#I need to now absorb every piece of media pertaining to them and I will not feel better until I do

[todolist-nothing07]

I need season two, stat!

[deliciousscaloppine]

Hot Takes Galore: A brief overview of fandom backlashes that influenced fanfiction writing traditions as I have personally experienced them:

In today’s segment I am going to talk about copyright infringement.

First let me preface this by saying I have only ever been in 3 fandoms, starting from 2008 and I have never been terribly active - like this blog has been the most active I’ve ever been in any fandom ever. I am not going to talk about particular fandom dramas because I am pretty clueless about that. What I am going to talk about is that friction between “reality” and online spaces that brought about changes that are still in effect today in the way fanfiction is written and perceived.

In 2008 as I was entering, nearly every piece of fanfiction had a disclaimer about the author not owning the characters, which were the property of Corporate Entity X, or Author Y, and also not profiting from the work in any shape or form. At the time getting money from writing fanfiction was a gigantic taboo, and almost no one did it, or advertised that they did. 

But as I understand through convention culture printed writing did circulate in exchange for money (zines), and at least in Japan one could sell doujinshis (self-published stories and comics, often within the framework of another work) in certain events. Although this was largely considered “illegal” under copyright laws, and artists could be persecuted or blacklisted from entering the industry if discovered. That’s also why fanartists often to this day may screen where and when their work is viewed, and move to take down reposts, or call others to protest if artworks are circulated without permission outside of the artist’s page.

Older fandom people also hated authors that moved against fanfiction, a big case being Anne Rice, the vampire lady everyone - including me - copies when writing about vampires. And now I am going to talk a little about that.

Usually, writers, just sit somewhere cosy and write, and often they have no idea, absolutely no idea, on how to manage their writing properties - usually a lawyer does that, and lawyers want A Lot Of Money (A brief brush with justice and lawyers over a civil dispute I won, cost me 1000 euros out of nowhere, in a single day, and no I couldn’t avoid it because I was the accused one, so I had to appear with some representation). 

So sometimes, quite often, it’s a lawyer that activates a writer or other artist to move against “smaller” copyright infringements, in order to make bank. And if one suffers such a case, they should make it as apparent as possible to the other party that they have no money, and the pressure will go away immediately. But even MORE OFTEN a small copyright infringement, may lead to a sequence of bigger ones, and ultimately the de facto loss of rights from one’s writing properties, and of course revenue. 

And for a lot of published authors, they just don’t know for how long they can publish things - publishing houses that have them signed can close, book sales can drop, tastes change, personal problems, and anything else may mean that they could find themselves without a source of income at any point in the future, while they are aging and becoming more and more irrelevant. 

A very famous case currently, is that of Alan Dean Foster, the writer who has done some novelizations for movies like Star Wars and Alien, and is no longer receiving revenue from that - while his wife is hospitalized and their family needs the income - because Disney absorbed the company that had signed the contract with him, and chose to not honor the previous contract. To make them pay he will have to go into a huge legal battle with a corporate giant, which he cannot afford. But they still absorb income from these novelizations.

But how does fanfiction tie into that, and Anne Rice’s case (which if memory serves right, also went through a series of personal problems, including her husband’s death during that time). 

So for a lot of writers, fanfiction may be that tiny breach that may threaten their rights in the future from tresspases of distribution networks. Meaning, people write vampire fanfiction based on Anne Rice’s work? What if another publishing house used the template of her works (historical settings, bleeding orifices, religious themes, homosexuality and sexual trauma etc) and produced a royalty free series of such works with a team of professional writers that do not own the work - who often have less rights, like not owning the characters, or the storylines, participating in a very small scale, so their payment goes down etc)

And in this way EVERYONE SUFFERS. Big Name Published Author fades into obscurity and goes into poverty and payroll writers are horrifically abused.  

A lot of hobbyists, and hobbyist writers whose sole dream is to be published in some shape or form, do not really care, and do not concern themselves with the legal aspect of creation, or the technical skill that it takes to produce writing on a consistent basis, which can only happen if you’ve got your basic needs covered. So they might see this type of backlash as inherently privileged. 

But it’s not really a privilege, there has been a global recession in basic working rights for everyone, and lovers of fiction don’t have to condone, of course, attacks against them, but they need to put that kind of backlash in perspective. Someone did write the content you enjoy, THEY ARE NOT DEAD YET, and may have opinions on how it should be managed, especially when it pertains to their livelihood. 

It’s a delicate balance that we all must keep in order to keep corporate regulations out of it.

For instance with the recent danmei explosion The Untamed brought forth, Ao3 was banned in China. Now a lot of you might know that this was caused by some real person fic involving the actor Xiao Zhan, which led to a whole other level of drama. But make no mistake this was a political act to protect the interests of the domestic publishing industry as it prepares to do an international opening that will bring in several billions from foreign markets.

Because Ao3 has been expanding as a platform globally it brings about changes, and in many cases steals readers away from traditional publishing, so it becomes unacceptable economically for a bunch of hobbyists to influence tastes, market mores, and create sensationalism around certain properties out of literally the blue. This is not a good thing for a lot of corporate thinking, they set the product and we are supposed to buy it. We are not supposed to go, it would look greater with a bunch of anal, and then put forth a million words altering the character of the intellectual property.

Why you ask? Again, because another publishing industry might choose to imitate the style of danmei fanfics and produce works that hijack readership, or lead to breach of contracts, making an unsafe environment for workers in this industry (Xiao Zhan’s case.)

Nowadays I see more and more fanfic authors coming out of their shell to ask money for writing in the form of donations, patronage and commissions, as fandom involvement is also becoming vastly monetized. The market of conventions coming into social media platforms. A strange more exists still in which while “legally wrong”, as long as money is not asked on the publishing platform (Ao3), it may not count as copyright infringement. But fanfic authors, may still be treated with hostility for this, for not “deserving” to profit from someone else’s properties, or even worse for “stealing” readership. 

For instance a recent argument I have seen from lgbtq authors, is that they remain unsupported by fandom spaces, who often proclaim themselves as lgbtq or lgbtq friendly (something that is not true), but at the same time they are not looking for published lgbtq stories, or authors, or even treat these with open hostility, or a lot of bias.

Fandom is not comprised from “readers” in the traditional sense, definitely not friends of literature, and it’s free, no one really has to pay anything to read a published fanfic.  So it’s a pretty loose demographic with no set characteristics, and no interest in investing time and money in something for long. It’s an online social activity and not a readers’ movement, highly influenced by peer pressure and branding. It’s basically a gigantic group of people who don’t really do anything for no one, and may develop a parasitic connection to intellectual properties (I am sorry peers, it’s the truth). 

