#Never actually used my Prime video

[fake-married-my-dead-fiance]

Marry My Husband was really good so far! The idea that good/bad events have to happen, but it can happen to a different person is so fun.

It's making me a bit sad how thin the main actress is though. I guess she had to be for the cancer scenes, but I just watched What's Up With Secretary Kim and she looked so much healthier there. And her magnificent ponytail is gone... I hope she gets it back.

[cassandracain52]

Reverse trope

where instead of the Bats forgetting that they’re adopted (something actual adoptees do on occasion and is hilarious) they forget that some of them *cough Damian cough* aren’t

_______

Jason in the heat of a probably ridiculous argument: Yeah well YOU’RE adopted!

Tim just as invested in said argument: So are YOU! We all are!

Damian who had previously been quietly watching this unfold while he drank his tea: Actually I’m not

Tim and Jason who didn’t realize he was there but are already DoneTM: …… Damian continuing to sip his tea entirely unbothered: :)

Damian: Because I’m not an orphan-

Jason: ok, yoU KNOW WHAT-

____

or like in their group texts (that we know they have thanks to Nightwing (2016) #79)

*Steph changed the group chat name to “Bruce Wayne’s Personal Orpanage”*

Jason: Really?

Steph: ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Steph: It’s the truth Damian: Both my parents are very much alive

Steph: Shhh you don’t count

Cass: Mine too Duke: Technically so are mine

Barbara: I still have a dad so there’s that

Steph: YOU GUYS ARE RUINING THE JOKE

Tim: Stephanie aren’t BOTH of your parents alive???

Steph: KNOW WHAT? FINE

*Steph changed the group chat name to “The Technicality Police”*

Tim: well that’s more accurate at least

Steph: :)

_____

Damian in his 10th argument with Tim of the day: That’s- this is-

Tim in full Antagonizing Big Brother mode: I’m listening

Damian -a Gen Z and best friend to Jon Kent- extremely frustrated: This is such Motherless behavior!

Tim taken aback: [voice cracking] W-what-?

Damian who didn’t mean to say that but doubling down anyway because his bloodline doesn’t believe in admitting mistakes: THIS! This is such Motherless behavior!

The rest of the family who is also motherless: :O

Cass whose been spending way too much time with Meme Queen Stephanie Brown and not involved in the argument but finding it entertaining regardless: [nodding along seriously] Facts

Tim: [visibly betrayed] CASS WHAT-

A video copy of the interaction gets sent out anonymously to the entire family. Barbara is the prime suspect but there is no proof as of yet (and they will never find any)

Steph, Cass, and Duke continue to respond “Motherless behavior” everytime one of the bats does something they deem questionable/insane. It is said often

It only stops when one night in the middle of patrol. Batman is in full Dark Knight mode (possibly in the middle of threatening someone) and descends from the ceiling into the middle of a warehouse drug deal, dark cape billowing out behind him-

and Steph just automatically whispers “Motherless behavior” forgetting her com was still very much on

She immediately realizes what she said and frantically apologizes but it’s too late.

Bruce just- Blue Screens. Completely stunned into silence

Dick -who was unfortunate enough to be the one teamed up with Batman tonight- is fighting for his life to choke back his laughter

Jason doesn’t even try to stop his and has collapsed to his knees from lack of air from how hard he’s laughing. Cass try’s half heartedly patting his back to help to no avail

The criminals are terrified into surrender from The Red Hood just laughing hysterically at seemingly nothing while Batman just Stands There

Damian ends up being the only one still functioning enough to continue arresting everyone, though he is privately amused and strangely proud

Tim and Barbara have saved both the com recordings and cowl footage to at least three different servers and sent it to absolutely everyone before Batman even recovers

Duke finds out second hand the next morning and is furious he missed the chance to see it in person. He declares he is moving to the nightshift so it doesn’t happen again. (He is all talk and goes to bed by 9 pm)

Bruce bans the phrase for life and promises swift and server punishment to anyone who dares to use it again

[tpwrtrmnky]

debate

[ID: 4-panel "pills that make you green" comic.

Panel 1: A light blueish grey stick figure is talking to a green stick figure.

LBG: "Hey I think the way you debate could use some refinement."

Green: "Oh?"

LBG: "Yeah like maybe check out Dischorse, they're pretty good."

Green: "Dischorse? Didn't they say-"

LBG: "Yes they did but don't worry about that just watch a debate."

Panel 2: Green is sitting at a computer setup with two monitors. On the left monitor is a logo that reads "Disc Hors", without the e, showing a horse head emerging from some kind of disc. On the right is a social media app.

Green: "Well, time to learn debate tactics I guess."

Panel 3: A stick figure with a horse head is slamming their hands into a table while a long chat (transcript below) flies by on the right.

Dischorse: "Look, CouchTruther69, we've been over this already. If your only source is a ten hour rant video then you don't have a source. No, no. Don't try to change the subject again, yes you're trying to change the subject. Behave."

Panel 4: Green continues watching, with the monitors in front of them.

Green: "It's four hours of this? I mean if they're getting paid to do it, sure. Not for me though."

Dischorse: "No, listen to me. We've been over this. That was already debunked ten minutes ago-"

End ID.]

[Chat transcript:

very dark off-white: horse they did a logical fallacy get them. orange: outside is so cool. God damn. games workshop fenrisian grey: horse your take on the season finale of Bexing Mech Politics was reprehensible, I've never seen media literacy this bad. blue: Thoughts on chromomedicalism? I think we should consider it. the imperceptible idea of a color known as "man": hi everyone moss green: If the election comes to microtransactions child versus immortal jeff, I'm voting with violence, actually. fishmoder37: why is everyone in this chat chromatic? where are my grayscale dischorsites at? cyan: lol purple: lmao red: speaking of, when's horse going on hue replacement therapy? in square brackets: user red has been banned for prime directive violation. blue: horse wouldn't look good anyway.

end transcript.]

Start - Previous - Next

[stevieschrodinger]

Part One Two Three four

Steve’s eating a bowl of cereal, squinting in the morning light. He’s barefoot, wearing nothing but sleep shorts, and is considering going back to bed. He shouldn’t though; he has to be on time today.

Since the mall burned down, Scoops Ahoy is, annoyingly, no more. Robin thinks she has something though, some guy at Family Video who probably has the hots for her or something. Doesn’t matter though, Steve doesn’t really care what this Keith guys motivation is as long as it results in gainful employment for the both of them.

He really should shower.

Steve can see the pool from here, so he’s in a prime position to watch as Eddie pulls himself out of the water and makes his way to the back door.

This is the second time Eddie has come into the house, if you don’t count the emergency temporary over nighter in the bath tub. Well, it’s the second time Eddie has brought himself into the house, at least.

He waits patiently at the back door, like a cat waiting to be let in, and Steve opens the door for him, cereal bowl still balanced in the other hand.

He holds himself in that same way, flat of his tail curled up beneath him, giving him a little height, and he sits himself uncertainly in the middle of the kitchen floor, “hi Eddie.”

“Stee. Buddidy”

Steve gets him some celery from the bottom of the fridge and gives him the whole thing. They stand, and sit, together in comfortable silence, crunching their way through their respective breakfasts.

Steve watches as Eddie cautiously makes his way to the fridge once he’s done, looking to Steve with his his hand on the door, a question on his face, Steve nods, “yeah.”

Eddie opens the door, and Steve watches as he explores, carefully moving jars and condiments and stuff around, glass clinking quietly, before he opens the drawer at the bottom and pulls out a pear, carefully closing the drawer and door again after. He eats the whole thing, stalk, core, seeds, everything.

Steve washes up his dish, checking the time, “want to watch some TV?”

Eddie cocks his head, but follows Steve into the lounge. He sits, looking around, feeling the carpet under his hands, running his nails carefully through the pile until the TV catches his attention.

He moves closer. And then closer again, making Steve laugh when he taps a nail on the curved glass of the screen.

“I’m going to go shower, you shouldn't sit so close, it’s bad for your eyes.”

Robin does her make up in the car on the way over to Family Video, “how’s Eddie?”

“I’m fine, thanks for asking, it really means a lot to me, how much you care about my well being.”

She sighs through her nose and rolls her eyes, and Steve tuts at her.

“He came in the house this morning, I left him watching TV.”

“Huh. I mean normally I would say it’ll rot his brain but, something for him to do would be good, right?”

“Yeah. And if I’m getting a job, we should try and teach him to use the walkie’s at least. In case there’s like an emergency or something.”

“A fruit and veg related emergency.”

“Yeah, kind of. We really need to figure out what to do with him, he can’t just sit in my pool forever.”

She hums in agreement.

It’s just starting to rain when Steve gets home, the first break in the nearly two weeks of sunny weather they’ve been having.

Probably won’t be sharing a beer with Eddie tonight then. Well, Steve hasn’t really been sharing, he’s been letting Eddie steal the last third of a bottle, which isn’t really the same thing.

Eddie’s actually sitting on on the couch when Steve gets in, which surprises him momentarily. There’s an empty container on the cushion next to him, Steve figures he found the grapes.

“Hey.”

Eddie turns to see him, smiling, clearly pleased to see him, which is a nice change of pace. Sure he knows Robin loves him, but she’s never actually openly really happy to see him unless she’s, like, drunk or high. And the kids. Steve knows they must at least kind of like him, but they’re all just little shits. Having someone to come home to who is genuinely pleased to see him is a really nice change of pace.

“It just started raining.”

“Raiiniing.”

“Yeah,” Steve points at the window, “uhm, wet. Uhm. Sky wet.”

“Et.”

“Yeah.”

Eddie’s eyes widen suddenly, scrabbling off the couch in clear panic, “Et! Et!”

“Yeah Buddy, what’s wrong-”

Eddie’s frantically slithering across the lounge carpet with what is a truly amazing turn of speed considering his anatomy, “et inied! Book! NO! NO!”

“Oh, shit! Your book,” Steve hops over Eddie’s tail, making it to the door and then sprinting across the grass, grabbing the book and bringing it back.

Eddie’s sitting in the door way, hands clasped together, watching anxiously, “it’s not so bad, just a little damp.” Steve holds the book out to show him where drops of rain have speckled the pages, “it’s not bad.”

“Not bad. Good,” but he’s still frowning, clearly concerned where the paper is discolored by the water.

“Wait,” Eddie does as he’s told as Steve runs upstairs for the hair dryer, plugging it in in the lounge and sitting on the floor, Eddie joining him with the book. “Here, feel,” he turns it on, pointing it Eddie’s way.

Eddie sticks his fingers towards it, and then pulls the back, startled. Then he does it again before watching Steve dry the pages of the book, “dry. Et inied.”

“That’s right buddy.”

“Stee Edidie budidy.”

“That’s right. Yeah.”

Eddie sits next to Steve watching nervously as Steve gets the final pages dried off, and Steve hands the book back.

Eddie grins, “thanks Birdidie,” and then darts forward to press his lips to Steve’s cheek. It's just a press, not a real kiss.

“Oh,” and then Steve chuckles when he realizes what’s happened, the behavior that Eddie's seen and is now mimicking, “no. Uhm. Thank you Steve.”

Eddie cocks his head.

“Wait, wait,” Steve takes the hair dryer with him, heading up the stairs again, and this time coming back with a handful of Polaroids, he shuffles them into a neat stack, sitting next to Eddie on the floor. “Right, this is Robin. Birdie.”

“Thanks Birdidie.”

“Yeah, that’s right, that’s Birdie, now,” Steve shuffles through, “Max,” he says pointing, “and El.”

“El. Max.”

It’s thirty minutes and two pears later, but Eddie seems to be able to identify everyone reliably from their photographs, “no, Dustin.”

“Dust bin,” Eddie replies, confidently.

“You know what, sure, dust bin. Let’s go with that. Kind of suits him, actually.”

Steve’s drinking his evening beer. The weather much better again today, but the evenings are drawing in, and the sun set has almost taken Steve by surprise with how early it’s painting the sky pink. Summer’s coming to a close. Which brings some urgency to the question; what are they going to do with Eddie? The pool isn’t heated, and it usually gets drained and covered for the winter months. It’ll definitely freeze over at some point if they leave it open like this, and there’s no way Eddie could survive that, could he?

Steve doesn’t know. There’s just too much they don’t know about Eddie.

Steve’s got his first shift at Family Video tomorrow, a closing shift with the manager, Keith. Apparently he wants to show Steve the ropes when it comes to shutting down the store; Steve figures just from that that he’s going to be stuck with more than his fair share of late shifts.

He wonders if Eddie’s going to miss his evening beer. He really should teach Eddie to use a walkie. Tomorrow, he decides, will be as good a time as any. Tomorrow morning, and then Steve can leave one with Eddie and take one to work with him.

At least he knows Eddie can get into the house if he really has to, if he gets hungry or whatever. He really could do with some sort of cover out here though. Some where to leave his book in case of the rain. Maybe put a couple of towels in there, some food in the cool box when Steve’s out, the walkie, that sort of stuff.

Eddie swims over, pushing his floating toy bucket along ahead of him in the water. There are things in it tonight, which is a first. Eddie puts his bucket on the side of the pool before pulling himself out to sit beside Steve.

He pulls something out of his bucket to show to Steve, “oh, it’s a pine cone. Hold on.” Steve puts his beer down to grab the encyclopedia, and Eddie duly swipes it. Steve flicks through the book wile Eddie sips the beer, “look, this is a tree.”

“Tee.”

“Tree.”

“Trrreeee.”

“Yeah, it’s a seed for a tree,” Steve shows Eddie the series of pictures, how the seed underground grows a little shoot that grows, eventually, into a tree.

Eddie fetches something else from his bucket, showing Steve, “trree?”

“Leaf,” Steve points at the leaf in Eddie’s hand, then, “tree,” as he points to the tree line at the bottom edge of the yard.

Eddie’s frowning at the page in the book, but he does nod, so Steve doesn’t push it any further.

“Steve do you know how early it is.”

“I know, but I don’t care, do you still have that tent you were playing around with last summer?”

“Camping, Steve, I went camping with-what do you want it for, anyway?”

“It’s for Eddie.”

“Oh, yeah,” Dustin’s tone changes to immediately helpful, “yeah, do you want to come and get it? I’m pretty sure I still have it-MAAAAA! MAAAAAAA DO YOU KNOW-”

Steve pulls the receiver away from his head while Dustin's hollering at his poor mother.

“Yeah, we know where it is, you coming now?”

Eddie’s holding a piece of plastic tubing, looking concerned, and watching Steve struggle with the worlds smallest two man tent, “it’s okay, I got this.”

