#12.8.19

[elceeu2morrow]

Louis on iHeartRadio Countdown with Jojo Wright, 12.8.19 (via @toupromo123)

[caeliriva]

[samsi6]

In diesen Hitzemonaten stehen Gänse und Krähen hechelnd am Ufer des Flusses

Der Zugvogel pickt ungerührt ein paar Zentimeter weiter etwas vom Boden auf

Dazwischen der Rassist

Erst betrachtet er das Hecheln und kurz darauf das Picken

Er hasst das Gehabe des Zugvogels und er verachtet das Hecheln der Krähen und Gänse

Wenigstens ist der Sommer deutsch denkt er und schwitzt

[joshhhhhhhhhhhhhhh]

So in episode 44 of Sailor Moon, we’re introduced to Queen Serenity, the mother of Princess Serenity and an incarnation of the Moon Goddess Serene. Immediately I’m thinking this makes Usagi and incarnation of a Goddess as well, so that’s neat. This episode’s mostly exposition as we set up for the finale, including us learning such details as Metalia not being so much a person as just, an evil entity, and Queen Beryl being a witch from Earth who wanted to rule over both Earth and the Moon Kingdom. Endymion meanwhile was always the Prince of Earth, but just fell for Princess Serenity and uh, that’s how that one went. Also when we’re seeing Queen Beryl and her gang raiding the Moon Kingdom, we actually see Kunzite, Zoisite, Nephrite and even Jadeite on the front lines! Never expected to see Jadeite again. Also returning to the present, all the Sailor Soldiers are able to give a bunch of their energy to Sailor Moon, and following a failure of a Moon Healing Escalation, she deflects one of Kunzite’s attacks and he actually dies! Since all 4 oof those guys are at last dead, and I strongly doubt they’ll reappear, I’m inclined to say that my favourite was Zoisite, and then Nephrite, and then Kunzite, and then Jadeite. So decent episode, again mostly just exposition to set up for the finale, but nothing wrong with that. The next episode is called “The Sailor Soldiers die! The Final Tragic Battle!” which is, uh, blunt. I’ve already heard that Sailor Moon has character deaths, albeit impermanent ones, but it’ll be cool to see how they handle it nonetheless. 

And actually, because I’m so close to being done anyway, I watched the episode, thus putting me ahead of my “one episode a day” schedule! Immediately I wanna mention the Sailor Teleport - Luna tells the Sailor Soldiers that if they put their powers together they can teleport, so that’s uh, something. It takes all 5 of them to do it and it took a bit of time to activate so it’s not the most convenient teleport I’ve seen, and while it takes them from Japan to the North Pole which is far enough for me to imagine they can teleport anywhere on Earth, we’re not given an upper level on its range, but hey it’s cool that they can. Anyway about the deaths, it’s about what I expected. We’re attacked by a group of super high tier youma, like some real upper echelon of the Dark Kingdom villains, and one by one, they take down the Sailor Soldiers - Jupiter, Mercury, Venus and then Mars. Of course, every Sailor Soldier kinda gets a noble sacrifice moment where they also take down one of the youma, and in fact Mars gets to take down 2 since she’s a badass. And when Usagi’s justifiably upset by all this, the other Soldier’s I guess ghosts all appear to tell her to stay strong and win and save the day and stuff. All of this is pretty much what I expected given how the show isn’t really especially dark or anything, and I also know for a fact that, through some means or other, the Sailor Soldiers will all come back to life, so it’ll be fun to learn how that one happens. I wanna take a quick moment to meditate on the nature of these character deaths though, specifically in comparison to Madoka Magica, which if you know me, you’d know is my all time favourite anime. Not here tryna say which one does character deaths better at all by the way, and despite what I’m about to say I don’t think Madoka’s all that dark nor that it relies on shock value. Anyway, I see a lot of people try to undermine Mami’s death in episode 3 of Madoka by saying that “even Sailor Moon has character deaths”. And they’re right, but I think that’s kind of a weak point to make if you look at the context whatsoever. All 4 of the Sailor Soldiers that die in this episode are main characters who’ve had proper time in the spotlight and when they die, it’s framed like, as I’ve already explained, this noble sacrifice against terrifyingly powerful foes in the grand finale, and again they get their little ghosts talking to Usagi and stuff. Mami is set up to be a main character, but dies in episode 3 of a 12 episode show. She’s killed by a completely random, nothing-special-about-it witch, and when she dies, she’s dead, we’re not gonna get her ghost telling Madoka to stay strong or anything like that, and she’s not really gonna be brought back to life in the same way the Sailor Soldiers will, whatever that ends up being. Again Madoka’s not exactly that dark and I don’t think Mami’s death is a shock value thing but people devaluing the way it goes against genre norms by comparing it to Sailor Moon are completely ignoring the entire context. That’s all.

