#we know that its a crack in space and time and that its scary

[bardinthezone]

Watching Making myself sit through Moffat's Who, trying to give it a decent chance and I can't stand it already. Y'know why?

The stupid fucking love triangle.

Because not only is it just generally annoying as a trope, but it is so poorly written here. It takes over the show in a really obnoxious way and completely flanderizes characters who, in the first episode, were decent people.

Rory is portrayed as a fool for being... concerned that his fiance is cheating on him with the not-actually-imaginary friend she's been obsessed with since childhood, who she ran off with and kissed (A normal thing to be concerned about!!). And just generally, he's portrayed as a bumbling idiot. As the one who just gets confused and makes one-liners about being insecure. And both Amy and the Doctor just brush him off, leave him behind! Mocked by the woman who's supposed to be there for him and abandoned by the Doctor who's meant to keep him safe. He's being reduced to basically just comic relief here, and it sucks.

The Doctor is so.. aloof. More so than 10 and DEFINTELY moreso than 9. He's a silly, childish man who often fails to recognize the emotional consequences of his actions. He has his emotional moments, yes, but a lot of his writing falls victim to what I call "Sherlock Syndrome." When Moffat just writes an aloof super genius and expects the audience to fawn over him because he has good outfits and witty one-liners. Matt Smith is a fantastic actor and he carries a lot of his run, but putting glitter on a turd doesn't stop it being a turd.

Amy is yet another victim of the "every woman falls madly in love with the Doctor" pitfall. Worked with Rose, got old with Martha and after that almost every one-off woman who flirted with him just made me roll my eyes. Her obsession and anger with the Doctor didn't have to be romantic, but Moffat just couldn't resist writing a "strong female protagonist" who's sexy and she knows it, who loves having all the boys fawn over her and flirts without a care in the world. Who's a brash girlboss in charge of her boys, but who also turns into a sobbing damsel in distress at the slightest sign of danger.

All three of these characters are so blatantly characatures of themselves right now that it takes me out of it. They're all just quippy one-liners of their smartness or their brashness or their insecure foolishness. Can these types of people exist in real life? Yeah. But the way they're written about here is just obnoxious. I'm willing to accept that later Moffat seasons might be better than this (at least on the interpersonal conflict side of things), but it's season 1 and he's already dropping the ball so hard.

We could've gotten something truly marvelous, with a PLATONIC conflict based on the Raggedy Man from her childhood finally coming back and offering her freedom from a boring adult life. She's enamored with him, but doesn't entirely trust him because hey, he massively fucked up once already. Maybe Rory is concerned about his place in Amy's life, and Amy tries to be comforting. Maybe she messes up, maybe she says the wrong thing. Maybe she says the wrong thing right before losing Rory to the crack in space and time. But she has to try, because why should I care about a relationship where one person doesn't care about the other's happiness, at least a little? And right now it just feels like she doesn't.

I'm not saying shows shouldn't have interpersonal conflicts and flawed protagonists. They should! But to pull that off well, you have to make us want to see these characters grow. You have to give us a reason to enjoy watching these characters interact, even at their low points. And revisting Moffat's run as an adult, I don't feel enjoyment. I just feel annoyed.

[triplefrontierbabe]

hello! can i request a dr3 x black cat! reader? we all know dr is like a golden retriever and the dynamic with a tough, badass r, i feel would be so good! it gets to the point where the grid is like “mate your gf is kinda scary” and are legitimately scared of her (except for max, and danny tries to tell them shes not). but one night maybe dr (+more) get tooo drunk and the grid sees how caring and loving r really is (takes care of them) and understands that shes just a tough exterior with a soft loving interior please?

if not, its all good!! thank you 🤍

Opposites Attract

summary: Daniel’s the only person who knows how to crack your hard exterior

pairing: black cat! f!reader x golden retriever! Daniel Ricciardo

warnings: mention of drinking, you are responsible for the content you consume

a/n: I love this prompt!! I truly think Danny has the personality fit for a black cat! gf. hope you enjoy!

Daniel loves to smile, a lot. It’s kinda his thing. If Daniel Ricciardo isn’t smiling then something is seriously wrong. You can’t forget about his contagious laugh that livens up any space he’s in. Overall, he’s just a ray of sun bursting with joy.

So you can imagine the confusion on everyone’s faces when he introduced you as his girlfriend. You, the stoic, keeps-to-herself, only-shows-minimal-expressions girl dating Daniel, the golden retriever of the grid.

To any outsider the relationship dynamic didn’t really make sense. But, to be fair, compared to many other wives and girlfriends of the grid, you keep your life fairly private. You accompany Daniel to his races, you watch the race then you’re ready to go home as soon as the last car crosses the finish line. And, unlike many of the other drivers’ better halves, modeling and being in front of the camera is not your thing.

“I can’t tell if she hates me or likes me? She seems a little intimidating.” Lando says to Daniel one day. Daniel has introduced you to many of his mates and you’ve gotten to know many of them on a personal level outside of the paddock. Your stoicism once again triumphing in confusing the drivers.

“No, she does like you, Lando.” Daniel says. “I know she’s hard to read sometimes but she enjoys the company.”

This was a conversation Daniel found himself having often with other drivers. While you did fraternize with the other ladies, your social battery was quick to wear out on long weekends. Often excusing yourself from conversations because you were tired and could only handle so much interaction in one go.

However, after one race weekend, Daniel somehow convinced you to go out with a group of the drivers and their partners. It was a good race for Daniel, he placed P8, so of course a celebration of points was in order.

“It’ll be fun, I promise!” He tried reasoning with you. He had tried many times before in convincing you to go to a bar or club to celebrate. Only once before was he successful, and that was because it was to celebrate his birthday.

“And, we don’t even have to stay that long” he began “just have a couple drinks, mingle a little bit then leave.”

Now that was a plan you could get behind.

“Okay, I guess.” You said, sighing in defeat. It was one night, that wouldn’t kill you. And who knows, maybe people would see you’re not all that emotionless after all.

The night was going along just fine. Drinks were served, conversations were had, music was played. Max somehow ended up dancing on top of a table which resulted in Daniel joining him.

You and the other girls giggled at the sight of the grown men acting like college frat boys at a rush party. Yes, you giggled too. Lando saw it. He tried to take a mental note, amidst his drunken state, of the expression of emotion you had. Who knows if anyone would ever see that again.

“Mate did you just see Daniel’s girl smile?” Lando asked Charles who was standing close by. Okay, maybe it wasn’t a mental note he made after all.

Before you knew it, the clock had gone way past midnight and many more drinks were had. You, however, tapped out after two drinks. Someone in the relationship needed to be the coherent one for the night and it sure wasn’t going to be Daniel.

“Babe, I love this song!” Daniel shouted over top of DJ Got Us Fallin’ In Love as he stumbled towards you and the rest of the group. Once he was standing next to you he started dancing, terribly, attempting to twerk or at least move his butt in a what he thought to be a provocative manner.

As he bumped around you, you couldn’t help but smile at the scene you had now been brought into. Your almost six foot tall boyfriend acting like a newly turned twenty one year old at a bar for the first time. It was truly comical in the way he moved. For being as tall as he was, dancing for him was quite the sight, his lanky arms moving every which way with no rhythm at all.

“Baby dance with me” he whined reaching out to hold your waist and slightly slurring his words in the meantime. He was quite gone. The thing about alcohol and Danny was that it just heightened his golden retriever energy. He’s already very energetic and affectionate while sober, but inebriated? That’s a whole new level.

As much as you were reluctant to leave, you knew if Danny didn’t get to bed soon, the inevitable hangover in the morning would only be ten times worse.

“Okay honey, I think it’s time we head out.” You announce putting an arm around his waist to keep him upright. As soon as your arm is around his tall frame, he leans into your touch just like a puppy who hasn’t seen their human all day.

“But the party’s just getting started.” Daniel said pouting. Once again, a laugh escaped you before you could even process what was happening.

“I know, I know” you began as you put Daniel’s arm around your shoulder. “We can have more of a party later, okay?” You said patting his chest, trying to maneuver him in a way that would make it easy to walk out.

Before heading out, you announce your and Daniel’s departure and thank everyone for such a great night.

The group watches in amazement as you methodically guide Daniel around the crowd and head for the door. And they don’t miss the kiss you press to Daniel’s cheek along the way.

The guys are stunned to say the least.

“I think that’s the most personality I’ve seen from her ever.” Max exclaims, eyes wide at what he just witnessed.

“I think that’s the most I’ve ever heard her speak before.” Charles adds.

“It’s no wonder he chose her,” George begins, “she keeps him calm.”

So yeah, is your and Daniel’s relationship dynamic totally different on the outside? Sure. But he’s the only one who has managed to open up your heart just enough for him.

Opposites do attract after all.

Check out my Masterlist

[moonstruckme]

Hello you wonderful, WONDERFUL creation of brilliance! I have another request for the 1k if thats alright.

I think it would be two ghosts?? But its reader x remus (again) where she know hes a werewolf without being told and uses halloween to tell/show him because she can see how guilty he feels for not telling her and scared to tell her.

How/why she knows and how she tells him is up to you love!!

Thank you love x (hopefully that's coherent, toddlers suck and ive only slept 3hrs 😭)

Thanks for requesting (and omg, I hope the toddler(s) become more manageable) <3

join the party

Remus Lupin x fem!reader ♡ 1.1k words

Remus comes to the door looking endearingly rumpled. He’s wearing pajama bottoms and a wrinkled t-shirt, his hair is fluffy from lying in bed all day, and his pillowcase has left a faintly pink crease on his cheek. You gather all this from the split second between him opening the door and promptly shutting it in your face. 

“Remus?” you knock again. “Come on, let me in.” 

After a moment in which you can picture him sighing laboriously on the other side, the door cracks open just wide enough for you to see one eye, narrowed with displeasure. Were it anyone else or under any other circumstances, you’d really be quite offended. “What are you doing here?” he asks.

You hold up your bag. “I didn’t think you’d want to face the slew of trick-or-treaters bound for your house alone. I brought movies for us and candy for them. Or, well, the candy can be for both, actually.” 

Remus is silent for a moment, and you press at the door insistently. “Let me in, Rem.” 

