#and the one I'm posting next is quite cute imo

[number-1-kuaidul-fanboy]

If I go quiet on my blog for a noticeable period of time, just assume I'm writing something fucked up.

[leclercsluvs]

MV1 | Songs of a Healing Heart | smau

part 1

an: did i disappear for like 2 months? yeah. is this what i meant to post first thing back? no. not really tbh. also time stamps are not important. also the timeline does not exist in this universe, i'm including some things that's happened irl (emails i can't send), but that doesn't mean i won't use earlier songs (on purpose). also it has been some time since i last wrote something, and my first language is not english, so this isn't perfect <3 fc: sabrina carpenter pairing: max verstappen x fem!reader warnings: swearing, a spoiler for chicago fire (a character death, i will also be reminding you, when it comes, so you can skip that one post it's honestly not that important to the story) inspired by: i can do it with a broken heart - taylor swift

yourusername

liked by maxverstappen1, danielricciardo, & 1.936.203 others yourusername guess who’s single again and guess who has an album coming 🥳🎉💃🎊🎈🎀

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user1 OMG OMG OMG NEW MUSIC NEW MUSIC WHO’S THE HEARTBREAKER???

user2 this is gonna be my fav album of ALL TIME ❤️ by author

maxverstappen1 who hurt you?

yourusername shut the fuck up ❤️ maxverstappen1 never 😌 danielricciardo wow max, really shooting your shot nicely hm maxverstappen1 shut the fuck up ❤️

yourusername

liked by georgerusell63, charles_leclerc, & 1.016.358 others yourusername *aggressively writes songs* >:)

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georgerussell63 why do you need to do it aggressively?

yourusername because why not?🤷‍♀️ georgerussell63 because aggression is not the answer 🤨 yourusername says who? >:( georgerussell63 says max yourusername that’s a lie.

yourusername

liked by maxverstappen1, landonorris, & 1.398.244 others yourusername guess what’s finally here! to everyone asking, i’m doing fine, don't worry.

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charles_leclerc okay so there was definitely more than one asking if she’s fine, who else did?

maxverstappen1 i did danielricciardo i did landonorris i did lewishamilton i did yourusername you all did 😑 oscarpiastri like everyone??? 🤔 yourusername as in everyone on the grid, even a few not on the grid anymore. the next one asking, will be feeling my greatness. logansargeant if that’s a threat, max should be the next one asking maxverstappen1 what the fuck

yourusername (chicago fire spoiler)

liked by maxverstappen1, danielricciardo, & 2.542.658 others yourusername this idiot forced me out of the house (i was very busy and comfortable watching chicago fire) and now i’m at the track?????

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maxverstappen1 you’re welcome

yourusername i’m not thanking you. i’m fine maxverstappen1 then why were you crying? yourusername uhm because otis just died and he was a good character georgerussell63 SPOILER WARNING??? OTIS DIES?? yourusername oh whoops yeah he does. very sad. very cryable.

charles_leclerc max is right yn. you need to get out a bit more.

yourusername aww charles defending his boyfriend

user3 yn is hanging out with the drivers???

user 4 well yeah. she and max have been friends for quite some time now. she's been to a few races as well user3 woah how did i not know?? user4 she kept a low profile because her boyfriend (or ex) didn’t really want it to be too public. she did take photos with some fans but asked of them to not take photos of her and her bf. how the paparazzi didn't catch them is a mystery to me.

maxverstappen1

liked by landonorris, yourusername, & 2.990.363 others maxverstappen1 isn’t she cute when she’s being sad in the rain on top of your car so you can’t drive her home?

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yourusername now why would you post this? :(

maxverstappen1 because you got yourself sick. yourusername that’s not a good reason danielricciardo because he loooooooves you maxverstappen1 shut the fuck up daniel yourusername shut the fuck up daniel

user5 max and yn having matching responses to daniel saying max loves yn is super cute imo

alexandrasaintmleux i would never post pics like this of you 💕

yourusername we should leave them and go live happily ever after 🤭 charles_leclerc you do know we can see your comment right? alexandrasaintmleux oh so you can see? 🤨 charles_leclerc I SAID I’M SORRY

yourusername

liked by maxverstappen1, oscarpiastri, & 1.207.087 others yourusername oh? had a lovely dinner. thank you anonymous man.

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maxverstappen1 looks cozy 👀

yourusername definitely enjoyed the company 🙃 danielricciardo i feel like there’s secrets here 🤨 yourusername like what?

landonorris looks a little like max

oscarpiastri what if it was me? then i would be hurt by this statement :( landonorris well you and i spent the day together yesterday  so i know it’s not you.

user6 okay but the power duo that is max and yn

user7 if it is max

user8 if he makes her happy i guess that’s great? ❤️ by author

[fountainpenguin]

Short Version: I don't even know how to begin explaining this, so take these 'fic doodles with no context.

Wish Fixers, my chronically unhelpful beloved...

Long Version (City Lights AU #ridspoilers beyond the above implication. Mentions of death and trauma; it gets pretty dark)

Nalooksthrough, I tag you below because I cited your co-dependent toxic friendship comic and said it was cool- If you don't want to click, that's all the tag was :)

So I started outlining my Dale backstory 'fic (Lemonade and Papercuts) since I am the most predictable person alive and of COURSE I can't resist 7 years of trauma and intimacy anxiety <3. But planning a 'fic like this requires many pieces and many questions.

First and most obvious- How did Vicky lure in Dale? From previous planning, I've already decided that since they're the same age (maybe one year off), they probably knew each other in school or activities.

