#'clowning for life' I believe is the quote

[epersonae]

I will post more later, but I can say that Samba's cooking class (peche melba/rosy maple moth/candied melon silk moth pie) was delightful, he's a great host!

I have not yet eaten the pie but will report back when I do. Have a mise en place photo and a couple of process photos in the meantime

[cornleypolytechnicgoeswrong]

I finally compiled my masterlist of mmni quotes

It's pretty long so it's below the cut

Lasers and Quasars

“I really think they shouldn't have a thing for brooms. I think it's unfortunate that our movie hinges on them having a broom fetish”

I Found it in the Bushes

“Sean, I'm Keith. Sean. Sean. Sean.”

“The actor playing the vampire is now openly laughing at the guy playing igor.”

-

“Yes dad.”

 “I'm reminding myself. Sean.”

“Dad, Keith.”

“Yes. Thats me I'm Keith you're Sean.”

“I'm Sean you're Keith.”

“Yes”

“You're the fireman.”

“I've come to the conclusion that it is infact a fire and you should put it out. Good day.”

“The firemen in Versailles don't put out the fires themselves?”

“I'm just Piecing together to story of petunia. So she was a woman who did not believe in vampires but died at the hands of a vampire which meant that Keith delivered his life to try to kill a vampire but seconds before she died - of a vampire - he divorced her.”

“Nope, they're not allowed to.”

-

Who Bun It

“Are you alright? Your beak fell off your face. Must you possibly see a doctor.”

Flat Pack Attack

“May I have a moment alone with the boy?”

“What I like about Steve is only 2 seconds ago he was called ben.”

-

“No need to be angry, no need to grieve. Hello, Steve.”

“Of course I'll be upstairs preparing my finger.”

-

“It's Ben.”

-

“You look like you could use some advice well I'll tell you something extra special nice.”

-

“You have a feeling like the tightening of a sphincter. well that's probably just the feeling of amygdala”

-

“Theres a jar of preserves inside me. That's right I must get it out as fast as I can the only way I know how. I'm gonna use some of these things at the IKEA store to get it out of myself.”

“That was Delta Von Tassle: The Man With No Name (Self-managed).

-

From Russia with Gloves 

“You've surely got a family koala. You could go away with them. You're such a good friend of mine.”

“Koalas are polygamous y'know... Polyamorous”

-

“You want to drive a speedboat to the amazon?”

“I love the full body glove, makes you're whole body look like hand and I like big hand.”

-

“I do”

“It'll take all bloody week”

-

“Sometimes I've wondered about slipping a hand in your pouch but then I've thought no, don't - resist”

“You are a useless man but you're damn fast on Expedia and I appreciate that.”

-

“Yes I've thought the same thing about you.”

-

“Im so sorry Georgina. You said they would all be adopted and looked after but instead they've been stuffed full of drugs and slit ear to ear. I don't know what to say really.”

-

“Together we got rid of the glove and now I'm ready for some interspecies love”

“It doesn't bother you that I'm all skin and no fluff....or a bit of fluff.”

-

A Cat in the Habit 

“No, you don't have horses in america do you?”

“I love the moment where sister Penelope really thinks this scene has ended and the camera will cut away from me but then she is answered by God.”

-

“I've seen you up at that convent, riding around on your horse with your top off, all oiled up.”

“No no only camels”

-

“She's teaching me about how to be a person in the world. How to love somebody else. No matter who you are.”

“You know I like to be smooth dad.”

-

“How to do erotic drawings of men.”

“God can do all of that son.”

“Yes, God not massively known for his eroticism in his artwork”

-

“Celeste is it? I can smell you a mile off. Named after the sky but stinking of hell.”

-

“Perhaps instead of the harpoons, we could read scriptures from the ok! Magazine and pray for her.”

“You may try your harpoons but it will not work if you've a rogue nun on your hands.”

-

“Katie Price breaks up with her latest boyfriend”

“Victoria Beckham redecorates her kitchen”

“Pregnancies....galore”

Careless Whisper 

“Well you know often these things first time round are tricky. Maybe you just need to give it another go. You know what they say, give things another go.”

“Listen I know you're my special special special boy”

“That's what they always say.”

-

“I'm 4 specials and nothing more.”

Dressed for Danger 

“I must be alone with each and every one of you.”

“Do you need thin translucent cloth that is almost completely pointless? Well then you need muslin cloth”

-

“And if you must do that then you've gotta find us first cause we do that via the game of hide and seek.”

“OK 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1″

“Tony I see you behind the umbrella”

“Damn it you're good!”

“I know. I am French.”

-

“Yes you are moist and sad from crying”

-

“I am afraid you are in the midst of a murderer”

“This is not case closed. This is case wide open, like a clam.”

-

“I'm in the midst of a murder?!”

“Murderer!”

“In the - you are - as in -”

“I'm in the midst of a murderer?”

“No you are like-you are standing in the same room as a murderer.”

“There's a murderer in the midst?!”

“I am going to do scene 2 of the show. Celia opens the show and now you will show me what came next. And by showing me what came next, you will show me what went before.”

“Yes. Your midst! In our midst!”

-

A Cop in the Ocean 

“I never stopped being dastardly in general did I?”

“Oh my god, a clown with a Squeegee”

-

“I guess not boss”

“No I just continued to be moist and dastardly but what I wanna do is get a whole crew of girlscouts fiddlin' cookies all over the good part of town.”

“Do a blood test on them and a urine test and you'll find blood in their system. Blood and- and drugs.”

“I can whip up some girl scouts for fiddling if you want that boss.”

-

High Tide School

“Kids have the spirit of a thousand... Enlightened Buddhists”

Suicide Squid 

“I just believe fish shouldn't make people rich”

-

“Their horrid squid outward is my horrid squid inward.”

“Some people wanna be rich. Some people want fame. But others just wanna kill fish.”

-

“You were hurt, you were lost, so you killed all the fish. We've all been there.”

“It’s too late for us we are outward squid”

-

Now Museum Now You Don’t

“Don't try anything boys. My teeth are faster than a nun’s nugget”

-

“My teeth are definitely faster. Your nugget is essentially stationary.”

-

“Never try to take revenge on a small bitter man when its gone past his bedtime cause he will just make you go ‘shlum’ for 15 minutes”

“I'm not who I was and you are who you were”

-

Light Over the Rocks 

“You know what they say, you know what I say your father he just-he just rubbed the rock and roll right out of me he ruined rock and roll for me forever when he ran off and left you and I and you and I, you”

“Us”

“Us that's the word I was looking for, us.”

-

“Y’know what they say about Oranges... They never stop being juicy. And that's why my hair is orange so I'm always juicy y'know what I mean. I've always been like this. Y'know what they say about lights... They're bright and they burn”

“Ooh dear oh dear oh dear. That's how it always goes down at the open mic night. Some people get recognised. Some people get left behind. But what do I know, I'm just Chesney Hawkes.”

-

The Quest for Escape a Lot 

“How did you know my one weakness was nets Arthur?”

“Everyone's weakness is nets, tim. That's why they're called nets. It stands for not easily traversible.”

“What about the s?”

“System. Not easily traversible system.”

Look Out 

“I only ever picked up sticks because I loved you. But now I'm scared. I'm scared, without any sticks, I'll have nothing. I won't be the same man I was before”

“Paul there is always a stick. The stick within Paul. Don't you know about it? Think about it, it runs all the way from your head to the bottom bit of the spine thing”

Enter the Elephant 

“Well you know what they say about cockneys. Fly pluckers, the lot of em.”

“The Young one is foolish. Only a rash man snatches ovaries at a fight."

-

Love Behind Bars 

“Yes you did your tax things and I did that thing where I stole... Hair... From the hairdressers... The floor...i took all the hair no one even wants that y'know”

“I know and here we are on the maximum security wing in prison”

-

“In what way is good mental health like a walnut latte? Like that-no! You can't just have a song and jig enough that it all makes sense. The next verse explains from a scientific point of view. How a walnut latte and mental health are in any way alike.”

“You know what, I always find walnuts so romantic. The way they look like a tiny brain. It makes me think of my brain connecting with your brain.”

-

“Well it makes perfect sense because, which camera are we on, okay you know I'm gonna explain this scientifically cause if you get a walnut and you like the taste of the walnut and it gives you endorphins which actually improves your mental health so if you're eating the walnut then you make your mental health better that's how a walnut oat milk latte improves your mental health”

Temple of the Red Giraffe

“I’m giving you the jewels”

“I thought you were burning my breasts off”

“No its a common mistake but I wasn't”

Nightmare on Bone Street

“You taught your dog to laugh?”

“pride comes before a fall remember”

“Yes he understands the rhythm of comedy very well.”

-

“yes but I don't believe in gravity”

-

“A wardrobe a wardrobe my kingdom for a wardrobe.”

“The lead less dog stops licking out the cream from that dead man. For God's sake get off the floor.”

-

Wishing for Wishy Washy

“I know most girls want ponies not a horrible sick old horse like me”

“Look at that horrible horse!”

“I've got an udder and I don't know why.”

-

When the narrative gets tough everyone else deserts Harry Kershaw to allow him to carry on on his own

“Congratulations on your womb”

-

Fraud of the Blings

“I've made the rope sentient.. Hello!?”

“You've given us our sense of purpose back. You've made us make sense again.” [just something Jonathan said that made me emotional]

“Help me I am a sentient rope. I have knowledge. For the first time I have knowledge. HELP ME! WHAT AM I WHAT AM I WHAT AM I WHY MUST THE ROPE EXIST. WHY DO I DANGLE SO?”

-

Over the Henge 

“Yes, I remember our young days, days where we were young, young before we were old but after we were very young. We were young men not knowkng where to go. But we went there, then we came back from there. We were just young of course. Not old, young. Soon to be young - old. Soon to be old.”

“You do speak a tremendous amount of bollocks sir”

“As all kings must”

The Hound of the Wensleydales 

“I was stuffed with a cheese puffed”

“Did cheese Radio just call him a ball bag? I think cheese radio needs to remember that this is a family show.”

-

“Yeah she's dead and it would appear The method of murder was cheese puffed”

Popes on the Ropes 

“Vampires v popes that's how it's always been in the WWE.”

“Always and forever since BC”

“It's an old, old profession.”

“Popes were around BC?”

“That's right.”

“Yeah we were real forward thinking then.”

“All dinosaurs work for the catholic church”

“We knew it was coming.”

-

Zoomania 

“We've got 8 minutes left and we've got story strands everywhere! We've got the elephant with a bomb on about to be dropped onto the earth, they’ve become gangsters about to kill people and our lead characters are frozen still.”

“Who's the tortoise pervert”

-

Singing in the Aisles 

“Asda is a wizard it would seem”

A Dice with Death 

“It is an unusual form of ventriloqy to begin with your mouth wider than when you were speaking yourself”

-

“It was all building nicely but now all of a sudden we found out that one of them is a cloud.”

