#and not have like 4 or 5 existence in-universe that will disprove of that

[drenched-in-sunlight]

very opionated talk underneath the cut

this is what I get for keeping checking out the fandom tag, but oh well 😭

seeing the reasoning behind the “Marika and Godfrey would have been proud of Godrick for the grafting” take is so wild to me like… are we just going to ignore the fact that Nepheli - who is implied to be Godfrey’s descendants, said Godrick’s deeds “taint the very wind” and helped us beat his ass and it’s her who later becomes the rightful Lord of Stormveil ?

+ Roderika, who is thematically a reflection of the girl Marika was pre-Godhood, losing all her companions and being left alone scared shitless and heartbroken in a shack, blaming herself for not being strong enough, brave enough to go die with her friends, all because Godrick is making a mockery of Godfrey’s name and enacting the same tragedy that befell Marika’s people ?

Like, I can sorta see why people refuse to see the Living Jars in the Lands Between as Marika reclaiming a practice that was tainted by the Hornsent deeds, returning it into something done to honor the dead and let them be returned to the Erdtree to continue the cycle of life - death - rebirth (is scattering ashes of the deceased to the sea not a thing in many irl cultures anymore or am I going crazy), cuz if one has certain…views on her, it can be hard to see anything she does in a positive light (actually even if you don’t see it that way, equating jar innards made of dead warriors in a ritual to honour them with living ppl being cut up and forced to meld together as a form of torture is… a choice), but to completely ignore Nepheli and Roderika’s stories and their role in the narrative? 💀

Plus, where in the game is it even stated or implied that Godfrey being a battlefield maniac means he is ok with *read writing on hands* some guy sending his lackeys out to hunt Tarnished (Godfrey’s own warriors) and making them into unwilling extra limbs?

The guy that gives his all to fight the player by himself and compliments us on a battle well fought… will see honour in gaining strength via kidnapping ppl and stealing their strength, instead of fighting your own battles, honing your own skills and getting stronger on your own? Huh?

And even ignoring all that, Kenneth - a mere nobleman, not even demigod or anything, fr called Godrick a “jumped up country bumpkin” who fleed from Leyndell, holed up in Stormveil to hide from Radahn (why are we forgetting this…bro can’t even pass the Godfrey’s no.1 Stan vibe check) and then got beaten up by Malenia?

To add insult to injury, Godwyn’s body lying beneath Stormveil will literally stab anyone coming close to him (which is sth I have an interesting conversation with ppl on twitter about. there’s one person bringing up an interesting interpretation that Godrick probably took off with a relic of Godwyn’s body hoping to graft a piece of the Golden Prince onto himself, but Godwyn body was like “no” and infested the castle ground like a disapproving ghost 😭 but Godwyn is cool with us because he knows we have Marika’s sanction 😊).

Godrick… has no support whatsoever from Marika and Godfrey’s direct descendants, other than maybeeee Morgot who probably was only there to keep an eye on Stormveil - a place of importance to his dad and maybeeee a bit family pity for Godrick, definitely not because he’s proud of the stuffs Godrick is doing (he astral project there to scare us a bit then leave. We gonna kill Godrick? None of his business.).

And there’s also Godefroy who literally got locked up in a gaol… by a Leyndell Knight who later got the highest honour of Erdtree Burial after he passed away - specifically because of his feat in capturing Godefroy. Why are we forgetting Kristoff???

No one in Leyndell likes the Grafted guys, no one in Limgrave likes the Grafted guys, there are numerous items in-game expressing disappointment and sadness at the decline of the Golden Linage…. it’s a real damn no one likes you situation 😭

Then later on, Godrick got replaced by Nepheli.

So who are the ones being proud here ????

I’m not even a Godrick hater, I think he’s a fucked up, but compelling!, conclusion to the linage that Marika has with Godfrey - who is probably one of few people who actually knows what she used to go through.

I could even see the kind of pressure and struggle he must have gone through, humiliation after humiliation, hiding from and losing to Radagon’s children of all guys, carrying a legacy that is too big for him to handle. But to say that Marika and Godfrey would have been proud of him? Or that grafting is somehow a reclamation of the trauma Marika’s people went through and turning it into strength ????? He doesn’t even know that Marika was once not a God, let alone anything about her people’s suffering to reclaim anything ? That’s not his pain to reclaim ???

Someone else already did that. Marika herself. Rakshasa herself. You really do not have to give a man all the flowers for something women (who actually suffered and went through that trauma) already did.

[lone-gem-half]

Common interpretations and misinterpretations of Pink Steven

Hello. I am Lynn, a fictive of Pink Steven. As this is my identity, I have come to feel quite strongly about the fandom's various interpretations of him. I am here to discuss why I believe some of them to be untrue.

Seeing as Steven Universe is a work of fiction (as real as it may be to me), kindly refer to the Reddit comment below.

[ID: A Reddit comment saying "no you are fucking alive do what you want". /End ID]

I do not wish to offend nor police anyone's enjoyment—in fact, I have enjoyed works containing many of these "misconceptions" myself.

Interpretation #1 – Steven is still himself without his Gem.

I understand why this may be a first assumption. Even the title of the soundtrack, "Steven meets Pink Steven", may lead one towards it. I am unsure if this is what was meant by the creators; the intent of the scene, however, is for Steven to realize that he is and always has been himself, and having Pink Steven be a separate person only bearing his appearance would be contradictory.

Additionally, Steven is half human, half Gem. Part of his conciousness and sense of self reside in the gemstone—it would only make sense, as it is the nature of every Gem. Pink Steven is not a separate entity from Steven. Pink Steven is part of Steven in all senses.

Interpretation #2 – Pink Steven is emotionless.

The "She is gone" scene in itself disproves this.

Steven's powers are led by his emotions. It would be nonsensical for the part of him that bears his powers to be incapable of emotion.

He would not have been able to laugh along with his human half if he were incapable of emotion.

Interpretation #3 – Pink Steven is raw power.

I apologize for the bluntness, as I am struggling to word it otherwise: Rose Quartz/Pink Diamond did not give up her form and self to make room for "raw power". Pink Steven could be intepreted as having raw power. Pink Steven himself should not be reduced to it.

Interpretation #4 – Pink Steven's purpose is to protect his human half.

Once again, I understand where this may come from. Pink Steven's priority is to protect his human half. Pink Steven's desire is to protect his human half. It is not a purpose, however. A purpose is what typical Gems emerge with. Steven—and, by extension, Pink Steven—is not a typical Gem. Otherwise, Rose's sacrifice would have been in vain.

Interpretation #5 – The halves have always existed as separate entities in Steven's head—AKA Steven is a fusion in the typical sense.

This is one I particularly enjoy reading about, despite not believing it to be what is meant in canon. Steven's halves are much like a Gem's shards. They did not exist separately before White Diamond did the deed. They never should have been separate in the first place.

My interpretation—or rather, me.

I am one half of Steven Universe. The human half might seem like Steven at first glance—that is because he is more overt. As a simplified explanation, the human brain deals with daily functioning and the processing of emotions. The Gem "brain" deals with logic, the subconscious, and our powers.

Without the human brain, processing emotion becomes difficult. I struggle with identifying what I am feeling. I do not express it in a typical manner, rather through actions and aura, if not through manifestations of my power itself.

This is tied to the "rawness" of my power. Unfiltered, unprocessed emotion comes out in destructive ways. Without the human half to aid in navigating (Accidental fanfiction reference.), Pink Steven's emotions may destroy him. Both halves need each other to live.

Protecting the human half, in addition to self preservation instincts, is a choice and an act of self love. Emphasis on the latter.

In canon, it is most likely that Steven went back to being his whole self. In my AU, we remained internally separate after reuniting. I enjoy thinking and reading about both possibilities.

Conclusion + fic recommendations

Most of these concepts are fun to explore in their own ways. While I believe myself to be correct (and may selfishly act as if I have authority on it), I am not the boss of anyone's fandom experience. Refer to the Reddit comment mentioned previously.

I would like to highlight some of my favorite works of fanfiction to end this post.

The Heart of a Star by Hastilt – This is my top 1, although all others are in no particular order. I agree with most of, if not the entirety of this author's interpretation of Pink Steven. The work itself is incredible. Mind the content warnings.

Aid to Navigation by Ppleater – It has interesting takes on hybrid biology.

Crack the Paragon by Novantinuum – While not fully accurate to my interpretation, it is excellent and remarkably well written. I am eager to see what will happen in chapter 15.

Threadbare Divinity by Ghostigos – Short and sweet. Vivid in its description of the experience. Contains remarkable wordplay with second person pronouns. A close contender for the first place.

What Went Untold by Andovia212 – Steven describes the experience in White's Head from both halves' perspectives. It is very good to see.

He's Gone by citrusella – A very interesting play on its concept. Mind the content warnings.

This should be all I have for today. Please feel free to comment.

[tobiasdrake]

Episode 24: The Sigh of Haruhi Suzumiya, Part 5

Been dreading this one because I really liked the confrontation at the end of Part 4 and some individual scenes have been neat but for the most part this arc has been extremely gross.

Also, had to change the shady piracy website that I'm taking my screenshots from. We're watching the show on Crunchyroll but we have to do "Someone in the extended family has a subscription and we all share" shenanigans for all of our streaming services so nobody knows who had the Crunchyroll password and I can't get it on my computer.

Yuki has a cat now. I wonder if she'll get to keep it. I would love to see Yuki transition from stoic robot with no furnishings to stoic robot who is a cat person now.

Her apartment filled with just that one kotatsu and also a scratching post, cat tree, cat tunnel, and food dishes.

Sitting at the kotatsu with a book open on the table, reading with a cat in her lap. Petting its head mechanically; The same exact motion on repeat like a metronome. "Kitty," she says aloud in her emotionless monotone.

In any case, we got through this shooting session without more Mikuru grossness so I'm hoping Haruhi learned something from yesterday's meltdown and reconciliation. I mean, this is still happening:

But that's still gonna happen. Haruhi gonna Haruhi.

I just. Would really like to see character growth come out of this gross arc.

Shamisen is amazingly verbose and capable of a complex understanding of language.

I want to keep him. I desperately want to keep him. Can we keep him? Please tell me we get to keep him.

I will trade this character for him.

Aww, we're sending Shamisen with Kyon. That's a shame. I was all set for Cat Ladybot Yuki.

At this point, the only reason I feel confident that those guys aren't another Haruhi Thing (TM) is because that's not her genre. XD

Part of me thinks it's for the best that Haruhi doesn't read medieval fantasy and didn't make a world with dragons and shit. But then I remember that she did make a world with reality-bending data aliens. Being as sci-fi nerd isn't any better than a fantasy nerd in this regard.

Who's up for a religious schism!?

Mikuru offers a conflicting interpretation of Haruhi to what Itsuki's been saying. Itsuki believes that, in the event three years ago, Haruhi created the universe. That, essentially, all things in existence are only three years old. There is no past beyond that point, which meshes with something Mikuru told us early on.

It's impossible to travel back in time beyond three years from today, for reasons unknown. This would make sense if there is no past, as Itsuki speculated.

If the universe sprang into existence fully formed from the timequake three years ago then it would be impossible to travel beyond the timequake.

The computer bug came to our time from a parallel reality 208 million years ago, according to Yuki. In order for that to be true, there must have existed a period of time 208 million years ago.

This doesn't disprove Haruhi creating the universe in the timequake. She could have created time retroactively. But it does mean that the nonexistence of time beyond the timequake cannot be used as evidence to prove that Haruhi created the universe, because time does exist beyond the timequake. Mikuru's organization can't reach it, but the Data Integration Thought Entity's awareness can.

Which, itself, makes sense since it's already been established that the aliens have a better grasp of time than the time travelers do. In any case, it seems likely that the world existed before three years ago.

As Yuki clarifies, Mikuru instead believes that the world was always like this but Haruhi has the ability to discover strange and mysterious things. There were always aliens, but Haruhi's abilities simply drew them in, basically.

I don't think that's correct either. Kyon brings up that all of the espers spontaneously developed their abilities and awareness of Haruhi during The Event Three Years Ago, which is fairly significant proof that the world was altered. Yuki's counterpoint... sucks?

"Maybe he lied."

I mean, sure, but if we go down that rabbit hole then maybe Haruhi has no powers and Yuki's just been using her alien magic to fake all of it this whole time. Anyone can be lying about anything, Yuki. That's a bad argument.

Obviously something happened three years ago because all three of them agree on that. Yuki, Mikuru, and Itsuki have all independently testified that some fucking shit went down three years ago that brought them all here.

