#Absolut Creation

[lexotanmerlin]

Lex # 5259

Suit up, gear on, and ready to conquer the cliffs 🧗‍♀️✨ Lexo’s adventure mode is unstoppable! 🖤🔥  In the rugged terrain of Second Life, Lexo had transformed into her daring alter ego—a fearless adventurer. Dressed in a sleek black suit that hugged her every move, she looked like a character straight out of an action movie. Her helmet glinted under the sunlight, shielding her identity and adding…

[billy-crudup]

Maybe once a week, I wake up paralyzed… reliving that night. But before the sun went down… I think that was the best day of my life. Was it like that for you? SINNERS (2025) dir. Ryan Coogler

[heph]

A lot has happened in 30 years

[bellameblake]

VIKTOR, THE MACHINE HERALD in ARCANE: LEAGUE OF LEGENDS

↳ Season 2, Act III

[aethersea]

another thing fantasy writers should keep track of is how much of their worldbuilding is aesthetic-based. it's not unlike the sci-fi hardness scale, which measures how closely a story holds to known, real principles of science. The Martian is extremely hard sci-fi, with nearly every detail being grounded in realistic fact as we know it; Star Trek is extremely soft sci-fi, with a vaguely plausible "space travel and no resource scarcity" premise used as a foundation for the wildest ideas the writers' room could come up with. and much as Star Trek fuckin rules, there's nothing wrong with aesthetic-based fantasy worldbuilding!

(sidenote we're not calling this 'soft fantasy' bc there's already a hard/soft divide in fantasy: hard magic follows consistent rules, like "earthbenders can always and only bend earth", and soft magic follows vague rules that often just ~feel right~, like the Force. this frankly kinda maps, but I'm not talking about just the magic, I'm talking about the worldbuilding as a whole.

actually for the purposes of this post we're calling it grounded vs airy fantasy, bc that's succinct and sounds cool.)

a great example of grounded fantasy is Dungeon Meshi: the dungeon ecosystem is meticulously thought out, the plot is driven by the very realistic need to eat well while adventuring, the story touches on both social and psychological effects of the whole 'no one dies forever down here' situation, the list goes on. the worldbuilding wants to be engaged with on a mechanical level and it rewards that engagement.

deliberately airy fantasy is less common, because in a funny way it's much harder to do. people tend to like explanations. it takes skill to pull off "the world is this way because I said so." Narnia manages: these kids fall into a magic world through the back of a wardrobe, befriend talking beavers who drink tea, get weapons from Santa Claus, dance with Bacchus and his maenads, and sail to the edge of the world, without ever breaking suspension of disbelief. it works because every new thing that happens fits the vibes. it's all just vibes! engaging with the worldbuilding on a mechanical level wouldn't just be futile, it'd be missing the point entirely.

the reason I started off calling this aesthetic-based is that an airy story will usually lean hard on an existing aesthetic, ideally one that's widely known by the target audience. Lewis was drawing on fables, fairy tales, myths, children's stories, and the vague idea of ~medieval europe~ that is to this day our most generic fantasy setting. when a prince falls in love with a fallen star, when there are giants who welcome lost children warmly and fatten them up for the feast, it all fits because these are things we'd expect to find in this story. none of this jars against what we've already seen.

and the point of it is to be wondrous and whimsical, to set the tone for the story Lewis wants to tell. and it does a great job! the airy worldbuilding serves the purposes of the story, and it's no less elegant than Ryōko Kui's elaborately grounded dungeon. neither kind of worldbuilding is better than the other.

however.

you do have to know which one you're doing.

the whole reason I'm writing this is that I saw yet another long, entertaining post dragging GRRM for absolute filth. asoiaf is a fun one because on some axes it's pretty grounded (political fuck-around-and-find-out, rumors spread farther than fact, fastest way to lose a war is to let your people starve, etc), but on others it's entirely airy (some people have magic Just Cause, the various peoples are each based on an aesthetic/stereotype/cliché with no real thought to how they influence each other as neighbors, the super-long seasons have no effect on ecology, etc).

