#(... but I really love this backstory for the little tiger warrior)

[spooky-spextre-arts]

Antonio's Birthday HC #2:

One of Antonio's most beloved presents: the tiger pillow.

This little guy was once again made by Mirabel, who had then been gifted to her little cousin on the night before he turned 4.

A kind townsperson Antonio befriended gifted him a few twine-bound pages of a late family member's studies on tigers (conducted long before the Encanto), knowing how much Antonio loved and cared for animals. The booklet's promise of another big animal (like jaguars) quickly sparked Antonio's fixation on the unfamiliar striped cat.

Because of his sheer love for the animal, Mirabel made quick work on a tiger-themed present for her cousin's birthday, ready to present it to him on the day he turned four.

Unfortunately, on the night before then, Mirabel found little Antonio in the middle of the night, crying and shaking, having been deeply shook by a terrifying nightmare... one about a tiger.

Since he was unable to easily go back to sleep, Mirabel gave Antonio the special pillow early, promising him this tiger was friendly and would chase away his nightmares. Antonio snuggled with Mirabel that night in the same bed, hugging his new gift close to his chest.

When he fell back asleep, he knew that Mirabel had kept her word - and that his real tiger friend would always keep him safe from nightmares.

(yeah this one got a bit sad ;-; don't worry the next next one will be a little happier)

[kafkaoftherubble]

破蛋日快乐！你的礼物是：为什么龙会戏珠？//

Happy Hatching Anniversary! Your present is: why do Longs hold pearls?

@secondhanddragon So, you wanna know why?

To be honest, while I was trawling for information, I realized that not even that many Chinese sites talk about the pearls. Such might be the nature of folklore—everyone gives their own interpretations, which are then spread orally. Tough to find "academic sources." And of course, wonky citations with broken links and poor reference points are always a hindrance.

"神龙戏珠" (The Divine Dragon Playing with Its Pearl) is a motif that has a few variations. It could be a single dragon (单龙戏珠), two dragons (二龙戏珠), three dragons (三龙戏珠), and even multiple dragons chasing one single pearl (多龙戏珠) [1].

In this figure, you can see five dragons chasing a single pearl. [1]

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#1: The Pearl... Really Is a Pearl!

Pearls are formed by living shell mollusks—which are members of the "aquatic tribes" [2]. They are hard to come by, lustrous, pretty as fuck, and very beloved in Chinese culture.

Chinese dragons, unlike the Western ones, are associated with water, right? That's because Long is "the king of the ocean" and it "rules over all aquatic tribes" [2]. If your dime-a-dozen clam could produce something as precious as a pearl, why can't the King itself produce the most beautiful and precious pearl that triumphs them all, huh?

This appears to be the genesis of the concept of the "Pearl." But naturally, as time goes on, more and more meanings are embedded in it!

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#2: The Pearl as an Egg

Long is a chimera of sorts. It's an amalgamation of, inter alia, a fish, a crocodile, a snake, a boar, a horse, an ox, a lizard, and a deer [1] [2]. Fishes and the reptilian reps in this group lay eggs. The crocodile's egg is even kinda big—way larger than a pearl.

Do you see? The egg is seen as a pearl and vice versa [1] [2]. Eggs are the source of life for crocodiles and snakes, and therefore, egg-pearl represents life in dragon arts [2]. When the dragon is "playing with its pearl," it's actually playing with "life." This motif embodies the dragon's status as a protector and caretaker of life [2].

Almost like a parent would...

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#3: The Pearl as a Symbol of Love for the Dragons' Children

Now, some might think that all Longs are male, as the mythical creature symbolizing women is often the Fenghuang (and so one might think that all Fenghuangs are females). That's not true. Dragons and Fenghuang both have two, uh, sexes.

This figure shows two dragons "playing" with a pearl. [1]

The "Two Dragons Chasing a Pearl" motif is popular in classical Chinese artwork. One of the dragons is male, and the other is female. The Pearl symbolizes egg/life, as stated in #2, which means the Pearl also comes to symbolize "a child" [1] [2].

In other words, Papa Dragon and Mama Dragon are playing with—and stealthily protecting—Anya Pearl.

An important note that isn't stated in any of my citations, but is nonetheless relevant: Chinese people may call themselves 龙的传人, "The Dragon's Heir." It means—as mythical origin goes—the Chinese people identify as "the children of the Long." Now connect this to what you learned in #3.

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#4: The Pearl as the Sun

Sometimes the Pearl is ON FIRE!!!

This is especially predominant in the aforementioned "Two Dragons Chasing a Pearl" motif. The Pearl looks more like a fireball than an actual pearl. Below the Pearl, then, one may find a depiction of the sea.

"The Pearl leaps out from the ocean." What does that connotate? The rising sun [2]!

Now, what does it have to do with the dragon? Well, have a little detour.

The Four Symbols (四象)

You might have already heard of this, but in case you didn't: each cardinal direction has a "guardian."

东方青龙 // Azure Dragon of the East

西方白虎 // White Tiger of the West

南方朱雀 // Vermillion Bird of the South

北方玄武 // Black Warrior (or Black Tortoise) of the North

They represent more than just directions—they have their own traits, backstories, virtues, etc.

Who's the Guardian of the East? The Azure Dragon!

Now, drawing our discussion back to the Pearl, you can see why the dragon chases after it now, right? The Pearl is the Sun; it rises from the East. The Guardian of the East plays/chases after it as an emblem of ancient Chinese worship of the Sun [1] [2].

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#5: The Pearl and the Dragons Representing Chinese Aesthetics [1]

Chinese art loves "wholeness" and "pair."

You often find a pair of things in Chinese culture: a pair of Door God, a pair of Chinese duilian (poetry of sorts; used for blessings and wishes), the likes. Chinese culture also really loves things like the full moon, because "roundness" symbolizes the whole, unity, and consummation.

Two dragons form a pair. In front of them, an orb—a round, whole object. Hence, the motif is well-beloved as it features two of the Chinese culture's favorite aesthetics [1].

Kinda hard to tell, but two dragons are playing with the pearl here.

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And that concludes the answer to your hundred-year enigma, haha! To the best of my ability, anyway. I sure hope it's been a blast to read.

More importantly, happy birthday, @autistic-beanmonster2!

I have been saving this up for a ramble just for you, but I couldn't find the time to write it. I'm sorry; I really planned to show this to you the moment the time struck 12 am in your time zone through the power of "scheduled post," but... let's just say I've been hit by a hindrance. Oops!

Well, does it matter if I'm just a bit late?

Thank you for reading my ramble!

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

Citations:

神龙戏珠，所戏珠子为何？("The Divine Dragon Plays with Its Pearl; What is that Pearl?") by 徐崇良工作室, essay on Sohu.com [in Chinese]

龙的嘴里为什么要含着珠子 (Why does the dragon have a pearl in its mouth") answered by an anonymous user on wenwen.sogou.com [in Chinese]

The question that produced this ramble is originally found here.

[originalwinnercheesecake]

Renaming some of the warrior cats

Yeah yeah, so basically I am grown now but when I was a young teen I was really into warriors, and I still look back at the series every few years to see what the Erin’s are doing and what different ideas the fans are doing. a little while back I made a post where I gave warrior names to deceased kits, apprentices, as well as adult cats who just never took warrior names. It was actually kinda fun and got some notice and views. So I decided to do something like that again. This time I will take various cats who already have warrior names and give them new ones.

I call upon the powers of starclan to

Bluefur/star: She was originally created to be leader of Thunderclan and have the leader name Bluestar. In Forest of secret when she tells Fireheart her backstory she just says her warrior name was bluefur, likely the first warrior name the Erin’s thought of for a cat with blue-grey fur. It stayed her warrior name up into Bluestar’s Prophecy. She is also like the only cat to share a warrior suffix with her litter mate, a thing that the Erin’s usually are careful to avoid. Pinestar already wasn’t in a state to be leader when he names the two sisters though, so I will fix his blunder for him. Bluefur’s warrior name is changed to Blueflame for her passionate defense of her clan (at least in the beginning), for the prophecy she chased as a warrior, and because then she would have in-part named Firepaw (the cat she passed the metaphorical torch to) after herself.

Snowfur: Might as well do both sisters. Snowfur warrior name becomes Snowstorm. In part because her son is Whitestorm, and if she had been Snowstorm then he could have carried the name in memory of her. Partially for the snowstorm in which she went to get Mosskit to take care of for her sister, just as Bluestar took care of Whitekit in her absence, Finally because “storm” is clearly a superior name for a warrior with the suffix “snow” but because of “the curse of the snow suffix” we have seen only a couple warrior cats named snow, and haven't seen any named Snowstorm .

Tigerclaw/star: He was originally Supposed to be Hammerclaw until it was pointed out that the cats would have no idea what a hammer was. His name was then changed to “Tiger” because in the old forest the cats had a part of their religion where they also believed in ancient spirits of Lions, leopards, and tigers. Tigers were the fiercest fighters. Tigerclaw was the best fighter in the clans throughout series 1 so he needed a fierce name. Well if that’s all he needed no need to go metaphorical with that. Tigerclaw’s warrior name is changed to Fierceclaw for his fierce courage and combat skills.

Fireheart/star: His warrior name is Fireheart I guess because even if he was not born with warrior blood he had the heart of a warrior. In later books the Erin’s go out of their way to emphasis his heart. Fireheart wasn’t all love and kindness though (at least in the beginning of the series) he was very aware of how harsh life in the forest could be, that cat’s were responsible for their actions ( broken record: at least they were in the beginning of this series), and had very little hesitation to fight and tooth and caw for his clan and code. If I change the name Fireheart, I will only change it to Firelight for the cat who found and to many was the light in the darkest of times. (note that would mean Nightheart would also become Nightlight (Lol on that warrior name) and since I do no give siblings, much less liter mates the same suffix his sister Finchlight can get her name changed to Finchheart).

more cats  names underneath

Graystripe: He a light gray cat with 1 dark gray stripe running down his spine. It’s apparently his most prominent feature and so he got his warrior name for it. Fine, fine it’s a name and a reason. I wanted to do 4 of the original apprentices on this list (Ravenpaw is Ravenflight on my other post). Graystripe’s warrior name is changed to Graypelt because it sounds similar to silverpelt a.k.a where Starclan live. Also for Willowpelt since he is apparently her son and none of her other children have her suffix.

Sandstorm: Named after Whitestorm who was her mentor. I like it; he was a good mentor and its a good name. But what if we gave Sandstorm a name that wasn’t after someone, but more a mark of her skills. Sandstorm is the best hunter in Thunderclan. One trait of a good hunter is the ability tread through the forest without prey being able to hear you. I do not think sand makes a sound when it is stepped on. Sandstorm’s warrior name is changed to Sandstep in honor of her quick and quiet nimbleness when going after prey,

Dustpelt: He’s brown like the dust dirt leaves on someone when they play in it???? He was a secondary character and there probably was not much reason to his name. Let’s give him a name with a reason. Dustpelt’s warrior name changes to Dusttail in memory of Redtail, his first mentor who admired greatly and still missed long after he died.

Ashfur: another cat who’s name is mostly meaningless. Ash is gray, his fur was gray, Ashfur. Ashfur’s warrior name is changed to Ashheart. I already hear people shouting that “heart” is only given to kind and noble cats. First of all no it is not. Both Hawkheart of Windclan, and Foxheart of Shadowclan were cats who were not nice (Didn’t the Erin’s try to put Hawkheart in the Dark Forest once)”. Secondly with Ashpaw volunteering to be one of the cats to help lure the dogs to the ravine, becasue he wanted to avenge Brindleface I could see Firestar mistakenly thinking that Ashpaw did it because he was noble and his heart was with protecting the clan (in reality this was probably his first time being consumed by anger and he wanted to be part of killing the dogs) and tucking the name Ashheart away in his mind for Ashpaw. The name also has a hint of prophecy because when Squirrelflight chooses Bramblecalw over him as a mate his heart does not just break it turns to ash and disintegrates, He never has a heart again, even in death.

