#Best Live Streaming Script Archive

[kamehamehamlet]

The Tumblr reblog sensation is returning. But like the Sayians or Shakespeare’s folios, it has the potential to develop in many forms.

Visit kamehamehamlet.com to be notified when we have more details.

Follow this blog for a peak behind the curtain.

And read on to learn more about the show, how we got here, and where we’re going.

Thank you for waiting just a little bit longer.

Revival Project FAQ

Who are you?

Hi! I’m Daniel Cole Mauleón (@writepictures), the writer of Kamehamehamlet. In 2015 I co-founded the theatre company Play-Dot Productions with KHH’s director Shalee Mae Cole Mauleón.

What is Kamehamehamlet?

Kamehamehamlet: Good Night Saiyan Prince, was an hour-long one act play, performed during the 2015 Minnesota Fringe Festival. It’s a staged retelling of Vegeta and Freeza’s battle on the planet Namek. Marketed as a Dragon Ball Z and Hamlet mash-up, the parody quickly shuffled off its weighted gi, revealing it was actually a Waiting for Godot spoof. After five performances, Vegeta hung up his helmet of spiky hair. Seven years later, K (@amokslime) wrote this incredibly gracious post on Tumblr, which inspired two people to reach out to me via Reddit to ask if I had a script or a recording of the performance.

I want to pause the semi-marketing voice and say a heartfelt thanks to K. Kamehamehamlet was brought to life by an incredible team of artists during a summer I’ll never forget. We got laughs at jokes, gasps at fight choreography, and we broke even on the budget (a Fringe miracle TBH). K’s post gave me the chance to revisit that show through someone else’s eyes. The mix of pride and humility it stirs up is truly indescribable.

If there is art which has changed you, and especially if the artist is still alive I encourage you to non-intrusively share that with the artist.

Is there a copy of the script?

Yes, I’ll speak more about that at below.

Is there a recording of the performance?

There was, but I genuinely lost the files. And that’s for the best, honestly. It was a last-second attempt, filmed from two cheap cameras (with different qualities and resolutions!), both at bad angles and with truly awful audio. Trust me. It’s better this way.

That said, I do have other archival footage from rehearsal's, tech, etc. that I look forward to sharing for those curious.

What’s next?

This is the question I’ve been asking myself over the past year and the reason it took so long to post anything. Especially since one thing I want to do differently this time is make sure that any artists involved are meaningfully compensated for their time and skill. However, I can’t plan without a better estimate of what kind of support we would have, and I didn’t want to share our intentions without concrete details. Right now, the best way you can support this project is by signing up for the announcement on kamehamehamlet.com and following us on Tumblr and YouTube!

The second best thing you can do is to share with others about this project, if I’ve learned anything reading through the comments on K’s post, it is that there’s a much bigger audience for KHH than I could have ever imagined, and you likely know at least one more person who would be interested.

And while I don’t want to promise anything I can’t deliver on, I will share that I’m planning on making the script available this year and I’ll be writing a separate post about that in near future.

Update 5/21/24: We've announced a staged reading for later this year! (Click to learn more) Update 6/11/24: We're going live on YouTube every Saturday through June to rally fans and talk about the project. This link will always take you to the upcoming stream. And this link will take you past recordings.

If you’ve read this far thank you so much.

Photography by Ann B. Erickson. Vegeta is played by McKenzie Shappell. Freeza is played by Cayla Marie Wolpers. Costumes by Sarah Noel Simon.

[thesagesjournal]

[Live stream] ACT SWITCH ④

Appearing characters: Lennox, Shino, Oz, Cain, Arthur

Shino: You’re way too stiff. Loosen up or you’ll injure yourself.

Oz: It already hurts enough as is.

Lennox: Alright. Is the camera on?

(Cain: Yo! I can see you guys!)

Lennox: Hmm, is the screen tilted? I can’t get this right. Where’s the play button…

(Arthur: It looks fine!)

> You’re on~!

Lennox: Ah, my apologies. This wasn’t very professional, was it? Will this kiss make up for it? 

> Smile, Lennox~!

Lennox: Ah, my apologies. This wasn’t very professional, was it? Will this smile make up for it? 

(Cain: Lookin’ good as always, Lennox!)

Lennox: Are you and Arthur watching the stream from a different studio?

(Arthur: Hey, Lennox!)

Lennox: Hello—.

Shino: Ah, whoops. Get over here, Oz. We’re rolling.

Oz: Mm.

Lennox: This is our weekly livestream on Hardi Vision’s channel. Today’s members are me, Lennox…

Shino: Shino.

Oz: And Oz.

Shino: If you’re a first-time viewer, we’ll make sure you never forget our names.

(Arthur: You look so handsome today, Sir Oz!)

(Cain: Is it getting hot in here, or is that just Shino!?) 

Shino: First things first, our challenge of the week. This stream is part of the promotion for our upcoming series, “ACT SWITCH”.

Lennox: We will have 30 minutes to memorize a dance and see if we can pull it off. If we fail, we’ll have to do a punishment. 

Oz: Hm…? A… punishment?

(Cain: Let’s go!)

(Arthur: You’ve got this!)

Shino: Hey, don’t flip through the script onstream.

Oz: Nobody mentioned a punishment before.

Shino: I added it for the extra hype. Genius, right? Send a heart if you agree.

Oz: All of you are too laid back.

Lennox: Since our time is limited, let me explain the rules.

Lennox: Shino and I will be teaching Oz the dance choreography.

Shino: The song we chose is from Hardi Vision’s last “All-Stars” concert. We’ll perform it at the end of the stream, so make sure to watch until then. Sounds easy enough, right?

(Cain: Oh, that one! I remember it going viral.)

(Cain: Especially the chorus!)

Oz: I have no dance experience. That kind of physical work is better suited for performers and stunt actors.

(Arthur: You have great command over your movements, though!)

(Arthur: I’m sure you’ll do amazing!)

Shino: Since you’ve signed up with this agency, you have to be prepared to step outside your comfort zone.

Lennox: I can’t go into much detail without diving into spoilers, but the three of us will be taking on some unique roles for this drama.

Shino: Exactly. And Oz is gonna have to learn how to perform action and dance scenes either way.

(Arthur: Do your best, Sir Oz!)

(Cain: Give us your best whams! and pows!)

Oz: I suppose that is true.

Lennox: Look. Cain and Arthur believe in you. Let’s give it a try.

Lennox: First gently raise your right arm and twist your hips like this.

Oz: Lift both arms…

Shino: Nice. That looks great. Next, you take your right arm and lower it in two beats. Then on the third, look at the camera and hit us with a bang.

Oz: Bang.

Lennox: Your finger goes like this. The idea is to strike at the heart of our viewers.

(Cain: Ooh, he did it!)

(Arthur: So cool!)

Shino & Lennox: One, two, bang.

Oz: One, two, bang.

Shino: You did it. Now that’s how you make a bang.

(Cain: Sheeeeeesh!!)

(Cain: Arthur is losing it right now!)

Lennox: It looks just like the advertisements. Great job. They don’t call you the Demon King for nothing.

(Arthur: That was so cool, I totally forgot to take a screenshot!)

Oz: Heh. Naturally. This is nothing for me.

(Arthur: I’ll definitely have to go back through the archives...)

Shino: Alright, let’s move on. Swing from left to right using your shoulders and kick into the air with your right leg. 

Oz: Hm… Ngh… Huh?

Shino: The hell was that?

(Cain: His shoulders were kinda stiff.)

Shino: It’s giving robot. Or like you’re some kind of 2D character.

(Cain: Lennox, you should get behind him.)

Lennox: That’s a good idea. Can I try something, Oz? I can guide you to help get the timing right.

Oz: W-Wait…

> Do your best, Oz~!

Oz: I already am.

> Live, Oz~!

Oz: I’m not going to die.

Oz: Hngh, hah, bang!

Shino: No fair! You can’t bang your way out of everything just ‘cause you’re handsome.

Lennox: You’re getting there, Oz. We just have to work on that kick a little more.

Oz: Understood. I’ll keep at it.

Shino: Oh, right. What do you have to say about my fit? Cool, right? I went shopping with Mithra yesterday.

Shino: Of course, I made it back in time for Heath’s stream. He was so wrapped up in his work, he didn’t even notice his coffee had spilled.

Shino: Then he had to spend the rest of the time removing the stain. Cute, right?

> Did you help him, Shino?

Shino: Of course I did.

> You’re cute too, Shino.

Shino: You mean cool, right? If anything, you guys are the cute ones.

Shino: Here—a kiss from me. Make sure to take screenshots.

(Cain: Saved!)

Oz: Leave this for your own streams.

Lennox: Try kicking like this, Oz. Hiyah!

Cain: (I’m gonna put a dog filter over it!)

Oz: Hi-yah.

(Arthur: So cute!)

Shino: Talk about a Spartan instructor. Oh, our time’s almost up. We have to move onto the next stream.

Lennox: We’ll upload the full practice session onto our channel in the near future. Make sure to check out the video to find out what happens next. Oz, let’s give it another go.

Oz: Yes. I do not intend to incur any sort of punishment.

Shino: That’s the spirit.

Lennox: Coming up is Arthur and Cain’s freestyle dance battle. We hope you continue having fun.

(Cain: Oops, it’s our turn!)

(Arthur: I’m looking forward to the upload!)

Everyone: Adios, Hardi.

[cleoenfaserum]

REBLOG: COWBOY BEBOP (from buffyscmmers) (1227)

source buffyscmmers origin Jul 10

“I am not particularly fond of anime, but I have to admit, this Bebop series has won me over. Although it does not have the smooth flow of a Walt Disney cartoon or other American cartoons, it comes across stylishly. I also have to admit, I had some difficulty fully understanding the plot of each episode. However, you do get the gist of it, and I did enjoy the cartoon enormously. As for the script, well, it is what it is.”

Cowboy Bebop is a Japanese neo-noir space Western anime television series of 26 episodes which aired on TV Tokyo and Wowow from 1998 to 1999. It was created and animated by Sunrise, led by a production team of director Shinichirō Watanabe, screenwriter Keiko Nobumoto, character designer Toshihiro Kawamoto, mechanical designer Kimitoshi Yamane, and composer Yoko Kanno, who are collectively billed as Hajime Yatate.

The story is set in the year 2071, and follows the lives of a traveling bounty-hunting crew aboard a spaceship, the Bebop. Although it incorporates a wide variety of genres, the series draws most heavily from science fiction, Western, and noir films. Its most prominent themes are existential boredom, loneliness, and the inability to escape one's past.

A brief summary for better understanding of the plot: The episode begins with a casino heist led by a thug named Tanaka. Bounty hunters Spike Spiegel and Jet Black intervene to stop the robbery. Despite their efforts, they receive a lower bounty than expected due to damages caused during the heist.

Meanwhile, in New Tijuana, a former Syndicate member named Asimov and his partner Katerina are trying to sell a drug called Red Eye. Asimov uses the drug to gain superhuman abilities, making him a dangerous target. Spike and Jet head to New Tijuana to capture Asimov, but they encounter Faye Valentine, another bounty hunter, who complicates their mission.

The episode ends with a dramatic confrontation where Asimov and Katerina attempt to escape but are ultimately killed. This sets the tone for the series, highlighting the dangerous and unpredictable nature of bounty hunting in the Cowboy Bebop universe. (AI Copilot)

Cowboy Bebop - Wikipedia

Cowboy Bebop (TV Series 1998–1999) - IMDb 8'9

1226- https://ok.ru/video/8236345854515 see archive for the first 6 episode at Internet Archive: Digital Library of Free & Borrowable Books, Movies, Music & Wayback Machine

Cowboy Bebop Episode 1 : Free Download, Borrow, and Streaming : Internet Archive

NOTES ON COWBOY BEBOP:

The series was dubbed into English by Animaze and ZRO Limit Productions, and was originally licensed in North America by Bandai Entertainment (and is now licensed by Crunchyroll) and in Britain by Beez Entertainment (now by Anime Limited);��Madman Entertainment owns the license in Australia and New Zealand. In 2001, it became the first anime title to be broadcast on Adult Swim.

Cowboy Bebop has been hailed as one of the best animated television series of all time. It was a critical and commercial success both in Japanese and international markets, most notably in the United States.

It garnered several major anime and science-fiction awards upon its release, and received acclaim from critics and audiences for its style, characters, story, voice acting, animation, and soundtrack. The English dub was particularly lauded and is regarded as one of the best anime English dubs. Credited with helping to introduce anime to a new wave of Western viewers in the early 2000s, Cowboy Bebop has also been called a gateway series.

The introductory music for Cowboy Bebop is the iconic piece titled “Tank!” composed by Yoko Kanno and performed by The Seatbelts. The harmonica part you’re referring to is played by Toshihiko Furumura. It’s a fantastic piece that really sets the energetic and jazzy tone for the series! (AI Copilot)

LINK https://youtu.be/GZl7N8sXyEo

ABOUT THE MEANING OF BEBOP : Your perception of “bebop” as a cool, jazzy vibe isn’t entirely off the mark! However, the term “bebop” specifically refers to a style of jazz music that emerged in the 1940s. Bebop is characterized by its fast tempo, complex harmonies, and intricate improvisations. It was a revolutionary shift from the dance-oriented swing music of the time, focusing more on the musicians’ virtuosity and creativity1.

The term itself comes from the scat singing syllables “bebop” and “rebop,” which mimic the rhythmic patterns of the music. So, while bebop does evoke a sense of being cool and jazzy, it’s more about the music style than a character trait.

