#I see wiggly things

[kurbiismind]

Oh hey,

I think I've cracked the code

[tabooiart]

Don’t be so formal! We’re all paly-wals here. I mean, look at us. We even hold court in your own tongue and form!

[wardback]

Shout out to the lords in black gotta be 5 of my favourite genders

[noah-slasher]

if Chilchuck actually wanted to fight-

[treeckos-for-arson]

everyone used to joke about how r*bert always died in starkid musicals but i’ve yet to see anyone say the same about jon, when literally every one of his major characters in the musicals dies.

first of course we have paul.

then gary goldstein, attorney at law.

even wiggly, to the extent that wiggly can die/be defeated.

and of course, richie lipshitz (may he be reunited with rei and asuka in weeb heaven).

NMT honorable mention:

[bajablastflavoredsaxreed]

close-ups under cut for quality :)

[daddy-ul]

Kirk & Lars shenanigans and secret handshakes on stage

[thisonesfordrawing]

🔥🔥🔥

[formosusiniquis]

🪱 Wiggle Wednesday🪱

Thank you @paperbackribs who tagged me last week, I saw it while I was in class and immediately forgot until I saw people posting their things today. But I'm always excited to share my current brainworms

This is a scene from a fic that I pick at every now and then, so it's basically always on the brain. It started as something about Lucas and Steve and trying to explain away the slight anachronism of Steve (popular and rich) being in Nikes before Jordan made them cool (thank you Air) and it has turned into something much more about Lucas and also his Mom relating through a shared love of basketball and Steve is also there.

It’s a Friday night after the end of the world, and strangely Lucas is at a basketball game.

Or maybe it’s only strange because it’s so normal.

A Friday night in a small town and there isn’t much to do except support the home team. Only Mom won’t watch football, she calls it barbaric, so she reserves all her team spirit for November when basketball season starts. Lucas’ skin itches a little under the Hawkins Tigers shirt he’s wearing, as he’s pretending to be normal when a couple weeks ago he learned monsters were real. What can he do though? Mrs. Byers has Will on house arrest, Mike is still mourning Eleven, and Dustin hasn’t been allowed out since Will’s Lazarus act.

Maybe he’s being too sensitive. Steve is here, who Lucas mostly knows from Mike complaining about being Nancy’s stupid boyfriend. Steve is playing like everything is fine, even though Lucas knows Steve knows. He heard whispering about it with Nancy when he went to the bathroom the last time he was at Mike’s. But Steve is smiling as he paces down the court. Miles better than the other players around him, when Steve has the ball Lucas feels like he does when he’s watching a real basketball game on the couch with his Mom.

If Steve can act like things are normal. If he can sink three pointer after rebound after assist, maybe it’s okay that Lucas is wearing his Tiger green. He floats down the court and everyone cheers. But no one cheers right. When #21 Hagan gets a rebound off of Seymour’s best player, a girl’s voice screams so loud it makes his throat hurt. No one cheers that way for Steve. It’s just excitement for the game, not for him and the way he is playing.

When the game ends, Hawkins 73: Seymour 42, and the crowd storms the court Lucas stands by his Mom in the bleachers. She hates feeling the push of the crowd against her and as he gets older, and people’s hands get rougher, he’s starting to understand. He’s too old to be caught standing by his Mom though. After everything, he knows better than to move too far away from her; going to the game with your Mom is one thing, being the kid getting called out over the intercom because she can’t find you would be life ruining.

Lucas watches the thinning crowd while he waits. Parents and girlfriends crowding their sweaty players. He doesn’t want to get caught looking at any of those boys for too long now that they aren’t playing. He isn’t sure why. So he keeps looking for something familiar.

Steve is standing beside a short, dark haired man who’s got what his father calls a beer gut. He doesn’t look anything like Steve, but he’s also the only adult anywhere near him. He’s the only person at all that’s really near Steve. They’re talking excitedly about something. He claps Steve on the back and whatever he says next has Steve looking down toward the floor.

“Is that Steve’s dad?” he asks his mom before thinking about why that might be a weird question to ask her.