-

“I’ve got my own show. I disappear into another man's box every night, I get confused, I don't know where I am, and then bang I'm in a curtain call”

-

“I am dissipating. Someone sprayed me with silver nitrate.”

“I am an elemental creature we cannot be together. Our children would be half human half vapour they would not survive.”

-

“No, I don't even know what that means!”

“It dissipates clouds.”

“What?”

“you need to know more advanced chemistry.”

“He's still putting his trust in the mass proposing ventriloquist”

“I don't think I do.”

-

Star Paws

“Of course the world needs intelligence but I'll tell you what else it needs, balls.”

“Which you come with many”

“I bring balls in spades not literally”

“Sir you can't keep your balls in the cupboard anymore you'll have to take them back”

“There we are”

“Did he just put his balls back on? So he's literally a man who has lots of testicles that's what's going on there.”

Angstronauts 

“You make sure that this ship is ship shape ready.”

“Ribena shareth? Yee.”

-

“I was gonna touch your hand but then I thought it would be horrible cause they're so sweaty.”

“It's always in the shape of a ship.”

-

“Mine are like pickled clams.”

If it Wasn't for Those Pesky Kids 

“It's unusual to blackmail someone during a press conference”

Abandoned Love

“I don't know what's weirder, that they didnt book or that the hats belonged to the premises”

“That's jazz.”

Good Guys Finish Last 

“I convinced Dec that he should actually do the double act with a real ant but um...he said no. And that was a good call.”

-

“I am the sea! Deeper than a thousand lakes, wider than 10 lakes, sideways greater in measurement Than 40 lakes. I am the sea.”

“He ain't no friend of yours. He's been using you like toothpaste. Well it's time the toothpaste became the toothpastee”

-

Ipswitch it up 

“These people with their newfangled things, internet, cars! I tell you what, I was very happy with the flip phone and a horse.”

Croydonosaurus 

“That man-ladybird has been the only thing that I've had in my life the last 5 years that has made me feel again. It's why I'm so competitive with my daughter about love.”

“That doesn't seem healthy. Bringing a 6 foot ladybird into the family home.”

“I suppose it's about a 1 all right now.”

Back to the Tutor 

“Nana you don't think my old friends will think it's weird or strange that my date is my grandma do you?”

“Before we went out to do this with a new team the one thing we said was let's keep it simple at the start. Already we have a half car assembled by a woman who is also the radio. Hold on tight everyone.”

-

“It's not weird or strange at all to have your - such a lovely busty lady as your date”

“No you're right. It's wasn't so much the busty as the grandma that I was worried about.”

Pier Today Gone Tomorrow 

“You take a grudge and you nurture it like a small cat.”

-

No. No I don't think she's the strange one in this. It was the parrot, the sleeping bag man and the medieval princess in a tiktok office interviewing for the role of 'friend' they are the strange things! A woman trying to turn over a new leaf - that's pretty regular I'd say.

“What has happened. It was all going really well, I thought this was going to be a quick scene where we saw it was really hard for Mirabel to turn over a new leaf, but she puts some glasses on, suddenly everything changed and now she's meeting the mayor, the princess and a small gentleman in a sleeping bag.”

-

The Man Who Came in from the Cold Storage 

“As we are in east London I got you some olives served on a bin lid with turmeric as requested.”

-

“You double killed Samson”

“Right,it's very very important - never thought I'd say this one - it's very important we don't shoot an unborn baby during the matinee. I think that's like, a theatre rule. If it isn't, it should be.”

-

“I don't care about Samson. His pool was tiny and not chlorinated.”

“But his heart was big and also not chlorinated.”

Fielding of Dreams

“Enjoying the fact that this is our life! There ain't no ups but there sure as heck ain't no downs. And that's fine with me.”

“I said one domesticated sheep. There's a flock of them. Ones a policeperson, ones a miserable old woman called Mabel and one appears to be smoking.”

“This really is the story of a child called felix who settled.”

-

Fire In the Hole

“A woman with independence is as strong as an oxen full of iron and a fire full of oxygen is as strong as that woman”

It's up to you, Newark Newark 

“Here's a newark hotdog. It's made entirely of meat. Meat bun, meat dog, meat onions.”

“Here are the 4 horsemen. You are the apocalypse.”

-

“Dog meat?”

“Your old 15 year old hips can't handle it anymore.

“No no comma, meat, dog”

-

Ah I take olive oil every day.

Cause you have to. We just produce it naturally.”

-

“They see! We don't see. We don't see the pooing. I'm sorry I forgot about I forgot about the pooing. Pooing? Outrageous. That stops. That stops now and she goes somewhere private. But it's awful. And of course jiminys dad, is David really going to be proud of them now?”

“The books have gone away. How awful. They threw a family of books into the famous Newark River. He knows what it's like to have his mum kicked into outer space. That's how dark this gets, that's how dark sports get man.”

-

“Gillian wait - wooahhh”

“Susan quickly-”

“We gotta help we need to just- wooahha”

[general screaming and shouting]

“PAUSE. PAUSE. PAUSE. NO! NO! NO! NO! NO! I SAY NO!I CANT HANDLE THIS. I'M GETTING LIGHTHEADED CAUSE I AM SO DISGUSTED WITH THIS FILM AND THE PEOPLE IN IT. BUT OF COURSE THEY STOP FALLING OVER IN IT NOW RIGHT.”

“Gillian Gillian come on inside the medical tent.”

“And these were these were the highlights from day one at the games I mean I think it's fair to say that the Olympic games have been well and truly soiled in reputation. What an awful thing to happen”

Ashopocalypse Now

“My names Jack I'm a car mechanic and I've lost my companion”

“Control yourself Sybill Peacock Penis”

-

“Thank you for that précis”

“Who are you? Can you give me a précis of you?”

“I'm Jolene my husband is a slightly crazed military man who seems to have lost perspective on real human connection. Then there's a man whose actually a woman. There's a happy birthday prophecy. They're searching for me but I've lost them but mostly I'm looking for my daughter who loves Jane Austen and she got lost in a Waterstones I think she may also be somewhere else so that's who looking for.”

“It's time! For... Other characters.”

“We come from quite different worlds.”

-

Ashopocalypse Next 

“Remembering when morrisons wasn't boarded up. People could go inside and-”

“Look at the fresh vegetables.”

“This sample isn't going to be enough to create an antidote. We're going to need all of your blood.”

“Moderately fresh yes.”

-

“All the brilliant characters we had and all we're left with is a guy who can't remember which character he is unless his peacock penis is out. I don't care anymore. Family friendly? I don't care anymore. We stop tomorrow. We stop tomorrow that's it. In for a penny in for a pound. Get your peacock penis out as much as you want. If you're not gonna try and stop it I'm not either. [...] what are you all applauding? Are you that culture starved that an umbrella penis gives you that much joy? What has happened to civilisation??”

“One second we'll - we'll need to get authorisation from the local council for that.”

-

Ashopocalypse Then 

“You're one of those weird people aren't you?”

“Nothing weird about us. I'm simply a man who gets involuntary erections and this is Andrew Garfield”

“I'm a pigeon”

“Dressed as a Pigeon.”

The Day Harry Got Cut in Half 

[Not a quote just a note that Lauren does a Scottish accent for 90% of her characters in mmni but the one time the film is actually set in Scotland she ends up doing a welsh accent.]

“Pray don't be fickle. Pray she won't be no pickle.”

[painfullyprickedandticked]

a common debate within the fandom is the annual question of “is striker a supremacist?”

particularly, whenever one makes an analysis on striker, there’s always one comment mentioning “he is a supremacist.” however, there have been, recently, arguments that he is not a supremacist but rather just believes himself to be superior.

let’s look into both sides of this debate and draw our own conclusions.

the argument on why he isn’t:

BLITZØ is the one who refers to striker as a supremacist and blitzø isn’t particularly good at perceiving people. he tends to resort to insults instead (like when he called fizz a “peppy fuck doll” and verosika a “drunken whore”).

if someone’s views contrast with how blitzo sees the world, he immediately resorts to throwing an insult and that’s his perception of the person up until they shake the viewpoint. we’ve seen this with clown boy and we’ve seen him relent with verosika. basically, there’s some bias on blitzo’s end towards cowboy snake dude.

a supremacist is someone who believes a certain type of person is better than another. striker doesn’t believe imps are superior to other hell species, he thinks HE is superior to other hell species. therefore he’s not a supremacist, he has a superiority complex. those are two different things.

“what is a superiority complex?”

 examples of evidence proving striker does have a superiority complex include:

he wrote a song dedicated to his own victory in harvest moon festival, with lyrics literally declaring “i’m so much better than you.” he’s always been self-centered, having an overexaggerated self-worth. 

a lot of his anger towards moxxie can be taken as self projections, and same with fizz.

the reason striker mentions to blitzø that the two of them are superior to most of their kind was a manipulation tactic to throw blitzø off of his case when he was caught trying to shoot stolas

it amazes me how many people miss this context when its so clear as day. its also apparent that hybrid imps can sniff out other hybrids, akin to how in real life, if youre mixed race, you can often have a gut feeling that someone might also be mixed.

another point someone made: blitzø doesn’t know about striker’s past. we know striker implied it in western energy, but blitzø himself doesn’t know. if he understood what happened to him, then maybe he’d gain more of an understanding of striker as a person instead of this “evil supremacist” facade he sees.

“"Look. Not every ring is some fancy ass city, with some fancy ass mansion, that only fancy ass royals get to live in. Some of us have hard lives to live. And some of us have everything we care about taken away by fuckers like you."”

I’ll quote someone I discussed this topic with, though I won’t tag or name because I don’t want people to go after them. I’m not here to start discourse—I’m here to explore viewpoints. Here's their take:

“His anger and pain is so genuine and so real, you hear it in Ed’s performance, i don’t get how ppl look at the disgust in his voice and his face whenever things get personal (his speech to Stolas and his reaction to Fizz saying he’s no better than any royal) and take it as he’s putting on an act and lying about it.” […] “Extremist is a better word for him imo than supremacist and he def has some self-racism/hatred going on for sure hence how he put downs imps he feels are lower than him but upholds those he feels meets his standards, if that makes sense yk? It’s about what he sees as weak or embarrassing for his own kind. It’s not actually about wanting any class to be superior, it’s about him and what he thinks.”

it’s important to note, no matter how you view the angle of coding characters who aren’t human – giving them racial coding and all – there is an allegory within the series. imps are the lowest on the hierarchy, and the goetias are merely only a step below the deadly sins and lucifer (+ charlie and lilith). so if we put imps into the minority role, that implies imp hybrids are, well, mixed race.

we notice this in an example of how stella treats imps, even including striker himself.

