#what crimes they may commit

[nikcaday]

i’ve somehow managed to hyperfixate on both whf and hazbin thanks to my girlfriend 🫠so then i thought,, what if radiodust were wellies

[clownsuu]

Hi hello, would you look at that, huh! Saw this lil fella on our backyard a dozen times already.. he looked lonely and it's getting cold here, so maybe I should take him in -

You seem to know a thing or two about bugs and I never seen one like this! So I thought I could ask for advice, like is he the friendly kind at all?

(Couldn't take much pictures cuz he kept wiggling around 😔😔)

I G A S P E D

THE LITTLEST OF GUYS

[fillipquesender]

You know when you fixate on something so much you slowly start drawing all the characters? Yeah thats whats happening right now I already am planning to draw moon next :3

I am not going to draw a gun it was already painful enough to draw the hands im nto drawing a gun you can't make me 😒

Close ups:

Love, death and rollerskates is a story by @spadillelicious, really reccomend you read it! Really love it great story uhhhh pretend i wrote something really convincing on why you should read it

[greenerteacups]

oooh please someday tell us what you think of GOT

oh, no, it's my fatal weakness! it's [checks notes] literally just the bare modicum of temptation! okay you got me.

SO. in order to tell what's wrong with game of thrones you kind of have to have read the books, because the books are the reason the show goes off the rails. i actually blame the showrunners relatively little in proportion to GRRM for how bad the show was (which I'm not gonna rehash here because if you're interested in GOT in any capacity you've already seen that horse flogged to death). people debate when GOT "got bad" in terms of writing, but regardless of when you think it dropped off, everyone agrees the quality declined sharply in season 8, and to a certain extent, season 7. these are the seasons that are more or less entirely spun from whole cloth, because season 7 marks the beginning of what will, if we ever see it, be the Winds of Winter storyline. it's the first part that isn't based on a book by George R.R. Martin. it's said that he gave the showrunners plot outlines, but we don't know how detailed they were, or how much the writers diverged from the blueprint — and honestly, considering the cumulative changes made to the story by that point, some stark divergence would have been required. (there's a reason for this. i'll get there in a sec.)

so far, i'm not saying anything all that original. a lot of people recognized how bad the show got as soon as they ran out of Book to adapt. (I think it's kind of weird that they agreed to make a show about an unfinished series in the first place — did GRRM figure that this was his one shot at a really good HBO adaptation, and forego misgivings about his ability to write two full books in however many years it took to adapt? did he think they would wait for him? did he not care that the series would eventually spoil his magnum opus, which he's spent the last three decades of his life writing? perplexing.) but the more interesting question is why the show got bad once it ran out of Book, because in my mind, that's not a given. a lot of great shows depart from the books they were based on. fanfiction does exactly that, all the time! if you have good writers who understand the characters they're working with, departure means a different story, not a worse one. now, the natural reply would be to say that the writers of GOT just aren't good, or at least aren't good at the things that make for great television, and that's why they needed the books as a structure, but I don't think that's true or fair, either. books and television are very different things. the pacing of a book is totally different from the pacing of a television show, and even an episodic book like ASOIAF is going to need a lot of work before it's remotely watchable as a series. bad writers cannot make great series of television, regardless of how good their source material is. sure, they didn't invent the characters of tyrion lannister and daenerys targaryen, but they sure as hell understood story structure well enough to write a damn compelling season of TV about them!

so but then: what gives? i actually do think it's a problem with the books! the show starts out as very faithful to the early books (namely, A Game of Thrones and A Clash of Kings) to the point that most plotlines are copied beat-for-beat. the story is constructed a little differently, and it's definitely condensed, but the meat is still there. and not surprisingly, the early books in ASOIAF are very tightly written. for how long they are, you wouldn't expect it, but on every page of those books, the plot is racing. you can practically watch george trying to beat the fucking clock. and he does! useful context here is that he originally thought GOT was going to be a trilogy, and so the scope of most threads in the first book or two would have been much smaller. it also helps that the first three books are in some respects self-contained stories. the first book is a mystery, the second and third are espionage and war dramas — and they're kept tight in order to serve those respective plots.

