#and how interesting a take it was on a decades old classic character

[ineedyoutotellmeyouloveme]

[see-arcane]

Our good friend Jonathan Harker is getting ready to leave for his business trip, Mina Murray is picking out a new journal, Lucy Westenra is charming a gaggle of smitten suitors, Abraham van Helsing is wrapping up his lectures, and Castle Dracula is prepping the guest room for a very long stay.

Which must mean that Dracula Season is here again!

 ‘Dracula Season’ being a catchall term for the voracious reading, memeing, writing, illustrating, analyzing, and general fun-having that’s ensued since Matt Kirkland’s project, Dracula Daily, caught on with us back in 2022. The Substack had already been running before then, but it sparked a conflagration as time went on and readers old and new to Bram Stoker’s Dracula—the actual novel, not Coppola’s fanfiction—devoured it in a way that scratched an itch none of us knew we had. Stoker wrote the book in epistolary fashion, clumping sections together as needed for the pacing without perfect adherence to chronological order. Matt went ahead and put all the events in order and proceeded to set up a lovely chain of emails that delivered entries on those correlating dates.

This style of organization and pacing turned out to not only make the virtual book club that much easier to engage with, but left space in-between to stew on the story and relate with the characters themselves. Every day of waiting in the book feels weightier when you have to pace and sweat and worry in tandem with poor Jonathan trapped in the castle or Lucy wasting away or Mina running out the clock before she loses the fight for her own humanity. And while we sat with the story or the lulls between Dracula Seasons, some of us found ourselves craving more of that ghastly gothic horror goodness to the point that we figured:

“Well. Why don’t I make something?”

And then we did! Tons of creative works have been churned out in the wake of Dracula Daily’s high. I figured that while we’ve still got a bit of time to wait for May 3rd, we should check out all this new stuff in the meantime. (Plus a handful of neat stuff that just clicks with the Dracula itch overall.)

So, in the interest of Dracula Season pregaming, let’s take a look at…

FICTION

Blood of My Blood – A recent addition to the Dracula Bad Ending AU pile, and definitely one of the most harrowing and addictive group-produced narratives I’ve ever come across, Blood of My Blood is the dramatically gothic currently-WIP work of @ibrithir-was-here and @animate-mush’s devious design. Give or take a heap of other fascinated folks (hello!) adding ideas to put more Horror into the Horrors that our cast has to face. The premise:

The Transylvanian climax went fatally sour and the Harkers were forced to shelter with Dracula himself, including their half-vampire son, Quincey. Cut to two decades later, and Quincey finds himself out in modern London, smitten with Lu, adopted daughter of Arthur and Jack, and diving into certain bloodstained old documents that detail the real history of how his parents came to live in the castle. Said revelations coming not a moment too soon, as a storm is coming for him straight from the Carpathians…

Dracula Daily Sketch Collection – An array of illustrations that captures every entry beat by beat, the Dracula Daily Sketch Collection by Georgia Cook, alias @georgiacooked was dished out over the course of the last Dracula Season. Some of the most fun character designs out there.

Fanfiction Spotlight: BlueCatWriter – With a whopping 99 works devoted to the novel Dracula (so far, the number may have gone up since I blinked), @bluecatwriter is one of the most prolific and talented fanfiction scribblers out there. Romances, nightmares, and overlaps between the two seem to crop up the most, give or take a crossover. Seems fitting that those blue paw prints have contributed to BoMB too.

The League of Extraordinary Gentlefolk – An ongoing comic in which all your favorite characters from the Classics section get together and tackle some perils ranging from the mundane to the monstrous. Started by the amazing @mayhemchicken and posted on @lxgentlefolkcomic, this series is a love letter to beloved Victorian era lit, with a spotlight on the two couples leading the League. Namely, the Harkers, ala Dracula, and the Nortons, ala Sherlock Holmes,’ “A Scandal in Bohemia.” Mina and Irene are the driving investigative and steering forces here, and still deeply in love with their likewise-infatuated husbands, just like in their canons! What a concept! Alan.

Without spoiling the full character list, just know there are going to be a ton of familiar faces roaming around before you finish reading the first arc. Said arc having conveniently wrapped up just a few days ago! Give the comic and its bonus silliness a look if you’re in the mood for a new comfort-adventure epic.

Re: Dracula – Probably the most well-known and incredible thing to come out of the initial Dracula Daily wave. This podcast is a full audio drama that follows the same format as the Substack, with episodes coming out in time with the entries themselves. And it has an unfairly cool soundtrack. They have a Tumblr with @re-dracula, a site and a Patreon to check out before the series kicks up again on May 3rd. (Also, keep an eye out for their next work, an audio drama in the same style with Carmilla.)

The Soldier and the Solicitor – Another treat from @ibrithir-was-here, this one involves a bit of time travel trouble. Quincey Harker has stumbled out of World War I and into the same dark forest where his father once fled for his life…then runs into the man himself, on that same night. Jonathan Harker, young and starved and lost, who has no choice but to trust this stranger while the Weird Sisters are at his heels…despite said stranger having no shadow. It’s a tasty emotional trek, already complete on Tumblr, but now it’s turning into a Webtoon. While Ibrithir is juggling a number of other stories, she’ll be redrawing spruced up versions of the comic and adding a few new scenes as things unfold.

Substack Stack – You know what’s better than one emailed-out public domain book club? A mountain of them. Just. So, so many of them. You’ll see that a lot of these are finished, but some are still ticking along. Either way, they’re all great picks if you’re craving some more old school lit to fill the void between undead emails.

Frankenstein Weekly – Frankenstein

Jekyll and Hyde Weekly – The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde

Voyage of the Nautilus – Twenty-Thousand Leagues Under the Sea

Letters from Watson – Sherlock Holmes

The Invisible Mail – The Invisible Man

Letters from Bunny – E.W. Hornung’s short stories of the eponymous Bunny and Raffles

Letters Regarding Jeeves - P. G. Wodehouse’s Bertie Wooster short stories, including the novel, Right Ho, Jeeves

…

……

………

…The Beetle Weekly – The Beetle (NOTE: Do Not Read This.)

The Vampyres – A novella I finally wrenched through the gears of self-publication as of March this year. Starring a petite but powerful paranormal cast, The Vampyres, centers on an unscrupulous undead fellow who finds that the revenants of the world are being mowed down by an entity known only as ‘Quinn Morse.’ Between trying to save his neck and figure out where the shadowy bastard came from, the Vampyre in question crosses paths with a new paramour and handy human shield in the form of a grieving Good Samaritan. He’s even polite enough to invite the Vampyre into his home while he’s in dire straits! Surely this will end well. All the info is available here and a little author site is over here.

What Manner of Man – This is the one made for everyone who started out hoping there’d be a real love story with our good friend Jonathan Harker and the Count when he was at his most charismatic. Where that sea of wonders dried up into a mire of horror, What Manner of Man by @stjohnstarling keeps things firmly on the romantic tracks. This Substack stars the letter-writing priest Father Victor E. Ardelian as he finds himself meeting with one enigmatic Lord Alistair Vane. It isn’t long before interest turns into intrigue and intrigue into undead intimacies.

The entire novel has been completed—along with multiple epilogues in the author’s Patreon, allowing readers to choose for themselves just how the uncanny romance plays out in the end—and the Substack now has a number of other gothic goodies piling up in the meantime.  

NONFICTION

Dracula Daily: A Unique Reading Experience: This one comes courtesy of @realwomenofgaming. It’s a short and sweet piece that amounts to a fun snapshot of the entire Dracula Daily ride. A cozy couple-minute read.

‘Dracula Daily’ is the One Substack You Need a Subscription To: Features my favorite Matt Kirkland interview. @mattkirkland, if you’re still floating around on here, thank you for dispatching our vampire newsletter again this year.

Dracula Daily is Tumblr’s hottest new book club: Alright, the ‘new’ part is worn out by now, but this one is still a delightful article to swing back around to. Two years on, this Polygon piece is a time capsule of those early months when people outside our bookworm bubble realized we were all happily receiving letters from our favorite classic gothic horror blorbos.  

“How Mina Murray Became Dracula’s Girlfriend” – Princess Weekes, if you ever read this, thank you, thank you, thank you. I am sending oceans of love and millions of rewatches to your video essay. If you haven’t seen it yet, “How Mina Murray Became Dracula’s Girlfriend” is one of the most refreshing and well-made breakdowns of both the title subject and numerous other issues that have proliferated in the public view of Dracula’s cast and plot as adaptations endlessly warp or outright bastardize the actual novel. An incredibly cathartic watch.  

Literary play gone viral: delight, intertextuality, and challenges to normative interpretations through the digital serialization of Dracula: A mouthful of a title for an even more elaborate article about the Dracula Daily phenomenon. This one is a full-on study that analyzes just what happened within the big bloodsucker book club surge and how its ‘wandering reading practices’ enriched the experience for participants.

 “The Undying Undead: An analysis of the Dracula Daily community for a theory of online community formation and interaction” – We have a thesis on here! Look at that! @sirangelothebestest’s MA thesis used our vampiric book club as the bones for a massive brick of an academic piece that definitely deserves a look.

…And I think I’ll go ahead and cap things here.

This isn’t everything I got recommended, but if I had squashed all of it in here, I think folks’ eyes would start to fall out of their head. I hope you can find something cool to comb through here. Or, if there’s something great I overlooked, tack it onto the list! We’ve got just two weeks to go until we’re off with Mr. Harker. Let’s enjoy our respite before those castle doors close behind us.

[lurkingshan]

Some Highly Recommended Kdrama

My pal @troubled-mind asked me if I had any recommendations for good kdramas to watch, and my answer to that is: literally always. I put together this short list for them and decided to share in case anyone else is interested.

Parameters for this list: modern setting, strong focus on friendship dynamics, mix of genres, avoid university settings, no one-sided romantic pursuits, and no terribly sad endings

Be Melodramatic/Melo Is My Nature (Viki)

Fantastic friendship focused drama about a group of close friends who all move in together in the wake of personal crises. A healing drama that includes a couple love lines. And an out gay side character (still extremely rare for mainstream kdrama, unfortunately). This one will make you laugh and cry.

Happiness (Viki)

Pandemic zombies attack! Now I am not really a zombie person, but I absolutely love this show. It’s about a pair of working class besties who decide to get married in order to win a housing lottery (one of them may or not be hoping this fake marriage turns real), then immediately get caught in a lockdown with all their new neighbors when there’s a zombie virus outbreak. Shenanigans ensue! This is more action thriller than horror, and the two main characters are some of my all time favs. The writing, plotting, and pacing are tight as hell and it’s a rare perfect 10 for me on that front.

Coffee Prince (Viki)

MY BELOVED. This is an absolute classic genderbend kdrama that I’ve watched several times. The show that made Gong Yoo famous. An honest to goodness queer narrative about a chaebol who meets a girl pretending to be a boy for poverty reasons, falls in love, and has a bisexual awakening. This show was way ahead of its time even if it doesn’t use our modern language (you will not hear the words trans, non-binary or bi/pansexual but trust me, they’re there). Also features a fun friend group who all work together at the coffee shop. I try to make everyone watch this one, and recently got @bengiyo and @kyr-kun-chan to watch and validate my read of the story, and they enjoyed it a lot despite the messy hets. Be warned though that this drama is old old, so you’ll need to adjust to the visuals.

Fight for My Way (Viki)

My all time favorite friends to lovers drama, this is a coming of age tale of two best friends and their long journey to getting on the same page about romance. Their dynamic is fantastic and the story is mostly set in their early adulthood as they try to establish themselves in careers and make sense of their bond as adults. Also features their close friends who form a fun little group with them. And Park Seo Joon, a god among drama actors.

Hospital Playlist (Netflix)

If you want excellent friendship dynamics, look no further. This show is all about a group of five friends who met in college and have stuck together for over two decades and all of life’s ups and downs. The story begins when they find themselves all working in the same hospital for the first time since med school and decide to restart their old band. Yes, there will be singing, and no, you don’t have to cover your ears - the cast is stacked with South Korea’s best musical theater talent. This drama is slice of life and takes us through a couple years with them as they reforge their bonds and each deal with their own family baggage and love lives.

Misaeng (Netflix)

My all time favorite workplace drama that has the unique distinction of being the only show to ever make me literally burst into happy tears. No romance in this one. Story centers on a former baduk prodigy (think if Reply 1988 Taek stalled out instead of becoming a master) who attempts to enter the workforce with no discernible skills. He bumbles and fumbles and alternately competes with and bonds with his fellow interns, and forms a deep and lasting relationship with his mentor. When I tell you this show is a master class in writing to create emotional stakes, phew! How else can you explain me getting deep in my feelings over the success or failure of an import/export company?

My Mister (Netflix or Viki)

This one is a bit darker, as it deals with themes of intergenerational trauma, abuse, poverty, depression, and general ennui. Not a romance, this drama focuses on the strange and unexpected bond that forms between a middle aged man and a younger woman working on his team. They meet at an important inflection point in both their lives and forge a friendship that changes them both. Really moving and utterly beautiful, with an ending that will make you feel happy to be alive.

Extraordinary You (Viki)

Time for a change up! This is a fantasy show in which the main character becomes self aware and realizes she is a side character in a manwha. Technically set in a school (inside the manwha) but not actually about that. She bonds with another side character who is self aware, and the two of them start working to change the story so that they can break free (and fall in love while doing it, naturally). The concept of this one is just so cool and they do a lot of interesting things with it, plus the visuals are stunning.

The Uncanny Counter (Netflix)

Because I know you liked Oh No! Here Comes Trouble, I’m adding this one about a kid who discovers he has superpowers and teams up with a little found family of grim reapers to fight evil. The family unit is great and there’s lots of good stuff in their various relationships with each other. This one is a lot of fun but also touches on the characters’ sad backstories and family lives.

Weightlifting Fairy Kim Bok Joo (Viki)

You said to avoid university settings but I’m adding this one in case you want to give a classic college romance a try. My fav in that category, it’s a sports romance between a weightlifter and a swimmer who used to be childhood friends and reconnect in college while they’re struggling with performance issues, body image, and romance. It’s a friends to lovers slow burn and they are utterly adorable.

If you like any of these, let me know and I can give you more recs!! Y’all can hit me up anytime, getting other people to watch my fav shows is one of my number one joys in life.

[its-dean]

I’ve been posting on other online platforms about Fossil Fighters for a long time now, and most who are familiar with what I share know that a lot of my content has a heavy focus on original vivosaur ideas. With these vivosaurs I come up with, as well as the stats I create to go with them, I notice that there are often people questioning whether what I come up with would be balanced or not from a gameplay standpoint.

As I’ve gone on with developing this unique vision for my vivosaurs, I’ve also slowly refined my idea of Fossil Battles entirely. All of us are aware that both the original Fossil Fighters and Fossil Fighters Champions don’t have the best balancing in the world. There are certain cast members and even a few core game mechanics that allow so many otherwise memorable characters to fall to the wayside, and with the stats I was coming up with I was only further encouraging that type of hostile environment. The more I worried about whether something I was coming up with would feel realistic or balanced the more I considered the fact that the formula itself may have been broken in the first place.

There have been others in the community that have projected their own ideas of how to change things up regarding gameplay, things like adding new elements or even having customizable skills. Because the series felt like it had ended so suddenly there's become so much to dream for in a potential sequel. These are the people that inspired me to attempt something similar myself back when I was making my vivosaur last year. It inspired me to take a step back with my thinking and ultimately led to me creating a total re-imagining of the classic battle system we all know and love. 

That's the thing, the games may not be perfectly balanced, but I always find how these games work to be something that's just inherently fun in a very unique way. Above everything else, with this project I wanted the new system I was creating to still have the "feel" of having a good old-fashioned Fossil Battle. These games have incredible potential for an interesting competitive landscape, just if only some of those unbalanced mechanics were to be adjusted. This is what I strive to achieve the most with my ideas: an environment where every vivosaur has something practical to them, a format where you CAN win using your favorite vivosaurs. The only thing that should stop you is how well thought-out and unique of a strategy you can come up with.

Fossil Fighters Odyssey is a personal project of mine that I've technically been working on for over half a decade now. Still, I think it's most important to stress the fact that everything I come up with and will be talking about in this post is for fun. This shouldn't explicitly be seen as a vehicle for a potential fan game, I make these things for my own enjoyment and have no plans or obligations to turn any of these ideas into tangible content in the future. We all can pretty unanimously agree that it’s fun to dream about a theoretical continuation of this franchise, especially because of how it felt like it came to such an abrupt halt in a way none of us were really ready for. This project is simply meant to represent the changes I'd most want to see if that were to ever somehow happen, and that vision of mine simply might not appeal to your individual preferences.

But now moving to the fun stuff itself. I strive to be as in-depth as possible when taking into account how I would rework the gameplay, taking a comprehensive look at the entire series. To keep things feeling familiar while also feeling like an "evolution" of sorts, I found it most compelling to try and utilize standout mechanics from all three of the previous games. Yes, that includes Frontier because, while I can't defend its battle system as a whole, I do think there are some features it introduced that can really enhance potential team building and strategy (mainly referring to the boost system it uses).