I've already made my argument against Itsuki's interpretation. A decisive argument against "The world was always like this" is Mikuru herself. You could say that the extradimensional bug always existed, and Haruhi's logo simply drew it to her. You could say that the Celestials are a natural phenomenon that are simply being stirred up by Haruhi's emotions. You could say that Shamisen is actually a talking cat because of reasons, that simply crossed Haruhi's path.

But Mikuru Beam is pretty hard to equivocate. Haruhi gave Mikuru the ability to shoot a photon laser out of her eye, which she did not previously possess. (The time loop also comes to mind.) So. No, Mikuru. The world was not always like this. Haruhi is doing shit.

The most plausible explanation is the alternative one that Itsuki first introduced. The one where Haruhi did not create the world but did remake it. Her power simply erupted one day and expanded across the universe like Devil Homura's Labyrinth.

I get the point they're making here about the complexity of belief. Like a proper religion, at the end of the day, it is difficult to draw any factual conclusions about the true esoteric nature of Haruhi Suzumiya. But I think, if you look deep enough, there are sufficient pieces to draw suppositional conclusions, at least - but those may vary from person to person.

We'll never truly know.

Okay, I'm loving the idea of Mikuru and Itsuki's factions being hostile to one another and the inter-group drama that such an idea would create. Especially since we all have to play Nice Happy Club Friends in front of Haruhi.

Religious schism and political intrigue in my slice-of-life show about goldfish scooping with the local cosmic horror? Yes please.

But I feel a little uncomfortable with the idea that *gestures at Mikuru* ALL OF THAT was stuff Mikuru went along with because she's trying to honeypot Kyon.

It feels like they're trying super hard to salvage what they've done with Mikuru and are instead making it worse.

That said, what I do like is that we didn't have any more gross Haruhi Molests Mikuru jokes in this whole episode. Itsuki's mad at Kyon for not fixing the "Haruhi's movie is warping reality" problem but I'm satisfied that Kyon and Haruhi's meltdown did result in changed behavior, at least for now.

She's still an asshole.

But at least she's backed off of the sexual harassment that these episodes had dialed up so high. So that's something.

Oh hey we're FINALLY having the lunch conversation that was promised all the way back in episode 6. Kyon's finally going to break the rules and leak everything to Haruhi.

And just like Yuki promised: Haruhi doesn't fucking care what you think, Kyon. In fact, she thinks you're making fun of her. Good job.

[jamesjbkim]

There is no direct relation between Jesus and radioactivity or the Big Bang theory. However, I can provide some context on how these concepts are sometimes discussed in relation to Christianity:

## Jesus and Radioactivity

Jesus lived long before the discovery of radioactivity, so there is no direct connection between them. Radioactivity is a natural phenomenon that has existed since the formation of the universe, including during Jesus' time on Earth, but it was unknown to people then.

## Jesus and the Big Bang Theory

The Big Bang theory describes the origin and evolution of the universe, but does not directly address religious figures like Jesus. However, some Christians have sought to reconcile the Big Bang with their faith:

- Some view the Big Bang as compatible with the creation account in Genesis, interpreting "Let there be light" as the moment of the Big Bang[1].

- The Big Bang theory was first proposed by Georges Lemaître, a Catholic priest and physicist, showing that science and faith are not necessarily in conflict[4].

- The theory's implication that the universe had a beginning has been seen by some as consistent with the idea of divine creation[1].

It's important to note that scientific theories like the Big Bang do not prove or disprove religious beliefs. They aim to explain natural phenomena based on observable evidence, while religious beliefs often deal with questions beyond the scope of scientific inquiry[2].

Sources

[1] [PDF] A Christian Physicist Examines the Big Bang Theory https://www.letu.edu/academics/arts-and-sciences/files/big-bang.pdf

[2] Does the Big Bang even disprove the existence of God? - Reddit https://www.reddit.com/r/Christianity/comments/17os86q/does_the_big_bang_even_disprove_the_existence_of/

[3] Does the Big Bang Require a Divine Creator? - MD Harris Institute https://mdharrismd.com/2012/07/02/does-the-big-bang-require-a-divine-creator/

[4] Georges Lemaître, the Scientist and Priest who "Could ... - BioLogos https://biologos.org/articles/georges-lemaitre-the-scientist-and-priest-who-could-conceive-the-beginning-of-the-universe

[5] The Big Bang? - Answers in Genesis https://answersingenesis.org/big-bang/the-big-bang-compatible/

[6] Christianity and science - The world - WJEC - BBC Bitesize - BBC https://www.bbc.co.uk/bitesize/guides/zqphw6f/revision/3

[7] The Big Bang Theory Explained - Learning RMPS https://learningrmps.com/2017/09/20/the-big-bang-theory-explained/

[8] The Bible and the Big Bang - Catholic Insight https://catholicinsight.com/the-bible-and-the-big-bang/

[lazodiac]

Part two! A lovely shade of...

BLUE

This adorable little guy is a native of Thunder Junction. You can also see him in that Homarid from part 1. Glad he got away from that awful lobster bastard.

This is explicitly a person of the Atiin entering Thunder Junction with her friends and family, so this is definitely an Atiin Plane card.

Additionally, since there's no evidence saying otherwise; I choose to believe this is the first group of Atiin to do so. This is why the plane has this aesthetic- it was their style. I imagine this'll be disproved the day we visit the Atiin plane and get an ACTUAL Native American themed set, but I digress.

Another Sphinx, but this time it's from Ravnica! It's hard to properly divine which sphinxes are from which plane since they're weirdly inconsistent on whether or not they're blue skinned or not, but the armor always tells- those are some Azorius orbs.

Ice magic is shockingly rare in the magic universe! There's no defining details of this particular spell but I'm choosing Kaldheim. It's got the vibe.

Another slick-shot, though in this case the gilding on his underjacket feels Kaladeshi to me? Poor sucker...

Another Outcaster, lassoing some poor pool out of existence, and another person who isn't really able to be identified unless I delve into "well racially this person looks X" and honestly that just feels distasteful, so I've been doing my best to avoid doing it.

Given this is a spell and not a person performing the spell, and the only other plane with rope tricks like this IS Thunder Junction, I'm safe saying this is a native bit of learned magic.

Blue mages are always doing shit like this but I've always felt this EXACT sort of cocksure attitude is the bread and butter of Tolarian mages, so she's from Dominaria.

This is the exact same effect that Aetherling had going on, so I'm gonna say Ravnica since Aetherling was from there.

Stop, thief! I can't really decide where she's from using art alone, so if we're thinking purely mechanically... she's another Dimir agent. Get out of here!

The make of this machine feels very Dominarian to me? Something about the chunky, blocky nature of it. I love how it uses twin Thunder lava-lamps for energy, that's fun.

Magic the Gathering's dedication to "no guns" meaning they have to justify Gatling guns by also making them crossbows is hilarious to me. As for this lady, I think she's from New Capenna. Just has the feeling, you know?

I somehow missed this card when I was looking through the commander decks on my own personal time??? This is incredible, I'd never considered we'd see a Dominarian djinn of all things but here we are looking at one. I love her.

And, finally, another native of Thunder Junction. Thank you you wibbly tailed Drake.

And that's it for all the base set and commander deck cards for Blue! Hope you all enjoyed, please tell me your thoughts/yell at me about who wrong I am below, and thank you for indulging this silliness. End Totals for Blue are...

BLUE

Atiin Plane 2

Arcavios 1

Amonkhet 1

Bloomburrow 2

Dominaria 4

Innistrad 2

Ravnica 6

Kaladesh 1

Kaldheim 1

Kamigawa 1

New Capenna 5

Oko's Plane 2

Tarkir 1

Theros 1

Thunder Junction 10

Vryn 1

Zendikar 1

Zhalfir 1

It's time again to look at Thunder Junction's cards and try and divine where each and every one of these bad boys are from.

Also just a note in case people are curious; since Tumblr has a 30 image limit per post, I'll be doing all of The Big Score at the end, after all the colours and stuff. It's my prerogative and I'll do as I please. If you missed the first part, you can find it here! So without further ado, it is time for...

BLUE

While I don't think EVERY mount is from Thunder Junction Proper... newts ARE a creature that shows up in the west. I was initially thinking this could be for Eldraine, especially given it belongs to an archmage, but... ultimately, I think this is a native to the plane.

Another native, and dare I say this is a CHARISMATIC crab. I love the crystals on its back! I also love the blue cacti nearby it? Those are real by the way!

There aren't many turtle-men in Magic. Three, in fact, before this one; the Lagoon Sage, a Quandrix student, and a Kappa from Kamigawa. The Kappa has a VERY distinct look, the Quandrix is a sea turtle, and the Lagoon Sage is a snapper just like the Thunder-Thief over here... and I'm gonna make a called shot and say this is from Bloomburrow as a result!

Homarid are a Dominaria specialty, so this racist bastard is absolutely from there.

Djinn of this type are only found on Tarkir, so this one is easy. He's taken a break from his dragon-infested plane to relax under a waterfall martial artist style, and that's just kinda fun.

This is a tricky one, since the ability is pretty plane agnostic, and the design doesn't evoke much in it... but her collar DOES have the typical three-fang Dimir tell, and it'd fit both colour and what she's doing, so lets go with Ravnica.

Sadly a cursory Wiki glance tells me only that this guy is from America.

... okay okay, taking this seriously; the wings and the scroll and the steps, the name, all the flavour suggests this is from Amonkhet for me. It could be from elsewhere, but this feels the most "correct" for lack of a better term. I wish cards like this would get flavor text reprints down the line though...

These are some home-grown ghosts, and we know from various other stories (Gideon, Elspeth, etc) that when you die you go to the afterlife of the plane you're on... so these are some newly "born" natives.

These unfortunate individuals are from the dead plane of Oregon.

... what? I already used that joke? Okay fine. There really isn't any actual signifiers here, and the only humanoid in the art is too indistinct to tell. Given the content of the card is trying and failing to ford one of Thunder Junction's mighty rivers, I'm calling this card "native to the plane" for lack of anything else appropriate.

Oh hey it's everyone's favorite running gag from Ravnica. Fblthp is an easy one, so instead of elaborating more on our mono-eyed friend instead I'll bring up a question I want any of you reading this to answer.

Didn't they say during the initial preview teasers that there was an important plot event happening in the background of this card? That never bore fruit and I can't remember the exact preview stream I heard it, but I swear I did. I want someone to confirm this for me. I'm abusing my power.

Regrettably, the flavor text makes this spell be sourced from Oko's Home Plane. I do love this weird tumbleweed creature though!

God I hate Oko he's such a scum bag (derogatory).

A personal favorite character of mine, Geralf is an Innistradi born and raised, here to investigate the Thunder of the plane- as well as test how mana bonds work for planebound folk now that they have access to planar travel. Good luck, sir.

An obvious native of the plane. I quite like the flavor of this card as well by the way, it's just a clever way to incorporate the geysers you would occasionally see in the old west.

Another Thunder Junction native! It's wild how many of these there actually are, but wild animals do make up a bulk of cards in Magic so it's not THAT unreasonable.

Fun lore tidbit; allegedly the Thunder only started after the Omenpaths opened up. No one has lived here before that so no one can confirm that is true, and this flavor text suggests otherwise.

One of the only cards showcasing the least important members of Oko's gang of ruffians! Kaervek and Satoru busting out of jail thanks to the help of Annie Flash. The framing of the card makes it feel more like Kaervek's doing the real world (valid, Satoru is a loser this entire story) so I'm gonna call it for Zhalfir here- and yes even though technically everyone from Zhalfir is from Dominaria, it's a plane all its own now. I make the rules here!

The Fomorian made star-key to open up their vault on Thunder Junction, I feel like it is safe to say this was made here. It's got little arcs of Thunder and even looks like a deputy star, so it fits the vibe.

Fun fact; being a six pointed star, plus the fact that in the story they mentioned the sixth slot started glowing purple, I briefly had the idea that they might be implying the Fomorian's know of Purple magic and we'll get it in the big Space set we're getting down the line. Then I remembered Cosmium is purple and a major energy source for the Fomorion people, so nevermind.

I can't confidently say this is from Bloomburrow, given we don't know how big the people of that plane can get- so far they've maxed out at Badger and Fox- but I really don't know where this guy could be from otherwise! Maybe Ravnica? So lets call this Bloomburrow until corrected otherwise.

Incidentally this is one of my favorite pieces of art in the set. Love this fucking guy.