the trouble begins with A Feast for Crows, and arguably A Storm of Swords, because GRRM starts multiplying plotlines and treating the series as a story, rather than each individual book. he also massively underestimated the number of pages it would take him to get through certain plot beats — an assumption whose foundation is unclear, because from a reader's standpoint, there is a fucke tonne of shit in Feast and Dance that's spurious. I'm not talking about Brienne's Riverlands storyline (which I adore thematically but speaking honestly should have been its own novella, not a part of Feast proper). I'm talking about whole chapters where Tyrion is sitting on his ass in the river, just talking to people. (will I eat crow about this if these pay off in hugely satisfying ways in Winds or Dream? oh, totally. my brothers, i will gorge myself on sweet sweet corvid. i will wear a dunce cap in the square, and gleefully, if these turn out to not have been wastes of time. the fact that i am writing this means i am willing to stake a non-negligible amount of pride on the prediction that that will not happen). I'm talking about scenes where the characters stare at each other and talk idly about things that have already happened while the author describes things we already have seen in excruciating detail. i'm talking about threads that, while forgivable in a different novel, are unforgivable in this one, because you are neglecting your main characters and their story. and don't tell me you think that a day-by-day account tyrion's river cruise is necessary to telling his story, because in the count of monte cristo, the main guy disappears for nine years and comes hurtling back into the story as a vengeful aristocrat! and while time jumps like that don't work for everything, they certainly do work if what you're talking about isn't a major story thread!

now put aside whether or not all these meandering, unconcluded threads are enjoyable to read (as, in fairness, they often are!). think about them as if you're a tv showrunner. these bad boys are your worst nightmare. because while you know the author put them in for a reason, you haven't read the conclusion to the arc, so you don't know what that reason is. and even if the author tells you in broad strokes how things are going to end for any particular character (and this is a big "if," because GRRM's whole style is that he lets plots "develop as he goes," so I'm not actually convinced that he does have endings written out for most major characters), that still doesn't help you get them from point A (meandering storyline) to point B (actual conclusion). oh, and by the way, you have under a year to write this full season of television, while GRRM has been thinking about how to end the books for at least 10. all of this means you have to basically call an audible on whether or not certain arcs are going to pay off, and, if they are, whether they make for good television, and hence are worth writing. and you have to do that for every. single. unfinished. story. in the books.

here's an example: in the books, Quentin Martell goes on a quest to marry Daenerys and gain a dragon. many chapters are spent detailing this quest. spoiler alert: he fails, and he gets charbroiled by dragons. GRRM includes this plot to set up the actions of House Martell in Winds, but the problem is that we don't know what House Martell does in Winds, because (see above) the book DNE. So, although we can reliably bet that the showrunners understand (1) Daenerys is coming to Westeros with her 3 fantasy nukes, and (2) at some point they're gonna have to deal with the invasion of frozombies from Canada, that DOESN'T mean they necessarily know exactly what's going to happen to Dorne, or House Martell. i mean, fuck! we don't even know if Martin knows what's going to happen to Dorne or House Martell, because he's said he's the kind of writer who doesn't set shit out beforehand! so for every "Cersei defaults on millions of dragons in loans from the notorious Bank of Nobody Fucks With Us, assumes this will have no repercussions for her reign or Westerosi politics in general" plotline — which might as well have a big glaring THIS WILL BE IMPORTANT stamp on top of the chapter heading — you have Arianne Martell trying to do a coup/parent trap switcheroo with Myrcella, or Euron the Goffick Antichrist, or Faegon Targaryen and JonCon preparing a Blackfyre restoration, or anything else that might pan out — but might not! And while that uncertainty about what's important to the "overall story" might be a realistic way of depicting human beings in a world ruled by chance and not Destiny, it makes for much better reading than viewing, because Game of Thrones as a fantasy television series was based on the first three books, which are much more traditional "there is a plot and main characters and you can generally tell who they are" kind of book. I see Feast and Dance as a kind of soft reboot for the series in this respect, because they recenter the story around a much larger cast and cast a much broader net in terms of which characters "deserve" narrative attention.

but if you're making a season of television, you can't do that, because you've already set up the basic premise and pacing of your story, and you can't suddenly pivot into a long-form tone poem about the horrors of war. so you have to cut something. but what are you gonna cut? bear in mind that you can't just Forget About Dorne, or the Iron Islands, or the Vale, or the North, or pretty much any region of the story, because it's all interconnected, but to fit in everything from the books would require pacing of the sort that no reasonable audience would ever tolerate. and bear in mind that the later books sprout a lot more of these baby-plots that could go somewhere, but also might end up being secondary or tertiary to the "main story," which, at the end of the day, is about dragons and ice zombies and the rot at the heart of the feudal power system glorified in classical fantasy. that's the story that you as the showrunner absolutely must give them an end to, and that's the story that should be your priority 1.