Eddie tilts his head one way and then the other, like a curious bird, as Steve struggles. It takes a couple of failed attempts, not helped by the fact that Dustin couldn’t find the instructions, but it doesn’t take that long before the tent is ready. Steve sets it on the grass, the doorway edge butted up against the tiles that surround the pool edge. Steve fixes the guy ropes using metal tent pegs driven into the lawn. It’s not hugely spacious inside, just big enough to accommodate two medium sized dudes when lying down, just as long as those two medium sized dudes are super comfortable with each other, then it’s fine.

Steve goes backward and forward, lining the bottom with a couple of sleeping mats he also borrowed from Dustin, and then putting in a couple of towels, Eddie’s book, and rescuing the Rubik's cube and slinkie from where they've lain, ignored, on the side of the pool, “there, what do you think?”

Eddie moves closer, cautiously looking inside before looking back to Steve, “yeah, good. Go in, it's okay,” Steve nods and smiles and generally tries to be encouraging.

Eddie goes inside before turning to look out, sitting on his tail.

Steve sits in the doorway, “it’ll keep your book dry.”

Eddie ponders that a moment, touching his book, before looking up. He carefully touches the inside of the tent roof, “et inied?”

“Yeah buddy, that’s right. Good.”

Part six

[neil-gaiman]

Hi Neil,

I hope this doesn't get buried in the ask box, but if it does, I'll still be glad I sent this, just to know this little lengthy slice of complement and thanks existed in your inbox is enough. I apologize for the length, I am pretty sure the grammar is in tatters...and probably just the general awkwardness in advance.

Frist of all, congratulations for Good Omens Season2, it's a roaring success even here in this...I don't know, bottomless pit? I myself and some others fondly call it the PRC. The show didn't made pass the firewall officially, neither was Prime Video. People still managed to watch it eventually by VPNs, shared accounts and when times are desperate...sorry, piracy. Chinese fans, including myself, using every tool in the shed to try to fool Amazon™ and our goverment, just to watch this on Prime and try to help to manifest S3, is one hell of an experience. This kind of experience is pathetic, ridiculous....and somehow hilarious in a dark, gallows humor way, almost like some bad spy comedy, I just have to share it. Worth all the trouble by the way, the reward at the end of the back channel is...well, some divine comedy to say the very least. All in all, it's a brilliant show and a solid job well-done.

Then some of my personal gratitude. They say good art resonates with your soul, I now know this is just as true as matter and gravity. Since I know Good Omens certainly resonated with mine. I'll redact the typical "depression and anxiety reduced me to a husk, a shadow of my former self" story and get to the result for brevity's sake. I can't write anything meaningful while I know I took joy in writing, I can't finish reading anything longer than a brochure while I know I was such a bookworm in the past. Then I was compelled to get up in the middle of the night, wrote a full 5000 character long analysis after marathoned S2, and then write even more analyses in both Chinese and English. I picked up American Gods because I know I need more Neil Gaiman in my life and then impressed by myself for actually finishes it the second time 5 years later. I didn't know how exactly that happened through one watch of a TV show, but I know I am changed for the better. I grasped life again, and can start living again, somehow. The resonation just keeps on giving.

This is a quiet, gentle and romantic story, it is soothing, accepting, filled to the brim with love and kindness, and it makes me feel safe and accepted and loved in a way I never felt before. I thank you for it, and hope thart I may have the privlige to witness more of this miracle. Thank you Neil, Sir Terry Pratchett and the team for this miraculous book and this miraculous show.

谢谢。(I just had to say thanks with my mother tongue, it feels more earnest this way)

Thank you so much! I'm impressed by everything you and your countryfolk have gone through to watch it as legitimately as you could.

[am-i-the-asshole-official]

AITA for telling off my sister about watching a kid's show?

💫 for searching!

I (15F) have an older sister, Penn (17F), who is kinda childish. Actually, she's really smart, and can be mature when she needs to be. It's just that her interests are kinda childish for someone her age.

Penn really likes cartoons and video games, and recently she's been getting into Sonic the Hedgehog. At first I thought she was just getting into the Snapcube fandubs, but out of nowhere I saw her watching one of the new Sonic TV shows, can't remember if it was Sonic Boom or Sonic Prime.

Anyways, at first, this didn't really bother me too much. She watched her show for the weekend, and I would get back to my shows for the next few weeks. But then the next weekend, she was still watching the show. When I asked Penn why, she said that she was really invested, and she hadn't actually finished the show yet. She said she was watching it in increments, because she wanted to savor the episodes, which felt stupid. The writing was obviously meant for kids, and the colors felt really bright and glaring to my eyes. I couldn't believe this was how she was unwinding, or how she could "savor" such a bad show. Plus, I prefer to watch as many episodes as possible in one go rather than in separate goes, but to each their own ig.

Next weekend comes, and guess what? Penn picks up the remote before I can get it, and says she's gonna keep watching some more. At this point, I'm pretty mad. I've been wanting to watch my shows all in one go during the weekends, but have been stuck watching one or two episodes at a time after school each day. So I snapped at her, saying, "Nooo, let's watch my things!"

Penn looked kinda hurt, and when she asked me why I said that in such an annoyed tone, I told her that the show she was watching was cringe and just plain bad. I also said that we never watched my shows anymore, only hers, and that she shouldn't be focusing on kids' media when she has college to focus on soon.

Penn got really mad at me for saying that, telling me that she just wanted to unwind now that the third quarter had ended for her school (our school years are divided into four quarters rather than 2 semesters), and that her homework load was lighter. She also said that she hardly ever uses the TV, and that I wouldn't die if she used it just once. She then left the living room in a huff and went up to her room. This was a day ago, and she hasn't spoken to me since then.

I feel like I was really a justified asshole in this. She's been hogging the TV with the Sonic show, instead of focusing on any of her advanced classes. I guess you guys can decide? It just feels like we're both getting older, and that she needs to stop focusing on such childish things. I think that if I help her get into media that's more aimed for older audiences, it'll help her get into more of a mature mindset.

[fob4ever]

i was at a bookstore yesterday that had a copy of the kerrang: living loud book that featured the FOB watergun fight article i've never seen transcribed anywhere so i made a transcript of it for archival purposes. enjoy! from kerrang, may 2005.

For a man staring down the barrel of a loaded gun while wearing just underpants, Fall Out Boy bassist Peter Wentz looks remarkably chipper. Especially when you consider the person about to unload in his face is guitarist and vocalist Patrick Stump, grinning madly despite the fact that fellow six-stringer Joe Trohman has a pistol to his temple. He in turn is firmly in the firing line of drummer Andy Hurley, cackling loudly with his finger hovering over the trigger.

Passers-by stop and stare, waiting for the inevitable, messy climax of this "Reservoir Dogs" scenario. The tension mounts, onlookers brace themselves, the band get ready to open fire. Suddenly it happens.

"Argh!" screams Wentz as several litres of icy water soak him. "That's fucking cold!"

No, Fall Out Boy aren't about to blow each other away, They're having a water fight for K!'s benefit in a car park at the Chicago stop on travelling punk circus Warped Tour, where they're knocking out their "softcore" wares ("We're basically a hardcore band that couldn't cut it as a hardcore band," laughs Wentz) on the main stage alongside big hitters like The Offspring, Avenged Sevenfold and My Chemical Romance. The Windy City is more than just another stop for them; Chicago is Fall Out Boy's hometown, the place where they formed out of the ashes of their old hardcore bands, and where they still live with their parents- who are here for today's show - during the few weeks of the year they're not on tour.

It all started for Fall Out Boy here in 2001 when the members wanted a break from playing in their various bands. Long time friends Wentz and Hurley got together with hardcore associate Joe Trohman to do something a bit less heavy. Following a conversation about avant-metallers Neurosis in a bookstore, Trohman introduced Stump to the rest of the band. When their other bands folded, they took on Fall Out Boy full time.

"We wanted to do things before we were ready," chuckles Peter Wentz fondly of the early days of DIY tours for the benefit of the one or two people who would show up. "We'd plan two-week tours, just to see the world. Nobody would book us, so we had to do it all on our own."

"A lot of bands have scenes to go into and surround themselves with those people," says Stump. "We had no scene, so we would just play anywhere, with whoever."

FOB have come a long way from their humble roots. Right now they're America's fastest rising band. Radio smash 'Sugar, We're Goin' Down' has placed them squarely in the mainstream, having spent three weeks as the Number One song on MTV's 'TRL', a prime-time show usually devoted to pop acts like Maroon 5 and Ashlee Simpson. So dizzying their Stateside assent has been, they had to cancel their recent European tour in order to play the MTV Music Video Awards, where they are also nominated for 'Sugar...'. Thankfully, FOB haven't let the screaming adoration turn them into big-headed twats.

"A piece of shit with legs on it could walk onto 'TRL' and people would still go crazy," laughs Wentz. "That stuff just goes straight by me. With the fast turnover in the music industry, how can anyone have an ego"

Andy Hurley chips in. "You can be today's main stage and tomorrow's trash."

That's to find out tomorrow, though. Today among the madness of trying to plan anything on the Warped Tour - stage times are decided daily by lottery - Fall Out Boy have to try and find time for hanging out with family and friends.

"Three weeks on Warped is like three months on a normal tour," says Peter Wentz.

"Home becomes like Atlantis on tour, you wonder if it actually exists after a while," adds Patrick Stump.

Now FOB are big stars, a lot of old 'friends' have been coming out of the woodwork. Joe Trohman and Peter Wentz have polarised views on those who didn't give a toss back in the day suddenly becoming your pal once you've made it.

"The way I look at it is if someone's a dick to you and you don't know them, so what?" says Trohman. "Just care about who did support you, keep those important people close, not the people who five years ago called you a loser."

"I work the opposite way!" Wentz counters, before adding darkly, "The people I think about most are enemies. My brain works on revenge!"

Though a tight knit group of close friends, Peter Wentz is clearly Fall Out Boy's spokesman. He does most of the talking during the interview and writes the lyrics, and seems like the most driven one of the lot. As well as doing Fall Out Boy, Wentz has also written a book with tattoo artist Joe Tesaure, 'The Boy With The Thorn In His Side'. It's a dark, twisted tale that could have come straight from the brain of Tim Burton.

"I've always been into Roahl Dahl and people like that, and I was friends with a tattoo artist at the time and we came up with this idea to do a book together," he explains. "It wasn't something I felt fitted in with what Fall Out Boy is, I hate when bands do something that's not 'them'. The book is what it is, and Fall Out Boy is what we are."

Despite all thise talk of nightmares and revenge, FOB are upbeat individuals, enjoying their newfound success, while refusing to allow success to go to their heads. They'll tell you they don't like the shallowness of groupies or industry parties, and that the trappings of rock stardom hold no appeal.

"I don't feel like I deserve it," says Wentz in closing. "It's not like, 'this amount of time and this amount of shows = this kind of bus'. I appreciate what we've got. We've toured in a tiny van and it was cool, but now we're having new adventures living like this. I don't feel we deserve it more than any other bands do."

He surveys the sumptuosly appointed tour bus for a moment before chuckling heartily.

"Actually, that's a lie, we totally deserve it more than anyone else! Ha ha!"

[pixiesfz]

we need a dad Jessie fic please 🫶🏼

I am a D.I.L.F

Dangerously In Love with Fleming

father to be j.f

plot: You and Jessie are preparing for your baby but Jessie is somehow picking up dad traits?

warnings: fluff, prime Chelsea team, little blurb

“It’s a girl”

The words were magic to your ears as you laid down on the chair, Jessie’s hand entertained with yours as she took a great look at the monitor.

You would love your baby if it was a boy or a girl but you secretly hoped it would be a girl, especially if you planned to have another kid, an older sister would be great for them.

The doctor excused herself from the room before Jessie lowered her body to hug you from behind “we’re having a baby girl” she hummed and you nodded “we’re having a baby girl”.

It was at your private home when you started decorating your daughter’s bedrooms that you noticed the signs of Jessie’s new persona.

“If anyone touches her before she’s eighteen” she grumbled, folding clothes “you touched me before I was eighteen” you smirked and the Canadian glared at you

“That’s different”

You laughed at her expression “what?” She asks “I’m just very impressed at your protectiveness over our unborn child”

The next time was when she came home from training late with target bags.

“Could you not have called to say you went shopping” you stated from the kitchen where you were cooking “sorry baby” Jessie quickly said before kissing your cheek, walking to the table before laying the bags down.

“But there was this sale on kids stuff and-“

“You went shopping for our child without me?”

Jessie’s eyes widened under her cap as she realised her small mistake “the sale was ending tonight, Pernille came as well of that helps”

You cocked your head over “that helps”.

“Okay so I got her some clothes and then I thought cause she’ll be my little princess I got her these”

You tried to ignore the horrendous Elsa dress, not bothering to tell her that Elsa was actually a queen and instead focused on her words “your little princess?”

Jessie ignored you “and then I got books aswelll, some for education and some for entertainment and then I also got little footy boots”

You stared at your wife “This baby will be waiting a couple of years before going on the field Jess” you told her sternly and she slowly nodded.

“I just got excited” she admitted and you smiled, walking towards her “I know, and I love it” you said, wrapping your arms around her “I love you”.

Then came the building of the crib, your belly had grown a lot more and Jessie refused to let you help in the build, claiming that she didn’t want any chance of harm.

“Jessie my father taught me how to use a drill” you told her from the door but she had her fists on her hips and crossed her head “no you’re not doing it” she said before grabbing the drill again.

“You’re so stubborn” you grumbled from you space “Give me twenty minutes, then I’ll start the pram”

You watched her for the next fourty minutes as she completed the crib, many YouTube videos and calls to her family helped her along the way.

But you smiled in awe at your proud girlfriend who stared at her creation, hands on her hips with her training gear still on, she was so excited to start making it as soon as she got home.

In all honesty early she reminded you of your own father and the pictures you had of him when waiting for your little siblings.

“Onto the pram” she said walking out of the room, only to see that you had already assembled it.

You had finally realised what part of the parenting trope Jessie had picked about a month before you were due when she kept checking her phone.

Jessie was not a social person, let alone a social media type person but she never told you what she was looking at.

Until she started using them on you.

them as in dad jokes…

“Hey babe, did you hear about that Actor who broke his leg, turns out he’s still in the cast”

You rolled your head back with a groan as you had heard the eighth joke that night “How many times have you told that one?” You ask, sitting down next to her.

“Erin and Adam loved it when I told it at training”

“Of course they did.”

Though throughout the traits that Jessie had picked up you still loved her more than anything in the world, you would even go out to say you learned to love her even more but you didn’t want to enlarge her ego any more.

Instead you cuddled up into her side “You’re going to be such a good mum” you told her and you felt her relax “yeah?” She asked and you nodded.

