#I honestly just prefer the series up to Tales in terms of the timeline

[sketchupnfries]

Guess who recently replayed the Handsome Collection and fell down the Borderlands hole again…Also it’s been ages since I drew Borderlands fanart and man it feels good

[differentnutpeace]

'Jupiter's Legacy' Decodes The Superhero Genre Without Subverting It

You'd be forgiven for wondering how Netflix's Jupiter's Legacy compares to other recent entries in the glut of "Wait, what if superheroes ... but, you know, realistic?" content currently  หวย บอล เกมส์ คาสิโนออนไลน์

 swamping streaming services. (To be fair, this "realistic superheroes" business is something we comics readers have been slogging through for decades; the rest of the culture's just catching up. Welcome, pull up a chair; here's a rag to wipe those supervillain entrails off the seatback before you sit down.)

So here's a cheat sheet. Netflix's Jupiter's Legacy is ...

Less cynical and empty than Amazon's The Boys

Less bright and blood-flecked than Amazon's Invincible

Less weird and imaginative than Netflix's The Umbrella Academy

Less funny and idiosyncratic than HBO Max's Doom Patrol

Less dark and dour than HBO Max's Titans

Less innovative and intriguing than Disney+'s WandaVision

Less dutiful and disappointing than Disney+'s The Falcon and the Winter Soldier

Less thoughtful and substantive than HBO's Watchmen

Less formulaic and procedural than the various CW super-shows (which I include here only out of a sense of completism, not because they're aiming for the same kind of performative faux-realism that drive most of these other series).

It's unfair to make these comparisons, sure. But it's also inevitable, given the crowded landscape of superheroes on TV right now. And in every one of those comparisons, Jupiter's Legacy doesn't necessarily come up short (it's far better than The Boys, especially), but it does come up derivative.

Makes sense: "Derivative" is a word that got slapped on the comics series it's based on, by writer Mark Millar and artist Frank Quitely, which kicked off in 2013. Millar and Quitely would likely prefer the term "homage," of course, and after all, the superhero genre is by nature nostalgic and (too-)deeply self-referential. So the fact that so many story elements, and more than a few images, of Jupiter's Legacy (comics and Netflix series both) echo those found in the 1996 DC Comics mini-series Kingdom Come is something more than coincidental and less than legally actionable.

Showrunner Steven S. DeKnight and his writers' room have carved out only a thin, much more grounded slice of the comic's sprawling multi-generational saga, but they've retained certain elements of family tragedy and Wagnerian recursiveness, wherein the sins of the father get passed to the son. They've also, smartly, retained the multiple-timeline structure of the comic as a whole, though they've pared it down and stretched it out over these eight episodes, clearly hoping for a multi-season pickup.

Readers of the comics will likely grow impatient at how little of the overall saga is dealt with here, but this review is aimed at those coming to the series fresh, who will find more than enough in this season to satisfy — it's a whole story that hints at what's to come without slighting what's happening now.

The now in question switches between two eras. In 1929, immediately before and after the stock market crash, brothers Walter (Ben Daniels) and Sheldon (Josh Duhamel) are the sons of a successful steel magnate. Walter's the diligent numbers guy, Sheldon's the glad-handing optimist. Sheldon's rich, smarmy friend George (Matt Lanter) is going full Gatsby, and muckraking reporter Grace (Leslie Bibb) runs afoul of Walter and Sheldon following a family tragedy.

Sheldon becomes beset by visions that will put him and several other characters on a path to their superhero origin story. Be warned: The series doles this bit out even more slowly than the comic — settle in for seven episodes' worth of Duhamel clutching his head and shouting while trippy images flash by, hinting at his ultimate destiny.

In the present day, Sheldon is the all-powerful hero The Utopian, who is married to Grace, now known as Lady Liberty. Walter is now the telepathic hero Brainwave, and George is ... nowhere to be seen.

The series has fun playing with the disconnect between the two timelines — characters from the 1930s story are either missing, or drastically transformed, in the present day, and while later episodes connect some of the dots, many of the most substantial changes are left to be depicted in future seasons.

The present-day timeline instead focuses on the generational rift between heroes of Sheldon and Grace's generation and those of their children. There's the brooding Brandon (Andrew Horton) who strives to live up to his father's impossible example, and the rebellious Chloe (Elena Kampouris), who rejects a life of noble self-sacrifice and neoprene bodysuits for a hedonistic modeling career.

At issue: Sheldon's refusal to acknowledge that the world has changed, and that the strict superhero code (no killing, no politics, etc.) that he lives by — and forces others to live by — may be obsolete, now that supervillains have escalated from bank robbery to mass slaughter. Younger heroes, including many of Brandon's friends, feel compelled to protect themselves and the world around them through the use of deadly force.

Clearly it's a fraught cultural moment to have fantasy characters who can fly and zap folk with eye-lasers deal with that particular all-too-real real-world issue; several scenes land far differently than they were originally intended.

But unlike other entries in the superhero genre, Jupiter's Legacy is prepared to deal overtly, even explicitly, with something that films like Man of Steel and shows like The Boys too simply and reflexively subvert: The superhero ideal itself.

The notion that an all-powerful being would act with restraint and choose only to lead by example is what separates superheroes from action heroes. Superheroes have codes; that's the contract, the inescapable genre convention, the self-applied restriction that tellers of superhero tales impose upon their characters; navigating those strictures forces storytellers to get creative. Or at least, it should. The minute you do what so many many "gritty, realistic" superhero shows and movies do — dispense with that moral code, or pervert it, or attempt to argue it out of existence by portraying a villain so heinous and a world so fallen that murder is the only option, you're not telling a superhero story anymore. You haven't interrogated or inverted or interpolated the genre, and you certainly haven't deconstructed it. You've abandoned it.

Say this much for Jupiter's Legacy — it's not content to wave the concept of a moral code away, or nihilistically reject it. It instead makes its central theme the need to inspect it, unpack it, and truly and honestly grapple with it.

Which is not to say it doesn't stack the deck by portraying a fallen modern world not worth saving — it does do that, usually through the lens of Sheldon's daughter Chloe, who throws herself into a world of drugs, alcohol, sex and general narcissistic monstrousness. The show attempts to explain her sullen self-destructiveness as a reaction to her father's unrealistic ideals, but in execution, her scenes prove cliche-ridden and bluntly repetitious. It's one of several examples where the show's choice to focus on and pad out one small part of the comic's overall tale results in leaden pacing.

But even though it takes seven full episodes for the characters in the 1930s timeline to get to the (almost literal) fireworks factory of their superhero origin, it's hard to argue that it isn't worth all that extra time, as Duhamel, Bibb, Lanter and especially Daniels have a great time with the period setting. (There are two other actors who get brought into the superhero fold in this timeline, but they 1. aren't allotted nearly enough screentime to really register and 2. represent spoilers.)