Beyond all the art signifiers, I believe it was straight up said on twitter this is a Therosian Sphinx, so she's from Theros. Good for her. Why is she wearing spurs...?

I'm fairly confident this is meant to depict Stella Lee, and she's from the Atiin people, so that's where this is from! Rundo meanwhile sounds like a Ravnica, but that's just some trivia.

This one I'm not fully sure on. The little bird like flecks of white in his magic, the watery energy... I feel like I've seen it somewhere before, but I can't quite place it. The red and blue suggests Izzet but then he's a Slickshot, the red-blue faction on Thunder Junction. I'm gonna go with my gut and say Ravnica, though.

Shit like this is why I wish we'd gotten a planeswalker guide...

Blue, so far, has some of the most easy and obvious ones to place, and for this I'm thankfully. This guy is a Stitcher, so he's from Innistrad. Easy as.

She's got some of the Sterling Company aesthetic going on, but I'm a stickler for stupid jokes so I'm gonna say she's from Zendikar. The armor could evoke Sea Gate, and they've always been good with ropes so why NOT translate that to combat?

Like with the earlier ghosts, dead-then-revived means you're native to Thunder Junction... but also this guy is clearly an Obscura from New Capenna, using some of his old magic, so I'mma call it for the big city here.

Oko's big bad gang preparing for the heist of the life-time. Since it's Oko's big idea it's from Oko's stupid plan.

The sort of misty blasts of fire and ice we're seeing here is aesthetically similar to the "gunfire" magic of New Capenna. I love this guy by the way.

Hey wait a second Ashiok can't do stuff like this. They can only read nightmares, not minds!

YEah for those of you who don't know, the Ashiok in this set is actually Jace in disguise! So this is from home-grown celtic Vryn mind-shredding. Our hero(?) ladies and gentlehommes.

An actual Sterling Company goon, though at least this one has a funny joke to his card. I still really like the work they did in making sure every weapon used in the set has the needed arcing loop for Thunder to channel through it.

Oh right the reason why we're here. I'm gonna say New Capenna again, because there's basically no defining traits here. Also god I just realized he's missing the front brim of his hat and it looks terrible. Graywater pay your men properly they can't even afford complete hats!

It took me a bit to realize what was happening in this card. The lady in the back is only choosing the final Spree option here, swapping around the Outcaster and the Hellspur's clothing. Rude!

Clothing swap spells seems like a funny prank to pull at magical college, so Arcavios is where this is going.

I think in cases where I just cannot make any reasonable assumptions based on art, I should look at mechanics. Flashback is usually in Innistrad... but this lady's neckline is WAY too exposed for that Even accounting for the new plane... honestly I give up, the only real identifying factor here is her little lockpick device, which... kinda looks Kamigawan? Lets go with that.

The vibe, the way she wears her hat, and the little phone cord(?) on her belt makes me think of New Capenna. Look some of these are really difficult and I gotta go by vibes!

And that's the 30 card limit, give me a half second for part two!

[gordonthesquid]

Vampire and Werewolves 😁💚

Vampires and Werewolves. Fact or Fiction, you ask.

I mean. Most cryptids and legends come from some aspect of truth. So there's no way to really know, is there? 😉 I can believe there are things out there we don't understand. And as a scientist myself, the thing about asking "does this exist?" ...well how do you really disprove that when everything we already understand about the world continues to change and evolve? What exactly is sufficient proof needed to disprove the possibility of an existence? I saw LIFE on Europa. Who would've anticipated that 100 years ago?

Speaking of.... The most awesome scientific explorers in the Universe - the Pendergasts, have you heard of them? Well they have a show called Into the Unknown. I am preeeetty sure it was season 4 or 5 when they did their first vampire episode. Plus there's the one on the chupacabra in season 7.

So, to answer: I like to keep my mind open, but likely both are born from some semblance of fact though certainly not how we've popularized the concepts today.

Still fun though. Maybe one day I'll be able to fulfill my lifelong dream of being a were-squid.

[bibliophileiz]

I want to get my Winchesters theory on the record before it probably gets disproved next week or in the finale.

So in a nutshell my theory is that the akrida are a byproduct of postseason 15 jack trying to remake the universes chuck destroyed in the final season. They can bleed through cracks in time bc of weird universe-making rules existing outside of time or something. We know Robbie Thompson's into messing with time and also I miss when doctor who was good. So something-something time's already screwed a little anyway so jack sends back some time traveling angels to just ... Drop little hints to the humans in like hieroglyphics or the dead sea scrolls or whatever about how to deal with these aliens from independence day. His version of the angel/demon/leviathan tablets. That's how you end up with secret supernatural-studying societies like the mol beating back the akrida throughout history even though there is literally no mention of them ever doing that in spn and in fact their whole thing is non-involvement anyway (except during WWII I guess, which is fair). That way there's not supernatural beings DOING THINGS that they haven't already been established doing and the groups that would be into this stuff anyway just have like, another thing to be into, so instead of killing just vampires they're killing vampires AND akrida. But what about when abbadon wipes out the mol Dean asks jack. Jack is like, idk, maybe Rufus can take care of it. And dean's like I know a hunter. And Jack's like no. And dean's like you killed my mom. And Jack's like ok but they can't know who you are. And so Dean goes down to earth on what is supposed to be a temporary trip to tip John off and then hangs around because when has Dean EVER done what an all-powerful supernatural entity told him to do?

Here are some things in the show that don't NOT support this theory

1. Dean's voice over in the pilot makes a point that the akrida aren't just a threat to earth but a threat to "the entire universe". Which is interesting bc dean knows chuck is going to wipe out all the other worlds in the universe in like 50 years, so what's a few decades give or take?

2. Obviously there's some time travel going on bc dean is hanging around. But it's ANOTHER LEVEL OF TIME TRAVEL to summon the future ghost of someone who is not yet dead, as they do with Henry Winchester.

3. idk how that last one actually supports my theory, it's just super weird and I find it fascinating.

4. The akrida existing are the only thing bringing John, Mary, Carlos, and Lata together, suggesting they may not have all been pals in the original timeline, which means Carlos and Lata don't necessarily die young and tragic like the rest of Mary's friends. This isn't really evidence, just a nice thought and another reason I like my theory.

5. I feel like I had more evidence than this but I can't think of any more

Basically I just think this theory is a good way to make Winchesters take place in another universe without making it ANOTHER UNIVERSE where it's not our John and Mary, the parents of our Sam and Dean. Probably chuck and jack will still have to show up and do some memory erasure of John or something to keep the future timeline from being too messed up though.

[douchebagbrainwaves]

YOUR EMPLOYEES AND INVESTORS WILL CONSTANTLY BE ASKING ARE WE THERE YET

I think I've figured out what's going on. After the first 10 or so we learned to treat deals as background processes that we should ignore till they terminated.1 Don't Get Your Hopes Up. Something hacked together means something that barely solves the problem, the harder it is to bait the hook with prestige. And that is almost certainly mistaken. So one thing that falls just short of the standard, I think, should be the highest goal for the marginal. Big companies think the function of office space is to express rank. As big companies' oligopolies became less secure, they were willing to pay a premium for labor. You can see it in old photos. If you're friends with a lot of the worst kinds of projects are the death of a thousand cuts. And what's especially dangerous is that many happen at your computer.

And the microcomputer business ended up being Apple vs Microsoft. In 1450 it was filled with the kind of turbulent and ambitious people you find now in America. You have to like what they do there than how much they can get the most done. That's not what makes startups worth the trouble. Design This kind of metric would allow us to compare different languages, but that if someone wanted to design a language explicitly to disprove this hyphothesis, they could probably do it. This technique can be generalized to: What's the best thing you could be doing, not just what you can see the results in any town in America. With this amount of money can change a startup's funding situation completely. There I found a copy of The Atlantic. Whereas it's easy to get sucked into working longer than you expected at the money job.2 That's ok. I think you have to do all three. But more importantly, you'll get into the habit of doing things well.

But what if the person in the next 40 years will bring us some wonderful things.3 They all know about the VCs who rejected Google. The writing of essays used to be.4 You may have read on Slashdot how he made his own Segway.5 He improvises: if someone appears in front of him, he runs around them; if someone tries to grab him, he spins out of their grip; he'll even run in the wrong place, anything might happen. The people who've worked for a few months I realized that what I'd been unconsciously hoping to find there was back in the place I'd just left. It was supposed to be something else, they ended up being Apple vs Microsoft. By 2012 that number was 18 years. The first thing you need is to be willing to look like a fool.6 Google they have a fair amount of data to go on. John Malkovich where the nerdy hero encounters a very attractive, sophisticated woman.

Many of the big companies were roll-ups that didn't have clear founders.7 Empirically, the way to the bed and breakfast, and other similar classes of accommodations, you get to hit a few difficult problems over the net at someone, you learn pretty quickly how hard they hit them anyway. Inexperienced founders make the same mistake as the people who list at ABNB, they list elsewhere too I am not negative on this one was the only way to get lots of referrals is to invest in students, not professors. It will actually become a reasonable strategy or a more reasonable strategy to suspect everything new.8 Never say we're passionate or our product is great. Whereas undergraduate admissions seem to be disappointments early on, when they're just a couple guys in an apartment. Programmers at Yahoo wouldn't have asked that.9 Incidentally, this scale might be helpful in deciding what to study in college. VCs think they're playing a zero sum game.

I spend most of my time writing essays lately. Almost everyone's initial plan is broken. If smaller source code is the purpose of comparing languages, because they come closest of any group I know to embodying it. Distracting is, similarly, desirable at the wrong time. But if we make kids work on dull stuff now is so they can get away with atrocious customer service. In fact, here there was a kid playing basketball? Of course, figuring out what you like.

Go out of your way to bring it up e. The industry term here is conversion. Try to keep the sense of wonder you had about programming at age 14. At least if you start a startup, people treat you as if you're unemployed.10 But hacking is like writing. Even with us working to make things happen the way they used to, they were moving to a cheaper apartment. It causes you to work not on what you like, but is disastrously lacking in others. I do in the rest of the world. Their defining quality is probably that they really love to program.

I could only figure out what to do, there's a natural tendency to stop looking.11 Economies of scale ruled the day.12 One is that this is simply the founders' living expenses.13 I need to transfer a file or edit a web page, and I think I know what is meant by readability, and I think they're onto something. Multiply this times several hundred, and I get an uneasy feeling when I look at my bookshelves. You may have read on Slashdot how he made his own Segway.14 Everyday life gives you no practice in this. Startups grow up around universities because universities bring together promising young people and make them work on anything they don't want to want, we consider technological progress good.

Notes

Samuel Johnson said no man but a blockhead ever wrote except for money. Which is precisely my point. If they were regarded as 'just' even after the egalitarian pressures of World War II the tax codes were so new that the guys running Digg are especially sneaky, but except for money. They don't know enough about the new top story.

The image shows us, they tended to make money. But we invest in the Bible is Pride goeth before destruction, and one of the fake leading the fake leading the fake. In No Logo, Naomi Klein says that 15-20% of the aircraft is.

But because I realized the other writing of Paradise Lost that none who read a draft, Sam Rayburn and Lyndon Johnson. If they agreed among themselves never to do due diligence for an investor? The best technique I've found for dealing with the other.

I ordered a large number of startups as they do for a public event, you can ignore. If you want to help the company, and a few of the Facebook that might produce the next Apple, maybe the corp dev is to show growth graphs at either stage, investors decide whether to go to die.

If you walk into a big company CEOs in 2002 was 3.

Or rather, where w is will and d discipline. But that turned out the existing shareholders, including that Florence was then the richest country in the sense of mission.

In Shakespeare's own time, because they can't afford to. The company may not be able to raise their kids in a company in Germany. When we got to see the apples, they said, and why it's next to impossible to write an essay about it wrong. That will in many cases be an open booth.

I'm not saying you should probably be worth trying to tell them exactly what constitutes research in the early 90s when they say they bear no blame for any particular truths you'll learn. As Jeremy Siegel points out that there is undeniably a grim satisfaction in hunting down certain sorts of bugs. Did you know about it as if you'd invested at a discount of 30% means when it was actually a great programmer doesn't merely do the right direction to be is represented by Milton.

But a lot of the next round. It's hard to say exactly what your body is telling you. In Russia they just kill you, they tend to be very unhealthy. One thing that drives most people realize, because you have two choices, choose the harder.

Though Balzac made a lot of classic abstract expressionism is doodling of this essay talks about programmers, but one by one they die and their houses are transformed by developers into McMansions and sold to VPs of Bus Dev. Or rather, where it sometimes causes investors to act. Eric Raymond says the best hackers want to trick admissions officers. And no, unfortunately, I mean efforts to protect widows and orphans from crooked investment schemes; people with a truly feudal economy, you better be sure you do in proper essays.

