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ronninoir · 4 years ago

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Can I Steal You For A Second Chapter 36

Summary: Adrien is forced to participate in a new dating show, but becomes more excited when Ladybug says she’ll participate as her civilian self.

AKA: AU where Adrien doesn’t know Marinette, the superheroes are 22 and Gabriel is mean and ruthless but not Hawkmoth.

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Start from the beginning Chp 1 on AO3

Welcome to the end everybody!!

Six Months Later

Marinette was walking home from the grocery store when her phone rang. Checking out the caller ID, she quickly answered.

“Papa! I already told you that we’ll be at your house promptly at 5:30 tonight!” Marinette sighed into the phone as her father went off, just reminding Marinette of the precautions her and Adrien needed to take as they traveled throughout the city. Marinette hummed and replied generally where needed, knowing her Papa was just going to continue on.

Marinette was fully aware of the precautions she needed to take, her whole family been dealing with crazy fans and excited viewers for almost six weeks now. Someone had made the connection between Marinette and the Dupain-Cheng Bakery soon after the first episode premiered. Business had been booming, and crazy fans would find Marinette in the street, pledging their loyalty to her and some even saying she needed to find a better person than Adrien. Marinette had been able to connect with all of the girls involved in the show through social media except Lila, who refused to acknowledge any of them. The other girls, especially the ones who made it far like Juliette, and Lucie, had been dealing with similar situations in their hometowns as well.

Thankfully, Adrien was steadily by her side, even if they couldn’t be in public together. After the first incident with people surrounding her on the street, Marinette had broken down crying in their apartment, and Adrien had built her up and talked with her about similar experiences he had been through, as well as what to do about it in the future. Marinette had been cheating slightly, travelling more as Ladybug than she had in her daily life before the show.

Hometowns were airing tonight, and with that meant even more press for the Dupain-Cheng Bakery and even more attention on Marinette. Adrien and Marinette always had dinner before the Bachelor shows started airing because her parents wanted to know everything that went down that week before they watched the edited version, and so there wouldn’t be any surprises for them.

“Papa, I promise that Adrien and I will be careful, I really have to go now, I’m almost to the apartment.” Marinette and her father said their goodbyes before she ended the phone call. The doorman, who smiled sweetly and tipped his hat at her as she neared, opened the door for her and she quickly rushed into the elevator and up to her floor.

Living with Adrien was a dream. They just fit so well into each other’s lives and it made the transition to living together easy. Adrien had just finished converting the extra bedroom into a design space/office for the two to share, and it was perfect and convenient. Adrien had been forced to work from home since the show started airing, only leaving the apartment for important business meetings that never took place at Gabriel’s offices. Too many people knew where to find Adrien on a daily basis, so Adrien’s security team thought it was too dangerous to go to that building. And Marinette was inclined to agree.

If Marinette had it bad, Adrien had it worse. There were adoring fans, begging him to consider them, angry fans, demanding to know why their favorites went home, and even the crazy ones, wanting to just be near him and breathe the same air as him, but those were no different from his model days, just older than before. Adrien never let them bother him, and he has also taken to travelling more as Chat Noir, who at the moment seemed less famous than his alter ego, and was able to get from place to place safely.

As Marinette unlocked their door, she felt herself relax. No one had found their apartment yet, but Marinette had a feeling it was just a matter of time. Thankfully, she knew that all of the locations for shooting, unless specifically chosen for brand purposes, were kept secret and edited out of the show. Which meant that no one could find the mansion, nor more importantly, the apartment she was currently in.

“Adrien?” she called as she placed her keys in the bowl by the door, the one grocery bag she had on the counter next to it, and hung her coat up on the rack. She was just slipping her shoes off as she heard footsteps approach, and a smile spread across her face.

“Welcome home, beautiful,” Adrien said as he pulled her into a hug. She relaxed into the embrace and a feeling of home settled over her. It didn’t matter where she lived, if Adrien was by her side, she would be home.

“How was your day?” Marinette asked, moving to unpack the groceries and put them away. Adrien followed her into the kitchen, not really letting go of her waist.

“Ugh it was long. Who knew rebranding would be so crazy difficult! The paperwork is horrible, as well as the physical part of rebranding.”

“It would be easier if you weren’t doing the rebranding in secret, and your father wasn’t causing so much trouble about it.”

Adrien finally let go of Marinette and plopped down on a stool that was positioned at the end of the counter. “You think he would just accept the fact that this was happening and move on. He’s not going to involve a courtroom because he knows they would side with me. But it’s not like I’m changing the brand dramatically! It’s going from ‘Gabriel’ to ‘Agreste!’ It’s still his name! It just makes more sense that when we’re running the company we aren’t running a company named after someone who retired unpeacefully.” Adrien groaned again as he ran his hand along his face. “I’m sorry, I probably sound like a broken record. We’ve had this conversation before. Tell me about your day.”

Marinette smiled and gently placed her hand on top of Adrien’s. “I will happily listen to the events of your day every day, even if that means I get to hear the same stuff. Whatever bothers you I want to hear about it every time.” Adrien smiled and flipped his hand over to give hers a squeeze. “Anyway, you asked about my day. Well, Papa called me twice today, determined to make sure I didn’t forget what time we are supposed to be at their house. I think he’s nervous about what this episode is going to do to the bakery.”

“If it’s anything like what’s happening to Gabriel’s, he should be pleased with the results.” Business had been booming since the show aired. Everyone was dying to wear whatever the beautiful girls that were fighting for Adrien’s heart were wearing.

“He figures as much, he’s just worried about the extra workload that it’s going to put on them. They’ve already hired three new employees just to brace themselves for the impact.”

“They sound very well prepared though, and that’s half the battle.”

“That’s what I’ve been telling them!” Marinette interjected exasperatedly.

There was a pause where Marinette, still thinking about her parents, had zoned out into her own world. “Is that all that happened in your day today, love?” Adrien asked sweetly, squeezing her hand gently.

She snapped out of her daze and blushed. “No! Today was good. We started working on the new designs for the spring and I’m really excited. Especially considering my name will actually be on those designs since I’ll have publicly begun working at Gabriel by then.” Marinette paused once more, racking her brain for anything else that had happened today when she nearly jumped out of her skin with excitement. “Oh my gosh! I completely forgot to tell you! I saw my wedding dress this morning before work!”

Adrien beamed and his eyes glazed over like he did every time he was proud of her. “How amazing was it?”

“Oh, Adrien, it’s everything I ever dreamed it would be! I know I designed it and everything, but I was blown away when I actually got to see it in person. Maman and Alya both cried too.”

“And you’re sure you won’t let me see even the designs for this amazing piece of art you created?” A playful tone had colored his voice and Marinette felt her heartbeat quicken.

“You know the rules. No peeking until the day of the wedding, as I’m walking down the aisle.”

“Not even if I gave you a little something in return?” Adrien purred as a smirk spread across his face. He leaned towards her, and Marinette almost forgot how to breathe. She loved this man with every fiber of her being, and yet he would do something seductive like that and she would pause, thinking, Is this real? Does he really love me as much as I love him? And he showed her all the time, through his actions and words alike, that he really did.

Their lips met in a rough way and Marinette felt the fire in her gut heat up in response to Adrien. She leaned in closer, parting their lips and deepening the kiss. He wrapped his arms around her waist and pulled her even closer than they had been a moment before. Marinette’s hands were tangling themselves in Adrien’s hair and she was just about to ask to take this to the bedroom when her phone rang.

The two jumped apart and Marinette quickly answered, trying to keep her heart rate down and her breathing steady.

“Hey Alya, what’s up?”

“We’re still invited tonight, correct? Because if I calculated correctly, I’m in this episode, which makes it automatically the best,” Alya asked, the city loud in the background of the call.

“Of course. You know that if Adrien doesn’t see Nino at least once a week, he’ll keel over and die of heartbreak.” Marinette joked. Both her and Alya laughed as Adrien let out a defensive, “Hey!” which caused the two girls to laugh even more.

“Oh well, we can’t let Sunshine’s heart break.” Alya responded, specifically using the nickname that she knew Adrien hated. Alya claimed that between Adrien’s bright blonde hair and his constant positive disposition that he was more sunshine than human. Marinette found it very appropriate, however, Adrien thought it was too high of a compliment to be applied to him, the black cat and essence of bad luck. He never argued with Alya though, just rolled his eyes and let it be, like he did right then, causing Marinette to giggle once more.

“I’ll text you as we leave my parent’s house and we’ll meet you guys here. The doorman should let you guys in the building, he’s used to seeing you two by now.”

Alya agreed, and the two girls said their goodbyes. Marinette put her phone on the counter after checking the time. “That call was very well timed, we really should be heading out. If we’re late, I think my Papa might pop his top.”

Adrien sighed as well and went to straighten his hair that Marinette had just messed up, “This having to be at places on a timely manner really is ruining my love life,” to which Marinette just laughed.

----------------------------------------------------

The week after Hometowns was aired, Adrien was summoned to a television studio to do a live question and answer episode of the show called “Women Tell All.” All of the girls are invited back, except for Lucie and Marinette, to talk about various things that happened on the show and get the opinions of everyone after having watched it all back on their TVs.

Marinette was grateful Adrien had asked her to come with him. She wanted to see Hanna and Juliette so badly it physically hurt her. The producers had demanded that no one get together or see each other in person until this show, in order to keep the tensions and relationships fresh, even if it was filmed six months before.

She was wearing a casual outfit, and felt very out of place with everyone’s fancy cocktail party dresses. But she knew that the only people who would see her are the other contestants and the backstage crew that passed her hiding spot. She watched the whole thing on a television backstage, and was able to watch Chris Harrison interview and ask the girls what the viewers wanted to know.

As the show began filming, Marinette almost felt more like an outsider rather than a participant in the show. The audience was lively and excited to hear what everyone had to say. Chris started out by interviewing Adrien, asking him about the journey, the ups, the downs, the bloopers, everything. It was exciting to see Adrien relax with Chris and play up certain things to the audience. He was a hit.

Then, Chris brought out all of the girls except for Juliette, who would have her own grand entrance, and Lucie, who wasn’t present. The conversation got heated, especially when the topic of where most of the drama stemmed from came up and all fingers pointed to Lila. Lila, who was paid by the broadcasting station to show up, was there and was the center of almost all of the discussion, as Chris (and truthfully, the viewers) were dying to know what in the world was going through that girl’s head for most of the show. Lila tried to deny all of her involvement in the drama, but a good number of girls, Hanna in the lead, stood up for Marinette, which warmed her heart. It was nice knowing that even after winning, these girls still cared enough for her to defend her on live television.

After Chris reigned in the chaos that Lila had caused, once again, among the girls, they brought out Juliette and asked her about the heartbreaking goodbye that Adrien had given her after Fantasy Suites. Juliette was awesome and Marinette yearned to give her a hug, especially when she teared up remembering how much it hurt to watch that back and have people tell her they wanted her to win. Eventually they brought Adrien back out and he talked with Juliette for the first time since that break up. Juliette handled it like a pro, and Adrien was as gentlemanly as ever.

Finally, Chris was signing off and telling everyone to tune in next week for the dramatic finale and a special live episode called “After the Final Rose,” where all the secrets will be revealed. Marinette had to pause, freaked out that in a week she would be going public about her relationship with Adrien. And on such a grand stage. She heard one of the producers say that they were viewed in every city in France, most of Italy, Germany, and England as well as scattered broadcast throughout the rest of Europe. It was an impressively scary number to consider.

Marinette was broken out of her trance by an all-too-familiar squeal.

“Marinette!”

She whipped around to see both Hanna and Juliette standing together, both looking ecstatic to see her. She let out a squeal of her own and collided with the two of them.

“Oh my gosh I’ve missed you guys so much!” Marinette squealed into Juliette’s shoulder. The girls laughed and echoed her sentiment. As they pulled away, Hanna grabbed her left hand and brought it close to her face.

“Ooooh he did a wonderful job!” Hanna announced, pulled back to show Juliette. Marinette blushed slightly.

“Damn, I would have married him for that ring alone.” Juliette said in a mock serious tone, shooting Marinette a wink, who let out a giggle.

“Just because it isn’t big and magnificent doesn’t mean that it isn’t beautiful. Plus, the two of us know better than anyone else, Marinette isn’t marrying Adrien for his money, and that here is obvious,” Hanna added with a wink.

“Hey!” Marinette protested, cradling her left hand against her chest. “I think it’s perfect.”

The two girls laughed and pulled her in for another hug. “Of course, you do, sweetie, because you’re smitten, that’s just who you are,” Juliette teased with a child-like pat on the head. Marinette giggled against them once more before they dragged her out of her hiding spot and onto the staging area, where the rest of the girls (minus Lila) were waiting. They all cheered for Marinette as she walked out and she blushed an even deeper red than before. They took turns admiring the ring, giving their congratulations and just reminding each other how amazing it is to be together once more.

“Oh, this won’t be the last time you see each other,” Marinette announced over the general chatter, after Alice sighed about how they would never see each other again. After a dramatic pause, Marinette continued, “You’re all invited to our wedding, of course!” The girls laughed and squealed and made plans to meet up at a later time to prepare for the upcoming event.

----------------------------------------------------

Nearly a week later, the day before the “After the Final Rose” special, Marinette was sitting at a coffee shop, mid-morning, sketching absentmindedly in her notebook. She was so engrossed in her work, that she didn’t even notice when someone had walked up beside her until they spoke.

“Beautiful work, as always.” Marinette startled a little, almost spilling her coffee on the design. She whipped her head to find the person she was waiting on.

“Lucie, glad you could make it,” Marinette replied as she closed her sketchbook, hoping to prevent any more almost-spills.

“Of course,” Lucie sat across from her and there was a beat of awkward silence before she spoke again. “I’ve been meaning to thank you.”

“For what?”

“For... reaching out. I was struggling a lot with what happened, and talking real with you made it better.”

“Lucie,” Marinette started, smiling sweetly and gently placing her hand on Lucie’s. “The worst part of the aftermath of the show was knowing how much pain you had to be feeling. I know you felt strongly for Adrien, as much as I did, and I couldn’t imagine what you were going through.” Marinette paused, making sure Lucie was actually listening to her. She wanted her friend to know she meant it.

“Well, I appreciate it. A lot.” Lucie gave her a small smile, and Marinette gave her hand a gentle squeeze and then reached to take another sip of her coffee.

“I would have wanted the same, so it only felt fair.” Lucie gave another sad smile and nodded. Marinette took that as a good sign. “Are you ready for tomorrow?”

Lucie’s head dropped, but she let out a sigh and met Marinette’s eyes. “I am. I know it’s going to be hard, but seeing Adrien again will be nice, and it’ll be good to have everything out in the open once again.”

Marinette nodded, “I feel that. It’ll be good to not be holding in any more secrets.” Except for the other major secret I’ve been hiding almost my whole life. Marinette sighed, rubbing her face with her left hand as her eyes slipped closed. She heard a gasp and her eyes flew open. Glancing down at that hand, she realized that she had forgotten to take off her engagement ring before she left for this public outing. Her cheeks reddened and she quickly slipped it off.

“Is that it?” Lucie asked, snapping out of her funk in a blink of an eye. Marinette nodded and handed the ring over for a closer inspection. “Damn.”

“What?” Marinette asked, slightly alarmed by her reaction.

“It really has been you this whole time.”

“What do you mean?” Marinette whispered, severely confused as Lucie passed the ring back to her and she slipped it into her pocket.

“Watching the show has opened my eyes to the way that Adrien’s relationships existed outside of the bubble I had created for myself. I was beginning to see it, but the ring... that is hard to refute.”

“I—I still don’t get it,” Marinette stuttered, her cheeks turned red with the implication that was inevitably coming.

“You two are truly sole mates, aren’t you? He’s a completely different person with you, and it’s amazing to see how much more he opened up with you than with the others. Something clicked early on with the two of you, and truthfully, none of the rest of us stood a chance.”

“Now that’s not true—”

“No, Marinette, I’m not upset. It—I actually have some closure now that I didn’t before. Adrien tried very hard to truly consider his options, but he found his person. My aunt says that some American sitcom called that ‘finding your lobster.’ I don’t really get it, but she says it with such reverence that it must be what you two did. I respect that. It’s going to make interacting with Adrien tomorrow that much easier.” Lucie nodded like that was the end of the discussion, but Marinette was still trying to process what happened.

“What—wait so you aren’t upset? What just happened here?”

Lucie gave the first genuine smile of the meeting, “I found my peace.”

There was a thoughtful silence as Marinette tried to figure out what to do next. The original reason for their meeting popped into her head and she shook her head to clear it.

“Lucie, there was actually a very good reason for me to meet you here, that didn’t involve you finding peace, although I’m glad that happened, it’s going to make this next part much easier.” Marinette stopped, scrutinizing Lucie’s face to see how she would react. When no alarming emotion appeared, Marinette continued.

“What do you know about Gabriel?”

“Adrien’s father or the company?”

“Both.”

“Not much. The company is popular here in France and other places around the world, chic, and a little pricey. The man is stoic and doesn’t talk much.”

Marinette almost snorted at that last comment but continued on. “What if I told you that your aunt and Gabriel Agreste have had recent business contact?”

Lucie’s jaw dropped, but she recovered quickly, “I would say you’re crazy. My aunt would never be considering doing business with a random French fashion line, no matter how popular. She’s firm on her designs and styles, which are very different from Gabriel’s.”

Marinette felt a sly smile creep across her face as the perfect plan clicked together in her head. “Oh, do I have a story for you.”

Hours later, after eventually having lunch with Lucie as well, Marinette ran home to talk to Adrien. As usual, he was sitting in the kitchen, doing paperwork while eating a sandwich. When she burst through the door, he almost jumped out of his seat.

“Marinette! What are you doing home? Did something happen?”

“Adrien, I figured out how to fix the company’s legal problems with your father and get him off our backs.”

Adrien blanched, “Oh this I have to hear.”

----------------------------------------------------

“Are you sure you want to do this?” Marinette asked, hesitation ringing in her voice. Adrien took a deep breath but nodded. “It’s not too late, just keep that in mind.”

Adrien pulled Marinette closer, wrapping his arms around her waist and resting his chin on the top of her head. “I think this is the only option we have going forward. It’ll be easier though, with Lucie on our side.”

“She deserved to know. I’m just grateful she took it so well.”

“Mr. Agreste,” a stagehand interrupted and both Adrien and Marinette looked up. “We’re on air in 60.”

“Thanks,” Adrien responded while reluctantly letting go of his fiancée. She straightened his tie and smoothed out his suit as he heard Chris Harrison address the waiting crowd.

“Well, after tonight the secret is out. You will publicly be my fiancée.”

Marinette sighed, “I can’t wait.” She grabbed his head and pulled her down to her level in order for their lips to meet. From somewhere onstage, he heard a crew member countdown from ten and he reluctantly broke off the kiss and turned to face the door he was expected to walk through after being introduced.

“I’m Chris Harrison, and welcome to After the Final Rose Live TV special. Tonight is a night none of us will soon forget. Just prior to the show, we received late-breaking news from Adrien regarding his relationship with Marinette.” The crowd ooohed but Adrien had to try not to laugh at Marinette’s eye roll.

“Yes, because so much has happened between getting engaged and still being engaged.”

Adrien let out a breathy giggle, “It’s just to build the tension.”

“And Lucie, how has her life been after a tearful goodbye almost eight weeks ago. And if that’s not enough, we have an exciting surprise for you, yes you, the viewers.” The crowd broke out in cheers for that. After a beat, Chris continued, “So, where to start tonight? How about the man himself—Adrien Agreste!”

Adrien walked on to the cheers of the crowd. He smiled and waved good naturedly and played along exactly as he was supposed to.

“Adrien,” Chris reached out his hand to shake, which Adrien took.

“Long time no see, Chris.” the crowd laughed as Adrien sat down on the love seat across from him.

“Yes, it does feel like it’s been a while. But tell me, how does it feel, now that the whole world has seen it all?”

“Oh my,” Adrien sighed, “It’s so nice. Marinette and I have been hiding and secretly being together since I proposed and it is just so nice to know that I can walk down the street holding her hand without it making the papers.”

“Well I wouldn’t go that far—” Chris joked, and Adrien couldn’t help but laugh too. Marinette’s and his lives would never be without the press.

“You’re right, that’s more of a pipe dream.”

“Speaking of that proposal, oh my it was amazing.” Adrien was slightly taken aback by the applause that followed, and blushed against his will. “What are your emotions right now, after watching that play out on the screen last night?”

“Honestly, I’ve never been more in love with Marinette than I am right now. Getting to watch the show, our entire love story, played back was such a treat and allowed me to appreciate everything that Marinette went through even more. She is so strong and I meant everything I said and more.” The crowd awed, but Adrien just beamed. He could talk about Marinette for a lifetime.

“Wow, that was beautiful, Adrien. Are you always such a poet?”

Adrien let out a hearty chuckle, “What can I say, Marinette just brings out the best in me.” Another round of awes and applause.

“That’s sweet. I hate to burst your happy bubble, but let’s talk about Lucie.” There was a sudden hush among the crowd. Adrien made sure his expression turned solemn as well. “That was one of the tougher moments of the show, to say goodbye to her.”

“Yeah it really was. After those last dates, I spent some time thinking. I had two amazing girls, who are both beautiful and full of life and both could add such amazing things to my life after the show, but my heart had already made up my mind. I hated having to say goodbye to Lucie, but it just had to be done.”

