#v5 review

[gorbalsvampire]

Gehenna War

It's pretty neat, yo.

Like Blood-Stained Love, it transforms the core "personal and political" horror of Vampire into another subgenre. Unlike Blood-Stained Love, it has a lot of concrete advice for Storytellers on structuring scenes, assembling pools, building characters to interact with, and making that subgenre work at the table.

An effort has been made, here. There's a little chart in the introduction claiming that Chapters 2 and 3, and the Appendices, will be of use to any action chronicle, be it more high concept or street level, and having read the durn things I think that claim's borne out. I'm gonna talk about those sections first, and later loop back around to the specifically Gehenna War stuff.

Chapter 2 has neat archetypes for characters in various armed conflict roles - generals, spies, intelligencers, recruits, veterans - with recommendations for priority stats rather than statblocks, so these can be flipped for player or Storyteller use. Suggestions for bonus XP amounts if you want more powerful starting characters, and focused specialisations that advise you to focus particular areas of your character sheet - almost like soft classes, or playbooks. A handful of new Merits and Flaws (one of which is getting slammed onto Penny), and a mixed bag of Discipline powers. Bloodform is back? Woo! There are "reroll Rouse checks for raising this one Attribute or using this one Discipline" openers for the Physical Disciplines? Swing and a miss, more filler. There's two incredible new high-end Blood Sorcery rituals (I shall be using both of them very soon), and some funky Thin-Blood Alchemy if you want your Duskborn to join a Methuselah cult.

Then: advice on running Basic Combat, and explicit guidance on the modularity of the Advanced Combat rules, and a few new ones. This is brilliant stuff for new Storytellers, reflective of the demand for the Combat Primer, and it's given me some ideas I didn't have before, and ALSO. VINDICATION. OBSERVE.

One of the things that waters down play over time is if the characters need to build the same dice pool every time for the same task. To avoid this, Storytellers should vary the traits involved according to the situation, to keep things interesting and to curb players trying to optimize their pools.

Leaving aside that awful syntax at the start - "Play becomes predictable if the characters need to build the same dice pool every time they attempt a task" - activate your voice, and dismiss "is" clauses, you cowards! - anyway, leaving that aside, this is how I've been doing things all along and I love that a book explicitly says "do it and don't get hung up on the exact RAW every time."

Car chase mechanics, cute new gear (I like the Scourge Blades, nasty-ass duelling swords that delay vampiric healing). Then it's on to story advice!

Chapter Three does something I wish Blood-Stained Love had done for romance: getting into the structure of action stories, how action interacts with other genre qualifiers (crime, horror, survival, thriller etc.), the escalating role of villains - like, actual formalist thinking about how stories work. We then get some mechanical advice on how to shift the mode of play, how to approach things like Hunger and Frenzy to make them more or less of a factor. It's short, but it's fuckin' GOOD.

Appendix I is all about dice. When you should and shouldn't roll, as opposed to taking half. Grouping those moments into broad types by what they do to the emergent story. How to add variation with tracker rolls or unusual dice pools. How to manage failures on tests and what to offer players to keep the story moving. And, most important of all, how to deal with the Beast, going through each Skill and showing how the Beast impacts a Messy Critical (still a success, remember!) or a Bestial Failure.

You need this Appendix. The corebook needed this appendix. Maybe it took six years of best practice and sharing ideas to get these ideas fully understood. Maybe if there'd been one dev team since the start we might have had this sooner. At least we have it now.

I'll talk about the Gehenna War itself in a follow-up post. That's Chapters One, Four, Five and Six, and Appendix II.

[maydaymainia]

Happy Month of Darkness to any VTM fans that accidently stumble across this mess:

Overall a fun read, and an interesting addition to my comic shelf. While I think the aesthetics and writings of the comic are a lot of fun, I don't know if it would draw me in as much if I wasn't familiar with the franchise. Still, the art and intrigue of the story had enough going for it to keep me invested until the end.

I didn't mention it in the video, but this is a pretty text-heavy story; pages can sometimes feel a bit blocky with walls of text bubbles, but in this case it works well-enough, and the page layouts and typography create a clean, easy to follow flow.

[heartsofhorrors]

heartstopper vol 5 (review) 🍂✨📚

⚠️ spoilers ⚠️

speaking of the characters!! not specifically just about volume 5 but i need to gush for a second. charlie is just so incredibly relatable for me. his struggles feel so personal and intimate it can be hard to read but i just feel so so so seen by him. the way nick loves and cares about him is almost healing for me, weirdly enough. the entire friend group and how much they truly care so deeply for each person has healed a piece of me that has felt broken for a long time. they’re not even a real friend group but they really feel like my friends.

tao and elle once again being the most lovely supportive besties and are also so in love!!! tara and elle are such great supports for nick it’s so sweet to watch. and oh my little baby aled!!!!! i missed my boy so much!!! with him not being in the show i feel like i’ve neglected my appreciation for him as a character but i truly adore him so much and i was so happy to see him more in this volume!

tori!!!!!!! michael!!!!!!! tori and michael not being straight!!!!! oh my god!!!!!! ok sorry this was the one page i had seen on tumblr when the webtoon came out and everyone was freaking tf out haha this makes me so incredibly happy! tori is my favourite character forever and im so happy to see her and michael progressing and growing in this. also every interaction of tori and charlie makes me cry :)

the teachers are also just so incredibly sweet and really thriving and i love that for them!! i still think charlie’s mom hardcore sucks though sry. his dad is ok but like sir please tell your wife to chill more.

overall, shocker it was a 5 star read for me! alice never misses and i would die for these characters ✨

ps i tried out something new with making the collage and it was soooo fun!! i used to love making collages so that really made me feel nostalgic to make

[doctorofmagic]

Doctor Strange's disability: a (much needed) chronological review

In view of recent ableism and drama on the other social hellsite involving Doctor Strange's disability, here's my response, based on *CANON* material. (link to the thread on said hellsite here)

Stephen disability is established since 1963, back in Strange Tales #115. The story is focused on a flashback which portrays his journey from the decay of his medical career because of a car accident to his path towards the mystic arts.

Note that, in this very same issue, the Ancient One never says he would heal Stephen's *hands*, but perhaps Stephen would find the cure within. In other words, Stephen was supposed to heal his heart and soul from arrogance and egoism through magic, not a physical cure.

Also note that there are limitations within every aspect of comic books' universes. In this case, we're talking about magic. Magic is not a miracle thing. It demands training and, most recently as established by v4, a cost (Doctor Strange v4 #4).

Another clue that "magic can heal anything because it's fantasy" is not a valid argument within Marvel's magic world, as seen in The Oath. Stephen had access to the Otkid's Elixir, which could heal any disease, but the formula was lost in order to save Wong's life.

One last example comes from Spider-Man Family #5 (2007), featuring Morbius and Spidey. It establishes that healing demands the exact same price when it comes to magic.

Long story short, it's clear that the magic side of Marvel does not offer a solution to diseases through magical miracles. So this argument is totally invalid ~within~ this established universe.

Now back to Doctor Strange... No, he isn't using magic to heal his hands unlike some misleading accounts are claiming. In fact, there are several panels which show that he's actually in constant pain. Here's some examples:

- Doctor Strange - Sorcerer Supreme #48 (1992).

- Captain Marvel v10 #6 (2019)

- Doctor Strange v4 #1 (2015)

He also struggles to hold a pen and write, relying on magic to do so, as seen in the Book of the Vishanti.

Then comes the stupid argument I saw.

"Oh, but Google says his hands are healed!" is not a gotcha moment you think it is. We had FOUR MAIN BOOKS after that (Surgeon Supreme, DODS, Strange v3 and current v6). Allow me to clarify the details in chronological order.

Stephen indeed made a "magic" gamble and healed his hands. That much is correct. But it's not all (panels from Doctor Strange v5 #19 - 2019).

