#you know its bad when i wish it would be silvio

[cherryisagamer]

a week of victories and defeats: first I finally managed to pull Yves' outfit from gacha!!

now you may be wondering what's this screenshot of that post of when I got Chevaliers card...

*cues to Joker music*

"at least it wasn't the other tiger"

Gilbert: And I took that personally

YOU ARE TAUTING ME YOU TIGER TWINK AND I HATE IT

and it was right when I switched the gacha poster to Keith bc he's my "relatively in good opinion" foreign prince out of the 3 to draw good luck... God, now I know Clavis pain

[scummy-writes]

Types of Gilbert & Various Hcs

I enjoy thinking about my favorite characters on a daily basis, if my brain allows for it. This generally leads to different versions of my favorite characters forming in order to explore AUs and other 'what if' scenarios. For Gilbert specifically, it's a scale of Normal Gilbert, More Obsessed Gilbert, and Fucked Up Gilbert. I said months ago I'd like to make a list compiling some different versions of Gilbert I think about, and share some Hcs with each type. People seemed interested, so I've decided to make a post for each version and just periodically update over time. This is all just for fun, so leave me alone if you dislike/disagree with stuff on this list. Otherwise, I'm happy to chat about them!

This post will focus on:

╰❧ Normal/default/'canon' Gilbert

This list will dive into spoilers, as well as some minor NSFW topics and topics of self harm.This is the type of Gilbert I write in The Beast's Torment, Gilbert in the Bath, This Is Love, Dousing Pervasion, and similar works. In my mind, this is what we see in canon content, but interspersed with personal hcs that I enjoy. I also use some versions of this Gilbert for when I discuss Gilbert/mc/Silvio, Gilbert/Silvio, Chevbert, Gilbert/Roderic.

➺ Some contamination ocd. I don't think its a fully blown thing, however in one eng event, where him and Mc go to that bar, and he ends up kicking a table away to show a hidden door, he has an odd moment where he goes to grab Mc and then jerks his hand back due to it being dirty from when he fought with a dude there.

Its a small odd moment, which showcased an issue with getting her 'dirty' in more than the physical sense. I believe that he has issues with this even further into their relationship, where if hes had to dispose of some troubling nobles, he will refuse to touch her until he's in clean clothes/bathed. I don't know if this would extend to him sometimes avoiding her in general, due to his own issues with being a monster. I think his love for her would trump over that.

It's an odd thing because, going through his route loosely, this isn't present but there doesn't seem to be many moments where it Could be present. He's more focused on trying to deduce how corrupted she may already be, as well as deducing other factors for his 'final judgement' wish.

➺ I like to think that writing was an escape for him with life in general as a child, but it kickstarted heavily the more he learned about Mc. Then, the writing became centered around wanting to leave a series behind for her, whether she knew he wrote it or not, with the hopes that she would find courage in how the protaganist sticks to her ideals and never seems to give up hope. (I believe thats what it's loosely about, anyway)

It would be a final comforting thought he would mock himself for, if he had chosen to die without meeting her.

➺ has trouble sleeping the first few nights theyre officially a couple and sharing a bed. Occasionally does later on too but not as bad. Sinks into touch more, leans against mc more. He's not used to relying on someone such as her, and trust is a fickle thing in Obsidian. It wouldn't really be a concious action, either, and he would have to ease himself into it even when he wants to do this.

➺ When first intimate, he has bouts of getting very quiet and focusing more on Mc's reactions to xyz scenario. Not always in sexually intimate settings, but would be more noticeable during them. He'd want to etch everything he could in his mind, stemming from the mild obsession and idolization with her. (i will call it 'mild' since he still seems to control himself regarding it, it could be so much worse in comparison to other obessed otome characters)

➺ selfharms. In particular, I don't believe it's typically with a weapon of sorts, but I believe that he has had random moments of fits regarding him becoming more and kore of a beast. It lessens over time, especially when he gets into a relationship, but I believe it still happens for years. It's tied to his trauma, tied to thinking how his mother and albert would be disappointed in him or disgusted, and tied to his own feelings trying to come out.

Specifically, I think he will sometimes starve himself, or physically hurt himself by scratching himself up with his nails. He doesn't like anyone to see it or address it if they see it, but unfortunately Mc would see it and it would prompt a few discussions, which would be... difficult... because he hates addressing it.

➺ in terms of nsfw, vaguely (since this is a smth that is consistently always being added onto, its harder to have a firm and solid set list for me). Switch & bi. I feel like he loves topping mc for various reasons, and he has a penchant for wanting to try out anything she may want to do even if he's not 100% fully into it, and trying out various things in general, because of his obsession skewing a bit towards wanting to be her first in multiple, multiple, ways that in return make him feel that they are more intertwined. (That is not specific just to sex).

He makes comments about not liking just passive submissive women, and I believe this may be tied to personal preferences but also just due to the role he plays as a villain. He *wants* the willing nature of the participant. He wants it clear that they want him back. Otherwise I feel that it could lead to him having a nagging suspicion that they feel coerced into it, when that's....not what he wants. I think this is also why he makes comments about wanting mc to dom at times (even though cybird will never have her do so...), because the very blatant and clear display of want turns him on and makes him feel, well, wanted for Him and not an object to be feared by someone he loves. (I think this is why he also seems to fluster a bit when mc does things like bite him or teases a sensitive spot). Yet due to trust issues he has trouble relinquishing control fully.

He would be a powerbottom fyi

It's been proved he is just also a little gross. Trying to drink from her glass where her lips were, even outside of a relationship. Licking his thumb to taste her saliva/crumbs left on her lips. Smaller moments like that where you realize he's a lil gross (appreciative). I do believe this still ties into obsession, at the end, however.

Last updated: 07202024

[aion-rsa]

The Suicide Squad Ending Explained

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This article contains major The Suicide Squad spoilers. But you could tell that from the headline. We have a spoiler-free review here.

Well done! You’ve survived The Suicide Squad! 

James Gunn’s stunning supervillain flick is a brutal ride through DC’s most deep cut characters and now you want to dig deep into what happened. So we’re here to break down that shocking ending, where we leave our heroes, and what’s next for the Suicide Squad in the DCEU. Well, those of them who survived, at least…

The standalone (sort of sequel) movie centers around the Suicide Squad on a top secret mission. So off they go to Corto Maltese. 

We begin with two crews but only one actually survives the opening bloodbath. Those lucky few are led by Bloodsport (Idris Elba) and the crew consists of Ratcatcher 2 (Daniela Melchior), Polka-Dot Man (David Dastmalchian), Nanaue/King Shark (Steve Agee/Sylvester Stallone), and Peacemaker (John Cena). 

Later, they pick up Rick Flag (Joel Kinnaman) and Harley Quinn (Margot Robbie), who both somehow manage to survive the trap set by Amanda Waller. After much scheming and fighting, the team kidnaps the Thinker (Peter Capaldi) and make it to Jotunheim, the Nazi prison where the Corto Maltese government have been keeping Project Starfish A.K.A. Starro the Conqueror. But when they get there things begin to spiral out of control and that’s where we’ll begin…

Why Were Peacemaker and Rick Flagg Fighting?

While this is a movie filled with wild unexpected moments, the most shocking–to some viewers–twist comes when the truth about Project Starfish is revealed. And we’re not talking about the fact that it’s actually a giant starfish-like alien called Starro. 

No, the real horror here is that Project Starfish is and has always been run by the US government. Yep, it’s the US who have been testing on and torturing innocent humans, and the Squad wasn’t sent to stop Starro but were in fact there to destroy Jotunheim so that the US government and Amanda Waller’s involvement were kept under wraps. 

It’s not something that Rick Flag can stomach as he states, “I joined to serve my country not to be its puppet.” It’s an honorable moment that finally makes Flag a true hero, but it’s short lived. Amanda Waller always has a backup plan and here that plan wears red, white, blue, and a shiny helmet. 

Gunn’s searing action flick has a lot to say about war, America, and the nature of disposability, and Peacemaker is one of its most brutal statements. He’s a man who believes he “loves peace” but it “doesn’t matter how many people I have to kill to achieve it.” That in itself is the oxymoron of imperialism. 

In that way, Peacemaker and Flag represent two different versions of the patriotic ideal. Rick is the idealistic man who wants to do the right thing in the hopes of making his country live up to what he thinks it can be. But Peacemaker wants to protect his country no matter what horrific crimes they’ve committed. That’s why he agreed to be a mole for Waller within the Squad and why he decides to kill Flag when his former teammate wants to leak the records of America’s Project Starfish to the press. 

Sadly for us and Rick, Peacemaker succeeds, leaving Flag dead and the American ideal shattered.

Bloodsport Makes a Choice

With Peacemaker planning to stop the truth about Jotunheim from coming out at any cost, his next target is Ratcatcher 2 (Daniela Melchior). After the explosions incapacitate them, the brilliant young heroine grabs the disk with the damning records, leading Peacemaker to hunt her down. 

Just when it seems like he’s going to add another Squad member to his kill count, we skip backwards eight minutes. Here we see that Bloodsport, King Shark, Polka-Dot Man, Harley, and Milton have been setting the charges, which end up going off too soon. As they start to explode (and after the tragic death of Milton), Bloodsport ends up falling through the building on a large slab of concrete, landing in front of Peacemaker as he’s about to kill Ratcatcher 2. 

As he draws his weapon, Peacemaker does the same, leading to a fatal shootout. And in a hilarious callback to an earlier gag when Peacemaker claimed he could shoot better than Bloodsport thanks to smaller bullets which would shoot through his enemies’ bullets, Bloodsport beats him using exactly that tactic, apparently killing Peacemaker (more on that in a moment) and saving Ratcatcher 2. 

It’s a key moment for Bloodsport, who made a promise to his surrogate daughter that he’d get her out alive, and it’s the perfect way to wrap up Bloodsport’s arc in the film, from estranged father of a young daughter to a man trying his best to form more connections under difficult situations. Yay for the world’s best bad dad! 

The Suicide Squad Takes a Stand 

Now that Jotunheim is destroyed, Waller calls the remaining Squad–Bloodsport, Polka-Dot Man, Harley, King Shark, and Ratcatcher 2–telling them they have to go back to the US. But there’s one big problem: Starro is now freed and the giant alien is on a rampage. 

After decades of being tortured by Gaius Grieves A.K.A. the Thinker, Starro believes the city belongs to them and starts shooting out mini Starros in order to turn the population into mindless zombies. Starro is able to create countless self-replicating copies of itself, so the carnage being wreaked on Corto Maltese is probably only a preview of how quickly Starro could spread their influence throughout the entire world if left unchecked. 

For a moment it seems like the Squad will head back into Waller’s cold and cruel arms, leaving the people of Corto Maltese to their gruesome fate. But at the last moment Bloodsport chooses to go back and is soon joined by the rest of his crew. It’s a massively powerful moment and one that transcends even our core team as before Waller can blow their heads up her colleagues knock her out and begin to help the Squad on their unauthorized but massively heroic new mission to stop Starro and save Corto Maltese.