He capitulates with a sigh, stepping back to let the door fall open. His apartment is dark, every curtain drawn, and it takes your eyes a second to adjust after stepping out of the sunlight. There’s half a dozen empty takeout containers strewn about the coffee table, and the space has the stale aroma that comes from lack of movement. 

Remus has that aroma, too, you realize as you step closer to him, pressing a kiss to his cheek regardless. He looks like he could use it. 

“Sorry about the mess,” he says dully. “I wasn’t expecting you.” 

“Course you weren’t,” you wave him off. “How could you have been? You’ve been avoiding me all week.”

Remus closes his eyes as if this conversation is already too much for him, and you feel instantly guilty. 

“It’s okay, honey,” you say gently, stacking the takeout containers to clear some space for your candy. “You’re allowed to take some time to yourself. It’d be nice if you’d let me know in the future, but I’m not upset at you. I promise.” 

His features relax slightly, a tension you’d barely noticed around his eyes easing. “Thanks, love. Sorry.” 

“It’s really alright,” you promise, taking him by the hand to pull him down onto the couch with you. “Listen, you seem like you’re not feeling well, so I know you might not want company right now, but would you be open to just having a relaxing night? We can watch Halloween movies and eat sweets, and I’ll handle all the trick-or-treaters.” 

“Yeah?” Remus looks at you with something between hope and sadness, and your heart breaks for him. You squeeze his hand lightly, like your boyfriend is a sponge that you can squeeze all the woe out of and force to absorb your love instead. “That sounds really nice, dove. Thank you.” 

“Course,” you say brightly, and you’re unable to resist pressing your lips to his cheek again before you turn back to your bag, laying your small collection of movies on the table. “Okay, we have some options.” 

Remus hums. “Well, there’s Halloween, the obvious choice.” 

“But too obvious?” you muse. “I mean, we definitely have time to watch more than one, but we only get to watch these at a certain time of year, love. Let’s not be hasty.” He chuckles, and your heart flutters. “I know The Exorcist is a classic, but it might be too scary for me, honestly. Um…Dracula is good…oh! This one’s my favorite.” 

Remus looks to where you’re pointing. “The Werewolf of Washington?”

You pretend you don’t hear the slightly hoarse quality of his voice. “Yup! It’s so funny, and I like that it’s technically a Halloween movie even though werewolves aren’t really scary.” 

He pauses. “You don’t think so?”

You do your best to appear blasé, knowing you have to tread carefully here. “No, of course not,” you say, as if the mere idea is foolish. “I mean, they’re dangerous, sure, but as people, they don’t really mean any harm. It’s not their fault.” 

Remus is being oddly quiet, and you babble on anxiously. 

“If I were a werewolf, I’d hope my friends wouldn’t care about me any less. It’s not like it’s me, it’s just something I have to deal with once a month. I mean, would you stop loving me if I turned out to be a werewolf?”

“No,” Remus says slowly, eyes narrowed to the point where they’re just amber. The circles under his eyes look really dark, you note with concern. You wonder if he hasn’t been sleeping. “Is there something you’re trying to tell me?” 

You take a breath, gnawing on your lip. “I think it’s more about if there’s anything you want to tell me.”

He slouches into the cushions, features slackening in resignation. “Seems like you already know.” 

“I’m sorry to do it this way,” you say genuinely, grateful that he hasn’t pulled his hand from your grip as you run your thumb over his knuckles soothingly. “I know it’s your secret, and you should get to tell anyone whenever you like, but I’ve known for awhile, and when James told me how down you’ve been this week—”

“What,” Remus says sharply, “did James say exactly.” 

“He only told me that you were sick. I asked if you might like a visitor, and he said he thought you’d rather be alone.” Remus sighs, tipping his head back against the couch. You can see the strain of the upcoming full moon on his face, his features pale and gaunt. 

“He didn’t have to tell me, honey,” you say quietly. “I guessed on my own. I know it’s a big deal, and I’m sure it’s been a massive burden for you." You run your thumb tenderly over the dark circles under his eyes. “I just wish you wouldn’t assume it’d be a burden to me, too. Give me some credit here, Lupin.” 

You feel his cheek twitch as he resists a smile, however small. 

“I don’t care, you know,” you go on, emboldened. “I just want to be there for you. It’s killed me not being there for you every month. I’m sorry, love, I couldn’t take it anymore.”

Remus opens his eyes, and your heart swells at the fondness in his gaze, even if it's mingled with wariness. 

“Would you watch some movies with me, please?” you ask enticingly. “Or we can nap, or just sit here. Whatever you want to do.” 

“You sure you want to stick around?” he asks, and you know he’s talking about more than just tonight. “This time of the month is not pleasant. I’m not pleasant.” 

You let your hand slide from his face down to his shoulder, rubbing delicately. “I don’t need you to be pleasant,” you tell him. “I just need you to let me be here.” 

Remus sighs. “Alright, but we’re watching Halloween. That werewolf movie is shit.”

[juniperhillpatient]

I have talked about this a lot before but it’s on my mind & also it’s something that really should be discussed more in Buffy fandom -

People are constantly talking about how Spike defies all the rules Buffy was taught about demons & vampires & rightfully so. A vampire falling in love with a slayer & fighting for his soul for her is such a romantic notion & I do love it but the nuance of Spike’s arc is even more interesting than that! He does love Buffy but not only that he befriends the Scoobies too. He brings flowers for Joyce after she dies. He helps prove that Tara is not a demon when her family tries to gaslight her & isolate her. He becomes a pseudo big brother to Dawn.

And yet none of that is even what I���m here to talk about! Spike IS a hero & he does have a long spanning redemption arc before the soul (& we’re NOT here to talk about Seeing Red right now, as usual that topic is too expansive & requires its own post) that should be acknowledged & his character is rightfully praised but he is NOT the only exception to vampires having nuance & it drives me crazy that we act like he is. The Judge isn’t just talking to Spike when he says this:

“You TWO.” He’s talking about Drusilla too! He says that they share affection & jealousy. That Angelus in his total sociopathic lack of human emotion is the odd one here.

Then you have things like this -

Conversations with Dead People has Buffy sharing a very long & deep conversation with an old acquaintance turned vampire. And it’s far from the only example in universe of a vampire retaining some sense of camaraderie with people from their life!

That’s right this entire rant has been a lead up to talk about my best girly Harmony Kendall. You’ve fallen for my ruse if you’ve read this far muahaha! Admittedly Harmony’s strongest moments are mostly unfortunately on Angel but even in season four of Buffy when she dates Spike she is clearly intended at times to be sympathetic. Season 4 is also interesting because we see a lot interactions between various gangs of vampires like Harmony’s so-called minions & even Sundays gang where they’re very much evil but also sharing in living (existing?) space & acting like bickering roommates or siblings. Like creatures with bonds & personalities & intricacies.

The point I’m trying to make is that the show never truly wants to grapple with the existence of Spike in all his nuance but it’s also not just about him! In general there is so much to grapple with in the idea that vampires can change & be redeemed & I’m not saying I’m anti scary evil vampires I’m just saying the universe gave us these hints of nuance & then the characters never grappled with it & that’s lame. For Buffy killing things that have a shot at redemption however small would be a major emotional blow if she ever addressed it! Especially in her season 5 “am I just a killer 🥺” arc. Let’s deal with the implications!

Let’s deal with Xander’s trauma about killing Jessie & just how much it would/should hurt for him to see Spike increasingly choose good & work with the Scoobies. I would LOVE to know Xander’s reaction to Harmony’s arc on Angel or Cordelia befriending her & letting her go ina world where the writing acknowledges that he drove a stake through his best friends heart!

It’s just that the writers accidentally complicated their own lore & then totally refused to ever let their characters address what the cracks in the stories they tell themselves mean. Giles says that a vampire is no longer the person but instead the thing that killed them. What’s scarier: the idea that your loved one was killed & something wears their face like a mask OR much more insane (to me) the idea that your loved one came back very wrong but it’s still them? Your brother eats people now but he still remembers how you like your eggs & can quote every episode of the cartoon you watched as kids. Your mom murdered that woman from the PTA who always talked too much in cold blood but she still remembers the recipe for your favorite pancakes. The show wanted scary vampires but it got so caught up in never addressing the infinitely more complex & scarier vampires it accidentally created & sticking to the more simplistic initial idea that it did both the characters & lore very dirty. And I’ll never shut up about it!!!

[magnificentstrawberryomen]

haunted hause (nicholas ruffilo one shot)

bc its almost halloween and ruffilo popped up in my mind and dear lord.

.......

giggles and sounds of amused laughter echoes against the empty walls of the giant house me and nicholas have found last week. as soon as we saw it when we went on an evening walk, we both knew we had to take a look inside. it's huge, practically an old left mansion, covered in green and cracks—basically the perfect house for some snooping around in the dark of the cold night.

'i'm so glad we found this,' i giggle to nicholas, as we begin to run through the hallways of the house, the wallpapers of it worn and full of dust and spider webs stuck between it and on old thick glue.

he smiles broadly behind me, his dark eyes holding a spark of joy in them, and i love to see him this way—fun and loose, the amusement also clear in the way he looks at me. some mischief as well, and i just know he is plotting something in his mind, probably something to scare me or something.

'oh, i know you,' i say as i start pointing at him, and i slowly start to walk backwards after i turn around, slightly out of breath from the running. 'you're plotting something, aren't you? some cliché scaring or some shit.'

nick chuckles amusingly at me, the same glint in his eyes as he keeps on walking towards me, his hands in the pockets of his jeans, and the corner of his mouth curled up. a wash of curiosity but also something else starts to flow through me and i slightly swallow, as i keep on walking backwards. then, without notice, i bump with my back against a wall, making me let out a surprised sound.

'shit,' i mumble, a sheepish smile on my face, as nick then stops with slowly pacing towards me, just a few steps away from me. he just looks at me with that same look for a moment, but something else is in his eyes now too as they take me in, and the suspense is suddenly killing me. he can be quiet often, but this silence is driving me nervous and anticipated.

'why are you looking at me like that?' i then say with a short chuckle, trying to sound calm, but his stare is already burning right through me, heating me up in all kinds of places. the right places.

