#I can’t really compare it since I’m not that well versed

[cinnbar-bun]

WHEN MY PERFUME IS IN A CAN I KNOW THIS SHIT IS GOOD!!!

[yuusishi]

Bro your writing is literally so cute and it makes me smile so hard man!!

I was wondering if I could request Floyd Ace and Malleus with an Edward Elric reader? (Basically really smart and comes from a non magic world where the powers used is alchemy also is really short for their age (149 cm) and hates when anyone calls them short reader also has a mechanical right arm and left leg)

Imagine Floyd just popping off the reader’s left leg and running away with it or sm and the reader chases after him at full speed with a makeshift leg they made using alchemy

. . . Alchemical Genius

pairings : Floyd Leech , Ace Trappola , Malleus Draconia x gn!Edward Elric!reader

genre : fluff

cws/tws : stealing of prosthetic limbs as a joke?? (<- non graphic descriptions)

a/n : sorry that Malleus’ part is like pretty short compared to the others I’m becoming like really sleepy as I’m finishing this

Floyd Leech !!

Finds your mechanical limbs so damn cool!! There isn’t much merfolk down in the Coral Sea that use prosthetics and he really only was properly introduced to them when he made it on land so he was fascinated with you like a science experiment.

But even if he finds your stuff cool…that won’t stop him from teasing you for your height…

I mean c’mon, he’s 6’1 (185cm) and you’re 4’8 (149cm), he can’t NOT take the opportunity.

Because of it, he tends to pick you up as if you were as light as a feather whenever you started getting annoyed at him. Either running around the hallway or just simply picking you up to spin you around (he holds your mechanical limbs while doing so though because he’s not entirely sure if they can just…fall off.)

But the rule is that only he can do that, only he can tease his Shrimpy like that >:( Anyone else will get squeezed hard with no hesitation.

Comes to you every time he’s too lazy to do alchemy homework and no matter how much you deny him you know you’ll end up giving him the answers, but when you're in the mood you'll just explain things to him (even when he understands it anyways) just to bore him enough to do the homework himself.

In the situation he just outright steals a mechanical limb from you...it could become quite the regular sight, Floyd running with a detached metal leg around the hallways while you blast yourself full speed at him to get it back using a temporary alchemy-made leg.

Ace Trappola !!

Thinks your mechanical limbs are cool v2. And you're good at alchemy? He def scored on friends in his first year.

Him scoring high on friends doesn't mean he scored high in alchemy though, with you not allowing him to copy your answers. And he learned not to bother you about it after the last time Professor Trein had to break him and you apart after he annoyed you a tad bit too much for the alchemy questions...

Honestly he doesn’t really have much to comment about your mechanical limbs like at all. He found them cool at first because “wow you have metal limbs” but after a while it’s just become as normal as biological limbs.

Especially since the most that can be seen is your hand and occasionally your ankle since the NRC uniforms are long sleeves, so they never drew too much attention in the first place.

Unbelievably jealous that you’re one of the top scorers in alchemy class since you were already very well-versed in alchemy from your studies and job in your old world. I mean, how does he even think of besting someone that was the youngest State Alchemist?!

He keeps up with whoever’s on the number one spot during exams since it’s ALWAYS either you, Riddle, or Azul.

You’re the shortest in the friend group and Ace teases about it from time to time but most of the time he just lowkey forgets about it, even when he literally has to look down to talk to you.

Malleus Draconia !!

Extreme height difference v2, this time it qualifies as a long distance relationship.

But also forgets about it, I mean he’s 6’5 and has had Lilia as his guardian for years, he doesn’t care for something as trivial as height differences.

The thing about you that makes him the most curious would be your prosthetics.

The people of Briar Valley heavily rely on magic, so even when there were veterans who’s limbs were cut off during the war they’d just use magic to do day-to-day things.

So having you, a human with replacement limbs, in front of him really piqued his curiosity. He’d ask a few questions and tried not to tread too far and possibly ask something too personal, but sometimes he’d do just that without meaning to.

It ticked you off, yeah, but you tried to understand where he’s coming from and cool down before telling him that you didn’t want to answer it (to which he’d be understanding of.)

He’d also be impressed that you became a State Alchemist back at your world at such a young age, he even pitied you slightly since you seemed to have such a bright future before getting plucked off to Twisted Wonderland.

Occasionally keeps up with whoever’s the top scorer during exams since you, Azul, and Riddle always seem to be competing with each other, this became even more apparent during housewarden meetings (whenever he got invited to it at least.)

[dysfunctional-doodle]

Just watched Mutant Mayhem, here are my thoughts!

Overall: Yes, very good I suggest everyone watch it when they can or I will break your knees :)

I’m going to end up rambling far too much unless I split this properly, so I’m going to break it down into sections starting from what I believe is most important in a movie.

This post is still going to be a mess ngl

Story: 8/10

The story is actually very good! It was paced very well and ended in a very touching way. No character interactions or plot beats felt forced or cliché, and no forced identity politics which is always a plus.

The action scenes - of course they were amazing. Paired with the stellar animation, each action scene was brilliantly directed and choreographed. The start shows the turtles’ origin story is similar to most of the iterations with its own unique factors - in this case the ooze was created by Baxter Stockman.

The conflict of the plot was well written, the final act was great and ends with a hopeful and satisfying ending (there is a mid credit scene that teases something big for the series though!).

If it’s any consolation, it’s also very friendly to new fans of TMNT - I went with someone who has not seen any TMNT media before and they really liked it and understood it easily.

Characters: 9/10

Needless to say, all the characters were very well done. Despite its run time and large cast, each one feels grounded with their own unique personality.

For starters: the four main boys! They were done brilliantly - Mikey being hopeful and optimistic whilst naturally being empathetic, Raph channeling chaotic good energy with his iconic rage personality not being over the top, Donnie being a geek in the best way possible, and Leo trying to be a good leader and anxious, always looking out for his brothers but not a complete teachers pet. All very likeable, and I can’t wait to see them in the series!

Splinter: probably the best since 2003! Openly caring of his sons and worries a great deal about how humans will perceive them. Has his own trauma from his experience with humans so he tries to protect his sons by isolating them completely, but eventually realises that his own view of humans should not affect his son’s happiness and lets them fulfil their dream of trying to be accepted by humans even if he will never like humanity himself. Peak character development, 10/10.

Villain/s: all of them felt fleshed out and I look forward to seeing them in the series! Posed their own genuine threats with varying levels of morals. Again, all were fleshed out quite well and played a role in the story.

April: honestly, she didn’t have too much in it compared to the others but does play a key role in the final act and the ending itself. An interesting iteration of April, curious to see more of her.

Animation: 10000000/10

It was brilliant. What else can I say? Though inspired by Spider-verse it is its own style which is amazing to look at. It thrives in action scenes and landscapes. Another groundbreaking style that I hope to see influence others.

Music: 8/10

It slaps. Almost all of them I will be playing for the next week or so. The soundtracks really set the mood beautifully, especially the sombre track. Paired with the animation - ugh - chefs kiss

Overall Rating: 8/10

I am usually very very harsh with films, so for me to rate anything above a seven is basically unheard of. Probably my favourite movie of 2023, and my favourite TMNT movie. 2003 only just beats it overall but that’s mostly because I’ve known it for longer - who knows, a few more rewatches and it might overtake.

[aaamike]

Very Light JJK Spoilers

I’ve seen a lot of criticism about Sukuna as a villain. But I don’t think many people have taken the time to enjoy the time of big brain he is. We see this intelligence of his on full display during the Big Raga Incident.

- here upon ariving on the scene, Sukuna was able to deduce very quickly that:

1: Mahoraga is a Shikigami summoned by Megumi, despite never knowing about Mahoraga. Or the 10 shadows technique outside of what he’s learned from past battles during the Heian era and or his time in Yuji’s prison

2: Megumi’s subjugation ritual keeping him in a suspended state, and thus, he can’t die until Big Raga is dealt with.

3: Haruta staying alive being crucial to keeping Megumi alive throughout the ritual.

Sukuna is so familiar with Shikigami users and rituals associated to them, he’s able to figure in a few seconds everything that’s going on and what he probably needs to do. No other character in the series has demonstrated this level of analytical accuracy, this quickly.

- Here, Sukuna is able to identify what Mahoraga’s sword can do from their first exchange. It’s clear he’s seen or read about it before in the past. We don’t know all the battles he’s been a part of but he is clearly well versed in some ancient weapons as seen as during his battle with Kashimo.

Sukuna may be an avid enjoyer of his curse technique, Shrine, but he’s a fan of weapons, mainly in a lot of his Heian era artwork. Mainly a staff like weapon and then that lightning weapon he used against Kashimo. Let’s not forget to mention all of his past Heian era battles gave him a lot of experience. Who’s to say none of those sorcerers carried a cursed weapon. Based off of his current battle with our cast, he seems pretty used to sword users.

In short, Sukuna knows his way around cursed weapons, and is able identify what they’re capable of. He is also very capable of dealing with a weapon user, barehanded.

- lastly, we see Sukuna compare Big Raga to a something named Yamata no Orochi. Now Yamata no Orochi the Legendary 8 Headed/Tailed Dragon, in real life is a mythical creature first written about around the early 700s in Japan, “filled with malice” and eating young girl sacrifices every seven years. Later, Susanoo, the god of Storms, kills it. It’s known for having a few amazing powers but the main one is regeneration from damage, even death.

Now Sukuna may be referencing the actual mythology, since it was around during the Heian Era, which started at 794 AD and ended in 1185 AD. It’s plausible to assume Sukuna grew up well aware of the mythology. Or perhaps in the JJK universe, there was a Shikigami that may have created the legend we know today. Regardless, upon identifying how Big Raga preferred to stop his ops, via, adaptation, he activated Malevolent Shrine, to create the right conditions for him to use Fire Arrow.

(A quick aside for context, recently it’s been confirmed by Gege that Sukuna’s activation of Fire Arrow is simplified and buffed by the storm of cleave and dismantle turning everything into a fine powder in an air tight enviorment/ie his domain, so when the Fire Arrow activates, it causes an instantaneous explosion, disintegrating any and everything within the domain.)

I’m not saying the manga or anime implies Sukuna fought Yamata no Orochi, but it seems clear Sukuna knows how to deal with an adapting enemy: Obliderate it with an attack it can’t heal from, adapt to, or come back from.

I really enjoy how Gege writes action in JJK. In many cases, it tells you a lot about the characters involved and I believe the Mahoraga fight is one of the best, because it fully demonstrates how well experienced Sukuna is.

