#Not a full transcript or translation because I don't want to get it wrong but TLDR:

[royalarchivist]

Pac: Fit. Where are you, Fit? Where are you, Fit? Where is my official gossip???

It's always very funny hearing Pac and Fit complaining when the other person hasn't logged onto the server yet, lmao.

[verycharismaticdragon]

On Air Island - chapter 5 - part 4

navigation: [prev] - [next]

catching up: ch.1 [full] - ch.2 p.1 - story so far [transcript]

other: [character guide] - [to avoid sp⊘ilers]

Trigger warnings for today's episode: (extremely stylized) depiction of, and slightly graphic description of, a mutilated dead body; loud noises.

(the transcript is available below the poll, under keep reading)

Whoa! Things are getting real spooky! What are everyone's guesses 🤔 Maybe Mr. PD didn't have the Halloween candy for the kids ready....? And if you don't have treats, you just may become a treat, right?

Jokes aside,

*og tl: What the hell did Naoto see? (t/n: since the names of most characters were translated, it seems the og tl mixed up who was who. the kr text uses ezra's korean name, and the following dialogue makes it obvious which was correct)

**og tl: Shut up, noisy people!

Transcript legend:

In-game text

Character speaking: dialogue line

regular chat message Donation: donation message

available donation messages

{ Alternative translation }

|| 🏅 award (achievement) collected ||

———— ———— ————

Thiago: Mmm… …then why don't you see it yourself?

[player] donated 10 Touching Spade: Let's go!

Hanse: Ugh...... Well, I'll go check it out myself.

outnow: We don’t really need to watch it though

Ezra: Ahaha. I'll go too. It's not often you get a chance like this.

Alice: Do I have to see it? I don't want to!

winkhans: Ugh… Well pRISMFAN: But I think it will be better if we check on it

Honari: You must...... but not until the end, right? I'd rather stay here with Alice. { It's not required... is it? I would like to stay here with Alice as well. }

Honari: Hanse, are you sure you don't mind?

Hanse: Yes. Actually, I don't like it, but if I don't see it with my own eyes......

Galchi19: Ah

Hanse: I think I'll get stuck in even more terrible thoughts.

DUMMY: Mmmh yeah

Honari: Ah............

Honari: Okay, you need to be careful.

WOLKER: Awesome Hanse!

Thiago: I'll check the people who have expressed their intention.

Thiago: Hanse, Mr. Fact, Jin, Ezra, Naoto... Is that right?

nohanse: Can you not go?

Mr.Fact: Ah~ Isn't this a ghost stop? I'll just have to check it out, right?

Jin: …………

Naoto: I'm just going to check it out. Don't put me on the same level as that bastard. { I'm going to check it because I feel uneasy. Don't put me on the same level as that bastard. }

Naoto: I might get offended and kill him.

MoeGuy: You have to see only good things, Hanse

Julia: I'm off to the races. If you want to follow up, come this way... { Let’s go then. Those who decided otherwise, please come this way. }

Jin: ……………

[Sound of stomping grass] [A group of people crosses the forest]

Thiago: This is it.

WatchOut: …

Hanse: This, this…………

ONLIONE: OH MY GOD…

Naoto: Huh, huh…… No way, how could anyone…… 

Naoto: Are you sure this was done by a human?

MoeGuy: This can’t be real

Jin: It doesn't look like he used a knife or a saw or anything. { It doesn't look like any tools, like a knife or a saw, were used. }

bbongGGu: What happened here????

Ezra: This is....... brutal and questionable.

Ezra: It looks like there's nothing left but bones and skin. { It looks like there's only bones and skin left. }

Tomato: Can someone report it?

Mr.Fact: What's wrong with you guys? It's obviously a prop.

Hanse: Huh…… Huck, huck……

Universe: Hanse… Are you okay??

Hanse: I'm sorry, everyone. We'll be right back…… we'll be back on the air.

hanseria: Argh eggrolly: Hanse OutNine: Hanse…

<Please check your connection>

… … … …

… … … …

[wind blowing] [waves are rough]

Hanse: Hello, this is Hanse.

artofhan: Ugh yesHan: Hanse danchu1: Hanse… Leggo: Are you okay??? hanmanse: Nothing bad right? { Did anything happen??? } captain: Fyuh

Hanse: I don't know if you've heard the news from the official, but just to give you an update…… { I don't know if you've seen the news from official sources, but to give you an update…… }

Hanse: Some of the crew had left the island first by boat.