“I can’t wait.”

[ponett]

Bobby's 2023 Media Wrap-Up

So! Like I said before, this past year I kept a running list of everything I watched, every game I finished, every new album I listened to, etc., and wrote one-paragraph blurbs with my thoughts on every single one. Please enjoy this journey through everything I liked, or didn't like, in 2023, with my favorites of the year listed at the bottom.

(Yes! This is long!!)

Some notes:

I mainly only included things I finished. Exceptions are marked with an asterisk.

I included some YouTube stuff as "TV shows" - mostly particularly long, high effort video essays and documentaries.

I was a bit less adventurous than I'd like to have been this year. Part of this was just that I felt like I was constantly playing catch-up with Big Releases I felt obligated to check out, and part of this was just executive dysfunction from burnout. Wait until you see how long it took me to beat Mario Wonder lmao

Yes, I need to read more books. I don't read a lot of books these days. I need to get back to Discworld.

COLOR KEY

Video Games • TV / Web Video  •  Movies  •  Comics  •  Music

January

1/15: Final Fantasy XIV: A Realm Reborn (MSQ) - Very slow at times, the Primal shit is generally extremely lame to me outside of the boss fights themselves, but god if the quality of life improvements over WoW, the JRPG energy, and the fact that it Actually Has A Story carry it pretty hard.

1/18: Sonic the Hedgehog: Scrapnik Island miniseries - One of the most creative and compelling uses of the Sonic IP… ever? Fantastic little self-contained arc about the struggles of Eggman’s abandoned creations that gracefully weaves between heartfelt optimism and moody horror with some of the best art ever seen in a Sonic comic.

1/18: Mega Man X4 - Glad I finally actually beat this after never even beating any of the Mavericks as a kid! I can see why it’s a lot of peoples’ favorites. The gameplay has very little of that X series bloat and is just fun, especially after getting X’s armor upgrades. (But the story really is a long series of missed opportunities.)

February

2/2: Donks - Felix Colgrave continues to be an exceptional artist. The sound design on this is fantastic and really sells this short as something unique. Had to go back and watch his older stuff again after this.

2/4: Final Fantasy XIV: Heavensward (3.0 - 3.3 MSQ) - I get it now. I get why people say this is just a proper mainline Final Fantasy game built into the framework of an MMO. That shit ruled. Not even walking back the drama in Ul’Dah from the end of ARR can sour me on it because the main storyline was so strong.

2/8: Disneyland's Forgotten Sci-Fi Rock Band - Live From the Space Stage - A nice and honest tribute to a group of artists who could have easily been forgotten. In hindsight this feels like a precursor to Kevin’s Disney Channel jingle video, a tribute to the unsung artists pouring their hearts into “lesser” art for a megacorporation, art that was designed to be transient but sticks with people nonetheless.

2/9: Metroid Prime Remastered* - Not gonna finish because I just played through the Wii version in 2021, but still. Very, very pretty remaster.

2/16: Theatrhythm Final Bar Line - It’s more Theatrhythm. What more could I want

2/17: JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure: Stone Ocean (anime) - Probably the best part of the anime so far (assuming they continue on to SBR). A near perfect mix of the more structured plot of part 5 with the goofiness of parts 3 and 4 that crescendos into a fantastic, bombastic, emotional, bittersweet ending. The use of footage from the original opening and the new ending set to Roundabout in the finale were perfect, and made me intensely nostalgic for the early days of my JoJo fandom between seasons 1 and 2 of the anime.

2/22: Aggretsuko Season 5 - I don’t really know what to make of this one. Once you get past the agonizing initial arc all about Haida where Retsuko has to be his overbearing mommy GF who flips out and starts spying on him when she’s left on read and chides him when he misbehaves, it feels like an improvement over the previous seasons. But I don’t know how much of that is due to the extremely low bar set by season 4. And then the ending is extremely rushed and anticlimactic. They got legally married and the only acknowledgement was a shot of them signing the paperwork in a montage partway through the final episode?????????

2/24: Double Fine PsychOdyssey - God, what a journey the making of this game was. I already loved 2 Player’s past efforts at documenting Double Fine’s process, but this takes it to a whole new level. This feels culturally significant. The depth and honesty with which they depict not just the nitty gritty of making a game, but also the inherent struggles of working on a collaborative creative work for years at a time, is astounding. Not to mention that they were there to capture the shift from office life to remote work as COVID hit. So much of this would have been nightmarishly stressful to watch if I didn’t already know how successful the game was, but that’s just because they really didn’t sugarcoat it. And yet even after all that, it leaves me feeling optimistic about video games as an art form in a way that the constant headlines about cynical live service games don’t. There are still people out there pouring their hearts into making real art, and this is their story. Everyone who plays video games should watch this.

2/25: Cracker Island (Gorillaz) - New Gorillaz albums feel like less of an event these days, but after Humanz it feels like they’re just more chill with the project and their ambitions with it. Every couple years we get some more laid back jams from Damon along with some fun new collabs. Hard to complain. Favorite track: New Gold

2/25: Pool Kids (Pool Kids) - I discovered this band because Derek knows them and was excited when they got a song added to Fortnite through the Bandcamp collab. Always down to find more cool indie rock bands I can vibe with. The mix of dreamy vocals and energetic riffs on some of the tracks here almost fill the Crying-shaped hole in my heart. Almost… Favorite track: Conscious Uncoupling

2/25: Insane in the Rain (insaneintherainmusic) - I thought it was really funny timing when Carlos announced that his first original project would be a jazz fusion album inspired by acts like T-Square and Casiopea right as I was getting into those two specific bands. The final product does not disappoint. Favorite track: Insane in the Rain

2/26: Get Up Sequences Part Two (The Go! Team) - I’ve never been one to believe that a band’s sound has to remain exactly the same forever, but it really does hit you hard that the first two tracks here sound like classic The Go! Team. Their more recent cleaner sound is still here too, though, for a nice mix of old and new. Favorite track: Divebomb

2/28: Mobile Suit Gundam: The Witch From Mercury (Season 1) - Oh my god. Oh my god. I got distracted around the time I was finishing SLARPG, but finally catching up now, wow. My assumption that the seemingly lighter tone of the series compared to the prologue was there to lull us into a false sense of security before twisting the knife when war finally breaks out was spot on. This is peak Gundam.

March

3/4: Pizza Tower - One of the best platformers I’ve played in a long time. It transcends its blatant Wario Land inspirations with the sheer speed at which Peppino can move and the way things like the level design, his wall running, and even the hidden ability to do a second lap around the level reward getting into a flow state where you’re just constantly moving. This is the type of game that wants to turn you into a speedrunner. My only real complaint is a few iffy enemy designs that I wish would get patched.

3/6: Bloons TD 6 * - I bought this before bed one night on a nostalgic whim and then the next morning woke up and saw the Steam receipt email on my phone in one of the most “what did I do last night” moments of my life. I like when the monkeys pop the balloons.

3/7: The Book of Boba Fett - I put off finishing this show for a very long time but finally caved upon the release of The Mandalorian season 3. This show spends four episodes failing to make me give a shit about Boba Fett trying to be “the daimyo” and drive the drug trade off of Tatooine, then just gives up and becomes season 2.5 of Mando, which in turn feels like it undercuts the main series. It fails as both its own story and as a spinoff. I know that finishing this after Andor did it no favors, but WHOOF.

3/12: Obi-Wan Kenobi - Some interesting ideas in the first half hinting at a more introspective show, but it’s mostly swept aside in the back half so it can become a generic Star Wars adventure remixing things from A New Hope and Rebels (and apparently Jedi: Fallen Order). Action scenes have zero stakes because you know nothing can happen to any of the returning characters and none of the new ones are particularly interesting. Why there’s a second climax hinging on a Luke Skywalker death fakeout eludes me. Obi-Wan throwing the rocks at Vader is one of the funniest things in Star Wars history. But it was still better than Book of Boba Fett, I guess.

3/19: The King of Braves GaoGaiGar - Wow, cool robot indeed… GaoGaiGar isn’t going to blow anyone away with its writing, but sometimes you just need a really fun monster of the week mecha show with great action and lovably goofy characters. This is a show where like 20% of every episode consists of recycled transformation, combination, and signature attack sequences and I ate it up every time because they look fucking cool as hell. I don’t care. I’d watch Final Fusion another 49 times.

3/21: The Last of Us (HBO) * - Watched the first two episodes out of curiosity, but I’m not sure if I’ll continue because I don’t give a shit about The Last of Us. It’s definitely a well done adaptation, though, even if I know it’s inevitably going to devolve into miserable torture porn with questionable politics if they adapt Part II faithfully. The ending of episode 2 also lines up perfectly with where I stopped in the game in 2013 lmao

3/27: The Future is a Dead Mall - Decentraland and the Metaverse (Folding Ideas) - Another banger from Dan Olson. This time the premise inherently gives him more time to just show off a bunch of stupid ugly bullshit made by crypto guys, which is fun. My main complaint was that I wished he would’ve brought up Second Life more as a point of comparison (a thing I basically always want out of discussion of “the metaverse”), but he at least did touch on it in the last section.

3/31: The Murder of Sonic the Hedgehog - I can’t believe after years of begging for the supporting cast to get more and better material in a Sonic game I got my wish in the form of a freeware murder mystery VN released for April Fools. This kicked ass.

April

4/7: Berserk - Completed Miura’s run and caught up on the chapters that have been released posthumously. It’s hard to say anything that hasn’t been said about Berserk, universally agreed upon as one of the greats of manga and fantasy fiction as a whole. What begins in its first few volumes as a nihilistic and edgy action comic built to facilitate as much sex and gore as possible quickly evolves into something deeply human and vulnerable and beautiful, both figuratively and in terms of its lavish art. The world sucks and is immeasurably cruel, and you will see that cruelty illustrated in graphic, sickening detail repeatedly throughout the series. (Perhaps a little too often throughout the Golden Age, where it feels like Miura never misses an opportunity to threaten Casca with sexual assault mid-battle.) But the point isn’t to wallow in that misery. It’s the story of a victim of horrific abuse learning to slowly open up to others, having those people he cares about torn away from him in the worst night of his life, hardening himself into a cold killing machine, and then slowly learning to open back up again, even if it means leaving himself vulnerable to more hurt. Anyone who says that the series peaked with the eclipse and went downhill in the “Guts’ JRPG Party” era is missing the point. Guts needed to find new people in his life to care about, to begin to find happiness again. Because no matter what unspeakable things Guts has gone through, it’s still possible for him to heal and to be loved. It takes time, but eventually you stop and realize that life has moved on.

4/8: Dedede’s Drum Dash Deluxe - Skipped it upon release because I didn’t particularly care for the minigame in Triple Deluxe, and I didn’t miss much. It’s fine as a little distraction, but not as a standalone rhythm game with only seven songs. If you don’t bother with the hard modes or chase after high scores this game is 15 minutes long. Oh how I yearn for Kirby to get the Theatrhythm treatment.

4/10: The King of Braves: GaoGaiGar FINAL - Eh… It was okay. Lots of cool robot fights, but said fights are stitched together with a mediocre plot that tries too hard to be more “mature” than its unabashedly schlocky kids’ show predecessor. Not crazy about the ending, either, which tries to be a bittersweet farewell closing off the series once and for all while also teasing that maybe there’ll be ANOTHER sequel after the OVA series they literally called “FINAL.” Ah well.

4/11: The Owl House - Sad to see this one go, but it’s hard to imagine them doing a better finale than this, even if they had gotten the six seasons they deserved. I’m not as obsessed with The Owl House as I probably would’ve been had it come out when I was, like, 20, but it’s a really fantastic show for all the reasons people always say. Great characters, great world, great story. I love that this starry-eyed fantasy story about a teenager finding love and a place where she belongs is also set on the rotting corpse of a titan with Hieronymous Bosch-inspired scenery and freaky monsters everywhere. What a great mix. If anything, I just wish I would’ve watched the first season as it aired so I could’ve had more time with it.

4/29: Mega Man Battle Network 3: Blue Version - FINALLY beat this via the new collection, 20 years after playing it as my first Mega Man game. (Technically my first was White, not Blue, but whatever.) There are more annoyances than I remember - lots of really really bad forced backtracking sections where you have to revisit every previous part of the internet, low chip drop rates, some really aggravating bosses like BubbleMan and KingMan, etc. But it’s still a great time overall. It’s Battle Network. In the back half the story gets surprisingly emotional, too. I was always under the assumption that the Hub stuff never came back up much in the story after 1, so I was pleasantly surprised with how relevant it was to the emotional arc of 3.

4/30: Mega Man Battle Network 4: Red Sun * - Yeah I’m not playing through the whole thing lmao. I just wanted to play the first couple hours for nostalgia’s sake, and as a baseline for how much better the rest are. Even before getting deep in the game and having to deal with all the shit gated between doing two new game+ playthroughs, it’s immediately obvious how much of a downgrade this one is. Tons of glaring errors and typos all over the script, blander music, a way more boring aesthetic for the internet, and a premise that mostly just recycles the tournament idea from 3.

May

5/14: The Venture Bros. - Glad I finally sat down and watched all of this with Anthony after having seen one (1) episode as a teenager and a bunch of random clips in the years since. Great show. Some jokes in the early seasons haven’t aged gracefully, but what the show grows into over time... man. Hank and Dean go from being the butt of the joke to being characters you actually sympathize with - while still also being funny little goofballs. And the journey Henchman 21 goes on throughout the show. Man. Amazing that a comedy like this could run for 20 years and maintain its level of quality. Can’t wait for the movie.

5/18: Future Me Hates Me (The Beths) - Okay yeah I’m now just discovering bands through Fortnite lmao. I can’t complain really, they pick some really great indie artists for the in-game radio stations. Anyway: It’s very easy to win me over with a combination of energetic power pop, catchy guitar riffs, and earnest lyrics like this. One of those albums where three or four tracks in I know I have to buy it. Favorite track: Not Running

5/18: Jump Rope Gazers (The Beths) - Ditto. Favorite track: Dying to Believe

5/18: Expert In A Dying Field (The Beths) - Another good album. (I’m listening to these in release order.) I’ve been a bit slower to warm up to this one, initially thinking it was a little too mellow overall, but it might be my favorite after a few listens. Some real high highs. Interestingly, the lead singer’s New Zealand accent is also coming out more in her singing? Favorite track: Your Side (or maybe Head in the Clouds)

5/19: The Super Mario Bros. Movie - As a Mario fan, I think I enjoyed it? As a movie, less so? It was decent, in spite of feeling like they came up with a list of fun action setpieces first and then wrote the absolute bare minimum possible for the story scenes tying it all together. Full thoughts here. (This is the first movie I’ve seen this year, huh? I really don’t watch a lot of movies.)