Waid continued this storyline in a new book called Dr. Strange (Surgeon Supreme), which would portray Stephen's duality as the Sorcerer Supreme and a brilliant surgeon. Except the book was cancelled at issue #6 (2020), leaving the character in a kind of limbo. Now enter MacKay.

MacKay kept a little bit of the former storyline as seen in Death of the Doctor Strange #1 (2021). On top of that, his hands appeared healed. However, that lasted only until Kaecilius murdered Stephen and stole his hands.

Stephen's temporal duplicate used a regenerative spell to bring original Stephen back through Kaecilius' body and the stolen hands. In here, we can see that his hands are scarred just like after the car accident (DODS #5 - 2022). OG Stephen died a second time with scars as well.

Stephen is indeed seen writing in v6 but it's not clear if he's using magic or not. Besides, he's not working as a surgeon anymore. Moreover, MacKay considers Stephen disabled as seen in this recent issue of v6 (#7 - 2023): "My own connection to the aether, the magic of the world, the power of the Vishanti, the power of the Sorcerer Supreme... Gone. Without all of that? I am just an old man with useless hands and a blade in his stomach."

In conclusion,

As of CURRENT DOCTOR STRANGE RUN by Jed MacKay and Pasqual Ferry, in the year of our lord Vishanti, 2024, Stephen Strange is a disabled character and no magic or ableism will erase that. Thank you very much.

[tecnestheim962]

A Rating & Scathing Review of RWBY Characters:

Done by: Me (surprise!)

This is a serious review where I seriously analyze each character and rate them all seriously!!

If I hurt anyone in this, I’m sorry, it’s not you, it’s me. It’s nothing personal.

That being said, let’s get on to the ratings!

Ruby Rose:

Can I just say:

I really just love Ruby. Isn’t she awesome? Like. Man. What a lovable, strong, caring, amazing person! Had the weight of the world thrown onto her, and she didn’t care, she just kept doing what she thought was the right thing. And when she broke? It was still selfless. She thought she was doing the world a favor after all her mistakes. Then she came back because she knew she could do and had to do more for everyone. She needs a hug and all the love.

Rating:

Infinity/10

Weiss Schnee:

Weiss??? The way she opens up and goes from being all, “friendship? Who needs it.” To, “I! Love! My! Friends! Friendship is magic! I will fight tooth and nail for them! They are the most important people in the world!” And the way she became so open minded after learning from different perspectives? Gotta love her.

Rating:

Infinity/10

Blake Belladonna:

Oh my gosh and another of my favorites: Blake! She learns to let herself be loved by those around her! She learns that letting people in isn’t a weakness, but a great strength! She is a fierce protector and a whole civil rights activist taking the world by storm! She finds a way to show love now in any scenario when beforehand she didn’t because she was scared to get hurt. Gosh. Spectacular.

Rating:

Infinity/10

Yang Xiao-Long:

Don’t even get me started on Yang. Protector Supreme. The way she used to let her emotions control her to controlling her emotions??? I’m in shambles. From learning how to live for herself and not just her sister??? It’s important even though she missed rubys pain she’s only human and she’s beautiful!! The way she loves through her actions and defends through her words??? Just kill me now.

Rating:

Infinity/10

Jaune Arc:

Oh yeah and Jaune??? The character development??? Wowza. The way he’s always there for those he cares about??? Fantastic. The way he would throw everything away just to be there for his friends?? I am deceased. His fortitude and determination to keep pushing through?? Ugh.

Rating:

Infinity/10

Nora Valkyrie:

Nora??????? My Queen????? With her heart a beautiful storm that she projects to all those around her??? Her protective nature over everyone??? How she learns that she needs to love herself and know herself before she can truly dedicate herself to another???? Literally puts me 6 feet under.

Rating:

Infinity/10

Pyrrha Nikos:

Pyrrha??? Don’t think I’m leaving her out of this! Her heart was so strong with her convictions and her love for her friends that she literally did everything she thought she could to protect them. She wanted to define her destiny and save the world in the way she thought only she could. I will literally never recover.

Rating:

Infinity/10

Oscar Pine:

Oscar???????????????? My baby???? My precious little prince??? Innocent farm boy who keeps getting slapped in the face by literally everyone (seriously crwby this poor boy needs a break and a hug) literally losing his soul but wants to spend every second he has doing everything he can for remnant???? He didn’t ask for this???? And yet here he is??? I haven’t stopped crying since V5 thank you very much!

Rating:

Infinity/10

Lie Ren:

Ren????? My boy??? Who feels like he always has to be the strong one emotionally??? Who always has to mask his own emotions to take care of others???? Who literally developed a semblance, a manifestation of his SOUL that is empathy??????? Like what???? Who would literally rather be dead than without Nora?? Who tried to take up the mantle of Jaunes emotional support humanness???? Orkcmekwkqo.

Rating:

Infinity/10

I could go on for the rest of my life for these people and literally every other character.

Also, how come tumblr doesn’t have more colors available??? Truly a tragedy and quite rude if I might say! Hmph!

I really hope someone gets some giggles out of this like I did!

Let me know if anyone wants me to do another HIGHLY critical review (ahem) and rating of these characters.

Gonna go cry now bye-

[iamafanofcartoons]

"Blacksun, which is a straight ship" my brother in christ Blake is canonically bisexual, no relationship she's in is straight, even with a male character. If you don't like Blacksun that's cool, more power to you, but kindly stop with this biphobic nonsense

I'm going to assume you made this ask in good faith, so I'm going to answer in good faith.

When I review a ship, I look at how it affects both characters.

For Bumbleby, the ship is about both women, their character growth, the role in the story, how both are affected, etc.

For Blacksun, however, let's look first at the shippers. Fatmanfalling compared Bumbleby winning a Sapphic Poll to the 9/11 terrorist attack...on the week of 9/11. Eruptionfang screamed lesbophobic language during volume 6. And several hundred blacksun shippers are hoping that RWBY gets rebooted solely so that Bumbleby could get retconned. Did I mention that one of the blacksun shippers harassed CRWBY with gore/snuff fanart and Tauradonna fanart? Basically for the blacksun ship? The ship is NOT about Blake. Or about women. Its about Sun, the men.

Its about taking a scene where Sun winks at Blake in volume 3 , and then claiming that interaction between them somehow is more important and more screentime than every last minute of Blake and Yang interacting together in the same season.

You ever watched The Notebook? Its a movie romanticizing stalking and harassing women. Its NOT for women...its for men and romanticizing misogynistic behavior.

Blacksun involves stripping Blake of personality and making her tied to SUN'S Arc, not Blake. It involves the shippers demanding that Blake stay behind in Haven with Sun after V5 or that Sun come with RWBY in V6.

With Bumbleby, the ship is about Blake and Yang both. Blacksun is about Sun first and foremost. So I call Blacksun a straight ship because the ship focuses NOT on the bisexual woman, but the cis white male in the ship.

Hope that helps explain my way of thinking.

In the meantime, please check out this video showcasing 2.5 hours of Bumbleby development.

[invested-in-your-future]

Just because I got few similar asks asking about that

The issue with "Fixing" a writing of a show is that you are naturally assuming you are only fixing specific "season" and that there will be a point in the show when the writing "goes back" to being coherent and proper.

So for example, if you are trying to fix Volume 4 as Volume 5 is airing, you might, consciously or subconsciously, hope that V5 ending is where everything once again "clicks" and thus you just need to alter what doesn't work in V4 and what doesn't in V5.

So you think up of which parts should be changed. And sure that might mean entirety of Menagerie location needs to go (because real world implications of that whole arc are just...NO and you can probably think up a better WF storyline in half a hour with how bad that was) and Port needs to disappear off the face of this fictional story and pointless empty scenes of Ruby and Co walking through exact same forest textures need to be changed, but the structure might still work right? They are still traveling towards a specific goal right? So you just have to change HOW they get to that goal, because there is a goal right??? And then You just need to tweak the elements that don't work in V5 up to the ending where you hope things might get shaken up a bit more and go back on track.

