#you've changed me for the better

[flannelepicurean]

HELLO, MINNEAPOLIS!

Oh my blog, bean buns. I just had THEEEEE wildest dream.

Absolutely PACKED concert stadium. Beautiful night. Fans in a mood of adoration.

RADITZ. Glorious. So much hair. Front and center, singing with his whole entire goddamn chest, I can't even describe the genre, but Big-Big Kitty Man Boyfie apparently has a voice that's like Josh Groban and Meat Loaf just Raditzissimo-ed together, and everyone went BA-NANNER-ZZZZZ. Of course.

And then he got this look of absolute feline delight and counted off a zesty, "ONE-TWO-TRUNKS-NAPPA!!!" so they could start jamming. The fuck. OOOUUUUUTTT.

Raditz on lead guitar and vocals, Kid Trunks slamming on bass, Nappa absolutely ANNIHILATING everyone on drums. I think Chi-Chi showed up on keyboards at some point. And then the genre was "Journey x Meat Loaf," because "Saiyans x Meat Loaf" seems to be a headcanon sticking point for me. It just makes cultural sense.

Also, during intermission, Goku came out and sat on the Flying Nimbus and played some chill bamboo flute jams for everybody. I guess so they could catch their breath and reorganize their minds before getting ANNIHILATED with the absolute VIGOR of the second half.

And in the "lead man lies on stage and talks to the audience for a minute" part that you get from Green Day, Raditz went full panther and looked out at the crowd and purred, "Hey, babes... Guess what? ...You're... still...

Here."

in the most adoringly threatening way. Like, a tone of, "I really want to bite you, and YES, it is sexual. But also romantic." Because it was like... referring to the fact that both he and Nappa (and by extension Vegeta) had totally come to Earth with EXTREMELY ill intentions for all the folks in front of them tonight. But something beautiful had happened that transformed all three of them, and now there's a bond of... THIS. THIS RIGHT HERE. This beautiful moment between the two Saiyans up here and the THOUSANDS of you out there in front of us, celebrating how much we love each other. We love you as much or more than you love us, humans. Humanity. Earthlings. Earth. We love you. I want to bite you, and it's both sexual and romantic. I love you so much. Chomp-chomp.

NOW LET'S ROCK!!!

And they tore the fucking house down.

And then Raditz was like, "Aw-RIIIIIIGHTTT!!! GOOD NIGHT, MINNEAPOLIS!!!"

And this morning I woke up like, "...goddamn."

[poorly-drawn-mdzs]

Lan Wangji Goes To Lotus Pier AU: Part 1: Dread on Arrival

(Part 2)

[buwheal]

How is your hand doing? Is it still bleeding, at all?

[bumblingbabooshka]

S'chn T'gai-Grayson Family Memes

[jayktoralldaylong]

Jon: If you need a vessel so bad why don't you just become-

Elias: Because I'm not scared of them.

Jon: ......

Elias: I don't need your body, Jon. I need your fear. 😈

Meanwhile, Elias the Gaslight King in earlier seasons: Jon you know I'd never let anything bad happen to you, I'm only trying to help. We need to save the world together, isn't that what we're trying to achieve? Oh Jon, Jon, Jon, bad things are only happening because you do not trust me. Trust me, and we can save everyone. Don't you believe me?

Then it went the exact opposite with Peter and Martin.💀😂💔

Peter: I've got the perfect plan to beat Elias. Can you do what it takes to become the hero?

Martin: I'm going to save the world?

Peter: Yes, and it will be you and you alone. Do you trust me?

Martin: I trust you.

That same season 💀

Peter: You played me! 😳😭 You've been lying to me this entire time.

Martin: You lied first 🙄 and I knew it the instant you told me I'd save the world. I can't save the world. I've never saved anything in my entire life. I'm not important enough to be the hero.