and again! none of this is actually bad! (well ok some of those stereotypes are quite bigoted. but other than that this isn't bad.) there's nothing wrong with the season thing being there to highlight how the nobles are focused on short-sighted wars for power instead of storing up resources for the extremely dangerous and inevitable winter, that's a nice allegory, and the looming threat of many harsh years set the narrative tone. and you can always mix and match airy and grounded worldbuilding – everyone does it, frankly it's a necessity, because sooner or later the answer to every worldbuilding question is "because the author wanted it to be that way." the only completely grounded writing is nonfiction.

the problem is when you pretend that your entirely airy worldbuilding is actually super duper grounded. like, for instance, claiming that your vibes-based depiction of Medieval Europe (Gritty Edition) is completely historical, and then never even showing anyone spinning. or sniffing dismissively at Tolkien for not detailing Aragorn's tax policy, and then never addressing how a pre-industrial grain-based agricultural society is going years without harvesting any crops. (stored grain goes bad! you can't even mouse-proof your silos, how are you going to deal with mold?) and the list goes on.

the man went up on national television and invited us to engage with his worldbuilding mechanically, and then if you actually do that, it shatters like spun sugar under the pressure. doesn't he realize that's not the part of the story that's load-bearing! he should've directed our focus to the political machinations and extensive trope deconstruction, not the handwavey bit.

point is, as a fantasy writer there will always be some amount of your worldbuilding that boils down to 'because I said so,' and there's nothing wrong with that. nor is there anything wrong with making that your whole thing – airy worldbuilding can be beautiful and inspiring. but you have to be aware of what you're doing, because if you ask your readers to engage with the worldbuilding in gritty mechanical detail, you had better have some actual mechanics to show them.

[itsmebeff]

[subterraneanna]

Sudden ambiguous eroticism, courtesy of L.A. Graf's Ice Trap:

Here's the thing: there's no way to pull Kirk's "surprise" move without crawling onto Bones's lap. This isn't the same as leaning on a desk that someone's seated 12" beneath. I think I got the proportions wrong in my illustration because it failed to show how absolutely lip to lip they'd be. It's also possible they could be whispering in each other's ears instead of talking mouth to mouth. If you don't believe me, try it yourself: feet on the ground, hands on the same surface your coworker the other person is sitting on.

[coffee-cait]

Ruan Mei notice us!!! 🥮🥟

[lexotanmerlin]

Lex # 5246

🐙✨ When curiosity leads you to the “Do Not Enter” door, you never know what’s waiting on the other side! 😳💃 Just a girl in heels, taking on mysterious adventures and living life on the edge! 💀👠  ♥Hair: AD – Capri – Reds ♥Head: LAQ Era2 ~ Finest Detailed Head Elle ♥Body: eBODY – REBORN – by eBODY ♥Skin: LAQ SupremeUHD Skin – Destiny ♥Veins: Izzie’s – Body Veins & Cellulite (combined)  ♥Earrings:…

[billy-crudup]

Do you want to know the real reason why I came here tonight? Because I knew this was gonna be hard for you. And for the first time in a really long time, I wanted to be there for somebody. Yeah. All right. I messed up. I did. I’m sorry. And I’m gonna turn around, I’m gonna walk away. I’m gonna vanish. You’ll never see me again, I promise. But I want you to know that I think you deserve — I think you deserve more than what you’ve settled for. I do. I think you deserve to be taken care of for a change. I—  I believe that. 

JAMES MARSDEN as KEVIN DOYLE in 27 DRESSES (2008) dir. Anne Fletcher

[ntls-24722]

What if Jurassic Park was Music Man park

~@monty-glasses-roxy

jurassic park if it was actually Worth A Damn

(/J. /J. /J . DONT FUCKING KILL ME CULTURED PEOPLE)

all the music man aus i have appear in the jurassic world movies as the hybrids/bioengineered dinos. indominous rex is just comet valero

[franzkafkagf]

and i was so young when i behaved 25, yet now i find i've grown into a tall child.

[clarkgriffon]

BUFFY THE VAMPIRE SLAYER 6x12 | “Doublemeat Palace” 

[pureanonofficial]

Marcia, you just wait and see…I'll be the power behind the president…and you'll be the power behind me.

PATRICIA NEAL & ANDY GRIFFITH | A Face in the Crowd (1957)

[earthfluuke]

He is sooo Barbie Girl™️ coded 💖💅🏻✨ THE HEART KILLERS (2024)

[mobius-m-mobius]

falling in love with a god is not a death sentence. the story is only a tragedy if the god loves you back. - nathaniel orion g. k.