Brambleclaw/star: Firestar named him “claw” because it’s the same suffix his father had and he believed that what nobility Tigerclaw took from the suffix Brambleclaw could put back... At least that is what the Erin’s say. In actuality any cat from the first series who was named after anything remotely sharp or pointy got “claw” as a suffix. I mean if “claw” really was a bad suffix in between Tigerclaw being banished and Brambleclaw going on the journey then why did Firestar also give it to Thornclaw in “Darkest Hour”. I have seen other fans changed Brambleclaw’s warrior name to Brambleflower for Goldenflower because she is his mom, or Brambleheart because it was Firestar’s own former suffix. For this list I am refusing to name him after another cat and giving him one that would be based on him. Brambleclaw’s warrior name gets changed to Bramblpath for the cat who spent so long walking a path of light and darkness, and faced so much pull from both sides.

Twanypelt: No real reason to her name. she supposedly has Twany colored fur (what does that mean? she is a tortishell that is more ginger than black???) Her defining character moment is leaving Thunderclan to join Shadowclan wee she better fit in. So for that moment Twanypelt’s warrior name changes to Twanyflight.

Hawkfrost: Well he big, and brown and black like a hawk. That might be the reasoning Sasha would explain his prefix with. Hawks are seen as really dangerous birds in warriors because they can carry off kits. “Frost” because he is cold-hearted. When he is first introduced at the gathering he never says anything, but they tell you right with his name that he the villain of this arc. He must be dangerous and cold-hearted. Those words have to circulate around Hawkfrost anytime he does so much as another cat a question about the weather. Yeah the Erin’s play all their cards way to early with Hawkfrost and his dangerous and cold-hearted name and discription. When you think about it the in your faceness of it does more harm than help with his ability to be a compelling villian. If I could rewrite Hawkfrost he would start as a loyal but paranoid cat, who was consistently afraid of his clan changing their minds once again about non pure blooded warrior. He  works consistently to prove and remind his clanmates of his worth. The strain of constentaly fearing that plus the manipulations of his father would slowly turn him into a villain cat by book 6. To help with that story I would give him a more neutral warrior name. Hawkfrost’s warrior name becomes Hawkstripe.

Mothwing: named Mothwing so that a moth’s wing outside of Mudfur’s den would be a clear sign that Mothwing was the right cat to become his apprentice. She is the only one named “Moth” in the clan though, wouldn’t that alone make the sign pretty obviously about her. Mothwing’s warrior name/medicine cat name gets changed int Mothshroud because so much of Mothwing’s character: her parentage, how the moth’s wing got outside of the medicine cat den, and her true faith (or lack of) are all clocked in a shroud of gray.

Feathertail and Stormfur: I am going to do them both together just to try and save time. When they were born I really wanted both cats to have prefixes for the two clans who’s blood mixed inside of them. Stormfur (along with his name being a tribute to two members of his kin) has a name like that but feathertail does not. Feathertail’s warrior name is changed to Icetail, in memory of ice her mother saved her father from when her parents first met (this would mean Crowfeather would name himself Crowtail, still a pretty good name). With Stormfur I at first wanted to leave his name alone because I really like his prefix being for Crookedstar (born Stormkit) and his suffix being for Stonefur. But the I realized that Stormstone would also be a tribute to both and hints that he would be a kinda rolling stone between Riverclan, Thunderclan, and the Tribe, plus that he would finally settle in the tribe which lives on a stone Landscape. Stromfur’s warrior name is changed to Stormstone.

Squirrelflight: Named “Flight” because she ran away from Thunderclan to go on the great journey, and it helped her learn to be the warrior that she is. I will keep that train of thought it mind with her new warrior name. Squirrelflight learns by leaping  head first into complicated and dangerous situations and from there having to use a combination of her own whit and main character plot armor to get herself out. For these reasons Squirrelflight’s warrior name is changed to Squirrelleap

Leafpool: she was named because when the medicine cats needed a new place to go to share tongues with starclan she went out and found the moonpool. This is another really good name that emphases her spiritual role as a medicine cat (a role she cannonly filled more than her own mentor did) as well as her deep connection to Starclan and I will have to think hard to do better. Leafpool’s medicine cat name is changed to Leafsign because she was always really good at reading and following signs from Starclan

Hazeltail: She’s is not an important cat, but I do not like her warrior name. I have never liked her warrior name. Her tail is not hazel, she is white and gray. Her mother gave her that name like the nut. And the Erins saying, years later, “Oh its because her tail is lean and whippy like a hazelnut branch” yeah no, that does not change that y’all probably just gave it to her in Outcast because “tail” was becoming your most common, go-to name. Hazeltail’s warrior name becomes Hazeleye because her eyes are green, which could be hazel-green, and because to personally give her a little character I like to headcannon that she was a sharp-eyed cat who was had a knack for being one of the first to notice things about her surroundings.

Lionblaze: Ahh the one cat from the original three to get his own suffix. “blaze” with an animal actually means a vertical stripe on their foreheads,  but many people associate Lionblaze’s name with being related to fire and the way his family blazes against their enemies. Lionblaze was the strongest of the three and fights with the strength of a lion, that was his one relevance to the trio, let’s make it his name as well. Lionblaze’s warrior name is changed to Lionstrike

Hollyleaf: Named for Leafpool, her birth mother who’‘s action in running away with a cat from another clan, getting pregnant with his kits, then giving way to her sister who she basically guilted/forced to lie to the clan that they were her’s. In Hollyleaf’s  own words these actions “shattered the warrior code and stomped it into dust”. Learning about her birth and bio mother devastated Hollyeaf and made her hate Leafpool (The Erin’s had her get over it, but if I remember it Hollyleaf is not depicted working through her feelings, or leafpool apologizing to her daughter for hiding this secret from them and making it seem likeshe was ashamed of their birth, or the two rebuilding a relationship. She just randomly got over it, mostly due to Leafpool being multiple Erin’s favorite cat and them feeling bad that her kits were angry at her.) I still do not think Hollyleaf liked her suffix when she found out where it came from. Hollyleaf’s warrior name is changed to Hollyshade partially because the truth about her birth was shaded over, and mostly because she hid in the shadows while fighting enemies and dealing with her issues (also to everyone who likes to headcannon that Mothwing is trans and the actual second parent of the three shroud and shade are similar).

Jayfeather: named for his bio-father crowfeather.. who did not raise him, rejected him multiple times after learning that he had fathered Jayfeather. Years later when Crowfeather had a change of heart and was ready to try and get to know his three remaining children, asking them if they wanted a better relationship with him Jayfeather is the one son who desides “No”. He does not trust Crowfeather, does not need Crowfeather, and no longer has any interest in having a personal relationship with Crowfeather. Crowfeather accepts and respects Jayfeather’s feelings. If Jayfeather isn’t to apathetic about his name to care what his suffix is ( besides not wanting to be called Jay no-eyes or Jaywing) I cannot imagine he was to happy to learn who Leafpool named him after either. Jayfeather’s medicine cat name is changed to Jaymoon. Moon is apparently supposed to be a rare suffix because of the moon’s association with Staclan. Jayfeather, even if he does not particularly like Starclan, is the closer to them than any other medicine cat, and during 12 books shared his ancestors powers and assisted them in many tasks.  

Breezepelt: I said on my last post that I wanted to name him Breezestorm. The thing is that is his name in an AU rewrite of TPO3 series and OOTS series where I try to keep his character more consistent to who he originally was in PO3. For who he is in the main series I am still going to give him a basic name, but one that better suits him. Breezepelt’s warrior name get’s changed to Breezeclaw because he is both a skilled fighter and a prickely and sharp cat.

Heathertail: named for her mother whitetail, and I think I heard something about Onestar also wanting to name her that for her older brother, whom he abandoned. Yet we never see her relationship with her mother and I guarantee you that despite what Onestar’s trail says its far more in character of Onestar that he never thought of Darktail at all between when he abandoned him and when a re-appeared Darktail whispered his identity to Onestar in battle. Let me give Heathertail a better name. Heathertail’s warrior name gets changed into Heatherblossom.

Dovewing: She is named after a bird and birds have wings? Was there any other reason? Dovewing’s warrior name gets changed to Dovewhispers for a cat who was always listening for and reacting to danger around every corner.

Ivypool: No reason I can think of for her warrior name other than that it sounds nice. You know what name also sounds nice and might fit her better? Ivyppol’s warrior name changes to Ivynight, for the cat who bravely served her clan every night while she slept.

Lilyheart: One more minorly important warrior cat/queen who’s name I really hate. This is a sweet cat. Heart’s a sweet name right? Anyone who owns a cat, or has been on social media has heard all the PSA’s that let you know that for cats Lil’y are an extremely poisonous flower. I would also assume that an organized government of wild cats with gull knowledge of medical plants also know they could die from Lily’s. This very sweet and loving daughter/sister/wife/mother is effectively named Posionheart, and that just does not fly with me. Wiki says Bramblestar tried t name her in memory of Sorreltail and Seedpaw. I will chalk this one up to Bramblestar not always being very good at names, because he missed the clear choice. Lilyheart’s name is changed to Lilyflower.

Sparkpelt: This is the name Harpercolins made the Erin’s give her. They supposedly wanted to name her Sparkfire after Firestar but were not allowed to do that. Well Harpercolins can go eat snails. Sparkpelt’s warrior name is changed to Sparkfire.

Violetshine: wiki does not say why she was named violetshine. I think I remember hearing once that the Erin’s let fans vote on it? What were they to busy coming up with Treebranch? (Note Treebranch’s is a perfect name, that is why I am not putting her sister’s on here). Violetshine is a nice name but I want to do more than 1 cat from that arc on this list, and I refuse to change Treebranch or Adderheart. Violetshine’s warrior name gets changed to Violetmist. That’s a nice name too.

Bristlefrost:a less common suffix, but still a pretty standard warrior name.I am changing her name to Bristlethistle. Because that is still a tough sounding name, and the rhyme is cute/silly.

Rootspring: Once again we have a pretty good name with a more unique suffix, Harestar is the only other cat I remember having it,buy I am not sure if there was ever a given reason for giving it to Rootspring... was he ever mentioned to be really quick or good at jumping? Rootsprings name gets changed to Rootspirit because his ability to see ghosts/spirits helped him get to the root of what Ashfur was planing

[cryptidclaw]

Rise of Change First Arc Summary !

Here are the changes I have come up with for the First arc so far!!!! I will update this post as I change or come up with new ideas!  

have realized this is very long so I am going to put it under here! v

Thistleclaw was the son of Pinestar and Leopardfoot instead of Tigerclaw, this is where Thistle got his hatred for outsiders from! I know that's not really a part of the first series but it is good backstory!

Tigerclaw is Thistleclaw's son and Whitestorm's brother from the same litter, and he learned his hatred for outsiders from his father. He grew to be much more like his dad then Whitestorm, mostly caused by him also being mentored by Thistleclaw

Sandstorm's parents are Redtail and Birdflight (Runningwind). Something I haven't mentioned is I think that a lot of her attitude and anger issues are caused by her mourning and not being able to process her father's death, along will her struggling with high expectations since she was a deputy's kit.

Dustpelt and Ravenpaw are Dappletail and Stormtail's kits, and are deeply affected by the high expectations of the Order since they are half siblings of Bluestar.

Dapple and Storm also had two other kits before Dust and Raven! These kits are Downnose and Cricketstep! They are very good warriors, which is an added pressure on Dust and raven since their siblings have lived up to the Order's expectations.

Dustpelt is mentored by Downnose after Redtail died, apparently he was mentored by Darkstripe but I don't even remember that lol, and this would give more Downnose content!

Darkstripe and Greystripe's parentage! Their mother is Willowpelt but their dad? He's unknown. Mollys are allowed to just not say who the sire of their kits are, but this leaves people with a lot of questions.... In truth Willow had taken a mate from outside of Thunder Order, I haven't decided who, and it doesn't matter much, but she had Darkstripe with this cat. Over time as Dark grew up he realized that his mother must have had an affair outside of the Order, and since he was mentored by Tigerclaw, this upset him greatly, he became in denial about his parentage, distanced himself from his mother, and spent his time trying to prove himself as the biggest outsider hater of all and Tigerclaw follower. When Willow had Greystripe, it was obvious it was with the same cat, he looked so similar to Darkstripe, just lighter in color, which just enraged Dark more, he basically decided to ignore that Grey was his brother at all and Grey grew up barely knowing Dark, but not really liking him.