'was just taking you in for a moment,' he casually says, still standing there with his hands in his pockets, the curl of his lip going even more up. then, he begins to slowly close the space between us, as he places his hands on my hips.

'y'know,' he starts, his face close to mine, his breath fanning against my neck, making me swallow nervously once again. 'we haven't had much private time for a while.'

that makes me slowly crack a smile as well. 'and here we are, in some dark, scary ass, probably haunted house.'

nick's smile turns broader as soon as i say that. 'exactly.'

'how romantic,' i tease, and he lets out a soft snort. his thumbs then begin to rub my hips, and my heartbeats starts to quicken even more.

'are you complaining though?' he says with his soft voice, a hint of teasing in it as well, and i slightly chuckle, shaking my head, and i wrap my arms around his neck, playing with his soft long locks.

'no, i'm not. how perfect for halloween, right?' i smirk, and he gniffles, his face coming closer, his forehead resting against mine, feeling the soft fabric of his black hoodie against it.

'mhm, really perfect,' he agrees, as his head then moves to the side so his lips can press against my ear, 'even more because i can hear your pretty sounds echoing all around me in here. only for me.'

heat spreads to my cheeks almost immediately when he says that, and fuel runs through every inch of my body now, getting lit up as soon as he presses his lips against mine. the fire burns roughly between us as i eagerly return his kiss, grabbing his hair more firmly now, making him softly whine.

'i can't believe i let you fuck me in a haunted house—what will the ghosts around us think?' i jokingly say, panting a bit as our lips part for a moment, and he deeply chuckles against it as he smiles, making pretty wrinkles form around his eyes.

'i guess they can watch then, darling. no way i'm letting this chance go of finally having you alone with me,' nick responds, then grabbing my thighs so i can jump into his arms, and he presses me firmly against the wall. i wrap my legs around his waist and my hands find his hair again as he pulls me in another hungry kiss, pulling his lip between my teeth at some point, making him groan.

'y/n, i promise you this will be anything but a nightmare,' nick then confidently grins at me, his eyes glinting with dark mischief, 'in fact, it will be something you want to be dreaming about for a long, long time.'

[little-pondhead]

