition and you only brought in a nice looking baked cod and circled the fries around it. It's like a prom night where everyone dresses casually and you come up all in a dull olive colored jacket and jeans with torn out knees. There might be something hidden in its niceness that can conquer (nice piano, nice chords, nice vocals, nice chorus, nice song formula, nice choir, nice keychange, nice message)... but with everything too nice, it just feels like that the UK are not feeling like getting a 'nice' result. Unless there's something that can make Michael do a 'male Lucie' and launch it around the 14th-19th place at best, but...

And here's the section where I repeat myself some more of what I think of the song as a whole and chances as a whole:

Approval factor: Eh I'll probably have to approve this but only reluctantly somewhat, maybe because I felt positive on the first listen unlike these people who wanted UK to dare to do something else than safe... yeah lol

Follow-up factor: It’s rather marginably favourable song than SuRie’s and only because I like it despite its ‘blandness’. “Storm” is just a song that I don’t really care about. Provided Michael gives all out personality-wise though and the revamp’s not gonna suck balls (if there’s one), this is a decent step in a decent direction for the UK... hope Michael’s not getting stage-invaded by anti-Israel people!

Big 5 factor: Thanks to all this pre-partying kicking in heavily as I put out these reviews (and actually having finished), it turns out that Michael is one of those people that clearly works his hardest to sell this typical British averageness (like he sells his waffles), with his live being so decent enough he was thought of to be a perfect EYD winner this year, so, if he keeps building up his vocal strenghts and rehearses a lot (and stays well and such), he’s actually likely to at least achieve something above bottom 7! Yes, yes, John Lundvik is still the master that will beat his pupil in the end, but that wouldn’t seem that excruciating for the UK anymore if they happen to have a place that’s not bottom 3 or anything. Just for the Michael to do his utmost best out there, and if he does, the UK won’t be in an extremely bad position this year - just not a very high reacher, because at the end of the day there are more nations that run straight with their A-game and therefore continue leaving the common-appealers in the dust. Only Sweden (and Australia until 2018 or so) usually excels at their safeness. The others must outstand to survive. And to wrap things up on this factor section, imo the UK just meanders in the safeness for another year - but at least the good enough safeness that might even be able to qualify if it were sent by a semifinalist country! (apart Sweden ffs, of course Mr. Lundvik would qualify with this one if he kept it to himself, jeez)

NATIONAL FINAL BONUS

Thankfully EYD didn’t really stink this year, because of certain key factors:

• There’s always this one or two act(s) that acts like a saviour each year. Bianca and Dulcima (or Darline idk) from 2016, Holly and Salena from 2017, Asanda (and maybe Jaz? or even Raya??) from 2018 and... ponder no more, Kerrie-Anne’s got you covered in that spot! Her version of the two one’s of “Sweet Lies” was arguably the greatest possible choice for the NF (or, in this case, the “very least bad”, and eventhough it’s incredibly reminiscent of Sigala’s “Sweet Lovin’” (vocals provided by Bryn Christopher, who - controversial opinion - is probably my fave male singer of all time), which makes it “dated” (to a 2012-2014 pop radio degree, yes), it still was a bop that I’d want to dance to in rollerskates (if I had any!!) and spray the colourful smoke things that... well idk what it is but the said video of “Sweet Lovin’” demonstrates the action. Get back to me to let me know what’s that, anyone reading this. K-A lowkey underperformed though (just like Asanda from last year) but the bop remained AND she was rightfully included in the British televote’s superfinal trio! ^^

• The hosts were, yet again, the ever-so-loveable comedienne of Lithuanian roots, Mel Giedroyc, and the witty-ass Eurovision 2015 winner Måns Zelmerlöw. The duo is charming as usual and delightful to see on the Beebs when there’s the Eurovision case. If I didn’t know him better I’d even say Måns is a native English speaker. When there’s at least the drought of the ever-so-good entries in an EYD, we can look back at the hosts provided us some entertainment we’ve probably been missing while trying to find some on those competing entries. My favourite moment throughout that evening was the “next up is” jokes, all randomly stringed together, all in one row - all of those “next ups” were so hilariously random (until one hit the point - I think it was something about adverts or another performance being next up).

• The postcards were lovely too. With the format of EYD upgraded to make it as a three-song duel between two different versions of each one and the juries deciding on the best one for each (one vote per version), we got to see some nice friendships over there (I mean, a postcard for two people who did duel over whose version is the best - they had to listen and compliment each others’ versions) and some nice things the artists said themselves on separate postcards. Like the time when the only band of the competition of the year’s, MAID, named Buranovskiye Babushki as one of their girlband idols (a ‘so random yet glorious‘ answer) and the victorious Michael confessing that he’s “never been to Tel(iv) Aviv”... that’s true Michael, I believe ya. You’ve so never been there that ou struggle to even say it right! Not to mention that the postcard setups were cozy, too.