so you do a hack and slash job, and you mortar over whatever you cut out with storylines that you cook up yourself, but you can't go too far afield, because you still need all the characters more or less in place for the final showdown. so you pinch here and push credulity there, and you do your best to put the characters in more or less the same place they would have been if you kept the original, but on a shorter timeframe. and is it as good as the first seasons? of course not! because the material that you have is not suited to TV like the first seasons are. and not only that, but you are now working with source material that is actively fighting your attempt to constrain a linear and well-paced narrative on it. the text that you're working with changed structure when you weren't looking, and now you have to find some way to shanghai this new sprawling behemoth of a Thing into a television show. oh, and by the way, don't think that the (living) author of the source material will be any help with this, because even though he's got years of experience working in television writing, he doesn't actually know how all of these threads will tie together, which is possibly the reason that the next book has taken over 8 years (now 13 and counting) to write. oh and also, your showrunners are sick of this (in fairness, very difficult) job and they want to go write for star wars instead, so they've refused the extra time the studio offered them for pre-production and pushed through a bunch of first-draft scripts, creating a crunch culture of the type that spawns entirely avoidable mistakes, like, say, some poor set designer leaving a starbucks cup in frame.

anyway, that's what I think went wrong with game of thrones.

[aaandbackstabbed]

Goldie: Be a better person!!

Scrooge: Why?!

Goldie: Because someone in this relationship need to have morals, and it sure as fuck ain’t gonna be me, sweetheart!!

[idontknowreallywhy]

An Eyebrow-Razing Incident?

Part 3

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Part 1 here

Part 2 here

Virgil may have gone to the dark side…

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Admittedly leaving the broken apart kiln open to the elements while he ran back to the villa to announce that The Barbecue would be today, at lunchtime and then not returning to it until after his flight to the mainland for urgent meat supplies was… a tactical error.

One of their frequent three-minute tropical rainstorms had dumped its load on the island in his absence. Perhaps he’d have made it back in time if he hadn’t made a detour to pick up a vat of heavy duty antihistamine cream for his itchy, well, Everything.

As it was, the beautiful black gold was more than a little dampened by the experience and for several minutes, so was its creator.

To add further insult, the devilish little creature, or creatures had even snacked on the skin beneath his eyebrows and ever since desperately rubbing the cream into those the hairs just weren’t lying flat as they should. And that made him itch almost as much as the bites did.

After precisely applying the Jeff Tracy fix to the errant pile of fuel and getting black dust all over his TBTwo-green bootlaces, Virgil got a grip of himself.

Even damp fuel could be persuaded into flame with enough accelerant. The show would go on and nobody need know.

He loaded up a sack of coal and hefted it to his shoulder like a particularly miserly Santa.

It had to be a food grade accelerant, though. Rocket fuel had a certain… tang…to it that even that spray on taste-bud torturer wouldn’t conceal. Grandma would be on to him quick as a flash.

No. He had to be cunning about this. What would Grandpa have done?

Ethanol was flammable…

At high enough concentration anyway, about 80% should do it. Pity none of them were habitual vodka drinkers. Well, maybe only for current purposes.

The craft beer wasn’t strong enough. And Virgil had plans for that which didn’t involve throwing it on a fire.

Gordon’s tropical-flavoured rum collection was more sugar and water than alcohol. Similar story re Alan’s alcopops.

Scott… Scott had whisky. Cask strength. Expensive.

Very expensive.

But also very flammable…

He deposited the sack next to the newly constructed, gas-free, poolside barbecue.

It was a terrible idea. Big brother would kill him if he found out.

But Grandma’s disappointed face would kill him more slowly and painfully.

His heart told him she would forgive him in time and that he should just come clean.

His itchy eyebrows said BURN IT ALL.

He scratched at them again. Three perfect dark hairs came off on his fingertips.

Horrified, he applied more cream then stashed the tub back in his pocket before strolling casually into the house, grabbed a large bottle of cola from the kitchen and sauntered past the rest of his beloved family who were huddled together in the lounge bickering over a notebook of some kind.

So focussed was Virgil on appearing natural he didn’t realise until after he was halfway up the stairs that Gordon had slammed the notebook closed as he’d entered, and had had a look of intense innocence on his face.

And Scott… his bestest big bro Scooter, who had been a fraction slower to achieve the nothing-to-see-here expression, had been clutching a fistful of hundred dollar bills.

Those only ever made an appearance for two reasons:

Either Virgil was missing an 11am poker session, or Gordon was taking bets on whether he was going to pull this off.

And Scott was betting against him.

Virgil wasn’t offended in the slightest. But his eyebrows screamed for vengeance.

Virgil waited for the bickering to recommence before quietly doubling back and sneaking his way into his way into Dad’s office. That was where Scott hid the really good stuff.

Sure enough, in a small cabinet in the corner were four beautifully sculpted glass bottles. Only the smallest amount missing from the first, it didn’t come out often, and so it wasn’t safe to take that one. Instead he eased the bottle from the very back and studied it. It whispered to him in numbers with too many zeros.