5/23: Don't Know What You're In Until You're Out (Gladie) - I feel like I don’t like Gladie as much as I should. Their style of noisy indie rock is very much in my wheelhouse, and I do enjoy listening to them, but I dunno. Maybe it’s that the particular style of vocals makes it more monotonous to me. A good album nonetheless, if not 100% my thing. Favorite track: Nothing

5/24: City Slicker (Ginger Root) - Yes I am still making my way through Bandcamp artists I heard on Fortnite don’t @ me. Any excuse to get me to listen to some cool city pop-inspired funk like this is a good excuse. Favorite track: Loretta

5/24: Rikki (Ginger Root) - Favorite track: Why Try

5/25: Spotlight People (Ginger Root) - Favorite track: The Classic

5/29: Succession - A good dramedy series that increasingly focuses more on the drama than the comedy as it progresses, but it’s hard to complain about that since the drama is so compellingly produced. I enjoyed it. That being said, I kind of rankle at the claims that it’s The Greatest TV Show Of All Time. It’s great, don’t get me wrong. Amazing performances all around. But the show LOVES to spin its wheels, to repeat itself, and to let most of its interesting dramatic developments fizzle out before anything really comes of them, almost as if the show is constantly getting bored with its own ideas. To some extent this is intentional - Logan Roy is the untouchable billionaire, his kids fail at everything (but will nonetheless remain billionaires), and in the long run none of them really give a shit about anything other than their own status. But it’s not like things tend to visibly impact anyone else, either, be they supporting characters or the world at large. Even the Big Scary Election, where the Roy siblings are directly responsible for plunging the nation into chaos, ultimately has zero impact on the finale a mere two episodes later. Certain Other Things do have an impact in the last season, though, allowing things to meaningfully change for the cast and for the show to sit with the ensuing drama, which has stopped me from souring on Succession more. There was finally a payoff for something. But it does still kind of feel like a show that goes in circles until it’s ready to call it quits, even if those circles did contain a lot of great acting and music along the way.

5/29: Kipo and the Age of Wonderbeasts - I’d watched the first 12 episodes when they originally released, but I guess the Netflix binge release and the fact that all three “seasons” came out in one year led to me waiting until it finished… and then I just never got around to finishing it. Glad I fixed that! Really fun and stylish cartoon with an art style reminiscent of Teen Titans, a hip hop-filled soundtrack, dynamic fight scenes, and a colorful post-apocalyptic world filled with mutant (mostly anthropomorphic) animals. I’ll admit that at times I do kinda roll my eyes at Kipo’s unshakeable belief that everyone can be friends in a way that I don’t necessarily with similar shows like Steven Universe, and not every joke lands, but I dunno. It’s a kids’ show. That’s to be expected. It doesn’t detract from the overall package for me.

June

6/1: Craig of the Creek (Season 4) - It’s been years and I’m still processing the fact that kids can turn on Cartoon Network and hear Jeff Rosenstock. Anyway! Craig continues to be one of the best cartoons on TV, consistently funny and creative and way more engaging than a show about a bunch of kids LARPing in the woods has any right to be. This season turned into One Piece with the gang effectively hunting down the Poneglyphs in search of a legendary treasure. The kids think it’ll be magic. It isn't. An increasing number of cartoon logic gags aside, this show is firmly set in the real world. Does that make it any less interesting? Hell no. Season 3 turned a game of capture the flag into an all-out five episode war between the heroes and villains, filled with dramatic turnabouts and a climactic guest appearance from Del the Funky Homosapien. I’m sure however they wrap things up in the (sadly shortened) final season, it’ll be great. (Also? I would watch a whole show based on that “what if” episode that jumped forward to everyone’s 20s.)

6/6: Barry - Holy shit, what a show. I ended up binging it in less than a week in a cycle of “okay, just one more episode.” The way this show is able to swing between tones and genres while still feeling like a cohesive whole is truly masterful. It’s a layered character drama, a tragic crime thriller, a farcical comedy, an understated action series, a surrealist morality play, and a scathing satire of Hollywood, all in one. Even within the criminal underworld subplots the show ranges in tone from Breaking Bad to Paddington 2. And it works! While the show naturally gets bleaker over time as it confronts the repercussions of Barry’s murders, it never completely loses sight of its comedic roots. My favorite episode was easily season 2’s “ronny/lily,” a mostly self-contained episode that somehow manages to keep throwing the perfect curveballs to escalate its dark comedy.

6/12: The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring (Extended Edition) - Y’all heard of this movie? Pretty good, it turns out. (I’d seen the theatrical cut before, but this was my first time watching the extended edition. I’ve also only seen parts of the other two movies, so it’s time I finally watch all the extended cuts. The Gollum game pushed me to this.)

6/13: The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers (Extended Edition) - give it to us RAW and WRIGGLING

6/17: The Lord of the Rings: Return of the King (Extended Edition) - I’m not crying YOU’RE crying

6/22: Clone High (Season 2) - While the first episode being about “cancel culture” (or, more accurately, a teenager from 2003 being transported to 2023 and putting his foot in his mouth a lot) put a lot of people off, I ended up enjoying the new season of Clone High. The new clones grew on me as the season went on and their roles in the web of teen romance melodrama crystalized, and it made me laugh a lot, and Cleo/Frida is galaxy brained. Also they played one of my favorite Antarctigo Vespucci songs like a minute into the first episode. I don’t think I could really ask for much more.

6/28: The Mandalorian (Season 3) - I'd been watching this weekly but put off the last episode for no real reason. Responses to this season have been all over the place, but my blistering hot take is… it was fine. Is it as good as the first season? Probably not. But Mando no longer needs to carry the whole franchise on its shoulders and set the bar for how good the live action Disney Star Wars shows can be, because Andor exists, and it’s never gonna top Andor. The Mandalorian is free to just be a pulpy space adventure show where Giancarlo Esposito plays a scenery-chewing cartoon villain and a little puppet does wire stunts. These are things Andor cannot and should not do, but that’s Star Wars, baby. It’s delightful. I could watch Grogu get underhand tossed like a sack of flour all day.

July

7/2: Mobile Suit Gundam: The Witch from Mercury (Season 2) - LOVE WINS. (More nuanced take from way later: It definitely feels like a lot of the more messy political conflicts in this show got swept aside by the big final battle where some more easily resolved family conflicts take center stage. I’m not sure the ending is the most satisfying. But also this show only got half the episode count that damn near every other Gundam show ever made got, so that might be a factor here. Idk. Still one of my favorite Gundams.)

7/4: Final Fantasy XVI (watched Anthony play) - I had to write my longest Medium article ever about this one because I was so frustrated

7/10: Home Movies - “Things I like that I’ve never seen in full” has certainly been a recurring theme this year. Home Movies remains an all-time classic of animated comedy that went out on a high note before things got stale or the characters became parodies of themselves. While it’s mostly known for its funny improvised banter, throughout the last season you can really see the arc where Brendon no longer enjoys making movies, yet he feels obligated to keep using them to escape from the real world. In that light, the ending where the nature of their dysfunctional makeshift family is cemented, Brendon’s camera suddenly breaks, and life moves on really does feel like the perfect note to end on. Truly one of the best to ever do it.

7/15: The Legend of Zelda - Tears of the Kingdom - Wow. Just… wow. I had serious doubts about TotK in the months leading up to release due to how close Nintendo was playing their cards to their chest. I didn’t want this to be a Saints Row IV, where the game is fun enough but the recycled map makes it feel like a rehash. Instead, I found a game that made me look at BotW’s map in a whole new light, brimming with so many more things to do and people to meet. Add on a better, more versatile set of tools, more varied dungeons and bosses, and a story that I felt was told somewhat better and we’ve got a real contender for my new favorite Zelda game. It was hard to tear myself away, but as this list shows, it’s been basically the only game I’ve played since it came out.

7/16: Sonic Prime (Season 2) - I liked the parts with Shadow and Chaos Sonic, but I’ve come to the sad conclusion that most of this show is just mediocre. More thoughts here.

7/18: We ♥ Katamari Reroll + Royal Reverie - “I’m a dog, but I love Katamari Damacy.” Truer words have never been spoken.

7/19: Transformers: Rise of the Beasts - Pretty good! It didn’t blow me away, but after how bad the Bay movies got I’m just thankful to have a decently cohesive Transformers movie where the human story is okay and I like the bots (although half of them needed more screen time), even if it is just another Hollywood blockbuster about two sides fighting over a macguffin that devolves into a big CGI battle against an army of nameless monsters in the third act. This is basically a mid-tier MCU movie but with Transformers, which won’t do much for most people, but again: the bar was underground.

7/22: The Venture Bros.: Radiant is the Blood of the Baboon Heart - God DAMN. A phenomenal ending for the series. While I would have loved to see a full final season to get some more one-off episodes in there, this doesn’t feel creatively compromised in any way–either due to the time constraints, or due to a desire to make it more marketable as a movie. It really does feel like they just took their outlines for the canceled final season and gently massaged them into the shape of an 84-minute movie, and I mean that in the best possible way. It’s completely on par with the previous seasons. A hilarious and fitting sendoff for one of the greats of adult animation.

7/23: Beautiful Katamari - This was one of my first Xbox 360 games, but a frustrating temperature-based level made me put it down for 16 years. “Maybe it won’t be as bad now that I’ve beaten the first two games and am better at Katamari,” I thought. Nope! Still an absolutely dogshit level. But also, turns out the whole game is only like two hours long lmao. It’s still Katamari, so it’s still fun - the final level in particular, which seamlessly takes you from ground level all the way to space, feels like a logical endpoint for the series - but beyond that it just doesn't have the same soul without Keita Takahashi's input.

August

8/4: Doom Singer (Chris Farren) - I’ve been waiting so long for Chris and Jeff to do another Antarctigo Vespucci album, but god damn. This is the best of Chris’s solo work, and a contender for his best record, period. Every track’s a banger, with more energy than some of his previous solo work but also a good deal of variety. Favorite tracks: First Place, Cosmic Leash

8/4: Transformers Earthspark (Season 1) - This show had a bit of an uneven start, unsure if it wanted to have the emotional maturity of a more serious action cartoon or a preschool cartoon where the characters have little kid mood swings and outbursts and learn basic lessons. It also felt like it was speedrunning its Wholesome Found Family Dynamic with characters who just met, which didn’t feel earned. While these problems never completely go away (see: the cheap and corny way the otherwise very dark season finale suddenly resolves), the show improves quickly, and the positives outweigh the negatives. It’s so great to have a Transformers cartoon that feels fresh, giving us a post-war setting with a bunch of new characters and new dynamics between the Cybertronians and the humans. The returning characters are also uniformly great as the old veterans overseeing the new generation. (Reformed Megatron! Danny Pudi as Bumblebee! Steve Blum returning as Starscream! Keith David as Grimlock!!!) And those super dynamic action scenes! I can nitpick, but Earthspark’s a ton of fun, and easily the best new Transformers cartoon since Prime and Animated.

8/5: Ghost Trick: Phantom Detective (remaster) - Everyone who told me this game was a masterpiece was right. I had played the first chapter when it dropped as the demo for the iOS version years ago, but never went further than that until now. What a game. Absolutely incredible through and through. Great story, great twists, great characters, great puzzles, great art direction. Everything comes together so perfectly to form a totally unique, unforgettable package, a top tier video game murder mystery. Everyone should play this, preferably going in as blind as possible.

8/15: It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia (Season 16) - Wow! Recent seasons of Sunny have been kind of up and down, with some interesting experiments (Mac Finds His Pride, the Ireland arc, etc.) paired with some comedic duds. Most of this latest season is standard fare for the series with fewer big creative swings, but it’s just hit after hit in terms of comedy. Not a single dud, whether we’re seeing Mac and Dennis try to start a rental business for inflatable furniture or watching the gang meet Bryan Cranston and Aaron Paul, believing the entire time that the latter is Malcolm from Malcolm in the Middle. Even the attempts at topical comedy landed better. Easily the funniest season in years.

8/16: One Piece Film Gold - It’s easy to see why this one has kind of been forgotten in the wake of Stampede and Film Red, which revolve around established fan favorite characters, but this was still pretty fun. Perhaps a little too long, but it’s fun to see the Straw Hats fool around in a giant casino and do a heist. They definitely cranked the fanservice up even more than usual in this one, though, as I probably should have expected for a movie made alongside the anime’s adaptation of Dressrosa.

8/17: One Piece: Stampede - This one goes for a different kind of fanservice. While most One Piece movies are isolated from the ongoing plot and its expanded cast of characters, Stampede instead asks “What if we just put damn near every active character on the same island and had them fight?” The answer: a fun time! It would get old if all of the movies were like this, but after a bunch of movies that are just like “the Straw Hats are gonna land on another new island and fight some more weird guys” it’s fun to see characters like Law and Buggy and Smoker get in on the fun. It’s also nice to get a movie with the Wano era art style, and Usopp surprisingly gets some really good character moments in here.

8/18: One Piece Film Red - This really is the best of the One Piece movies, huh? (Baron Omatsuri is a close second.) It really feels like a change of pace after the last four with the most interesting and emotionally engaging story out of any of them. And even if the events of these movies are never canon, it still feels significant in my understanding of Shanks as a character as we move into the final phase of the manga.

8/21: Pikmin 4 - The opening hour of the game made me really question if they’d changed too much, with all the focus on your new dog unit over your Pikmin and the extremely dull, drawn out dialogue scenes with your new companions back at the base. But once I got into the swing of things I had a blast. This is probably my new favorite Pikmin game. There’s a great mix of activities here to keep things fresh. I also really ended up liking Oatchi’s role as basically your second captain who can also serve as your tank or a rideable mount. The Dandori stuff and nighttime missions in particular show off how useful Oatchi is for your multitasking without necessarily overshadowing the Pikmin.

8/22: Never Get Tired: The Bomb the Music Industry! Story - I literally backed this on Kickstarter eight years ago (my name is in the credits!) and then never got around to watching it for no reason. It’s on YouTube now, and Jeff’s got a new album out next week, so now feels like the perfect time to watch it. And man… what a great documentary. Obviously I’m just a fan of the band, but this also really spoke to me as an artist. Jeff wanting to stick to his principles and give out his music for free and play cheap all ages shows, his discomfort over the idea of selling merch, and the struggles that come with not playing the game like that… It's hard. They readily admit that Jeff is an idealist, that people fight him on this stuff, that he’s missed out on some big opportunities because of these stances, and that he’s had to compromise a bit on some of these things over time. But that incredible climax with their final show, including a full opening performance of the slowly building “Campaign for a Better Next Weekend” and the closing performance of “Future 86” where the whole audience is singing along as the members of the band are hugging and crying… it’s beautiful. This may have been a band where the members had to go back to their shitty day jobs after every tour because they weren’t selling out arenas, but their art meant something to people, and that makes it all worth it.