• Can we all just kind of agree that at least the jury for EYD made THE BEST CHOICES POSSIBLE??? I mean, yeah, it’s a biT cruel they’re the ones to choose the superfinalists without the audience’s interference, but they still made the best choices possible, at least imo. Anisa’s “Sweet Lies” was a godawfully dreary sex slow-jam (no really, I can’t not imagine a scenario where you can’t use it anywhere other than a sex scene in a movie, or a steamy hot shower scene. Call me crazy-minded but it’s true), MAID’s “Freaks” was godawfully too creepy, strange and unbearable, and Holly Tandy’s “Bigger than Us”... well... while much more chill and way less overbearing (also with not enough “BIGGER” memes potential), it would have probably not stood out all that much - just written off as a Kygo remix rented for a cheap price of half a pound (but still co-written by John Lundvik though!!). So thanks to Rylan and the other two for picking the superfinalists reasonably, unlike A Dal jurors this year. It still wrenches my gut whenever I think about it, ugh.

• What even would be an appearance of Måns if he didn't try to remind y'all of his enthusiasm for Eurovision. No one really cares he won Eurovision 4 years ago, if anything, I dread that he's only being remembered as the "male singer guy of Love Love Peace Peace song" by the newer fans. At least Pepperidge Farm I remember how Måns really wanted to get to Eurovision (even if he didn't participate in that many Melodifestivalen editions). So in this year's EYD he went all out to be a part of the Eurovision best (British?) songs medley (and we got Katrina and the Waves later in the show, performing the nation's last winning hit, 22 years later... and that wasn't even a fully British-branded win, if yanno what I mean!), and it's all courtesy of the Melodifestivalen's best known scriptwriter and an occasional Eurovision commentator (and Melodifestivalen's narrator too), Edward af Sillén. Or at least I remember it being written that he has written some stuff for Måns to do in EYD, IDK. Eitherway, it was kind of a fun thing, the interlude. Just remembering all the nice Eurovision entries out there, even including Gina G (whose ESC entry was also sung by another person in another NF whose review will be up next I suppose!).

• Heyyyyy, wasn’t it all kinds of nice to see SuRie doing an interval act and a reprise of her own run-of-the-mill entry “Storm”? I applaud her of doing a tremendous piano rendition of it, with even singing some notes a little higher than in the actual song. Maybe THAT version could have done so much better in Lisbon - showing off SuRie’s vocal decency, intimacy and... idk about the intruder part, hopefully he’d have had no way to wrestle the mic out of SuRie’s hands that time. At least SuRie had just enough support from Eurofans to be wanted to represent the UK one more year in a row, with a special EYD designed for her, where the songs could be mostly composed by her and not by the useless songwriting camp. While it’s a nice idea for some British and non-British people to get to know each other on these camps, the end results barely end up satisfying because the artists barely get involved in the songs they’re singing - not even a song line, not even a hum of contribution! Why can’t you at least take examples from German songwriting camps... (except for the time “Sister” was invented, that one could have been a perfect contribution for an EYD (not necessarily in this year’s format but still)

All in all, this may seem like an improvement of things, but I still am really hoping that BBC will give into a decent internal selection... afterall there are good names that are down to do Eurovision and didn’t even say it will harm their ‘reputation’ (*cough* Paloma Faith *cough* Hurts), and yet BBC refuses them somehow, not thinking that Eurovision is more than just a SONG contest (while ironically not even having their songs sounding THAT ‘great’, oops)? Or at least reformat EYD big time and make it exciting a la Australia Decides is (you know you suck when even your colony does better NFs than you). For now, I’ll just grit my teeth and nicely wish Michael Rice all the best in Tel(iv) Aviv. You’ll need it, chap! And in secret I hope that you’ll get it xx

[laurelsofhighever]

Writing Questionnaire

tagged by @athenril-of-kirkwall and by @gingerbreton - thank you lovelies!

Short stories, novels, or poems? When I used to read regularly I would devour novels, and I still have a massive pile waiting to be read. I have read short stories and enjoyed them, but reading was my escape from the real world and they’re just. not. long enough.

What genre do you prefer reading? My bookshelves will tell you that my favourite genre is fantasy, but there are some classics and other things scattered through that.