The period details of the 1930s timeline (Lanter was made to wear a waistcoat; Daniels' pencil-thin mustache should win its own Hairstyle and Makeup Emmy), and the brewing conflict between the younger selves of Sheldon and Walter can't help but make those scenes much more intriguing to watch than those set in the modern day.

The ultimate effect is a lot like watching the 2009 film Julie and Julia, in that sense. If you imagine that Julia Child could fly and shoot lasers out of her eye-holes.

And, really, who's to say she couldn't, after all?

[shinneth]

what is your absolute favorite ship? How did you start shipping Stevidot? And rant about any ship you feel like, good or bad? :))

… you fool

OH GOD ALL-TIME FAVORITE SHIP YOU SAY. YOU KNOW DAMN WELL I CAN’T CHOOSE ONE.

(it’d probably be Stevidot anyway; objectively I’ve done more for it than anything else I ever shipped in my life and it’s absolutely precious both in platonic and romantic forms)

BUT IN THE INTEREST OF FAIRNESS… and attempt to tone down redundancy, let’s see what other ships earned the “OTP” label from me!

I mean, I pretty much had to lowkey ship Mamoru Chiba x Ami Mizuno because Usagi/Mamoru is basically what Connverse wishes it could be as far as the Ultimate Ship goes. So at the height of my involvement in the fandom (you know, late 90s era), I was never brave enough to make anything for this ship. But the few times they get to interact in the classic anime is legit adorable stuff and I wish we could’ve had more of it. 

Before Gem Ascension, before Travels of the Trifecta, my greatest multichaptered epic was a Digimon Tamers fic called By My Decision. I was a hardcore Digimon fan in my early teen years well before I ever got into Pokemon, in fact. And I shipped shitloads of pairings in Adventure and 02 - I can only imagine how many of those would be demonized by the new age fandom puritans of Tumblr nowadays. You can actually see literally everything I ever shipped on my FFN profile here.

But I didn’t really make anything for the first two seasons. Tamers was what really sparked my inspiration, because Takato and Jenrya… honestly, they’re just adorable together. They get to bond a lot, they’re really in touch with their feelings (contrasting to token girl Ruki who was a stiff hardass most of the time), and I often got the impression that Jenrya, unlike Takato, really doesn’t have any other friends. 

So of course, I tormented these two on the regular in my story. I of course didn’t forget Juri (for I love her dearly); I was kinda trying a love triangle subversion with Takato angsting over loving both Jenrya and Juri… while Juri’s still got so much PTSD (story is 2 years post-series), shipping is hardly on her mind, and Jenrya’s outright in denial of his feelings for Takato to the point where it very literally screws him up and awakens some inner darkness of his own. I even had Jenrya and Juri bond, but it was pretty platonic stuff. 

Still, this ship was way down on the totem pole at the height of Tamers’ fandom. Very frustrating. Takato/Ruki and Jenrya/Ruki were way more popular and I hated both of those ships something fierce. I love Ruki, but I just cringe at the idea of shipping her with either of her fellow leads. Then Jenrya/Ryo got something of a cult following that I couldn’t stand; admittedly I was jealous it was getting the representation that I felt Takato/Jenrya desperately needed more, and I also didn’t like Jenryo in its own right, anyway. 

But yeah. Jenkato is a very underappreciated ship that I loved dearly and invested many of my teenage years into.

So, here’s a fun fact: While I played the classic games (my cousins had a Sega Genesis), the way I was mostly raised on Sonic was via the first two cartoon series and the Archie Comics version of the franchise. Archieverse was largely based on the SatAM cartoon; Amy Rose also didn’t exist in the show and it took about 25 issues for her to show up in the comic. 

So I was big on Tails x Amy. For a long-ass time. And really, the ship was really only feasible in the Archie continuity. There, Tails is actually older than his usual depicted canon age and Amy is introduced to be around his age before she artificially aged herself with a magic ring so that she could later take on her Sonic Adventure design. 

Before that… in these years, Sally was the most well-known love interest of Sonic in the west. So Sonic/Sally seemed like a lock (none of us knowing how Sega felt about that at the time) - and in retrospect I honestly believe it’s a far better Sonic ship than his more well-known modern alternatives. 

So, because of Sally’s prominence, Amy was relegated to Sonic’s fangirl and her crush wasn’t really that big a deal. Honestly, that was for the best, as I by far found Amy way more tolerable in Archie’s incarnation than the majority of her other canon contemporaries (Sonic the Comic Amy Rose is more of a competent badass, though).

Tails and Amy had some good banter in Archieverse and the few times they were allowed time to do stuff together as a duo, they were very cute and endearing and I loved them. 

Tails also had a lot more going on in terms of character development and backstory in Archieverse. Like, a lot more going on. He even had a “Chosen One” deal that sadly didn’t have a very good payoff, but. It’s more than what they really do with Tails in any other continuity.

Bear in mind, I started on these comics when I was eight or nine years old. Yet I followed this comic well into my late teens and even part of my early twenties, so you can tell Archieverse Sonic has shitloads of lore to it to have that long of an ongoing narrative. 

After Sonic Adventure was released, then the Sonamy shipping started to explode. Amy was front-and-center in the spotlight, Sally became the obscure figure in the fandom, and it’s more-or-less stayed that way ever since. 

But I was like “It’s okay! Tails and Amy are still tight in Archieverse! Sucks they have to adjust to Sega’s many changes but they’re still best buddies who’ll hopefully get married one day….” 

Then 25 Years Later happened and for some goddamned stupid-ass reason, Tails was paired with Mina the Mongoose and I believe Amy was suspiciously never ever mentioned in the future timeline stories (as Sonic and Sally did become endgame in this little series). 

Tails and Mina had little to no interaction, and Mina was largely there to be a potential Sonic love interest, and even after she moved on, she got together with another character and still didn’t interact with Tails. 

I was sooooooo pissed off. Archieverse was my one hope for Tails/Amy becoming a thing and they ruined it for me. :(

I did get a consolation prize in Geoffrey St. John x Hershey becoming so canon they actually did marry. That’s another one I shipped ever since they first interacted years and years ago.

Of course, Hershey was then “killed off” - and was set for a major comeback, but Ken Penders put a stop to that and had them both erased from reality because fuck Ken Penders, I actually got a nice thing and you yanked it right out of my hands.

Genis Sage x Mithos Yggdrasill from Tales of Symphonia, a ship I hardcore loved enough to write about. Also a ship I think Tumblr would burn me at the stake for shipping at all, but you know what? Fuck Genis x Presea. It’s a boring-ass puppy love ship that in its own right should be lambasted similarly according to anti logic. 