[torturedblue]

All my thoughts and theories of this adorable clip:

Guys the soundtrack in the background sounds so good and epic, and I’m so loving the use of hip hop and rap in every trailer. You forget how effective black music is for action movies too considering how little it’s used comparatively. And it’s another thing about this movie that gives off Spider-verse vibes 👏🏽

Oml guys MM Leo is just like 2012 he’s such a dork and he gets all pouty all the time and the way Raph trolls him about it is just like the 2012 duo 🥹

I’m sorry the way Leo smiles so much while reciting that horrible speech??? 😂 like it doesn’t matter what Splinter tells them it is gold that he will gobble up even if it is objectively prejudice

Speaking of which, “I know that’s objectively prejudice but it’s what Dad taught us” line is so relatable to most kids today like yikes what a motto of the 21st century

But it really makes me wonder what Splinter’s backstory is going to be in this iteration considering no other version has hated or had a gripe with the human race as far as I’ve seen. I assumed he was going to be formerly human too, although this clip makes it seem that might not be the case, but if he still is I think that makes his speech to the kids much more interesting and honestly hilarious because if any of us were in his position would we tell them much differently? I mean come on that “they lust to murder that which is different from them” is so spot on. And honestly we already teach kids everything else he said too when it comes to strangers 😂 humans are bad, don’t say hi, humans are everything wrong with this planet, do not interact or you will die 👍🏽

“We wouldn’t have K-Pop without humans!” Wtf he’s so pure ugh

“I’d love to have a champagne brunch with Tom Brady” OMG GUYS HE’S JUST SO PROPER AND DORKY AGH

“Drake! That guy is the GOAT of all time.” I’m sorry did I hear that right 😂 sweet simple Raph ya gotta know what the terms mean if you’re gonna use modern slang

“Guy Fieri seems like a fun hang” ooooh continuing with the Mikey is the cook character trope maybe?

I really think this whole bit here is an interesting way of setting up the mutants vs human premise of the movie with the turtles in the middle of it all. Especially the way Leo recites that anti-human speech so whole-heartedly but also still acknowledges that they all disagree with Splinter about how cool humans are. Especially since they likely keep their own beliefs about it from their Dad, which again, so relatable to kids of old-fashioned parents today

“oOh i’M tHe lEaDeR. You sound like you have bronchitis!” They way they mock and roast him is just too much and too accurate 😂 also I just love their overlapping conversational moments

Other thoughts:

Also I gotta say in these released clips Leo is pouting or anxious half of the time while his bros are always having fun and I just gotta see how much that’s amplified in the entirety of the movie… Like it makes it seems like he must feel some kind of rift between him and his brothers sometimes and I want to see if that’s true

These kids are truly on their own… They at least start off keeping their fondness of humans from Splinter, they still can’t interact with humans either way, they find a group of mutants like them and seem to hit it off at first but then it just turns a whole fiasco where they have to defend humans from them, and at some later point we know when they do interact with/are exposed to humans it does not go well. I’m so excited to see how they tackle that post-climactic depressive section of the movie where the boys are really feeling the weight of all of it. Like, not too many clips have been released and there’s already so much isolation on their end. I’m glad April will at least be one positive outlet for them

[attheendoftheline]

Hadestown is the show for callbacks and mirroring, probably the best example is the Groundhog Day esc ending in road to hell reprise. Though one of my favorites has to be Orpheus and Eurydice when compared to Hades and Persephone. I often see the comparisons being drawn Hades and Orpheus/Persephone and Eurydice but honestly I’m here to argue the opposite is really true. The only time these comparisons are really viable is when they’re personally being made (Epic III ‘was like me a man in love with a woman’ it really stops their comparison wise, and Persephone’s cut chant II verse directly to Eurydice ‘when I was a young girl like you’.)

If I raise my voice-

Persephone and Orpheus are a lot alike. This added to the fact that they are canonically some level of friends, he would have seen her since he was a kid and she general likes him etc. They both are the emotional , sensitive party in their relationship. Heart out on the sleeve— “I’ll sing from the rooftops of my love and I don’t care who here’s it I’m in love!” Types. Now Persephone has been working hard to…well repress herself. She drinks and drugs herself into oblivion trying to put up a persona of not caring just being fun and indifferent. She wants to give up but can’t! She’s doing all this because her heart aches, because hades became someone else entirely - and doesn’t accept she’s still the same. We see her wild and free in the mortal realm and her sort of speakeasy.

They both raise their voice. Orpheus has been beaten, cast aside, lost and confused and he still speaks out and raises a crowd, he still Carries some level of belief in that better world, in taking her home. Persephone has been beaten in another way and mostly by herself with her drinking— but the moment things get serious she stops. She yells at hades! This woman screams at the most powerful man around— she appeals to his emotion first just as Orpheus.

Now emotion isn’t weakness don’t even try to get that argument from this but both are very… heightened. Highs are highs , lows are low. Being a very gifted demigod and a goddess— yeah it’s gonna be larger then life. It effects others- Orpheus more literally with his voice being magic and Persephone as her moods are just infectious (if mamas happy everybody’s happy). Their first instinct is to fight and yell and protest when things aren’t right, call it out! God they’re so optimistic …even if persephone tries to make you believe she’s not, she’s a rebel. She runs a speakeasy as I said as well as actually seeing views out of the wall (confirmed in working on a song).. she wants the downfall, she wants a change, she wants spring just as anyone.

Keep your head low-

Hades and Eurydice aren’t any less emotional, they just bottle things up. They’re terrified to let anyone see the real them, see them vulnerable! That’s when the strike to kill happens… that’s when they get to you, whoever “they” may be. Eurydice hides herself behind her coat and by never staying long to begin with— stirred on by fate itself. Hades hides himself in his work, in his factories and walls- his iron fist is one so he may never show the flower within. They’ve been slighted one to many times. If they’re honest people will laugh, people will hurt them— the world is cruel! They are the pessimist to their lovers optimist. Seeing the worst of the world instead of the best.

I’m not saying Eurydice has the potential to turn into a fat cat industrialist, but I’m saying it’s interesting how much she aligns with hades and it humanizes him. Eurydice always had a greater potential to change and perhaps it’s because she’s younger- slighted but not scorned. She found the right person at the right time who broke so many rules of the world for her that it’s impossible not to become optimistic. She stands of what Hades could be/could have been. As even as Orpheus is close to making him completely change his mind and as his relationship heels he still! Falls back on order and his work. It’s a crutch, just like how running away is Eurydices.

I like when the characters themselves make a direct comparison- mainly In love to the gendered party but I don’t think it’s the one everyone should be making/setting as the standard. I just… hghhhh show has a lot going on and I’ll die for it. (Also look out for more bullet points I have a lot of stuff that can’t be full posts)

[unculturedmamoswine]

My fic for Forduary week 1: Childhood and school years!

This one is an HDM AU-- Ford's daemon settles and he's not that happy about it. Takes place in the same verse as this ficlet I posted a good while ago. (Short version of an HDM au: people's souls live outside their bodies in the shapes of animals. Kids' daemons can shapeshift but they settle into a permanent form during puberty.)

Ford settles first, not so long after his and Stanley’s Bar Mitzvah. He’s almost relieved. He kind of didn’t want Stan to be first, but he wouldn’t admit it to Stanley. It’s just that people expect Ford to be the more responsible one, and if his daemon’s settled, it’ll get people to take him more seriously. Stan wouldn’t understand that; his feelings would be hurt if he thought that Ford thought he was better than Stan. Not that he thinks that! Stan is the best. The best brother and friend and the bravest and toughest and most fun and lots of other stuff, besides. But he’s not very responsible, and Ford can’t even quite admit it to himself that he loves being seen as responsible when compared to Stan.

So Ford should be really glad that Elisheba’s settled. They’re the perfect age for it, right smack dab in the middle of the bell curve– they’re normal about something for once. It’s just that he can’t understand her form. They used to fantasize about what she’d become, like all kids probably do. Ellie loved to be an arctic tern– a bird that’s always migrating! And they can sleep while they’re flying! That would have been so cool! And she was a green iguana a lot, and even a Tasmanian tiger! Almost nobody had an extinct animal for a daemon– that would have been really impressive. And if it set them apart, made them even more different than their peers, who cared? Ford could take it. He’d had everyone making fun of him for his hands his whole life, he could stand it if people thought his daemon was too different or strange. But Ellie’s form, the thing she’s going to be forever, well. He’s just not sure about it.

Castor canadensis, North American beaver, isn’t really… him. Right? She isn’t anything particularly interesting or special. Nobody brilliant or noteworthy ever had a beaver for a daemon. No inventors or explorers or anything. In movies, do hard-boiled detectives or chiseled leading men have beavers for daemons? No, they don’t. The only beaver daemons in movies and on TV are laundresses or scolding mothers.

The only person Ford’s ever seen in real life with a beaver daemon is a mechanic. A Catholic mechanic with a beaver daemon and arthritis.

“I don’t really get it, Ellie,” says Elisabeth, Stan’s daemon. She’s on the floor of their room next to Elisheba, a red fox at the moment, sniffing at her. “Is being a beaver really that great?” She becomes a perfect copy of Elisheba and loudly smacks her tail against the living room floor. “Oh, that’s pretty fun!” They both laugh and slap the floor until they hear a distant shout from Dad.

“Okay, I guess the tail-slapping is alright,” Stan tells him skeptically, “but not that great. You could just drop one of your books on the floor and get the same effect.” Lisa pops into the air as a hornet and buzzes teasingly around Ford’s head.

“You’re just jealous,” he laughs as he bats Lisa away, wishing that he didn’t agree with Stanley.

-

Ford kicks his feet against the hull of the Stan o’ War. He’s holding a schoolbook, but staring out at the ocean. He should be doing his homework while he waits for Stan to get out of detention, but instead he’s brooding. Elisheba sighs behind him, and Ford frowns. He doesn’t want to turn around and see her squat little form, her dopey face, her long orange teeth. It’s been two days since she settled, and he still doesn’t know how to feel about it.

“You’re just going to have to deal with it,” she says resentfully, breaking their hours-long silence.

“I don’t have to deal with anything. I’m fine. I’m happy! It’s good that we’ve settled,” Ford tells her, feeling his jaw settle into a mulish expression. He can hear her clawed forepaws dig into the planks of the deck. He rounds on her, ready to scold her for clawing up their dilapidated wreck, but he looks straight into her eyes and finds he can’t get a word out.

Elisheba stares back at him, burning with the resentment and disappointment that feels too big for Ford’s chest to hold. Of course she feels the same, how could she not? She’s him, the biggest, truest, most important part of himself. That's the problem.

“I just didn’t think that we’d… be like this.” He feels ashamed to say it to her, even if they both think it. It feels like some kind of betrayal.

“We are who we are!” Ellie slaps her tail on the deck for emphasis. “This form just feels right, what does it matter exactly what I am if we’re still ourself?”