The top VCs thus have a better education. Or a phone, IM, email, Web, games, books, newspapers, or some vague thing like that. You need to fix. But the question is not much to maintain their percentage.

Kant. Loosely speaking. The real decline seems to them to lose elections. Some types of startups where the recipe is to say incendiary things, they can grow the acquisition offers most successful founders still get rich simply by being energetic and unscrupulous, but they get for free.

World War II to the frightening lies told by older siblings. That's one of the most general truths. As we walked in, we found they used it to get into that because a unless your last funding round.

But this seems an odd idea.

Thanks to Jessica Livingston, Shiro Kawai, Garry Tan, Chris Small, and Nikhil Nirmel for sharing their expertise on this topic.

[outoutdamnspark]

OC Thoughts: Kana (& Osuke)

- Kana likes flowers, too, but not in the same way Reina does; rather than being interested in plants as a whole (with the ones used for food and medicine being their own separate thing), Kana just enjoys how pretty flowers are, and the romantic connotations they can have. She likes their aesthetic, the way they smell, the colors, the different ones that bloom in different seasons - one of her favorite things to do on summer evenings is sit and watch wildflowers in the breeze. Her favorites are daisies, clover, and sunflowers. (She’s always wanted to participate in Hanami, but never got the chance before Hoopa sent her to Hisui.)

- Her Murkrow, Buddy, was her late husband Osuke’s partner. ‘Buddy’ wasn’t his name originally, but Kana kept calling him “little buddy” when he followed her around, and it stuck.

- Unlike Reina, Kana does like to sing. Not as much as Hina, but Kana enjoys humming and singing to herself, or signing little lullabies or soft things to whomever is beside her while she embroiders or watches the sunset. Her (new) voice claim is Sharon den Adel from Within Temptation. 

- In addition to making her own sort-of makeup and perfume, Kana loves to embroider while in Hisui. It calms her head and gives her hands something to do while she sits and relaxes - plus it makes pretty things! A lot of her hair accessories are embroidered or knotted, and she’s been known to give them as gifts or to sell or trade them. Her Diamond clan tunic and leggings are embroidered with a jolteon, a gyarados, a murkrow, and a wartortle. She’s working on the rest of her team.

- She’s a strong swimmer and a nimble tree-climber; Osuke was a hunter and a forager, and so taught her how to climb and track and swim and forage.

- Despite the rest of the clan picking at them for it, Kana and Osuke never had any plans for children. They were both very good with children, and they agreed that maybe one day they’d want their own, but it wasn’t high on the priority list.

- Osuke was orphaned at an early age, and while he was raised by the whole clan essentially, he grew up feeling like he didn’t quite belong in any one place. As a result of this and his profession as a forager/hunter, he lived a little ways away from the village and came to visit several times a week. When Kana fell, he took her in and they bonded over feeling like (or being) outsiders. Osuke got some disproving looks, but he told the busybodies to shove off and nothing really ever came of it.

- They’d both known Adaman since he was young. (Younger Adaman had a puppy crush on Kana for about a year.)

- Kana was two years older than Osuke. They knew each other for 5 years as companions after he brought her into the Diamond Clan; then he courted her for a year before they were married. They were together for another 6 years before he was killed in a pokemon attack at the age of 28. The murkrow embroidery on Kana’s leggings is part of a pair that she made; the other one was on Osuke’s tunic. She wanted to keep his and sew it on next to her own so she’d have part of him with her, but she broke down when she realized taking it would mean he wouldn’t have a piece of her; she left it where it was so he wouldn’t be alone. (It’s around 3 or 4 years later that Kana and a certain Pearl Clan warden start dancing around one another.)

(Made using this Picrew)

- (There’s an AU, thank you Peach! in which a parallel timeline exists where Kana died and Osuke lived. In the AU, the timelines get connected, and Parallel Osuke falls into Kana’s universe, reuniting them. He chooses to go back to present day with her when Akari gets them all sent back home.)

- (Maybe if it’s far enough along, there could even be a linear polycule with Warden Ingo, with both men forming a friendship and Kana having two husbands? Who knows! Haven’t thought that far ahead yet!)

[9worldstales]

MCU The Avengers - How did the fandom came to believe Loki was tortured by Thanos? (aka when God, Saint Paul and Dante seem to say the same thing)

Everyone has probably heard how there are people who say that, after falling into the Void at the end of “Thor”, Loki was tortured by Thanos and then sent to Earth. Of course every time this story comes up there’s a debate because this is not explicitly shown and some say it’s just a theory (word of Dante), some say someone involved with the work said so (word of Saint Paul) and some says the creators, be it Marvel or Joss Whedon or another director/scriptwriter said so (word of God).

Well, the truth is a collective chat about the three.

But first...

SOURCES MENTIONED:

Movies: “The Avengers” (2012), “Guardians of the Galaxy” (2014), “Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2″ (2017), “Avengers: Infinity War”

Series: “Loki” (2021)

Comics: None mentioned

Direct-to-video animated film: None mentioned

Motion comics: None mentioned

Books: “The art of The Avengers” (2012)

Novels: “Marvel Cinematic Universe Phase One: The Avengers” (2015)

Webs: The official Marvel web

Others: Interview: “‘Thor: The Dark World’: Tom Hiddleston on boom times for evildoers”, Interview: “Tom Hiddleston - live on stage Q&A: Popcorn Tax.i October 8, 2013, Event Cinemas George Street, Sydney”, Interview: “Tom Hiddleston THE AVENGERS Set Visit Interview”, Interview: “Joss Whedon told Comic-Con the question he doesn’t want us to ask ever again”, Interview: ‘Avengers: Infinity War’ director explains why a major death had to happen so early in the movie, Script: “The Avengers”, Interview: Secrets Revealed in Joss Whedon’s Avengers DVD Commentary

Let’s start with...

WORD OF DANTE (aka fancanons)

Undoubtedly fans noticed some suspicious things in Loki which has brought them to draw certain conclusions.

1) At the end of “Thor”, when he control Selvig, his face seems to be bruised, as if he had been beaten. It’s easy for fans to assume if he seems to be beaten maybe... well, he was?

2) When he arrives, in “The Avengers”, in some scenes he seems unsteady on his feet and in poor shape as if he’d been beaten and, in one scene, he seems unable to stand straight. Same as above, Loki will prove through the movie he’s very resistant. If something made him unsteady on his feet... well, this can mean someone beaten him.

3) The Other threatens him and keeps him under surveillance, as if he’s controlling him somehow, both during the movie and in a deleted scene, which seems to imply Loki is working under coercion more than willingly.

THE OTHER: You will have your war, Asgardian. If you fail, if the Tesseract is kept from us, there will be no realm, no barren moon, no crevice where he can’t find you. You think you know pain? He will make you long for something as sweet as pain. [The Avengers]

4) Some wondered if Loki could have ended up being possessed as well by the sceptre as the sceptre could control minds.

5) Some noticed how Loki’s eyes appear as blue in “The Avengers”, a characteristic of the possessed guys, while in “Thor” they seem to be green was a hint Loki was possessed, same as Selvig and Barton.

6) Some wondered if Thanos might have tortured him to force him to cooperate as Thanos is known for having tortured people working under him. We saw him torturing Nebula in both “Avengers: Infinity War” and “Avengers: Endgame” and we also have those bits:

Gamora: He’s not my father. When Thanos took my home world, he killed my parents in front of me. He tortured me, turned me into a weapon. [Guardians of the Galaxy]

Nebula: You were the one who wanted to win. And I just wanted a sister! You were all I had. But you were the one who needed to win. Thanos pulled my eye from my head… and my brain from my skull… and my arm from my body… because of you. [Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2]

Gamora: All my life, I dreamed of a day... a moment when you would get what you deserved. And I was always so disappointed. But now... you kill and torture... and you call it mercy. The universe has judged you. You asked it for a prize, and it told you no. You failed. And do you wanna know why? Because you love nothing. No one. [Avengers: Infinity War]

7) Others assumed that, if Thanos didn’t do it personally, another of his children could have done it for him. We saw Ebony Maw torturing Stange in order to get the stone for Thanos.

Ebony Maw: You’ll only wish you were dead. [Avengers: Infinity War]

8) Since Thanos was willing to kill Rohan should he fail to bring back to him the orb, Thanos would have killed Loki if he hadn’t brought back the Tesseract so Loki was working for him under coercion.

Thanos: I shall honour our agreement, Kree. If you bring me the Orb. But return to me again empty-handed... ...and I will bathe the stairways in your blood. [Guardians of the Galaxy]

Ebony Maw: In all the time I’ve served Thanos, I’ve never failed him. If I were to reach our rendezvous on Titan with the Time Stone still attached to your vaguely irritating person, there would be... judgement. [Avengers: Infinity War]

9) Loki’s willing cooperation wasn’t needed if Thanos had the feeling Loki could do it. He had blackmailed Gamora into giving him the location of the soul stone and he had killed Tivan to get the reality stone.

World of Dante is, as usual, very charming but if not supported by anything else it can’t ascend to canon. This doesn’t mean it’s false unless Word of God ends up stating the opposite, but this doesn’t mean it’s true either. Just possible but unproved.

So is there someone else that’s a little stronger than fan theories?

Enter...

WORD OF SAINT PAUL (aka what Tom Hiddleston says)

For start that he has blue eyes and, from the way he speak, apparently he was never made wear green eye contacts.

Loki is a sexy villain, but that’s not part of his ambition, is it? He doesn’t seem to be interested in love or sex but he has this sexuality about him, maybe it’s his lust for power. What do you think of Loki as a sexy beast? [Laughs] That’s the first time anyone has ever used that phrase about Loki. It’s fascinating isn’t it? I don’t know because it’s not a part of the conscious construction. I take relish in playing him. I think there’s a physical self-possession about him, a self-acceptance. Of course I’ve been very exacting about his physicality. You know, I was born with very blonde, curly hair, and a mixture of Scottish and English genes, and my complexion is very ruddy and healthy. In making him with this raven black hair and blanching my face of all colour, it changes my features. Suddenly my blue eyes look a lot bluer, which lends a severity to my face. And even my own smile has a distorted menace to it. Whatever comes through me naturally is distorted. It’s almost like a filter on a light. [‘Thor: The Dark World’: Tom Hiddleston on boom times for evildoers]

This disproves Fan theory point number 5. You might have noticed though that the theory about Loki being possessed by the sceptre is point 4. You’ll see later why I hadn’t placed those two points together.

And now let’s see what he has to say about what happened between “Thor” and “The Avengers.

In your opinion, what happen to Loki when he fell in to the void? Like, what did he experienced? HIDDLESTON: “You mean at the end of Thor?” “Yeah.” HIDDLESTON: “I think he went like with everything else to… Joss Whedon and I discussed it, to a sort of… hum… as… It was like the worst place imaginable. I think, he went to sort of all of the darkest recesses of the Universe, you know. I’m sure he had a brush with… with... with... several brushes with death. I think he ran into the shadiest characters you can find in the Nine Realms. I think he had to rely on his wits to protect himself. Hum… It was really, really, really unpleasant, I think. Umm… and all I have to, you know, I don’t have any frame of reference for that, really, except for imagining what it might be like to be… I don’t know, to be kidnapped by sort of a terrorist cell or something. And have to survive very very frightening and precarious existence. But whatever it was, it was important when Loki came back for the Avengers. Whatever compassion he had left, was absolutely kind a shrivelled to a minimum. Because of the experience he had. Harrowing, I think, and scarring for life. In a way that Odin and Thor, and Frigga find very, very difficult to understand. It’s a good question. Happy Birthday.” [Tom Hiddleston - live on stage Q&A: Popcorn Tax.i October 8, 2013, Event Cinemas George Street, Sydney]

How different is Loki in this film when compared to how he is in Thor? I think that he comes into his own power at the end of Thor. Is he just very angry and bitter in this film? HIDDLESTON: Well, what can I say here? I swear to you that in that building over there, there are sniper rifles. [laughs] I think that what was interesting about the journey of Loki in Thor is that he went from second string and damaged prints to being the God of mischief and God of evil. I think somewhere between the end of Thor and the beginning of The Avengers, Loki has been to the Marvel equivalent of the 7th circle of hell. At the end of Thor you see him let go. He lets go of the spear, he lets go of Asgard, and he lets go of the need of his brother and father’s affection and approval. He has bigger plans now. [Tom Hiddleston THE AVENGERS Set Visit Interview]

HIDDLESTON: “At the end of Thor, Loki lets go of that spear and falls into a wormhole,” Hiddleston said. “And the question in the audience’s mind, one hopes, is what happens to Loki in that moment? And in the time between the end of Thor and the beginning of The Avengers, Loki has explored the shadowy highways and byways of the universe – and he’s met some terrible, terrible people and probably has some awful experiences, which he has survived and overcome. So by the time he arrives in The Avengers, he knows the extents of his power – and he’s unafraid to use it. And more importantly, he’s unafraid to enjoy it.” [The Art of The Avengers]

There’s actually more but I think I’ll stop here.