“When was the last time you had felt emotions like that?”

Adrien paused, trying to remember what he had been feeling. All he can remember is the happiness that was finally proposing to Marinette. He would be expected to be sad, so he played along with it. “The last time I had felt that kind of heartbreak was on the first anniversary of my mother passing. This was a very similar hurt, but for this one I felt like I couldn’t break down and cry. I was the one doing the heart-breaking, so I tried to stay strong for Lucie.”

“But afterwards, did it hit you? That you had just let an amazing woman get away?”

“In a way. Those first couple of days, I would have moments of just pause. I would think about how she was doing and just hoping that she could still be that amazing person that I had the opportunity to meet so long ago.”

“As I’m sure you know, Lucie is backstage right now. Do you have any idea what you’re going to say to her?”

Oh, I have a whole script, “Not really. I’m hoping the words will come when I see her again.”

“Well on that note, please welcome Lucie!” Chris stood and Adrien followed suit as the crowd cheered for Lucie. She looked stunning, as ever and she smiled when she saw Adrien, which made him smile in return. She gave Adrien a hug and then sat down next to him.

“Welcome, Lucie. How are you feeling?”

“Honestly, Chris, I’ve been better. This is a lot to take in, but I’m doing okay considering.”

“What’s it like seeing Adrien again?”

“It’s easier than I thought it was going to be. I haven’t seen Adrien since that last day. I’ve been watching the episodes, and that last one was hard to see. I’ve mostly just wondered what happened between us.”

Adrien made eye contact with Chris, who gave him a small nod, which he took as a go ahead to answer her. “I wish I had a reason for you, I really do. You are an amazing girl, and we got along so well. But in the end, I fell in love with Marinette and I knew I wanted to spend the rest of my life with her and there just wasn’t anything I could do after that. I hated having to say goodbye to you, especially without a proper answer, but I’m hoping we can still be on good terms.”

“It’s hard to be upset with someone as genuine as you, Adrien. I appreciate you sticking with your heart, and being honest with me here. That’s all I’ve ever asked of you, and I respect your decision. I’ve found my peace, and having watched the whole season back, I’m genuinely happy for you and Marinette.” The crowd applauded once more, and Adrien almost wanted to applaud himself. That had been very well said.

“Lucie, tell us how hard was it to watch all of the different moments you shared with Adrien on TV?”

Lucie laughed, “Funny that you would ask, my family actually was much more upset about the ending than I was. I treasure all of those moments where I got to see the real Adrien and even our last day, where we said goodbye, it was easier knowing that at least the girl he ended up with is amazing. She deserves my utmost respect, and I know that if the roles were reversed, she would have done the same for me.”

“Wait—wait. Back up. You said your family took the breakup harder than you?” Chris asked, shock easily read on his face.

Lucie laughed once more, “Yeah can you believe it? My parents adored Adrien and were already planning on taking him on our next family vacation and my aunt had even planned a trip for Adrien to come visit her in America. She had bought the plane ticket and everything.” Lucie laughed once more, and Adrien couldn’t help but blush.

“Wow, your family was dedicated.”

“Oh, that’s an understatement. I actually recently found out by accident that my aunt, who owns a fashion company in America, had actually been having secret business meetings with Gabriel Agreste. Apparently, when I won and Adrien and I became engaged, they were going to start a partnership and move towards merging the companies. So, as you can imagine, my breakup with Adrien threw a little snag in their plans.”

The entire studio audience broke into whispers and Chris’s jaw dropped. “Are you—are you serious? How in the world did you find that out?”

“Someone close to my aunt’s company approached me with their sympathies, and let slip about the deal going through.”

“Adrien did you know about this?”

“No, I had no idea.” He paused for a second and could feel his Father’s fury building from across the studio. “But, now that I think about it, it makes sense.”

“What do you mean by that?”

“Well, my Father had always seemed to prefer Lucie over Marinette, or any of the girls for that matter. I never understood why. Right at the end, he encouraged me to propose to Lucie, and I just assumed it was because of her knowledge in the fashion industry. We both have been working in the business side of that world and on paper, she was the best fit for my life. I never would have thought that there was anything more.”

“Well, thank you Lucie, for joining us.” Chris said, rather abruptly.

Lucie looked slightly taken aback, but her smile returned quick enough that Adrien thought he was the only one to catch it. “Thank you for having me, this is exactly what I needed.”

Chris turned toward the camera, “You heard it here, Bachelor Nation. We’ll be right back with Adrien, and his new fiancée, Marinette!” The crowd cheered, but Adrien didn’t hear it, as Chris had leaned forward, turning away from the camera and whispered, “Adrien you are required offstage now.” Lucie and Adrien exchanged a look and as soon as time was called, they both went backstage, gathering Marinette on the way.

Gabriel was in a back room, sitting. Adrien couldn’t read his mood and approached him like he would a wild animal, slowly.

“You wanted to see me?”

“What have you done?” Gabriel hissed in response.

“Father—”

“Shut up! You got your little bitch, it wasn’t enough just to stop there? The company, I understand it was going to be yours soon enough anyway, but my credibility? My dignity? How did she find out?”

Lucie stepped forward and for what appeared to be the first time, Gabriel realized there were other people in the room. “You will not talk to Adrien right now. What you did was sick and conniving and despicable. How my aunt could have ever agreed to do business with you is beyond me. But as a mostly impartial outsider, if you don’t step down and get out of Adrien’s way, you won’t have a company to pass on. We may have done some damage, but we did the right thing. You cheated the system and you lost anyway. Just admit defeat, or we can go out and do even more. Marinette told me stories, and I know what else you’ve done. In my opinion you are getting off easy.” And with that, Lucie turned on her heel and stormed out.

Marinette stared baffled after her and, with a quick glance at Adrien, she handed him the file she had been holding and followed her out of the room.

Adrien stood before his Father, who for the first time in Adrien’s life looked disheveled, and felt nothing for this man. He was upset that he had given so much of his time and love to this statue who couldn’t even recognize when he’d been defeated. “Sign these papers. We’re changing the name. We’re changing the way things are done. And more importantly. we’re accepting Marinette with open arms. She is my Emile, and if for some ungodly reason I lose her before we’ve lived a full life, I hope I don’t ever become as loveless and as cold as you.”

Adrien left the papers on the table and followed the girls out the door.

He found them right off of the stage, where they could still hear the commercials coming through. Adrien opened his mouth to say something, but was interrupted by Lucie.

“I am so sorry, Adrien. I don’t know what came over me. I just got so fired up for everything he had done to you and to me and to this show. I bubbled over and I hope it didn’t do too much damage.”

Adrien couldn’t help but smile. “You were perfect. I think you got through him better than I ever could. Thank you for your kind words and for being so amazing about this.” Lucie attacked him with a hug and Adrien felt his heart swell.

“I hope I can find something like you two have,” Lucie announced when they broke apart.

“You will,” Marinette said, stepping up and giving Lucie a hug as well.

A loud voice called from onstage, effectively breaking up their huddle, “Ten seconds to live!”

“Please stay in touch!” Adrien called to Lucie as he was herded onto the set. She nodded and turned once again towards Marinette as Adrien plopped down onto the love seat. This second half should be easier.

----------------------------------------------------

“Welcome back Bachelor Nation! It has been a whirlwind of a night. We’ve checked in with our Bachelor, we’ve checked in with Lucie, and we’ve checked in with France’s hottest couple, Marinette and Adrien, but what is the big surprise? Let’s find out.”

“Marinette, Adrien, all of those in the studio audience and the viewers at home all around Europe have been on pins and needles—scratch that even I’ve been on pins and needles waiting to know what this big surprise is. Will you please tell us already!”

Adrien and Marinette laughed, “Okay okay, we’ll tell you.”

“So, as you all know,” Marinette started, “Adrien and I are getting married.” Cheers from the studio audience. “And you know that Adrien and I love each other and are just ready to start living our lives together.”

“And with that being said, we want to tell you that we are indeed getting married—” Adrien paused for dramatic effect.

“In a month!” The two said together. The crowd went wild.

“And the best part is,” Marinette shouted over the glee, “everyone’s invited!” The crowd went crazy again, and it took Chris a couple of minutes to calm it all down.

“How does that work, exactly?” Chris asked, once everyone could hear again.

“Our wedding is going to be aired, live on television!” Adrien announced. He sounded as giddy as a child on Christmas.

“All of the viewers have been a part of our love story for so long, we wanted to make sure no one got left out. The ceremony will be filmed with exclusive behind the scenes features that you wouldn’t be able to see in person and the reception will be aired as well! All of the girls will be there and my best gal, Alya is going to be my witness!”

“Well what a surprise that is!” Chris said amongst the cheers that would never end. “Congratulations, you two! Everyone is invited to a Bachelor Wedding, a month from today. We’ll release more info as the time draws near. Have a great night, Bachelor Nation!” The cheers and excitement of the crowd continued, even as the credits began to roll.

“Are you really watching that again?” A voice said from behind her, causing Alya to jump.

“Ahh! Nino! Don’t sneak up on me like that!” Alya screamed as she clutched her heart and collapsed deeper into the couch.

“Babe, I’ve been in the house the whole time. At least I waited until the end to judge your 73rd watching of that episode. I learned my lesson.”

Alya flinched slightly, remembering how much she had yelled at Nino the last time he interrupted her mid-episode. “I said I was sorry.” All she got in return was a non-committal hum. “Look, our Marinette found the love of her life and we got to experience it with her the whole time, and then again as we watched the episodes. It’s beautiful, I love to be reminded of their true love.”

Nino just snorted. “More like you love you being on national television.”

“Hey now! They are starting to show our season in America as well, so it’s actually international television.” Nino just rolled his eyes.

“Whatever you say, babe. But if you don’t go get ready now, we’re going to miss the rehearsal dinner, and I heard a rumor there may be cameras there too.”