And lastly for Sailor Moon, before we get to R at least, we’ve got episode 46. And it was a pretty cool finale! Mamoru’s finally restored thanks to that little music box thing Usagi had, and it’s great to see him back to normal. He kinda sacrifices himself to save Usagi though which is getting old at this point. Following that, Usagi as Princess Serenity and a Queen Beryl powered up by Metalia’s dark energy have something of a really epic beam struggle, the OP music playing over it to really tell us how grand and amazing this all is. And yeah it was, it was super cool and Usagi gets energy from her friendship with the other Sailor Soldiers who contribute from beyond the grave I guess, as well as her faith in the world and stuff. Pretty cool finale. Don’t really like that the ending though is Usagi wishing for everything to go back to normal and everyone sans Luna and Artemis’ memories kinda hitting the reset button. Effectively now, everyone that died is back to life, but they’re also back to not knowing each other. I’m not big on this in stories as a general rule of thumb, unless they’re gonna restore their memories or something it just generally comes across to me as uninteresting and cancelling prior developments. It’s also not clear if Usagi’s still Sailor Moon, but the next episode preview, episode 1 of Sailor R, at least has Sailor Moon in it, so she might re-contract or something, who knows. No indication that any of the other Sailor Soldiers will appear as the Sailor Soldiers in the next episode, I guess I’ll find out tomorrow. Kinda want R to have the same OP song because it’s hecking delightful, but we’ll see what happens.

Anyway since I’ve finished Sailor Moon the MAL entry, it’s time to score it, and I’mma give it a nice 7/10. If you’ve been reading my episode coverage up to this point you’d know that I largely enjoyed basically every episode, but I do think it’s fair to say that between the filler, reused animation and most conflicts being taken care of in the same way, plus Jade/Nephr/Zois/Kunzite being mostly kind of identical until the ends of their respective “arcs”, that Sailor Moon is perhaps a little repetitive. That and me not liking how the ending resets everything. But you know, 7/10 is a really good score, I still really liked the show, and I’m pretty sure that the original Sailor Moon is nobody’s favourite season anyway, so I expect to like the upcoming stuff more. 

I can think of no better way to end this post than to say that Ami Mizuno, or Sailor Mercury, is definitely still best girl.

[godsnameisjoy]

The Shush Zone

Date : 12 August 2019

Duration : 40 minutes at bedtime

Depth :

There was no need for me to stop at 40 minutes. My meditation was so concentrated last night that there was no need to stop. I stopped out of habit not out of any meditational hindrance.

What a beautiful session ! I was in those quiet spaces that lie beyond the shallow super conscious mind. It sure is true that the part of human mind that takes care of the deep sleep function really isn’t suitable for the dreaming activity. These spaces are so quiet that even dreams don’t occur here.

There was no need for me to make a mental utterance of Hong and Sau. The breath-chant technique had turned into a silent film for me, last night. I could feel the syllables coming into my mind like temporary impressions. It sure was quiet. My mind had found its way into the ultra quiet zone.

Of course, I was concentrated. All the movement around me, wasn’t enough to shake this concentration. I could hear a thing or two from around me and then return to this deep space within. So cool. The super conscious mind beyond its shallow entry level is wonderfully quiet.

Imagine there’s no analysing, no uncontrolled dreaming too. Imagine all your thoughts living their short lives in silence. You may say I am a meditator but I am not the only one. ‘Hope someday you’ll join us and our silences will be as one !

[blackmysticinfinite]

hm.

this is a good warning. timely advice.

I got excited about a new project today, which I hope to complete in time for gift-giving. but this is a cautionary card--to not push too much. to not overdo it. a little bit of forethought will go a long way here.

let's just hope I can remember this when I start to work...

[devonjwerkheiser]

devonwerkharder “🦋”

[beingallelite]

x

[barryallenis]

CRISIS ON INFINITE EARTHS (12.8.19 - 1.10.20)

Across space and time exist 7 heros. Beings of the purest will who can ultimately defeat the antimoniter and help save the multiverse.

[droppedgloves]

🏀

12.8.19

[elceeu2morrow]

May I ask if the iheart audio clip is stuntfree?

Well, he does say "my girlfriend at the time" when he talks about WMI. So technically, no, but that is literally all he says. Same as he has done since WMI promo began.

[a-ramblinrose]

Whoops Another Book Haul 12.8.19

[samgirard]

└ kreider welcomes flower back to the game | nyr @ vgk | 12.8.19

[contemplatingoutlander]

Adso🐈by the Yule🔥Fire

Just because, well…it’s Adso!❤️️

_____________________

Video source for gifs; originally posted 12.8.19; gifs modifiedb12.24.21

[thiccyonce]

Blue Ivy performing in the Hot Chocolate Nutcracker earlier this evening 🩰 12.8.19

[nicoleknows-nothing]

connor hellebuyck & nathan beaulieu wpg v. ana | 12.8.19