#(here I go again with the rendering.. it's fun! and actually kinda simple really)

[themeeplord]

One thing you gotta know about the ferrofluid boys before you go kissing them all willy-nilly, is that their happy goosebumps/shivers are insane~

[ceo-of-kimona]

What to do with Scott…

A question that many many Kimona enjoyers face in our time is thus: “where the hell do we put Scott Pilgrim?”

The guy is a weird case. He’s the main character, the damn series was named after him, he’s integral to the life and stories of both of these women. Although; he is also a massive cockblock (or vag block?? Idk) and must be obliterated in order for the two to be happy. So, to prevent Kimona fic writers (also known as the greatest and most noble heroes of our time) from needing to contend with this great query again, I shall compile a list of potential things you could do with Scott to get him the hell out of the way. In no particular order.

1. Break Scott and Ramona up

Probably the most direct and simple answer, especially if you’re going for a more cannon compliant, post cannon universe. Though it does kinda invalidate all of the shit they got through to get together if they just split up like that. So I suggest that if you do break them up, make it on good terms. Make it so that it’s mutual and mutually beneficial and mature. Less of a “I hate you and I never want to see you again” and more of a “it was fun, you helped me a lot, but now we gotta go our separate ways in life.” Their development shouldn’t be rendered moot by the breakup, instead make the breakup part of their development.

2. Create an AU where Scott does not exist

A fairly easy one, if Scott doesn’t exist, you can just go along your merry way with your shipping. Fics where Kim finds Ramona before Scott or fics where Scott doesn’t ever fall in love with Ramona for whatever reason also fall under this category. These are good, but a bit bland. There isn’t a great lot you can tell here cause Scott’s douchery kinda holds together the plot pretty much. It is only by him being a rat-ass fuckboy that anyone ever meets anyone in the comics. Also, without having her relationship with Scott, Ramona just doesn’t have her vital character arc that the relationship brings. She’s always gonna be the same ol Flowers when she comes to Kim.

So unless you plan on retelling the entire story of the… everything with Kim instead of Scott, you’ve gotta very flighty and traumatized Ramona Flowers on your hands for the entire fic. Now, this is perfect for angst fics, as using pre-arc flaws to create a tragedy has been a a tool for angst fics since god damn Shakespeare. Also fluff doesn’t really need the “primest character development” in order to be good, so if you’re planning to either make angst or simple fluff then AU is your best bet. If you wanna make something more cannon compliant or lighthearted yet complicated, you’re out of luck.

3. Polycule

Self explanatory. Why not have both? Keep Scott and Ramona’s cute dynamic; and just bring Kim into the mix. While this can be very fun (I’m actually writing a fic where this happens at the moment) it isn’t great for every fic. Cause let’s face it: if you’re here and queer for Kimona, so maybe you do not want to write for the feelings of the dude who got here first so he’s also tagging along. Some people just don’t wanna write Scott, which is perfectly valid. Also, polycules are messy and complicated, both in real life and in fic writing. While complications can create some good drama, it’s also a lot of moving parts to manage. You aren’t getting a Kimona + Pilgrim fic down to 2k words without sacrificing a lot. This one is not built for oneshots or general Pilgrim-haters.

4. Send him off to be with Wallace

Probably one of my favorite options to use. It’s kinda an extension of the “breakup” idea, but it gives a happier ending for Scott, as it lets the breakup make sense. Scott falls in love with Wallace and can’t bear the pining so he communicates with Ramona about it, and they mutually agree that it’s for the better for them to split so he can be with Wells. It also will keep the Scollace shippers at bay, may their apocalyptic wrath be kept at bay /s.

If you don’t really have much stuff outside of Kimona in your fic and don’t know how to get Scott out of the picture, try this one. Just throw in a sentence about Scott being with Wallace and everything will make sense and be chill. Truly an option for us lazy bitches out there who just want yuri. It can also potentially set up some Scollace content later down in the fic if it comes to be of a larger scale, but if you just want your yuri you can throw out a “Scott is with Wallace” line and not need to elaborate further, we get it. All around a flexible, powerful, potent, and fun option. Though if you have any Wallace pairings already set up in your fic and you can’t fit Scollace in, this option obviously won’t be that useful to you.

So…

That’s all of the “bye bye Scott pilgrim” tropes for Kimona fics that I could think of. Now for which one is the best… prepare yourself, the answer is disappointing.

None of them!

No one of these is always gonna work for everything. These tropes are all just tools in your toolbox at the end of the day, and which one you use is up to what you’re writing and how you’re feeling. So don’t be afraid to try multiple of these for your fics, throw shit against the wall like spaghetti. Maybe you’ll find something new that you’ll like.

But that’s enough yapping from me. Now go forth and WRITE!

[ariibees]

Hi hi pixelrhys again do you have any fun AUs for your Terraria guys because I'm looking at you with big eyes. Do you ever consider making some if you don't have any?

This ended up rather long as I went into a big infodump, so I’m gonna toss it all under the cut!

Kinda yes, kinda no! It depends on how loosely you define AU -- Chris and Andrew (and sometimes others) occasionally get thrown into other things I’m doing, but I don’t have many actually-thought-out AUs of Purity Town proper. PT does have a sort of "levels of canon" thing going on such that the more self-indulgent ideas I have aren't really canon but are just for fun for myself, but none of them are fleshed out enough that they've gone beyond a one-off doodle here or there. (That category mostly consists of random ship stuff, fun character interactions like various characters being a part of the Lunatic Cult, indulgent fun with Chris' powers/power level and star theme, fun with Andrew's personal powers, and so on.) Things that don't go beyond a one-sentence idea, essentially. That also includes a lot of wildly differing post-game ideas that haven't yet been ironed out, though admittedly I haven't even posted most of the ideas I've had for hardmode, so that doesn't count for much.

Chris, Andrew, Alalia (the Dryad), and the Lunatic Cultist (kind of -- name irrelevant, roughly the same character) all appear as NPCs in a D&D setting I’ve been working on and off for a couple years now. The simple background of the setting as it relates to them specifically is that an age ago a civilization of arcane casters (“Ascendants”) inhabited a giant crystal cluster that grew after a star fell to earth, but all disappeared in an instant with the coming of a new god that replaced the sky. Chris, Andrew, and the LC were members of this civilization. Andrew was a Watcher, a unique role among the Ascendants for those with expertise in divination magic that allowed them to monitor the goings-on of their kingdom, a job that required a uniquely strong sense of self and strong discipline to avoid being swept away in the tide of information. Due to this quality, he was approached by the LC as a participant in a project to elevate a mortal soul into artificial godhood, but this initial attempt somewhat-failed as Andrew clawed his eyes out (and then refused any magical restoration) to reduce the amount of sensory overload his newfound godhood imparted on him. The LC also approached Chris to join them in a follow-up experiment, but he declined because he thought their research was bullshit (it was based on the true theory that reality, magic, mortal souls, and the souls of gods are all made up of the same fundamental material called Waver, but he didn’t think they had the technology to manipulate it in such a way). Chris instead worked on his own research, basically an in-universe equivalent of astrophysics-but-for-magic, studying how their world’s binary-planet (a gas dwarf named Sigil) and moon (a much smaller moon named Luna) influenced local spellcasting. When the LC’s next experiment killed every remaining Ascendant by ripping their souls from their bodies and forming them into a single light in the sky, Andrew survived due to the aforementioned partial-godhood and Chris survived due to working in a magic-insulated lab, and both were rendered unable to die as their souls were permanently bound to their bodies. Between then and the present day/start of the campaign after the crystal has been re-settled over centuries by non-Ascendants (forming the city/state of Lighthaven/Newveil), Chris starts a wizard school under the title of Wishmaster Delha, makes a magical crown to place a new king on the throne, fakes his death, and nowadays just hangs out selling potions to foolish adventurers. Andrew, on the other hand, started a mostly made-up religion around the new sky before dipping out of the spotlight and in the present day lives with Chris, helping him with his potions where able. Alalia is also present in the setting as the elvish-archdruid (i.e. not immortal but very very long-lived) leader of a druid community who oversees most of the area’s crops and natural trade goods of the area, and hates Chris/Andrew partially for being immortals, partially for being Ascendants, and partially because Chris keeps selling questionable not-druid-approved potions on the black market solely to piss her off.

Chris is also my player character for a Drakkenheim campaign (and Andrew is kinda there too)! The TL;DR of Drakkenheim is that 15 years prior to the start of the campaign, an eldritch meteor fell from the sky and hit the city of Drakkenheim, destroying much of the city and leaving the rest blanketed in a contaminating Haze, transforming the dead into monsters and making magic within the bounds of the city go haywire. In this setting, Chris is a human fighter (eldritch knight) who is mageborn (i.e. has the gene that makes people capable of channeling wizard/sorcerer magic -- relevant because mageborns have additional social-legal restrictions placed upon them due to the continent once being ruled by evil sorcerer kings and the fear of that happening again). Because of his weak magical ability and having grown up in the countryside and then having to move due to the spreading corruption as a refugee following the meteor, he missed out on being tested by the Amethyst Academy for magic and so didn’t learn about his powers until adulthood. He then had a very short stint at the Amethyst Academy before being kicked out for lack of ability, and over the next few years moved back in with his parents, met Andrew, learned another language, taught himself sword fighting, and decided to head to Drakkenheim to work as an adventurer for money and on the side try to research a way to control and eventually contain/destroy the spreading contamination that had destroyed his childhood home, while also trying to grow his own magical abilities. Kind of awkwardly, the Amethyst Academy mage NPCs tend to ignore his existence and belittle him, sole exception being his ex-teacher/ex-Academy-mage Ryan Greymere who’s also working to cleanse the city. Chris in this setting is also mildly religious (in a "it doesn't matter if it's inherently true to the world or if it gained power through people believing in it because in the end it exists and I grew up with it" kind of way), following a religion that instead of believing in a god like many of the old nature religions believes in a light of goodness inside of people. This puts him in an even more uncomfortable spot as the first paladins of this religion were renowned for freeing the continent from the ancient sorcerer kings, and thus said religion is the cause of a lot of the anti-mageborn movements floating around and the source of some nasty comments. Compared to some of the other party members (including but not limited to possibly the last surviving legitimate heir to the throne of Drakkenheim), Chris is very much meant to be Just Some Guy, but is super loyal and very ride or die as far as his relationship with the rest of the party goes (and unlike his first adventuring party, they didn't abandon him, so even better). Which is all good, because he’s not making much money from this, but instead got wrapped up in a plot to put his party member on the throne with hopes of using its power to restore the city. Andrew is kind of also present in this setting in that he’s an elven cleric of the same religion Chris follows, and is my backup character if Chris is killed. He’s Chris’ partner, and stayed with Chris’ family after Chris went off to start an adventuring career in Drakkenheim, giving him an excuse to join the party if Chris dies.