…. did I get sidetracked? I did? Pfff. Okay, let’s try and get to another question.

How I started shipping Stevidot?

Pretty simple story, really. I binged SU all the way up to Escapism (Change Your Mind hadn’t aired yet) last December/January. Also watched a looooot of Youtube clips. Most involving Peridot.

And inevitably, most involving Steven as well. 

When I started getting into Peridot and SU as a whole enough to seek out fanfiction and whatnot, I didn’t really have any set shipping preferences at first. But when I made myself think about it… honestly, Stevidot just felt the most natural to me. I wanted to see stories about antics with those two specifically - I never liked Lapidot and Amedot did nothing for me ever. So Stevidot was like, pretty much the only thing I really focused on after a while.

Then I found A Gem Like You. And suddenly, INSPIRATION! I developed headcanons for Watcher’s fic, I started reading as much Stevidot as I could, and I was convinced it was the best pairing in the world and fucking hell I need to give it some representation after I noticed how relatively niche it was in the fandom. 

And so, Stevidot consumed my soul for all time. I hope those clods are happy.

Rant about a ship, you say…

Good god, that really does need to be its own post. I have so much to say about various ships in general, I may need a bit to… uh, figure that out. Or throwing out some random ones I’d know about would help my focus, fff.

[ograndebatata]

Silver Linings

So... I’ve actually had this fic pretty much complete for weeks now, but I recently got motivated to polish it up and share it here, for... well... I’m not sure why, and honestly there may be many motivating factors, but... anyway, here it is. 

I hope you enjoy it. 

Note: Like pretty much every Elena of Avalor fanfic by me, this one takes place in my Tales of the Ever Realm AU. To give a bit of context on what it is, it’s basically an AU where all of Sofia the First is canon, and all of Elena of Avalor episodes until Snow Place Like Home (in terms of ‘timeline order’) are canon. Details and characters from later episodes will sometimes be used, but there are many important differences between my fic AU and canon.

One of those, as will be clear from reading this fic, is that in this AU, Ash Delgado has a genuinely and healthily loving relationship with both her husband and daughter (although we really only get to see the former in this one) and also is just a much better person in general, though still with a few traits of her canon self. I hope you will enjoy it for what it is, and I apologize in advance to those who happen to prefer the canon versions of her character and her relationships.

Also, I tried my best to make this fic strong enough to stand on its own, but I realize a few details may still come across as confusing. I apologize for that in advance as well. If you’d like any sort of clarification, please feel free to ask.

///

Note #2: There is some stuff in this fic that can be seen as slightly suggestive. Nothing full-blown NSFW, but still, there is a bit of steaminess. Those who aren’t particularly fond of such content want to tread carefully. I may be worrying too much over nothing, but... I feel it’s better to be safe than sorry.

///

Note #3: Although I tried my best to make it strong enough to be read on its own, this fic works better read as a sequel to @lostbutterflyutau‘s fic The Second Navidad, which she wrote for me as a Christmas gift last Christmas, and which I liked so much that I decided to make it canon to my fic universe. If you’d like to read it, I strongly recommend it.

And on that note, I say the same thing regarding all of her Elena of Avalor fics. They're full of well-written characters, great portrayals of feelings of all kinds, and wonderfully fluffy moments of the romantic, the friendship, and the familial kinds. I strongly recommend them all. Also, if you read them and like them, please take the time to leave her some feedback, even if it's only a few words. Remember that taking even only a few seconds to give feedback leads to better environments for fanworks of all kinds. 

With that said... let us begin.

///    

Silver Linings

The Kingdom of Norberg, February 14th, Year 9222 of the Ever Realm Calendar…

A series of sharp knocks cut through the cabin’s main room, making Ash Delgado jump in her chair as the sound brought her struggle with her focus to an abrupt end, ruining her already feeble efforts at forcing herself to study the weathered yellow page she held, trying beyond her best to find a solution to the dilemma she’d been struggling with for over a year.

One of her hands slammed the page against the table as her other one reflexively curled around her tamborita; the next instant, her ears picked up the last few knocks that rapped against the wooden boards. Her heart settled down as the force and rhythm behind the sounds told her who had arrived, drawing a relieved sigh from her as she released the drum wand’s handle. Ash looked up at the closed door on cue with its lock clicking as a key was turned inside it. The next moment, the door drew inwards, making her grimace at the chilly air that entered the cabin, followed soon after by her husband.  

“I’m home!” Victor announced as he closed the door behind him, before wiping a few fresh snowflakes off his shoulders and setting down a bag of canvas he’d been carrying. 

Then, as his eyes fell on her, still by the table she’d been sitting at since he left - though now with layers of pages scattered over its surface - a sheepish smile uneasily crawled across his features.

“Did I interrupt anything?”

A mock-annoyed smirk curling her lips, Ash teased, “Not this time.”

Besides, even if he had, his loud arrival was one of the safety norms that they and their daughter had established for whenever they stayed anywhere: to always make their presence known when arriving, to ensure they conveyed they weren’t any unexpected visitor. 

Still, the sheepish look remaned on Victor’s features as he unclasped his cloak and hung it on a hook beside the door, before walking over towards her. Smiling at him, Ash reached up to his face and settled her hand on his jawline as he rested his’ between her shoulder blades, closing her eyes as the two of them leaned towards each other and put their lips together. Cold seeped into her fingers as the mixed smell of salty air, tobacco smoke, cooked bacon and burned wood floated into her nostrils, but Ash kept her fingers on his face and pressed her lips further into his’, holding both her touch and her kiss for a few more seconds. 

Then, as she and Victor both pulled away and she opened her eyes, a faint chuckle bubbled up her throat at the sight she beheld. 

Victor blinked in puzzlement. “What?”

Suppressing another chuckle, Ash explained, “Your mouth is full of lipstick.”

Again. She inwardly added, as pointless as it was. Victor’s mouth or face ending up full of lipstick when they kissed was as big a given as water being wet or as the sun rising everyday. But Ash liked her makeup in the style she wore it, and she knew that for all his playful grumbling, Victor also did.

Giving an easygoing chuckle himself, Victor reached up with his free hand and rubbed it across his mouth, the faint dark-blue sparks she saw flying from his fingertips telling her what he was trying to do. Alas, the final results were different from the intended, the smear on his lips only spreading further across his face, bringing a stronger chuckle out of her.

“Here,” she said, removing her own hand from his jawline, silvery-grey sparks swarming around her fingers. “I’ll do it for you.”

Saying so, she swept her magic-filled hand over his face, the smudges of lipstick vanishing in her fingers’ wake.

