#which is objectively better 👏

[handsome-kakigori]

Where did my knight in shining armour go?

[thedomesticanthropologist]

Would you be willing to do an analysis on Karlach and how she seems to compartmentalize a lot of extreme feelings? Like she gives me the sense that that was how she coped in Avernus to stay alive and reduce the odds of exploitation by devils, but it's fascinating to see how fast she seems to shut down anything negative to the point that she disapproves of Tav/Durge questioning the ethics of using soul coins.

I haven't done the Karlach origin, so I may be missing some context or information. That being said LETS GOOOO 👏👏👏

Karlach has a reputation in fandom for being a cinnamon roll, but she is so much more than that. Her personality is really complex, and her history is full of decisions and actions that reflect her upbringing and the situations she was forced to survive. That history helped shape how she sees and responds to the world around her.

On Soul Coins: Soul Coins are small, coin-shaped objects forged of infernal iron into which a single mortal soul has been bound. They are used as currency in the Nine Hells, and can be used to power infernal engines such as the one in Karlach's chest

They contain an entire MORTAL SOUL. The full essence of a person, and once used in Karlachs engine, that persons soul is destroyed in a way that makes it irretrievable.

What does this mean? Can souls in coins be saved? Yes! From the forgotten realms wiki:

It was possible to release the soul within a soul coin. This could be achieved by casting an anti-curse spell, such as remove curse, on the coin. Once a soul was freed, the coin began rusting and was eventually destroyed. If the soul was of a good alignment, they were transported to the realm of their deity. If the soul was of an evil alignment, they were transported to the Styx and transformed into a lemure (dang yo lol)

Karlach sees the coins as a tool to enhance her power. If the player reminds her that soul is a person, she gets very angry and says she /knows/ that. She still believes that they should be used to juice her up. You can obtain quite a bit of disapproval from Karlach by questioning the use of the soul coins in Act 1.

Additionally, Karlach has unique dialogue with Mattis the tiefling child in the Last Light Inn. She essentially encourages the kids racket scheme, and if the player pipes up to say her advice isn't moral/ethical/a good suggestion, she has a strong disapproval and puts the PC in their place by saying you have NO RIGHT to intervene on her opinions of how a (poor, displaced) tiefling child should act to better their personal situation.

We are also aware that in her past, At some point Karlach lived in the city of Baldur's Gate in Faerûn, where she worked as personal bodyguard for Lord Enver Gortash. Personal bodyguard is key: this implies she was at his side, whenever he did whatever he was doing at the time. It is also stated that she "would do anything for him", and was betrayed by him. Her anger with him is based on what he put her through, and I do not believe she expresses anything about what he had her do while she was a bodyguard.

Karlach is not a "morally pure: character prior to Avernus, nor was she one during her time in Avernus, nor is she one when she escapes. The game never implies that she is.

However! What Karlach is is extremely loyal, and a SURVIVOR. She has the mentality of 'do what you need to do to survive', and she WILL do what she needs to do to survive. She came from a poor upbringing, she did the best she could with what she had, and now that she's escaped Avernus she wants to CELEBRATE and experience as much joy as possible before she burns up.

This makes her very sensitive to anything that might 'kill the vibe'. She doesn't want to face things like her impending death (she tries very hard to get you to stop talking about it) she doesn't want to question the coins, she doesn't want to deal with big moral questions when the bare bones of the situation are that that kid probably needs to be a thief in order to make it by, "morals" be damned.

Karlach went through hell. Literally. She was incredibly abused psychologically and physically and used as a weapon. She doesn't have the TIME to do anything other than be glad that she's not there anymore. She wants to smell the grass, drink the ale, laugh, love, make friends, enjoy as much as she can while she can. Is she a good person? I'd say so, yeah. But is she a paragon of virtue? No. She was never meant to be, nor was she ever given the opportunity to be.

She knows that reality is a lot harder and a lot more in your face than any higher 'ideals' that may be the best looking on paper. This may be an unpopular opinion as well, but I think if Gortash hadn't sold her, she very likely would have ended up on a path where she would happily do some pretty sketchy shit.

I'm not sure I'd say she compartmentalizes so much as actively chooses to avoid addressing things, to the point where it pisses her off if you try to push her. It's an avoidance of choice, maybe even a rationalization situation.

You do the best you can with the hand you're given. She always did. And now she's only got a few minutes left to enjoy what time she has, so... she does.

[silviakundera]

with the conclusion of Snowfall...

why do i enjoy Republican Era chinese dramas so much?

aesthetics! there is this blend of 1920-30s western fashion influences and traditional chinese garb & architecture that just pleases my eyes.

everyone looks very depressed & dangerous & sexy

chaotic period of transition - no matter if you're in the 1910's, 20's, 30's some absolutely wild historical shit was going down

cars and guns and gloves and swords. rotary phones!

dancing & drinking in night clubs, in glamorous pockets amid the violence & instability outside; a lil touch of mask of the red death vibes

end of empire themes, as a country tries to find its way after the end of the last imperial dynasty

there's those gangster, mob boss vibes from american and british dramas set in the 1920s, except everything is cranked up x100 because of general lawlessness; central government and law & order was a paper thin veneer over warlords

the start of WW2 from an entirely different perspective than the common narratives that I was exposed to growing up in the US (which is 99% stories about the european stage)

sino-japanese war / war of resistance material like Hidden Blade is fucking badass ok 🤷

in a time of resistance to occupation, colonizers encroaching, warlords fighting over cities, brewing civil war.... there are many different options of protagonists and unlikely "heroes" who are picking their battles and discovering what they are willing to fight for

Beautiful 👏 women 👏 in heels 👏and 👏 slinky 👏dresses 👏

Lots of revenge narratives. I love an over-the-top, bloodthirsty & destructive revenge narrative

Depending on the genre, there might be little or heavy politcal /patriotic discourse. But tbh none of the rah rah patriotism stuff distracts me much, because all the american and british produced stuff set around WW2 has rah rah patriotism & propaganda in it, so I just consider that part of the essential genre vibes. It's just another country's version. (Of course, others will have less patience when it becomes heavy-handed. YMMV.)

Dark & Gritty

Hidden Blade (film) - a masterpiece, if you enjoy dark WW2 spy films that play with narrative style and challenge the viewer to follow the story as it's woven. Had to review detailed historical context for the years in question, to be ready to consume. But worth it. I've watched it 3 times. 💀

Heroes (2024) - the very beginning era of this genre/the transition into repulican period. rocks fall, everyone dies. Primarily a tragic wuxia & pre-republican fusion. Excellent enough that I didn't mind the bleak storyline. 💀

Detective-ing

Miss S - adaption of 1920s Australian mystery procedural Miss Fisher's Murder Mysteries, staring Vengo! ML actor of Snowfall

Checkmate - Agatha Christie stories adapted to the setting & time period, plus bromance. I watched half the episodes w my brother, as we are both huge agatha christie fans. It was fun if you can be chill about adaption changes.

My Roommate is A Detective - for mystery & bromance lovers. Same actor duo as Checkmate.

Detective L - don't know much about this one tbh

Romance arc, with a somewhat happy ending for the 2 leads

Provoke - Gorgeous, glamorous, vibes vibes vibes all day long. Revenge and romance. ❤

Fall in Love - sons & daughters of warlords and their supporters get sexy and dangerous and decide even joining the civil war is better than the prior generation's bullshit. This is an objectively bad drama that I really enjoyed anyway (it helps that I skipped every scene for the 2nd and 3rd couples). This one turns v propaganda heavy at the end, if that bothers you. ❤

Arsenal Military Academy - military training hijinks w a side of cross dressing romance. Xu Kai and Bai Lu! It's soliders and japanese invasion et al, so be prepared for the standard patriotism. Comedy & drama. HE for the FL/ML but expect character death in this subject matter. ❤

Rookie Agent Rogue - Late 1930s spy drama with small romance side-plot. Expect the standard wartime patriotism, like with Arsenal Military Academy. The draw is the lead actress, the FL from Princess Agents, Minglan, Legend of Shen Li. HE for the FL/ML but expect character death in this subject matter. ❤

City of Streamer - Older woman seduces younger man who is the son of her revenge target. Melodrama with people serving looks. ❤

War of Faith* - Young man just wants to join the banking industry and have a subtextually gay relationship with his mentor in peace, but there's a civil war going on. Protagonist would like to be excluded from this political narrative, but ultimately is forced to pick a side. ❤🌈 *(Is it censored gay romance? No, not based on a gay novel. So not officially! But some viewers felt there was a subtextual romance storyline #shenlai ; YMMV. The happy ending is Untamed-esque; implied only)

many, many pulpy mini-dramas about revenge! warlords! ladies with pistols! (Miss Mystery, First Marriage, Maid's Revenge, etc)

Also... (happy ending not guaranteed)

Siege in Fog

Love in Flames of War

Couple of Mirrors - censored F/F 🌈

Stand by Me - censored m/m 🌈

Killer and Healer - censored m/m 🌈

Winter Begonia - censored m/m 🌈

[findmeinthefallair]

This frame that shows him looking down at both hands, while Gus is describing something he just did... ("...how did you do that? You have magic, dude!")

Thematically: Hunter is thinking about what he is capable of doing. And this is at a point which is weeks/months before his first attempts at palisman-carving. There is no better symbolism for this than the hands motif, since we've seen him in gloves, holding and switching staffs, clinging on with fragile hope to objects like the portal key in Eclipse Lake, and we see how he shows interest in sewing. You get the idea. Belos wanted to tear down what he endeavoured to build with his hands:

by forcing him to slay his first friend. Claws that belonged to...yet didn't belong to Hunter...closing in around Flapjack.