[attempted script format here. didnt work, lol]

he doesn’t like working for her. he puts up with her because that’s his meal ticket. it’s payment. there isn’t a moral high ground he stands on, but there is a ground where he’s below her and he knows it – he’s exhausted. he’s tired. resorts to a slur because that’s how much she exasperates him. because she’s a privileged royal lady, and he’s at the bottom of the caste system. he cant pick or choose, unlike with IMP and their jobs.

it’s a lot more nuanced than a lot of people are willing to take on simply because some don’t like striker and dismiss everything surrounding his character that isn’t those specific lines talking about superiority or blitzo’s supremacist comment. 

as i finish writing up this section, i wanna make it clear i also like blitzo and stolas and i’m not justifying striker’s treatment of anyone. i’m not being an apologist, but i’m examining this particular case “he’s not a supremacist” because, yknow, you gotta look at the other side sometimes when it is presented in a calm manner and not just straight up character bashing or disrespect to the creator bc “omg my ship didn’t happen” or “whaaaat? the villain was always a villain and NOT a love interest? how dare that BITCH” [these takes exist and my brain melts each time…]

okay, i think im done with this side. ill make the rest pretty concise and cite someone else here who's detailed things for the other side of the argument. thanks to TVM for letting me quote you. im tired to write up the other side because my fucking google doc with these notes got erased. i hate it here!!!!!!!

why striker at least has some Certain Ideals (sigh)

"Blue Bloods"

"Disgusting, rich, pompous goetia"

"Some of us have everything we care about taken away by fuckers like you."

"You don't get to talk over me. . . all you ever do is try to talk over us."

"Once I split your neck open and let you choke on your own blue blood, you won't be worth any more than the tomb stone you'll be buried under."

So . . . first, he doesn't actually say a lot that's solely about royals, and ALL of the quotes above are about how royals look down on people like him, NOT about any inherent flaws that they have. They're about class, not race, unless you count "blue blood" as race. I don't. It's tied directly to money. "Disgusting" comes up in reference to Blitz's relationship with Stolas, but the words "rich" and "pompous" follow immediately. Striker hates royals because he hates that society places them above him.

Imps

"Pathetic."

"You little things aint worth the cleanup."

"Oh I remember how easy you are to choke the life out of, little one."

"Blitz, come on. You know the two of us are superior to most of our kind."

"I still think it's embarrassing. You're wasting a lot of potential relying on a weak little . . ."

"Vermin"

I think that this is where Striker's worldview comes into clearer focus. He thinks that Moxxie and Millie (and by extension MOST imps) are inferior to him. The word "vermin" is particularly telling. There's something visceral about his disgust for "lesser" imps.

I think Striker worries that they reflect who he really is. I think he truly believes that imps are inferior to higher class demons, and he fears that if he doesn't prove himself to be special (through violent dominance), he's vermin himself.

Notice how in the image below, his edge over Moxxie is all about size and physical strength- the things he implies throughout the episode make him the superior being. Look at that wide smile. He loves the feeling of being superior.

Relationships between imps and royals

"You are so above sucking on a disgusting rich pompous goetia . . ."

"kill the unkillable . . . starting with the one that treats you like a plaything."

"Blitzy"

"You two are both embarrassments to our kind for meddlin' with blue bloods to begin with. But at least loud mouth here has the sense to only fuck his rich bitch, instead of being a little purse dog."

"This worthless little pet reeks of his over bloated master. I'll at least enjoy getting rid of him."

Striker clearly sees these relationships as imps lowering themselves. It doesn't seem to occur to him even for a moment that these relationships might involve genuine care because he sees all interactions between social classes as being about power and "who wins."

all sourced from here.

conclusion?

I don’t know how to finish off this post. I was trying to give both sides a microphone and at this point, every time I make a post on Striker, I have to make it clear that I hate the woobification of him from a loud majority who only do so because they’ve got a weird hate boner for Stolas. Y’all might not have seen it, but I have on Twitter. I have seen it from here. I have seen it in fucking AO3 with straight up disrespectful cross tagging of character bashing and actual flanderization (see here on why striker is not canonically ruined), along with straight up kill-fics and thinly veiled disrespect to the creators.

But lately I’m also hating the boring, simplistic take of “he’s just a supremacist” and not analyzing him more than that. He’s such an interesting, complex character in a show of complex characters, and nobody bothers to examine him! They just either dismiss him as revolutionary or a supremacist! They never go into his grey areas or “hey, why is he like THAT?” - no, it’s just the boring same old takes.

This guy has so many layers. He’s a minority within a minority. He’s turned off by sex jokes yet has such rizz. He has an adrenaline rush from fighting. He is self centered yet also emotional. Yes, he’s a dick and a murderer. No, he’s not just a rat bastard and no he didn’t threaten to kill Octavia - he simply brought her up to throw Stolas off. It was more so "shame your kid won't see you again", not "oh im gonna kill your baby girl after i show her your decapitated head". Yes, his layers and tragic backstory yet unyielding thirst for killing when he sets eyes on a target make him interesting. It’s called being a villain enjoyer but no one seems to like a villain for being a villain anymore in his case. They either gotta justify him or they gotta woobify him, or they have to demonize him. I’ve seen people make the worst comparisons and it baffles me.

I just wanna enjoy this rat bastard in peace but then stupidity resurfaces in my head and it’s inescapable at times. Tiring. </3

This isn’t the conclusion you probably wanted if you read this far. Sorry. But I'm at a loss of what else to say atp. I wanna find more normal fans of Striker who aren’t just insane people who woobify him to bash Stolas. And I'm also tired of people who actively bash him trying to weigh in on my stuff. Like... is there any normal enjoyer of him besides @eldritchcreatureofwords ?

Anyway, live laugh love Edward Bosco, bye.

[mcflymemes]

PROMPTS FROM THE SOPRANOS *  assorted dialogue from the television show, adjust as necessary

i find i have to be the sad clown: laughing on the outside, crying on the inside.

i went ahead and ordered some for the table.

when you're married, you'll understand the importance of fresh produce.

we've got guns here.

he just told you to shut the fuck up.

the things i take pleasure in, i can't do.

don't you ever say you hate life.

oh, poor you!

so what, no fucking ziti now?

you want compromise? how's this?

i'll keep this short and sweet.

you're weak. you're outta control. and you've become an embarrassment to yourself and everybody else.

sometimes it's important to give people the illusion of being in control.

are you in the mafia?

tomorrow i can be on time, but you'll be stupid forever.

let me tell you a couple of three things.

you're not gonna believe this.

a wrong decision is better than indecision.

i'm like king midas in reverse here. everything i touch turns to shit.

if you can quote the rules, then you can obey them.

we're soldiers. soldiers don't go to hell. it's war. soldiers kill other soldiers.

we're in a situation where everyone involved knows the stakes and if you are going to accept those stakes, you've got to do certain things.

there's an old italian saying: you fuck up once, you lose two teeth.

someday soon, you're gonna have families of your own and if you're lucky, you'll remember the little moments like this that were good.

hey, i don't even let anyone wag their finger in my face.

it's good to be in something from the ground floor.

those who want respect give respect.

is this a woman thing? you ask me how i'm feeling, i tell you how i'm feeling, and now you're going to torture me with it.

lately, i'm getting the feeling that i came in at the end. the best is over.

my father was in it. my uncle was in it.

maybe i was too lazy to think for myself.

buy land, 'cause god ain't making any more of it.

i don't care how close you are. in the end, your friends are gonna let you down.

family... they're the only ones you can depend on.

take your hat off.

teddy roosevelt once gave an entire speech with a bullet lodged in his chest. some things are just a matter of duty.

some people are so far behind in a race that they actually believe they're leading.

sometimes we're all hypocrites.

other people's definitions of you, sometimes they're more about making themselves feel better. you gotta define yourself.

people only see what you allow them to see.

death just shows the ultimate absurdity of life.

you know when i was depressed i said i didn't want to live? well, i'll tell you something. i didn't want to die.

that's why dinosaurs don't exist no more.

don't touch that! my program's coming on.

i wish the lord would take me now.

our existence on this earth is a puzzle.

i'm getting my wine in position to throw in your damn face.

[luvtonique]

I wanted to address all of the controversies about me and put some explanations on them because unfortunately we live in a day and age where people just see the dirt without ever wondering how the dirt got there. They think "Man that guy never washes his car look how filthy it is" because I just fuckin went offroading 10 minutes ago but they didn't know that.

Aight let's start with numero uno, the thing I'm called the most, the big word for good ol Jay: Transphobe!

This is the one with the most hilarious backstory of them all which to this day baffles my goddamn mind.

I used to be a hated artist because I drew violent shit, I was known for Lil Miss Rarity which is a super violent comic. Naturally this lead to people saying that I was "killing children" because I was drawing violent (and sometimes pornographic) images of a children's cartoon show (My Little Pony).

So in my quick rise to stardom, I had a lot of hateful people attacking me as well, and I had fun with it. I called them out, called them stupid, etc.

Well, one of them was Dumbo. Dumbo spent 6 full months making posts about me that are still on their blog to this day. Every single time I made a post, they reblogged it or reposted it, to call me a shithead, call me an ass hole, wish I'd kill myself, etc.

One day I was doing a fundraiser to put away money for a potential emergency because my mom had hurt her spine really bad and was in the hospital. I had a goal of $300 and raised $1200.

Dumbo, of course, was saying hateful shit about me still, and said, I quote, "I hope that whore dies in the hospital lmao"

So, I looked into who Dumbo was. The Brony fandom was, at the time, all about Love and Tolerance, so I did some sleuthing and found out they were an artist on DeviantART taking full color commissions for $10. I commissioned them on my DA account, and asked them to draw Lil Miss Rarity. They and I had a very polite conversation, and since they drew the picture very quickly I tipped them 100% and told them to up their prices because their art is very good.

They thanked me, not knowing it was me (despite that it was literally my main account), and I walked away.

Then, they checked my gallery, found out it was me, and went into a rage, making a post that says, "LMFAO, Jay just begged for money and then turned around and used it to commission an artist for double their asking price, what a shithead!!"

So, I took the screencaps of all of their death threats over 6 months, compiled them all, and showed my massive Tumblr following in a huge callout post against them. In the middle, I referred to Dumbo as "he/she/it/clown" and everyone (AND I FUCKING MEAN EVERYONE) completely ignored the 6 months of death threats and how consistently polite I was to them, and sided with Dumbo in a moment that labeled me "Transphobic" for the rest of my life.

Another instance is I called Kris from Deltarune he/she, and was called transphobic for that, and got the amazing quote "That's a real-ass child and you're misgendering them deliberately," to which I replied, "That's not a real-ass child that's a fictional character you fucking retard"

NEXT UP: ABLEIST.

I grew up in Los Angeles in special ed classes and have a mentally retarded brother, I have the pass to say retard, fuck off.

NEXT UP: RACIST.

I grew up in Los Angeles with a father who called himself "N*gger Bob" (he's white) because he was a super racist who believed being asked to help take the trash out was "akin to slavery." He also beat my retarded brother half to death for having a black girlfriend.