It’s one of several moments in the film that drives home the harder edges of Amanda Waller, who is played as close to a villain in this film as someone like Thinker or Corto Maltese dictator Silvio Luna.  

The Final Fate of Polka-Dot Man

David Dastmachlian’s performance as Abner Krill AKA Polka-Dot Man is one of the many stunning turns that the film has to offer. And while we’d love to say that the villain turned hero gets a happily ever after that’s not the case. In fact Polka-Dot Man gets an ending as tragic as his origin. After being tortured by his mother who infected him with a parasitic alien virus in the hopes of making him a superhero he became the villain known as Polka-Dot Man.

It’s not a conscious choice but more of a compulsion as he has to expel his deadly polka dot pustules or he’ll die. It’s the grossest power in a movie full of gross powers but as the crew face down Starro Abner finally comes into his superheroic own. 

As Bloodsport becomes the leader Waller always knew he could be, he uses Abner’s fear of his mother and the hallucinations he has of her to help him channel his powers into destroying Starro. Bloodshot yells “It’s your mother” and we see Starro through Abner’s eyes, the creature is transformed into a kaiju-sized version of the woman who ruined his life. His polka dots end up destroying one of Starro’s legs, and Abner celebrates screaming “I’m a real superhero!”

Just as Polka-Dot Man realizes his truly heroic nature, he’s killed by another of Starro’s limbs, crushed but finally happy in his last moments. It’s a fittingly bittersweet end for the unexpected and relatablely depressed hero.

The Final Fate of Starro 

Fighting a huge roaming starfish is no easy feat. It takes everything the Squad has to take down the monstrous creature, including that tragic sacrifice of Polka-Dot Man. When they catch up with Starro in the city, Harley takes the high ground using Javelin’s javelin to burst through Starro’s eye as Bloodsport and Ratcatcher 2 try to incapacitate the huge beast. 

As Harley swims around in Starro’s bloody eye she’s joined by thousands of rats called by Ratcatcher 2. The rodents swarm Starro, overcoming him as Ratcatcher 2 protects Bloodsport from his childhood fear come to life.

And with that, Starro is gone. 

Though Starro might have been a murderous alien kaiju by the end of the movie, they began life as a harmless creature floating through the stars, kidnapped by the American government. To kill him is a tragic but necessary act and one that cements the Squad as very much anti-heroes rather than the villains they began as. 

What’s Next for the Squad?

While we know that Peacemaker will get his own spinoff TV series on HBO Max (more on that below) it’s unclear what the rest of the crew will be doing after this. One thing is clear, though. They all have the freedom that they never thought they’d achieve. 

After killing Starro, Bloodsport blackmails Waller into letting him, Harley, Ratcatcher 2, and King Shark go. It means compromising Rick Flag’s final wish to reveal the truth of what Waller and the government did in Corto Maltese but it also allows Bloodsport and his crew to avoid returning to Belle Reve. It seems like the crew might stick together, especially in the case of Ratcatcher 2 and Bloodsport. 

Plus, once Flag’s friends find out that Peacemaker is still alive, they might have a score to settle. About that…

The Post Credits Scenes

The first of two post credits scenes is the big one. After we think that one good thing happened in this movie A.K.A. Peacemaker being killed by Bloodsport, Gunn has a shock for us. 

See, Peacemaker survived–to star in his upcoming HBO Max series–and Waller has sent two of her best to pick him up from his hospital bed where he’s recuperating in order to do nothing less than “save the fucking world.” After the brutal horrors that Peacemaker committed during the film, it seems strange that he’ll be taking a leading role in a TV series. But after the smart subversiveness of The Suicide Squad we’re cautiously optimistic. 

If you wait until the final moments of the credits once we’re done with all the good stuff like Special Thanks and celebrating all those amazing visual effects artists, then you’ll get to this gnarly and hilarious little stinger. 

If you throw your mind back to the beach-set murder fest at the beginning of the movie, the first character to apparently die is Weasel because no one checked whether ot not he could actually swim. It’s a sad and grotesque way to start the film, but there’s good news for anyone who loves the grody child-killing beast: he’s still alive. After all the drama of the past few days Weasel just popped back up and is totally and utterly alive. That means the people of Corto Maltese should probably watch out as there’s a murderous Weasel in their midst!

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The Suicide Squad is on HBO Max and in theaters now! 

The post The Suicide Squad Ending Explained appeared first on Den of Geek.

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[maydaymemer]

Reviewing every Hitman level - Part 2: World of Assassination

Part 1 here: https://maydaymemer.tumblr.com/post/635416983034380288/reviewing-every-hitman-level-part-1-the-ps2

WoA1 (2016):

ICA Facility - 3/5

Both Freeform Training and The Final Test are okay. There’s just enough there to be enjoyable, but I wish Freeform had Contracts mode since I think that would bolster replayability. As infamous as Final Test is for newbie Contracts some of them provide more interesting gameplay scenarios than Jasper’s basic route.

The Showstopper/Paris - 4/5

In most of these reviews for WoA levels I’m judging both the mission and location at the same time. As for Paris there’s level design when it comes to the geometry itself but I think the targets leave a lot to be desired. I’m a little harsher on Blood Money and WoA because their rating systems are a lot less flexible than previous games, so they have to make up for that with highly manipulatable targets. Sure I can kill either target anywhere I want but due to Victor standing in a lot of crowds that’s not going to get my SA unless I use accidents, which even then can backfire if a non-target gets caught under them. Victor and Dalia are likeable assholes but I couldn’t find many good ways to manipulate them and break their scripting. There’s still ways sure, the coin is a godsend, but not as many as say Robert Knox in Miami. If IO brought back the escalations this could be bumped up to a perfect score based on level design alone, but right now it’s way too simple and reliant on doing what the devs want. It was their first true attempt at this new style so it’s understandable they were a little squeamish at giving total freedom.

Holiday Hoarders - 3/5

This is a fun little distraction. Unfortunately Harry and Marv don’t react to distractions but their routes are long and they’re alone most of the one which makes up for it. It’s easier to get SA with these guys without using opportunities than it is with the main mission targets. The challenges are also fun, requiring you to stop the targets from stealing from the palace then becoming Santa to kill them.

World of Tomorrow/Sapienza - 5/5

The first masterpiece of the new style. Highly manipulatable targets, great level design and great potential for Contracts. I’m still finding new things about this level, from kills I’ve never done before two areas I didn’t know I could go to. It took a while to grow on me but it’s definitely one of the best maps IO has ever made.

The Icon - 3/5

This bonus mission relies a little too much on scripted kills. There’s still ways to break that scripting but the level is really pushing them as something you need to try. Not a bad thing, they are fun kills, but it’s not a level that holds up and gets better on replays like the main mission. You’ll still find ways to kill Bosco without the Rube Goldberg routine, but not as many as the near limitless possibilities of Francesca and Silvio have.

Landslide - 4/5

This is much better, less of a reliance on the mission stories/opportunities and the scripted moments themselves have lots of variants. You can snipe Marco in the graveyard from afar rather than setting up the electrocution kill, you can drop a chandelier on him as a bodyguard while he meets the lawyer rather than becoming him yourself. You can also just hit him with the Sieker and plant an explosive on the toilet and book it. Great bonus mission.

The Author - 3/5

Getting the targets to meet is a good way of creating your own kills, either partaking in the meeting, watching from afar or letting Craig Black flee. But the routes themselves around up to snuff. Akram stays in his tiny apartment until you ring the bell and Black spends way too much time reading.

A Gilded Cage/Marrakesh - 5/5

This level has really grown on me. I used to say “it’s okay but it is a bit of a disappointment compared to Sapienza”, then “it’s a pretty good level it’s a little unfairly maligned” to “this is one of the best maps in the series and I don’t understand why people don’t like it.” The map does have the big problem of its middle section being pointless but the routes of the targets themselves, their synergy, how manipulatable they are and how easy it is to kill them in all kinds of different ways suit only is an absolute treat. You can snipe Zaydan in his office and no one will find him, you can lure him into the room next to the prisoner and strangle him and you can lure him into the toilet and push him to his death. With Strandberg you can electrocute him sure, but that’s intended, instead you can follow him into his office (keep in mind, in the suit) and when he’s in that area no one goes in you can strangle him, or you can toss a coin into the toilet and if he hears you can drown him. The mission is criminally underrated and I think it’s on par with Sapienza.

A House Built On Sand - 3/5

It’s alright but it suffers from a lack of suit only options for manipulating targets via Mission Stories. The rooftop meeting is actually good for getting non-story related kills like dropping the cafe sign on Kwang, or you can just strangle him when he gets there. It’s neat. You can do something similar with getting rid of the guy the fortune teller is talking to, enabling a suit only kill by distracting the fortune teller when he talks to Mendola. That’s what I like about the scripted kills, when you can do shit with them the devs might’ve not directly intended, or are just secret ways to do them. I love missions that give me a lot of either that or ways to create my own kills, which you can do with AHBOS but since it’s a bonus mission and one set around the crowd it’s a lot more difficult with the rating system we have currently, so having more ways to use mission stories/opportunities for the purpose of getting different kills they weren’t meant for would’ve improved this level.

Club 27/Bangkok - 4/5

This level is really poorly designed but I like it anyway. I think it’s the atmosphere but also Jordan Cross as both a character and a target. He’s really interesting but he’s also fun to manipulate and try to take out suit only, of which there are multiple ways to do so without using stories. Even then I do like using the USB story occasionally for suit only runs because it’s so cool. Ken Morgan is a pretty terrible target, not that manipulatable, personality wise he’s really generic and his short route is out in public a lot so it’s a bitch to get him. I’ve gotten an SA kill on him in that little table he phones at but it wasn’t easy. Jordan makes up for it, however, even if getting to him is overly linear due to a lack of climbing in this very vertical location the options you have for actually killing him are numerous and you can really make a suit only run your own with him.

The Source - 2/5

This mission, on the other hand, is just bad. Every time you start you have to jog up flights of stairs to get to the targets, and while they have decent routes good luck intercepting them before they do that ritual that takes ages to finish and come back down. The targets also suffer from being too close to eachother, it’s almost pointless. At least there’s some cool challenges, I’m pretty sure you can use a sniper rifle on a gas canister from the other side of the hotel and get SA but don’t quote me on that.

Freedom Fighters/Colorado - 1/5

The entire location is garbage, I’ve played some pretty neat contracts but overall it’s a boring place whether you’re in the main mission or not. Rose and Graves have decent routes but Berg and Parvati are terrible targets. Sure you can manipulate them if you’re doing suit only but that requires a lot of movement and stealthing via an area that’s hostile to you without a disguise. Almost everything interesting is given to either Rose or Graves, which makes me think this would probably be a lot more fun as a mission if Berg and Parvati were just used as people for those two to interact with as part of their route or mission stories. It’s a very flat map with lots of walking, WoA 2’s maps have a large amount of movement too but they have shortcuts and verticality to remain engaging. Easily the worst map of the trilogy.