“I guess this just shows I still need more practice,” he said good-naturedly as he straightened himself, caressing her ponytail along the way. 

He glanced around the room as he righted himself, then turned back to her and asked, “Did Carla leave already?”

“Princess Chloe asked her to go early,” Ash explained. “Apparently so the two of them can properly help Queen Abigail get ready for her date with King Hector. And Carla said that because she was spending the night at the palace anyway, she might as well stay over already.”

Nodding in acknowledgment, Victor walked over to her right and pulled up the chair beside her, sinking onto it with a pensive look on his face, the expression looking more pronounced thanks to his placement against the lit fireplace that burned a few feet away. Ash knew without having to ask that he was having a bout of the same struggle they had both endured since Carla had unintentionally struck up a friendship with the princess of Norberg. On one hand, it was good that Carla had made a friend, at least for the duration of their stay here. On the other, Norberg was a close ally to Avalor, and even if wanted posters of him and Carla hadn’t made it here yet (and weren’t likely to be sent now that neither of them had been to Avalor for over a year), it could still happen, especially given that Princess Chloe was at least a friendly acquaintance of Princess Elena. Or then, the Crown Princess of Avalor or someone closely associated with her could unexpectedly drop by and recognize him or Carla, which would at best mean they’d have to leave, and at worst might literally spell their dooms. And that was assuming none of their more dangerous enemies was lurking in the shadows, planning something that Ash could easily conceive as far more horrible than anything Princess Elena would ever do to them if she caught them.

But Carla knew she needed to be careful, and the three of them were making sure to keep an eye on anyone who seemed suspicious, just like their jaquin allies were doing. With luck, Carla’s friendship with Princess Chloe would just keep going without incident during their final two weeks or so in Norberg.

“How did things go at the harbor?” Ash brought up, out of genuine interest as much as out of a wish to change subjects. 

The deepening of Victor’s frown answered her question well enough, but still, he replied, “Not very well. There weren’t many sailors there, it being the day it is and all, and most of those I found were more interested in drowning their sorrows or seeking other forms of consolation than in talking about some mysterious kingdom.” As he caught sight of Ash’s own frown, he added, “No thanks to it being the day it is, I guess. After all, it was the same thing during Sweetheart’s Day in Avalor.”

Though that didn’t make her feel any better, Ash gave him a reassuring smile. After all, it wasn’t his fault that today was Valentine’s Day - or Dia del Amor y la Amistad, as her parents had called it, due to it being the holiday’s name in both Paraiso and Cordoba. Most sailors who’d ordinarily be in taverns or at the harbor were likely to be with their girlfriends or wives or families, and those that weren’t would either be too busy with work or too sullen at their lack of companionship to be in a chatty mood. 

“Was any sailor at all willing to talk?” she probed.

Victor shrugged. 

“Some were. But most of those couldn’t tell me anything about that place, and the only two that could didn’t tell me anything we don’t already know.” He stopped, his eyes clouding over as he mentally sorted out his words. “They said that that kingdom looks clean and calm enough from a distance, and the rulers seem friendly enough, but there’s just something under its surface that doesn’t quite make it an inviting place, and anyone going farther than the harbor automatically needs a full guard unit escorting them because of the land’s perils.” His frown deepened even further, his eyes narrowing to the point they seemed to turn into two black holes thanks to the shadows from the fireplace. “In a sense, it’s like a more extreme version of what I heard Avalor was like under Shuriki’s rule.”

Ash pursed her lips, the mere reference to that woman’s name making her temper flare. She might have come to terms with her husband having fallen for Shuriki’s lie that she could make him and Carla malvagos, but having that daemonfirma brought up in conversation still made her blood boil. Good for her that she was dead, because if Ash had gotten to fight her for a third time, she would have done everything she could to ensure their fight would end with Shuriki having a departure far more painful than the one Princess Elena had given her. 

Forcing herself to push aside the hatred that still burned at her, Ash said, “Well, at least we have more evidence that that kingdom is not a place where we want to stay any longer than absolutely necessary.” Her heart growing heavier, she added, “Unfortunately, we still need to go there.”

His forehead creasing, Victor gave her a sympathetic look. 

“Things also didn’t go well over here then?”

The tiredness and frustration from her mostly wasted afternoon rearing up like a striking snake, Ash let out a long sigh. 

“Yes and no,” she settled on.

Victor didn’t even blink at her response, his sympathetic look staying the same as before. 

Taking a deep breath to gather herself, she explained, “On the good side, I went over my improved potion recipes again just to be safe, and it held up again. The improvements I made will be enough so that neither of the potions will take quite as many moon cycles to achieve its purpose.” Her heart again grew heavier as she once more realized what it implied, but she forced herself to add, “On the bad side, there still are a few ingredients for both potions that just can’t be replaced with anything found somewhere else.”

Victor’s mouth again started to curl into a frown.

“So… that means…”

Ash nodded.

“There’s no way around a trip to that kingdom that seems out of a mix between a crime novel and a horror story. It’s still the only place where some of the ingredients we need exist, and God knows how long we’ll take to find them all.” 

Again, Victor narrowed his eyes so much that the fireplace made it seem like he had two black holes in his eye sockets. Ash narrowed her eyes as well, the weight of the implication hanging over her like a boulder sustained by the finest thread that was about to break. The idea of spending any amount of time in that kingdom was anything but pleasant. And having to stay there for who knew how long (at least a year, to give an optimistic estimate) only made it worse.

“And that’s not all,” Ash forced herself to go on. “It’s not even the worst part.” 

Victor sat the tiniest bit straighter, his eyes opening ever so slightly.

“What’s the rest?”

Her answer seemed to swirl around in her throat, as if trying to come out, but unable to find its way to her mouth for some reason. Though she knew Victor wouldn’t judge her or think less of her, and she had never lied to him, admitting to her failures or inabilities was not something she had ever or would ever like. After all, they were failures or inabilities, which Ash had always loathed, even back when she had just been Seentahna.

But despite being a dark wizard, Ash knew how wrong it was to be dishonest, especially to the man she loved, and she knew he felt the same towards her. Neither had ever lied to each other, and she wouldn’t be the one starting now. 

“I think we may be doing all of this for nothing,” she at last managed to say. 

Reading Victor’s question in the way his eyebrow moved up his forehead, Ash reached towards one of the papers on the table and lifted it aside, exposing a round purple orb around the size of an orange, the orb somehow feeling as heavy in her hand as if it was made of cast iron. 

“I can’t know for sure without looking at the Codex Maru, but the more I study this blasted thing, the more unlikely it seems that we will be able to channel its power as we want to, if we manage to fix it in the first place,” she explained as she raised the jewel. 