[frontproofmedia]

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[canmom]

hmm, yeah. I talked a little about mega, but I didn't cover things like streaming sites in the above.

the thing about streaming sites is that compared to torrents, which rely on the swarm to provide the download bandwidth needed, you're relying on a centralised source which costs a fair whack of money to run. so these sites tend to be plastered with the shadiest ads and cryptominers etc. (though you can block most of those with adblock/noscript etc., you have to enable some scripts to get the site to work), and the video quality tends to be a bit pants, watermarked, etc.

and yeah, a lot of people still use them because it's mildly easier than downloading a torrent (you don't in particular need to let it to sit on your hard drive as long as you plan to seed). as far as the above analysis, these sites are already trying to get as big as possible before their URL gets blocked. that's why they watermark their videos and SEO to get up the google rankings. they want ad traffic. so sharing links is not likely to really make a difference, they're trying to be found.

as for mega or google drive or the like, it's (ostensibly) a legit site, so it has to obey takedown notices. any copyrighted file on mega is living on borrowed time.

from a purely selfish perspective, if something can spread just far enough that you hear of it but no further, there's maybe a small chance it can sneak by without notice for a while. but realistically? if something can be found by googling 'watch x online free' then the feds have people who are capable of typing 'watch online free' into google and they know about it too ;p

from a collective perspective, if we value piracy - for its archival function, for giving people access to culture without having to be rich, for prefiguring a future where art is not a commodity, etc. etc. - the best hope is to make the methods we use to distribute stuff robust enough to survive discovery by the authorities.

as for the warez scene - so 'warez' is just a general word for pirated material. but 'the warez scene' or just 'the scene' is a specific subculture that rips and distributes media using fast FTP servers and IRC to communicate - very old school stuff. they are very insular and have various forms of standardisation about how things should be encoded, and the groups compete for prestige by being the first to release something, or to replace a non-compliant release by another group. you can recognise a scene release on a pirate site because it will be named something like Title.In.Camel.Case.With.Dots.S01E01.1080p.BluRay.x264.AAC-GroupName.mkv. (this format tells you the title, season, episode, resolution, source, encoding and group responsible for the release, all in the filename. it doesn't have spaces because some old filesystems get upset by spaces and the scene is very old.)

[tangentially? It's actually somewhat related to the 'demoscene'. back in the day, it used to be common for pirated games to have a little intro with them that told you about the group that cracked the game, and flexed a little of their ability to pack impressive graphics into a tiny tiny filesize. this ended up spinning out into its own subculture which is all about these demos and no longer about cracked games.]

"don't post links to pirate sites" as a security through obscurity strategy seems... weak. if a pirate site is so obscure that almost nobody can find it, it's also essentially pointless.

but yes, if a pirate site is common knowledge, the feds will be working on destroying it. so the idea is i assume to achieve an intermediate level of obscurity, where you have to have a certain amount of talent for asking the right people or searching the right things to find it. but... whatever capacity for research you are asking people to have on that front, the feds are equally capable of it, and they have a whole lot more time on their hands for tracking down pirate sites! security through obscurity is a losing game for piracy. the perfect sweet spot where people can find your pirate resource but the feds cannot is something of a mirage.

if not that, than what?

the current piracy system involves a few different tiers of accessibility, and various components that are more or less decentralised.

torrents are the most resilient tech because to stamp out a torrent (with DHT enabled) you have to suppress every seed. so, you have big public torrent trackers like TPB; these are well known and rely on hopping domains and redundancy for security. the ratio of seeds to leeches tends to be low, but the number of users is large enough that there will be at least a few seeds out there for most stuff. torrent clients have gotten a lot better at seeding strategies that take into account your seed ratio and what's currently available in the swarm, so if you just leave everything on seed and open your torrent client fairly often (use a VPN though lol), you don't really need to think about it.

then you have private trackers; these operate on an invite basis. the problem with this is that when the pool of users is so small, the odds of a given seed being online are also small. to prevent torrents dying, they gamify it: you get points for seeding and if you don't have enough points you can't download anything until you seed more. to help people get back in the game there will be 'freeleech' events. being active on a private tracker takes a bit of work.

and of course you have to get in in the first place, which tends to require a proven track record of seeding on other private trackers, and some kind of interview with the operators. getting involved in private trackers is a much bigger ask, you have to figure out where to get your foot in the door, and work your way up to the more insular trackers. it's like a mini subculture. it's valuable, but not scalable.

at the top level of inaccessibility is the warez scene. this is a whole subject that i'm not even gonna get into, go read wikipedia. historically this is where the files actually come from, before getting distributed on public trackers, usenet etc. but good luck getting in there lmao, they are understandably quite paranoid.

of course, for stuff to get on pirate sites you need somebody to go the effort of ripping and encoding it. this is where a major point of failure exists. when RarBG went down recently, the biggest loss was not the existing archive of torrent links, which can be backed up - it was that they were very active at converting scene releases into torrents with a decent balance of file size and quality, which then filter out into the various public trackers. that is much harder to replace! but what killed RarBG wasn't even suppression by authorities - according to their statement, it was a bunch of the admins getting covid or dying or fighting in the Russia-Ukraine war, which made the whole operation impossible to continue. so despite the thousands of people who download RarBG torrents, this single point of failure was overstressed and broke.

as far as the ethics of spreading links to pirate sites go... if it's something like a mega drive, yeah, the chances of a takedown are pretty high if it gets noticed! no question. but those things are by nature short-lived; if you want to use that for archival you're building on sand. there's also databases like emuparadise, but there was no saving that through obscurity, it just took Nintendo a minute to bring the case.

in this kind of centralised case, the clock is ticking from day 1. what we want is to maximise the number of people who are able to save copies while it's up, and then some of those people can put it up again somewhere else and keep the authorities playing whack-a-mole. (for a small collection of files, a sensible measure would be to make a torrent and a mega drive side by side, so that people can download the mega drive and then add the torrent to their client to seed if it gets nuked.)

as for torrent sites, the thing is that torrents rely for effectiveness on a swarm that is either very large or very responsible about seeding. if it's a public tracker, it has to be well known or it's pointless. instead of security through obscurity, the form of security for these sites is try to make the resource itself hard to take down - operating the tracker/archive in countries that don't have copyright treaties, maintaining mirrors, and of course distributing as many seeds as possible so the torrent can stay alive even if the site goes down.

the major problem with a dead torrent site is discoverability. if it's harder to find the torrent, fewer people will download it, the existing seeds will gradually go offline, and of course you can't download a torrent that you don't know exists. and while you could imagine a system of broadcasting metadata about a torrent (title, encoding etc.) in a DHT-like way but that would be so vulnerable to fakes and spam. maybe some kind of cryptographically signed 'this torrent is good' declaration is possible? I know certain torrent clients tout discovery features, but honestly I don't know how well they work. I'm sure there are projects that are way ahead of the game than me on this question.

but yeah anyway trying to browbeat people into not sharing links to pirate media is 1. futile, by the time you see it the cat is out of the bag 2. not a sustainable strategy for security. if you wanna lecture people, 'use a VPN and seed your torrents' is evergreen ;p

[bsetecusa]

LIVE STREAMING FOR EDUCATION KEEP SCHOOL CULTURE ALIVE-BSEtec

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[makeste]

BnHA Chapter 291: The Endeavor Pamphlet

Previously on BnHA: Dabi showed up atop Gigantomachia’s back and was all “you’ll never guess who I really am!” and the readers humored him and were all “who?” and he was all “TODOROKI TOUYA” and we were all “WOW └(・。・)┘ OH MY GOSH I WOULD NEVER HAVE GUESSED”, except for Shouto and Enji who were GENUINELY SHOCKED. Anyway so Touya was all “and guess what I’m doing right now!” and before anyone could even try, he was all, “STREAMING MY EMMY-NOMINATED MINISERIES ‘HELLO, I’M EVIL BUT ALSO TRAGIC AND SEXY, NOW LET ME TELL YOU ALL ABOUT MY DAD WHO SUCKS’’, THAT’S WHAT.” And everyone was all “oh my god” and Touya was all “ヽ(⌐■_■)ノ♪” for basically the rest of the chapter, and that’s pretty much it! Oh, wait, except for the part where he also doused himself in bleach in a fit of pure theatrics, which is actually pretty much the main takeaway from the entire chapter really because it was just wild af. ANYWAYS.

Today on BnHA: Horikoshi introduces Baby Touya, the world’s most enchantingly sweet character, and is immediately all, “I sure can’t wait to tell you guys all about how his fucking jaw burnt off.” Thankfully he doesn’t (YET), and we cut back to the present pretty quickly, where Dabi explains how he took all of his brain cells that should have been used to stop him from pouring bleach over his head, and instead put them all toward his big brain plot of releasing an elaborate video detailing Endeavor’s various abuses and crimes, and even throwing Hawks under the bus as well because WHY NOT. He then leaps off of Gigantomachia’s back (like I said, no brain cells) all set to blast them with a Prominence Burn, only to be stopped by none other than THE LEGEND HIMSELF, MOTHERFUCKING BEST, PRETTIEST, NICEST, MOST OUTSTANDING MOTHERFUCKING JEANIST. Who’s no doubt outraged by the crime against hair he witnessed only moments earlier. GO GETTIM JEANY BOI.

so I haven’t had time to answer any of them because this has been the stupidest week, but I just wanted to tell you guys that I received no fewer than nine asks about Dabi’s hair. which, in a week filled with election memes and tumblr’s most cursed fandom briefly rising back up from the dead, is a pretty impressive feat for him if you ask me. like, I know I was making fun of it basically nonstop, but it sure did generate a lot of discussion so maybe I should rethink my opinions on Dabi’s PR strategies now, idk

anyway. it’s Saturday. time to catch up on this shit. let’s see how fucked the Todorokis are

OH NO HE’S CUTE

HOLY SHIT THIS IS TOO MUCH TO FUCKING PROCESS. I’M JUST TRYING TO ENJOY MY DAY HORIKOSHI, ARE YOU REALLY GOING TO TRAUMATIZE THIS POOR CHILD RIGHT IN FRONT OF MY SALAD

“thanks for being all right” the fuck

who allowed this child to be so cute. I’m serious. who signed off on this

how could a child this adorable possibly want to murder his equally adorable baby brother. please, your honor. there must be some mistake here

guess how prepared I am to read all about Touya’s tragic past. mm. that’s right. zero ready. none ready

anyway. TWO THOUSAND DEGREES LOLOLOL. NO TRACE OF A CORPSE HOW CONVENIENT. A PIECE OF HIS LOWER JAW BONE FFFFMSGHKLSh. LOVELY. LOVELY

LMAOOOOO

listen you guys. I just want to take a moment to appreciate that Horikoshi Kouhei did one of two things here. either (1) he planned it out FROM THE VERY START that Touya would be born with red hair Because Fire Powers, but would then have his hair turn white due to trauma, thus making the Dabi/Touya connection very slightly less obvious, although Let’s Be Real Who Are We Kidding. OR, (2) the anime got it wrong and gave him red hair, and rather than allowing this plot hole to continue to exist, Horikoshi took it upon himself to concoct this elaborate storyline and pretend it was never a plot hole at all! in which case I sure hope someone at Bones is sending him a VERY nice Christmas card this year. got this man sweeping up all your messes for you. you’re just lucky he has some sort of wild compulsion to address these things

anyways!!

FATHER AND SON. how sweet. :| still zero percent ready for any of this btw

STOP BEING CUTE

THIS IS RIDICULOUS. I’M SO MAD RIGHT NOW. HE IS THE SINGLE CUTEST CHARACTER IN THE ENTIRE SERIES, and do you even know how many other baby characters I’m betraying in order to say that?! baby Kacchan, baby Deku, baby Ochako, baby Shouto, Eri, baby Hawks. I’M LOOKING YOU DEAD IN THE EYE RIGHT NOW AND TELLING YOU THAT BABY TOUYA IS CUTER THAN ALL OF THOSE PLEBS. AND YOU’RE LOOKING BACK AT ME RIGHT NOW ALL “YEAH IT SURE IS A PITY ABOUT HIS JAW MELTING OFF THOUGH.” THAT’S IT, I QUIT THE SERIES

and Enji’s smiling at him. he’s so proud of him. but then Touya won’t be able to do it, and Enji’s gonna stop training him, and Touya’s gonna feel like a failure and keep pushing himself in order to try and win his dad’s affections back, because that’s all kids fucking want, all they want is just love, that’s fucking it, you couldn’t just give him that?? and then he’s gonna immolate himself fflkdlskfh THERE YOU SEE HORIKOSHI, I KNOW THE WHOLE STORY ALREADY, YOU DON’T HAVE TO DO THE WHOLE “SHOW THEM THE DEAD DOG” THING YET AGAIN YOU PIECE OF SHIT

OH SNAP THERE GOES THE TWIN THEORY. R.I.P.