But then V5 ends and the writing's still a mess. And before you manage to quite think through what to do, V6 starts and the writing is STILL a mess and what's more, it has a whole new set of problems and by this point you realize that for example, the entire structure of Kingdom of Mistral doesn't quite make sense, as if "someone" just plopped bunch of town locations in a straight line and then used Google's translation feature to just make up bunch of names for them, because entire continent is ultimately just an irrelevant detour.

Whoops, now you have to review what you did with fixing earlier parts and see if new problems arose, change up the geography of the story a bit, etc. You just realized that there's not really "a point" to the adventure of traveling through Mistral anymore so you need to think something up as you realize that the main character of the entire story has absolutely zero character growth from V3. The show is back to status quo yet again and its like V4 through V5 are completely pointless.

You realize, that Ruby Rose, the character that went through some of the most lifechanging events ever, just spent two seasons just ambiguously walking through bunch of forest areas and towns.

What's more, the team is back together but literally nothing that happened has been addressed in anyway and there's no actual growth of the characters at all. That can't be right. Right? Surely at least Yang and Blake w-... Oh no...

Resigned, you go back to your thoughts about what would need to change in V4 and a lot has to change once again to make Mistral anything but one huge pointless detour.

But its okay you th-...wait what's that sound? Its as if, somewhere just outside, a train just went off the rails as it was crossing a bridge and then somehow managed to jump over a shark and then exploded as it hit the ground...Whoopsie daisy.

In this exact moment, the writing throws you the infamous "Salem Flashback Episode", "The Lost Fable", and accidentally entire lore is now broken completely and it might be one of the worst written things in the entire show till that point, that kind of trivializes multiple mysteries people were waiting for and makes the writing for lead villain extremely tropey and honestly (yet again, as you start to notice a pattern in how the show writes women) misogynistic and if you want to make things work you might as well redo that too. Wait..."that" as in what??? As in the entire core of why the show is happening in the first place? THAT's broken? Well F-...

So now you barely started sorting out the mess of V5 (because its entire volume of basically literally nothing happening and whatever interesting happens always gets off-screened) and the show-proper just basically NUKED almost all of it's set-up and more than half of it's mysteries.

You realize you are staring at an episode that honestly can compete with worst seasons of Voltron in how bad it is. You actually start to think it might compete with the second genLOCK season in awfulness, but end up not thinking it can be THAT bad. I mean the show will never go bad as genLOCK S2, riiight?

Its okay, its okay - you have been theorycrafting RWBY stuff since the first trailers hit. You've read all the song lyrics which are filled with all these immaculate hints at the intent behind the show, thoughts of various characters and where things are going, you can maybe piece together something other than another "disgruntled manipulative woman" storyline. The songs having actual lore is great. I mean they wouldn't just suddenly throw that away, right? As that thought hits you, a sense of dread starts to overcome you.

And thus as another disaster closes in. at this point, little does your past self know that in the future, few years latter, the show will deliver a whole season of nothing but train crashes, but this time the sharks being jumped will talk like humans do.

So yeah... you can't really "Fix RWBY". Sure parts like Ren and Nora's backstory episode are nice and there are moments that felt good otherwise, but at that point, pretty much majority of post-V3 stuff is outright unusable. At this point to Fix RWBY means to redo literal core reasons on why the story is happening, how the world and it's lore works, motivations of the characters and, well, everything...

And that's how you end up with a file over hundred pages long that quietly has chronicled both your efforts to make sense of what the show even wants to be, as well as the show's descent into just complete randomness...

After all, when a writing team writes EVERY volume as one huge pointless detour that in no way actually enhances the characterization or story, at some point the whole train is bound to derail and crash...over and over again.

[cindersnowsstuff]

VOCALOID6 Free Trial Review

The short version: I didn't like it.

The long version: I tried out the VOCALOID6 free trial over the weekend and instantly hated it. Not being able to draw the pitch line with the pencil tool is so disappointing, and making pitch edits feels sluggish. The default AI tuning doesn't really do much either, and it makes the vocals sound drunk. It's crazy how lame this feels when it's so easy to make something sound good in SynthV. I think the worst part is that AI voices don't have the voice color options (like growl and character) that non-AI VOCALOIDs do. I double-checked the manual just to make sure I wasn't blind. Shouldn't AI voicebanks give you more options instead of less? I should note that I sold my past VOCALOID stuff, so I wasn't able to try any non-AI voices in this editor.

V6 is fine if you want a robotic/autotuned vocal sound, but past editors can already do that. The Vocalochanger is certainly there. It exists. I'm not sure what the point is though. If you can already sing well enough use the voice changer and not have it sound like ass, then why even use a vocal synth in the first place? Maybe I'm missing something. I was surprised to see that the custom style presets I made in V5 were saved to V6 when I had uninstalled V5 previously. That's something nice I guess.

V6 is very underwhelming, and I don't see myself buying it unless there's some insane 90% off sale or something (and they also make Lily or Mayu AI so they can sing in English lol). It's not really an improvement over V5. I've never used V4 or earlier, but I've heard others say they prefer those over V5 and V6. I've only started using vocal synths in the past year, so I'm definitely not as knowledgeble as others. This is just my experience. V6 probably is fine once you get used to it, but it doesn't seem worth it to buy or upgrade at this point. Maybe someday they'll improve things like pitch editing and voice color options, but I'm not getting my hopes up. SynthV is the only other AI editor I've used, and V6 doesn't even come close to matching it.

[gorbalsvampire]

More Humane Than Human - Humanity as degeneration vs. Humanity as detachment

I wanted to repost the Requiem readthrough review before I got into this, because it started as one of those "Requiem vs. Masquerade which is better" conversations. In rules terms I think V5 has iterated successfully on Requiem - there's probably about the same density of actual rules there but V5 makes a better fist of hiving some of them off into advanced/optional/discretionary territory - but Requiem innovates hard in terms of ideas about how vampires and vampirism work, introducing things like the Predator's Taint and Lashing Out and, crucially, Touchstones.

Touchstones give the lie to the "V5 does rules better" claim. I have never liked how V5 does them. The notion of tying an individual vampire to a person, place or artefact is nothing new. Those of us who are Old, or retro-curious, may recall Vampire: the Masquerade - Redemption, in which Brujah himbo protagonist Christof is told he needs an "anchor" for his Humanity and selects Anezka, the nun who nursed him back to health and who he's been having less than holy thoughts about ever since he woke up. Christof is told, by his mentor Wilhelm, that choosing a person as his "anchor" is a dangerous call - but his mind is made up and, not to spoil a twenty-five-year-old game, it turns out to be for the best for both of them... as long as he's kept his Humanity up, anyway.

So, Touchstones in the context of Masquerade are nothing new to me - in fact I was quite surprised when the full TTRPG didn't have rules for them. But! Touchstones in V5 are a bit different. Instead of one, there are many: instead of humanity in general, each of the vampire's Convictions has a named person attached to it.

The problem - and this isn't just me, it's something that's come up in all the V5 games I've played or hosted - is that viable characters have two or three Convictions. Coming up with two or three Touchstones at character generation, before you have a feel for who this person is and how you're going to play them and what their routine looks like, has not worked for anyone I've played the game with. One might work - most of us can ideate a relationship with one other person before we start playing - but three seems to stretch the limited sense of a starting character's identity too thin.

Rules As Written, of course, a Touchstone doesn't have to be someone significant to the story. They can just be someone your character saw every day, or sees every night, or notices every time they pass by. But... that's bullshit. That is not a "hang a key element of your personal ethic and capacity for self care on this person" relationship. I can see the story beat of "this person isn't there any more and you're morally shook by it" working once, maybe, but still, permanently altering your character's relationship with the Beast is kind of an integral function of the game. It feels like that hat should be hung on a sturdier hook - a full-on fleshed-out SPC. Like in Requiem, where you get one Touchstone.

Also, Humanity works differently, at its most fundamental level, and this exposes a key difference between the two games - one where I think Requiem is strides ahead. @awakenedsalamander touched on this talking about the differences in the concept of the Masquerade between the two games, but I want to go deeper on it.