I haven’t posted much about the D&D setting I’ve been working on, but I’ll occasionally post Drakkenheim doodles when I have the energy to draw. Sometimes they include other party members, and sometimes it just sneaks into more generic Chris-as-a-character posts, as without specifically drawing his armor/scarring/party members it’s hard to distinguish his Drakkenheim design from his Terraria one. With the armor and scarring it comes off closer to his hardmode design, but as mentioned, I haven’t posted much hardmode content so that’s pretty irrelevant haha. And then as for all of the assorted self-indulgent one-off ideas, I just often don't feel up to drawing them, so they get to live in my brain rent-free instead, haha.

[escarlatafox]

Okay so here’s some more substantial kfp4 thoughts/opinions (Kung fu panda 4 spoilers!)

-

Overall, as a movie experience, I mean, I didn’t have high hopes going in. I carefully kept my expectations low, so it wasn’t like, a complete and total disaster imo but it certainly had its issues. I was someone who sincerely enjoyed the third movie and didn’t actually really mind the third movie’s pacing, and while the third movie showed certain cracks of lowering quality, they could be looked past well enough. Like, for me, the final fight/villain showdown etc with Kai in the third movie, him getting beaten by Po, etc, was all narratively really satisfying to me and I was chill with the pacing for it. This most recent movie was like, kind of decent in parts… but fell apart towards the end with the villain confrontation scene and takedown. I was fine with movie 3’s pacing but this one’s was off. While 3 was narratively satisfying to me, 4 wasn’t. There was insufficient build-up, and so much of it felt unearned. The final confrontation was too quick for me, it was just… not great. Didn’t really pack the same punch that 3 did for me.

As for them bringing past villains back… man.

What was Kai even doing there. Like, my understanding of 3’s ending is that Po obliterated him within the spirit realm, thus utterly erasing him from existence entirely. You could make an argument for him just being like, kaplowey’d into spiritual Bits which could eventually make their way back together again hence him coming back into existence, but uh yeah… His presence in 4 actually cheapens the final confrontation in 3 for me. Because Kai getting “destroyed” in 3 had this sense of finality to it. Death in general just feels cheapened – I know that the Spirit Realm =/= Heaven, and it’s only kung fu masters who go there, but like, if you keep bringing these characters back + even Kai’s death wasn’t permanent, it just feels kinda ???

I can imagine that Tai Lung fans would be annoyed with this movie, what with how he was teased (being on the poster and everything!) I was actually cautiously optimistic for a little while before seeing the movie about how Tai Lung’s role would be handled, but no. It felt off, and like, if they were gonna bring back the character, I really do think he should have played a greater role. He just feels like set dressing/weak fanservice and imo didn’t add much. His presence is/should be a big deal and it felt kiiind of cheap to me, idk. I just wish it was handled better. On learning that he + the others got their kung fu abilities taken away thus rendering them useless, that was a fun idea to me – it would render them quite ‘harmless’ and put them all out of sorts. I would have loved to see more of Tai Lung and/or the others struggling with the simple fact that their abilities have been wiped and they’re kinda ‘helpless’ (I mean, in the case of characters like Tai Lung, their still strong and imposing, but have none of the actual kung fu moves). I was misled into thinking Tai Lung would be ‘tagging along’ with Po or something like that within this movie, and while I was on the fence/worried about how it would be executed, none of that even materialised anyway. Why was he on the poster he was barely in the film and given so little to do…

Like. Seeing e.g. Shen there was just jarring as well cause he’s just There. He doesn’t do anything. And apparently he was a late addition to the film like they slapped him in there last minute and I’m just like. hm

THE VILLAINS BOWING was very egregious to me. I call bull. Unearned. Out of left field. They WOULDN’T! And even if they would. It was absolutely not sufficiently set up for THAT kind of payoff. You need to put in WAY more work to even try pull something like THAT off. Yeah, they were annoyed by their treatment from the Chameleon. They would be ‘grateful’ to be saved by Po or w/e but even THEN. I cannot see it. I was in utter disbelief when that happened I was just like… there’s no way. I saw Masha talking about how Shen would ‘never’ bow like that and I agree 100% I’m just like… Hello?

Again… For me personally the Tai Lung stuff just felt kinda awkward and unearned. Like, if they wanna do that, they gotta give him more screentime. They gotta give him more stuff to DO. Let him get free somehow and briefly fumble/awkwardly try to help out Po in the absence of his kung fu abilities idk (the enemy of his enemy is his friend, etc etc, he’s fed up with the Chameleon so he wants her taken down, and so on). Of course, part of this stuff comes down to the movie’s short runtime + poor pacing. And if it’s true that this was done very intentionally because ‘kids can’t watch long movies’ then man that is just so depressing to me. This movie badly needed a longer runtime and it could have done so much with it.

Okay random positive thing to end this off... I love the whole deal/concept with a building like, on the edge of a cliff and w/e and the lampshading of how much of a bad idea it is amused me (but tbh I do think there are in-universe reasons, like, the 'danger' aspect of it is part of the appeal/point of its establishment in-universe as well). I'm a sucker for fight scenes that make use of the idiosyncracies of the surrounding environment so that's always gonna be a plus for me.

The villain lady was cool she had a nice imposing atmosphere. I like her voice

It was like, not a disaster. It was fun. it amused me. But it wasn't satisfying in a way that 3 was for me. Movies 1 & 2 were perfect, no notes. 3 was still GOOD. 4 was like... :/ like it was alright. Just didn't hit the spot.

[lemonberyy]

while im here actually. art dump

bloodswap human Calliope, one with makeup and one without. because i CAN suckers. isn't she silly? And a little ominous? A touch murder-y?

this one is her cherubic design! i put a lot of thought into the references i can make with her outfit. Namely though, I wanted to kind of make it look like a complete mish-mash of several inspirations from LE, haute couture, alt callie, and a few other bloodswap designs I'm familiar with. She's the LADY OF SPACE! Referred to as Her Grace of Space. The Goddess of Vast Light. She isn't exactly going to be subdued in her look. She wants everyone to look upon her with immediate recognition, and following it will be fear.

This one I JUST finished. Like last night at eleven pm just finished. Rendering my beloathed... This is inspired by song lyrics from Circle With Me by Spiritbox and Cyberhex by Motionless In White. I really like the idea of the imagery of Callie consuming the Green Sun. It's striking!

this is calamity in fantasystuck. she in fact compl abhors this dress . No cheek nonsense because TECHNICALLY she's dragonborn but i cannot draw dragons. I have one setting. It's cherubim.

this one is from a post canon au. i have a bazillion words as to how caliborn is on earth c it's all headcanon but it's all good and silly and he is Short and she is Tall (i also have a bazillion words for why Callie is able to start maturing properly post canon)

you know what, past me? this is my post! im gonna put all two-bazillion words on here actually. what am i thinking hehe? my post is a place for my words. silly joan!

So, for why Caliborn is on Earth-C. I honestly had fun rationalising this one!

For one, Caliborn is very, very cold. Another thing is that- I don't think cherubim were meant to go into black holes. I'm pretty sure that, while yes they mate near them, I don't think they fall in. It's something I feel is just something that doesn't happen. So cal being trapped within one is notable. But, we aren't talking about Caliborn being trapped! We're talking about him getting out.

Honestly if he were to tell it, he'd say he "FOUGHT TO GET OUT." or something. But the truth is he fractures,* his young body is rejected and he falls out. He retains only the passive effects of his godtier, like an understanding of timelines and being able to traverse them. But he has no control in this state.

*What do I mean by this? I basically think that he and le are seperate entities. In a lot of ways they literally are! Le is a combination of several souls and abilities and powers. He kinda reminds me of how the Condesce can learn all caste abilities. Caliborn has the abilities and knowledge of several godtiers including his own complete mastery of time. So, when Caliborn falls out and onto Earth-C, it's just a fraction of his soul and body. He's young again because it's a portion of his (falsely) mature body and he's very weak because it's only a portion of his soul. The rest is in the black hole. And due to some fuckery, he can feel it too. It's cold. He's constantly dizzy and disoriented. He is especially unnerved by this because cherubim are... this incredible species. He feels sick without context for what illness feels like. It's a pretty terrible experience for him but he's at least well enough to still be terrible to everyone.

Now for Callie. Honestly this is one is more simple. Her life ring fills her body with the very force of life! She may not have predominated, but she is full to bursting of more than enough energy for her body to age correctly. She can grow wings, become much taller, and toned. She doesn't really understand it yet but she really likes walks and runs because it's her body telling her to exercise and maintain her muscle mass.

alt callie...... 🥰 that's all send tweet

this is a magical girl au. one with her soul gem and one without. i have a bazillion words on all the symbolism here actually. For one I made her wish to be beautiful, which is why her face and everything is very Pretty and Sculpted and Lovely. Secondly though. Her soul gem, the space symbol in her birthmark, is a whole thing. She thinks her birth mark is a blemish on her looks, and seeing it not only A) remain after her wish and B) be her weakest point in a battle felt kinda like a slap in the face. (However it couldn't be erased because she Does like it. She just doesn't quite realise that). ALSO the space-looking symbol behind her? It's not Space! It's void, but she's FILLING IN THE SPACE... it's also Roxy's pink! They r soon to be dating... fills the void in her heart? Eh? Eeh?

anyways. uhhh homestuck cherubim are ok i guess

[anima-virtuosa]

long ramble post about how i used to do programming being hyperfixated on it awhile like 10 years ago

i actually like the idea of class-based programming, like how i remember it.. it was like making each class as a separate character/species, like with their own personality and traits, going and doing their thing and sometimes talking to other classes

that and using pointers pointing to an array of pointers pointing to self-pointing pointers and we would end up in null reference error land a lot but it was fun being meta anyway.

if i did coding again i would make them all into actual characters . all foxes of course. like having the code talk to itself. i already wrote one idea like that for the VNNXI art

i used to be obsessed with the idea of virtual worlds & simulations trying to make one as my dream project (becoming god) before i instead did that with art

there were some neat ones i remember my highest achievements being a 20-leveled puzzle roguelike "??? something adventure", a wave-based RTS base building defense game "Super Demon Apocalypse really edgy", a from-scratch-OpenGL-engine simple Minecraft clone, and an advanced Game of Life type unfinished project "Creature-something"

the last one being an infinite 2d world generator that made landscapes of continents & had these cute alien dragons walking around it going and eating plants on the ground. i had rly ambitious goals for it wanting to add features until it was an elaborate interactive alien world simulation

it stopped after me getting stuck optimizing multithreaded long-distance pathfinding or else i would have taken it further... my entire point of choosing C++/OpenGL was being able to do ambitious large scale weird stuff but as a result most of my time was just on engines... if i did that all again i would be way more design focused

if i made a dream game today it would be like a weird unholy hybrid of One Hour One Life, Space Station 13 and Pokemon Mystery Dungeon. idk what that even means but that is the vibe. maybe i will get around to making silly interactive creature demos at some point.