Pffft, Mr Billionaire of the Year could afford another when he eventually noticed.

But if Virgil walked past with the ornate bottle he’d notice rather too soon.

He had a plan for that though.

Unfortunately there was no sink in here so Virgil downed one and a half litres of sickly sweet caffeine before inflicting the last quarter on a slightly dry-looking pot plant.

Bleugh.

The speed and steadiness with which he decanted the whisky would have earned him a surgical scholarship on the spot.

The glass bottle was returned to the cabinet. The cola bottle was stripped of its paper label and a new one proclaiming “Bessie’s Artisinal All-Natural BBQ lighter fluid” in a somewhat hurried calligraphic script was stuck in its place.

The Perfect Crime.

Next Step: The Perfect Barbecue.

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[hyacinths-in-a-storm]

Crack AU where Ty Lee escapes Boiling Rock and retreats into the Earth Kingdom instead of joining the Kyoshi Warriors, and is completely off the grid, so that when she comes back to the Fire Nation and sees Azula out and about she thinks she’s gotten better and tries to reconnect with her. Shenanigans ensues.

[samatheia229]

Rise Ponderings:

What if all the turtle brothers had a savage mode?

Not necessarily triggered by separation anxiety like Raph, but is more like a survival mode in an unfamiliar environment?

I'd argue that Donnie experienced something of a Savage Mode during that episode when they were in the woods where he was acting like a feral creature of the forest and built that treehouse. I think in his Savage Mode, Donnie's gets hyper-aware and his brain kicks into overdrive, and I've always sort of seen him as the family's substantial provider - his high income from selling tech (he literally has a patented company - Genius Built), the Rise Lair looking surprisingly modern and comfortable given their circumstances - hence the treehouse. Even in his 'savage mode', Donnie thought of shelter and facilities first. Also, his homicidal urges would likely increase tenfold against threats.

With Leo, I'd like to think that his Savage Mood is more akin to ruthless, calculating strategist. He's a cunning bastard but usually loud and flamboyant, which would make it all the more unsettling if Savage Leo went quiet yet that sense of cunning and strategic mastermind was still present, and since he's in survival mode that means he's absolutely ruthless to any threats that may harm him and his family.

Mikey with Dr Delicate Touch as a survival mechanism would be deadly, but it'd be a lot more eerie if his Savage Mood maintained his cheerful dissonance yet had Dr Delicate Touch's abrasive and merciless behaviour. Killing with a smile, basically. He's tiny but strong, quick and resourceful as heck. Savage Mickey would be running around scaring people and wrecking havoc like a giggling gremlin.

Now take everything I just said, imagine it's post-Kraang invasion and put them into a crossover with another TMNT iteration. Just one of them alone would be a force to reckon with, as seen by Savage Raph, but all of them together, directly post-invasion?

Unfamiliar, potentially hostile environment? Check.

Hurt brothers? Check.

Entering Savage Mode? Yes.

[Also friendly reminder that Rise turtles were made intentionally by a then-villain for the purpose of destroying humanity(?) (Draxum does hate humans and why else would he want to create 'the strongest warriors'?)

Plus, they're dumb teenagers. The turtles definitely have a few moral screws loose]

Which means that the turtles from that dimension would have to deal with 4 feral, overprotective teenagers with overpowered mystic abilities in survival mode whose instincts are perceiving nearly every moving thing as a threat and telling them to ELIMINATE.

[deus-ex-mona]

god forbid a woman has hobbies

[cyndrastic]

hey remember when i said i was drawing Vic Chaos as a milf?

alternates with different lighting (with and without words) and a time lapse under the cut! (btw the words on the cover all have to do with lore in my post covid au so send asks if you’re interested <3)

tw for nudity (without genitalia) in the time lapse cause i shaded the whole body before drawing the dress

[bedforddanes75]

blocked nose itchy nose sore throat i should just die actually

[truethes]

just seen that twitter post talking about how dr ratio is apparently a red flag. im going to scream-

[fullscoreshenanigans]

pov: you and your partner are about to drag your other partner home and strangle him for going through with the demon genocide plan because you can’t seem to get it through his thick skull that he doesn’t have to shoulder these burdens alone and he gives you this look

[mercyisms]

incredibly me to not only be like 'i'd really love a succession/tlt au' and then to go 'also it's very important to me that frankgerrikarl be prominent in it.' incredibly me. incredibly, incredibly silly.

[harapeveco]

I love him so much bc he gives the vibes of a guy who doesn’t give a shit but the second he’s caught red handed he looks so stressed trying to explain himself 😭😭😭

[maximura]