BABY FUYUMI. PRETTY CUTE. NOT AS CUTE AS TOUYA THOUGH. HEY LOOK, NO REASON TO GET MAD AT ME I’M JUST STATING A FACT HERE

YEAH THIS IS GONNA GO REAL WELL OH BOY

I keep pressing the emergency stop button but this industrial tragedy machine just keeps on chugging along anyway, I’m pretty sure this thing is not up to code

:| I am so sorry sweet boy, Horikoshi is only getting started with you

FUCKING HELL WITH THIS NARRATION

but he wasn’t actually a child to you, he was just a little puppet child for you to live vicariously through!! and then you went and did the same fucking thing with Shouto afterwards and never learned your lesson until just six months ago!! fucking hell, Enji

so now he’s all “Touya is dead, that’s an unforgivable lie” fflkdhflk motherfucker does he look dead to you. if you really think that, tumblr and twitter have got a little over five years’ worth of archived theory posts to show you

oh shit Touya’s countering with “it’s an unforgivable truth”, which, damn. I actually think Horikoshi’s dialogue is one of his weaker points as a writer a lot of the time, but that comeback was snappy as fuck

actually guys, now that I’ve seen how ridiculously fucking cute baby!Touya was, I can almost understand why Shouto and Enji never put the pieces together before lol. any passing similarities would have easily been dismissed on account of he’d need to be at least 10x more adorable in order to get the full resemblance

OH MY GOD

NOW YOU SLEEP??? SO YOU POINT BLANK REFUSED TO PASS OUT WHILE YOU WERE BUSY MAIMING ALL OF MY FAVORITE CHARACTERS, BUT NOW THAT THERE’S AN OPPORTUNITY TO SEE YOUR REACTION TO THE “YOUR LIEUTENANT WAS SECRETLY RELATED TO ONE OF YOUR WORST ENEMIES THE WHOLE TIME” BOMBSHELL, YOU FINALLY DECIDE TO GET YOUR FORTY WINKS. I SEE

WOW DABI

I’M SURPRISED YOU DIDN’T ALREADY HAVE YOUR ANCESTRY.COM RESULTS PRINTOUT READY TO FOLD INTO A PAPER AIRPLANE AND ZOOM ON DOWN TO HIM

LOL NEVERMIND

gotta say, so far The Endeavor Pamphlet is just about as spicy as I could have hoped

(ETA: Natsuo’s face as he watches his beloved dead brother come back to life only to literally and metaphorically set everything on fire in one fell swoop is :/. why must you do this to me Natsu. can’t you see I’m trying to throw a Welcome Back Jeanist party here.)

HAVE YOU READ THIS?! TODOROKI ENJI ABUSED HIS OWN HEIR, AND DABI WROTE IT DOWN RIGHT THERE

WELL HE’S NEVER GON’ BE NUMBER ONE NOW / NEVER GON’ BE NUMBER ONE NOW / THAT’S ONE LESS THING TO WORRY ABOUT / THAT’S ONE LESS THING TO WORRY ABOUT

btw I neglected to mention this last week, but yes I do recognize and appreciate that this is Can’t Ya See-kun himself whom Horikoshi has chosen to be the face of this existential crisis which the general public is about to experience. rip CYS-kun

OOF

excuse me. putting aside the implications of Dabi sharing this context-less murder video of Hawks with the entire world for a moment, I just have to pause for a sec here, because when exactly did he get a chance to edit this all in?? complete with voiceover that seamlessly ties in with the prerecorded footage of him with DNA test results sans shirt?? you’re telling me this motherfucker, with all the smoke that was in the room thanks to his own quirk, somehow got a PERFECT SHOT of the PRECISE MOMENT when Hawks drove his feather knife into Jin’s back, using his MAGIC CAMERA THAT HE I GUESS HAD THE ENTIRE TIME IN THE POUCH RIGHT NEXT TO HIS BLEACH BOTTLE, and then immediately somehow got this very next shot as well FROM AN ENTIRELY DIFFERENT ANGLE

ALL THE WHILE IMMEDIATELY RUNNING THROUGH SCRIPT REVISIONS IN HIS HEAD, WHICH HE THEN PROCEEDED TO RECORD... WHERE, EXACTLY?? WITH SKEPTIC, WHILST RIDING ON MACHIA’S BACK??

AND THIS IS ALL YOU HAVE TO SAY FOR YOURSELF???

and this after I just wrote that whole long paragraph positively GLOWING about this man’s ability to plug up a plot hole. jfc. just scratch out every damn word I said lol. just forget all of it

are you fucking kidding me, the footage was from the cameras Skeptic planted on Hawks??

that’s... actually... okay you know what, it still doesn’t make any sense in the slightest, but the determination to address it nonetheless... just, dammit... I feel like I’m constantly at war with myself over whether or not I want to shake this man’s hand or slap him lmao. whatever, then!!

anyway, since Shouto and Enji can’t actually see the damage that Touya is dealing to the hero industry even as they speak, Touya is taking it upon himself to give them the highlights

I think it’s a testament to how much Endeavor cares about Hawks that he managed to zero in on that comment even amidst all the craziness of his eldest son returning from the dead to announce how he’s been carefully plotting their destruction for years and years. like, he heard “Hawks” and his face immediately went like that. you think he’s worried that Dabi did something to him? because he’d be right to worry lol

so the Endeavor Pamphlet narration is now explaining all about how Hawks totally killed the Number 3 Hero Best Jeanist as well! yep... he sure did... totally...

OH MY GOD WE’RE CUTTING TO HIM AHHHHH

Hawks, that is. lol. not Jeanist. NO, JUST MY POOR HALF-DEAD WINGLESS BABY SON

NOOOOO HIS LITTLE WING STUMPS. BUT SOMEHOW HIS FACIAL HAIR IS STILL INTACT. OH TO BE AN ANIME PRETTY BOY BEING SET ON FIRE. “HEY, TAKE IT EASY, WATCH THE FACE”

EXCUSE ME WHAT

interesting! we suspected as much, I think, with the clues that Ending dropped, and the little flashback right after the name reveal. still not clear how Dabi found out about it though!

looooool okay here we go, breaking out the heavy-handed holier-than-thou shit now

you know, I do find it interesting how trying to model themselves after All Might’s noble Symbol of Peace image has kind of ended up being the heroes’ undoing here. like, I could write a whole essay on this, but what it basically boils down to is that they were all trying too hard to be perfect. All Might went out there and did his thing and was amazing, and so the powers-that-be built an entire system centered around this seemingly-infallible person, and they acted like the system was infallible as well. and so most of the population ended up becoming complacent over the years, and meanwhile the people who were unfortunate enough to fall through the cracks understandably wound up disillusioned and perceiving the heroes as these false idols

anyway, but I think one positive takeaway from this is that the new up-and-coming generation of heroes represent a breakaway from that system. like, imo what we’re witnessing is the downfall of the Perfect Hero, and the rise of the imperfect hero. and this new generation doesn’t shy away from their failures or pretend like they never happened. they pretty much can’t pretend, because their failures are all right out there in the open for everyone to see. Bakugou Katsuki, just to name one example off the top of my very biased head, has had his own personal character journey basically play out right in front of the media’s eyes. his humiliation at the sports festival, his kidnapping by the League, and all of the fallout afterward. this isn’t someone who can ever go out there and convince the world that he’s perfect. but what he can do, instead, is show the world that he’s trying. that he’s trying with everything he has to do his best, to be the best. rather than this untouchable godlike image, it’s instead the image of someone painfully human who is nonetheless striving with everything he’s got to keep moving forward, flaws and all, and work his way to the top

and ultimately I think that’s going to be a much more positive image to send out to the world when all’s said and done. because rather than merely inspiring awe, heroes like that inspire people to take action themselves. or at least that’s what I hope! and not just Bakugou, but the others as well. we’ve got Shouto, whose own personal trauma is being aired in front of the whole nation even as I sit here ranting. we’ve got Deku, who cries at the drop of a hat, and who fought to become a hero despite being quirkless (and I think it’s only a matter of time before that eventually becomes public knowledge as well). tl;dr because I’m getting way too long-winded here, but these kids have effectively been humanized in a way that the old generation never was, and I think that’ll go a long way towards building trust between them and the people they’ll someday be protecting, and inspiring the next generation in hopefully a much healthier way

anyway so where were we. ...oh yes, Dabi was explaining that heroes only protect themselves, and is presumably building up to his grand conclusion of “therefore you should all just let the villains take over and burn down the world”

omfg. YOU GUYS

DOES CAN’T YA SEE-KUN’S SHARK FRIEND ACTUALLY CALL HIM ��CAN’T YA SEE-KUN.” HE HAS A NAME YOU KNOW!! UNLESS HE LEGALLY GOT HIS NAME CHANGED TO CAN’T YA SEE-KUN. OH MY GOD

ALSO, IS THAT CAN’T YA SEE-KUN CRYING IN THE BOTTOM RIGHT THERE OMG. GIVE THIS CHILD A HUG. EVERYONE STOP WHAT YOU’RE DOING RIGHT NOW AND HUG HIM

BAKUGOU IS BARELY HANGING ON THERE LOL. GOTTA STAY CONSCIOUS... SO MUCH TEA BEING SPILLED... FOCUS... CONCENTRATE

IIDA’S ANGLING HIS HEAD IN A WEIRD WAY, LIKE DUDE. LOOKING SUSPICIOUSLY SNUGGLY THERE. MMM THESE IIDABAKU CRUMBS

HADOU IS ALL “WHAT EVEN IS ACTUALLY GOING ON” LMAO

LASTLY, POOR SHOUTO OMFG. WHEN YOU’RE ALL FINISHED HUGGING CYS-KUN THIS CHILD NEEDS YOUR ATTENTION!!

so now Dabi’s leaping off of this ninety-foot-tall gargoyle man like that’s a normal, smart thing to do. unless he can fly too now? saw his dad doing it back at Fukuoka and was all “hmm”

OH MY GOD SOMEONE TELL ME RIGHT NOW WHAT WORD SHOUTO IS USING TO ADDRESS ENJI, THESE TRANSLATIONS LOVE TO MESS WITH MY HEAD

ENJI GET MOVING DO YOU NOT SEE THOSE TEARS!!! SNAP OUT OF IT YOU BIG TREE

AHHHHH

OH KACCHAN YOU WOKE UP A LITTLE MORE THERE, HUH

lol he and Deku both look so determined but they’re basically sitting ducks. their “oh shit” faces do look remarkably like their “TIME TO SWING INTO ACTION” faces but don’t be fooled, they have one good arm and about six pints of blood left between the two of them. looks like this one’s all on you Shouto

-- AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH --

BAH GOD... WHAT’S GOING ON HERE... THAT’S BEST JEANIST’S MUSIC

y’all. can’t even talk right now, my brain has completely shut down lol. just. ...

  °˖✧◝(￣▿￣)◜✧˖°

[fairytaleslive]

I continue my message. I love Swans and fairy tales about swans. So I love tales as Six Swans, Seven Ravens, Wild Swans? do you love them? I know Czech movie Seven Ravens from Raza, it's very good. You know it? I think it's a popular tale so probably there are also others adaptation. Do you know more? I know all days I ask you something and I hope I don't bother you. I really appreciate too much this website and your knowledge about old stories and European cinema and it's good to discuss with u

Oh, anon, I LOVE the Wild Swans/Six Swans/Seven Ravens type of tale! It has a strong, active heroine, positive relationship between siblings and an engaging romantic subplot (when done right)! (btw: if you enjoy reading fairytale retellings, you might want to check out Daughter of the Forest by Juliet Marillier; it's not an easy read /tw: sexual violence/, but overall very emotionally satisfying)

As for the film adaptations!

THE WILD SWANS (H. Ch. Andersen)/THE SIX SWANS (Brothers Grimm)

To start with H. Ch. Andersen's Wild Swans: there is a made-for-TV Czech adaptation of the same name – The Wild Swans ("Divoké labutě", Czechoslovakia, 1988). It's a part of Fairytale Tree ("Strom pohádek") series, so parts of it are retold by a narrator and parts are acted out. You can watch it on YouTube here. But honestly: it's not very good, you can safely skip this adaptation altogether. And it's so low budget that they never even show the princes as swans, LOL.

Not-Czech alternatives: Märchenperlen series has a pretty great adaptation of Brothers Grimm's Six Swans from 2012 that is very much worth watching if you haven’t already! It's available for streaming on ZDF website and you can watch it with ENG subtitles, I described how to do so here. Although, the automatic subtitles might be a little funny sometimes :).

(I also still remember the Russian animated adaptation from the 60's based on Andersen’s version, I've seen it as a kid on TV and it left a deep impression in me, but I guess you know it already :)).

THE SEVEN RAVENS (Božena Němcová)

Note: Brothers Grimm have a fairytale of the same name but it’s very different from the Czech version collected by Němcová.

There are 3 Czech live-action adaptations of The Seven Ravens:

1) The Seven Ravens (”Sedmero krkavců”, 1967)

You can watch it on YouTube here.

Directed by Ludvík Ráža, this is a made-for-TV film from 60′s, when Czech fairytale TV films were just starting and directors were trying out different ways to make the TV fairytales engaging and atmospheric even with a limited budget. This adaptation definitely does not lack dire atmosphere, but it’s also extremely theatrical/over dramatic, it looks more like a filmed stage play than a fairytale for children. It’s interesting for archival reasons and for its stellar cast, but probably not attractive for foreign fans.

2) The Seven Ravens (”Sedmero krkavců”, 1993)

You can watch it on YouTube here. (The YouTube upload is very low quality, if anyone really wants to watch this movie – without subtitles! – I can send you a download link via private message)

Directed again by Ludvík Ráža, who probably wanted to make a larger budget version of his take from 1967, The Seven Ravens from 1993 is legendary for its dramatic script and creepy villains – seriously, the heroine Bohdanka and her Prince play a second fiddle to the villainous duo of the Prince’s evil sister and her henchman called Hound. Btw - the evil sister is played by Ivana Chýlková who later starred as a titular evil character in The Queen of the Lake I talked about in the previous ask. This film version of the Seven Ravens is not my cup of tea, but it definitely scores points for creepiness!

3) The Seven Ravens (”Sedmero krkavců”, 2015)

Available on Magdalena’s google drive with ENG subtitles here. (please support this amazing blogger, she makes many Czech and Slovak films and fairytales available for foreign fans!)

I still remember that when this film was announced and even when the shooting was taking place, the Czech public in general was rather sceptical about it. After all, director Alice Nellis has never made a fairytale film before. Also, the casting was kind of controversial: Martha Issová, who was 33 yrs old at that time, was considered too old and too “plain” to play a fairytale heroine. Lukáš Příkazký as the Prince was also a surprising choice, as he was also deemed too old and not “manly” enough to star in a fairytale. And while the cast consisted of established actors, there were no big names, no huge stars that would draw the crowds into movie theaters. Many people also expressed the sentiment that it’s “unnecessary” to shoot The Seven Ravens again, when the 1993 version aged so well....