“Hey, break it up!” Lisa flaps up over the side of the Stan o’ War in her largest avian form, a brown pelican. She alights heavily on the deck next to Ellie, reaching a wing out over her as if to shelter her from harsh sunlight. “Man, this is why you need me around, Sixer,” she says lightly. “You get yourself into trouble when you think too much.”

Stan struggles up onto the deck, flopping down with an oof. He sits up, taking in Ford, standing facing his daemon and Stan’s, fists clenched. Ford knows he must be bright red, and hopes Stan thinks it’s all anger.

Stan, who is sometimes so able to be cool under pressure, shrugs off his heavy backpack and his jacket, leaving them behind him in a heap on the deck. The wind flutters through his and Ford’s hair, and ruffles Elisabeth’s feathers.

“Hi, Stanley. How was detention?” Ford mumbles, hoping to change the subject before Stan can even start it.

“Fired six spitballs onto Miss Lackson’s dress without her noticing even once!” Stan says proudly. Lisa preens. “And I even got some homework done, so you don’t have to do it all,” he adds impressively.

Ellie laughs. “My hero,” she teases, and nudges Lisa so hard she has to open her wings so as not to fall over. Ford snickers.

“You should be grateful!” Stan insists, all overblown indignation. Ford knows it’s just to make him laugh, but that doesn’t mean it doesn’t work. “Here I am slaving away, learning crap outta books that I’m never gonna use just so you don’t have to do my homework, and you’re here talking to yourself like a crazy kid!”

“I’m not crazy, you’re craz– hey!” Ford grabs for Elisheba as Lisa opens her beak wide, trying to fit Ford’s daemon into her cavernous mouth. Before Ford can grab Ellie, she hisses viciously, flashing her long orange teeth at her brother. With a whoop of delight, Lisa turns into one of her favorite forms, a caiman, and snaps her jaws right back at Ellie.

“Hah!” Stan flings himself at Ford, grabbing him in a headlock while he’s distracted by Lisa’s many sharp teeth trying to take a bite out of Elisheba’s new, permanent tail.

“Hey, I’m planning on keeping that tail, Lisa!” Elisheba yelps, naturally echoing Ford’s thought. “Ow! Stanley!” Stan’s knuckles dig into Ford’s scalp. Ford flails his hands blindly in the direction of Stan’s body, completely forgetting anything he might have learned in boxing.

“Say uncle, Poindexter!” Stan demands gleefully. Ford raises his foot to kick Stan in the shin– it’s a dirty move, which Stan should approve of–but Stan gasps and lets him go before Ford goes for it.

As he straightens up, Ford has a brief impression of Elisheba between Lisa’s shoulders, claws gripping crocodilian hide and incisors digging into her head, perilously close to Lisa’s eye. Lisa turns into a dingo and shakes Ellie off her back with a slight yelp. She bounds over to Stan.

“Wow, jeez, ease up, Fangs,” Lisa complains, as Stan cradles her head in his hands, inspecting it for damage.

“Eh, don’t be such a baby, Ellie ain’t gonna blind us,” he tells her. Still, he strokes her ears gently.

“Yeah, I had everything under control,” Ellie says, panting. “When have we ever blinded you before? The trend would suggest that we will continue not to gouge out any of your body parts.”

Ford, grinning, leans down to pick Ellie up. She’s heavy– must be almost forty pounds. They haven't weighed her yet, which they should. And they need to find out how fast she can run– can she even run? He doesn’t know, but he’ll find out.

“That was pretty good, Ellie!” Stan, satisfied that his soul will survive, reaches out and ruffles the fur on the back of Ellie’s neck.

“Stan!” Ford tugs her away from his reach, embarrassed. They’re getting too old to touch each other’s daemons like they did when they were small. That kind of thing is only for babies and really little kids, which they definitely aren’t. “You shouldn’t do that!”

Stan goes on like Ford hasn’t spoken. “You can fight pretty good in that form, but what else can I expect from a guy with metal teeth?”

“What?” Ford laughs.

“Yeah! Stan opens his own mouth and points inside as if that explains anything. “Beavers got iron in their teeth, that’s how come they’re orange! It’s like rust!”

“How do you know that?” Ford asks suspiciously. 

“I know stuff! I know everything! Specially everything about you,” Stan insists, as Lisa wags her tail charmingly.

“Come on!” Ford punches Stan in the shoulder, grinning at his brother. “You don’t just know that magically! Unless…” Ford scratches his chin, wincing as he scrapes a pimple with his nail.

“Don’t bring up aliens,” Lisa groans.

“It’s a known fact that the protective anti-alien-scanning machinery the government uses to protect national secrets interferes with human brainwaves!” Ford crosses his arms, eyeing Stan suspiciously. “Have you been having headaches? Dreaming about nuclear launch codes?”

Stan groans. “God, Ford, you’re the biggest nerd! I read it in a book, okay?” Stan slumps over to his backpack, Ford following curiously. He pulls two thick books from it, turning and offering them to Stanford. “Here. I figured, you know, you’re a huge geek, you’d wanna read up on Ellie’s form and stuff.”

Ford sets Ellie down, then kneels so she can look at the covers with him. Rodents of North America says one, and Beaver: America’s Engineer says the other.

It’s so strange to feel so many ways at once. It’s surprising, and not, that Stan would do this; Stan would do anything for him, and Ford knows that. But that Stan would do this, specifically, go to the library– the city library! Those are city library stickers on the spines, they aren’t even from the school! All just for him, because Stan is his brother and the only person in Ford’s corner. He grateful, really. It's a nice thing for Stan to do, but there’s a little part of him that’s annoyed that Stan could read him so well. Shouldn’t he get to have some feelings that are private? Oh well. Ford shoves that down, and tries to just be grateful.

Made nervous by Ford’s silence, Lisa says “We didn’t look that close at ‘em but there’s some cool stuff in there. About your fur and your teeth and all the stuff beavers can build. And you’re gonna be a real good swimmer! That’ll be handy if we’re ever lost at sea!” She wags her tail vigorously and nuzzles Ellie, who presses herself close in response.

“Yeah, yeah,” Stan nudges the daemons apart with his foot, as uncomfortable as Ford is with all the mushy stuff. “Look, point is… uh.” He scratches at the back of his head.

Ford jumps in to save them both from the awkwardness. “I get it, Stan, really.” He hugs the books to his chest. He’ll say it, partly because he means it, and partly because he should probably mean it more than he does.

“Thank you.”

[jkuniverz]

Ok, first long MSM post, let’s see how this goes.

Do you ever think about how all the Rare Core Seasonals follow a specific design principle? While the Commons are basic embodiments of whatever holiday they’re meant to represent, the Rares tend to take a negative aspect of that holiday and incorporate it into their design.

For example, let’s look at Punkleton for a second:

Pumpkin head, skeletal body, autumnal leaves decorating the neck and arms- yup, this sure is a Halloween Monster all right!

So what about Rare Punkleton then?

Well, since the poor guys’s head decomposes faster than usual, it dresses up in a paper bag to help hide itself from other Monsters. It’s taking the Halloween aspect of costumes and dressing up and using it to cover up this Monster’s insecurity, especially since it uses a brown paper bag to cover its head, which often in media represents embarrassment or shame at oneself.

I’m not sure if I did the *best* job at describing that, but looking at the other Rare Core Seasonals will hopefully better convey what I mean.

So, we’ve got:

-Rare Yool: based off of the Grinch and social outcasts

-Rare Schmoochle: have had conflicts and quarrels with one another

-Rare Blabbit: inversely steals Monster Eggs and covers its tracks well

-Rare Hoola: uses their extra hoop to distract Monsters while tricking them

…Ok, so the theme between them is a little loose, but hopefully you’re able to understand what I’m getting at. There’s some negative aspect to its respective holidays that the Rare Seasonals incorporate into its design and lore.

…but that’s just the Rare Core Seasonals. What about the Rare Auxiliary Seasonals? Do they follow this design principle as well?

Let’s take a look at the current 3 Rare Auxiliary Seasonals:

Rare Gobbleygourds have an indomitable will to try and fly- it’s all they really do. How this is supposed to be a negative aspect of Thanksgiving is… beyond me. Maybe it’s that it mirrors Gobbleygourd’s intense desire to feed everyone during Feast-Ember, but all Rare Gobbleygourd does it hurt itself? I don’t know.

All that we know about Rare Jam Boree is that it’s made of chocolate (or rather, chokkolit), and it may have something to do with poems, as it’s ingame Bio reads like one. Maybe Rare Jam Boree likes to write poems in celebration of events? It’s definitely a more deep and meaningful way to celebrate, by writing it down in contrast to plain partying, so there’s that.

Finally, there’s Rare Clavavera. I’m not too familiar with the Day of the Dead holiday, so I don’t really feel confident about pointing out any sort of reference it may have to its real life holiday equivalent. Though, it’s Bio does state that, “Unique to the Rare… is a special interest in writing of short, witty verses that poke light-hearted fun at those same ancestors”, so that may be the aspect of the Monster that fits with the Rare Seasonal theme?… though, I can’t say for sure.

It doesn’t look like the old Rare Seasonal design philosophy is being followed necessarily anymore, at least not with my analysis. Maybe it is, and I’m just not realizing it. Maybe there’s no such thing as a design theme with Rare Seasonals and I’m just a crazy man on the internet rambling about something that doesn’t matter. Regardless of that, I’m going to make small predictions for the next two Rare Aux Seasonals anyways that follow this probably made-up theme, and no one’s going to stop me.

The next Rare Seasonal to be released will be Rare Carillong, coming sometime soon. For it, I predict it to be based off of/poke fun at New Year Resolutions, and more specifically, how no one can ever follow them. The design would be more rugged and unkempt compared to the Common Carillong’s, maybe with frizzled hair, wear showing on the Chimekeeper, and so on. It’d be funny to imagine Rare Carillong as a hypocrite, preaching about turning over a new leaf and setting goals at the start of the year that it itself clearly doesn’t follow.

After that, we’ve got Rare Ffidyll, which I think would be cool if it were the unluckies Monster in the Monster World. Its nose can only sniff out disaster instead of money, it would look slightly beaten from all sorts of comical trouble it’s gotten in, and to show how unlucky it is, its clover hat would only have three petals.

Will these be accurate predictions for the next two Rare Aux Seasonals, following this theme I may have made up? Probably not. But it would be funny!