And it’s perhaps the biggest counterculture scene at the moment in the developed world. To this day it treats even its own authors with tremendous suspicion, disregard and dismissal, meaning that even if someone can get some money and recognition locally through writing fanfic they are on thin fucking ice at all times for all the reasons but mostly attracting unnecessary attention to themselves and subsequently the scene.  A pattern that we will see is endemic to all forms of fandom backlashes.

So to this day in contrast with fanart, fan writers may not be compensated for their troubles, but may also be ousted from their domestic professional spaces for writing fanfic that may infringe on their intellectual property. 

The thing is, for me, that fandom culture can become incredibly supportive of corporate practices that harm actual people (writers, they are people too) but when they realize that the same corporate practices may be used against them, it’s too late to realize that it’s not a lottery of who wins by crying more, and by the time that happens, a corporation or industry who has used them to do its dark bidding, can stop catering to them  because ultimately they have become again irrelevant once a well defined demographic of  readers and viewers has been secured.

So if you are going to do counterculture, at least do it right. Be respectful of the writers/authors of the content you consume and mindful of their troubles, do not generate public strife that brings in political regulation in favor of corporate interests. Become interested in writing culture, support your fanfic authors with lasting engagement in their work, even if it escapes the narrow confines of a certain fandom. It’s simple. Eat, live, pray, fuck, or something.

[lit--bitch]

Current-Reads (20/04/2020 - 26/04/2020) 🍓🐢

(Disclosure: I don’t know anybody I’ve been currently reading this week. 😊)

Adding the preface again here: every Sunday without fail I throw up the freshest literature and photography I’ve read over the week, sometimes it’s a book, sometimes it’s a piece I saw in a magazine or an online zine, sometimes it’s something I saw on social media, etc. Sometimes I add ‘RECOMMEND’ next to a few of the titles, but that’s not to say I don’t recommend all of them, I just love some pieces more than others. Not everything will be everybody’s cup of tea, yanno, c’est la vie. And any titles that you see in bold are hyperlinked so if you click or tap them they’ll direct you straight to the source… or shopping basket. 

This week I’m gonna throw in a red herring and tell you about something I’ve been watching as well as what I’ve been reading, because I think it’s really cool and definitely appropriate for the age we’re living in at the moment. 

So I’ve been reading: Susan Sontag’s As Consciousness is Harnessed to Flesh (Diaries 1964—1980) which was edited by her son, David. I also read an interview on Granta from March between Rachel Long and Morgan Parker. I’ve also tucked into a couple pieces on Fence, Lexi Welch’s ‘Astroturf’ and Anthony Michael Morena’s ‘The Whale’. I also saw Cecelia Knapp’s poem in Bath Magg Issue Three (but the whole issue is an absolute smacker, it’s great). Last but not least, I’m up to episode 5 of a brand new thing called The Midnight Gospel. It is crazy good. And it’s on Netflix right now. 

***

Cecilia Knapp, ‘I Used To Eat KFC Zingers Without Hating Myself’, Bath Magg Issue #3: I really loved the whole of Issue Three, I guess I was quite struck by this particular poem for its “staccato-ness”. This poem is buttered with present-day references. But they’re not necessarily about creating a familiar environment. Rather the object of familiarity is found within the assemblage of places, snacks and thoughts, all of which compound the grief ‘I’ is experiencing. The ‘I’ ruminates on life’s banality and their personal insecurities in living banality: ‘I need a thigh gap. I use emojis / to avoid conflict. Worry I’m a gentrifier. Watch docs about murdered women’. The vapidity is funny. The pain is not. The insecurities deepen. Your body, your life, continues the ache of day-to-day routine, and finds no resolution in the things which may or may not stand to comfort oneself when ravaged by loss. The poem feels quite loose, and disinterested. It’s a sore poem, but its array of references make it colourful. It sort of reminded me of Édouard Levé’s work a little bit? But if Édouard Levé had been a pop culture fanatic chewing HubbaBubba bubblegum on the London Overground.  Bath Magg is a pretty exciting new magazine, (been around just under a year I think?) and they’ve published a lot of great writers, many of whom are emerging and I’ve spotted some quite established peple in there too. Kudos to their rubber ducky logo. It’s run by Mariah Whelan and Joe Carrick-Varty. 

In Conversation with Morgan Parker and Rachel Long, Granta Magazine: I deeply love Morgan Parker’s work, she’s, in my opinion, the master of titles. I can’t think of anybody who titles their work as well as Morgan Parker does. And I love the depth of honesty and charisma in this interview. Like yeah, it appears to be a generic Q/A but, it genuinely feels like a conversation, and it’s welcoming and unpretentious. Rachel Long asks some penetrating questions, and Morgan’s answers are so detailed and self-aware. Most of the discussion revolves around the action of writing poetry in general and where does that impulse arise from, but they do discuss Morgan’s latest collection Magical Negro which came out February last year. It’s a narrative on black womanhood, on micro-aggressions and reoccuring violence, it’s about breaking down white perceptions of blackness, and dissolving those projections. What I love about Morgan Parker is she’s tackling this fucking idiot thing where (mostly) white people think she’s attempting to represent all black women in her writing, which is, by Morgan’s own admission, impossible. Her work is a duty to herself, to the background she’s lived and lives, and to unpack that discourse in her own way. And if it resonates, then great! I felt all this was inherent in the interview and only adds to my respect for her, and to Rachel for being such an attentive interviewer. BTW Rachel Long has a debut collection coming out this July, My Darling from the Lions.

Anthony Michael Morena, ‘The Whale’, Fence Portal (Streaming) (RECOMMEND): I can’t tell you how much I adored this beautiful mass of whale and word. It’s an essay which references the American Natural History Museum’s Blue Whale model. The writing is thick with feeling and fat with concern. It blends monologue, memoir. It’s non-fiction and documentary. It’s elusive, enigmatic, fragmented. It’s like broken biscuits and blubber. To me it felt like a note on the offences of climate change, the emotional response and grief as we bystand erosion and corrosion, the loss of life, and the urge to merge something back together as it dissolves and fragments before our eyes. It’s as personal as it is public. A gorgeous and complex piece.