The Vector - 3/5

The map lost a lot of its flow with the WoA 2 changes to explosions, but it’s still a pretty fun, frantic mission with random targets to spice things up. It’s also go bushes and accidents everywhere leading to a lot of flexibility, even if you use up a kill there’s always more nearby since the targets can be pretty much anywhere - even clumped together - which is randomness done right considering the short long of the mission.

Situs Inversus/Hokkaido - 4/5

Pretty good mission and a great location. Erich has tons of ways to kill him despite not even being an NPC and more of an objective according to the logic of the engine, and Yuki has a pretty good route with lots of variance, my favourite kill method being sniping her in her private area of the restaurant. I discovered it recently, usually no one sees her. I would say the level design is better than the target design, which is good because Hokkaido is a great jumping off point for secondary content.

Patient Zero - 4/5

This is a great experimental mission. Like Vector but on a larger scale this mission could go different every time. The Virus means anyone in the mission could become an additional target and your playstyle can vary from subtle and sneaky to panicked to mass murderer depending on how much you fuck up or don’t handle the virus effectively. I’d say that WoA 1’s version was a little bit better, I think WoA 2 changed something about like guard placement or just general glitchyness which can make it a pain sometimes. Hopefully H3 fixes it.

Hokkaido Snow Festival - 2/5

This was a free mission made for WoA2 so I’m not going to shit on it too hard, but it’s not very good. It’s overall way too easy to finish this level in under a minute by starting as the ninja, going to the helicopter, shooting an icicle over the target and leaving immediately. That creativity I love about Hitman isn’t really encouraged here, which is a problem with bonus missions in general but it’s at its most pronounced here.

2 God-tier Levels 2 Missions

3 Good-to-Great Levels 5 Missions

1 Average-to-Good Level 6 Missions

0 Bad-to-Mediocre Level 2 Missions

1 Really Bad Level 1 Mission

0 Horrible Missions

For the WoA games I’ve split up levels and missions in the totals. I think it gives a better indication of the quality of each game. WoA part 1 is a good start for this new style but I feel it suffers from inconsistent level design. While Part 2 can feel like they played it safe by basing the design philosophy off of Sapienza for almost every location, WoA 1 has some levels with outright sloppy design like Bangkok, wasted space or locations that are just plain bad. Something the sequel fixes and more.

WoA2 (2018):

Nightcall/Hawke’s Bay - 3/5

Hawke’s Bay really suffers from one exit and a mandatory objective. If you could exit via a car or if some guards were posted at the house before you got in it’d make the rest of the mission up to par with the actual assassination of Alma, which is great but unfortunately a small part of the mission. It’s a neat little puzzle box location ruined by some forced tutorialisation and sloppy story integration.

The Finish Line/Miami - 5/5

The perfect Hitman level. Everything from the geometry to the target routes is perfect. Hitman levels have a problem where sometimes one target is better than the other, this is one of those rare exceptions where both targets are equally fantastic with a balance between scripted kills and having a route that’s ripe for manipulation and creating your own kills even without doing so.

A Silver Tongue - 2/5

As good as Miami is it can’t save this boring target. His route is a small triangle which is a giant missed opportunity when he’s right next to bar area which is mostly unused in the main mission.

3-Headed Serpent/Colombia - 4/5

I’ve made an effort recently to play this level a whole bunch because it used to be my least favourite. I think after really getting familiar with it this is one of the times the rating system used in Blood Money and the new games really lets down a great location. There are cool ways to snipe the Rico and Jorge, poison Jorge with a cocaine brick, blow Andrea up and kill Jorge in the bushes that make this level so much more fun to play, but the rating system discourages bodies found or collateral accident which instead force you to do a lot of walking to each target to get up close and personal. I like how interconnected and intricate everything is, but I don’t like being forced to use that every time I play. It should be a rare luxury rather than a require part of dealing with the level.

Embrace of the Serpent - 1/5

Terrible terrible terrible. A target with a shit route in a small area that’s “repurposed” by just covering it in guards. Not to mention the missed opportunity of making the target a poacher but not giving us a way to make an animal kill him, when there’s an animal in the main mission that can kill a target. For shame, IO.

Chasing a Ghost/Mumbai - 5/5

Another God-tier level and an atmospheric masterpiece. The Maelstrom has one of the best routes in the series and the other two aren’t so shabby either, with ways to get them out of their fortresses for manual kills like the smoke and the laundry foreman. Having a target not locatable via instinct is so cool, and the Maelstrom goes places I don’t expect him to sometimes. It fits his character that his behaviour is as mysterious and varied as he is, leading to lots of ways to kill him. The only problems level design wise I have other than the rating system is the fact that there’s no big area you can climb up to survey and snipe the whole area due to its weird horizontal layout, and there’s lots of disguise swapping that doesn’t make sense. Why can’t I go into the Crows’ hideout as Vanya’s guard? They’re on the same side. The mission also has mission stories with lots of variance and experimentation, which wouldn’t save the mission if it did have bad routes and experimentation without that but it’s the cherry on top to have scripted kills that can feel unscripted with how you do them. Like suit only Kashmirian strategies, poisoning Dawood’s glass as the actor or using the script opportunity to blow him up in the bathroom. And not to mention that Dawood Rangan is one of the best targets in the series personality wise. He’s so awesome.

Illusions of Grandeur - 2/5

Basil Carnaby’s route is actually not bad, making the chawed a hostile area is kinda neat but all that is thrown out the window when the dude offers to hypnotise you. He takes you upstairs alone, you jab a poison syringe in his back then you leave the level. I don’t know what IO was thinking. What a waste of a pretty reskin of Mumbai.

Another Life/Whittleton Creek - 5/5

A brilliant sequel to A New Life. The clues thing can get old but I won’t let that get in the way of two fantastic targets. Nolan’s route is filled with accidents whilst Janus can be lured out of his home with a couple of coin throws, even then I would say Janus’ house in general I would single out as being one of the best single areas of gameplay in the trilogy. Guard placement, security cameras and enforcer choice is perfect.

A Bitter Pill - 3/5

This mission’s okay. It’s basically just a full level version of Janus’ house but security is way too easy to get past. If they just locked the basement door this mission would be so much better.

The Ark Society/Isle of Sgail - 4/5

Mediocre targets let down some fantastic vertical level design. Sgail is very fun to stealth through and explore but the Washington twins are kind of boring compared to Janus from the previous mission. They’re not outright bad, there’s lots of non-story kills you can do since they’re highly manipulatable, but their routes are usually taken through crowds and take to long to get to those areas. It’s great for Contracts mode however, with the most markable NPCs of any level, in fact the Constant has a pretty good route which is unfortunate since the whole point of the level is NOT to kill him.

Golden Handshake/New York - 3/5

Great level geometry that’s fun to sneak around, this level is also great for Contracts mode, but I feel the actual objective while fun is mostly there to make up for a mediocre target route. You can kill Athena anywhere anyway with some knock outs or items so manipulating her to go someplace else to try new kills isn’t that attractive an option. Plus her route is very short.

The Last Resort/Haven Island - 4/5

This is one of my favourites level design wise, all three targets have enjoyable routes with even Tyson being manipulatable via coins to get him out to his balcony. However what kills the levels for me is the viewcones. To give some context IOI decided to change sightlines for NPCs just for this level in order to accommodate the wide beaches of the map. As it wouldn’t make sense for a guy not to see you jogging on an empty beach you’re not supposed to be if he’s looking into the distance. This was a terrible idea and means you’re never sure when you’re going to be seen doing something or not. I understand the reasoning but some areas like the villa were clearly designed for smaller viewcones, and I think consistency of mechanics trumps realism any day.

The Last Yardbird/Austria - 3/5

The first of WoA 2’s three sniper missions. It’s decent but due to it being the first they made it’s a bit too simple and becomes very repetitive on replays. Most target manipulations are cryptic and slow, and a larger problem with Sniper Assassin is due to it being a shooting gallery you tend to just pick one strategy that works and stick with it, you don’t tend to experiment like you do the main game.

Pen & the Sword/Hantu Port - 3/5

This one is my least favourite of the sniper maps. While manipulations this time are faster and simpler the map being so wide and open means you’re going to get caught when you don’t think you should’ve. I played all three sniper maps again recently and this was the one I gave up getting silent assassin with. The strat I usually used for grinding just didn’t work consistently like the ones for Himmelstein and Siberia

Crime & Punishment/Siberia - 4/5

This is the one where they finally go it right. Crime and Punishment is a legitimately great mission, sniper or otherwise. The riot mechanic gives way to a lot of variance and experimentation that actually consistently works, there’s lots of ways to change target routes in subtle ways that make sense (like killing a guard that was meant to get someone for the target, so the target walks over there himself) and the design isn’t so wide bodies are getting found left and right. Whether you’re starting a riot or playing it quiet it’s an excellent Hitman-style shooting gallery.

3 God-tier Levels 3 Missions

4 Good-to-Great Levels 4 Missions

4 Average-to-Good Level 5 Mission

0 Bad-to-Mediocre Level 2 Missions

0 Really Bad Levels 1 Mission

0 Horrible Missions

As you can see where Hitman 2 excels in pure level design it flops hard when it comes to the bonus missions. Hitman 2 is still my favourite game in the series, I’m very biased towards it and its specific levels, but I’m not close minded and I hope IO can take the little failures and huge successes of Hitman 2 and deliver the magnum opus of the series with upcoming third part of WoA.

And that means the totals for the whole franchise are (and if you want to correspond this to a tier list it basically means S, A, B, D, E, and F, respectively):

12 God-Tier Missions

29 Good-to-Great Missions

21 Average-to-Good Missions

8 Bad-to-Mediocre Missions

5 Really Bad Missions

1 Horrible Mission

[sp4c3-0ddity]

It’s Beginning to Look a Lot like A Christmas Carol

Chapter Three:  No ‘Doctor Who’ Christmas Special Prepared Him for This

Prologue | Chapter One | Chapter Two

Read on ao3

~4800 words

i completely and wholeheartedly blame @hailqiqi...and in the interest of sharing reserve some for @rueitae. but i also thank them too for the editing and talking me out of rewriting this chapter!! but now the damn tune is stuck in my head how did this happen i don’t even celebrate Christmas!!

There’s no way Lance is sleeping tonight, not after visits from two ghosts and one whatever the quiznak Bob is and the promise of another, so he doesn’t even bother. Instead he stumbles downstairs to the living room and boots up the Mercury Gameflux he should really return to Pidge.

(Never mind that she’s having so much fun without it - and him - at a party.)

Well, he might as well take advantage of being the only one home, and a mindless video game he beat more times than he can count is as good a distraction as any. This Christmas already proves to be a bad one, a poor representative of the holiday and nothing like the ones of his childhood while his family goes on vacation. Quiznak, he never did get to introduce Allura to Christmas on Earth…

Lance jerks the controller’s joystick a little harsher than necessary, and his avatar on the screen launches itself off a cliff. He scowls as the music lowers in pitch, his lives ticking down by one.