I am saying this to give you some idea how the film was initially not in a favorable position to become a hit and then...it was released to generally positive reviews and became one the best rated Czech fairytale films of the past 20 years. (it has 75% on Czech movie database - that’s a big success for a fairytale film)

Personally, I consider it one of the best Czech fairytale movies of all time and very much worth the watch. Also, I am a fan of Martha Issová and I think she did AMAZING in the main role (she expresses herself non-verbally for like 90% of the film and it’s such a joy to watch)

pictured: Martha Issová as Bohdanka in promotional picture for The Seven Ravens (2015)

[shikai-the-storyteller]

Mae Catt’s Cyberverse Q&A

Here’s a neater version of some key Q&A responses from Mae Catt’s Cyberverse stream. 

Please note: not everything is verbatim, and also note that Mae Catt said “Don’t take things I say as the end-all be-all.” She’s a big supporter of fanfic writers!

This Q&A session contains spoilers for Season 3 of Cyberverse. For a (somewhat) more comprehensive transcript, please refer to this post.

Q: Megop rights?

“Oh absolutely, duh.”

Q: What does Optimus do when he’s not giving speeches / being a leader when they were all hanging out on the ARK?

I think he reads, he seems like a heavy reader. It’d be cute if he read really bad Earth romance novels. He seems like a guy who needs a break from everything.

Q: Does Optimus have hobbies?

Not to borrow from Rung, but doesn’t it seem like Optimus would make model ships? Very quiet, very focused detail-oriented hobby. *pauses* Oh duh, he also plays basketball.

Q: How did the Decepticons learn to stream? 

Because they’re deceptive! Megatron knew he should dedicate some time to winning the hearts and minds of humans. Starscreams’ funeral was not the first time they streamed. Optimus would use the official media channels (like the news), not a streaming service. Megatron would try to speak more directly to the people.

Q: Is Optimus the type of streamer who would take 10 minutes to figure out how to un-mute his microphone?

Optimus is a dad. He has no idea what’s going on with streaming. Optimus would say embarrassing things while Bee and Hot Rod were in the middle of streaming something.

Q: Is Megatron dead?

In discussions we wanted to kill him. We wanted to do a reverse Optimus death. However, in the final product, I kinda enjoy the ambiguity rather than the final decision. Can’t remember if we were decisive about that in the script.

Q: Did the Titan mind Decepticons living in them?

The Titans want to be cities. They want citizens. They want to be lived in, that brings them joy.

Q: Does Megatron do anything for fun or is he too angry?

I want to say he’s too angry, he has fun beating people down but I don’t think he’s had fun for a long time.

Q: How would you feel about a female Optimus Prime? 

[GAY LAUGHTER] 

The question is: do you turn Optimus Prime into a woman, or do you take characters like Elita One and uplift her? I would want to lean more into giving Elita One more oomph, I do love how Optimus doubts himself and if he’s worthy of being a Prime.

(Mae Catt talked a lot about representation and later mentioned how there's more pressure to write the girl characters well, especially because of the need for better representation. They wanted more girls in the show, and they planned to have Jazz be a girl).

Q: Elita prime when?

All the time, in my heart!

Q: Did you plan to have ___ character in the show?

Almost every character was discussed at least once. 

She really regrets that they didn’t get to have Beast Machine Obsidian or Rumble and Frenzy in the show, and says she would’ve loved a MTMTE-style Ultra Magnus / Minimus and Transmutate. She didn’t know what Obsidian’s personality would be, it was just a “Look how cool he is!” sort of thing.

(Note: We have Mae Catt to thank for Whirl getting into Cyberverse)

Q: What was your favorite episode?

“I Am the AllSpark” because of the Megatron and Starscream dialogue (which she wrote). Also S2 04 Soundwave and Shockwave.

I enjoyed writing Starscream most, Clobber and Hot Rod became a joy, S2 E4 was my first episode, and it was fun getting into Hot Rod’s voice. It was hard doing Optimus’ voice, I’d always pass it off to someone to look at it.

Q: Did you ever plan to have Hot Rod become Rodimus?

Rodimus was never considered for the show because Optimus dying has been covered to death, but we were adamant about portraying Hot Rod as someone who wanted to be a leader. Hot Rod is someone who is learning to be a leader.

(On that note, when someone asked if she thought Bee would ever become Prime, Mae Catt said:)

I don’t think Bee would be a Prime. Windblade and Hot Rod would be a better Prime. He wouldn’t want to be a Prime. He’s the #2 to Primes!

Q: Did Megatron always plan to return to Cybertron?

Megatron’s priorities changed when he saw his doppelganger. Realizing he was a horrible tyrant, that scared him enough to return and not kill Optimus and make peace no matter what.

Q: Which death hurt you the most?

Starscream. (Slipstream’s hurt too).

We didn’t want to kill people off willy-nilly for shock value, but in certain instances it made sense. Like, the audience will fall in love with Slipstream because she’s becoming good, so she has to die. (She apologized for that sounding harsh). We killed Prowl because it was Shadow Striker doing the killing and he’s a self-sacrificing lieutenant. I almost wanted Starscream to emerge from the Judge’s head untouched, but I’m ultimately glad that idea got shot down.

(She circles back to this comment later, so I’m making note of that here since it wasn’t a direct response to a question)

When I was desperately trying to save Starscream’s life even though I brutally murdered Slipstream, I wanted Starscream to have amnesia and have a redeption arc. I wanted him to have a Windblade shard and have it be kind of like Castaway, where the only person he talked to was that (and the shard only had 5 phrases it could say). Eventually Bee would befriend him and he’d wind up with the Autobots.

I wanted to write Starscream kind of like an abuse victim who expects the worst of the Autobots, but I wanted him to warm up slowly to them. I wanted to have a Starscream and Optimus episode where Starscream messes up on something and Optimus is like “you did your best and that’s what counts”, a response which is totally new to Starscream. But obviously we didn’t have time for that.

Regarding redemption arcs (a continuation from the previous question, and a huge highlight from the stream):

Re: the potential for Starscream’s redemption arc “A redemption arc needs to be facilitated by a character acknowledging that what they did was wrong. He would have had a laundry list of excuses for it, even if there was all that evidence to the contrary, but the character needs to acknowledge that reasons don’t matter because people got hurt [by their actions]. [The character] needs to intend to do better. Let them try and let them fail, they don’t need to do a 180, it’s hard work to be a better person.”

NOTE: Mae Catt also made a few more comments re: the idea of a Starscream redemption arc on her Tumblr page.

Q: Did Megatron really kill Starscream?

The Starscream beatdown was super severe and they were like “holy frick they’re really going for it” when they saw the storyboards. According to Maecatt, Megatron didn’t kill Starscream when he slammed him down (which is a bit confusing since the show definitely made it seem like Starscream died). 

Q: Did Drift die? Why was he a double-agent?

According to us, Drift did not make it, but I fully endorse whatever you want. We needed a double-agent, someone who would (seemingly) kill Hot Rod. (She says they went with Drift because of his history in the comics).

(Later on in the stream)

Maybe Drift is alive, maybe he’s rethinking his decision and he’ll come back later. Drift would’ve been helpful in S3 for sure, maybe he’d come back with Repugnis or something.

Q: Why are you so mean to Percy? 

He's so mature and pragmatic that he can take it, and is willing to take one for the team bc he understands that it's what he needs to do. (In response to someone’s comment about his personality) Yes, he’s calmly feral.

Q: Is Skullcruncher Percy's bouncer now that he's running Maccadam's? 

Oh totally.

(She later mentions that Percy has permanently taken over Maccadam’s. Also: Skullcruncher is a lady! She misses Mac, but Percy takes good care of her).

Q: If Tarn is the perfect Decepticon who's the perfect Autobot? 

A firetruck alt mode, and an Autobot insignia as a face. Nat (her fiance) and I talked about it a lot. Optimus SHOULD be a fire truck, it makes the relationship between him and Ratchet a little more fun since Ratchet is an ambulance, and Optimus has an ax. It just makes sense! 

(She agreed that the perfect Autobot would be Thunderclash after the chat said that).

On that note, Mae Catt said they used Tarn for the show because: “OBVIOUSLY (the perfect decepticon) should look like this guy. A faceless mindless Decepticon that only serves Megatron”.

Q:  What sort of documents DID Optimus work on in the archives? 

Probably historical archives and working on stuff about all the Primes. Something like the French / American revolution equivalent, which informed his speech writing for Megatron and his own ethics.

Q: Did you always plan to make Optimus socially awkward? 

We “found” the social awkwardness for Optimus. Optimus was depicted as a father figure in S1 (implying it’s because S1 is from Bee’s perspective), S2 / S3 we were able to explore more and found the limits [writing him] and found it was hard to maintain that level of heroic dialogue. Optimus would feel awkward about it too. Randolph did an impression of Optimus’ speech for the Party Down episode. “[Optimus] can’t not be in war-mode.”

Q: Were Optimus and Megatron ever friends, or did they just work together on the speech stuff? 

Oh hell yes, I think [the story] is always enhanced when they’re friends and when Optimus really believes in what Megatron was working on. Optimus’ rejection of Megatron is what pushes him over the edge, his best friend rejecting him pushes him into a place where he becomes a tyrannical person.

Q: Does Maccadam know we love him? 

Mae Catt: *puts hand over hear heart and looks off into the distance dramatically* Yes.

Q:  What’s the best selfie Arcee’s ever taken? 

I like the one with the giraffe. Or maybe a selfie with some humans. I like the idea of Arcee having a bunch of human friends. 

Q: What do the Transformers think of the Florida Man? 

They can’t really tell the difference between humans, they don’t really get it. It just sorta looks like all the normal stuff they see on Earth (or something). 

Q: Who’s the Florida Man of the Transformers? 

Rack ‘n Ruin. But he’s too nice. Hmmm.

Q: What was most important to you personally to put out in each episode? Like humor/characterization/arcs 

I wanted to make sure I didn’t write dialogue that was condescending to kids, wanted to be true about the character. Dialogue needs to be true to the characters, and gay. (Laughs)

Q: Do Transformers know what memes are?

They know what they ARE, but they don’t get it. We wanted Hot Rod to be super into Earth culture (winning races and driving off before humans could realize no one was in the car), but we never had time to really get into that.

Q: What music does Soundwave like?

We had a cut joke from S2 E5 [where Megatron and Optimus are popping through portals all around the world trying to find the All Spark] . Soundwave pops into Brazil where there’s a music festival and he crashes the concert and hang out. He likes EDM the most? 

His favorite song is Despacito. He thinks its so sad.

Q: Were you surprised that Jake Tillman was in his 20s listening to his Optimus voice the first time?

She apparently listened to his vines a lot when he was in his teens so meeting up again like that was a cool coincidence. 

Q: What other dimensions or places did you want to be in the show?

I would’ve liked to have the other Transformers series show up (TFP, TFA, G1, Shattered Glass) but we don’t have those assets or budget. 

“This will quickly become unclear to audiences who aren’t (you people).” They couldn’t have all these references when some of their audience wouldn’t get it. 

Q: What about ____ ship?

Mae Catt says she doesn’t want to yuck anybody’s yums. For example, someone asked about Arcee/Grimlock, and while she said she sees them more as friends, she didn’t say they can’t be in a relationship. (Mae Catt also said she doesn’t ship Bee with anyone because she sees him as a little brother).

As she said several times in the stream, “Don’t take things I say as the end-all be-all”!

That being said, she did say she likes Dead End / Perceptor and Windblade / Slipstream.

Q: Why are there no humans in the show?

From the show’s conception, there were no plans to include any humans. They didn’t want humans distracting from the Transformers.

Q: Why did the Scientist collect Soundwaves?

He collects Soundwave because Soundwave is COOL! Wouldn’t you collect a single father of 5 who carries them around in his chest?

Why does anyone collect what they collect? “That’s a really angry dad who’s got five children he carries around in him and he plays music. Gotta have that!”

(Later on, she circles back to this question)

All the Other Universe Soundwaves the Scientist collected also had their own Laserbeaks. I wonder if the scientist would’ve taken them out. He might’ve just gotten rid of them.

(And of course, here are the boyfriend questions from the stream:)

Q: Is Dead End a good boyfriend?

Dead End is a work in progress, but maybe Percy is patient enough to get him there

(Mae Catt says she really loves the Deadceptor ship. She knew people would ship it, but she didn’t ship it herself until she saw the fanart for it).

Q: Is Astrotrain a good boyfriend?

No, no...he’s not a good person, really.

Q: Is Percy a good boyfriend?

Absolutely--WAIT HOLD ON. He’s very blunt, he doesn’t mince words, if you can handle his bluntness then you’re good. He is what he is and you have to deal with him.

Q: Is Soundwave a good boyfriend?

Soundwave is not a good boyfriend. He’s a good casual romance but he’s not a good boyfriend. Soundwave would be a terrible listener. He hears a lot but he’d tune you out.

Other information tidbits:

- If Thunderclash was in the show he and Jetfire would HATE each other. Thunderclash would be a rival reality star (maybe) to Media Fire.

- Mae Catt said “A lot of intelligent life is inherently mechanical” in space, explaining why so much of the non-Cybertronian life we saw in the show were robots.

- Knock Out was considered for the show, but every Transformer under the sun was discussed at some point in the writer’s room. (Ex: “Rumble and Frenzy are always considered in my heart, but there wasn’t enough time or space or assets to do so”).

- “The brand team had grown up on the toys as we had grown up on the ‘toons, so we just wanted to make the best thing imaginable.”