Susan Sontag’s As Consciousness is Harnessed to Flesh (Diaries 1964—1980) (RECOMMEND): I felt so afflicted reading Susan Sontag’s diaries, because y’know, it’s the equivalent of invading an Ancient Egyptian pharaoh’s tomb. Like, leave people alone. At the same like, this woman. These diaries are still shaping me, and each section leaves you with the weirdest aftertaste. Her personality permeates through every detail, every line-break, every reference and articulation of feeling. You learn so much, you gain so much from her perceptions and observations. How do I contain Susan Sontag? How do I describe these diaries? Not at all. Just buy it. 

Lexi Welch’s ‘Astroturf’, Fence Portal (Streaming) (RECOMMEND): My eyes locked onto this piece and just didn’t really stop reading. Lexi’s voice is enamouring and hypnotic. It’s so violent too. You’re lunged into friction burns and sports injuries, time and progression, the tensions between collectivity and individuality, family and sexuality, or as Fence put it, ‘lesbian eros’. This piece felt acidic. At times you can’t tell if the ‘I’ is indifferent or hurting to the point of numbness. It straddles so many different thematics, and breaks down a lot of conventions pertaining to the “ideal experience” of family relationships and team work. The resolution seems to be that in spite of people, our collectivity is defined by our collective solitude. This essay kicked me around a football field. It takes a good few repeated reads to appreciate its kaleidoscopic shifting, but it’s definitely one of my favourites.

The Midnight Gospel, from Pendleton Ward and Duncan Trussell, Netflix: (RECOMMEND) So the other day my friend Ben linked this to me and I had seen the trailer ages back and thought “Oh yeah I really wanna watch that”, but just forgot. After his reminder, I started watching it and ever since I’ve been saying to loads of other friends “Have you watched ‘The Midnight Gospel’ on Netflix?” because I’m d y i n g  to talk about it with everybody. 

I literally can’t categorise this “TV show” to you. It’s like if animation had a baby with a philosophy podcast and then put that baby onto an IV drip of psychedelics. It’s this swarm of different stimuli which you kind have to zone in on and absorb individually and yet somehow collectively. 

So like, “Clancy” is a spacecaster who sets up “spacecasts” (podcasts) with creatures from other simulated worlds and he interviews them. But when Clancy transports himself into these worlds, it’s not like they’re sat down on some cream sofa with two glasses of water like it’s animated Oprah. No, his interviewees are like in the middle of fighting off a zombie apocalypse or meditating on a mountain or trying to find and save their lost lover. And Clancy just joins them on the journey and interviews them about their “specialism”. These are real people that are being interviewed like, the first episode is with Dr. Drew Pinker. And when you’re watching it, you think that the animation is totally separate to the conversation exchange the characters are having, but that’s not true. They have intersections, they have meaning. It only becomes obvious that it has meaning right at the end of each episode, but if you lock on you’ll see it’s all relevant throughout. 

One of my friends was like “Oh I might stick that on tonight and have a joint” and I was like, don’t fucking get high when you’re watching this because it’s already intense enough as it is, like you know that Pendleton Ward and Duncan Trussell have felt some real shit to create this absolute rare jewel. In my opinion, you don’t need cannabis to appreciate these discussions. But if you wanna do it, then hey it’s a “free country”. And it’s not as though there’s a serious, central core plot like there is with Rick & Morty, I mean there is a kind of overarching plot but it’s not always integral. Like ultimately we’re invested in Clancy’s story but also all the stories of all the other people that come his way. There’s multiple plots, there’s multiple dimensions and ways of seeing. It’s a programme which delivers on multiplicity, which manifests itself in everything and everyone we see and know and touch and hear, etc, etc. 

This production articulates some of the revelations that psychedelics can give you. Psychedelics don’t make you see the world literally like these animations do, but the sensations of the animation are reminiscent of an acid trip’s oscillating moods and sensitivities. It’s really cool, and it’s very poignant, and it’s my new favourite show to watch. And what’s so great about it is that, it requires multiple watches in order to really absorb everything in its entirety, so it’s a series you can just keep going back to even after you’ve seen them all. It’s re-watchable. Just fundamental goodness all round. Best way to indulge in it is with ice cream. 🍨

***

So that’s it for this week, next Friday’s review is Annie Ernaux’s A Girl’s Story translated by Alison L. Strayer, published with Fitzcarraldo Editions. 

Stay safe and well as always, my little caramels. 💁🏽

[diveronarpg]

Congratulations, LINA! You’ve been accepted for the role of TROILUS with an FC change to Henry Golding. Admin Rosey: I am absolutely HOWLING. So, when I was writing Troilus, I was having an amazing time -- he’s so nuanced and seemingly superficial, but there are so many detailed facets that contribute to his happy-go-lucky attitude. He’s so utterly disarming and charming that, from the interview alone, I couldn’t help but swoon over him. Your development for him promises so much, from the sought-after revelation of Celeste’s infidelity to turning him into a hollow and hungry creature. I’m absolutely over the moon to be putting my precious boy into your hands, Lina. By all means, ruin us all. Please read over the checklist and send in your blog within 24 hours.

WELCOME TO THE MOB.

Out of Character

Alias | Lina. Age | 26 Preferred Pronouns | She/her Activity Level | 5 – Med school honestly wipes the floor with me most days, so I can’t promise daily activity but as I’ve said before, I promise consistency and communication. I’ll request a hiatus if needed, and I won’t disappear or drop-out without warning.   Timezone | Finally back in EST (UTC-5:00) Current/Past RP Accounts | —

In Character

Character | Tomas Sabello -> Could I request an FC switch to ether Henry Golding or Godfrey Gao? I love Bob Morley to pieces but I’ve used him as an FC for long enough that I really struggle to dissociate him from the role I played. I think Henry fits Tomas’ gentle disposition best, but Godfrey has more versatility in terms of acting roles/expression which seems more in line with the mood in Verona and what he may eventually become… I dunno! I’ll leave it to you guys to choose the preferred alternate FC in the event that I do get accepted. I’d be happy working with either one.

What drew you to this character? | I really liked how opposite he is to Viv, honestly. He’s so enamored with emotion, and despite the fact that he’s an actor by trade, he’s an open book when it comes to anything that inspires feeling within him. I think Tomas loves the idea of love to such an extreme that there’s no thought to guarding himself from it. No amount of pride could keep him from offering his heart up, not even the threat of rejection. He takes and he takes, but he also gives to the people around him, indiscriminately; even to the most insignificant of passersby who’ve touched his life or inspired his creativity in some brief, ephemeral way. While Viv absorbs and safeguards whatever light she finds, Tomas reflects it freely back into the universe, and I really like that dichotomy.

What is a future plot idea you have in mind for the character?