In Masquerade, Humanity is about degeneration - it's the Downward Spiral, an almost inevitable drift from Man to Beast with exceptions being so rare they're practically mythical. It's about becoming worse, with all the moral judgment that implies, about committing acts that appear on a Hierarchy of Sins.

(At least, it is in V20. V5 abolishing that in favour of chronicle specific Tenets and character specific Convictions is really smart. I didn't grasp how it was meant to work from the corebook - it took the Player's Guide to spell it out to me - but now that I grok it, I love the tension between the Tenets that forbid and govern a character's actions and the Convictions that excuse and forgive those actions.)

In Requiem, Humanity is detachment. It's about the state of being a vampire slowly and inexorably reminding you over and over that you're not human any more, drifting further and further away from what you were and into the all-night society of predators. It's quantified in terms of Breaking Points - roughly grouped by significance and severity, these experiences hammer home that you're dead, you're dead, you're dead and out of this world. It's less "I did a bad thing" and more "I experienced something that no human ever should" like walking off a stab wound or being reminded you're a hundred years old and still act like you're twenty. When you hit a Breaking Point, you roll a number of dice - how many is a function of how serious and hard to avoid confronting the Breaking Point is - to avoid losing Humanity.

Now. In the past I've met quite a few players who don't really want to engage with the morality play aspects of Masquerade. Whether that's "we want to speedrun to Humanity 4 so we can play the game 'properly' without having to pretend we regret doing all the things RPG protagonists do" or "we think it's kinda stupid the way low Humanity says you may no longer create art or have sex without 'faking it' and let's interrogate what the developers think 'sex' is, shall we?" doesn't really matter. Maybe you want to play on the theme of post-humanity rather than be wrist-slapped for trying to do main character stuff. I don't blame you.

I think it should be possible to wholesale lift the Requiem system of detachment, rolled for at Breaking Points and mitigated by a singular Touchstone who can be a more developed character, or a place, or an object, and slot that into V5 replacing Tenets, Convictions and Stains.

That gives you a version of Humanity that's more permissive and less frontloaded, allows you to go deep on one hook instead of ideating sets of pairs before you even know who your character is. It also divorces functions of sexuality and creativity from being a good person - in the Requiem model, vampires fuck, and make art, and low Humanity expresses more in how they do it than whether or not they can.

(Although - there'd need to be some finesse around Oblivion, since I think the Discipline's theme of entropy inducing personal decay still works in the detachment model - maybe keep Stains as an additional lever, a function of Messy Criticals and dangerous Disciplines, and have Breaking Points inflict Stains instead of automatically triggering rolls...)

Important note on this idea: this does NOT exempt you from having a conversation about what's off limits in Session 0. It's easy to miss this in the V5 core book, but Chronicle Tenets aren't a safety tool. Chronicle Tenets are the moral rules that are going to come up A LOT in play, they define what your coterie collectively accepts as Doing A Bad Thing, to be excused for personal reasons (i.e. Convictions). An actual out of character trigger, an aspect of the World of Darkness with which a real live person who exists does not wish to engage, is a line or a veil - something we either don't include, or don't narrate explicitly. It's not something we build into one of the game's mechanical loops and ensure will come up. That would be... the absolute opposite of safe.

Whadda we think?

[gotchi-blog]

Starting to work on a Punitapi Chan review. Also plan on making a review of V5, V4.5 and Smart (once it arrives.) So a lot of reviews coming up!

[mister3127]

hii :3

-he/him

-minor

-music is literally everything i play guitar and bass 😼😼

More about me under the break !!

-fnaf fixation that came out of nowhere (watched the 8 hour lore video multiple times) please please talk about it with me

- faith the unholy trinity 🙈 PLEASE talk to me about it PLEASE

-fob 💔

- I climb, I would love to talk about it (mostly bouldering, I can flash v5s. For top rope I climb 11+)

-I play both electric and acoustic guitar but I can also play (very basic easy) piano, bass (my secondary instrument, I’m pretty proficient in it), ukulele, and classical guitar if I need to :) I would do anything to learn double bass

-I like most kinds of music but mostly rock in general (top three are MCR, CSH, and Radiohead) (recently also fob)

- please talk to me about music please please

-I like so many shows but my favorites are I Am Not Okay With This, Gravity Falls, Buffy the Vampire Slayer (❤️❤️), TEOTFW, and Lockwood and co

-As for movies, I like Fantastic Mr. Fox, Scott Pilgrim vs the World, Little Miss Sunshine, Perks of Being a Wallflower, and most of the Batman movies! (and all the other Wes Anderson ones)

THANKS ILY🫶🫶

https://letterboxd.com/mister3127/

[literary-illuminati]

I don't normally nitpick about spelling, but the title of your Monstress V5 review is kind of a mess. It also might be misnumbered; IIRC this should #31, not #23. Again, I don't usually nitpick, but I just thought you should know.

what, you aren't familiar with the work of noted award-winning author 'ctr-c'? For shame.

But no, deeply embarrassing mess. Ty for pointing it out.

[daniels-rwby-blog]

RWBY x Justice Leauge comments

For my actual review see (https://www.tumblr.com/daniels-rwby-blog/715604149128118272/this-is-pretty-much-what-ive-got-to-say-except?source=share)

This is just a lil something else:

I gotta say the animation and shots for this movie are awesome, like casually talking everyone has great fluidness and physics, and as "rwbyed" as JL's costumes are they move well for a RWBY episode. I mean it's nothing like V9 but it's more than on par with V8 or v7. At 54:15 as Weiss and Bruce fight the Grimm and the bees and wonder woman show up, Yang's jump punch is amazing and her hair is better than anything we've seen before.

Plus immediately after in the super fun anxiety closet with Jaune and Jessica, the framing as the crumbles from the walls moving in and FX and smoke is great.

Then at 56:07 as yang asks weiss what's going on, her hand (yeah ik it gets explained if you watch the film) on Blake, is amazingly well done, and Dina's little effects are hilarious, the way the animation and blocking shows how the JL adjust to being teens as stupid a plot point as that is, it looks great.

Which is not something I would have thought to say about RWBY 7 or 8 years ago.

As for plot, this obviously is not canon. It's like a really good fanfic and i like it that way, but the ending and the way team RWBY interact make it seem like it fits, near enough into mid V7 likely before the Schnee dinner and just after becoming licensed huntsmen. 

Firstly the way the bees act is how I would expect them to act in order for Blakes flirting to make sense in V9. 

Coming out of the end of V6 Blake knows yang is important to her, i don't think she has love in mind just yet but as we see during v7's bee scenes they care about each other a lot more now, we see this Blake jumping in to be by yang's side and reassuring Yang as she fights in the air with Dianna, things she will do again in the ponder-storm in V9, as she guides yang to the confession of a decade that is 🐝.

Meanwhile yang while coming around to Blake, hasn't latched on just yet, she knows when she's pushing blakes buttons and clearly cares what Blake thinks of her (they haven't confessed so yang still thinks what she thought on the bridge likely worse as well) but she isn't as connected or as longing to be by blakes side, a s Blake is for her.

However, like blakes shy and closed off shadowy character now being ready for joking and even flirting, following Adams death. Yang also feels more relaxed understanding Blake more and being open to a bit more flirtatious activity, but still gets stun locked by wonder woman, cause she doesn't realize yet that what she and Blake has is love.

This all makes sense for the show leading up to this point and what follows in V9

The reason V9 is so open, particularly from Blake, is that she realizes the slow burn she had with yang was taking Yang for granted and falling off the world made her realize that and start going in strong. She is determined to get everything she can out of this relationship and she will never take it for granted again. 

When the ponder storm hits SHE, guides the normally headfirst yang into the confession, while allowing yang to come to her own conclusions (hence i think qualifying from yang only)

Additionally by this point Renora hasn't kissed yet, i mean Nora and Ren have a lot more history, they had all of V4,V5,V6, V7 to get over beacon and start relationships again, compared to the V6 wonder that was the bees getting together again.