Think about this parallel:

Hunter had just done the unspeakable to Flapjack, hours before.

And that would colour and taint how he sees himself and his capabilities and his perceived usefulness and ughhh his perceived capability to love and connect healthily, for a long time afterward. He would be in the same place as Luz was: locked and frozen (via immense trauma) in the belief that he can only ever do harm and just...not be helpful or useful to others.

I wonder if the process of placing Flapjack's headstone paralleled this Luz moment:

Luz still looks so tired here, and it would be a while till the bittersweet release of her letting that final light glyph sheet be blown away by the wind in the show's finale, pre-timeskip.

Hunter's mentor-to-be, Dell, has a permanently wounded and scarred hand which prematurely ended his career. But he is more than capable of guiding Hunter, being warm and nurturing towards him.

And yesterday I was thinking of this comparison which drove me nuts and still does:

The designs aren't that different...?? (I haven't put them side by side before!)

Down to the choices that the crew made for the colour palettes. And of course: we know that they share the same ancestry. The brightness in Dell's expression is the emotional place which he - and the others in the wonderful found family - gradually helped Hunter to reach.

Caleb's design with the blue coat is similar too, for obvious reasons! :

It's 👏 about 👏 how 👏 the 👏 things 👏 in 👏 this 👏 show 👏 are 👏 connected 👏

[serial-serializednovelreader]

Nova’s Thoughts - Dracula Daily - August 19

In which there is joy at least and Renfield goes for a little run…

“Joy, joy, joy! although not all joy.” I love how she’s so happy, yet so practical. Like, “yay, everything’s great! Well, technically that’s incorrect…” ugh I love her so much

She’s going to see Jonathan at last!! These two crazy kids are going to reunite. Good for them <333

Love Mr. Hawkins playing wingman with “marriage now, maybe? 👀” I know there’s a more serious reason he’s suggesting this (for instance if Jonathan doesn’t get better…), but I still want to believe it’s in part because Mr. Hawkins just wants them to get married lol

“I have cried over the good Sister's letter till I can feel it wet against my bosom, where it lies. It is of Jonathan, and must be next my heart, for he is in my heart.” Awww Mina 😭😭 and also, *iconic* line right there.

I know she must be so worried for how he’s doing, especially after caring for her other favorite person Lucy and feeling rather helpless in that situation :((( you got this girl!

The letter he touched will comfort her 😭😭😭 could this get anymore sweet???

Now on to another edition of Seward’s podcast (which, FYI, does contain ableist language I won’t be quoting)…

Imagine one of your patients starts sniffing the ground like a dog and you try to talk to him, and his response is just “nah, I don’t want to talk to you, pleb.” Renfield becomes more iconic by the day.

Oooo I like what Seward’s putting down here with the religion distinction: to him, God cares about everyone, but Renfield’s god (or, Renfield, if Seward’s prediction comes true) doesn’t care about anyone except those they deem important.

^^ ok I wrote this really early in the morning before reading anyone’s takes on it and now, having read some takes on this, I see that taking into account Seward’s surly attitude, this is not the objective, rational opinion I thought it was. I still want to include my OG viewpoint because I do think it’s cool to get Seward’s views on religion if that’s actually what he believes, but I do see what everyone else means when they say he’s actually being pouty about Renfield not paying attention to him, and thinking of himself as an “eagle” in this scenario….Seward, buddy, get over yourself please 🙄

I’m just imagining Seward pretending not to watch Renfield while reading a book or something but all the time staring at him like 👁️👄👁️…somehow, I think Renfield probably noticed you doing that. Just saying.

Seward’s like “you don’t love spiders anymore? :(“ Renfield: *extremely cryptic reply, which equates to “I only cared about the spiders because Dracula wasn’t here yet”* :p

Seward thinking of Lucy again :((( yeah never a good idea to mix your — um, “sleeping chemical” (which, by the way, such a nerd move to list the entire chemical symbol and I love him for doing it) — with depressing thoughts of Lucy. I’m actually proud of him for sticking to his convictions on this one!

…and it pays off! Renfield’s on the run!

I’m picturing Seward having to get out of the window (with help) and it is a very funny image. 10/10 on Renfield for making Seward feel the need to do that 👏👏👏

Hey, Seward, maybe focus less on the “Renfield’s a beggar for wanting a reward from his ‘master’” thing and more on who he was talking to…it might save us some headaches in the long run. Oh? You’ve already taken him back to the asylum? Great, love that. /s

“So I took the hint, and came too.” ……………📸🤨 (I know that’s not what he means but it is funny nonetheless :D)

[amberskyyking]

Cooking up angst for everyone who still wants to believe 👏 that 👏 man 👏 is 👏 alive 👏 even in canon. Cause he is. Tech lives.

Implications Of Being Alive

Chapter 4 - It Must Still Be Dreaming (Cause The Empire Reeeally Skimps Out On Love And Comfort)

In its dream, Omega had been shivering.

They had just gone over the falls together, one after the other, back in the Ipsium mine, and crawled back out over the slick rocky edge, coughing and spluttering to clear their lungs before collapsing on the ground. The sequence was one that it almost remembered, like a preview playing somewhere distantly in its mind. There would be a beam of warm light, a sense of something akin to understanding, two others who would join them… But before the fullness of the memory could unravel, it took a turn, as Omega turned her body into him, pressing her warm and wet face into his neck.

CX-2 wasn’t expecting that, but the girl was trembling all over, from the chill of the water no doubt. All of their gear was either wet or left behind at the top of the cave where this started. With no other options, CX-2 lifted his organic arm over her to provide what little warmth he- it- HE could. What little was left of it- HIS organic body would have to suffice until the others arrived with a better solution.

Tech held her like that, laying with his back flat against the stone ground, an arm draped over her back, and the dream mercifully stood still. For a time there was only the rushing sound of the waterfall in his ears and Omega’s warmth as she remained there with him. Tech was vaguely aware that his body ached, but that didn’t seem to matter. There had been directives he was to follow, but they could wait. There were some things, some purposes, more important than orders.

When had they ever followed orders, anyways?

Inevitably, though, the dream changed. Omega was pulled away from him, leaving his organic hand grasping at a void in the cold. His body stiffened against the aches as they became more apparent, as the icy haze began to creep up his skin and into its bones…

There were only flashes after that, moments of vague lucidity between heavy, dreamless black.

Voices overlapping. Entirely too distant to decipher any words or attempt to match them to any beings in particular…

The sensation of falling. Familiar. Far too familiar…

Prickling shocks jolting up the nerves in its leg where the prosthetic met organic material…

A sudden awareness that it had failed its objective. It couldn’t recall what its objective was but registering the information at all came with a secondary realization. It… It would be decommissioned, if it even survived. It was no longer worth retrieval or resources to repair, Colonel Bragg had made that abundantly clear, and though it shouldn’t care enough to have a reaction, it seized up at the thought and registered a faint, foreboding beeping sound somewhere nearby. It… It didn’t want that… Yet its wants were irrelevant, it was a flaw to retain desires of its own at all. Perhaps termination was in its best interest if it could no longer perform its functions efficiently, if it had truly served its purpose. It would hardly matter, in any case. CX-2 wasn’t truly alive, so its death would be inconsequential.

No one’s going to terminate you, Tech! A voice broke through its thoughts. It does matter, you’re… You’re going to be okay… You HAVE to be…

Someone’s hand slipped into its own and squeezed it, which made little logical sense. There was no reason to comfort it now, at the end. Colonel Bragg never had before.

This isn’t the end, The voice spoke again, and this time something about it sounded familiar. There was obvious distress in the tone, though, and it tugged at his heart the exact way that nothing was supposed to.

You’re going to pull through, you’re safe now, I - I’m sorry Tech, I’m so sorry! But I’m getting you home, I promise. You’ll see your brothers again, okay? Just please, please hang on…

He wanted to see what was happening, who was speaking, but his eyelids were too heavy. The dream state slowly began to take over, though, and his mind supplied the rest of the image for him, even if it was false. Omega sat at his side, holding tight to his hand with tear tracks running down her cheeks.

Delusions, of course. Nonetheless, Tech squeezed her hand back before the scene dissolved again in black.

- - -

CX-2 hadn’t been activated, but slowly, it blinked itself awake.

It’s location was unknown. This was neither its single-bunk domicile nor its imperial-assigned starfighter. It lay facing up in what appeared to be a sterile white medical bay, though none of the humanoids wore imperial grays and none of the medical droids were the designated approved models…

“You’re awake!” Someone gasped. It turned its head to see who but hesitated. It had been damaged, had it not? Sudden movement could exasperate as much, but oddly, there was very little pain in light of the injuries it was sure it had sustained. The source of the voice made themselves known anyways, though, and in mere seconds an adult human female hovered over it, gathering up its remaining flesh hand in her own despite the hand being cuffed to the side of the medical bed. CX-2 cataloged her appearance as… Familiar.

“Tech?” The woman said cautiously. “It’s me, Tech. It’s Omega. Do… do you remember?”

CX-2 considered this for a moment. It had definitely failed its mission, more of it was coming back now and that much was certain. It never should have failed, it had been warned not to underestimate the rebel astromech unit, and yet, it didn’t consider that the droid was capable of wielding a blaster. The oversight was unacceptable, costing him several detonators and damaging its body beyond what it was capable of repairing in the field or what the Empire would consider a worthwhile investment if it returned. That alone had sealed its fate, yet its objectives were clear. Complete the mission or be terminated in the process.

If it had to be the latter, so be it.