I was in LA during the Rodney King riots, I was in LA right in the middle of the Crips and Bloods trying to kill each other and having fuckloads of gang shootouts that I overheard when I was chilling in the Ceritos (spelling) mall.

I know what racism looks like.

A white boy saying the n-word while playing Fortnite is not what racism looks like.

A white boy singing along with Busta Rhymes (hi that's me) on a livestream and casually dropping n-bombs because I'M SINGING ALONG WITH BUSTA, BITCH, is not what racism looks like. I had three black friends growing up, Davion, Julian and Smalls, and also Undrier but Undrier was retarded and I didn't consider him a friend he just followed me around and called me "Day" because he couldn't pronounce J's. But me, Smalls and Davion would stand on Davion's aunt's porch and eat zucchini cornbread and listen to Woo Haw and headbang and sing along til the fucking cows came home.

But now that I'm grown up, my upbringing apparently doesn't matter, my FUCKING SKIN COLOR DOES (you know, racist ideology!) and I'm no longer allowed to say the n-word despite having casually spent my entire childhood surrounded by black friends who were completely okay with me saying it. I grew up in the hood, motherfucker! Bellflower born n' raised, bitch! Wes' Side!

But I'm <skin color> and since <skin color> isn't allowed to <thing that's designated for only other skin color to do>, I'm racist.

NEXT UP: PEDOPHIIIIIILE

I was molested when I was 13, which thankfully didn't leave too much emotional scarring on me. Anthony Sevarino, the dude's name was, and he shoved my hand in his pants and showed me his dick during a camping trip and said he was gonna fuck me in my bed. I was so shocked by this happening that I didn't even tell my parents who were in the same motorhome literally asleep 10 feet from me.

Growing up, I always had a really emotional trigger to seeing harm come to children, I hate it. I cry and shake uncontrollably when I see children getting hurt, no matter what. It's the only thing I have I'd call a "trigger."

I saw that episode of Rugrats where Tommy cuts his finger and then he's scared to do anything anymore because he might get hurt, and that made me fucking bawl, it still does, seeing Tommy cry super fucking hard over seeing his finger bleed- holy shit it's making me teary eyed right now just typing that.

So, naturally, I don't want children to get hurt and am extremely against pedophilia, child predatory behavior, MAPs, grooming and these FUCKING PEOPLE WHO KEEP CASUALLY TALKING TO 13 YEAR OLDS ON DISCORD FOR FUCK SAKE.

"But Jay! You drew foalcon! Those fictional ponies are underaged!"

What, you mean that tag that's still extremely popular and always has been in the brony fandom?

Yeah can't imagine why I, a very popular artist in the brony fandom from 12 years ago to 10 years ago, would ever draw something so insanely high demand and so insanely popular. Can't fucking imagine.

Never mind that I haven't drawn it in 3 years, removed all my old images of it, and even announced I'm not drawing that shit anymore, I'm still losing friends when they find out I did once, because "I can't associate with a pedophile I'm sorry." (See: "I can't differentiate fiction from reality and also can't allow a person to move on from a troubled past that they had.")

Also never mind that the few crowdpleaser foalcon moments in Lil Miss Rarity were officially written out entirely (the part where Twist and Sweetie Belle kissed).

But you know what's amazing? Being part of the brony fandom and being an artist willing to draw anything meant that people would come to me and literally confess that they're in possession of the "real shit" and wanted to know if I was interested. Seven of them, seven, are in prison now because of me and my buddy "Z" contacting the FBI with their confessions and the shit they shared with me thinking that I was a "safe person" to admit that shit to.

My position in the fandom as an artist who gets to know their commissioners personally and was willing to draw that type of shit was literally fishing out real actual predators and putting them in prison, but I was still getting called a pedophile, and still get called it today. It's fuckin great man.

NEXT UP: TRANSPHOBE (PART 2)

I was trans. Shaved my hair half off, dyed it blue, called myself Jynkx, cussed out my family, moved to Ohio with a guy who wore diapers around the house (with his brother living there) and collected loli figurines, and dated a transgirl who was catfishing and manipulating me for 9 fucking years. I have a Discord server to this day with pronoun selection roles, my best friend is trans (I met her when she was cis and helped her come to the decision to transition and it has since improved her life and happiness), and almost every mod in my Discord server is trans.

The problem, of course, is that the trans activist community hates itself more than any other, which makes perfect sense if you think about it. This is a group of people who encourage hating cisgendered people, and encourage people to hate the body they're in and to transition to a "different body." It's been proven multiple sources that there are entire "Femboy Cults" (search that on YouTube) who are actively seeking out depressed people to manipulate them into starting HRT, and cutting off their family.

WELL GUESS WHAT HAPPENED TO ME?

Bridget, as you all remember her, was a manipulator who lied to me for 9 years of dating to make me depressed, hate myself, hate my family, give her thousands of dollars, and kept promising we'd meet some day while turning down every opportunity (such as conventions we were both already going to) to meet (yes, I went to conventions she was at and didn't meet her).

I was a victim of manipulation, was surrounded by horribly manipulative and narcissistic pieces of shit who warped my mind and made me believe I was depressed because I was "an egg" and needed to go get on HRT and change myself. And I almost did! I came within a hair's reach of shoving a hormone-altering drug into myself in hopes it would cure my depression, and then went "Wait a second, I'm not depressed because I'm a woman trapped in a man's body, I'm depressed because femboy-obsessed manipulative pervert rapists want me to turn myself into their fetish." I broke up with Bridget, I moved home from Ohio, I waited for my hair to stop being blue, and I became proud of myself for escaping that horrible situation and bettering myself mentally.

So how's this make me a transphobe?

I DON'T FUCKING KNOW, YOU FUCKING TELL ME YOU FUCKING INSANE BOOGEYMAN-BELIEVING ASSHOLES WHO BLAME EVERY OTHER PERSON FOR YOUR OWN INTERNAL LACK OF FUCKING SELF WORTH.

WAKE THE FUCK UP. YOU'VE BEEN MANIPULATED BY THESE FUCKING TRANS ACTIVISTS WHO ARE JUST SICK FETISHISTS WHO WANT TO TRANSFORM LONELY MEN INTO "FEMBOYS" UNDER FALSE PROMISES THAT IT WILL FIX THEIR MENTAL PROBLEMS. GET OUT WHILE YOU FUCKING CAN. I DID AND I'VE NEVER BEEN HAPPIER IN MY LIFE.

Next up: HOMOPHOBE

I draw LGD (Lesbians Getting Dicked) because I think it's hot when girls who like girls have sex with guys. I've drawn some pretty offensive pictures of it such as a pic of two lesbians being told "Pride month's over, ladies, time to be straight again" while being surrounded by hard dicks and looking scared.

Why'd I do this? Well because a lesbian friend of mine also likes that shit and we did that as an art trade.

But why do I draw it on my own sometimes? Because it's hot. It's fucking fictional porn, it's not real, it can't hurt you. I tag it LGD and only post it in servers you need accounts to see. You don't like it stop going out of your way to look at it, and if someone slams it in your face in your private "We Hate Jay" Discord server (which there are many of. I have moles who tell me.), that's not my fault y'fuckin dipshits. I properly tag and hide my stuff so only people who want to see it can see it. If someone showed you a picture of my spread asshole, you should get mad at them, not me. They're the one who SAVED IT TO THEIR COMPUTER AND SHOWED IT TO THEIR FRIENDS UNSOLICITED, YOU MORONS.

Anyway.

Next up: AN ASS HOLE.

I've spent 13 years being called all of the above names no matter how much I've catered to their activism and was even part of their activist movements directly. Fuck you.

Next up: A NAZI

Lmao.

I said on Twitter, "I hate that no matter what you say on this site, someone somewhere will get mad."

And that, without any further comment from me literally at all, turned into a massive amount of people including "Wootmaster" (Added note: I talked with Woot in private and he gave me the okay and apologized, we cool) calling me racist and a "Bootlicking Nazi." I literally did not add to it. I literally just said the opening line and left it for 3 days.

That's why I deleted my Twitter.

That's why people think I'm a Nazi.

Because I said "I hate that no matter what you say on this site, someone somewhere will get mad."

Next up: I DON'T FUCKING KNOW I BET THERE'S MORE.

You see why I make angry rant posts like this one?

Because this is how I've been treated for 13 fucking years.

I've been attacked, called names, labeled evil, told I'm phobic against the movements I was literally part of and being an activist for, had money stolen from me by perverts who got arrested for drilling a hole in the bathroom wall at a brony convention to jack off to his female roommates (he pretended to be trans and bullied them into letting him room with them in their "Safe Women's Hotel Room" and then did that shit and got arrested. But not before he stole money from me! Six thousand fucking dollars!), lived with a fucking probably actual child predator who would show me his loli figures and foalcon posters every day and try to convince me to like them and showed me his dick multiple times...

I literally was smack dab in the middle of super ultra liberal activism and trans activism for over a goddamn decade, right down to blue hair half shaved off and calling myself Jynkx.

And I come back, snap out of it, and get cussed out and called transphobic and "the reason trans people are being killed" because I don't like the flowery 1-dimensional LGBT representation in World of Warcraft and have a 9 year running best friend I went to multiple conventions with decide instantly that I'm a Nazi racist communist because I didn't disown my mother when she voted for the orange guy, and because I called one of their friends "Insane" for identifying as fae/fie and thinking they're a goddamn gaelic woodland sprite. (Btw he was my most frequent commissioner for loli shit and used to jack off while I was drawing it for him.)

You see, people.

I've spent 13 years surrounding myself with and getting personally connected with the lives of my commissioners as a brony/furry artist who was deep into LGBT and Liberal activism.

And in those 13 years I've come to realize that I surrounded myself with the most fucking disgusting and evil people on earth, who no matter how much I would shill for them and do what they asked, I would still be the label-covered punching bag whose reputation is now so utterly in the trash that literally no matter what I draw, say, or do today, I still have people on shady Discord servers n' shit calling me a fucking lolcow and a pedo and a transphobe and a Nazi and a racist and a homophobe and an ass hole.

I have learned in 13 goddamn years that you can't appease these fucking lunatic psychopaths.

And so I don't anymore.

So who am I really?

I'm an incredibly easy to talk to artist, I'm a dude, I love roleplaying and drawing pictures for people, I like writing song lyrics, I love hearing about new inventions and innovations, I love goats, I love dogs, I think cats make bad pets but I don't mind cats, I'm making a video game about an elf girl, and I want you hateful people who I've lived rent-free in the heads of for over a goddamn decade to leave me and my fanbase the fuck alone.

Love you all.

~Jay

[glubsurleseuil]

Don't be scared - Chapter 2

A Pennywise X F!Reader fanfic. First - Next

Chapter warnings: Violence, blood, discreet mention of a desire to die. It's just the beginning, it's about to get worse.

(Note: It was translated by Deepl, English is not my mother tongue, so I apologise for any mistakes. If you want to correct me, don't hesitate!)