Renora in the film sees a third party, unlike the one off remark on wonder woman that number one dark haired ladies simp Yang had, cyborg pushes Ren out of his comfort zone a bit by heading for Nora, ultimately this doesn't lead to anything more than a misunderstanding but it shows that Ren while not making the first move in the kiss, at least knows that he wants to be with Nora, showing that ReNora was paced well for a V7 confirm.

As for Arkos? Well i don't think I need to explain Arkos and its timing. 

And no, I will not talk about WR.

Alright that's it from me on the movie, I'll keep saying some stuff (watched it 7 times now woooo) 

But that's about all there is to it, it looks pretty, it makes the ships make more sense if it were Cannon.

Again I'm not saying it's canon, but this is what I'd expect from V7 Blake and Yang and V7 ReNora if placed in this situation when their characters were at the stage they should be for the kisses to make sense.

I'd highly recommend The Beethis by @bees-shitposting

For more on why bumblebee isn't coming out of nowhere, remember stay chill y'all

And DFTBA!

[popculturebuffet]

Beetlemania: Ted Kord (A review of Blue Beetle V5 #1 and 2 and Blue Beetle V6 # 1 and 2) (Patreon Review and Comissioned by Brotoman.Exe and WeirdKev27)

Hello all you happy beetlemaniacs, and welcome back to beetlemania, my look at those proud boys in blue just in time for the film.. well the day after it came out because my schedule has been in freefall.

Today we look at the man, the myth, and the guy who built his own giant dope as hell bug ship, Ted Kord, the second blue beetle.

To get to the blue part of the blue and the gold though, we have to talk about what happened to Dan. While fox published Blue Beetle into the 50's, dan fell victim to what most heroes a the time did: The Superhero Bust. Post WWII until the mid 50's, kids just werne't checking out superhero comics, preferring western and romance comics. As a result most superheros vanished and only super popular ones like Batman and Superman carried on and even the world's finest were hitting a wall. As a result Fox Comics went out of buisness and sold it's stock to Charlton comics Charlton DID try to make a go of things with dan, twice. First they reprinted golden age stories as a backup before giving him his own title in the mid 50's, ironically a likely result of superhero comics becoming hot again thanks to Dan's future owners DC Comics, before being taken over by Mr. Muscles. Now already just with THAT TITLE alone, I was curious.. but then I looked into it on wikipedia and who boy. Okay first off he was created by Superman Co-Creator Jerry Siegel.

Okay so brace yourselves for this breif detour: So Mr. Muscles is a former wrestler, who still wears a neat belt, has a kid sidekick and female version and fights with the power of being in peak physical condition, much like captain american if he could choke slam you. I also like the angle to him that he promotes physical improvment to the point that a guy who tries to KILL HIM WITH TIGERS, is instead given a chance ot better himself. Those parts.. all honestly work and i'm shocked this character has never been revamped especially since he REALLY would've fit well with the wrestling boom of the mid-late 80s around the same time the charlton cast got added to the dc universe.

But the most bonkers part is his origin....

Yes folks, Mr Muscles beat Polio, a disease that cut countless people down before Jonas Salk's polio vacine started to help just three years before this comic THROUGH SHEER FORCE OF WILL. Take that science! Again he'd probably need his origin touched up as "I didn't need a vacine I just beat this disease through will" isn't the uplifting message it was in 1955. Sadly the world just wasn't ready for him, and both Mr. Muscles and Dan Garret sat on the shelf.

So we enter the mid-60s. After dc plateaued with it's stories, Marvel breaks in with stories that treat it's characters like real people. Sometimes their real people who will fake being their own hepcat twin brother to fool their friends because they can't just tell them who they are because shut up, sometimes they'l lfight communists every week and sometimes they'll have their college roomate wind up as a dictator with his own country, but still people who have mostly realistic emotions and what not. So sensing another chance to cash in Charlton tried one more time to bring back Dan. The stories seem good, with Dan getting a new love intrest Cheri, an egyptian archelogy professor and a new job as an archelogist, an origin I honestly feel works better given the scarab and was carried over. The series breathed new life into the character.. but not new sales and once again the beetle was gone. However with a new boom going on they decided rather than let the beetle gather dust again to try a new approach: They combined the approaches of both companies: they'd give someone new the blue beetle identity.. and have one of marvel's top guys give him that sense of realisim.

Enter Steve Ditko, soon to be objectivst, loveable curmudgeon and co-creator of spider-man. Understandably angry Stan kept taking all the credit for the wall crawler and less understandably angry lee was a liberal, Ditko walked out of marvel and Charlton snapped him up and put him to work on a similar but still distinct new version of the blue beetle. They started with backups, just to be safe, before giving Ted his own title that... somehow only lasted 5 issues. Still it's a bafflingly un-republished classic that introduced one of the greatest superheroes of all so let's give it a look under the cut, along with what dc did with a similar premise

Blue Beetle Bugs the Squids: While another writer is credited.. it was simply a front: Ditko actually wrote and scripted the stories here, he simply didn't want a writing credit for some reason.

So we open with a high class party. The spread is bland, sauerkraut and boiled goose. There's no way these people will ever cut loose.. but more importanlty there's some man in squid suits with suction cups climbing the building.. suction cups on their ARMS.

The suits do look neat, not as squidy as i'd hope, I love me a good squid. Their beady eyes, their cupped mouths the fact they can murder you. Good boys. But their still a nice design.

They crash the party to rob it, but before the mystery men can burst in to stop this a diffrent costumed hero crashes the party

Ted's quip game is STRONG here, I can't show you them all, image limits, but Ditko's comedy and action writing is up to bat as ted acrobatically handles the much larger group. IT's very spidey-esque, without feeling EXACTLY like peter: Ted has no powers and thus his movements are more human level acrobatic, using a lot of throws and a lot of hand stands. It's a great level of art.

The Squids try to bug out with beetle following in the bug, his flying machine and something so iconic the blue beetle film makes sure to use it even with ted not physically present. But before we can get to that say.. do you have problems being short? Well charlton comics ad pages have a solution for you.

I can now see how randy newman thought short people got no reason to live, he was brainwashed by the liftee corportation! Someone deprogram randy newman!

we also get this ad for the charlton action heroes. We get a white guy doing judo, captain atom in his best red, blue , dark blue and silver armed ensemble, peacemaker: he'll eat every dick on the beach clean for liberty and of course the classic character Peter Cannon Thunderbolt. I have no idea who this guy is and don't care to. Why he's here and not Mr. Muscles, only god and charlton editorial knows.

Annnd looking it up he's bascially got the same gimick of human perfection with some added "White guy learning asian wisdoM' uncomfort. : Also I just noticed he's basically wearing socks.

Anyways beetle chases after teh squids in the bug which here looks more like a cricket than an actual beetle, something later designs would iron out.

We then see Ted Kord's personal life. It's largely what it'd be for most of his career: working as a researcher at a lab at his father's company, sometimes Ted's own company, though things.. aren't happy. Lt. Max Fisher is trying to figure out what happened to Dan Garret on Pago Island, and Ted can't tell him for reasons we'll get into next issue.. reasons he refuses to tell his girlfriend and fellow lab tech tracey.

He has reasons for keeping Max from knowing though: there's a secret there that could threaten the world, again more for the next issue. For now he's going to enjoy being blue beetle for as long as he can. I get the sense the detective subplot was added to throw in some drama to Ted's life, spider-man style. There' some elments of peter here: the dictomy of brooding civlian, carefree hero, the science background, the quips, the secret id driving a wedge between him and his loved ones.. but what I like is Ditko takes steps to make sure ted is his own man: he dosen't have powers, relying on techno wizardy, acrobatics and his own brain, has a steady love intrest from the word go and as we'll see next issue DOSEN'T keep his id a secret from those he loves for long if it'll keep hurting them. It's clear from the next issue Ditko either realized going the broody rout woudln't work forever or he was simply swerving his audeince expecing "Spider-man but blue and without powers". Either way it's nicely done.