It carried on best it could despite the melted metal and charred flesh compromising its effectiveness. It destroyed a single ship, flushed out its primary target, Hera Syndulla, and downed two more ships in the firefight that followed, though the actions had the unwanted consequence of triggering the rebels evacuation. It sought a hostage to lure its primary target towards, however at least one ship made it to the atmosphere, cementing the mission a failure regardless of the status of its other objectives. It nearly subdued the rebel soldier from the site of the crash, until something… Something had stopped it. An error. A malfunction.

Colonel Bragg had been right about it, after all.

There was more that had happened since then, but CX-2 couldn’t recall it clearly. From what it did know, it must have been dreaming. It wasn’t supposed to dream, though it hardly mattered anymore. It wouldn’t dream for long.

The woman had posed a question, though, so it looked up into her face. She had said she was Omega. She had called it Tech, like in the memories that it no longer had the strength to fight, from a life that didn’t belong to it, back when it almost certainly served a different purpose… When it.. he… had lived.

CX-2 tore its gaze away from the girl and tried to ignore the ache in its chest. It… It must still be dreaming.

Regardless, Omega was waiting for an answer, squeezing his hand even tighter now in apparent anticipation. His brothers had been its enemies once, hadn’t they? Yet that seemed to matter little in the moment. He had all but given up fighting the malfunctions, the memories, before its his latest mission, and now it was going to be decommissioned…

Logically, that rendered the fight pointless. It may still be all in its head, but if he provided her some comfort now, perhaps it would make whatever came next easier to accept.

“You are present within the memories I have retained,” He answered.

Speaking took more effort than he expected and the words came out raspy and tired sounding. It HE was tired. Even now, sleep prodded uncomfortably at his mind, and everything felt hazier than usual… Nonetheless, his confirmation seemed to mean a great deal to Omega, who promptly lost her composure and broke down in a fit of hiccups and tears at his bedside.

“Tech, I - I’m sorry,” She spluttered. “If - If we knew - We should have looked for you-“

“The effort would have been futile,” He attempted to assure her, but she only shook her head.

“I should have ripped the damn helmet off you in your own cockpit on the way to Tantiss-“

The doorway behind her whooshed open, and they both looked up to see a pale clone trooper with cybernetics that Tech recognized near instantly, one of the first names he had unintentionally slotted away years before, despite the fact that he had clearly aged some since they last met.

“Echo,” He identified the clone automatically.

Echo’s eyes widened. “T-Tech…”

“He’s awake!” Omega gasped out between sobs. “And he- he remembers m-me… Us…”

Tech saw Echo swallow hard as he pulled Omega tight against his chest, letting her bury her face in his plastoid armor. Her body began to shake like it had in his dream. Tech still held tight to her hand - something told him that if he let go the dream would end, CX-2 would be all that remained, he would wake up back in the imperial med bay instead of this one, finally facing his own decom and he DIDN’T WANT THAT-

“Easy, Tech,” Echo was saying, there was that high pitched noise coming from somewhere again and Tech was torn from his spiraling thoughts as he craned his neck to identify it. Omega and Echo both faced him with alarmed looks, but as quickly as it started the noise stopped.

“What’s going on?” Omega asked. “Your heart rate just…”

…A heart monitor. Of course. “It’s… Nothing of relevance,” Tech said uncomfortably.

Echo fixed him with a calculating look that he tried to ignore, but the feeling of being searched like that, like after all these years his brother could somehow simply tell when something was being omitted, made him feel distinctly vulnerable.

“Omega… Have you told the others yet?” Echo asked gently.

“N-no… I wanted to make sure-“

“I know,” He said soothingly. “But you shouldn’t put it off anymore. They need to know… And be gentle with Hunter.”

Omega let out a deep, shaky breath, but nodded.

“Do you want me to be with you on the comm?”

“No… Can you stay with him, please? I - I don’t want him to be alone.”

“Can do, kid,” Echo said fondly, ruffling her hair.

Before Tech could protest Omega had squeezed his hand one more time and then let go. For a second panic surged through his chest, the edges of his vision went black, that noise was reverberating throughout the room-

Until Echo grabbed his hand in her place.

“I gotcha, vod. It’s alright. Yes, it’s okay Omega, he’s okay.”

Tech held his breath, but the room didn’t fade away like he expected, even as he felt like he was fighting just to stay awake.

“Well, don’t do that. Remember to breathe, come on now. I… I know a lot has happened.”

Echo’s voice hitched, but it was warm and steady, too. It was okay. He was okay, like Echo said. He was still here, it wasn’t over, not yet. Tech dared to take a breath, then another, and finally, leaned back against the soft pillows again that he had to be imagining, nothing about the Imperial med bay was designed for comfort.

“I’ll be back soon, Tech. Don’t worry,” Omega assured him.

Tech gave the slightest, stiffest nod, and Omega turned away with a shaky exhale. There was the whoosh of a doorway, then silence.

“Good,” Echo said. “Just breathe. You ah… Really had us worried there for a little while, you know,” his brother continued a little awkwardly. “The better part of ten years, actually. When Omega told me…”

Tech waited patiently for him to finish the explanation, but Echo trailed off, his own shoulders shuddering for a moment as he fought to compose himself.

“I’m sorry vod. I… Kriff, there’s no excuse, there’s nothing I can say to explain this, but you’re safe now. We’re never letting you go again, I promise…”

Tech still didn’t want to close his eyes even though they felt heavy, but the effort it took not to do so was increasing. He pulled his gaze away from Echo’s glistening hazel eyes and stared pointedly at the ceiling as he pondered the words. It was a pleasant thought… He wished he could believe it, but he knew better.

None of this would last. It never did.

“You can believe it, Tech,” Echo suddenly insisted, his voice breaking entirely. “But I… I understand why you wouldn’t trust us again, after this…”

Oh. Apparently he had spoken some part of his thoughts out loud.

“‘T’s not your fault,” Tech mumbled truthfully, trying to take stock of his state of being. Perhaps he was on some sort of painkiller which was having an effect on his mind. That would potentially explain the vividness of this particular dream… Though the idea that Colonel Bragg would waste painkillers on it at all was ridiculous.

“They didn’t even give you painkillers?!” Echo spoke up suddenly, his grip on his hand tightening almost uncomfortably. Tech raised an eyebrow in surprise. Echo had gone from emotional and comforting to absolutely seething, and worse, Tech must be looser lipped than he would like to be on the matter. “Kark, they filled you almost as full of hardware as me and-“

Tech snapped its mouth shut. It was saying too much and it HE didn’t want to talk about it.

“It’s okay. We don’t have to talk if you don’t want to-“

Shit.

“Why don’t you just get some sleep-“

“NO!” He nearly shouted, and the alarms began blaring overhead yet again, which seemed counterproductive, it only served to increase the anxiety he was already feeling which was presumably the opposite of the goal of the device.

Echo touched his scomp arm to Tech’s shoulder- He still had the scomp, then, after all this time- and gently pushed him back.

“We’re not giving you back to them, Tech,” Echo said with fierce determination, and for a second, Tech could almost feel it himself. “You’re never going back there. But you need your rest.”

Tech met Echo’s eyes with exhausted desperation. Even though he wanted to stay here forever, the shadows of stasis or sleep or whatever his unconscious state was these days were closing in, he could tell. It… no. HE. He had so little left to keep fighting with.

“I’ll be right here when you wake up again. How’s that sound?”

Tech’s heart was still pounding, everything about his existence felt bleary and heavy, but there was such blinding sincerity on his vod’s face. He… he wanted to believe him…

“You’ll stay?” Tech asked in a voice that was barely a whisper.

“Of course, vod,” Echo said with so much gentleness, unlike anything Tech had heard in years. “Right now there’s nowhere else I’d want to be.”

Tech considered that as his eyelids began to droop. “Omega?” He muttered.

“She’ll be back soon. I couldn’t keep her away if I tried.”

Tech nodded. His eyes wouldn’t stay open anymore. His body ached, his mind was exhausted and pained, its failures of the day and looming fate sapped it of whatever strength it had left. Darkness closed in, and he would simply have to face it…

Echo’s hand was still warm in his own, though, even as his world finally went black and numb once again. Somewhere at the edge of his mind, he even thought he heard Omega’s laugh.

For the briefest second, before stasis overtook it, Tech let himself hope his family would still be there if he woke up again.

Chapter 1: Existing Isn’t Living (But It’s Better Than Being Dead… Right?)

Chapter 2: Serving Purpose (This Might Be Banthashit)

Chapter 3: When A Supply Run Goes Horribly Wrong (Or Right?)

Chapter 4: It Must Still Be Dreaming (Cause The Empire Reeeally Skimps On Love And Comfort)

[branded-perceptions]

Motivating vs justifying reasons:

without motivation no observation which simultaneously is an ACTION

that in the realm of quantum scale is bound to via subjective decision of observation SIMULTANEOUSLY ACT UPON / alter objective reality in order to measure it which we then justify / explain subjectively via our reductionistic (like a computer compressing) consciousness made up of fictional numeric and linguistic SYMBOLS🎅 that we collectively our subjective emotions attach to

our social desires (and the resulting actions that alter reality according to) what we subjectively long for and thus collectively compete to create (and "race" for / chase mimetically wanting "more" ... "mehr") like past colonialism is defined by HOW / what we "observe" and make sense of ... the socio-psychological metaphor "Quantum observer effect" at "SCALE" (double-entendre: dimension vs "SEEsaw"⚖️) which requires proactive metacognitive BALANCE to make sure in by our habits

(what we "SEE" depends on the filtering of our mind symbols whose order and connotations depend on what we "SAW" in the past)

defined motivational competitions' psychotically self-justifying in-group identity "races" (competitive group chases for via shared symbols convergerted goals, behaviours and identities) collective attention shadows happens no injust causal abuse like "racism".

a behaviour or moral in-group justification that to one group ("kin") appears as "kind" or "go(o)d"🤥😷😇 might appear to another "party" or group ("kin") as "hatred" or "bad": these PSYCHOLOGICAL "quantum fluctuations" in "deCOHERENCE" (📚Free energy principle by Karl Friston) of in-groups' symbolic (sinn bolic) understandings can now be better conveyed and discussed via help of music pattern bridging logos, mythos and underlying emotions, metaphorically flirting with each other's sense-makings instead of physically fighting:

our subjective sense-makings are constructed via and defined by our collective sense-makings and emotionally stabilised via grouped🏟👏👏👏 symbolic🎅 constructs' argumentative team identitifications. No one of us has ever had an "independent" or "individual" mind, but tend to arrogantly believe otherwise. But some introspect more than others and thus learn to evaluate and especially in moral contexts (Immanuel Kant) create social differentiations and symbolic groupings more autonomously with an intrinsic compass.

