#I'm into Transformers Animated and I like a whole bunch of the characters

[cloverpatches]

I've been reminded of this whole thing a lot lately and I kind of wanted to bring up my thoughts, just in case maybe it helps someone rethink stuff but

I keep seeing that when people go about redesigning/"redeeming" a character, one thing they often remove is like. symptoms of neurodiversity?

Such as removing a character's trauma related sensory and relation issues entirely, or having them suddenly being more socially aware without anyone actually understanding why they might not have understood a situation in the first place.

Nothing against redesigns n rewrites or trying to write redemption arcs! I just don't think traits of neurodiversity in specific are something to be fixed or treated as something to be removed just because the artist finds them unfitting.

Not every neurodivergent character is going to be pleasant. It doesn't need to be fixed.

[pyjamaart]

one of my favorite edgelords 😈

Let's talk about one of my favorite games of all time, Jimmy and the Pulsating Mass.

I had originally started working on a different piece of art for this game, but that one is still a work in progress, since I have to get my shit together and draw multiple pieces of furniture for it. That's why I decided to draw something easier first. And I say easier, even though I spent like two weeks on this. Man, I really don't have that much time to draw anymore since I started working at my new job... Sometimes I really miss my old job, where I could finish all my work in an hour and then read Transformers fanfictions for the rest of the day. Sigh...........

I tried out a bunch of new stuff with Buck here, like finally learning that there actually is an Overlay function in Gimp and then promptly using it for the fancy effect on the line art, the pattern on his wings and the background. This image also made me realize I can only draw giant Mega Man boots. That's why his shoes look like that, lol.

Now let's finally talk about this game. If you don't know anything about Jimmy, it's a Mother inspired game about a little boy fighting horrors in his dream world together with his family and some other wacky characters like the coolest man you have ever seen, an anime waifu and a bear. The game starts off like a typical RPG where his mom sends Jimmy and his brother, Buck (pictured here in this image, I'll explain why he looks like that in a minute), to fetch some honey for a cake she wants to bake. And to get that honey, the two brothers visit the beehive that's located south of their house. On the way there, they have to fight various goofy looking monsters in turn based battles. Jimmy unlocks the power of empathy and imagination at the start of the game and can turn into some of the monsters he defeats in battle, by putting himself in their shoes. Examples include a smelly green blob that was living in his brothers dirty clothes, a sunflower that was getting freaky with some of the bees, a very fast bird, and a bear.

When they finally make it to the beehive, the queen explains that a group of thugs is bothering them and promises to give Jimmy some of their honey if he takes care of the ruffians for her. The so called "petty thugs" are located in a canyon right next door, so Jimmy and Buck go and beat them up. After various shenanigans, including a "goon exam" and Buck breaking some bartenders spine after he refused to serve Jimmy some milk, they have a battle with Punch Tanaka, the worlds raddest guy and also the leader of the thugs.

I think this is a good time to mention that this game is freaking hard. Punch was the first fight in the game where I lost a couple of times, since it really takes you a while to learn all the games battle mechanics. I didn't truly understand the power of Startle/Alert until I was halfway through the game. That's on me though. I'm stupid. Still, later boss fights can get insanely difficult if you don't know what you're doing. (Looking at you, Lingering Eyes....) After kicking the thug leaders ass on the first try, the whole gang flees the canyon, but not before Punch warns Jimmy that he doesn't know what he's up against. He's not talking about himself or his gang, but his employer. And we soon find out who that employer is...

Back in Giant Garden, Jimmy and Buck make their way over to the beehive again, only to be confronted by a trail of green liquid that leads from the throne to a door in the back of the room. The atmosphere suddenly turns very eerie, with the whole hive being shrouded in darkness, the background music being replaced by a frightening track that sounds like someone held a microphone right inside a dying swarm of insects, rightfully titled "Cacophany of Bees" and the enemies you fight on your way deeper into the hive being horrifically mutated, suffering, cannibalistic versions of the bees you fought beforehand. This is the first time in the game you come into contact with a so-called "nightmare dungeon", if you ignored the secret one you can unlock in the canyon.

These nightmare dungeons all represent one of Jimmys fears, because, as you can probably recall, we're playing through the dreams of a ten year old boy. Maybe he was stung by a bee in the past and that's why he developed a fear of them? (Doesn't help that his brother loves to terrorize the poor things...) The other nightmare dungeon themes only get worse than bees: spiders, heights, drowning, haunted houses, math, eternal sleep ...and bears.

Coming back to the beehive, after trekking through a plethora of gore and dead cartoon insects, Jimmy and Buck get confronted by the now heavily mutated queen of the bees, who has some of the most chilling dialogue in the entire game.

"Jimmy... Jimmy, where did you go?

I can't see well, Jimmy.

I can't hear well, Jimmy.

I can taste blood, Jimmy.

It's dark and I'm alone. It's dark and I'm alone. It's dark and I'm alone. It's dark and I'm alone. It's dark and I'm alone."

In the end it turns out that the title-giving pulsating mass is behind all the terrible things happening to Jimmy's dream world, like employing the petty thugs to terrorize him, corrupting the poor bees, the nightmare dungeons, etc etc. And after Jimmy and Buck finally get back to their house, they arrive just in time to see their whole family getting kidnapped by a space ship. Even the two brothers get beamed up into the ship. All part of the pulsating mass's master plan...

Now I won't go into detail and tell you the whole story of the game (even though I really want to), but you can expect the game to get even darker later on. Normally, I don't enjoy playing really dark and gritty games, but thankfully, since this game was inspired by the Mother games, it still retains some of the funny and heartwarming moments that the series is known for. And I like that a lot. If the heartwarming moments balance out the horrors, then I can deal with the horrors. (TVTropes has this very fitting trope called "Too bleak, stopped caring", which Jimmy masterfully avoids with its charming, yet flawed characters and ridiculous moments that genuinely make you laugh, like the whole game shifting into an entirely different genre for one specific area.)

I'll try my best not to get into too heavy spoilers (that's reserved for the other piece I'm drawing), but I think I still need to explain what happened to poor Buck here. Just like the queen bee, he's been taken over and corrupted by the pulsating mass, after saving Jimmy from a murderous bear. (As you can tell, there are a lot of bears in Jimmy and the Pulsating Mass. Or is it always the same bear? Better play the game and find out!) After the dreaded bear boss fight happens and Buck gets dragged down into a hole, Jimmy and their mother Helga jump in after him, but you don't see him again until way later in the game, where he suddenly sports this massive pair of veiny wings, his slightly deformed skin and muscles have turned into a deep shade of purple and his eyes glow in a menacing red. There's also no talking to him, since his normal grumpy personality has been turned up to eleven and he's completely blinded by rage, actively attacking and sabotaging his family members in their quest to stop the pulsating mass.

He gets better though. Don't worry.