Nino had never seen Alya get ready so quickly.

~~~

This is the LAST CHAPTER and then the Epilogue! Hope you all enjoyed this story! We just wanted to say thanks for coming along with us!

There is an idea we have for a sequel, so let us know if you would like that to happen!!

@momor3202

@legendaryneckjudgestudent

@discoveringmiraculouswriters

@adrianarfox

@verooquieremimir

@jeminiikrystal

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chibivesicle · 5 years ago

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Golden Kamuy chapter 224-226: Pirates, serial killers and a killer rabbit’s much awaited backstory.

For the sake of time, I will combine my summary of the past few chapters that I missed while I was traveling and I don’t want to break it into smaller bits.

Chapter 224 had a color cover featuring none other than our favorite solitary wildcat sniper Ogata. I personally love the retro look for this! It looks like a classic comic from the 1960s with the odd color scheme and the handwritten shaded boxes.

The one box highlights the “100″ in Ogata’s first name as the kanji hyaku and the rest in latin letters.

The text refers to “Come on, Let’s Go! On wildcat Ogata’s sure-hit express! (one step forward!). Thanks to discussions on discord the phrase is in reference to the cat moving and delivery company in Japan, Yamato transport aka 黒ねこ (Kuroneko). A huge shout out to tsurumineko for translating the pun based on their “target hitting/sure hitting” level of service. I was previously familiar with the company in part due to my love of cats and noticing it everywhere when I’ve visited Japan.

Here is the official logo with a mom cat carrying a kitten and their official HQ (from wikipedia).

I can’t help but wonder if this implies that Ogata is a very reliable character in regards to performing his duties or that he hopes to one day make sure bring his own “kitten” home. Will Ogata be the one to take Asirpa back home to her kotan, Huci and her family? Either way, it implies that Ogata will get the job done, just like Kuroneko will deliver that package on time for you! He’ll snipe that target, he’ll get that info, he’ll make sure your mission is a success etc.

The retro look also makes me think of comics like these:

Batman works a bit outside of the law and has that dark edgy feel to it and Ogata also wears a cloak! Plus, look at the style of Batman and Robin, they’ve got quite the build just like our GK boys do.

Anyways, the cover is a combination of Kuroneko delivery and Batman.

Chapter 224 starts at the Uryu river as Asirpa is lighting a fire to attract a swan to it so that they can have it for dinner. For some odd reason, Noda chooses to rehash the Asirpa is going to kill a cute/beautiful animal for dinner. She pulls Sugimoto’s head when she sarcastically replies to him that they will gently grab the swan. . . .

I don’t understand this need to return to early Sugimoto-Asirpa humor. Shiraishi has returned from pooping and a swan approaches as the two of them freak out upon noticing the other. I personally find Shiraishi’s concern valid - swans are total assholes, so I’d also want to be upset at a swan at close range.

Asirpa beats it and they begin to prepare it for dinner in a temporary shelter as early on in the manga. This is a repeat of when they first started working together and ate the deer that Sugimoto failed to shoot. The three of them in Asirpa’s tent cooking some dinner.

Keep in mind Sugimoto didn’t want to eat the otter head etc etc and he still has issues with things beyond brains.

This time Asirpa really highlights the need to give it the Inaw offerings and place the head in the river.

Sugimoto still can’t eat animal heads and still looks awkward. However in contrast to chapter 25, after eating Shiraishi begins to explain what he’s observed from Heita’s belongings. He explains to us in a flashback what Heita told them about gold panning. He knows now that gold from different rivers looks different so there is a way to identify where it came from. And now, we get to see Shiraishi shine as he begins to help them lay out a new strategy for finding the gold without the skins.

He first off explains what we already know about the “Noppera-bou incident” which I find interesting based on the fact that he uses Noppera-bou - I wonder if Shiraishi thinks someone else killed the 7 Ainu men and Wilk was moving the gold, but not involved as Wilk told that to Sugimoto.

Shiraishi points out there may be people who know where the gold is hidden - and since supposedly Wilk moved it all by himself, he wouldn’t be able to move it that far.

He then continues to state, they just need to find the region where the gold dust was from and look close by. Sugimoto is not convinced by Shiraishi’s line of reasoning at all. He has a look of total annoyance and he’s like - “we” can’t identify a hidden gold dust stash etc. I’m disappointed that Asirpa simply chimes in that he’s an idiot as she eats the swan head that Sugimoto wouldn’t.

Shiraishi has to remind them what they learned from Tanigaki back when he was injured and recovering with Huci at Asirpa’s kotan. Part of the gold was taken from the stash by Wilk and the boat capsized on Lake Shikotsu. Therefore, they know where a sample of the gold is. As soon as Shiraishi reminds them of what they know from Tanigaki, he catches Asirpa’s attention and she takes him seriously.

She then summarizes where he’s been going with this - they likely won’t have the skins so they need another game plan. Bravo Shiraishi! He has created a plan B for them, better than Sugimoto’s “um maybe we will sweep in and steal the skins from Hijikata or Tsurumi . . .”

Sugimoto immediately rejects Shiraishi’s plan on the fact it is too hard and whines about it. Asirpa at least has a well thought out and rational reply that the lake is too deep, so they can’t get the evidence.

This leads into a flashback with Heita and our pirate convict at Lake Shikotsu the previous year. We get a “typical” reveal of his character as he’s completely in the nude about to dive into the cold spring water. Boutarou the Pirate’s real name is Oosawa Fusatarou and this reveals some of his background as a talented swimmer and diver.

He’s got some rather unique eyebrows - reverse Koito ones and he reveals that he’s going to dive for 35 minutes. He then uses special breathing techniques to get as much oxygen into his system and he’s got large feet, webbed hands (due to cell death not occurring between his digits during fetal development btw) and he became a convict by drowning people and stealing their stuff.

By having a rope tied to his ankle, Heita can signal to him when his time is up and he can come up from his deep free dive.

The chapter then returns to Shiraishi pointing out that Heita and Mr. Pirate already found the gold. This means that Shiraishi took the time to look at all of Heita’s samples and that they know the location and it is linked to one of the still remaining convicts.

Shiraishi then reveals that he knew that there was a guy who was intense, physically robust and pushed himself to the limits - so if he could dive to find the gold - he would be the most likely to succeed. The flashback shows that he was able to dive down to Wilk’s canoe and that Heita found at least 4 locations for the gold dust.

With the list of rivers, it means the gold dust found in the canoe can be traced to these four rivers: Toppu River, Saru River, Sorachi River and Shiriuchi River. I have labeled each of those rivers on the map of Heita’s description of rivers that can be panned for gold and included a few cities for reference. In yellow is the current approximate location of Asirpa, Sugimoto and Shiraishi on the Uryu river. The rivers where the gold dust is from are in magenta. The Toppu River is the closest one to them and the Sorachi and Saru Rivers are reasonably close.

The only river that is further away is the Shiriuchi River fairly close to Hakodate. Google maps has the Shiriuchi River labelled as the Chinai River (I checked with translator GlassHouses for clarification - apparently it can also be read as the Chinai River and there is one located in Shikoku - thanks for the help!) so if you try to find it in English it won’t be labelled correctly. Lake Shirotsu is the large lake on the map just next to my arrow pointing to Sapporo. Only put on a few cities for easy reference, Otaru, close to Asirpa’s kotan, Ashikawa and Kushiro.

The chapter then ends with Sugimoto holding the list of rivers as his eyes are white. He figures if they head to those rivers, since the pirate knows where the gold is from they just need to catch a pirate [and skin him]. Stop looking so well murder-y Sugimoto.

The tag line at the end states that every river eventually leads to the sea . . . I guess this must be true in Japan perhaps, but if you live in a basin, or in the Great Lakes region of North America the lake does not lead to the sea . . . . but I digress. This likely has to do with the pirate reference or something.

Recall that in 223, Hijikata is the one who remarks that Boutarou the pirate is making his move.

with the end of 224, it is confirmed that Boutarou is another faction entering the quest for the gold.

Quick observations and predictions from this chapter.

1.) Ogata is about to become a key player based on his color cover (if you don’t already get that Ogata is important). Momma cat needs to take her kittens home.

2.) Shiraishi has laid out their plan to look for the pirate. This may lead to an alliance or Sugimoto just trying to skin him based on the ending page. I personally think an alliance with Asirpa-Sugi-Shiraishi and Boutarou to be the most interesting. . . .

3.) Hijikata is not surprised by Boutarou’s move to enter the quest. He was working with Heita and now we know he will likely have his own faction as well.

4.) Based on my map, some of the parties will need to visit each of these rivers in order to gather information. With the much farther away Shiriuchi River, it takes the cast close to Hakodate. I can see this being key in future events involving Hijikata (due to his historical death during the Battle of Hakodate), Koito, since he was kidnapped in Hakodate by Tsurumi with the help of Ogata, Tsukishima and Kikuta. It seems like some sort of confrontation at Hakodate is in the cards.

Chapter 225 - Another convict enters the story.

So chapter 225 starts out with a clear reference to the infamous serial killer, Jack the Ripper who targeted prostitutes in Victorian London and was never caught. Oh yay, another serial killer - just my fav type of convict. [rolls eyes] The chapter title slums seems to refer to the slums of Sapporo where alcohol and prostitution were the few releases and the area was ripe with disease and violence.

An older woman is walking back to the inn of her client, he’s a much taller man wearing a western style of dress and a top hat. The woman is chatting away, she explains that she used to come from a wealthy family in Nagoya, since she’s in Hokkaido, it either implied her family was on the losing side during the Meiji revolution or that her late husband was on the losing side sent up to Hokkaido.

She’s clearly flush with drink and she turns to notice that he may be Japanese based on her “Huh? You’r Japa . . .” as he then grabs her by the face and proceeds to slit her throat and then cut up her body. As she struggled we get to see her hand pulled his jacket open a bit revealing yet another tattoo - so yep, another convict.

The following morning shows Sapporo police officers trying to keep the press away from a covered corpse, the woman covered with a straw mat. A member of the press is confirming what happened with a very suspicious looking police officer. Apparently, there was prostitute who was killed in the same location within the past month or less e.g. indicated by the 31st of last month (we don’t know how far into the current month things are). The man is revealed to be a criminal inspector and he has a shaded face and interesting wrinkles under his eyes.

From the start, this criminal inspector seems to be quite tall compared to the reporter. The next page reveals his identity as he’s trying to get a scoop on the story by bribing the inspector with food. The inspector’s face is covered as he simply tells him to shut up as he turns away.

The action then shifts to the temple where Hijikata and Co. are staying as we the readers are reminded that the man is Ishikawa Takuboku, the reporter who meet up with the group back when they had their photos taken before Abashiri in Kitami. Most of the group went to the photo studio with Hijikata while Shiraishi went off to the red light district with Takuboku instead as they hung out with sex workers and got very intoxicated on Hijikata’s money. The drunken Ishikawa blurts out that Hijikata is going to buy up newspapers to control the press.

Shiraishi knew that the Russo-Japanese war resulted in sales of papers but Ishikawa revealed that the change was due to the addition of pictures! Hence part of the reason why having a photo of Asirpa will be important to his Republic of Ezo plan. Again this exchange between Shiraishi and Takuboku-chan illustrates that Shiraishi is a pretty observant and smart guy. He’s def aware of more things than people give him credit for.

He’s finally back reporting to Hijikata and asks for more spending money. Unfortunately, he’s trying to get money from Nagakura who is having none of this and reminds him bluntly that if he wants money it needs to be information not printed in the papers.

Ushiyama makes a comment on how gruesome the murders are and wonders if the man has some issue with whores. Ishikawa comments that it is “unfortunate” since he hopes the man is apprehended quickly since he currently has a prostitute in the area that he is rather fond of. Wow, way to show how you care about women trapped in sex work Ishikawa . . . that the were likely sold into but I digress.

The English translation has Ushiyama refer to sex workers as whores, and Ishikawa’s use of prostitutes implies a little more respect, but maybe not since he’s concerned his current interest in Sapporo may get his fav woman killed and he won’t be able to sleep with her any more. What is clear is both men seem awkward in their opinion of how women in sex work should be perceived.

This is clear based on Nagakura’s reply to Ishikawa’s statement that he hopes he dies in a ditch. Hijikata completely ignores the info and just asks Kadokura if there was a convict in Abashiri who fits the description for the current killer.

Kadokura doesn’t reveal the name of any other information about the killer. Clearly, this information will be revealed when it becomes relevant and Hijikata is concerned that if this man is a convict and he is making such violent headlines that Tsurumi and his men in the 27th will certainly realize that they should investigate as well. It seems after Abashiri, Hijikata is taking Tsurumi as seriously as possible as well as the arrival of Ariko into his group after he was beaten up by Usami.

Hijikata’s reference to the 27th hunting the possible convict leads to another mallard flying. The final part of the panel shows Ogata aiming at the duck. Ogata fires at the duck.

The duck flies on, but Ogata simply exhales as he works the bolt with his left hand. He’s looking smug yet determined again. We don’t seem him exhale like this frequently, but it does remind me of his “I shot the woodcocks” proud face or a focused “hmmph” this is what I expected look.

The final panel shows two tail feathers from the duck fall to the ground both having been shot by Ogata. It is clear that Ogata is pleased with his progress on re-learning how to shoot ducks with his left eye. He’s making good progress - I’m not sure if we will get to see him make a successful kill in the manga or if Noda will keep it for a big reveal scene where he makes an amazing shot.

There are two ways to look at this i.) Ogata knows he’s getting better and he’ll let others see that he can still snipe and that he’s still a sniper. ii.) Ogata gets better, but publicly doesn’t want others to know he’s back to “normal” and uses his injury as a way to hide his regained sniping ability as his wildcard.

Both of these can be advantages for Ogata - everyone assumes he’s a sniper and forgets about all of his other skills. Or he makes others assume he’s weaker and than uses that to defeat them - an obvious sucker is Sugimoto - Sugimoto would look at one-eyed Ogata and think, “well if I can get close enough to break his arm again I can totally finish him off . . .” as Ogata then snipes Sugimoto again . . . (okay, not likely to happen just like that but you get my idea).

The chapter then shifts to an unnamed village along the Sea of Okhotsk. This is a vague descriptor, and as my map indicates it can be along this entire coast of the northeastern part of Hokkaido. Yay! The panel is quite simple as it shows a dead horse laying down.

The final panel shows Usami looking down upon the horse. Stares down at the horse as his eyes are white around the iris. As his head shifts a little to his left.

It is clear by the next page that Usami is the likely cause of death for the horse. A random man yells “Who did this? Who killed my horse!” as it shows Usami shuffling off rather quickly to avoid being caught in the act of horse murder.

Tsurumi is then outside of a shop that sells newspapers reading a newspaper with great interest. He then speaks to Kikuta who is nearby, telling him that the murders in Sapporo appear to be the work of an escaped tattooed convict.

He orders Kikuta to go to Sapporo to look into the convict. And that he should take Superior Private Usami with him. Wherever Tsurumi is along the coast is unclear, but Tsurumi seems to think staying on the eastern coast will allow him to find Asirpa from that area. Plus, he has sent Tanigaki in search of them as well. . . Kikuta replies yes sir rather calmly in a typical Kikuta fashion.

Usami walks up behind him with completely black eyes when Tsurumi tells him to take Usami with him. . . Kikuata can’t be too happy wit this as his reply is hesitant . . .” . . . yes, sir . . .” as he gives him the stink eye.

Usami then speaks up highlighting that he really doesn’t want to go with Kikuta. This is quite bold from a superior private, but Usami seems like he can get away with this in front of Tsurumi and Kikuta almost smirks as he feels the same way. Tsurumi doesn’t even turn to reply to Kikuta, he simply replies that Usami will be of use to him in Sapporo and Kikuta looks curious as to in what context Usami will be helpful.

Tsurumi figures that Hijikata’s group will also move there to investigate due to the newspaper coverage and that they should avoid them if all possible. Tsurumi doesn’t want them running into each other.

This is interesting as Kadokura is currently in Hijikata’s group and can easily recognize Usami so that may come into play. Usami beat the crap out of Ariko so he’ll be tied to the situation. Ogata is back with Hijikata for now and has a previous work history with Kikuta and there is enough information for the two of them to have some sort of showdown/reunion etc.

With somewhat erratic screen tones behind Usami and a equally creepy font he declares that running into Hijikata’s group is fine. He concludes that Ariko will be a useless spy and that he will just kill them all and steal everything - problem solved.

And with that Usami gives off super creepy vibes at 110%.

He and Kikuta don’t get along at all - when they were chasing after Toni Anji which required a well thought out plan he was useless and whiny and Kikuta couldn’t take it and also trusted Ariko to succeed.

When they were chasing Asirpa off of the ferry - Usami’s solution was to simply kill Huci and Kikuta was clearly appalled by how Usami’s mind seems to work. It was clear when Usami beat up Ariko that Kikuta was both hurt and torn about the entire situation. This likely is setting up some sort of disagreement between the two men. Kikuta is a sauve, sexy man, who appears a bit cocky at times but he gives off a vibe of really caring for others and avoids harming others who are not involved in things.

The next page reveals that indeed both groups are hunting down the convict in Sapporo.

Hijikata has brought his entire entourage. He leads the group followed by Ushiyama and Nagakura. Kadokura, Toni, Kantarou, Kirawus and then Ariko follow behind. Ariko looks back at Ogata watching them from a distance and taking up the rear as he prefers.

Kikuta leads with Usami behind, his face partially obscured by his visor of his army cap - Kikuta is too sexy to every wear a hat and mess up his excellent hairstyle.

It is interesting that even when you zoom in a bit, Ogata has his blank expression as Ariko nervously looks back at him. He was nervous to see Ogata and he likely thinks Ogata is onto him as a spy or maybe even thinks that Ogata is still working for Tsurumi.

It looks like Kirawus is watching Kadokura - I wonder if he’s onto Kadokura playing dumb. The two of them may get drunk and joke around, but I think Kirawus has been watching both Kadokura and also used him to get closer to Hijikata. I think both of these men are carrying secrets that will be important as time progresses in the manga. I just can’t shake the feeling that Kirawus knows more about the Ainu murders and I have a theory that he keeps his forehead covered b/c of some scar or something from the incident where the 7 Ainu men were murdered.

The next page has present day Tsurumi thinking of something disturbing based on the screen tones around him and it reveals a flashback, in Meiji 28 (1895) and back in Tsurumi’s home area of Shibata, Niigata. The flashback starts with someone asking Tokushirou, Tsurumi’s first name, about how the battlefield was.

The next page reveals Tsurumi talking with a man who appears to be his martial arts teacher for jujitsu. Tsurumi tells his teacher that he observed something interesting in war. Despite the vast amount of training that soldiers underwent before battle, most of the men actively avoided trying to kill the enemy soldiers.

Tsurumi goes on to state that during the American Civil war troops went to great lengths to avoid killing each other (as the nature of a civil war that split families apart at times) and he spends the rest of the page discussing that most humans will really try to avoid killing each other, even in the case of war.

This really is the heart of one of the major issues of GK. What happens to men who go off to war and the actually kill others? How do men do this and how to they move forward (or in the case of many of the elite men of Tsurumi’s 27th) how do those men get sucked into killing and do all of the dirty deeds for him.

This gets at the concept of how a person can be turned into a killer and be able to go to great lengths to kill and in this quest for the gold - who can serve Tsurumi best.

After perhaps working or training with his sensei, Tsurumi has changed into his uniform and is telling children nearby (perhaps students of the dojo) to be careful of Master Takeda’s horse is ill tempered (confirmation of the identity of the man he was just talking to) and that it may kick them. The fact that Usami killed a horse in the present time and then there is a flashback about a horse seems to indicate this will be something to do with Usami’s past.

A voice then calls to Tsurumi, calling him Mister Tokushirou, indicating a person familiar enough with him to call him by his first name but with respect.

This flashback now has revealed not one, but two people close enough to Tsurumi to use his first name either as a senior, his sensei and this unknown yet clearly younger person. Tsurumi responds, that he recognizes who the person is - revealed to be a younger Usami. He tells him that he’s gotten taller again, and then calls him by his first name, Tokishige.

Usami is blushing as he looks at Tsurumi before he replies yes, still blushing with black eyes as it reveals that he is Usami Tokishige, 14 years old. This means Usami was born in 1881.

Of course the editorial tagline mentions that he is yet another of the boys pining for Tsurumi.

Chapter 225 ends with several things as the main points:

1.) The next convict is a serial killer and is in Sapporo. This will lead to a likely encounter between Hijikata’s group and Kikuta and Usami.

How will this showdown happen? I’m hoping that Kadokura notices Usami and tips off the rest of the group and KIkuta and Ogata catch up. They seem to be more morally centered members of the 27th concerned about others who can get caught in the crossfire.

2.) The manga is back to the concept of the ability to kill, what makes a killer? what makes a murder? and what makes a soldier? Tsurumi wants men willing to go into the depths of hell with him to accomplish his goals.

Tsukishima will see this to the end - he’s officially dead on the outside and inside after his Koito confrontation.

Nikaido is losing all of his humanity to be a test subject for a new and improved solider.

Usami has clearly had a vibe that something is totally off with him since he was first introduced. The fact that Koito was groomed by Tsurumi when he was 14, means that Usami’s age and blush shows that he was a previous and older Tsurumi fanboy. The chapter ends with the idea that Tsurumi likely was involved in grooming him.

Usami is clearly a great soldier and killer for some of Tsurumi’s goals - this chapter is making it clear that Usami is “special” in the context of murder. Or that he lacks some sort of moral compass or control in regards to murder and killing.

3.) That criminal inspector at the Sapporo police department is shady as all hell. He could be the convict in disguise - and he’d fit the trope of the murderer working in the police so that he can’t get caught. Or he’s a total red herring.

Chapter 226 -Sacred Ground

The chapter starts out with a brief update on the status of the Asirpa-Sugi-Shiraishi-Vasily group. They are stopping by an Ainu kotan and Sugimoto notices another dog that looks exactly like Ryu, but isn’t Ryu. Shiraishi is the one to remark that Ryu stayed behind as Tanigaki gave Cikapasi Nihei’s rifle so he won’t be going anywhere. Interestingly, Sugimoto remarks that he hopes that Cikapasi and Ennoka treat Ryu well so he “let’s go” of his attachment to the rifle and move on.

This is an odd remark from Sugimoto, since he himself needs to move on from a lot of stuff ~ he can see it in a dog’s life but not his own.

This leads to a key comment from Asirpa about Ainu dogs, that their loyalty towards owners can be a bad thing since they get jealous and ill tempered. A Japanese man owned one and the dog was well treated but he ended up scolding it due to poor behaviour and went hunting without the dog. The dog’s reaction to rejection was to kill of off the man’s chickens . . . Shiraishi then comments that people will do the same thing for the love of another.

The following page is the title page with the title and a young Usami and Tsurumi. Based on the fact that we know Usami is very loyal to Tsurumi and he has killed for him - I think it is clear the story about the loyal dog is Usami and Tsurumi is the man with the chickens. . . oh great - this chapter is surely getting to the root of his creepy vibes!

Usami tells him that he’s there even on a day to not train even though after he performed housework and chores to help his family he is more than willing to walk 2 hours one way to come to that very spot on the dojo grounds.

Usami’s face is completely shaded so clearly something dark is tied to that place.

The next page reveals that Usami refers to that spot as “our sacred place” as the wind dramatically blows by as Tsurumi looks at his back.