CatProf: Yeah I read it somewhere ho___: Is the broadcast gonna get halted? onmang: Maybe nohanse: Keep doing it in this situation is awful RealFact: I came after reading about this on the social media

Hanse: This is to inform the broadcasters who are waiting outside and to deal with the situation...... { This is to relay the situation to the broadcasting company outside and decide on the course of action… }

Hanse: Why did this happen…………

forhanse: IKR adam3882: But is it a murder or a suicide? Angelic: You need to investigate to know about that Army: I still can’t believe it HsWAVE: What is really happening here?

Ezra: Hanse, do you see that?

Hanse: Huh? If it's over there…

RaMe: ??????? cocobab: WHUT? 1pmhanse: What’s going on again? hanseya: I don’t see anything specific…

Hanse: The fog………… When did it get this thick?

Ezra: No, you're wrong. It's not the fog I'm talking about...... { No, not that. What I'm talking about is not the fog… }  

[strong bumping sound] 

Hanse: Huh?

PorkSoup: ????? MySultan: ?????????? HeIsMine: What is it? Rolling: What was that sound just now? hanshack: It sounded like a huge collision…

[Something rumbles beyond the fog]

Hanse: Wh-what was that sound…………

Ezra: Oh, no…………

[Bizarre wailing] 

BIGNING: ? Rainbow: ????? whois: What’s happening this time… I’m really scared, I feel like I’m going to die MOoMOo: It felt like it came from the direction of the boat… 1ofEvery: It was a really horrifying sound

Hanse: …………!

Honari: Heh, what did you just......? { Eek, what just happened...? }

WOLKER: ???????????????

Alice: Kyaak! I think there is a problem with the boat! 

soofarrr: What did you say…??? boksunga: If it was from the boat… those production staff… MyFuture: People were on board, weren’t they?

Naoto: No! Oh, no, I don't think so......! { No way! Oh, no way...! }

Alice: But did the boat hit something or… ... What if it’s sunk?

Rolling: …How is this unfolding… { …What is going on… } deeping: It’s so scary, I can hardly breathe

Hanse, calm down and take care of the others

What the hell did Naoto see? { What on earth did Ezra see? }

Shut up, noisy people! { Shut the noisy people up. }

[mtg-player1]

a simple translation for privatisert barnål by resirkulert. (a political song, I will provide short explanations for the political parties referenced in the footnotes)

first, a translation I can't do afaik: "barnål" means the "needles" (leaf equivalents) of Pinales trees (which includes: Araucaria, cedar, celery-pine, cypress, fir, juniper, kauri, larch, pine, redwood, spruce, and yew, according to Wikipedia, version 14. Dec 20:10 to 15. dec 17:43 and maybe further).

another note is that I'm pretty sure some parts were just written wrong in the lyric transcript, cause multiple lines weren't coherent sentences so I wasn't true to that.

[lyrics start]

Straight to the point with a lawyer

I have a quote, you probably vote pirate¹

demonstrate and respond to Karl Johan² against the state decision

React against the self-important and they look down on citizens like you

Bureaucrats everywhere and the serious talk puts me off

[instrumental]

The wave of right-wing politics pushes me further left than I need

Everything is covered in soot, blue and green³ and all the time the conversation is about money

Everything you hear around is a loud voice influenced�� by a discussion

And I'm starting to wonder if the whole parliament has become an illusion

[instrumental]

[chorus: With barnål and sewing thread, I am sewing myself in place, With barnål and sewing thread, I sew myself in place ]

[instrumental]

When we hit the streets, everything is financed privately

and on every corner there is a person who has been discriminated against

Norway will become a country where praise⁵ should feel registered

And I met a man in the street, he had unfortunately been privatized

[chorus x 4]

[lyrics end]

ok so the footnotes:

"voting pirate" probably refers to voting for the pirate party, which is a real party in Norway (even getting 0.1% of votes in the national election), want to make online piracy easier I think the name is from. They basically believe in a right to knowledge and lack of surveillance. In 2023 they changed their name to "the innovation and technology party". (source: SNL.no, itpartiet.no, no.m.wikipedia.org, en.m.wikipeia.org). It could also mean something else, I'm not the only song interpreter, but yeah, some cultural context I figured may be relevant.