What I find really interesting about this character is that he genuinely loves his little brother and wants him to get stronger and more independent, but the way he tries to accomplish this is just really really... bad. In a late-game dungeon centered around Buck you find out that he's actually responsible for all the horrifying abominations and gore making their way into Jimmys head. How, you ask? By showing him a bunch of thrillers and splatter movies that were definitely not meant to be seen by a ten year old boy. Just to "toughen him up". Another dungeon centered around him, titled "The Abyss" (which is just a memory zone and not a nightmare zone, despite the scary title) implies that Jimmy is actually a little scared of his big brother. As I've said, all of Jimmys family members are deeply flawed people. (Don't even get me started on his uncle. Oh BOY. More on that in my next essay.) But I think it's nice. I think it makes the characters much more human. Much more relatable. Because despite all the horrible things his brother put him through and despite how scared he is of him, Jimmy still loves him a lot. And over the course of the game you get to understand that despite how imperfect and dysfunctional Jimmys family is, they're all there for him in the end to help him fight against the pulsating mass.

Man, I have so many feelings about this game. That's why it's one of my favorites of all time.

But before I'm done yapping, one more thing about Buck: The fact that he's an older brother, was presumed dead after going missing and reappears later in the game completely changed with a big pair of wings reminds me a lot of Claus from Mother 3. And since he's one of my favorite video game characters ever, Buck gets a lot of points in that regard alone. But enough with the Mother comparisons, other reviewers (Am I a reviewer now?) have already done that in massive amounts.

I think I'm gonna stop here for now and continue my essay when I post the other piece of Jimmy fanart I'm working on. Until then (and until I get my shit together and draw some cabinets and chairs), see you next time.

Jenny out.

[karanseraph]

I expect as more people see TF:One there's going to be a lot of fanfic for that.

I have not seen it and am low on funds, so I'm not sure when I'll see it.

But I have, as a separate TF-related activity, been trying to write some fanfic that is set specifically in The Transformers G1 cartoon continuity.

And, like...despite being here a fan these 40 years, i rarely try to write in this specific continuity. It's so wacky. I mainly started writing for Animated and branched out from there.

There's these examples of things that we know happened for out of universe reasons, right? Like, episodes were written by all different writers, then story editors sorta tried their best to string them together and there were even different animation studios involved.

But what's canon is canon. If you try to write for it, you have to sort of take the episodes at face value. Like, sure, one can write scenes that happen between the episodes or canon scenes. But canon stuff is established.

The whole thing with Optimus Prime, Alpha Trion, and Elita One is so weird in cartoon continuity.

Like, I started research with The Search for Alpha Trion. OP and Elita realize each other are still alive after like 4 million years? Stuff happens. But then, apparently, not long after, Optimus is on Cybertron again for The Key to Vector Sigma, and Alpha Trion is involved and dies/becomes one with Vector Sigma. And like, no mention of Elita, who had some relationship with both Optimus and Alpha Trion, and does anyone comm to tell her he's gone?? Also, Ironhide also was in that episode and there's no mention of Chromia either. But the new team does get named aERIALbots.

Then in the War Dawn episode, which takes place just weeks after Key, the Aerialbots, who got made by Alpha Trion on Cybertron, come back to Cybertron and do time travel in Eita/Erial's old neighborhood. And they basically cause Pax and Erial to become Optimus and Elita by Alpha Trion. Something something grandfather. But, in the present day segment, Optimus and Ironhide are again among the characters on Cybertron and there's no mention of Elita or Chromia again.

And Optimus and Elita don't fully recall the five bots they met back then or that they had other bodies or that Alpha Trion was the one who reformatted them? They have to piece it together later because trauma or timey-whimey stuff?

And then, I'm wondering, when did Elita's team first have any sign Ark or Nemesis bots survived? Like, was it tSfAT, or did they start to notice as much as a year earlier that Shockwave had a space bridge. Did they notice in Divide and Conquer when Ironhide(!), a bunch of Bots, and even alien human Chip are in the area and attracting notice of Rainmakers?

But then I was like, hold on, wait a second, the whole of Cybertron was transported next to Earth in The Ultimate Doom. Everyone on Cybertron would be able to see or remember that! There were multiple alien human slaves involved, too.

Like, there should have been the conversation where the Autobots from Earth are trying to explain how they were in stasis for most of the 4 millions years and so couldn't return as promised or comm and have been living on Earth - you know it, that blue planet that showed up in your sky!

[sunshinemoonrx]

since you've taught me so much already. top 5 characters from historical literature (i love the guys i've heard about so far)

Helllll yeah. Okay so a lot of these are gonna be "all right here's a pretty famous guy but did you know he was originally different and weird!" Folklore time let's goooooo

Honourable mention: All of Medieval Welsh Lit

This is a catch-all I'm using to stop all 5 of these entries from being this because I gotta cover places like Turkey and Ireland. There's still a couple dw. But there's so many more like Rhiannon, world's most magical snarky part-time ponygirl; Macsen Wledic, who everyone wants to be their ancestor, or wait this is a reflection of the historical would-be Roman emperor Magnus Maximus; Mabon ap Modron, world's specialest boy who does fuck all Oh Wait this is an ancient deity who was syncretised with Apollo? Neat! Okay actual entries Go

5. Robin Hood

This is a prime case of "in the original version..." I'm actually a big fan of the earliest medieval Robin Hood ballads we have, they're very fun bouncy little adventures and the middle English is just comprehensible enough that I can alternate between reading the original text and the translation. Did you know that it took a couple centuries for Robin to be turned into an exiled lord (to make him more palatable to a noble audience when they started making plays about him, he originated in songs and performances at country fairs), and he was a commoner fucking with the king before then? And that despite how much a "modern twist" it seems, Marian (who might have started as an unrelated character with her own adventures) beating him in a fight actually pre-dates the nobleman thing!

4. Battal Gazi

The absolute lad. A pulp adventure style hero from medieval Turkish epics sourced from the Byzantine frontier. There's a real cowboy adventure vibe to these. And they got made into a series of campy adventure films in the 50s! And he defeated one HUNDRED Romans with EACH swing of his sword and EVERYONE clapped (for real I'm pretty sure he kills Charlemagne in one of these)

3. Taliesin

The secret main character of medieval Welsh literature and poetry! An actual historical poet of the 6th century who became so famous that later medieval writers would write legends about him having magic bardic powers, write poems in his voice...which makes it hard to figure out what he actually wrote! But what can be sorta confidently attributed to him mostly consists of praise poetry for the north-British king Urien Rheged, which is...maybe a little romantic? He always ends them with

"And until I fail in old age,

in the sore necessity of death,

May I not be smiling,

If I praise not Urien."