8/25: Nimona - I haven’t read the original comic (yet), so I can’t compare them too much, but it’s nonetheless pretty apparent that some things were softened and easy kids’ movie jokes were added by the studio to squeeze this graphic novel for teens into a PG animated movie. Regardless, the emotional throughline hits REALLY hard, particularly the very blatant trans allegory and the climax. (It’s no wonder Disney was afraid of this movie seeing the light of day lmao.) The animation is also very squishy and fun to watch throughout. Great movie.

8/26: Puss in Boots: The Last Wish - Spider-Verse really has done so much for animation, huh? This one was as good as everyone said. Beautiful use of stylized color and lighting throughout, and every time this movie very conspicuously shifted to different framerates for a flashy fight scene it owned. Very cute and heartwarming story, too, which thankfully gave its second act plenty of time to explore the cast and let them go on their journey, unlike a certain plumber movie that came out a few months later. Also I would let Death [redacted]

8/28: Holocure: Save the Fans! - This isn't really something I can beat, but I've been addicted to Holocure lately. I don't even watch VTubers aside from maybe seeing a funny Korone animation every now and then, this is just a really, really good freeware Vampire Survivors clone with a huge roster of varied characters to pick from.

8/31: HELLMODE (Jeff Rosenstock) - A new album from Jeff is always a major event for me. If there were any worries that he was starting to go soft at 40 (because one of the three singles off this album was a gentle acoustic piece), the frantic opening of this album put those worries to rest. The first two tracks are Jeff screaming out for help as he’s pulled in a million directions by the chaotic state of the world, a theme that becomes the thesis of the album. I’d say it lags slightly in the middle, but overall this is another extremely well-rounded record full of bangers that’s unapologetically Jeff, with possibly my favorite closing track he’s ever done. Favorite tracks: I WANNA BE WRONG, 3 SUMMERS

September

9/3: One Piece (live action, Season 1) - They did it. I can’t believe it, but they did it. While I have my nitpicks (Usopp and Sanji don’t get enough big moments to shine), this is an extremely solid and faithful adaptation of the first few arcs of One Piece with a great cast. For the most part the changes feel smart and logical, and the big emotional beats of the story are all there and executed very well. I doubted it a little in episodes 2-4, where the Orange Town and Syrup Village arcs saw some major changes to shift the action indoors, and the increased focus on the drama in favor of repeating every gag and battle from the manga 1:1 took a bit of getting used to, but by the end I was having a blast. It’s a different take on One Piece, but it still feels like One Piece. Genuinely very excited for season 2.

9/4: Pseudoregalia - A great little N64-style 3D Metroidvania focused on platforming and very satisfying movement. I always love entries in the genre that are less prescriptive in what order you have to tackle areas in, a la Symphony of the Night or Hollow Knight, and this one’s great in that regard. While there are a number of new moves to find, most of the map is open to you very early in the game, and smart use of your moveset can allow you to “sequence break” without even realizing it. (You would not believe how long I went without getting the wall run.) I do wish it had a map, but that’s already being patched in.

9/6: Bomb Rush Cyberfunk * - Not a bad game at all, but I quickly remembered how bad I am at skating games, so like… eh? Not sure I have much desire to play past chapter 2. Also the soundtrack is sadly kinda hit or miss for me outside of the obvious Naganuma tunes.

9/9: The History of the Minnesota Vikings (Dorktown) - Jon Bois never misses. Even as someone who doesn’t actively follow sports, Jon Bois is a master storyteller, using graphs and statistics and funny anecdotes to explore these deeply human stories. He can convey why people care so much about these teams, these people, and sports in general, and how our popular sports reflect on American culture. He could tell the story of just about any team or player in any sport and I just know I’ll come out the other side a misty-eyed fan. And what a fascinating cast of characters we have this time, with origin stories for everything from the Hail Mary pass to a Minnesota state supreme court judge to the Griddy. Nine hours well spent.

9/10: Timespinner - A fun and highly polished Metroidvania that maybe doesn’t quite have enough of its own identity in its quest to replicate Symphony of the Night…but also, like, this was pitched as a Symphony throwback on KickStarter in a pre-Bloodstained, pre-Hollow Knight world, so I can’t really blame ‘em! Stopping time to avoid boss attacks is fun, the pixel art is gorgeous, and I liked the dark science fantasy story about warring empires and meddling with time a lot more than I thought I would - lore journal text dumps and all.

9/14: The Decay of Sam & Cat (Quinton Reviews) - All the stuff at the end with Matt Bennett (the actor who played Robbie on Victorious and Sam & Cat) in this was really good and sweet. It’s that kind of thing that makes these videos feel like they’re still worthwhile on some level. But the padding and the things Quinton chooses to spend the colossal runtime on does drive me more and more insane with each passing Nick sitcom video. I don’t know how much longer he can keep this schtick up. I hope he’s able to move on to other things before too terribly long instead of continuing to extend this “miniseries.”

9/19: Marvel’s Spider-Man: Miles Morales - AKA Insomniac’s Marvel’s Spider-Man 1.5. It’s fun for the same reasons Peter’s first game was fun. I had a good time swinging around New York again in preparation for the sequel, and there’s a lot of cute stuff with Miles becoming Harlem’s neighborhood hero, but WOW did the Underground v. Roxxon conflict fall flat for me.

9/20: I Think You Should Leave with Tim Robinson - I understand so many posts now.

9/25: Spider-Man (2002) (rewatch) - It’s you who’s out, Gobby! OUT OF YOUR MIND!

9/25: Futurama (Season 8) - I was ready to be a hater, recalling the fact that Futurama has already had three “perfect endings” with the show getting a little weaker with every revival. Then I watched the first new episode on a whim and thought it wasn’t bad, so I was like, eh, sure, I’ll watch the rest. Overall Hulurama is hit or miss. There are chuckles to be had, and it sure as hell beats modern Simpsons, but almost every episode is either a belated take on an overplayed Topical Issue (the pandemic, Amazon, cancel culture, etc.) or a direct sequel to an old episode people liked. Or both! It’s also really noticeable that certain voice actors sound way older - Billy West is struggling with the Fry voice in particular, and it hurts his comedic timing. But just when all hope seemed lost after the nigh-incomprehensible toy-themed anthology episode, possibly the worst episode of the entire series… the last episode, where the Planet Express crew explores whether or not the universe could be a simulation, was really, really solid. Great note to end on to make me not regret my time with this season as a whole.

9/26: Spider-Man 2 (2004) (rewatch) - Once the GOAT, always the GOAT.

9/27: Spider-Man 3 (rewatch) - Revisiting this movie for the first time since I saw it in theaters… it’s not bad. It’s fine! It continues to have the heart and sincerity that make the first two movies work. It’s just not as concise with three villains vying for the spotlight, but I also wouldn’t cut any of them, necessarily. I guess Eddie/Venom would be the easiest, but Peter getting the black suit and giving in to his resentment feels too central to cut. (Yes, even with Emo Peter becoming a meme.)

9/28: Adventure Time: Fionna and Cake - I wasn’t really sure what to expect with this one, especially since I was never really a fan of the genderbend episodes in the original show. (At the time they mostly just felt like an excuse to crank up the teen romance stuff to 11.) But MAN. This was a fantastic coda to the original series. It made me care about Fionna and Cake and their friends as their own characters separate from their original counterparts, it gave the Simon/Betty arc a much more satisfying (if no less bittersweet) resolution than the original finale had time to do, and it even managed to be a multiverse story that didn’t make me roll my eyes in 2023. A+ all around. Makes me wanna rewatch the original show again. [spoiler: I did]

9/29: Meanwhile (aivi & surasshu) - It’s been a whole decade–they were busy with, you know, all the music in Steven Universe, among other things–but we finally have a new aivi & surasshu album! Their chiptune/piano fusion style is familiar, but they’ve definitely grown as composers in subtle ways. Favorite track: Time Travel

October

10/1: This is Financial Advice (Folding Ideas) - A lot of the nitty gritty finance law stuff turned into white noise for me, but still, great video. I had no idea that the GameStop stock craze devolved into this bizarre cult that thinks they’re going to crash the global economy and rise from the ashes as the new kings with the value of their GME stocks. Glad this video exists to try and balance out the narrative.

10/5: Sonic Frontiers: The Final Horizon DLC - Good ideas, absurdly frustrating and tedious execution. Full thoughts here.

10/10: Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse (rewatch) - I didn’t plan this, but very fitting that I would end up rewatching this on 10/10.

10/12: Half-Life Alyx but the Gnome is Self-Aware (wayneradiotv) - ha he! (Seriously though, that finale was a fucking masterpiece. The RTVS crew has an incredible knack for using the framing device of video game livestreams to blur the lines between comedy and horror, or ironic anti-humor and complete sincerity. I’ve never seen anything else like this.)

10/15: Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse - Not sure how much I can say that hasn’t already been said. The most visually creative movie I’ve ever seen, grounded by some really excellent storytelling about Miles (and now Gwen) that’s probably better than his actual comics. But it also does feel like it’s about to end and then the movie just keeps going like ten times over lmao. Can’t wait to watch this a second time on a better TV.

10/20: Sonic Superstars - A mostly really solid and fun 2D Sonic game that’s unfortunately dragged down by an extremely hodgepodge soundtrack and some overly drawn out boss fights. I spent HOURS trying to beat the final boss of the bonus scenario (which is required for the true ending in this one) before giving up. Really a shame that that’s the note I’m leaving the game on, because I otherwise enjoyed it, but ah well. More thoughts here.

10/27: Marvel’s Spider-Man 2 - Another good Spider-Man game from Insomniac. Liked the story more than the one in Miles Morales, but maybe not as much as the first game. Extensive thoughts here.

10/28: Venom - Was in the mood for more Venom after the game. As expected this was not a very good movie, but the dynamic between Eddie and Venom made it a fun watch. Tom Hardy is constantly about to shit his pants in this movie. It’s great.

10/28: Venom: Let There Be Carnage - I had a way better time with this one. Is this a good movie? No. But it cranks the insanity of the first movie up to 11. Goofy as fuck in an extremely watchable way.

November

11/5: Pluto - An absolutely masterful series that anyone interested in sci-fi needs to watch. The anime adaptation was great, and I immediately understand why people who’ve read the manga speak so highly of it. Really makes me want to get into Astro Boy more, and also read some of Urasawa’s other works.

11/18: Scott Pilgrim Takes Off - Wow, just wow. When news of a Scott Pilgrim anime broke I was cautiously curious to see if we’d get a more direct adaptation of the comics, and instead it veered off in the exact opposite direction in the best way possible. This is almost entirely a different story, one that’s in conversation with the previous versions (sometimes in very meta ways), and I think it’s really valuable to see O’Malley revisiting these characters with new things to say about them. The major story divergence gives us a chance to examine the characters from a new angle - particularly Ramona, who’s the real protagonist of this version, and the evil exes, who completely steal the show. This was a great reminder of why I fell in love with this series as a teenager. I now genuinely hope we get more Scott Pilgrim.

11/22: Void Rivals (Issues #1 - #6) - The first arc of the new Robert Kirkman series that kicked off Skybound’s new “Energon Universe” is now complete, and I’m left thinking Void Rivals is… okay? I thought the first issue was a decent (if not particularly original) sci-fi comic with an appealing art style, which just so happens to also briefly have a Transformer in it so there can be a Big Surprise. And the series still hasn’t quite shaken that feeling to me. It’s an okay sci-fi series that arbitrarily dedicates a couple of pages of every issue to something from Transformers, but I’m not really sure what the shared universe stuff adds to Void Rivals, or what Void Rivals adds to Transformers and GI Joe. I guess we’ll have to wait and see.

11/22: Journey to EPCOT Center: A Symphonic History (Defunctland) - Yeah, gotta be honest, I only got halfway through this one. It seems like Kevin just 1) really wanted to push himself creatively and 2) make a love letter to Epcot, and while I respect that, I think it suffers as a historical documentary. It’s Fantasia but for the creation of Epcot. That might be very impressive on a technical level, but it feels more like a piece of Disney propaganda than prior Defunctland videos due to a lack of context and nuance. 

11/24: Aperture Desk Job - A short, sweet, and funny little tech demo for my new Steam Deck set in the Portal universe. More effort was definitely put into this than was strictly necessary.

11/26: ESCHATOS - I am not good at bullet hell games, but I enjoy them from time to time and I really love this one’s FM synth soundtrack, so I picked it up on a whim in the Steam sale. I only beat it on Easy, but still, I had a lot of fun with it! It’s straightforward but very flashy, with the camera dynamically zooming around from set piece to set piece at ridiculous speeds and each level segueing directly into the next. The lack of a powerup system on the main mode in favor of just needing to know when to use your different shot types makes it feel very approachable.

11/27: Lunistice - A great little 3D platformer with a good soundtrack that I had fun hunting down all the secrets in. This is an easy recommendation for fans of games like Kirby or Klonoa - whimsical games set in colorful dream worlds where the underlying story can get a bit more somber. (Although the story in this one is mostly told through mildly cryptic lore dumps, so your mileage there may vary.)

11/28: Spark the Electric Jester 2 - The leap from 2D to 3D here is impressive, but this is very clearly a rough draft for Spark 3. Very, very fun Sonic-style 3D platforming, but the combat is lacking and the storytelling is just kinda bad. More extensive thoughts on this and the above two games here.

December

12/2: Fortnite (Chapter 4) - This was my first full chapter of Fortnite, after having been roped into the game by the siren songs of Zero Build mode and Goku during Chapter 3. This means it’s harder for me to compare this chapter to previous ones, but still, Fortnite remains a genuinely very well made Battle Royale shooter that’s a blast with friends. If I have any complaint about this Chapter, it’s that they would regularly introduce zany ideas and then slowly reel them back in, whether it was the Augment system or the increasingly mundane movement items. It also felt like it was a little too easy to get the perfect loadout in every match, meaning the final showdown would almost always be against players with Slurp Juice and gold shotguns. And I missed the smaller mid-season map updates of Chapter 3. But overall I still had a really good time, and look forward to playing more for the foreseeable future.

12/4: Plagiarism and You(Tube) (HBomberguy) - This will get written off by many as “YouTuber drama,” but this really is an excellent video essay that feels like the kick in the pants that YouTube needs. If video essayists are gonna be a major source of information for so many, then they gotta have standards. I also think it does a good job of highlighting the people that have been plagiarized and trying to drive more attention their way in an attempt to right those wrongs.