Some fic because I love your au, Fenton is gender brainrot, and little baby dan cracks me up. Full disclosure, my only familiarity with DC is DP crossover fanfic, and a Batman movie I fell asleep during. (If I had a better grasp on the characters I would totally write more :(( i love interactions) also sorry for the weird spacing. Idk why tumblr did that

~~~~~~~~

There was an empty cardboard box on the table of the Justice League’s main conference room. Taped on the top flap, next to a doodle of Fenton’s logo, was a jump drive.

Heaving a sigh, Batman plugged it in and pulled up his screen on the projector. The drive, which was named “little baby dan’s evil playtime”, contained two files; WATCH_ME_FIRST.mp4 and its-a-secreeeet.pdf. He clicked on the video file, and immediately the projector filled with a blurry close-up of Fenton’s goggles.

After a moment of fiddling with the camera, Fenton stepped back, giving a cheery wave. His lab coat and goggles were a pastel pink, which was new. “Heeeeya, Bats! Whoever else is there! If you’re watching this, you probably weren’t there when I dropped the box off, aaand it’s probably empty.”

He clapped his hands together gleefully. “And Connie, if you’re there, this is payback for cussing around my daughter.” Batman was instantly relieved that Constantine wasn’t on base. Hopefully the situation wouldn’t require Constantine’s expertise. (Or any of the Justice League Dark. Fenton seemed determined to drive them all to an early grave with his casual refusal to acknowledge the supernatural air around him.)

“Now, as you’re all heroes, I’m sure you’re all familiar with the whole,” Fenton paused for a moment, as if searching for the proper words. “���You ate a burger on a Tuesday or something equally inane, and it kickstarted a series of events that led to you going insane and evil and murdering 95% of the Earth’s population and now you must fight your evil alternate self, because your time-controlling cryptid Peepaw said so,” shtick, so I’ll skip the backstory. Say hi to Dan!” Fenton grabbed the camera, and Batman quickly jotted down several notes about the concerning number of things the boy had just said.

The camera swiveled around to show Nightingale, holding a strange beast in a manner that reminded Batman of an “elongated cat meme” Nightwing had shown him when he was still a Robin. The creature bared a maw full of razor sharp fangs at the camera. Nightingale adjusted her grip to hold the creature’s paw and make it wave, which evoked a deep growl.

“Haha, he’d kill me if I did that. Dan likes Nightingale much more than he likes me.”

“Because the worst she has ever done is attempt to shoot me.”

The camera had moved, so Batman couldn’t visually confirm that the deep voice had come from the creature, but the voice didn’t match any of Fenton’s previously revealed companions. “Yeah yeah, her aim sucked back then.” Fenton gave the camera a toothy grin that was only slightly less unnerving than the creature’s. “Dan’s not technically me, he’s much more like Dani, actually, but the world would probably end again if we left him with his other... What did you call him?” Fenton glanced offscreen.

“Bane of my accursed existence.”

Fenton chucked. “The other half responsible for his existence.” Batman added more notes to his file. “So, yeah, Clocky left him with us for a bit to help along his rehab. But a certain psychologist-in-training I know says that repressing rage isn’t healthy, and even without a lot of his powers, he can wipe out most of a city in- what, an hour? We tested it. It was around an hour.”

Everyone present shared a look of deep concern. As if able to see their reaction, Fenton quickly held up his hands in surrender. “Don’t worry! Clocky reset it. Approximately zero people have died from Dan in this timeline.”

“Yet.” Came a furious rumble from off-screen.

“Yes, you’re very scary.” They heard Nightingale coo.

Fenton laughed. “Yeah, we need him- and all of you, -out of our hair for a bit while we concoct more evil plans, and you’re all the least likely to die to him, so you get to babysit! Thanks!”

He reached to shut off the camera before pausing and turning away. “Foley! Which of the furries is the one who really likes animals?”

“Man, do you realize how that sounds out of context?” Foley laughed. “I think Tim said it’s the little one. Damian?”

Fenton nodded and turned back to the camera. “Don’t let Damian try to adopt Dan. Or anyone. Dan will bite their hands off. I mean it!” To emphasize his point, he removed one of his hands.

Batman sighed and added “ability to remove limbs” to a list of Fenton’s powers.

“I’ll include a list of “tasks”” Fenton’s disembodied hand made finger quotes, “we gave Dan to keep him occupied. There’s some at the bottom for you guys. They’re mostly just blatant abuse of his powers for the sake of fun and science. I’d appreciate it if you’d let him mark things off the list and add notes on how it goes. Or you can do it. Or I can steal your cameras. Your choice.”

He thought for a second. “I think you’re supposed to leave, like, pizza money or something, but I don’t think you can get pizza delivered to space. Anyway, thanks for letting me blab your ears off while Dan’s probably committing war crimes for twelve minutes. For your sake, I hope he inherited my interest in space. Good luck! Thanks for babysitting!”

Waving with his still detached hand, Fenton ended the video. Batman closed it and opened the PDF as the few other members present murmured amongst themselves. Most of the pages were filled with a curling script Batman didn’t recognize. The fourth page had a huge, bolded header, reading JP TASKS.

The door opened and shut in half a second as the Flash burst in. “Superman!” The speedster wailed. “I can’t get this thing off of me!”

The Flash waved his arm around, sending small droplets of blood flying as he tried to dislodge the creature sinking his teeth into the speedster’s arm. Batman raised an eyebrow beneath his cowl as Superman quickly lent his super strength in attempt to pry the creature’s jaw open. Dan didn’t budge.

Well, he could certainly see the family resemblance been Fenton, Dani, and Dan. Shaking his head, he turned back to the list.

Task 1: Find Dan. He’s probably attacking someone.

He highlighted the text and crossed it out. This was going to be a long shift.

[Anon, this is me crying over the wonderful gift you have given me. You bastard.]

---

"Do you think Fenton's regeneration powers extend to his..." Green Lantern frowned, trying to remember the word the kid had used but coming up blank. "I dunno. But do you think if we cut off little Dan here, he'll heal back up with no problem?" He gestured helplessly to the scene in front of him. Flash was still screeching about the beast on his arm, and now Superman and Wonder Woman were trying to pry him off. Batman was standing to the side, silently bemoaning the lack of quiet. He just wanted one peaceful shift. Just one. Please.

"I'd like to see you try, hero. And I'm not little." Dan spoke, startling all of them. His grip on Flash's arm tightened, making the speedster squeal before releasing the man and spitting out a mouthful of his blood. Batman noticed that his mouth didn't move despite the clearly spoken words. In fact, when Dan closed his mouth, it was like he didn't have one at all.

"So you do speak!" Superman marveled.

"Of course I do. I am not unintelligent, unlike you lot."

Despite his pain, Flash still made sounds of protest that everyone promptly ignored.

Superman flushed. "I just wasn't sure. It was hard to tell in the video."

"Ah, yes. The video that the Fenton menace sent you. Was there a note for me in the flash drive?"

"Uh, no." In one of his less finer moments, Green Lantern stuttered over his words and moved in front of Batman, obviously lying. Dan merely growled and flew through both men, heading straight for the giant monitor. Batman barely suppressed a shiver. Density shifting? Might as well add it to the list. He could see Martian Manhunter, who was in the back of the room, tilt his head at the display.

Dan ignored the room as he used his entire body to manipulate the computer mouse and scrolled back up to the top of the page. Staring intently at the scribbles no one could make out, the heroes could do nothing but shoot each other nervous and confused glances. More than a few of them jumped when Dan chuckled deeply. Honestly, his tiny body was at complete odds with his baritone voice.

"Maybe rehab will be fun if he's letting me do this." Dan sneered, flashing their reflections a sharp fang. No one wanted to ask what exactly he was in rehab for. The little beast turned his gaze to Batman. "You are the one called Batman, who rules the cursed city, correct?" The dark hero nodded, not trusting himself to say anything. "Excellent. You will be my chaperone for now, just as Fenton decreed it. Good luck, mortal man. Pray, I do not destroy your home a second time."

Without any time to unpack that conversation, Dan promptly disappeared from view. Some blinking text caught his attention, and Batman scrolled back down to the English text, glancing at the next few items on the list.

Task 2: Do not let Dan read his portion of this letter until you have a way to track him. There is no containing him.

Task 3: Keep him with a chaperone at all times. (If you can)

Task 4: Do not let Dan back into Gotham unless you're fine with a sudden decrease in the clown population.

Task 5: Take him for a walk in Death Valley. He likes hunting lizards.

Task 6: Make sure he goes down for his 2pm nap every day.

Task 7: He'll ask for it, but do not give him any burgers for mealtime. It upsets his stomach.

Task 8: Dan gets ONE(1) sweet after dinner before brushing his teeth. Those green pop rocks Batman always carries will do fine; he likes those. :)

A sudden alarm blared from his wristwatch, making Batman tear his eyes away from the screen, indicating an emergency at Arkham. This time, Batman actually sighed out loud. There was more to the list, but right now, he really needed to find their new charge before he killed the Joker, from the sound of it.

[l3xdrigo]

Under the Oak tree

The wilderness of the suitcase is an expanding space of forests, lakes and rivers, no one knows how it formed but we know that it's been there since the beginning. In a specific place of the wilderness, there is a large oak tree, its branches swaying in the wind, taking a closer look, there are things placed under the tree. It looks like a small makeshift of graves, rocks used as the tombstone,twigs tied together in the form of a small cross, flowers sprouted from these graves, slowly swaying in the breeze. All graves were slightly different, be it having different colored flowers or having tiny trinkets that have seen better days. Two trinkets standout from the others, one is a giant ring, placed on the cross slightly slanted, the other was a pair of glasses, that have small cracks placed on the rock. It was a somber and peaceful sight, it was clear that whoever placed this had made this as a memory for them and a way to grieve the loss. The grave of a boy who had an adventurous spirit, who grew curious of the outside. The grave of a girl who was shy and timid but had the soul of purity and was courageous till the very end. The graves of children who sought freedom of the outside but in truth were just lambs to the slaughter, being used as a sacrifice for a plan of manipulation and repentance to one of their kind who stands alone in the rain. Isn't it scary to die at such an age, the unexpected feeling of death as you felt raindrops on your skin for the first time, it's not all bad, at least you now have now met peace and freedom. For the lone sheep who's still standing, the chains have broken, but the shackles are still heavy. The door is open yet freedom is still so far.

(Or I personally headcanon that in the wilderness, Vertin has made makeshift gravestones for her fallen classmates when she first became the timekeeper, to keep their memory and as also a way to grieve the loss and guilt that she still faces till this day)

[pjohoo-reclists]

Percy Jackson & Grover Underwood Fic Recs

Part 2. A list of fics featuring Percy and Grover's platonic friendship. Requested by @evadne01 Enjoy!!

embarrassing middle school stories by orphan_account

G | 400 words | Complete

Percy Jackson/Annabeth Chase, Percy Jackson & Grover Underwood

Good friend Grover Underwood, Friendship, Bromance

Leo wants Grover to tell embarrassing middle school stories about Percy.

An Easy Target by newwwwusername

G | 600 words | Complete

Percy Jackson & Grover Underwood

Grover Underwood is a Good Friend, Rejection Sensitivity Dysphoria, Book 3: The Titan's Curse

Percy is hurt after what Thalia said to him in the car. Grover helps.

Endemism by mouserat

G | 900 words | Complete

Percy Jackson & Grover Underwood

Pre-The Heroes of Olympus

Grover Underwood has absolutely no idea why Percy Jackson is his best friend.

Grover and His Grievance by Spacing-Outtt (Lunarifie)

G | 1.0k | Complete

Percy Jackson & Grover Underwood,

Best Friends, Percy finally acknowledges Grover's efforts, Family Loss

Percy tries to console his friend after he just faced a familial loss. An understanding is shared between the two of them.

let's see you try, punk by maverickk

T | 1.2k | Complete

Percy Jackson & Grover Underwood

Percy Jackson is a Good Friend, Scary Percy Jackson, New Rome

New Rome University gets its first encounter with Percy Jackson's visceral hate of bullies. If the students know what's good for them, this will also be its last encounter. Grover just wants to get to lunch now, please.

Don't get too close. by StormRoad

G | 1.8k | Complete

Percy Jackson & Grover Underwood

First Meetings, Friendship, Pre-the Lightning Thief