Fire (paw) does not have a crush on Spottedleaf and Spotted def does not have feelings for him! Spotted views him as a little brother, and took it upon herself to guide him because of the prophecy that she received. Her death was impactful to Fire because it felt like the death of a sister, and someone who believed in him and did not doubt him for being a kittypet.

Raven (paw) does not get to run away to the barn, instead he is chased off by Tigerclaw. Tiger claims that Raven deserted the Order, but Fire and Grey, know that Tiger most likely killed Raven. 

Cinderpelt decides to be a healer because she falls in love with healing while she was recovering in the healer den. She receives the Title Cinderspark instead of Cinderpelt!

Swiftpaw is Tigerclaw and Goldenflower's son! His death was caused by his own father!

Throughout the series Longtail and Fire's relationship has progressed though slower than Sand and Fire's, and after Swift's death things come to a head and they comfort each other over the loss and become officially friends, and after this Longtail is outwardly a Fireheart stan!

Bramblekit does not look like Tigerclaw, at least he doesn't look like him in pelt color, he is gold like his mom, and has a slightly softer personality, (though this more so progresses when he grows older in the second arc and has character development)

Fireheart does NOT hate Tigerclaw's kits for being Tigerclaw's kits, that never made sense to me, I feel like he would be one of their main defenders since he too suffered from judgment for his blood and origins.

After the battle Fire and Longtail become mates (Fire and Sand became mates before the battle) Both Fire and Sand are poly in my au!

Tigerstar is not the one to enlist the help of Blood Order, Firestar is! Blood Order is not evil, but instead cats just trying to help eachother and survive. 

Raven (paw) is not in fact dead! he is Scourge in this au! Tiger chased him off into the city, where Raven grew tough and formed Blood Order! Firestar hears word of a cat by the name of Ravenscourge who sounds a lot like his old friend raven, and goes to find him to enlist his help in the battle against Tiger Order! in RoC Tigerstar would never request help from outsiders and he is very xenophobic, while Firestar symbolizes the fall of old ideals and the beginning of a new era led by newer ideals. Firestar is willing to embrace the help of outsiders to protect the clans, and the side who is willing to accept change and outsiders, is the side that wins in the end!

Ravenscourge kills Tigerstar just like Scourge does, but this time he and the Blood Order show up during the peak of battle as reinforcements! Tiger stops the battle due to his anger at outsiders joining the fight, and Raven challenges him to a fight to settle the battle. 

Sandstorm is made Deputy instead of Greystripe!!!!!!

[eggsaladstain]

i am once again thinking about how the central theme of hunger is so deftly portrayed in kingdom

spoilers for ashin of the north under the cut

i’ve written about the theme of hunger before but i have to say, i think the special episode centered around ashin may be my favorite portrayal of this because it is just so much more emotionally devastating and cathartic than what we’ve seen before

in the first two seasons, we saw both literal and metaphorical hunger - for food, for flesh, and for power - and in this special, we saw the hunger for revenge - a hunger we haven’t seen portrayed in the series before and one that plays out with horrific consequences

as in the previous two seasons, we see once again that it’s mankind, not the undead, who are the true monsters, because it is men who slaughter the fifteen jurchens in cold blood, it’s a man who decides to spread a lie that the dead were killed by a tiger and uses ashin’s father to perpetuate that lie, it’s men who destroy ashin’s village, it’s a man who sexually assaults her once she’s an adult, it’s men who have kept her father alive and tortured him for years

time and time again it is men in positions of power who use that power to abuse the weak and just as we’ve seen in the previous two seasons, it is the weak, the poor, the overlooked who rise up in the end, for better or for worse

in ashin’s case, it’s clearly for the worse, as we watch her murder indiscriminately and raise an undead army to destroy everyone in sight, as we realize that she resurrected her dead villagers and condemned them to a never-ending purgatory of hunger, as we learn that she is the one who gave the resurrection plant to the king’s physician, thereby setting off the events in the series

by the end of it, ashin says herself that she wants to kill every living thing in joseon, which puts her directly at odds with lee chang and his allies, and yet, it’s hard to see her as a villain because of everything she’s endured and because her backstory is so similar to yeong-shin’s, one of our beloved heroes from the series

like ashin, yeong-shin was also betrayed by people in power who he thought he could trust, he was also the sole survivor of his village, and he also dedicated his life to avenging his fallen family and friends

their stories are the same but the similarities end there - where yeong-shin wants justice for his people, what ashin wants is revenge, and the difference between the two has never been clearer

when we meet yeong-shin, he’s full of righteous anger and fiery determination but he still has his humanity and he’s able to put aside his personal vendetta to join the greater cause to save those around him

when we see ashin as an adult, there is a chilling coldness in her eyes, a complete and utter detachment from everything going on around her that only gets worse with time and when we see her let loose her zombies on the unsuspecting army camp and notch an arrow toward the warriors who massacred her village, she seems little more than the living dead herself, fueled only by vengeance, existing only to bring destruction and death to those who once harmed her

that’s not to say that it’s not satisfying watching her exact her bloody revenge - it’s incredibly cathartic to see her destroy the men who hurt her, but that cold, calculating look on her face and her eye-for-an-eye brand of revenge are eerily reminiscent of queen cho and the bloody and destructive lengths she went to to keep her throne

but then there are brief moments when we are reminded that she is not entirely like queen cho, not really, not where it truly counts, because where queen cho was driven by greed, ashin is driven by love, and more importantly, the loss of it

the scene where she faces her shackled, undead villagers is horrifying, not just because she turned them into monsters, but because it’s apparent that she loves them still, even as they snarl at her, even as their unseeing eyes no longer recognize her

it’s clear she is trying to hold on to the happiness they once had by replicating her previous life as best as she can but instead of giving the villagers a second chance, all she has done is created a perversion of the life they once had as those bright, vivid memories of her neighbors smiling, laughing, welcoming her home, and sharing a meal together have turned into her present nightmare where those villagers now share a very different type of meal

from the series, we’ve seen how destructive a force hunger can be, whether it’s hunger for sustenance or hunger for power, with seasons one and two showing us time and time again how ordinary people suffer at the hands of the few powerful men and women who rule a kingdom

but we see now that it’s the hunger for vengeance that is perhaps the worst of them all, with ashin’s story showing us how one ordinary woman’s rage and suffering caused by those powerful men has the potential to destroy an entire kingdom

it seems so fitting that this special was released now, when the pandemic has exacerbated income inequality between the ultra-rich and the ultra-poor and billionaires are literally taking joyrides to space while workers are begging to be paid a living wage

for a show about joseon-era zombies, kingdom continues to be incredibly timely and relevant, and while it certainly leans into a literal interpretation of “eat the rich,” it never lets us forget what the full quote actually is:

when the people shall have no more to eat, they will eat the rich

[grasshopperdoingdogpaddle]

Through talks with a friend I have developed a convoluted but very fun backstory for Omi that involves HannaBarbera R B time traveling to the past to try and destroy Omi after finding out his birthplace is a lost village, Chase following him into the past because Bean messing with the timeline is Not a good thing in the slightest, meeting baby Omi and his parents living humble lives in said mystical lost village and being their guest while watching Omi until he can find and clobber Bean to drag him to the future while musing ideas of playing baby Omi into his past self's care to get Omi to be his apprentice from the word go, Bean getting the drop on Chase and ending the village with Chase barely escaping with baby Omi in tow, until finally dropping Omi on the steps of the Xiaolin temple in baby swaddling to complete predestination after deciding his past self would not be a very good child carer and also feeling Omi wouldn't have grown into the spirited young Warrior Chase has come to respect in the present. Then tricking Bean back to the present and absconding with the Sands of Time to keep Bean from trying it again. A bit complex perhaps, but very fun to come up with!

NOT HANNABARBERA R B LMAOOO

This was insanely fun to read from start to finish, thank you anon! It sounds like it'd be a fun fic to write! I love Hannibal vs Chase plots.

Dashi and Dojo implied there was a time travel Shen Gong Wu they buried in either Egypt or Europe, which is... not where the Sand of Times were. So it must have been a different one, so theoretically there is still some sort of time traveling device that Hannibal could get his hands on, one with slightly different rules.

So, with that in mind,

Hannibal manages to distract the monks with some red herring chaos elsewhere and so he can go find the time travel Wu unopposed. Chase is the only one who knows Hannibal well enough to catch onto his game, and he arrives just as Hannibal just moments too late. Hannibal activates the Wu, opening up a time rift (sort of like the space rift opened up by the Golden Tiger Claws), and Chase jumps in after him. They tussle en route, Chase knocks him off course "too soon," so he arrives at the time Hannibal set the device for, in a small, isolated, mystical Chinese village, soon to be lost to time.

Since Hannibal was knocked off course, Chase knows he'll eventually arrive here too, but isn't sure how many days it will be. Chase keeps the Shen Gong Wu on him and decides to just wait until Hannibal arrives so he can confront him and drag him back to their present before he messes up the past.

In the mean time, Chase is just stuck here indefinitely in this village. He gets some regular clothes so he's not sticking out like a sore thumb in his warlord armor the whole time. He's walking through the village, trying to figure out what time period Hannibal sent him to without being too obvious about it. While he's wandering, he feels something on his leg. He looks down to sees a very familiar looking baby patting on his pants and trying to climb up them.

With a sort of bemused smile, Chase picks up baby Omi and muses aloud, "Well, now I have a pretty good guess of when I am. Thank you as always, little one."

Omi just babbles and giggles and waves his arms, so Chase pulls him away far enough that he can't hit his face.

"Trying to pick another fight with me, Omi? I admire your spirit, but you're a few years too early to take me on, aren't you?" Omi pouts and babbles out an incoherent argument and chews on Chase's sleeve defiantly, so Chase rolls his eyes and flashes his sharp teeth. "Alright, then. I'll indulge you. When have I ever turned you down before?"

"--Ah! That-- I'm so sorry! That's my baby, he escaped again!"

They're interrupted when a woman runs up and apologizes, she says her baby is always running off ever since he learned to crawl so early. She takes Omi back, and Omi gets upset about it. "Sorry, sorry. I guess he was fond of you! He usually get really fussy or scared around people, but it looks like he likes you!"

Chase smiles again. "Yes, we do get along rather well, don't we?"

Omi's mom asks who he is, and Chase says that he's just a lost traveler with no particular destination. He prepares to walk away, but Omi fusses and cries and reaches out for him, so Omi's parents invite Chase to stay with them for a while since he has nowhere to go and gets along so well with Omi.

So Chase decides to just stay with them as their guest, since it's the most convenient course of action until he can figure out when Hannibal will be dropped in the past. Chase meant to be actively monitoring the Hannibal situation, but he quickly gets distracted with how much he enjoys looking after baby Omi.

Omi's mom is very appreciative for the help, because Omi is really bad with people and also a very hyperactive and very prodigious baby who can also control water, so it goes without saying that he's a handful. But Chase can always handle him so well.

One of the best methods to get baby Omi to sleep is Chase tucking securely in his arms and rocking him for a bit. Omi always giggles when Chase bounces him in his arms. Baby Omi had a bad habit of hitting and biting people, but Chase takes it in stride and just pretends they're sparring and Omi absolutely loves it. Chase can always find Omi when he crawls away and hides somewhere. Omi loves showing off to Chase, and he's always sharing his snacks with him. They play together really well, and Chase never gets tired of or annoyed with Omi.

Chase isn't particularly fond of babies in general, but he thinks that in Omi's case, he could definitely handle raising him. He's already attached, and full of energy, and he's have Omi's unquestioned loyalty if Omi was taken under his wing instead of raised at the temple. "Would you like to come and train under me as a Heylin warrior? You'd like that, wouldn't you, Omi?" And Omi just giggles.