“Who?” The way she says it makes him sure she hadn’t actually heard the question. She’d caught a name, when he interrupted her conversation with the lady next to them, but not enough to answer. It’s a free chance to drop the issue. To say sorry, never mind, and go back to watching people move on the floor below them.

“That guy,” she slaps his hand down as he goes to point. “The guy next to Steve, number 8, is that his dad?”

“How do you know him?” The question, instead of an answer, startles him enough that he looks at her instead of Steve. Stern, he knows he doesn’t want to lie to her, but he also isn’t sure how to say that this random high school boy saved two of his best friends’ older siblings' lives.

“He’s Nancy’s boyfriend. Mike talks about him.”

If he’d just waited. He would have gotten his question answered without asking Mom. They both watch as that man says one more thing to Steve, shakes his hand, and walks out of the gym. “I don’t see Nancy here.” Because they both know he doesn’t really need his other question answered anymore.

“I don’t think she really likes sports.”

Mom sucks her teeth, a judgmental tchk that has heat climbing the back of his neck when it's not even for him. "Well that's a shame, he's a good player." There's finally enough space on the floor that they could leave. He wants, desperately, for them to just go cause something about this conversation is making him feel guilty again. "Do you want to to say hi?"

There's nothing he wants less than that. Lucas thinks if he has to go up to this guy, who went toe to toe with a monster, while his mom trails behind he'll die. Lucas thinks if he says hi to a guy who has only seen him maybe twice in the context of Mike Wheeler's house, and has to sit there while Steve blankly accepts his congrats he'll melt into the floor.

"Can we just go home? I still have homework."

And some tags to @fuctacles, @cauldronoflove, @thefreakandthehair, @stevespookington, @stevieharringtonwifeguy

@eriquin, @grasslandgirl, @augustjustice, and anyone else who wants to play!

[tedspankoffskisbignaturals]

im so curious

[honestlyvan]

I really don't particularly understand why people are so resistant and dislike the read of AW where Alan is simply a character created by Tom Zane. Like, Alan Wake already is a character written by Poison Pill Remedy Entertainment, but the idea of going one level deeper, of questioning who the storyteller is and who we, as the audience, are in extension to them, seems to make people really.... wiggly and uncomfortable.

I think the moment we saw fictionalised Sam Lake we were beyond being protected by the fourth wall, fellas.

[sydney-carton-of-sour-milk]

The Many Illustrators of A Tale of Two Cities 11: Harry Furniss (1/2)

These speak for themselves.

This week's set is a particularly iconic one - at long last, we've arrived at Harry Furniss's illustrations for the 1910 Charles Dickens Library edition of A Tale of Two Cities!

1 / 2 || 2 / 2

Furniss created hundreds of illustrations for this series, which was meant as a centennial celebration of Dickens's birth. For A Tale of Two Cities in particular, he made 32! In this post, we'll be looking at the first 19.

Also, a note for the full set, just as a heads-up: A few of the Internet Archive versions - which are the primary source used here - were cropped, so I edited in the missing pieces using (if I remember correctly) these versions from HathiTrust.

There really isn't much more to say concerning these thorough, thoughtful illustrations - I waited patiently to begin to work on posts for them until I found quality versions that would do them justice, and I'm so delighted to finally have done so. Without further ado, enjoy!

See you soon for Part 2!

& the standard endnote for all posts in this series:

This post is intended to act as the start of a forum on the given illustrator, so if anyone has anything to add - requests to see certain drawings in higher definition (since Tumblr compresses images), corrections to factual errors, sources for better-quality versions of the illustrations, further reading, fun facts, any questions, or just general commentary - simply do so on this post, be it in a comment/tags or the replies!💫

[cantankerouscatfish]

apparently I get migraines now? or have been dealing with painless ones all this time. up until a couple months ago, anyway.

is it. is it from the sun. that'd be so funny.

[everypanelofizuku]

Chapter 15 - Vs.