Since there are far too many changes to cover in a text post, I created a PowerPoint to explain everything in a more presentable and organized way. The link to it can be found directly below this paragraph, with the presentation being separated in order of different areas of discussion, from how vivosaurs have changed to the differences in the battle system to new and altered abilities and so much more! Plus, attached to this post are the stat sheets for every single vivosaur, #1-300. My own vivosaurs as well as the 10 unique vivosaurs from Frontier are included in the lineup, and all the vivosaurs you're already familiar with have received numerous changes and enhancements to their skill sets so that they can thrive in this new Fossil Battling format.

Link to the PowerPoint (in case the picture quality is too poor to be able to read on this website)

FFO Mechanics.pptx

Link to all 300 vivosaurs and their stat sheets:

FFO All Vivosaurs.pptx

(Disclaimer: not all of the vivosaurs have artwork to correspond with their dino medals, but those will be hopefully trickling out down the line in the future.)

To round things out, I definitely want to thank the people that have already been supporting me and the things I create these past few years elsewhere. Without the level of the recognition and approval I see from the people who always respond to what I make, I definitely never would've come this far with developing my ideas. You guys are the ones who've been enjoying these things, from vivosaurs to characters to the overarching story I hope to one day be able to share with you all. I owe it to you for allowing myself to become as invested in my favorite series as I now am. And hey, depending on how people react to what I have here I may make another post outlining the more creative story and character elements I have in mind… 

Thank you to everyone who's been there for all this time, as well as anyone willing to read through everything I've been able to put together here, this project never could've been completed without you all for me to share it with.

[radioactivedragonbones]

Back In The Ol' Days [2014] we had the punk/nerd AU... but I have my gripes with the PNAU; it feels outdated to me. In 2014 I ate that shit up, but it's 2024 and the rampant micro-trends have me re-thinkin modern Hijack portrayals...

So here I am to propose a new PNAU: Grunge X Emo.

Hiccup as a cozy grunge kind of guy- basically just classic comfy casual clothes but with earthy tones, ripped up jeans covered in motor oil stains, and loose flannel shirts over worn-out tees.

Jack as a casual emo kind of guy- Skinny jeans with rips (often on the end of the legs cause they annoy them when they're too long), tight band tees, and his classic hoodie he can disappear into the shadowy hood of to sulk.

Elaboration ⬇️

I think it could be fun to explore the way Hiccup has a ton of hand-me-downs and spends a lot of time patching up old clothes, or adding custom painted patches to his bags. Maybe he knows how to sew just from patching/mending. I like that in the movies we see him doing bith heavy work in the forge, and having gentle hands as an artist. I think he'd be good at a ton of different diy skills and put them to practical use with his wardrobe.

In canon, Hiccup does have a lot of leftist and punk ideology; The Edge is literally equal-ownership equal-imput everyone else just decides he runs the show. And he literally changes the dominant mindset of the society he lives in to better the life of both his people and the ones they've been at war with for decades. Hes pretty punk... but I don't see him going so far aesthetically as to be a full Spiky Punk TM. He's always on the move, working on something, or chilling outside with Toothless, so I think a more casual comfortable style suits him. Though I do think he would like jackets with extra straps and buckles on the pockets and stuff, and maybe a good belt bag + leatherman combo. Totally the type to always have a pocket knife. He'd paint himself patches and slap a few of em on his bags, coats, maybe over that burn hole in his jeans that's been annoying him. He'd favor practicality over aesthetic, but he still has a sense of style. As he gets older he probably leans into the edgier style, wearing more black and red combos, more strappy belts/coats/bags, and even gets a few tattoos. But I do see him as a grungey earthy engineering guy with comfy, often oversized silhouettes.

Jack I could see being super impulsive and latching onto pop culture; something emos were notorious for. I, personally, was clamoring for a branded tee shirt the moment I deemed a band good enough to youtube->mp3 to my ipod. I could see Jack doing that kind of thing, and latching onto this misunderstood invisible-yet-visibly-different identity. He probably favors dark blue, brown, and black. Deffinitely the type to get on the colored jeans trend when it hit. Maybe he even doodles little swirling patterns on his clothes when he's bored- an adhd habit I know all too well.

Without being, yanno, dead, Jack's Different Look would probably come just from him wanting to express himself. He feels isolated and finds it hard to make lasting friends because when people *do* notice him, they tend to see him more as a silly little jester than a person worth getting to know. He copes with humor and trying to get attention every now and again but ends up with a closer knit group of oddballs. He's good with kids, of course, and tends to take on a cool-big-brother to anyone in need of one. All of this playing into this casual and easy-going but edgy, kinda emo look. He probably listens to sad emo music while sitting on a roof, staring at the moon, contemplating his purpose in life. He pretty much does that in his movie so it isn't much of a stretch lol.

Anyways, feel free ro give your 2 cents and build onto or off of this as you please, I'm just brainstorming I guess. Thinkin aloud... visually. I tend to like psychoanalyzing characters and it's interesting to me to think of Hic & Jack's canon portrayals and what they would mean in a modern-human AU.

[wellofdean]

This is old news, but I just read it for the first time and really loved it:

Rewatching Supernatural has been an interesting experience. I first watched most of it (from the start of season 2 on) in real time as it aired, and I have to admit that I did not take it very seriously. I gave it no thought whatsoever between episodes, and thought of it as an hour of indulgence in something dumb and pretty: two handsome brothers and their angel who fought monsters and melodrama every week. I never missed an episode and did love it, but I didn't truly engage with it.

It seems, however, that Supernatural worked on me in some kind of subterranean, unconscious way, because when it ended, I found I couldn't let it go. Part of that was the terrible narrative malpractice of its ending, but when I really thought about it, I realised that I also just missed Dean. He had been a weekly visitor for more than a decade, and I just didn't want my time with him to be over. I started watching Supernatural again, and the experience has been really interesting. A lot of things about my perception of it have shifted, and one of the main shifts has been in my apprehension of the serious artistic intelligence, nigh-on unbelievable range, and sheer excellence of Jensen Ackles' performance of Dean.

I keep thinking about what an incredible undertaking Dean is -- a 15-year-long development of one character! About how different the actor who played Dean in episode one is from the actor who played Dean in episode 325. How age, experience, and depth are reflected in both the character and the performance. It is just impossible to watch it and not see that there is an incredible evolution there, and at the same time, a kind of devastating psychological and emotional continuity.

Supernatural is a show that requires you to suspend disbelief and agree to go along with it. It can be silly and schlocky, and it's emotional strokes are often broad ones. It started airing in a time when our society was very different from the way it is now on issues surrounding social justice and inclusion. It isn't 'prestige TV' and it puts on no airs of being anything beyond what it is, but when the whole story is in your mind and you revisit it, and you aren't engaged with taking in plot and anticipating (or desiring) outcomes, you start noticing its subtlety, its themes, motifs and story parallels, the liminal spaces of its setting, the subtler play of emotion in moments without dialogue, and it starts to feel much deeper, more epic and just straight up BETTER than you ever thought it was.

All of that is mirrored in Jensen's performance. He grew into Dean and grew into an artist who could play Dean. He's not afraid of a little schtick, he's very capable of being obvious, but he's even better at the subtleties that allow Dean's inner life to rise up in his face without words. I love how this article positions Jensen's performance as being like that of so many classic film stars, the idea that he used his own essence -- the full range of his psychology, emotions and physicality with skill and intention to achieve what he did with Dean. His long commitment to and investment in the character, and the way he fully embodies Dean because Dean is a character that he built from pieces of himself.

Anyway. I have a lot of respect for his work. I love Dean and think he is magnificent. I hope Jensen Ackles knows how good he is, and is suitably proud of himself, and I am very grateful to hear that by all accounts, Dean is not over for him, because Dean is not over for me.

Sheila O'Malley wrote a few really nice pieces about Jensen's performance as Dean and one about Soldier Boy, and I recommend them. Very much enjoyed.

[richincolor]

Trans YA Books for Your 2023 TBR Pile

The last time there was a big B&N sale, I knew I had to stock up on some YA books -- and as I was sifting through my frankly absurdly long to-be-read list, I realized that there were more than a few YA books centering trans and BIPOC characters. I was so excited by this, and hope there are even more books centering BIPOC trans characters in 2024. For now, here are 5 trans YA books -- available now! -- that you should bump up to the very top of your TBR:

Venom & Vow by Anna-Marie McLemore and Elliott McLemore Keep your enemy closer. Cade McKenna is a transgender prince who’s doubling for his brother. Valencia Palafox is a young dama attending the future queen of Eliana. Gael Palma is the infamous boy assassin Cade has vowed to protect. Patrick McKenna is the reluctant heir to a kingdom, and the prince Gael has vowed to destroy.

Cade doesn’t know that Gael and Valencia are the same person. Valencia doesn’t know that every time she thinks she’s fighting Patrick, she’s fighting Cade. And when Cade and Valencia blame each other for a devastating enchantment that takes both their families, neither of them realizes that they have far more dangerous enemies.

Lark & Kasim Start a Revolution by Kacen Callender From National Book Award–winner Kacen Callender, a contemporary YA that follows Lark's journey to speak the truth and discover how their own self-love can be a revolution

Lark Winters wants to be a writer, and for now that means posting on their social media accounts––anything to build their platform. When former best friend Kasim accidentally posts a thread on Lark's Twitter declaring his love for a secret, unrequited crush, Lark's tweets are suddenly the talk of the school—and beyond. To protect Kasim, Lark decides to take the fall, pretending they accidentally posted the thread in reference to another classmate. It seems like a great idea: Lark gets closer to their crush, Kasim keeps his privacy, and Lark's social media stats explode. But living a lie takes a toll—as does the judgment of thousands of Internet strangers. Lark tries their best to be perfect at all costs, but nothing seems good enough for the anonymous hordes––or for Kasim, who is growing closer to Lark, just like it used to be between them . . . In the end, Lark must embrace their right to their messy emotions and learn how to be in love.

Self-Made Boys: A Great Gatsby Remix by Anna-Marie McLemore Stonewall Honor recipient and two-time National Book Award Longlist selectee Anna-Marie McLemore weaves an intoxicating tale of glamor and heartbreak in Self-Made Boys: A Great Gatsby Remix, part of the Remixed Classics series.

New York City, 1922. Nicolás Caraveo, a 17-year-old transgender boy from Minnesota, has no interest in the city’s glamor. Going to New York is all about establishing himself as a young professional, which could set up his future—and his life as a man—and benefit his family.

Nick rents a small house in West Egg from his 18-year-old cousin, Daisy Fabrega, who lives in fashionable East Egg near her wealthy fiancé, Tom—and Nick is shocked to find that his cousin now goes by Daisy Fay, has erased all signs of her Latina heritage, and now passes seamlessly as white. Nick’s neighbor in West Egg is a mysterious young man named Jay Gatsby, whose castle-like mansion is the stage for parties so extravagant that they both dazzle and terrify Nick. At one of these parties, Nick learns that the spectacle is all for the benefit of impressing a girl from Jay’s past—Daisy. And he learns something else: Jay is also transgender.

As Nick is pulled deeper into the glittery culture of decadence, he spends more time with Jay, aiming to help his new friend reconnect with his lost love. But Nick's feelings grow more complicated when he finds himself falling hard for Jay's openness, idealism, and unfounded faith in the American Dream.

The Wicked Bargain by Gabe Cole Novoa El Diablo is in the details in this Latinx pirate fantasy starring a transmasculine nonbinary teen with a mission of revenge, redemption, and revolution.

On Mar León-de la Rosa's 16th birthday, el Diablo comes calling. Mar is a transmasculine nonbinary teen pirate hiding a magical ability to manipulate fire and ice. But their magic isn't enough to reverse a wicked bargain made by their father and now el Diablo has come to collect his payment: the soul of Mar's father and the entire crew of their ship.

When Mar is miraculously rescued by the sole remaining pirate crew in the Caribbean, el Diablo returns to give them a choice: give up your soul to save your father by the Harvest Moon or never see him again. The task is impossible--Mar refuses to make a bargain and there's no way their magic is any match for el Diablo. Then, Mar finds the most unlikely allies: Bas, an infuriatingly arrogant and handsome pirate -- and the captain's son; and Dami, a genderfluid demonio whose motives are never quite clear. For the first time in their life, Mar may have the courage to use their magic. It could be their only redemption -- or it could mean certain death.

Transmogrify!: 14 Fantastical Tales of Trans Magic edited by g. haron davis Transness is as varied and colorful as magic can be. In Transmogrify!, you’ll embark on fourteen different adventures alongside unforgettable characters who embody many different genders and expressions and experiences—because magic is for everyone, and that is cause for celebration.

Featuring stories from: AR Capetta and Cory McCarthy g. haron davis Mason Deaver Jonathan Lenore Kastin Emery Lee Saundra Mitchell Cam Montgomery Ash Nouveau Sonora Reyes Renee Reynolds Dove Salvatierra Ayida Shonibar Francesca Tacchi Nik Traxler

[birdofdawning]

Le Poison des Pierreries

Two women kissing in nature, by Georges Rochegrosse (1859-1938).

This is such a sweet picture. I’ve seen it pop up a few times on Tumblr.

And now I am going to ruin it. But then I’m going to try and unruin it! However, if you just want two girls kissing in nature then scroll on by and vote in some polls. It’s all good.

So this is an illustration from 1903 French novelette Le Poison des Pierreries (The Poisoned Stones) The two characters kissing are the Princess Alilat (the tall brunette) and the Prince Sparyanthis (the blond). Sparyanthis is eighteen years old and we weren’t yet at the point where we required super-buffness to indicate masculinity, so the artist depicts him as a pretty youth. But don’t stop reading! Because 1.) this is a tale of eroticism, revenge, obsession, and treacherous murder by sorcery, and who doesn’t love all that? and 2.) there is nothing straight about this couple or this novel.

Also, 3.) it’s pretty sexy. So, you know. Be aware fellow asexuals.

Le Poison des Pierreries was written by the author and essayist Camille Mauclair for his friend the Orientalist Georges Rochegrosse to illustrate. Orientalism was very pretty but very, very problematic and if you don’t know why you can easily find out by doing a search.

(BTW I am not an expert on textual analysis or art history, or queer and gender theory, and know almost nothing about the French language — when I get stuff wrong feel free to let me know! I’m sure at the very least there are lots of classical allusions I’m missing.)

Also: there’s some implied lack of consent in this story.

The novelette tells of the distant city of Etesia. It is ruled by two brothers, the doughty warrior Cimmérion and the beautiful, decadent Sparyanthis. They are really really fond of each other. But in a way that wasn’t a big deal in 1903.

Cimmérion arrives home from war with the beautiful princess Alilat whom he has forced into marriage. Alilat is now the last of her house, thanks to Cimmérion, because he’s slaughtered everyone she ever knew, and she has opinions about this. Despite Sparyanthis’ best intentions, Alilat beguiles him, and they begin having an affair while Cimmérion is away hunting each day. ‘Two women kissing in nature’ is the moment when Sparyanthis finally gives in to his desire for Alilat.

But Alilat is (understandably) after revenge for herself and her people, and she uses her sorceries to bring a strange malady upon Cimmérion that robs him of his strength. At the same time she relishes the agonies of guilt Sparyanthis feels over his ongoing betrayal of his beloved brother.

Eventually everyone dies!

But until that happens there is a lot of queer sex going on.

The Queerness

So we can try and read this story as someone from 1903, or we can read it as someone from today. In 1903 it’s a story of masculinity as a vital, conquering, barbarous force versus femininity as a languid, yielding, civilising… perhaps too civilising… influence. A healthy nation was thought to be warlike and ever-expanding. Old civilizations — like the ancient nations of the East — were regarded as rich but dwindling due to becoming too decadent; their sexual mores (which the West took a not at all creepy interest in; c.f. Richard Burton) were held to be intriguing but Not The Done Thing. A proper western couple — one (1) man + one (1) woman, married — had quick, penetrative sex and then went to sleep or something idk. This is how Cimmérion takes Alilat, and she loathes him for it (there’s a line about her ‘being thrown down upon the couch of the conqueror’ and having to endure his caresses). Real men are too busy hunting or making war or running kingdoms to bother much about girls.

But Sparyanthis is quite a different sort of person from his dull brother. He wanders around the palace in women’s clothes having sex with whoever he finds; the explicit incidents are with women, but there are plenty of young men in the illustrations. And everyone is down with it because the Etesians are known for two things: war and having A LOT of sex, never mind with who (at one point Spary can seek out Aliat at night because all the servants are busy making out with all the soldiers in alcoves).

Both in words and illustrations Mauclair and Rochegrosse suggest Sparyanthis is a young woman. He is ‘more beautiful that all the maidens of that country’. He is frequently described as wearing women’s robes, or of being naked except for his jewellery. He is languid and wanton (not vigorous and virile like Cimmérion), with golden tresses and soft, white limbs. There are suggestions that he is sometimes rouged or kohl-eyed, but I don’t trust my translation enough to say for sure. He lays around on couches and beds a lot, and delves into non-manly stuff like magic and secret knowledge. There’s much made of how devoted to each other the two brothers are because of their differences. Soft, white Sparyanthis idolises tanned, brawny, bearded Cimmérion, and Cimmérion ‘adores Sparyanthis’ beautiful body’.