Which is nice. Urien is the sneaky other subject of this--he's also a really interesting guy halfway between history and legend, subject of a whole bunch more poetry and hegemon of his while region. His son, Owain, possibly fought in the famous battle of the Gododdin, was written as the leader of hundreds of giant magical ravens, and finally got absorbed into continental Arthurian legend as 'Yvain'

2. Cai the Fair

Speaking of Arthur! I'm a big fan of the original version based in Welsh folklore, a wandering warrior prior to his transformation into a chivalric king. Similarly, some of his knights started as companions of the original version, and my favourite is the counterpart of Sir Kay. In later and mainstream Arthuriana he's the jackass who exists to get clowned on to show how cool Lancelot or whoever is, but this is actually because he started off as Arthur's best guy, so in anime rival tradition, showing him up is an easy way to establish your cool new OC. The original Cai can grow giant, has both heat and cold powers, can survive underwater for weeks...he slays all kind of giants, fights a giant cat, and then he does one giant slaying in a slightly sneaky way and Arthur (who is sometimes called a "frivolous bard") sings a mean song about him and he swears never to help him again. Oops!

He's also a bit gay with it--he's often paired with Bedwyr (source of Sir Bedivere), they love questing together and swear by each other, Cai was heartbroken when he died...

1. Cú Chulainn

The BOY. My GUY

The central hero of most of the Ulster cycle, you may know him from Fate. But the Fate version is less weird and less anime than the medieval version!! This Cú is a weird little trans-coded twink with three-coloured hair, seven-coloured eyes, a bunch of named special moves and an epic duel to the death with his boyfriend.

He's such a fucked up little guy! He's the perfect product and also the perfect victim of the glory-obsessed warrior culture he exists in, he's driven to destroy himself and everyone around him by a constant terror of not being the best at all times, he's so...arrrrrgh. he's the guy!! He's an extremely bad person to be clear. I love him. Sometimes he gets so worked up into a warrior's frenzy he generates a flaming aura that can melt snow and has to be dunked in cold water to chill out! I have like three writing projects in the works that are basically "Cú Chulainn for lesbians". Highest honour I can bestow

[descaladumidera]

TW for GotG Vol. 3

I watched Guardians of the Galaxy – Vol. 3 last night and while I think it was a good movie (one of the better ones in recent years, like, I think it was genuinely good), I also think it warrants some trigger/content warnings. So. I will do just that to keep y'all safe (please be careful).

With that said, this will obviously contain spoilers. I will put the general trigger/content warning under the cut and then further down will explain what happens in the movie, so you can pick and choose which triggers you want to know about. And if you have any further questions, you can always DM me here or on Discord and ask. I will do my best to answer them.

I don't claim that I will get everything, though, as memories are fickle things and I'm not perfect.

Anyway, onto the trigger/content warnings:

BODY HORROR/BODY MODIFICATION

ANIMAL ABUSE/ANIMAL CRUELTY

ALCOHOL ABUSE

GORE

(There's also some fighting with more or less fatal injuries, but as this is a superhero movie, I won't go into detail about this.)

BODY HORROR/BODY MODIFICATION

To preface this: This is Rocket's story. So this theme is all throughout the movie and it is graphic. There are a bunch of animals other than Rocket that others have been experimenting on (the otter from the trailer for example). And it's way worse with them than with Rocket. The otter has no arms anymore, instead she has rudimentary prostheses, a rabbit has been modified to have some mechanical spider legs and a mask, a walrus has modified eyes and some kind of wheelchair like thing to get around. This is all integrated into their bodies, these are not removable. There are other animals like this.

You have probably also seen the society of anthropomorphic animals in the trailer. There are scenes in which it gets shown how they were made—it's graphic. The first time we see this they use a tortoise and you can see the transformation and it's not pretty.

Then there's Nebula who gets basically killed several times, her limbs and neck and whole body bent and broken in ways no one would survive. And she fixes herself in a horror like way (remember Wanda emerging from the mirror in MoM? Something like that).

Groot gets beheaded once and the head crawls around like some kind of spider for a brief amount of time (until he regrows himself). Not that bad, but I thought I should mention it.

As said, this is the theme of the movie, this is Rocket's story, and it is pretty damn graphic for an MCU movie. This is also the biggest trigger warning imho.

ANIMAL ABUSE/ANIMAL CRUELTY

Several animals (not just Rocket) get experimented on and killed. They get abused and mistreated and kept in cages. Their bodies get mutilated in those experiments and their bodies get modified. It's a bit of a horror show.

(More details in the body horror/body modification part above this one.)

ALCOHOL ABUSE

Peter gets blackout drunk to the point of passing out in the first few minutes of the movie. He is trying to deal with his broken heart this way and, according to his friends, this is not the first time. But it's the only time we see this in the movie.

GORE

Pretty mild case when it comes to gore tbh., but better safe than sorry. A character's face gets taken off and you see the skull, muscles, and blood beneath it. The character is still talking afterwards (it's pretty much at the end of the movie).

I didn't know if I should put it under gore, but I also didn't know where else to put this. But there is a planet/spaceship/whatever like thing that is a living organism. It looks pretty gross and you can actually see it briefly in the trailer when the Guardians jump out of their ship in the colorful spacesuits. Everything in this place is organic and they cut through the skin in one scene and the sounds are just pretty gross imo. Also, the interaction with this organism is … How do I describe this? Like, sometimes they put their hands on the "buttons", but it's like this semi-liquid goo? And this goes on for quite some time.

[cutebutalsostabby]

I'm thinking about Twilight's twili crystal shard thing, and I'd like to know what is it made of? Is there a reason why he's a wolf? Why is the Hero's Shade also a wolf? Why is Legend a bunny instead of a wolf? Does the twili magic have anything to do with the dark world from ALttP? Do you think the rest of the chain would also be wolves?

Oops, sorry! I saw this previously but missed responding at the time!

The in-game story behind Twilight's crystal shard is basically this:

People in the Twilight Realm are minding their business until one day, the guy (Zant) who really wanted to be king but wasn't chosen turns up with a whole bunch of new magic powers and uses them to take over the throne. We later find out that those powers come from Ganondorf.

Zant then proceeds to take over patches of the Light World as well. When he does, those patches turn into echoes of the Twilight Realm. Normal human turn to spirits in that environment, but Link turns into a wolf. According to the Light Spirits, this is proof that he's the legendary hero.

Link goes around dispelling patches of Twilight in various provinces, and completes the first three dungeons along the way. Then he runs into Zant, and Zant lays a curse on him that forces him to turn into a wolf even in the Light World. In this cutscene, you see a crystal embed itself in Link's forehead. This is the curse, in a physical form.

Link and Midna go off and find the Master Sword in order to turn him back. The Master Sword is a blade that can dispell evil, and when he approaches it, Zant's weird little crystal curse thing is driven out of his body.

Midna hangs onto the little curse thing. She seemingly has some kind of magical storage space where she can swap out the curse and the Master Sword, so you can change to a wolf whenever you want.

In-game, Link CANNOT turn into a wolf without Midna's help. For this to work in an AU, there's probably some offscreen moment where Midna teaches him a little bit of Twili magic and/or equips him with some sort of item that lets him safely store the sword and curse and to swap them out as needed.

As to what that crystal is and whether it has any connection to ALTTP: although TP's Twilight Realm and ALTTP's Dark World are technically two very separate things, they operate very similarly. And remember that Zant's power is based on Twili magic BUT is supercharged by Ganon's own magic. So it makes sense that certain elements of how the Dark World works would carry over! Maybe that's why our hero turns into a wolf.