Everything we think or communicate is inevitably a lie to a certain degree as we are bound to need to compress data of objective systems reality in order to fit into reductionistic psychological symbolic🎅 representations of it like linguistics or algebra that thus has inevitable blind spots as explored by Higher topos theory Jacob Lurie which we can only strive to handle responsibly via proactive curiosity about subjective UNfamiliarity of everything that might not be represented by familiARITY (in-group identifications "ARITY master functions" as used in AI-TECH) of our symbolic subjective perceptions and interpretations of objective reality.

Irony is the mimetic tool to communicate and dialectically evolve that: both linguistically and mathematically (ponder about the meaning of mathematic 0).

the emotional charging of dominance of linguistic / numeric symbolic🎅 constructs' explanatory reductionism of an in-group define what "MATTERS" to / is perceived as "real" (matter) and worthy of pursued by them, emotionally calibrating their motivations and out of this resulting curvature of psychotic justifications we tend to confuse with reason: 🔍list of psychological (group) biases.

https://twitter.com/BEFREEtoSEE/status/1788485006567850320

[catty-words]

because my ever after (2011) list helped me find the marianas trench corner of tumblr and i want to celebrate being among my people and also because i simply cannot resist the allure of this format as one ideal for expressing my appreciation for music on which my brain likes to chew,

a non-exhaustive list of things i love about masterpiece theatre (2009):

- themes!!!! this album’s exploration of performance vs authenticity is its beating heart and like, i’ve gotten the sense that it’s the work that really carved the band’s name into the tree trunk of canada’s popular music scene - nevermore to leave there (heyooo) - which makes the bitterness that runs through the album’s veins so so potent. this album is biting me biting me biting me and i never want it to stop

- how the title functions as a mission statement. one of the identifying characteristics of the band’s work following this album, and arguably* including this album, is that it’s serving at least forty percent theatre at all times

“masterpiece theatre i”

- first of all, the fact that this album includes a piece that has three separate movements (and the way this makes ‘symphonic rock’ the objectively correct way to sort marianas trench into a genre thank you very much)

- the tune-up is such a nice touch, why lie? yes kings, i am on the edge of my velvety seat, i am at the theatre!!

- please note that when i mentioned captivating prologues being a hallmark of the band’s work, i was thinking of “masterpiece theatre i” as the next best example to “ever after”

like, a thesis statement for an album what could be better?? the performer (i am consciously separating the art from the artist, josh ramsay et. al., but i am also kissing you directly on the mouth) feels the curse of the performance as much as he can’t live without it.

- the line every word is calculated because the closer i look, the more i see the loving care with which every creative choice in the band’s discography was made so like. say👏 that👏

- the soft plosiveness of this is just a part i portray and how it makes the refrain really fun to sing along to, as well as all the more powerful as the performer’s greatest plea to his audience, that they recognize the divide between authentic self and performance

“all to myself”

- the punch to the face that is the transition from “masterpiece theatre i” to this song

- how it belongs among the ranks of the band’s most danceable numbers, i never can sit still listening to this one

- i’m half asleep, and i am wide awake because, yeah. constantly, forever.

- ostensibly, the way it’s about a romantic relationship, but like.

you can just as easily read the chorus in the context of the performer speaking to his audience. the push of “isn’t the very act of creating art asking for attention, we’re only giving you what you want”, the pull of “if i’m constantly performing for you, when does the mask end and my truest self begin?” we - audience - are literally making the performer feel like someone else.

- this isn’t what i wanted but / i can’t keep my filthy fuckin’ mouth shut firstly because it fucks!!! but also because of how it fits into the album’s larger theme. fame isn’t what the performer wanted, but quite literally he’s not keeping his fucking mouth shut! he is in the act of making music for us! biting me biting me biting me

- chorus variation to round out a song, my beloved

“cross my heart”

- the way this song bewitches me into doing some bastardization of the hand jive every freaking time

- however you would describe these three bad bitches and their contributions to the structure of the song

- just the whiny, slutty energy of this one in general and how well the little bursts of guitar string feedback build up this feeling throughout the number

- the way and i do want to show you, i / will run to you, to you, til i / can’t stand on my own anymore sets the stage (theatre!!) for the speaker/performer/narrator’s pervasive attitude toward relationships and how he’s constantly swept up in the capital R-Romance of this conception of love while simultaneously having to unlearn it for the sake of his beloved, album in and album out

- how the clapping and then the music phases back in during the bridge

“beside you”

- y’all ever croon?

- this is not going to be accessible to anyone else but it’s my list so. the lyric when it’s in your spine like you’ve walked for miles because so much of my logged marianas trench time has taken place while i’m working, moving between my silly lil dog walks and i’m literally walking for miles and do occasionally very much feel it in my spine

- the words you want are out of reach, but they’ve never been so loud for the way it captures something so small and yet so profoundly true about being a person

“acadia”

- nostalgia!!! and how this song is the album’s first attempt to unpack the authentic self in the performance vs authenticity dynamic. is who i was when my childhood home was my one and only home my one and truest self?

- just like. the way i wonder about the names dropped and how my curiosity necessarily plays into the album’s theme. if they’re real people the performer knows, then he’s shilling out something intimate in an attempt to heighten his art - though, to be fair, he’s doing it in a way that’s not completely accessible to us, there’s only so much to a name itself - but if the names are completely made up, then the performer is merely playing at authenticity to bait us into reading intimacy in his art. and doesn’t that make your brain want to eat itself?? biting me biTING ME BITING ME

- god, the way this song is so well-accomplished at bottling nostalgia because like every memory comes on / when i hear that old song / that we used to sing / with the words all wrong immediately evokes thousands of moments that have tied me back to my childhood. this song really said ‘the power of music!!’ and then repeatedly knocked me on my ass with the truth of that screaming crying throwing up etc.

- not to keep harping on this, i know you guys get it, but like, the way ran out of gas on the highway / we walked there, and i gave / drunken speeches / on sobriety makes me feel like i’m part of this anecdote! i’m there, recalling that stupid speech alongside the performer. stop pulling me so close if you don’t want more kisses directly on the mouth!!!

“masterpiece theatre ii”

- the way the first verse reads as a direct response to “acadia”

after giving us so much of himself, the performer’s inclination is now to draw back

- the way the whole movement feels almost bashful compared to its powerhouse counterparts because more than the other two, “masterpiece theatre ii” is about the performer considering his performance from the audience’s perspective, about his understanding that he’s beckoned us closer but, regrettably, still can’t bring us all the way inside for how that’d destroy him.

- the refrain i’ll burn out and slip away posing the questions to the audience: can we forgive the performer when, eventually, he no longer has more art to offer us? can we turn around and recognize his humanity like he’s acknowledging ours?

“sing sing”

- how the brash opener - can i have your attention? - reads particularly cheeky coming off “masterpiece theatre ii”, where the performer just cautioned us that too much of our attention causes him to slip further and further away, and sets the bratty tone of the whole number perfectly, perfectly

- nothing captures the performer’s feelings about his relationship with his audience as succinctly as the “sing sing” chorus

this is destroying his health, but he still wishes that he were an endless well for us, full of freshness and vitality and all that we need

- just, obsessed with hear the sad little sounds as they fall from my mouth because i DO i AM

- the way the song’s brattiness comes out especially in the bridge. i’m partial to the whininess of gets very hard to drink to my continued success because like, boo hoo. i can’t toast to how popular i am :( it comes at the cost of being adored by you :(

- don’t you ever tell me i’m not loving you best because i WOULDN’T you DO

“good to you”

- GOD but the way they literally invited an audience member (i.e. a fan) to join the performance?? the way that heightens the tenderness this song has for the performer-audience relationship, even as both parties are actively getting a lil messed up by it?? gonna just drape myself on a fainting couch for a minute

- the way the chorus reinforces this read, especially when the performer and the audience sing it as one

hello????

- the way looking at the song through this lens literally just reframed the lyrics i thought i saw a sign / somewhere between the lines for me. here we are, experiencing recognition of the self in the performer’s art and thereby forging an intimacy he has no access to. AHHH!

- so yeah, every love song on this album is actually about the complex love between performer and audience. we are the object of our favorite band’s affection!! we are corrupting each other with our codependency!! ain’t love grand?