The blue light emanating from the screen flickers, an electrical hum filling the air. A sigh escapes Lance while the shadows coalesce in the corner of the room, and he pauses the game before the cloaked figure blocks his view of the screen.

“Oh, great,” he grumbles, rolling his eyes. “Let me guess: you’re the Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come, and if the last guy was Bob you’ll be…Zarkon?” No, that can’t be right; the figure’s too short and not nearly bulky enough for him. He raises an eyebrow and guesses again, “Haggar?”

“I am most certainly not Haggar!” the figure hisses in a familiar voice that sends a shiver down Lance’s spine, and his worst fears - or fondest hopes? - are confirmed when they push their hood back.

Lance jumps, the controller slipping from his fingers when he yelps, “Allura?”

Allura crosses her arms, her pink cheek markings gleaming the dark. “That is my name.”

Lance stands up slowly, his heart in his throat and his breath trapped in his lungs as he steps towards her. “Really? You’re the Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come?” And rather than saying anything else he’s wanted to say to her - he should’ve kept a list… - since she gave her life for the universe, he wonders, “Shouldn’t you stay cloaked?” He gestures towards her hood. “I thought the whole point of the cloak was that the future was always changing so you can’t really know it.”

Allura frowns, looking utterly unimpressed, and observes, “You sound like Bob.”

“So is that a—”

“It’s a bit stuffy under the hood, so I decided against it. Besides”—a hint of a smile crosses her face—”wouldn’t you rather see someone familiar for your last journey through time?”

“Does this mean you’re the last one?” Lance wonders hopefully. Maybe after Allura’s visit comes to an end - the thought of it ending makes his chest tighten - he can finally get some beauty sleep.

(And oh, will he need it if he keeps finding silver hairs.)

But Allura doesn’t reply except to grab his wrist, and Lance blurts, “Wait, the TV—”

His surroundings dissolve, the blue-lit darkness of the living room giving way to a conference room Lance recognizes immediately from the Garrison.

It’s a much smaller party than the one Bob showed him, with the table shoved against the wall and heavily laden with dishes both familiar and foreign and…alien. A wreath decorated with a red bow hangs from the door, and a streamer reading CONGRATULATIONS DEFENDERS underneath a more seasonal MERRY CHRISTMAS hangs from the ceiling.

He almost doesn’t recognize Pidge standing at the front of the room, not with hair long enough to sweep her shoulders or wearing an elegant green dress rather than the Garrison uniform most of the guests don. She raises a glass of what looks like champagne and clinks a fork against it, attracting the attention of everyone in the room.

A smile lights up her face, bright enough Lance wishes he could pretend she directs it at him. “We’ve come so far, Defenders,” she says. “Just a few years ago we were only in the prototype stage, and finally tomorrow our first ship launches with the Garrison’s best pilot in the cockpit.” She flashes a grin and a wink at the unfamiliar man standing beside her and adds, “I’m sorry, Keith; we’ve let him usurp you.”

Laughter fills the room, and another familiar voice says, “He’s welcome to it.”

Lance spins around, his eyes widening when they land on a smiling Keith standing with Hunk and…himself.

An older version of himself, one with a hint of gray in his hair and who looks a touch sullen judging by the glares he keeps shooting at the man beside Pidge, the one she named “the Garrison’s best pilot”. The champagne flute in his - or in future Lance’s - hand is already empty, though no one else’s is, and for one painful heartbeat Lance thinks he understands.

He wishes the pilot launching into space was him.

Everyone toasts the launch, and it’s then that Lance notices that Pidge doesn’t drink from her glass. Instead the pilot beside her takes it and—

—he and Allura stand right behind him in a blink, in time to watch Pidge rest a hand on her stomach and mutter, “I’d kill for an empanada.”

“After this, I’ll take you,” the man promises. His fingers interlace with hers, a silver band glittering.

Lance’s stomach knots with dread. He steps back, unsure if he wants to see this but unable to look away when they share a brief kiss. “Is she—is she pregnant?” he asks Allura.

Allura, oddly silent where Bob had been all too happy to make frequent observations, confesses, “She is. She told him just this morning.”

“Told who?” Lance asks.

But before she can reply, his future self marches his way through laughing scientists both human and alien, heading right for Pidge and her…whatever that guy is to her.

“Lance?” Pidge says, her voice breathy with surprise. “You came?”

The man/pilot looks decidedly displeased rather than shocked. He wraps a protective arm around Pidge’s shoulders, and—

“Hey!” Lance screeches as the scene changes from the warm and crowded conference room to a chilly and well-lit sidewalk. He rounds on Allura and says, “I was watching that!”

Allura sighs, her eyes darting away from him, and says, “I wanted to spare you that.”

“I thought I was supposed to be learning something from this time travel,” Lance says, throwing up his arms in exasperation. “How am I supposed to learn if I don’t see what you want to show me?”

“I’m not sure the specifics of your and Pidge’s fight will do you much good,” Allura tells him.

Lance’s heart sinks. “What fight?”

“They…change,” she admits, smiling weakly. “It’s the nature of trying to predict the future. Sometimes you try to sway her away from her betrothed because you once had an affair—”

“We did what?”

“—and others you demand answers for why she didn’t choose you for the mission.”

“W-what?” Lance’s jaw drops. “But I’m not even a—I’m not a pilot anymore!” He blinks, remembering that Allura is showing him the future, and wonders, “Did that change and she still didn’t choose me?” And why does that feel like a smack to the face, for Pidge to pass him over like that?

“I’m afraid…it hasn’t,” Allura says.

The scenery shifts from a suburban street to the familiar inside of his family’s farmhouse. A Christmas tree stands in the corner, its branches heavy with a bizarre mix of ornaments.

Allura picks one up - Lance immediately recognizes it as an angel that Silvio decorated one year in school, though its paint is more chipped than he remembers - and wonders, “What is the reason for these?”

“Uh…to make the tree look pretty?” Lance supplies with a shrug.

“Yes, but they all look so different.” Allura pokes a classic red bauble. “And why do you all worship a fuzzy tree this time of year?”

Lance chuckles - did he really never explain this part of Christmas to her? - and says, “We don’t worship the tree. It’s just for decoration.”

“What if it starts a fire?” she wonders. “It’s made of fibers, isn’t it? And that’s easily ignited so—”

“Allura,” Lance says, grabbing her attention with a hand on her shoulder, “it’s just a tradition. Sometimes we do things because they’re a tradition. Didn’t you have stuff like that on Altea?”

Allura’s gaze drifts down, her affect so somber his stomach twists with regret, but she nods and concedes, “Yes, and I suppose you would find them just as alien as I find yours.”

“Right,” Lance agrees. He rubs the back of his neck as they drift into an awkward silence - oh, he hasn’t missed those with her - but the clinking of metal utensils on glass plates distracts him.

Lance leads the way into the noisy dining room. The first thing he notices with a squeeze in his chest is that his Meemaw is nowhere in sight. The next thing, judging by the number of children Lance doesn’t recognize, is—

“You’re the only one of your brothers and sisters unmarried,” Allura points out. She raises an eyebrow at where future Lance - at least a few years older than the last future Lance - sits between Veronica and his mami.

“When are you going to bring that new girl home to meet us, Lance?” his mami wonders. Her words, directed at his future self, cut through the cacophony of a million other conversations.

“I don’t know,” future Lance says with a dismissive wave of his fork. “I still haven’t figured out if she’s the one, you know?” He avoids her eyes in favor of spearing a chunk of turkey and stuffing it into his mouth.

“I haven’t seen you eat like that in a while,” Allura notes with some amusement.

Lance, utterly unamused, rolls his eyes.

“Don’t tell me you’re still hung up on Allura,” Veronica cuts in with a frown. “You were so excited to introduce her to us, but now you keep putting us off the scent.”

Future Lance sets his fork down as a grimace crosses his face. “Maybe Allura was the one,” he retorts.

The air is too thick and solemn for what should be a pleasant holiday meal with family, but a hush falls over the table.

Veronica’s hand falls onto future Lance’s shoulder. “Lance, even if she was your soul mate, you can’t just…consign yourself to widowhood because someone you dated for two months died. Hell, Shiro and his ex had one of the most solid relationships I’ve ever seen, and even he’s married to someone else now.”

Lance can’t help a sideways glance at the ghost of Allura standing beside him, can’t help the twisting in his gut when she doesn’t meet his eyes.

Future Lance throws up his hands and snaps, “Then I guess not all defenders of the universe have to put up with this!”

“Lance!” his mami chides, but Veronica replies tartly, “What are you talking about? You’re a farmer now, or did you already forget?”

He gasps, his heart heavy with regret and his shock leaving him speechless. Would he really talk to his sister, no matter how snide, like that on Christmas Eve?

But the scene changes before he sees what happens next.

Lance instantly recognizes Sam and Colleen Holt’s living room, minus one bull terrier and plus shredded gift wrap littering the floor. Krolia, of all people, sits cross-legged on the floor with a boy Lance has never seen in his life - though, well, he probably hasn’t been born yet - in her lap. She grins at the boy - he’s three years old at most, Lance guesses - before sticking a bright green gift bow on his reddish brown hair.

The boy giggles the way only a small child can when Krolia blows a raspberry against his cheek.

Lance stares with wide eyes; he never thought Krolia the maternal sort…and why is she with the Holts anyway?

Allura redirects his attention with a touch to his shoulder. He glances at her, eyebrow raised, and she points at the living room doorway, half-hidden by a Christmas tree. Pidge stands there, agitatedly sliding a ring up and down her finger, with Keith, who appraises her with a furrow in his brow.

“I swear your mother will end up spoiling him worse than mine,” Pidge complains. Her heavy frown softens when her gaze falls on the boy in Krolia’s lap, and it hits Lance who he is.

“She has a kid?” he screeches, rounding on Allura. Nausea turns his stomach - oh, quiznak, if he throws up, will his vomit be as immaterial as his body? - and questions buzz through his mind so rapidly he can’t think which to ask first.

Lance looks between the boy and Pidge, searching for all the physical similarities and differences. Hair like hers in color and texture, a light dusting of freckles on his nose despite the season, maybe a little small for his age, but his eyes are gray rather than bronze like hers.

“He’s a…he’s a cute kid,” he observes, but with a tightening in his chest Lance wishes for him to be his too.

“I suppose,” Allura concedes, “but I never really understood the appeal of children at that age. They make such messes and smell worse than a Kaltenecker.”

“Hey!” Lance exclaims, but she only rolls her eyes before jerking her head back towards the scene.

“…sorry that happened, Pidge,” Keith says. He pats her shoulder in an awkward approximation of comfort. “Anything Krolia and I can do for you?”

Pidge shakes her head before finally slipping her ring - her wedding ring? - off and tucking it into her jeans pocket. “It’ll be—it’ll be fine,” she says. “I’m an upstanding Earth citizen and a former Paladin of Voltron! There’s no way the judge will let my husband have full custody…is there?”

She sounds so uncertain - what’s happening? - that Lance’s heart aches for her. He steps towards them, longing to be the one to comfort her rather than have her suffer Keith’s feeble attempts at sympathy - obviously his strengths lie elsewhere - when a glint at her ears catches his eye.