So we cut to Todd Van III, a socilate suggesting a yacht party to raise money for .. something. Naturally given this guy we've never heard of has a lot of focus, he's the big bad behind the squids, having spent his inhereitance to show he can make his own money to his dead dad. That'll show his ghost! He also plans to make himself out to be a hero: since th eparty's a masquerade he swaps places with a minon so said minion will play him and stand up to the squids, who then slink away to the lower decks with the money.

This ends up backfiring as Ted was montoring the scene the whole time. It's nicely set up too: this time he's ready since the yacht party is too big a target for the squids to pass up.. and thus he notices how weird it is the squids AREN'T on his radar.

So we get a really fun action scene as the yacht, c leared of guests but not of squids, gets sieged by ted, who uses the bug in some really fun ways, including giving them a second to sweat it out before pouncing. It's cool stuff. Todd has decided to blow this pop stand... literally. He plans to blow up the yacht and everyone involved to get away. Unfortuantely for him the squids find out and escape while Ted is able to chase todd, and get the very moist back of money back. We get a REALLY fun fight scene as Ted keeps quipping about how todd REALLY wants to go to prison.

IT's a really great bit and really sells who ted is. In the end Beetle wins, the squids go to jail and he wonders what's next. Before that though I have to say..t his is a REALLY fun story. The dialouge is hilarious, the mystery for next issue is very well set up, and the squids are fun badies. Their not exactly a threat, but their not really here for that: there here more to give ted someone to show off against. To show what the beetle can do and to show he dosen't have any powers like dan. For a first issue it's a lot of fun

This issue also introduces the Question. The question is vic sage, a tv reporter by day who fearlessly speaks against corruption despite a good chunk of the board at his station wanting him gone. You can see a LITTLE of ditko's budding objectivism peak in, him blaming people with gambling problems for enabling mobsters, but otherwise it's also a great story. It's a really solid first issue and given it introduces such important characters i'm baffled dc hasn't reprinted these since the 2000's. It's great stuff. And there's more of it coming up next

The End is A Beginning By this point steve apparently got less shy about taking the writing credit as this one credits him rightfully as writer and artist.

Ted's stressed as Lt. Fisher keeps pressing him and Tracey hasn't showed up for work. So after Fisher leaves he decides to do some blue beetling to clear his head.

He flies over Pago Island, remphasising for new readers it has some terrible secret.. but it also has a guest. Ted's worried so he checks in.. and finds Tracey. Turns out she was here all day searching..

I... fucking love this scene. Ted sees his loved one is hurting.. and decides to come clean, despite the risk. Because it's the right thing to do. It's something I REALLY wish more superhero works did after this. Nowadays this sort of thing is way more common and deconstruing the secret keeping way more often, but it still took it's sweet time and even then we have things like miraculous ladybug where they just.. outright keep the ids secret because shut up. Here ted sees his girlfriend in distress and simply agrees to tell her.

So we cut back a few months: Ted was working with his Uncle Jarvis, with Tracey running his lab while he did as Jarvis preferred ted work only at his lab. Ted was curious, only getting in pieces, and while he was innocent enough to not ask big questions he still wanted to know what was going on. Jarvis agreed to tell him.. but then exploded.. literally. The lab explodes, Jarvis is apparently dead as he's the only one there.

Naturally though it's not that simple as Ted finds a box not destroyed in the fire.. and to his horror finds out the experiment was actually to create some cool looking artifical super solders. Before now their weakness was being slow.. but Ted accidently solved that. So he goes to Dan. In this continuity their old college buddies, and he figures Dan can find it with his archelogy. Dan tries to go alone so he can beetle it up if needed but Ted insists on going with because.. of course he does. He gave his uncle the keys. As for the whole being dead thing Ted rightly dosen't buy it and has to be sure. What I also love is that Ditko makes sure we get Tracey's perspective: she thought Ted was distraught because his uncle died, and she was supscious he was lying about being alone on pago island because she KNEW he left his house with someone else.

Naturally Jarvis not only has his atomic men capture them but gets monologuging. This case I get though: he has NO idea ther'es a superhero among the two guys he just captured, thus he has no reason to fear them.

dan naturally goes into action, secret identity be dammned and we get one hell of a fight. It alsos hows Dan's own fighting style: throws and more up close brawling once again to Ted's later acrobatics. Sadly... given ther'es only ONE blue beetle in present day.. you can probably guess how this ends.. in tears.. and expoding robot men

dan's body was soon lost for an explosion and while Ted managed to make it out, the police were left supscious.. but now he's given good reason. While Ted COULD at least reveal the pago island stuff without outing himself or dan as the blue beetle, though the latter might be necessary, he can't trust that anyone find the robots now jarvis is dead (his control center also conveintly overloaded), as no one man can be responsible for that kind of power.

So after some soul searching Dan used some of his dad's old experiments, his dad having left indefintely on his own vauge quest, and thus.. a legend was born

Turns out though the Androids themselves aren't gone and we get a breif but awesome fight. This is the real test: Ted is out powered, out gunned and barely survives.. but he manages to outwit them, dumping the two that emerged into a crevice.. but barely. It really cements who ted is: he's not a brawler, he can't use brute force: all he has is gadgets (something emphasized more in the dc version) and his greatest weapon: his brain. Like spider-man he has to think his way out over stronge foes but unlike spidey his brain is all he has.. and he uses it well. he then has the bug cover the crevices to be sure. Tracey vows to help him no matter what and the two embrace.. as under the island more robots are made... and the future is uncertain.

This issue is even better, giving ted a really fantastic origin story one that's been kept in most versions of him since, it's that good. DC would use it, brave and the bold would base an episode around it, and even the movie is using pieces of it, simply turning Jarvis into his sister rather than his uncle and , like brave and the bold, having the scarab be the basis. The art is fantastic, the fights as usual are great, and the stuff with Tracey is top notch character work, making her feel more like a person and less like an object.

Out From the Ashes!

So after only a few issues the blue beetle folded. Again. He'd appear breifly in AMERICOMICS. Because Merica, which finds a nice way to reconcile his golden age adventures with his silver age ones: reincarnation. It makes sense given both the egyptian themes present in the second run and the scarab itself not being defined as an alien just yet. Also as one last note the term Kahji Dah pops up here. Remember it, it'll be important later.

Anyways with that the beetle set on the sidelines again till the mid 80s. In 1983 DC Bought Charlton Comics, and it's characters, seeing the potetial Charlton had squandered just letting Steve Ditko and Jack Kirby creations sit on a shelf somewhere. At the same time Marv Wolfman, editor at dc and writer of the new teen titans (I covered his run with george perez in full last year and STILL feeling winded from it), had pitched a crossover: history of the dc universe!... which was set to completely reshape said history for a new generation, with Wolfman feeling the various parallel earths of dc had gotten a bit much, and with DC lagging behind marvel they felt a refresh was needed. They changed the name to...

Something I intend to cover eventually. When i'm not sure (I'd be happy to do it on comissoin). For those not familiar with it, Crisis was a massive 12 issue crossover, and while marvel beat them to the punch with secret wars as the first crossover, crisis was still the first proper linewide crossover: every book was effected in some way, and many would never be the same for better or worse. The book brought in EVERY altenate earth dc had, had most die horribly, and merged the remainder.

It was in these pages our boy Ted made his dc debut, and once the dust was settled he and the other charlton characters were put front and center in the new universe and most given another shot at a title or mini series with Captain Atom and Blue Beetle being the first to get ongoings, likely since Steve Ditko had worked on both, with the Question, after a guest stint in Beetle's own book, getting one and peacemaker getting a mini series and a key role in checkmate.. the latter of which I only know because he showed up for an overly long crossover between Checkmate and Suicide Squad, before largely disappearing until...