Within ALttP, EVERYONE within the Dark World transforms in some way, rather than just becoming a spirit. Your transformation is supposed to reflect your true nature, so bullies turn into monsters while most others turn into animals, and our sweet lil hero who just tumbled out of bed in his pajamas, then went and watched his uncle die and then went off to save the world at like... 15 years old at most(?), turns into a little pink bun bun.

There are a few ways of reading that, and the rabbit does have some different inferences in Japan vs the Western world. But to me, it's like... he's trying so hard to be brave, but secretly he feels small, helpless and scared. Oof :(

Also did you know that hares are trans in Medieval lore? Now you do.

TP!Link is a bit of a different character. He is fiercely protective and loyal, and he also seems to be a bit older and more sure of himself. Wolf form makes sense for him, even going off ALttP's logic about how your transformation is determined. The Hero's Shade, aka OoT!Link, is the only other non-monster character in TP who has a transformation like that, and the fact that it's also a wolf shows the connection between the two of them.

I don't think the others would be wolves. I think they'd be whatever form matches their own hearts. I probably have a few headcanons, but that's for another day :)

Hope that helps!

[altraviolet]

I was tagged by @viol3lite in this post here for a little chain answer thingy thing. Thanks for the tag :) The original post is super long so I'm answering here instead of reblogging the whole thing.

1. How many works do you have on AO3?

33

2. What's your total AO3 word count?

654,175

3. What fandoms do you write for?

Transformers. I used to write for other fandoms many years ago.

4. What are your top 5 fics by kudos?

LOL this is how all my stats look. The Echo Garden has a jillion more stats than everything else.

5. Do you respond to comments?

Yes :)

6. What is the fic you wrote with the angstiest ending?

I don't have any fics with angsty endings, per se. But horrific or sad or horrifically sad... probably "Lightning Rod."

7. What's the fic you wrote with the happiest ending?

Plenty of them have happy endings! Probably Echo Garden wins here. I literally wrote the sappiest ending I could, then wrote the whole fic, wondering if I could get to a place where the sappiness was in character, and it was. bahaha

8. Do you get hate on fics?

never got a flame on ff.net and I've never gotten hate on AO3 =)

9. Do you write smut? If so, what kind?

lol. uhhhhh. the roboty kind

10. Do you write crossovers? What's the craziest one you've written?

The craziest one was a character from TFP going onto a vessel from MTMTE. It's a crossover from different parts of the TF franchise, but not a crossover between entirely unrelated franchises.

11. Have you ever had a fic stolen?

not to my knowledge

12. Have you ever had a fic translated?

yes! there are 2 Russian translations and 1 Chinese translation for Echo Garden, and there is a Russian translation for the Rodimus/Megatron fic The Field Ballad.

13. Have you ever co-written a fic before?

not in TF fandom

14. What's your all time favorite ship?

Mirage/Skywarp :)

15. What's a WIP you want to finish but doubt you ever will?

sequel to Face The Past. I have a bunch of stuff written but will probably never get it together.

16. What are your writing strengths?

worldbuilding, characterization (keeping characters in character even through an arc), flow

17. What are your writing weaknesses?

plot, ugh

18. Thoughts on writing dialogue in another language in fic?

is this a contentious subject? o_O oh maybe for anime, putting random Japanese in?

in Transformers fics the "other languages" aren't real the way non-English languages are real, so I can't put them in without inventing them and then translating them anyway. I put those parts in italics and make it known to the reader what's happening. I think it's good for showing character or culture

19. First fandom you wrote for?

I made my own Star Trek ship and crew xD

20. Favorite fic you've written?

oh nuuuuu how am I supposed to piiiiiiick...

*sigh* I guess Echo Garden? it was extremely long and extremely indulgent. I held back a little, but overall I did almost everything I wanted to do. the length came from the indulgence.

If you'd like to consider yourself tagged and join in, feel free =)

[duhragonball]

Journey to the West ch1-6

I've gotten my feet wet with Journey To The West, and I feel like I need to record some observations as I go, since this is going to take a while, and there's a lot to take in.

I guess I should start by explaining my agenda here: Dragon Ball is famously inspired by Journey To The West, with a number of characters and situations based on the 16th Century novel. Goku's magic staff, his flying cloud, his numerous transformations, his monkey tail, his name, it's all a callback to Sun Wukong from JTTW. I've been a Dragon Ball fan for about a quarter century, and I feel like it's high time I got in on the joke.

The book is surprisingly simple and complex at the same time. It's kind of fascinating, really. Sun Wukong is born, becomes leader of a community of primates, then learns super powers from human teachers to better safeguard his "kingdom". He seems to be nigh invincible, and so he just kind of does whatever the fuck he wants. It's not that he's evil, it's just that no one seems to be able to stop the guy. A guy named Erlang finally fights him to a standstill and this allows the combined forces of Heaven to (barely) capture Sun Wukong, and that pretty much covers the first six chapters. It's pretty easy to follow.

At the same time, there's this dense mythology surrounding almost everything that isn't a wild animal. There seem to be hundreds of supernatural beings and concepts in the story, and most of them don't appear to actually do anything, they're just casually mentioned throughout. The Jade Emperor runs Heaven, and there's lower deities that report to him, and that's pretty easy to understand, and there are a lot of them, which isn't unreasonable, but at times the redundancy almost seems to be an end unto itself.

The first six chapters feel a lot like a big dumb Marvel crossover, where 900 superheroes meet up in a conference room to fret about the latest crisis. Or, in this case, I guess it's a lot like that picture of all the Marvel heroes facing off against Goku and Vegeta, only it's a bunch of Chinese deities vs. Sun Wukong. They keep throwing guys at the problem and none of them can get the job done, and then some other guy shows up and he wants to give it a try and that doesn't work either, and then they call in another guy who apparently hadn't heard about this whole mess.

The thing I'm picking up here is that I probably don't need to study all these concepts in depth to follow the story. In a "Goku vs. Marvel" image, they probably put Captain Britain in there somewhere, but you don't need to know anything about him. He's just a face in the crowd. The "who" and "how" and "why" of it is less important than the "what", which is this cool OP monkey dude owning all the strongest gods. Well he beat Hulk and Silver Surfer, but there's no way he can stop Galactus, ope, he beat him too. Wow, this guy's strong.

So I appreciate that there's this entry-level access to this story. I think there's a lot of other levels to all of this, but even if you don't know much about Chinese folklore of Buddhism, you can still relate to the idea of a monkey getting drunk and stealing God's peaches. Journey To The West is giving me permission to read this on easy mode. I don't regret skipping that 100-page introduction at the start of the book.