Grover knew he needed to stay away from the half-blood this time. After Thalia, he knew he couldn't get too close to the half-blood as that made it too dangerous. He needed to stay away, be impartial and guide the kid to camp as neutrally as he could, lest he forgets the reason he was doing this in the first place. Though, why was this black-haired boy who reeked of human-like nothing else defending him?

The Last Olympian: Contemplating Friendships and Prophecies by dhpanya10

G | 2.1k | Complete

Percy Jackson & Nico di Angelo, Percy Jackson & Grover Underwood

Missing Scene, Empathy Link, Percy is amazing and loved

The scene where Percy and Grover reunite in front of Orpheus' Entrance to the Underworld + a missing scene thrown in from the perspective of Nico di Angelo.

crack baby (you don't know what you want) by rainymarcel

Not Rated | 3.9k | Complete

Percy Jackson & Grover Underwood

Abusive Gabe Ugliano, Good Parent Sally Jackson, Percy Jackson Needs a Hug

From the very beginning, Grover knew. Maybe it was the way he carried himself, always curled in, eyes wandering and mistrusting, as if anticipating an attack. It could have been the way he spoke quickly and quietly, as if him speaking was a crime. But whatever it was, Grover knew from the very beginning that Percy was his best friend. Or: Grover and Percy have a rough start

stay down by bipercabeth

T | 5.1k | Complete

Percy Jackson & Grover Underwood

Suicidal Thoughts, Hurt/Comfort, Angst with a Happy Ending

An AU in which Grover is on the Argo II as protector instead of Hedge, because I say so. He and Percy get to have an actual conversation about the effects of Tartarus + that godawful conversation with Jason.

bring the forgotten dawn by poisedwalrus

G | 22k | Complete

Percy Jackson & Annabeth Chase, Percy Jackson & Grover Underwood, Nico di Angelo & Percy Jackson

Time travel fix it, Percy is a bad child therapist, Annabeth is ready to kill a god, Grover is a little scared

“What is it?” Grover asks, “What’s with that weird look on your face?” “Just trying to figure out if turning me in will get us enough bounty money to buy our way to LA.” Percy says, craning his neck towards the news van. “We are not turning you in to the police.” Grover presses his head back into the alleyway. “Why not?” Percy says. They could use a bit of cash. “You guys can just break me out afterwards, right?” Annabeth looks like she’s considering it. “No, guys,” Grover says. “No.” If Percy has to spend the rest of his life cleaning up after the gods, then he might as well start from the beginning.

Will of Our Own by Sand_wolf579

G | 50k | Complete

Percy Jackson & Luke Castellan, Percy Jackson & Grover Underwood

Good Luke Castellan, Developing Friendships, Child Neglect

Percy understood why the master bolt needed to be retrieved, but if he was going to do it he was going to do it on his own terms. Percy was tired of everybody taking advantage of and using him, so when Annabeth volunteered to go with him on his quest just so she could prove herself, Percy said no.

[thesofthuman]

Hi Emery. I’m 28 and I had to move in with my mom. I’m coming to terms with it, and the fact I’m in a terrible town that I hate. I also had to stop my pursued career because it was too physically demanding. So now I’m in this space of a massive change (I think). I’m afraid but also not Afraid of my fear. I’m more afraid of not knowing what I want. I know what I want in life, I just don’t know what I want to study to pursue it. It feels like a very long journey ahead

oh but honestly i love this for you because it is such a time of cracking open, diving within, exploring what is true to you that you may not know yet. while it is scary and uncomfortable it is also so open. i think these phases of our lives need us to be present with them. not to avoid them or push them away or pretend everything is perfect. lean in and hear what it has to say, because i think it has a lot to say. distilling down to the essence to grow in a new way. you have time, you have the gift of space in your life, you have the opportunity to potentially see things you hate in a different light and learn something from it. try to embrace beginner's mind, or shoshin. its a zen buddhist term that essentially means having an open mind and allowing yourself to see things in a new light, to step away from the habit of assigning our personal meanings to everything as if we know exactly how it is. i have been going through a similar dark night of the soul process this past year and while it has been challenging and uncomfortable and makes me question myself a lot, i have leaned in and really paid attention and tried to embrace this distilling of my life to know what it is that is important to me, or to explore a new way of living. all this to say: the journey may feel long right now but eventually there will be bits of awareness and light and softness and goodness that you weren't expecting -- all hints to something within, all hints to a way of living your life that will make sense to you.

a quote that comes to mind from this question is my rainer maria rilke: “Be patient toward all that is unsolved in your heart and try to love the questions themselves, like locked rooms and like books that are now written in a very foreign tongue. Do not now seek the answers, which cannot be given you because you would not be able to live them. And the point is, to live everything. Live the questions now. Perhaps you will then gradually, without noticing it, live along some distant day into the answer.”

[thankyouforthev3n0m]

Aye, it's DubDaddy on the track

Not a rapper, but I thought I'd have a crack

Another song, another bar, another stack

We keep coming back now we're picking up the slack

Get laid, get paid, gatorade

Trigger treats sweet but can't beat the blade

It's Halloween bitch it's time to get made

You better lock up or you're gonna get slayed

Aye the boys are comin in

Got lit last night on the cherry gin

Smokin gas, eating ass, now committing sin

We going large like Amy Schumer's second chin

Hey everybody my name is JoshDub

When I don't do crime I talk shit at the club

I like corona no lime and having a tug

I get my bread no crust cause you know I'm a thug

It's Halloween, my girl cook and clean

Doing flips in the sheets, call that trick and treat

In the back of a Bentley and we got on rings

Riding in the streets shouting scary things

The Boys in town and we hunting clowns

Couple Kings with a couple crowns (dank memes)

Scaring kids while we're blowing clouds

It's Mully in the back and your bitch is getting ploughed

It's spooky and cold on this dreadful night

But we got some beauties in our sight

We love the shadows, and fear the light

But we'll steal your girl with one quick bite

On Halloween you can hear many sounds

Some screaming, some crying in the background

But if I see some kind of creepy clown

Oh you better believe it's going down

All the witches they be on me, with glee

When I walk up in a room its a party

Got no reflection but there's one thing you can see

All competition running scared as they should be

Never giving out our secrets I'm like (hush hush)

Wiping away all the haters like a (brush brush)

We be stealing all your candy in a (rush rush)

Dropping songs and videos that always (crush crush)

Got these demons in my head overwhelming me with fear and dread

(Dread dread dread)

Screaming in my bed, keep me grinding till I'm dead

(Dead dead dead)

Spirits in my mind come to visit me from time to time

(Time time time)

People say I'm sick but I swear to God I'm fine

(I'm fine, I'm fine)

Trick or Treat, excuse me what the fuck is this?

Candy corn, Bit O Honey, one Hershey Kiss

Que no sabes que me dicen el Mexorcist

If you don't know who I am, then I'll tell you what it is

Got a blanket to protect me and a wooden cross

I sprinkle holy water to show demons who's boss

I make videos to scare all the kiddos

And I'll exorcise your Tia with a bag of hot Cheetos

I shook Freddy Kruger's hand

Grow harder than the grudge

Make Pennywise float too

And give Huggy Wuggy a hug

I got good at hide and seek

You can always ask the fed

I put poison in your goat

Now that chupacabras dead

I live in the States, born in Monterey

Got a gringa by my side

She can cook some frijoles

I cross the border and la migra said

'hey, come on down but you just can't stay'

Running and hiding and walking and fighting

You don't got the papers to even be trying

To say it was easy then I would be lying

Soy un inmigrante con gran corazón

empeze recojiendo la bazura de tu escalon

Y ahora ocupo la pantallo de tu abitación

Asta parece yo tomo gasolina.

Te incendió con mi rap eso es pura adrenalina

Mi tierra la extraño nunca olvidare mi casa

Un saludo para todos mis latinos y mi raza

Now give me the Reeses cup bitch

Yada yada yada yada, something bout a square

New meme Juice Box bout to go Blair

Like the Witch, that's the sitch

Halloween night bout to wake up in a ditch.

And I'm stacking up dinero

Got this young man feeling like George Romero

Pick the bone clean always saw it in the tarots

Dig a little deeper boy you almost skipped the marrow

I don't really know

I don't really know

Yada yada

Yada yada

My goldfish took a little holiday

Left me feeling sour like that Minute Maid

One day he said he want to go to outer space

So I made a little rocket outta Gatorade bottles

Catch your grandma at the Walmart

And she gonna catch the fade

I don't really give a fuck

Im just tryna get paid

I'll smoke your grandad too

If he even looks my way

I'll kick your little sister

In her motherfucking face

That's that shit you learn in Florida

When you smoking K2

Hold that shit up in my chest

Boy I'm bout to turn blue

Im might mosey down to Target

Man and buy me that canoe

@jadest0ne

[frankendykes-monster]

Countdown to Halloween 2023, Ranked

43. Swamp Thing (1982)

42. Curse of Bigfoot (1975)

41. The Haunting (1999)

40. Orca (1977)

39. Teenagers Battle The Thing (1958)

38. The Beast (1975)

37. Don't Go in The House (1979)

36. Countess Dracula (1971)

35. Hillbillys in a Haunted House (1967)

34. Beware! The Blob (1972)

33. Alien Space Avenger (1989)

32. Baby Blood (1990)

31. Shriek of The Mutilated (1974)

30. The Mutations (1974)

29. Phase IV (1974)

28. Curse of The Faceless Man (1958)

27. The Sadist (1963)

26. Jennifer (1978)

25. The Wasp Woman (1959)

24. Noroi: The Curse (2005)

23. Girls Nite Out (1982)

22. The Monster of Piedras Blancas (1959)

21. The Cat and The Canary (1927)

20. Tell Your Children (Reefer Madness, 1936)

19. The Company of Wolves (1984)

18. It's Alive (1974)

17. The Wolf House (2018)

16. Michael Jackson's Halloween (2017)

15. The Girl Who Knew Too Much (1963)

14. The Omega Man (1971)

13. Gamera: Rebirth (2023)

12. Student Bodies (1981)

11. Night Caller From Outer Space (1965)

10. Inhumanoids (episodes 1 - 5, 1986)

9. Blind Woman's Curse (1970)

8. Maniac (1980)

7. The Child (1977)

6. Zombie 3 (1988)

5. Return of The Living Dead (1985)

4. Spider Baby (1967)

3. Basket Case (1982)

2. Messiah of Evil (1973)

Godzilla (1954)

Woof. Okay. This has been a mostly disappointing viewing experience.

Critical difference between this year's countdown and the past two is that now that I have stable employment, there is far less time to be watching horror films. I normally begin the countdown in September but we started in July of this year and still barely managed to crack 40, with my original goal being a full 100 this year. Timing. As such a lot of my plans and possible viewings were cut short and compared to last year specifically we fell back on a lot of "seen it already" at least for the top of the list.

This year's batch of viewings were largely blah, but a step up from the shitshow I put myself through last year (watching nearly every Texas Chainsaw sequel does things to a person). As such it'll be difficult to conjure up words for a decent chunk of these mostly because yes, these movies exist, I watched them, I would not recommend that you yourself watch them. That is all. If I write briefly on a given film that's not necessarily an indictment of its quality as there a decent number of these that I saw and enjoyed it's just their impact might be a bit fleeting. You will know which ones I actively disliked. I mostly just want to write about the top five or so but I will play fair.

Our grand loser this year is Swamp Thing, the DC Comics adaptation by Wes Craven. I watched this pretty much entirely because I finally got the Alan Moore Swamp Thing run in paperback this year after quite some time of having it on my to-buy list. Longtime Rachael/Ray/Ratchet fans may recall me reading it in early 2019 alongside [REDACTED]. Still one of the best Moore comics, and a second volume of Swamp Thing wouldn't have been possible without the success of this film. For context I did read the early Swampies by Len Wein and Bernie Wrightson and my general reaction to those was a'ight but there was definitely material for a serviceable film adaptation there. This is not that serviceable film adaptation. I'm not hung up on details like how Abigail has no connection to Arcane now despite being his niece in the comics, but this film is just kind of painful in how relatively unambitious it is which is saying something for Swamp Thing sword fighting another human mutation at the end of this. It's just silly and stupid and not scary or awe inspiring or anything, the Swamp Thing suit sucks, the action sucks, any sense of pathos is not there or gone, it stretches for 30 minutes too long like it's a padded TV pilot, the only highlight is being able to see Adrienne Barbeau's breasts. Fuck this it's a miserable experience to sit through. My mistake for watching a Wes Craven film that doesn't have "Scream" in the title.