Karl Johan (-s gate / 's street) is the street in Oslo, the capital, where the parliament (Storting) building is.

for this footnote I've interpreted "covered in soot" as a metaphor, considering Norway doesn't have coal power afaik. But this is about the criticism of "blue and green". both the green Senterparti (centre party), the blue-green color Venstre (left party (although they're actually right wing libertarians, pro privatization though pro queer) and the blue parties (all the right-wing ones) are for privatization. A notable exception here is mdg (The Environment Party The Green) who are leftists (criticized for dividing would-be Red Party (the furthest left with any power) voters) , but use the color green. (disclaimer that this is a politics summary and thus people have strongly varied perceptions of them, the parties vary locally (I'm not checking 10 k + communes), and I don't have any academic background in politics).

it feels weird to translate "å prege" as to influence, but it sorta does mean that. You could also say "informed by", "impacted by" and such. "his voice was [prega] by fear" means "his voice was full of fear".

I translated "annerkjennelse" as praise because of context, I assume it's about money, and basically praise = money being the message. But technically it means "recognition" (primarily), or "popularity", "acceptance ", "respect", "esteem" or "praise".

[detective-beebo-archive]

#i enjoy when the people theorize #i go yesssss my carefully planted seeds...... theyre being noticed #it did make me realize that this is the kind of game u play twice to fully get #Lets gooooo one (1) replayability point #that means game is good. all steam developers say so #detective beebo

Transcript for search purposes:

Rat #2, Eden: I've got an idea. Bwob: Alright. Eden: Is Vera somehow, like… part of the house now? Bwob: That's an interesting theory. Eden: Uh, I'm not going f—I'm not thinking full Monster House where like, trying to kill people, but like- Bwob: [crosstalk] Oh, yeah, no! [laughs] Eden: Yeah, it's—Do, but do you follow it? Like… But- No, but I was thinking something like that, because she- You know, even the guy said, like, y'know, the whole thing [that] her spirit, uh, did it, but he didn't think that. I don't know, what if it—what if it is kind of her in a way, keeping ev- people alive. That was her one wish. Bwob: [unclear, inaudible] Eden: I like it, I like it. Listen, alright, [unclear]. [WhatsApp message tone]

Eden: Wait, what if it just thinks it's Vera? Bwob: That's, uh- Eden: Do you know, like—'cause—'cause he did say, he said—he said something like, "the spirit of Vera" and shit like that. But—I don't know, 'cause it is keeping people safe in a way. But I don't—do you know, like, kind of in a fucked up way that thinks it's doing something good. Bwob: But I think the real problem is, does it think? Eden: [pause] If it was—ahh, I don't know how, like, to give an example. Do you know when you sh- see things in the, like, mimic? Bwob: [laughs] Yeah? Eden: Like that? What if it's just—it's mimicking what it's seen Vera be like, and then eventually it's just, "uh, keep people alive", [laughs] like— Bwob: I like that! Eden: I'll put—Listen, that theory's going in the—in the "probably not" pile, but I like it. [laughs] Bwob: I also like it, it's okay. Eden: [as Nadia] "…called them haunted."

Eden: [as Nadia] "—answer is yes. Somehow, some way, with enough intention, with enough emotion—" Ahh! I fucking- "Us cells can make a house do anything." So, like—'cause they wanted to protect people as well, what if it was just the fucking… the guy? Bwob: Yes? Eden: It could literally just be the guy. I don't know, like, it's just because he brought his wife up something and she has to have something to do with it. 'Cause she's dead as well! Bwob: She is.

[room change SFX throughout] Eden: We're going to try and walk out and we're not going to get out. Bwob: Nah. What's wrong with that? Eden: It's gonna happen, it's gonna happen. [pause] I FUCKING KNEW IT!

[room change SFX throughout] Eden: Why is he just in here? You fuckers! Let me out! Bwob: [laughs] Let me out. Let me out!! Eden: Let—Let me out of here!

[breakage SFX throughout] Eden: Oh my god. Yes! Beat the fuck out of it all! 0 fucks given.

[breakage SFX throughout] Eden: Fuck off, Mr Happy. Fuck off, Mr Frowny. Fuck off, Mr Happy. Fuck off, Mr Frowny. Bwob: [laughingly] You're so into this thing. Eden: [laughs] 'Cause it's pure destruction. Fuck you, coffee table. That's from IKEA. That's from Wayfair. And that's from fucking Carrefour warehouse, don't know why you got it from there. Bwob: There's one more. Eden: Oh-! Fuck the map and all. [music ends, pause] Oh. Did I fuck too much?