[paragonrobits]

shapeshifting as a power set i need to think about for my characters has honestly been the bane of my writing experience but not in the way you think! I don't dislike shapeshifting; i love shapeshifting. I love the ideas it offers, transforming into different forms or combining multiple aspects of animal shapes to create composite chimeras or humanoid monster forms! I love the idea of a character being able to go 'hmm, today i will be four feet tall, have six arms and SO MANY EYES, also maybe translucent skin to REALLY Freak out the squares, maybe add in a few intestinal tracts that make DOING noises'

i love the concept of my characters being able to assume a wide variety of forms based on context or just them wanting to do it; i love the possibilities it involves, the possible questions it can be used to interrogate identity. I love the idea of different shapeshifters having differing transformations because one does it to assume their ideal form while another one has little attachment to their body as a component of their identity and transforms into cool things

however what really ANNOYS ME is that its hard to put it in, because as much as I fundamentally just want shapeshifting as a way for characters to transform themselves and open up design possiiblities or just go 'whatever i have four arms today', in practice I always dread the idea of having to ask the question of why they don't weaponize their shapeshifting or use it in ways I'm not interested in doing for that specific character. I don't want them to pick locks with their fingers, there's other things to do with it, so i want to avoid that kind of response??

so its just really frustrating to figure out. So here's a few possible ideas I've thought of over time:

Shapes must be earned. What this means varies; they may have to bargain to assume a form from the spirits of animals, drink the blood/dreams/whatever from someone with the form they want (and then tailor it later on). They can't just assume whatever form they imagine. However, they can combine any element or feature FROM those forms freely; shapeshifting is therefore largely a question of how many shapes you can stockpile in your library, what limitations apply, and what this effect can have on your mind. (Some other possibilities can include these shapes having their own reality; it is possible to gain shapes of other people and gain their powers, but you must assume those forms to a big degree to use that, and its not necessarily a good thing for your mind. Additionally, if you get hurt while shapeshifted, that form must heal, forcing you to retain that form; they also don't normally benefit from your own strength increasing, so you must train those forms as well or otherwise they remain the same strength or qualities indefinitely.)

free transformation! They can assume whatever form they like. However, this doesn't necessarily mean its functional; growing wings doesn't mean you can fly, and you need a whole bunch of other modifications you might not know how to do. Mass is a real issue with this one; you can grow bigger, but that might not make you stronger unless you can find a way to acquire more mass. Functional transformations are hard to do.

Transformation as an expression of identity; taking it to a literal extreme, a shapeshifter can assume whatever shape they like and tweak it to extreme degrees, but they cannot assume a form that they don't vibe with, good or ill. (This can be used for characterization, if they have an easy time assuming horrific or gross forms but not conventionally beautiful ones, indicating on some level they don't WANT to belong, they want to demand the world accept them without having to be pretty about it.)

Shapeshifting is a common power, but exactly what it involves depends on the other spells and abilities a person has. You can assume that spells can be used as a sort of add-on, giving additional powers for shapeshifting but are NOT universal; you need to have the powers to enhance strength if you want to become stronger, for example. Magic has 'weight', in this context, and shapeshifting is an ultimate expression of self-hood.

Related to the above, shapeshifting is an incredibly basic power that most people can do to some degree. Doing complex hacks like growing mega-muscle fiber for super strength is NOT something you can do that easily, though; getting the magical weight to weaponize transformations is actually a lot harder than it sounds. (In the same way, disguise shapeshifting is rarely effective; something about magic ensures that people immediately recognize you regardless of shape.) 6. Freeform shapeshifting and exploits are TOTALLY possible, but in this context, magic often works a bit like Vancian magic; you need to 'equip' magical capabilities over a notable amount of time, and this equipment is what you can actually do with magic. Shapeshifting that can be exploited in the sense of 'functionally being able to have every power by transforming the right way' CAN happen, but it takes a truly monumental amount of magic space that takes a very long time to do, and few people want to do that. Even those who dedicate themselves to it mostly only can consistently produce a few different techniques. (Consequently, in the setting, shapeshifting into your ideal body is easy or otherwise tailoring your look. Using it for practical or offensive means is a lot harder.)

[transingthoseformers]

Another couple of characters I kind of want to see in Earthspark are Blackarachinia and Noble/Savage from BM. Given we already have Tarantulas, I kind of want Blackarachinia to be somewhat of a mix between her BW and BM personalities or designs, with the whole aspect of her being a techno-organic, though without TFA's whole stance that she wanted to be "cured" but that she wants to be free of not being shoved into being a "Decepticon" or an "Autobot" and being tied into a conflict she doesn't care for. Conversely, I also kind of want her to have a background as being an offworlder, maybe from a distant colony world like Eukaris, in that she doesn't know of the Autobot/Decepticon conflict until it spills over or the Quintessons started conquering more worlds, especially those that have Transformer lifeforms on them. I kind of want her to be around or near the same age as the Terrans.

As for Noble, I kind of want another mutation type Transformer created by the Quintessons fooling around with the AllSpark, plus Noble hasn't gotten as much media presence since Beast Machines, and he would be a pretty interesting addition. I'm actually kind of the thought that if the Quintessons have the AllSpark, they would try to fiddle around with it, making new Transformer life but it's wrong on some level. Maybe they end up have a bunch of weird Transformers just around, maybe some Transformers who can't transform maybe Transformers who turn from one animal to another, maybe a lot of mutations here and there.

Honestly I feel like BA would be so cool in Earthspark because it'd let us possibly get into the world of mecha who've been straight across neutral the entire time, which considering what Tarantulas indicated about it being super fucking hard to be neutral will lead to interesting consequences

Out of her tfa personality I feel like the scientist route without the cure thing would lead to interesting interactions with Tarantulas as possible rival science spiders with Nightshade willing to assist either. And finding it somewhat amusing.

Her and Noble being technoorganic has gotta lead to interesting questions because the terrans to me count as somewhat technoorganic? Somewhat. Slightly.

You're right about how Noble is absolutely underrated out of the BW mecha, especially since his design would look super cool in not the beast wars style (I'm so sorry beast wars you're amazing but your animation and designs aren't)

Noble being created by the Quintessons would be interesting because ultimately speaking out of all their creations I'd say he's one of the successes

Oooo so you're suggesting we'll get monoformers (considering what I've seen I feel like that's something very possible for Earthspark, especially regarding a lot of importance being put on altmode here, it'd be a ~thing~ that ultimately I'm here for). As well as possibly situations like the cassettes where they've got alternate root modes and non humanoid altmodes? Sign me the fuck up!

[irafuwas]

Now that I finished putting up my translations for chapter 1 of Book 7 over on my translation blog, I wanted to come here and jot down some of my thoughts/observations/questions/ramblings I had while going through everything. Putting this under a read more 'cause it contains spoilers.

Anime Girl Lilia doing the "Oh no, I'm late!" bit was perfect

Malleus said he's been alone since long before he hatched from his egg, which provides credence to the idea that his parents had already passed away before he was born

Lilia said the house he raised Silver in was just a vacant home he came across in the woods. So did he have another home in town that he just chose not to live in or something? The guy's a decorated war hero so I would presume he'd have a proper house in the castle town, so why did he choose to raise baby Silver in a random, abandoned home he found in the middle of the forest?