Our next shitter is the two-for-one abomination that is Teenagers Battle The Thing (1958) and Curse of Bigfoot (1975); these are the same movie except Curse of Bigfoot has a 25 minute opening scene framing device that is bizarre given that "The Thing" of the original film is a Native American mummy of some sort unearthed by a group of white high school students. It's the rare personal pet project movie made for fun by some locals but the only highlights are the occasional kill scene, Curse of Bigfoot ranks lower just for making me sit through it longer. Blah.

Speedrunning through a bunch of these because theyre all varying degrees of bad and I don't want to spend any longer writing about these than you probably do reading about them: The Haunting is awful and I don't even super care for the original film so adding shitty CGI monsters and a moral lesson of "it's about family!" doesn't help. Orca is a shitty Jaws cash-in that's like a reverse Moby Dick where the sea animal hunts down the human, nice finale where the orca and shitty poacher guy are fighting it out in the Arctic but otherwise avoid. Don't Go in The House is a mysoginistic torture porn movie that really doesn't sell the "seemingly normal guy is a closet nutcase" thing even though movies made before and after have done it well (see Maniac several paragraphs below). The Beast is advertised as this really scandalous porno film but most of it is French aristocrats sitting around in stuffy rooms arguing about real estate. I think I only watched Countess Dracula for its inclusion in the "if this is her vibe I would fucking cum" meme and it's barely worth bringing up at all. Hillbillys in a Haunted House has an absolutely lovely Tennessee country soundtrack that I wish I could listen to without having to watch the actual movie which is devoid of both scares and laughs. Beware! The Blob gives off the feeling of sitting at a funeral for a family member that was just distant enough for you to be aware of them but not actually be upset but it's still a funeral so it's not like you're smiling, stick with the 1988 Blob film. Alien Space Avenger has some decent gore effects but that's all I can recall from it. Shriek of The Mutilated has one of the best titles for an otherwise uninspired yeti movie that has a needless third act twist about it being a cover for a cult and blah blah blah fuck you. Baby Blood has an alien mutant whatever crawl up a woman's vagina into her womb and she has to eat people to feed it and yeah I'm actually struggling to remember what happens here. The Mutations has a scene where a guy cuts into a tree and it bleeds, I think he's played by Donald Pleasance. Yeah, it's like Freaks except it plays to the freak show straight so you get to laugh at all the outcasts of society, no thank you.

Some odds and ends that I'd say are decent-to-pretty-good: Phase IV has some footage of ants and synth music. All you need is some footage of ants and synth music. Curse of The Faceless Man employs a rarely seen archetype of the living statue monster, it's cute. The Sadist is another starring vehicle for Arch Hall Jr., who was also the star of last Halloween's Eegah! (1962), though this film is a bold trendsetter for the 1960's with Hall being a unhinged killer holding people for ransom until they can fix his car and he can make a getaway. The film lives and dies by Hall's performance and it's mostly the latter until we get to an absolutely superb final act with him hunting down his remaining victims, it makes the whole film worth seeing. Jennifer is an oddball that plays out mostly like a character drama ("It wasn't my fault Daddy it was that stupid hillbilly bitch Jennifer") that suddenly remembers that it's supposed to be a cash-in of Carrie (1976) in the last 20 minutes and cue our titular character being able to summon and control snakes to send after her tormentors. Girls Nite Out is a plodding meandering slasher that's oddly hypnotizing considering so much of it takes place in pitch-black night and the killer is wearing a bear mascot costume with serrated knives hidden under the glove, not sure what fully to make of it. The Monster of Piedras Blancas is made up of leftover parts from the Gillman, Mole People, and Metaluna Mutant, but still manages to star in a decent enough film that gives a sense of what a series of monster attacks would do to a small seaside community. The Cat and The Canary is "cute" for lack of a better term being a horror comedy before the former genre had fully crystalized. Reefer Madness is horror adjacent more than anything but a hilariously good time about how the use of "marihuana" will drive today's youth into becoming crazed fiends and get involved in organized crime.

We can do this.

The Company of Wolves has an excellent story book like setting an atmosphere that you can't get in films nowadays and it's a shame that it's mostly remembered for its transformation sequences. it's Alive is the best Larry Cohen film by default of not sucking but it's still not "great", genius however for playing the concept of mutant newborn killer baby completely seriously without any sense of humor to the proceedings. The Girl Who Knew Too Much is almost a parody of giallo films which is interesting given those hadn't fully sprang up in 1963; absolute highlight is the main character being interviewed in bed by doctors and reporters and the like that yes she did see a murder and no she doesn't drink. I've always been fascinated and haunted by I Am Legend and while The Omega Man doesn't really capture the novel to a superb degree it's so beautifully shot that it lands high in the rankings for that alone. Night Caller From Outer Space is hilarious to me because of how it shifts halfway through from a Hammer-esque mystery about a meteorite with radioactive properties to a film about an alien that lures women in through a modeling advertisement. Blind Woman's Curse I've mentally confused with Irezumi for a while now (haha all 1960's Japanese genre films where woman have large animal tattoos on their backs are the saaame), and it's one I mostly watched for being directed by Teruo Ishii, but there's enough bloody yakuza fights and cats licking up blood for me to stick around; not the strongest Meiko Kaiji vehicle compared to Female Prisoner Scorpion or Lady Snowblood. Maniac I find mostly interesting as a precursor to American Psycho (2000) but also it's probably the only serious film to successfully pull off it's ending trope (which I will not spoil here). The Child is an absolutely lovely 1970's only-a-dozen-people-made-this-and-not-much-more-watched-it horror that oozes atmosphere, I could watch stuff like this all day. Aaand Zombie 3 is far and away the best film that Lucio Fulci has been involved with that I've ever seen. I love random scenes and set pieces of ghouls just massacring people that are shit out out of luck.

Okay, now for the ones I actually want to write about.

The Wasp Woman is one that sticks in my head way more than any other random monster movie that Roger Corman directed in the latw 1950's. I've said on here and Letterboxd that it could have served as a standard pop-feminist piece about how the cosmetology industry is built on misogyny and invariably a monster is accidentally created because of that, but this most recent viewing has made me sort of "get it" because that might be what the film is going for considering Susan Cabot's performance leads me to believe that she is aware that she is becoming a homicidal wasp monster but views it as a tragic means to an end where she still has the ability to have a new advertising campaign with her as the star. Tragic. This is why you don't wear make up.

Both Noroi: The Curse and The Wolf House are ones I didn't care for whatsoever but I put them in places on the ranking that I thought were fair given that people should probably watch them regardless of my personal thoughts. Noroi's format didn't really lend itself to the escalation of tension and reveal of information that the plot demanded and I found myself thinking it meanders quite a bit. The Wolf House was an odd one where everything that was happening onscreen bounced off of me mostly because I felt intimately aware that I was watching a movie, that someone had made something and that I was now being shown it. Blah. People like these so don't let me stop you.

Our animated offerings this year...

Michael Jackson's Halloween more than anything feels like an unlicensed creation that later had an English fan dub commissioned, not something that actually aired on CBS twice. Any laughs that I found in this thing were the unintentional type as we open up with Bubbles talking and being Jackson's chauffeur; you know exactly what you're getting into. Very little of the plot is explained but I'm assuming Jackson (who has no lines given this was made posthumously) orchestrates a dark fantasy adventure to hook two...teenagers? People in their late 20's? And convince them to follow their dreams of performing instead of working a deadend dayjob. I'm not sure who the actual audience for this was given it feels like so much of it was made for children but I will say anything that has this much of Michael Jackson's music in it can't be all bad, though I'm not sure why they didn't largely stick with tracks from the album Thriller (in the contention for best album ever, I don't care).

Gamera: Rebirth is one I feel like I'm on the outside on compared to most other tokusatsu fans because I didn't really *love* to a serious degree even though, yes, Gamera is finally back. The first three episodes are mostly just kind of a slog for me with the backhalf not doing enough to retroactively make me think highly of it, though giving off End of Evangelion vibes may make me consider that a second viewing must be in order down the line. Rebirth's strongest attribute is that it feels like it takes into consideration and influence from every prior era of Gamera, no stone is left unturned, and it's a marked contrast from how every recent Godzilla property only captures a single facet of their respective character. But that also creates unique issues like how a lot of criticism of ongoing US military presence in Japan is undercut so there can be a white kid in the main cast (because white children were always present in half of the Showa series) or having the ancient civilization that genetically engineered the kaiju now being malicious and actively sacrificing children as a means of reshaping the world gives me vaguely anti-semitic tones, I don't know, Gamera is still here, I guess.

"I was just a little twerp who liked Scooby-Doo and Smurfs, now I was viewing Cthulhu mutants ruin the Earth."

Everyday that we have Inhumanoids is a gift. Inhumanoids is another Hasbro/Sunbow production like G. I. Joe, Transformers, or Jem and The Holograms, and it is truly tragic that it never got anywhere near that level of attention compared to its siblings. The fact that a 1980's action figure tie-in cartoon is named for its antagonists is only the start; the series follows a small paramilitary outfit of scientists named Earth Core that are tasked with more or less saving the world alongside the Mutores, elemental beings, when the Inhumanoids, eldritch abominations, are unleashed. The degree of world-building beyond your typical "good guys vs. bad guys" affair is astounding with villainous humans and virtuous monsters abounding, but Inhumanoids is mostly magical and remembered for saying fuck all to any type of broadcast standards. Seeing giant monsters destroy cities, undead armies, and spelunking deep into the Earth (where nightmares begin...) are just standard fair here, as are witnessing the actual Inhumanoids such as Metlar (basically the devil) or D'Compose (giant undead entity that can zombify people by touching them and uses his ribcage like a jail cell) in action. The first five episodes here are the pilot movie of sorts for the series which only lasted thirteen overall, and they get more grissly from here on out, but maybe it's best that Inhumanoids is the short lived cartoon and no the cartoon that went soft as early as its second season. I will never not love this show, to this day it's one of my favorite animated series from any decade, much less the 1980's.

Back to our regularly scheduled live-action programming...

Student Bodies is a fascinating film for a myriad of reasons the first of which is that there were somehow enough slasher films by 1981 for there to be a comedy poking fun at all the already established genre-cliches. It's essentially Scary Movie (2000) a full 20 years ahead of the curve only actually funny in spite of the subject matter frequently being as juvenile and prejudiced; but it also reminds me quite a bit of Scream (1996) with stuff like two killers working together. All I know is I was in for a decent time when the film opens with three identical shots of a house just with different framing text: "HALLOWEEN," "FRIDAY THE 13TH," "JAMIE LEE CURTIS' BIRTHDAY" and then the killer, The Breather, calls the opening kill girl doing nothing but breathing heavily, she hangs up, he calls back with "I SAID [heavy breathing]."

Return of The Living Dead is one of those films that should have destroyed the any artifically-imposed boundaries between "high" and "low" art. Every aspect of this film is brilliantly made, it just so happens to be made for stuff like Scooby-Doo music overlaid on top of thunderstorms over graveyards where one female character is stripping to the concept of dying. Media involving ghouls is incredibly oversaturated, and this was still the case in the 1980's where a film like this had to redefine the rules to make it so killing ghouls was basically a non-option. It only recently struck me on this viewing that that's the whole purpose of removing virtually all weaknesses they have, to keep the characters as the nail instead of the hammer. Compared to the Romero films, there's never a point where anyone is in control of the situation, it just escalates further and further until there is literally no way out. Taking that into consideration, there's no way this film couldn't have been a comedy that frames people getting swarmed and eaten by ghouls as hilarious.