(Note 2: I found the gif at @pennydaddywise)

(Note 3: The "lyrics" of the song are actually quotes from Mr Stephen King.)

It was a difficult night. First, when you arrived home, your body's first reflex was to throw up in the toilet. Then your brain's reflex was to search your apartment from top to bottom to make sure no one was home. Then, finally, you curled up in a ball on your bed, scared out of your wits, unable to sleep. Every minute, you checked your phone, not wanting to believe that the clown's damn message had disappeared. You'd searched your whole phone but couldn't find it. And you hated for most of the night the incredible capacity of the human survival instinct to try and make you believe that all these strange and terrifying events never really happened. Finally, you fell asleep convinced that no, you're not crazy.

Of course, like every night for some time, you had a dream. But not the same one this time. This one was just as hazy and incomprehensible, but less terrifying, and you woke up more peacefully. It made you remember the clown's message: Don't be scared... You laughed nervously, shivers running through your body just thinking about your adventure the day before.

The day had gone by too fast for your liking, and you'd been unable to concentrate on anything, that damn clown haunting your mind at every turn. Then it was finally time for work.

It was a quiet evening, without too many customers. These evenings are often pleasant to spend, but this evening in particular, you could take advantage of it and go home early. The very idea of not seeing the sun when you leave the bar terrifies you.

"Are you sure? There's no one on stage tonight. You can sing if you want."

Your boss suggests you go on stage when there's no one there. You love these moments. Singing and playing on stage is the only time you feel your life isn't miserable. But singing tonight means coming home later, when it's dark... Fuck.

You can't refuse. These moments are too rare. You get up on stage and take advantage of this moment to forget everything, your rotten life, the sadness, the anguish... The clown...

Monsters are real, And ghosts are real too. They live inside us, and sometimes, they win.

Your voice trembles slightly and you close your eyes to concentrate.

God is cruel. Sometimes he makes you live. The devil's voice is sweet to hear.

At the end of your song, the few remaining customers applaud. You hate that noise. It reminds you of harsh reality.

Finally, the bar closes and you leave through the back door. The cool silence of the night reminds you of the horrors of life and you look down the dark, empty alley. The lights are still malfunctioning, and there's a large section of the alleyway plunged into darkness. Obviously...

You reassure yourself that you don't have to go into the forest this time. Phone in hand, you make your way down the alley, lighting every nook and cranny, and you're soon relieved to see that there's nothing and no one there.

You move forward, a little more reassured, towards the exit, towards the light. And as you put your phone back in your bag, something touches your back. It's light and it bounces against you. You turn around slowly, cautiously, holding your breath...

A balloon? A balloon. Red, floating in the middle of the path, alone. The first thing it brings to mind is your dream from last night. Yes, there was a red balloon in it, which you grabbed and flew high into the sky...

Looking at it more closely, you see a piece of paper hanging from its string, wriggling like a hanged man. You untie it and unfold it. On it, in ink as red as blood, a message.

DON'T BE SCARED

You swallow your saliva as thick as sand and your whole body shakes with tremors, preparing to run. But as you turn to leave the alley, two gloved hands grab you, one by the nape of the neck, pulling your hair as you go, the other by the mouth, pressing down hard enough that you can't scream. And you find yourself facing those predatory golden eyes, one of whose pupils squints outwards. A multitude of gleaming, pointed teeth, dripping with slime, smiles at you, just inches from your face.

Faced with such an apparition, your first instinct is to punch the face you recognize as the clown's, but you instantly regret it. True, the grip of his hands has loosened, but you note with horror that his features have deformed where you struck him, his uneven teeth protruding from his mouth in an excruciatingly inhuman way. Blood is dripping from his lip... floating upwards would be more accurate.

You push him back hard and turn to flee, knowing full well it's no use. He grabs you by the arm and pushes you violently back against the alley wall. You grit your teeth as you feel your back and the back of your skull crash against the hard surface. With one hand, he grips your neck and lifts you to his full height. No matter how hard you pull on his arm, you're unable to free yourself and breathing becomes difficult. The clown brings his face close to yours like an enraged predator.

"I said... don't be scared!!!"

He finishes his sentence by slamming you back against the wall. You close your eyes in pain, your head begins to spin and you no longer feel strong enough to push him away. All you can do is watch him rage at you, hoping it's just another nightmare.

"You don't want to live, I know it! Then why are you afraid? Stupid, ridiculous humans... This fear... So beautiful, so appetizing. How am I supposed to resist this?!"

The clown hits you once more, more brutally. This is too much. As your arms fall unconscious to your sides, you faint under his fingers and everything goes black. The last thing you hear is the clown swearing to himself.

When you open your eyes, you're unable to understand where you are. An old-fashioned smell of mildew assails your nostrils and you see dust flying in the dim light of the room. You realize you're lying on something soft, covered. Probably a mattress on the floor. Soon, the pain in the back of your skull reawakens. You run your hand through your hair to find dried blood tangled in your locks.

You sit up abruptly, the events before you fainted coming back to you in an unbearable headache, and a question forces you to hold your breath. What else has this clown... this thing... done to you? Trembling, your hand raises the old grey blanket over your legs and you begin to inspect yourself... Nothing. At first glance, anyway. Everything suggests that he's just put you down there, nothing more. You breathe again.

Your gaze finally settles around you: you find yourself in an empty room, apart from the mattress you're lying on. The light is diffused, so unnatural that you want to define it as dark, even if that doesn't make sense. The windows are so dirty that you can't tell if it's still night. You have no idea what time it is or how long it's been since the clown attack.

You suddenly see your shoes tossed haphazardly around the room, as well as your bag. That's all it takes for you to rush out of the mattress and rummage through it, your phone being your goal. But you panic when you realize it's buggy. It doesn't look particularly broken though, it simply refuses to work, the screen displaying bizarre glitches and... The message the clown marked last time, in the forest. You throw your phone to the ground in anguished annoyance.

Close your eyes. Inhale. exhale. You've got to get out of here. A hint of determination returning, you pick up your phone, your bag and put on your shoes. Passing as quietly as possible through the first doors you come to, you arrive in a corridor with a staircase leading down a few meters from you. You descend carefully, the steps creaking beneath your feet. But there's no sign of the clown, and the door opposite the steps seems to be the entrance door. You suddenly have the foolish hope of getting out of here without any trouble.

You approach slowly, your hand sliding noiselessly over the handle of the closed door. You turn it slowly... but nothing happens. You pull, you push, quietly at first, then louder and louder, suddenly panic-stricken. But nothing happens. The door doesn't move. It doesn't move at all. As if it were an optical illusion painted on the wall. A groan of despair escapes and you hold back your tears. Inhale. Exhale. All is not lost, there are always the windows.

They're as dirty and dimly lit as those upstairs, plunging the house into an atmosphere of eternal twilight. Some are boarded up, but not all. In a room that looks like a living room, you work hard on one of them, but get the same result as with the door. In a fit of anger, you end up banging on what's supposed to be the glass, even throwing a stool lying around, in vain.

A few seconds pass before a cry of rage comes from your mouth. And you knew that all the noise you'd made would attract the clown. A weak but piercing laugh pushes you to turn towards the entrance to the room. There he is, leaning against the wall, mocking you without the slightest hint of embarrassment.

"Silly, silly little human. Thinking you can escape from my house. So stupid, so angry..."

He pauses, and you can see his mocking smile break down, giving way to annoyance, his features turning stern.

"...So scared... again..."

You step back as he moves closer to you. You'd have thought his eyes were blue a second ago... You quickly bend down to grab the stool you threw at the window, tossing it at the clown to distract him and get around him, running towards the living room exit. You already knew it wouldn't work and you're not surprised to feel him propel you to the floor. He barely gives you time to turn around before pinning you down on your back. Your eyes see his face blurred by tears, while you feel warm drool running down your shirt. Above you, the clown shakes frantically, as if arguing with himself about what to do with you.

"Fear... so delicious... Maybe I should... eat you.... No! Or maybe... just a little...?"

He shakes his head like an animal shredding a piece of meat, and the comparison terrifies you.

"No. No! You are..."

His gloved hand caresses your face with a gentleness that makes you sob. Your eyes close tightly, as if that's enough to make you forget everything that's going on.

"...perfect. I need you."

You feel the clown's breath coming closer and your eyes reopen in panic. You can see his lips curling over his sharp teeth, many more of them. Your brain refuses to believe what it's seeing and you start laughing nervously.

"Don't. Be. Scared."

It's an order and he emphasizes it by snapping his teeth together in a jaw-clenching sound that echoes in your head. At this point, he lets go and walks away, leaving you alone on the floor with your migraine, covered in drool. All you hear is the echo of your own delirious laughter, resonating in your eardrums as if it belonged to someone else. 

[carnivalcarriondiscarded]

ON THE TOPIC OF BARNABY. as well as his relationship with Wally.

So. To kick this off - Riv (@funonion) and I were Speculating, and they introduced me to the johari window:

They put Barnaby in the “facade” section, and I entirely agree. To quote them;

“So he’s Wally’s guide, right? He’s the “knowledgeable” one of the two and is always the one teaching him new things. And you know, it’s one thing if you’re just teaching him how to laugh or how to tell a joke. But.

Clown has given us two doors. One says that Barnaby understands Wally in a way the rest of the neighborhood doesn’t, and is willing to do his dirty work so to speak. The other says that their friendship was not a natural occurring thing and had to be enforced repeatedly within the show. HOW THAT’S BEING ENFORCED IS ANOTHER THING ENTIRELY but it is worth it to note.

What is Barnaby willing to keep? What is he willing to bury for his little buddy? I can’t say anything definitively yet, but the fact that I even have to ask is telling. The class clown archetype is usually used as a way to cover up for something else a character might be experiencing”

And my response, (I won’t directly quote because I have little things in the phrasing & elaboration to add / tweak );

Barnaby being a Comic Relief Character immediately raised so many alarms in my head. I love comic relief characters. They’re always so fucked up in one way or another, and Barnaby is almost certainly SO inauthentic. He’s wearing a comedy mask just as opaque as Wally’s own mask. In everything we’ve seen about him so far he’s either Teaching Wally, wisecracking/joking, or… pretty much nothing else. We got that moment of concern in audio 14-14, but that doesn’t reveal anything beyond genuine care for Wally.

Comedic characters have the best disguises. Their poker faces & ability to deflect is always top tier [and practiced], and just look at comedy-focused actors and entertainers - so many of them have severe issues, either with their mental health or life. From what i’ve observed both in that aspect & with fictional characters, they play it off & work hard to entertain/deflect [one in the same] right up until the end. Sometimes it’s a coping mechanism. Usually it’s both. If they laugh loud enough and make people think they’re lighthearted fools w/ nothing underneath, no one will look any deeper and thus they’re “safe”. 