Squatter Lilia confirmed

I think Lilia's weapon that Sebek found while cleaning out Lilia's closet is going to play an important role later in the story. They went of their way to draw up art for it and it was, like, the main focus of a whole episode so I feel they are drawing attention to it for a reason. The special characteristic of this weapon is that the stone blade is adorned with a magic type of metal that changes shape in response to the owner's magical powers. Maybe Silver will take up the sword from/for his Father later on, and it will transform in some way? Possible future Mulan reference?

I haven't been able to puzzle out if Lilia's beloved acorn bracelet is a reference to anything in particular. I can't think of any Disney movies where something like that was featured. Can you guys think of anything? It's literally just a bunch of nasty old acorns tied together with a piece of string, and Lilia said that even Malleus is jealous that Lilia has it.

It's absolutely and positively way too suspicious that Lilia is trying to leave so quickly and suddenly. I feel like whatever secret he's keeping from anyone is about to come to a head and that's why he's trying to exit stage left so quickly. Or maybe if he were to stay with everyone, it would be putting them at risk somehow? Idk I just don't believe his "i'M olD aNd mY mAgiC raN oUT" story for a moment.

I really don't think Malleus himself realizes his own feelings of loneliness. So often, he will say that he's used to being alone and that he prefers it (and he does indeed often split off from groups in order to do his own thing), but I don't he's conceptualized quite yet that yeah, he gets lonely sometimes. I feel his loneliness, and possibly that of the other Diasomnia crew will be the defining theme of this book (Silver's loneliness in his ephemeral humanity, Lilia's loneliness as a broken ex-soldier, and Sebek's loneliness in not having a place to belong in either side of his family (humans fear his fae-nature, and the fae despise his human blood)).

Loved the shoutout to Elsa with Malleus accidentally scaring others with his ice powers and almost turning his home (the castle) into ice forever. If/when he does attempt to prevent the people around him from leaving him behind, I'm now curious if it will purely be a sleeping curse or if his ice powers will also be involved as well? Maybe a combo of the two?

If Malleus is Elsa, who is his Anna?

One of the "rules" for TWST books is that whoever overblotted in the last book will use their Unique Magic to aid the main characters of the next book in someway. All Idia's UM does is just open and close the gate to the underworld, so I'm a bit concerned how that will come into play later on... Could Lilia's story about wanting to go to the Land of Red Dragons just be a cover up, and his true destination is... idk but somebody gonna end up getting trapped in the underworld or something and it better not be Silver 😡

[tossawary]

Needing something to play in the background during the day, I have started watching Transformers G1 and have now finished the first season. It is very funny to visit the original after getting most of my information through Fandom Osmosis and passing acquaintanceship with more recent Transformers media. I decided to start at the beginning (terrible decision, I know, I will not be changing it) because I have like 40+ hours per week that need background sound and I like studying adaptational choices over time, so I intend to progress through a bunch of Transformers shows in chronological order.

It's kind of like Star Trek: TOS (Star Trek is better) in that I find parts of it very charming, there are plenty of aspects that are even compelling in their potential, but it's also... bad. A lot of it is Very Bad, sometimes in a very funny way and sometimes in a way that is just Not Good and even Problematic. I cannot possibly recommend it.

The animation quality is understandably very low due to the context of its creation (television show from the 80s made to sell toys). I like a few of the Cybertron background paintings, but it still takes me a second to tell a lot of the characters apart, partially because there is a revolving door for supporting characters. The writing quality is even worse. The physics is all over the place. The powers and abilities are completely arbitrary. None of the science works. No one can decide what body parts the Cybertronians actually have. There is way more mind control in this show than I ever expected there to be. This is apparently an alternate universe where the Earth has various types of energy crystals. The Idiot Ball trope is flying all over the place like dodgeballs and the characters are repeatedly hitting themselves with it constantly. Some of the accents are quite silly, yeah, but it still doesn't justify how some people type them out in fanfiction.

And yet I am still mildly entertained, probably because I am already partial to both animation and space opera with robots. And I recognize enough of the characters to find these early versions of them very funny. And some parts of this extended toy commercial were very clearly Done With Love.

Megatron and Starscream are like two halves of a whole idiot. The Decepticons are incapable of not betraying each other for more than a few episodes. Except for Soundwave, who is the MVP of the Decepticons, and yet also does nothing to stop any of the drama. Both sides can just Make New Guys at any time apparently and the Dinobots should unionize. I think Optimus Prime essentially "ok boomer"ed Megatron in the second episode and it was justified. I can't believe that Shockwave didn't just straight up stage a coup or otherwise move on in 4 million years, like, man, DUMP HIS ASS already. Bumblebee has apparently always been Very Smol and Just A Little Guy. Because this is a kids show, all these giant robots are constantly calling the Mortal Enemies They Want Dead "dweebs" and "nerds" and "twerps" and it's Very Funny. And I'm just going to assume that Sparkplug is a nickname and not an adult human man's legal name.

Also, I know the reason that the human kids are in the show is so that the show can go, "Look! This could be you! Being friends with all your favorite giant robots!" But it very much comes off as the Autobots having no real context for Spike's age or squishiness, probably because their own newborns are already able to fight. And Carly's introduction involving renting scuba gear and breaking into the Decepticon base makes her look (and I mean this with bewildered affection) fucking nuts, girl.

[paxesoterica]

Some Thoughts About the First 3 Episodes of Mobile Suit Gundam [0079] Part 2

*Spoiler warnings again for both Mobile Suit Gundam and The Witch from Mercury.

*I forgot to mention this in Part 1, but the first time I saw Amuro in animation isn't 0079, but was instead the time he met Hello Kitty, who proceeded to transform his enemies into super deformed versions of themselves:

*And yes, you should watch this, even if you know absolutely *nothing* about Hello Kitty or Gundam (or, perhaps especially if you know nothing). Incidentally, super deformed (SD) Gundams have a long history in the franchise, so what Hello Kitty does isn't even that weird for Gundam (just imagine if she met Suletta instead, and transformed Aerial).

*Another thing I forgot to mention, was that the show's pretty competent about transitions: the Zeon's soldiers earlier were scouting Side 7 via binoculars, which led to them spying Fraw's buggy and switching to her perspective, and her discussion with Amuro about his dad incidentally transitions to scenes with the folks working on Side 7's secret military projects. While the titular Gundam is one of those projects, it's not the only one: I've mentioned before that several characters will be joining White Base, which is a new battleship the Earth Federation has been constructing:

*Shiny! And yes, very toyetic, though I'm growing to get very annoyed at people who refer to Gundam shows as toy commercials as a pejorative about their storytelling quality (some folks have been especially fond of talking about Witch from Mercury that way, and always for the same reason).

*Aboard White Base, we get to meet Amuro's dad, Lieutenant Tem Ray.

*The book he's reading is the instruction manual on how to pilot the Gundam, which I believe was written either partially or in whole by him (yes, this will be important shortly). The other guy with him is Bright Noa.