[mixelation]

me: ....and this is the final figure

my boss: can you [minor adjustment]?

me: no.

my boss: why not

me: i don't think you understand how cursed the making of this figure was compared to how good it looks. i used four different programs. do you even know what gimp is

my boss: what--

me: the select tool and the move tool are different buttons. DO YOU UNDERSTAND

[kingwaino]

i don't talk about him a lot on here but a couple years ago i got a beta fish which i so sweetly named sebass-tian hamil-fin. i'd never had a fish before but at the time, since i wasn't in my apartment a lot, a fish was really the only thing i could care for. unfortunately, he passed away today.

i didn't think i'd be this upset by it because i could kind of tell over the past week or two that he wasn't doing too well. i tried my best to make him feel better but unfortunately, it wasn't enough.

i plan to go and get another fish tomorrow but i just...don't really know how to feel about it right now. he was my first fish and certainly won't be my last.

[loopnoid]

No more star trek?

i still love star trek dearly! i wish i could be one of those artists who are just pumping out art all the time like it's nothing, but unfortunately i am quite slow and my drawing energy is limited so i tend to focus my efforts on my newest ideas, which are usually for my latest interests. i haven't necessarily given up on star trek—i still plan on participating in the yearly swimsuit zine however long it runs (i skipped this year's because of burnout and college but i'm doing better now), and i'd love to do some art for lower decks before it ends... but i can't promise anything :( i can barely keep up with new ideas for new interests, so going back to older ones is a little difficult for me, much as i try. i don't like it anymore than you do but it is what it is

[stemacademics]

small update

ok so um I got my number theory paper today, and the TA had cut marks for me because i left the answer at 66^2 and not 4356 (fermat's little theorem) 😔 I even wrote the full proof

my friend told me I should mail the TA about this, I got 14/20 and should be getting 17or18/20 😔

scores aside, number theory is so much fun, so much fun. the only good thing here is that I know the concepts well, and I fully knew the paper (still fucked it up, because I'm so frickin slow while writing and time). and it hurts worse because there's not enough proof that validates my knowledge. which in turn makes me question if i actually do have any.

I am, in general, a person who does well in concepts but screws up the exams (70% of the time) and I'm trying, I'm trying to get myself out of this "exam paniK" that I often spiral into, just minutes before the exam. I hope I change and grow; I hope, I hope.

[thresholdbb]

You know what I like? Star Trek

[ninjagirlstar5]

I was in the mood to draw Minako Tomori, and so I did. I put her in this melancholic pose while dressed in casual clothes, like she's hanging out in public, but she started getting distracted by past regrets...

Her casual clothes are based off of this sprite edit I made of her for my fanfic:

There's no tattoo-covering-a-scar on her shoulder in this sprite cause I literally just came up with that headcanon yesterday and this sprite edit is almost a year old (I just never posted it until now). Not that you would've seen it that well from this angle anyways.

Her tattoo is based off of the flower, Sakurasou or the Japanese Primrose, btw. Kinda proud on how it turned out, ngl, as I'm not really that good in designing tattoos for characters. ^^;

Anyways, I made an off-the-cuff Minako Tomori analysis under the read more, oops:

I've been seeing a lot of Tomori family talk lately and that made me start thinking of Minako again as she's, well, kindof my favorite out of the 6.5 crew next to Dr. Ando (which led to me making this drawing of her). Now, I'm not defending her in how she raised Kizuna or her horrible attitude or anything like that. She's pretty horrible in DRA 6.5 and she gets called out on multiple times by Ryutaro and even Dr. Ando, and rightfully so. But man, from what I can understand in DRA 6.5, she's clearly a goddamn mess. From all the smoking she does to (badly) cope with the stress of dealing with her failure of a marriage to a shitty husband who is also a shitty dad, to constantly cheating on him cause she'd rather be anywhere but with him and can't divorce him due to collateral so she's just legally stuck with him so she goes off to find other men (usually younger but at least they're of age) to ignore her problems at home, puts importance on money because she's the only one trying make sure they have a fuckin' roof over their heads cause her husband is too busy gambling and drinking all their money away, and probably put importance on her appearance more than anything else cause it's one of the few things she can control about herself and feel confident in (and even then, she can't stop the passage of time that is old age). And all of this, plus how she interacts with Ryutaro in her Talk sections (a.k.a. her FTEs) by constantly calling him brat and trying to get him to go away, and no wonder Kizuna turned out the way she did. She had a dad that was never there for her or his wife, refusing to take responsibility for anything and just focuses on himself, and her mom is dealing with SO many things that she's constantly stressed about money and her appearance to the point that she's unable to be emotionally supportive to her daughter in any healthy manner that her flaws, her own attitude about men, and her beliefs in money and appearance is all that matters just ended up trickling down to her daughter and influencing her in a way that it turned her into the messed up girl she is in the short time we got to know her in DRA. Like, holy shit, Minako. You're an asshole of a parent, but when you really think about it, the poor woman got the short end of the stick in life and that really affected how she acted in raising her daughter. Again, not defending her as she's still a bad influence but it's hard not to pity her when she's left to do all the work herself, from parenting, to working, to just trying to take care of herself (by coping in very bad ways)...It's not an enviable position, that's for sure. But honestly, that's what makes Minako so interesting to me. She's not a good person, far from it, nor is she the "better" parent in this scenario. But she still cared enough about Kizuna to follow a suspicious note and getting kidnapped in the process, even when it had the underlying motivation of deciding that she had enough of her shitty husband and took the opportunity to run away from him. And whenever the other characters, particularly Dr. Ando, call her out on her nonsense, I think she gets struck silent in response. Like their words are genuinely getting to her and making her question the way she acts.

And you know what fucks me up the most?

The implication that, between finding out what happened to Kizuna and the rest of the class in DRA post 6.5 upon getting rescued and before the events of SDRA2, she actually changed and improved as a person. Minako, while she is gossiping in the epilogue, is a lot more nicer and friendlier here, is giving us a rundown of what happened after the Utsuroshima Killing Game and the rumors surrounding it to Midori, and making light-hearted jokes in an attempt to cheer Midori up by making fun of herself. And when Midori starts to cry over Teruya's death, Minako's sprite goes sympathetic and concerned and it fades to black for awhile and we come back to Midori reassuring Minako that she's feeling better now with the implication that Minako was trying to comfort her through her mourning. And then she gives out some pretty sound advice, even when dropping this bit in the process:

(The translation is an unofficial version and this bit of dialogue appears at the 3:55 mark.)

"...Go ahead and cry your heart out. You're still young, so you don't have to pretend you're strong."

"With age, the tears won't come even if you want to cry, so when you feel the need to cry, cry."

Which, OW to that last one.

Like, imagine going through so much shit through your life as an adult that you can't even bring yourself to cry about it. You just go, "Yep, this might as well happen," with all the apathy and frustration you can muster in your body.

And when Midori goes to leave to talk to the criminals, Minako has the sense to go "That's a bad and dangerous idea, Midori, don't go alone!" and points out that she JUST got out of the hospital and hasn't fully recovered yet. She even tries to convince her to stay by asking her to continue talking with her cause she's bored. (And, well, I can believe that, even when she's speaking some common sense.) But it clearly rubbed Midori the wrong way as she seems to want to be useful in any way she can, regardless of whether or not her life gets put in danger, so she goes anyway. Aaand Minako complains about Midori's parents not teaching her to treat her adults with "respect," and has brought up "worrying over Keisuke getting a scratch on his pretty face" earlier in conversation, which shows that she's still a flawed person. But I consider that good writing as just because she's a better person now, that doesn't mean her flaws are just going to go away or disappear suddenly. Taking away a character's flaws in order to make them a "good" person will only make them bland, boring, and flat as a paper. Flaws are meant to help characters be more nuanced in personality, and Minako still being abrasive is good as it's a flaw that is a part of her to be aware of and keeps her character recognizable despite the implication that she's trying to do better now. And when Midori gets kidnapped, she immediately runs over to Ryutaro and Keisuke to tell them what happened, calling Ryutaro "kid" in the process, and showing fear for Midori's safety. I don't know if the translation between Kid and Brat is any different, but it's a step up from brat, at least. (And honestly, I can see Minako using "kid" and "brat" as a more affectionate nickname to Ryutaro over time since she comes off as the type to show affection through teasing.) And to top it all off, the cigarettes from her DRA sprites have been replaced with lollipops in her SDRA2 sprites, and candy is a common way of trying to combat addiction to nicotine.