Giving him a starring role in the suicide squad book thanks to his movie apperance and his own mini series recently.

The four along would also be adapted into the Watchmen, another book i've covered, as DC wanted to reuse the chalton characters after and watchmen was a bit too.. permeant.

And so in 1986 ted bravely and boldly enterted the dc universe proper with Blue Beetle #1.

Writing the book was Lein Wein, comics legend responsible for co-creating Wolverine, Colossus, Storm, and Nightcrawler, and of course KRAKOA THE ISLAND THAT WALKS LIKE A MAN AND WAS A MUTANT NATION TILL RECENTLY. IT'S COMPLICATED. Lesser known though was his run on Spider-Man. What i've read of it is pretty dang good, and it's clear even after a healthy run with the wallcrawler Lein still wasn't quite done doing this type of story and jumped aboard when DC asked him.

So once again we have a spidey alum bringing a wallcrawling energy to Ted, let's see how it bears out.

We open with some brave chicago firefighters tryign to put out a penthouse blaze... and failing. Goly firehouse 51 was a lot less competent before Chief Boden ran it huh.

Anyways Chief Red Haired Guy is dismayed to see a familiar face, The Blue Beetle, who he thought retired. Apparently Ted took some time off between picking up the mask and now, a nice way to explain why he hadn't been in any recent dc history prior to the crisis in-universe. What they never explain is WHY Chief Carrot Top hates Ted. No really this guy is j jonah jameson levels of dismayed ted is back, gets weirdly mad at him later, they never tell us WHY this guy hates ted. Maybe it's in an issue past where i've read in this book, I don't know, but it is hilarious, you have to give it that.

At any rate ted swings in on a line he has that comes out of the bug and he can call for help. It showed up in the previous adventures. Ted then tries to help someone in the fire.. only to get a cup of punch to the face instead. Turns out this is our villian..

Yeah the idea of firefist is a good one, and we'll get to why he keeps starting fires besides it being his desire later as well as why it burns so hot. But that outfit.. where do I even begin. the armor parts MOSTLY look neat, my only complaint being that his eyes shoudln't be visable, especially since he has a whole thing about wanting no one to see his face, trying to barbeque ted over it. The idea of an armored man with undousable fire who is determined to murder all firefighters is brilliant. The problem is the rest of the outfit. The pure white underpinning, the inexplicable utility belt no doubt caring firefist shark repeleant, the GIANT bulge

And the fucking logo. He looks like a dollar store shredder knockoff. I like paris cullen's cartoony art on this book, it fits well and he makes ted look great but I have NO IDEA what he was thinking on this costume.

It's honestly what i've realized on a second read took me out of the book the first time I tried reading it. Since dc had all the issues and no intention of reprinting the series (and as of this writing despite the movie STILL hasn't, though they have reprinted Jamie's series after too damn long which is nice), I bought the first two.. and wasn't really impressed. It felt like it was trying way too hard to be spider-man. I see now it's not really that bad, it has some good stuff i'll get to, I just let the problems stack up because one of the first things I saw was this guy. And on second read like I said he's not a terrible villian he just has a bad costume. And he's far from the first supervillian to start out with a bad costume before getting an upgrade later. I'd honestly love to see him fight Jamie if he hasn't already: just upgrade the flames to make hima threat to the scarab and your good.

At any rate firefist gets away though Ted escapes via the zip line thing I mentioned the sky wire, and uses it to save the last firefighter left in the building. The sequence is tense cool and really shows what ted can do. Granted I woudln't of also opened with him getting punched in the face but I do get it: they didn't HAVE to talk ted up since he had a prominent-ish role in crisis on infinite earths.. but for people just turning into bb it's a weird choice.

The Fire Comissiner wants answers and wants Beetle to come int o the fire house.. what. Ted does tell him about firefist but skedadles as fire chief grumpus vows revenge.. well he dosen't but wouldn't i tbe neat if he did.

Ted is a LITTLE bummed that was a bumpy return.. but what I like is he dosen't stay glum for long. He instead comforts himself with the fact that he at least prevented some damage. We then get a rundown of things as he pilots the bug underwater and into his secret lair. We also find out something I think is neat as Ted unmasks: the beetle mask has a lock on it that he can undo with his glove. It's clever, giving good reason why someone can't just yank the top off and find out who the blue beetle is and fits who ted is. Wein is the one who really codified that ted is a man of gadgets: while Ditko's Ted used more acrobatics, this is a ted who uses sceince and skills and it's something that would stick from here on out. And I .. really like it. It's a way to set him apart from both spider-man and batman, his most obvious comparisions being both a bug based hero with a load of quips having a load of fun doing this and a gadget based viglante. Peter is smart and WILL use his science knowhow and strategic genius to down foes, it's part of his charm, but dosen't really pack a ton of gadgets in most runs, only doing so when he has enough backing to afford gadgets or in the Insomniac universe, while

It's more criminology: most of his gadgets are based around crime solving and are down to earth. He CAN have something custom whipped up if the need arises, but prefers more practical solutions. It's seen in their modes of transportation: batman has a car, a boat and a plane, all speclaized just in case he needs one, and while all conspicious all black, fast and able to get in and out quick. Ted by contrast has the bug which while not exactly slow, is flashier, multipurpose (both plane and sub) and designed to more make an impact and look real cool. It's in how they treat the job: To ted this is something that needs doing and honors a friend, but something he also has FUN doing most of the time or can snark at to cope when he really REALLY isn't. For batman it's a sacred mission that has to be handled with the utmost seriousness while he wears a bat costume.

We get a recap of ted's origin, which is mostly untouched. The only diffrences are a change in design for the robots, Dan is switched from a college friend to Ted's old teacher and the fact this time out ted got to control the narrative, so while Lt. Fisher is still suspcious, we'll get to that, Dan is thought to have died mysteriously.. and in a nice touch the beetle cave has a memorial set up for him, the newspaper reporting his death with two candles next to it and Ted hoping to do him proud. It's a great way to speed through the origin without trivalizing what it means or what ted's lost.

Ted rides an elevator up to the proper levels of Kord Omniversal, his company which he runs as CEO. This is it's research part. He meets with his secretary, Angela, who has really neat looking big pink glasses and is nice.. but is hiding something. To get this out of the way now she's subtly stealing tech from the company for her uncle whose forcing her to. It's a subplot that dosen't get paid of here so i'm mostly glossing over it, but I apprciate these first two issues setting up later ones already. I also love this bit of ted going through the stack of messages she has for him.

It suits him so well. I also like his hat. I want that hat. Mail me that hat.

Ted heads to the lab where we meet Melody and Jermiah. Melody is ted's love intrest.. and a fairly eh one. Sh'es mostly just "Perky' and "Into ted" in the issues i've read. There really isn't a lot to her. With Tracey it was fine because A) it was two issues and b) It was 1965, love intrests rarely got fleshed out and her feeling as fleshed out as she did for the time was nice. It dosen't really help that ted later has chemistry with both Barbra Gordon (though sadly it never went anywhere), Power Girl and Booster Gold. I personally like Karen, but i'm not against tedbabs or the blue and the gold. What i'm saying is ted is just so likeable and charming that like Spider-Man he is shippable as fuck and Melody just dosen't do enough to stand out against what came after. Update: As I was writing this review I looked ahead at future issues via the dc database (their wiki).. and found out there IS an intresting subplot where Melody is mad Ted keeps vanishing.. that being said it's still frustrating as Ted has no real reason not ot tell her WHY he's vanishing and still dosen't quite fix the character. It IS neat though.

As for Jerry he's an old friend of Ted's dad's and a wacky guy, doing get rich quick schemes reguarly and having been fired from STAR Labs for it. For those not familiar with it, STAR is dc's go to super science outfit, with branches all over the country, and has heavily shown up in Superman the Animated Series and was home base for Team Flash in the CW Flash.