The soundtrack and the faux-punk sensibilities lend this a daft feeling of "you shouldn't be watching this" in spite of it not being one of the MOST gory horror films of the 1980's. I still don't get how this never broke into the mainstream. I mean somehow people know that ghouls (in this film) speak and only eat brains but I can't go down to Target and get a Tarman action figure like I can one of Michael Myers. As such Return of The Living Dead remains a criminally overlooked film regardless of its subject matter. It's made me laugh and cringe and feel disgusted and revolt at the concept at dying but mostly it's made me feel a delicious sense of joy at seeing corpses rise out of the ground to the tune of "Do you wanna party? IT'S PARTY TIIIME!" Some of you need to sit in the corner and think about your life choices for making stupid shit like Re-Animator (1985) or fucking Shaun of The Dead (2004) more popular than this, fuck you.

The act of watching Spider Baby is like discovering the missing link. For as much as 1960 gave us an explosion of horror (Eyes Without a Face, The Ship of Monsters, Psycho, Jigoku, Black Sunday, etc.) and Night of The Living Dead (1968) reins as the perennial transition point of the genre, Spider Baby is the road by which we go from The Cat and The Canary and The Old Dark House to the likes of The Texas Chainsaw Massacre and Eraserhead, it's magical finding an essential piece of a genre you love so much. Both the former and latter points of comparison are apt as a family of now only children [and their butler] suffering from Poe-esque hereditary illness have their condemned house set upon by distant relatives and everything slowly unravels.

Lon Chaney Jr. is an actor who for the longest time I felt never got a proper chance to shine wherein the last 25 years or so of his career was spent playing as side character actor in independent films. Spider Baby is his crowning achievement. Seeing him smile through almost tears on several occasions as he has to play bridge between worlds of sanity and madness and lie to everyone that he has some sense of control over the situation is brilliant in ways I always knew he was capable of but had never seen before this point. Bravo.

I will never not love Basket Case with everything I've got. This is the epitome of 1980's horror and my clear pick for best of the decade. It has everything from being a grungy putrid grindhouse spectacle to being an intimate character drama to everything presented through a wry ironic lense where you can't tell if any "bad" performances are all done on purpose. Between this, Brain Damage (1988), and Frankenhooker (1990), there is literally absolutely no reason why Frank Henenlotter shouldn't be more popular than Stuart Gordon, Brian Yuzna, and Lloyd Kaufman *combined*. It's tragic that the world of cinema being enclosed and captured by studios again in the late 1980's prevented us from getting more from him, but realistically could we ask anymore than what we already got from Basket Case? I could watch this every day and never grow tired of it. I will never stop making more and more people watch this.

If Basket Case is the apex of 1980's horror, then Messiah of Evil is the same for 1970's horror. This is one of the most efficient horror films ever made in how not a single frame is wasted, the opening scene is literally a guy running from unseen force, seeking refuge, getting his throat slit, cue title card with synth music that then leads us to a sunburnt hallway as our narrator descends into acceptance of complete lack of control of the situation. Every night shot in this film must be 50 - 75% completely black with whatever headlight or store front there is just making the scenery look like a dollhouse that our characters are trapped inside. There's so many shots of people running away or walking down streets that make them look tiny as the camera is so far.

Every scene is an exercise in building up dread. There's no point where the film relents, something awful is not only coming, it's already here and there's nothing anyone can do. What I love particularly is that the mystery being laid out doesn't offer any answers because there's another mystery on top of what our characters find out only too late. Layers upon layers of dread that even the titular Messiah of Evil isn't the center of. The world is a cruel fucking place where this film languishes in obscurity whilst shit like The Exorcist enjoys mainstream attention. A lot of my taste amounts to "why isn't this thing I like more popular" and cases like Messiah of Evil vindicate me.

"Godzilla is the son of the atomic bomb. He is a nightmare created out of the darkness of the human soul. He is the sacred beast of the apocalypse." - Tomoyuki Tanaka

Generally a yearly trend is that a #1 pick for Halloween is self-evident to me and this year it was Basket Case for all of 30 seconds until I picked Godzilla back up.

There's something to be said how Godzilla isn't quite a horror monster? Terrifying but not necessarily creepy, but what power do things that go bump in the night have against the destruction of everything you know? Everytime I watch Godzilla is like the very first time, when flashing lights out at sea destroy fishing ships I have no idea what happened, or at least any much of a clue as anyone in film does when we're told that the entire ocean exploded.

Godzilla is a reptile, but lacks scales and its entire body is coated in keloid scars. In 1954 Godzilla must have been the largest monster every committed to film, trains are derailed from running against its ankle and bell and radio towers are throttled for being a sensory inconvenience. Godzilla's first on-screen appearance on Odo Island is obscured by a hurricane but the impression is clear; you can't fight Godzilla in the same way you can't fight a natural disaster. When Tokyo is reduced to complete ruin amidst a sea of flames, it's an onslaught of destruction never before seen in a film of this genre. Survivors being afflicted with radiation poisoning shows that Godzilla will claim victims long after being driven back to sea.

There's a sheer apocalyptic dread to all of this sensed by all the characters. Love tries to exist on the edge of annihilation. There's nothing that can be done but persevere and maybe hope tomorrow will be better. A scene that always strikes me is when Serizawa is adamant about not using the Oxygen Destroyer until forcibly confronted with the results of one night of Godzilla making landfall in Japan. The absolute pain felt by everyone in the finale starts here, things couldn't play out any differently as the "scientist of the century" can't join in and celebrate his victory.

Godzilla is a rare perfect film. I will never tire of it.

[vidreview]

VIDEO ESSAY ROUNDUP #1

[originally posted october 11th 2023]

so, i watch a lot of video essays.

i started this blog with the intention of reviewing video essays at length, in the hopes of highlighting best & worst practices, discussing the history of the form, and using them as a jumping off point for personal/political introspection. but as time has gone on, i've found myself encountering more and more videos that i didn't have a whole lot to say about, but that felt worthy of a spotlight anyway.

WITH THAT IN MIND, welcome to video essay roundup, an occasional list of stuff i've watched recently that i think is worth your time. enough preamble, let's get started.

"Self-Discovery Stories | Video Essay" by Glouder Glens.

are you watching Sylvia Schweikert? i know you're not because its numbers are disastrously low. her video about it/its pronouns is a genuine work of art, a video essay about the dehumanization of trans people that seamlessly transforms into lesbian werewolf erotica. this newest video is just as beautiful and strange, not least because it's rendered in portrait mode like a tiktok. it's an honest, far-ranging and personal essay whose sub-300 views is genuinely criminal. seriously, seriously, Sylvia's an essayist you NEED to be paying attention to. it's making the kind of stuff that simply does not play well with the youtube algorithm, and that's the stuff that i live for. watch her videos and share them with your friends. give it money on patreon for gods sake! also definitely go watch her short film "Self Centered," it's a haunting and masterful work of art.

"More unremarkable and odd places in Mario 64" by Any Austin.

i stumbled across Any Austin a couple months ago and he's quickly become one of my favorite "it's time to relax" creators. his "unremarkable and odd places" series scratches an itch i never knew i had, as someone who loves exploring the least interesting corners of any digital world i find myself in. his other series involves calculating the unemployment rate of video game locations by talking to every NPC and deducing their employment status. the editing is calm, his tone is measured and matter of fact, and his sense of humor ties it all together. this is the kind of thing that used to be the bread and butter of video teams at outlets like Cracked or Polygon, before they were summarily laid off or pushed out. it's good to see someone else picking up that mantle in a way that seems relatively sustainable and isn't under the umbrella of a layoff-happy corporate enterprise (except for google of course, but we're all in that boat together aren't we?)

does this count as a video essay? i think that's a reasonable question. i'm inclined to say yes, with the understanding that there are many different types and genres of video essay. but that's a conversation for another day.

"On the Ethics of Boinking Animal People" by Patricia Taxxon.

i should do a full vidrev on this one honestly, but i can't do a post like this and not include it. if you play around in any sort of furry-adjacent fetish space, have opinions about the sexual proclivities of furries, or are otherwise prone to pearl-clutching as an outsider, this is an essential watch. Patricia here does a great job drawing attention to how even well-meaning defenders of, say, feral furry porn, often give up unnecessary ground to opponents with fallacious devices like the Harkness test. i've talked to a lot of fellow kinky furries who came out of this essay exalting in the joy that finally, someone said it! many of the arguments made here, especially in underlining that all furry porn is immaterial and imaginary, are thoughts i've had since i first made a furaffinity account in 2007 or 08 (though i swore up and down i wasn't a furry until 2019) but was always too afraid to express.

this is scary, sensitive territory, but that's what makes this such an essential intervention. this is the perspective of an autistic transfem furry who just wants to have an honest conversation without all the moral fearmongering and shortsighted kneejerk cliches that come up when a topic skirts dangerously close to taboos that we just, generally, refuse to talk about like adults. these are conversations that, in my experience, only ever happened among friendgroups with a long-established repartee and understanding of each other's boundaries, if at all. otherwise, even progressive supposedly kink-positive spaces can encourage a sort of cop-brained punitive attitude towards imaginary sex acts that very easily bleeds over into puritanical takes on, say, kink at pride. frankly, i'm sick of the language & rhetoric of Respectability, because saying "no, most of us aren't like the freaks" only ever results in a liberal block decrying the deplorables and subjecting them to further marginalization and abuse. it takes a lot of guts to make a video like this and i'm so, so glad that Patricia Taxxon stuck the landing.

"Who Is Killing Cinema? - A Murder Mystery" by Patrick (H) Willems.

i've already written two separate vidrevs on Willems, but what can i say? this most recent stretch of work focusing on the business and philosophy of cinema in the streaming era is good stuff. nothing in this particular essay is new per se if you've been paying attention to the business of hollywood for the last ten years, but it does a great job assembling the broad strokes of a lot of different-but-common arguments into one far ranging thesis. much like the prior two videos, i think this works as a solid introductory primer to a more materialist understanding of these trends for folks who aren't necessarily familiar with materialist theory. bonus points for wasting no time getting to the point, unlike his otherwise excellent video on the word "content."

alright, i think that'll do it for this video essay roundup! enjoy :)

ROUNDUP #2 ->

[NOTE: as i'm migrating the archive, links between roundups will direct back to cohost. i probably won't get around to changing that until i write a new one.]

[littleblondesoprano]

Working on my answers now! 🥰🦇🎃🦇

Boo halloween hearth macabre novel for you!

YAY!!! <3 I saw!! I love it!! I 100% agree that holiday Reece's are so freaking good! My favorites are the ones shaped like ghosts 👻 Also hell yeah for Make Some Noise!! Thank youuu!! :D

Boo - ghosts or witches?

Ghosts, all day every day!

Halloween - what's your favorite Halloween tradition?

I have a few! But one of them is that, whenever we decorate the inside of the house, we put on Nightmare Before Christmas and sing along as we run around, lol! I swear I know that whole movie by heart.

Hearth - ideal home?

Oh, a Victorian, absolutely. I don't care where it is, but I am getting a Victorian house, preferably a painted lady, but I'm not picky. 😂 It's gotta have plenty of gingerbread on the porch, and I want space for a library (there's gonna be books everywhere anyway) or a study I can put shelves in and make into a library. It doesn't need to be huge, but, I need a little bit of space - for the aforementioned books and all my antique stuff. I'll put a photo in of a Victorian I fell in love with!!