The words forced its way out of her like thick mud mixed with sharp knives. Just having to utter them made her heart sink almost as much as them being true. Another smile dawned on Victor’s lips, his hands moving over and curling around her right hand like a comforting blanket, his thumbs ghosting over her knuckles in a tender caress. 

“It’s alright, Pluma,” he whispered. “We can get through this.”

Despite the warmth in both his gaze and voice, the weight in her chest didn’t fade. She wouldn’t give up his support for anything, but what she really needed was a miraculous breakthrough on how to use the Jewel of Night, or on another way to recharge it. Ideally, both. Because as things stood now, achieving even one of her goals seemed borderline impossible. All means to recharge the Jewel of Night that she knew were difficult to put in practice, and many of the ingredients they would need to make both the potion that would repair it and the one that would recharge it (assuming they would manage to find a certain key ingredient for that one) came from plants and animals that had already been rare when she was a child. If even one of those had already gone extinct, they’d be right back where they started, and the Jewel of Night would be good for little more than to place on a shelf as decoration.

And even if they managed to fix it and recharge it, the only thing that might have anything on how to properly siphon its power into them was the Codex Maru, assuming that could be done in the first place. And to get the Codex Maru, they’d need to face Princess Elena, who could wield the Scepter of Light, and her Royal Wizard, who was Alacazar’s grandson and was all but certain to take after his grandfather if he’d managed to defeat a malvago powerful and skilled enough to cast the malvago-making spell on Victor and Carla at the same time and successfully pull it off. 

Whoever said malvago was, defeating him would have been an impressive feat for any wizard, but it was all the more so coming from a boy who hadn’t even been eighteen when he did so. And the boy would only have grown more powerful since then. Even now that Victor and Carla had grown much more powerful themselves, Ash knew the three of them would need a good plan and a very healthy amount of luck to get the Codex on their own. And if she had to guess, they would only have one try, because if they got caught, Princess Elena was bound to execute them all.

The thought hitting her like a blasting spell, Ash’s gaze snapped away from Victor, the fear that too often lingered at the bottom of her heart suddenly shooting up to the surface, her eyes wide as if to let it fly out. The next moment, twin caresses ran over the back of her hand, soft despite the roughness of the skin giving them. Though she knew where they came from without needing to look, Ash turned to meet Victor’s eyes, which still glowed with the same warmth.

“Let’s not think about that now,” he said. “Let’s think about something else.” 

An empty smile flitted across her face, her gaze turning away from his’. As if drawn to it, her eyes fell on the Jewel of Night, stared into its opaque depths, the emptiness within it seeming to remind her of how difficult their mission was, and yet how they needed to accomplish it if they were to ever be truly at peace. To think Victor made it sound so easy. To put aside something that their lives in a sense literally depended on, as easily as if it was a matter of deciding not to wear clothes they didn’t particularly like. 

“I’ve had practice,” he replied as if he had read her mind, a playful smirk on his lips. 

Against her wishes, Ash allowed herself a small smile. Quips aside, she knew that must be true. After all, he had managed to keep himself and their daughter alive and safe, despite having very few magical skills before he was made a malvago. More than that, he had managed to raise Carla as happy and well-adjusted as their circumstances allowed, and done a better job of it than she imagined most men and some women would. 

But that still didn’t change the main point.

“If we don’t think about it now, we’ll have to think about it later,” she insisted, even as she lowered the hand holding the Jewel of Night.

Her words came out tense, almost solid, but Victor simply kept giving her the same warm smile from before, rubbed his thumbs across the back of her hand again. Then, he rose from his chair and moved to stand behind her, taking his hands to her hair and releasing the knot in her hair tie, the tiniest sense of relief washing over her as a slight pressure left her head, her hair spreading out from its ponytail and cascading free to below the middle of her back. Though she couldn’t see him, she felt Victor smiling as he curled a hand around her hair, his other one gently scratching her scalp. A wider smile breaking through her lips, Ash hummed in delight, leaning back into her chair, guessing what he intended to do. As she expected, Victor lifted her hair so it wouldn’t be stuck between her and the back of the chair, his hands then settling on her head and running over her white locks like a hairbrush, spreading the strands apart and gently easing tangles and knots. 

A louder hum flowing through her, Ash tilted her head back as Victor pressed the tips of his fingers to her hairline, before gently but firmly running them back, tension falling apart in their wake as he caressed her scalp. 

“I know it’s difficult, Pluma,” he whispered. “Believe me, I had more than enough time to learn it on my own.” His voice shivered the slightest bit at those words, and Ash knew he was remembering his and Carla’s many close escapes over the almost fifteen years she hadn’t been with them. “But we’ll figure out how to use the Jewel of Night.” He ran his fingers over her scalp again. “And even if we don’t, we’ll find some other way to get rid of the Evergrowing Forest.”

Ash chuckled mirthlessly. 

“You talk as if the odds are on our side.” 

Running his fingers over her scalp once more, he replied, “I’d rather think I talk as someone who chooses to keep on believing things will get better. And as someone who was lucky despite the odds.” He reached downwards and slid his  thumbs in a half-circle behind her ears, bringing them forward rubbing them over her cheeks. “And more than once at that.”  

Frowning at the second sentence, Ash knitted her eyebrows as he moved his fingers back up to her scalp, rubbing continuous circular motions from her hairline to her nape. 

“I was lucky enough to meet you in the first place,” he went on. “I was lucky enough to run into you again and start to know you better. I was lucky enough to reunite with you more than twelve years after losing track of you. And I was lucky enough to reunite with you a second time almost fifteen years after we got separated again. And I could make a longer list.” 

Unable to help herself, Ash turned her head even farther upwards, literally smiling up at him as he looked down and gave her a smile of his own.

“I don’t suppose I could argue against that,” she replied.

His hands rubbed just a bit harder across her scalp, a sigh rolling out of her lips as relief surged from his fingertips and rushed through her. 

“I was lucky as well,” she added. “On all those accounts, and more.” 

Yes. Ash thought, sighing once more as he massaged her scalp again and relief rushed through her being once more.

Despite everything, she had been lucky. Probably luckier than she deserved after everything she had done. Not only for getting to meet Victor and getting to reunite with him a grand total of three times - or two, if she only counted those after they had actually started their relationship - but also for having a wonderful daughter who she loved and who loved her back, and for getting to be with them both and just be able to be a family despite the threats hanging over their heads. 

Victor must have read something on her face again, for he said, “So... back to not thinking of unpleasant matters for now… why don’t you put these things away, and I can tell you an idea I’ve had?”

A deep groan rolling from her lips as Victor’s motions suddenly reversed, she fake-glared at him.

“You should know by now that I don’t take orders from anyone.” 