& I’m a little suspicious that Barnaby’s red/orange/yellow spots aren’t naturally those colors. While yes, he could be (in-universe) designed that way to echo Ms. Beagle, there’s a strong possibility that that’s not it. What if he paints them to feel a connection to her, or it’s a physical manifestation of Barnaby covering up his insecurities/issues - what if it’s part of him striving to convince the world that he is what he paints himself as. 

The laidback funnyguy with a loving mom and not a problem in the world. 

And I mean, Barnaby claims to be a natural blue and I believe him! But the other colors? I’m doubtful

(I was going to include the Cast As Lil Kids Designs in this since Barnaby has all blue spots, but given how early in 2021 it was posted and how there seem to be little discrepancies from the ~official~ designs, I don’t want to provide it as evidence.)

& on the topic of Wally and Barnaby’s relationship being both real and not - disclaimer, this conversation happened before my Updated Thoughts On Them post, so there may be some minor rephrasing here from what I originally said - I’m sure that the relationship started out as inauthentic. Wally was assigned Barnaby as a best friend and technically vice versa, but I don’t doubt for a second that it became real to some extent. Clown wouldn’t treat their relationship outside of “canon” WH stuff the way that he does if they weren’t actually friends. They’ve said that Wally & Barnaby would be friends in every universe (which melts my heart <3 platonic soulmates my beloved <3), so then I have to agree with Riv. what WILL Barnaby do for Wally? I touched on this in the Milk Theory, but especially if Barnaby prides himself on “knowing Wally better than anything else”, what would Barn do to preserve that?

This relates to another conversation we had - Barnaby possibly having abandonment issues. It’s such a choice to have him of all characters be explicitly stated as an orphan. That and while every other Neighbor with a mentioned family have a somewhat large one (Howdy and his gajillion relatives, Julie and her three siblings, Poppy and her crowded tree [note: Eddie has a mentioned mother, but that info is tenuous and who knows if there are other Dears]), Barnaby has also explicitly stated that Ms. Beagle is his only family. That’s it. And farm life can’t be a sociable way to grow up, not with all the chores he must have had and how rural he might have grown up. Barnaby jokes that Home is the “Big Apple”, which could just be a joke - but jokes often come from a place of truth, and Home might be the most populated area Barnaby has lived in. Who’s to say!

Either way, Barnaby was orphaned one way or another, and I don’t doubt that it weighs on him. Especially if  his birth parents really did abandon him. That added to a possible life of loneliness… I wonder if he’s latched onto Wally emotionally, which would hit all the painful places if it turns out that my “Barnaby is more attached to Wally than Wally is to Barnaby” theory has merit. Abandonment issues could also strongly back the apparent walls he’s plastered over with circus tent fabric

Back to Barnaby & Wally: the fact that, at present, Barnaby and Wally seem to have the best disguises / strongest masks. That. looking at 14-14, i suspect that Barnaby is excellent at keeping his up, but as soon as Wally’s mask cracks, so does Barnaby’s. 

And then there’s the side of their dynamic that we could look at - it seems to be a very multifaceted relationship. The way that Barnaby genuinely cares yet in the 00 Halloween audio Wally was left off to the side and Barnaby was just “checking on him” while socializing (then again, this could be part of Barnaby understanding Wally & respecting his space / Wally wanting a break from that socialization). Barnaby is patient with Wally and yet he seems to sometimes treat Wally as his sidekick / let him fade into the background and yet Barnaby kept checking in on Wally during the 14 bug audios (this last one I could tie into the abandonment issues theory). 

Then there’s how Barnaby calls Wally kid & can tend to treat him like one despite both of them being in the same age group. The way that all of this could, in a way, relate to the infantilization of autistic people (no matter how well-meaning or unintentional) & internalized ableism. 

Note: Riv pointed out that Barnaby does seem to be doing the best with what he has, and that this can connect to the Johari Window’s blind spot / unknown. 

I do agree with this wholeheartedly! And I have to mention that - and making a Very educated guess here - the interactions we’ve seen take place in the very late 60s / very early 70s, so Barnaby’s behavior towards Wally is actually pretty fucking stellar given the time period. We can’t expect him to be perfect or do everything / say everything right. That would be boring I think! And one thing I deeply appreciate about the Neighbors & their dynamics is that they feel like real layered people, not cardboard cutouts being perfect caricatures of what people are “supposed” to be like.

Riv also presented this:

We likely are going to reach a point where Wally asks Barnaby something that he can’t / doesn’t want to / won’t answer. And like.. Ok. This is a slight tangent but I swear it’s related! When I first discovered WH and learned the Wally basics, I wondered two things.

Are we going to watch Wally “discover” new emotions? Because he certainly has them. Clown has said that Wally only ever feels happy, and a lot of people took that to mean that Wally can’t feel anything else. I don’t think we should take that answer at face value, because. I mean. Look at the project & creator we’re talking about. Layers, guys. Indirect direct answers. I think that Clown meant that Wally only ever feels happy in the Neighborhood because he has no reason to feel any negative emotion. Everything is as it should be. Until it isn’t - and I think that’s where he’s going to have to struggle with new emotions as he encounters them through new situations/events unfolding as the “story” starts to deteriorate. We’ve actually seen this a little bit - in Wally’s record audios (i believe the chronological second to last?), the way he says “Let Me In” so insistently. That’s definitely not a positive emotion being expressed. 

How will the topic of death be handled - because it will be handled, it’s stated in the project warnings. I was wondering this even before I read the list, because I was presented with a blank slate puppet character and so went “oh fuck, this dude doesn’t know about death, does he?” Obviously I wanted to know how that would go. I want to know how it Will go! 

How would Barnaby explain emotions that Wally doesn’t know how to convey? How would Barnaby explain death in a way that Wally would understand - given that Barnaby (& all the Neighbors sans Wally) knows what death is  - and would Barnaby be willing to explain such a thing? I have a feeling we may find out.

And in a way, I suspect that if none of them know, Wally will find out himself and have to process it without help. But then again, how can something die if it was never really alive in the first place? Unless the death warning relates to human characters… I’m currently assuming it relates to both humans and puppets. 

In conclusion: Barnaby has a carefully fabricated facade, he's doing the best with what he has but it likely won't be enough, and uh. shits fucked!

[blitzosicedcoffee]

More HB Incorrect Quotes to distract from the

~Thoughts~:

Blitz: Stolas I'm here to save you!

Stolas: *sips tea* hmm?

Andrealphus: and then I told her-she could stick it up her arse!

Stolas: ohhhh hehehehehe

Blitz:.....wtf is this

Stolas: oh blitz hi! Andre was just telling me what he told Stella when she asked him to help her with the divorce. Turns out we have more in common than we thought.

Blitz:.....I don't think I love you anymore

Stolas: you loved me 🥺

-----------

Blitz: and then I told Fizz, 'hey, stop clowning around ya doofus and help me with my boy problems!' haha....ha....

Moxxie: 😑 sir I just asked how your weekend was. I'm never asking again.

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

Blitz: Where's your sense of empathy?

Loona: with your mom.

Blitz: mine did die with her 😭

Loona: wtf ..

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

Blitz: *takes blindfold off Stolas* voila!

Stolas: 😧

*all of his pots are broken and the plants are shoved in a corner of the garden*

Blitz: I made us an outdoor seating area with a fire pit! *Points proudly*

Stolas: *eye twitches* it's ....wonderful....dear.....

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

Blitz: Get ready for a life on the run, gang!

Millie: IVE BEEN TRAINING FOR THIS! *Runs off*

Blitz: where...where the fuck is she going?

Moxxie: I have no idea.

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

Blitz: *walks up to the secretary desk and gives Stolas a sultry smile* are you...behaving...employee?

Stolas: I believe so. I've organized all your paperwork and called everyone back and rescheduled the hits for tomorrow.

Blitz: fuckin...that's....that's great 😑 good job.

Stolas: 😊

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

Moxxie: *barges in Blitz's office* Blitz, Stolas moved all my paperwork!

Stolas: *leans sexily against the doorframe* blitzzyyy Moxxie is just being so unfair....

Blitz: 😳 get over it Moxx.

Moxxie: but sir!

Blitz: I said get over it! 😤

[mieczyhale]

this was so fun!! much thanks to @its-tortle for the tag (as i get to this ages late lmao)

- - - - - - - - - -

RULES: Put your playlist on shuffle. For each of the 10 interview questions, select a lyric from the random song that comes up. (Skip if there aren’t any lyrics and make sure to drop the name of the song in your interview answer!)

1. First off, how would you describe yourself in one sentence?

I love everything, fire's spreading all around my room, my world's so bright, it's hard to breathe but that's alright "cradles" - sub urban

2. What kind of [insert my super secret zodiac sign] are you?

You've got to make a choice if the music drowns you out, and raise your voice every single time they try and shut your mouth "sing" - my chemical romance

3. You’re visiting your favorite spot, what are you thinking about?

Can you feel it? I gotta live with it everyday, I can't take the pressure, I'm going insane "bad religion" - godsmack

4. If your life was a movie, what do you think the first review would say about it?

They say"freak" when you're singled out, the red, well it filters through "red" - chevelle

5. Say you get a book deal, what are you titling your memoir?

Take or leave who I am 'cause this is me, like a fish out of water, do I belong here? "pride" - american authors

6. What would you say about your best friends?

Speak to me when all you got to keep is strong, move along, move along like I know you do "move along" - the all-american rejects

7. Think back to when you had everything all figured out in high school, what was your life motto as a teenager?

I just wanted you to tell me the truth, you know I'd do that for you "running away" - hoobastank

8. Describe your aesthetic now:

I won't give up so don't give in, you've fallen down but you will rise again "a reason to fight" - disturbed

9. What’s a lyric that they’ll quote in your eulogy?

I bet you got pushed around, somebody made you cold, but that cycle ends right now, 'cause you can't lead me down that road "mean" - taylor swift

10. And for our final question, say we believe in soulmates, what do you think their first impression of meeting you will be?

Clowns to the left of me, jokers to the right, here I am stuck in the middle with you "stuck in the middle" - stealers wheel

tagging:: @deanspillowprincess @penguinsandpanthers @ketterdam-snack-bar @octoberconstellation @starkund-schon and whoever else wants to do it :3

[rineedagger]

Some things I've learned this pasts twenty six years

Do NOT alter your form and size to fit into somebody's ribcage. Authenticity is the ground for a healthy environment.

Authenticity can't exist without self-criticism and sticking to your core values.

A peaceful solitude is just as important as a nutritious companionship.

We aren't born knowing, not even of our own self. Wisdom is the fruit of life-long learning, therefore, making mistakes is the key to be and do better (this reminds me of the famously quote "Do not be sorry, be better" from Kratos lol).

Doubting, asking questions, is the concrete to build a fulfilling life.

Remaining the same does not imply to be more stable nor having a healthier life.

Easy and good are not synonyms.

Enough with the label bullshit and the blaming. It isn't about been or not been normal/right, your life/truth is yours only. Do not try to make sense of it using somebody else's eyes.