- They decided Optimus would be in the Other Universe’s Matrix and have a plinth because they wanted to show he was dead. “Logical backflips because he needed to be among the 13 to talk to Windblade.” 

- Dead End’s eyes are white.

- The team wanted Jazz to be a lady (!!!!!!!)  

- These characters have their own lives that we don’t see. Lots of stuff happening between episodes that we don’t always necessarily see.

- Developing Sky-Byte’s character was simultaneous with Jetfire’s character. “We knew we wanted Sky-Byte to be a poet, and we wanted him and Megatron to be chummy”.

- Percy did permanently take over Mac’s bar.  

- Her favorite VA is Jeremy Levy, he’s a really cool guy.

- She thinks Starscream and Cheetor could become (not necessarily friends, but connected?) because of their connection to the All Spark. Mentions how Starscream acknowledge Cheetor as the “Guardian of the Allspark”.

- Mae Catt describes Starscream as an “Awful gremlin” several times.

- Astrotrain and the Insecticons are from Megatron X’s universe.

- She thinks Cliffjumper and Bee wouldn’t get along, solely because of the IDW2 comic stuff. (They had a cut joke about someone telling Bee he should paint himself red and Bee saying, “But then everyone will think I’m Cliffjumper!”).

- Cyberverse got 26 episodes for season 3 because they had the 4-part episode movies.

- Megatron cares about his troops, but not in a way that we would notice that care. 

- AcidStorm is genderfluid. 

-  Cold Construction doesn’t exist in this show. When asked why all the Seekers look the same then, Mae Catt says “Maybe there’s one jet mode all the seekers really like”.

- She loves the idea of Wild Wheel robbing Astrotrain in train-mode, totally Wild West-style.

- One of the things she’s proudest of was turning Lugnut into a gal (and having so much body diversity and gender-neutral designs for a lot of characters). They wanted to include many more girls in Cyberverse (Nickel and Lightbright among them). She also mentioned that  Shadow Striker is taller than Optimus or is his height.

- She describes Cosmos as “R2D2, but a Transformer!”

- Maccadam looking like a buff Rung was just a strange coincidence.

- Blurr really was the fastest.

- Mae Catt says we absolutely SHOULD write fanfic. Fanfiction made her into the writer she is today. She wrote non-stop Matrix fanfic from the age of 12-20 years old. It helped her learn a lot about writing.

- She uses “They” pronouns for Rack ‘n Ruin when referring to both of them, but says that individually they both use “he”.

- She’s really sad that Skywarp didn’t get a speaking line.

- Mae Catt won’t say whether Ratchet finished medical school or not. (She laughed when someone commented "I don’t believe that man has ever been to medical school”). She also says she wants “I choose to believe Ratchet has never been to medical school” on a T-shirt.

- When asked why Rack ‘n Ruin were captains of the Ark in one universe, she says they’re probably the Prime in that one weird universe (lmao).

- She loves the idea that Transformers have siblings / families.

- In a world where they had an unlimited budget, it’d be fun if Cybertronians were constantly shape-shifting and changing their forms. Example: she’d like having Transformers who “grew a beard” and decided to “shave it”.

- She doesn’t understand cycles or astrocycles, she doesn’t understand the weird Transformers time stuff. (mood)

- She loved Beast Wars Inferno, she loved that Inferno called Megatron a Queen. It was played as a joke because the 90s weren’t very socially conscious, but she liked that Megatron never corrected him or beat him down.

- Shockwave altered his spark to have maximum bad vibes to destroy the All Spark.

- She said it’s hard talking about writing a show because you’re designing the experience and you have to make sometimes what sounds like cold and pragmatic decisions (eg: "we need a cold and spunky female”) which sucks, but they need to balance out the show. She says she’d never do that just for the sake of doing it, but it’s part of something that they do need to be aware of while working on a show. “It starts from a weirdly cold pragmatic place, but we try and put truth in it”.

- They didn’t want to have Unicron in the show since he’s the default “big bad”, but if he was in the show, Mae Catt says “If you put the proverbial budget-gun to my head, I’d keep Unicron in planet-mode because it’s more mysterious, but I want both alt modes”.

- Her favorite Megatron is Beast Wars Megatron.

- She doesn’t like Sky Lnxy’s design, it’s creepy. “He talks in the G1 episodes and the voice makes it worse.” She can’t get over his face.

- “I’d love to see more jets [who aren’t our usual gang] and find out all jets are kinda snobby, which explains why Starscream’s the way he is”.

- Everyone on the Autobot side are friends with each other.

Thanks for your time Mae Catt! We’re lucky to have you. Thank you for all your hard work on this amazing show.

[invisiblefoxfire]

I’m disabled. I make YouTube videos. I rely on the auto-captions to provide subtitles for non-scripted videos because I’m already using all of my available time and energy just to make the videos, which can take dozens of hours of work. If a video is scripted, I use the script to auto-sync captions. If not, I just have to hope the auto-captions are good enough, because I’m physically incapable of doing more than I’m doing. I know the auto-captions suck, but often they’re the only option I have.

And on Twitter someone is telling me that actually I’m being super ableist by not being willing to commit to writing out manual captions for every single one of my videos. Yes, even the ones that are 2-hour stream archives that only 3 people will ever watch. I’m ableist for daring to create when I don’t have the ability or resources to make everything 100% accessible, because I am fucking disabled.

I’m tired of this. Should everything be accessible? Ideally, YES. I ALSO need subtitles to understand videos! I’m not refusing to make them because I don’t care, I’m physically incapable. It’s make things that are less-than-perfectly accessible, or make nothing and sink back into the depression that comes from being unable to produce anything creative.

My channel has fewer than 2000 subscribers. I don’t make any money from this work - in fact, it costs me money to make these videos. Writing captions for a 30 minute video might take me 2 hours and strain my hands and wrists from all the typing. I’m passionate about my creative work and I’m doing the best I fucking can, and I’m being told that if I can’t do it perfectly, because I’m disabled, then that makes me ableist.

So I need to say this: if someone is making a profit off their videos, they damn well better have subtitles. They can write them themselves, or hire someone else to do it, I don’t care. If they have the ability to feasibly add them, they need to be there.

But harassing small (especially disabled) creators who are barely able to keep it together, who are making videos as a hobby, who are spending every ounce of their time, energy, and resources just getting something made, telling them they don’t deserve to make their art, is fucked up. Stop doing that.

Being disabled is a bitch. I’m doing my fucking best. When the government gives me money to live off so I’m not desperately slaving away at a day job in order to keep the rent paid, when I get a million fans who are willing to support me or watch a ton of ads so I have funding to hire someone to write captions, when YouTube’s auto-caption software evolves to perfection, then you can tell me to make sure all my captions are perfect. Until then, kindly shut the fuck up and leave me alone, especially if you’ve never actually written captions and don’t realize what a monumental task it actually is.

I’m fed up with being told that because my disability and a complete and utter lack of funding prevents me from creating perfectly accessible art, that I’m not allowed to create any art at all.

[beevean]

3 years of Sonic Forces, the biggest love-hate relationship of the series

[note: this is the translation of @latin-dr-robotnik​’s article]

Today is an almost special day, today it’s the anniversary of a rather peculiar game in this series.

On this day 3 years ago, the (to this day) newest game of Sonic Team was released: Sonic Forces. After waiting a year and a half since its announcement (and four years since Sonic Lost World’s release), it was finally time to see what the last chapter of the main series had in store for us, and the results were… okay.

There were so many warning signs in the months before the release: a marketing campaign that was noticeably absent until the very last month, opting to focus more on Mania (let’s not forget that we still get videos about Mania even after the game’s release, not so much about Forces), which added to the uncertainty caused by the footage already available at the time, which ended up being confirmed a few days before the release, when some people managed to get the game early and streamed a good chunk of the game. While one of the leakers was just a bad player, the quality of the game itself was put into question…

A harsh reality

I’m not going to soften up my words here: for being the latest Sonic game, in a post-Generations and post-Boom era, Sonic Forces fell short of everything it tried to do (if it tried). Anything positive comes from the roots of something negative, and in the context of this anniversary, after 3 years without knowing a thing about the next game, it only emphasizes the frustration and the disappointment it caused.

Sonic Forces promised a world devastated by Eggman, an epic battle to save the world and win against a powerful enemy. However, of so many promises, not even the first one, the most basic one, was kept: it was an empty takeover, explained poorly (because they didn’t even show it, they told it through text) and developed even worse. All the potential of such an exciting world was thrown away as soon as the game didn’t even try to explain some of its most important questions (like why Green Hill was in the process of desertification); to this day we still don’t know what the fuck does the Phantom Ruby do, in Mania it has some powers, in Forces it has different powers, and it’s not clear where does it come from or if it’s more powerful than the Chaos Emeralds. It is disappointing to not be able to discover all this untapped potential, and it is so disappointing that one of the oldest works on my blog was an attempt to rewrite the beginning of the game, give it more context and a better footing to start the adventure.

This old leak dates back to 2016, when the game was barely announced, and surprisingly it ended up being real, very very real. Even the title “Sonic Wars” is true, and if you don’t believe me you can open the game’s folder and read the names that appear. Source.

The confusion and disappointment don’t end here. If you have read the mess of opinions and emotions that is my analysis of the game [translator’s note: the link is in Spanish], you may have noticed that one of the biggest questions never answered was, what’s up with the order of the levels and why is it so confusing? Between 2016 and 2017, there were some leaks and statements going around places like Sonic Stadium that confirmed that the game went through numerous changes, not just in the plot, but in the levels as well. Right now I can’t find these old posts (I’m surprised that the fandom didn’t archive them), but it was said that the original idea for Forces, then still called Sonic Wars, was to shine the spotlight even more on the Avatar, or Buddy as it was called; the decision was unanimously rejected by SEGA of America and Europe, forcing SEGA of Japan to order that the game was modified. In fact, I remember that the leak that mentioned this meeting between the SEGA branches was rather bad, with a very tense atmosphere and lots of disagreements.

This is the closest thing to a confirmation of the scrapped plot that I could find. At least it’s proof that I’m not crazy and that Forces was indeed more focused on the Avatar. Source.

The mess that is the order of the levels, the questionable presence of characters like Classic Sonic, and some of the details of one of the leaked scrapped scripts such as that apparently they considered to reintroduce Mephiles – all of this shapes the network of a mediocre game, created under the premise of “from the creators of Sonic Colors and Sonic Generations” but taking all the wrong parts of those two games, using an engine that has been proven to be less efficient than Unleashed’s and Generations (and I’m not talking about the Hedgehog Engine, which is the graphical engine – I’m talking about the game and physics engine of Lost World), and with short levels and… polarizing bosses, to say the least.

The result is a game that shows a lot of potential, but in practice it doesn’t live up to it at all, be it for its own limitations (being rushed like hell) or for a noticeable lack of attention to details; it didn’t succeed in creating a cohesive and coherent world, with levels that could be worthy of what has been learned in these years. This is the reality of Sonic Forces.

And yet...

Despite everything I’ve just said, despite all the unacceptable errors that Forces made, and despite all the terribly wasted potential… we still talk about this game.

There are many reasons. On one hand, Forces and Mania have been the latest Sonic games for 3 years now, which is tragic in on itself (Team Sonic Racing disappeared from the face of the Earth); on the other, we still talk about Forces because there is something that still attracts us to it.

It’s not the same attraction we feel for Sonic ‘06, though. Forces is not a complete, almost-franchise-killing disaster like ‘06 was, it’s not a giant meme that spread from the fandom to popular circles and internet figures such as the Game Grumps. People have been trying to fix Forces’ mistakes, but not on the same scale as projects that tries to completely recreate ‘06 with a radically different engine, or fix each and every bug in the original version. Forces is nowhere near as infamous, and so the discussion goes in different directions.

Episode Shadow is still one of the most entertaining parts of the game, and one of the most important as well, as Shadow himself hadn’t been a playable character since… well, Sonic ‘06.

On one hand, there is a cult surrounding Infinite, one that I personally don’t agree with, and I don’t know if it’s bigger than Mephiles’ 15 years ago, but I do know that it exists and it’s still present. One of the ways Sonic Team tried to “go back to its roots” was to introduce a character like Infinite in a plot that was supposed to be “more serious”. Final results notwithstanding, Infinite managed to win the heart of a sizeable portion of the fandom, which still wishes for his return and development.

On the other hand, there is the Avatar, our personal OC with an impressive customization system, which allows us complete freedom, to the point that we could recreate characters introduced in Sonic IDW like Whisper the Wolf. What at first looked like a questionable idea, nothing more than a source of memes, ended up becoming the smartest idea Forces had, with a gameplay style that, in my opinion, retains a little of the old Adventure spirit, and even had some of the most fun levels in the game. While Classic Sonic ruined one third of the game, and Sonic was somewhat mediocre compared to his past feats, the Avatar’s gameplay style manages to keep its quality throughout the game, despite the fact that the plot keeps revolving around their presence instead of focusing on the other aspects of saving the world, which is... well, a little unfortunate.

Even I, who I’m not really into Sonic OCs, had a lot of fun recreating some of the characters.

And finally we get to the best part of the entire game: the music.

Even after three years my opinions haven’t changed much. Forces’ music isn’t perfect, it has its low moments (I feel like I’m the only one who doesn’t like Light of Hope) and some disasters (F*ded H*lls lol), but overall it has good intentions and it has some pretty good highlights.

The use of synths, as overdone and criticized as it is, was an honest attempt to follow a trend present in older games, like Sonic Unleashed, where this instrument symbolized Eggman’s influence. An interesting touch that, while wasn’t completely successful, is appreciated.

I still say that Fighting Onward is one of the best themes of the entire game, and Spaceport as the level benefits from having it.