Alilat, meanwhile, is not an Etesian and is accustomed to wearing sombre modest clothing (there is a scene where Sparyanthis invites her to one of his afternoon gambols, and when everyone strips off and starts making out Alilat remains in her black robes and pointedly focuses only on her host, Sparyanthis, and he wonders what’s going on). But once she seduces Sparyanthis, she starts playing with gender too: she frequently meets him dressed in masculine clothes, while he is still in his woman’s garments. She is a vital force, determined as she is to achieve her revenge, and this is juxtaposed with Sparyanthis’ languorous attitude. She is compared to a hunter, and him to the quarry.

Alilat explicitly cannot stand the touch of a man, so she's having an affair with the beautiful, voluptuous Sparyanthis... because neither her nor the story considers him a man.

She intends to destroy both Cimmérion and the city of Etesia, and she takes a devilish glee in how tortured with guilt Sparyanthis is, but she does seem to be as sexually obsessed with him as he is with her. And there are moments of maternal kindness too, where she fondly treats Spary like a younger sister.

So while in 1903 it’s a story of what city-destroying calamities happen when men and women don’t follow their natures or whatever, today it reads like messed up queer people having a lot of queer sex. And I think it’s definitely much more fun to read it that way.

The Sex

So I am asexual and modern sex stuff doesn’t really do much for me. But, tell you what, 1903 veiled door sex knows what it’s about.

Everyone is having great sex here, and it’s implied that because of all this sensuality the kingdom is doomed to fall: the ‘warm voluptuousness’ is ‘softening the men’. You just can’t run a country while everyone’s fucking all the time, and Mauclair is here to tell you all about how bad an idea it is.

No sex is ever described (though it’s taking place in the background of at least one illustration), so the excitement is all in the set-up: Alilat abducts and fucks Sparyanthis while dressed as one of his own archers (“and seized him with the audacity of a soldier taking a weak, conquered Syrian”). A bearded magician approaches Sparyanthis while he is studying the stars in his chambers and traces on the ground with a wand the symbol for an astrological union, and then the 'magician' opens her robe enough to reveal her breasts and they have sex with Alilat still wearing her false beard. I mean

They met in secret caves and rut like beasts, howling, then sit in the throne room in their official robes and give each other secret looks (which, to be fair, is kind of like every new love affair).

Sadly there are no illustrations of any of this! I guess Rochegrosse just wanted to draw beautiful youths embracing and had no time for Mauclair's gender-switching antics, and I think that's a shame.

Anyway, because Cimmérion has laid hands upon Alilat without her permission she has come up with a very particular murder scheme. She tells Sparyanthis that Cimmérion prefers to take her ‘naked save all her jewellery’ and so she enchants her jewellery to burn away his vitality while it caresses his bare skin — the Poisoned Stones of the story’s title. The very act of sex brings about the stoic Cimmérion's murder.

Everyone in Etesia is making out with everyone else, and Cimmérion’s and Alilat’s marriage seems to be the only expected exception to all this polyamoury or so you would think. But then comes the kicker at the end: as Cimmérion lies on his death bed he tells Sparyanthis and Alilat that he knew all about their secret love the whole time and he was totally okay with it: they should carry on with his blessing. Sparyanthis is not okay about that. But too late, bud.

Anyway, not two women kissing in nature, but — I think — two genderqueer people kissing in nature. Read it for yourself! It’s really short!

(Okay, so this is too long already, but Alilat is just so cool. She sends dreams to Spary and begins seducing him before they've even met.

There’s this whole bit where she summons up a spirit of fire from the underworld to infuse her jewellery with wicked magics, and Sparyanthis is like “Do we need to use sorcery? Can’t we just stab him?” and Alilat says “Don’t be such a nerd, Sparyanthis, I wanna do it with evil sex.”

And there’s also another part where she’s wondering about how it will all turn out once Cimmérion is dead, and she’s thinking that maybe she’ll usurp the throne, but then again maybe she’ll just destroy the kingdom and then ride out across the desert as it falls, laughing, and then she’ll go to the mountains and establish her own country of sorceresses and she will be their queen.

And hey, maybe the Alilat who ‘died’ was only a simulacrum and the real Alilat did just that. I hope so, people should just leave a girl alone.)

[ordinaryschmuck]

What I Thought About The First Doctor's Run

Salutations, random people on the internet who certainly won’t read this! I am an Ordinary Schmuck. I write stories and reviews and sometimes draw comics and cartoons.

So, I’ve made a discovery…Almost every episode of Classic Doctor Who is available FOR FREE on Tubi! You know what this means?!

“More people can watch the early beginnings of the most iconic sci-fi series of all time?”

That AND I can finally review Doctor Who as a whole!

I won’t lie, this has been something I’ve wanted to do for a WHILE. Either as a ranking of each Doctor or a ranking of their best episodes, I’ve been wanting to go in depth with this series for SO LONG. And since the odds are I WON’T become a writer for television like I’ve always dreamed, I might as well talk about my favorite TV shows! Starting with the son of a bitch who started it all: The First Doctor.

Here’s what I know about the First Doctor: Next to nothing. My experience with The Doctor as a whole started all the way with Number Nine, with the only taste of One being through that Christmas Special a few years back. He’s definitely more cynical and rude than present Doctors, but this is way back in his early beginnings. NO ONE knew what direction this character would take years later and just focussed on making an interesting character NOW. Er, then? Now? Then?

Eh, bibbly-bobbly.

The point is that I’m going to TRY and not be biased with One, look at him as if I were right there in 1963. Unfortunately, unlike everyone ELSE in the sixties, I don’t have access to all the episodes. During 1968-1978, most tapes that held Doctor Who episodes were reused for new film or deleted completely for space, leaving NINETY-SEVEN episodes erased from time forever and causing twenty-six serials either gone completely or incomplete. It’s basically what streaming services and studios are doing nowadays, but without pirating sites as a safety net to preserve the art from being COMPLETELY lost. Now, there are some audio tracks saved for commercial release that feature still images or commissioned animation, but that’s not the case for every episode, unfortunately. So things are going to get a little…weird for this review. For now, I’ll say that I’m going to stick to what’s on Tubi and improvise with what’s NOT on there. Also, I’m not going to go through every single episode. Just share my thoughts on each serial as a WHOLE, mainly because those practically add up to modern episodes anyway, just an hour or two longer.

Now, with that said, let’s take a step back in time as we discuss the first adventures with our first Doctor.

Decades Old Spoilers Below

THE SERIALS

We’ll begin by going in order of each serial, starting with his first adventure and ending with his last. Helps go through this journey together.

The Unearthly Child: Okay, full disclosure, this one’s NOT on Tubi, so I had to look it up through…other means. But to be fair, it’s not like I could just IGNORE The Doctor’s very first adventure. It’s here we see a sort of formula that still remains constant to this day. The Doctor meets new companions, they become shocked by how the TARDIS is bigger on the inside, they go to a place that’s filled with a temporary cast of disposable characters, and are forced to solve a problem for them or die trying. Of course, some things are different, and not just the inside of the TARDIS. The fact that The Doctor had a granddaughter was mind blowing and left me wondering what happened to her since she never showed up ONCE in the revival. And The Doctor was…surprisingly inactive despite being the titular character. He caused more problems than fixed them, like being the reason everyone was trapped in the Stone Age and later becoming the person who needed to be rescued. Honestly, Ian proved himself more as the leading man than The Doctor did throughout the whole ordeal, calling the shots and even being the one who came up with the plan that got them OUT of danger. Even when taking account that this was just the show starting out, it seems weird that the titular character isn’t the one who leads the group and is instead the whiney bitch that the others just tell themselves to ignore. As for the adventure, it’s pretty dull. Granted, you need to introduce audiences to the concept of time travel by showing them something easy to grasp like going back to the stone age. You gotta save weirder stuff for the future episodes. But the characters getting chased around by cavemen isn’t really that engaging, and it REALLY drags down a lot by part four where the conflict feels stretched out to meet the full twenty-three minutes. Overall, not that great of a first introduction but most of the best series of television rarely start off perfect. The question is if it makes me want to see more, and…it honestly doesn’t. If not for the knowledge of what the series would eventually become, I’m not sure WHY someone would stick around. But the Doctor Who fan in me is strong so I say we keep charging on.

The Daleks: The first encounter with The Daleks, the Doctor’s WORST enemies, and the serial is much better because of it. It’s actually interesting to see how these villains began with how simple they are to fight, the fact that they don’t INSTANTLY kill others they attack, and how they actually keep PRISONERS. And the serial does a great job at showing how they’re definite menaces to be feared, but not impossible to defeat, creating decent tension as the characters try to fight back literal killing machines. I also love how every character throughout the serial does something important, especially The Doctor who manages to do much more this time than whine and complain as he actually uses his intelligence to help his companions out of this troublesome situation. Although, he’s still the jackass that got them all trapped in this situation all for the sake of exploring a town that they know NOTHING about. There’s definite improvements to his character this time, but The Doctor being the cause for their current conflict is not one of them. And while we’re on complaints, this serial STILL feels like it stretches its adventure out for the sake of making the serial longer than it should be. There’s some definite excitement in the first half with our core four characters trying to escape the Daleks, but this serial still didn’t need to be seven gosh dang episodes long. I feel like there’s some meat to be cut out with making the Thals stand up for themselves, conceiving a plan of attack, and invading the Daleks’ base. Other than that, this is still a pretty decent serial filled with great tension from the Daleks and strong chemistry and dynamics between our core four. It’s definitely stronger than the last serial and a MUCH better introduction to the series. No wonder it’s the one that Tubi has.

The Edge of Destruction: A nice, short mystery where the first half does really well in making you feel as disoriented as the rest of the cast. There’s this solid unease where you’re not sure what’s going on and you’re left to pick up the pieces, bit by bit, to figure out what happened and if there’s anyone or anything responsible for this mess. Although, part two tends to fall a tad short because most of the clues we got were then explained to the audience and then given this big explanation that came out of left field because the biggest clue wasn’t revealed yet. So as a mystery, it definitely isn’t strong. Though, I do like how The Doctor is the one to figure things out and save the day in this serial. Sure, him being antagonistic towards the others wasn’t great but I enjoy how The Doctor has finally warmed up to his companions and that it’s implied that he no longer chooses to be suspicious of them. So while the mystery fell short, I can’t complain when it improves The Doctor’s character.

Marco Polo: Unavailable on Tubi due to the BBC deleting episodes. Yeah, unfortunately, this is our FIRST serial that can’t be seen in its entirety through official means…Though, no one said anything about using transcripts.

HAHA! Loophole! Because while I’m not going to steal audio-only episodes for the sake of reviews, who’s going to stop me from READING. It’s not stealing episodes if I’m just reading what happens! Although, unfortunately, it only gives me a PART of the picture. I won’t understand performances or fully grasp how characters look, but it’s no different from strictly LISTENING. There’s a lot that unfortunately goes missing when a visual media loses its visuals, and for a case like this it’s best to work with what we have. And what I have is the story pretty much described to me by someone else. It’s not preferable, but it IS what I can do for these times. Remember this every time a studio deletes episodes or entire shows off its platforms.

With that said, based on what I’ve read…Yeah, this one DRAGS. It’s The Doctor and company being forced to move from place to place and dealing with Marco Polo as they do. Doesn’t sound too bad, but each place they go to follows a specific formula: Someone does something Polo doesn’t like, he voices displeasure about it, The Doctor and others argue their case, Tegana points out how they’re actually evil, and Marco Polo, who flips from being reasonably cautious and unreasonably stupid, constantly tells them to get out of his face while still dragging them off to the next location. This goes on for SEVEN EPISODES, each one making the whole serial feel way too long and way too repetitive. I kept hoping this would be the end of the serial and we could move on to the next, only for it to KEEP. F**KING. GOING! It’s so dull that I needed TWO DAYS to read through the damn thing. But maybe that’s the problem: I had to READ it. There might be subtleties in the VISUAL performance that better conveys Marco’s personality, even if it DOES seem to flip/flop on paper. Plus, there are some things like the set designs and special effects that a transcript could gloss over and not properly convey. And there are SOME nice bits like The Doctor trying (and failing) to win the TARDIS back in a game of backgammon, which is all kinds of fun. And Susan made an endearing friendship with Ping-Cho. Those two are surprisingly adorable together and it’s nice to see Susan make a connection with someone her own age. Other than that, though, if this wasn’t that great of a story on paper, the original serial better have some MIND BLOWING execution to make it great. Otherwise, maybe fans aren’t losing much if this serial is lost to time.

The Keys of Marinus: A pretty clever idea with this one. The story for this serial is that The Doctor and his companions are out searching for the titular Keys of Marinus, presenting a story that’s a fetch-quest, with each episode dedicated to the characters finding one key. It’s smart because instead of stretching out one adventure to make the serial longer, it connects four adventures through this loose thread, keeping audience interest up as everyone tries to get out of the danger of the week. It’s fairly effective, filled with great moments like Barbara trying to save the core four from being brainwashed into mindless zombies, the entirety of “The Snows of Terror,” and The Doctor solving a murder. It’s all good fun, but not without some problems. An episode like “The Screaming Jungle” feels like it needs more time as there’s a lot of ideas that don't live up to its full potential or come out of nowhere. Like, a living jungle SOUNDS cool, but it only really comes into fruition until the end. There’s also the fact that the search for the last key feels stretched out because the writers didn’t realize soon enough that the finale for this serial was too short so they made the final hunt longer to compensate. But what bothers me the most is that The Doctor just…leaves the hunt just to spend time in a more civilized society. It works out for the murder mystery, but it also feels weird that the titular character bows out for two whole episodes, leaving his companions to do all of the work he neglects. Honestly, at this point, I’d say Ian should be the one the show is named after with how well he leads the party and even comes up with a clever plan to stop the big bads. And I know I keep harping on it, but why name the show Doctor Who when that same doctor hardly helps? Still, “The Keys of Marinus” is a fun serial that leads to solid short tales, even if there were some rough steps along the way.

The Aztecs: Oh, this one’s racist, isn’t it…? You know what? I’m as white as a ping-pong ball and have the patience of a goldfish to do proper research myself to make any judgments to decide something that I have no official standing on. So I won’t be the one to say what is and isn’t racist…Aside from the fact that those are obviously WHITE people playing the Aztecs.

But possible racism aside, this serial is more on the dull side. I do like this conflict between The Doctor and Barbara, where Barbara tries to change history for what she thinks is for the better (Which means changing the history and culture of Aztecs–Let’s not get into it) where The Doctor tries to convince her that there’s no way to change history. Future episodes continue to dive deep into the idea that history cannot be altered no matter what the characters want, and it’s interesting to see one of the first instances where the characters learn this the hard way. I also love how it ends on this idea that while they couldn’t change what happened, they still touched the lives of those they’ve made relationships with, meaning that it ALL wasn’t a loss. It’s a shining light of optimism within the tragedy that becomes a reoccuring theme through a lot of future episodes, and I love it each time. But other than that, this serial is another one that DRAGS. It’s just The Doctor and his companions screwing around with Aztecs for two hours while this boring subgroup conspired against them. It makes the whole serial feel like it’s running in place for too long, and I feel like if it cut out ONE episode or maybe shorten it down to two, the serial could be stronger for it. It’s also weird how Barbara is, like, a different person in this. Like, I get it, she’s acting like a goddess, but she seems TOO good at her performance, almost as if the writers wrote her as an ACTUAL goddess and not a character PRETENDING to be one. It feels off a lot of the time, and it’s just one more thing that makes this serial weak. Even though I like the idea of characters trying to fight hard to change history, that’s something done MUCH better in the future. It’s a charming first attempt, but not one I’m willing to revisit.

The Sensorites: A pretty…substandard serial. The titular Sensorites start off pretty scary and intimidating, being unlike anything the show has produced so far in this run. It presents a bit of uncanny horror for a good while…But then the serial reveals that they’re mostly peaceful creatures, aside from a few devious outliers, who actually need help. It’s a decent twist that also leads to The Doctor being the most active he’s ever been. The way he goes about finding a cure for this mysterious illness and taking charge in dealing with any dangerous Sensorite made it feel like, for the first time, he deserves to have the show named after him. I like it…but it doesn’t stop the serial feeling like it’s a little aimless at times, almost as if it’s drifting by for six episodes. We get some good stuff from it, but storywise it feels like we’re just bouncing from scene to scene as if the writers are making stuff up as they go and presenting coincidences that foil some villains’ plans. And then there’s this out of nowhere idea that this subgroup of humans lived under the Sensorites for so long, but there was never any indication of this and it’s presented in the VERY LAST episode, making it an almost pointless idea that went nowhere. I’m glad to see The Doctor become more  of a leading man, but I would have preferred it in a better, more coherent serial.

The Reign of Terror: MOST of the serial is intact…aside from two episodes. Meaning that it’s incomplete and not available on Tubi, so…ONTO THE TRANSCRIPT!