you would open up my program and get sucked into the sparklefox dimension with nightcore blasting in the background or if i were feeling really edgy it would just be 100 Levels Of Heaven

(i wrote that as a joke but actually i really like the idea of a roguelike that is a 2D board rendered in 3D, where you fold-over different parts through 3D and bend reality around like a puzzle, making wormholes like the trope of poking a pen through a folded paper. ok i promise that makes sense visualized; but that is the sort of weirdness you can do with custom engines)

o my god i found the file of one of them well time to go get nostalgia playing my own game ._. it's so silly im back it took 30 minutes to beat lol. there was a speedup button but i forgot what it was so i spent most of my time vibing. just gonna leave this here

(kinda loud warning)

[studiothetics]

Drawing People 2

Expecto patronum, my dude. It’s me, Evan! I am but a humble visitor in your land of tumbling, so I do not mean to presume, but perhaps the “long post” tag applied to my last missive means verbosity hath claimed my tongue, once again. Let me see if I can make the second act of this drama a little snappier.

these folks got basic, boring poses so I could use them as simple mannequins. Drawing like this out of my head is fun, but kind of time consuming. Doing a thorough job of the figure before clothing it shortens the time a good bit, and keeping the pose pretty simple removes any demand of the fabric to do difficult things.

Who this? Can’t tell you. Why this? Experimentation! These drawings were great test beds to answer questions about rendering: what kinda stuff works with characters in this idiom, what kind of linework, what level of detail, etc. But on the other side of the arbitrary distinction I’ve just decided to conjure are compositional questions. God I love that word. Composition — The sum of a picture.

Art history, and particular commercial art history has so many good answers to compositional questions, and a lot of their answers make a lot of sense for visual novels, what with commercial art often needing to wrangle decoration and flatness with representational stuff. I’m partial to the solutions of your Muchas Alphonse and kin, but that sort of density and curation of parts is only possible when you’re working with a single picture at a time. Duh, you say and I concur. We have to do more modular stuff, especially if we're going for a high level of detail, and we’re splitting up character and background duties. We needed to find ways of simplifying, modularizing and keeping things unified.

Western commerical art in the late 1800s is really a zenith of single-picture making in my books. It seems to me that there was an endless variety of exciting design exploration supported by real chops.

Luckily commercial art has some answers to this as well. Ya’ll heard of the Weiner Werkstatte? How about John Austen? Oh you’re a connoisseur are you? You’re a quite hip individual? Well then, you heard of Carl Otto Czeschka? (I dunno if that’s actually a deep cut.) Here are some common themes between them. Flatten space, use only a few distinct values and colors and use heavy blacks to unify the picture. 

Aside from these general ideas, we were specifically interested in Austen’s use of orthogonal perspective. It seemed like a really natural fit — centering the picture on the characters with the world as framing, it’s flatness generating less friction with textual and decorative elements and giving us a pretty consistent format to interface foreground and background elements. Hypothetically it gave us a tremendous amount and demanded less work… Hypothetically.

Pyrga didn’t wind up actually featuring in the prototype but I still love the big weirdo. A compositional feature you might not notice unless you a comp dweeb is that they're not fully balanced pictorially. They very much need an answer to their left, preferably above their shoulder. I tried to carry this compositional incompleteness forward with every asset so they would mesh well with one another and even if they were solo, there would be a visual relation with the background.

So bam. heavy blacks, less variety in the linework, very few colors and orthogonal perspective. There are things that work well here: being attentive to the turning edge of the shadows gives it a flavor I don’t see many places, and aiming for more naturalism gets it out of the Hades/Hellboy sorta cartoony zone that it was trending toward initially.

There are problems, too. I’m not good enough to get that level of naturalism out of my head with any kind of speed so I needed reference. With this character, that’s sort of ok. They're kindof an amorphous blob of fabric and that’s just fine for kit bashing different references and imagined bits and whatnot, but other characters have much more, let’s say definite garments. Secondly the spot blacks pose a real issue for decoration, they wind up needing to override any kind of patterning, and the linework on turning edges winds up noising up and cluttering things. The lack of line opacity and overall brush size is also making some detail work challenging, but I wasn’t quite sure how else to get the linework readable with the asset scaled at different sizes.

Now all this stuff shoulda given me pause, but there were a lot of plates to keep spinning. We were in the thick of writing, I was bouncing between finishing up other designs and trying to get the UI on track, yada yada. Petra was on the mind, as well. We were missing some key things for her — A mask and a cloak.

Designing this mask coincided with a push for more overtly greek looking stuff, so I was thinking of how to style a sort of blank face after typical greek statue face forms.

What good is a mask to a very overpowered warrior? Our answer was threat display, what with Petra often fighting enemies that wouldn’t be repelled by armor. This was something to stop hapless goons from running into the three toothed meatgrinder. So the question is what’s scary, then? What’s badass enough you don’t wanna fuck with the person wearing it?

It’s nice to do a little painting every now and then. 90% of this project h linework and flat color. Here the painting was particularly useful to communicate the form to future me who’d have to draw it from a lot of angles.

Turns out neither of us wanna fuck with the Hydratic's eponymous Hydra. It’s a pretty obvious subject in retrospect, what with Petra being a state zealot, but the thought of making that her mask didn’t come up till quite late, likely because in my head the Hydratics were a fundamentally 2d people — wouldn’t you know, turning a 2d idea 3d gave it a lot of personality.

A sasha sketch page. They had a lot of really fascinating ideas about Hydratic garments that made so much sense for their history.

The mask design was pretty straightforward all things considered. But the cloak… Sasha and I had been trading sketches of just what to do with that fuckin thing for like months. It was a complex problem because there were a lot of bases to hit. The Hydratics are modern, sporty, military, brand heavy, decorative, flat, uninterested in veneration. Petra is workmanlike, zealous, uncharmed by culture, physical, and at a pinnacle of hydratic military service. We need some indications of greek-ness no matter what, but we shouldn’t be too greek cause reasons. Getting these competing elements to all work together became a very interesting puzzle. How would you solve this?

For us the answer actually came outta watching 1917 a while back. Both Petra and Io are supposed to have a couple cues that liken them to ww1 soldiers, their experience in the apocalyptic conflict sharing some character with 1917’s hellish proceedings. This got me thinking about more dedicated military gear, and a slightly different character to Hyrdratic warriors. What of instead of hoplites, they were more like riflemen?

This almost looks like concept art!

In research, I’d found a genre of eastern european military poncho/cape thingies that really worked. They got armholes so the soldier can handle their firearms while still wearing it, it doubles as a tent, it’s rugged, it’s got kind of a rigid silhouette but it can be worn in interesting ways to break up the figure, and importantly, it’s got a whole lot of real estate what you could jam Hydratic Icons on. It’s a perfect fit for Petra who’s traveled Greece fighting monsters and champions. Her spears even work as tentpoles!

I can’t say I’m 100% happy with the final design (pictured at the front of part 1) but good golly it’s a hellofalot closer to the goal than what we were cooking up before. So I think we can call this a draw. Some problems on the style front, some solutions on the character design front. But the damoclesian sword of asset-completion hangs large above our heads, dear reader. Oh dam I think that means there gonna be a part 3! Good golly! Check back in soon for the laborious conclusion to this junk where I do a full process breakdown of an asset.

[noblechaton]

I've seen Voyage of the Damned twice in the last few weeks (once with Ari and once alone) and funnily enough I feel I'm kind of two minds on it and wanted to further blabber about Doctor Who things so

on one hand I think the special is probably the weakest of the era. it has this almost dour feeling throughout given that basically all of the side characters - most of whom are entertaining but really one note and bland otherwise - get fucking killed throughout the episode lmao. the plot feels really thin in that the entire story is "a CEO guy is so mad that his company failed and shareholders bailed that he's sabotaging them by killing thousands on the ship and potentially 6+ million on the planet below which is the earth btw". it's a really simple story that's kinda written as simple as it sounds and the entire hour feels more flash than substance

Astrid in particular is maybe the worst companion - as temporary as she is - in the era thanks to how aggressively one note and boring she is. she wants to see the stars and is just another blonde woman the Doctor ends up kissing twice for no real reason, especially given their chemistry did not really exist (tho Tennant sells that shit as hard as he can all the same - a true pro). like going from the end of series 3 where the Doctor may finally have overcome his romantic grief in relation to Rose thanks to Martha's wakeup call into an hour where the Doctor makes out with another random girl who has no screen presence or connection with him is a huge misstep imo and whatever attempt at romance they tried here actively takes away from the episode. it felt mandatory and not like some natural thing that came about throughout the course of the episode. really forced and very annoying

and on the whole it just isn't very strong. it doesn't really leave much of an impression bc the setting of a ship's interior is largely bland, the plot is fairly barebones and even the "alien" designs are. basically just humans? I really didn't get this, like makeup can be tough and I understand not wanting to do it for a huge cast like is featured early on but. why are they all just humans. there's nothing really said or done to make them stand out from humanity but they're not meant to be humans but they're just. humans. except for Bannakaffalatta

but on the other I actually think it carries a somewhat darker depth similar to the depth found in runaway bride and christmas invasion even - there's an underlying current that ties into the ongoing themes around the 10th Doctor and it becomes really apparent at the end where he's outright told that it's not up to him who lives and who dies and I really loved that exchange between him and the uh faux Earth expert guy it's probably the highlight of the special and really sets the stage for what comes in series 4 and the specials that follow

I also think it's the best the show has looked to this point where it still has that visual charm but isn't too blurry or unfocused. the effects are largely solid and the music has reached that masterpiece level it'll stay at through at least the rest of the era with bombastic themes well mixed with those softer melodies. the writing is also largely fine as is sort of typical of RTD by this stage - the dialogue is snappy and fun even if it lacks in some areas and is a bit too simple in others. they've been good at this for a while now but this is where they're firing greatness on all cylinders

there's some other odds and ends that I both love and hate. I think the TARDIS once again being rendered useless is annoying if only because I think having it could have made the story more interesting - ala Runaway Bride - while I really enjoyed the married couple every time they were on screen. Alonzo is a fun character and his side of the story is probably the best but I also find it really funny how he just stands around with a bullet (from a fucking revolver btw. a HUMAN GUN. hello.) inside of him the entire time and that he survives all of this and presumably goes on to bang Captain Jack at least once

anyway it's a really mixed bag and ultimately really middling I feel even if that just makes it fine at worst really (the power of RTD tbh). weakest holiday special for sure - it doesn't feel like a christmas special at all btw lmao - and going from Last of the Time Lords into this could almost make it seem as if the quality of the writing is decaying and I could see myself being concerned of just such a situation if this were my first time seeing all of this, or if I'd watched these come out in real time way back when

but thankfully as we all know that's not true - for, next episode, Donna's back and we hit the peak of the mountain

[fruitcoops]

since your Possessive!Remus thing was literal perfection, would you consider writing Possessive!Sirius? I feel like Loops would get hit on by a lot of guys who see it as some sort of challenge to steal him away from Cap and I wanna see Cap react... strongly to that 👀😂

Ohohoho, I like the way your mind works! Hope you enjoy! The possessive!Remus fic is called Hey, Jealousy and is linked here if anyone would like to read it.