She felt his hands temporarily stop their movements as he shrugged. 

“I prefer to look at it as an invitation.” His massage still halted, he crouched to whisper in her ear. “Though it’s one I confess I would very much like you to accept, mi amor.”

“You would, wouldn’t you?” she breathed as he straightened himself up, a deep sigh flowing out of her. “Very well. What is it?” 

“Uh-uh-uh!” he tut-tutted. “I’m not seeing anything put away...” 

Her eyes narrowed at his response, a low mock-grumble joining her change in expression. He really knew her a bit too well. 

“Watch out, Victor,” she teased. “You don’t want to fall prey to the stereotype that men can’t keep a house.” 

He again ran his fingers through her hair, the white locks parting in their wake. “It’s more like I don’t want to go against how you like to be the one putting your own things away, especially when it comes to magical studies.”

Another affected grumble rippled out of her mouth. Again, he knew her too well. 

“Very well then,” she conceded, her fingers curling around her tamborita’s handle.

On cue once more, Victor withdrew his hands from her hair and curled them over the sides of her chair, pulling it back exactly as she stood up and drew her drum wand, then aimed it at the table’s surface. 

“Llévaluq!” she chanted as she smacked the drum.

Identical silvery-grey glows bloomed around each page spread over the table, as well as around the purple gem she’d been studying for hours. Ash fiddled her fingers as if she was playing a harp; the papers bent and swerved and turned over the table like flying carpets before settling into a neat stack, the gathered pile of pages then flying into the shelf behind her with a beckoning motion from her hand. The Jewel of Night followed in their wake with the same gesture, but swerved slightly to the right and upwards, stopping its course once it hovered above a small, seemingly ordinary light yellow jar with rectangular Maruvian patterns of a darker shade over its surface.

She directed a look at Victor as she held the jewel in place. The next instant, he drew his own tamborita and aimed it at the jar. 

“Piikrete tarruyniu waaygico!” he chanted, punctuating each word with a smack on the tamborita.

After the last smack resounded through the cabin, a dark-blue glow bloomed around the drum as Victor raised his hand, the jar’s lid floating about a foot off and allowing Ash to slide the Jewel of Night in. Hearing the low clatter of it landing, she holstered her tamborita as Victor lowered his hand, setting the lid on its place.

Sliding his tamborita into its own holster, Victor turned to her with a smile, reaching out with his left hand. “Now, where were we?”

Taking his hand, Ash replied. “You were about to make an invitation.”

He raised his arm in response, in time with Ash twirling in place, her hair fanning out as she completed her spin and then stepped towards Victor’s chest as he drew her to him, wrapping both arms around her as he settled his lips on her neck. 

“I was thinking…” he halted his words to kiss her neck “...that you could wait here while I run you a nice warm bath…” he kissed a slightly higher spot “... and then you take the time to enjoy it while I cook a special dinner with what I brought…” So that’s what’s in the bag! Ash thought as he kissed below her ear “... and then we could have our second celebration of Dia del Amor y la Amistad.” he finished, tenderly kissing her cheek.

Her eyes widened at the words, her heart leaping slightly in her chest. Their second celebration! Amidst her frayed nerves after repeated failures with the Jewel of Night, she had completely forgotten about that! Not about the celebration they and Carla had had that morning - after all, it had been the first time the three of them properly celebrated Dia del Amor y la Amistad since her return - but about the second celebration that was meant to be just for her and Victor, which they had even talked about more than once over the previous days. 

I really need to stop thinking about that jewel if it can make me forget something like that. 

Victor chuckled as if she had spoken her words rather than thinking them, the curling of his lips telling her that he was cooking up a joke. 

“You know, as far as stereotypes go, it’s men who are said to forget romantic celebrations…” he brought up. 

Despite the laugh at his quip, Ash reached back and nudged Victor’s nose with her index finger. 

“Watch your tongue, Mister. If I get annoyed, you’re going straight to the couch tonight.”

He gave her a melodramatic gape, put a hand to his chest. “Oh, the horror!...”

Taking her chance, Ash twisted out of his embrace and then pressed herself flush to him, wrapping one arm around his shoulder and sinking her other hand into his hair as her lips leapt upwards to claim his. He engulfed her in another embrace, resting his hands on her back as their mouths met. For a heartbeat, their lips started to glide over each other’s, both reading the other’s intention to take things slowly. But then, like alcohol meeting a cinder, their passion seemed to explode through their bodies, leaping the frustrations this day had brought them both as their lips devoured each other time and time again, each trying to both drain their pent up tension and help the other with their own, somehow wanting to put out and build the fire flowing between them at the same time. Awareness of everything faded into the background as they devoted every bit of their focus to the flutter of each other’s hands and mouths, to the feeling of each other’s touch, to the warmth of their kisses. 

It seemed to last an eternity before they drew apart, looking into each other’s eyes like hypnotized, as if they were floating. 

Then, despite herself, Ash burst into chuckles, taking her hand to her lips in a token attempt at suppressing them.

Amusement twinkling in his own eyes, Victor curled an eyebrow and blew through his pursed lips.

“I’m full of lipstick again, right?” 

Her suppressed laughter slowly fading, Ash summoned magic into her other hand and waved it over Victor’s face, the lipstick smudges dispelling under the sparks swarming around her fingers. 

Lowering her hand as she let the magic fade, Ash drawled, “So… that warm bath?”

“Coming right up,” he replied with a mock-casual tone and a warm smile as he lowered his arms. 

Realizing she would need to let him go for him to run her bath, Ash pulled away, following him with her eyes as he headed to their cabin’s small bathroom. 

A warm bath sounded nice indeed. While cleansing charms could do the job just as well, and far more quickly, they couldn’t equal the peaceful feeling of sinking into the warm water and feeling it melting the tension from within her, making her stop thinking about the day’s concerns better than the best mind control spell. 

It wouldn’t really make them go away, she knew. However good this night was, their concerns wouldn’t become any less real, and the Evergrowing Forest would remain a threat to their lives until they managed to destroy it.

But at least tonight, Ash would enjoy what she had to be thankful for.

[i-just-like-commenting]

The Witcher review

When I first read critics’ reviews of this show, they seemed to fall into two camps: non-fantasy fans who dismissed it as nonsense, and fantasy fans who said it got good but took a while to get there. Knowing I was a fantasy fan, I figured I might be in the latter camp, and started watching it. Casually at first, one episode a day, taking a break for Christmas…and then about halfway through I was hooked and marathoned the rest of the series. I genuinely liked this series…but it has problems, and I can see why it lost a lot of non-fantasy fans from the outset. Let’s get the bad out of the way first so I can gush about the good.