But eventually, the looming threat of Hannibal rears its head, and Hannibal is very prepared. He razes the town and wipes it off the face of the map, and it's all Chase can do to rescue Omi and eventually incapacitate Hannibal.

The village is gone, but Omi is alive, so at least Hannibal's plan of going back in time to stop Omi from growing up is thwarted. Chase needs to get Hannibal back to their time before he wakes back up, so he has to decide what to do with Omi.

And this whole time during all his destruction and the battle, Omi is just bawling and sobbing, and even now that it's over, Omi is still freaking out.

Chase doesn't know how to comfort him, and he definitely knows that if he drops this crying infant off at his lair to be found by Chase's past self, that wouldn't go well.

And besides, he likes Omi in the present, as he is. The brave, heroic boy who truly believes in the honorable warrior monk ways. It's for the best to keep things as they were.

So with a heavy heart, Chase swaddles up baby Omi and drops him off to be found by Master Fung's Xiaolin temple. Omi fusses again when he sees Chase leaving, but Chase just smiles and shushes him and promises they'll meet again. "Until then, get stronger and work on your form. I want our next spar to be more challenging, alright, Omi? I'll come for you again, in the future."

And with that, Chase finally uses the Shen Gong Wu and takes himself and Hannibal back to the present time.

[sendme-2hell]

Ranking the books I read in April

aka just ranting about the books I read in april pls ignore me

1. The Space Between Worlds - Micaiah Johnson 

I cannot believe this book wasn’t nominated for a Hugo! I like the Hugo list (of the books I’ve read) but cmon. This book is like if you combined the social commentary in The City We Became and the queerness of Harrow the Ninth. Seriously this book had everything I wanted: parallel universes, great character development, social commentary, woc sapphic slow burn, satisfying ending. Also I feel like the title is paying homage to W. E. Dubois which is cool. “Between me and the other world, there is ever an unasked question: How does it feel to be a problem?” Like there is just this very cool idea of talking about other worlds as in literally other universes but also different worlds due to social and racial hierarchies. 

2. Plain Bad Heroines - Emily m. Danforth 

Horror, Hollywood, boarding school, everyone is gay, the narrator talks directly to the reader and it is hilarious, copious footnotes, have I mentioned how many sapphics there are? It’s hard to keep track. Plus polyamory. I just really loved this book and I felt it all came together in a way that was worth it. 

3. Steel Crow Saga - Paul Krueger 

This godamn book. I loved this book so much. I was so ready to yell about it on tumblr and tell people to read it. But apparently the author is someone who has harassed a lot of women so...uh...yeah. Nevermind I guess.

 I do want to say it is the most accurate depicition of a Sherlock Holmes superfan that I have ever seen in media. 

4. The Tiger’s Daughter - K. Arsenault Rivera

What if we went on a long trip on horseback and we were both lesbian warriors...jk unless…

Yeah so I loved this book so much. A lot of it is about navigating familial responsibility, fighting literal and metaphorical demons, fighting the patriarchy, fighting your anger, fighting tigers, etc...and yet I kept thinking to myself “this is the most romantic book I have ever read” and honestly I am gonna stick by that. It also has the “you think me a monster so I will become one” trope which is great. It is set in an Asian-based fantasy world and I did read a goodreads review that said it was as accurate to the countries it draws inspiration from as Leigh Bardugo’s Grishaverse is to the Russian and Scandinavian cultures it takes from. So that’s not great. 

5. Six of Crows - Leigh Bardugo

Speaking of! A few months ago I tried to read Shadow and Bone in preparation for the tv show and I could not finish it. The writing was...bad. Anyway I really liked Six of Crows and even though, yeah it’s tropey (I’m looking at you, Helnik backstory), there’s a reason those tropes work. Plus you cannot go wrong with a heist. About halfway through I did realize that there are six mcs and three couples so its kinda just like a giant triple date, which really changed how I read the whole story.

I’m very glad I did read it before seeing the tv show because I was able to be appropriately excited for the Crows and catch the Wylan reference and everything, but I also got to see the Alina stuff without having to read about it. 

6. Crooked  Kingdom - Leigh Bardugo 

I think I somehow liked this even more than Six of Crows, but for narrative simplicity I’ll put it after. I really like it when you put people in an impossible situation and see how they figure it out. Especially if they get out in a clever and reasonably possible way that ties together many different plot threads and has a few good fake-outs. This did all of that, and also developed every character in a way I found satisfying (except [redacted] *cry emoji*). 

Kaz pulls a Baru Cormorant with some money stuff and now I wonder if they would be friends. 

I read this after watching the show which was good because I knew who Zoya and Genya were but bad because there is a point where Nina is like “here is how shadow and bone ends.” She’s just talking to Mattias and casually spoiling everything for me. So there goes my dreams of living spoiler free until the end of the show. 

7. The Miseducation of Cameron Post - Emily m Danforth

My expectations for this book were....very different than it turned out, and I’m glad for it. After reading Plain Bad Heroines I shouldn’t have been surprised at how well written it is. I really appreciated how nuanced it is. It doesn’t spell out its ideas or themes and therefore lets you really sit with them. I would rank it higher but I don’t really enjoy reading about high school. 

8. Foundryside - Robert Jackson Bennett

I love a good found family, especially if at the beginning of the book they are on opposing sides. Enemies to friends = best trope! Also it’s sapphic that’s always good. But the best part of this book was the worldbuilding which was so cool. 

9. Malice - Heather Walter

Remember what I was saying about “you think me a monster so I will become one”? This book is the definition of that trope. Women becoming unhinged after being treated like shit, we love to see it! Especially if it’s gay. I do have to say, authors who write duologies where the first book ends on a cliffhanger, I see what you’re doing but yes, I will be preordering the next book. 

10. Fugitive Telemetry - Martha Wells

I don’t have much to say because Murderbot is so consistently excellent.  uh why is it so cathartic when xenophobes disrespect Murderbot and it’s humans step in and shut that shit down. Gets me every single time. 

11. Queen of Coins and Whispers - Helen Corcoran 

This book was like half romance half politics and unfortunately I did not find the politics that interesting or well written. But the romance was A+. It reminded me of Priory of the Orange Tree a LOT. Though significantly less dragons and I’m taking many points off for that. 

12. The First Sister - Linden A. Lewis

I wanted to like this book a little more than I did. There was just maybe too much body horror for me. Interesting characters and world though. There was  a location named Cytherea that they mentioned a lot and it was very distracting. I guess I still have tlt brainrot. 

13. Shorefall - Robert Jackson Bennett 

I think this book was well plotted out but it didn’t quite have my attention like Foundryside did. Also yet another book where a woman’s girlfriend ends up in her head. This time no one had to die so that’s nice. TM and SD take notes! 

14. The Deathless Girls - Kiran Milwood Hargrave 

Ok I LOVED the Mercies by KMH so I was a little disappointed in this Dracula retelling. It got interesting in the last 50 pages, but unfortunately that is not enough for me.

proud of myself for not reading a single straight book this April 

[myheartismadeofstars]

More babies for my otps! Scum Villain Edition!

BingQiu:

Now, I have two backstories for their children. One is in an ABO verse, but the other is canon verse. The canonverse one involves LBH and SQQ deciding to have children together. (Well....more like LBH starts getting all wistful whenever they are around children which reminds SQQ of how, though Bingge was never a very present father for his many children...he did love them. And he was always ecstatic to find out he was going to have another, and when he did spend time with them, he enjoyed being around them Airplane didn’t think readers would find children very interesting once they were born and it made him realize that that is still part of who Binghe is and he’d still want a family)

SQQ hated himself for it, but he asked the system for methods to have a child with LBH, and discovered a plant known as the Frog Pomegranate (not to be confused with the Pomegranate Frog, apparently). The interesting thing is....the plant is relatively normal (!!!???) until a specific ritual is done, after which point consuming the seeds of the fruit (and papapaing of course) will guarantee conception (if it wasn’t in such a stupidly remote area...it only grows on a rocky mountainside, on almost a 90 degree slope, far from human civilization, it would probably be extremely popular as a fertility aid!) Of course it turns out the ritual to make the fruit magical requires a *ahem* gift for the tree (and SQQ went alone!). SQQ ended up gathering an armful of the magical fruit, to bring them back to Mu Qingfang. Surely he’d have a use for it!

The result is triplets.

The first child to be born is their oldest daughter Shuilu (”Light Green”) she highly resembles SQQ, and you can really only tell LBH is her father if you have them both together. Otherwise her silky smooth hair and seafoam green eyes are all SQQ. She grows up an independent but helpful child. Able to care for herself young, but always mimicking her parents. Wanting to “work” with them (trying to imitate them doing paperwork, or help LBH cook). She grows up the very image of a princess. Elegant and polite and hardworking and diplomatic. LBH and her have a very special bond and while most tend to favour his son as his heir....privately? He favours her.

The second child is their son: Shuanghu (”Frost Tiger”). He actually resembles Tianlang-Jun quite a lot, though like his father his hair begins to curl as a teenager. He is very much the tsundere type, a bit proud, a fierce warrior since he was young (he often trains with Liu Qingge who had always been a part of his and his sisters’ lives), however he doesn’t get along well with his father. He’s very loyal to him (something a few would be conspirators learn the hard way) because he does love him (LBH is never anything but good to him, just a bit strict and not as bad as LQG is!) they just clash personality wise. Like his father, however, he’s very popular with women...he’s just not very good at expressing himself lol.

The third child is another little girl. She was born so tiny and delicate that even MQF wasn’t certain if she would make it. After a lot of TLC from SQQ, A-Zhen (one character, and it means “to receive blessings in a sincere spirit”). She’s the most even mix between her parents, even inheriting both their signature features: SQQ’s green eyes and LBH’s curly hair. She’s Baba’s special baby, and...admittedly he kinda spoils her a bit. She’s a bit shy and clingy...and a bit of a crybaby. That’s not to say she’s useless! She’s the child with the second closest connection to her 1/4 demon heritage (after her brother. Her sister barely has any such connection and relies entirely on regular cultivation) She simply is mostly a pacifist.

In addition to their three biological children, LBH and SQQ end up rescuing a lot of street children which they teach, and love as their own children.

BONUS: Moshang!

SQH and MBJ have a son a few years after the Bingqiu Triplets are born.

The choice was kinda pressured, and SQH really didn’t think he was really ready to be a parent...but they were basically being told either they have a child, or MBJ will have to take a second (female) spouse in order to have an heir or more. MBJ would obviously have vetoed that with extreme prejudice, but SQH didn’t want to be more unpopular than he already is.

At birth, he is named Fengying (Wind Shadow). SQH, slightly uncertain on how the Lang/Jun suffixes work in this scenario (he’s the heir...but he’s also a half demon?) at first gives him the suffix “-Lang” but MBJ scolds him for trying to deny their son his inheritance. As per tradition, he is called Fengying alone until he’s a teenager, when he officially becomes Fengying-Jun. If/when his father can no longer rule, he will take the name of Mobei-Jun, as his father did. (Random headcanon: MBJ’s given name is actually Ji “Sharp/Fierce or To Incite” and Lin “to tremble in fear or shiver with cold” but also “imposing, cold, austere, majestic, stern, etc” however due to sharing that last character with his Uncle, no one, not even SQH is permitted to call him Jilin-Jun) 

He’s on the short side for an Ice demon, only 6′2 as opposed to his father being between 7-8), he only leans ever so slightly to his demon side, his father’s sharp features being softened by SQH’s human side. Making him slightly more delicate looking (SQH wonders if being so pretty might be a half demon trait now, rather than specific to LBH). He retains most of his demonic features: icy blue-white skin, pale eyes, black hair frosted with white when healthy and pure black when ill, sharp ears (though his are rounder than normal), and a low body temperature, though his is higher than standard. Leading some to be concerned he’s running a fever. He does however, lack his father’s sharp teeth.