[sesamestreep]

Taylor Swift prompts: Matt/Foggy, 13

13. hands around a cold glass (from the SECOND Taylor Swift prompt list) I was struggling with some writer's block a few weeks ago and my dearest Zainab was kind enough to give me permission to write a tiny Matt/Foggy-centric one-shot set in her Great British Bake-Off AU and I absolutely leapt at the chance, because I love this 'verse and I've been bothering her with texts about what these two would be up to in that AU since like January. I think this makes sense without reading her previous entries in the series (which focus primarily on Sam and Bucky, with an ensemble cast of other MCU characters), but you should read them anyway because they're very good and they will make your life better! Cross-posted to AO3 here (with more notes) if that's your jam 🍯

Even though they’ve set aside their evening for the express purpose of making a decision, Foggy waits until they’ve finished the takeout they ordered to the office (neutral ground, so no one has home field advantage) and cleaned up all the various cartons and silverware and settled back at the conference table with each of their second beers of the night before he brings up the thing they’re supposed to be talking about.

“Okay,” Foggy says, setting his beer down firmly and flipping a page over on his legal pad to find where he scribbled some notes earlier. “Reason number one that you should move into my apartment: you love me.”

“You can’t use that as one of your reasons,” Matt replies, tapping a pen against the table in a fidgety gesture that’s unlike him.

“Why not?”

“Because you also love me, which means you should move into my apartment. They cancel each other out!”

“Oh, my bad,” Foggy says, as he crosses it off his list. “I didn’t know we were playing by Boggle rules…”

Matt scrunches his nose in confusion. “I’m not familiar.”

“Really?” he asks. “You don’t know Boggle? It’s like a classic word game, you have these little cubes with letters on them that you shake and—you know what, saying it out loud, it makes sense that you haven’t played it. I understand that now. It would be impossibly boring even if there was a braille version. Moving on! Reason number two that you should move in with me!”

“Okay…”

“I’m super handsome.”

“Foggy!”

“What?”

Matt shakes his head. “I’m also handsome,” he says, quietly, after a minute.

“Damn, that’s true,” Foggy says, as if it had never occurred to him.

“Please take this seriously!”

“Fine! Reason number three: I have a lot more stuff than you do. It will take me so long to pack and it will probably make me cry and possibly throw up. You, comparatively, would have a much easier time packing, because you live like a weird, sad monk.”

“Hey! I do not! Just because I don’t like clutter…”

“Until we started dating, you owned one singular blanket,” Foggy points out. “It was a blanket for your bed and your couch that you moved back and forth as needed.”

“It was a perfectly good system,” Matt grumbles.

“Right, but isn’t it better now that you have a bed blanket and a couch blanket?”

“I guess,” Matt admits, as though he’s being tormented. “To be fair, it would probably take you at least a week just to pack up all of your cookbooks.”

“I don’t have that many!”

“You bought three new ones last week! That’s already three more than I own!”

“I can’t help it that my friends keep writing cookbooks,” Foggy objects. “What was I supposed to do, Matt? Not buy Daisy’s book?”

Matt crosses his arms, irritably. “No, but you didn’t know the authors of the other two books you bought. You could’ve skipped theirs.”

“Cookbooks make me happy! I don’t tell you not to…go to the gym!”

“You do, in fact, tell me that all the time.”

Foggy makes a hand gesture that’s meant to convey the sentiment of duh, except that such things are generally lost on Matt, for obvious reasons. “Yeah, well, usually it’s because I want you to stay in bed longer.”

“And I want you to own fewer cookbooks so that there’s room in the apartment for us to actually have a bed.”

“Okay, fine,” he concedes. “Give me one of your reasons, then.”

“I know where everything is in my apartment,” Matt says, simply, “whereas at your place, I’m always looking in the wrong cabinets for stuff or tripping over things.”

“That’s just because you’re not as used to it. I’d go through the same thing if I moved to your place!”

“You’d still have an easier time of it than me.”

“That’s…fair,” Foggy concedes. “I can’t really disagree with that without being an asshole.”

“My favorite way to win an argument,” Matt replies, with a smile. “Playing the blind card.”

Foggy shakes his head. “You devious son of a bitch.”

“Also, my apartment is closer to the office and my rent is cheaper.”

“I’ll give you the cheap rent thing, though it is only because of that terrible billboard with the crazy LED lights that come through your windows at all hours, which does not bother you but would definitely bother me.”

“I remember you sleeping through three separate fire drills in college. I think you’d somehow manage to deal with the unique lighting situation of this apartment.”

“Fine,” Foggy admits, begrudgingly. “But I absolutely contest it being a mark in your favor that your apartment is closer to the office. I think it helps with work-life balance that my place is a little farther away.”

Matt thinks this over for a moment and then nods. “Okay, fine. We’ll call it a draw.”

“Good. Moving on, then. Reason number…whatever that my apartment is better: I live right next door to that bodega with those amazing breakfast sandwiches and the good, cheap coffee you love.”

“Fuck,” Matt says, with feeling. “That’s a really good point.”

“Yeah, it is!”

“Okay,” he says, in the tone Foggy’s been hearing him use in court and mock trials and even drunken debates for over a decade now.  It means Matt is currently running through his rebuttal in his mind, devising the best and most efficient way to win this round. Foggy loves that tone of voice, and the expression of intense thought that always accompanies it, even if it usually means he's about to lose whatever argument they're having. He really should be more immune to it by now, but love has made him weak and he's truly not even mad about it.

“My apartment,” Matt says, finally, “has an in-unit washer and dryer.”

That’s a solid point, but Foggy is not going to admit defeat so easily. “Okay,” he says, “but—counterpoint—mine has a dishwasher!”

“I don’t mind hand washing dishes,” Matt replies with a shrug.

“Wait until you live with me to say that,” Foggy says. “I bake all the time! It’s a lot of dishes!”

“It’s still not as bad as having to go to a laundromat and pay whenever you need to do laundry!”

“Well, my landlord says the machines in the basement will be fixed soon, so my laundromat days are numbered.”

“I will believe that when I see it.”

“You can’t see anything, sweetheart.”

“Exactly,” Matt says, smugly. He may have a point. Foggy’s landlord has been saying the washing machines will be fixed “soon” for six months now.

Foggy blows out a breath, making as much noise as humanly possible to express his frustration. “So, where does that leave us? Is somebody winning?”

Matt laughs and distractedly runs a finger through the layer of condensation on his beer bottle, dividing it down the middle with a thick line. “Honestly, I don’t know. It feels like we’re even, at this point.”

“In the spirit of honesty, then, can I ask you something?”

Matt shrugs, the gesture completely at odds with how tense the rest of his body became at the question. “Sure.”

“You do want to move in with me, right?” Foggy asks, hating himself a little for even needing to. “I know we’ve discussed it, and you said you wanted to, but it’s okay if you’re not ready yet or you changed your mind. It’s a big step—”

Matt leans forward to cover Foggy’s hand with his own, letting his fingers, still cold and damp from holding the glass, brush over Foggy’s wrist, raising goosebumps in their wake. “Of course I want to! Does it seem like I don’t?”

“No, it’s just—I know you like your space and that you value your independence a lot, and I get that but I also don’t necessarily relate to it on the same level. I wouldn’t want to pressure you into doing something that’s going to make you miserable.”

“Well, for one thing, you’re not pressuring me and living with you is not going to make me miserable. It will do the opposite, in fact.”

“Yeah, but—”

“It’s not even going to be our first time living together, dumbass,” Matt says, fondly. “You do remember college, don’t you?”

“Very little of it, in fact,” Foggy quips. “I think I was drunk for most of Spring 2010. It’s more or less a blank spot.”

“Still, we didn’t hate living together then, did we?”

“No,” Foggy replies. “One could even argue that we loved living together.”

“And that was with us sleeping in twin beds. Imagine how much better it will be, uh…not in twin beds…”

Foggy stifles a laugh. “Matt, did you seriously get all blushy at the idea of a queen sized bed?”

“No,” Matt says, tipping his chin down to hide his face. "Shut up!"

“You’re so cute. I want to have sex with you immediately.”

“No! No sex! In fact, I’m breaking up with you.”

“No, you’re not! You love me!”

“Yes, I do,” Matt says, sullenly, “And for what it’s worth, I only got embarrassed because it felt like I was implying that we slept together in our dorm in college, which obviously wasn’t true and I didn’t want to…”

“You didn’t want to admit how big of a crush you had on me back then, I get it,” Foggy says. “Oh, wait, sorry! That was me!”

“Again: shut up!”

“Okay, but now you’ve got me thinking: maybe we should do twin beds…”

“Foggy,” Matt groans.

“I don’t want our relationship to be in violation of the Hays Code, Matt!”

“Well, we’re both men, so that ship has already sailed, I’m afraid…”

“I’m just saying: if it’s good enough for Mary Tyler Moore and Dick Van Dyke, it should be good enough for us!”

“To each their own, I guess, but I sleep better when I share a bed with you.”

“I’ll pretend your reasons are romantic,” Foggy says, aiming for sarcasm and missing by a wide margin, “and not just because you turn into a koala when you sleep.”

“Have you considered being less huggable, maybe?” Matt asks, with a straight face.

“That’s like asking the sun to be less radiant! It is counter to my very nature!”

He smiles. “Fair point.”

Foggy leans back in his chair, making sure to keep his fingers tangled together with Matt’s as he does. He sighs, closing his eyes, and tries to come up with an answer to their problem. It’s a big step for their relationship and huge life changes tend to require sacrifice or compromise on some level, but it’s difficult to think of an option that doesn’t require much more of that from one of them than the other. Except…

“I have a very stupid idea,” Foggy announces. 

“Okay,” Matt replies, warily.

“And I know it’s stupid, okay? I just said that, but I want to be very clear that I’m aware of it. I’m just going to say it anyway, to put it out there.”

“Okay…”

“Should we just look for a place together?”

Matt furrows his brow, puzzling through the implications of this option. “As in, we both leave our current apartments for a completely new one?”

“Yeah. That way we both have to pack, and move, and get used to a new space, instead of only one of us having to do it. I know it’s more expensive and more trouble, so—“

“Is it weird that it makes me feel better?” Matt asks. “The idea that we’d both have to be inconvenienced, equally?”

“No,” Foggy admits. “It makes me feel better too. I want it to feel equal. And we could find a bigger place, maybe with an extra room.”

“For an office?”

Foggy laughs. “Honestly, it’s a sign of how low my standards are that I’m just relieved your mind didn’t go immediately to an in-home gym.”

Matt’s eyebrows lift, excitedly. “We could find a building that has a gym, though.”

“Like you’d ever cheat on Fogwell’s like that.”

“I meant for cross-training…”

“Of course you did,” Foggy says, rolling his eyes. “We could make a list. Things we need—“

“Close to the bodega with the good coffee,” Matt interjects, smiling.

“And a functional laundry room, somewhere on site,” Foggy adds, nodding. “And then a list of things that would be nice to have, like a gym or no nearby billboards that will fry my retinas in the middle of the night.”