Ted then has the team analyzie the wreckage to figure out what Firefist is using without saying that. I do like that Ted uses his resources cleverly and being boss, and on good terms with both Melody and Jerimiah, they don't question it. That said.. I would've preferred it if the two just.. knew who he was. There's no real reason to hide it at this point and they don't give us a good one: Melody and Ted are doing super well and Jermiah is an old friend of Ted's dad and clearly likes the kid. Jerry MAYBE could tell kord sr, but there's no reason given Ted's dad can't know either. It'd be more fun for him to not have to hide it and see how they grapple with this as well as how they help Ted hide he's the beetle from the rest of the world. Loop his secretary in too. It isn't helped by hindsight: as noted above the flash show demonstrated how cool it is for a hero to have his own support staff, while as we'll see with Jamie while he still has a secret identity, his family and two best friends learn VERY early on and his book is better for it, something the movie seems to stick to judging from the trailers.

We cut to Pago Island where we meet Conrad Caprapax, aka one of the movie's villians.. and our second subplot that dosen't payoff here. In this case it's understandable. To get it out of the way this issue ALSO sets up Lt. Max Fisher looking into Pago Island, recyling that plot from volume 5. I figured the two plots would eventually dovetail, and since i had only read the first ten issues my first time trying this book, I looked it up and confrimed: the two plots do indeed payoff eventually in issue 14 and at the same time.

We then get to setup for future issues #4, or three chronologically, as Ted helps his good friend Murray Takamoto over at star. It's a neat setup too: Murray's an old college buddy and Ted often does consulting work for him. It's a nice way to setup plots. In this case a red headed stranger wants to steal some promethum star labs plans to transport to kord omniversal. The guy turns out to be Dr. Alchemy, longtime dc villian and honestly a fun choice to go up against the more traditionally scientific ted. I love this setup. He later tries to flatten the tires on the delivery but we find out his magic is shorting out, hence the promethium need. Oh well possible stories for another day.

With our various b-plots mostly out of the way we can focus on the main story again. Ted's chilling with Murray and chatting over coffe whcih his a bit fun if also a LITTLE bit stitled, but I get comics back then weren't the most natural and prefered over the tom, 80's sitcom style talking between characters, and it still feels natural enough.

Ted heads off when he gets a ding on his watch, as he was montoring for fires.. and Firefist has stepped up his game this time SETTING A FIREHOUSE ON FIRE. Ted is prepared though using fire foam on him from the bug before fighting the guy and actually has the upper hand this time. It shows off ted's smarts with this time his acrobatics. The roof caves in.. but we get an absoltuely DOPE shot of ted sliding down the fire pole.

Sadly this dosen't last and we end with Ted pinned under flaming wreckage while firefist gloats.

This City is Not For Burning

Man Len REALLY loved his melodramatic titles.

Anyways Blue Beetle is trapped in a burning building and we get a moment that's a clear homage to a spidey classic: This be my destiny aka that image of spidey under a ton of rubble he barley escapes from through willpower alone. Here it's diffrent ENOUGH for me to consider Len.. isn't just ripping it off: Ted has no power, the heat is a diffrent kind of complication and he has to use what he has on hand, a pipe and whatever else to escape. It's a well done scene all thigns considered and ted BARELY escapes. Fire Cheif Petty Grudge decides to call it even if Beetle can stop this guy. He's still mad Ted won't fill out his forms.. which is fair.

We then get firefists origin.. and I meant what I said earlier. While his costume is messy... his origin is both great and genuinely heartwrenching.

My guess is they assumed he was dead.. but I still can't blame him for being mad they abandoned him. Granted it still dosen't justify putting on a costume for revenge but frankly if no one did that superhero comics would be kinda boring wouldn't they. I also like the ambiguity: we geninely DON'T know if that firefighter didn't care to save the victim his friend went in for.... or simply missed the guy and assumed he was dead. It's a true tragedy and i'ts clear the ptsd and circumstance warped this poor guy into the arsonist we see now.

So with that Melody and Jerry find out the substance is apparently greek fire, a substance used to burn ships and find all the places the ingredignts could've come from before clocking out. ONce ted gets back and notices via the computer that everyone's gone he heads home for a shower and folks... and he's not alone.

I.. am endlessly baffled and amused by this whole thing. Does ted like being choked and Melody just simply didn't think to ask consent because it was the 1980s, or did Melody REALLY just think "Tee-Hee you know what would really be fun, suprising my boyfriend in his dark apartment alone when he's the head of a major company and thus a target for robbers or kidnappers. The fact that as the lights go back out Lt. Fisher is watching the apartment just proves my point. He already has a stalker, he dosen't need it simulated.. unless that's what he's into and again you gotta set that stuff up first.

A few subplots later ted gets the info and goes out after firefist but while he finds the stuff to make it, the guy's already gone. He did burn his newspaper in a rage thoug hso ted has meldoy read it to him.

This.. really hurts my brain. Ted is careless as hell with his identity here. Which again would be fine if the people he was careless to found out.. but instead we get a subplot of melody being mad he disappears.. and it somehow gets worse as she not only emotoinally cheats on him but CALLS IN HIS DAD TO DEAL WITH HIS ABSENCES WITHOUT TALKING TO HIM ABOUT IT. When as far as I could tellt he company.. was fine. Ted was just missing meetings but he still did all his work on time. Girl chicago , as far as I can tell has the ONE superhero. Company 51 is still under old managment, we're not there yet.

Anyways Firefist publicly targets a firefighting museum with ted giving chase as we get an add for the dc roleplaying game from back then.. and now I want to play that. if you knwo where the docs are online or have a copy let me know.

Anyways Beetle fights him and it's a decent enough fight.. with ted trying water for some reason even though greek fire is famous for being waterproof

Ted eventually wins by tarring up the mask and then takes off the mask... with firefist seemingly comitting suicide over his burns. A tragic end. Blue BEetle plugs firefigghting and the issue ends.

This two parter.. is a decent intro to ted. It shows off his skills, what his wealth can do, and firefist, while looking like bargin basement moltar, is a good first opponent: powerful enough to give Ted a workout, but nothing to major off the bat and with a tragic ending.

The books flaws are more character wise: Ted's well done, as his his secretary, but everyone else feels kinda.. eh. Len wanted the vibe of spider-man and the repor but forgot the audience needs to feel it too. I also could've done with using more tactics with ted: while him bounding around was nice as always, part of what made the ditko one so loveable was Ted was SMART: he could outhink his foes not just out manuver them. We see bits and pieces but with ted having a full secret lab and a fortune this time we really don't see him use it. The final fight is decent.. but he dosen't say try to figure out how to counteract greek fire or at least use some gadgets.

It was fine in the ditko era he didn't whip up specific gadgets because the situations didn't call for them; The squids were tricky but he had the means to deal with them. They were just guys in suits at the end of the day, same as him, but without the skill and the bug did the rest of the lifting and while he COUDL'VE for the androids with time, he simply didn't. Here he's dealing with firefist for two days, gets full analysis of what he can do.. and does NOTHING with the info but track the guy. Say what you wil about ted curbing from spidey.. but this bit, the thinking after getting his face caved in and being ready next time, is the one bit that was crucial and that ditko rightly carried over. As it stands this is just okay and i'ts a shame this is, as of this writing one of the ONLY two solos ted's had. It's not horrible and might even get better with time, i'll certainly look into it but the more I wrote about it the more it became clear why I just.. never really took to this run: it's good god ideas.. but just does not a whole lot intresting wtih them.

Fortunately Ted would get another big break midway into his series.

But more on that next time as we find out whatever happened to ted kord.. and see the rise of a new boy in blue. Thanks for reading.

[gefdreamsofthesea]

I was not expecting to check my email and see that the developers of Defiant (urban fantasy ttrpg where you play as the supernatural elite) have a new supplement out about....orgies?

Based on reviews, the game is a bit more mature than say, VtM (although I feel like VtM's a bit hornier now, I'm pretty sure at least one artist who has worked on V5's supplements has a foot fetish) so it's not like this is coming out of left field it's just one hell of a thing to wake up to in the morning.