Eden: [as Nadia] "An interview said he wished to have such a good art gallery that the visitors would never leave. I believe that was the purpose. And somehow the house translated that into an infinite labyrinth." I was right! I knew! This is what happened! This is what happened with the other one! He wanted to save people so fucking bad that it—the house was like, "Oh, I know what'll save people." Bwob: [laughs] Eden: "You need more time, dickhead. I'm gonna give you more time." That—It has to be it. [as Nadia] "Really makes you think, are these things conscious? Malicious? Just literal?" See, yeah, I don't think they are being malicious. Bwob: They're just- [unclear in crosstalk] Eden: [crosstalk] They can't be, they can't th—yeah, they can't think, they're just working based on what the person that fucking lived there wanted. I wonder how Beebo got out eventually then. Do you think it was 'cause he just—he was breaking everything that the house just realized, "oh, he doesn't wanna be here." Bwob: That's an interesting way to say it. Like, "Oh, you don't want to be here? Why didn't you say that before?" Eden: [crosstalk] That—'Cause I mean, he—Yeah, the house… Yeah, the house literally will have no idea of knowing Beebo didn't wanna be there. Bwob: Like, "You were crying? Damn." [laughs] Eden: Yeah, I mean—well, 'cause the house cannot p- really perceive that, can it? Bwob: I mean, I don't know… [laughs] But it is really funny, something that like, "Oh, so now you want to get out." Eden: [crosstalk] Yeah, [laughs] just like, smashing shit, "Oh, you—Oh, he wants out. [laughs] Right, summon—summon a door. Send the cat on out, it keeps shitting." [laughs] Like- [Discord message tone] [unclear]

Eden: [as Beebo] "But what was it all that m- what was it that made it? Do we need a femur? I hope not." Just break shit! "…absolutely losing my mind? Maybe just angry?" Actually, I'm f- what would be the way you kill this house, 'cause its sole purpose is to keep people alive and reset the time? So the only way to break it would be to br—to, like… Somehow, no one dies, or like, no one gets injured or anything so there's no reason for the f- the whole time jump thing. Bwob: Yeah, but there is that guy killing people, like, actively. Eden: Nah, that's what I'm saying as well, like, so if they can stop him, that's at least— [laughs]

Eden: [as Nadia] "That man has been nothing but a curse to us. It's so offensive when everyone compares our eyes." D'you know, I've been comparing her to him so fucking much. Bwob: I know, and I'm like, "yes. YES!" Eden: See, it's f—it's 'cause she just has that kind of fucking coldness to her. Bwob: But her— Eden: She's probably- Bwob: —her mom also, is also, like, cold. Eden: Yeah, but I don't know why, her cold just feels warmth. Bwob: [laughs] I think you just like MILFs. Eden: It might be that as well.

[Clock sounds the hour] Bwob: [singing] It's the final countdown…! Bwob & Eden: [singing the instrumental sequence that follows in the song]

(Transcript may have errors; feel free to suggest corrections, or to fill in the unclear portions!)

Rat 0002 theorizes!! Plot things!! Yeah!!

[yukidragon]

Remember the secret tape with a threatening message from Jack? I think it’s a message left for one of the other love interests and the “them” is Sunshine, but my question is, where do you think did Jack take the MC? He probably has MC close by, and he said that he’s in a place “they can never reach.” Do you think he means “Cloudy Town”? Does that mean he takes us into his tape, or to the original Sunny Time Crew Show studio?

Ah yes, the classic audio of Jack going full yandere. It’s really effective seeing him looking bloody and sanity clearly frayed while he’s giving his monologue too, as you can see on the official twitter.

You know what, why don’t I transcribe the monologue really quick for those who need to run it through a translator.

Quick disclaimer: I have auditory processing disorder, so if I get anything wrong, please let me know so I can correct the transcript.

You think you care about them... don't you. You've convinced yourself that they need saving. That you can save them. It's too late, you know. They're already gone. Where I am, you could never reach. And every day that piece of me grows bigger and stronger. It's only a matter of time until we're one... truly and forever. I love them... and they love me. I'm not letting them go... ever. (Unhinged chuckling)

There’s so much here that could be figurative or literal. We don’t have a full grasp on Jack’s powers, or even what he is exactly, since Jack being a ghost is still in question.