*∆* - Ignorance isn’t bliss, it’s oblivion: I’ll keep this point short and sweet; I want Tomas to find out about Celeste’s infidelity and for his heart to get absolutely shattered in the process. It could be sooner, later or whenever, but I think we’re all holding our breaths for that to happen in the story, and I’d love the opportunity to portray that.

*∆* - To fight one’s nature is a losing battle: This is a plot contingent on the arc of his relationship with Celeste and details pertaining to their marriage (how long it takes for him to find out she’s cheating on him, what they do with that information, if they divorce, etc.). But essentially, I’d like to show Tomas’ struggle with his own fidelity because in his bio, he strikes me as the sort of character that doesn’t settle on one lover easily. And he loves Celeste with every inch of his being and right now that’s what’s keeping him faithful, but I think that even if her infidelity isn’t revealed, eventually Tomas will start to feel the strain. He’ll notice the little signs along the way that hint that she doesn’t quite love him the way he loves her. I think those would put cracks in the marriage even if Isabella wasn’t in the picture. I’d like to explore those, and how little micro-tensions crop up in chronic relationships when one partner feels like they’re pulling all the weight. I want to dig into that and cast the lens on a quietly troubled relationship, and I want to see how far it pushes Tomas in response. Does he grow colder?  Does he seek intimacy elsewhere? Does he fall into the same temptation and cheat on Celeste, whether physically or emotionally? Let’s find out!

*∆* - Any way the wind blows: I’ve always imagined Tomas to be the unsettled sort, in all senses of the word. His loves have always been transient and fleeting, his decisions (both in leaving Rome and marrying Celeste) seem rash and impulsive… I think capriciousness is a trait of his that extends to all facets of his life. So one headcanon I have for him is that now that he’s on sabbatical from acting, he’d want to try his hand at something new. Activities or careers that he gets excited by every few weeks and actively chases until something changes and then he drops the ball and moves on, certain he’ll find his luck elsewhere. I think it’d be interesting to see him get into all sorts of mix-ups while catering to this instinct, and maybe unintentionally making himself a nuisance to other characters in their line of work in the rp. Just this over-excited dude picking up positions and then dropping them as if life’s his own picnic… It’s definitely going to rub some people the wrong way and I’m here to see it happen!

*∆* - The hardest of hearts:  … I’m intrigued by Tomas’ deep resentment of Roman Montague. His bio implies that it’s his acting experience which primes him to look at Romeo as if he’s also an actor, playing a part he doesn’t deserve. But I think it goes deeper than that. I think canonically, even, Tomas’ character seems to have a lot in common with Romeo from Shakespeare’s original, or at least, the earliest version of Romeo that we see. Lovelorn and lackadaisical, an innate predisposition for goodness, and yet undoubtedly leaving lovers a little carelessly in his pursuit of love, etc. So the way I see it, beyond his judgment of Roman as being unfit to rule, I think Tomas doesn’t like him bc he sees in Roman all of the same flaws he recognizes subconsciously in himself. It’s always easier to see our flaws through a mirror. I’m interested in seeing how far Tomas would go to spite Roman in order to avoid having to confront himself. The fact that Celeste is still tied to the Montagues would also be a continuous dilemma for Tomas, who dislikes both mobs. Depending on what plots come up, I might even entertain the thought of getting Tomas tied up in Capulet business, with the singular goal of bringing down Roman Montague.

*∆* - … Destroys itself in the end: In his bio, it’s alluded that Tomas took from both his parents when it came to his nature. He loved as frequently and as persistently as his mother, but destroyed those in his wake as surely as his father; leaving his path littered with broken hearts. I want to see that side of Tomas again. Except this time, instead of it being an accident of youth and of too much ignorance, I want it to be intentional. I feel like heart-break would leave him hollow and hungry, and I want to experience that side of him. I think his capacity for hurt is almost equally potent to his capacity for love, and that’s what makes him such a compelling character in my eyes.

Are you comfortable with killing off your character? | Through a well-developed plot, yes.

In Depth

These interview chairs are always so stiff that Tomas has to wonder whether it’s intentional. Maybe it’s to keep him from falling asleep, but he’d never do that. He likes giving interviews for the most part. Of course, it was easier in his early twenties; when he had very little in the ways of a filter but was blessed with the circumstances in life that permitted him to get away with it. Oh, and an adoring audience. That always helped of course. These days, as a married man in a new city, he has to be more careful with his tongue.

That doesn’t make him any more careful with his smiles, however. And right now he’s aiming one of his most brilliant at the interviewer who’s already started asking him questions. They’re three minutes in, but she hasn’t returned any of his good cheer so far, and that’s uncommon. He’s remembered all his pleasantries, he’s been considerate enough in opening doors and waiting to be seated - but still, nary a smile. He doesn’t mind too much, but it makes his job so much more enjoyable when they do. And as a result, Isabella Gagliano is both a damper and a challenge. But before Tomas can engage her into lowering her defenses, she’s presented him with the next in a series of fan-chosen questions.

“What is your favorite place in Verona?”

”The Two Gentlemen. Certainly the best bottle of pinot grigio that I’ve ever had.” Tomas tells her, lips pressing together as sweetly as the juice from those sticky wine grapes. “You wouldn’t be remiss either if you tried the risotto al tastasal. That’s a real recommendation, you know?” He stage-whispers with a grin, “Off-the record.” But if Isabella takes note, he can’t tell.

The truth is, it’s a lie. A white lie, he consoles himself, because sometimes, the truth is too heavy a price to pay. The truth is that his favourite place in all of Verona is the recently abandoned Multisala Rivoli. It’s a cliche, he knows, an actor finding his second-home inside of a rundown movie-theatre. But it isn’t for the movies that he goes, nor out of any misplaced vainglory. Rather, it’s the promise of nondescript privacy that draws him like a bee to to honey. There, he can meet his new friends beyond the prying eyes of the media. There, he has a clandestine spot to escape the humdrum of the city for a few hours, alone with his thoughts. But it’s not a truth he’s ready to share, and moreover, the Montagues will like this answer better. It’s a nod to their territory; a little more promotion for their best-boasted restaurant. He refuses to join them, he refuses to share in their cause, but maybe sliding in such harmless tips will convince them to lay off of Celeste’s case and stop pressuring her to pressure him to join. Truth and politics don’t mix. Every time a video begins recording, Tomas is well aware of that. But above all, an actor must always remember his part.

“What does your typical day look like?”