This leads to a flashback in the flashback, 2 years earlier so 1893, showing Usami’s family. He’s 12 and he appears to have his mother and father, an older sister, younger brother and another younger sibling on his mother’s back as well.

His father asks him if things are going well at the dojo and with his training. He replies that Mister Tokushirou told him he’s the most talented of all the students that he’s seen there before. Therefore, at the age of 12 he was comfortable enough to call Tsurumi by his first name - san!

This catches the attention of his older sister and his mother as they look at him in shock and awe, his mother stopping her mending of clothing while his sister blushes. His sister asks excitedly “Mister Tsurumi Tokushirou = Tsurumi Tokshirou-san?” followed by her having a teenage fangirl moment over him while his father looks on with shock and concern. His mother confirms that he’s got to have talent since his father was talented too . . . I guess this implies that Tsurumi’s father was a well know ladies man and it is clear that Tsurumi is also seen as a ladies man in the area.

So, Tsurumi is clearly a charismatic, charming and a confirmed ladies’ man and is the 4th son of another man who was also very well known and must have been an important samurai family. Usami is happy that his family are glad to hear he’s attracted the attention of an important local man. Their family is large and it looks like since his mother is mending clothes they aren’t the richest family but they must come from a more noble/samurai background than some of our other cast members. It looks like the Usami household is a happy and fertile one.

Clearly, Tsurumi is interested in getting to know Usami and some time later, Tsurumi is working the water wheel that his family uses to pump water for their rice paddies. Tsurumi clearly is doing some sort of research into him and he seems to realize that using the foot powered water wheel leads to the develop strong legs. Usami is explaining how hard the work is based on their location etc when he is interruped by another young boy.

This other boy is introduced as Takagi Tomoharu another 12 year old boy. He really reminds me of Sugimoto a bit, that slightly messy hair and friendly look. He clearly is another Tsurumi fanboy.

Tsurumi also calls him by his first name and asks if his father is doing well and the boy responds excitedly as Usami silently smiles with his eyes closed in the background having Tsurumi’s attention focused on another person.

Sometime after school, Tomoharu tells Usami to stay over at his house since they have training at the dojo and they can go to school the next morning. He then adds that Tsurusumi will be at the dojo that evening! This immediately gets Usami’s attention and he runs to the dojo yelling “Hurry, hurry!” so Usami is excited by this!

The next page shows the dojo and both boys want Tsurumi’s attention to train with each of them and Tsurumi just smiles back, again Usami’s eyes are closed.

Sometime later it shows Tsurumi in winter leaving the dojo - we don’t get the full conversation, just that Tsurumi is responding to something that Usami said. Usami will be graduating - I guess based on his age primary school - and Tsurumi who’s face is obscured asks if he will keep training at the dojo. Usami responds with his eyes closed again stating he will have to help his father work on their family farm so it may not happen.

Tsurumi then turns and looks at him in a very friendly way telling him to continue at the dojo to become much stronger - he’ll be able to surpass Tsurumi as well based on his skills with time.

Tsurmi then states he won’t be able to visit the dojo soon, with the impending Sino-Japanese war he’s about to go off to (with Tsukishima) and finally Usami opens his eyes with concern in them as well as light in his eyes. Usami is clearly worried about Tsurumi leaving. All of a sudden his friend appears interrupting him and Tsurumi again telling him to go home together. Again we don’t know what else Usami was going to say to Tsurumi . . .

The winter gives way to spring, when the school year ends and another one will begin.

We get a scene where Usami is able to pin Tomoharu down and someone tells them to stop for the day . . . maybe Tsurumi maybe not. It is clear that just like Sugimoto’s friend Toraiji - Usami is the natural martial artist while Tomoharu will always lose to him. Tomoharu is sulking in the dojo and Tsurumi has to ask him what’s wrong so that he and his sensei can lock up. He reveals that he’s never been able to beat Usami before he leaves. Tomoharu then cases after Usami who is waiting outside for him.

It looks like he told Tsurumi that he’s leaving and Tsurumi got him to approach Usami to tell him about his departure to high school? in Tokyo. However, Usami is not surprised as he already knew his friend was leaving and tells him that he really doesn’t want to spar with him one last time.

Usami from a very dramatic angle tells hi that he doesn’t want to lose on purpose b/c he’s worried about his feelings . . . and before he finishes Tomoharu yells his reply that he shouldn’t, that wouldn’t be a real friendship, it would end it. Usami has light and sparkle in his eyes as he says his lines and his friend sounds like a passionate young Japanese man with fighting spirit.

Tsurumi tells him that he will watch their match in the corner of the yard - the sacred place which Usami will say to Tsurmumi 2 years later. . .

The next two pages are a montage of memories of Tomoharu with Usami as he thinks to survive alone in Tokyo requires him to defeat him. It seems that Tomoharu really enjoyed his time with Usami - but I really get the feeling that Usami just tolerated him. It really does have this vibe of a one sided friendship, I could even see him staying over at Tomoharu’s place just to be closer to the dojo and by extension Tsurumi.

Tomoharu cries as he knows he’s fighting hard but still ends up defeated by Usami.

This scene is very much like the Sugimoto’s flashback in chapter 35 - courtship. He met Toraji at his burnt down house on his wedding day and he attacks Sugimoto who promptly defeats him. With his eyes full of tears, Toraji refuses to give up and goes for another round with Sugimoto as he roundly defeats him again. This clearly is linked back to Shiraishi’s comment about humans and the people that they love. Yes, Sugimoto is a dick to show up, make Toraiji upset, beat him and then congratulate him on his marriage which only makes Toraiji more annoyed.

Yet, in their second round ends with him declaring that he may have lost to Sugimoto in kendo and judo, but he won in the battle for Umeko’s heart. . .

This is clearly a parallel with Usami and Tomoharu and this is linked to Sugimoto.

Anyways back to 226. Tomoharu despite being defeated pulls on Usami’s shirt and states that he’s not done yet. The next full page panel shows Usami’s reaction -

full on murder rabbit!!! He’s gained the white along the edge of his black pupils as he’s drooling, his veins are bursting and his entire face is contorted in rage/anger/i don’t know what else. I call him a murder rabbit based on a nickname that the lovely Merdopsuedo came up for Usami a long time ago.

She calls him the The Killer Rabbit of Caerbannog, based on the rabbit that lives in the cave and kills many men in an excellent scene requiring the use of the Holy Hand grenade of Antioch in “Monty Python and The Holy Grail”. This flashback has confirmed all of our fan jokes and theories and was a much better nickname the previously proposed one of “Thumper” the rabbit from “Bambi”.

Tomoharu only gets a glance of his face as he raises his foot before he firmly kicks him in the throat with his bare heel.

This action is enough to even shock Tsurumi! We see Tomoharu make his last gasp for air as Tsurumi, the man who watched his family die in Vladivostok, perhaps killed by his own actions or those of Wik, Kiro and Sofia. Tsurumi is a broken and twisted man by this point before he even heads off to the Sino-Japanese war, but Usami’s actions have completely caught him off guard. He thought he was helping out with a teenage issue and he’s just resulted in the death of Tomoharu by accident. Look at those wide open eyes, sweat on his forehead and those stress lines! Tsurumi is completely shocked.

It is clear a man who has seen terrible things like Tsurumi (as we don’t know what his spying and previous military service was like) he is shocked by Usami’s violence that he uses as he clearly struck a killing blow on his friend.

And with that the chapter ends!

Wow! Usami’s backstory is clearly revealed to be super creepy as I was always afraid of. At the age of 12 he killed the boy who on the surface appeared to be his best friend.

Final thoughts on chapter 226

1.) Usami may be a natural born killer rabbit who always wants to please Tsurumi. Chapter 227 will likely further explain why that part of the dojo is sacred to both of them. Sei Kobiyama also mentioned on twitter that due to both Tsurumi and Usami practicing jujitsu/judo indicate they both came from samurai families.

Tsurumi has alluded to the fact that his family was once wealthy when he was young and we know he’s the 4th son and they lost the wealth. It is clear based on Usami’s families reaction to him the Tsurumi family was well known.

Usami is clearly not in a wealthy household that has to work very hard to survive, yet has a connection to samurai habits and culture. This may be a link to chapter 225 referring the the slums of Sapporo and how the murdered woman was from a once wealthy family that lost it - likely a pre-Meiji era samurai family.

Is Usami jealous of Tomoharu? Or does he want Tsurumi’s attention all to himself? What motivates him? He seems off the entire time before he kills Tomoharu so I think there is more going on than we realize just yet.

Does this information from Sei Kobiyama imply that since Sugimoto and Toraiji also practiced kendo and judo that they were also from poor samurai families also fallen on hard times in the Edo area?

2.) I believe that Usami and Sugimoto are supposed to be compared in some way with this flashback. Both men are talented in judo and when they kill both men are demon or animalistic in the way that they fight and kill. Yet, one killed his crybaby best friend while the other one as far as we know was unable to save his friend.

Noda has kept away from Sugimoto’s past and his unresolved issues surrounding Toraiji and Umeko for a long time. This may lead to the reveal of more of Sugimoto’s past and what really happened when Toraiji died and Sugimoto clung to his dying body, giving up the sled for Tsukishima at Mudoken. It keeps alluding to a potential situation where Sugimoto is either indirectly or directly related to the events that result in Toraiji’s death. And keep in mind in the flashbacks his nickname is Tora-chan or Tiger. If Kiro is Tanigaki’s tiger, we’ve discussed that Toraiji is Sugimoto’s tiger . . .

Sugimoto currently has a broken wrist and maybe he will have to rely on Asirpa, Shiraishi and Vasily his non-friend, not-enemy-ally. I think Usami may be a link to more background into Sugimoto.

Keeping that in mind, I suspect that Kadokura will lead to more background into Ogata as his father would have been a contemporary of sorts with Koito and Hanazawa, but on Ogata’s mother side.

Well that is all I have for now with the chapters! I’ll work on getting a few more meta up hopefully in the next few days including as long delayed cover analysis and some Koito meta!

#golden kamuy #golden kamuy meta #sugimoto saichi #asirpa #ogata hyakunosuke #tsurumi tokushirou #tsukishima hajime #ushiyama tatsuma #hijikata toshizo #usami tokishige #warrant officer kikuta #kadokura #kirawus #ishikawa takuboku

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thecorteztwins · 6 years ago

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[Just a small ficlet featuring little-known Marvel “villains” Black Mamba/Tanya Sealy, Haven/Radha Dastoor, Skein/Sybil Dvorak, and a surprise guest at the end in a comedy of errors!] Tanya Sealy was also known as Black Mamba, the mercenary who served in the Serpent Society and the aptly-named B.A.D Girls, not mention a super-villain with the Masters of Evil and a super-heroine with the Women Warriors. But she had another identity besides all that---Tanya Sweet, professional escort. As with her mercenary work, it wasn’t something she did simply for the money alone, or because she had no choice. No, far from it---Tanya did it because she liked it. Of course, the money was a factor, she wouldn’t have done it for free, just like she wouldn’t do a merc job for free, but she still liked a damn well lot more than she would have enjoyed some boring office job or dirty menial work. Why people thought it was degrading was beyond her; she got treated like a queen while the poor saps in retail, fast food, and any other service industry were the ones really getting reamed! One of the best parts was picking her customers. You couldn’t say “no” to them in most jobs, but Tanya could any damn time she pleased. Not that she often did, since most of the people who called her were those to whom she’d personally handed her card. She kept different business cards for her different careers/identities, and different phone lines as well. And right now, her line for escort work was ringing, with an unfamiliar number. So, a new customer! Time to find out who it was---someone she’d personally selected, or someone who had been referred to her by another satisfied client? “Hello there stranger,” she said professionally, though with of course the expected hint of sensuality, “You’ve reached Tanya Sweet. To what do I owe the pleasure?” “Hello, Ms. Sweet,” said a woman’s voice. Holy shit, that was unexpected. It wasn’t that she’d never gotten female clients, but they were very rare. “I’m calling about scheduling your services. We’ve met before, if you remember---my name is Radha Dastoor, I went by Haven?” Holy. Shit. No way. She had NOT seen that coming. Yeah, she remembered Haven from the slammer, but she had NOT read her as interested in women at all, let alone the type who would get an escort. It wasn’t that there was just one “type“ of person who purchased her time and attentions, there were a lot of different people who did...but there were a lot of different kinds of people who never would, and she could have sworn that this lady was one of them.

“Oh yes, yes I do,” Tanya swallowed her surprise and continued with her congenial customer-service-with-a-sexy-smile voice, “When were you hoping to schedule?” “There’s a gala in a week,” said Haven, then gave the specific time and date, and explained, “I apologize so much for the short notice, Ms. Sweet. My brother was to be my original plus-one, but something has come up for him, and he’s simply not comfortable attending to his own business unless he knows there is someone to go with me in his stead. He showed me the card you gave to him, and suggested you, since you’re...well, you’re a woman, but you’re also very capable. So he thought you would be the safest option for me.” It was extremely difficult for Tanya not laugh. Oh her god. Oh her GOD. This was HILARIOUS. She’d slid that big stud her calling card when he’d come to pick Haven up from prison, and apparently he had THOUGHT that escorting meant...just accompanying someone. And clearly Haven thought the same thing! Oh man. It was too funny. Though it also made a lot more sense! It also meant she could make some really easy money. “I’m absolutely free that night,” she purred, before realizing she should not be purring anymore, and amended to a more prim tone as she continued, “What will the dress code be?” “It’s black tie, but please don’t worry if you don’t something you feel is suitable,” Haven assured, “I’d be happy to buy you a dress and shoes sometime this week before we go.” Oh SWEET! For sure, Tanya was doing this gig. She’d have to remember to thank Haven’s big dumb lug of a brother next time she saw him! “Yes, that would be excellent,” Tanya continued to successfully contain her excitement at the easy work and free stuff, “After all, you’ll know best what’s appropriate for the occasion. Now, you mentioned your brother would be concerned about me being ‘capable’---are you expecting threats?” “Not expecting per se,” said Haven in a resigned tone, “But, well, a gathering of wealthy people in New York City...” Yeah, that was sitting ducks. Sitting ducks broadcasting their diamonds and Dom Perignon to every dumbass super-criminal in the city. Would the rich never learn? Black Mamba---er, Tanya---hoped not. “I absolutely understand. I assure you, my powers are suitable to combat both baseline and superhuman threats, and I have experience handling both. I believe I told you about my time in the Women Warriors?” She felt that emphasizing her background as a superhero would be better than bringing up her more regular, less legal doings. “Yes, yes I do,” said Haven warmly, “If I recall correctly, you protected the entire state of Delaware. So I have no doubt you can do so for me for the night--though of course I hope you won’t have to.” “And in the event I do, you understand I will be expecting compensation for any medical care needed for injuries I might incur?” “Oh, of course. Do you have a form I should sign?” She was starting to love this woman. Perfect customer. “Yeah, no worries,” she said, her professional veneer finally slipping into a more casual, natural mode for her, “I’ll just bring it with me when we meet up to buy the dress. Hey, is your brother gonna be there for that?” Alas, he was not. But once they had discussed rates, Tanya felt anything but disappointed. *** Things were going great. She looked fantastic in this dress, Ms. Dastoor wasn’t upstaging her---okay, her...Indian outfit thing...was super beautiful...but Tanya had LEGS and CLEAVAGE---, and she’d slipped her card to a whole lot of fine gentlemen who, if they were here, could probably afford her. And best of all, no one had--- “Well hello Tanya. I didn’t expect to see you here.” Oh great. It was Skein. Skein, aka Sybil Dvorak, was actually a friend to Tanya Sealy. They got along great, in fact. But the problem was, she was also a fellow, well, supervillain. One who had gotten her start crashing the parties of the social elite like this, not even for personal gain but for...kicks, Tanya supposed. Something to do with an ex boyfriend. “Hey, Sybil,” said Tanya casually, “Hey, not that it’s not great to see you, but you’re not planning anything, are you? Because I’m here on a date. You know, for work?”

“Ohhhh,” Sybil winked at her, “Well...since we’re old friends and all, I could be persuaded not to make a scene if you cut me in on what you’re getting for this “date”. Since we’re friends.” Tanya glared at her. “Come on, Black Mamba,” said Skein, undaunted, “You’re a mercenary. You can hardly judge me for being the same.” “I’ll still get paid no matter what you do here tonight,” said Tanya, “So it doesn’t really matter. In fact, she might tip me more if I save her from some disaster. So go ahead.” “Oooh, she?” said Skein, intrigued. Oh, double great. Tanya had forgotten---Skein had a crush on Haven. She’d been one of the other lady villains in their cellblock, and for some reason she was just crazy about her. Tanya didn’t really get it. Sure, Haven was beautiful, she supposed---Tanya wasn’t into women herself---but she was kind of old, and really boring. She just couldn’t fathom her being Sybil’s type at all. But then, Tanya, who considered herself an expert in matters of sex and romance, was of course aware of the old adage that opposites attract. Maybe Haven represented to Skein the sense of stability and restraint that Skein herself lacked. Maybe she felt she needed someone calm and responsible and conventionally moral in her life. Maybe she admired it. Or maybe she wanted to corrupt it. Whatever the case, Tanya was letting her find out that the object of her amorous affections was her meal ticket tonight. Skein might take it the wrong way.

So naturally, no sooner did Tanya decide this, than Haven glided up and greeted their mutual friend, “Sybil? Oh Sybil, that is you!” “Hi, Haven!” Skein trilled in a girlish sing-song voice, twirling a strand of her long black hair around one finger and assuming a flirtacious pose. Tanya had to try hard not to role her eyes at this, especially considering how obviously unaffected that Haven was by it. As crazy as Skein was about Haven, Haven was equally oblivious. Which was kind of odd, given how perceptive Tanya had noticed Haven was in her short time knowing her, but maybe she just didn’t know how to handle being hit on by another woman so blatantly. “Wow, I can’t believe you and Tanya are BOTH here!” “We’re actually here together,” said Haven, clearly having no idea the implications she had just dropped. And that was when Tanya knew...it was over. Sybil blinked. And then... “Are you kidding me?!” she shouted at Tanya, her dress unraveling around her in a whirlwind of thread. . “Sybil, chill out, it’s not what you think--” Tanya tried to calm her down but it was too late, the attention of the security guards had been attracted. A threeway battle ensued, with Sybil/Skein trying to attack Black Mamba while both attempted to evade the super-powered guards. As the completely baffled Haven watched in hypnotized horror, another party guest stepped beside her. “Ah, I’m sorry you had to see this,” lamented the tuxedo-clad Fabian Cortez, “They’re fighting over me, you see.” Haven believed him.

#fic #writing

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secretsofthemasquerade · 7 years ago

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V5 Corebook, no gloves review P.1

Y’all know me, it had to be coming. Sorry it took me so long. Part 1 is about the physical aspect of the PDF (I don’t have the physical book at hand yet), Part 2 is going to be about mechanics and “content”, since I’m still testing that out.

So first and foremost, the small Mature Content Warning that was added last minute to the PDF. It has been published online on its own so I have no issues posting it here:

Mature Content Warning For the past several decades, Vampire: The Masquerade has addressed the darkness in the real world through horror stories: it has talked about AIDS, capitalist exploitation, sexual predation, the resurgence of far-right political extremism, religious fanaticism, state and private surveillance, and many other issues. This version of the game does not shy away from any of the above, and we believe exploration of subjects like these is as valid in roleplaying games as it is in other media. Including a problematic subject in a Storytelling game is not the same as glorifying it, and if you take the chance to explore it critically, it can be the exact opposite. If we understand the problems facing us, we are better armed to fight them. V5 includes in-world references and expressions of the following: sexual violence, political extremism, physical violence and gore, mind control, torture, abuse, imprisonment and kidnapping, racism, sexism, and homophobia, to name a few. It’s a game about monsters. “Why are you telling me this?” you might be saying. Someone at your table is not familiar with this game. Someone at your table has dealt with some of these issues in real life. Someone at your table wants to know that you read this warning and know you will be considerate to them as players, while putting their character through the wringer. In the Appendix, you will find concrete techniques on how to handle difficult subjects in your game in a manner that is respectful to your players and their experiences. Calibrate beforehand which techniques your group wants to use. People have different needs and not every method works for every person. This is a game about monsters. But it is only a game. Don’t use it as an excuse to be a monster yourself.

This is something I consider good (that last sentence is more necessary than I’d like to know), considering the rest of the contents of the game, but I wish they had taken a far more respectful approach to the mature themes instead of name-dropping horrors without meaning.

Now, the PDF itself has MAJOR issues in terms of book-making. The bookmarks are terrible, they integrate stuff from the side boxes that just make no sense, there’s little to no proper hierarchy, some are even missing, the internal links don’t work very well, it’s just poor, poor design.

Seriously look at this:

How can I navigate this? Like seriously ? I know there’s a table of contents, but it should be in the navigation bar as well, that’s how PDFs work.

(The Nossies are missing, it makes me laugh because it’s the Nossies, but they’re there, that’s why Malks seem to have two sections about Disciplines and Banes)

Now, the layout itself isn’t the worst I’ve ever seen, and some parts of what I’m going to be saying may fall upon “personal taste”, but I’ve been editing PhD thesis for long enough to recognize bad layout when I see one :p

Like, this is fine, I really like the new Tremere Clan Symbol (all the clan symbols are pretty neat tbh, and the Disciplines symbols are the VTES ones so that makes me extra happy), and they’ve used beautiful fonts, even if we disregard that they couldn’t be bothered to spell HERMETIC correctly...

However there are two major issues with the book layout as it stands, as you flip through the pages. First, the text isn’t justified (aka aligned left and right), and second, the text is sometimes in two columns, sometimes in three. Quite often, the titles are at the end of a column (see here “The Anarchs”) and some paragraphs have poor lonely lines in the precedent page or column and it just looks bad. I screenshot some pages with low res: the text itself does not matter so it’s ok if you can’t read it ;) But notice how “Relationship” is hyphened because of the three columns there...

Then, you have plenty of pages which have either black background or colorful background. That would be fine if some of the pages weren’t the kind of pages you’d want to print out to give as handouts to players...

My poor eyes.

These four pages would be far more useful with black on white, even if plenty of us like reading white on black because it’s easier on the eyes on a tabler, but this isn’t printer friendly when you sell a pdf... This should have been in the Appendix with a printer friendly version.

Sometimes the placement of elements is just weird or off putting in certain pages:

This image touches the bottom of the page, but there’s three meters of white space above. There are examples of the exact opposite (the image touching the top of the image with extra space at the bottom).

This chart should be centered, I think.

Something’s wrong here, isn’t there something missing above the first page? And that block alone on the second column, it’s very common across the book.

Now, on a tablet or phone, it’s easy to double tap and match the column length, and the fact that the text isn’t justified isn’t much of an issue when reading plain text, but I find that the text not being justified in any of the pages is just Bad Design.

I did like the separations, the small lines between the columns and all, they looked great, the change of fonts in between “boxes”, “quotations”, “examples” and so on was also well made.

Now, the Art.

Some of the art is old WWP art, some of it is WoD MMO art, some of the art is newly commissioned illustrations, and some of the art is photography with (or without) filters.

Old WWP Art is clearly to link back. The old Helena art is there. Theo Bell got new art (I think it’s new?), but Helena didn’t.

They also reused MET By Night Studios photography for Jeanette and Therese, and cropped the photo, taking away the key composition of the original. Did Bradstreet give the rights to alter his work with such cropping?