TW for implied sexual content and heavy flirting, attempted groping/ the inability to understand a simple ‘no’.

Coops credit goes to @lumosinlove, as always!

The music was loud enough that Remus’ head hurt if he paid too much attention to it—luckily, he was a little preoccupied dancing with his fiancé. Their cheeks brushed every few seconds, and if Remus glanced up slightly he knew he would see Sirius’ face illuminated in the vibrant club lights that flashed in a thousand different colors.

Sweat made his hair stick to his forehead and he pushed it out of his eyes; he felt it on the back of Sirius’ neck as well, as if he had just played a hard shift on the ice. He couldn’t even remember which of the guys had suggested going to a club in the first place, but they had come along to let loose and get out of the house for a change. It was a Friday night, after all—why shouldn’t they have some fun?

He tapped the back of Sirius’ neck and tilted his head toward the bar, shouting “water!” as clearly as he could. Sirius smiled and kissed his forehead before letting go of his waist. People jostled him on all sides and he thanked whatever higher power existed that nobody spilled their drinks—or anything else—on him.

“Two waters, please,” he panted to the bartender, wiping his forehead off with the shoulder of his shirt. The woman nodded and headed back for clean glasses.

“This one’s on me,” a deep voice said as someone sidled up to his right with a smirk. “Hey, sexy. I’m Cal.”

Remus smiled politely. “Thanks for the offer, Cal, but I think water’s free.”

“Then I’d be happy to get you something else. What’s your name, cutie?”

“I’m not really in the habit of talking to strangers,” he said. God, this place was so fucking loud. “Coincidentally, neither is the person I came here with. Have a good one.”

Cal squinted at him in the low light and his smile broadened into a challenge. Shit. “Where’s your boyfriend, mystery guy?”

It’s not a mystery that I don’t want to fucking talk to you. Remus rolled his eyes and leaned on the bar counter, searching the crowd for Sirius; he was hanging out by the back wall, laughing with Kuny as Remus pointed to him. “There. The one with the backwards hat.”

“That guy?” Cal shook his head with a laugh and Remus bit the inside of his cheek. “I saw him dancing earlier, he has no rhythm.” He turned what was probably supposed to be a smolder on Remus. “Dancing with me would be a lot more fun, I can promise you that.”

He snorted. “Uh-huh. Sure, dude. Sadly, I don’t have any rhythm either.”

“I could teach you.” Cal was leaning closer and Remus could smell his overdone cologne.

“I’ll pass.”

“Come on, don’t be like that.” Movement caught the corner of his eye and he reached down, hauling Cal’s hand upward by the wrist.

He made direct eye contact with him. Blood thundered in his ears. “I said no. Touch my ass and we’re going to have a real problem.”

“Hey, chill out.” Cal pulled his wrist away and held his hands up in surrender. “Can we talk about it outside or something?”

Remus almost laughed. “Fucking hell, you’re persistent. What part of I am in a relationship are you failing to understand with the two braincells left in your goddamn head? That updo might be sharp enough to cut glass, but apparently all the hairspray has rendered you incapable of understanding simple words. Should I say it again or do you want me to get a whiteboard?”

“Look, man, I just don’t think you actually have a boyfriend,” Cal said defensively.

“He doesn’t.” Remus recognized that low voice, as well as the warm arm draping over his shoulders. Sirius reached a hand out and his ring glinted in the light. “I’m his fiancé. Who the hell are you again?”

Call didn’t take it; he just stared at them. “Sirius, this is Cal.” Remus kissed his cheek. “Apparently, he thinks you have no rhythm.”

“It was just a joke, man—”

“Hey, don’t worry about it,” Sirius laughed, though there was no humor in it. “You’re right. I don’t. Neither does the man I’m marrying in a few months, but that hasn’t stopped us yet.”

“Sirius,” Remus warned under his breath.

“Cal, I’m sure you’re plenty nice when there’s not music blasting at a hundred decibels and you can actually see someone more than two feet in front of you.”

“Thanks, man.”

“I’m not finished.” Sirius’ tone became hard and unrelenting. “But as nice as you might be then, that doesn’t change the fact that you tried to grope my fiancé. I’m giving you five seconds to get lost.”

Cal straightened up indignantly, though Sirius still loomed over him. “What are you going to do, call the bouncer?”

“No.” Sirius made no outward threat and did not elaborate. Cal vanished into the crowd in half the time given to him, but Remus didn’t feel him relax. “Are you okay, mon coeur?”

“Irritated, but fine. You can take a breath now.” He ran his thumb along Sirius’ cheekbone and smiled up at him. “Not that it was fun, but that was kinda hot.”

Sirius’ eyebrows rose. “Really?”

“Yeah. You got all growly.” He knocked their hips together with a smirk and pressed a water glass into his hand, taking a sip of his own.

“He tried to grab your ass.”

“He did indeed. It’s a good thing I’ve got sharp reflexes.”

“And a sharper tongue.” Sirius grinned around the rim of his glass. “Oh, yeah, I heard what you said.”

“Was the whiteboard bit too much?”

“Nah. It really drove the point home.” They set their glasses down at the same time and Sirius inclined his head toward the dance floor. “Care for some more no-rhythm dancing, sweetheart?”

Remus grabbed him by the hand and dragged him back into the crowd, where he turned and wrapped his arms around Sirius’ neck as they swayed. Sirius’ hands were tighter on his hips than before; it sent a thrill through his veins and he pressed back into him a little more.

“Re.”

“Hmm?”

“What are you doing?”

“Clubs are overrated, especially when you’re rumbly like this.” He ground back again and Sirius let out a harsh exhale. “What do you think?”

“I think we should go home before I make an absolute fool out of myself over you.” There was a smile in his voice and Remus leaned up to pull him into a kiss.

“I always make a fool out of myself around you,” he murmured into Sirius’ lips, biting the bottom one just enough to make him whine. “Take me home?”

[coffeekit]

take my quirk genetic theory bc reddit autoremoved it and i spent like 3 hrs on it hh

I don't think it's too far fetched of an idea, but the concept of quirks while explains it well enough doesn't really go too in depth with it.

We know that inheriting a quirk gives the user either one of their parent's quirks, a combination of the two, or more rarely, a whole new quirk.Class 1A has a handful of both students with combination and inherited quirks.Students who inherited their quirks off the top of my head seem to be Jiro, Hagakure, Tsuyu, and Iida, on the other hand students who've got confirmed combination quirks are Bakugo and Todoroki. 

There's also the third category where Eri falls, but other then her and Tenko there isn't many people who fit in here.

Anyways, my question stemmed from the Iida family, they're heroes going on their third generation, and somehow the main quirk of their family is still striving otherwise, unchanged from the first generation of Iida's grandfather. Of course, it's possible that the Iida family chooses instead to have quirk marriages of those with the same power to keep the lineage going, but I'm unsure of that possibility.

Similarly, though not hero's Hagakure's parents were both users of the same quirk and as such passed on the same, and Tsuyu's parents seem to have had the same quirk with minor differences in physical appearance. 

Jiro seems to be the only proper example of a student who had both a parent with a mutant quirk, and one without and she inherited such from her mother over her father.

Quirks appear to use a inheritance theory sort of thing, but of course, I'd be more interested in if certain quirks have certain dominance/recessiveness.

My theory after noticing such information would be something simple, at the information I looked at of those with inherited vs combination quirks, all those inherited seemed to be mutant, while combination quirks were emitters. Mutant appear to be more dominant in multiple senses of both power (inherited quirks) and physicality/appearance (physical abnormalities that offer no power; Koda's head for example) while in comparison emitters are more recessive.

That in it's self poses another question however; Do certain emitter quirks have in comparison, more dominance than others? Do the bodily adjustments made to adjust to those quirks have anything to do with that? 

A good comparison with this would be the Todoroki family

.Rei's ice quirk and Enji's Fire quirk yielded different results with all of their children.

Touya had fire stronger than that of Enji, but inherited his mother's constitution resulting in his burns.

Fuyumi has an ice quirk stronger than that of Rei enough to burn, but lack the same constitution as her mother, rendering it unsafe to use.

Natsuo is implied to also have an ice quirk, and that's as much as we know.

And Shoto has a combination of the two, but seems to rely on each of the two to regulate his body.

I actually totally forgot how to do punnett squares since I'm rusty, but here's one with both quirks and quirk tolerance;

fuyumi and natsuo's are pure speculation, im not going to claim either, but to an extent i do think it might make sense since fuyumi can't handle her quirk, and natsuo hasn't shown his off but idk, that's not the main point.

The Todorokis have a generally bad genepool, at least half of their children can't use their powers without getting hurt, and they were generally suggested against procreating for the purpose of designing children for the sole reason that doing so would more likely than not have harmful consequences.

I went a bit off topic with the quirk/quirk tolerance bit, but with implications of all of their children's quirks. And again a big part of this goes off of implications and assumptions that ignoring the punnett square, Natsuo does have an ice quirk, it would seem to point towards Rei's ice quirk being more dominant over Enji's just slightly, seeing as it was still recessive enough to combine with his to create Half-cold Half-hot.

Another thing I'd like to consider would be the carrying of the quirkless gene in Izuku's case.

In this sense, simply I'll chalk it up to both Inko and Hisashi carrying a more recessive quirkless gene compared to their more dominant quirk genes, in this instance it would more so point to the possibility that Izuku could've inherited either or a combination, but he just unluckily got the rarer instance of getting their recessive quirkless genes, while likely also still carrying the genetic information for his parent/s quirks say they jump a generation or so.

There's also the possibility of inheriting neither quirks.With what we've got we can say that there's the base gene for the quirk which carries the genetic information needed for tolerance/bodily modifications needed for the quirk, and depending on the individual, a recessive quirkless gene, at least, for emitter types.

Mutants more so, rather are just dominant, and also feign a possibility of carrying a recessive quirkless gene.