“So, you’re saying we’d get to debate and write out two more lists?” Matt asks. “Are you trying to seduce me right now? In our office? Where solemn attorney-ing is done?”

“No, it just comes so naturally to me,” Foggy replies, running his thumb over Matt’s knuckles affectionately. “Though it sounds to me like that’s a yes?”

Matt gives him a surprised look. “Yes to…?”

“God, keep your pants on for two minutes, Murdock! I’m talking about the plan!”

“Oh, yeah. The plan. I mean, I know it’s more work for us and more trouble, but…”

“I’d go through a lot more trouble for your sake, if it means making you happy,” Foggy says, simply. It’s the truth, and he tries to make it a habit to say what he means, especially with Matt. It took them long enough to get here. What’s the point in hiding how he feels now?

Matt rests his chin in the hand that isn’t holding Foggy’s. “You’re very sweet, you know that?”

“I’ve heard it before, once or twice.”

“I don’t know what I did to get so lucky.”

“You smiled at me once when we were eighteen and it was all over for me. And then fifteen years later, you got jealous of a woman I met on a reality show and finally fell in love with me.”

Matt turns an adorable shade of pink and takes his hand away to cross his arms petulantly over his chest. “That’s not true.”

“Oh, so it didn’t take me going to a wedding with one of my best friends under completely platonic circumstances for you to admit you had feelings for me?” Foggy asks, grinning.

“I don’t recall, actually,” Matt says, primly, as he reaches for his beer again and takes an uninterested sip. 

“Speaking of Daisy,” Foggy says, enjoying this way too much, “I should talk to her. She and Daniel said their realtor from when they moved was great. They might be able to put us in touch with someone.”

“We could always use the realtor who rented me my place,” Matt suggests, in the neutral tone of someone who definitely wouldn’t rather eat glass than ask Daisy for help with anything. “She was very helpful and I remember she gave me her card. I could probably find it.”

“Yeah, she gave you her card because she wanted to sleep with you,” Foggy says, shaking his head. “Pass.”

“You don’t have to be jealous, Foggy,” Matt replies, with an evil smile. “She showed me the apartment under completely platonic circumstances.”

Foggy rolls his eyes at that. “You’ve never been in platonic circumstances with anyone, Matt! Every person who meets you wants to sleep with you immediately.”

Matt shrugs, like this means nothing. “Too bad for them. I have a boyfriend.”

“Oh, yeah?” Foggy laughs. “Is it serious?”

Matt nods, and his smile isn’t evil at all anymore. “Very,” he says. “We’re moving in together.”

[satoruhour]

t, i loved your comparisons of gojo/shoko/geto as a piano trio. if i could maybe offer an alternative viewpoint, one that isn't neatly tied up but i think fits their (at least high school) personalities better

1. geto's absolutely cello coded, you nailed it on the head. no thoughts there

2. gojo is also violin coded, i would maybe argue that he can be piano coded but i'm a pianist so i see a lot of pianistic qualities about him. pianists are often singled out, since we're not quite part of an orchestra, but we operate independently and are responsible for so many instruments to show off. also, the amount of solo piano rep is pretty much infinite, no one can possibly comprehend how much music there exists for pianists. the solo and isolating nature of the piano also lends itself quite well to gojo's personality, being that he's the "honored one" - gojo would be an infuriatingly good solo pianist, completely untouchable and godlike

3. imma be honest - shoko's more of a viola to me than piano. violas are often overlooked, but their range in between violin and cellos is so so important. also they read alto clef comfortably, which confuses violinists (read: gojo being confused by reversed cursed technique initially). there's also not many violists compared to violin and cello (supply is low, demand is high though). when a viola has a melody, the darkness it carries in its timbre i think matches shoko really well

for the sake of a piano trio, i'm with you there. i just personally see that trio as all string players 👍🏼

omg ofcofc I LOVED THIS THANK U 4 GIVING ME UR VIEW POINT !!!!! i love ur point abt pianos being singled out, really fits that ‘strongest’ thing he has going on where he’s so untouchable both literally and figuratively! and gojo’s technique is so... all-rounded for some reason and that comparison of the endless pieces of piano repertoire relates to that

and NOOO omg tbh i have NO idea about anything relating to a viola, hell i’ve never even played in an orchestra before or done shows bc im more of a beginner but YES! i was trying to find something for shoko and i tried to fit it into the piano but it didn’t really fit that well, but i could see some qualities of her that could be compared to a piano. the overlooked part yes yes! it mirrors that part of the manga where she mentioned “i was there too, you dumbass”, referring to gojo’s and geto’s whole shebang and how geto was her friend too, no matter how much jjk’s whole story sort of revolves around stsg’s conflict. also alto clef is insane!!! i have no idea how to convert it lolol and that detail of gojo being confused by her technique is so yum! can’t believe i didn’t see that before. i would also note that shoko’s RCT is not that rare but also not that common, coming back to your point on supply vs demand! and yess, shoko’s morbid personality really fits the viola as well - but i’m not that well versed in violas or viola repertoire to comment much <3 BUT THANK U 4 UR INPUT

when i first saw you comment about that music being fuckable LMAO i was like “so real” and then this came to me randomly while also keeping you in mind. this epiphany helped me to finish my assignment — i’ve never typed so fast loool!

[valhallakonbi]

Nadeko Sengoku and puns

i thought i would write about some wordplay on here to take my mind off things. i think some of this stuff is common sense but there’s also more double-meanings you might not find reading subtitles or translator’s notes alone.

please note that i am not fluent in japanese! if this post is missing anything or if i’m wrong about something, definitely let me know!

i chose to write about Nadeko because she’s the most punny character that comes to mind. of course most of them have something punny going on, but Nadeko’s name itself is a double pun, and so is Otorimonogatari as a title. i also want to talk about the Renai Circulation lyrics.

first things first, Nadeko’s full name is spelled as follows: 千石 Sengoku (surname) 撫子 Nadeko (first name)

literal readings of the writing for Nadeko 撫子 include “dianthus girl” or “caressable child”. 撫 means dianthus (a type of flower, the traditional japanese one is pink and is called dianthus superbus) and 撫でる, a verb, means “to stroke, to caress”. most japanese first names ending in -ko use the 子 kanji (”girl, child”) as a suffix, which denotes that they are feminine.

together, the two kanji 撫子 can be read as “Nadeko”, but the most common reading is “Nadeshiko”. Nadeshiko is a first name as well but it is also synonymous with Yamato Nadeshiko, the “ideal woman” archetype in japan : soft, graceful, humble, good-natured, faithful, etc. in Renai Circulation, some of the puns make reference to the Yamato Nadeshiko archetype (keep reading for direct quotes).

the surname Sengoku 千石 means “a thousand stones”. a lot of people have noticed this but Sengoku is pronounced the exact same as the name of the japanese period of continuous civil war that eventually led to the unification of japan and put an end to the feudal system. it is written differently though, Sengoku 戦国 (war + country), so i don’t know how relevant this one is (i can’t remember but this could’ve been mentioned once or twice in canon?)

now, onto Renai Circulation, because there’s one particular verse i really like:

Senri no michi mo ippo kara! (Even a lengthy journey begins with a single step!) Ishi no you ni katai sonna ishi de (With this determination, hard as a stone) Chiri mo tsumoreba Yamato Nadeshiko? (If dust is piled up, then Yamato Nadeshiko?) "Shi" nuki de (Without the “shi”) Iya shinukide! (No, I’ll go all out!)

i roughly translated it line by line above but as you can tell, it is incomprehensible in english since none of the puns hold up.

i’ll break this down further with more thorough translations :

Senri no michi mo ippo kara!  (Even a lengthy journey begins with a single step!)

“senri” (”long distance, lengthy”) means “a thousand ri”, with ri being a japanese unit of measurement. think of it as if in english “thousand mile-long” was a phrase commonly used as a euphemism to describe something that goes on for a great distance. the use of the word “senri” is interesting because the “sen” 千 in senri 千里 is the same as the one in Sengoku 千石 (”a thousand stones”).

Ishi no you ni katai sonna ishi de (With this determination, hard as a stone)

in japanese, the words “determination, will, volition” 意志 and “stone” 石 are pronounced the same, ishi, but written differently. the character for stone 石 can be read ishi like it is here, but also koku, like in the surname Sengoku 千石 (koku turns into -goku because it forms a liaison with the previous syllable)

Chiri mo tsumoreba Yamato Nadeshiko? (If dust is piled up, then Yamato Nadeshiko?)

this one makes no sense in english but it is the punniest line out of the whole verse!!! i love it. there’s a proverb in japanese that goes, Even dust, when piled up, turns into a mountain. it’s basically the “Mighty oaks from little acorns grow” of japanese, “small yet repeated efforts lead to great achievements”.

in romaji, the proverb goes “Chiri mo tsureba yama to naru”. compare with the above, “Chiri mo tsureba Yamato Nadeshiko”. the “yama to naru” (which means “to turn into a mountain”) is replaced with Yamato Nadeshiko. (in the official lyrics, the japanese line is written in full hiragana)

"Shi" nuki de (Without the “shi”) Iya shinukide! (No, I’ll go all out!)

in reference to the previous line: without the “shi”, “Yamato Nadeshiko” becomes “Yamato Nadeko”.

a literal reading of “shinukide!” 死ぬ気で (from the last line) would be, “with the feeling like one is dying”. as a common saying, it means “to go all out”, “to desperately give it one’s all”, “to go at it like hell”, etc. the pun here is pretty straightforward : “Shi” nuki de and shinukide are pronounced the same.

that’s it for the Renai Circulation verse!

now onto Otorimonogatari! Otorimonogatari 囮物語 is the first Monogatari arc narrated by Nadeko. it means “lure tale” or “decoy story”.

if you compare the writing for Otorimonogatari and the writing for Bakemonogatari, a first pun emerges :

Bakemonogatari  化物語 Otorimonogatari  囮物語

the “otori” kanji is the same as the “bake” kanji, it’s only difference being as if written inside a mouth 口 kanji (which makes sense for a “lure” kanji if you think about it).  化 + 口 = 囮 (as a side note, Hanamonogatari 花物語 uses the same formula, the kanji for “hana” 花 (flower) is the same as “bake” 化, only with a grass radical over it)

this is pretty neat on its own, but we can go further with the mouth 口 kanji. the writing for “snake” (hebi) in japanese is 蛇. in Otorimonogatari, Mr. Serpent, aka Kuchinawa-san in japanese, is introduced. “serpent” is a great localization for “Kuchinawa”, because kuchinawa is actually a more archaic reading of the 蛇 (snake) kanji mentioned previously. this reading comes from the writing 朽ち縄 kuchinawa “rotten rope”, but kuchinawa can also be written “rope with a mouth” 口縄. it seems like “rotten rope” was more common, but for the sake of the pun i really like the mouth thing. it circles back to otori 囮.

in the novel, Kuchinawa is written using katakana クチナワ (ku-chi-na-wa), and in the anime his giant form has 蛇 ideograms floating around inside him, so i would say this one isn’t necessarily intentional.

welp that’s it! thanks for reading!!!!