“What, like a twenty-four hour play-by-play?” He asks playfully. “No one’s that interesting,signorina, I promise. I remember I was asked a similar question in an interview two or three years ago. I think it was for Sorrisi e Canzoni? Or maybe GQ…. Either way, it was a much more exciting answer back then. Plays, parties, private jets… ” Tomas reminisces fondly, but not fond enough to want to trade it in for his present. “I hate to disappoint, but it’s not the same anymore. I’m a married man on sabbatical now, remember??” He says, directing the question towards the camera before letting his gaze find Isabella once more. His life is quieter now, but happier too. “Not that it’s boring by any stretch. I’d recommend marriage, actually. I know it’s done wonders for me! But if I start talking about her and all the ways she’s changed my routine everyone will be rolling their eyes and complaining about cavities before this interview’s over.” Tomas chuckles, thinking of the myriad of ways his daily life has become synonymous with Celeste. What time she wakes, what time she leaves, when she comes home or when he gets to persuade her out of the house on little dates… He has a life outside of Celeste to be sure, but it’s only around her that he’s really reminded of what he’s working towards. Like Eros and Psyche, he thinks. He loves, but she sets fire to his love and gives it true sustenance. A future, a family, a very happy ending - That’s all he wants these days.

“What has been your biggest mistake thus far?”

He laughs at that, taken aback by the girl’s directness. “Is that really what it says on your sheet??” He cocks a brow, leaning forward as if to sneak a peek. “Damn… That’s harsh.” Sometimes, his fans seem like tiny mosquitoes; hungry for every teeny-tiny drop of his blood as they submit questions as invasive as these. “I have to think about that one…” Tomas admits with a bemused shake of his head. “I try not to think of my experiences as mistakes. Even the ones that might feel like it initially. Everything happens for a reason, doesn’t it? Don’t you believe that?” He looks to his interviewer as though hoping to coax another answer out of her, but she doesn’t indulge him. He’s always preferred dialogue to monologue, despite his choice of career. It takes an exchange of ideas to see the world through new lenses, and he can’t do that while talking continuously about himself. But another pensive, stolen glance at Isabella tells him that she probably won’t care what his answer is, so long as he gives one. He could make it up right here on the spot - something like ‘I’ve started a third gang in Verona to spite the Mobs‘ or ‘I kicked a dog once’, and she probably wouldn’t bat an eyelash. He wonders why. He wonders why she’s so determinedly expressionless.

“Do you play Poker?” Tomas asks without warning. He hadn’t meant for that to come out of his mouth but somehow it does and it takes another laugh and a wave of his hand to dismiss it. “Sorry. But you could! It’s impressive actually - in a good way. To answer your question, I think I’ll have to keep this one to myself.” It’s apologetic but firm, because his biggest mistake is failing his parents. Of all the roles he’s played thus far, that of ‘son’ has always left him most wanting. He couldn’t fix their marriage. He couldn’t inspire their divorce… To this day, his adulterous mother and destructive, ill-tempered father remain tethered to each other. Two rusting anchors, weighing themselves down to the bottom of the sea-bed… Most days, Tomas tries hard not to think about it. But there are some moments, moments when he’s feeling low, that he wonders if he’s responsible for their unhappiness; wonders if he couldn’t have done more to help them find happiness, along the way. Today is one of the predetermined no-thinkdays though. The days he’s giving interviews always are. “Sorry about that… Got anything else on your nifty list?” He prompts her, hoping to move on to a happier topic.

“What has been the most difficult task asked of you?”

This question too, gives him pause. More than he’d like. There’s the shadow of fleeting suspicion as he steals a glance at Isabella, wondering if they’re posing these questions on purpose to throw him off. But what cause would a reporter have to do that? You’re being silly,he chides himself, mulling over the question. Again, he knows the real answer.

Commitment.

It isn’t easy to choose a single person in this life, Tomas thinks. To narrow his expansive romantic inclinations and promise them to one individual and one individual only. But it’s a choice he reminds himself of every morning when he wakes up, when he cracks an eye open only for his gaze to fall on the familiar comfort of Celeste’s blazing red hair, like a halo around her cherubic face. It’s a choice he must remember when he’s comparing paintings with Juliana and hears the clear-bell tone of her laughter echo in the museum. A choice he must remember when his fingers find the soft, unwritten skin beneath Santino’s wrist as they look for stars in a midnight sky. A choice he recalls even as he listens to Paola recount the tales he’s missed in her life; eyes dancing with ferocious passion and he thinks what if, what if…

… But it’s a struggle he dares not reveal. It would insult his beloved wife, it would make a mockery of the vows they took in front of that altar, all those months ago. Worse still, it would surely garner derision from the audience, especially from his most die-hard fans; some of who still count on the failure of his marriage in order to regain the bachelor fantasy they’d attached to their idol. But idols were effigies of gold and silver. He was not an idol, he was a man of flesh and blood and feeling. Do you understand?… You will never understand me like she has, he wants to rebuke them. But there’s an old fondness that he can’t help when it comes to those who loved him first. And so his countenance softens as he answers the reporter’s question. “The most difficult task for me, has been leaving behind all my loved ones in Rome. My friends, my family, my fans…” He presses his fingertips to his lips for a moment before waving them towards the camera, sending the kiss to those who’ll hope for it most, when the interview airs tomorrow night. “I send my love, and I’m humbled by your continued support.”

“What are your thoughts on the war between the Capulets and the Montagues?”

“It’s-… It’s insanity.“

Now the Montagues won’t like that. But he feels the answer so strongly, and with so much conviction that he thinks the glassy brightness in his eyes would betray him anyway. Some lies are too big to swallow, even for an actor. “Brutal and unnecessary - do they even remember what they’re fighting for?” He asks Isabella, though he thinks she’s probably no closer to answering that than the other Veronesi. “You know, the stories say that it’s been so many decades now that no one knows any more… Isn’t that silly? To fight over something that you can’t even remember?” But deep down, Tomas knows it’s not that simple. Because mobs don’t need an impetus; not when there’s so much profit to be made in criminality. All the rest is just stories, to play on the sympathies of a winsome public. He should know… He played on that same, guileless sympathy, night after night after night on a front-lit stage. But art is one thing, war is another. And Celeste is tied up in this war, much as he hates to think about it.

“Maybe I’ll go back to Rome one of these days,” Tomas announces abruptly, shifting upright in his chair. There’s an ardent gleam in his eyes because he likes thinking in maybes. They’re so much more satisfying than the limitations of what is or isn’t strictly possible. “I’d like to take my wife with me. She’s never been… Can you believe it?? Never been to Rome… We could start there, then maybe a tour of Europe. Maybe a second honeymoon. I’m sure she’d like that.” He doesn’t know if that’s true, he doesn’t know if he can ever return to Rome, but it has a romantic ring to it nonetheless. And when has Troilus ever been able to deny the sweet-nothing whispers of romance, even as a city tears itself apart around him?….