Barriers of Entry

Most TV viewers are not fantasy readers. Those of us who are may regret that, but it’s not a genre that everyone gets into, and it has its own storytelling quirks that can be off-putting to newcomers. This is why, for all that it failed in later seasons, Game of Thrones did well for general viewers in its early seasons. The small bit of fantasy hinted at isn’t all that different from the zombie films people are used to, and the rest feels mostly like period piece drama. Magic only gets introduced gradually, with an explanation of what it is and how it works as it’s introduced. Also, there’s a map.

The Witcher doesn’t have any of that scaffolding. It is full high fantasy, magic-heavy, thick in world-building from the very instant it opens. It explains very little about anything; by the end of season 1 I don’t know what Cirilla’s powers are, how Witchers are made, or what the Conjunction of the Spheres is that gets repeatedly mentioned. Now, as a fantasy reader I’m used to this; ideas and supernatural mysteries get introduced and not explained until later because the characters in-universe understand the and don’t need an explanation. All I need to know is that Cirilla has some dangerous power that Nilfgaard wants, that Witchers are made and not born, and that the Conjunction is an important thing that happened in the past that may be relevant in the future. Presumably all will be made clear in time.

But I really would’ve liked a map. Up until the penultimate episode we’ve no idea of what this place looks like, how everything is connected to each other. It makes the stakes of Nilfgaard’s invasion harder to fathom. How big are they as a kingdom? How at risk are the Northern Kingdoms? How many Northern Kingdoms are there? A few map shots in the first episode as Calanthe prepares for war, a few more as the series progresses, all of that would have helped situate the story and have it feel more grounded spatially.

As for temporally…

Timeline Shenanigans

I have no problem with this series choosing to have three different timelines for its three different characters that don’t meet up in the “present” until the final episode. Certainly there have been excellent series that have done this in the past (N.K. Jemisin’s Fifth Season comes to mind). But time stamps would’ve been really nice. Let the first episode play out as it does, but when we jump back to Ciri for the last time, have a heading that says “30 years later,” confirming to the audience what they suspect from some throwaway lines about Calanthe, that this is taking place much earlier than Ciri’s scenes. Do the same when Yennefer is introduced, keep updating how far along we are with Geralt’s story, not just to clarify the timeline but to also build suspense as the viewers realize that the plotlines are catching up to each other.

However that wouldn’t fix all the problems inherent to the time-jumping. Between episodes 5 and 6 we find out, for example, that Yennefer and Geralt have met several times already and are pretty heavily involved with each other. It works well enough because the actors are very good, but it’s a bit “oh, really?” when you find that out.

Likewise, I have no idea how long Jaskier has been around having an obvious crush on annoying Geralt; is it months? Years? I think it’s years, because that’s the same time frame for Geralt and Yennefer’s hookups, but maybe it wasn’t that long? And how long did Yennefer’s education take? When did her immortality kick in? How much time passed between Geralt and Yennefer breaking up and Geralt deciding to seek out Ciri? Was it right before? Years later? How old is Jaskier supposed to be at this point? Was Yennefer’s joke about crow lines an indication he’s approaching middle age? Time stamps!

This show is really lucky it had as good a cast as it did to carry it through these narrative issues.

Special Effects

The elves, hedgehog people, and fauns all look…bad. Like, almost Halloween costume bad. Don’t know what else to say. The other effects were really good, so they stuck out.

But now let’s talk about how this series rocked:

Have I mentioned this cast is fantastic?

So my interest in Henry Cavill may have been less than high-minded, but he is in fact absolutely fantastic in this. The show also walks that fine line with “jerk with a heart of gold” characters where it explains their dickishness without excusing it. We understand that with the life he’s led and the discrimination he’s faced why Geralt is cold and aloof, but we also see how being that way destroys his relationships with people he cares for, especially in episode 6. And Cavill manages to convey perfectly how, at the moment he sees Ciri, Geralt realizes that his whole life has been leading up to him taking on this role as protector and guardian. He needs someone to need him, even if that terrifies him.

And then there’s Anya Chalotra as Yennefer who you might call a deuteragonist since she doesn’t show up until the second episode and isn’t the title character, but honestly the show is as much about her as it is about Geralt. You start with her as an abused child with a spinal deformity who thinks she’s unimportant and worthless. You have her trying to conform herself to the purposes others give her, literally changing her body to meet their expectations, failing, flailing about trying to find a purpose, and then in the final episode landing on the grim realization that she is the only one who can protect all the Northern Kingdoms. It’s an excellent arc, even with the timeskips sometimes making it not as smooth a one as it might have been. Again we have Anya Chalotra to thank for making it work in spite of the narrative missteps.

Even Freya Allen, though she doesn’t get much to do plotwise, does a great job portraying the internality of Ciri’s journey this season, as she slowly realizes her beloved grandmother may have, in fact, been terrible – but that this doesn’t justify what was done to them.

Relationships you can root for

Two broken and emotionally distant people learning to break down their barriers and be vulnerable to each other? Sign me up, nothing is hotter. I really like Geralt and Yennefer, and I honestly hope they find common purpose together next season and realize that, wish or no wish, they’re good for each other and should try to work it out.

But Jaskier and Geralt’s relationship is honestly great, too. While I don’t think they’re sexually interested in each other and therefore this counts more as a “bromance,” I also hate the term “bromance” and prefer to just say that their unacknowledged but obvious affection for each other is charming. I’m guessing Jaskier will come back later? Maybe he was just in the short stories they use here, but that would be a shame.

The soundtrack “slaps” – that’s the term young people are using, right?

While “Toss a Coin to Your Witcher” is attaining meme status and so many Youtube listens that it threatens to break into Billboard’s charts, let’s not forget how all the music in this series is so good. Like, literally, even if you can’t get into the show at all because of its other problems, check out this score, it’s amazing. It is incredibly frustrating that it’s not up on Spotify yet, though a few tracks are available on Youtube.

Its total embrace of being a fantasy series

And here we come back round to the beginning of my review. While Game of Thrones did well in its early seasons by easing its audience into its fantasy setting, as seasons went on it seemed progressively more and more embarrassed that it had to be a fantasy story. The Stark children’s warg powers are forgotten, prophecies are removed, the House of the Undying is reduced to like one room, bye-bye krakens and any kind of water magic, Euron’s just a pirate now, and who is this Lady Stoneheart you speak of? They even dispensed with the big final threat of the White Walkers as quickly and unceremoniously as possible, just so they could get back to the politics.