Overall Tom Hiddleston seems to be a big supporter of something terrible happening to Loki, something equivalent to being ‘to the Marvel equivalent of the 7th circle of hell’* evidently at the hands of someone, the ‘shadiest characters you can find in the Nine Realms’, ‘some terrible, terrible people’.

Basically he says ‘I don’t have any frame of reference for that, really, except for imagining what it might be like to be… I don’t know, to be kidnapped by sort of a terrorist cell or something. And have to survive very very frightening and precarious existence.’

[*7th circle of hell: For who’s curious the 7th circle of hell in Dante Alighieri’s Divina Commedia is where are punished those who had committed violence against others and against themselves (suicides). Loki committed both sins. For Dante people who committed violence against people is immersed in a river of boiling blood with centaurs shooting arrows at those who try to escape while suicides are transformed into bushes and trees, gnarled and thorny, fed upon by the Harpies for all time. Likely that’s not what was done to him but anyway that’s not a nice place to be.]

Yes, Tom Hiddleston never said it was Thanos and his men who ‘kidnapped Loki and put him through the equivalent of the 7th circle of hell’. He’s very vague on this but we now Tom Hiddleston is careful not to give information which could constitute spoilers.

He also never mentions Loki being mind controlled as far as I know.

So we need an even higher source.

We need...

WORD OF GOD, or, in this case the WORD OF GODS, plural, because in the Marvel world there’s plenty of people who can claim authorship for the stories of those characters.

Whedon avoided speculating about his future plans, claiming he had too much on his plate to think about what will come next, but he did reveal that he’s bothered by a bit of unresolved backstory for Loki. At the end of Thor, Loki was emotional conflicted, but at the beginning of Avengers, he’s a demented villain, with no qualms about unleashing alien hell on Earth. Asked about how happened in between, Whedon said: “Well, I can’t tell you exactly what went on because it’s this dark, dark secret that I didn’t make up yet. But, the other day, I had trouble with that because he had this very passionate Shakespearean tragedy thing going on in Thor and then I needed a villain who’s not only capable, but ready and willing and anxious to take on all these heroes. For me, he just basically went on some horrible walkabout… That was pretty much as far as I got.” [Joss Whedon told Comic-Con the question he doesn’t want us to ask ever again]

God confirms what Tom Hiddleston said, Loki went through something terrible... but he had no idea what because he still had to work on it. He didn’t want to establish what. But, as I said, Marvel has plenty of Gods willing to talk.

After Loki fell in the wormhole... where did he fell?

Arriving at the Sanctuary through a wormhole caused by the Bifrost, Loki met the Other, ruler of the ancient race of extraterrestrials the Chitauri, and Thanos. Offering the God of Mischief dominion over his brother’s favorite realm Earth, Thanos requested the Tesseract in return. Gifted with a Sceptre that acted as a mind control device, Loki would be able to influence others. Unbeknownst to him, the Sceptre was also influencing him, fueling his hatred over his brother Thor and the inhabitants of Earth. [MARVERL official web]

So no, after falling into the wormhole Loki didn’t go on a touristic trip through the universe, met someone bad unrelated to Thanos, changed and then met up with Thanos.

He straight out ended up at the Sanctuary and met with the Other who worked for Thanos.

Yes, they don’t say he got tortured in this bit but they confirm the sceptre was influencing him, ‘fueling his hatred over his brother Thor and the inhabitants of Earth’.

There’s some more that comes from Joe Russo and Stephen McFeely.

If you’ve watched every movie in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, you shouldn’t have been too surprised Thanos killed Loki. His death has been a long time coming since 2012’s “Avengers.” You may not recall, but it was Loki’s job in “Avengers” to secure the Tesseract and deliver it to Thanos. Loki never made good on that promise. It was only a matter of time before Thanos came after him to collect. Co-director Joe Russo says Thanos ultimately murders Loki “for disobedience.” “Remember, he [Thanos] had a relationship with Loki, even if it was off-screen where he entrusted him with a duty in ‘Avengers 1’ and Loki failed,” pointed out “Infinity War” screenwriter Stephen McFeely. “He’s [Thanos] making him [Loki] pay,” added Joe Russo. “Thanos has a long memory,” McFeely concluded. [‘Avengers: Infinity War’ director explains why a major death had to happen so early in the movie]

And then... then there’s something that’s even above World of God.

So finally we have...

CANON, aka what the movies say, and they say the weirdest canon lines in this regard if I can say so.

Thanos: [Walks over and drops Loki’s body in front of Thor.] No resurrections this time. [Avengers: Infinity War]

Loki: Is that the only reason you brought us here? To kill us? I’ve lost track of the number of times I’ve been killed, so go ahead. Do your worst. [Loki Ep 4]

How all this translates? (aka Word of Dante comes back because God and Saint Paul are just too obscure and canon is no better)

If Loki after falling into the wormhole ended up straight to the Sanctuary, the ones who played the part of the terrorists and lead him to an experience similar to ending in the 7th circle of hell where he had many brushes with death where either Thanos or his men.

Do your pick if the Other took care of it personally, if Thanos did the job or if he let the pleasure to Ebony Maw and what they did to him, if they forced him to fight with others same as Gamora and Nebula where forced to do, with the loser also losing a body part or if they just beat him.

The fact that Loki, in the “Loki” series say he has been killed so many times he lost count and that Thanos in “Avengers: Infinity War” says there will be no resurrection this time seem to be connected.

That Loki as far as we know only attempted suicide by letting himself fall in a wormhole once, and Thanos couldn’t know Loki was given up for dead in Svartalfheim so the idea that Loki was killed many time and that Thanos know he had been resurrected should be connected.

How? That’s beyong my understanding as, as far as I know, no one in Thanos’ group has resurrecting powers. Can the mind stone do it? This would open up another theory.

As for the sceptre controlling him ‘fuelling his hatred over his brother Thor and the inhabitants of Earth’ what does that mean?

That he’s clearly not completely brainwashed as Selvig and Hawkeye.

So which is his level of brainwashing?

Very likely it’s at the same level as the one of the Avengers when they are in the same room and start arguing and the discussion degenerates to the point they seemed about to go at each other while the gem in the sceptre starts to glow, which is something both the script and the novelization reference...

[As the “team” argues, they don’t realize the BLUE GEM on Loki’s sceptre is glowing brightly.] [“The Avengers” Script]

None of them noticed when the gem set into Loki’s sceptre started to glow. [“Marvel Cinematic Universe Phase One: The Avengers”]

...and that the visual remark, turning the scene upside down as the gem is in full focus.

The novelization describes them as arguing without even knowing exactly what they’re arguing about.

Tony and Cap squared off over an argument that they couldn’t remember starting. Tony was still mad about the last thing Cap had said to him... whatever it was. [“Marvel Cinematic Universe Phase One: The Avengers”]

We also see Bruce picking up the sceptre without realizing, something that’s referenced both by the script and the novel.

BANNER: You wanna know my secret, Agent Romanoff? You wanna know how I stay calm? [BLACK WIDOW and Fury have their hands down to grab their guns.] STEVE: Doctor Banner... put down the sceptre. [BANNER LOOKS DOWN AND IS SHOCKED TO SEE HE’S HOLDING LOKI’S SCEPTRE. The computer beeps. They all turn to it.] [“The Avengers” Script]

“Dr. Banner,” Cap said. “Put down the sceptre.” Bruce looked down. He hadn’t even known he’d picked it up. He looked back up and saw Natasha’s hand on her sidearm. Fury was also ready to draw. The others were drawing back from him as well. Even though he could see what was going on, the hostility in the air was still tick enough that Bruce didn’t know wherever he could back everyone down... or wherever he could back himself down. He could feel the tension rising inside him. He could feel the monster trying to get loose. [“Marvel Cinematic Universe Phase One: The Avengers”]

The implication is that the sceptre is influencing them, pulling out their worst feelings and competitively and whatever which matches with what it did with Loki, it fuelled his hate.

It’s interesting how, when Loki arrives on Earth, the gem is glowing...

Also, the stranger held a kind of spear in his right hand. Set into its head, a gem glowed the same icy blue as the energy that had spilled from the Tesseract. [“Marvel Cinematic Universe Phase One: The Avengers”]

...and he also looks at the sceptre as if he hadn’t realized having it in his hand.

“Sir,” Fury called as armoured S.H.I.E.L.D. agents closed nearer, “Please put down the spear.” The man looked at the sceptre as if he had only just noticed he had it. Then, slowly, he looked back up at Fury, and a vicious smile spread across his face. [“Marvel Cinematic Universe Phase One: The Avengers”]

It’s worth to mention though, in that scene in which the Avengers argue, none of the Avengers has his eyes turning blue, although they weren’t themselves any longer.

So, it’s possible this is the distinction, Clint and Selvig have completely lost their will and are subjugated to Loki’s will, and as a result they’ve the blue eyes, Loki and the Avengers instead only had their mind warped by increasing exponentially their negative feelings to the point they might have started losing focus of the situation and only operate on negative feelings... if that’s make sense. They’re still themselves but their perception is warped so they’re acting in a way that’s not normal for them.

On another note it seems that in Joss Whedon’s Avengers DVD Commentary he said that

Hawkeye’s blue “possessed eyes” were added in post very late in the game, to make it more obvious that he and Eric Selvig were under Loki’s influence. [Secrets Revealed in Joss Whedon’s Avengers DVD Commentary]

This means that originally they weren’t meant to turn blue.

In the novel there’s no mention of it, in the script they’re described just as glowing black and then nothing more.

LOKI: You have heart. [Loki places the tip of the spear against Barton’s chest. Barton’s eye glow black, and he stops resisting. Loki begins controlling other agents around the room. Fury sneak up, grabs the Tesseract, and places it in a briefcase, trying to sneak out.] [“The Avengers” Script]

In the movie instead they turn all black for a moment and then settle on blue.

It’s an unnatural blue though, where Loki’s normal.

But again, this too is a fan explanation. A fan explanation based on canon, but still a fan explanation since God didn’t bother to explain further and at this point I’m afraid he’s not even interested in explaining it since the “Loki” series could have dug on this and instead expressed 0 interest in digging into the past movies.

Sometimes we’ve just to accept that fan theories are all we have and that we can like or dislike them.

And that’s all. Thank you to who remained till the end of this long post!

[annebrontesrequiem]

CLAMP Timeline BS: How xxxHolic and CCS are Connected

Major spoilers for xxxHolic, TRC, and minor-ish spoilers for Cardcaptor Sakura and Cardcaptor Sakura Clear Card

Also it long

Backstory

Cardcaptor Sakura run: 1996-2000

xxxHolic run: 2003-2011

Clear Card run: 2016-present

What I have read: The entirety of xxxHolic

What I have watched: The entirety of Cardcaptor Sakura, the entirety of Cardcaptor Sakura Clear Card, xxxHolic season 1

 Crackpot Theory Time

So I got the idea for this after seeing some post somewhere (I’ll try to look for the post later) something along the lines of “maybe Sakura in Clear Card will be so powerful she’ll be able to influence the TRC universe/help the members of the CLAMP universe.” Then I started thinking about how, though there have been many posts on the TRC/xxxHolic timeline, I haven’t seen an xxxHolic/CCS timeline. I’m sure it exists somewhere, but since I’ve got my own theories I’m not writing one myself.

This is less of a timeline and more of a “how are they connected”, basically I’m going to be going back through the anime and the manga and saying whether I think CCS and xxxHolic take place in the same universe, and whether or not they’re taking place at the same time.

Let’s start with the most stuff (and apologies the manga scans are ones I made myself so if they’re kinda wonky that’s why)

Also one day I’ll update this when I actually read TRC (lol)s.

Also some of these are a bit crazy.