For the possibility of receiving neither nor, you'd consider that the base quirk gene itself is mutated far beyond what it should be, be it coming from one or both parents.

The mutation of the quirk gene would hypothetically be on a spectrum of mild to severe mutations.

Say a mild mutation would be a mutant quirk would loose it's functionality, the person would appear to look like an animal, but lack it's abilities, to more severe, in which the gene itself is completely rewritten to create a new quirk. As in with Eri and Tenko's cases.

Less genetic based, and more on the being of Quirk factor:

Quirk factor =/= Quirk genetics.Genetically Midoriya is still quirkless, he doesn't have a power of his own.

He does however have a quirk factor, as many others.

Going off a sheer guess, I'm just going to assume that almost everyone has quirk factor, but not everyone has a quirk.

I'd really only chalk up the possibility of having no quirk factor to being genetically tied so far back to original human DNA, which would be very rare.

In Midoriya's case when he inherited One for All, it tied into his quirk factor, but not his genetic makeup.

Anyways, I went on a tangent because of one question I had about Iida and filled in some blanks with the what I knew and some researching, I'm by no means an expert in this kinda stuff because i barely remember my freshman biology class, but it was fun to think about :), feel free to add your opinions

i’d also like to mention that the most scientific knowledge that i have so far is up to my 10th grade chem class hvhdbgh so please go easy on me haha

[magioftheseas]

Year In Writing (DGRP Version)

2020 was a hell of a fucking year. But I still got several fics out. I’m gonna be splitting them up a little, and will start with the dgrp fics since there’s more of them. Won’t include any nsfw/m-rated stuff just to make things slightly easier on me.

About That Guy (Hope’s Peak Academy Arc-focused)

I guess technically this started in 2019, but it still was the first thing updated in 2020. Written for the Hinata Hajime Project, this fic is a collection of shorts all from other characters’ perspectives regarding...Hinata! And Kamukura. Also World Destroyer. Many characters get focus, including all the sdr2 survivors, so it was quite the experimental piece!

World Constants and Conditionals (sdr2.5)

Written for the Hinata Hajime Fanzine! I don’t actually remember if it was written in 2020, but I assume so? How old can it be, rip... Anyway! Hinata makes the World Destroyer. It’s a prologue, you can say, to the OVA. Comes with a beautiful illustration.

Take Me Back, Back, Back (sdr2/dr3-zhen rewrite)

This is a commission and set in a zhen rewrite by @gothitelle-goddess. It’s a fun time loop idea in which Komaeda tries to prevent Hinata from partaking in the Kamukura Project. Sometimes, it ends messily.

Bumblings of a Brainiac (dr0/Hope’s Peak Academy Arc-focused)

Written for the Matsuda Yasuke Fanweek I hosted. I decided it’d be a lot of fun to write various short fics in which Matsuda interacted with different characters. Includes an AU where he does not die. I like it a lot when he does not die.

The Recollection Of Ryouko (dr0)

Written for the Ryouko Otonashi Memory Week. These are all ficlets to be more manageable, but they’re also all first person. A fun experiment and some of these actually turned out rather well. I’m pleased with myself.

Budding (Hope’s Peak Academy-focused)

Matsuda gets along with not only Komaeda but also the Warriors of Hope. Has a sort of TDP-esque setting where everything is relatively happy. It was part of a trade but was a lot of fun. I love these terrible kids.

Held (sdr2/dr0)

Matsuda Lives Again! An introspective fic about Matsuda’s messy as hell relationship with Junko and with people in general but one that segways into his relationship with Komaeda. Just a lotta codependency with our resident brainiac. Written for the Bad Things Happen Bingo.

Scars To Burden (sdr2/dr0)

Ghost!Matsuda harasses Hinata post-canon. I’ve always wanted to write something like this. Hopefully I managed alright, considering this was for a trade in addition to the Bad Things Happen Bingo.

Far From Love (sdr2.5)

Komaeda is a bit more stubborn when it comes to staying in his fantasy world, much to the World Destroyer’s chagrin. Written for the Bad Things Happen Bingo.

Soul-Crushing (sdr2)

Soulmates AU. However, Komaeda and Hinata are not soulmates despite being the main relationship. Messiness ensues. An old-ass WIP that I randomly decided to complete for Komaeda’s birthday. I was just in a mega yearning mood. A lot of my wips from way back when involve yearning, some to think of it.

Please Take Good Care Of Me (sdr2)

Komaeda’s rendered almost mute after getting attacked by one of the other remnants. Kamukura takes care of him afterwards. Pretty straight-forward. Written for the Bad Things Happen Bingo.

Flights and Guilt (sdr2)

Komaeda deals with not just nightmares but also survivor’s guilt. Hinata helps him through this. Also straight-forward. Also written for the Bad Things Happen Bingo.

Soft Trauma (sdr2)

A really old WIP that’s a Post-Canon AU, but had been started way before Kodaka even dreamed dr3 up. It’s focused on recovery in which Komaeda struggles but Naegi’s there to help. It’s super messy. Super yearning. Please mind the tags.

You're The Woooorst~! (v3)

Sick fic. Kaito gets sick and who’s there to take care of him but the resident liar? Pretty simple premise. I love Oumota a lot.

Look Look Look (v3)

Saihara and Ouma are hanging out/dating but solely to get Momota’s attention. It doesn’t go well for Saihara, so he breaks things off. I also love Saioumota a lot and want more of that OT3 focusing on the space boy. This is a pretty bitter fic because Saihara is a bitter, bitter boy.

Can’t Even Trust (v3)

Technically Salmon Mode but is really just a non-killing game au. Ouma still exposes Maki as a killer. Kaito still takes Maki under his wing. Ouma is very annoyed by this.

KomaHina Exchange + Week Fics

Between The Sky’s Grasp (sdr2)

Idol!Kamukua and Fan!Komaeda, except Kamukura is going undercover. Written for the KomaHina Secret Exchange. I love idol stuff, especially more dubious idol stuff. So, I was excited to write this one.

For Fools Rush In (sdr2/dr3-zhen)

A Kamukura/Hinata Twins AU in which they split the talents. Kamukura is then assigned babysitting duty for Class 77-B. Also for the KomaHina Secret Exchange, which means there’s a bit of a sibling love triangle going on. A very weird AU, but still pretty fun.

Feelings To Write About (sdr2/udg)

Post-Canon. Komaeda and Hinata play a kids’ board game and then talk about the kids that Komaeda babysat once upon a time. Melancholy, morose, but a bit hopeful. Written for the exchange. I love the kids.

The Sun Sets (sdr2)

Despair!Hinata AU. Written for the exchange. Was definitely a favorite of mine because I love Hinata when he’s villainous. Characterizing him was a blast. It took some inspiration from the song Ready As I’ll Ever Be, which is a good fucking song. I love that song. I even love how this fic turned out.

Reserved (sdr2/dr3-zhen)

Childhood Friends KomaHina during HPA days. Probably one of my favorite things written. It’s angsty and emotional and I’m proud of it. This dynamic of affection and resentment on Hinata’s end was very fun. 

It’s Easier (sdr2)

Soulmates AU set during sdr2. A little self-explanatory. Unsurprisingly, a killing game is not the best setting for soulmates to meet.

Joyous Occasion (sdr2)

Cisswapped/Genderflipped. Hinata is pining for Komaeda while she’s getting married to her sister. Sometimes, you just gotta write gayngst. You just gotta. Gaygnsting Gals.

Twisted Branches Entwined (sdr2)

Talentswap AU. Swap!Hinata and Swap!Komaeda have a sit-down and talk in a post-sdr2 setting. Pretty simple. Kinda clumsy.

The Farce of Hope (sdr2/dr1)

Fantasy AU. Demon Lord Hinata is sent to target Hopeful Hero Naegi and gets distracted by Hapless Healer Komaeda! Definitely a fun idea. I’ve always wanted to write one like it since the Tropical Despair Carnival has a similar idea, I believe. It’s more set-up than a full fic, but I still hope you like it.

Sweet Poison (sdr2)

Chapter 5-focused. Sometimes you just gotta write Komaeda fantasizing about better things with Hinata as he lays on the floor dying. You just gotta.

I Hope Our Future Is Beautiful (sdr2/dr3)

Post-Canon fluff to make up for the largely angsty as hell week of stuff that came before it. Yep. Not much else to say here lol.

[punkscowardschampions]

Liam & Edie

Liam: [a picture of Rio with her eyes crossed out like 1. Miss you and 2. Guess who I just talked to]

Edie: ofc she did 😑

Edie: what’s the damage

Liam: 0 to us I deflected the - to Lexie

Liam: do you want her framed for jumpscaring herself or is there anyone else

Edie: That’s all she cared about?

Edie: Bitch

Liam: it just didn’t take no time to convince her we’re perfect for each other

Liam: bc we are

Edie: yeah we are 🥰

Edie: surprised she copped to anything of the sort though

Edie: clearly can’t resist being nice to you

Edie: Lexie needs to calm down

Edie: 🤔 I mean, be kinda fucking hilarious if everyone reckoned she was doing it to herself

Edie: but maybe I’ve been too mean already 🥺

Edie: what do you think?

Liam: I think it’s pretty close to showing everyone her true colours if we do, Lex has gotta have been talking to your sister about me, I could tell, she thought I was a dick before I talked her round

Edie: She wouldn’t be happy for me unless you were a total 🤓 with no dick

Edie: that’s just what she’s like, crazy

Edie: but also not a stretch to see Lexie being a gossipy cow, I’ve heard her on other people before so

Edie: why would I give a fuck if her life is ruined

Liam: she basically accused me of wanting to hit you up for one reason and then wanting to immediately dip, if she thinks that’s what I’m like that’s only coming from one person

Edie: She’s pathetic

Edie: it’s clearly her saying it because you didn’t sleep with her

Edie: it wouldn’t be hard to spoof some shit, make it look like her

Edie: and she has nothing to say it was me, or you like she thought, and it weren’t no one else so she’s fucked, basically

Liam: [send her some shit that you’ve already started to work on because you knew she’d agree with this plan and the bits of the Rio convo where you said you’d try and find out and made it sound like you thought it was her but obvs it couldn’t possibly be hehe]

Edie: You’re so smart

Edie: She deserves this, she was definitely bitching about you, you can tell from how hard Rih said she weren’t

Liam: don’t be upset with me, but I was thinking about how Lexie also deserves to see us together and you happy and I invited them both to your show

Liam: you did say you want your family to take your music seriously

Edie: I’m not mad

Edie: You invited Rih too so she isn’t going to think you’re trying to get back with her

Edie: and I get to rub that and the fact I’m talented in her face?