Never, he thinks… Not even then.

——————————————-

(Thank you for Reading!!)

[gaslightgatekeepgodot]

A (sizeable) rant/essay concerning my experiences in the Tumblr JJBA fandom.

None of you asked to hear this, but I’m getting pretty pissed off at some people in particular (I will not name names, though I may heavily implicate some people) and it’s finally started to kinda spill over. So I’m letting it spill; take it or leave it.

I’m... Fairly irate at the moment, and writing out my feelings does tend to help me calm down in situations like this, so if I was going to put this anywhere the best place for it is probably on the public internet. Again, take it or leave it: this is the internet, you don’t have to interact with me if this concerns you or your ideals. Just click that handy little block button on my profile and you never have to see little Nat mouthing off again.

If you want me to summarise (I know not everyone wants/is able to read a fluffed-up pillar of text) or explain my reasoning behind anything I’ve said below the cut, feel free to direct message me here or on Discord @nati bati yi#1462. Once I get this off my chest I’ll be more than willing to chat to people about it. <3

(Before I say anything else, this is not intended to be a callout in any way, shape or form. I don’t mention the specific names of anybody, and the actions I do mention here will only point to specific people if you know them too. Anyone on the outside should have zero idea of who anyone I bring up is; I do not want anyone to get harassed over this, and I very much do not want to start drama - that’s what inspired me to go off and write this hunk of garbage in the first place. I’m just... Sick to death of the fandom as a whole.)

Anyway. Here we go.

From what I’ve been able to tell, being in this fandom for just under a year now, there are two main halves to it: the gay-hating, stale-meme-parroting dudebro side, who seem to mostly congregate around YouTube and Reddit, and... Whatever the side based on Tumblr (and probably now Twitter) is. I don’t spend a lot of time on Reddit, so naturally I’ve been more exposed to the Tumblr side of the fandom, and after experiencing the ideals some people here want to force on other people I’ve come to the conclusion I’d almost rather be immersed in the bigoted dudebro side. And I say this as an ace-spec/gay trans man.

I’ll start with the blocklist.

I think most of us on Tumblr came to the conclusion that the blocklist was utter bullshit, but I did see a few people in a Discord server I have since left (I will expand on this later) defending the reasoning behind some ships being on there, citing the fact they had been abused in a relationship with a similar age gap. I can definitely see why that would bother a person, and I do not want to erase the fact that people have been and will be abused in similar relationships, but you can’t project your singular experience onto every fictional, non-canon character relationship and every person who ships it. For one, not every relationship is going to turn out the same just because it meets this one criteria of “the age gap is too big”, and, also, you don’t have to write fiction to totally reflect reality. You are in full creative control. Maybe if the characters were real people they wouldn’t click, but if you’re drawing a picture or writing a fanfic you don’t have to go along with that. You can write them so that they’re good to each other, while still keeping it in character. Araki has said that Jotaro and Kakyoin’s personalities don’t work together very well, and that they wouldn’t have become friends or even spoken to each other if Jotaro wasn’t a Stand user... But Jotaro/Kakyoin just happens to be the most-written about JJBA ship on AO3. Me? I love Jotakak. It’s about the only thing I do ship. And I’ve read some quite frankly amazing fanfiction where the two boys are paired and they work together, and it’s still very much in character. Of course, I’m very much against loli/shota content or content depicting characters who don’t look very old- if someone drew Koichi in a sexual situation I would be pissed as all hell, but I don’t have to engage with that content any further. I can just filter out the tag/block the OP and move on. You don’t need to make a fuss and tell/imply to people that they are paedophilic for enjoying well-written content where a 17-year-old is in a healthy relationship with a 22-year-old, platonic or otherwise.

My second point brings in some of the things I’ve learned while studying media this past year. My main point here: not everyone in an audience is the same. There is a reason differential decoding and the uses and gratifications theory exist. The uses and gratifications theory states, at its most basic, that the audience of a media text is active, not passive; i.e. they are not just absorbing every piece of data thrown at them by the text they are consuming, and they are consuming different media to satisfy a need- for JJBA, that need could be entertainment, escapism, identifying with a character similar to yourself or to give you something to talk about with your friends. Differential decoding arises when someone consuming a piece of the media does not entirely go along with the creator’s preferred reading of it- an example might be how a sizeable amount of people enjoy villainous or “disgusting” characters such as Dio, Cioccolata, Stroheim or Melone, when they were clearly written in canon to be abhorrent, unlikable people for varying reasons. I can also say that, because the audience is active, and consume media based on their personal needs, that somebody writing fanfic of a ship you don’t like isn’t going to make incest or paedophilia more socially acceptable. I don’t consume that content, because I don’t feel the need to. Sure, real paedos might, but they’re a minority. Just because a couple hundred people or so read a fanfic on the free web where a grown adult does the dirty with a little kid, doesn’t mean to say everyone in the world will suddenly start thinking it’s ok. Mention it to any sane person in real life and they will not like that idea any more than you do.

And my third point is more a personal thing than anything else, but there is a community I used to be part of (and was part of almost from the beginning) where I didn’t feel welcome because of people causing drama over things like what I mentioned above. I started multiple discourses entirely by accident by saying I didn’t understand why everyone though X ship was horribly problematic and worth getting mad at people over. I still don’t feel like anyone deserves to be harassed over characters and ships they enjoy, but that doesn’t mean to say I support all of it. Along with generally feeling ignored by a lot of the moderators of that server, as well as their friends, I was just sick to death of how they seemed to single out some certain people to say, “hey, don’t do this” when other people seemed exempt. I was verbally warned for posting innuendos in a general chat (but it’s not like I could anywhere else on the server, because I’m not 18 yet), but at least once every day I would see two people flirting in-character in whatever channel they happened to meet in, and it never seemed to be in a roleplay channel- I couldn’t see into NSFW to check if they did it there too, but the fact it would leak out into gen concerned me. They would throw innuendo after innuendo at each other, and they never seemed to stop, or be told to stop. Yes, I could have messaged the moderators to say it made me uncomfy, but one of them was a moderator themselves, so I felt a little out my element doing so. 