On paper, this whole thing seems like a drag. It starts interestingly enough with The Doctor being separated from his companions as they’re taken prisoner during the French Revolution. It leads to Ian, Barbara, and Susan trying to escape while The Doctor tries to reunite with them (instead of pissing off for half the serial), creating this situation where everyone’s putting in the work as they share the same goal. The problem is that, like the REST of the serials before, the characters fart around for too long just to stretch the story out to reach a goal. They will escape and then get recaptured for the sake of forced tension, and by the time Susan and Barbara were in prison again I just wanted the serial to come close to an end. Thankfully, by then, there were two episodes left, but it doesn’t change how it’s all two episodes too long. The only thing to catch my intrigue later was Barbara wishing they could help Robespierre from getting killed and The Doctor reminding her that they can’t change history. I still love an idea like that, but here, it happens near the very end and there’s barely enough time to appreciate it or dive deep into it. In fact, this could have been a great “Can’t mess with the past” episode, but it’s just…the characters trying to escape a situation and spending too long on it. The worst part is that this is the Season One finale, the time to go for broke, and it’s just…the same old thing with the same old problems as previous serials. Maybe it worked better visually or even through audio, but on paper it’s just as slow and boring as ever. Hopefully the next season starts big.

Planet of Giants: Huh. Guess it did. Just…literally.

Jokes aside, I am impressed with the set design in this serial. I can tell everyone worked so hard to set the scale, making you feel how small these characters are. Sure, you can tell exactly HOW it was done, but for the sixties this all must have been mind blowing work, especially for a TV show. As for the story, it’s…adequate. The characters are trying to prevent these two men from making an insecticide that could do more harm than good while also trying to find their way back to the TARDIS to reverse their size. It’s not the BIGGEST (ha) danger in the world and it’s something they could have stopped easily at normal size. If they focussed on growing again, they could have stopped the main evil prick within seconds, so the majority of the serial is just them messing around by trying to stop him while they’re an inch tall. And there’s also the fact that Barabara held the idiot ball throughout the serial, touching something in a lab when she shouldn’t have and keeping that information to herself for far too long. Like, WHY didn’t she tell the others she was infected with the insecticide? We never got an answer for that and it’s kind of frustrating as it adds unnecessary tension to a serial that doesn’t really need it. The characters trying to get big again is more than enough, we don’t need a nefarious plot about an insecticide gone wrong or one of the characters getting sick from it. But while the story definitely could use some improvements, the set design really does carry it, being an impressive visual display even if it’s for an inferior serial.

The Dalek Invasion of Earth: OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOH, so THAT’S what happened to Susan…Anyways, the best way I could describe this serial is two steps forward and one step back. The cinematography is impressive, looking like a feature film at times with dynamic shots and cool ways that the camera follows the characters. BUT the direction seems to be all over the place. Most of the time, it’s fine, but then you get stuff like actors interrupting or talking over each other or moments where peripheral view is…not a thing. There’s even a part where a Dalek is looking RIGHT AT THE DOCTOR as it’s moving away…and it just continues moving onward as if nothing happened. It’s actually kind of hilarious at times. And speaking of the Daleks, this serial did a great job showcasing how threatening and evil they can really be. The twisted way they used humans as slaves to destroy a planet is sick and seeing how that broke the human mind and ruined their families proved that the Daleks are nothing to be messed with. The problem is that the serial shows how easily they can be messed with. Like, even if they doubt the intelligence of normal Earth people, it’s not a smart plan to have a way for them to escape their prison cell WITHIN THE CELL ITSELF! And how is it that they can blast away people no problem but struggle with the robot slaves they made? I don’t know how it’s possible, but this serial manages to make these tin salt shakers MORE and LESS terrifying. On the upside, our heroes are at least competent in this adventure. Much like the last encounter with the Daleks, everyone does something of value, only this time they’re all split up to accomplish their own task that actually helps the others in a way they wouldn’t expect. It DOES feel like some plot lines are a little aimless with some of our cast waffling about a little longer than they should, but it all leads to a great ending when they reunite once more. 

And, of course, there’s the sad departure of Susan. It’s performed well and does a decent job of making me FEEL a little sad when The Doctor allows Susan to leave so she can live a life of her own without being forced to travel everywhere with him. I liked it…though I do have issues with how the reason that she wants to leave is because she fell in love with a man she’s known for a few days. It’s part of the writing of the sixties, I know that, but it doesn’t change how WEIRD it feels that Susan is willing to give up everything she knows for someone she recently met. So while I enjoyed the scene, it felt very flawed, which is the same for the whole serial. I enjoyed it a lot, but there were a few imperfections here and there that made “The Dalek Invasion of Earth” a messy, albeit fun, serial.

The Rescue: This was a blessedly short serial. The big twist was fairly easy to figure out after Part One, and if this serial was stretched out for more than two parts it would hurt it significantly. We don’t need four parts of the characters farting around, picking up little clues, and then solving the big crisis within minutes. So having the story last for about two episodes leaves for a brief adventure that works well on its own while also introducing the audience to Vicki. And I’ll admit…I’m not too sure about Vicki in this serial. She comes across as a less competent Susan who cries more and doesn’t have the same intrigue Susan did as being The Doctor’s granddaughter. It’s obvious that she’s there as a replacement for the “The Young One” in the group and it doesn’t work for me. What DOES work is how The Doctor is presented, as he acts much more like The Doctor I know now. He’s active towards figuring out what’s going on, caring towards Vicki and consoling her when she needs it, and is the one to confront Bennett in the climax of the serial. I do like how it’s sort of a slow burn with The First Doctor, showing him eventually grow from the bitter old man who couldn’t care less about anyone else to a more kind and proactive character due to the adventures he went on with his companions and the people that they meet. I still say it was off to name the show after the guy who didn’t do much, but The Doctor’s slowly earning his role as the leading man and I enjoyed that this is one of the earlier starts of them becoming the hero we know now. So while this is a standard serial, it does give us one of the better presentations of The First Doctor.

The Romans: *INSERT DATED ROMAN EMPIRE JOKE HERE*

Anywho, this one’s pretty entertaining. There’s basically two sides of this serial’s story: The Doctor and Vicki hanging out with Nero and his hysterical nonsense and Ian and Barbara being stuck in the slave trade…Yeah, probably sounds like the tones would heavily clash with this one, but it surprisingly flows well. You laugh at the hijinks of The Doctor acting as a close friend towards Nero while feeling empathy for Barbara and Ian as they’re forced into the worst possible position in Rome. There’s even equal attention to both plotlines, making them balance each other out fairly well that leads to the serial feeling fast but fun. The only thing that drags it down is how it begins and ends. The cut between the TARDIS falling and The Doctor and Ian chilling out in Roman attire felt jarring. Same goes for the reveal that they willingly stayed in Rome for a whole month instead of focussing all attention on fixing the TARDIS. I suppose it would come across as a pleasant holiday, but then they say they’ve been hanging out in someone else’s house while they were away and that’s…odd. It’s odd that it worked out like that for a whole month. Same goes with the ending, where The Doctor feels giddy at causing the fire of Rome. Even for the First Doctor, it doesn’t seem right that they would take joy in causing such destruction and mayhem. But aside from the problems in the beginning and the end, everything in the middle of the serial offered great entertainment for a pleasant viewing for me.

The Web Planet: AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH! MY EARS! For whatever bizarre reason or another, SOMEONE decided to give these giant ants the most ear-piercingly irritating sound for how they communicate. It was already grating by the first episode, yet they still thought it was a good idea to use the same sound, continuously, FOR SIX EPISODES! Halfway through the third, I genuinely considered skipping the rest of the serial entirely because I couldn’t STAND those f**king ants! Thankfully, I remembered that subtitles were a thing, so I just played the rest of the serial on mute and just read the subtitles. Trust me when I say that is the only way to make the damn thing watchable. And even then, it’s not that great of a serial anyways. It’s the characters helping these anthropomorphic bugs with slightly less annoying (but still pretty annoying) voices in a rebellion against the ants. I’m all about it, because screw those things, but it’s still a bog-standard adventure with some admittedly impressive costumes and effects for the time. I don’t know, maybe it’s because I couldn’t stand LISTENING to this episode, but I would have been completely fine if this was one of the few serials lost to time.

The Crusade: Speaking of which, HALF of this serial is missing and not on Tubi either. So ONTO THE TRANSCRIPTS (Gosh dang it…)

I think the problem with this serial is made clear with how it begins. We have new characters talking about political nonsense as if we, the audience, should already know the context of what they’re saying. Then when we’re introduced to the core four, they’re thrown into the middle of a battle with no proper set-up that their conflict of Barbara getting kidnapped happened so fast that it barely registers. This slow pace of boring politics with characters we don’t know and fast paced attempts of Barbara trying to escape her kidnappers remains throughout this whole serial. MAYBE it was handled better visually, but the way the serial constantly introduces new characters to discuss politics while The Doctor and his companions are barely there makes the whole thing feel like its priorities are disjointed. There should be more focus on Barbara trying to escape while the others go out to save her, but there’s so much attention on the politics and trying so hard to be historically accurate or whatever and it…doesn’t keep my interest. Not to mention that the constant new characters to keep track of as they steal attention is not all that entertaining and causes the whole serial to seem like it forgets who the show’s really about. I just wanted it all to end, as I feel like this is one of those serials that aren’t better on paper nor through execution.

The Space Museum: This one starts off pretty confusing, first intentionally and then unintentionally. I’m just as lost as the characters are, wondering what happened to them and what’s to come of it. It effectively puts me in the mindset the serial wants me to have, but then they give this explanation that just makes my brain hurt when I try to think about it too long and hard. Thankfully, the premise that the serial tries to sell is simple enough to shrug off the nonsense of time and relative dimension or whatever the hell. Basically, The Doctor and his companions saw a vision of what COULD BE their future, and the whole serial is them trying to make sure that never comes to be. It’s a solid premise that’s effectively tense in a lot of scenes as the characters seemingly get closer to what could be an inevitable future. Added with some fun moments of The Doctor being a giggly old goof as he screws with his enemies and it’s a fun time. The only weak part is this subplot involving the most ineffective rebellion I’ve ever seen, where it’s a miracle that they survived this long until they received help from Vicki of all characters. Though, even then, the subplot does well to show how independent Vicki can be in a situation AND adds to the theme that a person’s future can be changed if they changed the lives of others. It’s a decent message that helps make the serial a surprisingly good time. And yeah, that ending sting made me excited for the next one. Speaking of…

The Chase: This was…not what I was expecting. In the last two encounters with The Daleks, it was a big, tense adventure with the characters struggling to find a way to beat them. Here, it’s more like “The Keys of Marinus,” a collection of small adventures as the characters are chased through space and time as they try to escape The Daleks. It’s less of an epic adventure and more of a mixed bag of fun escapades and…awkward distractions. For example, watching the characters get stuck in a haunted house or fighting a robotic Doctor can be entertaining, but them interacting with this weird, underground civilization or this man from Alabama just drag it to a halt. Thankfully, the worst of it is only in the first half, making it a serial that starts slow but picks up momentum as things go on. There’s also some decent money put into this, having some impressive sets that change each episode, some crazy special effects for the sixties (the part where there’s two Doctors still looks good), and some creative camera angles that give a more cinematic feel. I dare say that this would be an impressively put together serial that is mostly fun despite some awkwardness.

But the real meat of this is that “The Chase” ends with the departure of Ian and Barbara. I will admit, the pacing upon their exit felt a bit too fast, with their decision to leave coming out of nowhere and their return home not giving us enough time to appreciate them appreciating Earth. Although, as weird as the pacing is, The Doctor’s heartbreak to see them go is well-acted and believable. You can tell that he’s less upset about the risk that comes with using The Daleks’ time machine and more upset about the idea that they want to leave in the first place. It’s odd that he feels more upset over two humans than his granddaughter, but this is still a moment that introduces the tragedy of The Doctor. They’re a character that’s always on the move, going from one part of the universe to the next and having to say goodbye to every friend and companion they ever make. They WANT to keep company, but know that their companion’s departure is always inevitable. Yet it breaks their heart just the same. I FEEL that tragedy here way more than with Susan, where The Doctor seemed more than willing to let her live her life. But with Ian and Barbara, these two humans who left an impact on him, they’ll stick with The Doctor’s heart for a long time.

The Time Meddler: The premise of this one is great. A time-traveler disguised as a monk is screwing with time to make himself the most important person in the universe. And The Doctor, being the biggest defender of time and space, tries to stop him. It’s a perfect idea that fits perfectly with who The Doctor is while giving him a true foil that he won’t have again until meeting The Master. It’s actually a ton of fun watching what’s basically the Beta Master trying to mess with history just for the pure selfish reasons of self-importance. And I do say that the serial perfectly captures that idea…by Part Four. Yeah, the majority of the first three parts are about hinting at what The Monk has been doing and padding out the runtime with characters screwing around in the woods or the monastery. By the time we get to Part Four, it does work well with the premise, having The Doctor and The Monk try and outsmart each other for victory with The Doctor, of course,  coming out on top. And I’ll admit that it was great seeing The Doctor take charge without someone else stealing the show as the leading man. What, do you think that the new guy STEVEN is going to take Ian’s place as the take-charge companion? Get the hell out of here…

But, yeah, while the first three parts DRAG, “The Time Meddler” at least ends on a high enough note where I say it was worth the watch. I’ll likely only return to that final episode instead of watching the whole thing, but what are you gonna do?

Galaxy 4: Unfortunately, this is another that’s been deleted from history. HOWEVER, it’s still on Tubi…Sort of. Because the audio logs are still intact, they had the whole serial reanimated by Digitoonz Media & Entertainment. And it’s…distracting. Not because the animation is bad. I mean, yeah, it’s not GREAT, but what’s distracting about it is that the animators tried their hardest to give this serial a cinematic feel, having grandiose backgrounds and doing things the actors and set designers wouldn’t be capable of doing. It’s entertaining to see, but leaves me questioning what the original episodes would have looked like. Because there is NO WAY this animation is an EXACT reenactment of what happens. But I’m not really complaining because there are some good stuff that comes from making this serial animated, like having all of Maaga’s forces exact copies of one another or actually seeing the destruction of the planet as Maaga is forced to watch it fall apart around her. I like a lot of this stuff, despite the distractions. As for the story, it feels blessedly quick, albeit simple. I saw the twist of Maaga and her weird ass clones being the real evil a mile away, but this WAS likely one of the first instances when a story presents the nice looking creatures as evil where the ugly looking ones are good. I can give it a little leeway for that, especially since “Galaxy 4” makes it clear that it’s MAAGA who’s the real villain whereas her clones are more or less drones following orders to appease their crooked master. There’s actually a bit of tragedy to the clones where they don’t get a chance to think on their own and do what their master says because it’s all they know. It effectively makes you feel bad for them as you also feel grateful that Maaga dies knowing it was all for nothing. And, again, it all goes by fairly quickly, making a serial that feels short and to the point. I couldn’t ask for better and I REALLY wish there were more lost episodes that were animated. Would have at least made for a more unique experience than reading transcripts to ones that are lost.

Mission to the Unknown: Speak of the devil! At least it’s only ONE episode…And a pretty decent one at that.

This is the first time where we don’t follow The Doctor or any of their companions, but instead some one-off characters. This would happen on occasion, with one of the most popular examples being the episode “Blink,” showing great tension as we watch these characters try to survive without a Doctor to save them. It’s no different here, as “Mission to the Unknown” features two men trying to warn the galaxy of a master plan of the Daleks, setting up a future serial while also standing well on its own for a quick adventure that ends in unfortunate death. It doesn’t give us enough time to really CARE about them, but that might have something to do with me reading it too fast. It’s still a solid episode that leaves one fearing for what’s to come later.

The Myth Makers: And another for the transcripts. Son of a bitch…

It’s not easy to tell strictly through text, but I think this is meant to be a more comedic adventure. In past serials like “Marco Polo” and “The Crusade,” they bore me by forcing in politics and dull characters, likely for the sake of “Historical accuracy.” Here, it’s The Doctor and his companions dealing with idiots on both sides of the Trojan War, with historical accuracy most definitely thrown out the window as people are more familiar with the version in Homer’s Odyssey. It is much more entertaining to see The Doctor try to appeal to the whims of a meathead like Odysseus and watching Priam and his family bicker about Cassandra and the legitimacy of her visions, rather than getting lost in the politics. It’s fun, but I’m curious if it’s meant to be. You have obvious comedic moments like Steven’s quickly failed rescue attempt and Menelaus wanting a drink after hearing The Doctor’s Trojan Horse plan, but the majority of the lines also don’t strike me as TOO humorous. That’s largely because the way an actor delivers a line versus how it’s written can give two different reactions, and it’s why READING the lines doesn’t leave as big of a comedic punch as hearing an actor say it in a funny way.

“Well, then listen to the audio versions.”

I’VE READ SO MANY TRANSCRIPTS AT THIS POINT! I’M IN TOO DEEP NOW!

But I will say that if the point WAS to make this adventure more comedic, then it makes the inevitable fall of Troy feel all the more tragic. I didn’t want the Trojans to die! They were FUNNY! And because they made me laugh a little, it hurt seeing them killed, even if I should have expected from the beginning.

One thing I didn’t expect, though, was that this was Vicki’s departure. Which I wouldn’t have minded if not for how it’s weirdly unceremoniously done. There’s no final goodbye and it feels like it breezes past The Doctor saying he’ll miss her. And her reasoning is just…dull. She leaves because she liked a boy, much like how SUSAN left. I guess there WAS a bit of foreshadowing given how Priam changes Vicki’s name to Cressida, a female character in retellings of the Trojan War who famously falls for Troilus. But even then, it still feels weak and even strange that Vicki would willingly choose to stay in a time she doesn’t live in for Troilus, a boy she knew for about two days. I know it’s something that just…happens back then in 60s fiction, but makes for an off addition to an already entertaining serial.