In other words, the way Minako acts in SDRA2 shows that she's trying to be a better person, even if that development happened between games. (And frankly, we shouldn't just stop everything in the epilogue just to have a flashback of "here's why so-and-so acts like this now!" Like, that would just kill the pacing of the epilogue and defeats the whole purpose of a time-skip between games.) It's just a shame that Kizuna's death was the wake-up call that put her on that track to growth in the first place (alongside the call-outs). It's through the death of her own daughter and what led up to it and why she acted the way she did in that moment that made her stop, take in the call outs she's been dealt with throughout the 6.5 chapter, and go, "Oh. I've been a shitty mom and that played a part in how Kizuna acted and led to her death." Cause think about it: if Kizuna was never concerned about her appearance, if she never had this belief that she had to extort others in order to benefit herself, whether it's men for money, affection, popularity, attention or anyone else for anything else, DRA's Chapter 2 probably wouldn't have happened the way that it did. It may not have prevented Kizuna from dying at some point during the killing game, but her behavior was something that she learned and inherited from Minako. And that realization had to sting for her as she not only lost her daughter but had to come to terms with the revelation that it was indirectly her fault for influencing Kizuna in a way that made her a terrible person that decided her only option to survive was to try and kill (which backfired on her hard). But unlike some people, who would double-down on their behavior or just grow worse through their grief, Minako seemed to have reflected on everything up to that point and decided to grow as a person instead. But even though Minako is trying to be a better person now, she can never make it up to her own daughter that she messed up the most. Because that chance is forever lost thanks to death itself.

Reflection is important, because if you don't do that much, you'll never realize what you've done wrong until it's too late and the chance to make it up to your loved one is forever stripped from you.

...At least, that's how I've interpreted Minako Tomori.

[bearsinpotatosacks]

Update on my Whumptober thoughts: Not all the prompts will be posted, I have all 31 planned out but I found out that you don't have to post all 31. If a fic is finished, I'll post it but there's some big beasts that I want to write properly instead of rush. Also, I might not even write all 31. I want the completionist title but I don't have the time nor energy to force myself to write all the prompts and I did it last year and it wasn't like life-changing. I like Whumptober because the prompts help my creativity, spark some inspiration (talking about my Delancey Brothers Fic) but the perfectionist in me just beats myself up about not getting enough fics done before October or not writing enough each day to get them finished and then writing fics that all sound the same or the ideas being kind of shitty because I'm forcing them. I want to do my ideas justice rather than mass produce shit I don't like because I feel I need to, it's a constant line I walk between "I want to write something well and that I'm proud of so might be inactive for a while on AO3" and "I want to get this idea out there so need to post a bunch of stuff now"

[isan0rt]

Me just now: ugh I kind of regret modeling my khux Player after myself when I first signed up to the app in 2016. Like, yes they kinda look like me but they are NOT me, they're their own character!! Player is a different person!! They just happen to kinda look like me!!

@organizationhimself : isn't that like, just the general Kingdom Hearts thing tho? 'He kinda looks like me but he's a different guy'?

Me: ... :O!!!?

[oldtvandcomics]

So the funny thing in I Saw the TV Glow is of course that in-universe, The Pink Opaque's ending must be weird AF. Like, we don't talk about it because it works just too well as a metaphor, but that teens' TV show absolutely did end with both main character getting buried alive and kind of left there.

Except that, of course, our world has got wildly popular TV shows with similar ending, too.