12/6: Transformers (Skybound comic) - We only got the first three issues of this in 2023, but I just HAVE to say something about how incredible this series is here. Daniel Warren Johnson is knocking it out of the park. This is the new bar for Transformers. The hand-inked art is extremely dynamic and full of character, and the story is using the familiar beats of G1 Transformers but doing very new things with them. You can tell this from the very first page, but the emotional scene of Optimus accidentally crushing a deer in the forest and realizing how fragile life is on Earth sealed the deal for me. And yet in the very same comics Optimus can do suplexes and clotheslines and lord knows how many other wrestling moves on Decepticons, and it doesn’t feel like tonal whiplash? These comics just fucking rule, and anyone with even the slightest interest in Transformers should be reading them.

12/8: What We Do in the Shadows (Season 5) - [spoilers] WWDITS has very much settled into being a status quo show. Every season has its own little arc where one or two things change to keep things interesting, but then everything returns to normal by the end. Guillermo finally becoming a vampire, only to become a human again in the end, might just be the most egregious example of this yet. But also… the show’s still really funny? And I continue to be happy that Kristen Schaal has stuck around as a series regular as the Guide. So it’s hard to complain. I could see the show running out of steam over the next few seasons, but it’s still hitting for me right now.

12/12: Pony Island - Finally got around to this since the trailer for the sequel dropped. I feel like playing this years later in a post-Inscryption world where Pony Island is a known quantity kind of lessens its impact, but still, it’s a fun and funny puzzle game where you try to hack your way out of a possessed arcade machine. I’m not sure I found it particularly scary, but I’m not sure it’s supposed to be? The way the game messes with you during the Asmodeus “boss fight” was probably the highlight for me. I also like being able to say things like “The part where you have to not kill Jesus was so hard. I kept getting terrible butterfly patterns.”

12/16: Breaking Bad VR but the AI is Self-Aware (wayneradiotv) - As always, Wayne and co.’s commitment to the bit is unrivaled. This kind of got interpreted as just a way to troll HLVRAI fans, but so many moments in this genuinely made me laugh out loud.

12/18: Soul of Sovereignty Prelude - As someone who would list Cucumber Quest as a big creative influence, I was naturally very excited for this first chapter of GGDG’s new visual novel. Their mentality of both scaling things back in terms of labor while also going more shamelessly self-indulgent in terms of storytelling after burning out on making webcomics has really spoken to me, and WOW, the end result of that new process of theirs is shaping up to be something really special. The art and music are sparse but extremely evocative, giving you the rough sketch of the world and letting your mind fill in the rest. The story blends literary high fantasy vibes with the style of fantasy seen in ‘90s JRPGs (you can definitely tell this came from an idea for an RPG), but rather than constantly winking at the audience and making self-aware video game references it plays these storytelling ideas extremely sincerely, giving them real dramatic weight while still indulging in fun tropes to their fullest extent. While it’s a far cry from their most famous work with much more mature content, GGDG always excels at creating characters and worlds that immediately grab me. I can’t wait for the rest.

12/18: Barbie - I’m only… what, five months late for the whole Barbenheimer thing? Perfect timing. Anyway! On the one hand, I get the critiques saying that this movie is just a major corporation funding a self-aware feminist critique of their own product as a marketing ploy. And I kinda agree with that. And the movie is a little too long, and I don’t really know what to think of the way the Barbie/Ken conflict plays out. Anthony asked me to summarize what the story ended up being about, and I had no idea what to even say. But also… I did still like the movie? We don’t get a lot of cartoonish, absurdist, fourth wall breaking comedies like this anymore, and this is a good one of those. Also the whole cast is great, the set design is kind of stunning, and the cinematography is consistently appealing. I wouldn’t say it’s a revolutionary work of feminist filmmaking by any stretch, but it’s a good comedy movie.

12/21: Dr. Stone: New World - Man, Dr. Stone is great. I’ve said this many times, but I just love that this series uses all the trappings of shounen that would normally be used to hype up the protagonist learning a new move to instead hype up things like the protagonist building a loom or a hot air balloon. It’s shounen Bill Nye. I didn’t completely love everything about the Treasure Island arc this season, but it all built towards a really fun climax with a lot of satisfying turnabouts where the heroes use their ingenuity to just barely win.

12/23: The History of Mike Tyson’s Punch-Out World Records (Summoning Salt) - Truly one of my favorite Summoning Salt videos ever, even with how repetitive Punch-Out can get to watch. It’s just so hard to beat “and that runner… was me.”

12/24: Super Mario Bros. Wonder - What more can be said that hasn’t already been said? It’s the best and most creative 2D Mario game since the ‘90s. The only real flaws are that it’s a little easy, the Search Party stages are annoying in singleplayer, and I wish that every boss prior to the final boss wasn’t just some form of Bowser Jr. fight. But those aren’t nearly enough to drag the whole experience down. It was a blast.

12/24: Do a Powerbomb! - Got this from Anthony as a birthday present. This is the previous series by the creative team currently doing the new Transformers comics I was gushing about a few entries ago. Even with the high bar set by those comics, Do a Powerbomb! exceeded my expectations. Holy shit. An absolutely entrancing fantasy wrestling miniseries full of dynamic, energetic action and tons of heart. These comics where a guy wrestles a giant talking orangutan almost made me cry. Twice. An instant favorite.

12/25: Adventure Time (rewatch) - We ended up finishing our rewatch of Adventure Time (the main series, anyway) on my 30th birthday, which feels appropriate. I already kinda knew this, but this rewatch has truly confirmed that Adventure Time is my favorite TV series of all time. The entire show is even better on a full series rewatch. In hindsight, even parts that annoyed me when they aired end up being important parts of the beautiful tapestry that is this series. The many low points of Finn’s adolescent love life are important stepping stones in his growth as a person, which leaves him in an extremely satisfying place by the end. Jake having kids didn’t get to be a huge status quo change because they grew up instantly, but then they did a bunch of fun episodes about Jake’s relationships with his adult children that deepened him as a character. And most of the big lore questions they kept teasing over the years (“Where’d the humans go?” “Who are Finn’s parents?” “When’s Finn gonna get a robot arm?” etc.) ended up getting satisfying and creative answers, because the show left itself the room to figure those things out later. This is a truly special, one-of-a-kind series, one that lasted nearly 300 episodes and yet still seems like it was over too soon. And yes, I did in fact cry during the final montage, like I knew I would. I will always cherish this show with all of my heart.

12/25: Olive the Other Reindeer (rewatch) - Haven’t seen this one since I was a kid! It was a favorite of mine back then, and while it might not be quite as funny as I remember it’s still very cute, with a 2D/3D hybrid art style that remains very unique and appealing. As an adult I can also appreciate the cast they got for this, with like half the cast of Futurama bolstered by guests like Michael Stipe from REM and The Sopranos’ Joe Pantoliano.

12/26: Guillermo Del Toro’s Pinocchio - Anthony and I capped off our Christmas with the most jolly and festive stop motion movie of all! Jokes aside, man, what a beautiful movie. The animation is immaculate, and we really just don’t get children’s animated films like this anymore. Ones that overtly feature real world politics and religion and so many other dark themes in a way that doesn’t talk down to kids or sugarcoat things. This one hits hard. We need more movies like this.

12/31: Oppenheimer - This was an interesting one. Despite being three hours, the way that first hour jumps around in time makes it feel like Oppenheimer is constantly being propelled forward through life at a breakneck pace, swept up by the rising tide of nationalism in spite of his personal left wing politics, never really reflecting on what he’s doing until it’s too late. Then when he’s no longer useful to the empire, he’s chewed up and spat out, only to eventually be honored as a national hero as a symbolic gesture. It’s a compelling story. However, I’m a little torn on how certain aspects of history were framed. Does the abstraction of the bombings detract from the true weight of those events, in favor of sympathizing with the man who built the bomb? Or is it clever a way to show how the realities of the war were compartmentalized away by people who were complicit in its most heinous acts of violence? One minute a bunch of physicists are talking theory, thousands of miles away from the theaters of war, and the next they’ve killed 200,000 people. So which is it? Eh, probably somewhere in the middle, I guess. But I liked it overall.

12/31: Kirby’s Return to Dream Land Deluxe - I’ve been really surprised by how good this rerelease is. It kind of flew under the radar for me. I liked the original game, but at the time it also almost felt like the New Super Mario Bros. of Kirby. It was a straightforward throwback game where you went through a grass world, then a desert world, then a water world, etc., and also they added four player co-op. But returning to this one after the kinda mid Star Allies has made me appreciate just how solid RtDL is as a Kirby game. I really like the updated graphics, too - yes, even the new cel shaded outlines around the characters - even though I didn’t think it looked that great in screenshots. Also the two new copy abilities (Sand and Mecha) are fun, the minigame collection is shockingly fleshed out to the point that they could’ve sold it as a standalone eShop game, the collectible character masks are fun, and the new epilogue mode where you play as Magolor is one of the coolest bonus modes they’ve ever done. This is a top tier Kirby remake any fan of the series should check out.

Ongoing things I followed in 2023 that don't have a blurb:

Halo Infinite multiplayer

IDW Sonic the Hedgehog (main series + specials)

One Piece

Chainsaw Man

My Hero Academia (not caught up)

The JOJOlands (not caught up)

Things I started in 2023 that I still need to finish:

Freedom Planet 2

Hi-Fi Rush

Live A Live

Super Monkey Ball: Banana Mania

Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order

Picross 3D Round 2

Rhythm Heaven MegaMix

Mega Man Battle Network 5: Team ProtoMan

Ratchet & Clank: Rift Apart

Spark the Electric Jester 3

Sonic Dream Team

One Piece (Wano arc, anime)

Jujutsu Kaisen season 2 (I’ve already read the Shibuya arc already in the manga, though)

Astro Boy (2003 anime)

Futurama (original run rewatch)

One Piece (manga reread)

The Amazing Spider-Man (Lee/Ditko era)

Scott Pilgrim series (reread)

And finally... my favorites of 2023!!!

Overall favorite game: The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom

Favorite indie game: Pseudoregalia

Games remastered in 2023 that are now among my all-time faves: Ghost Trick: Phantom Detective, We Love Katamari

Most pleasant surprise in gaming: The Murder of Sonic the Hedgehog

Favorite film: Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse

Favorite live action show: Barry

Favorite anime: Pluto

Favorite anime written by a Canadian guy and an American guy based on the Canadian guy's old graphic novel series: Scott PIlgrim Takes Off

Favorite live action adaptation of an anime that I still can't believe they didn't fuck up: One Piece

Favorite Western cartoon: Adventure Time: Fionna & Cake

Favorite older cartoon I only got around to watching in its entirety this year: The Venture Bros.

Favorite documentary: Double Fine PsychOdyssey

Favorite semi-improvised semi-scripted absurdist comedy/horror/tragedy Twitch livestream performance art thing: Half-Life Alyx but the Gnome is Self-Aware finale (wayneradiotv)

Favorite manga: Chainsaw Man

Favorite older manga that I only read this year: Berserk

Favorite Western comic book: Daniel Warren Johnson's Transformers

Favorite album: HELLMODE (Jeff Rosenstock)

And that's a wrap!!!!! Happy new year, everyone! Here's to me maybe actually reading a goddamn book this year

[in1-nutshell]

Add this to the bottom of the barrel.

I was playing tears of the kingdom and my brain did a hop skip and a jump.

Human body that climbs everything and everyone. has killed a bot with some really archaic weapon, lord knows what they'll do with an actual gun. doesn't really talk but communicates through grunts and hand gestures.

plus

Rodimus who just wanted to get a midnight drink - ...Buddy?

cut to Buddy who just stares back at him for a moment before running into the vents.

Rodimus - HEY GET BACK HERE!

Buddy is chaos. There is no stopping them from climbing anything they can get their little hands on.

Hope you enjoy!

Human Buddy who communicates in grunts, noises and likes to climb with Rodimus Prime, Cyclonus, Nautica, and First Aid

SFW, Platonic, Human reader

MTMTE

The crew picked Buddy up from a planet’s flea market.

Buddy looked so miserable and malnourished.

The crew members were outraged seeing a human so far out in space and being treated like this.

Some go off in a corner to think of a plan to get the human without buying them.

Buying them will only make the buyer rich and chase more humans.

Whirl was the one who stole them from the buyers after causing a diversion.

For once Magnus didn’t put him in the brig for stealing them

The human didn’t speak like any normal human and was very distrustful of all the bots.

Except Whirl.

With time the human eventually warmed up to the bots, but they never really learned how to talk.

They were just fine with the grunts and noises.

It was a random name generator that picked their name since many bots had already gone to the brig for wanting to name them and others not agreeing.

Buddy was a simple name.

And they seemed to like it.

But there were some habits the bots picked up on.

Buddy loved to climb anything they could get their little hands on.

This caused much distress and amusement amongst the crew.

Buddy becomes the crew’s mascot/ friend/ gremlin that lives on the ship.

Rodimus

Rodimus likes Buddy.

He even set up a little chair for them on the main bridge in case they wanted to sit there.

He put it there after too many times seeing Buddy trying to climb the chair themselves.

And that one time they did manage to get on the seat and Rodimus nearly sat on them.

That’s why Buddy now has their own chair.

Do they use the new?

Yes and No.

They use it when they are on the main bridge for more than 5 minutes.

But they don’t sit on it.

At least correctly.

The amount of times Buddy has sat down on the chair wrong nearly glitches Ultra Magnus’s circuits.

Buddy knows this and likes to get a laugh out of everyone.

Rodimus is the loudest.

But not everything is fun and games.

Rodimus hates it when Buddy uses the vents.

He’s scared they are going to get lost up there like one of those Earth videos of families not finding their gerbil until they had to cut a hole in the wall and find it deceased.

Buddy, obviously, doesn’t listen to him.

Rodimus came back to his room after a meeting with Magnus and Megatron.

Turns on the light.

Buddy is sitting on his berth eating some chips.

“…Buddy?”--Rodimus

Buddy stares at him before running to the vent on the ground.

“HEY! NO, NO, BUDDY WE TALKED ABOUT THIS!”--Rodimus

Buddy makes some mocking noises in the vent.

“I HEARD THAT!”—Rodimus

Cyclonus

Being one of the bots on board that they were slower to warm up to, Cyclonus does find himself looking after them.

He blames Tailgate for planting the idea in his helm.

He lures Buddy in with treats and by being calm.

Buddy warms up to him eventually.

Cyclonus wants to teach Buddy how to talk so they don’t have to rely on noises or grunts like some unintelligent being.

Buddy was intelligent, they just couldn’t talk or write, that’s all.