[girlreviews]

Review #46: Graceland, Paul Simon

It makes sense to do Graceland next, right? Ha. You might think I’m gonna fucking rip on it after that last post but I did say I loved it, and I do.

Here’s the thing: I think Paul Simon is a twerp. I could write a white paper on his ego and pretentiousness. That ego and pretentiousness would factor into whatever section that covered the controversy surrounding the production and creation of Graceland. That’s a nuanced discussion. He’s still a twerp.

However, he’s a twerp that made a damn near perfect album on this occasion. I’m going to have to keep myself in check or this review will itself turn into a white paper. Simon recorded some of the album with South African musicians including The Boyoyo Boys and Ladysmith Black Mambazo in Johannesburg, and remaining parts in the US with other guest artists like Linda Ronstadt and The Everly Brothers (!!). Unlike his previous work, since he had always been a singer-songwriter type, the music came first and the lyrics came last. This, is SO fascinating to me, because the lyrics are two things in Graceland:

One: Completely disconnected from the sound of the music behind them compared to the lyrical content, which I have always thought just somehow works. Songs about Memphis, songs about New York City, but sung over South African street music.

Two: Absolutely stunning. Masterful. Some of the best to ever be written and sung. I will have a lot of trouble not quoting entire verses. And I don’t always feel this way about Paul Simon. Sometimes I think he misses in a big way. He just didn’t on this record.

I’m going to start with Graceland itself. Make no mistake: this song brought my ass to Tennessee. It did. I listened to this record more in the year preceding my decision to move back to the US more than any other. So much so that I got banned from playing it in my office (true!). Consciously or not, when the time came for me to decide what the fuck to do with my life, I was hearing “I’m going to Graceland, Graceland, Memphis, Tennessee, for reasons I cannot explain, there’s some part of me that wants to see Graceland”. I actually have never been to Graceland. Well I have, I’ve been to the parking lot and the gift shop. But that’s it. I’m not paying that much money to look at some weirdos weird lair. You’re never going to get me to care about Elvis like that. Anyway, I digress. This song breaks your heart. Knowing your love doesn’t love you anymore. Everyone seeing directly inside your totally deconstructed heart and soul looking at the ruins of your future. What do you do to recover from that but hit the fucking road? Accompanying those soul crushing lyrics is a guitar riff that feels like how tears feel. It sounds like you’re in a bath tub and you go under for a minute. It’s under water. And that’s exactly right. It hurts so good.

Next! Oh my god, I want to say my favorite but this is one of those where they’re all my damn favorite. I Know What I Know. Firstly, this is the wittiest Paul Simon has ever been:

“She looked me over and I guess she thought I was alright

Alright in a sort of a limited way for an off night”

But he then describes her as moving so easily “all he could think of was sunlight”, and that’s pretty fucking special. I can’t lie. You could be a twerp but with talk like that, if you were a little funny, and you could sing pretty songs, yeah maybe plenty of women would give you the time of day. Maybe the ego makes sense. This song also reminds me of a former boss, who was actually from South Africa. He just sung the last words of each line, because they were really pronounced “moooooney”, “fuuuuuunny”, and it was annoying as hell. Probably because he was a real racist piece of shit, and one day when I really just told him I had nothing left in me and thought I might kill myself, mans looked me dead in the eye and told me to “pick a different thought and just keep showing up for work”. Money. Funny.

Moving on, there’s this chaotic accordion in Gumboots. I don’t really know how to single out any of the lyrics, but I’ll pick “I said hey señorita, that’s astute I said, why don’t we get together and call ourselves an institute”(the fuck???? Come on! I want to be mad at it, but it’s just the right damn side of the line where he’s not high on its own supply, it just is really that good). It’s a vocal performance for sure. It’s witty again. It’s conversational. It’s confusing. It’s unresolved. There’s joyful happy percussion and trumpets backing that up. It doesn’t make a damn bit of sense and yet it works perfectly.

I can’t get into every other song because they’re all amazing. But a poor boy is “empty as a pocket” in Diamonds of the Souls of Her Shoes. There’s a “roly-poly little bat faced girl” in You Can Call Me Al. In Crazy Love, Vol. II, “the fire in your life” is “all over the evening news”. I really can’t cope with it all.

Here’s my two stories. They’re good ones, too. Like I said, I really got to know this record in 2012, when I found it in the charity shop across from my shitty apartment at my shitty job that ruled my shitty life. I found so many good ones there (Joni!). I listened to it non-stop. Got banned from listening to it. Did it anyway, etc. Wouldn’t you know, it was the 25th anniversary of it being released? Paul Simon toured that year, with all of the original musicians. I saw it. My life was a disaster, and I was miserable all told. The people largely responsible for the misery bought tickets for everyone but me, knowing how much I loved it. But I was given VIP passes by my former housemate who worked for Columbia Records, because yeah! Sometimes you catch a break! I know in spite of all of the misery and pain of that time that felt all consuming, there was a sunny day in Hyde Park where I saw this album performed from start to finish by the original musicians. I wore a cute leopard print dress and have a picture from that day with my very dear friend Sophie, and I can see in my eyes that I was happy. He threw in some other classics too. Even some Simon and Garfunkel. I got drunk. I was in the moment. I was the roly-poly little bat-faced girl. Whatever that means. For me it means I was happy.

Fast forward a year, I moved to Tennessee. Fast forward a few more years from there. I’m married to a man who works for a nice couple who happen to be South African. One Saturday I stop in to see him at work, and he says “Hey girlreviews, I need to introduce you to someone”. That someone was a tall, slender, aging white man that I recognized from a documentary I had watched some months ago. He had a lovely South African accent. My husband tells me, “he worked on Graceland”. I didn’t know what to say, but I shook his hand and told him how much I loved the record and how special it was. I was so overwhelmed I don’t even recall his name without rewatching the documentary, or what role he played in the making of the album.

Brb, crying about that guitar sound for the 87546490075734643th time. If you’ve never heard a guitar under water, all you have to do is get in your car, put on Graceland and head to Memphis. Only the putting on Graceland part is actually required.

[unpassive-viewer]

Across the Spider-Verse Review (mild spoilers)

I have finally seen the long-awaited sequel to my most favourite movie. Y’all, I am in love with what Sony is doing for Spider-Man these days. I have literally not been this excited to see a movie since I was 12 years old waiting in line in a themed outfit to see Catching Fire for its opening weekend, and I think this film lived up to that hype. I have some critiques, but overall it was really good. I won’t include any major plot spoilers, but I’ve tagged it as mild spoilers just in case you’re the type of person who doesn’t like to know a single thing going into this movie. 

The good (not in order of importance): 

1. More Gwen character development. She’s in this one in a much larger capacity than the first one, and all of her parts were awesome. 

2. Soundtrack. I started listening it to it before I even went to see the film. It’s good music already, but it is such a different experience to hear it over the movie. The art direction for these films is SEAMLESS, the different elements blend so well. 

3. The visuals. The animation is genuinely so beautiful, I would use literally every frame of this movie as a screensaver, and I would tattoo them on the inside of my eyelids if that didn’t mean I’d have to pick only one. I want to give the animators a big kiss on the mouth because this film is so visually incredible. 

4. The fight scenes. I love animation because you can capture things that cameras just can’t. The pacing of the fighting was so, so good. It’s one of the only movies I’ve seen that keeps the momentum of its fight sequences and really lets you feel the energy of the actions you’re watching. It was unique from movies like the second Captain America, whose fight scenes I also LOVE, because of the way it followed characters with such fast and dynamic movement. Whereas the Winter Soldier had great representation of real fighting styles, Across the Spider-verse was able to make use of a lot of its characters uniquely-inspired movements like Gwen’s dancer style. It could also follow them while they did insanely complex movements - if you’ve seen Gwen’s first fight scene, you’ll know exactly what I’m talking about. 

5. The new characters are unbelievably cool. All of them. From the design to their personalities to their theme songs, they were really well thought out. In particular Spider-Man 2099 and Spider Byte are so beautifully visually contrasted with the rest of the movie. The characters also felt very honest to their backstories. By that I mean it felt like the animators and storyboard writers really did their research into the people they were trying to emulate, both from a source material standpoint and a cultural standpoint. 

6. Miles’ story in the sequel is still really interesting, despite him being established as a character now, and the additional dimensions this film brings to his character are super cool. 

7. The humour is top notch, and very true to Spidey humour that has carried through all of its iterations. I especially liked the first altercation between Miles and the main villain. It reminded me of Letterkenney and VEEP in that I felt like I needed subtitles to get all of the jokes because they were so rapid-fire and because the characters were talking over one another. It’s a very organic brand of humour that I appreciate. 

8. The inclusion of so many Spider characters was well handled. The MCU movies now essentially make no sense because of how much background knowledge you need just to watch one film. Comparatively this handled having literally hundreds of similarly designed characters really well. 

9. It seemed like altogether (much like the first one) there was a lot of creative license for this film. My biggest critique of Disney movies is that they’re soulless because of how much they’re supposed to appeal to a wide audience to maximize profits, but this movie and its predecessor have actual soul. If I learn that all the animators were treated like trash and they considered this film their personal hell I will be crushed, because it looks like something that is the product of a lot of amazing minds coming together for an incredible project. 

10. A lot of fun nods to the other Spider-Man films and games. Spider-Man PS2 is in there, and I think Yuri Lowenthal even does a voice cameo. I’m a big fan of the “don’t get me started on Dr. Strange and that little nerd on Earth-199999″ line. 

The less good:

1. Way too long. This film did not need a 2+ hour runtime. After about 1h40 I started thinking at the beginning of every scene “this has to be the end now, right?” wrong. This film had a “first book of the Lord of the Rings technically just being exposition” feeling to it. 

2. Too many heart to heart scenes. One of my least favourite things in cinema lately is trying to force feed you character development through dialogue. There could have been like... 10 fewer drawn-out heartfelt conversations and the movie wouldn’t have changed. 

3. The two major conflicts kind of got lost in one another. I enjoyed both but after a point I was confused as to what the real issue was. I know we’ll see the resolution in the second part, but I felt at least from my first viewing that I was watching a second movie after a point. 