So, may I propose the mental image:

You are out here, living your life. It kind of sucks, like there is this thing that isn't quite right, but you don't know what it is, so you are kind of existing without any greater joys or passions, but what can one do. Then your old friend, whom you haven't seen in ten years, randomly shows up, looking somewhat hectic, and announce: "So, remember that old TV show, Blake's 7? Turns out, I am actually Blake. The Federation caught us and is currently mind washing us to think that all of this is real. You need to wake up, Avon."

I genuinely don't know what I would do in this situation. But the idea is so fucking funny.

[total-drama-brainrot]

my total drama oc is a reversal of the show's pre-established "villain" archetype.

right off the bat, they're just the worst person; outright antagonistic towards everyone and constantly causing conflict amidst the cast, openly orchestrating people's eliminations, blatantly cheating but in such a way that technically they're not breaking any rules- without disguising themself behind a mask of geniality (like alejandro, heather and julia did).

and they're kept around well into the competition because their villainy? it's ratings gold. people love a good antagonist, especially one that's so productive. the audience loves to hate them, or hates that they love them, and everyone is gunning for their downfall- which only becomes more and more tempting with every elimination.

plus, chris is more than happy to enable them so long as they keep things interesting.

interestingly enough, they never seem to use the confessional. or at least, none of their confessions are aired. well, that's not exactly true. one confession is aired, and it's them boasting to the audience that they wouldn't understand the inner machinations of their mind, and that they don't deserve to hear their thoughts.

consequently, the audience has no idea what they're thinking at any given time, only seeing glimpses of their schemes throughout the episode until everything comes to fruition- like a puzzle finally being completed. it's a smart move for the network, because it means the audience gets to watch their plans play out in 'real time' without their insight/foreknowledge, making it just as impactful to the viewers as it is to the competitors. it helps with immersion, which is a boon for the ratings!

until their elimination, wherein their confessions are played out on the big screen, and it's heartbreaking.

they explain, in their first confession, that they were accosted by chris at the beginning of the competition to act as the main antagonistic force for the show, and that he's turn a blind eye to their antics so long as they kept the viewers watching, even paying them a decent salary if their act was good enough. because they're smart- smart enough to play the rest of the cast like a fiddle if they wanted to, and chris wants them to.

what a great deal, right? being given blanket permission to be as conniving as possible, and a pay check to boot- who wouldn't take the opportunity?

and they round it out by "getting into character" on camera, sneering haughtily at the lens and- you guessed it- boasting to the audience that they wouldn't understand the inner machinations of their mind, before giggling dorkily at the silliness of their statement, commenting that it'd we way too obvious they were faking if they acted that snooty. they're a theatre kid at heart, so the idea of "playing the villain" is exciting! it's going to be so fun!

but their second confession is sombre. they're visibly tired, wiping away at the concealer under their eyes to reveal some heavy bags, and they're curled up into a pitiful ball in front of the camera. they divulge that the pressure to constantly live up to the shows expectations of antagonism is crushing, and their status as a social pariah is more draining than they'd care to admit, and that- despite the apparent glee they've been committing these acts of villainy with- being so outwardly morally corrupt has left them with a constant churning of guilt in their gut. they only agreed to be the "bad guy" for the money, which would help their family's financial situation tremendously, but they're growing increasingly uncertain if the reward justifies the risks.

by the third confession, they're actively sickened by their actions, eventually devolving from airing their frustrations, lamenting their choice to method act as such an awful person, to throwing up into the confessional's toilet as they hold back guilt-leaden tears and repeat a mantra of "i'm sorry, i'm sorry,". they're drowning in the murky waters of their persona, and backing out now would only lead to more scrutiny and suspicion from the people who were supposed to be their friends, and they know they'd deserve the mistrust. plus, backtracking from their deal with chris would jeopardise everything- from the dirty money they've earned from their antagonism to their place in the competition itself; they'd be voted out in a heartbeat without the network's safety blanket of plot armour!

they don't know what to do. they barely even know who they are anymore.

and then the camera's focus cuts to the real-time them, who's sat ashen-faced and deathly still as their weakest moments are broadcast, not only to the people who rightfully hate them, but to the whole world.

[wolfsong-the-bloody-beast]

She's so funny.