Note that I personally dislike this picture, cropped or not, a lot, simply because being a Bloodlines fan I don’t think it represents either Therese or Jeanette properly. Jeanette wouldn’t be caught with a power stance and serious face like that, Therese wouldn’t be caught with such a non imposing, reserved pose, and coming from Bradstreet, I am VERY disappointed, because he has done official art for Jeanette for the video game before and it was far better representative of her; the model from the OG picture looks far closer to the Jeanette we meet in the game, but this is truly a matter of personal taste and opinion so I won’t scream again about it.

The MMO art is overall great quality, and sometimes it’s even used in a very smart, beautiful way:

(I’d have put this image on the Embrace and not on Predators, tbh...)

They also used the fashion spreads looks for the MMO in the corebook, some of it is plain silly, and I’m very much afraid they’re used literally as how PCs look like. Here’s the Gangrel Fashion splat:

I consider the art to be good, and to be great concept art for a MMO, and great fashion shots, but.. in VtM? this is not Masquerade Friendly. Also these types of art (as well as the Investigator image you can see on the first few pages I pasted above) are all 20 something model-like people, and yes that involves the Nosferatu, because they’re fashion drawings. Fashion drawings have stupid proportions and no realism, since they’re meant to show the clothes, not the model. And for a book about characters, well, why? This was suitable for the MMO because MMOs have transmogs and such and such.

I just find them to have completely missed the “Punk and Gothic Aesthetic of the World” and just stacked as much weird clothing as they could to look “hype and modern”. Hipster Instagram Fashion that’s unwearable.

Yes, vampires are marginal by nature, but please, their goal is to blend in, not be noticed, and considering how long they’re effectively inactive, and how age affects your will to stay on trend... Eh.

The New commissioned illustrations are hit and miss, and some of this criticism does fall on “personal taste”, but here I ranted about one of those art pieces (which was the page for the Vault, but it’s in the book). They’re all a little bit like this, some having a far better composition even if they all seem to be this saturated. They’re all overall good and I like most of them.

This one is “look at my butt” kind of situation. I’d have rather have this picture just without this foreground couple, it would have been a perfect street look example, and the two jumping above the roofs guys would have had the attention they deserved. I love the fog, the graffity, the textures are nice, i just hate the butt.

And finally, the big chunk, the Photography Art.

I understand how they made it so that most people would be able to “make their own art” (photography being now more accessible to the masses than illustration), and that is something I nod to, appreciate and completely understand. HOWEVER, Photography IS art and not everyone can be a Photographer with a snap of their fingers (or a click of the camera :p).

What’s good with photography art is that they picked diverse looking models of all sorts, and they put them in interesting and somewhat telling situations. What’s bad is that “suddenly” all “positions of power” are held by middle-aged (so plain old 60yo) looking vampires and all Anarchs Rebels looks like they’re in their twenties.

This goes against VtM. Older vampires tend to look younger because being a King or Queen at age 14 wasn’t uncommon until the 1800s. Embracing people right at the end of their teenage years, at their prime, at their best, as they’re “perfect” is the best a vampire could do (remember Dark Ages have rules against embracing the young, the elderly, the crippled, the insane...).

It’s only after WWII that embracing people over 40 wasn’t uncommon.

I’d have LOVED to see a 60yo looking Punk, and have the Dominating Prince on Their Throne look like, 15. And own the place.

Now there are plenty of issues with some of the photography art, and here’s one (page 232) that I’ve screamed at for like, two weeks now.

This picture had one of the best compositions, the diagonal works great, the leaning away, the androgyny of the chalice (despite them still having a personality and free will...). How he filled the glass with the blood from the chalice through this.. pinky finger condom thing, okay, sure, weird af but why not. Does’t explain why the chalice has two marks on their forearm but okay. Sure. Also, FINALLY a photography in VtM of a dude wearing a suit that’s actually his size? Great. And it doesn’t come out of a Goth Store (tm). Great! Amazing!

But there are in this picture TWO things I just cannot forgive.

First, the guy has his jacket buttoned. When you Suit 101, when you sit, you unbutton. You button up when you stand up. Now this is supposed to be The Ventrue (tm), this is just wrong.

Second, his fucking zipper is down. YES HIS FLY IS DOWN. How the hell did this not get photoshopped in like two seconds? Because of the jacket, I know this is an accident; the model just isn’t used to suit etiquette. You could explain this away by saying he’s a pervert or something, but in that case you’d have needed to add slightly more eroticism to the guy (jacket and maybe shirt open, no glass, slight smile, leaning towards the chalice and not away from them?).

Some of the photography-manipulated art is just beautiful, let’s be honest, this is the splat before Disciplines:

I’m not a fan of the orange (simply because I’m not a fan of orange in general), but this works just so well, the composition, the lines of sight, the shadows, the mirroring, just, top notch choice here, who did this??

But then you have post apo band :p

I mean I like this group shot, it’s very classical, it looks like a fine coterie with a specific turf.. But is this Mad Max? I know Gehenna happened, and I do know some people actually dress like that, but if you’re being tracked down and hunted into oblivion by the Second Inquisition, you.. just don’t do this.

Most of the photography is like this; marginal overdressed looks. Now this is personal taste again, I just wish we had more.. normal looking people. People who are exceptional, but not through their looks or clothing style. The back of the book claims “A Storytelling game of personal and political horror.” and I see little of it in the pictures and illustrations.

Anyway, want more Art Rants? click here

Stay tuned for part 2!

#secrets rants about art #art rant #v5 #vampire the masquerade #world of darkness #v5 review

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bcemina · 7 years ago

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hello pals!! i’m acacia (satan), i’m twenty years old, i use she/her pronouns and i hail from the pst timezone! i’m hella excited to be in a lil ol group again because i haven’t been in one since like... idk?? but enough about me — let’s get to the good stuff aka bae mina. anyways, if you like this, i’ll take it as an invitation to IM you for plots, so be careful!! ♡

is that kim chungha ?? no, that’s just bae mina, a 21 year old dj/sephora mua. the cisfemale has been described as witty but is also known as cynical. she resides in 613 !!

BACKGROUND + TRIGGER WARNINGS: abuse

to kick things off, mina’s father passed away before she was born. leading her mother to dating an array of men to cope with the sadness. often times neglecting her daughter, with the exception of the times she brought in successful report cards.

when she was thirteen, her mother married a man who physically abused mina any chance he had. especially when mrs. bae started cheating on him. so mina recoiled around music for a few years.

being an only child, she had to keep herself entertained. she started off with the piano, but got too impatient. eventually steering towards percussion instruments. then ultimately discovering the art of DJing!! her goal is to become a producer one day.

she also had to teach herself a lot of basic life skills. since her mother wasn’t around too much. luckily, she had the internet at her fingertips and stubbled upon makeup tutorials on youtube.

eventually she became a freelance makeup artist to make some $$$ on the side. saving up for the day she turned eighteen...

and once she had turned eighteen, mina packed her things and moved very very very far away. her mother tries to contact her every now and then but most of the time she just ignores her calls.

now, she works at sephora as a makeup artist (lives off the employee discount) and also lands dj gigs frequently. mina is pretty content with her life at the moment.

PERSONALITY

PERSONALITY: mina’s personalty is quite something. she has that tell it like it is personality. she just calls it likes she sees it. even if she’s not exactly right. she’s witty and intelligent. she’s very particular when it comes to most things. she wants things done correctly. so she often runs by the quote, “if you want things right you gotta do it yourself.” she doesn’t like relying on others to get things done when she knows she could do it faster and better. a little bit of a ocd queen. she’s very dedicated to her work, thus making her very goal oriented. she’s very creative when it comes to her music. she really enjoys any and all kind of art. overall, she’s slowly growing out of her tough head of hair and morphing into a young woman so beautiful over the years, but also at times, terrifying ?? self destructive ?? even if she’ll never let anyone see her deteriorate her insides sigh. basically she’s a hot mess. but she tries her best to hide it.

RELATIONSHIPS

FRIENDS

best friend(s) — bestest best friend. that one person whom mina can trust with her life. they could tell mina absolutely everything! although, she might not do the same. but, she’d never let go of this person. they’re her ride or die. | m, f, or nb

winghoe — someone who’s constantly trying to hook mina up with people. always prying in her love life. probably made her a tinder. they just want this chick to find love dammit. | m, f, or nb

brotherly figure — completely platonic relationship. just someone who will consult and take care of this chick. sees her as a lil smol bean. even though she’s a viscous chihuahua. but lbr she’s a mess. take care of her. | m or nb

motherly figure — someone who she looks up to. probably aspires to be like them. someone who she sees a role model. even if they aren’t the greatest influence… or maybe they are ! | f or nb

partner in crime — they may not be the most reliable person like her best friend(s). but definitely someone she can get turnt tf up with. to make a long story short: this is her party buddy !! | TAKEN BY JAYDEN LEE

first boyfriend — the first person she’s ever dated ! at this point they’ve both agreed to forget about that awkward month in their lives and just remained friends | m or nb

one sided crush — someone mina openly admits to having a crush on. she’s probably always saying, “so, ___ when are you going to finally admit you like me back ?” cue huge eye roll from everyone in the room. anyone who touches them dies. note: most likely just an on going joke | m, f, or nb

confidant — their friendship sparked through their similar problems. they’re the only person she feels confident in telling anything and everything too. (even things she won’t tell her bff.) she knows they feels the same. they’re someone she genuinely trusts and values. | m, f, or nb

FOES + NOTE: i honestly can’t think of a lot for this because….. they’re all friends ?

frienemies — these two are just always trying to one up each other. whether it be with friends, family, or just life in general. they’re always in a (not so) secret competition. | m, f, or nb

ex boyfriend | hate/love — these two are constantly arguing. hella drama all. the. time. maybe they’re too much alike or just not a like at all. or…. maybe….. still in love ?? | m or nb

LOVERS

friends with benefits — a no strings attached sorta thing. always hooking up. that late night booty call. and of course, they’re keeping it away from the group because… imagine that fucking mess. | m or nb

“best friend” — honestly, mina’s first love. (although, she’d never admit to that.) she honestly thinks they’re the one. these two are just way too close. everyone’s wondering when they’ll date. but nah nah. they’re best friends. it can never be… right ? | m or nb

CONGRATULATIONS ! you made it to end ! if you read all of this… i love you. i only ever write so much bc… it gets me in character lmao. also, i wrote all of this at 4am. HENNYWAYS… i would really love to plot with everyone. so just slide into my dms and we can get things started!! luv u *blows a kiss*

#♡ ◜˚ —「 you can't spell emo without me » ooc. 」

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idealisticrealism · 8 years ago

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Blindspot recap 2x14

(Aka the one with Rich and the secret society)

Aaaah okay so I have had basically zero available time to do this review and this is the latest I’ve ever gotten it posted (still before the new episode though so at least there’s that) but please to not assume my lateness is reflective of my feelings for this ep because honestly my love for it knows no bounds

So if you have time before the new ep, see below the cut for a lot of screaming over Rich haha

Okay firstly let's not talk about how old I was in 2001 and how very NOT college-aged I was because that would make my gigantic crush on Rich just a little awkward haha. But omg this scene. The music and the remote control car with the laser and their OUTFITS omg and okay I desperately need to know what is going on with that goatee situation bc it looks so wrong and I don't know if that's just because I'm used to the beautiful beard or what. Given the time it would take him to grow that beard back, have they literally just put a prosthetic over his actual beard to make it look like unshaven skin?? I need to know. Hell, I’m gonna ask Ennis, he'll probably tell me lol. Tbh that guy has gotta be sick of seeing my name on his twitter notifications by now haha. But also lbr I kinda have a hard time believing Rich (or Gord, rather) didn't get straight A's anyway? I mean he's a genius, after all. Though I guess he had other, cooler things to spend his time on rather than study. Probably involving more lasers. And then aaaahhh they're caught (lbr those outfits are a crime in themselves haha) and while I didn't expect Rich's charm (lol, if it can be called "charm") to work on cops (or campus security?) literally who the hell tasers someone just for being irritating?? I assume that was a bit of artistic licence bc a cop would get strung up for doing that here. Plus you cannot tell me that Rich wouldn't have had lawyers (or law student friends, idk) all over that. But anyhow.

Reade. Dude. Get your shit together, because you're a damn mess. And so is your apartment, since you and your lil drug honey have apparently trashed the place. And now you're gonna be late to work, again? Ugh. He needs to grow a set and tell Nikki to leave and stay gone. Maybe he should get Tasha to do it since she's clearly got more balls than he does...

Speaking of being a mess, here's my poor baby Weller, who is messed up for a slightly more legitimate reason (or a myriad thereof). And so wait, a whole weekend has passed since the last ep? So Weller's only just telling Jane and Nas now? What was he doing this whole time? Maybe he was having a bender of his own in his apartment... but ugh Jane is immediately reassuring and tells him it's not his fault and that there was nothing he could do. Because she's nothing if not a supportive wifey. (Wait maybe he already told Jane over the weekend and he’s just telling Nas for the first time now. It’s possible so I’m running with it haha). Anyway he's clearly torn up about it though and you can tell his ~THING~ with Shepherd is building into what's going to be an epic arch-nemesis showdown at the end of the season. But for now, Nas has magically conjured some property records for 'Ellen Briggs', including places in Wisconsin, Maryland, North Carolina, Florida, Colorado, and New Jersey. That's a decent number of states to have lived in?? Though I guess the whole army thing involves a fair bit of shifting around. With this new info, though, they can send Jane and Roman to the places and see if they trigger any memories, since they might have lived at some of them too. Which is kind of a bummer because it means that Jane's gonna be off with Roman and Nas and isn't gonna get to hang with her buddy Rich much :(

Ooooh update: Ennis answered me, apparently they saved the '2001' scene for the end of filming, then shaved his usual beard down to the chin beard. Tbh I am personally offended by the murdering of that beautiful beard but he assures me it lives again now haha

Anyway back to the case, Patterson has just interrupted (which is perfectly acceptable/even welcomed whenever Nas is in the room) to say there's a tattoo they need to see. And ugh Weller's reaction is the sweetest, going all concerned big bro and telling her she should be at home. But by the look of things, she had the weekend off, which is a pretty good effort for her? And ugh she saw a doctor who cleared her medically but it's clear that she still needs to be checked out psychologically and ughhhh my baby I hate that this has happened to you. But anyhow because Patterson's a genius, she'd already figured out that the tattoo contained an equation which, for reasons that I am not smart enough to comprehend, would solve itself today and somehow involve Lithium and a secret society at Jameson College called Daedalus. Of course Rich went to a college that shares a name with one of my favourite alcoholic beverages. And again we have a perfect moment where Zapata gets to shine, explaining who Daedalus was and then adds "stop looking at me like that when I know things". Damn straight, Reade, show your awesome partner some more respect. She's a smart lady. And then he makes a joke about the college kids maybe mixing lithium with jager and doing shots and lbr Reade with your newfound proclivities you don’t really get to judge anyone for what they put in their body. But anyhow Patterson brings up a list of the Daedalus members, and who else appears on it but Gord Enver, aka Rich DotCom. The team manage impressively well at suppressing their groans-- though lbr, Weller was actually pretty quick to say that they needed to bring Rich in. He didn't even look for alternatives. Like sure, Rich does like to talk, an he has a soft spot for the team, but... aw Weller, were you missing your hairy homie??

Okay Rich has been onscreen for all of a second and I already can't deal with this. The others all there awaiting him like some kind of royal welcoming committee-- and he definitely ACTS like returning royalty. I'm so intrigued to know if his newfound religion(s) was just a spur of the moment thing when he heard he was going back to the FBI-- maybe he was like "hmmm how can I annoy them even more than usual" and then turned to his cellmates or whoever and was like ‘hey I need to borrow your stuff’ lol. Or maybe he'd just been bored in prison and the library was fairly limited? Either way literally everyone's faces here are precious, especially Jane, who I think tends to be more perplexed by Rich than anything else (probably because she knows she shouldn't like him but does). Speaking of faces, Weller's "hurry the hell up you idiot" face as Rich is praying in the interview room-- which looks like a very fun version of praying-- is priceless. Rich freaking ending his prayer with 'bless this mess' earned my first shriek-laugh of the episode, followed closely by the second when Weller asked for help and he answered 'say no more' and gracefully slid the bible/Koran (can’t see which) across the table. Honestly as much as I love all the characters on this show, Rich is always gonna be a special case for me. I just adore this little shit. Speaking of which, he's refusing to help on grounds that he's already busy investigating ‘the spiritual plane’ and ugh everyone here knows he's gonna help them, that he WANTS to help them, but he can never make things easy. Weller tries threats, Nas tries insulting him (you have much to learn Nas, lol) whereas Jane just gets straight to the point, showing him the formula and the tattoo on her back, knowing it will shock him free of his play act. (Though I love that he throws in "let he who is without sin..." to Weller when Weller is getting judgy. You know, he has a point weller, you aren't exactly innocent either buddy) Also omg "Oh Gott im Himmel" Aaaahhhh Rick speaking German is an instant favourite thing for me. Two things I love combined haha. And good lord, there is too much to love about this scene. Weller's "I'm already distressed" (possibly the most truthful thing he's ever said), Rich trying to cross himself with cuffs on then quoting Matthew '24:7', then getting to ominously foretell an impending war.... please make him a regular, writers, I need it

And then ugh yes we're in the bullpen which means Rich interacting with the rest of the team (while Jane rolls her eyes at him in the background lol). Patterson explains-- with interruptions from Rich, naturally-- that lithium is getting super pricey so technically it would be cheaper to invade another country (by deliberately starting a war with a fake terrorist attack) and steal theirs. They just don't know which country, or who's planning it. Tasha catches on first which is funny bc she's actually often the one most... in tune?... with Rich. She tends to be able to cut through his bullshit to the bottom line of a matter and I think he digs that about her. Also Weller is having trouble pronouncing Daedalus correctly haha. But anyhow Rich points them towards a guy called Zack Riley, who was one of the guys who broke into the college with him back in the day and who Patterson seems to have a little geek-crush on. Which Rich is not at all pleased about-- maybe he's worried about losing his spot as their favourite (term used loosely) billionaire computer genius lol.

And then what's this?? Rich insists they need Boston too, since he's also a member of Daedalus and can help. Mmmhmm, I'm sure that's the reason, and not that Rich is trying to win him back haha, since these two definitely seem to be in the middle of a spat. But even better than Rich and Boston's relationship is that of Patterson and Boston-- the moment she walks in and sees him she literally makes an "Ughhhhh" sound. Oh my precious little supergenius sassmaster nemeses, this is gonna be gooood. And so it turns out there just happens to be an Alumni event on at Jameson right now that will be the cover for a secret Daedalus meeting, and since they already have two members, why not sneak in? I love that the conversation immediately gets derailed by Boston and Rich bickering ("how many times do I have to say I'm sorry??" "ONE time!" omg) before Weller tells them they'll be taking dates. And ugh Boston is being all belligerent like he's not going to help them and then bam Weller tells him he can have him transferred to a prison near LA so his parents can visit him more easily, and ugh he didn't have to do that. He could have made threats, like he made to Rich, but instead he recognised a way that he could make Boston's life better and offered it to him. Ugh my baby. Rich doesn't need any threats or bonuses; though he says he'll do it for spiritual reasons, as always, he's totally in it for the game. (And secretly for his love of the team and wanting them to approve of him)

Ughhhh Weller and Jane having their own private little conference in the corner of the lab (while Rich and Patterson fight over the touchscreen thing like siblings, which was all apparently ad-libbed and I'm delighted about it) and ugh Jane wants to stay and be with the team in case they need her but Weller asks her to go with Nas and Roman to the houses instead, because getting a lead on Shepherd is his biggest priority but he can't do this, only she can, so he's relying on her. And she recognises that, which is why she agrees to go (but before she does he grips her arm and looks at her with those expressive eyes and ughhh look at these two being a unit againnnnn). Then mom heads off while dad stays with the kids, assigning Patterson to Boston-- it's hard to tell who's less pleased about it, but I'm in love with Patterson's comic-con line (particularly since I met Ashley at Comic Con last year). And then omg "Rich, you take Tasha" "Which one's Tasha?" hahaha cmon, like you don't know, Rich. You love giving her as much shit as she gives you. You two are practically buds. But he's right, she's really not his type. There's only one person in the FBI who is (I'm excluding Jane from this because I don't think he considers her to be FBI). Though tbh I think even if Jane had been there as an option Rich would have still chosen Weller just for the fun of making him uncomfortable lol.

And so this episode gives us one of the greatest gifts of the show so far: Weller and Rich, out on a date. Which so far has entailed Rich 'helping' Weller out of the car, and Weller informing him that he has just drunk water with a tracking isotope in it so he can't escape them. I love the "You are so controlling... Why do I keep coming back to you" because he really doeessss. He keeps coming back. And well, Weller is a control freak haha. Oh but the real brilliance comes from the other pair, Patterson ignoring Boston's politely extended hand as she gets out of the car and then implies that he and Rich broke up because Boston's 'the worst person ever' and ughhh I love the antagonistic relationship between these two. At least they can get through the door, though, whereas Rich and Weller are turned back due to something Rich did to piss someone off in the past. And Rich is all "Oh well. Hey let's go check out the carnival!" like this is a real date and ugh he is the cutest??? Literally how can anyone not love this man. Instead, to his disappointment, Weller makes him find a way to sneak in-- aka though old hallways/tunnels that he used to use to sneak in hookers. And then they have a ~moment~ as they bond over their mutual prankster school days. Well, at least Rich thinks they're having a moment. Weller just has slightly less heat in his voice when he tells him to shut up. Then they get to the door, which no longer has a handle, so Weller kicks it open. Literally kicks it off its hinges, in fact, and while I know Weller is strong, that was a VERY solid old door. No way its hinges would give like that. But anyhow luckily no one was on the other side of that door, because they'd be out for the count right now. And after such a dramatic entrance, security is immediately onto them-- but then an old friend vouches for Rich and sends away the guards-- before looking properly at Weller with what can only be described as a 'hubba hubba' gaze. Rich promptly introduces him as his HUSBAND Kurt Enver (*shriek laugh*) and lays his head on his shoulder. Weller valiantly tries to roll with it, but the other guy is like ‘nope, this guy's got hooker written all over him' and oh Weller, I bet you never expected to find yourself in a situation where you'd prefer to be Rich's husband??? And then they talk about his burly arms and how the other guy would 'back that stallion' and calls him a meat trophy and omggggg there is nothing I love more than hypermasculine men experiencing what it's constantly like for women to be treated like sex objects by other men. Although lbr I think Weller's enjoying this a tiny bit bc he didn't have to smile at all during that conversation-- he could have just stood there all strong and impassive-- but he was practically grinning and ugh this is the beeeessssst. Also he then talks to Zapata and Reade over the comms and man I hope they heard that whole conversation because that would make my day. Btw as a sidenote, they say that the party guest that tried to keep Rich out had a pharmaceutical company that raised the cancer drug prices by like 1000%. And again, this show is totally unafraid to pull things from the current news and pass judgement on them...