He tries his best and sees that Buddy does try their best.

Even if they manage to make a letter sound, is plenty accomplishment for both.

“Repeat after me. Hello.”--Cyclonus

Buddy tries to say but huffs instead.

“No, like this. Hello.”--Cyclonus

Buddy starts making noises that sound like a cat hacking on a hairball.

“…Maybe that’s enough lessons for today.”--Cyclonus

Hacking noises increase.

Nautica

Nautica is one of the crew members that got along the fastest with Buddy.

Maybe it was her being friendly and kind to them.

Or it could also be the snacks she secretly gave to them after their meal.

Who knows?

Buddy has a habit of climbing on her when they want something or need to relax.

They do this with certain bots too, but she still feels honored to be chosen for this job.

All she needs to do is acknowledge Buddy, then be still until they reach the top of her helm or neck cables.

Gives them many head pats.

Buddy looking at Nautica from across the room.

Nautica was talking to Brainstorm about her new wrench.

Buddy walks over and begins to climb her leg.

“EEP! Buddy! You know better to do that without me knowing.”--Nautica

Buddy still keeps on climbing until they reach the top of her helm and just lays there.

“I guess someone wanted some attention?”--Nautica

Buddy huffs but pats her helm.

First Aid

Also, one of the faster members Buddy warmed up to.

But First Aid doesn’t really know why.

He did help Ratchet in making sure they were okay and helped them around the ship, but he didn’t do anything extraordinary for Buddy to like him.

But he is fine with that.

First Aid rather enjoys the company of the smaller human.

He knows Buddy is smart.

One day First Aid came in feeling a bit under the weather and Buddy was making all sorts of gestures and noises to get him out of his desk and to the med slab.

Even trying to carry his digit to the slab.

They knew he wasn’t feeling well and wanted to help, something First Aid found endearing.

However, …

Giving Buddy checkups were 50/50

They could come into the med bay doing everything he said to do and get a treat by the end.

Or…

They would be ‘clawing’ and squirming at everything that came towards them.

First Aid walks into the med bay.

Buddy is sitting on his desk chewing.

“Buddy? Buddy what are you chewing?”—First Aid

Buddy pauses, but then chews faster.

“NO, NO, NO WHAT DO YOU HAVE SPIT IT OUT!” –First Aid

[alittlebitofloveliness]

Could you do some modern day Soda headcanons please? I love him so much and I love your blog so much soooooo….

Ok so soda is tricky for me to write but I tried my best!!!

Modern Au Sodapop Headcanons

-Drinks every single energy drink imaginable. Rockstar? Like its water. Prime? For the plot. 5 hour energy? He’ll down it in five seconds. Darry is HORRIFIED.

-Is pretty enough he’s one of those people who becomes moderately famous on TikTok without having to really do much. His followers notice he’s always talking to someone off camera, and they’re desperate to find out who it is, but Soda only ever responds to comments with ‘oh that’s just Stevie, he doesn’t like TikTok’.

-Soda’s followers have a lot of theories about this ‘Stevie’. Soda is weirdly tight lipped about him, despite the fact he often breaks off mid rant in videos to talk to him. There’s also the fact that the rest of the gang is often around/in the background of videos, but the mysterious ‘Stevie’ never appears. (okok I’ll stop here before this becomes a Stevepop social media au)

-Regularly forgets to take his ADHD meds and Darry often has to remind him

-Would either have a hockey flow or a mullet (whatever y’all think, personally I think modern Soda with a hockey flow tracks with his character)

-One of those people who loves horror movies but is also completely terrified of even the dumbest ones and has to sleep with the lights on for weeks afterwards. Steve makes fun of him for it, but will also stay up on the phone with him if Soda watches one by himself and freaks himself out

-Has a million fidget spinners because they actually help him focus on stuff when he needs to

-Soda in modern AU wouldn’t call Ponyboy ‘kid brother’ as a nickname (don’t get me wrong, I love it but Ive never heard it used irl). Instead, I think him and Darry (and thus the rest of the gang) refer to Pony as ‘shrimp’ and Ponyboy absolutely hates it  “where’s the shrimp” “he’s has track practice ‘till four, you of all people should know that Dar” (brought to you by me and my interactions with my own little brothers)

-The whole gang is super into video games, but Soda is kind of shit at them and lowkey grumpy about it

-Every teacher he’s ever had has done that thing where they expect him to be exactly like his older sibling, and therefore expect him to be a model student like Darry, and every time they are proven entirely wrong. By the time the same teachers see Ponyboy’s name on their class lists they’re terrified of what to expect

-He definitely had that horrible middle school boy stage where he just reeked of axe body spray and BO before he figured out proper hygiene

-Every two weeks him and Steve end up doing some sort of YouTube deep dive where they end up being convinced of some sort of wild conspiracy theory that Ponyboy and sometimes Darry have to spend three hours talking them out of

-Uses far too many emojis in texts

-He had a pet hamster once and you know that thing died in the most horrendous way imaginable. Two-bit probably farted into the cage at one point as a joke and the poor thing asphyxiated to death or some shit like that

-He’s that kid in group projects who does nothing and tanks the presentation for everyone by mispronouncing half the words on the slides some other group member made for him

-Him and Steve are so inseparable that when they’re not together people will be like ‘where’s your boyfriend’ and he just answers without thinking before flushing really hard and sputtering a bit. 

-One of those people that casually catches snakes with his bare hands. Steve HATES it and Ponyboy is TERRIFIED of snakes so he gets in trouble with Darry if he does it too often or brings them near the house

[imfineitsfineeverythingsfine]

Communication and a Question for the Fandom

I started this off thinking I would end up with one conclusion and I actually found myself changing it by the end. I’ve read a lot frustration with the ineffable husbands and their lack of communication. “You don’t ever talk to each other" and "You never say what you’re really thinking.”

Now, that may be true. But also, throughout both seasons, we have seen repeatedly how they have been under surveillance too. 

Not just visual

But audio as well… Sign in Hell: Be Careful What You Say. But there’s more to the sign itself. I just can’t make it out. It’s not a sign that’s featured in the extras either, which is also interesting. 

What I could find though, in the The Devil in the Details X-Ray video was a little more of the sign, but I still can’t make out what the rest of it says:

Which brings in my Question for the Fandom. If anyone else is able to make out rest of this, I’d be interested. (This was around the 2:05 timestamp)

Moving on, that’s not the only *Clue* about their surveillance either. We know about Hell using electronics as a means of communication. They just cut in to whatever happens to be playing at the time, right? Radio, tv, Saturday Morning Funtime… so it would make sense that they’d use it to listen too. Is the Bookshop any safer, being an embassy for Heaven and all?

And it’s hard to pinpoint exactly how either side is listening in. We all remember this interaction but really… played as a joke but what if it wasn’t? Or maybe they just hadn’t figured out the specifics yet at that point.

Maybe there are certain “trigger words.” We see the reactions when Crowley is called “nice.” 

Crowley tells Aziraphale to “shut up” numerous times. We hear both them say “don’t say that” a lot. 

But also…

Closed captioning capitalized it just like that. Interesting. (If you haven’t watched the show with cc on, I recommend it)

What does this all mean? They just don’t talk to each other? Well, no. Not necessarily. We’ve also seen them find ways around directly speaking too.

Writing it down. (Which was promptly burned)

Aziraphale mouthing “Trust Me” during the bullet catch. Could they have had other short hands or code words? Emergency contingency plans? I personally imagine so. Side note: could they have also been using alcohol (laudanum) as cover for plausible deniability? 

“Safe spaces”? The backroom in the Bookshop that they kept going to for private conversations. We know they had alternative rendezvous locations in the first season too – the old bandstand, the number 19 bus, and the British Museum café. 

The Final Fifteen. I don’t want to take away from the emotion of the scene and I think Season 3 (come on Prime!) give us the rest of the story. I have faith in Neil Gaiman (pun sort of intended). But I will propose that the kiss may have been not only Crowley’s plead but also a misdirect or signal or other way to communicate between the two that we have yet to understand. In the end, Aziraphale was able to get the Metatron to break and divulge that the next step of the Great Plan was the Second Coming…before even leaving Earth…which was pretty impressive in itself. Was Aziraphale then able to relay anything to Crowley before the elevator? Sendarya’s video here does a great job with that very question (and others).

Most experts agree that 70-93% of communication is nonverbal and when communicating emotions, applying the 7-38-55 rule. Meaning only 7% through spoken word, 38% tone of voice, and 55% through body language. So maybe they’re not doing so bad after all. Those are just my thoughts and we’ll just have to wait and see and hope.

[the-heart-of-a-monster]

I’ve always wanted to do a comic, but I can never follow through or end up burning out. Do you have any advice? I really admire what you’re doing here on every creative level and think it’s so cool you can do this kind of thing <:0

ok here's my comic QnA with an extremely elaborate explaination of my workflow, if u want to put this on in the background while working or soemhting (timestamps in video description):

in my newest video i explained how long it takes me to do the pages and how i manage to have a regular posting schedule without going insane again but shorter (linked with timestamp, actual time talking abt thoam is only 10 minutes):

TLDR:

In order to be able to follow through with thoam, as opposed to every other project i've had in the past, it was important i already had a finished outline before even attempting to do art. having a clear path/goal of where this comic was going to go from the start was super important for me not to be stressed about figuring out how the story will continue, because I've already done that work before I started.

I used to always make things up as i go in the past and it always ended in burnout because that is just too many creative processes at once, it'll fry the brain.

I work many many pages (weeks to post) in advance so that if i ever don't have the motivation I can rest for 2 weeks or even a whole month without ever touching the comic without stress that i'm missing the posting schedule.

Otherwise staying motivated can only be achieved for me by sharing with friends. constantly sharing wips and gushing abt my project helps me staying motivated to keep going, becasue i love when ppl respond and engage with what i'm doing.

[huevobuevo]

I CANT FUCKING SLEEP SO IMMA JUST POST THE SCU COUNCIL DRAWINGS AND HOPE TO THE GODS IT LETS ME REST.

Erm I really like pantheons and shit so uh. I made lore

Essentially each council member are gods similar to the Aspects from APOTHEOSIS, except instead of aspects of humanity they’re aspects of the universe. They each are gods of their respective campaign-worlds, the other council members can only interact with them through the creation of their player characters. I made three designs for these fuckers- their initial godhood form during the Hardest Difficulty Video, their present forms after their respective churches & worlds have been established, & their Higher Divine Form that’s basically just their fursonas (except Slimecicle since he’s just like. A Slime Hybrid already so now he’s just Cooler Magical Slime Guy yipey!)

Much like the aspects, the Council Members are referred to by their domains instead of their original names. In the case of Condi he has a secondary name, Yonder; in the case of Charlie, he can be referred to by either Fortune or Misery- more on that in a bit

the gribble -> Bloom

🍃bro is in charge of the biomes of the Overworld, including the tools and weapons that are crafted using its resources

🍃Bloom is ONLY in charge of the Flora, NOT the Fauna. The creatures of the Overworld are owned by Evolution

🍃weather phenomenon and natural disasters are also his strong suit

🍃MYTH TIME!!! Bloom hasn’t learned to change into his Higher Divine form until after his first Fall, thus his bright red and black wings were never appreciated. After he arose again, the ash of the Nether stained his wings and hair, turning them a deep grey. Many birds of the Overworld had grieved his loss, so after his return most of them had rolled in the ashes that fell from his skin in tribute- thus the Grey Parrot was born.

🍃he grew an affinity for the sea after the creation of his first universe (Mana; Riptide), thus a majority of his time is spent in the Overworlds ocean, where his presence is spotted through the whirling winds of a hurricane.

Condifiction. -> Yonder

🔥god of the Beyond- any of the upper and lower realms in any universe belongs to him, including;

🔥The Nether

🔥The End

🔥The Spirit World (prime defenders)

🔥The Chaos Zone (prime defenders)

🔥The Faewilds (riptide)

🔥The Celestial Plane (apotheosis)

🔥The Land Between Time (prime defenders)

🔥Yonder is also in charge of all the interdimensional creatures and entities that live in these domains. Potions are.. also technically his deal since to make them one must acquire interdimensional items such as blaze powder

🔥the boundaries between worlds and the magic to traverse them also fall under his rule

🔥Yonder has a spear called the Aether Piercer, a blade strong enough to even cut through the fabric of reality. It is the strongest weapon in the entire multiverse, and the boys use it for their “dnd campaigns”

🔥he is also called the Quartz Dragon

🔥 FUN FACT! He actually has TWO outfits- the Nether Regalia & The End Regalia. However my stupid ass drew the End one first despite the fact that the Nether outfit is his main one (molten lava dress and cape with deep reds and brilliant whites & gold). That’s why the end suit doesn’t really match his dragon form, but I ran out of time so I couldn’t draw it out. Also im never gonna use these designs most likely so honestly it doesn’t matter but STILL FUCJ IM SORRY :[

the bibbl -> Evolution

📡ok this one was hard to figure out but bear with me

📡Evolution is the protector of all living creatures and time- he can see the past, present, & future, and is in charge of the development of every single organism that can breathe. Humans, especially fall under his command.

📡Evolution is also the patron of technology, society, and history

📡he can personally control how mobs & humans evolve and adapt

📡his higher divine form is usually a strange gryphon like creature, but he can just about change into whatever form he desires. He is the only God who can truly shapeshift with no limitations- Yonder & Bloom only have their Higher Divine Form, while F&M is still pretty visibly Slime no matter what form he takes. Speaking of

the slible-> Fortune/Misery

🎰the god of many things, but can all be simplified into one word- Luck. Everything has a risk, and F&M can make it happen

🎰gambling, yes, is a part of his domain, as it involves a risk of either a win or a loss

🎰destiny & fate are intertwined with his powers, due to how extremely fluid they may be

🎰harvest & agriculture TECHNICALLY are his thang as well, since he’s not really in charge of the PLANTS per say but rather the possibility of either a plentiful harvest OR a miserable famine

🎰F&M have two different names for two different occasions- Fortune, for instances of prosperity, & Misery, for instances of disparity.