It does seem like that it’s directed at one or more of the love interests. It could even be something Jack would say to the specific love interest that the player is trying to pursue. It would make sense that he would go full antagonist on the other romance routes, since he has every reason to go to desperate lengths to keep his sunshine.

It could even be something Jack would say to one or more love interest that’s trying to get in the way of his route. After all, just because the scary yandere ghost(?) is claiming someone is mistaken about how their darling feels, it doesn’t mean he’s necessarily wrong.

I highly doubt that Jack would willingly want to return to the tape. He described the place as hell, it was cold, and he couldn’t sleep while trapped in there. I doubt he would be willing to hurt MC by forcing them to go there either, even if to keep them. He’s more of a softcore yandere after all; he doesn’t want to hurt his sunshine.

If we take what Jack says as purely figurative, he could just mean that MC has fully chosen him instead of whoever he is talking to. They are so deeply in love with him that any rival’s affections could never reach them the way he can. The piece of him that grows bigger and stronger would be the figurative piece of him they hold in their heart, the love they have for him that only grows by the day.

In this case, being one forever might mean making MC so in love with Jack, need him so much, that they feel just as strongly towards him as he does for them... so, essentially, turning them yandere for him.

If we go with a more literal interpretation, then Jack has physically taken MC someplace accessible only to the two of them. While the tape seems like the obvious location, it seems too extreme for Jack to be willing to send his sunshine to a place he described as hell.

In a fully literal interpretation, there would be a literal piece of Jack inside of MC that is growing in strength and size. Eventually, it’ll get big enough that they will be ‘one’ and as such that they become one entity.

There was a theory that Jack’s ultimate goal was to merge with MC and share their body, though Sauce debunked it. They stated that Jack just wants to bask in MC’s warm and happy light, and he wouldn’t want to do anything to diminish that. He just refuses to let anyone get between them.

This is another reason why I doubt Jack sent MC into the tape. I would imagine being sent to a cold, sleepless hell would absolutely diminish one’s warm and happy light!

What I think, personally, is that there’s a mixture of figurative and literal going on here. My theory is that MC can see/hear/touch Jack because they are literally connected. I think MC has a piece of Jack’s soul inside them, and vice-versa. I’ve gone over this in previous headcanon posts, particularly one where I dissected a quote from the “no” route.

I want him to re-write me in this moment. I want him to do what he wants to help me forget anything that isn’t him. He’s taking some part of me… Infecting me with some kind of fever… Some need… And I don’t want to admit it… But I want to surrender and let him fill it.

I think this is a direct reference to the piece of Jack that’s growing bigger and stronger inside of MC. This only happens in the “no” route, so it could be that the monologue will only happen in most/every route but his.

The very human other love interests certainly can’t literally reach inside of MC to remove Jack from them, can they?

MC could be “gone” in that they’re so under Jack’s influence by that point that he won’t leave, won’t be forgotten. He “re-wrote” them, took a part of them, and is filling the empty space left behind. They love him because they just wanted to forget everything that wasn’t him since he makes them feel so good...

Though, I can see Jack’s speech applying to the “yes” route as well. MC loves him and is choosing him. Sure, he’s nudging things along by making them feel really good, but he’s not going as far with those good feelings as he does in the “no” route. In the “yes” route, he seems almost amazed at times that MC desires him and even takes the initiative sometimes.

While in both routes MC is choosing to be with Jack, in the “yes” route it’s because they’re happy with him rather than being addicted to the good feelings and security that he offers them.

In that situation where MC is actively taking steps towards jack rather than being lured closer with everything he can provide, it almost seems silly to assume that they need saving. Why would they need saving from something they want? They’re an active participant. They want to be with Jack forever.

I think Jack grows stronger the more MC loves and needs him. In the “no” route he’s influencing it with his own emotions, being a living drug and giving them hits of his feelings of love. In the “yes” route, they don’t need that, even if they question the dreamy haze they find themselves in at times when they’re around him.

I think, to some extent, there’s a certain level of involuntary empathy sharing between the two. There are times when MC feels cold, and it reflects when Jack is scared due to the distance growing between them.

Empathy is a really strong feeling. What better way for a yandere to prove just how much they love their darling than by letting them feel it? If they feel it then surely they will understand that they were meant to be together, as this love is too strong to be anything else.

You could say that a yandere’s love for someone is like a drug, and Jack is just sharing his drug of choice with MC when they’re not making their own for him on their own.