*So, Bright is rather (in)famous for slapping Amuro at least once during Gundam (maybe more?), so much that there's memes about it, and that, along with the fact that he's a captain, is probably one of the first things you'll hear about him. However, this is an excellent example of how memes decontextualize stories, and fun though they can be, can give you an extremely wrong impression. See, when I first heard 'Captain Bright Noa slaps Amuro for insubordination', it gave me a rather negative impression of him, since it sounded like a military officer flexing his rank against a kid who was drafted into battle (and understandably not okay with this). But if you actually *watch* 0079:

*It turns out Bright is only a few years older than Amuro, and is very much a teen himself who's only been in the military for half a year. Meaning the only way he's becoming a captain anytime soon is if he's the highest ranking officer who's not dead or incapacitated.

*In short, yes, Bright Noa using physical force against Amuro still isn't a good thing, but this is also very much the story of (essentially) someone who'd normally be a freshman at college being put in charge of a bunch of high-school-aged kids in a life-or-death situation and finding himself a bit in over his head, so I'm inclined to be a bit more sympathetic than I might otherwise.

*I really like this scene, even though I find it sad. Tem is very clearly talking to Bright here, but the camera notably focuses on Amuro, and it's pretty good foreshadowing if you didn't know Amuro was getting in the Gundam. With the passage of time, this scene has also taken on a layer of dramatic irony as well.

*I'm also not sure what to make of Tem from this scene. He seems friendly enough to Bright, and seems distressed about the idea of kids like his son fighting in wars, so he doesn't really come off as someone bad (except for the naive belief that you can build a weapon strong enough to end war, of course). While Amuro and Miorine seem to have a bit in common, I'm not sure yet how much that's true of Tem and Delling, aside from being military officers who want to protect their children, since Tem doesn't really seem like the sort of guy who'd authorize the UC equivalent of the Vanadis Incident. I'll have to mull this one over a bit more.

*It seems that unfortunately the White Base was followed by a Zeon ship, which was where the Zaku pilots were dispatched from, which segues into the audience meeting this guy:

*Char Aznable, whose very first lines instantly reminded me of this exchange between Belmeria Winston and Prospera Mercury:

*Char is is quite possibly the most (in)famous Gundam character, to the point that he's featured in commercials for cars and fast food (in Japan at least), and, of course, a number of memes. An examination of Gundam as a whole will reveal that many shows feature at least one mask-bearing antagonist or rival, who's typically manipulative and/or vengeful, and all of them can be traced back to Char. While I will be mentioning points of similarity between him and Prospera, I honestly feel like the connection between these two is by far the most obvious, and that it might be more worthwhile to discuss the ways in which they differ.

*Case in point. In addition to having unusual perspectives on luck (likely influenced by their high levels of confidence), Char and Prospera also have a good grasp of tactics, and are generally skilled at predicting opponents and choosing good moves to counteract them (though they are not always completely successful).

*Their attitude toward subordinates is also noteworthy. Prospera doesn't have a lot of interactions with her Shin Sei staff, but her calmly interrupting the one in the screenshots above (during the stress of the attack on Plant Quetta no less) is the rudest I've ever seen her act toward any of her them. In general, she seems to be a congenial boss who doesn't seem to get angry at her employees for disagreeing with her, a trait Char seems to share with how he treats his followers (so far anyway), and which is probably remarkable to me due to how often I see antagonists act like jerks to people loyal to them. Of course, both Char and Prospera are also known for manipulating people close to them, so how much this might be an act versus how much they genuinely care about others is ambiguous (and, admittedly, makes them interesting characters to observe).

*Char's mention of mobile suits shifts the scene back to the three Zeon pilots from the start, and one of them, Gene, decides that spying on the mobile suit project isn't enough, and opens fire.

*Amuro leaves the shelter to look for his father, and has his first encounter with a mobile suit.

*Anyone who's seen all of Witch from Mercury will already be aware that, leaving aside any armaments, the sheer size of a mobile suit is already incredibly dangerous to a human, as the Zaku simply taking a step knocks Amuro around a bit and prompts him to get in the buggy he and Fraw were in and drive.

*Amuro finds some soldiers and asks for help, but they meet a very abrupt end:

*You have absolutely seen shots like these before in anime, but I recently learned that they're typically referred to as postcard memories, a technique pioneered by Osamu Dezaki back in the early 70s, and since made ubiquitous. It's use is particularly interesting here for a couple reasons, the first being that MSG was made less than a decade after Dezaki started using this animation technique, meaning it would still feel relatively 'new' to audiences at the time. This shot also experiments by including some more traditionally animated objects in the scene, namely the transparent books and papers flying forward on the left side.

*The other reason, is that typically these were shots shown (at the time they were first used at least) to mark a transitional point, either narratively or in a character's arc, and while my knowledge of 70s anime is currently impoverished, I think Gundam may have been among the earliest to use this in such a tragically violent way (possibly beaten out by The Rose of Versailles since that also came out in '79, but I'm not familiar enough with that one to be sure). In any case, this a transitional shot, as it marks Amuro's first encounter with the horror and death caused by war, and the end of his childhood.

*This is a rather somber note to leave on, but at least next time we'll be finally seeing the eponymous Gundam, so hopefully that's somewhat comforting.

...to be continued in Part 3

[dawnstudies]

Spoilers to Stephen King Carrie !!!

I'm slowly transforming into a Stephen King fan, and I have no shame or regrets. His writing is just simply too awesome to ignore or to trash on.

It took me around two days to finish Carrie off and let me tell y'all, it was one of the best things I've ever read even though this was only a sip of the beginning of Stephen King's writing carrier.

Let me ramble some about the book itself...

Carrie's character, way of speech, description in itself is beautiful. I love how devoted she is and how much she loves her mother even though Margaret is nuts. I love that after all the crap she's been through she never lost her belief in God.

I'm also borderline fanatic about the imaginery of religion in the book, the sick, twisted part of it that a lot don't talk about; how the "love" of God can bring out the animal of some people.

Sue's character is a bit controversal for me, since I myself as others in the book too cannot believe that this happened the way it did, I don't believe Sue to be so selfless to pass down her last chance at prom to Carrie even out of guilt; even though guilt is an emotion worse than a bunch, a lot of times it hits the wrong, resistant person. However, if I accept that what Sue had written in her book to be true, that'd make her one of my favourite characters, right after Tommy.

Now, Tommy. Great student, brilliant sportsman, a true gentleman at the prom; obviously if what Sue wrote down to be true. I know that there were parts of the book which were in story-teller prespective, but it still can be doubted that whatever happened on the prom night and before was actually what was written down. And the possibility that it might be a big, fat lie just makes the book more intriguing.

Tommy's death was one of the things which broke my heart and I believe that it was meant to be this way; Tommy was made to be a lovable character, who's adored by every reader since he was just the perfect boy. Polite, smart, sporty, strong and kind. Stephen King truly knows our greatest fantasies, huh?