Edie: It’s a good idea, baby

Liam: still, if you wanna create me in game and spend your time testing out different murder options, I won’t be mad, I should’ve asked you if it was a good idea before saying yeah to having us all there

Edie: [an 8-bit Liam but obvs we’re making an 8-bit us to smooch him not murder him, a lil gif moment of this or whatever it would be]

Liam: you only want a play through where we 👩🏼‍❤️‍👨🏻

Edie: that might make the thread 🤮 but idk if they’d be 😱

Liam: we’ll keep it off thread

Liam: [send her the floor plan to where your dad lives/holiday cottages so she can build it in sims like my boo would, live your dreams kids]

Edie: don’t need to make 50k nerds jealous, I get you

Edie: [just nerd out with that]

Edie: I’ll show you how generic the 👶 is

Edie: very rude

Liam: if the mods and cc don’t fix it, I’ll pretend I don’t 👀

Edie: the 👀 are already insane colours

Liam: no match for yours in real life

Edie: [pics forever]

Edie: [obviously also make your enemies to actually kill and send that]

Liam: if you sent it to Lexie nobody’d believe she created herself looking that accurate

Edie: harsh reality of a sim

Edie: the alpha CC does look like her facetune attempts, tbf

Liam: at least you can make her try to seduce the grim reaper instead of me

Edie: she’ll have ample opportunity to meet him

Edie: [all the dramatic deaths cut with her sim when they get hysterical]

Edie: I’m still mad at her

Edie: Rih blatantly thinking it was me too, not surprising but still 🖕

Edie: how’s it been today

Liam: only bc she knows how smart you are and most people who Lex hangs out with ain’t, I barely had to cover for you so she don’t really wanna think it

Edie: story of her life

Liam: how 😡 are you

Edie: it’s exhausting being mad at her, there’s nothing to do

Edie: people like Lexie, you can fuck with, or care even less than that

Liam: would it make you feel better to fuck with Lexie more

Edie: I wanna make you feel better more

Edie: you must be feeling as bored and crazy as me, if not more

Liam: if I could feel anything it’d be 💔 you’re not happy or here

Edie: is it worse

Edie: nothing

Edie: maybe that’s stupid

Edie: nothing seems preferable sometimes but only sometimes, which is maybe what takes it over feeling too much

Liam: it’s isolating, everyone expects me to feel too much, that’s acceptable, even years after

Edie: acceptance would be easier

Edie: you have me

Edie: no matter what

Edie: idc if no one else gets me, you do

Liam: I dunno what it says about people that they’d be happy if I was going round punching holes in walls but I know my ma would

Liam: she looks at me like she’s waiting for it, watching for a massive crack or something

Edie: they’ve got their reason, they want the reaction

Edie: then they can link a and b and ???

Edie: problem solved, not really

Edie: but they understand it and can wash their hands of you

Edie: that’s what they give a shit about

Liam: yeah

Edie: enough sympathy and hot meals dropped off and you’ll be ‘fixed’

Edie: you weren’t even the sick one

Liam: get enough hobbies, a part-time job, a girlfriend, move the fuck on

Edie: right

Edie: it’s so

Edie: I can’t think of the word

Liam: “she’d want you to be happy/have a life” no she fucking wouldn’t, she wanted it for herself

Edie: dead people get sainted

Edie: no room for who they actually were, better and worse

Liam: she’d hate me having any of those things just to rub in her face

Edie: what was she like, between being sick

Liam: I’ll show you

Edie: do you reckon she’d want you to remember what she’d want for you then, instead of how she was at the end

Edie: not to be like every other cunt about it

Edie: not that simple, or at all

Liam: she was a teenage girl, she’d probably want me to do more fitting in too until I’ve completed the coming of age shite milestones everyone else is, instead of telling other teenage girls from the internet how fucked up I am 😏

Edie: I think that might be a milestone so 👏

Edie: the bullshit of your sister not having her own life to live dealt with then, in this scenario

Edie: we have to find what you want

Edie: even if that’s not 🤵👧🐶🧒👰 with me

Edie: not gonna be Lexie about it, you know

Edie: I’ll still help you find it

Liam: I want you, not to be gay about it

Liam: to see where this is gonna go, how far I can take it before it ends

Edie: then let’s do it

Edie: what can I do today

Liam: what would you be doing if you could do anything

Edie: that’s the problem

Edie: I wanna be with you

Edie: but I don’t know what we’d do yet

Liam: I said I’d show you what my sister was like, the quickest way to do it is to act like nothing matters, your behaviour has no consequences

Liam: it’s not about me at all, only what you want, what’s gonna happen

Edie: and I can’t hurt you

Edie: because you don’t feel anything yet, yeah?

Liam: you can’t hurt me

Edie: you promise

Edie: do that and then we can do what I want

Liam: how do you want me to promise

Edie: 🤏🩸

Edie: mine is 📫

Liam: [brb father he’s gotta go draw some blood and put it into something she can wear as jewellery like Angelina Jolie and record the endeavour to send to the bae]

Edie: [that’s exactly what we gonna send, I know you can legit buy them so I’ll find a cool pic tah, his poor father so confusion]

Liam: [great minds boo]

Edie: kiss it better for me

Liam: [send her another video boy we’re in this deep]

Edie: god

Edie: okay, what do you do to relieve stress, let go and let off steam

Edie: do that

Liam: what do I do or what should you, bc I have an idea that I think would make you feel better about your sister

Edie: you can start by telling me what I should do because I’m intrigued

Liam: she said she’d lose it at Lexie if she did anything to you, if you lower your IQ by at least 100 you could have fun trashing her room but making it look like she did it herself to frame you, you’d have to wait til she was forced out with her family and bc there’s no check in or selfie proof everyone would just think they’re covering for her, but that’d be the only boring bit

Liam: your sister would feel bad for falling for it and believing you might be involved at all

Edie: I definitely don’t want to see her at mine ever again

Edie: I’ll do it

Edie: Bet she has a shrine to you

Liam: a curse would explain me being dead inside

Edie: she has no ✨

Edie: so whilst I’m ripping the heads off all her 🧸s

Edie: you’ve gotta do…

Liam: 🏊 the only thing there is to do

Edie: your da didn’t come prepared? 🔥🪓

Liam: he’d be prepared with a 🧯 more like but I don’t need his help 🔥🪓

Edie: you should see if anyone is around, like anywhere

Edie: see how easy it is to 👀 them without getting caught

Liam: it’s like you know me inside out

Edie: I do

Edie: I’ve got X-Ray 👀s

Liam: next time you miss me you can do an artistic rendering

Edie: of all your vital organs

Edie: not to kill the mystery and show myself up as a fake fan on the forums

Edie: but I think the outside view of you is a lot prettier 😳🥰

Liam: ok I’ll not send you any in the 📫

Edie: only the non-vitals, tah 😏

Liam: what’s left Alexis hasn’t got in her shrine

Edie: she 🥺 so hard you gave her your gallbladder

Liam: 10% risk of shitting myself side effects after it’s gone, 100% chance of that putting her off wanting to jump me, I’d do it

Edie: no need to do that now I’m here

Edie: no one is gonna wanna jump her when she’s outed as 😵🥴🤡

Liam: I’ll keep the scalpel sharp for lads who wanna get with you when they realise you’re 🤩🤓😎😇😈

Edie: I’m not complaining

Edie: I only want you around, ever

Liam: I’ll be going nowhere without you ever when I get back

Edie: Good

Edie: because I feel like

Edie: it’s like I’m doing so much to fill my time but I still just think about and miss you constantly

Liam: I’ll climb a tree and call you from the top

Edie: Describe your view the best you can

Edie: like I’m there too

Liam: facetime’ll make you feel like you are

Edie: not quite VR but I’ll take it

Edie: talking to you feels like our own 🪐 anyway

Liam: [do climb a tree and call her because what a mood just like you’re Elizabeth Allen]

Edie: [save that tree henny]

Liam: [do we wanna skip to his bday now or is there anything else you can think of that you wanna do while he’s still away?]

Edie: [hmm, we probably know the vibe, she’s busy with all the things they’re gonna continue when he’s back, also finding the first house they can break into and stay in, fucking with Lexie loads more]

Liam: [yeah and if we do think of anything specific later we can skip back it’s chill]

Edie: [let’s do it]

[ask-the-wordsmith]

On the Purpose of Formula

Okay, you’ve all heard of “formula” TV shows. You’ve probably heard amateur writers who have never actually produced something tell you how bad they are, using “formulaic” as a negative term.

Well SIT THE HECK DOWN. I’m here to explain how formula— even BAD formula— can make a show funny, endearing, suspenseful, or exciting.

First of all: the way I’m using the term, a “formula TV show” is one that follows a distinct pattern every episode. Every show follows a formula to some degree, but my area of expertise— children’s programming— often uses very specific formulas that are easy to recite and make fun of. Usually these formulas go so far as to include repeat even dialogue, which is how catchphrases are born. (“Team Rocket’s blasting off again!”)

I could go into the psychology of why the human mind likes repetition, or how formulas make it easier to produce content on a budget because the writers don’t have to start from scratch with a new framework every two weeks, but what I really want to hammer in today is the beauty of breaking the formula.

“But wait, I thought you said formula was good—”

Yeah. Because you break it. You can’t BREAK a formula if you don’t HAVE one to begin with. Let’s take a highly-formulaic, yet very popular and extremely well-written comedy show: Phineas and Ferb. (You can skip the entire next paragraph if you already know the show.)

If you’ve seen one episode of P&F, you’ve seen them all: Phineas and Ferb decide to build a crazy, huge, impossible invention out of boredom (“I know what we’re going to do today, Ferb!”) and the core cast joins in (“Whacha dooooin’?”) while their pet-slash-secret-agent Perry the Platypus (“Agent P!”) gets sent on a mission to defeat the evil Dr. Doofenshmirtz, who’s building an evil “Inator” that will cause some vague and oddly specific harm so he can “rule the ENTIRE TRI-STATE AREA!” Meanwhile, Candace, P&F’s older sister, tries to bust them for their shenanigans (“MOOOOM! PHINEAS AND FERB ARE—”), the evidence of which always gets erased at the last possible minute as a result of Dr. D’s failed schemes. Evil is defeated (“CURSE YOU, PERRY THE PLATYPUUUUUS!”), Perry returns home incognito (“Oh, there you are, Perry!”), and the mom invites the kids in for snacks (“Who wants pie?”) none the wiser.

Wow. That’s one specific formula! And not even HALF the requirements! With every episode being half-length (11 minutes without commercials), you’d think there’s hardly room for anything original. So why is the show so funny, and so good?

Because about once per episode, the writers break one part of the formula.