The Daleks’ Master Plan: SWEET MOTHER OF ALL THAT IS HOLY, this is the LONGEST serial yet! Possibly the longest serial in the show’s history! And the weirdest part is that only three episodes of it still exist, which is crazy not only because of the length but also because it features The Daleks. Even back then, it’s pretty clear that The Daleks are the fan favorite villains of the series, with the writers inserting them in when they can. And you would think that major characters such as them would be more valuable to protect, but no. All we have are mostly audio logs…And transcripts for yours truly.

Which is a shame too, because…this is a frickin’ GOOD one! Quite possibly the best serial I’ve ever read yet! The plot is basically characters playing keep away from each other, chasing after this insanely impressive element that The Daleks want to use for another doomsday weapon. And I just loved that the second The Doctor saw The Daleks, he knew that they needed to be stopped. He wasn’t forced into it or was trying to survive The Daleks attacking first. After three whole adventures of dealing with them, The Doctor finally put two and two together to realize that The Daleks just existing is enough to know that nothing good can come from it. So he takes charge on an adventure that’s definitely a little too long but reads as incredibly grand. It’s sort of a repeat of “The Chase,” where The Doctor and company go from place to place, planet to planet, so they can avoid The Dalek’s capture, but there’s some things that make this serial stronger. For one, the stakes feel real this time, with characters who assist The Doctor and Steven on their journey getting killed unceremoniously or tragically. You’re given enough time with Bret, Katarina, and Sara that when they meet their end for the sake of saving the group, it makes you feel a little something. The whole serial comes to a close with this idea that while victory was met in the end, The Doctor and Steven still take a moment to reflect on the lives they lost to win. It really sets how grim and deadly this adventure was, showing characters could die whether they’re ones you care about or even enemies to The Doctor. Speaking of, this serial also works in giving more unique foes outside of STRICTLY The Daleks. You have Chen, an arrogant and egotistical dilweed who’s maniac drive to be ruler of the Universe and doing anything to get it makes you enjoy his untimely demise all the more. There’s even a surprise return of The Monk, who sets himself more as this pathetic failure of a villain as he stumbles constantly to one-up The Doctor only to be outsmarted every turn. Both mix things up well while also making it clear that The Daleks are the real threats as Chen and The Monk follow every command due to fearing for their safety. It helps make the serial feel like a more unique adventure compared to past ones with The Daleks, adding more life, energy, and intensity to it. The only time I was taken out of the whole thing was this random Christmas special that got inserted halfway through. It distracted from the plot way too long and was filled with jokes that were probably funny VISUALLY and maybe AUDIBLY, but not so much when you’re reading it…like I did. Still, that’s ONE episode in a twelve episode long serial. Being entertained with eleven out of twelve episodes is still a great feat that makes “The Daleks’ Master Plan” a masterclass serial. Now can we go back to actually WATCHING these episodes again?

The Massacre: Guess not…

And this one’s one of the worst, if not THE worst. “The Massacre” has the same problems as “The Crusade.” So much of this serial is focussing on the politics of the historical event taking place, watching these characters you barely give a shit about with the main cast you love getting pushed to the sidelines. Except that while “The Crusade” had the charming cast of THE DOCTOR, Ian, Barbara, and even Vicki, “The Massacre” focuses on Steven. And I’ll get into the specifics in a moment, but I do NOT care for Steven. So to have four episodes focusing on boring historical politics and a character I do not like, it’s pretty easy to pick up why I dislike this serial the most out of all of them. I’m not kidding when I say that the best part about it is the moment where it seemed like Steven was leaving. Before you say anything, it’s not because it gave me hope that Steven was gone for good…Okay, it’s partially because of that, but it’s mostly because of this moment where The Doctor reflects on the people in his life and how he misses them. He even corrects HIMSELF when getting Ian’s last name wrong, showing us that he cares enough to get it right now because he misses his friend. It’s a bittersweet moment that proves how much The Doctor loves each companion they’ve made, even the first few people they’ve met in this first life. It was beautiful…and then it got undercut immediately to introduce Dodo and shove Steven back in as he changed his mind. The one thing I liked about this serial, and it’s ruined by itself. Yeah, this one’s definitely the worst, and I’m not missing it.

The Ark: FINALLY, something I don’t have to READ!

“The Ark” surprised me for a second. I knew going in that it was a four-part-long serial, but by the time Part Two met its end I was confused. It seemed like the story was wrapping up as The Doctor and company cured a ship of the common cold and went off to a new adventure. Only for the TARDIS to appear in the same exact spot many years later with a new problem caused by their actions in the past. Already, I love this premise. We almost never return to the same place twice with The Doctor, where after they save people from this great threat they always head off, assuming everything is fine. This is the first time we actually see what happened to the people that The Doctor saved, only to find out something worse happened to them. It’s a solid premise with good enough execution. I like that this whole thing started with an accident. Dodo just happened to have a cold and didn’t expect the consequences that could come to a species that never experienced it. It puts The Doctor and company in a situation where you don’t BLAME them for what happened but you understand that they have to clean up this mess they caused. I also find it brilliant that the first half of the serial has The Doctor and his companions dealing with rouge Guardians and the second is rouge Monoids, giving this message that both parties aren’t innocent creatures and that peace can only be made when they learn to live together instead of treating one species as slaves. It’s a bit muddled as we don’t really see much of the extent that the Guardians treat the Monoids and how disrespected they are. It gives the idea that the creepy-looking creatures who look different are more at fault, especially since the human Guardians are the ones who assist The Doctor in both halves. There’s never any assistance from the Monoids, which makes it feel like peace might not be the best option. I wouldn’t harp on it if not for the fact that several serials back in “Galaxy 4,” we had the same message of “The ugly ones aren’t evil” with decent results. Still, the idea and meaning is clear as no one’s really, wholly good. Just could have used some cleaning up on showing the good side of the Monoids, making “The Ark” having a strong story ARC.

HAHAHA–Kill me. Next one!

The Celestial Toymaker: All but the last part of this serial is missing, so…onto the transcripts.

I mean it, kill me.

(I don’t actually mean it. Just…been doing this for a while)

This serial introduces The Toymaker, a character that would only reappear once more…fifty-seven years later with the incomparable Niel Patrick Harris playing the role. And speaking as someone who got introduced to this character through NPH doing random accents and a random ass dance sequence to “Spice Up Your Life,” I wasn’t sure what to expect from the version in the sixties. Turns out, while he’s not as bombastic and jovial as Niel Patrick Harris, The Toymaker is still the most unique villain that The Doctor and others have come across so far. The Doctor isn’t kidding when he says that The Toymaker loves using people as his playthings, sending out dolls, board games, playing cards, and all sorts of other traps to entertain himself with The Doctor and his companions. And while Steven and Dodo aren’t the best duo in the world,, they’re at least paired up with despicable and hilariously incompetent antagonists as The Toymaker sends out his toys against them. You’re entertained by them, but at the same time you feel bad for them when they fail because they’re all trapped souls captured by The Toymaker. Or are they? The serial cleverly keeps you guessing whether or not these toys were once people, leaving it up to interpretation on if it’s all a part of a trick he’s playing. It adds a bit of tragedy to the goofs and gags, which I certainly appreciate. Then you have The Doctor’s game with The Toymaker that adds intensity, as he’s trying his best to stall to win the game until Steven and Dodo find the TARDIS. And, sure, I would have loved MORE to actually SEE The Doctor beat The Toymaker in a battle of wits as opposed to watching Steven and Dodo going through a goofy, silly adventure, I’m not complaining too much for the end result. “The Celestial Toymaker” is still an incredibly entertaining serial that has every character working well together to survive and being competent as they win their own game. Although, I do have to call nonsense towards Fourteen in “The Giggle.” Saying that cheating is the last thing The Toymaker would do when that’s all he does in this serial…Nonsense.

The Gunfighters: This serial finds the characters in a wild, wild west adventure, and this one’s definitely meant to be a more entertaining ride rather than an epic adventure with huge stakes. You’ve got fun stuff like Steven being forced to sing at gunpoint, an outlaw playing dentist as he rips out The Doctor’s tooth, Dodo fainting as she attempts to hold a man at gunpoint, and British people trying to do western accents. It’s definitely a good time, but it also feels like the writers leaned too hard into this being a western. All the tropes and cliches seem present and it’s definitely enjoyable, but it doesn’t feel like a Doctor Who story. The characters are pretty much in the background as we follow the narrative threads of these outlaws and a sheriff. Sure, they’re entertaining as well and don’t make the serial drag like “The Crusade” and “The Massacre” did, but at the cost of abandoning who we really follow this series for: The Doctor and his companions. What’s crazy is that ten (eleven?) regenerations later, The Doctor would go on another wild west adventure, facing down a space robot playing bounty hunter as The Doctor protects a town that’s inexperienced with this kind of threat. Not only does that episode have a concept that works perfectly for this show but it makes the story revolve around The Doctor and his companions trying to save this town. In “The Gunfighters,” The Doctor and company are pretty much absent for most of the story, either being dragged along by characters with more narrative importance, or stepping out of the entire climax. And yes, there are instances when the show follows random characters for the entirety of a story, but that’s still done in a way that it feels like it matches the show. Like how in “Mission of the Unknown,” where we follow characters trying desperately to stop The Daleks. Goofy or intense sci-fi nonsense and seeing The Doctor and co. reacting to history is what makes Doctor Who one of the most engaging science fiction shows ever made. While a western can be entertaining, something like “The Gunfighters” tends to make you forget what show you’re watching.

The Savages: Deleted. And a shame too, because this is another good one. The concept of this civilized society using living people as an energy source is already chilling, and the serial does well in showing how messed up it is for the supposed Savages. Though, if this was written in Modern Doctor Who, I feel like  the results of this power draining would be MUCH darker. Especially if Steven Moffat wrote the episode (The sick bastard). As is, it’s still great with how they made the power draining as dark as it could be for the sixties, all while adding a classist message that still manages to work NOW with its themes of the high and mighty sucking the life of what they think is savage. I love it and I also adore how The Doctor quickly picked up on how sick this whole idea is, wanting to shut the whole thing down immediately. THAT’S The Doctor I know, and it’s pretty fun that what saved the day is their leader taking some of The Doctor’s essence. Even when temporarily beaten, The Doctor still wins.

It’s all pretty great, but do you wanna know what’s better? STEVEN! IS! GONE!

Again, I’ll get to WHY later, but I am so glad to see Steven go. He wasn’t really the best companion out there and it is pretty nice that in his last adventure with The Doctor it’s all about Steven finally learning how to be useful. It’s to better sell that he’d be a capable leader to these people and…under his leadership, they’d probably die, but I can take it. Seeing Steven gone makes me willing to accept any nonsense of making him a leader and it’s nice that the show lets him leave with dignity. Even with the worst companions, it’s great the show at least treats them as people and lets ones like Steven leave happy enough instead of injecting him out the airlock or something. His departure is very welcomed and makes this serial stand out a little higher.

The War Machines: The final serial available on Tubi, and it’s…alright? Yeah, I honestly have no strong feelings one way or the other towards this one. The premise itself is what I love to see in Doctor Who, as this machine meant to help humanity ends up wanting to conquer it, with The Doctor being a key factor in securing the victory only to become the machine’s downfall. It’s all decent enough, with actors doing well at portraying these disturbingly obedient human puppets and there being some impressive puppetry on display with WANTON’s war machines. But as decent as it all is, none of it really WOWED me. The techno babble that The Doctor used to explain how he outsmarted and bested the war machines lost me due to how convoluted it was. Same goes for how WANTON was able to hypnotize human beings. I don’t even know if it was ever explained because of how much non-scientific science was thrown in this entire serial. It’s the central part of this entire premise, and it makes little sense how a computer was able to hypnotize anyone, even if it was supposedly advanced.

Another thing that bothers me about this serial is that this is supposed to be Dodo’s exit. She’s out for half the adventure and doesn’t even get to say goodbye in person. She just takes a nap, lets her replacements do most of the work, and then she’s gone for good. It feels cheap and gives her the weakest exit out of any companion in this run. Possibly the weakest exit ever. It’s another little aspect that makes the serial not BAD but not outstanding, either.

The Smugglers: Not much to say about this one. Just a fast romp as The Doctor and his companions fend off pirates in their hunt for a legendary treasure. It drags a little bit and there’s a lot of flip-flopping in terms of certain characters’ loyalty, but it has some fun moments, like The Doctor outsmarting opponents and Ben and Polly proving their worth as companions fairly quickly. Not a spectacular adventure, but entertaining enough.

The Tenth Planet: Here it is. The final serial in the First Doctor’s run…And it’s incomplete.

Yeah, the final adventure with William Hartnell’s Doctor, and you can’t see it in its entirety. You can watch the first three parts, but the fourth? Not a chance. It’s quite disappointing and, you know what? If I could cheat with his first adventure, I can cheat with his last. Let’s use “other means” than Tubi to watch those first three episodes and read what happens next.

And I’ll just say…it’s ALMOST perfect. It has a STRONG premise, introducing the Cybermen, a longtime enemy of The Doctor. It was so fascinating to see how humanlike these monsters began, moving and speaking like everyday men just with a slight robotic lean to it. It actually makes the more robotic, emotionless Cybermen more chilling in the modern age as it now becomes clear that the Cybermen perfected their goal to be more robot than human. The serial also cleverly makes it where the Cybermen aren’t the ONLY threat. I truly love that the bitter and impulsive General Cutler is just as much of an antagonist as the Cybermen are, with his desire to kill them before they kill Earth being potentially more damaging if he ever got away with his plans. It goes along with a recurring theme of this show in the modern age where those who try to be the victor in an unnecessary war tend to destroy themselves. Cutler dies because he attracted Cybermen attention with the warhead and the Cybermen die because their planet burned up when they could have asked for assistance with their problem instead of destroying the Earth for survival. It’s handled really well, with Polly and Ben still continuing to be useful additions to the cast as they do all they can to stop both Cutler and the Cybermen. Mainly because they have to with The Doctor checking out for when things get their most deadly.

Speaking of, the one thing that holds the serial back is The First Doctor’s exit. This was his final adventure, and he doesn’t do much aside from telling people what to do and taking a nap. By the time his regeneration begins, it all goes by so fast that it feels like he’s being rushed out the door. In a way…he kind of is. Due to age catching up with him, William Hartnell was forced to leave the show because his memory problems and exhaustion were getting difficult to film around. So now they had to get him out of the show for his own good, all while making one last serial as a final goodbye to this actor. However, it doesn’t change how…off his farewell feels. He’s not the triumphant hero who stopped The Cybermen and he didn’t get any final words to make his goodbye feel haunting or bittersweet. Future Doctors got this chance, even ones who decided to leave on their own accord like David Tennant or Matt Smith. It’s actually kind of sad that William Hartnel didn’t get the same treatment and that the writers would only learn their lesson for FUTURE generations. His flawed departure is the one thing that holds back what is admittedly a well-made serial.

And that’s it. That’s the last adventure with The First Doctor. But before I talk about my overall thoughts with this man, I should first discuss some other characters. Characters who are important to any Doctor no matter WHO (haha) they are…

THE COMPANIONS

Doctor Who would not be the show that it is without the companions. They’re frequently the audience surrogates, experiencing new adventures alongside The Doctor while assisting them across space and time. One thing that Chris Chibnall did correctly is point out that the companions are the true power of The Doctor and are worth talking about within the same breath. However, it DOES get a little tricky on who’s considered a companion or not. And trust me when I say it’ll get trickier as time goes on. So, for the sake of sanity, I’ll say that a companion is a recurring character who travels with The Doctor in the TARDIS and is there for more than one episode (Or serial, in this case). With those rules that I’ll probably break in the future out of the way, let’s begin with each companion as they left us.

Susan: I have…complicated feelings towards Susan. She had great chemistry within the group, did well as the wide-eyed, naive child who was excited for everything, and I was truly sad to see her go…But while my heart was sad, my ears were eternally grateful.

Yeah, as sweet a character as Susan is, she wouldn’t. Stop. F**KING. SCREAMING. Every time danger happened, she would always go, “AH! AH! GRANDFATHER! IAN! BARBARA! AH-AH!” Everytime. And when Susan was part of the group, having fun with them, being just as silly as the others, THAT’S when Susan worked. She was “The Young One,” acting as someone who the others would look after but still treat with respect as they knew Susan was capable of so much more than SCREAMING. As a member of the group, Susan worked great. As someone who could face danger…Let’s just say that my ears will be bleeding less now that she’s gone.

Ian: It’s weird that a college professor has more of a hero’s heart than the titular character of our show, but I’m not entirely complaining. Ian was a solid companion, willing to take charge for the sake of the group and having some great interactions with The Doctor. You could tell he wanted to strangle the old man, but also enjoyed The Doctor’s company as they shared a similar spirit. They both consider themselves leaders of the party and find conflict when one has an idea they believe is better than the other’s. After a while, they learn to work together and you feel that trust they have thanks to them realizing they’re basically the same kind of men who want the same kind of things. It DOES tend to feel that Ian steals the show at times, but it doesn’t change how much of an entertaining and perhaps even inspiring character Ian can be. He went through so much for The Doctor and the others, being the hero that they need and being charming as hell when doing it.

