messagesfromthefrog

[messagesfromthefrog]

I feel bad for being a hater sometimes like I'll read an interview and some actor or director will talk about all the care and love they put into their work and how much it meant to them and I'm always like oh king that's so lovely 🥺 the movie does still suck though like it is still bad

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Fantasy setting with magic neatly organised into elemental spheres, except each magic-using culture disagrees with all the others about what the primordial elements are, what their associations and correspondences are, and even how many of them there are. Spells always interact with other spells from the same magic system as though its elemental theory is complete, consistent, and correct, but when spells from two different magic systems come into contact it all goes a bit sideways, often in ways that require flowcharts to explain. Like, you think Ground Type vs. Rock Type is bad? There are five separate, mutually exclusive spheres of magic all called "Fire". The Sylvan Confederacy's "Water" magic explodes on contact with the Empire of the Five Pillars' "Water" magic and nobody knows why.

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my breaking bad headcanon is that one time pre-series hank was like. Haha i don't know about this 'global warming' thing, seems pretty damn cold out to me! and walt through gritted teeth was like. Well actually hank if you look at the science involved you'd see that scientists agree that temperatures have been rising steadily over the past century to an unprecedented degree that is clearly the result of human interference. and hank was like. Well if you say so haha what do i know we got mr. chemistry over here! and walt was like. It's not me who's saying it hank the science speaks for itself which you would know if you read the reports involved. and marie was like. Well now hold on i think hank has a point i mean who exactly are these scientists to talk scientists get things wrong all the time. and skyler was like. And what qualifies you to talk about climate change marie. and marie was like. Well nothing i just think we should be open to different ideas you shouldn't be so narrow-minded skyler. and skyler was like. Thank you so much marie i'll try to keep that in mind you're just full of useful advice aren't you. and hank was like Woah woah calm down ladies it was just an innocent question. and walt was like Climate change denial is not innocent hank it is actively killing the very planet we're living on. and marie was like. Well we just have a different opinion. and walt was like. It's not an opinion it's a matter of scientific fact. and hank was like Hey man it's okay I believe you this stuff's above my paygrade anyway. and marie was like. Hank you shouldn't just give in you should be allowed to express your opinion. and walt was like. Well as i said it's not really a matter of opinion. and marie was like. No walt i think it is a matter of opinion actually. and skyler was like. Well marie my opinion is that you should shut the fuck up. and then they didn't talk to each other for a month

[messagesfromthefrog]

Art by Axel Sauerwald

[messagesfromthefrog]

[messagesfromthefrog]

my favorite celebrity non-controversy was when lorde wanted to express her love of baths so she posted a picture of her bathtub captioned “and iiiiiiiiiii will always love youuuuu” not realizing that whitney houston died in a bathtub

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Fuck this thing

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If Numberman wore a letterman jacket would you call it a Numberman or him Letterman or Numberman’s letterman or Letterman’s Numberman or Numberman’s letters or letter numbers

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Worm comic part 2

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How are conchs even real

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[messagesfromthefrog]

[messagesfromthefrog]

[messagesfromthefrog]

This was one of the first comic ideas I've had for this fandom. It's been haunting my mind since like September. Anyway.

Doof takes it so normal that theres a regular platypus just walking on the balcony of his 39 floor whenever Perry takes off his hat?

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oooh have you ever done a post about the ridiculous mandatory twist endings in old sci-fi and horror comics? Like when the guy at the end would be like "I saved the Earth from Martians because I am in fact a Vensuvian who has sworn to protect our sister planet!" with no build up whatsoever.

Yeah, that is a good question - why do some scifi twist endings fail?

As a teenager obsessed with Rod Serling and the Twilight Zone, I bought every single one of Rod Serling’s guides to writing. I wanted to know what he knew.

The reason that Rod Serling’s twist endings work is because they “answer the question” that the story raised in the first place. They are connected to the very clear reason to even tell the story at all. Rod’s story structures were all about starting off with a question, the way he did in his script for Planet of the Apes (yes, Rod Serling wrote the script for Planet of the Apes, which makes sense, since it feels like a Twilight Zone episode): “is mankind inherently violent and self-destructive?” The plot of Planet of the Apes argues the point back and forth, and finally, we get an answer to the question: the Planet of the Apes was earth, after we destroyed ourselves. The reason the ending has “oomph” is because it answers the question that the story asked. 

My friend and fellow Rod Serling fan Brian McDonald wrote an article about this where he explains everything beautifully. Check it out. His articles are all worth reading and he’s one of the most intelligent guys I’ve run into if you want to know how to be a better writer.

According to Rod Serling, every story has three parts: proposal, argument, and conclusion. Proposal is where you express the idea the story will go over, like, “are humans violent and self destructive?” Argument is where the characters go back and forth on this, and conclusion is where you answer the question the story raised in a definitive and clear fashion. 

The reason that a lot of twist endings like those of M. Night Shyamalan’s and a lot of the 1950s horror comics fail is that they’re just a thing that happens instead of being connected to the theme of the story. 

One of the most effective and memorable “final panels” in old scifi comics is EC Comics’ “Judgment Day,” where an astronaut from an enlightened earth visits a backward planet divided between orange and blue robots, where one group has more rights than the other. The point of the story is “is prejudice permanent, and will things ever get better?” And in the final panel, the astronaut from earth takes his helmet off and reveals he is a black man, answering the question the story raised. 

[messagesfromthefrog]

so fucking real

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So back when I was a senior in undergrad, my partner went through, like, the craziest nervous breakdown I'd ever witnessed in my life. And like, maybe it makes me a back girlfriend or whatever but I was kind of like, "I'm gonna mind my own business on this one."

So my partner gets super close to two other students in his program. He was a film student so his senior year was being capped off by him making a movie. He decides he's going to make a movie about him turning into a salmon. He gets crazy into it. He starts eating salmon for every meal. He buys a bunch of salmon-related stuff. We found a T-shirt at Goodwill with a salmon on it and he thought it was divine intervention that he was doing the right thing. He walks into the freezing-cold Puget sound fully clothed several times to "get into it." He watches videos of salmon spawning and is like, "Nothing is more poignant than this." He gets a tattoo of three salmon on his arm.

The entire time the two students he got really close to are fully enabling him. It's a folie á trois sort of situation. They're out until six in the morning doing creepy art school shit and encouraging his (possibly no longer fictional) desire to become a salmon. My partner has an answer for everything. "Salmon get eaten by bears," I say. "That's a cool as fuck way to die," he says blithely. "And Salmon are free of the yoke of capitalism."

And if I dared to say, Hey, this is....getting a little odd..., he would throw a full-scale tantrum. I'm not supporting his dream (I wasn't sure at this point if it was his dream to be a filmmaker or his dream to become a salmon). I'm basically like, okay. Be a salmon! Fuck!

We had been dating for five years at this point and this behavior was such a left turn that I just decided to ignore it. And then after all that he basically went back to normal after graduation. Sometimes he'll be like, "That was weird, huh?" and has nothing more to say on the matter.