Another thing that bothered me is when I tried to join an offshoot of that server for kin, and the admin - I assume - of said offshoot server messaged me (with some other conversation concerning it in between) that, despite the fact I only wanted in to help me figure out what it meant to me, I wasn’t allowed in because somebody was uncomfy with doubles. I completely understand that, but I had spoken to the only person it could have been (I wasn’t given a name, but it wasn’t difficult to figure out who it was) multiple times about that character and how similar we were- hell, we had even roleplayed together as doubles of that character and no problems were ever expressed to me. If anything it seemed like we left off in a spot we could have carried on from later. It might not have been intended that way, but being told I wasn’t allowed in there made me feel excluded from the community nonetheless, especially because I’d had a few people tell me the night before that they wanted more people in there and that I’d be totally welcome. I was also told, before any of this happened, that the same person blocked a friend of mine in another server for going on a small rant about how they didn’t like the way Josuke acted in the episode where he plays dice with Rohan and ends up burning his house down, because they kin Josuke..? At least, that’s what was relayed to me.

But, hey ho, it’s all behind me now. I won’t lie; I don’t really plan on ever going back. I don’t want to engage anymore, because it makes me uncomfortable and anxious thinking about it, so I most likely will unfollow most (if not all) of the blogs pertaining to that community tonight. I do have a few people still there who I miss speaking to, but I’ve DM’d all of them on Discord at least once since I’ve left and talked to them about either how I miss them or something entirely unrelated to the server. I’d like to talk more with them, but DMs are always awkward for me to begin with... I have a feeling they might not want to talk after reading this, and I think I’m ready to accept that? Might be difficult not being able to scream about fanfic as much, but I won’t impose on anyone if my presence makes them uncomfy. I don’t want to be that guy.

I’ll say it again: now that I’ve got this off my chest and subsequently calmed down a lot, I’m more than willing to talk about any of it. Just shoot me a message on Discord and I’ll reply when I’m able and feeling up to talking about it again. For now I’m probably just going to go back to pissing about on Flight Rising or play Smash or something

[edgarhardman429-blog]

Stereotypes Around Aging May Negatively Effect Mind And Also Hearing.

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Expertise has actually taught me that when it pertains to family life, absolutely nothing is actually simple or formulaic. Individuals without in-person social contact with youngsters, other loved ones, and good friends at the very least every handful of months possessed a significantly higher likelihood from clinically notable oppressive indicators 2 years later on (11.5%) compared to those possessing in-person call one or two times a month (8.1%) or even once or twice a full week (7.3%). The homes were actually found out to turn around any kind of liberal, irreligious or left-wing suggestions the kids could have picked up coming from their moms and dads, and indoctrination was actually intense. Many individuals realise exactly how their body movement not just influences exactly how they experience, they additionally realise how this influences exactly how others probe them. GROWNUPS ONLY (minimum age 18-21 depending on where you are actually) which decide to view as well as enter for art admiration, amusement, as well as improved understanding. She is actually a youngster molester's aspiration - the little lady in appearance which is actually actually certainly not a little gal at all (although at 15, Venus Palermo is actually still officially underage for unanimous sexual contact). Female's "obesity," however, is resulted in to some extent by well-balanced physical body excess fat in their hips as well as upper legs, while males's body fat is actually much more apt to become unhealthful physical body excess fat in their tummy and also midsection.hqdefault.jpg" width="304px" alt=""/> In addition, total, existing and newest periods from the following series will definitely additionally be actually offered during the course of Watchathon Week: Archer, Awkward, Bates Motel, Boston's Greatest, Braxton Family Market Values, Bridezillas, Chicago Fire, Dance Moms, Deadliest Drawback, Snow Job, Diggers, Medical Professional That, Elementary, Happen, Grimm, I Affection Jenni, King from the Geeks, Legit, Mad Guys, Portlandia, Raising Hope, Real Husbands of Hollywood, Change, Knockout, Swamp People, The Americans, The Undergraduate, The Stopover, The Mindy Job, The Vocal, The Walking Lifeless, Best Equipment, Tosh.0, Contact, Undercover Boss, Vikings, Whitney as well as Evil Tuna. The authorities and this banner anticipates me to be sufficiently mature adequate to get a gun in the U.S. armed forces and decide that lives and that passes away in war, blow folks to pieces, as well as perhaps decapitate little ones in unintentional friendly fire incidents and then go back to the conditions, if I do not perish, and also become a typical person.

While disciplining the child, moms and dads savour gentle mental force like 'our company love you a lot, we have actually provided you whatever, still you misconduct or even don't hear us'. The problems facing much older adults that endanger their lifestyle as well as well-being often result from clinical, bodily, or economical scenarios that confine self-reliance and also functioning. Like all markets - authorities, healthcare, retail and also financial - the adult and porn companies are actually feeling the effects of certainly not making surveillance a top priority, in awful feasible methods. Problematic children often hammer doors and also scream about wanting to be handled like adults.And also is among the guarantees our managements produced to our investor base over the previous one-fourths is that our team are going to possess a hefty concentrate on massive margin growth as well as our company assume the true - our company presume the actual one-upmanship our experts achieve is actually when a considerable amount of this framework happens online as when our team observe considerable, substantial as well as an imaginative massive frame growth.Smell of decoration and also baked cookies in your kitchen space will certainly offer your children a quite homey experience. The IOM suggests that older adults take supplements as well as consume fortified meals, which include a more easily absorbed type of the nutrient, in order to help satisfy their day-to-day needs for B-12.

[animeindoblog-blog]

The Red Strings Club - PC/Steam [Game Review]

New Post has been published on https://animeindo.org/blog/2018/01/24/the-red-strings-club-pc-steam-game-review/

The Red Strings Club - PC/Steam [Game Review]

Rob “NualphaJPN” B.

No strings are pulled here. This game points out the many truths that most people are totally blind to. Exceptional.

Game Info

System: Steam/PC

Publisher: Devolver Digital

Developer: Deconstructeam

Release Date: January 22, 2018

The Red Strings Club – Reveal Trailer

It’s quite apparent that at this very moment, the world in which we inhabit is in a crisis. This isn’t just a crisis pertaining to war or poverty but more so on the psychological battlefield. Much of this issue is attributed to the fact that we’re now living in the information era, one in which there’s just too much to absorb and our brains become oversaturated with unnecessary data. We become blind to the truth and often find ourselves entangled in the many traps corporations set for us to walk in. Can we truly blame them? Or perhaps it is the individual who should be accounted for? The Red Strings Club is a game that questions your moral intent, your belief system and overall awareness of what’s actually happening in society. In a way, The Red Strings Club is a visual novel that’s compelling in that, it’s telling us a story which in fact is a direct representation of our current social climate, and the psychological issues that we all deal with on a daily basis. It’s nevertheless a game but it strikes a chord in your mind as you play through the story, picking apart every investigation and having to determine whether the information given to you is of clout, or just another scheme to further deter you from the truth.