His personality is intelligent and he’s pretty skilled with his demon magic considering he’s only half...and he inherited resting bitch face from his father...but he’s actually pretty shy, which he never properly grows out of. He’s even gentle and merciful, which a lot of his father’s court consider an embarrassment, and clearly SQH’s fault. (poor boy has a lot of pressure on him, might have anxiety)

He develops romantic feelings for Luo Zhen, despite her being older than him. And his courtship methods are very human.

[gizkasparadise]

kdrama rec/review: mystic pop up bar

KDRAMA AND CDRAMA MASTER LIST OF REVIEWS

Series: mystic pop up bar Episodes: NOT ENOUGH 12 Genres: urban fantasy, urban horror lite, found family!!!, friendship, mystery, comedy, supernatural, warm fuzzies despite an alarming amount of death Spoilers in the Rec: minor ones/for the set-up If You Like, You’ll Like: hotel del luna (although it has a very different feel), early bleach (manga), found families, being human (uk & us versions), those moments in shows where you’re like OH MAN HOW ARE THEY GETTING OUT OF THIS and then they do. because friendship.

Rank: 10/10

I went into this with low expectations. it sounded like it was trying to bank on hotel del luna, but i was still down to watch a ghost version of leverage or whatever this turned out to be. figured it’d be decent to watch but not AMAZING. 

the first ep gave me that impression. by the second ep i was hooked. and by the third ep this was one of my favorite shows of all time

PREMISE

during the joseon era, a shaman named weol ju went and fucked up a perfectly good sacred tree. as punishment, she now has to resolve the grudges of 100,000 humans or go to hell. as a shaman, she can accomplish this by plying them with alcohol and entering their dreams (well the alcohol part might just be her artistic signature).

time to start a bar!

in the current day, 500 years later, weol ju owns and runs mystic pop up bar, where she learns about her customers’ grudges. and apparently has sound business strategy, as she serves like 4 people a day but still has enough overhead to craft these 4 people bespoke meals that speak to their inner tragedy. and also sandwiches.

helping her is chief gwi, a ghost cop who’s been reassigned to her bar to help weol ju accomplish her quota. because time’s running out--weol ju now has less than a month to solve her 10 remaining grudges.

enter bambi kang bae. a regular human who works a regular customer service job, kang bae has one terrible power: anytime someone touches him (or he touches them), they want to confess their deepest, darkest secrets. kang bae is understandably not comfortable around people (but desperately wants to be around people. my poor fucking heart) and incredibly lonely. 

when his and weol ju’s paths cross, she makes him an offer: he helps her out with her remaining grudges, and in return she’ll remove his powers.

deal!

MAIN CHARACTERS

weol ju

a 500+ year old shaman who is paying for her sins on earth because she went out on a limb :| . begins the series angry and ends the series angry, because it turns out angry people can still be kind, which is great to see with a female protagonist. how close she’s cutting it to the deadline on her quota speaks strongly to sixth-year senior vibes. wears modern versions of hanboks which are all v. cool and on moments of aching realization wednesdays she wears pink.

will steal your shit and look you straight in the eyes as she walks backwards into hell.

gwi/gui

a former ghost cop who’s been reassigned to help weol ju run the mystic pop up bar. he’s a lot more chill than weol ju and has the vibe of someone who forgets keys at home. while at the bar, he does a lot of the prep work, and is sometimes asked by yeom to help catch nearby, evil spirits. 

he’s actually like a hardcore warrior, but you forget it because he wears goggles to cut onions and dresses like someone who would be the spokesperson for microwaveable fish sticks. team dad. fanboy of romantic serial e-novels.

han kang bae

a baby.

in a truly amazing narrative move, kang bae works customer service at a market by day and solves grudges at a bar by night. is a sweet, simple boy who just wants to help people and is SO EXCITED to have new friends in weol ju and gwi. you want to give him a hug BUT YOU CAN’T.  human carebear

even the yellow collar of his customer service uniform makes a heart:

SOME SUPPORT CHARACTERS SELECTED BY HOW MUCH THEY ARE MY FAVORITES

kang yeo ri

lmao you know it’s going to be good when a character is introduced dropping a dude straight to the ground. yeo rin is a bodyguard mild spoiler turned security guard for the market where kang bae works. she could beat the shit out of you and you’d thank her. has no luck in dating. rocks a suit. sobs at movies about gout

yeom, the grim reaper

your friendly neighborhood grim reaper. yeom very much screams middle management, and works in the same “district” that weol ju and gwi have their pop up bar in. sometimes they’re at odds with one another (because weol ju has about the same amount of respect for the rules that an untrained puppy has for new carpet), but they’re still friends. gwi sometimes works with him to catch evil spirits, buddy-cop style. loves noodles. 

yeomra-daewang 

god of the underworld. in charge of handing out punishments and determining the fates of those sent to the afterlife. forgets who she’s texting. appreciates true love but is also aggressively annoyed by it. take your fucking scroll and go

samsin

probably the character with the most name recognition. samsin (or samsin granny) is the goddess of mothers and children, and in the show the focus is more on children. loves karaoke, basic bitch coffee, and claw games. gives out too many sexy tiger dreams.

kim wong hyun

he gave them the heebie jeebies. he had nothing else to give

ringtones.

they’re their own character. check out those motifs. 

Drawbacks

if i had any, it’s that the first episode undersells the rest of the series. and even the first ep isn’t bad

12 episodes is not enough :( 

Reasons to Watch.

i love the little details: that the supernatural characters have ring tones that correspond to their role (ex: the god of the underworld’s are screams; i believe the grim reaper’s are a shaman’s bells?, gwi has SPOILERS), or that the food special of the day connects or reflects with the person they’re helping. themes/significant moments are represented by the colors characters are wearing. im a nerd for this stuff

there are some dramatic reveals about who characters are and how they relate to one another, but like. dynamics barely (or don’t at all) change, and that’s due to how strong/familial they are already? and the show’s built up to it and it all feels really earned A+

i HATE monster of the week formats, but the ones in this show are integrated with the main characters’ backstories and also propel the major arcs forward. and it’s wholesome when the grudges are solved

i like that you think you saw a full scene in the flashbacks, but then a few eps later the flashback gets extended. idk it’s a cool narrative device

the romance is wonderful all-around

the pacing was great. i wish one of the Reveals was introduced earlier just so we could have more moments with it, but everything was cohesive/wrapped up nicely

all the characters have their own unique relationships to one another. kang bae + weol ju have their own dynamic, weol ju +gwi, gwi + kang bae, and so on. it was nice to see that none of the main trio were satellite characters 

Final Thoughts.

they’re a team, god damn it ;;;;;;

[thecorteztwins]

So, I'm curious, who would be on your ideal Hellfire club?

Okay so I am a BIG fan of the classic 80s lineup---Sebastian, Emma, Harry, Pierce, Selene, Tessa--but I also very much love the little-knowns. If I was going to do an adaptation of the Club, like for a TV show or a movie, I think I would do the classic 80s lineup plus Shinobi. I think that’s a good intro to them. If I was going to do a 616 comics story, I think I’d try to AVOID the typical choices. I love Emma, but I would leave her out of it, because I think that any story with Emma in it is just going to end up being all about Emma, particularly if the other characters aren’t “big” enough to compete with her...and honestly, she doesn’t need to be tied to the Hellfire Club for everything, she’s a hero now for a reason. So as much as I love her, I wouldn’t have her in it. I’d also be wary of including Sebastian or Madelyne for the same reasons, despite my love for them, but at the same time I feel like Sebastian hasn’t had a story in waaay too long that wasn’t about Emma, and he deserves a chance to come back as a good villain again? Up until the issue where he kills Shadowcat, he was a pretty limp villain for the 2010s. Madelyne isn’t really synonymous with the Club in the way that Sebastian, Emma, and Selene are, but she’s likewise just got so much going on that I feel she’d take over the story for me. So, no Emma or Selene or Maddie, but TENTATIVELY one or both of the Shaws. Tentatively. And tentatively Harry Leland or RED LOTUS But more importantly, the women. We know the Hellfire Club has a ton of badass women, but what about the less prominent ones? First off, BENAZIR KAUR is a longtime one-issue wonder fave of mine, I want her back as White Queen. Sat-Yr-9 was also the White Queen for one story, and while I have always wanted to see her back in that role, I think for this setup, I would instead cast VIPER as the Black Queen. Viper served as Sat-Yr-9′s bodyguard (”White Warrior Princess” that is not a chess piece or position Viper) but she’s a longtime major villain in her own right with a ton of backstory. I think her criminal empire in Madripoor would make her a good fit. But speaking of Madripoor and criminal empires, you know who else I think would be a good fit? TYGER TIGER. She’s like...a very ambiguous character, she’s like the good guy gangster type, you know? Like...Viper allowed slavery and sex trafficking in Madripoor, Tyger Tiger did NOT but she’s still allowing the sale of slaughtered tiger pelts. That kind of thing. And she and Viper have beef between them as two rival badass Madripoor lady crime lords so that makes for a good dramatic setup, there always needs to be a conflict in the Hellfire Club, they can never be a united group. Maybe Tyger is Black Queen and Viper is White King! Women can occupy the King seat, after all. And Viper was Prince of Madripoor for a bit! So, I think that Benazir Kaur, Tyger Tiger, and Viper are a great mix for the ladies, and while Red Lotus will probably get involved, Harry and the Shaws will stay out of it, haha. I would actually still LOVE to have Emma and Madelyne there, but like I said I feel like they would take over the story? I feel like Sebastian risks that already so I might cut it to just Shinobi and Harry plus Red Lotus. Of course, if I threw out concerns about story constraints, the lineup would be a HUGE clusterfuck of:

Sebastian Shaw Shinobi Shaw Emma Frost Tessa/Sage Selene Madelyne Pryor Harry Leland Benazir Kaur Sat Yr 9 Viper Tyger Tiger Red Lotus Monet St. Croix (she was White Queen for an issue and I was so excited about that and NOTHING CAME OF IT) Haven and Monsoon Fabian Cortez THE HELLIONS And I’d have the London Branch pop in for a bit! They had some interesting characters--- Emma Steed aka Damask, Scribe, Margali Szardos (yes as in Kurt’s mom!) and the Red King, who was never given a name but was a sword-wielding fellow of Maori or Kiwi heritage:

And I certainly wouldn’t mind seeing Emma’s siblings again, especially Cordelia! That lineup would be insane to juggle, of course. But they’re all characters I like who either were canonically members, or that I could see being members for whatever reason (wealth, status, etc) who I like. I would also REALLY love to see the Paris and Hong Kong branches! 95% of the Hellfire Club stories are specifically about the Manhattan branch, to the point that when anyone says “Hellfire Club” that’s who they mean, and I think most writers have forgotten this but there are FOUR branches---Manhattan, London, Paris, and Hong Kong. I think maybe the Madripoor drama could focus on the Hong Kong branch, since Madripoor is a southeast Asian country and thus would be closest to China. Of course, building those Inner Circles might just plain call for designing new characters!

[randomikemendegen]

Bullet-point trivia/facts about Lala:

Lala was born into a clan of (tiger) warriors who strongly valued and adhered to the idea of "The weak are meat; the strong eat.”, with her being basically their “princess” due to her parents being, essentially, the “rulers” of the clan.

She was actually really sickly when she was a child; so sick that even she couldn’t even walk on her own without quickly falling to the ground in just 3 seconds.

Or even coughing up blood every so often. Even opening her eyes proved too much too hard due to the pain of her entire body and being too weak to move.

Thus she always had to rely on her older brother, [Shir-Kani], who was always by her side and would protect her from anything.

He vowed to always stay by her side no matter what even if the others had already long given up on her due to her condition. It even got to the point that even their mother, as was typical of all the women in their clan, who was extremely loving and protective, sadly resigned to her daughter’s fate of an early demise (whilst blaming herself for birthing Lala a weak body).

Her condition has actually existed since long ago within their clan’s history, though it was extremely rare and as a result, no one really knew what the cure for her illness was or how to combat it.