“The earrings…” The vines glitter and scatter light from the nearby Christmas tree, almost mocking him. “Allura, have Pidge and I - or future me, I guess - talked lately?”

“I…no, you haven’t,” Allura admits with an apologetic smile. “You haven’t spoken since your fight at that first scene I showed you.”

“But she’s wearing earrings I bought her,” Lance says, frowning.

“Those were from you?” Allura’s eyes widen slightly in surprise before she laughs. “Oh, did I ever tell you, Lance?”

“Tell me…what?”

Their surroundings melt away, Keith comforting Pidge and Krolia playing with her son dispersing faster than smoke, until they stand in front of the well-lit church in Varadero. Churchgoers pass under the gate after midnight mass while a few peel away to walk to the nearby cemetery.

Allura leads him after those while she confesses, “Before you asked me on that date, I thought you had feelings for Pidge.”

Lance snaps around to look at her. “I—what?” His conversation with the ghost of Keith’s dad rings in his head and he wonders, “Was it…that obvious?”

Allura shrugs before shooting him a rare teasing grin. “You forget I had four spies that reported only to me.”

He blinks at her, confused, until a surprised chuckle bursts out of him. He takes her hand and reassures her, “I promise all I saw when we were together was you, Allura.”

Her grin falters as she says, “I believe you, Lance, but you and I…sometimes I wonder if we both would’ve been happier had I told you no.” She tugs her hand from his grasp, and before he can stammer a startled reply or an assertion that she’s wrong - but is she? - she leads him into the gloomy cemetery.

As they walk further in, passing through gravestones as if they’re not there, he wonders with a gut-wrenching fear if he’s about to see his mami’s grave.

(For what purpose? So that he can learn she died disappointed in her youngest son?)

But the gravestone they halt before is unmistakably his.

Lance’s breath catches in his throat as he reads the simple stone carving. Nothing inscribed on it so much as indicates he was once a Paladin of Voltron, a hero of the universe, and there’s little more than an inscription declaring him a “beloved son, brother, and uncle”.

It tells so little of who Lance is - who Lance was - that a scowl twists his lips. Who was this Lance to leave so little behind when he died?

“Lance,” Allura says, jerking him from his bitter musings, “do all humans live such short lives?”

He can’t breathe while he takes in the numbers and does the math. “N-no,” he chokes out. A lump lodges in his throat - will he really end up mourning his own death? - as his eyes narrow at the gravestone. “What did I even spend that life doing?”

“Farming juniberries,” Allura tells him. “You rarely saw the other Paladins - you only met Hunk’s children once - and you…well, you even stopped visiting Altea and never returned to space.”

Lance falls to his knees, but he’s somehow still dry-eyed, staring unseeingly at the gravestone. “Why? You—you love it there. You died to bring it back, so why would I never go back?”

Allura kneels beside him and rests a hand on his shoulder. “I don’t know for sure, but I can guess…”

“Then do it.”

“I suspect it became too painful for you to see our friends moving ahead with their lives while you…idled.” Her fingers tighten on his shoulder. “You lost your purpose when the Lions left, so now you must—”

An indistinct voice cuts her off as three people bundled in jackets and scarves - a chilly evening, he guesses, though he’s practically a ghost now and can’t feel it - approach. A tall, middle-aged woman with a beanie pulled past her ears leads the other two towards them.

Rachel always was sensitive to the cold.

Lance’s heart skips a beat when he recognizes the other two with her as Hunk and Pidge, and—wow, they both aged well, Hunk with his goatee not even a little spotted with gray and Pidge with a more mature beauty in the way she holds herself and the hint of wrinkles around her eyes.

(And who’s the lucky quiznaker that gets to grow old with her? Definitely not him.)

"...missed the funeral," Hunk is saying to Rachel as they draw closer. "We were both in space."

Lance's gut twists oddly at Hunk's words, both at the implication that they weren't at his funeral and that they went into space without him.

(Of course they did if Allura's assertion that he never returns is right.)

"I understand," Rachel says. The three of them pause in front of the grave. "You both have busy lives, so I think he would too."

"I don't—I don't know," Pidge says with a waver in her voice. She sniffs and huddles closer to Hunk, for warmth or comfort or both, and he wraps an arm around her. "He wasn't so forgiving of it last time I saw him."

She speaks without bitterness, as if she only states an objective fact.

"Either way," Rachel says a little awkwardly, "we are grateful that you visited since I'm sure you'd rather be with your own families for Christmas."

"Lance was our family too," Hunk tells her, smiling. "I can't forget him even if it's been a while since we met."

Pidge drifts away from him, passing through Lance until she stands right before his gravestone. She traces the inscription of his name with a fingertip and quietly muses, "He was a lot more than what this says..."

Rachel pinches her eyes shut and nods. "H-he was," she says, "and we'll remember him for it."

"Can I—can I have a minute alone?" Pidge asks.

Rachel's eyes widen with surprise, but she says, "Oh, sure." She paces away, and Hunk follows after Pidge reassures him she's fine.

Lance holds his breath, watching Pidge examining every centimeter of his gravestone. He doesn't dare glance at Allura, not when he wants to take in every second of this no matter how tightly an invisible hand squeezes his heart.

Pidge reaches into her jacket and tugs out a slim plastic case to set on his grave. "I think I waited too long to play this with you," she says in a surprisingly steady voice.

Behind him, Allura gasps, and when he finally turns to her questioningly, she says, "I recognize that game."

"What?" Lance looks over Pidge's shoulder. "Killbot Phantasm 26?"

"Yes...Pidge used it to barter for the dress I wore to my date with you," Allura explains. "I'm glad she eventually tracked down another copy."

Pidge...really did that? Lance returns his attention to her, hanging on every word she says to him - or to the future and very much dead version of him:

"How you died...it sucks, Lance," Pidge says. She sniffs, wiping at her nose with her sleeve, and continues, "You would've rather died in a-a heroic blaze of glory and not in something so normal and random like a hit-and-run."

"Oh, I..." But Lance doesn't know what to say; does he really die in such a forgettable way?

Pidge's hand covers her mouth, muffling a sob. "I wish I—quiznak, why were we both so stubborn? Who f—who cares whose fault it was? I shouldn't have—after everything we—I'm sorry I waited till it was too late, Lance." She crumples, finally bursting into gut-wrenching tears.

Lance's own eyes burn as he kneels beside her. He tries and fails to wrap an arm around her shoulders before stammering, "P-Pidge, you - all of you - mean everything to me."

But of course she doesn't hear him.

The cemetery melts away to an even cooler and more dismal night. A simple stone obelisk rises before him, a plague at its front. In the distance - and with a tug in his abdomen - stands the Galaxy Garrison’s main hangar, its exterior strung with red and green blinking Christmas lights.

A small floodlight washes the obelisk in a white glow that reflects off the metal plaque. Lance squints at the engraving and reads:

Dedicated to the heroes of Earth and beyond that defended us in our hour of need.

His jaw drops as he scans the names inscribed below, recognizing every single one as someone he befriended, fought beside, and loved, from Shiro to Keith and the Blade of Marmora to Pidge and her family and Hunk and Allura and Coran and—

“M-my name,” he says numbly. “It’s not…it’s not here.”

Lance holds his breath as he reads the names over again, his gaze catching on Veronica’s, but with his heart sinking, he knows he won’t find it.

And the disappointment is so crushing that tears finally escape his eyes. “Why am I not here, Allura?” he wonders. Feeling oddly detached from his actions, his fingertip traces his - or his sister’s - last name. “I-it’s stupid, isn’t it? Keith always almost…scolded me for wanting attention, but they forgot me…”

“If it’s any consolation,” Allura offers from just behind him, “this memorial wasn’t commemorated until most humans that fought to free Earth of the Galra had died. Someone who fought with you would never have forgotten.”

Somehow that hurts even more, as if his teammates, his friends, his family never spoke of his role - if he had one at all. Bob’s parting words return to him in sharp relief, but he can’t help feeling their irony.

Is he enough if no one bothers to remember him?

(Is it his fault if he’s so easily forgotten?)

“It’s—it’s not,” Lance admits, “but thanks for trying.”

He can’t tear his eyes away from the list. Every single person with their name engraved on the plaque deserves their place, but they forgot him.

He doesn't notice Allura touching his shoulder, doesn't notice the shift from the memorial to the farmhouse's living room, still illuminated by the screen stuck on a video game pause screen, doesn't notice much of anything until his dead girlfriend and personal version of the Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come wraps her arms around him and lets him bury his face in her shoulder.

"Well, this is awfully familiar," Allura says. "Are you...mourning your own death or Earth’s short memory?"

Lance sniffs and holds her a little tighter. "N-no, I'm—am I really that forgettable, Allura?" He pulls away to look her in the eye.

When she frowns and reaches up to cup his cheek, his skin tingling right where her thumb brushes the mark she left on him, he sees both everything he's lost and, for the first time, everything he still has to lose. "You're not," she reassures him, "but one day, you might be if you're not careful."

Lance lets go of her and turns to grab a tissue from the box on the end table only to realize she's transported them to his bedroom. Instead his gaze catches on the broken picture frame.

He picks it up, careful to avoid the sharp edges of broken glass, and guesses, "This intervention was your idea, wasn't it?"

"It was," she admits.

"Why?" he wonders, although he thinks he already knows the answer.

Allura smiles, though it holds an edge of sadness. "If there's anything I could change about my life after I met you and the other Paladins, it's that I shouldn't have let the past rule my future so much. And you..." She gently takes the frame from him and stands it up on his desk. "I can see you're on the verge of making the same mistake."

"Am I?" Lance still can't help the flicker of doubt despite everything he saw tonight. "I don't know, Allura...I want to uphold your legacy.”

“What about my legacy makes you think you should cultivate juniberries?” Allura demands, tone sharp enough that he flinches. She picks up the small vase with a single flower on his desk and pinches a pink petal between her fingertips. “Juniberries grew wild on Altea. They were prized precisely for how nearly impossible they were to cultivate.”

“Why are you telling me this?” Lance wonders.

“Because you’re on the brink of losing your way, Lance.” The corner of her mouth quirks up in a slight smile. "Find a purpose," she advises him. "It seems you work best when you have one."

"It feels like I lost mine when you died," he admits. “You never even told me what’s special about the Blue Lion.”

Allura sets the vase down. “I thought you would’ve figured that out for yourself, intuitive and supportive and nurturing as you are.” She winks, and where once the gesture would’ve warmed his face, now it fills him with a cool understanding.

Lance rolls his eyes and grumbles, “Could’ve fooled me.” Then he sighs, running his fingers through his hair, and confesses, "I missed you so much..."

"And that's all right," Allura says. She takes his hand and adds, "But you'll miss so much more if you're not paying attention to what and who else you love." She leans up and kisses his cheek, that odd, familiar affection he hasn't felt from her in years so startling his face warms, but before he can so much as respond she's gone.

Lance's heart pounds as he reacquaints himself with her absence. He dries his snotty nose with a tissue and sits on the edge of his bed, mind reeling with all this new - and old - information.