4. No comparable “what’s up danger” scene. To be fair, I think that scene from the first movie is my favourite in literally all of cinema. I want to inject it into my veins, I want to breathe it like perfume, I want to wrap it around myself like a blanket. It is beautiful and perfect and amazing and I don’t know if it can be topped, but it was strange to have so many smaller moments that were supposed to be cool that were sort of lost in one another. HOWEVER I have to assume we will get another one in the second part next year. Miles’ character arc is obviously not done, so it makes sense that we will get something like that closer to the climax of the next movie. 

Anyways, I will be seeing it a second time in theatres. I usually don’t see films in the cinema because it’s so expensive, but I will happily give this franchise all of my money. I cannot overstate this - I am genuinely looking at getting a tattoo for this franchise. Sony owns me and I am okay with that. 

[totaldramafan-lauri]

First Impressions part 6

PROMISE ME IT’S GONNA BE ALRIGHT, WHOA, OH-

Georgia

They’re still here, huh.....Wonder how long before they qualify again, pfffff.....

Choir and drums!? OK, I’m interested! O__O

Other songs are doing similar to this, but I’m still liking it so far!

I wish I had more to say about this......um, the chorus is nice and big

This is probably the best entry Georgia’s sent since......geez, “Keep The Faith”? I’m not blown away, but I’m impressed! They’re trying for sure! O__O  What a GRAND song! Potential grower!

Better than last year?: Yes, but not by a LOT cuz of how memorable Circus Mircus were

San Marino

Another rock song!? That’s two in a row from them!

Do I like it more than the Slovenian song tho....? Let’s see.....

I like the vocals.....and it’s bouncy.....

Y’know what? I’d say it’s pretty close....I’m gonna have to listen to them back-to-back XD

This is fun! Nothing more to say! It’s yet another song with energy and a nice beat! The best kind of rock

Ooooooh, nice ending. Good departure from the abrupt ones XD

Uhhhh....yeah, good, solid song from San Marino! Dunno how well it’ll go over, but I liked it

Better than last year?: Definitely yes. The much better song, altho “Stripper” had fun staging. Will this one? We’ll see.....It seems this song’s more serious

Austria

Um.......what the heck is that title?

I’m expecting an explanation quickly. You don’t title your song something like that for no reason

WHAT-

OK, DO CONTINUE-

This is a CONCEPT

Y’know what? I’ll stop typing and listen. Entertain me

*a bit later* What am I listening to? XD

This is something you CANNOT prepare for- This is the “Eat Your Veggies” of the year-

I-it’s fun, but um......WHY XD

It’s....memorable, that’s for sure! O__O

No but seriously, I’ve read Edgar Allen Poe’s work in middle school and it hurt my brain just as much as this song did, so......i-it tracks.....I guess....?

.......S-seriously, what

Better than last year?: NO!

Albania

Right away, this sounds like......an Albanian entry

OK, it’s getting more interesting

It’s less out there than last year’s, but I like it more. It’s got more actual singing

I wouldn’t say I love it, but it’s a potential grower that I definitely like right now. It just.....sounds a BIT like I’d expect from Albania, but a BIT stronger

Better than last year?: Yes

Lithuania

A Eurovision entry named “Stay”? You got a BIG act to follow for me....

More Lithuanian? Cool! .....Nevermind, it’s in English

Another ballad, huh?

“My heart is bleeding....I need your healing...” OK, maybe there’s something for me here-

OK, it picked up! I like this now! If I had to say, I’d call this comparatively toward the bottom of my ranking with how strong the competition is tho

But the lyrics are good.....and I like the drum part....It’s not bad

I need to be healed.....I need your healing.....

(Gosh, multiple of my interests are being pandered to this contest....Strange...)

Better than last year?: About the same....? Maaaaybe a slight no....?

Australia

Finally....the rulers of Why Are You Still Here

......These lyrics sound like clickbait in song form- *shot*

OK, it was just the first verse XD

WGHOAESGFDG CHORUS HELLO-

OH MY GOD

HOLY CRAP

IT’S GONNA BE ALRIGHT!!!!

OK, HOW DO WORDS, I LITERALLY CANNOT, I DIDN’T SEE THIS COMING

WHY IS IT METAL NOW, HELP

I PROMISE, I PROMISE, I PROMISE IT’S ALRIGHT, OK

JUST DON’T STOP, DON’T STOP!!!!

THAT FLIPPING INSTRUMENTAL!!!!!

IT’S ALRIGHT!!!!!  ALRIIIIIIIIIIGHT!!!!!

I TAKE IT BACK, I TAKE THE CLICKBAIT COMMENT BACK

It’s over!? NOOOOOOOO-

.........

...........

I have no idea WHAT THE HECK I just listened to, I just know that it was INCREDIBLE.....a-and I need to listen to it again but I can’t-

OK, this is just NARROWLY my new favorite, neck-and-neck with Finland, I’m gonna need to listen to both of them more to make my decision

But even tho both songs b-blindsided me in the best way, th-this one got the bigger r-REACTION outta me, so I’m gonna give it the s-slight edge

H-holy c-crap.....on a stick, what the HECK......@___@

Better than last year? YES!!!!!! (Altho they were still really good last year)

[reikunrei]

got some little (big) brain worms thinking abt Heroes popping up twice in Stranger Things and how i would not be surprised if it shows up for a third, and probably reading into it a little too much but hey! that’s what this website’s for, babeyyy!

not sure where exactly i’m going with this, but i think i’ll figure it out as i go along. overall, i think the song works very well for the whole show, and many of the lyrics i feel work very well for El’s character, but i’m especially interested in tying it to Mike and Will, too.

i started thinking about this because i remember specifically when it plays in s3, they cut out the lines “And we kissed as though nothing could fall / And the shame, the shame was on the other side” in the final verse, so i wanted to go back and see exactly when that happens, and compare it to when the song shows up in s1, and see if it’s founded to believe that it’ll show up a third time in s5.

obviously, a good deal of the songs in the show are likely for the purpose of nostalgia and fitting the era, but for the big emotional scenes, they have to be considered very closely, I think.

under the cut because uuuuh i don’t know how to be succinct :3 be advised, a lot of this contains endless rambling and tangents bc I wanted to write stuff down as I worked it out in my brain

first!  i want to break down what exactly happens in each of these scenes and my immediate thoughts/interpretations.

Heroes in s1e3:

it starts playing just as the kids roll up on their bikes behind the fire engine to stay hidden from all the cops.

“i will be king” plays as they pull Will’s “body” out of the water and we and everybody else realizes that, yes, this is the Byers kid.

Mike says, “it’s not Will. it can’t be” before/during “though nothing will drive us away.”  in this moment, Mike (and the others) don’t want to believe it’s Will because not even death will drive them apart.

“Oh, we can be heroes” starts when Lucas says that “it’s really Will” and when Mike snaps at El.  she wanted to be the hero, she wanted to help these boys find their friend, she still wants to help them find their friend, she wants to be the hero, but Mike isn’t having it anymore.  he has the understandable knee-jerk reaction of getting angry because he’s so upset thinking he’s lost one of his best friends in the world forever, believing that El deliberately ran them around in a circle (like how he also gets frustrated with her when they go back to the Byers house) because they don’t understand that she’s correct.

Mike is the first one to leave in this scene.  he yells at El, and then picks up his bike and runs off, leaving Lucas, Dustin, and El.

“I can remember / standing by the wall” plays as Jonathan comes up on Joyce running away from their house after the Demogorgon came out of their wall.

“And the guns shot above our heads” plays as Mike gets home, and “And we kissed as though nothing could fall” plays when he reaches out to Karen and weeps into her arms.  this kind of automatically makes me think of all of the boys spending time together, playing dnd, dealing with pretend “guns” and weapons, but reveling in it, having fun, because it’s all just games.  they “kissed” so to speak, they celebrated their fun and their victories, because for them, nothing could go wrong.  except it did this time, and now all of that love is turned painful at this abrupt loss of life and hope.

interestingly, “And the shame, the shame was on the other side” is split between Mike and Karen, and Jonathan and Joyce, both pairs of which are hugging.  maybe Mike is feeling ashamed that he though to trust in Eleven, maybe he’s feeling ashamed that he couldn’t save Will, that maybe he could have saved Will if he had tried to go out on his own rather than humoring this random girl, and he feels guilty for it.  for Joyce, since at this point she doesn’t know that they found Will’s “body” maybe she’s leaving the shame that she’s “crazy” behind.  she saw this thing crawl out of her wall, it’s not just in her head, it’s not just faulty wiring, something is wrong.  and she doesn’t care what anyone thinks, as she later expresses to Jonathan as they leave the morgue, and she insists that she knows she sounds crazy, but she knows she’s right.

before we get into the song in s3, i want to describe the scene leading up to it:

El reading Hopper’s letter to her.

overall he explains that while life hurts sometimes, that means you’re alive.  in the end, you’ll only hurt more if you ignore all of the pain, because that just makes you apathetic. you get “stuck in one place, in a cave, you might say.  A deep dark cave” because once you ignore the hurt, you don’t feel much of anything at all.

he expresses how it hurts to see her growing, changing, becoming distant (which is also what he says during the focus in on Mike as they leave the Byers’ house on their bikes, but hey, let’s not get too distracted here!) and that scares him more than anything else.  because he doesn’t want things to change, even though he knows it’s inevitable.

he then goes on to hammer home that it’s good to keep changing, to keep moving, and nobody should stop her.  she should make mistakes, learn from them, and remember the hurt.

then, the song starts.

Heroes in s3e8:

it begins playing right as El finishes reading Hopper’s letter, and it picks up on the “I will be king” line.  i think the “king” in question is the sentiment he expresses in his letter.

“you will be queen” is sung over El as she assures Joyce that she’s okay.  this feels too literal, but i’m a snotty crying mess after watching the scene again so i can’t really think too much rn, but i do think that El is the “queen” in question.

“Though nothing will drive us away / We can beat them forever and ever.”  even though things might keep dragging them back down, they have to keep beating back those monsters, both literal and metaphorical. they have to beat back the Upside Down, but they also have to beat back their trauma because of it. they have to deal with it rather than ignore it.  they won’t let the apathy take them over. they might yearn for things to go back to the way they were before any of this happened, but what would be the point in that?  it would be the same as being apathetic.

i also love the “we can be heroes just for one day” line in relation to El, specifically because of this idea she has in her head of being a hero vs a monster.  in this context, it almost feels like she’s trying to assure herself that she doesn’t have to be the hero.  she doesn’t have to be this big, powerful, amazing person all the time (like Mike and the others have painted her out to be, despite how that will ultimately hurt her more).  she’s allowed to be a hero “just for one day,” and for no more.

this also makes me think of how so much of s3 was about El overusing her powers, and that scaring Mike because they don’t know what it’ll do to her.  like, they end up relying on El again and again, making her be the hero, always saying how “this’ll be easy because the girl with superpowers is on our side!” when constantly putting her up on this pedestal led to her ultimate crash and burn.  she is allowed to be a hero “just for one day.”

the switch to “we can be us just for one day” is also interesting, because it makes me think of them longing to just be allowed to live again, to be kids.  especially in relation to El and Will.  El has only recently been allowed to live a “normal” life, and Will had his “normal” life ripped away from him, but neither of them will ever get that normalcy back in its entirety, despite their yearning for it.

and then we get to the final verse.  all of this pans across Jonathan closing the moving truck door and Joyce looking back into the house one last time before locking the door.  they’ve endured so much trauma in that house, and in this context (again taken very literally) the lyrics are driving home that the Byers have been through hell, but they will continue to “beat them forever and ever” and power through the change and the hurt along with the other characters.

and the part that got me thinking about this at all: the removal of those two lines.