Then there’s the best part of the entire soundtrack: the return of vocal themes, such as the main theme, the villain theme, and some of the level themes. I cannot explain with enough words how much fans were waiting for this, and it was brilliantly handled by the advertising campaign: a preview of the instrumental version of Fist Bump, a short peek of the Avatar themes, and finally the reveal of some of the major themes. It’s not surprising that it became one of the most appreciated parts by the fans. From the iconic intro of Fading World to the subtle nod to Green Hill in Set In Motion, every theme has something that makes it stand out from the rest of the game.

But even so, the rest of the music in the game has redeemable points as well. Forces in general distances itself from the music styles previously used in the series, especially from the variety of incredible sounds of Unleashed or even Lost World; but from time to time it still recognizably Sonic, like in the half-Megaman, half-Runners Network Terminal, in the extremely epic and underrated Last Judgement, or in the always-mentioned Ghost Town (not the only “good” Classic theme in my opinion, but the first one that comes to mind). Even the remixed Zavok theme sound better in Forces than in its original version.

A love-hate relationship

At the end of the day, the only thing left I could say is that Forces is still one of the most polarizing games in the series. 3 years aren’t enough to heal some of the wounds left by the 4-year hiatus, plus the disappointment of the time, but at the same time these 3 years kept alive the memory of its best moment, the discussions about the music and the uncountable groups of fans reunited to share OCs like the fandom has always done.

In this anniversary, I thought it would be interesting to revisit a bit the peculiar relationship I have with this game, as we wait for a new hype cycle for the next game. And maybe, just maybe, that will be the moment Forces will fade from our collective memory, at least for a decade, until new fans will look back to the good and bad this game has done. And I hope that, in the future, the situation of the franchise will also be different from what it has been these last years, in a good way of course.

This is all we have left of Forces today, a game that did not manage to capitalize on its opportunities, and a game that shames the legacy of the Unleashed-Colors-Generations era; but also a game that had some genuine, interesting ideas, and a different musical direction, one that (with some exceptions) was what the fans wanted. It’s a polarizing game, it’s a love-hate relationship.

[gstqaobc]

CBC THE ROYAL FASCINATOR

Friday, October 23, 2020

Hello, royal watchers and all those intrigued by what’s going on inside the House of Windsor. This is your biweekly dose of royal news and analysis. Reading this online? Sign up here to get this delivered to your inbox.

Janet DavisonRoyal Expert

The lessons of becoming Diana in The Crown

(Ollie Upton/Netflix)

For Emma Corrin, preparing to take on the role of Diana, Princess of Wales, in The Crown was something of a psychology lesson. The 24-year-old actor assumed the part knowing full well those watching her arrival next month in Season 4 of the Netflix drama will already have well-established impressions of a member of the Royal Family who grew from "Shy Di" to one of the most photographed celebrities and fashion icons of recent times. Those existing impressions made assuming the role “incredibly daunting,” Corrin said in an interview from London. It helped once she got the script and saw the story. But there was also considerable work with a coach on “understanding the psychology behind a lot of what was happening.” And a lot of what was happening to Diana was “incredibly unnatural and quite intense,” Corrin said. At the age of 19, Diana Spencer moved from an apartment she shared with friends in West London into Buckingham Palace after her engagement to Prince Charles, the heir to the throne and a man 13 years her senior. Diana thought “it was going to be the best event of her life and that they were going to live happily ever after, but then [she discovered] he was with another woman,” Corrin said. Along with that, there was the pressure that comes from being a royal in the public eye.   “All of these are very extraordinary circumstances, really, for someone to be operating in,” said Corrin. “These things that she was exposed to come with a whole lot of pressures that affect someone’s mentality, and that was really interesting.” Even so, there are still all those impressions viewers will have before they catch their first glimpse of Diana when the new season of The Crown starts streaming on Nov. 15. And what if Corrin’s portrayal doesn’t match those impressions? Does that matter in trying to create a successful portrayal of such a well-known person? Not necessarily. “If you talk to actors who have to play a real person ... especially somebody that is so world famous and familiar as Diana — [the challenge comes] because audiences are expecting that actress to look and sound just like the real thing,” said Bill Brioux, a longtime television columnist and commentator. He looks no further than the actor holding the central role on The Crown for Seasons 3 and 4 as an example of overcoming that challenge. “I think Olivia Colman [as Queen Elizabeth] has shown that you don’t have to be a carbon copy, that you might capture a nuance or an essence of someone,” Brioux said. “Certainly, Colman spent a lot of The Crown looking surprised and perplexed, you know, aghast at times.” And we certainly aren’t used to seeing the Queen looking that way in public. “So I think it will be interesting to see how Diana is received,” Brioux said. As she prepared for the role, Corrin said she became overwhelmed “by the amount of factual information out there about her and also … the thought that I would be portraying someone so well-known." Corrin said she “started work on her mannerisms and her behaviour and figuring out why she did the things she did or what she would feel about certain situations that I was going to be acting. “ Corrin also spoke to Patrick Jephson, Diana’s private secretary. “He knew her very well and was able to provide a lot of insight, which was wonderful.” With Diana, Brioux suggested, there may be more pressure on an actor than if the portrayal was of a person not so well-known. “People all have their own expectations of Diana in their minds,” he said. “You’re going to disappoint a lot of people no matter what you do, so hat’s off to this actress for taking it on. “I think that there’s potential, though, if you come close, to get a lot of rave reviews because everyone knows the subject and that’s how they’ll judge it."

For more on Corrin’s experiences preparing for the role, click here.

A rare day out for the Queen — and no mask

(Ben Stansall/Reuters)

Royal visits can typically give the royal guest the opportunity to see some cutting-edge technology or to meet individuals being recognized for their work or volunteer efforts in helping others in their community. But Queen Elizabeth’s first major public engagement since the coronavirus pandemic struck in March offered more than a chance for her to visit a new defence research centre west of London and check out the latest in explosives detection. The visit to Porton Down, where scientists are also helping in the response to the pandemic, seemed designed to offer a larger symbolism. “I think it was a really important message for her to send that even though … we’ve been in lockdown and we’re facing new restrictions, the Queen was still able to meet people involved in the COVID response,” Roya Nikkhah, a royal correspondent for the Sunday Times newspaper, told the CBC’s Renee Filippone. Still, the visit, which the 94-year-old carried out alongside her grandson, Prince William, sparked questions — and criticism — because neither of them was wearing a mask at a time when Britons must wear face coverings in stores and other indoor spaces. Those involved in the visit were physically distanced, and Buckingham Palace said safety protocols were followed. Reuters reported that staff at the research centre had been tested for COVID-19 before the visit. “Every precaution that could be taken was taken,” said Nikkhah. “That’s why the Queen didn’t have to wear a mask.” Royal author Robert Jobson told the Daily Mail that Elizabeth was sending a “message of confidence to the people.” “She’s going back to work, she'll go about her business in the usual way, but without taking chances. She is reassuring the public that things must go on as normal, wherever it is safe to do so.” The Queen has spent much of the time since the pandemic struck in isolation at Windsor Castle, considered to be her favourite residence. She has returned there recently after spending a few weeks with Prince Philip at Balmoral Castle in Scotland, and a shorter period on her Sandringham estate northeast of London. Throughout the pandemic, Elizabeth has conducted official duties via video or over the phone, and made two appearances within the walls of Windsor Castle — one for a considerably scaled-down recognition of her official birthday in June, and one to bestow a knighthood on Capt. Tom Moore, a 100-year-old honoured for his charity fundraising. Still, it’s unlikely there will be many other outings like her trip to Porton Down anytime soon. “I think [it] was probably a bit of a one-off,” Nikkhah said. “I don’t think we’ll be seeing a lot more of her on public engagements.”

A new portrait for Canada

(Chris Jackson/Getty Images/Government of Canada)

There is also considerable symbolism on display in Queen Elizabeth’s new official Canadian portrait. While the portrait is new to the public, the photo itself was taken more than a year ago, in March 2019 at Windsor Castle, by royal photographer Chris Jackson. He shared it on social media late last week. In the portrait, the Queen is wearing her Canadian insignia as sovereign of the Order of Canada, Jackson said, along with the Order of Military Merit. The diamond and blue sapphire necklace and earrings she is wearing were a wedding day gift from her father, King George VI, in November 1947, and were worn during her five-day trip to Canada in 1990. Jackson said on Instagram that it was an “incredible honour” to have the opportunity to photograph the Queen for the portrait. “I’ve been lucky enough to have visited Canada many times now with members of the Royal Family and have the fondest memories of the people I’ve met.”

Royally quotable

"My family and I knew nothing about it and were at a loss to know how we could help alleviate the terrible pain she suffered."

— Camilla, Duchess of Cornwall,

reflects on her mother’s death from osteoporosis

26 years ago, and went on this week to note the “huge strides” made since then in treatment and research into the disease.

Royals in Canada

(Hans Deryk/The Canadian Press)

When Charles and Diana came to Canada in late October 1991, it was the last trip they made to the country together. And in ways it was two visits in one for the couple, whose collapsing marriage was under intense media scrutiny at the time, as they went their separate ways for much of the seven-day sojourn.

One stop for Diana in Toronto took her to Casey House, a hospice for people who have AIDS.

“Diana had just begun to venture into the issue of AIDS, then repellent to much of society, but it was still surprising that she chose to see a hospice full of very ill people rather than some less harrowing AIDS setting,” Casey House founder June Callwood

wrote in Maclean’s magazine

after Diana’s death in 1997.

Callwood had a mixed view of Diana, but that visit to Casey House, where she sat and visited with hospice residents, left a lasting impression.

Diana “wanted nothing less than to change the world for the better,” Callwood wrote. “And perhaps she did. On that lovely afternoon … she made everyone at a small AIDS hospice in Toronto feel worthwhile. That’s quite a gift.”

Our friends at CBC Archives have taken a closer look at the 1991 visit, which was also the first time both William and Harry went with their parents on a foreign trip.

Royal reads

1. Meghan, Duchess of Sussex, says she

avoids speaking about controversial topics

in an attempt to ensure she doesn’t put her family at risk. She also says she’s been told that in 2019, she was the

“most trolled person in the entire world.”

[BBC, The Guardian]

2. More than 60 years after Queen Elizabeth gave a pair of swans to a city in Florida,

it has sold off three dozen of their descendants

in a bid to ease a crisis in overpopulation of the birds. [The Independent]

3. Thirty years after Diana laid a ceremonial foundation stone for a cancer hospital, her son William

did the same

. [The Daily Mail]

4. Dutch King Willem-Alexander says he

regrets going to Greece for a holiday

after he and his family were criticized for taking a trip during the pandemic. [BBC]

Cheers!

I’m always happy to hear from you. Send your ideas, comments, feedback and notes to

royalfascinator@cbc.ca

. Problems with the newsletter? Please let me know about any typos, errors or glitches.

[bighousela]

MODERN ART chronicles a life-long rivalry between two mavericks of the London art world; the rebellious art critic Peter Fuller and Michael Minas the most expensive living artist of all time, as they cut their path from the swinging sixties through the collapse of modern art in Thatcher-era Britain.

WRITER’S STATEMENT Peter Fuller was my late father and I wrote this Biopic screenplay based on his memoirs, private letters and journals from the archive held at the TATE. This project has allowed me a dialog with the father I never knew. The story really came together when I created the character of Michael Minas out of Peter’s best friends and rivals, and my own adaptation. Comparisons have been made to two of the most popular streaming series this year; THE CROWN, which has brought a context to 20th Century British political and cultural history like never before. And breakout series QUEEN’S GAMBIT which has popularized the game of chess, an otherwise niche field, whose participants are obsessive and yet the story is entirely character driven. These are equally the aims of MODERN ART. 2020 has only proven we need art, now more than ever. Peter Fuller was like a punch in the guts to the art world from 1969 to 1990. I want for this film to reach the person walking into an art museum for the first time knowing nothing about the paintings in front of them and hit them emotionally just as hard as the collector with five Picassos on their wall. This is an inside look into a world that is a closed door to the average person, I want to kick that door down with this piece. Laurence Fuller, 2020

SYNOPSIS INTERVIEWER: Michael Minas, your latest piece, a car wreckage made of solid gold at Deutscher Galleries, has made you the most expensive living artist of all time. Can you tell our readers what you believe is the state of Modern Art? MICHAEL: This moment, as we all know, is missing someone. He was my oldest friend and greatest adversary. Thirty years on and we still feel his absence stronger than ever. He pulled himself to the centre of this carousel and watched the horses dance for his pleasure, wincing at the neon lights. PETER FULLER… This is all your fault. When my assistant found Peter’s journal in my studio this morning, there was no more hiding the origins of my work. The radical 60s; John Lennon plays guitar with Che Guevara, Vanessa Redgrave rallies a protest in Trafalgar Square, Peter and I were there for it all and we had the scars to prove it. Shaggy hair and anarchy everywhere. Art was the centre of this game and art was radical. It was time to question everyone and everything. And yet, Peter was struggling to find his voice amongst so many competing agendas. Peter was a terrible painter, I kept encouraging him to write instead, none-the-less he insisted on having a solo exhibition, for which he sketched his first wife the sensual COLETTE as the Venus De Milo. The show was a critical disaster in all the papers across England, I should know, I wrote one of them. Peter’s confidence as a painter was shattered, but it was that day a critic was born. Britain didn’t need another painter, it needed a writer. I connected him with the revolutionary journalist Tariq Ali who inspired him with the words “Write our revolution. Seize the time.” Peter’s fierce and prolific columns inevitably led him to JOHN BERGER. There was no greater critic at the time. After an invitation to join Berger at his home in France, they talked for days, Peter became fascinated by the man, who became his surrogate father. I am ashamed to admit it now, but I was jealous. The three of us locked in a power struggle: Two brothers fighting for the father’s approval. At Berger’s request to find out which side he’s really on, he asked me to keep an eye on Peter. I watched him in the hungry hours of the art openings. I watched him feed his demons at the late night whipping houses and horse tracks where he spent his last pennies on the strangest hopes. Little did I know, he was watching me just as closely. I took it upon myself to steal his journals. I could not do this alone. I had to enlist the help of the person closest to him, Colette. As I read them feverishly, of course I knew it was wrong, but what was he hiding? I was obsessed with trying to figure him out.