Medical checking is important. Nobody likes going to the doctor nor feeling sick (and yes, I am talking about going to the therapist and psychiatrist as well). It is part of been human and you will never be alone in the process.

Cooking life actively and over a low heat, is vital to have an appetizing full of flavour meal.

I'm never going to feel ready nor good enough.

Life isn't right nor makes sense. Do not try looking for the missing leg, you'll lose yourself in the process.

Communication is important, but not all communication matters. It has to be direct, understandable and, overall, precised. Overcommunication is as bad as the total absence of it, if not more painful.

Accepting and respecting are not the same thing. One is mandatory while the other, even important, isn't indispensable.

In order to live and not survive, you have to accept your own vulnerability and fragility.

Drinking water is always the good choice.

There will never be enough strawberries to satisfy the craving.

Whoever loves you today may not love you tomorrow, and that's okay.

There isn't such thing as good and bad emotions, rather comfortable and uncomfortable ones. And we must feel them all.

Setting boundaries with yourself and your surrounding is vital to be certain that, whoever remains by your side, is because they actively want you and love you, since there are parts of your self that are not negotiable. If not, you will always be the coach, the therapist, the mother, the sister, the helper, the clown, the mad one, the weirdo, the mysterious one, the thug, the whore, etc., but never you. Consequently, these means an assured expiry date plus food poisoning (I don't know why I'm comparing so much with food...maybe it's because I didn't eat strawberries for a while).

Social media has become a demanding, violent and sick place, filled with expectations, constant stimulation, manipulated or sensational information, rule-following, triggers, distortions and the possibility of been reachable to people that you don't need in your life. It is okay if you can't live in it. Also, if you're the reactive kind, set boundaries immediately with how you manage your social media and your exposure and be firm with it (believe me, I couldn't stand seen someone hating my friend on social media and saying lie after lie after lie...it was REALLY consuming and it leaded to impulsive and shameful acts).

If you are the one that overthinks or re-read texts after a fight, delete them.

Having life-long or very long friendships does not mean that you should cope with every mistreatment.

Do not remain by somebody else's side only because you pity them. Pityness and no compassion is vile.

The same with egotistical interests. The other person is a whole living being aside of yourself, if you put your own interests and greeds as the motivation of that relationship or over it, is vile.

The world is not trying to punish you for any mistake you've done nor for any joy you've experienced. That is, indeed, the process of living.

Boredom is a freaking gift, and a pleasure indeed.

[web-novel-polls]

Favorite WN Quotes - Bonus: ORV

Quote 11: KDJ Crying

I didn’t cry. 「 Kim Dokja was crying. 」 - Kim Dokja & the Fourth Wall, Omniscient Reader’s Viewpoint, Chapter 180

Quote 37: Three Ways to Survive in a Ruined World

「There are three ways to survive in a ruined world. I have forgotten some of them now. However, one thing is certain: you who are currently reading these words will survive.  –Three Ways to Survive in a Ruined World [Complete]」 - Omniscient Reader’s Viewpoint, Chapter 1

Quote 38: I Believe in You

"If hyung was such a person, you wouldn't have saved me on the subway. I believe in you.”  - Lee Gilyoung to Kim Dokja, Omniscient Reader's Viewpoint, Chapter 21 

Quote 39: Just Somehow Survive

"Survive and take responsibility! Atone for the rest of your life or live a garbage life. Just somehow survive!”  - Kim Dokja to Lee Jihye, Omniscient Reader’s Viewpoint, Chapter 40 

Quote 40: Wanted to Believe

"Still… if possible, I wanted to believe. I was able to come here because I believed in someone.”  - Yoo Sangah, Omniscient Reader’s Viewpoint, Chapter 46

Quote 41: Face the Wall

“I only believe in people with walls. In order to understand someone, I think I should face that wall first.” - Han Donghoon, Omniscient Reader’s Viewpoint, Chapter 60

Quote 42: Fuck capitalism fr

"Working up to build up history to become a constellation and then building up narratives to become narrative-grade constellations… then what? The higher the sky, the brighter the star? How long will you continue using the descendants of this land for your own sake?”  - Kim Dokja, Omniscient Reader’s Viewpoint, Chapter 72 

Quote 43: Won't Give Up So Easily

“–If I was going to give up so easily, I wouldn't have started this journey.” - Yoo Joonghyuk, Omniscient Reader’s Viewpoint, Chapter 82

Quote 44: No Sentences Describing These Deaths

“I had read all of Ways of Survival. I understood the settings, the meaning of the explanations and finally thought that I had figured out the author's intentions. But in Ways of Survival, there were no sentences describing these deaths.”  - Omniscient Reader’s Viewpoint, Chapter 90

Quote 45: Loved by the Others

“I, someone of no redeeming quality, could be loved by the others.” - Omniscient Reader’s Viewpoint, Chapter 513

Quote 46: Pound at the Walls

“Even if we can't reach each other, even if we can't meet each other, we should continue to pound away on each other's walls. Even if that wall would never open up, keep writing something on that wall, anyway.” - Omniscient Reader’s Viewpoint, Chapter 538 

Quote 47: Most Proficient at Lying

“She wanted to tell him. Tell him that there was a world that didn't need his sacrifice to be saved. She thought that, if it was her, she should be able to do it.  Because she was most proficient at lying than anyone alive, after all.” - Omniscient Reader’s Viewpoint, Chapter 539

[Propaganda below] - Spoilers Warning!

Quote 11: KDJ Crying

Submission: 

Kim Dokja, putting on clown makeup: "I didn't cry."  The narrative, immediately calling him out: HELLO???YOU'RE LITERALLY SOBBING.  Kim Dokja, getting louder, as circus music starts to play behind him: "I'm a reliable narrator!" All of Kim Dokja Company: staring immediately at the camera like they're on the office

Quote 39: Just Somehow Survive!

Just somehow survive!!!! You can’t atone through death!!! You just have to somehow survive!!!

Okay, serious talk, this quote makes me want to eat dirt due to Kim Dokja (insert spoilers here) saying it to Lee Jihye, a teenager, facing her trauma of killing her best friend in a life-or-death situation. Kim Dokja killing Kim Namwoon as a way of killing him younger self is OUT, Kim Dokja helping Lee Jihye as a way of helping his younger self is IN (/mainly joking)

[zeroducks-2]

I've just finished Gotham Knights and I get that people aren't happy with the fucked ass haircuts but like, I do believe this is the most progressive and well written Jason Todd we've ever gotten in recent times. Even in recent comics. Like damn, bro goes to therapy, picked up his interests and hobbies again (e.g. the cooking and the reading and the shit talking) from his "Robin makes me Magic" days. Like yeah, he's still edgy, but he was murdered by a fucking Clown, he's allowed to be edgy. We got a Jason Todd that isn't diluted to "the angry black sheep character" archetype. He's healing, working on himself, his relationship with his family, and he's fighting his way (brutal and all strength and tact) to do what he stands for and what he believes is right. And his heart is just so big and full of compassion, but it doesnt blind him and make him wishful or naive. He's so well balanced in Gotham Knights. I hope this version of his character is written in future comics. I'm sick of DC writers making him this angry anti-hero who's only reasoning and purpose in life is to get back at Batman for failing him and so many others. Jason is allowed to be more than his trauma. Thank you Gotham Knights for seeing that.

I'm glad you enjoyed the game anon. I personally am not a fan, not because of Jason but because of the game itself. The dialogues felt stale, more reminiscent of tumblr "incorrect Batfam quotes" than the source material, and the NPCs felt dull compared to how full of life they were in the Arkham series (so much so I would hide in random spots just to hear them talking about the current game events, especially in AK). The most unforgivable bit to me was Tim not having ever fought the rogues because he's "young" - I've never seen anything more insulting and infantilizing for a character which already heavily suffers for being treated as the useless one, never allowed to participate in the game changing dynamics or to have meaningful arcs, and is relegated to being the cute little bisexual twink.

That being said it's a matter of taste, and Gotham Knights is surely a good game for those who prefer a wholesome loving family approach to these characters. Jason working on himself and going to therapy and having a good relationship with his "family" is surely what lots of people (especially in here) want to see. Me, I don't think any amount of therapy would help since therapy is based on shared human experiences and repetition of patterns, and Jason died and dug himself out of his own grave. That's not a trauma any therapist would have the means to help with. They indeed "diluted" the event in the game, changed the fact that Jason dug himself out of his own grave and was functionally braindead and homeless for two years, and made it so UTRH never happened in order for therapy to make any sense, because there is no reconciliation possible with a parent that slit your neck to save the person who broke all your bones with a crowbar and then murdered you.

It's kinda like when Wally went to therapy (canonically) after Barry's death. The therapist was a good one and he tried! But ultimately he didn't manage to make a real difference because Wally is the Flash, a super-powered creature with time bending powers who does things on the scale of absurdity, and who also happens to have had an extremely traumatic childhood and to have just lost the only person who ever loved him unconditionally. His problems have roots in reality but are out of the scope of any therapy method currently known to man.

And Jason is more than his trauma, but pretending his trauma doesn't inform his actions and can be solved with him "working on himself" is not an approach I hope they take in comics. I'd rather they went back to Jason doing things his way and protecting the people of Gotham in the only manner he finds helpful, because he experienced on his own skin (twice!) that Batman's methods don't work. I'd rather they allowed him to stop clashing with Bruce as main theme of his stories, and have his own plotlines in which he's in between a vigilante and a mafia lord (which they were doing with Dick by the way, before chickening out and have Slade bomb Bludhaven) with Bruce only as a cameo sometimes.

We have a high number of morally irrepressible characters who always do the right thing more or less. I'd like Jason to be something different, something darker, because there is a dramatic lack of grey characters and anti-heroes which were sanded down to either 100% bad guys or 100% good guys. I hate that, why can't we have nuanced choices and people struggling with the darkness they carry, why does everyone need to be a perfect "unproblematic" paragon of goodness who would never do anything wrong. We have A LOT of characters like that and I love them, I really do! But if everyone and their families are like that then it's really frickin boring!

Plus, I'd like the characters to actually struggle with their past traumas in a meaningful way, otherwise why even giving them those traumas to begin with. Give me Tim still grappling with how he couldn't save his father, give me Dick haunted by all the times he slipped and let go of the no killing rule in a way or another, give me Jason haunted by the tragedy of being abandoned by every person who was supposed to protect him and working from there to being the protector of everyone else.

That's what I hope DC would pick up and write about. I was never much for fluff and wholesome things unless it's in small amounts, I always preferred strife and complexity. But hey, I'm glad you enjoyed the game, at least one of us did!

[chickawah23]

This🤡 thing turned into an analysis of I Hate It Here based on that one little glitch lolol

You know if I was a crazy I’d think that “no midnight in Paris” glitch only on Apple Music was directed for me to hear. However the glitch is only on the streaming side of Apple Music or I need a new phone or beats headphones idk. But as of right now I haven’t heard it on my album because I tripled checked “I Hate It Here” on my purchased version and it was fine.