Getting back to the monologue, I think “being one forever” does have a supernatural angle to it. I think with enough love, Jack might get more of a grip on reality. It might even progress to the point that he can be perceived by others, strong enough that no one could ever banish him to the hell of the VHS tape ever again.

Heck, if Jack gets stronger, he could possibly gain even more supernatural ghost(?) powers. We really don’t know the full extent of what he can do yet after all.

@channydraws @earthgirlaesthetic @sai-of-the-7-stars

[samsspambox]

Hi Sam! I just wanna ask, do you read all of other boys' cards? If you do, do you collect all of them or just watch it on yt?

heyo nonnie! that is an excellent excellent question!

i do, in fact, read all the cards i get from any boi! if i pulled it i've read it! there was this one time i was pulling for perfect partner on the standard banner (because i had the tears) and i ended up getting narrow road. while i was bumbed i still read it. i don't have a lot of marius cards (rrg 1 was horrible for me LMAO) and i want to learn more about him so i read it. the s-chips were a plus too!

im not exactly a collector of cards. like if i get them i get them and if i don't i don't, there's nothing wrong with that. but! i do have a bias for cards i do collect, and that's...

behold my artem collection! i have almost every single ssr except the paid one (which, fair) and the stretching MR (rrg2 pulls weren't good so i had to go full ham on the tears, rip s-chips). otherwise i have every single artem card. he's the one i wanna treat like a pokémon. gotta catch 'em all

as for watching them on youtube: i tend to avoid it if i can. there's the vyn polo sr card that i don't have and i WANT IT but it hasn't been in the gatcha stars, but i haven't looked it up on youtube mostly because i hate the reading speeds 💀

like i want to be able to read at my own pace, ya know? actually i can compare this to a bit of twisted wonderland since they have similar UIs (you tap to proceed with the story) but the translations for twst are all placed as dialogue on some websites. while yes videos still exist, i much prefer the dialogue transcribed, even if i don't hear the voices. i have half the mind to transcribe all the cards i have for ease of access but nah. i'll do it if someone pays me 💀😂

though that's not to say i haven't seen some on youtube, which i have. ive seen vyns anni card, artem's anni card, artem's birthday card, and artem's revisiting youth card (there's a pattern, as you can tell). it's just,,, kinda aggravating not being able go at my own pace so they're the only cards i've ever watched. it's usually only bc my curiosity got the better of me, i like going into cards blind (or i needed it for a thing™️) i know youtube has a transcript function but it rewinds back to where the video is stopped and it's annoying af to keep clicking so i don't loose my place, so i really try not to lmaoo.

but yeah! i hope i've answered your question nonnie!! <3

[rataltouille]

GEOMETRY OF THE HOLY MOON (1 AM): A SHORT STORY

GENRE: surrealism, literary fiction.

POV & TENSE: this little space is not enough for how wild the form is so i talk about this later!!

SETTING: a small desi village, 1924-25.

TONE: dreamy, unsettling, melancholic.

THEMES: faith vs reality, how people perceive others and how they perceive themselves, grief dealt the wrong way.

AESTHETICS: the splash of water on a quiet night, thick clouds obscuring the sky, rippling the moon’s reflection on the water. the intensity of a garden in spring, the emptiness of a dying town, the suffocation from being singled out. hands grazing lightly but never fully held. a lingering sadness behind your laugh. believing in things you shouldn't believe in. putting faith on a starless sky.

STAGE: completed first draft, 4085 words.

LOGLINE: a young boy, surrounded by loss, claims to talk to god. the story follows him and his conversations with this god, all while his village spies on him as he weaves his way around the two most crucial and lonely years of his life.

LITERAL LOGLINE: on today’s news let’s talk about a small backward town that hates sad little boys who worship god, even though the place is lowkey a cult!!

CHARACTERS:

THE SUMMER BOY: he’s around thirteen, and he’s very emotionally attached to his past. he lost his family at a young age to an unstable force, so he spends his time talking to himself. he’s a quiet, demure and sweet person, always willing to help others. he’s outwardly oblivious and sees only the good in people to a point where he doesn't understand when they’re trying to do him wrong. but! considering how the story [like a lot of my others] has themes of perception vs reality, it needs to be said that he isn't all that innocent. he’s rather impulsive and rash, never afraid of hurting himself [and thus accidentally harming others].