Now, Chris and Billy were two characters that I had a love-hate relationship with. Both of them were crazy, that's for sure. Chris, the typical daddy's girl, who got everything they wanted, and Billy, who grew up in a bad environment. Opposites completely, yet they still attracted, they both loved the roughness of the other as the book wrote it down. Though Nolan was way more gone than Chris and by the end, when Billy made the choice to leave Chris, I almost felt bad for her; interestingly, even though when they died, all I felt was sick satisfaction.

Desjardins was another one of my favourites, because she might've been rough on Carrie at first but after she learnt that something might be wrong, she tried to help as much as possible. Though, her actions do not make her any more of a saint that Sue, because both watched for years as Carrie got bullied, but both of them tried to change. However, Desjardins was more straightforward and she apologized. Sue never apologized. I saw her death coming before it even happened, I knew it was meant to be.

I loved the smaller characters, the connections with another, Norma and the other girls, I loved the whole plot and how Stephen King turned something like telekinesis into something so beautiful and cool. Before I've read the book, I've been asked the question, whether I'd choose telepathy or telekinesis. Back then, I immediately said telepathy. Now, I'd contemplate my choices more.

To sum it all up, the characters were interesting and detailed, every puzzle piece that had to fall in place alligned perfectly, while the ones that had to be left out were left out, which makes the book mysterious and even more worth to read. It gives the reader something to think about.

I can't wait to buy another Stephen King book.

[outeremissary]

✨ How did you come up with the OC’s name? For Balthazar (Seriously curious because I love that name and have had a stuffed animal named it for years)

Siren, I fear you (and Cassy, who asked as well) are about to get far more than you may have anticipated for this and it will be very silly. Balthazar is probably second only to Carmen (who is a much older character) in terms of convoluted meta histories that get long winded answers.

[prompt list]

✨- How did you come up with the OC’s name?

Okay, so there's a bit of necessary background here. Balthazar is loosely derived from a character conceptualized in 2016 who never had a real, settled name (mostly a series of titles; at this point the most consistent have been Herald and Three-Horned Devil). The project this character was made for was mostly to entertain me and keep me sane during the first year of university. At some point in the front half of 2017 I began learning 5e. A part of the process for this was getting a feel for the scope of characters and limits of character creation by making a bunch of character sheets with different concepts. To expedite this process, I used OCs from stagnant or abandoned projects as the basis for concepts; Caina and Balthazar were pulled from the same one (although it's possible that Balthazar actually had a 3.5 sheet first- he was a recurring character in my 3.5 campaign and I don't remember if he was introduced in spring or fall).

So Balthazar at this point did not have a name, and I needed to make a "traditional fantasy" name appropriate for what was then a half-elf sheet. The class, sorcerer, had already been determined, as had the first of several concepts for the adapted version of the Herald. My goal was to make a name with an occult sound to suit this ambitious Vecna cultist and to honor the Herald's whole evil god thing. And my other, more specific goal? To work in at least one demon name to amuse myself. I hate coming up with names so I have a bad habit of the joke name that sticks.

Anyway. I started with the demon names. The first and most obvious point to me was Ba'al. I was familiar with Ba'al as god king and god of storms from the Ba'al cycle and some related Urgaritic texts, but as I recall Ba'al was a title meaning "lord" attached to a number of regional deities (some variants of that Ba'al). In Jewish and Christian texts Ba'al appears as a false god and force of emnity. Ba'al also provides the root of "Beelzebub," and eventually becomes absorbed into the roster of demons in many traditions (I'm most aware of medieval Christian here) before washing back up in horror flicks as a stock name for a demonic force. The aspect of transformation was appropriate, I felt: a messy polytheistic deity who was also now known as a menacing demon. This worked well for the Herald. I was especially attracted to the "false god" aspect. So I wanted a name that could incorporate that name and ideally might naturally produce something functionally like Ba'al as a nickname. I chose Balthazar. It was a real name, which felt especially grounded, and it had an archaic sound due to having fallen out of style in the region I live in long, long ago, which gave it a certain mysterious flair.

From how that story went you may already have guessed about Lucienne. And you would be correct. That famous angel Lucifer was the over the top element used to round things out- partly because it's very easy to find other derivations from lux. It's also true that Lucian was a given name I'd considered for the character before discarding for being too trite (although Lucian Balen would become a recurring tongue in cheek alias for NPC Balthazar cameos in oneshots). I decided to push for a French sound because in my mind - and don't ask why, I have no fucking idea - French was an especially alchemical sounding language. Now some of you reading this may know some things about French, and may perhaps speak it yourselves. If this is you, you've probably caught the thing I wouldn't realize until two or three years too late, which is that Lucienne is not a French sounding name. It is an actual French given name of the feminine gender, the feminine equivalent of Lucien and the French version of Lucia. Whoops. At that point I was in too deep to change it and I just pretend I do not see it. Maybe it's endearing in a quirky JRPG way. French doesn't exist in most fantasy settings anyway despite the prevalence of Latin out there. It's fine. At this point the in story origin of the name is that he made it up himself anyway, so who knows. Maybe that 12 Int just produced the same mistake as me.

[arceespinkgun]

It's a shame to hear people have been hating on Elita One, she (amongst other female characters that made a cameo in the trailer) is literally the only reason why I'm even going to watch Transformers One! REALLY hoping they don't kill her off :⁠,⁠-⁠)

Because beyond my concerns for the possible themes and handling of themes, I think the story they seem to be going for would've been more suited for Alpha Trion or characters that are/perceived to be a generation older than Optimus. Also if I wanted to see a young Optimus become estranged from a close male friend of his whilst living in an oppressive society, I would just watch Transformers Animated because that's literally his dynamic with Sentinel Prime (even right down to the fact that Sentinel Prime enjoys poetry lol)

While I'm not interested in this movie I definitely get it, like Airachnid is one of the only things that made me happy to see! They'd better not fridge Elita...!

I can see where you're coming from (I miss Beta... I really wish we could get to see Beta and A-3 together again someday) though I think since the whole movie seems to be a whole bunch of different continuities mashed together I can see why it would be framed as an origin story for well-known (marketable) characters set under Quintesson oppression. Also, you mention Sentinel... I kind of would like to see a heroic incarnation of that character again that goes back to his earliest roots sometime.

I have a lot of concerns about this film and race, honestly. I'm putting this behind a cut because I mention a potential spoiler from people discussing a preview screening:

I mean, this includes a Megatron origin story—D-16's going to become a villain and he's voiced by a Black actor, and that means the characters who gets to remain heroes will be two white leads and their comedic Black sidekick, Bumblebee, and their Black mentor who gifts them with power, Alpha Trion? I could see this narrative falling into some really old, problematic tropes. Worse, it kind of sounds to me like Elita may have been something like a cop, since people have said she tries to turn the others in, which would compound potential bad themes greatly.

Me at Elita being voiced by Scarlett Johansson and maybe being a cop

So many once-heroic characters have been made cops already in different continuities… Optimus, Prowl, Jazz, Chromedome, Chromia, Nightbeat, Ironhide, Kup… those aren't even all of them. Please, not Elita too!!!