“celebrity status”

- they didn’t have to make our return to bitterness for the way performance muddles identity so sexy, but they did and they did it for me, to make sure this album never stops BITING ME

- the PANTING and how evocative it is and, like, yeah, you got me josh ramsay et. al. put me in horny jail, i am once again fuckstruck by your music. but you’re the ones who made it this way so do not pass go, do not collect two-hundred dollars

- the lyrics trading in who i’ve been for shiny celebrity skin / i like to push it and push it until my luck is over because once more with the succinctness of this album’s theme but also because it builds on the drunken speeches on sobriety moment in acadia by making me feel like i know the performer being invited as i am to share a wry laugh over how Much he is at any given moment

- the way i wonder why, why, wonder why, why i oughta / let you wreck, resurrect whatever you wanna tastes

- for all the sexy sardonic tone of this number, there’s a beautiful little ray of hope in the line there’s a piece of me they’re throwing back at us if only for the way it builds on fix me (2006)‘s refrain of the speaker losing bits of himself (see: “say anything”, “september”) by implying that the performance, despite the sea of inauthenticity he sometimes finds himself drowning in, offers the performer the chance to know himself better. it’s a refracted image because of the audience, but he does get to experience recognition of the self in his art, too.

- the way hope also lives in the i’m trying refrain. overwhelmed and cynical about the odds, the performer is still putting forth the effort to be authentic, still putting forth the effort to create art. you gotta keep running up that hill, bitch!

“perfect”

- the seamless fade of “celebrity status” into this song

- if the point’s to never disappoint you / somebody’s got to tell me what to do because it’s very real and it makes me want to pull my hair out in chunks!!!

- i love how pointed the inclusion of this bit

feels because, on one level, “perfect” is about cultivating your image and your art until it’s as appealing as it could possibly be to the masses, and so borrowing a line from the far less polished and palatable (affectionate) “sicker things” builds on that in a delicious way

“lover dearest”

- first of all, shoutout to their ‘live from inside’ concert for unlocking the power of this number for me and, like, i am once again unwittingly roped into active participation in this album’s theme but!! can we grapple for a sec with how watching a performance - seeing the performer laid raw, specifically - is what woke me up to the emotional core of this number?? 😬

- so. you know how some words can be used often enough in a sexy enough context that you can’t help your pavlovian response to them? they lowkey get you hot no matter how they’re brought up? josh ramsay et. al. are responsible for making ‘taste’ one of these words for me (this time that we waste, but i still love your taste)

- the way i’ll just try to hide it, or i could slip into you / it’s so easy to come back into you builds on the “masterpiece theatre i” refrain of you’re beautiful / can i hide in you awhile? and how in general this song really shines a light on the codependent nature of the performer-audience relationship. the fact that this song is also about struggle with addition is like - woof - the performer traded his old vice for the thrill of the performance and amassing an audience and have i mentioned lately? BITING ME BITING ME BITING ME.

- the leave me wail. reblog, you agree.

- how the bitter in you and the quitter in me / is bitter in you and the quitter in me being reminiscent of the “shake tramp” bridge makes my brain go brrrr

“masterpiece theatre iii”

- the way the tinkling xylophone (??) intro automatically brings the drama. i am once again on the edge of my velvety seat!!

- the i’ll wreck this if i have to / tell me what good would that do / i’ll wreck this if i have to refrain being followed-up by a creeping couple bars of i’d be so good to you and how it’s a call and response between the performer and his audience. consenting to the wreckage of the masterpiece is how we, the audience, can be good to the performer. it’s how we could show our most unselfish love.

- how weaving “celebrity status” into “cross my heart” continues to highlight the album’s interest in the act of creating art being essential to the performer’s personhood while the audience’s act of consuming the artist alongside the art turns around and cheapens the performer’s identity all in the same breath

- and then also how the outro makes explicit the connection between “lover dearest” and “masterpiece theatre i”

and the way it all adds up to acknowledge the codependence without resolving it??

- and then these motherfuckers have the audacity to sprinkle on a dash of “say anything” (that’s the thing i’m sensitive about!!!!!!)?? the way i never took you for a trick but sometimes i don’t know what you want serves as the performer’s last acknowledgement that he needs to hold the audience at arm’s length because our want for his art is so monumental that it threatens to overshadow him???? the way i could take it if you need to take this out on someone beckons us closer one last time, invites us to use the art as a mirror????????? UNFAIR, I AM GNASHING MY TEETH

*in conclusion: all these songs being in conversation with one another gives the album a really satisfying cohesion and sets up what’s to come in the band’s later works, though it ironically lacks the rising and falling action that’d convince me to count it among the more theatrical pieces in their discography. it’s my rotten soldier, my sweet cheese, my good time boy, and either my second or third favorite marianas trench album, depending on what day you ask me.

[whythehailnot]

Hi! I'm a woman who is 5'10 and 315lbs, and i absolutely relate to your post. When i was in middle school, people used to dare each other to ask me out, because they thought it would be funny + they knew i was perpetually single. (I was also a lesbian and didn't know it yet, but that's beside the point.) Before my current gf (who is amazing and wonderful and thinks I'm the hottest woman alive), i wouldn't be approached by anybody but the occasional Black gentleman of the sort who chases bigger white women (such as myself) because he is misogynoirist + thinks we're more likely to be unaware of/tolerate his shit, or once, memorably, by a random female coworker (with a whole entire long term boyfriend) who wanted me to "step on her" because she assumed I'd want to because I'm goth and bigger than her. It's really fucking disheartening the way I'm treated as either completely repulsive or a Fetish Object, and people who are skinny absolutely Do Not Get point C on your post. Because they're skinny, they have the privilege of remaining largely oblivious to what fat people, especially fat women, are subjected to, except for how they know damn well how we're treated with how scared they are of winding up fat themselves. Their obsession with skinniness and the desperate maintenance thereof proves they know that fat people are treated like absolute shit, they just don't care as long as they get to maintain their position of privilege.

Sorry if this is a little incoherent/offtopic. Hang in there, buddy. You'll meet your special somebody one of these days <3

Oh man, I also was subject to the middle school pranks of boys asking me out as a laugh 🙄 ughhh I hate that you also dealt with that but BOY is it validating to read someone else with such a similar experience! 😔👏✨✨

And god with your two other experiences with misogynoirist men and being treated as a kink dispenser for that coworker - absolutely sickening and SO disheartening - you completely nailed it on the head and I'm so sorry you've dealt with both of these 😩😩😩 God forbid that you're fat and also goth (or alternative to any extent) - some people just have to go and make the weirdest fucking assumptions over it (and fetishize you in the process of course, yuck 🙄😩)

I feel lucky that I'm surrounded by more supportive friends nowadays (even if some of the fat experiences really aren't understood), because god the amount of people I knew who basically treat fat people as an accessory is awful - whether they are aware of it or not. And accessory ranging from making themselves feel like a good person (diversity hire), or to be used as a means to make themselves feel more attractive by comparison, which is so diabolical.

Anyways - I hope my response wasn't incoherent! Your post was definitely clear and I appreciate you sharing your experience 🙏💖💖💖 It sounds like things are better with you and I hope they continue to just get more lovely! 🙏💕💕💖💖💖 You're so kind to share this and I really appreciate the support so much! 🥺🙏💕💕💖💖💖

[kybelles]

while i understand your point about the slavery system VS the pet system, i think it’s important to remember that what a character thinks ≠ the author thinks, so i don’t think it’s fair to judge pacat’s character off of a series that has intentionally morally grey characters.

about the actual point, laurent said that a pet has more of a choice than a slave, which is objectively/legally true in the capri world (though of course not *actually* true, considering children can’t consent under any circumstance). while at face value this seems like a strange thing to say regardless, i think the reason *why* Laurent in particular said it has to be considered. It’s pretty clear that Laurent at least partially blames himself for the abuse he suffered at the hands of the regent (i.e. when he said that auguste was the only one in his family free of taint, implying he had it himself), and so in my opinion, it seems that he still holds the belief that it’s possible for someone under his, aimeric’s, or nicaise’s circumstances to have a choice, because he believes that he did (even though we the readers know he didn’t). it’s his own self-blame that seems to have leaked into his opinions on the pet system as a whole, which of course doesn’t justify his way of thinking, but i don’t think it was exactly meant to be justified either. again, laurent is a very morally grey character, who i don’t believe is meant to reflect the morals of either the author or the reader.

not saying you’re wrong, just wanted to give my two cents

this was a lovely read! 👏

i have no notes except for the part about pacat: of course i’m aware a character’s thoughts don’t always align with the author’s actual views (tho i believe pacat used self insert in a lot of areas in this series but that’s another convo) but i believe it did fell on her to condemn the pet system the same way she did slavery. even if she didn’t have enough space in kr she could’ve tackled this issue easily in taoc. the way she left things in canon feels very unfinished to me. like even a line or two about damen and laurent changing the law to protect pets better alongside of abolishing the slavery would have been sufficient.

[gaymer-hag-stan]

Fighting Games is a genre that I have always loved because they allow for unique player expression like no other genre. You get a wide selection of characters to choose from hailing from various different countries and practicing different styles of martial arts or even wielding melee weapons.

We've been lucky to have gotten tons of different games to choose from, and I have personally singled out the nine most vital franchises to the genre; the pillars of the fighting game community, if you will. Unfortunately, I only get ten options per poll, so games like Killer Instinct, Marvel vs. Capcom or Injustice have been left out. But that's why the tenth option has been left free of choice, as I'm sure that some of you will have the most obscure niche options in mind and will immediately comment "why is X not here" so there.

I'm also not deliberately ignoring Super Smash Bros., I just have traditional fighting games in mind and it's kinda not. But it's very much still a fighting game.

I'm also specifically talking about series of games and not one offs so that's why no Skullgirls and so on.