Quiznak, how does Pidge handle so much data at once without getting overwhelmed?

He can ask her that himself...can't he?

Lance isn't sure what impulse pushes him towards his closet. He rummages around, searching for the one cardboard box he tucked away just because he thought he could hide from the reminders like a coward.

The grin that pushes at his lips when he opens the lid and beholds his belongings from his Paladin days surprises him.

He finds the Blue Lion slippers first, shoving his feet into them - they are a little chilly now that he has enough of a body again to feel the cold - before digging through the rest of the box's contents. His bayard is there, of course, as is the glove that came with the Mercury Gameflux, myriad knickknacks and souvenirs and gifts from different planets he visited, and—

Lance's fingers brush against a small, slim box. He grabs it and opens it before setting it aside and standing.

It's time to change his plans for the holiday.

[djbimbu-blog]

Bruce Springsteen - Darkness on the Edge of Town

For the first review why not start with the album this blog is named after, Bruce Springsteen’s fourth album, 1978’s Darkness on the Edge of Town. Why did I name my blog after this album? Is it my favorite album? Favorite album by the Boss? Nope. It’s not even my favorite Springsteen album (that would probably go Born to Run, but Darkness is close). It’s just what I happened to be listening to when I decided to start a blog because I needed a hobby, and I spend most of my time reading about whatever record I’m listening to anyway, so I might as well write down my half assed research and opinions.

I don’t remember when I got this record, a few years ago at some point. I bought it from one of my usual record stores. I had already tried to buy it once at a flea market, but when I got it home  the record actually was an Elvis Costello record inside of a Springsteen sleeve. And try as I might, I just can’t get into Costello. I learned the hard way (probably about $8 hard) that you don’t just look at some of the grooves for scratches, look at the label and make sure its the right fucking record in there. So I had to buy a second copy. It’s in decent shape, has a few crackles here and there, but I don’t go for mint condition stuff. I go for the record that’s the cheapest one out of the three copies the store has, because the sleeve is a little worn and one song has a scratch in it. I buy records to listen to first and foremost. I’m not rich, and I’m not buying them to look at, so some of my records are of questionable condition. 

The first copy I bought is now framed and hangs right above my stereo. A reminder not to be such a dumbass with my record shopping, and a reminder to stop being so quick to shit on artists based off mental cliches you’ve made about their fans. Basically a reminder to be a more open minded person, and less of an asshole.

Most of my life I had written off the Boss as boring baby boomer dad rock, stuff you hear on the radio in the waiting room of an automatic car wash, stuff along with solo Clapton, Toto, The Eagles, Journey’s slow songs. So you’re drinking free Keurig coffee while ESPN plays on the TV, hoping the balding, goateed man next to you doesn’t ask you you’re opinion on the draft because you didn’t watch it and don’t want to deal with the awkwardness of a judgmental look for being a 20 something man who doesn’t care about sports. In his mind my dull, offended, smart phone generation is destroying the spirit of the country, and in my mind, I thought Springsteen was his music, music from when “men were men”, worked at factories, ate McDonalds when it was still legally a food product, and Reagan was going to turn everything around from the malaise years of Carter. He probably listened to Springsteen back in 1980, played high school baseball, dealt with all the bullshit in his life by looking forward to Friday night when he could get drunk, hang out with his girlfriend, and drive around with his friends in a shitty rust box Nova (with the inline six, not even the v8 that still didn’t make 200 horsepower). Needless to say, I had judgmental opinions about Bruce Springsteen and the kinds of people who listened to him.

At some point something happened. I honestly think it was mostly just that I grew the fuck up just enough to hear Springsteen on the right day and it finally connected, finally all made sense. I remember where the change happened. I was sitting in one of my old apartments, a few years out of a bad break up (and dropping out of college), living with some of my best friends, working a dead end job, starting to drink too much, mentally planning a half impulsive move across the country away from it all…and binging The Sopranos for the first time. At the end of the first season finale, Tony and his family are driving in a bad storm, and seek shelter in the restaurant of Tony’s long time friend Artie. Artie, trying to close up, reluctantly lets them in to eat. Other friends and family are there dining, Tony and his family sit down, then Tony toasts to remembering “the little moments, like this…that were good.” Fade to black, and this faint acoustic guitar comes in over the credits, with this haunting voice, coated in a slap back delay, singing about having a “clear conscience for the things that I’ve done.” It’s a beautiful scene from one of the pinnacles of television. And I had to find out what the fuck that song was. It was like a combination of Elvis singing “Blue Moon”, Bob Dylan’s “The Ballad of Hollis Brown” with a touch of Suicide’s Alan Vega thrown in. I do some internet digging, and find out it’s this song called “State Trooper” by Bruce Springsteen. Bruce Springsteen? The guy behind that “Born In The USA” song drunk assholes ironically jammed on the Fourth of July, that I couldn’t stand? Was I wrong about him this whole time? So I started to dig into the Boss, first into the Born to Run album, since the song “Born To Run” I always had sort of guilty pleasure liked when it came on the radio. Within a year or so I would consider Springsteen a musical genius, and one of my absolute favorite musicians of all time (though I must admit I only deeply know his first 7 albums). All from hearing one of his least Springsteeny songs in the end credits of a tv show I was watching more than 10 years after airing.

On to the album. Springsteen had already recorded three albums, his last, Born to Run was a massive success, that had him maturing as an artist and writing songs that were absolutely beautiful and somehow could be absolutely depressing at the same time. Listen to “Jungleland". If it doesn’t make you feel every emotion at once, you’re not human. The lyrics tell a story I’m still not quite sure I understand, and it has the best saxophone solo ever put on a record (and for what it’s worth, the “Jungleland" sax solo is my favorite part of any song ever). It’s a perfect fucking song. It was a hard album to top, and I’m still not sure if he did. Darkness is a fantastic record, though I’m not sure if it’s as good as Born to Run (I’m also not sure if it’s worse). But you have to applaud Springsteen for not pulling an AC/DC, writing more of the same, and riding it out for the next 30 years. He came into the studio with a new band member, Steven Van Zandt (who I will still always think of first and foremost as Silvio Dante), and recorded a massive collection of over 50 songs. Some are available on the album The Promise which didn’t come out until 2010. 

Ten were picked for the record, which was harder hitting, darker, rawer, and more stripped down. It wasn’t as poppy (if you could consider Born To Run that), and wasn't as successful. The highest single off Darkness only made it’s way to No. 33 on the Billboard charts. How could he top Born To Run? He couldn’t, but the lack of relative success doesn’t make it any less of an album. It’s his In Utero, so to speak.

“Badlands” kicks off the album. With a rhythm Springsteen claims to have “borrowed” from The Animals “Don’t Let Me Be Misunderstood” it moves quick. It has raw, crunchy guitars, you can already tell this isn’t Born To Run. The lyrics follow similar Springsteen territory, but you can tell right away this is a different album. The problem with “Badlands” though is the version on the Live 1975-1985 album just has that little bit extra. “Badlands” is a great song, but I usually find it just leaves me wanting the live version instead. The version of the live album comes from a 1980 show in Tempe, Arizona, which has concert footage on youtube. Honestly, most of the tracks from that show are better than the album. I have a hard time finishing Darkness sometimes without getting sidetracked watching Springsteen live videos on youtube about halfway through.

“Adam Raised A Cain” is maybe Springsteen’s heaviest song. It starts off with a fast, overdriven guitar, and goes right into a ripping, pissed off, guitar solo. The tempo picks up a bit in the bridge, and then the chorus hits you hard, with yelling background vocals and squealing lead guitar. The guitar solo comes in later, reminiscent of the intro solo, but with a few unique lines thrown in. At the end they go back into the chorus for a solid minute, and jam on it until the end. Springsteen doesn’t have many songs like this. I wish he did. It’s really fucking good.

“Something in the Night” is a slower tune. It’s not bad, but I find it a little forgettable. If I’m scrolling through Spotify for the car or something, it’s not the tune I’d pick out if I only have a 5 minute drive. I do really like last half though, where the vocals get a little less ballad, and a little rougher, a little louder.

“Candy’s Room” has just not aged well. Something about the piano line, the driving bass, the drums, I’m not sure what. Some of the production on this album is pretty dated, but for some reason more so on this one. Maybe because it’s about a girl named Candy, and nobody’s been born with that name in quite a while (at least not that I know). It just sounds very 1970’s, and not in the good way. It’s a little boring, and the lyrics don’t really do much for me. It has a pretty good guitar solo though, so points for that. Probably my least favorite track.

“Racing In The Street” heads right into a different direction. It starts off with a solo piano, and Springsteen singing about his 69 Chevy. I’m a bit of a classic car lover myself, so I appreciate the references, and only a few people could sing a love song about girls and muscle cars and not make it hokey as shit. It’s definitely not Van Halen’s Panama. How though? A song with this subject matter should be corny and terrible, but it’s really fucking good. It’s pure beautiful Americana. It’s the musical equivalent of having a fire on the beach with your best friends in the summertime. It’s simple, but taking simple stories and making them something relatable to everyone is what Springsteen is the best at. Even if you don’t like cars, anyone can listen to this song and have something in you’re life it could be about.

“The Promised Land” starts off with a midtempo guitar and a matching harmonica. I don’t quite know what the lyrics mean, but you sure as hell want to get to the promised land too. The song slows down in the middle, with a guitar solo, and rips right into a classic Clarence Clemons sax solo. This is probably the “poppiest” song on the album, which is not to say it’s “Dancing In The Dark.” It’s still in full rock and roll territory, but it’s fucking catchy. Another song you need to watch the footage of from the 1980 Arizona show. The album version is good, the live one is perfect.

“Factory” is one of the lesser songs on the album. I honestly usually skip it. It’s just a little too slow after “The Promised Land” and the song after “Factory” is really good. It’s not a bad song, but just a victim of track listing choice. Especially if I’m not listening to the vinyl, in the car or the gym or something, it’s getting skipped. If it’s on the record, I’ll listen, but I’m not that invested. The lyrics aren’t Springsteen’s best, a little too on the nose.

“Streets of Fire” is another slower tune, but a little harder. I doesn’t have that much in common, but it reminds me a lot of “Backstreets” off Born To Run. It starts off pretty mellow, with just an organ (some sort of keyboard, I’m going with organ), but starts to pick up and hits hard when the guitars come in, and then goes right into one of the coolest guitar solo’s on a Springsteen album. The guitar tone is just fuzzy enough, it’s loud, drenched in reverb, and the rest of the band just lays back. It comes out of nowhere. The rest of the song is more of the same and fades out, but that solo makes the song.

“Prove It All Night” is a classic mid tempo Springsteen rock and roll love song. Nothing ground breaking, but it’s still one of the better tracks on the album. In the middle it goes into a sax solo, and then up another level with another great guitar solo. This is definitely the best Springsteen guitar album. The solo’s hit hard, sound mean, but aren’t showy or lame 1970’s rock show off stuff. They serve the songs really well. Something about this song though makes me feel like it would fit better on The River. Another song to check out live footage of. It turns into an extended jam, and is just a little bit quicker. I think if they recorded it with the tempo of the live show, it would have brought it from one of the decent tracks on the album to one of the best. I don’t know why, there’s nothing about this song particularly interesting, but I find myself throwing it on quite a bit.