Also, due to her condition, she’s the only one who has albinism in her entire clan after the last one who existed a few couple centuries ago, while the rest have the normal (bengal) tiger fur/hair color. (EDIT: Ok, so, mod suffered a brain fart and slightly forgot she drew what if!Lala still with albinism skdljakdjasd) 

EDIT: Albinism in her clan is a trait not exactly tied together with the condition Lala is currently suffering from, so it doesn’t always mean that that Tigris is inflicted with the illness and it could just be from the recessive genetics.

When Lala turned 5, and Shir turned 9, however, Lala was able to stand up on her own and beat the ever-loving shit out of a group of kids (they were all around 11 to 12 yrs old) who had been picking on her older brother for quite some time now due to Lala’s condition. 

Having had enough, Lala lashed out and ended up sending the kids near death with the sheer brutality of her attack, with even their resident doctor stating that the kids will bear literal scars all over their bodies for the rest of their lives and that it was a miracle even that they managed to survive.

Conveniently, it was also due to this event and a recent discovery regarding Lala’s condition that, while her physical growth WILL be drastically slowed down, in exchange her body and muscles amplifies itself greatly to the point that she could just as easily have killed the kids with only a couple of (good) blows to their faces or chest area (specifically, where their lungs are at). [note: currently, she’s strong enough to easily carry Malleus, with little to no effort, and is practically a one-woman army).

Double conveniently, her weak physique stopped after she turned eight and she proceeded to get stronger from then on. (Though not long after, she left the clan all on her own without telling anyone...)

(Aaaaaand I’m going to stop there before this goes out of hand and becomes WAAAY too long lol. If any of you want the full backstory, then I might just finish it sooner or later; that is, IF any of you actually want it....)

(What she looks like  VS  What she COULD have looked like)

[illegiblewords]

Explanation of design approach and some personality info under the cut.

Essentially, the way I’ve been approaching this I wanted to make each world feel like a self-contained and cohesive team. Nivienne is actually from Lamia and so isn’t designed to mesh with the others, but I use her a lot and have a design strategy for her so she’s included. For team Famfrit as a whole, I wanted to make sure that each personality and design would feel distinct and that the main color for each character would stand out. Most are also pretty obvious lol--black mage is black, red made is red, white mage is white. Areas I went different are gold dragoon (or aurum dragoon if we’re being fancy), purple scholar, green bard, orange ninja, blue warrior.

CENRIC ASHER

My main and a hyur midlander black mage. With him I wanted to push against the concept that hyurs are inherently vanilla or “boring”. Imo there is nothing wrong with designs that look like they could occur in nature, but with him I wanted to do an edgy personal spin in the classic Final Fantasy black mage look where the character is a dark silhouette with glowing eyes, a high collar, and a broad hat. Sometimes he wears other things too but the overall concept ties to that particular look. In personality Cenric is a pretty angsty guy due to having been a con artist who got a lot of people killed with medical fraud. He lies a lot out of fear of the reaction he’d get if his background was known. Possibly a little nuts, thinks he is the son of Nald’Thal and bound to spread death and destruction wherever he goes--striking enemies and allies alike, regardless of his own wishes. Probably actually just has Duskwight heritage. Has pretty hardcore imposter syndrome about being Warrior of Light, but in partial response to having been destitute and outcast for a long time he tries to play into the persona of a powerful, luxurious, mysterious black mage brimming with forbidden knowledge. In reality he is intimidated by most children, can’t whistle, and is a bit of a smartass when he’s not panicking his way through conversations.

J’MOR TIA

My red mage alt, I wanted to do a few experiments with him! One was that Red Mages usually read very sophisticated and swashbuckle-y to me, and I wanted to play more into the rapier as an almost roguish weapon. Very physical. He’s somebody who you initially would not assume is a magic user but who is just as versed and capable on that front as the ivory tower casters haha. I also wanted to make him a combination of ethnically black (contrasting Cenric who is ethnically Arab but weird) and a male miqo’te because I have never seen that combination before. I wanted him to feel very charming and like he has kind of rugged good looks. Just a bit too scruffy for pretty boy. Personality he is probably the most shonen hero of my alts lol. He has stuff he struggles with (he and his sister both wanted to be adventurers but she opted out after taking things way too far in a fight and getting scared of her own power) but doesn’t get stuck in his head nearly as much as some other characters do.

CESAIRE DELAROUX

I futzed with this guy for a while—main inspiration comes from a particular kind of horse called the Akhal-teke.

Also because I have seen some really cool and pretty elezen that specifically worked to play up gold as a color scheme, and in this case I wanted to evoke a kind of warm, soft golden light. Originally I was going to make him a contrast to Cenric and make him much paler, but I wound up going that route more with Asklona instead with drawing loose inspiration from certain forms of albinism. I went more gold to make sure Cesaire would stand out visually from Asklona. Another reason for this route is because I want to make a character who looks very light and pure, but in practice has hardcore bloodlust. XD Wanted one case for playing into that possible WoL element haha. I also thought it might be neat to make a character who could serve as a kind of foil to Zenos in many ways and might credibly say yes when invited to be besties. Cesaire is still a mostly heroic guy but I figure he’s a bit like Dexter if that makes sense.

KIYO SHIROGANE

An auri white mage from Hingashi! To me it felt a little odd that the Ruby Princess of Sui-no-Sato has more of a magenta color scheme than red. I wanted to tie Kiyo to Kugane specifically in part because I think the parallels between geomancy and white magic (land, sea, sky) are super cool imo, there are a fair number or Raen au ra in Kugane with less lore exploration, and I wanted to make a character whose past trailed behind her in a clear and interesting way while she travels. So for Kiyo I kind of took inspiration from the idea of a red pearl (pearls often being white as per the horns and scales but then she has vivid red hair) and from the idea of blood tied to injury and medicine. Plus ya know, white magic. I also took light inspiration from candles conceptually. I totally forgot that Shirogane is the housing district also lol so now she has backstory lore that her family had been heavily involved in establishing the area. Kiyo comes from a large and noble family with a ton of political and economic influence, being herself somewhat sheltered and naïve. She is very sincere, playful, outgoing, and does her best to be kind. Very animated!

OSK YASKARET

For Osk, I was essentially going (ʘ_ʘ;;) because I knew that I hadn’t used ANY brown hair so far and it was making so uncomfortable lol. So I thought about what combination would be appropriate, distinct, and striking enough to fit within the cast while also being distinct. Gray and brown feel like chinchilla colors to me and I think are nice in a way that wouldn’t be out of place with rabbits/viera. I wanted dark eyes since again, I hadn’t yet for this group... so dark purple wound up being her main color. Since I was going scholar, I also wanted to keep the sense of intellect and feeling like a healer without being mistakable for astrologian or white mage. I still want to build into her look, but another aspect I wanted to incorporate--saw a lot of people arguing about the inherent sensuality of Viera, so I figured for her I wanted to make her look elegant and sophisticated but more conservative in glamours. I didn’t want her to instantly read like she hopped out of the woods either. Figure she’d have had time to adapt since.

I’m still very much debating backstory and personality or her but am leaning toward her being the offspring of a viera who left the woods while pregnant. I like the idea of Osk wanting to connect with her heritage but feeling somewhat adrift. I also want to incorporate Nym lore because omg I want more Nym in-general. Personality I do think Osk is probably a little bit of a smug bunny but things remain super tenuous.

ASKLONA WANNEYNWYN

Asklona I literally wanted to make a super soft feeling, hyper feminine lady roegadyn because most interpretations I’ve seen have been either harder feminine or tomboyish. Still fun imo, but given the grief some fans heap on femroes I really wanted to show that this kind of look is doable. I usually try to incorporate the black noses on Hellsguard designs (tiger roooooes) while with Seawolves I tend to push either fully into something natural or fully into something unnatural. So ex. the most desaturated option or else just run with blues and greens. Asklona is specifically a bard because it is pretty and fancy imo and I haven’t seen a lot of roegadyn bards in-general. Asklona I mentioned before is modeled off of certain kinds of albinism, but by that I want to make the disclaimer that pink eyes don’t generally occur in people (pale blue or violet is more likely) and that normally there are some eyesight problems that come with the condition as well as ease of getting sunburn. I don’t necessary play into that with Asklona/am going artistic license because I mean final fantasy we can lift swords bigger than we are. I know these things get overlooked a lot though so it seemed worth specifying. My choice to go this route was because I wanted to make myself use more pastels lol and I figured this would be a fun spot to contrast Cenric. I think in backstory Asklona’s father lost his mind to a siren, and Asklona pursuing adventuring as a bard is partly to take revenge and partly in the hopes that she can call her father back with song. Her involvement becomes more complicated over time but I think that’s the general direction. I picked green for her color scheme because it’s a color that feels like it evokes both the woods of Gridania and the sea itself... and because pink is a shade of red and with green being complementary, I figured it would make the pinks stand out a lot. Asklona is tied to Limsa Lominsa and besides looking for outfits that will flatter her body type I am trying to evoke the ocean in her designs. Pirates, sailors, the works. Personality I am still figuring out a bit but I think Asklona is definitely a shameless flirt, can read as insensitive and self-centered at times as she indulges in what makes her happy. She plays herself off as much more shallow than she is and in-general focuses on pursuing pleasure as a way of avoiding heavier issues.

KOKONO KONO

The scrappy daughter of a Doman fox auspice and a Thavnairian lalafell, Kokono saw her mother waste away with homesickness after fleeing the Garlean occupation. She has two brothers, one who returned to Doma while the other remains in Thavnair witht her father. Kokono hates the idea of loving a place so much you would die over it and decided to travel Hydaelyn, causing mischief while indulging a deep-rooted curiosity and love for discovering new places. Has severe commitment issues. Can be prone to swearing and being insensitive because the shocked reactions amuse her a lot, but her heart is ultimately in the right place. I designed her literally to make a lalafell fox because with the dark nose option + werewolf ears it is SO EASY to make tiny canines and I don’t understand why more people don’t do this. Like I could make an elegant white fox lalafell or a yorkshire terrier lalafell or any number of things. We can have itty bitty dogs! And like Kiyo I wanted some background to be evident in her clothes too. I designed her before I picked her backstory and mainly went for rule-of-cute/what would most evoke the red coat of a fox.

SVATOMIR AZORYA

Last of team Famfrit, he’s a Warrior Hrothgar. Very conceptually rough, I’m interested in playing him much more reserved and traditionally masculine in a lot of ways. I think a character in that vein will help balance out against the other Warriors of Light I made for that world. Design goal here was to make him look as wolf-like as possible haha. I think we have plenty of cat people already with Miqo’te.

NIVIENNE LECLAIR

From Lamia, I’ve talked a bit about her before so copypasting that in.

Basically, when I decided to try doing the whole WoL/Emet-Selch fic writing misadventure it was just a personal challenge for funsies. I’d seen other people do some really interesting and impressive stuff using unnamed lady WoLs. Hadn’t really tried something like that myself so I decided to go full improv with it.

Except my instincts tend toward specificity lol, so I scattered details according to what would make for fun scenarios or cute details. I wanted the lady to be a certain level of tall so I went with elezen. I needed to describe a readily portable weapon that would mesh with that sweet, sweet Amaurotine lore, so I made her a summoner. So on and so forth. Very seat-of-the-pants.

Particularly since the fic I have coming up is gonna be bigger, I’m thinking name is okay now lol.

Cenric as my black mage main is a dark, broody guy who doesn’t quite realize he’s nicer and sillier that he gives himself credit. So I decided Nivienne should be much more socially adept (read: not a lameass poser), very mischievous, confident… but lowkey has some heavy shit going on. Girl can be ruthlessly manipulative. Other WoLs of mine have different personalities.

As I was going through fic stuff, I decided I wanted to visually tie to and contrast with Emet-Selch since shipping. He’s got gold eyes and accents on his regalia? She’ll go silver, but her skin will have a more golden tone. He’s got dark hair with a white streak? She’ll have light gray hair, tie into the ruff of his coat. So on and so forth.

Name-wise, I actually fucked up initially by going too on-the-nose. Nivienne is another (more elezen-French) name for Nimue. Given how that story goes I figured it would be fitting here.