Shepherd lived in Robinhood lane? I bet she picked it because she felt she was a Robin Hood that was helping the poor by taking down the rich. And lol Nas wants to go inside to see if it triggers anything for them and Jane is all 'what if it's a trap' and Nas goes 'With you two? I'll take my chances.' And wow that's the first likable thing she's said in a long time. Tbh she's right, too-- if I had to be ambushed, I'd want to have the mayhem twins there to protect me haha. But ugh Roman and Jane are unable to believe they could have grown up in such a normal looking place rather than like a barracks or something and it's so sad? And then Roman gets so upset because he can't remember anything and when Jane says 'I know how you feel' (which she does tend to say a lot) he yells 'then why don't you FEEL it??" and ugh damn Luke just SELLS all of Roman's emotions and I'm just so impressed with how good he is. But He has a point-- Jane doesn't feel what he feels, and that's partly because she's had time to adjust (she was definitely very upset in early S1) but also she knows things that he doesn't know. She has answers, and that makes a huge difference. I love that even when he gets aggressive, Jane doesn't back away-- she moves closer, speaking gently to him. She just wants to soothe him, but it's not possible, not when he's still missing so much of himself. And definitely won't be possible when it's revealed that she zipped him, because mannnn does he wanna kill Shepherd for that, so thing are gonna get really ugly when he leans the truth.

WELLER INSTIGATES THE DANCING. I REPEAT, WELLER INSTIGATES THE DANCING. AaaaaaahhhhHHHHHH. Rich is craning his neck trying to see who their target is talking to and Weller is the one to pull him onto the dancefloor so they can surreptitiously (term used loosely since they're a little distinctive) move closer. I love these two, and I love that Weller's letting himself 'loosen up' a little. Tbh I think a part of him does actually like Rich. It helps that Sully and Ennis get along so well because they are just totally able to sell all their interactions ugh. Then they head up to the office to find the target's hidden laptop, and Rich monologues about the guy having stolen something from him, but in doing so practically set him on the path to being Rich DotCom. But think about that, Rich-- if he'd never wronged you, sure you could maybe be a rich famous computer wiz like him, but you would have never gotten to work with this team or meet your 'husband' Weller, or be here playing super spy right now.... so maybe he did you a favour?

Alone in the van, Zapata and Reade finally have a moment to talk, and she calls him out on not being himself today. Thankfully he doesn't just brush it off like he did a few days ago-- I think he's recognised that he needs to get out of the quicksand pit he's in but he can't do it on his own. So he tells Zapata, who he knows won't stand for it. And she won't; she's pissed and incredulous that he would be stupid enough to date (term also used loosely) the ex of the murderer who he helped to flee the city. Weller interrupts their conversation but I'm at least comforted by the fact that Zapata won't let this go. She will get Reade back onto the straight and narrow even if it means camping on his couch and sending away anyone that knocks on the door, dammit

While Rich and Weller find the laptop, Patterson and Boston are trying to figure out how to get the password off the key fob that the target carries with him at all times. After a bit of sniping, Boston has an idea, and grabs Patterson's hand to pull her over to the guy and introduces her as the love of his life, which confuses the guy (I loved his "I thought you were...", though hey cmon, bisexuality can exist, buddy). And lol Patterson is gushing over him which isn't completely fake? Like she did seem like a fan earlier. But meanwhile Boston has picked his pocket and shows her the code over the guy's shoulder, and of course she memorises the dozen or so digits in a moment and then is like 'okay great to meet you byyeeeee' haha before telling Weller the password over the comms. Nice work, team. Except for some reason the guards are suddenly headed their way, which is unfortunate. I do love the parallel to the hacking at the start, where Rich is on the computer and the person with him is like 'we gotta go!'-- and like that time, they get completely busted. And then when Zack (their target) comes in, Weller's about to reveal himself (not in the way Rich would enjoy) but Rich speaks over him, convincing Zack that he was there to steal back the software that he created and which made Zack rich. But omg I’m in love with his shouty voice and the fact his middle name is Meredith and Weller's FACE (literally this look of shock needs to be a reaction gif because it's AMAZING), but lol it all totally works, and Zack sends away the guards and apologises to Rich that he feels that way but makes it clear that he didn't steal anything-- they developed it together and he asked Rich to join him to complete it but Rich stayed to finish college, taking the 'safe way out', and you can see ffrom Rich's face that it's true. And okay Rich said earlier that nobody likes a prequel but seriously I would watch a whole movie about this backstory. For real, show, give it to me now. But anywho turns out their target isn't actually their target after all-- he no longer has any reason to need lots of lithium as he sold that part of his company-- and then he even offers Rich a spot on his team. Naww Rich wants to beat him up and it’s adorable

Aw Jane brings Roman and Nas back to her place to give Roman a chance to settle himself beore they look at any other places. Ugh she's such the caring big sister, getting him water and trying to soothe him and making Nas give him some space. She's so cute and self-conscious about her safehouse (still feel weird about her being back in the same one, given the bad memories of That Night) and he throws back that at least her doors can open when she wants-- and she tells him that they didn't always. Roman's situation is tough because I can see how much it would suck to be locked up and treated pretty much like a prisoner, but at the same time I'm just like 'please be patient, they're trying to trust you' and ughhh it just sucks for everyone involved. And then he seems to try to settle himself, and looks around, noticing the frickin huge bouquet of roses on the table beside the couch. He asks who Oliver is, which means she hasn't talked to Roman about him yet, which is kinda disappointing-- I want her to tell him all about Oliver and Weller and her feelings and I want him to be a confidante for her (and to help her realise that Weller is still the one she wants lol). And then the flowers trigger a memory-- he's in a flower van watching Weller and a dark hairded woman having lunch, and sends a text that says the target (Weller?) is in sight, and gets one back from shepherd telling him to proceed. Aaaaahhhh but with whaaaatttt

So their target isn't Zack, but it's still someone within Daedalus. Patterson uses a camera hidden in a makeup thingie to send video back to 'lenny and squiggy' in the van-- who can also apparently hear her and Boston's conversation, meaning they can hear him complaining endlessly abut Rich but also hear her blow up at him about all the things she went through with Borden and David and ugh my baby has been holding that in for so long. And then lol 'you feel better?' 'kinda'. I love that Boston was the one to be able to help her in a way that no one else had been able to, because while they were gently trying to coax her feelings out of her he just set off a mini explosion which finally let her breathe once it was off her chest. And then by moving back to his problems he shifts the focus off her. I love these twoooo ugh

Meanwhile Rich is also more focused on his own problems-- in his case, acknowledging that he did chicken out and give up on the software in order to finish his degree. But dammit I need more backstory here-- were there other reasons he stayed behind? A mother who desperately wanted to see her son finish college? An elderly grandparent that he was the carer for and couldn't just move to silicone valley and leave them behind? Weller tries to get him to refocus but instead Rich is the one trying to make HIM see clearly-- "don't waste your life on missions. You grab Jane now before somebody else does (...)" and ugh Weller's face. His mouth moves like he's trying to find the words to deny it all and tell Rich to shut up but he knows Rich is hitting the mark. He still wants Jane even though he knows how much he shouldn't. I wish we'd gotten to hear what he would have said in response to that, but then we're interrupted by the beginning of ~the ritual~. And then omg here's another shriek laugh as he says "this better not be a sex thing" and Rich replies "if it is we should probably go along with it right? Don't wanna blow our cover" and omggggg the look Weller gives him. I love these two SO MUCH. I decided to name them ‘Welch’ (I've seen WelCom around which is good too). Ennis approved of Welch tho so I'm sticking to it haha.

Meanwhile Patterson and Boston managed to avoid being stuck inside for the ritual and are currently sneaking somewhere, and she gives him shit about ‘Boston Arliss Crabb’ being his real name-- she'd thought it was an alias like Rich's, but while everyone here knew Rich as Gord, Boston was just Boston-- and he retorts that she can't talk when her first name is.... aaaand she interrupts him because she sees someone up ahead. Dammit, writers, you're so cruel. Just tell us her name!! Clearly it must be something either quite unusual OR something totally whitebread and boring, since he's judging her for it. Personally I've always stuck with Tiffany, just because I like the thought of her having a super girly name (and one that does seem to get unfairly associated with being an airhead).

Anyhow Weller and Rich try to leave to go join them to follow this guy, but the guards block their way--- so Weller kicks both their asses and steals one's gun, before heading for the exit with Rich in tow. I love the guy that pipes up "Oh you're definitely banned now, Gord" to which Rich throws back "Oh, suck it, Phineas." Which will now and forever be my new insult hahaha. And then I love the clever little aside "What's wrong with rich people?" "We get bored". Yep, that explains a lot of things happening in the world, doesn't it? Anyway mystery guy heads into another building, pursued by Patterson and Boston (though Boston pauses briefly to admire some art outside) and they step into the deserted building-- only to find him right there waiting for them. They try to talk their way out of it (cue another shriek-laugh at Boston’s "We came in here to have sex with each other" and Patterson’s little "Oh") but unfortunately their acting isn't that great haha. Their fighting is pretty good though-- Patterson takes on the guy with a gun while in heels and wielding just a crowbar, while Boston valiantly tackles the other guy and risks those delicate artist's hands to punch him in the face multiple times. Weller calls for Reade and Zapata, then tells Rich to hold out a hand-- Rich gets all excited thinking he's gonna get a gun, whereas I am inexplicably expecting them to just hold hands-- but instead we're both disappointed as Weller cuffs Rich to the art sculpture out front. But ugh he does it to protect him because he knows he's about to be running into a firefight and doesn't want to put Rich at risk??? Awww my babies do care about each other. I love the subtle nod to gun safety that Rich makes as Weller runs off too. No one can ever say this show isn't at least a little political. But omg Weller gets in there to help but Patterson and Boston have pretty much got it sorted, with her stomping on her guys hand in her heels to get his gun and Boston knocking out his guy with a can of paint. The grin and thumbs up that they share is the MOST ADORABLE thing ever. Are they friends now because I would be so happyyyyy

Outside, Rich's friend from the party finds him cufffed to the sculpture, jokingly asking 'a little trouble with your date?' which lbr is not that far off. But then poor Rich makes the mistake of being honest (that never works out well, bro, you know that) and admits to working with the FBI-- then immediately knows he's about to get a gun pulled on him since he's just found the bad guy. Who does pull out a gun, but just shoots the cuffs to free him, and can I just say I totally called it that Rich has a very girlish scream lol. Thankfully the guy 'needs him alive' for whatever reason so we're safe for now. He also knows that he's Rich Dot Com oooohhhh plot twistttt

Jane and Roman and Nas have found the restaurant where Roman was watching weller. In a strange display of trust (has Nas given Roman some of that tracker water too? I bet she has) she walks off to check in with Weller, leaving Jane and Roman alone-- conveniently meaning that if he has another flash, Jane will be the only one to witness it. Which he does-- he sees a couple hugging in the doorway (they look a lot like one of the couples that was dancing near Weller and Rich actually... same extras?) and then remembers Weller hugging the woman before she got in her car and Roman crashed into her with the van before smothering her. Okay firstly how do you have a crash in the middle of NYC in daytime and then SMOTHER the victim without anyone seeing?? And secondly that kind of asphyxiation leaves evidence such as finger bruises around the mouth-- she wouldn't even need an autopsy to note that. And thirdly oh my godddd she died on the way back from meeting Weller, which means he would have absolutely blamed himself, like 'If only we had met soemwhere else or picked a different day or if I had done this or that differently’ uuughhhhhh my poor babyyyyy why must he suffer so muchhhhhhh

And ugh Roman immediately tells Jane that he killed Weller's friend Emma (ugh in the memory he soothes Emma, telling her it's okay, and ugh thi is awful for everyone involved) and Jane is so horrified that they both had ties to Emma's death, since Emma would have known that Jane wasn't Taylor. And ugh my precious Roman wants to tell Nas straight away, which shows he's already a better person than he was before the wipe-- but Jane won't let him. She's protecting him from Nas and from repercussions of what he did, but she's also protecting Weller from getting this news abruptly thrust upon him. She promises that she'll tell him, and god I hope she will...

Poor Rich is being forced to hack into a computer at gunpoint, in order to open some kind of thing that gets them the stuff they need for a dirty bomb. The bombing itself will be blamed on the poor dead Bolivian guy lying on the floor in the corner-- and so the team is proved right, someone was trying to start a war between the US and another country. Rich is adorably doing his best to talk the guy out of it, saying that the FBI knows the truth and that he'll be caught, but the guy says that once there's been an attack on their own soil, "the truth isn't gonna matter". Wow, again with the politics. This show packs a very subtle punch. And omg Rich is still refusing because he may be a criminal but he doesn't hurt people (generally. I know he did kill that guy in 1x09 but shhhh) and then the baddie SHOOTS HIM IN THE FOOT. Oh Richy my baby, you don't deserve this. Thankfully the team will soon be to your rescue, bc they're tracking you right now (they think you went on the run, so disrespectful of them) and they also found a key thing from the campus lab-- which the tracker says is where Rich is, plus the baddie, whose phone they tracked. Of course hubby immediately jumps to the rescue, finding Rich while the other are still searching. Then omg the baddie grabs Rich and threatens Weller that his 'buddhist friend will get his third eye' and of course Rich has to correct him that that's actually a Hindu thing and both of them yell for him to shut up haha. But ugh baddie is using Rich as a shield and Weller apologises and says he can't let him get away, and Rich is all ‘uh that's okay, why are you apologising’-- and then bam Weller shoots him in the leg, causing him to drop and leaving the baddie exposed, who immediately surrenders (bc lbr, if a guy is willing to shoot a member of his own team, he'll sure as hell shoot you). Weller immediately calls for an ambulance for Rich though, so at least there's that. And lol Rich still manages to give him a jibe about being too obsessed with the movie Speed, which is a cool throwback and is just overall really cute and ugh these two

Nawwww Patterson and Boston deciding maybe they don't totally hate each other after all. And then she sees him looking at the nameplate on the sculpture-- he'd actually made it, back in 2001. I can't quite see how it represents 'Wind through the pines' but then I'm much more of an impressionist fan than a contemporary/abstract fan. But aw she calls him talented and asks how he became a criminal and he looks at Rich and says he followed his heart. Naaawww I ship itttt

Awwww Mom and Dad visiting their lil boy in hospital. Such a brave boy. And omg Jane is such a sassmaster: "Redemption is its own reward" ahahahahahaaaa oh man I love their relationship. But lbr, there's totally gonna be a knock on Rich's door sometime soon and a nurse will come in and give him a little package that was dropped off for him, and he’ll open it to find a little plastic medal with HERO stamped on the front and he will cherish it FOREVER. Also lol when she pats his thigh does he say "geeez that's close?" aka being mildly sexual or am I just mishearing him saying “geez that hurts”? But then just as mom and dad are about to leave him all alone in the big scary hospital, he entices them with solving another tattoo, revealing that he knows exactly what they're up to-- which is fascinating?? Does he know why they're trying to solve them? How far does his knowledge go?? Will this turn out to be one of those things where someone could have found out all the answers they were seeking just by asking the right person? (like Weller showing Jane the yearbook that led them to Shepherd's real name?) And then ughhhh he only asks for Boston to be moved to minimum security. This guy is too cute sometimes. Also lol "I'm here every other week" yaaaasss please come back every week lol. I love that they've set him up to come back, ugh thank you writers

Oooh Patterson's read up on Dr Sun, apparently she was present in Nas's team at the NSA when the Sandstorm mole was revealed, had even expressed concerns about the person herself. But that doesn't mean we should trust her! Dr Sun is almost as shady as Nas is, definitely do not tell her ANYTHING.

Lol Reade, coming home to a clean, empty apartment is a GOOD thing. Tell you what's not a good thing? Cocaine!! Gawd man what are you dooooooinggggggg. You need to see someone abput this self-destructive behaviour (not Dr Sun though) before you combust!

Awww Jeller strolling through the corridors together, joking about Patterson and Rich, being all super cute... and then he asks about Roman and she clams up. NO JANE NO. YOU KNOW WHAT LYING LEADS TO, PLEASE LEARN YOUR LESSON AND TELL HIM BEFORE HE FINDS OUT SOME OTHER WAY. YOU'RE ALREADY IN THIS SAME PREDICAMENT WITH ROMAN, DON'T BOX YOURSELF IN ON ALL SIDES UGHHHHH. Seriously honey you need to go to his apartment later with more beers, sit him down and tell him everything. He's not the same out-of-control guy that arrested you, I swear. Ughh. But ugh then he admits he actually kinda maybe enjoyed spending the day with Rich (oh how Rich would weep with joy to hear that) and then they bond over the fact that Weller got to shoot him, something they have all low-key (or high-key) wanted to do since the moment they met him haha. And ugh this is such a cute little jokey moment (remember when they couldn't even bear to look at each other and now there's heart eyes everywhere again ughhhh) and lbr Weller might even have been about to offer to get some drinks or something when they are-- as always-- interrupted, this time by a text from Oliver. Which in a way I'm happy about because it led to the casually awkward (or awkwardly casual) little exchange about her going on a date and gave Weller the opportunity to realise he doesn't really like the idea of Jane being out on dates with people who aren't him. Bet Rich’s warning is ringing in your ears now, huh buddy??

Oh I forgot this scene even existed. Apparently Nas and Weller can't figure out what the Truman protocol is, other than there might have been some meetings in the 40s. And then woahhhh here's a twist with the next scene: Borden is working with that Zack Riley guy, who is apparently a key player in Sandstorm's Phase Two! Boom. Hope this means Rich can come back and engage in some kind of hack-war with him to defuse the missile....

Anyway phew done with like twenty mins to spare, time to get my livestream set up for today’s ep!

#Blindspot #Blindspot recap #Jeller #RICH RICH RICH RICH RICHHHHH #I love this ep so freakin much omg

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youremyonlyhope · 7 years ago

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Children of Earth: Day 5

AKA: Torchwood just loves to hurt of its fans.

OR: Some of the most upsetting and disturbing stuff I’ve ever watched.

Why why why why why am I watching this? I don’t know? But I don’t know when I’ll have time to, so I’m watching it now. Before i chicken out and avoid it for months.

I’m gonna press play. If I remember correctly, the episode opens with Gwen on camera right? Giving that chilling speech? I hope I’m wrong because I’d rather work up to that and not just be thrown into it. Too painful.

Ok the preview played. Are those doors airtight? The ones the people were banging on before they died? Shouldn’t the virus have gotten out? NOOOO IT’S GWEN’S VIDEO WHY. “The Doctor must look upon this planet, and turn away in shame.” Just... That line hit me so hard the first time and I still think about it and it still hurts. I’m so so so stressed out. I hate the Prime Minister so much. I love Rhiannon so much. I love her taking in all the kids. I hate that her taking in all the kids leads to the most upsetting scene I’ve ever had to watch. I’m emotional already, my eyes are wet. No. She said “My brother works for the government” and she has no idea about Ianto wow I am in pain. I still like the American General, for now. “Any soldier refusing to do his duty will make his own family liable” YEAH SO ME STILL LIKING THE AMERICAN GENERAL LASTED ALL OF ABOUT 2 MINUTES. Ok Unit Colonel, please, please don’t disappoint me. You’re the only one left that I like. Oh, I still like Dekker since he’s at least smart. Glad he survived since he was the only one who actually believed they’d be back and prepared for it by keeping track of the 456 frequency. Honestly, UNIT should have been on this a long time ago. I wish I could remember my exact reaction to finding out they use the kids to get high. This time around, when 456 said “We need them for the hit” I just kind of rolled my head back slowly because I forgot that that was the way they worded it. “Let’s not forget, your government started this trade. You opened the market over 40 years ago.” I don’t like the American General anymore but he’s still right, and still better than the PM. Oh god we got the World Health Organization in on this too. Frobisher’s too smart. Frobisher really deserved better than being sucked into this. Better than having all of this on him. LOIS DESERVES BETTER TOO. I can’t remember if Torchwood gets her out of jail and gets her record cleared, but they better. Jack. Jack Jack Jack Jack Jack I hate everything I love you and I love that you love Gwen so much that you want her away from this but I hate everything that’s about to happen I hate everything and I hate Torchwood especially. I LITERALLY FORGOT GWEN’S EVEN PREGNANT AT THIS POINT. AND THEN I JUST REMEMBERED. Oh poor Lois. Also, I think this jail cell set is the same one from Small Worlds. I can’t breathe. I literally can’t breathe. This when PM tells Frobisher his kids will be taken, isn’t it? “Terrible day.” Understatement of the century, Frobisher.

I’d forgotten that his kids had been picked as a way to show the public it was all ok. The PM didn’t have to have his kids actually go through with being taken. He could have had them be given a flu shot in their home, or even in some other location after Frobisher lets them go off with the soldiers, and be like “look it’s just a shot.” BUT NO. HE TELLS FROBISHER TO HIS FACE “YOUR KIDS ARE GOING TO BE GIVEN TO THE 456 TO BE USED AS A DRUG.” IT COULD HAVE ALL BEEN FOR SHOW. BUT THIS EVIL PM IS LETTING THEM BE TAKEN. WHY? WHY?!?!?!?!? FROBISHER’S DONE NOTHING BUT BEEN LOYAL TO A FAULT. A HORRIBLE FAULT. BUT HE DID EVERYTHING HE WAS TOLD. AND YOU REPAY HIM BY TAKING AWAY HIS KIDS? AS A WAY TO REASSURE THE PUBLIC?

OOOOH IT’S SO “THE GOVERNMENT MUST BE SEEN AS A VICTIM OF THE 456.” HIS KIDS HAVE TO GO MISSING AND “DIE” TOO. SO 1/10TH OF ALL KIDS ARE TAKEN, BUT ONLY ONE GOVERNMENT OFFICIAL’S KIDS END UP BEING PICKED? OUT OF HUNDREDS OF GOVERNMENT OFFICIALS, OR AT LEAST THE 20 THAT WERE IN THE PLANNING ROOM, ONLY 1 HAS THEIR KID BE PART OF THE 10%? AND IT’S THE ONE GOVERNMENT OFFICIAL THAT ALL OF THIS BLAME IS BEING PUT ON IN THE FIRST PLACE? I HATE EVERYTHING.

“If you put me on camera, I will tell people the truth.” YES FROBISHER. I mean, I’m mad it took you specifically being affected to start fighting back, but at least you came around eventually. And you did kind of rebel just the tiniest little bit last episode in a subtle way. “But then your daughters would know where they’re going. Best not.” SO HE’D STILL FORCIBLY TAKE THEM FROM HIM. I HATE HE’S SO CALM. “I’m sorry John.” You’re not sorry at all. You’d let your own kids or grandkids be taken if you were truly sorry. “And I’m really very busy” OH. OH. SO NOW YOU’RE BUSY. YOU WEREN’T BUSY BEFORE WHEN YOU WERE MAKING FROBISHER DO ALL THE HARD STUFF. Andy. Andy my baby I want to cry I’m so happy to see him. Oh I guess Gwen’s trying to protect Andy’s family by not telling him, since the stupid American General said anyone who didn’t follow orders would have their kids picked. He doesn’t have kids, so I guess maybe any children in his family. “That’s what Torchwood does, you see. It ruins your life.” Truer words have never been spoken. The paparazzi. No. IT WAS BRIDGET WHO GOT HER OUT. I never hated Bridget. Sometimes she frustrated me, but I never was actually mad at her throughout this whole thing. I hope I wasn’t mad at her the first time... Oh god they filmed the girls going up the stairs through the front door window, like paparazzi.

God I’m like... shaking. I cannot describe the feeling, it’s not even shaking it’s different. I almost feel like I want to throw up. And Bridget already using “John Frobisher was a good man.” in the past tense. I had to pause and stretch to try to get the feeling to go away. Oh my god. It’s still there in my shoulders.