Barbara: Barbara’s sort of the character that has a well-defined relationship with everyone in the TARDIS. She’s a supportive, motherly figure to Susan and Vicki, treating them with respect while calming them down during intense times. With Ian, she’s a good friend and ONLY a friend. I’m actually glad that she was never forced into a love-interest role with him. There were so many moments where that could have been a possibility with how often those two are paired together, but it’s nice that they remained as close friends who can rely and help one another when the time comes. Not every man and woman needs to end up dating in the end. As for how Barbara is with The Doctor, where Ian and The Doctor are the same in a goal-driven level, The Doctor and Barbara are the same through an INTELLECTUAL one. They often share the same kind of thoughts and curiosity for each adventure they go on, and when they argue, you can tell it’s between two people who are of the same mind but with different opinions. It’s done well and I appreciate seeing these two interact the most. I also appreciate that Barbara stood strong in the face of danger, being just as valuable of a helping hand as the others are and not being a damsel in distress. Sure, she was like that SOMETIMES, but for the sixties this was likely the most independent a woman could get on television. Barbara was a strong character, and likely my favorite amongst the original companions.

Vicki: I was very worried that Vicki was going to turn out to be Susan 2.0, and in a lot of ways, she is. She was very much the young one who was commonly paired up with The Doctor or Barbara as she oozed with childish naivety. Even her exit was nearly identical to Susan’s, except that Susan’s was handled better because The Doctor at least said goodbye. Still, while very similar to Susan, there were some things that I did like a little more with Vicki. For one, she didn’t scream as much…thank FRICK! And two, she was a bit more proactive. Instead of screaming for Ian, Barabara, and The Doctor, Vicki found solutions herself and was frequently the one who helped save the day. I appreciate that, as it helps set her apart more from Susan and gives fans a different kind of naive character that’s endearing in her OWN way. I will say that it feels weird that The Doctor treats Vicki with more respect than his actual GRANDDAUGHTER at times, but this one isn’t screaming too often, so I don’t blame him. Vicki’s a little too much the same, but in some ways, I’d definitely say she’s a bit of an improvement, as mean as it is to admit.

Katarina: Does she count? She doesn’t really go past a single serial…Aw, screw it. She traveled in the TARDIS and helped the group for some time. I’ll say she counts.

And there’s not much to say about Katarina. She was along for the ride for such a short time, not really given a chance to stand out between the young characters like Susan or Vicki. There is this bit of naivety due to her seeing technology for the first time and mistaking The Doctor as a god, but there’s not enough time to develop that idea further and show her capabilities. I will say, though, that she gets the DARKEST exit of any companion I’ve seen. It’s sudden and unceremonious, dying because of some stupid maniac trying to escape his personal Hell. What’s worse is that it’s left to interpretation as to whether or not her death was an accident. Because she was from the distant past and had no knowledge of technology or buttons, it’s unknown if she sacrificed herself to stop the others from going back to The Daleks or because she didn’t know what button opened the door. A character that got to see the universe for the first time, thinking she was a part of something perfect, only to die in an unpredictable circumstance. She had a short amount of time, but I’m with The Doctor. I hope she found that perfection.

Steven: I. Do. NOT care for Steven. It feels like the writers were trying to make him Ian’s replacement as the heroic figure that was often at odds with The Doctor. Except that Steven is very much NOT that. He’s more like this bumbling buffoon who caused more problems as he constantly needed to be rescued by The Doctor and even Vicki at times. The very SECOND that proves how useless he could be was during his introduction when he ran to get back his teddy bear during a grueling escape from The Daleks. You COULD make the argument that the writers wanted to slowly develop Steven into a more heroic character, but there was barely any progression with him constantly being the butt of every joke. The only time he felt useful was during his last appearance, which I can appreciate. Again, they let him leave with some dignity intact and I’m grateful that he and The Doctor left on good terms. The two of them had a lot of one-on-one times with Steven having a great amount of trust towards The Doctor despite the constant jabs The Doctor gave. The Doctor admires every companion he lets tag along, and I love that it’s no different with Steven, even if I was more glad to see him gone.

Dodo: I…am incredibly indifferent towards Dodo. I don’t HATE her, I guess I could say that. She never really made my ears bleed like Susan did, but, at the same time, she wasn’t really the most useful companion. Dodo was either a damsel for The Doctor to save or someone that CAUSED a problem instead of leading to a solution. In a way, she’s more of what I expected Vicki to be: A downgrade rather than an upgrade who never really got a chance to shine as a worthy member of the group. Even Steven seemed more proactive than her, and that is a crime. And I’m pretty sure even the writers weren’t sure what to do with her either, given how they just…kicked Dodo out of the series without any proper exit. If Steven could get a proper ending, then so could Dodo. Regardless, I wouldn’t exactly say I’m going to miss her. Not too much, anyway. I didn’t mind her existence in the show, but I won’t lose sleep with her being gone. Sorry.

Ben and Polly: Yeah, might as well lump these two together. They weren’t on this run for long, and I assume they’ll be more dynamic characters when we talk about Number Two. For now, I’ll say that they’re fairly useful, saving the day with cunning and bravery. I wish Ben was a LITTLE less whiny and Polly a lot less of a damsel, but who knows? Maybe they’ll improve with The Second Doctor.

But that’s enough with the companions. Let’s finally talk about the man who started it all…

THE DOCTOR

The Doctor, no matter the iteration, is one of my favorite fictional characters. I ADORE a character who solves problems through wit, prefers not to use violence but will if pushed to their limits, and is the kindest being in the universe who will also destroy you if you hurt anyone they love. The Doctor is a being of many contradictions, who’s personality may fluctuate throughout the generations but still, at their core, is a caring being who won’t let ANYTHING stop them from doing what’s right.

…So to see The Doctor start off as this old fart who constantly complains while everyone does everything, causes problems for others, and sometimes cowardly bends to the will of enemies was a definite SHOCK to the system. The Doctor did NOT start out as the nobel hero I know them now as. It was actually kind of frustrating to see him stand off to the side while Ian took charge of everything. THIS would be the person who defeated countless enemies all over the universe? The person who sets out to save lives and regrets the ones they lost? That all started with someone who purposely trapped him and his companions on a distant planet just so they could explore? I couldn’t believe it, but thankfully the writers knew this neat little trick to storytelling: Character development.

Slowly but surely, The First Doctor does become more and more like the character I now adore. He fought Daleks after knowing how dangerous they are, weeped for the friends he had to let go, and outsmarted enemies rather than overpower them. He even gained The Doctor’s silliness and sense of humor. Just look at his grin as he scared enemies off after pretending to be a Dalek. The man relished in the chaos he brought, and it was fun to see…Except when he got giddy for being the one who caused Rome to burn down to the ground. Still have no idea what that was about.

Now, things weren’t always perfect. The First Doctor, while improved over time, still never became the heroic badass I know him NOW as, relying on his companions to do most of the work while he’s off having his own fun. Still, that’s where him being the FIRST comes into play. I can absolutely buy that it would take a few regenerations before he became The Doctor I know and love. As is, I’ll say that The First Doctor is an interesting, albeit off-putting, look into what The Doctor USED to be. It wasn’t always good, but I had my fun and I’ll miss this goofy old man.

And with that, we close off The First Doctor’s run. Most of it was fun, a lot was more dull than I expected it to be, and there were both good and bad surprises given to me through this journey into The First Doctor's adventures. It was great to finally see how this show I love started out, and it’s only the beginning from here. Tune in next time when it’s out with the old and in with the…significantly less old as we talk about The Second Doctor’s run.

[threewaysdivided]

Hobson Heckled into Historical Haute-Couture

Continuing the Dan Jones & Dragons gala parade with Hobson, the Flower Crowns' oft-harried Halfling Warlock (played by the ever-wholesome Dan Floyd). Is he trying to massage away the realisation that letting his literally-half-brained patron choose his gala attire might have been a mistake? Is Valse giving him a headache over something else entirely? Did he use Detect Magic in a room full of powerful items and accidentally flash-bang himself? Yes.

More Flower Crowns Gala Outfits: Morenthal | Gelnek

As always, design talk under the cut:

But before that, a short story: I've been following Dan's content on Youtube for... oh jeez, that sure is almost a decade now, both on his current New Frame Plus/Playframe channels and back when he was the primary founder and narrator for EC. His old games education videos helped me get one of my earliest jobs in project work and introduced me to a bunch of media production concepts (like scope management) that would go on to inform some of my own storytelling analysis posts. It was a startling little moment of artistic ouroboros to realise I was mentally running through key points from Dan's own Pose Design 101 video as I was drawing his DnD character. Never expected things to come full-circle like that, but if you're seeing this, Dan: here's to you 🫡 If you're not Dan and haven't already, do go check out his stuff - it's all super well-produced, informative, funny and he's just an overall stand-up guy.

Now: onto the tiny little nerd and his passé party attire

This was a really fun costuming challenge, with a bunch of interesting curveballs thrown in the mix. Unlike the rest of the Flower Crowns, Hobson didn't choose his own party outfit: it was picked out by his patron after Valse kibbitzed him into giving up and letting a heroism-obsessed Fey call the shots. Dan cited Valse as having the fashion sense of Stede Bonnet-as-depicted-in-OFMD, briefing a vaguely 19th century-style outfit that had frilled sleeves and 'would have looked gaudy even when it was in fashion a century earlier'.

Actually dating his outfit was the first challenge. D&D settings are kind of an anachronistic uchronia, with classic swords-and-sorcery fantasy campaigns potentially pulling inspiration points from anywhere across the Arthurian era up to pre-war modernity. Which leads to the question: how do you make something seem dated in a setting where most everything looks vaguely ye-olde-fantasy? The other challenge was that, IRL, the 19th century (i.e Victorian era) was when menswear started taking on a lot of the shapes that would eventually become modern suit and top-'n'-tails fashion. Since Trilby was already going to be wearing classic top-'n'-tails formalwear, I decided to set Hobson's style earlier in the 1800s-1820s and pull in some 18th century Stede Bonnet flourishes to visually set them apart. This article provided some great reference images, and once I hit on the figured silk waistcoat I knew I had a potential starting point.

Colour-wise, I stuck with the burgundy-and-gold palette the Dans gave Hobson in his official gala stream art, since those looked good together and matched up with Dan J's tendency to draw Hobson wearing greens/earth-tones and Valse in reds/jewel-tones. The combination is a lot more colourful and richly saturated than is typical for this style of Victorian-adjacent clothes, which felt appropriate for Valse's gaudy tastes.

Fabric-wise, I figured a fun way to gaudy things up even further would be to lean into the silks and satins that were fashionable at the time, but make all of his outfit shimmery rather than just a single feature piece. As a bonus, silk and satin clothes tend be hot, inelastic and have horribly itchy seams if worn unlined, which felt like exactly the kind of thing Valse's all-form-no-function sensibilities would inflict upon the small, long-suffering fellow. Both these fabrics also have a habit of behaving hideously and ripping themselves apart when worn wet, which makes this a great outfit to, say, accidentally fight an Aboleth in. Poor Hobson.

Some other details, just for fun: 1. Hobson's sketch layers include a drawing of his un-removable cursed left bracer. He's pulled the frilly, puffy sleeve over it but you might spot hints of the shape and the gem if you squint. 2. The reference waistcoat I used had floral embroidery on it. Had this actually been a Hobson outfit, I would have converted them to his garland flower (Forget-Me-Nots), but since it was a Valse pick I decided to make them Senaliesse chrysanthemums; a flower given out to friends of the Feywild's Summer Court as a sign of protection and favour. (It also adds extra layers to Pocket mistaking Hobson for a denizen of the Fey, which is fun).

Close crop on the details because I'm very happy with how they turned out:

[literary-illuminati]

Book Review 33 - Solaris by Stanislaw Lem

This was the third work of really classic sci I read in June, and the second that’s probably more famous as the raw material for an adaptation than as a book in its own right. Though in fairness the Tarkovsky movie is as far as I’m aware a better adaptation of this than Shadows of Chernobyl is of Roadside Picnic. Anyway, all to say that I think I’m starting to get used to the sort of abruptness and lack of narration regarding the protagonist’s emotions that seem to have been common in sci fi from the 60s-70s.

Solaris takes places on an eponymous alien world, almost entirely covered in a vast and strange ocean-like body with only half a Europe’s worth of rocky islands scattered across its surface. The story follows Kriss, a scientist, as he arrives for a posting on the skeleton crew living in a station floating above the ocean and studying it. As he arrives, he learns that the only member of the crew he personally knew had died the day before, and that the only two residents are acting paranoid and erratic; this all starts making sense when something that seems to all appearances to be his dead ex-girlfriend appears and starts talking to him, and he learns that the other two have doppelgangers of their own bothering them. Things spiral from there.

So, I’m not sure if this is a cosmic horror story, exactly, but it’s not not one either. The overriding theme is the limits of human rationality and understanding, the total impossibility of what we’d recognize as communication with something truly alien, the feeling of smallness and insignificance in the face of vast and strange and awe-inspiring. The first chapter of the book includes an intellectual history of the Solarists, going over decades of study and all the discarded theories and failed experiments that have made the posting such a dead end as the bright lights of science moved on to more promising problems. The ocean is Other, beyond human comprehension, and even at the end of the book none of the characters have come any closer to determining whether the phantoms it conjured out of their memories is an attempt to reach out and communicate, an experiment to see how they react, a reward or punishment, a purely reflexive response by something that isn’t even really properly conscious, or something else entirely.

I honestly don’t rightly know just what sort of science fiction a Polish guy in 1961 might have been writing in conversation with, but from my perspective there were definitely a few passages that seemed to be taking shots at what most space opera treats as aliens. ‘We have no need of other worlds. We need mirrors.’ and all that. But again, that could very easily be me projecting – easy enough to read it as commenting on a dozen other things.

It was interesting that Rheya was the only doppelganger we ever meet – the story’s quite claustrophobic, and the other two scientists go quite out of their way to make sure Kriss absolutely never sees whose haunting them. Interesting, too, that Kriss is the only one whose actually got anything to be guilty about with regard to his – or, at least, according to Snow the other two were the subject of intrusive thoughts or unbecoming fantasies, whereas Rheya did in fact kill herself a couple days after the two have them had a particularly cruel argument and ugly breakup.

It’s not what the book was about, but I’m honestly kind of sad we didn’t get more insight into Rheya’s psychology? A simulacrum that knows she’s a simulacrum, created by by some unknowable agency for some purely instrumental purpose, not even in her own right but entirely to prod someone else with, unable to spend too long out of sight of him without some control mechanism sending her into a panic attack. There’s some real meat to dig into there, right? Just think of all the juicy existential angst.

My library’s copy of this is the old Kilmartin-Cox translation, which I’ve since regrettably learned is considered pretty rough and low-quality relative to the newer editions. Still, even given that, I kind of adored a decent amount of the prose in this? Or the descriptions of the alien environments, to be specific – the lengthy descriptions of the constructs thrown up by the ocean and how the appearance of the station shifted so dramatically with the rising and setting of each of the system’s two suns were just legitimately beautiful, and make me extremely eager to watch one of the movie adaptations when I can conscript some friends for it.

[okayto]

Mini-Review: Akuma Kun

Ichiro Umoregi is the second Akuma-kun – adopted by Shingo Umoregi as a little boy, Ichiro is meant to be carrying on his father's work of bringing about the utopic Millenium Kingdom. But Ichiro has a difficult relationship with his dad and despite the sometimes desperate attempts of his cousin Mephisto III, Ichiro just kind of trudges through life. But when a strange angel from his past appears, Ichiro is forced out of his torpor because sometimes the world really is worth preserving.

-or-

Akuma Kun, a boy raised by a demon, works with his half-human partner Mephisto III as paranormal investigators to solve various murder and mysteries.

Paranormal investigators? Right up my alley! This was pushed to me on Netflix and as per uzh I added it to my watchlist and ignored it for a while. I was definitely intrigued, but the art looked...odd. Not bad, but with some round heads and other features that put in in mind of styles popular before I was born, I figured I'd look into it another time.

Interesting art style, right? Not bad--let me be clear! But definitely distinct, and when I see something that appears to have roots several decades old, I often want to look it up and see what its backstory is, y'know?

Fast-forward a couple months later: I'm reading Anime News Network's best/worst end-of-year roundup, and Rebecca Silverman listed this anime as one of the top five "moments of the year," writing:

Shifting from Japanese folklore to Western religious lore, the story follows the second person to bear the title of Akuma-kun, the adopted son of the original. Shingo rescued Ichiro as a child, and he gives the impression of not being nearly as invested in his role as "Akuma-kun" as he perhaps ought to be. But as the series goes on, it becomes apparent that it's not that he doesn't care; it's that if he lets himself, he'll get lost in the role, and that means seeing the absolute worst that humans are capable of, over and over and over again.

Mentions of horror, investigation, supernatural, and a character who appears to be hiding under a gruff or apathetic exterior? Suddenly, it seemed like a good time to start watching. And then the moment I heard the main character's voice, absolutely marinading in calm apathy, I knew it was going to be good.