As a couple of other notes--color scheme being gray was experimenting to try for a different-but-distinct summoner aesthetic. I wanted to play up horns/third eye concepts (not strictly in the Garlean sense) and create a vibe that wouldn’t feel like white mage, or red mage, or black mage, etc. I also saw people arguing that female casters all end up looking like magical girls, so I wanted to really make sure that she had a different look from that while still being very feminine.

[raggydraws]

Whitestorm 🙏

Aight, my friend, my dude. Do you want WhiteTiger? Or my more obscure RedStorm?

Imma do do Whitestorm x Redtail. Good boys, my two favorite boys, golden bois~

General headcanons for Whitestorm

Whitestorm

Whitestorm was a family guy and if he felt he had the chance he would've pulled a Fernsong in an instant. He loved his kids so much, regardless of who you think his kids are.

Speaking of kids~ He is the father of Greystripe (cause incest is yucky Erins) and I imagine he was supportive of his son's decisions after Silversteam's death. When he came back he welcomed him with open arms.

He was also really sad that he passed away before he could see Sorrel, Soot and, Rain beccome warriors and at how soon his sons joined him. He's a great grandpa to Molepaw, Honeyfern and, Seedpaw though!

Whitestorm x Redtail

So starting off, I firmly believe that that Tigerclaw and Whitestorm did date for a long time, at least up until Thistleclaw's death, before they had a really nasty break up. Tigerclaw grew up into something Whitestorm couldn't support and Tigerclaw's following tantrum/outburst for White's 'betrayal' stung very deeply.

"But Raggs I thought you were doing Redtail x Whitestorm??" I'm getting there, y'all need backstory first.

So, Whitestorm kinda bounced around short relationships for a while after he and Tiger broke up. He was very upset and wasn't in the best state of mind to be in a serious relationship. Some of these were WhiteLion, WhiteWillow (possibly making Greystripe in this narrative?) And finally him and Redtail.

Redtail was a breathe of fresh air for him, Red is mature and responsible but never gave into White's feeling sorry for himself. They kinda balanced each other out, as Red often felt a little stretched thin and Whitestorm (with a little experience with deputy duties) could help him out or convince him to go hunting when he was at his breaking point. Also imagine Single Dad Redtail telling Sandkit that he's dating Whitestorm and she's just like ":0".

Once Whitestorm's gotten over Tigerclaw and has healed from that heartbreak he starts taking what Red assumed was a casual relationship much more seriously. It's kind of a surprise but a welcome one and the two actually becomes mates not long after Sandkit becomes Sandpaw. Greykit, who still sees Whitestorm very often and is aware that parents aren't together, calls new dad everything Willowpelt says he can't do something. Also Step-siblings Greystripe and Sandstorm sounds like fun! Warrior cats should have more step families like...come on Erins...stop being Cowards you fools.

And because I want a happy ending I could see Whitestorm being more aware of Tigerclaw's ambition towards leadership. He dosen’t want to believe that Tigerclaw would go has far as removing Redtail from his position but when the battle with Riverclan rolls around Whitestorm manages to convince Redtail to stay behind. He tells his mate his concerns and while Redtail brushes it off at first, the glares and hushed conversations between Tigerclaw and Darkstripe start to become more obvious to him as time goes on. The two live through the events of first series, most likely with Redtail becoming Redstar, and possibly both passing away in late New Prophecy to make way for Firestar (or Brightstar!)

[irrepressible-domovoy]

I was trying to write fanfiction and somehow ended up with this instead. (It bounces around, but bear with me)

You ever notice how friggin’ jacked superheroes are?

Like, take Captain America: The First Avenger for instance. In that first scene where he’s just been turned into Erskine’s super-beefcake, Carter (or, more accurately, Hayley Atwell, because that was not scripted) couldn’t keep her hands to herself when he popped out of the pod shirtless with washboard abs and boobs that rivaled mine.

And every time we get a female superhero, she’s this stick-figure thin girl with an absolutely flat belly and no scars (unless they’re the Black Widow) and no stretch marks because those are considered “gross.”

But here’s the thing.

The actors aren’t naturally that way. It’s not even healthy to be that way.

I remember reading how Chris Hemsworth got his “look” for his shirtless scenes in Thor by not drinking water for a few days and right before he would need to be hospitalized for dehydration, they called, “Roll it!” (I legitimately cannot remember where this was. Someone help me?)

At another point, I remember reading an interview where Chris Evans said those super-tight shirts from the Captain America movies were really uncomfortable. He even hinted that they were painful.

And in another movie, (Was it Spartacus?) the cast pretty much survived on chicken and lettuce. Look, I’m not a nutritionist in any sense of the imagination, but even I know that’s not safe, physically healthy, or good for your mental health.

In Fight Club, Brad Pitt screwed himself up big time by cutting his weight constantly to keep his “perfect” physique.

Slightly off-topic, but Brendon Frasier nearly killed himself with the stunts on top of the weight/muscle-tone demands for The Mummy 3. There’s a serious problem with the industry here.

And let’s get onto the women’s body image here that affects literally every woman on screen: Flat bellies? Dudes. Cis women have these things called ovaries that are in there. We need more room. Plus, it is actually unhealthy for anyone of any gender to have less than 8% body fat, at bare minimum.

Then there’s the issue with erasing scars and stretch marks. I am twenty-two years old. I have scars from everything from an accident in the kitchen to skinning my knee as a kid on a patch of shattered glass. You (the writers and directors of the films) give them to the dudes, but not the girls? Just work those scars into your BAMF super-heroines. They already have the backstories for them to be viable and even likely. I, as well as more than half of the people on this planet, have these things called stretch marks. They are what happens when we grow. It means I started out as a baby and turned into an adult. They are not shameful and only serve to remind me that I, and the person on my screen, were once small and innocent. (Also, they either look like tiger stripes or lightning bolts, depending on how you look at them)

My point is, we the viewers (whether children learning how to view our own bodies and the world, teenagers struggling with self-image in a world that tells us we aren’t ever going to be pretty enough, or grown adults struggling with all of the above and more) deserve to be able to see heroes that are real and the actors portraying these characters deserve to not only feel better about themselves but to also be able to do their job without causing permanent damage to their bodies.

@fightyspidey and I came up with some ideas, if Marvel Studios wanted some suggestions.

Give us Thor, mighty Viking warrior king, with the fat from too many feasts. (Human weightlifting champions are known for being “a bit pudgy” but they can also kill you with a pinky. It’s not that far off the mark)

Give me Steve Rogers with stretch marks and scars from growing too fast after Project: Rebirth.

Give me a Natasha Romanov with scars that aren’t there to maximize the mangst and aren’t perfect little circles that are easily hidden.

Give me Tony Stark without a shirt and his scars aren’t some “sexy work of art,” but rather an ugly reminder of pain and hardship.

Give me Sif coming to visit the Avengers and she comes in with shorts or a skirt on and we see how she doesn’t shave her legs and literally no one cares.

I want to see the Hulk with stretch marks and Bruce completely chill with his pudge.

I want to see Peter, Shuri, and Wanda with acne and acne scars. (Please?)

I would love to see Scott Lang telling a story about the time he fell out of a three-story window (”And Luis did nothing!”) and he ended up with a bald-patch on the side of his head from where his helmet cracked his skull open. (I actually have one of those)

I want to see burns on Pepper, because her Extremis is still imperfect and can’t heal everything without leaving something behind in its place.

Happy should still have scars from Iron Man 3.

In short: Give me characters that I can see myself in.

The fans aren’t perfect. We don’t have clear skin, no matter our ages, and we have scars and fat in weird places and hair in even weirder ones.

Give us heroes that we can identify with.

Give your actors a chance to breathe. Give them a chance to be okay with themselves.

[jace-the-writer-guy]

A dream game of mine

These are the ideas I often come up with for a dream game, and it just combines so many elements from different things I've played or watched videos of into one huge and crazy thing that would be amazing to see and play. It's pretty much a pipe dream in this lifetime of mine but I can't help but imagine it. So without anymore stalling, here's all my ramblings about it.

I would just really love a game like Skyrim is, but just... more. Like Skyrim has a bunch of the adventure/exploration elements I love in a game, but I didn't think it had enough diversity in scenery and it all felt cold because of the part of the world it was set in.

I would love a game that was like Elder Scrolls Online in size with all the different provinces you can go to with all that land to explore between the snowy areas, desert areas, and forest/jungle areas and all the settlements that would be scattered throughout. And all the scenery in that game was beautiful to me. And along with that, add the crafting/blacksmithing stuff from ESO too, because that was the main thing I did when I played the game. I created everything I used from different swords and armor.

And speaking of swords and armor, I'd love the game to have what ESO does, which was have there be different styles of weapons and armor you can craft after you read the plans or whatever for it. Like a steel sword can be one style, or you can craft it in another style but it would have the same stats, just a different look. Same with armor too. Or a greatsword could be more on the skinny side, or you could make it be a massive weapon like what the Buster Sword is.

Whatever weapons you favorite will be visible on your character and you can choose where you want something specifically placed. For example, a Ranger could have their bow across their chest and back and their quiver of arrows at their back either behind either shoulder or at their waist, or on their thigh while they have a dagger on one hip and a sword on the other. You can't have too many weapons on your body though. There would be a weapon wheel you can bring up that lets you choose between what weapons you have favorited.

The weapons and armor would be highly customizable too. Like with armor, you could mix and match different pieces or furs to make something unique to you, and for weapons you could add different accessories to them like jeweled hilts or carved bow shafts.

As for the exploration, I think it would be a phenomenal thing to focus on in a fantasy game. With so many environments like what I mentioned above with forests to snowy areas, there can be some absolute magic to be discovered like beautiful lakes or ponds, or something like my Heaven's Clearing area I created in my RWBY AU. Mountainous areas with waterfalls cascading down the rocks? Giant trees in a gorgeously lush forest with a treehouse village? A snowy village deep within the mountains? An ancient and run down fortress in a canyon with only one small valley to access it? Sprawling cave systems in the mountains? Tropical beaches? A beautiful oasis hidden in the middle of a vast desert? Explore and you can find stuff like this and more.

Examples of the sights you could see. I don't know the artists sadly. I found these all on Reddit at r/imaginarylandscapes)

And if and when you find this stuff? Build there if you want! It could be like Fallout 76 with the C.A.M.P. thing, but you have such an extreme amount of freedom to build kind of like in Minecraft, and have the building be like a mix between Minecraft, 7 Days to Die, and Ark. Build what you want from a nice, cozy little cabin in the woods, or a big estate on the mountainside with the waterfalls going under the house. Make it as big and as grand, or as small and as cozy as you want it to be with loads of decoration stuff you can build, and with different variations to the decorations. Different styles of beds, candles, wardrobes, chests, doors, windows, whatever. Just give unmatched variety. And of course for all of them, you would have to go out and find the materials, like for a simple cabin you would have to go out and either buy the lumber, or cut it down yourself. Or if you want to just dig into the side of a hill or mountain and mold your home from there, you absolutely can, given you have the equipment to dig it all out. Or you could just be a nomad and camp around anywhere you wanted while you travel and not be held down to one place.

Character customization would let you be able to make the character you want for a fantasy game like this is in my imagination. Loads of different hairstyles, body types, eye/hair/skin colors, customize your height to be the size of a Goliath (in D&D) or a gnome and so on. Pick from a variety of races from human, different races of elves, dwarves, halflings gnomes, goliaths, orcs and tabaxis', mix races, and more. And in game, you can really pick any type of clothing/armor style you want from even more choices. And along with that, you can of course pick different classes for your character to be from a fighter/warrior, to a ranger, to a magic user, to a bard, or whatever. You pick your skills from a huge list of stuff for each class and you go around and do what you want to do as that character. And like with Dragon's Dogma (one of my favorite games), you can change your class instead of being tied into one class at really any point in the game that you felt like. And you can multiclass too and combine any two classes you want to try.