Never mind, Bridget doesn’t get her out. I still don’t hate Bridget though. Oooohh Rhiannon doesn’t know Gwen. Oh no. Do these soldiers know what they’re doing when they hand off the kids? Because the first time around, they got Jack to do it since they thought he wouldn’t care. But I guess the “you family will be picked” threat is what’s making them do it. This teacher fighting for the kids... my heart. God. I’m just an assistant dance teacher and work at an after school, but if they tried anything like this to my kids I’d fight tooth and nail. Wow I’m emotional. The boy running to his mom and being grabbed by a soldier. Wow. God just... Gwen probably treasured the moment where Ianto gave her a new wedding dress... and Rhiannon kind of took the memory away in her grief. “Then we better go and get them” AMERICAN GENERAL, I HATE YOU AND I HATE THAT YOU’RE TRYING TO GET ON THE PM’S LEVEL OF AWFULNESS. “He’ll be fine. The nice kids are safe.” THEY’RE ALL NICE. THERE ARE NICE KIDS AND BULLIES OF ALL LEVELS OF “VALUABLE” OR WHATEVER YOU GUYS ARE USING TO PICK THE KIDS. SO NO, NOT ALL THE NICE KIDS ARE SAFE. Oh god poor Lois again. My baby Andy. Deciding to help distract the guards and buy more time. I love Andy so much. Breaking into houses... why why why. My baby Andy. He should have kept on the armor since it’d protect him, but I understand the metaphor of him shedding his police uniform to fight the soldiers. Johnson, girl, I love you at this point since you’ve officially flipped sides and you were always awesome even when you were bad, but Dekker did not deserve to be shot. Gwen was holding the littlest girl while making the video. Oh god I hurt. Oh Rhys. 80% Ughhhhh whyyyyyy Oooooh Dekker. Dekker no. Dekker. No. No no no. I was remembering this as Jack’s idea. As something Jack thought of reluctantly. But no. It was Dekker. AND I SPENT THE ENTIRE SEASON SAYING HOW MUCH I LIKED YOU. I know you’re on our side, but it was easier to blame Jack for sacrificing his own grandson, a child that he has at least some sort of custody of. NOT YOU SUGGESTING SACRIFICING SOMEONE ELSE’S KID. AND HE LAUGHED ABOUT HIM “FRYING.” WHYYYYY. No background music while Alice screams “Steven.” I hurt. WHO IS THIS LADY WHO RATTED OUT WHERE THE KIDS WERE? I GOT SO CLOSE TO CRYING JUST NOW. IF THE SCENE OF THEM RUNNING LASTED 10 MORE SECONDS I WOULD HAVE BEEN SOBBING. THE MOST HORRIFYING AND UPSETTING SCENE IN TORCHWOOD. I FORGOT ABOUT ALL THE CHILDREN SHRIEKING. “We can say that today’s events were in American hands.” I. HATE. YOU. SO. MUCH. PRIME. MINISTER. OH MY GOD. YOU THINK OF NOTHING BESIDES SAVING YOURSELF. YES BRIDGET CALL HIM OUT. MY. GIRL. BRIDGET. YES. Ok Denise just because you’re a better person than the PM does not make you a good person. But thanks for looking out for my girl Lois. HIS VORTEX MANIPULATOR. I forgot that that could have gotten destroyed, I was focusing on his coat too much.

I hate Jack and his stupid habit of running off. Stop it. Please baby stop it.

Ok. Gotta get in a car for an hour. Will edit and add thoughts later.

Aaaaannnddd I’m back!

Children of Earth probably is Torchwood’s best season. But Season 2 is still my favorite season. But I appreciate Children of Earth so much more now since honestly over this last year or so sometimes I’d be like “Was Children of Earth REALLY that good? So good that everyone has to say Season 1 sucks and Season 2 is only ok?” and yeah COE is pretty fantastic, people aren’t exaggerating I just had blocked a lot of it out because it was so painful. I still love Season 2 more. But that’s because I’m biased and love Owen and Tosh too much.

God Ianto. Poor Ianto. And poor Rhiannon, losing her brother and then nearly losing her kids. Why why why must Torchwood kill all of my babies. All of my loves. Torchwood, STOP KILLING OFF MAIN CHARACTERS. And give Owen and Tosh shrines too.

Children of Earth is way too relevant right now with Trump’s zero tolerance policy separating families. Especially Day 4, that was hitting wayyyyyy too close to home. People always say that Children of Earth is so good because it’s exactly what would happen in that situation, and yeah after this month that’s pretty much confirmed. And the worst part is that you can’t even be completely mad at the people begging for their children not to be picked because we just naturally want to keep our families safe above everything else. It’s understandable, but still horrible. It’s selfishness but... almost not since it’s because you care for others? It’s just that the others that you care for are related to you. It’s such a complicated and messed up situation.

But the Prime Minister was just plain selfish. Not even motivated by his love for his children like the selfishness of other characters. He just wanted to keep his image clean. I hate him SO MUCH. I THINK I HATE HIM THE MOST OUT OF ALL THE CHARACTERS IN THE WHONIVERSE. Literally I cannot think of anyone else I hate more. Not even Daleks. Not even Cybermen Not even the Master since at least when the Master’s being evil they are also lovable. Or at least Simm!Master and Missy were lovably evil, I haven’t seen any Old Who episodes with the Master.

Lois Habiba. Girl deserves to be the new Prime Minister. Just, give her whatever job she wants. She’s so fantastic. I love her so much. She deserves everything. I’m glad Denise at least got her out of jail and pardoned.

Peter Capaldi. I cannot put into words. How much I love Peter Capaldi. He blew me away. I’ve told the story many many times, but it was mid-August, 2013, and everyone and their mother is being listed as a potential 12th Doctor. The announcement’s either a day or 2 days away, and I’m scrolling through tumblr and see someone say “Peter Capaldi’s name has popped up on a lot of lists of who could be the next Doctor.” and I got “Who’s Peter Capaldi? Why does that name ring a bell?” So I google him. And I see he was in Torchwood. I had just finished watching Torchwood barely 2 months earlier. So I go “HIM. I WANT HIM TO BE THE NEXT DOCTOR. PLEASE TELL ME IT’S GONNA BE HIM.” because he blew me completely away as Frobisher and I was sure he could blow me away as the Doctor. The day of the announcement comes, but I have to go to lunch with my grandpa and my step-uncle while it’s supposed to be airing. Right before we leave, I go to the bathroom and check my phone, and my tumblr has blown up with gifs of Peter Capaldi being revealed as the Twelfth Doctor. And I was so happy because I knew the Doctor was in good hands. And I loved Capaldi as the Doctor. He’s honestly my second favorite Doctor after Nine. Apparently, I love my Doctors to be a little grumpy. And Twelve was sooooooo grumpy and I loved it. And he was also so kind and caring. I loved every second of it. I loved everything about Twelve. I LOVED his guitar, I joked that Capaldi leaving was like a bad break up for me because in the days after Christmas, if I looked at a guitar I’d end up sobbing because it reminded me of Capaldi. I even loved the sunglasses that half the fandom hated, I thought they added to his older-Doctor-who’s-kind-of-punk-and-doesn’t-know-people-think-he’s-old thing that he had going for him. I thought they were perfect. And I loved that Twelve being a “good man” was an overarching theme for his run. I’m honestly still mad they didn’t acknowledge Frobisher in the show (and my ultimate dream was Jack coming back and seeing Twelve and FREAKING OUT thinking Frobisher was still alive) but I’m glad that the “good man” theme was probably definitely a little subtle reference to Frobisher.

John Frobisher was a good man. A good man in a very horrible situation. I hate that after all that, he not only died, he killed his family and himself. Because death was a better fate for his daughters than being drained as a drug for aliens. And he and his wife could never live without their daughters so he had to kill her and himself too. AND THEN IT WAS ALL FOR NOTHING. BECAUSE JACK MANAGED TO SAVE THE WORLD IN THE END. FROBISHER DIED FOR NOTHING. HE KILLED HIS FAMILY FOR NOTHING. And the 3 quick shots, followed by one a few seconds later. Because he had to look at what he had done before he killed himself. Wow. TORCHWOOD HURTS ME SO MUCH. PETER CAPALDI, YOU ARE AMAZING. And finding out that the Frobishers dying was like Time’s way of correcting Caecillius’ family surviving Pompeii just completely RUINED ME. I think I literally felt my soul leave my body once I figured that out. And sure enough I looked into it and saw that RTD and Moffat confirmed it.

Jack killing Steven. I get why he did it. It was the only way to ensure that he would be the only one to suffer. Except, Alice had to suffer too. But it was the closest thing to Jack being the only victim of what he did to save all the other children. If he had picked another child it would have hurt that child’s family. Jack would rather he and his daughter be the only ones in pain. And Alice looking at him one last time before leaving forever. Wow. It hurts. I wish there had been another way.

Yep. So. That was a painful journey. I don’t know if I’ll watch Miracle Day. But yeah. That’s it for Children of Earth. Lois Habiba is the best. John Frobisher was a good man who deserved better.

OH GOD THAT WAS ONLY 5 DAYS FOR THEM. WHY IS THAT REALLY JUST NOW HITTING ME?!?!?!

#hope rewatches torchwood #ignore me if you want

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bynkii · 7 years ago

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Everyone should try doing standup

It’s amazing what trying to be funny on stage can teach you

First, this isn’t a “yeah, and then you’d see how hard it is” post. I think that most reasonable people can intuit that being funny on stage in front of strangers is really hard. Since I assume people are reasonable, I’m not going to explain that part.

What I am going to talk about is what doing local amateur (okay, I got paid once, but I don’t think I’m really a “professional” comedian yet) standup can do in terms of helping you communicate better in all sorts of settings that have nothing to do with standup.

Know Your Material

If any of you have been to a local open mic night, (and if you haven’t you should, they’re really cool), you’ve seen the person who’s not done a lot, if any comedy before and figured they’d wing it. It is rare that it works out well for them. Being able to just walk on stage and riff off of whatever pops into your head and be funny to a group of random people, especially if you’re a n00b is hard. Like “Never played guitar before doing the solo from “My Sharona” perfectly” hard.

What you learn, and what I’ve learned is that the folks who are the funniest work the hardest. They think about their material. Not just the basic joke, but the arc of it. Should it be a short ‘in and out’, should it be part of a longer story? What about this is the funny bit? Is it a formal punchline? Is it the entire story? How do I end this? I’ve had stories that are funny in the middle, but the ending just sucks, because they don’t really end as much as I move on to something else. The person I think is the funniest in my local standup scene is also the hardest-working person in the room. That’s not coincidence.

You have to think about what you’re going to say, why you’re going to use this instead of that. I imagine everyone reading this can think of a dozen meetings or presentations where you wish to $DEITY that the person had thought about what they’re saying and why a lot more. Or at all.

In any situation, be it a presentation at a conference, or talking in an office, or in a bar, thinking about what you’re saying, and why you’re saying it is critical. What’s the point? What are you trying to say? How will the person you’re talking to take it…which brings us to:

Just because it makes sense to you…

One of the hardest things about standup is that you’re trying to read minds. Literally. You’re trying to figure out what a random group of strangers is going to find funny. It absolutely forces you to step outside yourself and (brutally) evaluate what you’re saying and how you’re saying it because it has to be funny to people who aren’t you, who may be nothing like you. There’s no second chances on stage. You’ve either figured that out correctly, or you suck.

Again, if we look at some of the more spectacular public comedy flameouts, you can see what happens when you guess wrong, or forget that it’s not just you and that asshole of a heckler, it’s the entire room. Or world. (Thanks YouTube!) You have to think about all the aspects of your material including places where it crosses the line from being humor to being asshole.

One of the best examples here is something that is incredibly hard to pull off, but something that far too many people try for: The Funny Rape Joke, aka TFRJ. TFRJ is like a postdoc in terms of comedy. There’s very, very few ways it works, and sooooo many ways it fails. I’ve now seen…5–6(?) locals try it. I’ve seen one person, maybe two hit it well. A couple that have the potential of a legit funny joke in there, but keep snatching defeat from the jaws of victory because they aren’t thinking hard enough about it.

I’ll also say right now that I agree completely with George Carlin on one thing: anything can be funny. The potential for offense is not, in and of itself a reason to not do a joke, or at least not the sole reason. But just like wearing a speedo or a thong, just because you can doesn’t mean you should. One bit that I’ve done that works because I don’t actually cross any line is one that starts with “I’m no racist, but…” and turns into a diatribe on how we should just admit the “white people in charge” experiment is a complete failure, already. Riiiiight up to the edge, but then turn 90º at the last second.

If you’re going to stray into certain sensitive areas, like rape, race, etc., you have to be very, very sure about what you’re doing. Just because it’s funny in your head does not mean that room full of people is going to agree. If you’re not sure, maybe consider another joke.

Note: just because you are a part of the group you are making the joke about does not mean you get a free pass. I’ve seen black comedians fail when it comes to racial comedy almost as much as white comedians. Like TFRJ, racial comedy is postdoc-level stuff. Approach with care.

I see this in my ‘professional’ life all the time. Someone is talking and then you can see the moment the wrong part of their brain fires and they say something that’s just so…stupid. A great example was the kid at MacIT a few years ago. I’m standing there with my friend, N. Now, N. is one of the smartest people I know, degrees in Math and CompSci, decades of experience in the industry. She is smart as fuck. We were standing outside her employer’s booth in the little showcase area, and two teenaged boys come up and start talking.

At first, because dumb and a bit of sexist, they start assuming she’s a graphic designer. Sigh. She explains no, she’s a researcher, she does math and programming things all day long and can’t draw a stick figure. Dumbo’s friend goes “Oh, wow, that’s kind of cool”, and maybe won’t make assumptions based on gender again. Possible win! Dumbo however will not be dissuaded. For almost a half-hour he insists that she’s a designer. He is literally telling a grown adult, which he is not, what she does for a living, that she doesn’t even know how she earns her paycheck. That’s not even mansplaining, that’s just asssplaining.

And I am quite sure that in his head, all of his assery made sense. But to everyone else….not so much.

Note: This relentless refusal to accept reality is something that teenaged boys, in my experience, just do. I watched my son do this as a teenager over things that had nothing to do with gender, such as: the completely wrong way to mop a floor, why he was so cleaning the catbox correctly, planes do not work that way, and a remarkable attempt to justify not brushing his teeth for a week…teenaged boys don’t just back themselves into corners, they slam into the corner at high speeds and their legs keep working because there’s a part of the corner they haven’t managed to wedge themselves into. It could have been a lifetime of being raised in background sexism. It could have also been that teenaged boys are just mind-bogglingly dumb and unable to back down ever. Both are equally likely and not mutually exclusive.

Thinking outside your own head, your own experience is vital in this world, and Standup teaches you that both brutally and quickly. Don’t be the guy who keeps trying to pull off the PTSD/Rape Victim joke. Sarah Silverman? Sure. You? Not so much. Which is another lead-in to…

Know your limitations

There are jokes I know I can do reasonably well, and jokes that I couldn’t hit if I had a joke-hitting machine. You don’t see Jeff Foxworthy trying to be the second coming of Pryor, nor do you see Sarah Silverman doing gentle jokes about “oh that husband of mine”. Any good comedian figures out, pretty quick, where their sweet spot is, and rarely move out of that. You didn’t see Carlin doing a lot of slapstick. I’ve seen folks doing jokes and material that would be hilarious…with someone else on stage. It’s kind of painful to watch.

Know what you’re good at. Know where your expertise ends. I’m probably a pretty good person to talk about a wide range of sysadmin issues. I’ve a wide breadth of experience in that field. But there’s no way you’re going to get me to talk about Agile Programming, or really, any kind of programming at all, because I’m not even vaguely qualified to speak on programming as a programming expert.

That doesn’t make me dumb, it makes me someone who is good at these things, but not those things, which is everybody. (Okay, everybody who is not Isaac Newton. That motherfucker was good at everything.) Knowing what you should not talk about is really, really important on stage, in the office, at the bar…well, everywhere. The old “if someone thinks you’re an idiot, don’t open your mouth and prove them right” saying applies here. Be more than willing to admit you’re out of your depth. It’ll make you look a lot smarter than you may think.

HOW you say it…

Successful standup, at times, has less to do with the actual material and more to do with the metadata. A good comic could read you the recipe for upside-down cake, and you’d be pissing yourself from laughing so hard, while a bad one could have The Perfect Joke™ handed to them by $DEITY and it would still suck.

Timing, inflection, pacing, volume, do I stand still or pace or jump, energy level (Not always high. Steven Wright had a rather successful run with an almost negative energy level), everything about how you are doing your thing. Standup almost completely inverts “the end justifies the means”. With standup, the means are everything, the end is almost unimportant. George Carlin had me howling just talking about refrigerator behavior.

After Richard Pryor literally almost killed himself via self-immolation due to his drug habit, (is there anything less funny than someone being severely burned?) he turned it into fantastically funny comedy. Ponder that. He took a moment of what has to be unbelievable pain, mental, emotional, and physical, and turned it into something that made people laugh until tears flowed. One of my favorite lines by Elaine Boosler centers on the dangers women face from sexual assault and rape: “Excuse me? I’m sorry, no, we can’t just walk around New York at 2am, I have a vagina.”

The true masters of standup can take mundane or horrifying things and make them funny to a room, sometimes a huge room of strangers, and they do it not because the content is inherently funny, but because everything else about what they are saying is funny. Watch any top-flight comedian as a guest on a talk show. Even when they’re not doing standup, they kind of are. They’re still using the pacing, the timing, the facial expressions to make a story about parenting funny.

Again, when you’re talking to people or writing, think about how you are saying it, and this includes writing. Because that will enhance or totally destroy your point. How many times do you see someone say something on twitter that gets them raked over the coals, or has their lives completely fucked with, but when they have a little more space to talk about it, you think, “Oh. Well, that wasn’t anything like how it looked.”?

When you are using a medium like Twitter, where you have no space for anything really, you cannot afford to ignore how you are saying something or what this might look like to someone who isn’t you or doesn’t know you well. Unless you lock down your account, the entire planet can see what you are saying, and guess what? Most of them aren’t you.

You’ll note throughout this post, and indeed most of my posts period, I make somewhat liberal use of italics and other styling features. That’s not an affectation. I know that text, even long-form text, is sparse. You don’t hear the tone of things, you don’t hear where I’m putting the stress, you can’t see facial expressions and timing just doesn’t exist. I don’t have any of that, but what I do have are italics and block quotes and other thing that let me call more attention to this word or that phrase. It doesn’t guarantee success, but using those, and other tools, gives me a much better chance of success.

Twitter is even more sparse, your toolset is even more limited, and yet, we (literally) continually see people saying shit that comes across as mind-bogglingly stupid, and when that is pointed out to them, they immediately blame twitter. Look, once or twice, sure, maybe you’re new to Twitter, (more common than people think), or whatever. Everyone should get a mulligan or two. But after the fifth or sixth time? Come fucking-on.

Richard Dawkins is an exemplar of this. He continuously says things that simply do not translate well to the forced near-haiku simplicity of twitter, and yet, like someone with no short-term memory at all, keep pushing on that door, because one day, that “pull” will change to a “push” and it will work. That’s not insanity, that’s just dumb. Dawkins knows he talks about a lot of things that are often subtle and need space, and rather than admitting Twitter is not good for that and that he does not have the skills to use Twitter well, he just keeps ramming into that wall. I hope he lives near a good chemist.

It is nice to assume that everyone will be so blown away by our amazing point that any problems or defects with how we articulate it will be ignored, overlooked, or forgiven. I have a question for the people who do this:

Are you really that fucking stupid?

Because there is nothing about the world, now, or really at any time in history, (and I’m going back past Gutenberg here) where that’s been true. How you say something, the techniques you use, the context in which you are saying it (for every value of “say”) are so hugely important, and we see this reality reinforced every day that I cannot believe anyone who does not live in a sealed, underground box with no link to the rest of humanity would think that way. Even a Skinner Box doesn’t teach you that level of ignorance.

Notice Things

If you really analyze the majority of comedians, they aren’t talking about anything you haven’t seen or done a hundred times before. They are all talking about the stuff that makes up our lives. What they do that we don’t is notice the details of life. The absurdity of our daily routine, the mental gymnastics we use to get through the day without going insane, the lies we tell ourselves to justify our beliefs.

They hold up a mirror, but they do so in a way that allows us to not just feel stupid, but to laugh at our own stupidity. The laughter removes the defensive walls and allows them to worm inside our heads in ways no amount of stentorian lecture can. They look at all the little rituals and habits we have, and say “You know, this is all kind of stupid.”

They let us know that yes, we all do have that background commentary track in our heads saying the things we can’t, because you know, fired, divorced, arrested.

Pay attention to things. Notice things. One of the reasons I like live conferences over conference calls or videoconferencing is that in person, I can notice things that you won’t see in those other mediums. Even on Skype, people know they’re being watched, so their behavior changes. But live, in person, that part of our brain that lies to us and says “YOU’RE INVISIBLE TO EVERYONE!” (you know, the one that tells that CEO in the Rolls-Royce that their windows have a special “antipoorperson” tint, so the guy in the ’96 Camry can’t see them picking their nose) kicks in and you can see when someone doesn’t seem to be getting something, or has a really urgent question that their sense of ettiquette won’t let them ask or, or, or.

If you want another viewpoint, what is most of what Sherlock Holmes does? He notices things.

No, really, I promise, I’m done

If you’ve hung on this long, good job! (Also, you may want to get off the toilet, your legs are probably going numb. ) It’s wordy, but so am I.

Standup can be terrifying, it is regularly brutal, and possesses little gentility. But, it can, if you let it, teach you a lot of things that are surprisingly useful.

…and every so often, you might make a roomful of strangers laugh. That is not the worst feeling in the world.

#everyone should try standup #comedy is hard #movedoverfrommedium

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getseriouser · 7 years ago

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20 THOUGHTS: Nic Nat Tackle Whacked

DONALD Glover, aka Childish Gambino, has released a very provocative music video for his latest hit This is America. Why mention that here? That’s a song and subsequently a film clip too that is about gun violence, American politics, race-based atrocities. This column is about none of those things, most weeks anyway.

But one theme that Glover touches on with the way the video is choreographed is about where your eyes focus. In it you naturally take notice of him, centre of shot, dancing, smiling, making faces. The subtext explored is that because the viewer does this, they miss all the more important stuff happening in the background, which is natural but undesirable human behaviour – a metaphor the for the political landscape in the United States on a number of sensitive but highly pertinent issues.

So what’s the link?

Whether it’s state of the game, suspicious tribunal reports or the reasons we immediately think in diagnosing why Essendon’s bad, or the Brisbane-Collingwood game is good, our proclamations might not necessarily be accurate. What’s happening in the background, what’s the root cause of what we’re seeing and sensing. Are we just being lazy in our judgement?

Not here we ain’t. We proclaim we get serious here. And we do. On that note…

1. So we start with tonight’s tribunal sittings. Firstly, Tom Hawkins, touching the umpire. The precedent on this is Heath Shaw, who was dismissive in his physicality without being overly demonstrative. Hawkins was similar. But we say Shaw was a good ‘precedent’ but in reality, that will be relevant in predicting the punishment as how good a mood the sitting Tribunal members are in tonight. How good was their day, did they have a good lunch, did their Uber run late which really got their goat, did their Foxtel not record Masterchef last night and they can’t get the Tenplay website to work as well? For me, it’s a week. Not because he is playing Collingwood but because any sort of fine doesn’t say much. If umpire contact is a big deal, when deliberate, then it’s a week.

2. Now, young Nic Naitanui. Tackles a bloke strongly and he has a date with the tribunal. But as per the Ryan Burton-Shaun Higgins incident of a few weeks back, the theme in 2018 is that if your actions are good, ok, legal, but the injury is purely accidental, you’re ok. So in that case, from a technique standpoint, other than a push in the back free Naitanui did not do anything to warrant a suspension. So he should get off, not even any sort of minimal fiscal sanction either. Watch him get two weeks down to one or something and we’re back for an appeal on Thursday but he should not get anything.