“And we kissed as though nothing could fall / And the shame, the shame was on the other side.”

right away, those two lines are the most hopeful to me.  "we can be heroes just for one day” always sounds more like a plea to me, it sounds desperate, but “And we kissed as though nothing could fall” just screams that love is the answer, and feeling the hurt makes the joy so much richer.  everything could be going to shit around them, but that “kiss” will save them every single time.

“And the shame, the shame was on the other side.”  they’re allowing themselves to feel all of their feelings without trying to hide any of it.  they’re moving on from trying to keep themselves buttoned up.  moving and changing and growing might be messy, painful, they might make mistakes, but that’s okay.  they don’t have to be ashamed of any change that comes their way.

but neither of these lines appear in s3.  how come?  i know that the decision could purely be because they wanted to trim down on time, but just a few seconds...?  especially when the final verse played all the way through in s1?  who knows how far ahead they were thinking when they made s1, but the Duffers seem to do everything very deliberately, so, at the very least, it was a deliberate choice to remove those 2 lines from s3.

compare and contrast:

in s1, the song plays over the whole party.  in s3, the song mostly plays over El and the Byers, most specifically Joyce and Jonathan. however, Joyce and Jonathan are also present in both s1 and s3.

in both instances, Hopper is a big part of the lead-up into the song.

in both instances, the song comes in on the lyric “I will be king.”

in both instances, there’s an emphasis on acceptance.  in s1, it’s about the boys accepting that their friend is really dead, but also about Joyce finally accepting the severity of the situation she’s in, and accepting that she’s gonna sound crazy even when she’s right. in s3, they’re accepting that they have to move on, that they have to keep growing and changing, and they can’t remain stuck in one place, otherwise they’ll only get hurt, even if the change also hurts.

“oh, we can be heroes just for one day” plays most often over shots of El in both scenes (minus the final shot of each scene, both of which have Joyce (and Jonathan) as the final lyric plays out).

branching off of the above point, i find it interesting that i had different interpretations of the same lyrics between both seasons.  in s1, she (and the boys) wanted to be heroes and save Will.  in s3, it feels very much like El wants to stop being the hero, that they all want things to go back to “normal.” although, you could also argue that she wants to be the hero again, meaning to get her powers back.

while in s3 the shots of Mike don’t take place during the song, he has similar moments in both seasons: we see his pain the most out of the other characters with scenes dedicated to him in the aftermath, and in both cases he goes home to his mom and asks for her comfort.  in contrast, he’s the first to leave in s1 and the last to leave in s3. also in contrast, he’s visibly crying in s1, while he isn’t in s3.

and, the final point that got this whole ramble started: removing “And we kissed as though nothing could fall / And the shame, the shame was on the other side” from s3.

in the context of El:

I’ve already said this a few times, but the “we could be heroes” line always jumps out as distinctly El to me, especially because of her insistence in being the “hero” rather than the “monster.” she wants to be the hero so badly, she wants to save her friends, but it doesn’t come as naturally to her as she wants it to. this isn’t any fault of her own, it’s just how life works, nothing will be as neat as she wants it to be, but it makes her desperate for it.

“We could be heroes just for one day” as I said before has always sounded like a plea to me. whether it be read as “let me just be a hero for one day and nothing more” or “please I want to be a hero so bad” they’re both desperate pleas for something. and I think El is desperate for both.

in the context of Mike:

I didn’t actually start thinking about his relation to this song on his own until I started writing this up, but I think it’s super interesting, and sort of obvious once you realize how prevalent he is in both scenes.

Mike is a big fixture in both scenes.

in s1, he’s the one who gets upset, certain that it’s not Will’s body, and goes home to weep in his mother’s arms as the (false) reality sets in. we see the rest of the kids upset, we see Lucas and Dustin beginning to grieve, but the focus is on Mike.

I feel like it’s also obvious that he, too, wanted to be the hero in s1. he and the others were so certain that the adults didn’t have the whole picture, and they were determined to find Will on their own without help.

in s3, while he’s not a main aspect during the song actually playing, the lead up to it ends up focusing on him a fair amount (hesitating as all of his friends get on their bikes to leave, him being the only one to look back at the house before riding off, him going home and falling into his mother’s arms again. though, notably, he’s not weeping this time, he just looks... empty).

he also did many heroic things in s3, like taking on Billy in the Sauna Test, trying to convince everyone that El should ease up on her powers, always physically protecting her and his other friends.

most notably, though, Mike is the only one we see a further reaction from after the fact.  we get long, dedicated moments to emphasizing his pain at losing someone, and the one consistency in that loss is Will.

this leads me back to the two missing lines, and how they remained in s1 when the only person Mike lost was Will, and how they were removed in s3 when he was losing both Will and El.

two thoughts with this:

1) maybe the lines were removed because, as i said before, those lines feel the most hopeful out of the whole song.  and in s3, because he’s losing his best friend and his girlfriend in the same instant, he’s lost his hope.  matched with the fact that he isn’t crying like he was in s1, he’s falling into that cave of apathy that Hopper warned El about.

2) maybe the lines were removed because, even though the whole season had Mike and El dealing with their romance, she’s not the one he should have been kissing in the end.

b-b-b-b-bonus 3) it’s both at the same time.

and so we finally get to the song in the context of Will and Mike as a duo:

the song as a whole, but especially the final verse, and more especially those two lines, I feel like are extremely closely tied to Mike and Will as a pair because of how the lyrics appear (or don’t) in the show.

a lot of what we saw of Mike in s4 was him being wishy-washy.  he’s unsure of himself, finding himself not as emotionally mature as El and Will, and being stuck in forcing himself not to feel his strong feelings for El (and Will).  obviously, we see this most explicitly with El in s4, with him being afraid to tell her he loves her because he thinks it’ll hurt when she “inevitably” decides she doesn’t need him anymore, but we’ve established that the hurt is good!  he just hasn’t learned that lesson yet!  he’s scared of feeling so much, but that’s coming to bite him in the ass.  not only because it’s greatly unfair to his friends, but also because it’s unfair to himself. it’s stunting him, and he’s unable to keep growing and changing like he’s supposed to because he’s trying to keep things exactly as they were/are.

when we get to his feelings for Will, obviously we have nothing explicitly stated right now.  but we can infer that there is something going on in Mike’s thick skull, and maybe we’ll get something more concrete in s5.  i think it’s safe to say, though, that he feels shame.  he feels shame at not being able to tell El he loves her, and he’s ashamed that he can’t tell Will how he truly feels.  and i think, if he is queer, he will feel ashamed of that, too.

but we all know they (the Duffers) won’t let him wallow in that.

Will also feels shame. he’s terrified of being true and open about his own feelings, always hiding behind El in s4, but we can see that he’s accepted his feelings to some degree. he knows he’s in love with Mike, and he’s accepted it, fear and shame and all. he’s already one step ahead of Mike in terms of emotional maturity in this department, and I think he’ll be the one to get Mike to really open up. Will will be the one to have Mike dissect himself, to look inward and acknowledge all of his strong feelings, and embrace them. Will will show Mike that it’s okay to feel shame, they don’t have to shove it all down and pretend to be “normal.” only when they acknowledge their feelings, including the shame, will they be able to grow as people and as characters.

I feel that it would be a disservice to not have the song show up again, with those two missing lines added back in. I feel like the fact that they decided to put the song in twice is already evidence enough to think it could show up again, but the fact that they cut out those two lines of the last verse feels like we were meant to take it into consideration, and assume that it will appear in s5 again, hopefully now with those two hopeful lines tucked back in to remind us what the core of the show really is.

i believe Will and Mike, while the world is growing darker around them, will “[kiss] as though nothing could fall” and they will leave their shame “on the other side.”  they will express their love for one another, come to accept their growth and their changes, no matter how scary it might be to embrace who they truly are, and they will be unbeatably strong for it.

but alas, I am ready to be proven wrong now that I’ve jinxed it and the song will never show it’s face again :-)

[my-strange-attraction]

fellow label anarchist! i have been reading into the history of stud and i really identify with it. I like how powerful and wanted it makes me feel. People have been saying i can’t ID as stud because I’m not a lesbian and i don’t match the definition of it fully (i’m pretty pale). But labels are just words and to me it means something different. I guess i’m taking a leaf out of your book and saying fuck them and identify however you want!

Ok, I don't want to yuck your yum or cause offense in any way, but you do seem to have run into one specific situation in which I might draw a line. I'm also having trouble articulating the issue fully here because I am white as well (assuming that's what you meant by pale), so if any poc can add on in the comments and speak to this, I would be so grateful for that.

I keep saying I'm a label anarchist because most of the time with queer labels, using one that doesn't necessarily "fit" you is not harming others in any way. I've only done a cursory search on Google about the stud label, since I'm not super well-versed with that one, but it does seem to be a label coined by black mascs to differentiate from their white counterparts.

I guess the best way I can think to explain why this is different than identifying as, say, a lesbian when bisexual is probably a better descriptor is by comparing it to the conservative argument against transgenderism where they claim that it would be the same thing as claiming to be "trans-race." It's difficult to fully articulate WHY these are different things, but we all know that they very obviously are.

It just seems, to me, like it might be appropriation to use that term when butch (and other masc labels like stone or just masc) exists.

I may be way off here. I'm not super knowledgeable about the various lesbian labels beyond a surface level understanding, and I'm also not involved in conversations about them. I really want to invite anyone who knows more than me to share their opinions/ understanding in the comments or reblogs, because I do feel out of my depth here a bit.

Ultimately, the first part, not being lesbian and using the label, I totally agree with—there are so many queer identities and to restrict expression descriptors like "butch" and "femme" to just lesbians doesn't make much sense, especially since there's so much overlap in the queer community. I would just be really careful with anything involving race, because it just seems like it might be infringing upon a safe space they've created for themselves, and that kind of thing actually IS harmful to those communities.