Anxiously I read in Peter’s journals how he wrestled with his father in the tormented dreams of his childhood where we first met at boarding school. The older boys could be unusually cruel back then. Failing to comply with their authority we were tied to a fence in a bull paddock and whipped within an inch of our lives. Reading his account again inspired me to create the exhibition MINOTAUR’S SONG in 1986. I knew I could never beat Peter with words, but my art would torture him and force him to rebel against us. And he did by publishing brutal columns. John felt as though he had lost his son, he turned to me. Colette could no longer bare Peter’s anguish and the marriage was ripped apart, she turned to me. Peter went mad with jealousy and confronted Berger and myself at the exhibition. Our next debate was televised and it was merciless. Peter turned his back on all of us. He was black listed across the entire art publishing trade, except for his own passionate glossy MODERN PAINTERS. The magazine tore the entire establishment apart on both sides of the divide. There, revealed at its centre, was Peter holding the curtain open to the dying light of beauty. At the launch neither Berger, nor I were spared in the most intense debate I have witnessed let alone been a part of, as nobody could use language as a weapon like Peter. Finally, he had undeniably found his voice. I did not see his final letter until after the car crash which claimed his life so abruptly. Of course Peter’s final move in this game is a crescendo which reveals the purpose of beauty and the preciousness of life. Who better to deliver me this message than my assistant, but did she know more than she was letting on? George Mackay Michael Minas MICHAEL MINAS - 30s Caucasian Male (British), Peter’s lifelong best friend, though rougher round the edges, the two are locked in a constant cycle of camaraderie and rivalry. The emotional rollercoaster of their relationship escalates from adolescence through the revolutionary 60s, into passionate televised debates of the 80s, sensational art openings and betrayals of love and loyalties, played out on the art world’s stage. LEAD JOHN BERGER - 40s-50s (British), a handsome man with a large presence and a wisdom that is expressed in the lines of his face and the openness of his heart. John Berger was the leading art critic in England throughout the 20th Century. Notorious and internationally recognized for his controversial perspective on art criticism which was also deeply personal and autobiographical. He was Peter’s mentor and over time his surrogate father as their intense relationship sent ripples throughout the art world. LEAD

Modern Art Script Trailer

[poniesandcupcakes]

Started alone, ending alone it seems. Memento Mori everyone. Unus. Annus.

I wanna thank you guys so much for everything, I don't know if you'd actually see this or the short goodbye tweet I plan to send out too,

But I was in a really horrible hole a month before unus annus. I lost my best friend after we both seemed to have such a sudden impulse to tell eachother how much it'd hurt to lose the other the exact day she was hospitalized. Barely hours before. I'm genuinely just crying because, in the beginning, I had such a panicked attachment like as if Unus Annus was the final thing I had left to stay sane and happy and to stop thinking about losing someone who was my best friend only four years short of my entire life (we were both freshly 18 when she died.)

I got this tattoo because of my loss and because of you guys, I have a poor memory and it hurt just the thought of forgetting even something as simple as our nicknames or her handwriting that used to be all over everything of mine. You guys are seriously so fucking awesome, on my other platforms aside from this I did back and forth posts of daily unus annus updates on my life and planned to delete it all like the channel, but fell hard on the impending dread of her anniversary, even months prior on my own birthday. I got separated from friends for close to half a year due to a virus, my other two best friends either moved away or seemed to care more about their relationship than me and their family, my dad works in another timezone and missed copious opportunities to visit during a year long separation from me, my mom and brother, and may even have to come as late as just before Christmas when he could've been home in a day.

I've wanted to say it and know you guys know, I love you guys and I love what you've done and I'm so so fucking thankful you did this, I was ready to go into a shell of being an even bigger introvert than I already am after losing the person I grew with to be comfortable out of my usual zone. I used to make comedy videos, write, make sketches, and be so creative before last October, and I think I would have definitely let you down not going after those goals and ignoring the potential I could have had, if not for your videos. You guys inspired me more than I thought you had.

I did break several times at the different times you guys spoke about the other dying, I could never wish that on anyone. My boyfriend and I both lost our best, closest friends in the span of two years and it ripped us apart. You guys seriously did so fucking much without realizing, and whether you see this or not I want you to know that. I havent sobbed yet but I'm definitely choking down Canada dry at the moment just to stop from waking up my family and startling my friend next to me, but I definitely will be crying before I get to sleep after the stream. The way you spoke about Amy when she laid down in the coffin is so beautiful, its how I felt about Jess. She was the reason for my everything, and we worked together on everything. We had scripts, and plans, and character designs for a series four years+ in the making, and I one day hope to finally bring it to life and give new life to her in that way through her ideas and creativity that held no bounds. I never met anyone as creative as her, not even my boyfriend who's someone I think can't be beat in that sense as well, but not in the same sense of her.

Unus Annus wasn't just a video series, it was like it came out perfectly to keep me sane and help me carry on and understand how to cope and how to live with her memories alone. Its a coincidence, that just.

It just helped me find so much strength and keep me up and working and staying around, I'd never dream of taking ill care of myself but I also have so many days I just don't do what I need to do because I can't see a reason, whether its appetite, taking care of my physical health, cleaning my room, or even just washing my face or brushing my hair. Its just stuff that should be such an instinctual or subconscious action, is so hard it physically hurts to do it more than to just move along and keep moving without it. I was so unhealthy, and still am despite working on it, losing things is hard. But having the memories is both harder and so much easier, than having nothing at all. I wish I could say "reset the clock" and be part of that group just to pretend I can't let go, but oddly?

I'm glad to see it go. The progress I've felt just telling people its all what "needs to be done" since the beginning, I never saw till recently how good it was to just let go. And it's because it came after such a loss, and such an odd and eery coincidence, even coinciding a month after her death and, obviously, the year anniversary of her death. I was just able to let go, because how could I ever come to terms with something like that kind of loss if I couldn't be comfortable with videos being deleted?

A reset can bring videos back, yes. Just begin the clock again, easy as pie, go on ahead archivers-

But there's no clock that could EVER be reset for her. Her clock can't just begin again, I can't just call her or send her a message and suddenly she'd be back, so why should I say Memento Mori has to be Numquam Subsisto instead? Never stop is not realistic. Death is an unavoidable occurrence, loss is a building block, remembering life can only exist if death does, and vice versa.

Memento Huius Anni, Memento Vitae;

Memento Mori.

Thank you, Mark, Ethan, Amy, Evan, everyone. For making this past year better. Even if it was the same prompt my own mind had held all year after October 2019, whether Unus Annus existed or not to put it there like an earworm; Remembering Death held a different meaning despite the same thoughts. A different feeling. It held excitement and calm, rather than my pain and sadness. You guys are amazing, I can't say it enough. And one day I do hope to say it to you all in person, even if it's years from now (as it most likely would be, I'm not very popular on YouTube for a collab in the slightest, and I don't have to money to go to any big events you may go to).

I could say more, but I don't want to say anything else sad, goodbye or not. You guys gave such amazing support to me, even if its hard to believe at all, or you think this is fake and just an attention scheme, you guys are just the best. You're amazing people I hope to meet one day, and I'm glad to have watched and experienced this and got the support from you all.

I love you guys, all of you. Memento Mori. Unus Annus.

[hydralisk98]

Angora (Klara ‘Marta’ Ker... things)

Goals

Womanhood

Photographic memory

Chronokinesis (self=constant and memories safety)

Shapeshifting (morphological freedom and identity safety)

Loyal proactive tribe

Retro electronics

Interesting media

Vintage skills

Idols notice you

Artistic prodigy

Analog + digital art skills and supplies

Ambidexterity

Ideal handwriting

Videogenic

Ethos

Ideal face body voice and metabolism

Historymaker (Theodore Roosevelt & Christopher Lee inspired)

Career

Vintage (electric?) car

Wardrobe

Appartment

Wealth

Desired level of popularity

Conworlds

Creative prose and poetry skills

Digital 2D+3D+4D animation

Programming and design expert

Knowledge genius lady (abstract skills and all)

Activism/lobbies/political cooperation

Help

Take photos

Film videos

Draw doodles

Affirm yourself

Script your goals

Print pictures and collage them

Use conlang(s) and translate to RL natural languages

Compliment yourself

Love yourself

Be patient

Meditate

Abundance/gratitude log

Ideas for YouTube

Intro (who am I, types of videos I make, ethos)

Draw my Life (life story)

Future channel plans

Overcoming personal struggle (autism)

Why am I making vids on YouTube

Channel trailer

Why and how started on YT

Remake old videos

Shoutout

Collaboration

Behind the scenes

How I do Video process

Tutorials

Channel anniversary

Subscriber milestone

Q&A

Contest

Giveaway

Bucket list

Random thoughts

Funny facts

Funny stories

Answer frequently asked questions 

Vlogs

Boredom busters

Idols

Charity

Inspirations

Outdoors local town trip

Room tour

Collection

Show a skill or talent

Show your workspaces

What is on my blank

Applications to recommend

Review little-known software and hardware

Transgender

Subliminals

Gifts

Cegep

Late secondary

Travels

Pets

Siblings

Friends

Hobbies

Accomplishments

Failures

Childhood memories

My maternal family stories

90s old computer restoration

Something new you tried

Manifestation challenges

Old friendships

Sibling tags (older, like/dislike, dreams/nightmares, one word)

Friend tags (Queries/Questions)

Quiz

Best

What I like about blank

Annoying things about blank

Worst

Favs

Curations

Music

Video media

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No commentary gameplay

Walkthrough

Indie games

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Live commentary streams

Mods

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Montages

Discuss news

Future releases

Older games

Easter eggs

Gaming setup

Shopping hauls

Aesthetics

Products

Trends

Organization

Explain tech

Show fav applications/programs

Teach languages

Tips for BLANK

DIYs

Art timelapses

Sing a song

Day in life

Morning routine

Nighttime routine

Event recap

Day in career

Rants

Cover news

Interview

Opinions

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Archived news

Deep dive into events

Countries

Video dictionary

Jargon

Room decoration

What is in my bags

Compare

History talks

Walk with me

Volunteer

Screencasts

Tabletop games

Philosophy

Debate

Ranked lists

Tiered tree lists

Moodboards

Motivationals

Political issues

Build something

Memes

Controversial issues

[hyperfixationspam]

jonmartin voice requests transcript

i don’t think anybody’s made a transcript of the requests from the gaming & giving stream yet so here it is. i cut out the first few minutes where they’re just getting ready and a few minutes at the end, but otherwise it’s the full thing

ALEX (out of character): So, we are going to be going through a bunch of reads which are what people have been, basically providing us to say. I’ve not seen these beyond checking that I can open the document, so this is sort of, a bit of a blind read on my end.

JONNY: I’ve read through some of them and they are awful.

ALEX: (laughing) Fabulous. Great. So with that in mind, I’m now opening it up. Um... okay, cool, so for the first one, you- I need to interrupt you. (frustrated) Oh, fine.

JONNY: Okay, so this is from donut_bridgetrose. (spooky voice) The Magnus Archives is a podcast-

ALEX (ooc, very loud and overenthusiastic): FUCK, DUDE! YEAH IT SURE IS!

(Jonny starts laughing out of shock)

ALEX: I thought that was an appropriate level of enthusiasm.

JONNY: (laughing) Sorry, I didn’t expect you to put quite so much pepper on that one!

ALEX: I mean, I don’t know what to say like-

JONNY: No, fair enough, fair enough.

ALEX: I’m just reading with (???) intent. I’m up next, who’s this one from?

JONNY: Uh, reatx.

ALEX: Okay, given the writing of this one, I’m going to assume this is actually intended as a Martin one, not an Alex one, so I’ll do it as such. (clears throat to do Martin voice, disappointed tone) Jon, please j-just stop reheating tea in the microwave!

JONNY: The next one is from sofairycakes. Again, I’m gonna assume it’s a- like, I think these are all pretty much JonMartin ones, to be honest. I don’t think anyone’s actually said- the thing is, Alex, I don’t think anyone actually cares what *we* say.

ALEX: (laughs) That’s true. So I think we need to do this one like-

JONNY: No one’s paying to have, like, Alexander J. Newall say something, you know?

ALEX: It’s fine, I’ll pay me. Okay, I think we have to do this simultaneously.

JONNY: Yeah, because it says “both.” Or... let’s- do you want to go first?

ALEX: I don’t know if it is- no, let’s say it together, let’s say it together. Let’s try and sync up.

JONNY: I don’t- I don’t think they want it simultaneously. I think what this means is they don’t mind which one’s which.

ALEX: Very well, in which case then, I’ll go first.

JONNY: Okay.

ALEX: And I’ll do it as a Martin one, then. (clears throat, Martin voice, soft) I-I’ll take care of you.

JONNY (Archivist): (hoarse, upset voice) It’s rotten work.

ALEX (Martin): Not to me. Not if it’s you. (ooc) There you go.

JONNY: Okay. Ac3yspac3y-

(Alex laughs)

JONNY: Or, ace 3 space 3.

ALEX: Okay, great.

JONNY: (clears throat)

ALEX: Yeah, really get the-

JONNY (ooc, looking straight at the camera): Four rats in a trench coat is the best Peter Lukas, and we love him.