Magic in the game would be more... magical. Like you start out with basic spells if you're one of the magic using classes with sorcerers getting a bit more, but it all starts out as just looking very dull. And when you train and level up your magical abilities and find new spells out of the huge selection of them in the game, the magic gets more and more bright, vivid, colorful, vibrant, and flashy too so you can actually see the results of all the levels you poured into your magic.

It wouldn't just be exploration though, considering weapons, armor, and magic would be in the game. There would be so many different jobs and ways to make gold to choose from, and there would be multiple long running quests you could accept that would be like something from D&D. And a thing for that is that the game can either be single player and you can pick a party of NPCs to join you through your adventures, or you could switch it over to multiplayer and invite a few of your friends in to explore the world together or do these quests and split the rewards from both the journey itself and the reward for completing the quests. The questscan have different styles, like serious ones and some where there can be some fun, like a Borderlands mission.

And as something in between these quests, you could have different jobs you can choose from like I mentioned. You can start your own mine or lumber yard to sell ores, precious gems, or wood to anyone (NPC or player) that wants/needs it. You can do guard duty for someone, you could scout an area out for any dangers for someone wanting to build a house or for military, or chart out unknown parts of the world and draw a map of it (provided you take a cartography skill) and sell them to people. You could even just be a simple hunter and hunt game to provide meat and pelts for yourself and for trade. Or be a bard and make some music between more somber songs or uplifting ones, or ones where you just tell the tales of events that have happened in the game. And for that, the game would have a huge score of music. And there would be bounty hunting quests as well, and sometimes they can lead into something more.

You have the choice between if you want to be a combat focused character or a trader/craftsman focused character or something along those lines. In single player, you could hire an NPC bodyguard and they would be extremely competent (unlike the referees in WWE games :p) in battles in order to protect you. Or in multiplayer, your friends could provide your protection while you create trade routes or gather materials, or explore the world for treasures. And it could be the other way around with you being the bodyguard and your friend being the one you're protecting too.

Choose your own backstory from a huge list of options. You could have a backstory as a simple farmer, a guard, a soldier, a trader, a blacksmith, a mercenary, or a craftsman to name a few. Each backstory comes with a specific set of gear depending on the backstory and an area of the world you start out with and in. Like a mercenary would start with light armor and a battle axe, having just completed a job in the colder regions so you would have fur cloaks and armor or you could have just completed a job in a more tropical spot of the world.

And romance too! You could have your character romance any NPC in the game no matter if they're male or female, unless they're already married. Or if you want to do a bit more, romance them both! Start a family with them, and hire bodyguards to protect them while you're out adventuring, if your spouse doesn't have any combat skills of course. Or hire bodyguards anyway to secure your childrens' safety.

See a dog you want to adopt? Adopt it! Same with cats or any other animal you might see up for adoption or for sale from somewhere. Each province have different kinds of pets you can get, so traveling the world for your perfect hunting/travel buddy or housemate may be something to do. And you can name your pet too. Or you could even capture and tame a wolf or tiger or something in the wild too if you wanted. Also, you can pet your pets. Give them attention!

For travel, you could either carry the bare essentials on your character and just walk either alone or with a companion by your side, or you could save your gold for a horse or go tame a wild one to ride through the world. And on top of that, you can buy different types of wagons to carry all the things you need to set up a larger camp for yourself or for your companions. Larger wagons mean the need for an extra horse. And you can also buy or craft accessories for your horse and wagons, like different saddles or canopies respectively.

And also for travel across the seas, you can either pay for passage on a ship or save up gold to buy your own and hire your own crew to go on voyages. Along with that, one thing you could do is become a pirate if you chose to in case you didn't want to just spend your days on land, or become a trade vessel to transport goods from place to place, or you could even just have it become a passenger ship and take gold to take people across the sea. Search for buried treasure and pillage other ships as a pirate, or discover an island to claim for yourself and your friends.

One thing that would be in the game would be hunting, from small game all the way up to dragons. The hunting is something I enjoy so much in Red Dead Online that I would love to see it in a game like this with so many animals and creatures. Of course there would be stuff like boars, deer, bears, and animals like that but there would also be fantasy creatures to try to hunt, and the biggest, baddest, most difficult, and most rewarding would be dragons if you chose to hunt them. But you could just stick to hunting normal animals too, because that can be very rewarding in its own way like with what I said before about hunting. And of course, you could go fishing at one of the many rivers, streams, ponds, or lakes in the game too.

There would be two separate modes you could do between a more casual experience or something more hardcore. The casual mode would be that you don't have to worry about eating, drinking, sleeping, or worrying about temperature to survive while the survival mode would include all those things, plus the need to watch out for poisons, venom, or diseases or anything like that so players can enjoy the game how they want to enjoy it.

One thing about the game is that there is single player and multiplayer of course, but the multiplayer would have private servers and public ones for if you only wanted to play with friends, or if you wanted to take it online and interact with a bunch of other players. And on top of that, there would be separate servers for players who only want to have a peaceful time with other players where they can't attack each other at all, and servers where PvP is fully on for the players that want the danger of dealing with other players that want to take them out so there aren't those types of people in the same servers. Choose your server, choose your experience.

Another thing that would be a part of the game is full, unrestricted mod support. Create mods for the game to craft it into something truly special either with different weapons, armors, spells, quests, races, or anything. Download any mod you want at your discretion, no matter what it is. And the mod support would span all platforms the game is on with absolutely no restrictions regardless of platform or the content of the mods.

To make the game even more special, you can create a new character at any time you want, and your previous character will still be wondering the world while you're starting anew. And if you end up finding your other character, you can form a team with them and easily switch back and forth between the two. That would make it possible to create your own adventuring party rather than hire NPCs or relying on your friends. Or, you can just have your characters be completely separate. And if you wanted to, you could possibly romance your own characters if you can't find the right NPC in the huge world.

The hud would be something very simple, with a health and energy/mana meter, a mini map, and radar. Each thing here can be toggled on or off so you could just have your health and energy/mana showing while turning off the radar and map, or you could have it all be turned off to have nothing on your screen for a more immersive experience. You can switch between third and first person to increase that even more.

Basically what I want is some huge fantasy exploration/adventure/action/RPG, something so huge with so many things to do that it has such an immense amount of playability and replayability. Something set in an hugely detailed and gorgeous world with multiple large provinces/climates/biomes. It would take an insane amount of time to try to explore every little part of the world, along with completing all the quests. And there would never really be a shortage of quests because they would keep being added every once in a while to the game through free updates, along with the ones added through mods.

That's all I have to share about this huge, crazy, borderline impossible dream game of mine right now. I might add more to it if/when I think of more. I hope you all enjoyed the read if you decided to read it. I'd love to hear what you guys think, and I'd love to hear your own ideas if you have them.

[fuforthought]

“Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon: Sword of Destiny” Review

There is no doubt that Ang Lee's classic wuxia film, "Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon" revolutionized kung fu cinema, nay cinema in general. It allowed martial arts films to be far more than traditional "chop socky". It introduced art, beauty and lots of floaty, flying shit to audiences all over the world. I've called it a masterpiece. Others might not think that word should be used but those people are (subjectively) wrong. Wrong, wrong, wrong. Anyway... Sixteen years after the original, Netflix announced a sequel. Kung fu cinema fans immediately felt a mixture of happiness and worry. Then Yuen Wo (is it Wo or Woo?) Ping was announced as the director and we collectively let out a breath. Granted, he doesn't have the technical eye of Ang Lee but he couldn't go too wrong...could he? Then the cast was announced: Donnie Yen, Michelle Yeah, Veronica Ngo... Hell, even Jason Scott Lee! This gaggle of actors had a lot of us giving our nod of approval and we waited with baited breath for the film to finally release on its streaming platform home.

When I first saw this film, I had a lot of bad things to say. A lot. This review is based on my second viewing. So, take what I say with a pinch of salt. With that said, let's get into it...

"Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon" Sword of Destiny" is one hell of a double-sided coin. Where to start? Let's go with the plot first. The plot of the film is very simple. Almost comically so. There is a war going on in the martial world. Hades Dai (Scott Lee) is attempting to destroy all other clans so that his own White Lotus clan can thrive and rule the world (cue maniacal laughter). Meanwhile, Yu (Michele Yeoh) is living a life of solitude. She has traveled to Peking where legendary swordsman, Li Mu Bai's sword, the Green Destiny, is held. Oh yeah, she's also there to pay her respects to a friend's recently deceased father but that's really by the by. Fast forward a little and a fighter called Snow Vase (Natasha Liu Bordizzo) attempts to kill Hades, fails and then makes her way to Peking to steal the Greeen Destiny. At the same time, Hades has sent his own warrior to steal the sword. He's caught, logged up and blah, blah, blah... Put simply, the film is a massive fight over who has the Green Destiny. Donnie Yen, playing Silent Wolf, hops on board with his merry band of fighters, to protect the sword. And that's about it. There are protectors of the sword and those that seek to steal it. Why? Because it's a really, really good sword! Or something. The subplots are, unfortunately, quite weak. There's a paper thin love story between Silent Wolf and Yu. There's another backstory involving Snow Vase and Wei Fang (Harry Shum Jr.) being switched at birth.

So why is it a two-sided coin? Well, firstly, it's all about the performers. "Sword of Destiny" has the misfortune of featuring some amazing people and some god awful people. For example, Michelle Yeoh puts in a quiet, elegant, nuanced performance while Jason Scott Lee hams it up as a Disney-esque villain. Donnie Yen puts in a noble, gentle performance mirroring Yeoh's while Liu Bordizzo is painfully wooden and messy. This causes the film to be very disjointed. It makes me wonder exactly what Wo Ping was going for. Big, silly fantasy? Or a careful attempt at wuxia? Then there's the action. Some of the cast simply cannot perform. Michelle Yeoh is saved by doubles because, quite frankly, she really can't pull off the moves like she used to. She's stiff and dare I say too old? Put away the pitchforks and torches. I'm just suggesting she might be a little too long in the tooth to pull off quick, grand swordplay. The young newcomers, while having speed, are also pretty weak when it comes to action. The fact they're fresh faced and new to cinema really comes across. They're not used to fight choreography it seems. Although, there is a hushed, silent fight near the beginning between Snow Vase and Wei Fang that's really quite nice. What I'm trying to say is there are a lot of hit and miss action performances here. The best fighters seem to be those associated with Donnie Yen's Silent Wolf.

Speaking of the action, upon my second viewing I saw it very differently to my first. I actually thoroughly enjoyed the fights this time around. Honestly, Donnie shines. His moves are crisp, his kicking looks great and he used his two-handed sword wonderfully. He's head and shoulders above anyone else on screen. However, with that said, the choreography here is actually very nice. It's a little "soft" but I think this was a weird artistic choice by the director rather than a fuck up. There are some very nice exchanges here. Hand-to-hand (granted, not enough), weapons...it's all here. Even some environmental fights. The ice fight being a lovely use of the fighters' surroundings and featuring some beautiful "skating" exchanges. I liked the action. It's swift and charming. I will say that it's very much the simplified choreography we have some to expect from Yuen Wo Ping as of late. By that, I mean it's much more like "True Legend" than anything else. But it's nice. The flip-side to the action coin is that the wire-work really is quite clunky in places. It's nowhere near the serene gracefulness of the original film. Many of the moves look forced and...well...ugly. It's sad because there is a LOT of wire-work here. It's not enough to ruin the film but it may elicit a few sighs here and there.

The key to watching "Sword of Destiny" is to separate it from the original film entirely. If you view this film as a silly, standalone fantasy kung fu film, you can really enjoy it. Don't try to compare it. You WILL be letdown. There is a lot of fun to be had here. Sure, it's almost camp. Yes, it feels more like a Syfy movie than a Netflix movie. But it's genuinely enjoyable. It's a tight little slice of b-movie wuxia with a semi-solid cast and enjoyable fight scenes. Ignore its attempts at profound side-plots and honorable character traits and see it as a goofy old kung fu romp. Refrain from comparing it to the original and you might very well be pleasantly surprised. I certainly was.

GRADE: C+