I follow so many Victorian house appreciation pages on facebook, it's so fun.

Macabre - you have peculiar interests?

I'd say so! I've always been weird, but I get it honest; mom's the same way. She got me started on a lot of weird things that I love, both practicing (tarot, numerology, dream interpretation, ghost hunting) and collecting (taxidermy, antiques, skulls, books). I've moved the needle towards horror movies/slashers (and bone jewelry) where it was gothic lit, originally, and I love it. I don't think its weird, but I know in a litmus test against regular people, I'm an oddball!

Tbh, I think my whole family has peculiar interests. On family vacations - when we could go - it was a tradition to always go on at least one ghost tour. More, if we could! We've hit a lot of the big places you'd think of for hauntings, except New Orleans, but it's on the docket at some point!

Novel - favorite book?

Oh I have so many! One of them is definitely A Prayer for the Dying by Stewart O'Nan. That book changed my brain chemistry when it came to writing, especially in 2nd person. It's also just a really enjoyable read with a hell of a twist.

Another is Priestdaddy by Patricia Lockwood, if you like humor books that are memoir - it made me crack tf up.

If you like poetry, definitely check out I Am Not Trying to Hide My Hungers From the World by Kendra DeColo. That one is not only fucking amazing, but changed how I looked at poetry and writing as a whole. That book gave me permission to write whatever I wanted to.

Another poetry book I loved was Choking Back the Devil by Donna Lynch. 100/10!

Pretty Monsters by Kelly Link is also a really good, spooky read! It's a book of short stories, if I remember right. Along the same vein, Those Fantastic Lives and Other Strange Stories by Bradley Sides was really good, and very spooky! It's another book made up of short stories - none of them are scary, but they are creepy, and I found myself smiling the entire time.

[homoirrealis]

"The way some science fiction does"...

Loved a recent post from @drinkingbitterboy where he is talking about Hillsborough Park posters and how they look a bit like voyager golden record... Check it out here. And it got me thinking... Consciously or subconsciously, his music oozes sci-fi and space references... Not only with TBHC, which is in a category of its own... but across years of his work and interviews: - "She's made of outer space/And her lips are like the galaxy's edge/And her kiss the color of a constellation falling into place" - "The lunar surface is what my friends nicknamed the room in my house in L.A" Alex said - "And as we gaze skyward, ain't it dark early?" And more... use comments to add your favourite - there is definitely more... But coming back to the point made in the post linked above, the line "no matter who or what it meets and what wonders it sees, it carries a piece of home with it and a map of how to get there" got me thinking about how he uses sci-fi main ploy, creating other worlds in order to comment on this one... Alex seems to be always teetering between a notion of: a) creating a record to preserve a moment in time, to travel to it like through the Stargate. After this I more and more think about it as the keys on a device, a portal, a dial to travel between time and space, to a better future or a comforting past... Alex said:"I like the idea that records can sometimes feel like places the listener can go and get lost." that you trevel to at warp speed chic, of course, and staying for a little while... Thanks, mahaonthegram for cementing the idea of Stargate in my mind - credit on visual below to her.

b) Lamenting a future with dreams of heading skyward to outer space, but the reality seemingly earthbound and fixated on what it's in our hands and newsfeeds. Part reflecting on human nature, part resentfully Amusing ourselves to death... - To begin with, "TBHC" and "The Car" give me very strong Solaris by Stanisław Lem vibes... In Lem's own words: "Man has gone out to explore other worlds and other civilisations without having explored his own labyrinth of dark passages and secret chambers, and without finding what lies behind doorways that he himself has sealed” Alex always seem to be saying - we look skywards, we are dreaming about better future, we travel bloody space, yet we always stuck with "rocket-ship grease down the cracks of my knuckles"... In the book, while being surrounded by beauty of space, in his head he is grounded on Earth by his problems, fears, hopes, secret desires and longings... Lem, similar to Alex, makes a point that human obsessions and desires are as strong as any gravitational force, and it only takes a vision of one’s beloved for man to lose himself completely, let alone recover from that and then have strength to discover some external fascinating aspect of the universe... For Alex it might be his creative process, when all of the demons come out to play... it might be creative somebody that he feels gravitational pull to... or a lover... - Furthermore, references to the cheap thrill of social media, "stackable party guests", "hitchhiking with a monogrammed suitcase", even "weekly chats with God" being video calls... He is enjoying some parts of his life no doubt, but there is a strong sense of resentment too... and longing... because, well, he "Ain’t Quite Where I Think I Am". His main mantra to himself being "dance little liar monkey", " stayin' strong for the crew/Wardrobe's lint-rollin' your velveteen suit/And smudgin' dubbin' on your dancin' shoes"...

The sad part is that he says that he needs to be reminded that "it ain't a race when my invincible streak turns onto the final straight"... Like worrying that there is nothing more to it... Scary thought that...

Technological advances really bloody get him in the mood indeed.... It was a very long one, let me know what you guys think....

[king-carnivore-creations]

My mom passed away Wednesday, January 18th, 2023 at 11:58 AM. Her surgery went well, but in recovery everything went wrong. Pneumonia led to a heart attack that lead to strokes that led to her body shutting down.

This was my first experience with death and I learned two things from it.

Dying is loud and painful. Dying is heart monitors and IV machines constantly beeping. Dying is deafening oxygen masks and ventilators. It's moments when you know they're not going to make it, but your heart still hopes anyway. There is nothing you can do but watch as the person you love wastes away, becoming a shell of a human. Watching skin that was once warm and pink swell and discolor and grow cold even though their heart is still pumping. There's something so surreal to it. Your mind can't accept what you know is a fact: this person is dying and there is nothing you can do about it. It pierces the silence louder than any "I love you"s that get no response, than sobs so heavy it leaves your bones aching. There is no grace to dying. No romance or beauty. Dying is the flash of light as lightning illuminates the black, with endless seconds of anticipation, waiting for the crack of thunder overhead to shatter the steady rhythm of rain. Dying is opening your eyes to the sun after having them closed for so long, blinding and sharp, and as your vision fades, you are left startled and confused, suddenly unable to feel the world around you, trapped in a white numbness. Loud, painful, blinding, confusing, heartbreaking, endless.

Death is quiet and sleepy. Death is the soft light of a barely lit hospital room. Death is unbearable silence after the monitors are turned off and the ventilator is disconnected. It is the quiet "I love you"s whispered as your loved one takes their last breaths. The moment is only minutes, but it feels like forever. The world stops as the light of dead stars watch overhead, taking a deep breath with you as the moment passes. The dull roar of space is sleepy and comforting, a reminder that we are all stardust once and will become stardust again. Death is just a horizon, the limit to what we can understand as our existence, and what lies beyond it is vast and unknown and welcoming. Death is gentle in its indifference, settling quiet in the empty chair, waiting patiently for the right moment to come forth and collect, to shepherd the dearly departed to the next stage of our eternity in the universe. Death is the winter sunset of a vast open sky, painted in solacing and reserved pastels, the void between light partially filled with stars, the sun sinking behind the horizon with such muteness it feels motionless. Death is the overhead of streetlights passing across the car windows, streets and parking lots uneasily barren and liminal, the world around you asleep but awake, contained in this curiously fragile and drowsy state, your breathing as quiet as the midnight, the silence sacred. Quiet, sleepy, patient, motionless, finite.

Death and dying are intertwined for eternity, coexisting patiently beside life and living. We all die. But death is not as scary as I originally thought. Death gives a release, an end to the pain of dying. It is not so much the end of a life but the transition between worlds. Our lives do not continue to forever but our memory continues on like a dying star. The light we produce shines on long after we are gone and will be seen eons away by people who never knew us. We ingrain ourselves into others, whether we know it or not, and it influences every thought, decision and action they make. And they will do the same when their time comes. This cycle continues on, sending ripples of light across the universe until the end of time. A pulse of love and light and stardust creating galaxies in the image of our fingerprints. 

Life may not continue on forever, but death is not the end of existence.

We are endless.

[deepdarkdelights]

When I saw you mention ur releasing the fic, I was so excited!! I absolutely love this android concept. I love how you explained further with the details on how the world progressed into it, how it almost became a norm to have an android for one another. That to for several reasonings, especially the loneliness. Which I relate to a lot.

Can I also mention how Jin is the perfect candidate for this type of scenario! He heavily fits the boyfriend look almost realistic.

He was such a sweetheart, almost immediately being the teasing bf yet caring as fuck. I really liked the cute little moments a amongst both.  The part of him having small realisations over those little moments, feeling urges to do things that aren't "normal"

"This feeling like he was trapped behind a glass wall and on the verge of breaking through it and finally taking control of his body." I felt bad for him for feeling this way yet it was scary because that's a sign of it going wrong eventually too

The part when she said if he'd remember her

But the slow and scary transition of him liking mc, keeping her memories and replaying them with others, feeling in his safe space until that client forced themselves on him.

"It felt like he was throwing himself against solid glass - spider cracks slowly but surely spreading along its surface with each violent attack until it finally shattered and fell apart. And he could move. " I loved this description. He always felt trapped with the glass until he could finally open.

But that also lead him to cause other things and murdering. But at the same time, the client violated him completely. But him finally feeling like a human must have been terrifying and confusing tho nothing could be done after that

"He didn’t want to be decommissioned - he didn’t want to die. But he also didn’t want to let go of you. That was no longer an option. " I found this really sweet 😭 I know he's a yandere but its definitely a lot more softer than rough and how he cared for her. Really love your descriptions! 💘💘

But the sick feeling that washes and realisations of him having a virus. At the same time, mc always wanted to be special in his eyes and unfortunately she was in the most horrifying way.

I really really enjoyed this overall, the concept, your mind??, your the best at writing characters so crazy (in the best way I mean bc wow I love ur characters so much) I love your dialogues, your descriptions on everything is so amazing, how easily we can see the shift beginning to occur and how each one of them felt in their ways 💘 I really love android jin, hes coming my favourite after reading this 😭 idc I'm insane but I want him 🤣

Yay! I'm happy that you liked the android concept!

When I started writing Awake, I knew that I wanted the android to be a hyung line member. It just so happened that when I got the idea for the fic, Jin enlisted. And I really missed him and needed some comfort 😭

This fic takes place in the "Detroit Become Human" universe, so a lot of the ideas about the androids come from there - them operating under strict parameters, them learning how to feel emotions, etc. The scene where Jin "becomes human" and murders his client was heavily inspired by the Eden Club chapter in Detroit Become Human. I really didn't want to write about a sex-bot though and that would put the MC in a really difficult position because then what would make her any better than the other clients? And then I remembered that professional cuddlers existed and I wanted to play around with that.

The company that makes androids is Cyberlife, and when androids start "deviating" from the programming Cyberlife claims it's a virus that's making them simulate emotions. The actual question is - is it really a virus or is it sentience? And I think that's something interesting to think about in regard to Jin's fic.

In short, I really love DBH so I was happy to expand on that universe in my own way with my love for the yandere trope as well as BTS 😂