What genre do you prefer writing? I’ve had a stab at urban fantasy and high fantasy, though with concentrating on fanfic more recently I’ve discovered a love for alternate universes with high political drama.

Are you a planner or a write-as-I-go kind of person? Definitely a planner. I went through almost two notebooks just jotting down ideas for Falcon, and made sure I knew exactly where I was going before I started writing the first draft, which was really just a more detailed version of the previous plan. I like to frame things around dialogue, since that’s what I struggle with most, and that usually means that when it comes to actual, polished writing I can produce it relatively quickly. I’m also ten chapters ahead of what I publish so I can go back and change things when I forget a detail, and planning about ten chapters ahead of that so I know where I’m going. 

What music do you listen to while writing? It’s usually movie/game soundtracks, asmr videos with a white noise generator in the background, but just this morning I’ve discovered the Vitamin String Quartet, so I can see them being added to the list.

Fave books/movies? I’ve read too many books to list absolute favourites, but I love Garth Nix’s Old Kingdom series, Havemercy by Jaida Jones, and the first book I ever read, Black Beauty by Anna Sewell.

Any current WIPs? I’ve got two longfics at the moment, The Things We Hide in the A:tLA fandom, and The Falcon and the Rose, which is a Dragon Age: Origins AU. I also have far too many planned oneshots to count.

If someone were to make a cartoon out of you, what would your standard outfit be?

Everyday wear is usually jeans, a t-shirt and a hoodie, a shirt and waistcoat if I can be bothered.

Create a character description for yourself: Summed up in the pub last night: I’m an old soul, a very nice person completely prepared fuck you up if you cross my boundaries.

Do you like incorporating people you actually know into your writing? I don’t see how it’s not possible to have at least a little bleed from reality, but I don’t actively try to insert real people into characters.

Are you kill-happy with characters? I don’t really see the point of killing characters for shock value, but sometimes it’s needed for plot reasons.

Coffee or tea while writing? I’m not really a massive fan of either, but one of my favourite places to write is a bubble tea bar in town, and it’s only polite to buy a drink before setting up the laptop.

Slow or fast writer? Most of the time I end up procrastinating far more than I should, but then I’ll get into the zone with a scene and i won’t be able to type fast enough. Those are good days.

Where/who/what do you find inspiration from? I get so much inspiration from history and mythology for plot points, but beyond that it’s hard to pin down where inspiration comes from. Really, it’s just an ever increasing web of ‘what ifs’ with ever more interesting answers.

If you were put into a fantasy world, what would you be? A dragon. Or a forest witch who lives on the edge of society with a pack of large hunting dogs, decorates her home with animal skulls, and offers quests to passing adventurers.

Most fave book cliche? Least fave book cliche? Magical artifacts that choose their wielders are usually fun, because aside from granting a whole load of cool powers, the reaction of the new wielder is fun to play around with.

Amorphous evil empires with no clear intent other than ‘to be evil’ are so overdone, and so often have very little thought put into logistics, all I can do is roll my eyes.

Fave scenes to write? Battle scenes. I love figuring out the choreography and the emotions behind it.

Most productive time of day for writing? Mid-morning, probably, which is annoying because that’s usually doing my real-world job.

Reason for writing? It’s an outlet for my maladaptive daydreaming. If I didn’t write it down, I would go insane.

tagging, for those who want to: @dovahgriin @tea-me-and-salt @magpiesandmabari @thejeeperswife @out-of-the-embers @athenasdragon

[chucktaylorupset]

is red letter media an ok channel to watch? My partner loves them and I watch them sometimes but they don’t seem malicious to me idk. Just the edgy joke every once in a while. I only ask bc I don’t know anyone else besides my partner who even KNOWS about them

EDIT: POST CANCELLED EVERYBODY GO HOME turns out anon was wrong i dont know what red letter media is I dont know why but i thought it was an umbrella corp name for the cinemasins brands in reference to the logos one red letter, post dead, blogger down, multi hundred word typo in the groupchat

far be it from me to be the arbiter of what is or isn't okay to watch, seek not from me permission, but the major criticisms of red letter media are summed up most efficiently, I think, in this series of videos by the youtuber Shaun

the most imperative critiques being that, first of all, cinemasins are a couple of white guys with a whole running gag of yelling "more boobs! get this bitch to do a lap dance!" at the screen, who critique movies from a mentality of uncharitable incuriousity

which results in offensive cultural insensitivity when they review movies like moana and mock the made up constellations that are actually real polynesian constellations or the drums that don't look anything like drums unless you know that these again are an actual drum made and used by actual polynesians (Cinemasins is Still Wrong About Everything 19:30)

shaun also finds, after reviewing an arbitrary sampling of their works, that they are frequently lying or purposefully misrepresenting what happens in movies in order come up with more sins

on a personal rather than systemic level, my bone to pick with cinemasins boils down to the fact that their content forces them to engage with media in a toxic mindset. the more negative they are-- the more harshness to their criticism, the more sins they add to their counter-- the more content and ad revenue they create.