You never know which part it will be. You never see it coming. And when that moment comes— when Ferb (who only gets one line per episode) breaks into an entire monologue about finding a lost lizard, when Perry the Platypus knocks instead of breaking down Dr. Doofenshmirtz’s door, or when said evil doctor’s curses are interrupted by a “hey, is that the Baljeatles?”— THOSE moments are the ones that take you by surprise. And because the writers already find a new and funny way to use the formula, you’re too distracted by all the new jokes to remember that they’re going to break it at some point.

No, wait, don’t stop scrolling yet! I know this is a long post, but bear with me. Because breaking formula can be used to create suspense and shock as well.

Wanna know another formulaic kid’s show that, while it has objectively bad writing and makes literally no sense half the time, has somehow risen to international fame? Miraculous freakin’ Ladybug. I’ll spare you the full formula rundown, but one crucial piece is that at some point, the superhero Ladybug uses her patented, once-per-episode move: Lucky Charm! It summons some obscure object, which she uses in tandem with her surroundings to create a convoluted mousetrap that defeats the villain.

So when Silencer, an episode that isn’t even a season premiere or finale, TAKES AWAY HER VOICE AND RENDERS HER UNABLE TO SUMMON HER LUCKY CHARM— well, shoot! What’s she gonna do? What are the WRITERS gonna do? She’s not allowed to defeat the villain without using her special move. It’s not just improbable in-universe; you’re aware, as a viewer, that the writers can’t do it either. It’d be like revealing Perry the Platypus’s secret identity. It just can’t happen!

My point is, you’re invested now, aren't you? Even if you don’t watch the show, you kinda want to know how they resolved it. You’re hoping I’ll tell you. That’s the power of television. That’s how you create the “what happens next?” cliffhanger that stopped being interesting decades ago when people realized the main character was never going to die. You cannot rely on a scary monster to be an effective cliffhanger. Because we KNOW that Ladybug will win. Even the kids know she’ll win. But HOW will she win?

After all, you broke the formula.

How will she win if you broke the formula?!

...and THAT, my fellow wordsmithers, is the purpose of formula. There are things in this world that were meant to be broken.

But to break a formula, you have to have one first.

So if you ever hear an amateur critic on youtube or writeblr use “formulaic” as an insult, take everything they say with a grain of salt. Formulaic shows can be bad, but it’s not the formula which makes them that way.

(Oh, and since I know you’re wondering? Ladybug tricks the villain who stole her voice into saying “Lucky Charm” for her so she can summon her power. Simple solution! —once you’ve thought of it. But it kept you reading ‘til the end, now didn’t it?)

[cateringisalie]

Village: Resident Evil ramblings

(Some spoilers)

Ethan Winters is a goddamn idiot.

I say this without a shred of nostalgia; I first encountered him in RE7 and feel less than nostalgic towards the guy. RE7 without the benefit of the former entrants was a FPS horror and pretty good. Though you couldn’t escape that the characters you remembered were the Baker family and Mia; Ethan was a walking camera with a gun and some very simplistic emotional responses (fear, rescue wife, escape, swear occasionally). Having now run through the whole sequence of games, Ethan stands out starkly as the blandest and least interesting protagonist the series ever produced. He is possibly worse than Piers. Village updates Ethan’s personality. A bit. Well. Not really. Still got that fear, still got the swearing. Still got a mind to escape. But rather than rescue his wife, it’s about rescuing his daughter. I mean; Mia was gunned down and shot a further 9000 times by infuriating series stalwart Chris Redfield a little under ten minutes into the game proper. Not that Ethan really comes to terms with the trauma. By minute fifteen of the game the van you’ve been shoved in by Chris (who doesn’t shoot you for no reason he feels like explaining) has crashed and Ethan’s daughter is missing. Mourning Mia doesn’t actually enter into Ethan’s thought process. Goddamn idiot. Not to say that life with Mia was exactly picturesque; a few years after RE7 the couple are now somewhere nebulous in Eastern Europe in a very lovely house with a distressing number of empty wine bottles in the kitchen. A happy marriage this does not seem to be given Mia doesn’t want to get into the events of RE7 anymore, but Ethan does – but also failing to understand that the cover-up of the incident might be why no one is talking much about the whole mess in Louisiana and that bringing it up both distresses and angers Mia. But; the inciting incident has occurred and we’re propelled into our new scenario. Ethan; once again fish out of water, and its not like we have a choice. This is not to say Village does not repeat the same narrative trick of changing POV character, but there is both less of that, and the Half-Life-style regimented first person view jarringly completely goes out the window in the last quarter. It was less than consistent at points, but sparingly when occasionally and jarringly camera angles shifted to depict an introduction. But the game is also perfectly happy to render whole FPS sequences with gun visible and everything as it plays out a story beat, so... I don’t know? Fortunately Ethan’s environment and the setting are much more interesting. The unnamed Village is a satisfying knot of tangled streets, locked doors and environmental obstacles. Enemies don’t respawn per se, but additional enemies are added on subsequent visits to the effective hub of the game. There’s livestock to kill and give the Duke – the merchant playing a similar role to the pirate-like guy from RE4. Duke’s an entertaining character (some have objected to his physical and hugely overweight depiction); chatty and far more knowing than he will let on. He has a dangling thread come the end so perhaps will reappear elsewhere. He’ll sort the gun upgrades, supplies, let you sell treasure and point you towards your next destinations. Which is just as well as the human population of the village dies out somewhere between the first and second hour. No one left and any futile attempts to save people end in almost hilariously disastrous tragedies (no Ethan, don’t go higher in a building that is on fire). Leaving you with Lycans, zombies and gargoyles to fend off. Occasionally there’s some bigger foes on the level of the Executioner from RE5 but nothing on the level of the Tyrants. That kind of thing is left to the Village Lords. The villagers – before they all die – have a curiously unfamiliar religion and praise a figure known as Mother Miranda. She reportedly kept the village safe, but something has changed and now the Lycans run amok and without restraint. Not hard to pin that the reason for the change is Rose’s arrival (or could it be Ethan? COULD IT? No. Man is a goddamn idiot). The only door out of the village you can open is to Castle Dimitrescu and... It feels unnecessary to even get into what awaits. Given fandom have been so noisy about the tall lady and her vampiric daughters since the first trailer. She is so very, very tall. The castle is the first mode of Village. Possibly closest to RE7; Dimitrescu’s daughters are vulnerable based on certain environmental details (read the notes!) but otherwise should be fled from. Dimitrescu herself is invulnerable to everything bar one weapon and you need to work at getting that, so she needs to be fled from. Otherwise, explore the castle, find treasure. Sneak. Solve puzzles. It all looks suitably gorgeous and you get multiple chances to see if as you loop through the rooms and unlock more doors. The Village macro mechanics wrought as micro here. There’s a canny hint at a late reveal in the blunt utility of in-game mechanics to be had too. But – really should have been obvious given their prominence in the trailer – given Castle Dimitrescu is the first level, it means we must say goodbye to the very Tall Lady with knife hands and move onto someone else. In between levels, we get the first reinforcement of a tease from the trailer; the symbol of the Umbrella corporation. Its engraved into a location called the Ceremony Site. Its daubed on a cave wall as high as the Tall Lady. Its on the strange structure you insert the yellow flasks each Village Lord guards. And it means... almost nothing. RE's meta-plot has always been a mess and everyone’s favorite pharmaceutical company hasn’t been so active for a while, so the idea that we might be getting into some interesting weirdness with them again is oh so appealing. And yet – I was disappointed. Despite the repeated glimpses of the familiar white and red logo, the connection ultimately comes down to one letter I found at about 7/8s of the way through. Oswell Spencer – founder of the company – visited the Village years ago and saw the cave painting and adopted it as his logo. Oh. That’s... underwhelming. The same letter does at least prod at wiring Village’s latter reveals into the formation of the company along with tying in some parts of RE5 but if you thought this would be the company or the family dynasty origins or anything like that, you are in for a disappointment. It’s a tease and one that goes nowhere and does little. Oh we might now see how Spencer got into the whole inadvertent zombie making mess but its not a factor in the plot of this game nor does it really change the stakes of the previous. Perhaps I should be glad it’s so frivolous given other retcons in certain other franchises, but it feels so suspect to have drawn the attention and then shuffle the implications out the side-door. At least the other village lords have their own appeals. The second level is RE once again stealing PT (the PS4 demo to announce Silent Hills) given Konami outright don’t care about it anymore. Stripped of your guns and inventory, it’s a claustrophobic puzzle level requiring you to hide with mechanics familiar to both Evil Within and Alien Isolation. That same loop of rooms as you seek out puzzle solutions and hide from a staggeringly distressing malevolent entity. The third is combat light until the final confrontation; the fight staged in a flooded village – oh and Chris who still doesn’t shoot you but refuses to explain anything. And the fourth cheats. Heisenberg is thoroughly entertaining and grabs two levels for his own; an assault on a stronghold and his horrible cyborg factory outside of town. He has Magneto metal powers. Heisenberg is the camp villain to outdo the other camp villains. He’s having fun, he kinda likes Ethan and is oddly on his side. He found time to put together massive signposts to direct Ethan onto the last two levels (a good thing too given his lack of sense). But both levels are lacking. The Stronghold is a relentless firefight against hoards of mook enemies; the factory is overly long and maze-like. I am as tired as Ethan when he exclaims “What more?” And after Heisenberg is dealt with; the long, convoluted lurches to the ending. First person goes out the window. The game dabbles in characters toying with your understanding of what was going on but in a strangely limited way and completely ignoring the other implications of the reveal. Suddenly you mow down more and more enemies than ever before, bullets scarcely a concern. The final reveals of who/what/where/how come through. Not exactly explicable for what’s on-screen, but the effort’s been made to tie Village’s overt supernatural tendencies back into a world setup in RE. Its not magic and those are not truly werewolves. And the villain’s motivation is! Hugely disappointing. Connected as it is to the Umbrella letter, you might hope for something completely out there, but its unsatisfying and feels pretty sexist too. Or at least lacking in imagination to an astonishing degree and yet here we are. The game feels sloppiest as the final boss fight arrives flitting between characters without the shaky but workable character hand-offs RE7 deployed. Back in first person mode to talk to Duke one last time before engaging in.... a relatively simple boss fight. All the boss fights have been pretty easy – there’s nothing on the level of RE6’s sometimes horrendous contextual fights, or the annoying two-player RE5, nor the demanded accuracy of hitting specific weak-points as in RE7. And I don’t mind that. Unload all your weapons and keep your health up. And victory. There are fix-it fics already, but really, I don’t see the point in trying to fix the issue these people have. There’s an obvious setup for a game past this one with a strange throw-away reveal in the end-sequence (whither RE9, Revelations 3 or something else there are no clues as yet). There’s a spoiler for the sting given the end-credits lists a character who didn’t appear in the main game. The sting itself might wind up drawing on the sting from Revelations 2. Village is not RE at its best, but is at least more in the spirit of goofy, campy nonsense than 7. It at least is more at home with playing with the trappings of horror while not actually trying to be outright scary. As with 7, the villains are more interesting and more memorable than the good guys. And – as I found out after completing the game – we were robbed of Ada Wong dressed up like a Bloodborne character somewhere in the game. And that I think is the biggest shame of all this.