Here is a link to a video that shows the glitch.

Here’s the glitchy lyric from I Hate It Here:

“Seems like it was never even fun back then / Nostalgia is a mind's trick / [no midnight in paris] If I'd been there, I'd hate it / It was freezing in the palace”

Why would I think this was a targeted glitch?

I had a thought trail clown theory about Karlie and jack hinting at midnight in Paris before the Midnights album dropped and we got the song Paris in the 3am version and it made my life.

Because every Spotify wrapped over the last few years I post on here and I say I listen to taylor on my Apple Music library more than Spotify. 🤡

Nostalgia and the movie midnight in Paris

So idk. At the very end of my midnights in Paris post I brought up the film Midnight in Paris which is basically a writer who travels back in time to 1920s Paris at midnight and he meets all the great artists of that time. Essentially this romantic is nostalgic for what he believes is the golden age. But by the end of the movie he realize there will always be a past to run away from the present back to so maybe learn to like where you’re at. Here is a quote about nostalgia from the movie:

“Nostalgia is denial. Denial of the painful present. The name for this denial is Golden Age thinking - the erroneous notion that a different time period is better than the one ones living in - its a flaw in the romantic imagination of those people who find it difficult to cope with the present.”

So the lyric before the glitch is “Nostalgia is a mind’s trick.” Then “No midnight in Paris.” But she’s singing about not wanting to go to another point in time because no time would be better than where we are at currently so the safest place for her is in her mind. But the twist to this concept is that it’s not a nonexistent fantasy. It’s a secret life she keeps in her mind unspoken. (“Now you hang from my lips like the gardens of Babylon.”).

Why do I think this?

Because in the same song she says “I'll save all my romanticism for my inner life and I'll get lost on purpose.” She says inner life instead of inner thoughts. And then she says I’ll get lost on purpose which reminded me of the song How Did It End? Specifically this line “"Guess who we ran into at the shops? Walking in circles like she was lost. Didn't you hear? They called it all off.” She wasn’t lost she just wanted to look lost. She’s putting on a performance or act to keep her inner life sacred. Nostalgia is for the fans to focus on while she protects her secret unspoken present.

It’s just all very much the lakes to me.

“It kinda is the overarching theme of the whole album. Of trying to escape, having something to protect, trying to protect your own sanity.” - Taylor discussing the lakes at lpss

Anywhoooooo i think this is an okay place to stop.This is a rambly tangent that went all over the place. lol But I am okay with that.

[onward--upward]

I’ve never watched 911 in my life but I’m so invested in Buddie it isn’t funny, I come on my dash and see that bi Buck is canon?? Is it actually literally canon?? What happened!!???

hiii!!!! okay well first of all i LOVEEE that you’re invested in buddie without watching the show!! (you should watch the show though it is wonderful for many reasons outside of them as well!!)

technically he is not literally canon yet, however, people have been speculating that it’s coming, and then today buck’s actor oliver stark gave an interview that was extreeeeemely queer-coded and included lines like this:

and knowing that his storyline this week is going to involve jealousy over eddie’s friendship with tommy (a character who has been in a few previous episodes and who showed up again last week), to ME bi!buck seems very likely!! because i literally cannot think of another explanation for these quotes, haha 💖💜💙

i won’t truly believe it until i see it, but at this point i have a permanent seat in the clown car

[foxes-that-run]

Mirrorball

Taylor said the entire song "This is me trying" is referenced in Mirrorball. It is about celebrity, a performer without an audience who makes art from her pain and can't stop. She talks about being a different version of yourself for specific people, to me this is also who she is with away from performing. It is a self-reflection song but also refers Harry and his Sign of the Times which is a similar.

Lyrics

I want you to know I'm a mirrorball I'll show you every version of yourself tonight I'll get you out on the floor Shimmering beautiful And when I break it's in a million pieces

The opening verse is setting the scene that the song is about Taylor entertaining everyone with her glimmering performance where she sings about her pain and heartbreak.

Taylor also refers to breaking into many pieces in Big Red Machine's Renegade "And if I would've known / How many pieces you had crumbled into / I might have let them lay" while in Renegade it is her muse who is broken in Mirrorball it is herself.

Taylor is reflecting on how pain and heartbreak is what she is rewarded for, she talks about this in Miss Americana also

Hush When no one is around, my dear You'll find me on my tallest tiptoes Spinning in my highest heels, love Shining just for you Hush I know they said the end is near But I'm still on my tallest tiptoes Spinning in my highest heels, love Shining just for you

This section is considering who she is without an audience, and who's attention she has in private, away from performing.

'hush, the end is near' is a direct quote of Harry's Sign of the Times, "Just stop your crying / It'll be alright / They told me that the end is near" I think she is relating to him and he is the listener.

In the Long Pond introduction she spoke about being a different version of herself for people. She is saying she is still performing for those in her life even when she is off stage.

I want you to know I'm a mirrorball I can change everything about me to fit in You are not like the regulars The masquerade revelers Drunk as they watch my shattered edges glisten

In Renegade she also refers to edges of broken pieces of emotion, there as her muse and here herself, being used to entertain in song. "And if I would've known / How sharp the pieces were you'd crumbled into / I might’ve let them lay"

This verse is reflecting on how she shows a different side of herself to different people. This muse is not like everyone else who marvels are her pain in song, this muse sees Taylor.

Which is interesting, Harry has a similar, though less flattering lyric in Fools Gold: "And I knew that you turned it on for everyone you met / But I don't regret / Falling for your fool's gold"

While in Fools Gold Harry saw that Taylor performed for everyone, he took that as him not being special and loved her anyway. Mirrorball is the reverse, she performs for everyone, but rather than marveling at her shining heartbreak like the other revelers he's there for her. It’s worth noting unlike anyone else in her life much of their heartbreak is shared.

Music for a Sushi restaurant is also similar, in that it comments that they are making music for others, but Harry would rather be together "Music for whatever you want / Scuba-duba-do-boo-boo I'm not going to get lost / I'm not going to go broke / Staying cool / (Know I love you, babe)"

And they called off the circus Burned the disco down When they sent home the horses And the rodeo clowns I'm still on that tightrope I'm still trying everything to get you laughing at me I'm still a believer but I don't know why I've never been a natural All I do is try, try, try I'm still on that trapeze I'm still trying everything To keep you looking at me

Here the circus, disco and clowns are shows being cancelled by the pandemic/ In the Long Pond Session Taylor said this verse is about the pandemic, her shows were cancelled and she reflected on who she is without an audience and starting to drink.

I'm not a natural, all I do is try, try, try is referring to "This is me Trying", which Taylor notes in the Long Pond Session.

To me 'Still a believer' is also a reference to Hoax. I hear this section as without the ability to perform for her fans, Taylor is left to reflect on her personal life and who she wants attention from. She reflects her insecurities in her personal relationships

This is also in Say don't go, with the same muse "I’m standin' on a tightrope alone / I hold my breath a little bit longer / Halfway out the door, but it won't close/ I'm holdin' out hope for you to" this is so similar, and less matured than Mirrorball and Hoax where she is holding out faith this person will notice and love her.

In the Daylight Music Video, released after Mirrorball:

Because I'm a mirrorball I'm a mirrorball I'll show you every version of yourself Tonight

This returns to the beginning, Taylor puts her audience of 1 or 100,000 first, before herself.

[theluckywizard]

Trotting the longfic out because hellooooo DA fandom, nice to see you perking up!

My multiship Cullenmance, Hawkemance WIP In the Shattering of Things! My girl Rose Trevelyan is funny and plucky and not real talented but doing her best. She comes a loooong way.

In the Shattering of Things

WC: (WIP) 405,305 New chapters biweekly Rating: Explicit Ships: f!Trevelyan x Cullen, f!Trevelyan x m!Hawke Summary: Lady Rose Trevelyan's idle, aristocratic life blinks out in a haze of irrelevance when the breach destroys the Conclave. She may be soft and coddled when she joins the Inquisition, but there's a fierceness inside her she's yet to fully recognize. Armed with only a few relevant skills and the mark that makes her a legend, she is thrust onto a path delivering hope where it’s long been scorched away and finds comfort in the grumpy, handsome stick in the mud charged with her protection and training. As she stumbles her way across southern Thedas, she begins to realize she's tangled at the center of machinations she barely understands, and she's not alone in that. Enter Hawke.

Meet the romantic leads and art below the cut 👇

Rose Trevelyan

29 years old, plucky, funny, playful. A weird mix of pragmatic and flights of fancy. Bit of a brat really, but she is trying her best at all times. She's got some rich lady hunting skills, and a bunch of other skills that make her a nice catch in the Marcher marriage market, but other than that? She is learning on the fly. Character quotes:

"Yes and with my eloquence, I’ll be lying face first in my own pile of metaphorical horseshit"

"I was always a terrible Chosen One. The Maker was amusing himself."

"You want– what– a fruit basket? A commemorative mug?"

"This is starting to feel like a can of worms. A really gorgeous can of worms."

"There’s nothing quite like a family with a storied lineage that has managed to squander their wealth. The combination of snobbery and desperation is always a joy to behold."

"You’re a couple dozen smolders away from making me your puppet."

"I believe my dignity was thrown from my body when I crashed into you. I think it’s still out there in the bailey somewhere."

Cullen Rutherford

Does he really need an introduction? I'll skip to quotes.

Character Quotes:

"In the Order people were made to scrub the privy floors for that kind of backtalk"

"Am I to learn that I’ve developed wiles next?"

"Oh, were we planning to assault the palace with undead?"

"You predicated a tactical plan on a joke?"

"Smooth? I’m not the common thief caught breaking into an unlocked door"

“Rylen was entirely too pleased with himself. I’m sure he’ll continue to be so today. It’s insupportable.”

Garrett Hawke:

34, warrior. Silly, chaotic, romantic, consummate big brother who just can't seem to keep away from trouble. Deep pool of guilt and sadness beneath his affable, goofy exterior. He just wants a chance to fix things he unwittingly helped break.

Character Quotes:

"Let’s do that again. Backward and inside out."

"Well fuck them. Elegantly. With a crystal goblet."

"I dedicated myself to that place. To the refugees. To the people who needed someone when the law was failing them. I never hid behind a desk and pretended to care while innocent mages were made tranquil on the whims of some clown before his first lyrium hit of the day."

"I only ever wanted two things— I wanted to help. And I wanted to be entertained. And I never seemed to learn my lesson."

"You smell like pie. Or those ginger biscuits from Starkhaven that come in those little tins. Shockingly edible. Was that on purpose?"

"You seem worried about my influence. What could I possibly say to her? Don’t be an arse nugget? Don’t forget all the collateral you could squash as you steamroll ahead?"

Read the fic here!

Art by me! 👆

Art by ExaltedDawn 👆

Art by me!

Art by me 👆

Art by me 👆