Anyway, at the end of the day vote for whatever you like, just don't bust my balls about "excluding" your fave 🤣

Really wish I could add:

A. More options

and

B. Images to the options to make them look prettier.

But overall I think polls have been a great addition. Good job @staff 👍😁👏

Here's a few general thoughts

I have a weird relationship with Mortal Kombat. My earliest memory of it must be some older kids next to my grandma's house playing MK4 and letting me watch them play for a while. Then I definitely remember the PS2 era games' covers and the video store, the dragon logo is so cool, but I never actually bothered to pick any of them. Until I got the 2011 game when I had a PS3. I liked it a lot, I kinda liked the story but I never understood the normies obsession with it? And here's a hot take; NRS stories are not that good, certainly not any better than any other fighting game like Tekken or SoulCalibur. The only key difference is that they have relatively good writing, while the rest of the major game, which are mostly Japanese, have cringey anime dialogue that absolutely does not fit the dramatic NRS storytelling everyone has been trying to copy post 2011. I wish they would straight up drop it and go back to having a decent, eight-level minimum arcade mode with character endings and stop trying to do what NRS does, because it's not that great to begin with. Anyway, I have since developed a love-hate relationship with it. I got both X and 11, and while both are objectively good games, with 11 FINALLY even making the characters look not ugly for the first time ever, but I think I've kind of moved on from MK. I don't have any attachment to the overall plot, I only mostly care about Mileena, Kitana and co., I mostly prefer 3D fighting games in general and I'm not that good at it so... Yeah. Still a fan series though, both the Reboot Trilogy as well as the, mostly underappreciated, PS2 trilogy.

I was born in 1997 and arcades weren't really a thing in Greece? I remember only having seen a Tekken 5 cabinet at a bowling alley in my entire life, so I never got to experience the "birth" of fighting games with Street Fighter, and Street Fighter itself was almost completely absent from the PS2, save for a few Alpha and SFII rereleases I think. So I finally got to play Street Fighter during the later years of it's fourth iteration when I got Ultra Street Fighter IV for the PS3. I was VERY frustrated at the beginning like, I was used to Tekken, DOA and SoulCalibur style gameplay, all of which are 3D but also combo-heavy games. Street Fighter was not that at all and I thought this made it a bad game. But I decided to give it a second chance with Street Fighter V. SFV is, perhaps notoriously, more simplified in both it's inputs as well as it's overall difficulty, so it helped me appreciate the series a lot more. Most of the characters no longer look ugly too (heavy emphasis on MOST) so that helped too. What's more, I can now actually play IV a lot better, and I even had money to spare to get Super Turbo II HD and Third Strike for the PS3, though I do struggle a bit with those too still, Third Strike in particular. Street Fighter X Tekken is also my guilty pleasure, don't @me. My only real issue is that I seem to be mostly interested in the "less regular" characters in the series like Elena or Poison or Laura which means that I have to find a new main in every single game and... I really don't care for most of the cast, especially the ones who seem to be featured on most of the games and never skip an entry.

I've been playing Tekken since I was 8 or 9 years old and got Tekken 5, the first fighting game I ever owned and I've been obsessed ever since. I love the gameplay because I feel like the four-limb system feels so natural, you know? If you press the X button you get a left kick, if you press the Δ button you get a right punch. It's so simple. Nina Williams is probably my favourite video game character ever, after Lara Croft, and I just really the series as a whole. It's also the only game I feel confident enough to play online atm.

For some reason I was always vaguely aware of The King of Fighters existence since around 2010-2011 but I never felt the desire to play it? Mai was added in Dead or Alive 5 however and I absolutely loved her. I played so much as her. But as far as picking up her own games... Well... KOFXIV looked like shit and I'd heard that XIII, and KOF in general, was very difficult so that was a bit off-putting. After falling out of love with MK however, I had to feel the gap. And along came KOFXV! I was still not completely sold, but I had money to spare and I got the game and I now love the series so much? Definitely my favourite 2D fighting game series. I wasted so many years gatekeeping myself out of playing the games but, honestly, while I sometimes buy things on impulse, the money I can spend on games is a very specific and limited amount so I always try to actually buy things that I will actually play and enjoy. XV is fun, but it turns out the "ugly" KOFXIV and the difficult XIII are even more fun! Shout-out to KOF for having an amazing cast of characters too. Even with Tekken which has been with me since childhood there are TONS of characters I straight up hate or just don't care about. KOF has over 90 characters and the ones I actually hate are probably fewer than Tekken's. This is certainly not a quantity over quality case (the yearly release for the first decade of the series was insane though, I don't know why they thought that was a good idea)

SoulCalibur is another series I loved since childhood but this one I didn't personally own until my late teens. A friend's uncle had a Dreamcast however, and when he would visit him in the summer he would bring it over and we would play SoulCalibur a lot! I have several reservations about Namco basing the series entire marketing on "who's the guest this time?" and later on the character creation. The sole focus should be on the characters themselves, because SoulCalibur has the most detailed and complex backstories in fighting games. Period. But because SoulCalibur has devolved into an overglorified character creator and the guests get the only media focus the game is gonna get during its promotional period, I feel like the brand itself has lost its mainstream appeal. SoulCalibur I is one of the best fighting games, and it has zero guests and no customization, other than being able to choose different weapons for each character. Have your guests by all means, I personally had tons of fun with Ezio and 2B, and Haohmaru even peaked my curiosity for Samurai Shodown, and customization can be fun too, but don't make it your main selling point. It has evidently not been working as well as Namco wants it to. Tekken and Mortal Kombat have guests and customization too, but they're not the games main selling point, they only help bring in additional fans.

Dead or Alive is the booby pervy game, sure, but it's also a great fighting game? The fast-paced gameplay is extremely fun and satisfying, most of the cast is actually pretty interesting, despite the sexy outfits and bikinis and beach volleyball, and whenever there's a new DOA in the market it it will always be the best-looking fighting game available at the time. There's no contest. I had tons of fun playing DOA2 as a kid and I had tons of fun playing DOA5 as an adult, because since DOA became Xbox-exclusive for a while, I never actually owned DOA3 or DOA4. I wish I could have had more fun with DOA6 too but the game is just... Soulless, and that's a shame. The fact that both DOA and SoulCalibur are unlikely to get sequels any time soon is also very heartbreaking.

I was way past my anime phase when I became aware of Guilty Gear's existence, so I was at first hesitant of checking it out. However, a chain of events led me to eventually get Rev 2. See, Haohmaru was a guest on SoulCalibur VI, and Baiken was a guest in Samurai Shodown and I guess you see where I'm going with is. This is why guests should absolutely not go away, but it is much better they remain actual (fighting) video game characters first and foremost and not stupid horror movie characters that haven't been relevant for decades (fuck every single MK12 guest, but especially RoboCop) Rev 2 is so much fun. It's still hard however, so I'm not yet ready to fully embrace Guilty Gear, but Strive looks more and more appealing each day is all I'm saying. Jack' O and I-No may have helped.

Virtua Fighter forever revolutionized the genre by moving things for the first time in the third dimension. I only had a VF4 demo as a kid and I was creeped out by having to fight Shun Di, a drunken old creepy guy, in a dark cave on a raft as Sarah so I never touched the series again until 5. The game is really fun and I will forever be grateful for it because it eventually lead to Tekken and DOA's creation, but while MK having a "good" story mode does not automatically make it a good game, Virtua Fighter having NO story mode, not even arcade endings, doesn't help it's case all that much either.

I've been contemplating trying out BlazBlue lately, Rachel, Taokaka and especially miss Litchi look really promising, but I'm trying to let the thought mature in my mind first rather than making an impulse purchase. I haven't played enough of any of its installments to have an opinion on it, but I know tons of people love it so it must have a few things going on for it, right?

Shout-out again to Samurai Shodown, I love the "fencing" aspect of its gameplay, but I'm just not as invested to it's cast as I am in KOF's yet. I've also always wanted to try out Darkstalkers but Capcom seems to be hellbent on wanting to make this franchise DIE. I don't understand why they don't at least start adding it's cast in Street Fighter as "permanent guests", in the same spirit as Final Fight characters keep on coming back. Morrigan is too good a character to be left to rot. I'd also love to try Killer Instinct, but it's another Xbox exclusive so RIP. Finally, I do own the first Injustice, but American comic book super heroes have always been morbidly boring to me (except Spiderman and Batman & co.) so, consequently, both Injustice and Marvel vs. Capcom are of no interest to me at all.

[justin-peudeau]

WHY THE LIVING HELL DOES THETA HOLD HER GUN LIKE THIS

WHY ?!?!??!?!?

I was busy drowing THAT scene. And my little sister (who draw better than me 😅) saw how I drew the gun and though that I was stoopid 😭.

More seriously, Theta hold her gun in this position at the second when she get arrested. She planified so accurately that she will be arrested, that even the Prince disappearance wasn't distracting enough to makes her forgot to hold her hands up like this when the bodyguards arrived.

So she totally did it on purpose ! IT'S A CODE FOR HER TEAM GUYS, SHE MAY HELP ASK TO SOMEONE ELSE THAN SARKOV IN THE FUTURE!!!

With THAT in mind, listen 👏CaReFuLLy👏what👏I👏 am👏going👏to👏say !!!

One thing that our godess Theta need for survive in this situation is teamwork. Because, since this right instant, Theta is now weaker than the Prince.

She CAN'T defeat him all by herself now.

Before, if Tserriednich wanted to assault her, she could have avoided it. But not now. In this appartment, Theta's fate is completely dependant to the Prince will.

BUT.

Our bad old Tserriednich never thinks to kill Theta yet. Plus even his nen-beast wants to preserve her in an "alive" state. So exactly like Theta and Sarkov deduced, she still had plenty of time to readjusts her objectives.

Tserrie is totally playing with her like he usually do for the other women he tortured before. By the way ,it will be so interesting to understand the process of how he usually goes to

Point A:

To point B:

But of course, things will go wrong this time, because Theta is different. And so will be her fate.