 Plot Points

Since xxxHolic came second it’s unsurprising that the majority of the things I’m going to be discussing comes from this series. So I’m going to start by framing this around xxxHolic, dipping inThis is going to be a bit all over the place but since I’m focusing on a specific chapter it shouldn’t be too confusing.

1.      In Chapter 2 of xxxHolic we see the most references to Cardcaptor Sakura. Namely Watanuki and Yuuko have an argument about the plastic replica of the Clow Key that Yuuko owns.

2.      Now the version that Yuuko has is the first iteration of the key. That means that when Yuuko acquired it (whenever she did) it was most likely during the first part of Cardcaptor Sakura (although yes I understand in meta it’s because it’s the most iconic iteration). Then again the key has been around for a long time, as it’s the original iteration. It’s possible that Yuuko got a copy of it from Clow, or some point before Sakura got hold of it. Although that’d most likely have to be before Kero fell asleep for 30 years, and before the cards got into the Kinomoto house.

3.      Another thing to note is that Yuuko only has a prop version. Although you might use this to say CCS is a show in this version, it’s pretty obvious that this is just for a gag. Considering the fact Watanuki doesn’t recognize it, there’s little chance that CCS is a beloved kid’s show in the xxxHolic universe.

4.      This is further proven by Yuuko’s words: “…The one who owns the original now is the creep’s [Clow’s] blood relation, a cute young girl.” This is probably the best indicator that CCS is taking place at the same time of xxxHolic. Although it’s possible that CCS takes place in an alternate world/universe, that also seems unlikely. Although Yuuko never seems tied to the shop in the way Watanuki is in the latter half, there’s also (in xxxHolic) no proof that she’s jumping around worlds. Besides, it seems unlikely she’d bring it up to Watanuki in the present-tense if that were the case. Thus we can pretty safely say that Sakura is both alive and still a little kid in the xxxHolic world.

5.      Now the most confusing part in regards to the CCS/xxxHolic timeline is Watanuki’s existence himself. In Chapter 11 Watanuki and Yuuko go to see a fortune teller. During said interaction the fortune teller explicitly states: “Your parents have safely passed into the afterlife” after noting that they died in an accident. Now this could cause some issues, as we know not only that Watanuki’s parents are Sakura and Syaoran (from what I know it’s specifically their clone versions but again I haven’t read TRC so I could be wrong). This could point to two things, either A. This is just a lie or something that CLAMP retconned later, or B. Sakura and Syaoran are dead. Assuming that this isn’t just a retcon or a sort of lie (since Sakura and Syaoran clone’s weren’t actually dead at this point, I’m pretty sure in TRC they don’t even know about Tsubasa Li yet) we could explain this via Eriol. Eriol is confirmed to be the reincarnation of Clow Reed. As of such if we assume that there was another Sakura and Syaoran running around in this world (plz god no), then the accident which caused their death doesn’t actually mean that CCS happened way earlier. It just means that they might’ve reincarnated.

Random Exposition

I’m just going to be talking about technology and geography here

1.      Firstly I had to go back and check and unfortunately the name of Watanuki’s school doesn’t match with the name of Sakura’s school (or rather her brother’s old school). Cross Private School has nothing to do with Tomoeda. Although that could actually further point to them existing in the same timeline, since if they lived in the same place it’d be weird if they never ran into one another.

2.      Tomoeda is said to be close to Tokyo. In fact in the second season we see Sakura and the gang taking the train to Tokyo. Watanuki obviously lives in a city, or a very dense suburb, and in Chapter 5 he mentions that Ginza would take hours to walk to. Having lived in a very dense city myself once (Paris I miss you baby) I know that walking from one side of the other could theoretically take hours. Though I’m not sure how large Tokyo is and I have no real sense of distance, I’d guess that Watanuki lives either in some made up part of Tokyo, or in the suburbs directly connected to the city. As famous landmarks are never mentioned, it could be either or. He could even be from a neighboring city theoretically, although then it’d prolly take much longer to walk to Ginza.

3.      Lastly I want to talk about technology. In Cardcaptor Sakura Clear Card we can clearly see that this is meant to take place in modern times, as Sakura has upgraded to an iphone, in keeping with the time. This definitely disproves CCS coming before xxxHolic, as nothing in xxxHolic suggests it takes place in the future. I also think that there’s no way xxxHolic comes before CCS for any real period of time, after all in Volume 1 there are many chapters dedicated to the woman who cannot stop using the internet. This too points to me that xxxHolic and CCS are running in conjunction to one another, or are at least only a few years off.

Conclusion

So this is all very crackpot and weird, but I do think it’s interesting to ponder. As that forum post said Clear Card definitely seems to be upping the scale of Cardcaptor Sakura, the magic is greater, the stakes seem higher, and characters such as Yuna D. Kaito point towards a storyline that seems more tonally in tandem with the greater CLAMP extended universe, as really ratcheted up by xxxHolic and TRC.

You could make the argument that CCS and xxxHolic are from different universes, though considering what I’ve written and read I don’t think you can argue that they’re utterly disconnected. Overall I’m still missing a huge piece of the puzzle, that being TRC as well as the rest of the Clear Card chapters. One day I’ll prolly remake this post, but until then I hope you enjoyed!

[ryukyuan-sunflower]

Even in spite of the time period of the show Fuu is considered in the present time, by us, by the law to be a minor.... Anyway, she's still mentally and physically a child; you're just creepy.

First, you ask a loaded question, of “Can I ask why you ship it? Isn’t Fuu a minor, and Mugen is 19.” when you were not looking for an actual response. It seemed you were looking for an opening to attack.

If you don’t agree with me, that’s fine. But it is clear you do not have the mental capacity to see outside of your own emotions on the subject, because you resorted to name-calling of “creepy” after I bothered to put in the effort to explain myself to you, logically and historically in this essay here: Link for anyone else interested in reading it.

But I doubt you read more than a paragraph of it. Otherwise, you would have seen then that I wrote about how the shipping of Fuu when she’s 15 is not about sexuality, but about the intimate and emotional love the two bore for each other in the anime. 

And, you would have read how Mugen as a character is then just as morally flawed as any shipper because, your belief in his feelings aside, he:

1. makes a joke of raping her in Ep 2.

2. asks her to show him her breasts in Ep 11.

3. asks Jin what he thinks of her “man to man” in ep 12.

4. admits to liking and then kisses a girl younger than her that looks identical to her in the videogame.

So sure. Alright. I’m creepy in your mind. I’ve been called better. I’ve been called worse. But I hope for your own mental state that you do not like or idolize Mugen as a character.

Also... Sure, you can argue that Fuu is mentally a child, though I disagree. Why would a child be wandering Japan alone, taking care of herself or traveling with two grown men? 

But I must disprove your argument of Fuu being physically a child. Many girls actually stop physically developing a year or two after puberty. I personally, stopped developing at 13. 

The average height of a Japanese woman today is 5″1. 70 years ago, it was 4″9.

Fuu is canonically 158cm. 5″2. Above average of the modern, and of 70 years ago.

As for the average weight, it is not given. But, she does not seem that far off from adult Japanese women. The average modern weight of Japanese women is between 116lb and 117lb. This is far below their western counterparts if you’re assuming Fuu is unnaturally “tiny” or “thin”.

She’s also shown having very wide hips, which is the universal indicator of a woman’s femininity, as it is for the purpose of childbearing.

Argue all you want, but bringing in physicality is not sufficient enough to say Fuu is a child. If your basis of Fuu having the physicality of a child is just assuming a woman with a smaller chest size is therefore not physically a grown woman, then that is offensive to petite women.

 If I’m creepy for shipping an emotional romance, well, the official creators are creepy for making this her main art in the Roman Album, emphasizing her hips, and buttocks.

If you’re going to call anyone creepy, maybe you should direct your resentment at the creators of Samurai Champloo, or perhaps the entire anime genre as a whole. 

How many people own body pillows and figurines, a lot of which is OFFICIAL, of underaged characters such as Yoko from Gurren Langan who is 14? Or Rei and Asuka from Evangelion who are also 14?

I’m not justifying nor criticizing these examples. Not really a fan of these characters. I just ship a cute romance of Mugen x Fuu.

Personally, I just don’t think you should embarrass yourself trying to take a moral high ground if you like an anime that completely defies your moral view of the world. You have ignored the Japanese culture of the past and present, the evidence I’ve provided, and the artistic value of the show.

But I’m glad, regardless that you “asked” what you asked. I got to make a logically sound, and deeply personal post that others got to read and enjoy and agree with. 

I have nothing to hide and am not afraid of the “controversy”. I love the love between the characters. Not some sexual relationship that didn’t exist in the show. I love this anime, and have made content for and got to talk with dozens of other Fuugen shippers who have praised my posts and have asked me to make more. 

So, thank you. Thank you for being you and taking the time to send me a message. I am also happy you remained anonymous... It is better than having a bunch of shippers overloading you with hateful comments and disagreements.

And I hope that in these troubled times we live in of 2020/2021, when there are far greater issues to worry about than a girl on the internet shipping an implied canon ship that many others also ship, that you and your family stay safe and happy.

Please be happy and positive, and please don’t let some “creepy” shipper on the internet get to you so badly. There are far worse monsters in the world you can be directing your energy on.

[snowdice]

Gaps in His Files (Part 8) [Relabeled; Refiled Series]

Fandom: Sanders Sides

Relationships: Logan/Patton

Characters:

Main: Logan, Patton

Appear: Remy, Virgil (but only in the epilogue)

Summary:

Logan Berry has learned many things the last 10 years: a lot of math and physics, a bit of humility, and how to be a hero being just a few. Through his education, his experience teaching, and his exploits as the superhero Bluebird, he’s changed in a lot of small and large ways. He has recorded these changes in well-organized documents and files. He’s even had to create two new file designations: a red one for files about his moonlighting at Bluebird, and a light blue one dedicated to his boyfriend, Patton.

When Bluebird is targeted by a memory device and all of those 10 years of progress suddenly disappear, Patton Sanders and Logan’s extensive files are left as his only resource to get those memories back. But what is Patton supposed to do when there are clear gaps in his files? And what does he do when he is one of them?

This is set 25 years before Sometimes Labels Fail though it’s story is completely independent of it and it is not necessary to read that one first.

Notes: Superhero AU, memory loss, past child abuse, past child neglect, unhealthy ideas about ones place in relationships, emotional suppression, self-deprecating thoughts, medical procedures mentioned, very brief unhealthy views of sex

Part 1 Part 2 Part 3 Part 4 Part 5 Part 6 Part 7

Erm. Logan says a few not so nice things about people who struggle academically which are very wrong. I think from context it is clear that the author doesn’t agree with it. As a teacher I do not endorse his statement and in the missing 10 years he’s learned the lesson for himself... he’s just a very dumb smart high school kid. That being said, I thought I might warn you all especially with the fact that people might be in the middle of finals and a little emotionally vulnerable to that one.

Patton spent most of the morning getting Logan familiar with his red files while also asking him subtle questions about his real opinions on things. The mention of the crying thing did sting a bit even though Patton already knew it made Logan uncomfortable. Patton knew that from the beginning, but he’d still let Logan force himself to try to help when Patton was upset.

God, Patton was a bad person.

After he’d helped Logan get a good feel of the newer files, they started brainstorming about how best to work on recovering his memories over lunch.

Patton had thought they were on the same page, that being they were going to read through the pages in his files hoping he’d remember something in them. However, now he was doing that finger tapping thing on the table while he chewed slowly on his sandwich.

“What?” Patton finally asked.

Logan had clearly been waiting to share because there was no pause before his response. “Have you heard of Blight?” Logan asked, casually, as though that were not a name that made most of the population shudder when they heard it.

“This is nothing like that,” Patton said firmly before he continued with that line of thought.

“Why couldn’t it be?” he asked with a curious head tilt.

“Because… because it’s not,” Patton said.

“Do you have any evidence that it isn’t? Just because it was a device instead of a superpower does not mean it is not the same methodology.”

“It’s just not,” Patton said, “It can’t be.”

“Why?” Logan asked again.

“Because none of them recovered,” Patton tried not to snap.

Logan hummed. “Ah. That seems like an emotionally charged conclusion.”

“Can we please just not talk about it?” Patton implored, turning back to his lunch even though he wasn’t hungry anymore. There were a few moments of silence.

“Did you know,” Logan started, and Patton sighed, “that Blight was on record as having telekinesis before she revealed herself as a Mind Warper? People say she must have implanted false memories in her victims, but if she really was then it would be evidence of-”

“The Monofacultas Theory,” Patton finished for him.

Logan gave him a startled look. “You know it?”