So, this is a new (2023) anime that apparently can act as a sequel to a 1989 anime of the same name, which was itself an adaptation of a 1960s-70s manga by the creator of Gegege no Kitaro, a classic series involving many yokai, and one which I've heard about but have thus far never managed to read or watch. The connection between the classic about Japanese ghouls/ghosts/creatures and Akuma-kun, which is more based (vaguely?) on Abrahamic mysticism, intrigued me.

The basis is this: every 10,000 years, a child, always called Akuma-kun, is born who will help usher in a period of peace between humans and demons. Our current Akuma-kun (whose non-prophecy name is Ichiro) is the adopted son of the previous one (Shingo, who starred in the 1989 series). He's assisted by his cousin-by-adoption, the half-human, half-demon Mephisto III.

Together, the two boys set up a supernatural detective/investigative agency, and that's when we get to see how good this series actually is.

Don't let the cartoony designs fool you, this stuff gets dark. While it's never particularly gory, there is blood, there is at least one off-screen-but-audible instance of ripping a heart out, etc. So as the viewer, we quickly realize that these kids are up against actual threats.

The cases cover things like demon possession, trying to use power beyond your control, and so forth. They're not mysteries the viewer can solve, but they're good at keeping you paying attention to learn the result, not drawing things out too long nor fixing everything too quickly.

The recurring characters are what makes or breaks it, however. Mephisto III takes everything seriously, understanding and worrying about what happens when normal humans come into contact with a demon. He looks like comic relief, and he can get a bit shouty, but at his core he's just a straightforward boy who wants to help people and is frustrated at his cousin's...lack of that.

Ichiro, the current Akuma-kun, is more of an enigma. He's clearly brilliant, book-smart with good recall and not particularly excitable. He also has absolutely no social graces and is frequently rude, not because he's mean or wants to be, but because he's incredibly blunt and, despite Mephisto's attempts to rein him in, has no concept of tact regarding delicate subjects and really doesn't care about learning. (And let's be real, that's a dream for many people in at least some situations.)

We know that Ichiro lived with demons for a while, and his relationship with his father, Shingo, the previous Akuma-kun, is strained despite Shingo appearing to be a perfectly nice and well-adjusted person. It takes the whole series to work out the details, which makes the ending feel like excellent payoff.

As the series goes on, it shows more and more of its worldbuilding, and it's just so intriguing. I want to know more about demons! And the demon world! And Ichiro's life with the pre-adoption! How'd he even get there? What is sexy ghoul Gremory's deal? She's so fun, can we get her history? What happens next?

Verdict

English dub? Yes! And like most dubs through Netflix, it's good. Everyone was excellently-cast; Mephisto's voice was exactly what I expected based on his performance, yet without being grating on the ears. And Ichiro/Akuma-kun's flat, unexcited voice was perfect. It would have been easy to take that voice and make it boring or monotone, but it's not: it does an excellent job from the moment you hear it conveying that this is a character who doesn't really get upset or display strong emotion, without making the character himself seem flat.

Visuals: Very nice! Not only is this a recent series, but I really liked the kinda-round, cartoony style. Like I mentioned above, as soon as I saw it I thought it originated in another time period, which it did, and there's something about older art style that appeals to me; maybe it's just a weird combination of nostalgia for things I did experience as a kid (the way Ichiro's mouth is drawn slightly droopy, is reminiscent of a lot of older American cartoons I watched) and a really strange nostalgia for anime I've never watched but which floated around when I was first entering fandom, names and pictures of things I'd never heard of, but which everyone older than me sure seemed to.

Worth watching? Yes, as long as you have a tolerance for paranormal murder investigations where people sometimes die and/or there's some blood splatters. I think it's really interesting, particularly because this kind of supernatural topic doesn't come up in anime a lot. The two minor downsides to it are:

It gives you enough information to understand, but there are probably some references or other context missed because of its connection to the 1989 Akuma-kun. Don't get me wrong, it's understandable and enjoyable regardless! But I did read the non-spoilery series review on Anime News Network before I watched, and I think having that context going in specifically understanding that Shingo was the previous Akuma-kun (and ran around with Mephisto's dad, who now cheerfully supports his son) was helpful context.

Netflix for some reason calls it Akuma Kun. Trying to recall, I think this is the only Japanese honorific used in the English dub, so I assume this was a stylistic choice to allow them to keep the same name/title as Japanese. But to people who have some familiarity with honorifics, it's weird to see it written like Kun is a second name, like "Mary Ann."

Where to watch (USA, as of February 2024): Netflix

Click my “reviews” tag below or search “mini review” on my blog to find more!

[thefirstempress]

Some background on The First Empress

So the following excerpt was going to be my original foreword for The First Empress. Last October, however, I was informed in a rejection letter that the foreword was too long (among other, more homophobic reasons for rejecting it). Then, when I looked up how to write a foreword, I found out that, at least in fiction, it's customary to have someone else write it for you. While Matthew Keville (@matthewkeville) was kind enough to write my new foreword, I kept the original foreword, and at a beta reader's suggestion I think I'm going to use it as an "About" page for my website. Content warning for background and personal history.

I think it was fall semester of 2002 at Boise State University. During one of my literature courses, the professor was highly impressed with my reading responses for Homer’s Iliad, particularly in regards to my observation that the story is in no way a conflict between good and evil. And I liked that about it. I liked that there were noble and ignoble characters as well as likable and unlikable characters on both sides of the conflict. In his notes on one of my responses, Professor Jim recommended that I read Thucydides’s History of the Peloponnesian War, which began my interest in ancient history in general and Classical Greece in particular. One of my college friends owned a lovely little coffeehouse/used bookstore for several years, and I bought many volumes out of her ancient history section.

In the late ‘00s, I developed acute depression/anxiety while working on my Master’s Degree in Literature. Though I somehow managed to complete my degree, my depression became so severe that in 2011 I had to step down from a teaching job I loved beside colleagues I liked, because I couldn’t function well enough to fulfill my duties outside the classroom. I decided it was horribly unfair to my students that they couldn’t count on me to do my part, so I walked away. I made the most painful decision I’ve made in my life and stepped down from a job I’d spent three years studying and training for.

My first successful step toward recovery came when I started writing for myself again. No more thirty-page theses, no more ten-page research papers written over the weekend, no more feedback on forty-to-sixty student papers. I typed up some story concepts and revisited some old stories that I hadn’t looked at in a decade. I started a blog, and then a side-blog, and then a Tumblr page to go with the side-blog. I even started a fan-fiction account that features mostly The Legend of Korra novellas and Star Wars one-shots.

During the summer of 2012, I wrote several chapters of a young-adult fantasy novel in a high- to late-medieval setting, featuring a young, somewhat Mary-Sue heroine whose wizened mentor was named Zahnia, the Chronicler—an immortal historian trapped forever as a nine-year-old girl. As I started to flesh out Zahnia’s character, I decided I wanted to explore her origin story, tying it in with the creation of the Tollesian Empire, where the story takes place. For National Novel Writing Month 2012, I began work on the first draft of The First Empress and spent over ten years tinkering, expanding, and revising in my free time. But the more I worked on the story, the bigger it got. George RR Martin once described a spectrum of writers, ranging from architects who outline and design the structure and foundation of their story before they start writing, to gardeners who plant the seeds of the story, then let it grow, expand, and develop organically. I’m very much the ­garden-variety writer.

And so the story kept getting bigger, both in my head and on paper. I fell short of the original 50K word goal by over 10K, but felt like I had a pretty solid start. By the end of that first NaNoWriMo, I knew that it was probably going to be multiple books, so I narrowed down what I wanted to include in Book I and started focusing on those story lines. The original story was to be two separate stories that converge at the end of Book I, with the main story focusing on the title protagonist, Queen Viarra, and the first year of her rise to power, while the background story focuses on Zahnia, the curse of her immortality, and her escape from her captors. In the original outline, Book I would end with our characters first meeting.

Even in the early stages, however, it was extremely difficult to reconcile the two stories. Viarra’s story was over twice the size of Zahnia’s and, for the most part, more exciting for my beta-readers. Zahnia’s scenes often felt like unwelcome interruptions, rather than interesting interludes, and were difficult to intersperse side-by-side with scenes happening in Viarra’s story. At some point in the process, I stopped trying to intersperse them and made Zahnia’s scenes separate chapters. While this worked better, there could be as many as four or five Viarra chapters between Zahnia chapters, and some of my readers pointed out that they sometimes had to go back and reread previous Zahnia chapters to understand what was happening in the latest chapter. I occasionally thought about taking Zahnia’s story out altogether and making it its own novel.

I made my ultimate decision on the matter in July of 2021 when I finally finished the first complete draft of The First Empress. The draft weighed in at over 206K words—which I knew was a lot, but I didn’t grasp the full size until one of my readers pointed out that in paperback format, that’s over eight-hundred pages! I decided almost immediately that the best option was to split them up into three books. Books I and II now deal entirely with the first year of Viarra’s rise to power, meeting Zahnia, her future chronicler, at the end of Book II. Book III is instead mostly about Zahnia’s origins, including her curse of immortality and her daring escape from the madmen who cursed her. This worked out wonderfully as it allowed me to break the revision process into smaller chunks instead of attempting to revise 800 pages in one go.

Though Zahnia isn’t physically present for Book I and only gets a single scene in Book II, I make sure she’s still present in spirit throughout both books. In homage to classic fantasy stories like Frank Herbert’s Dune or Isaac Asimov’s Foundation series, I include epigrams written by Zahnia at the beginning of each chapter. Additionally, all footnotes and appendices are also by her. Despite her unavoidable sidelining in what was supposed to be her origin story, Zahnia became something of an alter-ego for me, and I want readers to understand that she is still a foundational character in the series.

While brainstorming leading up to that first NaNoWriMo, I decided to put my studies of Ancient Greek history to use, basing the setting and culture on the late-Classical, early-Hellenic Aegean Sea and the surrounding regions. The culture, politics, and technology—both in how they begin and how they advance as the series progresses—are intended to feel similar to the cultural, political, and technological changes occurring in the wake of the Peloponnesian War through the rise of Kings Philip II and Alexander the Great and beyond. Indeed, Philip and to a lesser degree Alexander were both inspirations for Queen Viarraluca, my title heroine.

(That being said, I don’t tend to view any of my characters as being an equivalent of X figure from Greek history. I drew inspiration from many historical and fictional characters for my cast, but I don’t have a story-world equivalent of Socrates or Pericles or Leonidas or Sappho or Olympias or whoever.)

The setting, though, is less intended to feel historically accurate and more about feeling historically authentic. I’ll be the first to admit that I’m a hobbyist historian who hasn’t taken a history course since early in my undergrad studies. Thus, all of my reading and research is unguided, and I have no idea how well my understanding and analyses align with contemporary views. Ultimately, The First Empress is an ancient-world period-fantasy that’s inspired by rather than entirely representative of late-Classical Greece.

Throughout the process, I loved playing with the ancient-world world-building and found perverse enjoyment in taking pagan gods’ names in vain, portraying ancient inventions as new and exciting technology, and treating pants as an unusual and barbarian garment. But as a fantasy, I of course included plenty of embellishments. Sometimes world-building is brainstorming how an intelligent warrior queen and her officers would attempt to adapt a hoplite-centered army to fighting in forested terrain, generally considered unfavorable to phalanx warfare. Sometimes world-building is giving a society based on the Ancient Greeks access to tea, despite zero evidence that the Ancient Greeks had anything similar to tea, all because my warrior-queen protagonist seems like a tea-drinker.

I tried as well to include neighboring cultures inspired by those the Classical Greeks had contact with. The Tollesians are inspired by Classical Greece—the Empire Pellastor and its allies being akin to the Attic and Peloponnesian Greeks while the Hegemony of Andivel and their allies are more like the Ionian Greeks. The Illaran League was originally inspired by the Ancient Illyrians but evolved into more of an Illyrian/Macedonian hybrid. The Gan are inspired by the Gauls. The Venarri are Phoenician. The Artilans are Achaemenid-era Persian. The Kossôn are Achaemenid-era Egyptian. The Wattasu are inspired by Classical-era Nasamones. And the Verleki are largely inspired by the Ancient Scythians. I want to emphasize inspired by, as I’m not an expert on any of these ancient cultures. I have no illusions that I didn’t make mistakes or misinterpret things. I also eventually hope to include cultures inspired by the Samnites, Germanic tribes, Kushites, and possibly even cultures as distant as the Han and Mayans.

Experimenting with ancient-world cultures and in particular with ancient-world sexuality has been some of the most fun I’ve had writing. The Classical Greeks were an openly sexual culture, openly bisexual and often polyamorous. Rather than gloss over their sexuality like a coward, I chose to let my characters embrace it in the story. In doing so, I quickly decided that authors who only write monogamous, heterosexual relationships are missing out on all kinds of wonderful and fascinating relationship dynamics. Queen Viarra is a lesbian, and nearly all of the other characters fall somewhere on a pan- or bisexual spectrum. Zahnia, meanwhile, is asexual, as is one of Viarra’s ambassadors. I have a transgender hoplite officer, as well, and I have other characters in mind for future LGBT+ representation. As bisexuality was normal and even expected in Classical Greek culture, I try to treat it as something normal in my stories as well.

Though so far only one person has asked me why I’d include LGBT+ characters when I’m not LGBT myself, my answer to them and anyone else is that positive representation is important. Louie, my therapist, shared an anecdote during one of our sessions back in 2021 and gave me permission to share with readers. He was hosting some friends of his family for a few days, including his childhood friend who is a lesbian. His copy of my manuscript was lying around, and he started telling them about my lesbian title protagonist who’s also a strong ruler and a formidable warrior queen. His friend was very curious and asked smart questions about the character and story-world. Louie told me that she almost teary-eyed asked him to thank me for writing the characters as gay. She apparently was thrilled not only at the gay representation from the leading couple, but also at the bi representation from other characters.

When a gay woman in her late forties gets teary-eyed at the inclusion of a lesbian couple in a period-fantasy novel, I think it’s a sign that this kind of representation is absolutely necessary.

On the other hand, there were other aspects of Classical Greek culture that I wasn’t as keen about attempting to portray. The Greeks at the time were notoriously misogynist, for example. Much of Greek culture viewed women as property. Athens in particular had all kinds of laws restricting women, including a truly heinous law specifying that female slaves’ court testimonies were only valid if they testified under torture. I did away with a lot of that in my story-world. Scythians, Illyrians, Nubians, Sarmatians, Lusitanians, Suebi, Gauls: plenty of ancient cultures had traditions of skilled huntresses, warrior women, women pirates, influential queens and noblewomen, and successful businesswomen. Philip II of Macedon’s first wife was warrior queen, and he allowed their daughter and granddaughter to be trained in the same manner. That the Classical Greeks couldn’t get with the program is frankly their loss.

As this is my story-world and my tale to tell, I saw no particular reason to carry on that tradition. Queen Viarra isn’t the only powerful queen in the story, nor is she the only woman-warrior in hoplite’s panoply. Though a certain level of misogyny exists, it’s on the level of individual characters or communities, rather than a cultural norm.

Why?

Because it doesn’t have to be a norm! It’s fiction! Misogyny and sexism don’t have to be normal! Racism doesn’t have to be normal! Homophobia and transphobia don’t have to be normal! I shouldn’t have to create a hateful story in order to meet some mouth-breathing neoclassicist’s concept of historical accuracy. One of the best things I learned from reading Effie Calvin and Garrett Robinson’s novels is that truly excellent and inclusive stories with engaging characters, world-building, and conflicts can be created without some need to incorporate real-world prejudices. And when these prejudices do show up in The First Empress, I try to set them up as criticisms of ancient society, rather than something I lazily included for some pretense of “historical accuracy.”

At least three of my beta-readers compared The First Empress favorably to George RR Martin’s A Song of Ice and Fire series. (To paraphrase one of my Tumblr readers, any fantasy with historical inspiration and more politics than wizards will draw Game of Thrones comparisons.) Even so, not only would I never assume to be in the same league as an award-winning fantasy author whose stories have sold countless millions of copies and gotten their own popular television adaptation, I don’t feel like Martin’s goals as a storyteller are at all similar to mine. His stories seem to place the most emphasis on shocking readers—and he’s unparalleled at it! My goal is to give readers a lot to think about. Hopefully I pull that off well.Plus, if readers can handle A Song of Ice and Fire… I think The First Empress might seem a little mellow by comparison.

Thanks so much for your interest in my book, folks. I hope you find my story and characters entertaining, interesting, thought-provoking, or at the very least enjoyable to read. Thanks for reading and take care!

[nyarlathotep-thecrawlingchaos]

A couple of my OCs who won't be appearing until a fair bit later in Hearing Problems won't get out of my goddamn head, so I gotta do a thing, please forgive me.

Here's a rough outline of their character profiles without giving away too many plot points.

These are my boys. Know them both like the back of my hand, have been dealing with them for literal decades.

So here we have the captain and first mate of the Hurricane pirates, Lyon D. Rollo and Janx.

Their general dynamic in a nutshell, pulled from an old fic:

Janx shot a glare at his captain, and then elbowed him into an innocent bystander. Lyon turned to apologize, but instead decided, as Janx had at that moment, that it would be a better idea to run, as it was actually a Marine that Lyon had just been elbowed into. Behind him he heard the man yelling, "Vice-Admiral! Lyon just ran off down the street!"