“Darkness on the Edge of Town” ends the album. It’s a little bit of a middle ground between “Racing In The Street” and “Streets of Fire.” It’s one of Springsteens more critically regarded songs, Rolling Stone rated it the #8th best song by him apparently, but I don’t really see it. It’s good, but even on this album there’s quite a few better songs. It’s okay, it’s a good outro to the album, I can see what they were going for, but it just never really jelled with me that well.

Final thoughts:

Favorite songs: “Adam Raised a Cain,” “Racing In The Street,” “The Promised Land,” “Streets of Fire.” 

Least favorite songs: “Candy’s Room,” “Factory”

[adriennescomingbacktolife]

The Good, The Bad, and The Lonely

OOC: A collab piece with Silvio Leon!

“Hey! Nice day for a walk in the park.”    Silvio beamed at Adrienne as she approached. He’d sent her a message to meet at Pierce’s Park. Dressed in blue jeans, brown leather sandals and a sleeveless red shirt, he stood from his seat on a bench and waved her over. It was good to see her - not just for the purpose of work, but also for the pleasure of her company. Setting down roots in a new town and reworking a social network from the ground up was difficult, but it also presented new opportunities; new stories.    “Nice kicks! Putting that winner’s purse to good use, huh?” he said with a grin.    After waving, she looked at her New Balances and shrugged with her reply, “Oh, these? I got these with my tag match winnings. My old ones were coming apart at the seams.”    Adrienne appreciated that it wasn’t raining today. It was just very, very hot. So she opted for a nondescript white tank top and jean shorts.    “Nate did buy me all new ring attire for the big show, though.” She said with a wry smile.    Silvio laughed, closing the distance between them and raising a brow. “That was a helluva match. Never doubted you for a minute, though. Congrats!”    Seeing Adrienne’s continued success was exciting. He reflected on the woman he’d met with at the cafe just a few weeks ago and how much of a difference there already was between her and this freshly triumphant Adrienne Levi. Winning wasn’t everything, but the new vibrancy he saw in her promos, her ring-work, and just the way she held herself made him glad.    “Victory suits you. Looking forward to continuing that win streak at WAR?”    Taking in all of the unorthodox architecture surrounding them, Adrienne considered that. Knox had told her to essentially revel in these moments. She finally answered after a bit of silence during their stroll, “Sure. Winning’s fun. I try not to make too big a deal about it, Silvio. Knew someone who did. Know lots of people who do.”    Adrienne stuck her hands in her pockets, head hung low as she trailed off.    He raised a brow, cocking his head to one side.    “Hey...sorry, I didn’t mean to hit a nerve or anything. Something on your mind? You don’t gotta tell me if you don’t feel like it, but I’m always happy to lend an ear.”    Stopping, she looked around. As of late, Adrienne had been hearing things from folks that couldn’t possibly know.    “No need to apologize. As for that, I’m not sure.” She didn’t want to betray Matt’s trust. Their conversations were private but something he said resonated with her in the wrong way. Her voice lowered a little, “I appreciate what you’ve done. Like more than you could ever know. But I’m not sure if I can be what is expected of me. I’ve done bad things, Silvio.”    He blinked in surprise before gesturing for her to have a seat with him on a nearby bench. “Everyone has done bad things, Adrienne. A bad action doesn’t necessarily make you a bad person.” Pausing, he glanced around before nodding to a man having a stroll with his wife, their children laughing and racing before them. “Pretty sure that guy’s new in town; or at least to this park. See how he keeps patting his back pocket? That’s where his wallet is. When people are out and about, especially in places that might be unfamiliar to them, they tend to touch things they value to make sure they’re still there; still safe.” Leaning back, he continued in a conversational tone. “Now, if someone were to take that wallet, he’d probably notice pretty quickly, and he might be able to spot the thief before they had a chance to get away. That’s why you leave a bunk biscuit in its place. A bunk biscuit is an object that is about the same size and weight as the one that’s being stolen. It’s tricky to do, but it’s worth it because it’ll take longer for him to realize anything’s gone amiss. By that time, the person stealing the wallet will be long gone.”    Looking at Adrienne, he gives her a little smile.    “How do you think I know that?”    Looking at the man with the family and then back to Silvio, Adrienne returned the smile sheepishly. Her answer was innocent in nature, “Books?”    But what he said started to set in.    “Oh. OH. Well, I won’t tell anyone.”    His grin widened. “It’s okay. Look, sometimes people find themselves in extraordinary circumstances and they do things they wouldn’t have expected to do.” Silvio shrugged. “I wasn’t a bad kid, I was just poor and hungry and desperate. Life can take us places we weren’t prepared for, and we do the best given the circumstances.” Looking at her, his expression softened. “I’m sure whatever you’ve done, you did because your options were limited or you were in a desperate situation. I wouldn’t judge you for that.”    She appreciated Leon sharing like this. Adrienne felt a compulsion to let everything out but nobody deserved that. Trying her best to commiserate, she mumbled, “Thanks. I did things for Danny. Things I’m not proud of.”    Silvio felt his heart give a lurch at that. He’d never met Danny Levi, but the tone she used to talk about him, her body language when he came up, raised some red flags. His body posture relaxed, and his own voice became lower and softer. “Yeah?” he murmured. “Is it something that’s hurting you now? I mean, do you need help or some time for yourself? The match is just a match - if you need to take care of yourself, that’s way more important.”    She smiled at Silvio’s kindness. Her eyes were mired in the sadness of the acts but she had promised herself that they would not define her.    “I’ve been reminded of a lot lately. But, gosh, Silvio, I’m so tired of being alone. I hate Clearwater. Feels like my tomb. And I guess it’s obvious: Danny’s not really in the picture anymore. I don’t think he’s coming back. I wish he would.” Subconsciously twisting the gold wedding band on her finger, she sniffled a little before resuming. “Cuz I did a lot for him. Did things I can never take back.”    Alone.    The word lanced through his heart like a shard of ice. But it was nothing compared to the way his stomach churned at Adrienne’s admission of things she’d done in her husband’s name.    “Do you,” he said softly, “want a hug? Or do you want to hold my hand? I understand if you don’t, but it’s okay if it would make you feel better. I know...how you feel. I don’t...I left everything behind when I came here. It’s really hard sometimes because so much of my support network is so far away. I’ve been incredibly fortunate with everyone I’ve met at Carnage since I got here - you included. But if it’s that bad, Adrienne, do you wanna work on getting you out of Clearwater? If it’s an emergency, I’ve got an open couch at my place - no questions asked.”    If it were only that easy to leave that place behind. Her mother would have a thousand reasons as to why leaving her hometown would be foolish. But there was one reason to leave that overrode them all.    “I’d like that. I really would,” and then she knew the following admission from a grown woman would make her seem sort of pathetic but she swallowed her pride and continued, “I gotta talk to my mom about this. She’s put up with so much already. With Danny and all, she didn’t want me even coming back to do this. She has her doubts even with how amazing all of you have been. I’ll convince her one day but for now, I’ll have to settle for visits.”    Looking forward to the myriad of people enjoying their day, she discreetly offered her hand.    Taking her hand in his, Silvio felt a pang wash over him. He drew in a breath, brow knit as he considered his words. “Do what you have to do. But - and if I’m out of line here, you can tell me - you gotta start living your life for yourself sooner or later. If you need out of Clearwater, you should start looking at other possibilities. I guess ultimately you have to ask yourself if the pain of the situation you’re in now is sustainable or not. Is enduring a known pain easier to deal with than an unknown potential for something better?”    “You make a lot of sense, Silvio. In fact, all of you have lately,” she paused, politely taking her hand back to brush a stray lock of hair out of her face. However, something had been bothering her. She would have a lot to mull over considering her situation but the newest addition to her nightmares as of late had been bothering her as of late. She summoned a little courage and posed her statement, “Only thing that doesn’t make sense is Zane King and you. You teamed with him. Walked by his side like it was nothing. Matt took issue with that but I’m not sure I feel the same way he does. That guy, he scares me. But, not only that, he nearly crushed my windpipe. Yet, here you are, unscathed.”    Silvio’s expression faltered somewhat and his gaze dropped to the ground. Taking a deep breath, as if steeling himself, he looked up at her. “He isn’t...Zane isn’t the same guy outside of the ring. I was able to talk with him; reason with him a bit. We worked out a deal, and that’s why that match even happened. If I hadn’t been able to get through to him, I’m pretty sure it would have just been a free-for-all. It was still pretty chaotic, even then.”    He pressed his lips together, thoughtful.    “...I wouldn’t...approach him when he’s near the ring or when a fight is about to happen,” he suggested. “There’s no getting through to him then. But when it’s quiet? When things are still...calm...he isn’t dangerous. I think…” Shaking his head, he gave her a sardonic smile. “I don’t know if you’ll believe me, but I think he’s a little scared, and even more lonely.”    Adrienne remembered back to the match. Was really easy to remember the worst parts. Silvio however reminded her of one strange moment towards the end. After an errant boot had busted his lip open, he became uncontrollable. It stopped being a competitive wrestling match and instead became a struggle to survive the night. After managing to escape his clutches, he was dragged up the ramp by his security detail and King gave her the strangest expression. All she could see were his eyes and yet they told her for the briefest moment that what Silvio had just explained was true.    “I believe you,” she replied emphatically.

[thecosydragon]

My latest blog post from the cosy dragon: Review: Aldo Agostinelli & Silvio Mauzza – People are Media

People are Media Aldo Agostinelli & Silvio Mauzza

Digital technology has been disruptive even in this field. Nowadays, everybody can communicate with whomever they want, wherever they wish, for free and instantly… We are talking about a huge human capital which needs to be regulated, but also a potentially limitless market where to make business by interpreting big data and using the most refined and efficient storytelling techniques. ”

I hoped that this book would discuss how to exploit people as media. Instead it reads as a list of facts with no actual argument. My wife got half way through this book before she gave up and needed to rant to me about it. She did read the second half (no other books on offer at the time) which had more details and practicality in terms of what will happen next eg. ‘getting lots of likes’ is the way that things are heading.

One of the later chapters discusses the ‘Big Data’ of ads – you can give feedback that you already purchased it so that it can predict what you might like to buy. Google not only knows where you are going, it now knows where you park. This data can be used better, and at the moment isn’t good at cross-selling. He writes as if this is a bad thing at two two extremes: ‘everyone wants freedom & chaos’ and compares it to Singapore where ‘a lot of rules and tracking leads to fines when people do the wrong thing, but can also be used to improve traffic’. I don’t believe that the culture in Australia and the US  would let the latter happen to us, because we like our freedom, and campaign hard to keep it.