Indeed, unlike the other women:

1. She is the one who had the intention to kill first .

2. She is at the head of her agressor's protection squad. And with THIS code, Togashi shows that she creates a particular bond with her team that Tserrie don't have (We never see Tserrie using secret code to communicate to his employees. In fact, it's the opposite, he is often super cash while talking to them).

This code shows that some bodyguards are fine with being secretive around Tserriednich because they trust communication with Theta more. We don't know how many of them think like this, nor how many would love her enough to sacrifice themselves to follow/save Theta instead of being obedient to the Prince only.

But it still a really great point that Theta is less alone in her mission that it seems to be. Because the only hope I see in her survival is a solid teamwork for escape the appartment and found other strong parters willing to kill the Prince (Morena and her gang maybe 👀).

So Tserrie's plans to slowly torture her until the point of no return in humanity will certainly be overly more complicated because, as I said before, Theta is intelligent AS FUCK so she will for sure mess up with his planifications in some way.

.

.

.

Anyways thank you guys for reading 🤩. I only have hope for my dear Theta. I know our bad charming Prince is OP as fuck, but he still have a main weakness which is ignorance. I know even more that my wife Theta sure have soooooo much other secrets in her sleeves that will plays against him. 😁✌

Don't hesitate to ask me questions or add some informations or analysis if you want ! 😊 Bye bye 👋

[struggle-but-its-all-ocean-floor]

You ate 👏 I agree with everything you said. Something I did want to comment on is about Taehyung's popularity. I'm surprised you didn't think he was that popular 😱 This is just my theory, but I think something that really hindered Tae was the dating stuff. Yes, his music isn't that GP-friendly, but I do feel if the dating rumors didn't surface, he would have had more support, which is sad because fans shouldn't abandon him for being human. Do you think if Jungkook got into a dating scandal he'd lose popularity?

I've been Army for 4 years. I promise I'm not baby Army - I have to at least be a teenager by now! But it's so easy for me to underestimate V's popularity because he's so difficult to understand or connect to at times. He's adorable, weird, funny, goofy, sweet, a good dancer, handsome, charming, unique, has sweet vocals, etc. but his quirks can also act like barriers too, making him seem cold, distant or unapproachable at times to me. He's also a bit inconsistent on stage in terms of dancing. For all these reasons, I just don't fully understand the depth of his popularity. Jungkook and Jimin's popularity is super easy for me to grasp. However, while V's popularity makes perfect sense, sometimes I don't get it? Our personalities are too different. Plus, to me V was the member doing the "least" in chapter 2, since all he did was a variety show, photoshoots, attend fashion events. None of that was interesting or particularly impactful to me, so I assumed that Jikook's popularity had increased a lot more than his. But seeing him promote Layover I'm reminded of why he's so popular and why I love him so much. He's just hard for me to understand, you know?

So, yeah, I don't follow V biased Armys on twitter, and I don't see a lot of discussions about him because of it, making it even easier for me to underestimate his power. I'm not sure the dating rumors had any real impact on his career. Objectively, I think he performed as well as he could've under the circumstances, and a lot of fans chose denial anyway - Taekookers are still going strong lmao. I'm not V biased and didn't see any discourse about the dating, but, as a Jungkook stan, I can imagine the shit show a dating rumor would be. But Jungkook's had a few "scandals" recently, like the drinking in lives, the vaping and now the smoking, plus the Seven lyrics and MV (a near equivalent to a dating scandal), and he's doing better than ever. It seems most fans stick around regardless of their disappointment or dissatisfaction (and denial is a very real, very powerful coping mechanism that many Armys swear by). Jungkook's image change has also attracted tons of new fans. So, a dating rumor wouldn't hurt him imo, but a dating scandal that is all but official would have a much greater impact on the fanbase. He would be fine though, I think. It'd all really depend on the "scandal" was handled - if nothing was confirmed vs. if Hybe confirmed the rumors, or if Jungkook himself explained the situation to the fans. I don't know...

Thanks for the ask!

[luckyqueenreign]

major 🤡 alert!

Hey, HELP A GIRL OUT PLEASE i’m stuck in the love triangle with Suresh and Alfie. I KNOW! I’M DOWN BAD BUT hear me out. I actually really liked Alfie in the beginning and wasn’t even thinking about Suresh (hated him to be exact) but we all know what happened how the season progressed. Plus i’ve been reading y’all’s theories and everything on here and yeah that resulted in this. I literally tried to make myself hate Suresh over the past two months so bad but god dammit i just can’t do it 😭Every damn time when i was finally like okay there’s no way i’m taking him back (especially after i found out about Gabi coming in, their relationship and him switching to Lulu from the scripts) i open tumblr AND IT’S BACK AGAIN. Alfie looked like a way better option to me even after kissing Kat but recoupling with Meera after Casa was my last straw. Suresh on the other hand… we know damn well what was happening in the last 2 months. We all figured that in this season we simply gotta pick the least bad option so i feel like they’re both as bad as each other and i just don’t know who to go for. Plus their routes are literally 👏mirroring👏.These theories about them feeling like they don’t deserve MC break my heart even though they did her well dirty. Final recoupling is probably about to be next week and i’m over here on the biggest fence ever. I know it’s probably not a good idea asking this here (where a lot of Suresh stans are) but i would be beyond grateful if you could look at it objectively and try to find some advice 😭coz i’m dying over here. Thank you so much for reading this, have a nice day! <3

OK girly i'm going to try soooo hard to be impartial but I'm so not an Alfie girl so this may prove difficult for me 😩😬.

I also want to preface this by saying that when I was coupled with Alfie I took full advantage of that coupling to make Suresh jealous and I actually did start to like him. I found him super endearing and I felt bad that I was going to break his little heart...that is until he Cherrygated me 😡. And look did I kiss Suresh? Yeah I absolutely did! But Alfie wouldn't even wait two seconds to hear me out. And I've seen other girls post on here who did NOT kiss Suresh and when you didn't kiss him you had an option to tell Alfie nothing happened and he still didn't hear you out. BOO!!! I just also feel like with Alfie some of his words and actions don't line up. He tells you one day he wants to take things slow and the very next day is asking to do bits? He tells you two days in row he wants to end the summer with you, you're his only girl but then he kisses Kat and 2 days after that brings Meera back and is suddenly all about Meera. IDK for me... There just hasn't been enough of a redemption arc for Alfie like there has been for Suresh. And I'll get into his misgivings now. Suresh comes into the villa incredibly unapologetic and extremely cocky. It's clear he thinks that he's got this in the bag and he's going to win MC back, that these guys have absolutely no chance. But MC proves to be a bigger challenge than he originally anticipated and he's forced to deal with ALL of his demons. Suresh thinks he's changed before Arlo comes in but he obviously hasn't hes still acting the exact same way he was before. MC kisses/flirts with Alfie? He does the same with Arlo. He flirts with MC while with Arlo, which in it of itself is a dick move to both women (I mean I loved it...but im being impartial here It was a dick move) Then the whole casa speech. We all loved it but then NOTHING. We were all left scratching our heads confused like WTF happened to this man?? We all came up with theories to explain his odd behavior after Casa but then this week he confirmed our suspicions that he was hurting, he was struggling hard, but most of all he was SORRY. This man has never been this apologetic, this self-loathing without wanting anything in return. this man has properly changed, there's been growth and character development (I mean as much as there can be for a pixel game). I just dont feel like we see the same for Alfie.

But again take this info knowing I am not an Alfie girly. You may find an Alfie girly out there who will give you 845 reasons why he's redeemable and has had growth. 💖

[m4lice5un]

I watched the entirety of the Umbrella Academy. I had seen it before but wanted to watch the whole series before watching season 4

I don't think I've ever been more disappointed by the ending of a show - it was painfully bad

Spoilers ahead, not that I recommend watching season 4

In no particular order, here are my grievances

Allison got to negotiate details of the timeline they entered - why not include Sloan? What, she gets present day Ray but Luther can't have the woman he *literally* just married?

How did they not see the glowing liquid in their sake bombs?

Why is marigold a liquid at all? When Reg released it, it flew into the air

Klaus hit some waiter when he tossed his sake over his shoulder - did they not get affected by the marigold? Why?

Fuckin durango.. just.. why

How did the durango get into Jennifer?

During the original timeline's Jennifer incident - why did Reg send the Umbrellas? He very clearly has the resources to hire some merc group to blow up the container she was in. Why risk her coming into contact with them?

During the current timeline, why the town built to protect her? You telling me Reg isn't capable of child murder?

What in tf was up with they're powers?

Powers unchanged, but why did he get ape-ified? That had nothing to do with his powers

Powers unchanged

Can rumor people without speaking, which gets used once. Also acquires telekinesis...?

He can fly now

Can't jump thru space, but rather jumps into a subway that allows him to travel into other timelines. Cool concept, I admit, but come on - it's the last season - give me a sick ass Five fight scene

Tentacles come out of his back rather than his belly

Gone are the OP sound based powers. In it's place? A beam. Woo

Why did Klaus not even *try* to stay sober? It was clearly super important to him yet he immediately relapses as soon as he gets his powers back

What in the god damn was Jennifer doing, inviting Ben back in? Fuck him, he was a prick

No, really, why run away from lifelong friends with this dude you've known less than 2 hours?

Seriously, they had glowing rashes that were clearly from them touching. Why 👏 did 👏 they 👏 bang? 👏

Why have Allison save Klaus? Wouldn't it be a better story beat to have him make peace with the dead and conjure some dudes to dig him up? He's in a graveyard ffs

They gave Allison telekinesis... how that connects to rumoring people is beyond me

The cleanse, man. Just, like, wtf. All of a sudden there's this other magic substance, that counteracts the already established magic substance, somehow. It manifested in a girl who was found in a squid belly and instead of nipping the issue in the bud - Reg coordinated this massive effort for her to live in some backwater town

Does durango just 👋happen👋 whenever marigold is released? Why?