The Red Strings Club speaks about mature themes, but these very themes are the ones in which many of us grow fearful of the minute they reach our lips. Politics, corruption, and prejudice among many others. This all takes place in a cyberpunk world perhaps not too far from the current situation we all live in and places heavy emphasis on a strong narrative that pokes fun at the ignorance of society, and how many seem to follow the sheep mentality in order to avoid breaking the status quo.

What to expect? Expect there to be a lot of thought provoking scenarios where you’ll need to determine whether the person you’re investigating is a total fraud, or if they’re truly holding up to their word. You play as bartender Donovan as he systematically breaks down the mind of the individual using persuasive tactics to generate pivotal information about a corporate conspiracy, which will help to bring justice to a world filled with deceit and brainwashing. Let’s dive deeper into the gameplay and emphasize just why The Red Strings Club is such an incredible title, and why you definitely need to play it many times to see the underlying truths that are presented to you.

Right off the bat, you’re thrown into a world that feels all too real. A society burdened by corrupt corporate politics and the majority are reeled in by its deceitful ways, which only creates a mountain of issues. Donovan, his android assistant along with his freelance hacker partner are pitted against this big corporation known as Supercontinent Ltd., who are on the verge of releasing a product that is supposed to eradicate feelings of depression, anger and fear from society altogether. What this essentially means is that the company is planning to create some form of utopia in which everybody behaves the same, and in the end, creates a peaceful environment. However Donovan thinks that it’s all rubbish and this scheme is just another corporate tactic to undermine the human psyche and brainwash society into believing that such an environment would prove worthy. Much of the gameplay revolves around you reading dialogue between Donovan and those surrounding him, using his bartending tactics to reveal flaws in clients explanations and generating more clarity as to what’s really happening within Supercontinent Ltd.

Every dialogue provides you with an eerie reminder of just how cruel our society can be, and why we need to extremely mindful of the information we take in. It speaks about the impurities of the human agenda and how big corporations try to paint a pretty picture to generate a form of security, when in reality it’s all just a plot to steal your freedom and manipulate the mind into conformity. Many people in our society wear a mask and can never truly tell whether they’re actually who they think they are, of if they’re just a mould that society created for them. This is where things get weird and is where Red Strings Club tries to dig into, not to scare you but rather to inform you that not everything that the eyes can see is truly real. As you serve certain beverages to clients and obtain a great deal of information, your android partner plays a small mini game with you to see just how well you were paying attention to the details, and if you managed to score high, she provides you with rewards to help gather information more accurately. Some of these gifts include a short-term capsule which essentially erases the mind of the client to a certain time, allowing you to dig deeper into their psyche without generating a negative response from questions earlier.

It’s very interesting and becomes a somewhat strategic approach because overusing your rewards can often generate little leads, so it becomes a balancing act of knowing when to administer the drugs and when to just keep the conversation flowing. You also get to know each character exceptionally well and can see their own flaws as well, for example Diana Neves, one of the clients you work with, is very adamant that the Social Psyche Welfare system will prove worthy, noting that if everyone’s at peace then there’ll be less concern in the world. Donovan is more of the pessimist in this regard as he feels that emotions play a very big role in the evolution of humanity, and that jeopardizing that natural tendency would only invoke more problems than solutions. This back and forth of philosophical dialogue is what truly makes The Red Strings Club such a thrilling ordeal, because it provides you with two sides of the same coin and it creates a beautiful synchronicity in a way.

“Reminds us of the movie Ghost”

Shakespeare had said that there’s no such thing as good or bad, only thinking makes it so and yet, Donovan claims that without duality in the world, there would be no balance. So while you constantly play through the game, it really stimulates your brain and makes you question a lot of things not just about the game, but the overall integrity of those ruling our society. Are what they’re feeding us really benefitting, or is it just another tactic to desensitize us even further and create this need for social acceptance? Our emotions are not toys and yet for most corporations, most notably Supercontinent Ltd., their mission is to toy with the minds of the people and create implants that will restrict certain natural human behaviors. The subject-matter is certainly a controversial one, but is it really? Perhaps what we think is controversial is actually pointing us in the right direction but because we allow the powers that be to dictate our emotional state of mind, we grow fearful of change and instead, we alienate the truth. The deeper you continue to dive into The Red Strings Club, the more thought provoking things become and the plot thickens heavily, unveiling some pretty surprising details that even made us scratch our heads.

Ultimately, The Red Strings Club focuses on issues that many of us would avoid and that’s what makes playing it so endearing. The relationships you create with clients and the ways in which you use persuasion to lead them into spilling the beans is quite fascinating and perhaps a bit over the top, but in the end, it paints a very vivid picture of just what can happen if we aren’t careful. Information can be vital but it can also be a detriment depending on where you look, and so being extremely careful about the directions you take is just as important as the information itself. The visual novel approach to the gameplay creates a nice relaxing pace, allowing you to really think through your decisions and decipher clues more effectively. The lack of voice acting surprisingly doesn’t take away from the experience. In fact, it provides more to it because as you read the dialogue, you can create your own flow in the mind. You learn about human expression, dealing with depression and anxiety among other things, and piece these all together to create a remarkably enthralling experience.

We had an absolute blast with The Red Strings Club and truly wish more titles like this would release more often. Often times, we allow ourselves to get to caught up in the social media landscape and create this pitfall of despair. Perhaps it’s nice every once in a while to just take a break from it all, sit back and meditate for a minute and really think about what’s actually happening around us. Like Diana stated in her conversation with Donovan:

“Art is emotion through the filter of calm focus.”

Perhaps we all need to just filter out all the nonsense and start questioning things around us so that our minds can create a clearer picture of just what’s happening in the world. Maybe then will we be able to truly express ourselves artistically without the need of a mask.

As always, for all things sweet, with news straight from Japan, be sure to keep it locked here on Honey’s Anime.

Editor/Writer

Author: Rob “NualphaJPN” B.

A passionate fan of gaming, writing, journalism, anime, and philosophy. I’ve lived in Japan for many years and consider this place to be my permanent home. I love to travel around Japan and learn about the history and culture! Leave a comment if you enjoy my articles and watch me play on twitch.tv/honeysgaming ! Take care!

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