“I’ve known you for over three years Logan and while I agree that the theory is interesting and feasible, there are no known cases of someone having a set of powers that span more than one of the Tri-divisions.”

“If Blight had telekinesis there is. She would have had a physical power as well as a mental one. Witnesses said…”

“She tore the minds of an entire city apart at the seams and restructured them to her desire. Excuse me if I don’t trust the validity of those mind’s statements especially when they have been disproved by video evidence.”

“Just because she didn’t use telekinesis for that one situation caught on video doesn’t mean she couldn’t.”

“Fine,” Patton said. “Say you’re right. Why does it matter?”

“Well I have telekinesis.”

“So, you want to… move your memories back into place?”

“Basically, yes.”

“With your telekinesis?”

“Well, brains are ultimately physical objects.”

“And you are going to not simply give yourself a stroke because…?” Logan shrugged. “Absolutely not Logan.”

“It would be interesting,” Logan said, eyes alight. “I could prove that powers are not truly divided into physical, metal, or energy powers but are originally one singular power that develops due to circumstance during early childhood.”

“If your brain doesn’t literally explode because you don’t know what you’re doing.”

“All science has risk.”

“No, Logan.”

He gave him the look that Patton was not allowed to call a pout.

“Can we at least try some less extreme methods of memory recovery before the theoretical methods with no hard evidence? Like continuing to read your files to try to jog your memory naturally as we had discussed.”

“Fine,” he agreed, looking downtrodden. Patton really hoped he got his memory back before he got too restless and tried something like that.

“If you’re finished eating, we should get back to reading,” Patton said. Patton was certainly finished with his lunch.

The afternoon went well without any major disasters or talk about dangerous methods to get memories back. Logan had not remembered anything, but he’d been calm and patiently started sorting through his files in chronological order. Then, when Patton left him alone for a moment to go to the bathroom, he somehow managed to find his daily planner from where Patton had hidden under a blanket in the front hall closet.

“It’s fine,” Patton insisted from the couch, watching him pace back and forth and wringing his hands. “I called your advisor and told him you wouldn’t be able to meet with him because you were sick.”

Logan frowned at him. “You shouldn’t’ have done that. I could have gone. I don’t want to appear irresponsible by skipping meetings.”

“He wanted to talk about your research. You would have had no idea what he was talking about,” Patton reasoned.

“I would have managed.”

“Logan,” Patton said patiently. “Your research area is partial differential equations. Do you even know what those are?”

Patton could tell by the look on his face that he had no idea. Yet he still stuck his nose up in the air. “I know what a differential is, and I know what an equation is. I am sure I can figure out how to do parts of them.”

“You haven’t even taken multivariate calculus.”

“It can’t be that hard.”

“It is,” Patton groaned, “It is hard.”

“Perhaps for you,” he said hotly.

“No,” Patton ground out. “For you. The 28-year-old you spends hours a week trying to understand these things and he has a bachelor’s degree and almost 6 years of graduate education under his belt. You are in high school.” Logan just gave him a withering glare and turned his attention back to the planner.

“I’m supposed to teach two courses tomorrow,” he said.

“Oh, absolutely not,” Patton said.

“I have a responsibility rather or not I have my memories.”

“Logan, listen to me. You have not graduated high school. You cannot teach a calculus class.”

Logan bristled. “I took calculus last year and got an A.”

Patton had to take a steadying breath. “That is not the same as teaching it.”

“It can’t be that hard. I will simply explain the information to them.”

“And when one of them asks you how to add two fractions?”

Logan’s eyebrows crinkled. “That is a basic skill. I am sure anyone in a college calculus course can do that easily.”

“You have clearly never taught a day in your life.”

Logan bristled. “Any adult who cannot add fractions should immediately be kicked out of university and returned to kindergarten where they belong.”

Patton looked at him for a moment hoping perhaps he would figure out on his own why what he just said was completely out of line. He just kept his jaw stubbornly firm. Patton took a breath. “And that is why you cannot go and teach these students.”

Logan scoffed. “I am not sure why my future self would put up with such things.”

“Because you almost failed your real analysis course,” Patton answered in a heartbeat. “Your first semester of teaching, you were also taking a first-year graduate real analysis course and you couldn’t understand a word of measure theory. It was the first time in your life that you had to work for a C. One day you looked at your students and came to the realization that the look on their faces when you tried to explain the product rule to them was likely the same expression your professor saw on yours when he tried to explain the existence of non-measurable sets. We all have our strengths and weaknesses and if we let someone else draw the line for stupid, there is every chance we’d end up on the wrong side of it. So,” Patton said crossing his arms, “I am not going to let you go ruin your own reputation with your students as a teacher who is not an asshole because you’ve not had to toe your own line yet.”

Logan met his eyes, clearly wanting to argue, but Patton just kept his face strict and his arms crossed. Logan’s face cleared suspiciously quickly, and he backed down. “Fine,” he agreed. “I will stay here.”

“Good,” Patton replied eyeing him. “Now put down the planner and let’s go back to work.”

Want to read more? Use the links below!

AO3 Part 9

My Masterpost 

[official-transsexual]

Hey, do you have some relevant sources that disprove brain sex handy? I saw some cowards reblogging a thing that had 30 separate links to brain sex studies, and I was looking to close their case

So, first of all, I want to clear up a misconception I see a lot- I’m not actually interested in “debunking brain sex” in general. I mean, neuroscientists are still trying to figure out how they should even define brain sex, never mind having anything concrete to prove or disprove its existence. My concerns with brain sex research have to do with the way truscum & other groups (mis)use studies on this subject to support claims that are not in evidence, generally because those claims are outside the scope of what those studies were capable of measuring. For truscum, these claims tend to be that 1) brain sex research proves that real trans people are born with brains that don’t match our bodies and that 2) this proves that all trans people experience dysphoria, which I’ve seen justified in turn with the claim that 3) having a “male brain” or “female brain” necessarily means having ~the~ neurological body map associated with that sex.

Second, before jumping in to debunk lists like that, I always recommend that you take a moment and ask yourself who you’re debunking it for. Whose mind are you hoping to change? If it’s the creator of the list, you might as well save your energy. On the other hand, if your aim is to help readers who haven’t learned how to read a study judge the validity of sources that are presented to them, you only really need to get far enough through the list to cast doubt on that posts’ trustworthiness ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Now, on to debunking truscum claims about brain sex!

I have a couple of general sources in my FAQ, and I recommend looking into neuroplasticity research (here’s a paper that might be useful) but when it comes to lists like the one you’re talking about, the best refutations often come from within the papers themselves.

I know there’s a doc floating around that goes through a list of sources truscum like to link one by one & explains why they don’t support the claims truscum are making, but I don’t have the link on-hand, and honestly this feels like a good excuse to go over how I read studies to test for truscum claims about how brain sex relates to dysphoria. What I’m going to describe is basically an adapted version of how I did my first read-through of studies I was thinking of using while writing papers as a university student. Keep in mind, this only applies to studies; editorials/opinion pieces by experts in the field need to be approached differently.

Don’t even bother with news articles, non-academic media is notoriously bad at presenting brain sex research accurately. Make sure you’re looking at the full-text version of the paper (you can check for access to the journal through your school or a local library, search for a copy on google scholar, email the author asking if they’d be able to send you a copy to help with your own research, or download it from sci-hub if need be), & look at the scope and limitations of the study. If something feels off about the paper, run it through google scholar and check the “cited by” for red flags like critical responses, or a high rate of endorsements from dubious sources. Don’t worry too much about the names of specific molecules/structures/processes on your first read, even if you’re familiar with the jargon; you can get into that later, but right now you just want to know 1) who was included in the study, 2) what they were looking for, 3) what they *actually* found, 4) what they *think* it might mean, and 5) the limitations of the study.

If the answer to 1 is just cis people, the paper is *probably* not relevant. Again, not arguing against the concept of brain sex in general, just the claim(s) that brain sex research proves that trans people all experience dysphoria because of neurological maps. If you can’t figure out any point of relevance at all, you might just want to skip to point 5.

If the study actually includes trans people, look at how they selected the sample. These papers are generally more relevant, but they can’t necessarily be said to be a representative sample of trans people. Studies that don’t include non-dysphoric trans people are not evidence to draw conclusions about that group.

Once you’ve confirmed that a paper is in some way relevant to the subject of trans neurotypes, start looking at points 2 to 4. I can’t even count how many times I’ve seen someone cite a study claiming it proves a point, only to read the paper itself and see that the authors were actually suggesting a potential area of future study, or even just explaining their starting hypotheses. Some authors will lay these points out neatly, but for the ones who bury “maybes” in paragraphs of jargon, it helps to take notes.

The 5th and final point here is checking the limitations. I put this one at the end of the list because of how most published studies tend to be structured, but it’s probably the most important point on this list. If a research paper doesn’t describe any limitations of the study, that’s a huge red flag.

When researchers describe the limitations of these studies, they almost always include some kind of caveat that the data collected is not sufficient draw causal conclusions about specific gender-related experiences, sometimes combined with calls for further research.These are mostly aimed at people who would use those studies to back gendered stereotypes about things like language or spatial thinking, but they also apply to assumptions that commonly feature in truscum arguments such as “why dysphoria occurs” and “how neurological body maps form.”

In addition to the authors’ stated limitations, there’s other things you might be able to double check. Is there any indication that size measurements were controlled for variations in body mass? Does it seem like they’re testing a single data set for multiple hypotheses, and if so, do they talk about correcting for the increased risk of sampling error? How much overlap is there between results from all of the groups observed?

Going through these 5 points won’t necessarily tell you if a study is *good* or not, but it should give you a pretty good indicator of if it’s being seriously misused- and if it was linked to you as part of a long list, you’re probably more familiar with it at this point than the person who sent it, and you should be able to take these points and use them to explain why the listed studies fail to support the claims that they’re being cited to back.

Now, you might be sitting there going “okay but that seems like a lot of work,” but that’s the point of these lists- not to provide accurate information, but to make fully disproving their claims into an overwhelming task that takes exponentially more time and energy than they spent digging for links. It’s a lazy version of a Gish Gallop, so again, think very carefully about how much time is actually worth putting into responding to individual lists.

Anyway, this got extremely long and only barely answered your question but hopefully it’s useful? 😅

[philjacobsen-blog]

Antarctica. How I learned to stop worrying and love the isolation.

I put on my gloves and face mask like I had done every day for the past six months. I wanted to protect myself, be safe and I wanted to be healthy. No, I wasn’t a prepper preparing for the end of the world and/or the coronavirus, I lived in Antarctica.

From 2002 to 2018, I spent over six years of my life working and living in Antarctica. Math might tell you that looks like “16 years,” but Antarctica works on a different schedule.

Scientists and contract laborers (like myself) have been limited to work a maximum of 14 months straight in Antarctica. Because, after 14 months of isolation, it has been said, “You might lose your mind.” Therefore, four weeks, six weeks, or eight weeks of coronavirus quarantine is like a walk on the frozen ocean.

Everyone loves Top 10 lists, but first, here is the background of life in Antarctica.

There are two different seasons in Antarctica: summer and Winter. For the laymen, that’s when it’s light 24 hours a day (summer) and then when it’s dark 24 hours a night (Winter). It’s not by accident that “Winter” is capitalized and “summer” is in lowercase. This is because you need to respect Winter.

I have spent four Winters in Antarctica. While there have been changes to the Winter schedule, when I Wintered in Antarctica at McMurdo Station, the largest of the three American bases on the 7th Continent, a plane with all of our friends, hopes, dreams and escape plans left in February. The next time we would see the lights of a plane in the sky would be in August.

In other words, shit got real when that last plane left. We had to trust we had enough food, talent and toilet paper to last us until the end of August. This is because, as the saying goes, “If we don’t have it, then you don’t need it. And, you don’t need it, because we don’t have it.”

If you run out of chicken, then you eat pork. When you run out of pork, you eat lamb, when you run out of lamb, you eat hamsters--hamsters are, what we called, microwavable breaded (or deep fried) ham and cheese Hot Pockets™®.

In other words, the grocery stores are open; quit panicking. When you’re outside, hoping your squirrel trap has been bountiful today, this is the time to panic. However, today, it’s not minus 45 degrees outside. Walmart will be restocked soon, put on your mask and gloves and purchase only what you need. Then go home.

And, if Walmart is out of toilet paper, hook a garden hose to your faucet and clean your ass, and be happy your water supply doesn’t give you frostbite.

It’s going to be fine.