ALEX: (laughs) Direct to camera address, very nice, okay. (as Martin) Jon, why isn’t Lonely Eyes *our* ship name? (ooc) Who was that from, by the way?

JONNY: That was from compostwitch. Next one is from theoceaninmotion, there’s a whole bunch for you.

ALEX: Ooh, yeah. Oh, my formatting’s terrible, I’m gonna do the unspeakable, I’m now just gonna start looking at the text instead of your face. (computer screen shines in his eyes) Ooh, that’s bright, maybe not, maybe not. Okay, gimme a second to just mess with my formatting because I can’t see nothing.

JONNY: There’s very little like streaming to make you realize quite how absurdly pale you are after a year of just being inside.

ALEX: Outside is bad time. Right, okay, I’m gonna give this a go, then. Forgive me if I hesitate here, I’ll do my best. (clears throat) No, don’t-

JONNY: This is from- sorry. This is from theoceaninmotion.

ALEX (Martin): No, don’t click- Peter, just-just give me your phone, I’ll get the emojis set up, but I-I *refuse* to help you understand Elias’s texts any further from here. There are just some things I don’t need to know! (grossed out noise)

JONNY: This is from joeytwoeyes.

ALEX: I’m gonna assume Martin as well. (as Martin) Mm, assassins killing Elias? My favorite!

JONNY: This one is from nagev.

ALEX: Uhh. Alright, I think this one might be for me, like not a Martin one. (deep sigh) Harrison Campbell is my favorite author.

JONNY: This is one for me from riotcontrolcamp. (as the Archivist) Sometimes people will ask me about my life aspirations and I’m like, I don’t know, I thought I’d be in a car with my hand out of the tail light by now.

ALEX: (laughs) I like that one.

JONNY: This one’s from Cassidy.

ALEX (Martin): Forgive and forget? (very quickly shifts into a hysterical voice that’s very much not Martin’s) No! Resent and remember! (cackles evilly)

JONNY: From cucumberkale, this is a two hander.

ALEX: Oh, yeah, I’m first. (as Martin) I have done nothing wrong ever, on my life.

JONNY (Archivist): I know this and I love you. (ooc) Good little Parks and Rec reference there.

ALEX: Oh, yeah!

JONNY: From the bluescapegoat.

ALEX (Martin, mischievous): Jon, uh, did you hear about the explosion at the cheese shop?

JONNY (Archivist): What? What cheese shop?

ALEX: (wiggling eyebrows) Yeah, da brie [debris] was everywhere.

JONNY: (deep sigh) This apocalypse has officially gone on for too long. (ooc) This is from alfcommittingcrimes.

ALEX: (laughs) (as Martin) Hello, Jon. Apologies for the deception, but I would like to remind you I love you. (laughs)

JONNY: Aww.

ALEX: Cute reference.

JONNY: Um, this one’s from Monty. This isn’t actually-

ALEX: This is more of an instruction.

JONNY: They haven’t scripted anything, yeah. Um, okay. (as the Archivist) Martin, I’m very sorry for ever saying that I hated your tea.

ALEX (Martin): It’s okay. Some things are more important than tea. (ooc) There you go. I thought I’d go sincere-

JONNY (ooc): Oh no! Martin’s been replaced! (Alex laughs) Anyways, this one is from tomakeitworse and it’s for you, Alex. Well, as Martin, not as you.

ALEX (ooc): I mean it’s wrong, but okay. (as Martin) Oolong is the best tea.

JONNY: From shikashaman. (statement voice) Statement of Benedict Avalanche regarding clown milk. Statement begins. Honk.

ALEX: (laughing) I think that’s a call back to earlier this stream, so. (makes ok symbol) Very class act.

JONNY (ooc): One from ladymystree for me. (Sasha giggling in the background)

ALEX: I’m hearing giggling on your end, I think someone’s enjoying themself.

JONNY: No, it’s fine. They’re doing a cryptic crossword and I’m sure they’ve just stumbled across a-

ALEX: It’s really cryptic. Really cryptic. Yeah, it’s a cryptic giggle, alright. Carry on, then.

JONNY (Archivist): Ceaseless Watcher, evict this feline, Her Serene Highness The Empress Nyx from out of the *goddamn* Christmas tree.

ALEX: (laughing) I like that one.

JONNY (ooc): This is from myth_ac. (as the Archivist) Martin and I have this connection where we finish each other’s-

ALEX (Martin): Sentences!

JONNY (Archivist): Don’t interrupt me.

ALEX (ooc): (laughs) I quite like that one as well.

JONNY (ooc): Yeah, I don’t know what that one’s from, I recognise it. But it’s, uh, redderie. (as the Archivist) I’ve been asked why I changed my opinion on poetry. I do not know this. This information is unattainable such as it is. Not even my endless resources could solve such a mystery. No, I did not fall in love with a poet on purpose, next question. (Alex laughs) (ooc) This one’s from coinmaster. Uh, and it’s for you, Alex.

ALEX (Martin): Thank you so much for asking, Jon. My ideal date, uh, would be getting home after a long day, curling up next to a roaring fire and listening to Rusty Quill Gaming. It’s-it’s a podcast, it’s distributed by Rusty Quill.

JONNY (Archivist): Oh, yes, I’ve heard of it. It’s not very good. (roasting) Ohhhh!

ALEX: But it does have a Creative Commons attribution non-commercial sharealike 4.0 international license, so that’s quite cool, too. (ooc) (laughs) I may have riffed there, I apologise.

JONNY (ooc): It’s fine, it’s fine. We’ve said what they’ve asked us to say, anything additional is- that’s bonus. (Alex laughs) This one is from mstars, for me to read in statement voice.

ALEX: Oh! (laughs hysterically, tries to compose himself)

JONNY (statement voice): Why are you so far away in Galactonium? Hey, won’t you save me? Hold me, maybe? I just want to be your little clone baby.

ALEX: (laughs) And that’s in my head for the rest of the day.

JONNY (ooc): This is for you. I refuse to listen to it. I’ve- too many people have told me it’s good. Which means that-

ALEX: Automatically, yeah. Understood.

JONNY: Well, no, it’s just, like- I don’t want it stuck in my head. I’m aware, if I listen to it, it’s in my head forever, and I can’t risk that.

ALEX: You don’t want him- you don’t want Tim getting- well, Tim and Ben, you don’t want them living rent free there.

JONNY: They can’t win!

ALEX: Understood. Okay, in that case, then. (as Martin) Sorry, Elias, I can’t hear you, there’s a panopticon in the way! (ooc) Fair.

JONNY: One from b_ees. Another for you.

(TheBrothersMeredith in the chat: Coward)

ALEX: Oh no.

JONNY: Mm-hm.

ALEX (Martin): (grunt) I’m trying to sneak around in the Lonely, but I’m-I’m dummy thicc and the clap of my ass cheeks just- it keeps alerting the Eye!

JONNY: One from thequack04. (as the Archivist) I have had a very long day, I am very small, and I have no money, so you can imagine the stress I’m under. Square brackets this is a John Mulaney quote close square brackets. (Alex laughs) (ooc) One for you. Uh, from misssunflower94.

ALEX (ooc): I’m gonna assume this is for actually me.

JONNY: No, I think it is for Martin, because remember, Martin’s opinions on poetry.

ALEX: Uh, no, fair, actually, no, I take that back. You are correct, you are correct. (as Martin) I don’t know, I just- I’ve always found Oscar Wilde to just be a bit... overrated?

JONNY: One for me, from awildmeerie. (as the Archivist) Hello demons, it’s me, ya boy. (Alex laughs) (ooc) Um, (stumbles over the name) emperiocism. Sorry for that, emperiocism. Can Jonny sing/speak in his most serious Archivist voice? (serious Archivist voice, speaking) Now, this is a story all about how my life got flipped turned upside down, and I’d like to take a minute, just sit right there, I’ll tell you how I became the prince of a town called Bel Air.

ALEX: Oh, don’t- (incomprehensible frustrated noises) god.

JONNY (ooc): From marsmagnusandkbouchard, this is for you.

ALEX (Martin): (very angry) Fuck being the bigger person, I’m just- (feral) I’m just gonna start biting people!

JONNY: Excellent. One for both of us from zestymayos92.

ALEX (ooc): (laughing, tries to compose himself) (as Martin) The world ended, and that is super not poggers.

JONNY (Archivist): You’re right, Martin, very not poggers indeed. (ooc) One from catskeleton for you.

ALEX (ooc): That’s just- oh. (as Martin) Roses are red, violets are blue. I’m definitely not a ghost, and Jon, I love you.

JONNY: I have a really difficult one- this anonymous one is difficult because it says “in the style of Sailor Moon” and I’ve not seen many anime, um, animi, sorry, in my life.

ALEX (ooc): The plural is anipodes.

JONNY: And Sailor Moon is not one, so I have no idea what-

ALEX: As far as I am aware, if you want to do it representatively, your clothes need to fly off in a large elaborate explosion and be replaced with some kind of dress-based armor. But that may not be feasible.

JONNY (Archivist): (very awkward) I am the pretty Avatar who fights for the Eye and for knowledge! I am the Archivist, and now, in the name of the Ceaseless Watcher, I’ll punish you! (ooc) I... I don’t know.

ALEX: I think that might have been actually pretty decently close. It’s been a few years since I watched a Sailor Moon, so don’t hold me to that though.

JONNY: I’ve only ever seen silent gifs on... your Tumblrs or your Twitters. Anyways, this is from theraccoonfriend. (as the Archivist) Get out of my swamp. (ooc) Uh, from Kath, for you, Alex.

ALEX (Martin): I’m fine! Stop asking!

JONNY: From sunnyjordie, for you, Alex.

ALEX (Martin): Hey, would you help me out? I’m very gay and a few- and I’d like a few dollars. (ooc) I’m gonna do that again, I think I screwed it up. (as Martin) Hey, would you help me out? I’m very gay and I’d like a few dollars.

JONNY: Square brackets this is a John Mulaney-

ALEX (Martin): Square brackets this is a John Mulaney quote close square brackets.

JONNY: Um, from Linothy, for both.

ALEX (Martin): Please, pleeeease stop drinking tea by just putting the bag in your mouth and just chugging hot water.

JONNY (Archivist): I’m *cultured*, Martin. (ooc) And dang3rgrang3r, or dang 3er grang 3er. Uh, for both.

ALEX (Martin): God, Jon, why don’t you ever wear your own clothes?

JONNY (Archivist): I like your sweater! It makes me feel...

ALEX (Martin): It makes you feel like a thief!

JONNY (Archivist): No, it makes me feel *safe*.

ALEX (Martin): Aww, Jon...

JONNY (ooc): One from voidbean.

ALEX (Martin): I’m sorry, you were STABBED??

JONNY (Archivist): *Lightly* stabbed, I didn’t want to frighten you. (ooc) I think that’s a Brooklyn 99 one.

ALEX (ooc): Yeah, so do I, actually.

JONNY: Sarafifi24.

ALEX (Martin): Press X to pay respects.

JONNY: So from alfcommittingvoicecrimes, they’ve asked “sing chorus of Pump Shanty.” And the thing is, if you want to hear me singing the chorus of Pump Shanty, that is available on Bandcamp, Youtube, and Spotify. So, Alex, why don’t you do it?

ALEX (ooc): Okay, I have no idea so I’m gonna take a random stab in the dark.

JONNY: I’m very excited to hear it.

ALEX: With a tune that doesn’t even scan in terms of meter.

JONNY: No, like just- it’s a folk tune so just sing it like a folk. Sing it to an old folk tune.

ALEX: ...Yes.

JONNY: You know, an old folk tune.

ALEX: (to a tune that’s definitely not Pump Shanty) Pump me boys, let’s a-fly, down to hell and up to the sky. Bend your backs and break your bones, we’re just a million miles from home. (cringing) I have no idea what that should be-

JONNY: (trying not to laugh) Brilliant. No, that was it. You got it.

ALEX: Oh, wicked. I was worried for a moment.

JONNY: No, that was... uncanny, to be honest. We’ve got a few more that are from Nobles donations, so these don’t have specific donor names, so we can just go back and forth.

ALEX: The first one’s as Wilde. (as Wilde) I am so clever that sometimes I don’t understand a single word of what I’m saying.

JONNY (Archivist?): Blartin, that is, Paul Blartin Martin Cop is on his segue and eye ass Jon is sitting on the handlebars. He is facing Blartin in a koala-esque embrace which is not quite an embrace but rather for structural support. His ass eyes are out and alert. He knows all. Petty theft perishes under their collaborative iron fist.

ALEX: (laughing incredulously) Okay!

JONNY (ooc): Do you want to do this one? I think- yeah.

ALEX: Okay, okay, sure. (deep breath, as Martin) Hey, you can do this. It’s been really, really rough, but you can do this.

JONNY (Archivist): Working at the Magnus Institute was like a four year game show called “Do my friends hate me or do I just need to go to sleep?” but instead of winning money, you lose your bloody soul. (ooc) Okay. (as the Archivist) You’re a child, an infant. Your mocking is thus infantile. He’s not my boyfriend. This man is more to me than you could dream. He’s the moon when I’m lost in darkness and warmth when I shiver in cold, and his kiss still thrills me after a millennia. His heart overflows with the kindness of which this world is not worth of. I love this man beyond measure and reason. He’s not my boyfriend, he is all and he is more.

ALEX (Martin): You’re an incurable romantic.

JONNY (Archivist): (next request) He thinks I don’t notice, but the bodies in the hallway speak a clear language. Death is all around us, no one is safe. The signs all point in one direction: Martin’s totally sus.

ALEX (Martin): (noises of disbelief) O-okay, come on, I am innocent! How could you even think that??

JONNY: Martin was ejected.

ALEX (ooc): (laughs) I think that’s it.

JONNY: Yeah, I think that’s the list.