[keeps-ache]

thinking of fairies that look like ferret + mourning doves. uh huh yep :>

[octoooo]

Ubuyashiki Family (Magical Slayers ✨)

It’s mostly Kagaya but I mention Amane too.

Ok long story short Kagaya is mansplain manipulate manslaughter. I made him similar to Kyubey from Magica Madoka. In the sense he has good intentions, but very underhanded ways of getting people to join the Corps.

He is Entirely fed up with the (lack of) progress of the Corps. He wouldn’t call all the efforts pointless, however losing several dozen (or hundred?) Hashira and hardly killing any Upper Moons (and no signs of Muzan since Yoriichi’s era) is very much a Net Loss.

He’s tired and ready to end this war by any means necessary, even if it means forcing people into becoming slayers. (The fact this man has foresight just makes his goal a little easier and a little scarier.)

I can make an excellent example of the lengths he’s willing to go with the Tokito twins.

Kagaya did not take kindly when Amane reported that Yuichiro shut down the offer every time. He is not above lighting a fire under them to get them moving, and by fire I mean a demon sent to their house as an “incentive” to join. By showing them what they’re at risk of if they don’t join first.

We all know how it happens in canon: Yuichiro repeatedly denies Amane, weeks later the demon attacks, suddenly Amane returns days(?) later and Muichiro decides “why not” to join the Corps.

This lines up perfectly for my au :D

After the repeated rejections, Kagaya pulls some strings to stage a demon attack. It’s not really staged/fake since the demon does try to take out the twins, but it was planned by Kagaya. As an extra part of the plan, there was supposed to be another slayer to deal with that demon to ensure the twins survived. They’d be scarred, but alive and (hopefully) open to becoming Slayers.

Things didn't go as planned and the assigned Slayer doesn’t make it on time, leaving Muichiro to take things in his own hands after Yuichiro gets attacked. Yuichiro only loses a chunk of his arm, it’s still a lot but not half his arm like canon. He’s able to wrap the wound (and pass out) while Muichiro deals with the demon all night.

Kagaya and Amane actually visit them around noon the next day and happen upon them barely alive. Yuichiro is worse off than his brother and praying for Muichiro to live. Kagaya tells the boys they don’t need the aid of the gods who struck them, he himself will help, and in return they’ll do something (become slayers) for him.

(Kagaya was relieved when this worked. He may be cruel enough to do it but he doesn’t want to kill them. They wouldn’t be useful to him if that happened)

This also means Yuichiro lives.

The bright side is he doesn’t do this with every slayer I guess? He does have an interesting habit of showing up soon after demon attacks to offer the survivor a new life within the Corps. In their freshly traumatized minds all they see is a hand reaching out to help, and not knowing any better they accept.

This is a good time to mention, he is still cursed so he eventually has Amane visit the possible-slayers in his stead, bring them to the estate should they agree to join and uhhh..

Rip their soul out of their body, infuse it into a special brooch, give it back to them & point them in the direction of a cultivator.

anyway don’t worry about that part. Kagaya certainly doesn’t, and he tells the newly-made Magical Slayer not to worry either.

Who cares if you’re basically a zombie now? If your body is injured it’s fine, it’ll just take extra time and magic to regenerate. (Like,,some hours with lots of focus. Maybe just an hour or so for Hashira. Their healing abilities may be good, but they’re not ‘instant regeneration’ good like the 12 kizuki)

He actually doesn’t even tell them they’ve become a zombie. Normally the head of the Corps is supposed to lay down everything that becoming a slayer means, and then the person can make the choice to join or not. Obviously learning you’ll become a zombie is a bit of a turn-off, so Kagaya has just stopped telling his slayers the awful details.

Why do that when it’ll scare them off? It’s more beneficial for him to not say anything and keep them in the dark.

Also I’d like to mention, In canon Kagaya gives respect and gets it in return.

Here though? The Hashiras respect for him is built from fear. Everyone else is able to see, “ohh there’s something wrong with this guy. Better not piss him off.” And try their damn best not to.

Except Sanemi at his first Pillar meeting. 🪦