🎰he is also called The Great Gambler, Magician Of Chance, He Who Reaps, The Debt Collector, The Slime Lich, and The Nightmare King

🎰he’s like a Lich but not dead lol. More on that later

[ FORTUNE ]

🎰wealth

🎰dreams

🎰arcane wisdom and enchantments

🎰skills in crafting and smelting

[ MISERY ]

🎰nightmares

🎰plague

🎰curses

🎰loss of control

🎰debt

🎰punishment and penance

🎰yeah so haha if someone has cheated and exploited their way to fortune then Misery with a capital M comes down and basically sucks their life force out and turns them into goo, which is what he uses to sustain himself like a Lich. Luckily for him, greedy men spawn like rabbits

Some extra notes for the council in general plus some insight in how their religions work

☀️Yonder and Bloom are both patrons of Travelleds, Adventurers, and All Who Voyage On. However, Bloom offers protection from the world itself such as wild animals and weather phenomenon , while Yonder helps ease the passage itself. Basically Bloom helps people not die in a storm while Yonder focuses on getting to the destination in the first place I.e. not getting lost in the fucking woods

☀️Evolution y F&M are conceptual gods while Bloom y Yonder are more physical. Bloom y Yonder are everywhere, omniscient and omnipresent, encapsulating the world around us- meanwhile Evolution and D&M control the hidden sacred systems of the world such as time and luck/magic

☀️Evolution and F&M have highly selective religious followings, only specific followers are trained and perfected to wield the power of their gods domains. In the same vein, Evilution and F&M have two symbols- one for prayer and one for summoning. Unlike the other two gods who just have one for both of these purposes, the powers of time and chance are far too chaotic in nature to be possessed by many. Instead of being able to talk to plants and go to a funny new world, the highest followers of the Conceptual Gods can literally harness time itself and perform the Ultimate Spells that could level cities- thus not only are these followers specially picked and trained, but in Eder to actually USE them they must first reviver a blessing by their respective gods which requires a summoning. This requires their summoning sigil which not only requires EXTREMELY rare items BUT are also forbidden without express permission from elders. The summoning sigils are kept secret, sharing the sigil to others is punishable by death. The symbol for prayer is used to just represent the Concptual Gods following, much like the symbols for the other gods are used to represent them as well. the Pjysicak Gods need no summoning since they’re technically all around us soooo-

☀️slimecicle, bizly, and grizzly haveANOTHER outfit for their other campaigns (blood in the bayou, wonderlust, and total monster kill) BUT once again I had No More time Left so I sorta just Didn’t draw them my bad homeboy

This took an hour to type out dear god im exhausted

[sugarcoatednightshade]

I haven’t thought of Lily Orchard in years, but she just made a video on dungeon meshi and I wanted to hear what she had to say. I couldn’t even finish it.

It’s clear she hates anime as a genre and is pissed about having to review something she didn’t want to watch, and that anger permeates the whole* review. On top of that, it’s so fucking disingenuous to review a show that’s not even halfway over and then claim it’s thematically disjointed - like 1. Of course it’ll seem that way if you’ve only seen the first quarter of a piece of work, we’re still in the setting up stage, these themes haven’t had time to fully commingle and resolve and 2. Even considering that, dungeon meshi does actually know what it is/where it’s going, and at this point it’s fairly obvious how all the themes/mixed genera’s are gonna fit together.**

*to be fair, I haven’t seen the entire review, so maybe she calms down partway through. I don’t make a habit of watching things I know will upset me, and watching someone make bad faith criticism of something I like would literally ruin my week

Post chapter 65 spoilers below:

**Granted, cookings prominence in the show, while cute*** on its own, didn’t really seem plot relevant to me until around chapter 65 when it was revealed that in order to save falin they would have to eat her dragon half. Y’all, I went fucking feral over that reveal.

***cute meaning: it’s used mostly for worldbuilding at first. That’s really cool if you’re into it, and an integral part of the story ryoko kui is telling, but not technically necessary in every story. There are plenty of storys who spend needless time expositing about the world instead of focusing on the interesting bits, and if you’re only a quarter of the way into DM, I can see how you might think that this is one of those cases.

But obviously, as time passes, the worldbuilding aspects become more important, because the entire show is about worldbuilding. Or more accurately, it’s a deconstruction of the fantasy genera. It spends time setting up familiar tropes and then examines how those tropes would actually play out in a realistic world, setting up and then questioning our expectations for the world in a really nuanced way.

My favorite example of this is how dungeon meshi treats dark/ancient magic.

1. The words ‘dark magic’ and ‘dark elf’ have negative but vague connotations in traditional fantasy. “The thing is bad because it is bad.” It’s a fact we’re primed to believe, but shallow and easy to question

2. We learn that marcille uses dark magic, but that she’s using it for good. “Actually dark magic is forbidden because the people in power were afraid of The Plebs and want to restrict the populaces access to knowledge” is also a common fantasy trope.

3. As we learn more about dungeons and how they intertwine with dark magic, we learn that it does truly have the power to end the world. Not by itself, but because the dimension it pulls power from is populated by beings who would use that bridge of power to enter our world and cause havoc. Holy shit, we think, black magic is actually dangerous and was banned for a reason. Naming it ‘black’ was part of a smear campaign intended to save the public by dissuading them from using it

4. And then we learn that the so called catastrophe scenario has never happened, no demon has ever escaped a dungeon and successfully ended the world. Is this because of the work of the Canaries and ppl like them, or are demons perhaps not as much of a threat as they are made out to be?

And it’s great because there is no one correct answer. We learn things through the characters, whose perspectives are limited and realistic and based on their own life experience. Nobody knows the whole story, and neither do we.

[mecachrome]

omg k i just saw ur top 3 landoscar moments post from october 2023... any changes/updates since then? new moments made it onto the list? or if not... favorite moment of 2024 so far? (i just like hearing (reading?) ur thoughts it's like reading an intellectual (but still sappy in my fave way) bedtime story 🥰)

hklsdfhlsfhd naurrr... this is so embarrassing why am i still deeply landoscarpilled 6 months later 😔

but honestly i have been thinking about this and the sheer volume of crasyinsane material and lore we've accrued since last year because now i'm like how would you even begin constructing a top 3....... the possibilities are endless!!!

in terms of pre-october content that i might have missed before, i'd say most of this ask still holds (lando's biggest fan dot mp4 will NEVER lose its insanity to me. quintessential landoscar meta as far as i'm concerned) but now i also desperately need 2 shout out portrait painting challenge...... when it came out i was of course susceptible to the "you look beautiful" bantz though mostly just wrote it off as shipbait and since then i've looked back on this video multiple times and been like ?! why was oscar's deference to lando so insane actually.... i've alr mentioned this b4 but 1) oscar taking lando's intro in stride and immediately responding i am ready lando norris 2) oscar playfully acquiescing and letting lando use purple after he'd already chosen it 3) >like 5 seconds later. "you like purple don't you?" "uhhhh... i can do now" (who says that.) 4) another stunning display of lando Nooticing and fixating on oscar's hair swoop and last but not least 5) the way oscar FOLDS OVER and giggles helplessly when lando tells him i've just done you all pink ??? like. OKAY. cheers

looking @ recent content..... personally i find 814 so fascinating because while there are many Discrete Moments i can point out that make my brain explode i also feel like to some degree the reason we (? or maybe just me. again i apologize for the nonsensical drivel i create) love to make parallel gifsets of them is because they have such an understated dynamic built off many minute unspoken habits and wordless exchanges and essentially Patterns so there is less of like... a need for spontaneous intimacy.... if that makes sense. it's about the consistency of reciprocal comfort... iterations..... palisades palisades......... ok this is totally not related to the ask i've just been rotating it in my mind

anyway 10 personable favs !!! arranged chronologically

finish the lyrics (oct 2023): a deeply obvious one but you can't Not include it 😩 i can't believe this came out a week after i answered that because seriously what da hell. @ OSCAR PIASTRI WHAT IS WRONG WITH YEWWWWWWWW. there are sooooo many things i could mention here that i feel have already been exhaustively expounded, the most obvious of course being the classic ojp Heart Eyes moment(s) (Many such cases......but also specifically the love story one) (like i'd argue silverstone was mostly responsible for getting 814 off the ground BUT this video was when their dynamic became the most "mainstream" and accessible to fandom as a whole... the amount of non-f1 fans i saw qrting reups of that clip!!!!) anyway but then you also get 👉 whatever the inside joke they have about old town road is. oscar saying "i reckon you'd be unreal in a karaoke bar in japan" which i still think is such a Line... just me ??? the way he verryryryyyy softly sings "yes" with lando at the end of their love story karaoke and the insane camera angle of him just out of focus. like. really in general there is just such a soft and lighthearted and Fun air to their dynamic in this video that makes me ;__; AND this is another prime moment of lando narrating oscar's firsts for him (singing on camera at mcl!!!) . ALSAURR lando tapping oscar on the bicep while sarcastically complimenting him. once again for two guys who never touch it compels me... actually i could go on about this video tbh like how oscar nearly falls off the couch giggling at lando playing the songs together and then it cuts to the next one and he's suddenly all flushed and his bangs have gotten all fucked up. he's so... they're so... let's move on.

splunk sim city challenge (nov 2023): many classic lines such as "i haven't even distracted you yet!" + oscar knowing his podium year and lando saying "you're a nerd!" + lando going ":) :o are you okay?" and so on... general setup of this challenge was crasy tbh. how it revolves around disrupting the other person's focus and the visual asymmetry of one being sat higher and having to lean over to distract them and how oscar just giggles goodnaturedly when lando sticks his cue cards in front of his face instead of getting annoyed and—SO ON. also forever obsessed with how oscar wordlessly lifts his eyebrows at lando at the end lol

that one sticker video (nov 2023): this video is insaaAAANEEEE to me. ANYONE ELSE??? first of all oscar and lando gingerly standing across each other on either side of the flower bed (while zak brown assumes a power stance directly on it lmfao) is already so visually overwhelming but then the way oscar glances up as he's removing the sticker from the cap, how you can seeeeee him calculating the move the entire time and being adorably pleased about it, @__@ the way lando grins at him afterward... (also crying at zb glancing at them and being equally charmed by their antics) wahhh TT__TT the vibes of this clip... immaculate

oscar thanking lando in their final post-race message (nov 2023): honestly the entire message in general but :__) one of my fav 814 moments OAT is oscar including lando in his thank you speech and lando not really expecting it and being genuinely touched by the gesture. lando is so endearingly fidgety the entire time honestly and the way he perks up a bit and wrings his hands together and playfully smiles at oscar when he mentions him... okayyy. anyway 2 me it's reminiscent of yes/no challenge "am i the funniest teammate you've ever had?" "(shyly) yeahhh... you're up there" (said in the same baby-ish voice as "so... lando?" UGH. UGHHHH) and how lando genuinely gets a bit awkwardly flustered by it like!!! god. wait ALSO i don't have the space for this so i'm throwing in end of season awards MMMM debatable + how gleefully lando threw oscar under the bus and in general just the incredible expression work going on for both of them during this exchange. God [2]

si rapid fire questions (dec 2023): this video was crucial in determining that oscar... well. is obsessed with accommodating and mirroring lando. many things we already knew (aka listening to whatever music lando listens to; insert prema lap "maybe i should move to an english team because the music's better" moment here) but equally important is oscar "stealing" lando's dinner, how lando presses him on the back to the future question until oscar just changes his answer to his, and of course as you know per my blog title NO I'M GOING TO KEEP YOU HAPPY is in my eyes top 5 most insane things oscar piastri has ever said. likeee... lando showing a bit of jokey remorse over enforcing his rules (don't even get me started about lando and game/challenge rules...) but oscar being sooo determined 2 honor his teasing 😵‍💫😵‍💫😵‍💫 :melting_face: x100!!!

need to split this into two lists because apparently there's a div character limit 😔 continuing on

hilton spa ad (feb 2024): of course this pained me because of This Moment (specifically lando bringing his hand back down when oscar tried to lift it from beneath him 😮‍💨) but that is neither here nor there. obsessed with the salmon at the engineering table anecdote because the most logical explanation for oscar Not doing that anymore is because lando didn't like it... or he just eats different things now but we already know that he's adopted lando's preferred meal b4 so that's equally a lot 2 digest !!! also >the callback to their one million LOOK AT YOU/HIM moments >how they touch shoulders exactly Once when they sit down and then never again despite lando continuously leaning into oscar's space to get to the button... eugh. also just top tier oscar faces + hair 🥰

opening title behind the scenes (mar 2024): thinking about all the hilarious gifsets of this moment that i ate up deliciously 🧡🧡🧡 this was such a significant reminder of how 814 have just gotten like, exceedingly comfortable around each other & have learned 2 communicate via the most inscrutable expressions and noises and gestures that somehow suit Them perfectly x__x although i doubt they will ever really become ~effusive~ with each it's frankly even more devastating that they both help each other care less about maintaining appearances / how they often get so sucked into their interactions (see next bullet point) that everything else kind of just fades away in that instant.... all right ⚠️⚠️⚠️ maybe that's a bit of a stretch but we can pretend for the rpf lens!!! see also my tag spiel in this beautiful tuva gifset.

photo day antics (mar 2024): do you ever just...... what went on in bahrain. honestly. more from this weekend in a second but this video plus the accompanying photo encapsulate their dynamic so perfectly it makes me scream... how 814 are not only so annoyingly focused on each other all the time but also stand SOOO UNNECESSARILY CLOSE while every other teammate pairing is spaced out normally. yuki and checo glancing at them alksfdhdf 😭 truly so ridiculous that the poor photo person tried to get lando's attention and they pretended to comply for two seconds before oscar was lifting his foot to show lando his boot again. also why did it take oscar a million years to step away from lando and put a more appropriate amount of space between them...?! and even then it was barely that much........... (10 paragraphs of speaking later) I prefer really not to speak.

accidental waist grab (mar 2024): this gave me psychic damage so bad i should be lobotomized. we've already spoken about this perhaps erm excessively but why did lando feel the need to stand JUST as close to him if not closer after they broke apart. there was truly no need...... honestly the way this ship will have us looking up driver cams and staring at esteban ocon's ass as he gets out his car just for a single glimpse of their parc fermé dynamic.

bahrain post-race interview antics (mar 2024): You already knowwwww. the sky sports "he follows me everywhere" moment is equally important but the f1tv interview giving us horrifically natural banter (juxtaposing this with their previous interview moments...), lando's dumb faux australian accent and oscar playing along as always, and most of all them HIJACKING THE INTERVIEW & commiserating on camera together ❓❗️ lichrally the grid photo all over again. often when i have emotions over an 814 moment i worry that i sound overly He_Only_Got_Two_Eyes.jpeg but truly sometimes two people are just objectively insane. plus land of piastri/lando piastri.....

also runner up is the f1tv interview with lawrence aka lando's cooing noise @ oscar discussing lily (anyone else frame by frame color pick oscar's face to see how badly he flushed... no? just me?) + the beautiful self-aware surfacing of the CONTRACTUAL OBLIGATIONS of their relationship...... !!! love when 2 guys expose and confirm their own sincerity in trying to verbally resist it. hem

is this anything. sorry eve LKSFDHLDHSF thank u for the ask & pls lmk what ur fav moments are too 🧡