so their engagement with what they consume is cynical and superficial. rather than what the audience-art roles and contract should be, a partnership with the goal of the interaction being the creation of meaning and understanding, they instead are lazy and uncharitable because the more they fail to understand about the work, the more sins they can write about its supposed opacity.

art is a trust fall and they have thrown up their hands because they want to laugh at someone falling on their face, and this slapstick routine works well with bumbling corporate shlock, but they will also take the sincere, the serious, the substantively artistic, and laugh like a ballerina's dip is the same as doubling over after a rake to the nuts.

i made the mistake of watching their music video sins piece on Janelle Monae's Pynk, where they mocked her for forgetting to put vagina pants on a couple of her backup dancers. i knew for a fact that the artist had spoken in interviews about this being an intentional decision because not all women have vulvas. not only was cinemas sins blindly punching down, but they were being

i watched a lot of cinemasins as a young teen, evenings gathered up with my family around the tv. my family's taste in movies rarely agreed, movie night selections had to be negotiated like international treaties, and fell through about as often, but we did all agree on the fun of mockery. i got really into it, as only middle schoolers can, when you're just young enough that confident stupidity sounds like bravery and commonplace novelty looks like genius.

i stopped after watching a rare out of character vlog. in it he decries the death of art, which in hindsight, was really a dad driving alone in his car talking about how the music and the movies they make just aren't as good as what was new back in his day. but again, at the time i took it very seriously.

after all, i grew up in the age of a thousand thinkpieces about facile avocado toast eating millenials and the bog standard eternal hatred levied against the preteen girl. i wanted to become a serious person because i wanted to be treated seriously, because it meant i would not be mocked, and so the answer seemed to be to take the side of whoever was doing the mockery. this mentality led to a lot of bad decisions like watching cinemasins, flirting getting into atheist youtube, and performatively hating twilight like i was casting a ritual circle of protection.

i stopped watching because i realized cinemasins made me sad. this man i respected said there would be no more good art and i believed him, even as he said the solution was to take away the movie making privileges from everybody but the guys who made the lego movie. i believed him, but i didn't want to think about it. so i stopped watching, and what happened instead of art ceasing to be good, was that i ceased to feel bad.

mostly. we live in a late stage capitalist hellscape, but my despair at the leviathan threatening to devour us all still leaves more room for joy than the men whose livelihood relies on routinely locking themselves in a room to write about the latest superfluous disney live action adaptation or the modern equivalent of maze runner two or finding a way as white men to shit on jordan peele's get out.

i soon started watching video essays that did actual media analysis, which was a shock to my system likened to an introductory college philosophy class to the moral system of a perennial catholic with intrusive thoughts, and both of us would finally obtain a language for what was wrong with the world, beyond the simple prison of one word, "sin."

[justiceforskywarp]

can i just say the massive influx of mediocre indie horror games is such a turn off? like i recall when amnesia first came out and people thought it was terrifying. when fnaf was labelled the scariest game made. when people put tons of effort into their indie horror games, like the rpg maker games that spent so long being developed but promised jumpscares and terrifying experiences with great stories. Ib, The Witch’s House, The Crooked Man, Misao, are just a few examples of such games that left lasting impacts and garnered fanbases that continue to this day. nowadays, indie horror games are pumped out at a rapid rate, so much so that they are forgotten as soon as the next one comes out. the gameplay always feels the same, with no uniqueness in any experience. fourth wall breaks and unearned jumpscares are used to scare the player. they ultimately leave no impact upon those who play them and become numbers in a system. amanda the adventurer, for example, is one such game. despite being a twenty to thirty minute experience max, people have been playing and reviewing its every update. its not even good. it fails to build a strong atmosphere and can’t even keep the player hooked on it. every replay is the same unless you look up guides. and i see youtubers adding it to their three random games uwu compilations, along with whatever other shlock falls on the market. i feel like the horror game genre has taken a massive hit from the three scary games category--its become quantity over quality, and as a result, most of these games are hardly worth playing or even watching. they leave no impact and feel like grabs at attention and fame.