The last baddy in the series is a blob monster, omg

Five already had a compelling love interest, Dolores. I don't buy him and Lila hooking up. The show fumbled a chance to depict a healthy platonic friendship between those two and I'll never forgive them

Most importantly tho... The ending doesn't fit

The earlier seasons depict these deeply broken characters as being valuable in their own ways, as long as they practice compassion and offer each other room to grow. The Umbrellas are a tight knit group; it's shown again and again that the world is a better place with each of them in it

Soooooo... How does it all pan out? Turns out their existence is objectively harmful to everyone. So they decide to let themselves be consumed by the cleanse; erasing their existence entirely from the timeline. Except for Claire, and Diego's and Lila's kids. Feels super paradoxical to me, but hey, what do I know? I only just watched 3 seasons worth of explanation for why this kind of thing is, you know, bad

I gotta say tho, as a person with severe depression who's battled thoughts of self shutdown... What the fuck. The world *is* a better place without them? What kind of message is that? Shits hella disappointing

These are all just off the top of my head two weeks after watching it. I'm positive there's so much more I could nitpick if I watched it again. I genuinely wish it would've been cancelled instead of getting a last season with what we were given

If this series continues elsewhere, I hope it's an entirely different story. What we ended up with is an abomination of media, full stop

[kudosmyhero]

Giant-Size X-Men (vol. 1) #1: Deadly Genesis!

Read Date: June 18, 2023 Cover Date: May 1975 ● Writer: Len Wein ● Penciler: Dave Cockrum ● Inker: Dave Cockrum ◦ Peter Iro ● Colorist: Glynis Wein ● Letterer: John Costanza ● Editor: Len Wein ●

**HERE BE SPOILERS: Skip ahead to the fan art/podcast to avoid spoilers

Reactions As I Read: ● my first x-men comic ● Storm meets Professor X

● 👏👏👏

Synopsis: Chapter 1: Second Genesis

In Winzeldorf, Germany, an angry mob rages through the streets in search of a monster: the mutant Kurt Wagner. Kurt pleads that he only wants to be left alone, but the hysterical mob attack and overwhelm him through sheer numbers. Suddenly, the whole mob literally freezes in their tracks, subdued by Professor Charles Xavier’s telepathy. Xavier offers Kurt refuge at his school, which is a haven for mutants. Kurt asks if the Professor can make him normal, but he responds by asking if, after that night, he truly wants to be normal (i.e., like his persecutors). Kurt accepts the Professor’s invitation.

Quebec, Canada: Professor X visits a government base and meets Major Chasen and the mutant referred to as Weapon X, but better known as Wolverine. Charles offers Wolverine a chance to join him and become a free agent, an offer Wolverine accepts on the spot. Chasen objects but Wolverine officially resigns from duty by slicing off his tie. As Wolverine leaves, Chasen warns him this isn’t over.

Nashville, Tennessee: Banshee is attending a show at the Grand Ole Opry when he receives a telepathic message from the Professor with an urgent plea for help. He quickly agrees to do what he can.

Kenya, Africa: A woman named Ororo is being worshipped by local tribesmen as a rain/fertility goddess. Xavier approaches her with an offer he hopes she will not refuse. After listening to his request, she accepts.

Osaka, Japan: Xavier pays a visit to Sunfire, pitching him a similar offer. Sunfire is disinterested in helping white westerners, but reasons that he owes it to himself to test his abilities.

On a commune in Siberia, Farmer Piotr Rasputin is harvesting crops when a fellow farmhand notices a neighbor's tractor has gone out of control and is heading straight for Piotr’s young sister Illyana. As Piotr runs towards her, he transforms into a giant metal being. The tractor collides with him but is destroyed by the impact with Piotr’s metallic body. Xavier invites him to come to America to his school. Upon asking his parents’ permission, he accepts Xavier's offer.

Arizona: An Apache Indian, John Proudstar, chases a bison on the plain, easily chasing it down and tackling it. Xavier offers him acceptance into his school. Proudstar refuses to help a white man at first, but Professor X counters that perhaps he is just a coward. Infuriated, Proudstar accepts Xavier's offer in order to prove him wrong.

Chapter 2: And When There Was One

The seven disparate mutants meet at Xavier’s school in Westchester and are given new costumes composed of unstable molecules. A narrative caption relates that Professor X gave each of the international students instant fluency in English, via telepathy. Proudstar questions why Xavier has brought them together. Xavier introduces them to Cyclops, who makes a dramatic entrance sporting a new visor and slightly redesigned costume. He informs them that this new team of X-Men has been assembled to find and rescue the missing original team.

Cyclops shows them Cerebro, the mutant-detecting supercomputer which Xavier used to find them. A flashback depicts that just recently, Cerebro had alerted Professor X and the original team (Cyclops, Marvel Girl, Angel, Iceman, Havok, and Lorna Dane) to the existence of an extremely powerful mutant on the remote Pacific island of Krakoa. The team headed off to find this mutant (there is a passing mention to the Beast having departed from the team). Immediately upon their arrival, they were ambushed. Later, an amnesiac Cyclops awoke alone on the X-Men’s stratojet, which was already in flight on cruise control. His visor was missing but his eyes were inexplicably no longer emitting optic blasts. Upon returning to Xavier’s school, though, his optic blast began firing once again but with more power than ever; so much more power in fact that Professor X had to build a new visor for Cyclops to control them.

Sunfire initially refuses to participate on the rescue mission and flies off in a huff. The rest of the new members agree, however, and depart in the stratojet. In midair, though, the group see Sunfire flying alongside their plane. He boards it and tells Cyclops he’s changed his mind and will participate in the mission.

Chapter 3: Assault Force

As the Stratojet approaches Krakoa Isle, Cyclops directs the team to split up into pairs: Storm (Ororo) and Colossus (Piotr), Banshee and Wolverine, Sunfire and Nightcrawler (Kurt), and lastly Thunderbird (Proudstar) and Cyclops. There are minor disagreements and bickering among the new members, who are still just a pack of strangers to each other.

Cyclops and Thunderbird land the Stratojet and begin their search. They have barely begun exploring the island before the Stratojet vanishes inexplicably. Upon seeing a temple in the distance, they head towards it. En route, they are attacked by creeper vines but take care of them quickly.

Along the shore, Wolverine and Banshee are attacked by giant crabs. Elsewhere, Colossus and Storm trek toward the temple and are nearly struck by an avalanche. As they run for cover, the rocks follow them and Colossus uses a tree as a makeshift bat to swat them away. Finally, Nightcrawler and Sunfire battle a group of angry birds. Nightcrawler teleports around the attacking birds while Sunfire just blasts them. Each pair of heroes has spotted the temple and they all convene outside of it.

They enter the temple, busting through a pair of tightly-sealed doors. Inside, they find the missing X-Men. Weird tendrils bind the captives and appear to feed off them. The new team quickly gets their predecessors to (relative) safety outside. The Angel scolds Cyclops for returning. He explains that this was all just a trap. The ground shakes, the temple rises out of the ground, and the entire island moves. The X-Men had come to Krakoa to find a mutant, but that mutant is the island itself!

Chapter 4: Krakoa…the Island That Walks Like a Man

In a flashback, it is revealed that radiation from atomic tests near the island caused a host of mutations on the island’s indigenous life before the island itself eventually mutated into a single group-mind entity. Krakoa needs to feed off the life energies of other mutants and found the X-Men to be an excellent source of sustenance. It allowed Cyclops to escape in order to bring back more mutants, which he did.

James Howlett (Earth-616) from Giant-Size X-Men Vol 1 1 001 Krakoa launches an all-out assault on the combined teams. Despite the combined power of old X-Men and new, none of their attacks seem to affect the island. Professor X then intervenes via a telepathic message and tells Cyclops he thinks he knows of its sole weakness.

As Professor X attacks the island with his mind to distract its communal intellect, Storm flies into the sky and shoots electricity down into Lorna Dane, stimulating her magnetic powers. Fearing that the tactic may kill Lorna, Havok pleads with Cyclops to put a stop to it. But Cyclops tells his brother that he cannot risk the life of one woman, even the woman Alex loves, for the safety of the entire world. Suffering from fatigue, Professor X's assault falters and Krakoa regains its strength from the typhoon that Storm has created.

Scott and Alex combine their powers with Lorna's own and she directs it downward. Her magnetic power penetrates to the center of the Earth, causing Krakoa to cry out in terror. As everyone flees to safety, Iceman snatches up an unconscious Lorna, refusing to allow Havok to help her. This angers Havok, but Cyclops tells him to set aside their personal feud until later. As the island begins breaking up, everyone jumps onto Iceman's ice raft. Lorna has disrupted the magnetic energy in the vicinity of the island's location, effectively canceling out gravity. Krakoa is flung out into the vacuum of space. The ocean at its (now former) location churns into a swirling whirlpool.

Iceman covers his raft in an ice-bubble just before it is sucked into the whirlpool. Eventually, it breaks the (once again calm) ocean surface and the team emerges to find the Stratajet afloat nearby. After boarding the ship and flying off, slight disagreements that occurred between the new members are (almost) sorted out. Angel then ponders aloud to the assembled group what they will do with thirteen X-Men.

(https://marvel.fandom.com/wiki/Giant-Size_X-Men_Vol_1_1)

Fan Art: X-Men color by YamaOrce

Accompanying Podcast: ● Amazing Spider-Man Chronicles - episode 02