3. Quick divert to other sports before back to the Footy – first, Ice Hockey. Yep, you saw that coming. Shout out to Nathan Walker. Who? Yep, fair call, but he is someone you should know about. He is the first Australian to play in the National Hockey League, he has played only nine games, seven of which for the Washington Capitals. But today he was the first Aussie to take part in a playoff game. And he scored a point too, an assist. Bloody good on the bloke.

4. And then also in the US, Ben Simmons. Haven’t touched on the fella in this column yet but oh my. His 76ers are only a game away from having their season come to an end, still a pretty good performance even if they don’t get the chance to play for a title. But no question now that he is this country’s biggest star. The fact he plays just like Magic Johnson, someone we’ve all heard of, and just maybe could be just as talented as Magic too, is phenomenal. Sure, he will go to the Olympics and help the Boomers finish with a Bronze, maybe, one day, perhaps, but what he’ll do in his NBA career on a global stage will amaze. He won’t just amaze us patriotic few back here, he’ll amaze the natives over there, which is quite something.

5. Quick couple on the A-League, and we have to touch on the Grand Final. Yes, it was a pulsating finals series, the standard on show was reasonable and Victory deserve all the plaudits. Now the bad stuff. Adelaide vs. Carlton on free-to-air Saturday night rated 415,000, 170,000 of that in Melbourne. Only 183,000 people watched the A-League on ONE, 64,000 of those in Melbourne. Both NRL games out rated the game on Foxtel, and the Swans-Roos game matched it as well. So it’s a good thing no-one was watching to see the horrendous attempt at a pre-match obviously choreographed by sugar-high local kindergarten students. Or the missed offside goal…

6. How does that happen? We acknowledge the score review in the AFL is poor, but compared to the stuff up in Newcastle Saturday night it’s as perfect as Baby John Burgess hosting a TV game show. The fact that the television referee, known as the VAR, lost his feed to do his job correctly 20 seconds before the only goal in the game, a goal that was clearly offside, that the assistant referee missed it too or believed that his mate upstairs would see it anyway so not to worry, that the game continued without any pause or review – disastrous. Then, the audacity with the statement on Sunday morning to not just admit the stuff up but adjoin it with an apology, that they “understand the disappointment and frustration of the Newcastle Jets”. The FFA is as good as running the A-League as Steve Harvey announcing the winner of Miss Universe. Oh my hat!

7. Ok, so some Footy again. Where to start. Let’s close off this ‘state of the game’ nonsense. Firstly, the Brisbane-Collingwood game wasn’t the saving grace, which I’ll touch on shortly, but it was decent we concede. But clearly what we could do to ensure that all games can be attractive, not just one or two a weekend, is twofold – remove the ruck nominations and be far more stringent with incorrect disposal. Remove the need for ruckmen to nominate, it means a quicker stoppage, no time to set up, and as long as only two go up, we’re good. The third man up was the issue, why we need to outline who the rucks are beforehand is redundant.

8. And then incorrect disposal – how many times do we see play on when the ball spills out, or is dropped, or someone attempts to kick but misses, but gets let off because he had a crack? Bin it. If you take possession, you must get rid of it legally unless your tackler knocks it free, then we are cool for that to be play on. You’ll get a lot more free kicks and less ball-ups. But no-one will be put off because everyone knows if you had prior and you don’t get rid of it properly you’re in danger. So there’s two good moves, no need for zones, which is laughable given it will do precisely zero to congestion. Malcolm Blight, you’re a legend, but on this you’re drunk, or old, or both. Sorry mate. You think it sounds legit but practically it does nothing.

9. Now as for that Lions-Pies game, oh, the ecstasy afterwards, the number of children that will be born in nine months’ time off the back of it. It only gets the love because it was a high-scoring thriller. It was high-scoring firstly because both teams uncharacteristically kicked straight, it even broke some league accuracy records. If they kicked at league average it would be 14 goals to 13, or similar, and just a ‘good game’ then. The game in Sydney on Saturday was arguably closer, and if anything more akin to a finals game standard, but everyone got swept up in Sunday twilight. Spare me. The Lions were gallant, the Pies were good enough, move along. Rub your eyes a bit and then look again perhaps? It was decent but not orgasmic.

10. As for the Swans-Roos result, that’s a far more relevant game to look at, so let’s. Firstly, the home team. That’s the third loss at home, which is strange. Yes, no Franklin, but they didn’t have the Budweiser down at Geelong and got away with it. The forward line, or forward of the ball play, is hit and miss right now for the Bloods. They are so Buddy-focused that without him they are so unpredictable it can mean on-the-road success to a off-guard Geelong, or equally make them ripe for the taking at home to North. A reliable plan B is necessary, may mean they don’t win that Cats game, but it assures them of the home win instead, which is probably a better outcome going forward when he misses.

11. So how about those Roos? A big scalp. Needed it, so far their wins were not massively persuasive. But ahead of the ledger, playing some good football, the combo of Brown, Ziebell and the return of Mason Wood inside 50 is very dangerous. Reliable down back too but I fear that when it comes to big games, much like the Melbourne loss they a month ago, up against a class, top-8 midfield they’ll be found wanting more often than not. But, great signs for the rebuild, this isn’t about 2017 for the Shinboners, so it’s all good stuff.

12. Hmm, Essendon. Not good at the moment. Brendan Goddard continues to add to his portfolio of ‘really bad high possession count games’ and the whole ball movement is just ordinary. Certainly putting talent on the park each week but they’re not able to do enough when they have it for long enough, but worse still are not defending anywhere near enough cohesively as a unit when they haven’t got it. Clearly looks a confidence thing, couple bad losses have set them back, a good game or two can turn this around pretty quick; momentum is pretty powerful when you have it (West Coast) but gee, when you haven’t, it’s horrible – hard to stop, hard to turn around.

13. Joe Daniher is copping plenty around the traps, out of form, a bit of a poster boy for their performance as a team in one sense. Now this is an All-Australian centre-half forward only 12 months ago, so he deserves a little more credit. And mind you, yes, he might not be playing his best, but I don’t think the team setup is helping him too much. For mine sharing the 50 with James Stewart and Jake Stringer is hindering Daniher. Yes, Daniher meshed ok with Stewart last year, but now with Stringer spending a lot of time inside 50, Stewart is now in Daniher’s way. This team does not look good with all three, and its main impact is being felt with the form of their key man. Either Stringer has to get on the ball more, or despite how well he has played in his role Stewart’s spot needs to be looked at. Harsh, yet Daniher can play a lot better but a shuffle of the magnets is required first.

14. A tick to this column, pardon the forthcoming narcissism. This time last week we whacked Jon Patton, he then had another off night Friday (did a lot rucking though, granted) and the football media then jumped on. Remember where you read it first. They all either read my column or are just massively behind. Either way, stick with this column each week first and foremost.

15. Freo are just not bringing the effort this last little bit and it’s very concerning. Lots to like about their 2018 prospects as this column outlines but the stats that measure effort and want are looking a little wanting. Has the club been distracted by the Ross Lyon stuff? Do they need a good old-fashioned week of training where mouthguards are required? This team is good enough for September, if they miss it’s a lost opportunity. Still only early May, they remain a ‘Hold’.

16. Nat Fyfe though, playing beautifully. Best on ground for sure on the weekend, with the reigning Brownlow medallist sharing the same field. They didn’t really play on one another for comparison but as we speak, if you had to do the old-school lunchtime picking teams, Fyfe goes before Martin. Don’t let any Victorian bias let you down, Fyfe is just better.

17. Um, St Kilda. It’s all a bit scratchy isn’t it? And the real shame is you ask Carlton fans, is there anything to be positive about, winless from seven, worst start in their club’s history, a club that’s properly old, not GWS old? And they respond no, sure, Curnow, Cripps, but no, not really. It’s a very sulky and sad kind of response. But if you ask them to choose between their list and the Saints’, then there’s a pause, followed by a wry smile. They answer theirs, and wonder off with the slightest pep in their step. And I agree with them, the Saints list might just be league’s worst right now. I’d rather Brisbane’s list a well. Trouble at Moorabbin.

18. Couple on Hawthorn. Think Fox Footy’s Tom Morris might be on good oil here, the Hawks right now would be favourites for Tom Lynch. They will offer more money than Richmond off the top, and whilst I still believe Collingwood won’t be outbid for salary or term, just feel Lynch would chose Dingley over the Holden Centre. As a Roughead replacement it’s perfect. And to be coached by Clarkson, the man who was coach of the last 100-goal season, it makes too much sense.

19. And on Clarkson too, he might be the biggest threat to Richmond right now. This column doesn’t massively rate his Hawks, but is besotted by his ability to get results, make things happen, strategically and tactically get his team towards the top. And Clarko knows this year’s yardstick, it’s the mob from Punt Road, and can now over the course of three months analyse and break down and plot a method that his less-talented team can deploy should they meet in September. If I’m Damien Hardwick, I’m almost somehow preparing for that already in readiness, Clarko is that good, and dangerous.

20. And lastly this week, Bomber Thompson. Bad week for him last week, and then curiously this week those especially grubby journos thought it public interest to run a column exposing his long-term love interest who just happens to be Thai citizen. What’s curious is what is the point in doing so? She has nothing to do with anything related to the two-time premiership coach getting into hot water with the law, she’s got very little if anything to do with his social spiralling away from football. The only reason you run that story is, and we’ll be careful here even though we know we don’t need to, is because of … how to be delicate here… her interesting backstory. Or should we say his interesting backstory. Now that’s no-one’s business, nor really that interesting. But clearly that’s the only reason you run that story, yet they didn’t mention it. Bizarre times.

(originally published May 8)

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symbianosgames · 8 years ago

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The following blog post, unless otherwise noted, was written by a member of Gamasutra’s community. The thoughts and opinions expressed are those of the writer and not Gamasutra or its parent company.

We just released Osmos 2.4.0 on iOS – our first release in almost 4 years. Why the long hiatus? Was it because 2.3.1, our previous release, was perfect? No, though it was solid and stable, and we were happy with it. Rather, it was due to our reliance on “floating-point determinism” for multiplayer. And for years afterwards I thought it might be the last version we ever released on iOS.

Desynchronization: A Little Osmos Multiplayer History

It’s 2013. Miley Cyrus is wrecking stuff in her underwear. I was about to submit version 2.3.1 to Apple for approval. This was a minor update from 2.3.0 – just a few fixes. We did a little testing, and all seemed solid. Then, just before submitting, we got a “blobiverse desync” error during a multiplayer test.

What, you may ask, is a “blobiverse desync”? Well at the time it was something I never expected - nor wanted - to see again.

It’s 2011. Everyone is getting into Minecraft. Aaron and I were working hard on creating a multiplayer mode for Osmos – a surprisingly ambitious and tricky project. One technical question we faced was how to synchronize game state between devices over a network. There are a lot of moving blobs in Osmos: It takes roughly 7 kb to represent the game’s state at any given moment. Multiply that by a decent framerate, and the network bandwidth required to stream Osmos state across a network gets into video streaming territory. We wanted to avoid putting that kind of load on people’s networks and devices. Instead, if we could simulate the game locally and identically on each device, transmitting only player input (mass-firing, mainly) across the network, the bandwidth requirements would be minimal. We decided to go that route.

We encountered and solved so many technical challenges in our development of Osmos multiplayer, many of which I found super interesting, but I want to focus on just one here: simulation determinism. It’s actually a huge subject, so I’ll just touch on a couple bits and zoom in on an even narrower subject: floating-point determinism.

For starters, a titch about simulating physics on computer. If you’re familiar with the term "lockstep simulation" - one of the things we implemented for Osmos multiplayer - feel free to skip the rest of this paragraph. Generally, physics is simulated a frame at a time: calculate, step; calculate, step; and so on. If you do it right, the smaller your time-step is (the time from frame to frame) the more precise your results will be. Precision aside, it’s important here to note that a different time-step will give you different results. For example, simulating one second in 60 steps (1/60th of a second per step) will give you a different result than simulating that same second in 30 steps (at 1/30th of a second per step). But so long as the framerate is decent and things are stable, these differences don’t get noticed by most players. In single-player Osmos we simply run as many frames as we can per second. If your device can handle it, this means the game will run at 60 fps, bound by the refresh rate of your display. But for various reasons some frames end up taking longer than others, sometimes due to the complexity of what’s happening in game, and sometimes due to what else the device might be doing in the background. So one frame make take 1/30th of a second, another 1/47th, another 1/60th, etc. And that’s fine. The problem arises when you want two different simulations to give identical results. In that case, the time-step used for calculations must be identical for both simulations. Physics programers call this a “lockstep” simulation, which we implemented for Osmos multiplayer. I won’t dive any deeper into this subject here, but a great resource on all this, including code examples, can be found on Glen Fiedler’s website.

You may ask: is this necessary? Won't these calculation differences be minor? Who will notice? Well, Osmos falls into the category of sensitive systems that can produce drastically different results from slightly different initial conditions – aka the Butterfly Effect. For example: A tiny difference in mass-transfer between motes on different devices will cause them to exert slightly more or less gravity from that moment onwards, causing trajectories to vary more and more over time, until a near-miss on one device is a collision on the other – a “catastrophic” divergence. A player could die on one device but not the other. Not good.

Moving on, once you've implemented a lockstep simulation over a network, how do you know if it's working correctly? Well, you could run a simulation on two devices and watch… and watch… and watch… until you maybe notice something looks different on the two displays. We did this for a little while, saw differences accumulate over time, and decided to get more rigorous. We computed a checksum / hash of the summed masses, x & y positions, and x & y velocities of all motes on the level (5 floats total), and started to send that across the network for every time-step. The devices would compare their local hash with the remote device’s hash, and if they differed we’d throw an alert up on the screen - blobiverse desync! - and dump a bunch of relevant numbers to a log file to analyze. One by one we found the divergences, and resolved them in various ways. And once we were done we were kind of amazed: devices from different generations, each running different versions of iOS - even the Xcode simulator - they all gave the same results! We had achieved simulation determinism. Huzzah!

I remember chatting with Jonathan Blow at GDC 2012 about what we were up to. We got into some technical details, and I mentioned we were using a lockstep simulation as our multiplayer solution. He made a face I can only describe as "Ugh" with a dash of "Really?" I remember saying "I know. I know. But it's working well! We got this."

We happily released Osmos multiplayer and never saw that error message again...

... until that final 2.3.1 build in 2013. What happened with that build? I had actually tested it a lot, and had never seen the desync. But one day right before release Dave and I were testing and - blammo - there it was. After some investigation we realized the desync only happened when playing 2.3.1 against the 2.3.0 store build. But what had changed? It turns out I had recently updated my version of Xcode. I tried reverting back to the previous version, and the problem went away. (I tested this to death.) Something in how the new Xcode was compiling our code gave different results from previous versions. Spooky. So, while Apple was still accepting builds from the older version of Xcode, we slipped it in. All went well with the release. But soon after, Apple stopped accepting builds from that version. We could no longer submit new versions of Osmos without breaking multiplayer. And for several years, we didn't feel we needed to.

The 32-Bit App-ocalypse

Over the past half-year, Apple has gotten more aggressive about culling “unsupported” apps from the App Store, with 32-bit-only apps slowly approaching the chopping block. It's pretty clear at this point that Apple will cut support for these with iOS 11. And so this January I rolled up my sleeves and started work on an update. I figured - worst case scenario - I might have to cut multiplayer entirely. I’m not actually sure what percentage of players play multiplayer. In any case I figure single-player Osmos is better than no Osmos.

Modernizing the Osmos project so it would build and run using the latest Xcode and frameworks took some work, but less than I expected. Ditto for 64-bit support. There were only a few glitches related to memory alignment in our rendering pipeline and network protocol. For example, here are a couple before-and-after videos I put together demonstrating the kind of alignment bugs that required squashing.

[embedded content]

Pretty smooth work for the most part.

Desync issues aside, bigger changes were required for multiplayer. Apple’s networking and game frameworks have changed a lot over 4 years. And while I was at it I took a cue from Apple and removed all Game Center UI from the game, adding support for “background matchmaking” so players can practice/play single-player levels while waiting for a match. (There aren't as many people playing Osmos multiplayer these days, so it can be a while before someone else comes along looking for a match.)

Hunting for Synchronicity

Of course, synchronization was the big question / risk in this update. I didn’t expect the new version of Osmos to be compatible with the 2.3.1 store build, and sure enough it wasn’t. So we’d lose backwards compatibility at least. But I wondered if this new version would be compatible with itself across different devices and OS versions, like it was in “the good old days” – specifically, 32 vs 64 bit devices. It wasn’t. Ugh. And so began the deep dive into floating-point determinism.

I tried many things. I spent a good chunk of time tinkering with compiler flags / settings. Turning off optimizations solved most of the desync issues, but I wanted to avoid that if possible. I tried flags like mfpmath and sse2, but they didn’t seem to get me anywhere, and documentation on the web with respect to those and clang is pretty thin. I revisited my understanding of floating-point math. I stared at waterfalls of numbers with many decimal places, trying to figure out where, why, and how things were diverging. I reduced the Osmos physics code to the point where nothing moved and no collisions occurred – at least that stayed in sync! I isolated the problem to the point where I had a single line of code that gave different results on 32 vs 64 bit devices for some (but not all!) input values. Simplified, it looked something like this:

mote.x += mote.vx * dt;

Simply update a mote's x-position by its x-velocity times the time-step. For example, with

mote.x = 0.00668302644 mote.vx = 2.32162547 dt = 33/1000.0 // time-step in milliseconds

The mote's new x-position on the iPhone 6 would be 0.0832966641 whereas it would be 0.0832966715 on the iPod 5. (A small difference, but still important.)

Were IEEE standards being ignored? No. This difference only occurred in Final Release builds, with optimizations enabled. Eventually I convinced myself it was due to compiler optimizations causing some intermediate results to be temporarily stored in double / 64-bit registers on 64-bit devices, leading the final float / 32-bit result to be somewhat different. So I tried “unrolling” some simple calculations. For example, I expanded the single line above to

float dx = mote.vx * dt; mote.x += dx;

This kind of change helped in some sections of code, but not everywhere. In some places the compiler was still optimizing / merging instructions. So, how to tell the compiler not to daisy-chain floating-point calculations? Well, as someone who is absolutely not a compiler expert, I came across a neat trick: the somewhat esoteric volatile keyword. Rewriting the above code as

volatile float dx = mote.vx * dt; mote.x += dx;

tells the compiler to rewrite the result (as a float) to the dx variable as soon as it's calculated, and not to use any intermediate / higher-level registers. It’s a nice, code-local solution to the problem that can be applied in a very precise way where needed. I ended up having to do this to about 30 different blocks of code here and there in Osmos. It lengthens those sections of code (in some places from 10 lines to 40 lines of code), giving it more of an assembly-language style, but it works.

Unfortunately that wasn’t the one, magic bullet that solved everything. It took me a while to track down the last couple sources of divergence, and they turned out to be the sqrt() and some trignometry functions. (Osmos is all about circles after all.) When compiler optimizations are enabled, these both give slightly different results for some inputs. For example, acos(0.830012262) returns 0.591666639 on my iPhone 6 and 0.591666698 on my iPod 5. Volatile doesn't help with this, so I tried rounding the results to the nearest degree, throwing away a bunch of precision, but giving indistinguishably-different results – totally fine so long as results match across devices. That worked. 99.999% of the time. Turns out every once in a while - hours of play on average - the results would end up on different integer boundaries after rounding. Ouch. Rounding can be a more complex operation than you might think, but it’s a solvable problem when there’s a ground truth you’re looking for, like the nearest integer to a given value. But when inputs are different, neither device in isolation has enough information to always come to the same result as the other. I lost days to that one, with much fun staring at streams and streams of tiny decimals. The solution? I went back to some basic circular-geometry and came up some new equations that would give a decent approximation of mote-mote area-overlap without the use of any trigonometry functions. The new approximation always underestimates the overlap, but that’s ok since the mass transfer generally gets spread across multiple time-steps anyways. I didn’t notice the difference, and I doubt anyone else would either.

With that, and after tons of testing, I think Osmos 2.4.0 is solid on this front. All seems good after a few days in "the wild" as well. Can I guarantee there aren’t any super-rare divergences remaining? Nope. Hopefully people will let me know if they ever see it occur.

TL;DR

Overall I spent nearly 4 months working on this update. Most of that was on multiplayer, with one month of that spent in the rabbit hole of floating-point determinism. I hope this blog post helps others avoid some of that pain.

To summarize: Lockstep synchronicity got you down?

Try unrolling your calculations, assembly-style, and using the volatile keyword.

Watch out for trig and other math functions. Sometimes they give the same results; sometimes they don’t.

Don’t try rounding to solve your problem. It’s futile and just makes the problem rarer and harder to track down.

Make sure you test with optimizations on.

Moving forward I’m curious if a future version of Xcode will again break our synchronization, or if we’re now more-or-less future proof. Time will tell.

ps. I could go on a lot longer on this and many other subjects related to Osmos multiplayer. If you find this blog post useful and/or interesting, please let me know. It’ll motivate me to blog more than once per year! ;-)

#IFTTT #Blogger

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symbianosgames · 8 years ago

Link

Desynchronization: A Little Osmos Multiplayer History

What, you may ask, is a “blobiverse desync”? Well at the time it was something I never expected - nor wanted - to see again.

We happily released Osmos multiplayer and never saw that error message again...

The 32-Bit App-ocalypse

[embedded content]

Pretty smooth work for the most part.

Hunting for Synchronicity

mote.x += mote.vx * dt;

Simply update a mote's x-position by its x-velocity times the time-step. For example, with

mote.x = 0.00668302644 mote.vx = 2.32162547 dt = 33/1000.0 // time-step in milliseconds

The mote's new x-position on the iPhone 6 would be 0.0832966641 whereas it would be 0.0832966715 on the iPod 5. (A small difference, but still important.)

float dx = mote.vx * dt; mote.x += dx;

volatile float dx = mote.vx * dt; mote.x += dx;

TL;DR

To summarize: Lockstep synchronicity got you down?

Try unrolling your calculations, assembly-style, and using the volatile keyword.

Watch out for trig and other math functions. Sometimes they give the same results; sometimes they don’t.

Don’t try rounding to solve your problem. It’s futile and just makes the problem rarer and harder to track down.

Make sure you test with optimizations on.

Moving forward I’m curious if a future version of Xcode will again break our synchronization, or if we’re now more-or-less future proof. Time will tell.

#IFTTT #Blogger

0 notes