A GOD: is he real? do we even know if he’s an actual god? a very elusive figure despite having a lot of screentime. he’s a surprisingly humanised character and arguably the one with the most empathy. he has a soft spot for the boy and the two have a deep bond which is not common for a human and a god to have. you don’t get insight to what the other gods are like, but they’re implied to exist. this story has a very messy and hazy view towards religion and godhood and their nature towards humanity, and this vague figure, a dreamlike character, is proof enough of that.

THE VILLAGE: okay so in general these people suck. the village consists of, well, the village, but they’re very fluid in the way they appear in the story? as in for the most part they appear as a collective, a unit. one character, the summer boy’s “friend”, is somewhat separate considering he’s a pretty important character. it’s very hard describing this unit of a character but essentially they’re the main antagonistic force and they hate the protagonist for seemingly no reason.

WHAT GOES DOWN:

sometime around this time, the boy chances upon meeting his “god”, this being who lives up in the clouds and whom he talks with often, except you don't know if this god is real or not. that’s one of the recurring themes of this story: what’s real and what isn’t. it’s :) a fun time :) for sure :)

essentially Things Happen And It Only Gets Weirder. i cannot even try describing what happens because it’s all very spoilery but let’s just say that this is a very sad story but not even in a “this makes me cry” manner, but rather in a “this is so fucked up wtf why”. the prose of this is very, very hazy and thick, in a manner that’s both smooth and suffocating. there’s also a lot of moon and water imagery which we love. i love the atmosphere + the setting—colonial india— as it’s a subtle but key element to the plot.

FORM:

OKAY YES be prepared for the true colours of how unhinged i am. i apologize for the form brainrot.

POV: so in this story i really said “what if it had all three of the main povs... jk jk... unless 😳😳” and then proceeded to use all three povs. you’re probably wondering, how did i do that? WHY did i do that? and my answer to that is: 🙂

the first-person pov: the summer boy narrates in first person. his pov takes up about 40% of the story, and this is where we unlock family backstory + how he feels about the various forces playing into his life. he’s an extremely unreliable narrator and he knows it; his narration oscillates between very naive and very self-aware, and this effect is pretty disconcerting. the summer boy is kind of a walking contradiction and we love that conflict.

the second-person pov: a god narrates in second person. his pov takes around 20% of the story, and his scenes all involve his conversations with the boy. his pov is extremely detached, and suspends belief because he seems awfully made up. there’s an edge to the prose in his narration, where you know that something's off, but you can’t exactly pinpoint what.

the third-person pov: the villagers narrate, either as a collective, or as an individual figure, in third person. they take up the other 40% of the story, and there are so many different people and differing opinions with this, and every time we read a third person excerpt it’s a different person, and this is mostly used to add onto the different ways in which the boy is perceived. this is also where the structural part of the form gets really wacky.

STRUCTURE: if my story isn't told in vignettes is it my story though /j. gothm is told in vignettes, each one between 50 to 500 words. the first and second person bits are normal-ish vignettes, with straightforward narration. the third person vignettes, on the other hand, are super assorted. we have a lot of epistolaric sections— there’s a letter, a folk song [which was found around the summer boy], and most of the conversation is told as just plain dialogue without tags. there’s also a phone call transcript, and finally some normal chunks of prose. what am i doing wtf.

also to add onto this the story is told non-linearly. 😀 the only thing that keeps me from going insane is the fact that there are chronological tags before most vignettes [also the manner in which they're tagged differs from pov to pov. for example a few of the third person conversations are marked just as “sunday” or “thursday”, while the summer boy’s narration is marked with the full date and year]

in all this clownery i completely forgot to mention what the tense was [the way everything else was so complicated that i forgot tense was a thing lmao] and good news!! it’s the only sane thing about this story!! it’s told fully in present tense. thank everything.

AN EXCERPT:

okay i’m once again not sharing much because this will be submitted to litmags 🧞

[The boy is scrawny as always. He carries an air of diswant— even death had rejected him when the plague killed only his grandmother— but walks like he doesn’t notice. He smiles at them, jitters, and wipes his hand across his knees. Blood comes away in thin, translucent lines. He saves it on the kerchief he keeps tucked in his shirt, careful to dirty the cloth even more. The villagers scrunch their noses in disgust; who knew how old and rotten the kerchief was, or how long it had carried blood like the unwashed sword of a warrior?]

also by the way this excerpt is in square brackets because it is a third-person interjection in a vignette that is otherwise first-person [at this point...]