The Witcher, on the other hand, is a fantasy series from its first frame to its last and loves it. There’s monsters and magic everywhere, Destiny sets everything up to follow fairy tale rules, and humans share the world with multiple other sentient species. It does not apologize for this, and it has a very lived-in feel to it that many magic-heavy universes fail to achieve. You believe that this is a world where the supernatural is natural, where people have seen and lived alongside magic their whole lives. We see how magic is integrated into combat, healing, and politics, and it’s all believable in spite of how unbelievable it is. It makes it refreshingly fun and escapist without feeling completely divorced from reality.

So overall, I recommend the series while really wishing they’d structured it more clearly and accessibly. And had better makeup effects because ugh.

[atariince]

Tagged by @vanimore​ (thanks :3)

1) Replace Beren with….?

Hm. Despite my pervasive dissatisfaction with the treatment of Beren and Luthien, I wouldn’t change Beren as a character. The tale would lose all significance. To me, the problem relies more on the (biased) way the characters are depicted, their unreal flawless behaviours, the readers’ blindness around it all, and the nonsensical aspects of the narrative. It’s not the tale itself, or the characters, that irks me , but the global approach.

2) Open your front door to see what realm of Middle-earth? 

That would greatly depend on the timeline! East Beleriand before the breaking of siege seems like a lovely place. Ossiriand, perhaps?  

3) Silmarillion series? Yay or Nay?

As an adaptation? Nay. Definitely NAY. (I’m still sore about the Amazon thing).

4) Sauron was…what he was, but would he actually have been pretty successful as a world ruler, had the War of the Ring gone the other way?

Good question… if by successful you mean being the tyrannical ruler of a kingdom of slaves, then yes, he would have, for a while at least. I cannot help thinking that he would eventually be consumed by the ring, if not physically (clearly, he doesn’t exactly need a body), at least spiritually. If Melkor was diminished by the fact that he spread his power through the matter of Arda, then I don’t see why it wouldn’t be the same for Sauron. It would take more time of course, the ring being considerably smaller, but I daresay it would eventually happen. Besides, I believe that an empire relying on one single oligarch, no matter how powerful they can be, is ultimately doomed to fall (Aren’t all empires doomed to fall?). Plus, Sauron’s distrust in his own servants and his lingering paranoia would not help, and even though his servants would not dare betray him, there would eventually be much unrest among the mortals (if not among the orcs). Would he end up exterminating every single slave? That’s a possibility. Would he end up as the king of an empty kingdom? Lol. I can totally see it. Perhaps in his eyes, that would be a form of success…. The extermination of “the swine”, “purging” the world (as many tyrants did), or something of the like. Anyway, it might take a long time, but I‘m convinced his empire would eventually fall (Look at the decadence of the Roman empire and its last emperors). And if he doesn’t destroy the ring by himself in his folly, I guess he would just become a sort of wraith himself, still powerful but unable to efficiently use his power.  

5) Rescue just one character from the Silmarillion - who and why? 

Curufin. Several reasons, but just imagine the Eregion events if Curufin had been alive (and eventually returned beside his son). Just imagine it. 

6) After the War of the Ring, one assumes Aragorn would have exterminated all the orcs he could find. Do you look on it as genocide or as in destroying vermin? 

That’s a very interesting question! I daresay it depends on what you do with Myths Transformed. In the case the orcs being “beasts of humanized shape” with no fëa, and with “just as much independence as have, say, dogs or horses…”, you may deduce that the utter destruction of the species would be more or less equivalent of the destruction, if not of vermin, at least of an entire animal species - which could be seen as morally blameworthy..  

Then we have this other draft in which orcs are said to be “capable of speech and craft” which ultimately place them out of the spectrum of simple “beasts”. On the other hand, they also tend to “bred and multiplied rapidly”, which may (from of a human perspective after the War of the Ring) require some sort of regulation? Especially if they are “so corrupted that they were pitiless, and there was no cruelty or wickedness that they would not commit […] doing evil deeds unbidden for their own sports” (that is, cruelty became a part of their very nature). Yet, let’s not forget that they are said to be “within the law”, which includes that “they must not be dealt with in their own terms of cruelty and treachery”. So, I think it unlikely for Aragron to attempt to exterminate the whole species.

I think the question would be to know if there could be, after the end of Sauron, a sort or non-aggressive cohabitation between human and orcs (which in the end would be impossible because there is no unified group of orcs)

In any case, I would be very cautious about these notions and to be fair, I’d rather not emit any conclusion, although it remains a fascinating thing to think about :3 the only conclusion that can be made is that it is a question of morals; can a powerful ruler exterminate a potential threat in the name of the “precautionary principle”, even if it includes bloodshed?

7) Do you think, honestly, that had you been alive then, that, if Sauron had offered you one of the Nine Rings you would have refused? 

Hm. Although it would have been difficult to convince me because I’m naturally distrustful and suspicious and I particularly don’t believe in uninterested altruism and generosity, I must admit that the offer of being “immortal” (lol) and powerful would have been very tempting. So, if Sauron was determined enough, I would have eventually accepted. 

8) As an Quendi, remain in Cuiviénen or go West?

The West would have been tempting. I’m curious. But as I said, I’m also very suspicious about people offering me stuff, be they Vala or not. :3 I guess I would have remained behind? I don’t know for sure.

9) Did you find the Silmarillion hard to read when you first read it?

Only the first chapters. This first reading was enchanting and fascinating, but I struggled a bit. After the theft of the Silmarils it became much easier. Then I cried.

10) One sentence from Maedhros after Fingon rescued him from Thangorodhrim

“Why?”

11) One thought from Mairon when Melkor returned to Angband with the Silmarils 

“Why?”

My questions:

If you could possess one single object that appears in the Silm/hobbit/Lotr/HoME, which one would it be? 

As a mortal man arriving in Beleriand during the first age, would you have trusted the Eldar?

You are on a long errand and eventually find yourself in Lothlorien. Before you leave, you are given to choose between Miruvor or lambas bread. Which one do you take with you?

Any opinion about the “petty-dwarves” and the way they were treated in Beleriand?

What did you like the most the first time you read The Silmarillion?

Do you think a Sauron-Smaug partnership could have been possible if the dragon hadn’t been destroyed? Any opinion about it?

Should we talk about the portrayal we get of Finrod in the debate with Andreth?

 Can you share one headcanon about Celebrimbor and Narvi’s friendship?

Any thought about the idea of Maedhros wearing the dragon-helm? Why giving it to Fingon if it had already been given to him? Isn’t it rude? Is it even a good gift-idea?

According to you, in The Silmarillion, which action is the most meaningful (/heartbreaking) token of loyalty?

If you could be fluent in one single tongue of Arda, and be clueless about all other languages, which one would you choose? (pick the age you prefer)

Tagging: @silverartisan @doegred-main @curufinwefeanaro @nihthelm  @putrid-tongue @the-mirador