We used to be so focused on keeping our data and information private. People used to be secretive and not even mention when they were going on holiday so that people wouldn’t rob the house! But now, we even let Facebook know when we are out to lunch. Technology already knows where I am all the time (with a phone in my pocket), now I’d just like to be more useful – so the only way forward is to improve the technology. The authors don’t feel this way at all – whoever has that data like Facebook and Google can monopolise and use it to control the world.

The authors are clearly Italian because they mention it a million times, but it’s not really relevant. With this in mind, perhaps it is typical that I comment on it not being written well with many long sentences a lot of commas. A lot of the paragraphs are a single sentence with no links or reasons for why particular things are mentioned, leading to it reading in a fragmented manner. Additionally, statements are randomly bolded – things that he seems to think are important – but they are just facts, not the point.

When you look at past inventions such as trains/planes it was new for the time and considered a huge innovation. The media selfie era is no different to what has already happened in the past. Because it is new to you in your lifetime doesn’t mean that it’s a unique occurrence! The statement of ‘When I was young…’ is something that can be applied to many things. When I was young, my grandparents told me that there were never books about cooking because everyone knew how to, and it was just passed on. Then in my time, and my parents time, cook books were popular. Now, it’s all on the internet. It’s a natural progression of things in my opinion.

The conclusion wasn’t a conclusion. It was just what you could have understood from looking at the front (there’s no blurb). The authors ask their rhetorical questions in the conclusion, but don’t actually answer how technology can be harnessed in a positive manner. The point of the book is that we should learn to harness the technology and use it to improve the world, but we have no hope of doing this until… ever. Apparently there is no hope of doing that.

This book wasn’t for me or my wife. I’m not sure who would enjoy it or find it useful – perhaps in its native language it is more relevant and well written. Don’t rush out to buy it, have a browse in the bookstore first.

from https://ift.tt/2T9ayR8

[yourclassygal]

Prince Philip Gaffs 

‘I declare this thing open, whatever it is.’ During a visit to Canada in 1969.

‘It looks like a tart’s bedroom,’ — on seeing plans for the Duke and Duchess of York’s house at Sunninghill Park in 1988.

To a driving instructor in Scotland, during a 1995 walkabout: ‘How do you keep the natives off the booze long enough to get them through the test?’

Pointing at an old-fashioned fusebox in a factory near Edinburgh in 1999: ‘It looks as if it was put in by an Indian.’

In Kenya, in 1984, after accepting a small gift from a local woman: ‘You are a woman, aren’t you?’

In Australia, in 1992, when asked to stroke a Koala bear: ‘Oh no, I might catch some ghastly disease.’

‘You can’t have been here that long, you haven’t got a pot belly’ — to a Briton in Budapest, Hungary, in 1993.

‘Aren’t most of you descended from pirates?’ — to a resident of the Cayman Islands in 1994.

At a tree-planting ceremony in Hyde Park in 2011, the Queen met 16-year-old Army cadet Stephen Menary, who lost an arm and most of his sight in an IRA bomb attack. When the Queen asked him how much he could see, Philip interjected: ‘Not a lot, judging by the tie he’s wearing.’

‘You managed not to get eaten, then?’ — to a student who had been trekking in Papua New Guinea in 1998.

‘I wish he’d turn the microphone off’ — muttered at the Royal Variety Performance as he watched Sir Elton John perform, 2001.

‘You look like a suicide bomber,’ to a young female officer wearing a bullet-proof vest on Stornoway, Isle of Lewis, in 2002.

To young designer Stephen Judge in July 2009: ‘Well, you didn’t design your beard too well, did you?’

Addressing multi-ethnic Britain’s Got Talent winners Diversity, who are from London, in 2009: ‘Are you all one family?’

‘Children go to school because their parents don’t want them in the house’ — prompting giggles from Malala Yousafzai, who survived an assassination attempt by the Taliban after campaigning for the right of girls to go to school without fear — October 2013.

To the Queen at her coronation: ‘Where did you get that hat?’

On Princess Anne: ‘If it doesn’t fart or eat hay, she’s not interested.’

To disabled comedian Adam Hills, who has a prosthetic foot, in 2009: ‘You could smuggle a bottle of gin out of the country in that.’

He told Paraguay’s dictator General Alfredo Stroessner: ‘It’s a pleasure to be in a country that isn’t ruled by its people.’

Speaking to singer Tom Jones after the 1969 Royal Variety Performance: ‘What do you gargle with, pebbles?’

In 2010 he asked disabled mobility scooter rider David Miller, 60: ‘How many people have you knocked over this morning on that thing?’

After being told Madonna was singing the Die Another Day theme at the film’s world premiere at the Albert Hall in 2002 he asked her: ‘Are we going to need ear plugs?’

In Ghana in 1999 he asked an MP: ‘How many members of Parliament do you have?’ When told 200, he replied: ‘That’s about the right number. We have 650 and most of them are a complete bloody waste of time.’

Overheard in 2005 at Bristol University’s engineering facility, which had been closed so that he could officially open it: ‘It doesn’t look like much work goes on at this university.’

As he and the Queen walked down the aisle through a fog of holy smoke in a birthday service in a high church in 2004, he asked: ‘Is this a celebration or a cremation?’

After a meal of venison at Magdalen College, Oxford, in 2008, Philip spotted a herd of deer in the grounds and asked the bursar: ‘How many of those buggers did you have to shoot for lunch then?’

Then, on being told the supply had come from Kent he quipped: ‘Well, don’t tell Charles because he likes everyone to buy local!’

In 2008, to a soldier whose head had been injured by shrapnel from an explosive device packed with ball-bearings: ‘Does your head rattle?’

In 1955, when asked what he felt about his life: ‘I’d much rather have stayed in the Navy frankly.’

At a reception to honour Australians, Philip met the husband of Gill Hicks, who lost her legs in the July 2005 London bombings. ‘You’re not Australian!’ said Philip.

‘No, actually I’m not important, I’m just here because of my wife,’ he said. ‘Tell me about it!’ said the Prince.

On a 1961 visit to Sheffield’s Hallam University, he was shown a plastic dummy which talked, used in medical training. The dummy lay in bed saying: ‘I don’t feel well.’ Philip replied: ‘Frankly you don’t look well!’

To Welsh singer Katherine Jenkins in 2007: ‘How are your vocal cords?’ Miss Jenkins: ‘Fine thank you.' Philip replied: ‘No boils or warts on them yet?’

During the same walkabout in Kent in 2012 where he joked about being arrested for unzipping a woman’s dress, he spotted 90-year-old Barbara Dubery sitting in a wheelchair, wrapped in a foil blanket to fend off the cold . . . and asked: ‘Are they going to put you in the oven next?’

At a Buckingham Palace dinner in 2011 Philip listened to tenor Russell Watson’s stirring rendition of Jerusalem.

As it ended he said: ‘Why do you need a bloody microphone? They could have heard you in outer space.’ He then turned to the singer’s partner Louise Harris and added: ‘You must go deaf listening to him all the time.’

During a 1991 visit to Swansea he met four local belly dancers and told them: ‘I thought Eastern women just sat around smoking pipes and eating sweets all day.’

On a visit to Hull in 2009 he met victims of bad floods, many of whom had lost their homes. Bidding farewell to council leader Carl Minns, he said: ‘Keep your head above water!’

At a G20 summit, the Queen asked of Italian leader Silvio Berlusconi: ‘Why does he talk so loudly?’ Philip replied: ‘He is Italian, my dear, how else would he sell his ice creams?’

‘Are you responsible for making people overweight in Crawley?’ — to the manager of a cake shop on a 2006 visit to the town.

At a 2008 Buckingham Palace reception he was introduced to Oscar-winning actress Cate Blanchett. Thinking she was a film technician he asked: ‘Do you know how to fix my broken DVD player? There’s a cord sticking out of the back and I don’t know where it goes.’

During a 2009 Buckingham Palace reception for British Indians, Philip glanced at business chief Atul Patel’s name badge — and remarked: ‘There’s a lot of your family in tonight!’

On a state visit to Britain in 2015, President Xi Jinping of China was shown some Chinese treasures from the Royal Collection. Philip told him: ‘You can’t claim any of them back — we check your luggage before you go!’

For a 2016 programme about the 60th anniversary of the Duke of Edinburgh’s Award scheme, presenter Phillip Schofield performed a wing walk.

‘Why are you doing that?’ asked Philip. ‘Does someone not like you? Open your mouth up there and you’ll blow up like a balloon.’

He later introduced Schofield to a parachutist saying, ‘Meet a fellow idiot.’

At a Buckingham Palace reception to thank those involved in the Diamond Jubilee celebrations in 2012, Prince Philip met Conservative Health Secretary Jeremy Hunt.

‘Who are you?’ he asked. Hunt explained he was Health Secretary but that he’d been Culture Secretary during the Jubilee and Olympics. ‘Well they do move you people on a lot,’ said Philip, walking off.

In 2006 an official at a Canadian airport asked the Duke: ‘What was your flight like, Your Royal Highness?’ Philip: ‘Have you ever flown in a plane?’ Official: ‘Oh yes, Sir, many times.’ Philip: ‘Well, it was just like that.’

On a visit to open the headquarters of GB Airways at Gatwick Airport in 2000, Philip chatted to pilots and cabin crew and told them: ‘When you think of all the publicity about planes being dangerous to fly in, I wonder, why aren’t all of you dead?’

In 2009, a young man told him he’d worked with the Samaritans. He replied: ‘You didn’t try to commit suicide did you?’

As he sat with the Queen at the Royal Variety Show in 2014, watching a male stripper scene from The Full Monty, Philip told their biographer Gyles Brandreth: ‘Don’t worry, she’s been to Papua New Guinea and seen it all before!’

On a visit to the GCHQ building in Cheltenham in 2004, Labour MP Chris Mullin asked Philip about the modern design, saying: ‘Would Charles approve?’ ‘Charles who?’ replied the Duke.

His most infamous gaffe came in 1986 when he told a British student in China: ‘If you stay here much longer you’ll be slitty-eyed.’

In 2005, a female reporter asked him: ‘I wondered if you might like to talk to me?’ He replied: ‘You can carry on wondering.’

After meeting Gogglebox regulars Sandra Martin and Sandy Channer in 2016: ‘Well, I won’t be watching you, that’s for sure!’

In 2006, to comedian David Walliams after he swam the English Channel for Sport Relief: ‘Is this the nut who swam the channel?’ Turning to Walliams’s mother, he added: ‘Any more nuts in your family?’

AS the Queen opened a dental hospital in 2015 in Birmingham, Philip asked the crowd: ‘Are you all here to get your teeth done? We don’t want to jump the queue.’

At a 2014 reception for a disability charity, Philip saw ex-rugby player Alastair Hignell in a high-tech wheelchair that could be raised or lowered as required. He said: ‘That must be good for cocktail parties.’

He then told BBC disability correspondent Nikki Fox — who was in a normal mobility scooter: ‘You should get yourself one!’

Extracted from Prince Philip: Wise Words And Golden Gaffes by Phil Dampier and Ashley Roberts, published by Barzipan Publishing