SPARE THOUGHTS:

this was inspired by a conversation i had with my grandfather, where he was telling me about how people used to sing songs to the skies, as a way of devotion to a specific god. he used the [loose translation of] the english word “yearning” to refer to the emotion the singers would invoke, and that sparked the concept of a disillusioned young boy who talks to the moon as a way to please the god he’s in love with. it’s a very softly disconcerting story and once again deals with the theme of “perception vs reality” which if you know me and my work, is the theme i’m forever obsessed with.

i really like how this turned out? the atmosphere is exactly how i wanted it to be, and there’s so much i have to add on as i edit and i’m really looking forward to that. this is also the only short story i’ve written where i knew which litmag i’d love for it to be published in? like i never write things with publishing in mind, but for some reason while writing this story it occurred to me that it would be a perfect fit for this specific magazine and i love that. anyway if you’ve made it through the post till here,,,, bless you and your braincells. and that’s all for today!!

[leonardalphachurch]

transcript under the cut

RvB Seasons 14-18, Watch or NOT? | QvsA

Writer's Notes

-- Hello, everyone! It’s been a minute since I’ve had the chance to type something up about one of my projects and, to quote Abed Nadir, basically just rant about “really specific settings that most people don't notice or think about.” Ahh, I’ve missed it. I’ve spent most of the year thus far in pre-production. I have a few episodes of Death Battle coming soon, three episodes of Desk of Death Battle, and a bunch of QvsA! I think for the latter, I’ll post more notes in batches as the episodes come out.

-- So I mentioned this at RTX but I’ll say it again. Eddy pitched the idea of this show to me in perhaps the best way possible. “It’s Grif and Simmons doing a Q&A show like Troy and Abed in the Morning.” Perfect! Say no more, I got this. Community is probably my favorite show, I've probably written that out in a past journal entry or three, and I probably sound like either a broken record or maybe more accurately like Abed in the season two episode, Asian Population Studies: “It’s a mixer. It’s a mixer. It’s a mixer.”

-- So while this first episode did just sorta pour out of me, it still took a lot of work to edit it into the right spot. It’s like this really fun high wire act. It’s only 2-3 minutes long, we’re introducing a new show, answering a question, and establishing a set up and a punchline. Originally, I had both Grif and Simmons doing more of that morning-talk-show-host thing. Where they’re super enthusiastic and full of energy but in that dead eyes, manufactured way that morning shows run on. It rarely feels authentic but that’s why It’s fun to parody I think. If you haven’t seen Ben Schwartz’s The Earliest Show, do yourself a favor and check it out. It’s a really fun jab at morning shows. So I shared that first draft with the crew and Eddy came back with a great note about how Grif would still be lazy, reluctant Grif and that really clicked for me and made the show work in my head. He can start high with the morning show energy but then almost always return to who he really is. So in the high wire act that is QvsA, there will always be this inherent, logical source of conflict that is Grif agreeing to do this in the first place.

-- I also just want you to know, as a former part-time graphic designer, people really do have passionate conversations about font. And while it’s perfectly ridiculous in our show, people talk about it so much because it’s deceptively hard to pick out the right font for something and there is so much to consider. I can’t tell you how many times I had settled on a font with a client for months only to then change it at the last minute. Jenn even pointed out at some point in production that serif fonts are actually less accessible. Which in my mind made the episode, and the fact that Simmons is wrong, that much funnier.

-- Austin did an amazing job with this episode! While I really enjoy directing myself, I find it’s always fun to hand your script off to someone else. I think collaboration makes stuff better and in some ways I feel like I’m in the audience because I get to hop in to watch something after it’s already been made. It’s always fun and exciting to see how my pages get translated.

-- If I may get a little cheesy for a second…it was really special to watch this episode with y’all at RTX. It had been a loong time since I’ve had the chance to watch something I worked on with people and that feeling is pretty amazing. Hearing y’all laugh, hearing y’all “awww” – which was unexpected!! – was a much needed reminder of why we do what we do. Thanks to all of you who were there and laughed along.

-- Thanks for checking out the new show and these notes! I hope to see yeah throughout the season! Submit those Qs and get some As!

Some notes by Joshua Kazemi about the process behind writing the grimmons show. They're available on the rooster teeth site.

I really love how much thought he (and the team) is putting into this project, especially when it's just a silly miniseries. I feel most people wouldn't think that this much care or attention would go into it.