They took a detour down a back road and slowed down a little.

"Well, I guess we won't be skipping off into the sunset anytime soon, will we?" Janx said bitterly.

"Skipping? Definitely not. Running wildly toward it with a hundred or so heavily armed Marines chasing us? Very possibly."

That's them. That's my idiots.

Lyon first.

Age: (during Hearing Problems) Late 30s to early 40s. Hard to say since he honestly won't give a definitive answer, been lying about how old he was since he joined Roger's crew as a cabin boy/apprentice and hasn't really been able to get it straight since. Around the same age as Shanks and Buggy, give or take a year or two.

Appearance:

face claim is Josh Upshaw, edited for eye color; younger face claim is Berthold Rothas, hair and eyes edited, age late teens to early twenties

Art by me

Wild dark blonde hair that he keeps around shoulder length or longer, may be tied back in a loose ponytail. Honey brown eyes, short dark facial hair. Around 5'11" height, broad shoulders, lean build.

Black tricorne hat (replacement for the tricorne he gave his daughter twenty years ago), loose button shirts or t-shirts, loose comfortable pants, cloth belts, long black or dark blue overcoat. Silver oval locket he keeps tucked into his collar, with pictures of his late wife and daughter enclosed in it.

Primary weapon is a curved cutlass. Also often carries an old classical acoustic guitar; can't actually play the thing, it's just a reminder of home.

Personality: Oh the poor sweet dumbass. He's not exactly stupid; he's actually quite well-spoken and well-read, but he has all the common sense of a thumb tack. Was gullible to a fault in his younger years, and while age has eased that off a bit it hasn't done away with the issue entirely. Strongly prefers negotiation over physical altercation, but doesn't shy away from a fight at all if it becomes a necessity. Absolutely will deck anyone for shit-talking his mother. Hates Marines with a burning passion. Bit brooding at times, but mostly fun-loving. Strong sense of ambition—no interest in becoming King of the Pirates since that honestly just sounds like too much responsibility, but he's quite intent on racking up the highest bounty in known history.

Powers/abilities/talents:

Blades: If it has a sharp edge, Lyon can wield it fairly well, but he has a strong preference for one-handed swords, in particular sabres and cutlasses. He can easily go toe-to-toe with Shanks in a swordfight.

Devil Fruit: Kaze Kaze no Mi (Logia type: Wind). When Lyon initially left home at twelve, he really had no navigational skills whatsoever, and following the Log Posse he had stolen led him to an uninhabited island full of nothing but trees and beasts. Bordering on starvation while he waited for the log posse to set, he happened across a tree full of fruit. Being twelve years old and honestly not the brightest bulb in the box, he noticed one particular fruit that stood out due to its bright colors and shape, and he decided he wanted that one. Tasted disgusting, but he had climbed a damned tree to get it and he was hungry, so he dealt with it begrudgingly. Once he was back out on the sea, he realized by total accident that he could now control the wind (wind wasn't blowing and sloop was crawling along, he got impatient about it and started literally shouting at the wind to just blow already and it listened). Had no knowledge of devil fruits at the time and didn't really know what was going on until he joined Roger's crew and found out devil fruits were a thing and he had eaten one. Roger found this hilarious of course, though Lyon's abilities did cause them a bit of trouble; they were difficult to control, and if he wasn't careful he could end up altering wind and ocean currents and causing a literal hurricane.

Haki: Very adept with Armament Haki (Busoshoku), fairly adept with Conquerer's Haki (Haoshoku). Observation Haki (Kenbunshoku) not so much.

Music: Try though he may he has never managed to learn to play any instrument, which annoys him to absolutely no end because his mother was talented with several; but he has quite a lovely singing voice, and has penned a good few shanties in his time on the sea.

Affiliations/Relationships:

Helena Lionne (OC): His mother, who raised him more or less on her own. He was unaware she had been a pirate until he was around ten years old, when one of her old crewmates got a little too drunk and spilled the beans. She didn't want him to follow in her footsteps, but he ended up doing so anyway, stealing a sloop and a log posse from their island when he was twelve years old and setting out on his own. He's fiercely proud to call himself her son and took a variation of her surname rather than his father's.

Monkey D. Garp: The initial source of his hatred for Marines. Absolutely not his father and if anyone suggests it he WILL fight.

Monkey D. Dragon: Much older brother (more than ten years older), weren't close in their youth but have recently reconnected due to mutual interests.

Janx (OC): First mate, best frienemies, pretty much brothers. Janx probably never would have become a pirate if it hadn't been for Lyon. They bicker like an old married couple, but they also balance each other and they'd both lay their lives on the line for each other.

Sedna Lyon, nee. Beckman: The love of his life, his original first mate, briefly his wife, who died tragically amid a firefight with the Marines barely an hour after their daughter was born. They barely had two years together, but he still firmly believes they were soulmates, and he's never truly loved any other woman since he lost her.

Karimi Lionne (OC): His daughter and only child, who he hasn't seen in twenty years; left her in the care of his mother after she accidentally ate a devil fruit aboard his ship when she was three years old. Believes her to have died in the massacre that killed his mother and destroyed the village where he grew up.

Red Haired Shanks: Best friends in their youth, Shanks was essentially responsible for recruiting Lyon into Roger's crew. Hard to say which of them is actually older due to Lyon's tendency to lie about his age, but Shanks is definitely the older brother figure here since Lyon was such a gullible little shit. They set out together after Roger's execution, as allies rather than actual crewmates since they both intended to be captains, and parted ways as friends once they had both gathered enough crew to handle a ship.

Benn Beckman: First mate of the Red-Hair pirates, and also technically his brother-in-law. Benn still blames Lyon for the death of his younger sister and essentially hates his guts. Refers to him almost exclusively as Lyon D. Dipshit.

Buggy: Once a good friend aboard Roger's crew, but Lyon hasn't heard from him since they went their separate ways after Roger's execution. Buggy used to prank Lyon relentlessly when Lyon was younger and more gullible, but it was all in good fun. Mostly.

Hurricane pirates: Captain thereof, though presently disbanded for personal reasons.

Red-Hair pirates: Strong ally, though they haven't heard from him in nearly a decade

XxXxXxXXxXxXxXXxXxXxXXxXxXxXXxXxXxX

Aaaand now Janx (who I may or may not have named after the strongest liquor in the galaxy, a la Old Janx Spirit from Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy)

Age: 42

Appearance: (face claim, after literal years of not being sure, is Bruce Campbell c. ARMY OF DARKNESS, except bright blue hair. Voice claim as well. Basically just picture Ash with blue hair and that's our boy. Young face claim is Trent Ford for late teens-early twenties.)

Bright blue hair, slicked back from forehead and temples, not quite shoulder length. Big bright blue eyes that he has no problem using to get himself out of trouble. Clean shaved. Square jaw, square shoulders, trim build, about 6'3" height. Rarely seen without a shit-eating grin.

Tank top with black and white horizontal stripes, loose black pants with several pockets and belt loops to attach belts and guns.

The trope of characters being patted down and innumerable weapons being removed from their person is Janx in a nutshell. He never has less than six guns on him (two revolvers, two flintlock pistols, a rifle across his back, a sawed-off double barrel shotgun at his hip, probably a few knives in strategic locations, and a pair of brass knuckles for particularly sticky situations). Also has an altered gun holster at his belt where he carries a corked bottle of either liquor or some other flammable liquid, for use in making a quick molotov cocktail for distraction.

Personality: My beloved idiot, I haven't written him in literal years but he still lives rent free in my head twenty-four-seven. He's not very well read, and every other word out of his mouth is probably a profanity, but he's got enough street smarts and common sense to make up for it. There's no filter between his brain and his mouth. None, at all. I'd say he's a womanizer but that wouldn't be totally accurate, he's pan af. Basically if it can be fucked and is willing then he's going for it. There is absolutely no question that he has ADHD, with severe executive dysfunction. Everything is a chore, just let him vibe. Gives not one single iota of a fuck what anyone thinks of him. Eternally the life of the party. Cannot say no to a bet or a dare. Will start a bar brawl, throw a punch or two, and then quietly back out of it just to revel in the chaos he has created. Fiercely protective of his comrades and chosen family, especially his captain, and would lay his life on the line for any of them.

Abilities/Talents:

Firearms: Whether it's building them, maintenance, or shooting, he's your man. His father was proficient in carpentry and gunsmithing, and Janx took to the latter far more than the former. He could disassemble and rebuild any firearm put in front of him by the time he was eight years old. And shooting? You could throw a pebble in the air and he could shoot it down without batting an eye. Quick reload time even with flintlock weapons. If it uses gunpowder, he knows everything about it—and if he doesn't, give him five minutes and he'll be all but a certified expert.

Charisma/conning: He could sell ice to an Eskimo. He could convince you that he owns an entire island. He spent the better part of his formative years scamming people to make ends meet and he's turned it into an art form. If he had never become a pirate, he still would have been a successful conman.

Gunsmithing and carpentry: He had a fair knowledge of both from apprenticing under his father, but definitely more knowledge when it comes to gunsmithing. He can handle minor repairs around the ship, but not anything major. But when It comes to guns, he's the one to ask.

Chaos: If havoc need be wreaked, he's got it. He has a serious talent for it, is pretty much the embodiment of chaos. He absolutely revels in it, and if a distraction is needed, he has it handled.

Haki: Armament haki (Busoshoku), and even more adept with it than his captain; and fairly adept with Observation haki (Kenbunshoku), which goes hand in hand with his talents for both charisma and chaos.

Relationships/affiliations:

Lyon D. Rollo (OC): That's his captain, but that's also his lil bro. You fuck with him, you fuck with Janx, and you do not want to f with Janx.

Karimi Lionne (OC): That's his babygirl, basically his niece, see above for further instruction. If he considers someone family, you do NOT f with them. Would protect that child with his life, even if she does irritate the everloving hell out of him. Like Lyon, he is under the impression she lost her life along with her grandmother ten years ago, amid the massacre of Conch Cove.

Helena Lionne (OC): MILF. Does not care at all if it makes his captain uncomfortable, if he can bag The Siren then that's fucking bragging rights. Only actually met her once, when they made it to her island to take Karimi there, and he literally bowed down and pledged his undying loyalty on the spot. Helena did not help the situation by flirting right back, and Janx has spent the past two decades occasionally referring to his captain as "son" to get under his skin.

Monkey D. Garp: Government trash, no other opinions.

Monkey D. Dragon: Pretty cool dude, if a little intense.

Red-Haired Shanks: Also his bro, these two are not allowed to drink together unsupervised under any circumstances. Last time they did was over twenty years ago, around the time Janx joined up with Lyon, and it ended up resulting in Janx's first ever bounty because they decided it would be fun to incite a brawl in a primarily Marine tavern.

Benn Beckman: Considers Janx an absolute menace to society and is probably not wrong.

Buggy: Literally his younger brother, by blood. They haven't seen each other since Buggy was nine years old and Janx was thirteen or fourteen; they didn't part ways well. Janx still hated pirates at the time. Their father was killed by pirates, along with the majority of their hometown. They avoided death because Janx, at eight years old, convinced said pirates that they were children of a noble and worth taking for ransom. When said pirates learned otherwise, they were sold to a noble as servants, who treated them as less than human and had a tendency to punish them violently for insubordination. Janx ended up murdering the man at ten years old when one of said punishments nearly killed his younger brother, by smothering him in his sleep with a pillow, and then incited a riot among the other servants at the estate that allowed himself and Buggy to escape on a stolen brig without any notice and get as far away as possible. Janx remained fiercely opposed to pirates, used his skills in carpentry and conning to make ends meet for the two of them; but Buggy, having been much younger and not having any vivid memories of their father or their home, ended up being enticed into joining Roger's crew as a cabin boy/apprentice at around nine years old. Begged Janx to come with him but he refused, and the resulting argument between the brothers ended with them essentially disowning each other. Janx still regrets it almost three decades later, and still keeps an ear out for any news of his younger brother; he doubts there's any chance of making ammends at this point, but he would still to this day give his life to keep him safe.

[heaven-said]

{{ SO........ in honor of the holiday its time for sacrilege

Let's discuss the real world connection of the archangel Gabriel liking blood !!!! If you humor me with this tangent i will be very thankful--

TL;DR....... I adore the feral, primordial god madness just beneath a calm surface trope, and think Gabriel should be allowed a bit of that as a treat-- but also all this explains so much about him.

The long version--

Now, fair warning, logically speaking, the reason for a lot of the cultural dissonance i'm going to explain is because Gabriel is from an extremely old religion written by dozens of ancient people across hundreds of decades. BUT.... for fun, I love to justify these weird disjointed beliefs through a fictionalized lens from a character perspective.

So! Why associate Gabriel with blood, mythology wise? Gabriel, old testament creature that he is, has a lot of connections to blood sacrifices. Especially lambs. You know the lambs blood above the door thing as I've mentioned before-- very classic plagues story, love the dreamworks movie-- but also there was the lambs of atonement, which was a borderline routine live sacrifice in the old testament era, and vaguely the origin of the very concept of why something needs to die to atone for sins at all. Why do some people associate these with Gabriel? Well, despite not outright naming an angel for who declares the need for sacrifices, being both the Will of God and also the proclaimed "guardian" of the group of people who used to do this, it seems likely this was his job, personality speaking. Just as some people, as far as l've seen, assume Gabriel to be the angel that takes the first-borns in Egypt.

Now what's interesting to me!! is that lamb sacrifices quickly, in modernity at least, became associated with satanic worship! And from a character perspective I love the thought that what people are seeing is actually a general ritual, that ALL angels are capable of accepting the benefits of this kind of sacrifice. Its just that Lucifer continues to use it where as the angels nowadays are like " NOPE we don't do that shit anymore hush-- "

And culturally.... there is always this split where Gabriel almost abruptly stops being associated with scarier subjects and becomes very tied to just Christmas and being a messenger. And I feel like, in character, he deliberately changed how he presents himself when he stopped doing the blood thing and went on to be who delivered news of the immaculate birth that specifically is going to free him from doing it anymore. ( its all connected-- ) Maybe specifically because he didn't like the ritualistic mania that comes with the blood, not just in the mortals but himself....... ( my man has an "ecstasy" form for when he's happy about bloodshed,, )

But to ME ( in my heart ) this is so absolutely the root of why Gabriel can literally get drunk on blood. Why he falls in love through blood and viscera, why doing the exterminations in his Hazbin verse make him a little feral and unhinged.

This has all become my secret in-joke for why Gabriel likes deep red wine so much. Like its a substitute for when he gets the craving sometime. ( which is literally functionally the point of "subsituting" wine for jesus' blood ) When he is holding that wine I'm just like yup there's gently contained demi-god insanity somewhere deep in there-- }}

[marine-indie-gal]

Now before anyone dares to come up to Me and ask Me a simple question that I'll answer easily...Yes, I'm a Pegasister. 

I remember when back in my hey-days of the Golden Age of the early 2010s, I was completely obsessed with My Little Pony (being that it was one of my actual first fandoms alongside with TAWoG), mostly around with The Fourth Generation (Friendship is Magic). However, somewhere in my Pre-Teens, I remember discovering its actual history being that it was actually popular around in the 80s as a Toyline. Also, another thing that I remembered the times that as a young kid who is still a Pegasister to this day, I used to watch some G3 Movies and even that G3.5 Movie, "Twinkle Wish Adventure".

I have been seeing the recent generation (G5) that has been streaming on Netflix lately (only a little bit but not too much since I actually stopped watching FiM after Season 4 a long time ago as a kid and it turns out I completely missed out on everything ever since I felt done with MLP for a long time). Now that my Pegasister energy has been coming back to Me lately, I have been recently on a binge-watch to the actual very first generation around in the 80s (because I live for Old-Decade Classic Fantasy Nostalgia), Generation One.

In the First Generation to MLP, there were actually Human Characters in it despite that the first show itself actually really did had some Dark Moments which G4 and 5 brought some aspects from but I never really considered the first version of MLP to be that "Girly-Girl" since there were a lot of Fantasy Franchises with its epic dark moments in kids media.

Especially for an interesting fact that the Main Ponies (most notably the Mane 6) were actually based off of the First Ponies around in the 80s (Posey was an Actual MLP Character and main inspiration for Fluttershy before Posey even became her own character in G5). And even some of the characters (Applejack, Spike, Tirek, and Grogar) were actually a thing around in the 80s despite not including a lot of other characters that G4 brought some of the G1 characters in (Bray, Hydia, Hydia's Daughters (Draggle and Reeka), Catrina, Squirk, Lavan, Arabus, Zeb, Night Shade, Moochick, The Grundels, ect.) and of course, my most favorite characters from the First Series despite one of them that did make a cameo in Equestria Girls...The William Kids (Danny, Megan, and Molly).

After seeing some much interpretation of how that the First Human Children looked if they were to appear in the G4 Style, it was my turn to shine as I figured why not to my personal take on Megan Williams and her Siblings if they were actual characters in "Friendship is Magic" rather than have one of them be some kind of cameo-joke in one of its Modern Spinoffs.

My Little Pony (c) Hasbro G4 Interpretations of Danny, Megan, and Molly Williams (c) Me