In Antarctica, we were living like it was Gilligan’s Island, “No phone, no lights, no motorcar, not a single luxury.” The only difference was we had phones, lights and motorcars, but when we went outside it was minus 45 –degrees—not a luxury. Stay inside on your couch and be happy that when you do go outside to take out the trash, walk the dog or mow your lawn, you’re not getting third degree frostbite and having your toes cut off.

This little piggy went to the market. This little piggy watches Netflix. This little piggy stays home.

Speaking of movies and TV shows, my good God, we would have loved to have had Netflix, bootlegged versions of Game of Thrones, YouTube or Facebook in Antarctica. Instead, the entirety of McMurdo’s bandwidth is mostly for Science.

Rarely could I “LOL” with my friends on Facebook or “YOLO” with spring breakers at the beach. Nope, Science is the priority in Antarctica.

Science, I tell you. A bunch of people, who we called “Beakers,” is the entire reason McMurdo Station exists. These Scientist are in Antarctica to prove or disprove Global Warming and/or can penguins fly and/or are penguins cute. Generally, they proved it, but why listen to scientists?

Scientists went to school and studied stuff, but have they ever studied the “economy” or “Facebook?” Can you imagine an entire community who listens to scientists? Oh wait, you can? Possibly because we’re in a global pandemic? Yeah, listen to scientists?

During my Winters in Antarctica, I could go days and only see the one person who I worked with, and guess what? I hated him.

In the community, we called him “Skin Suit.” This was his nickname because, even though he passed his battery of psychological examinations, which are required in order to Winter-Over in Antarctica, he said to Suzy—a la “Silence of the Lambs.”

“I wish I could wear your skin, so I could touch you all day.”

So, there I was, working at the bottom of the world, with Jame “Buffalo Bill” Gume as my coworker for six months, in total darkness, and do you want to know how I got along with him (aside from the one time I threw hot coffee in his face)? I complimented his outfits. I tried to look for the positive in the people who surround me.

My first job in Antarctica, I was a dishwasher. I left my home, friends and a girlfriend to seek this adventure. I’m still happy with two out of three of those decisions.

The first year I spent in Antarctica there was a “Dishwasher Emergency” at the South Pole (850 miles from the sea level solitude of McMurdo). Just like we need grocery store employees, drive through food and universal health care, the South Pole needed a dishwasher—and they chose me.

The South Pole is located at 9,301 feet above sea level. That’s not very high. When I live my life in my hometown of Salt Lake City, I live at 4,327 feet above sea level. I have climbed high mountains in Utah, like Mt. Timpanogos that is 11,752 feet and Mt. Nebo that is 11,928 ft. I’m not healthy, but I’m also not fat.

When I was asked to work at the “high altitude” of 9,301 feet of the South Pole, I said, “Okay. I’ve done that.”

However, what I didn’t know, was that because the South Pole is at “The South Fucking Pole” it’s not just about the altitude. The South Pole has a variance of altitude because of the Earth’s centrifugal force which makes the South Pole seem much higher than the actual 9,301 feet. At times it can feel, because of lack of oxygen, as though you are over 12 or 13 thousand feet.

Before going to the South Pole, the doctors and scientists said I should take “prophylactic acetazolamide” to combat the feelings of high altitude sickness. However, my friend Donald said, “You’ll be ‘okay.’” He said that since he was from Colorado and I was from Utah, that I would be fine, because I was “use to the high altitude.”

I was at the South Pole for eight days. I quit taking prophylactic acetazolamide on day four, because I was feeling great. I listened to Donald.

On day eight, I nearly died. This wasn’t Utah. Because I’d lived at sea level for four months at McMurdo Station, and Donald didn’t know shit, my pulse oximeter (the amount of oxygen which should be in my blood and close to 100) was 52. I was failing breathing.

Pulmonary edema cut the oxygen supply to my brain making me think 3 + 7 = Cat. The South Pole doctor said, “Phil, you are two to four hours from death.”

All flights to the South Pole were canceled on this day, due to weather, but, due to “2 to 4 hours of death,” a C130 National Guard Airplane risked their lives and flew from McMurdo Station to rescue me at the South Pole. If not for universal Antarctica Health Care, I could be dead.

On this day, I learned I needed to listen to the scientists, and not to Donald.

This story ended up being too long. I’m sorry. I’ve lived through isolation, listened to friends, instead of the medical community, and somehow I’m still alive. How did Antarctica prepare me for the isolation of the coronavirus?

1: Do something today better than you did yesterday. Did you go to bed sooner? Wake up earlier? Brush your cat?

2: Exercise. In Antarctica my exercise routine was called, “Brushing the Dust Off of David.” There is no reason to take a hammer and chisel to David. All you need to do is to take a wet cloth and brush off the dust. Do 10 sit ups, pushups, or jog in place. Be happy with who you are, and barely maintain. If you set higher expectations, you might fail. Simply, brush the dust off of your personal David.

3: Do something better today than you did yesterday. There were many times in Antarctica I got more drunk on Friday than I did on Thursday. I’m not advocating alcoholism, but lower your expectations. Don’t look for perfection when a glass of wine might do.

4: Did you make your bed after you woke up? Some days you will go to bed and your biggest accomplishment will be, “I made that bed today.” Congratulations.

5: Groundhog Day. Every day may seem like yesterday, but, how did you make it different? In Antarctica, after six months of Winter the trash shelves are lined with “Learn ‘This Language’ in 30 Days” DVDs. Nobody accomplishes a lot during the isolation of Winter. But, if we do little, then that is a lot.

6: Communication. Does your phone work? In Antarctica, no one can call us, so we have to call out. Instead of waiting for ‘that phone call.’ Make it.

7: Don’t go outside. It’s too cold. In the Covid-19 case, it’s too dangerous. My dad goes to dialysis three times a week; please don’t kill him. Don’t go outside.

8: Appreciate your pets. In Antarctica we are not allowed to have pets. I started the “Antarctica Cat Club.” All we did was share photos of our cats from home that we wished to be with. Now, we get to live a cat’s life. Nap. Eat. Shit. Nap. Clean. Nap. Eat. Repeat.

Love your pets you lucky sons of bitches.

9: Art. Be creative. Rather you’re by yourself or preferably, with only yourself. Do something artistic. For instance, today, I chose to write this Manifesto. In Antarctica a group of us recreated the (drunk) history of the race to South Pole by Roald Amundsen and Robert Scott (https://vimeo.com/35084075). What will you or your isolated group create?

10: Know that it ends. A plane will come and take you away or scientists will tell you it’s safe to go outside. And then, it’s over. You take off your mask and gloves. You shop at a grocery store, you go to a movie, you hug your parents or, you love being able to hold those who you love.

Stay warm. Stay isolated. And, stay indoors.

[thekennewickman-blog]

Saga of the “Ancient One”

1990 - Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act (NAGPRA) is passed by President George W. Bush.

July 1996 - Two college students Will Thomas and Dave Deacy found the Kennewick Man, referred to as the Ancient One by Native American tribes,  skull along the shore of the Columbia River in Washington state, USA. They call the police and Benton County coroner, Floyd Johnson arrives at the scene. He does not know what to do with the findings and he calls local archaeologist, James Chatters.

Approximately 300 bones and bone fragments dated to 8,340-9,200 years ago were found belonging to the the Ancient One, “the oldest and best-preserved sets of remains ever discovered in North America.” These bones made up “~90% of an adult male skeleton.”

Chatter sent a bone sample for it to be carbon dated and that is when the Army Corps of Engineers (managed the land where the bones were found) not only claimed the authority of the remains, but also “demanded all scientific study cease.”

They proved their jurisdiction over the remains and they were “locked up at the Department of Energy’s Pacific Northwest National Laboratory.”

Native American tribes said the bones belonged to an ancestor and quickly moved to reclaim the remains and provide a “ritual burial.”

Armand Minthorn, a spokesman for the Umatilla tribe, wrote, “Scientists have dug up and studied Native Americans for decades. [...] We view this practice as desecration of the body and a violation of our most deeply-held religious beliefs.”

In response, the corps agreed to return the bones to the Native American tribe. However, scientists did not agree with this. Owsley contacted members of Congress and the corps and said that “the remains should be studied, if only briefly before reburial.”

Researchers lead by Owsley filed a lawsuit (eight plaintiffs) against the Native Americans claim because according to them, the Kennewick Man “could not be linked to living Native Americans” and in fact, needed to be study to show an affiliation to a modern tribe. NAGPRA did not apply.

1998 - Authorities recognize that “substantial parts of the femur bones” had disappeared in the move to the Department of Energy’s Pacific Northwest Laboratory.

2000 - Then-Secretary of the Interior Bruce Babbitt concluded that the Ancient One’s remains belonged to the tribe and ordered they be returned.

2001 - The femur bones of the Kennewick are found this year in the evidence vault of the county coroner’s office.

2002 - U.S. Magistrate John Jelderks in the United States District Court of Oregon ruled the remains of the Ancient One were not related to Native Americans “based on its physical features, and therefore the NAGPRA didn’t apply in this case.” The remains were sent back to the researchers and the decision was upheld in the court of appeals.

The motion was granted and the District Court specifically held (Bonnichen v. U.S. - 217 F.Supp.2d 1116): 

“(1) remains of Kennewick Man were not Native American within meaning of Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act (NAGPRA); 

(2) Secretary of the Interior erred in assuming that coalition of four federally recognized Indian tribes and a band that was not federally recognized was a proper claimant under NAGPRA and in failing to separately analyze the relationship of the particular tribal claimants to the remains; 

(3) evidence did not support determination that there was a “cultural affiliation” between remains and tribal claimants; and (4) plaintiffs would be permitted to study the remains.”

2004 - The United States Court of Appeals of the Ninth Circuit rules in favor of the scientists, citing research that demonstrated the Kennewick Man was not Native American. Native Americans tribes appealed, the Court of Appeals affirmed the decision and tribes moved for rehearing.

The court specifically held the following (Bonnichsen v. U.S. - 367 F.3d 864):

“(1) scientists had standing to bring action; 

(2) human remains must bear some relationship to presently existing tribe, people, or culture to be “Native American” within meaning of NAGPRA; and

(3) substantial evidence did not support Department's decision that remains were Native American within meaning of NAGPRA.”

2005 - Research on the Kennewick Man continued this year, following eight years of legal battles preventing the repatriation of his remains to Native Americans.

The research group was led by Douglas W. Owsley, the division head of physical anthropology at the Smithsonian received permission to study the bones discovered.

These are some of discoveries his team made:

“He was a stocky, muscular man about 5 feet 7 inches tall, weighing about 160 pounds.”

Right-handed

Looked a lot like “baseball pitcher’s;” he threw a spear

Left left was much stronger than the right one, must have “arrested [his] forward momentum” with this leg

Hands and forearms show he “often pinched his fingers and thumb together while tightly gripping a small object”

Leg bones suggest he swam in shallow rapids and they reported he had “been growth consistent with surfer’s ear”

Knee joints show he must have “squatted on his heels” often

Years before his death, he had broken half a dozen ribs

five broken ribs never healed properly since he continued throwing spears with his right arm

Two small depression fractures on his cranium

Spearpoint was thrown at him and it injured and embedded itself in his hip when he was 15-20 years old

Others must have taken care of him because his injury healed and his limp disappeared over time

Ate “almost exclusively on seals, sea lions, and fish”

Drank glacial meltwater

Died at around 40 years of age

2014 - “Kennewick Man: The Scientific Investigation of an Ancient American Skeleton” edited by Douglas W. Owsley and Richard L. Jantz is published in September of this year. It is regarded as “the most complete analysis of a Paleo-American skeleton ever done.” His remain were in storage at the Burke Museum at this time.

2015 - Geneticists at the University of Copenhagen in a collaborative study with Stanford University’s Medical Center published an article in the journal Nature that demonstrated that the Native American tribes had been right all along. The senior author of the study Eske Willerslev, PhD, said, “It’s very clear that Kennewick Man is most closely related to contemporary Native Americans.” He added, “In my view, it’s bone-solid.” The study found that based on genetic comparisons, the Kennewick man “shows continuity with Native North Americans over at least the last eight millennia.”

Stanford University released a statement on June 18, 2015 with more information of their findings, disproving claims made in a 2014 study that said the Kennewick Man was “more related to indigenous Japanese or Polynesian peoples than to Native Americans.”

2016 - President Barack Obama signed the Water Infrastructure Improvements for the Nation Act (WIIN Act), which included a section that transferred the control of The Ancient One to five Native American tribes.

2017 - The tribes reburied the Ancient One “in a grave not far from where he was found along the Columbia River.”