[garazza]

Action Comics #1023 Review

“The House of Kent: Part 2″

Action Comics #1022 “House of Kent: Part 1″ Review

Hoo-boy.

I actually appreciate this recap page, I really do, but it just rubs me the wrong way. I’m not sure if it’s the content of the recap that pisses me off or if it’s for the fact that they literally just took a page from the previous issue and slapped in some new dialogue (see Bendis’ Man of Steel mini for this to be taken to the extreme).

Most likely the latter, but there’s a good argument for the former because reading objective statements about what Bendis has done tends to do that. I guess what they could be going for is for something similar to when Svengoolie comes back from commercial break and it’s a still from the movie with Sven’s face superimposed somewhere and he makes a quip about the movie before it starts back up again.

But I digress. It fills me in on what’s been happening in the book and that’s what I needed it to do.

The art really goes down in quality since last issue. Romita, Jr.’s pencils aren’t as good, Janson’s inks are heavier and a lot more boring, and Anderson’s colors are bland and flat and not as lively. There are a few good spots and I’ll point them out, but they’re infrequent, and overall, the quality of the art is much more similar to the art in the Metropolis Doom arc than it is to last issue. This leads me to believe that editorial only gave the art team enough time over the pandemic-induced break in publishing to produce one good issue before forcing them back into a deadline where Romita, Jr.’s work is not as good and tends to suffer.

Red Cloud attacks and attempts to kill Jimmy Olsen instead of Lois Lane to send an even greater message to her and Clark.

For those of you that don’t know, the Invisible Mafia speak in code to avoid detection by Superman’s super-hearing and meet in areas surround by lead to hide from his supervision. In the beginning of this confrontation, no one says anything that Superman would respond to if he hasn’t already tuned it out, which is why Lois says out loud her nickname for her husband to get his attention.

It’s a sign of affection for them and could be utilized for such a scenario, but I don’t see why she had to say his nickname over anything else to get his attention. Maybe because since he revealed his identity to the world his real name is being said a lot more often in non-criminal ways, so he doesn’t respond to it as much as he has in the past. I’m not sure if I’m trying to come up with a rational excuse for what is actually a writer’s weird and out-of-character creative choice or if it’s what an actually competent writer intended for a discerning reader to infer and get joy from a successful analysis.

Regardless, it’s what got Superman’s attention at the end of Superman segment in the last issue. I don’t think what was supposed to be conveyed with those panels last issue was accurately conveyed by the art. Either Romita, Jr. didn’t sufficiently depict (but still beautifully rendered) what Bendis had directed him to draw, or Bendis had poorly directed Romita, Jr. in what he wanted him to draw. With this added context, however, these panels do make a lot more sense, but only with the added context. Without it, the scene is a little unclear.

You can clearly see the change in art with the two issues side by side like this. This issue, the art just doesn’t look as good. It’s just kinda blegh. It accomplishes what it needs to convey the story, but in a very boring and unspectacular way.

Also, this panel is very Harry Potter to me. Superman’s more subdued face is similar to that of book!Dumbledore in Goblet of Fire, but the almost hyperbolic dialogue is more akin to that of movie!Dumbledore. It’s very dissonant.

I really want to hate the humor of this panel, but it’s just so fun, so I won’t.

This is a really cool panel, one of the few standout moments, but I have issues.

First, I may have enjoyed the humor in the last panel, but Bendis’ attempt at humor with Jon here just makes me want to cringe. Whenever Bendis makes Jon talk, it just pisses me off and makes me want to stop reading.

Second, I see what they were going for with the glowing eyes, but this is some more of that dissonance between the art and the writing. It actually looks quite menacing, but the dialogue has a more humorous tone. Also, the actual effect for the glow is just two red circles, making their eyes look more like flashlights than radiating energy. I also want you to keep this moment in the back of your minds, I’ll refer back to it in a second.

I think the dissonance is the result of the Bendis-speak, where some of the characters are quippy, but other characters are playing the situation straight and are reacting accordingly to the incorrect behavior. There’s nothing wrong with a superhero comic being light-hearted, but it just doesn’t quite fit here. All the right ingredients are present, but they’re not all in the right proportions.

Another panel I really like. The smoke and its color are really well done, especially in contrast to the all black silhouettes except for their back logos of the Supers.

The eye glow effect looks much better here. It’s simple yet powerful.

I don’t know how important this revelation is actually supposed to be, so I’ll defer to the depiction of the comic instead of playing the fool and acting upset about something I’m ignorant about simply because I’m not a fan of the writer.

This moment is cool and all, but I don’t think Conner has super-breath. He doesn’t actually have the powers of Superman, he uses his tactile telekinesis to mimic some of the powers of Superman.

The “extreme high-velocity super-speed” was this issue’s first indication that Bendis might not know anything about this character he has stewardship over, but that can just be chalked up to Superman not remembering the powers of Conner. We don’t know the upper limit of Conner’s tactile telekinetic flight, nor should we care, it’s supposed to be a fun line.

The second indication is that Conner is shown to have heat vision when his eyes glow alongside Clark and Jon’s. He only has heat vision when he wears special goggles or a visor. Again, he doesn’t have all the powers of Superman. Tactile telekinesis only covers so much of Superman’s powers. But this can be forgiven because it is a pretty cool image.

“Once Is Chance, Twice is Coincidence, Third Time Is A Pattern.” This panel is the third instance of Bendis’ lack of understanding of Conner’s character. If this was the only instance, this would be fine, but it’s not. The moment is cool, but it’s a bridge too far.

Refer to my review of the first issue for more of Bendis not knowing anything about Conner.

EDIT: Thanks to @thebartallenblog​ for pointing out to me that Conner does in fact start developing more Kryptonian powers outside of his tactile telekinesis in the 2003 Teen Titans  book by Geoff Johns, so Bendis does in fact know more about the character than I give him credit for, which is more than I can say for myself in this instance.

Also, this moment goes on for way too long, almost two entire pages. Beautiful, the art of decompression and wasting reader’s time and money.

“Should I super-inhale?” Shut up, Bendis.

Also, why is Red Cloud is so fixated on Superman’s family instead of just Superman. Does the Invisible Mafia have something against his family as well? It was my understanding that they have it out for him specifically, anything that is ancillary to him is extraneous and not worth their time.

“Hey! It’s not my favorite super-move on a good day.” Then why the fuck did you even make him suggest it, Bendis?

I don’t know if loved ones referring to Lois as Ma is something Bendis has been trying to push as a character quirk or if it’s some sort of weird one-off. Either way, I don’t like it. It’s not bad in of itself, don’t get me wrong, it’s just not my thing and there’s nothing wrong with that.

Again, I’m not sure how significant Jimmy figuring out Red Cloud's identity is supposed to be to the plot and the narrative, but this seems to be a bit of lampshading from a writer who literally has no right to be lampshading.

Couldn’t give a shit about the plot, I’m just here to nitpick. Next.

Feels a bit janky in the art department, but the dialogue is surprisingly in character. They all feel like they have their actual voices. It’s a nice little moment.

I would address all the instances of Bendis making Jon talk, but that would make this longer than it already is, so I’ll only do it when it’s particularly egregious.

Red Cloud comes back and attacks not!Jon and I couldn’t care less. Kill the bitch. Please.

The next two pages are a lot of nothing, just a boat load of Bendis-speak.

I’m pretty sure this played out a lot differently and more humorously in Bendis’ head when he wrote it down and Romita, Jr.’s art makes it all the more funny but for all the wrong reasons.

Who’s his partner? Officer Tomasi?

You know when I said that one panel with Lois, Clark, and Jimmy was written really in-character? This panel with Conner and Jon is the exact opposite of that.

Red Cloud and Ms. Leone have a fun back and forth for two pages. It’s a good example of Bendis-speak working well.

“Black Label Club?” One meta-reference is enough, but two is stupid. I actaully feel a little conflicted nitpicking this, but Black Label is in such a weird place right now, so why reference it?

But “Clark Kent walked into a bar...” is a pretty bad ass line, very John Wick.

A very cool sequence, but it’s full of Bendis-speak and very decompressed.

Why the fake-out of the Superfamily executing a gangland-style shooting with Jon being the one pulling the trigger? I get it’s a story beat the narrative is supposed to hit, but still.

The reveal is pretty funny, shrinking the club, so it’s a little forgivable, but the set up and the pay off don’t quite match. It’s just another example of that dissonance I’ve been mentioning.

I know that “supersons” line was put there by Bendis as a deliberate dig at his detractors, so I’m not going to take the bait and get pissed. Nice try, big guy.

All in all, this issue was not as bad as I initially thought. It’s series of some really big highs and lows.

[fa-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-liar]

Okay writing side of Tumblr, I'm going to ramble here for a sec because I have the beginnings of an idea for a (hopefully original) story, but it might be stupid, so if it sounds stupid lemme know. 'kay? Cool

TW/CW: colonialism - just to be on the safe side

My brother and I like to watch TedEd videos - they're really fun to watch, actually - and one video that we saw yesterday was about what would happen if all satellites orbiting the globe were to disappear. I linked it here if you wanna check it out for yourself, but to give you a quick rundown, civilization would be set back by decades at the very least.

So that got me thinking - what if, as a form of futuristic colonialism (?- there's probably a better word for it, but that's the best I can use to describe it at the moment), a country were to mess with or destroy the satellites of the other countries with natural resources? That would render these countries vulnerable, allowing the colonizer to sweep in and steal natural resources for themselves.

And then I was wondering, what if my protagonist came from one of these colonized countries and happened to be really good at building machines and often tinkered around with that kinda stuff? So she, even though she doesn't have the access to resources & such (on the account of, y'know, living under colonial control), is able to play a part in defeating the imperial powers that control her country (I say "play a part" because I know that colonialism isn't as simple to eradicate as "one hero vs the colonizers"). I also think part of me is using this story as a way to indirectly spotlight how hard Indian scientists, mathematicians, etc. had to work/worked without even being able to go to school when they were under colonial rule.

Again, this is the beginning of an idea, so there will definitely be more details & thought put into the plot/world-building, and I'll clean it up a little, for sure. But that's what I have as of now.

Any feedback is very VERY much appreciated! I'm worried it's too insane or surreal to even work.