Ex: Squirrely Scouts & Cream Puffs... Not unreasonable- Throughout the series, many kids participate and the organizations seem to have a big following in Dimmsdale. Vicky's sister Tootie is in the Cream Puffs and Vicky is seen bossing them around in the Season 0 episode "Scout's Honor" ("Oh Yeah! Cartoons"). There's a comic by the same name depicting Remy in Squirrely Scouts (after "Fairy Fairy Quite Contrary" but before he gets his memories back in "Remy Rides Again" and I always thought it was cute). I mean, look at him:

Pictures courtesy of the FOP Wiki

It's not unreasonable that Dale - who's also rich - might've gotten into that (especially since Doug is big on the cowboy theming and of all the rich parents, he's probably the one most okay with his son playing in dirt). Something scout-related could be an option even if Dale and Vicky went to different schools.

A friendship that gets increasingly toxic until it spirals into full-on abuse sounds really interesting (and @nalooksthrough portrayed this idea beautifully imo in THIS comic I can't stop thinking about).

Sounds fun to write, so let's go with that. What's next?

Hey, remember when 7 years ago, I headcanon'd H.P. as Dale's godfather because of this doodle in Da Rules that specifically refers to Pixie godparents and depicts a fluffy-haired kid in a purple shirt?

I recently found out I still had Dale listed as a godchild of H.P. on his full character profile on my fanfic sideblog. I was waffling over whether to retcon that (since I hadn't yet done anything with it), but I started brainstorming whether I COULD do anything with it.

I've always written Wish Fixers in 'fic [e.g. Origin of the Pixies] as a therapy business run by H.P.'s dad (which H.P. bought off him out of spite despite not being licensed for therapy) but, like...

Does Jorgen know H.P. isn't licensed? I can't see why he would... As far as he knows, H.P. owns and runs the place- especially given my lore that Wish Fixers has been in his family for many generations. Sounds qualified to me!

In "School's Out! The Musical" (episode that Da Rules screenshot is from), we learn Pixies are at the back of the line for godparent work, even under creatures like unicorns (Hence the Musical's plot requiring them to remove magical creatures from earth before they could assign themselves to Flappy Bob).

I said in a recent liveblog post that I'd always imagined this was a punishment given to them due to H.P. absolutely failing as godfather to Dale- Thus, the origin of the doodle on the page for that rule. But... I never decided what happened.

See, Dale SEEMS like a guy who would qualify for a fairy. He was probably pretty miserable under Vicky's 7 years of torture and he's still holding onto that trauma in his adulthood.

DID he have a fairy?

I'm just saying, we know from S4's "Wish Fixers" that H.P. is legally(?) allowed to make contracts that swap a fairy godparent with a pixie one if godkids choose to sign of their own free will... Hmm... I'm connecting dots I don't think I like... (I am lying).

I mean?? Dale clearly did not get out of the pit due to magical interference. If I'm committing to the doodle being Dale and reflecting an actual godfather-godson dynamic between him and H.P., then something sure went wrong there. I can't NOT make Dale suffer...

What on earth could've made Dale sign a contract for something a fairy couldn't give him? We know from "Nectar of the Odds" canon that he wished to see his dad, and thanks to previous liveblogs, I DO already have a headcanon of Dale being extremely desperate for his dad's love... Hmm... I can work with that.

I went down a rabbit hole trying to answer the question of how Vicky secured lemons for 7 years for Dale (and other kids) to work with. Here are some lemon tree facts:

- Lemon trees bear fruit after only a few years - They can bear fruit multiple times a year (depending on variety) - A single lemon tree can produce 1,500 lemons in one growing season - Dimmsdale is in California - a state known for lemon orchards.

That feels likely... An orchard of even a few trees can keep you going for a while.

But lemonade doesn't sell for much compared to other things Vicky could've set a kidnapped child up to do (Ex: In "Microphony," she has kids doing a bunch of other tasks like answering phones for her babysitting service, painting houses, and washing cars).

So... WHY lemonade? What is going on that makes this the thing Vicky has Dale do for 7 years?

And who owns the orchard? I need Vicky to obtain lemons without being stopped for 7 years.

Is it a Dimmadome orchard? Maybe, but several episodes imply Vicky's not familiar with the Dimmadomes - and she probably would have turned Dale in for cash reward if given the chance - so those are two things I need to keep in mind.

Does the orchard belong to her family? That's a possibility- Vicky is shown drinking lemonade after "Nectar of the Odds." She definitely could've bought it - It can't be too expensive unless prices were jacked up after she lost her cheap labor - but it's a drink she's seen with in multiple episodes. She definitely likes it.

And we know from "Timmy's 2D House of Horror" that Vicky's parents are terrified of her. It's not likely they'd stop her from taking lemons from the family orchard.

One problem... If Dale goes missing when he's about 9 (Closer to 7 or 8 in my planned timeline), Vicky is also 9 or younger. Are her parents scared of her when she's that small and inexperienced in the ways of the world?

In "The Switch Glitch," she's 5 and seems mild and sweet until 10-year-old Timmy mistreats her- She clearly didn't have memories of Timmy, implying she totally regressed to how she acted when she really was 5. Worth pointing out she goes off the deep end and chains up Cosmo and Wanda, so... she IS mean even at age 5. But also, she's 5. She wears the same purple hair bow in "Switch Glitch" (at 5) that she does when Timmy drains the meanness out of her in "Vicky Loses Her Icky," which is interesting.

So that begs the question... Can I turn my Dale backstory 'fic into a double story of Dale abuse AND Vicky going from a pretty innocent child to Totally Messed Up? Keeping in mind that according to Vicky in A New Wish, Vicky IS the one responsible for abusing him and he "spent 7 years' worth of Saturdays in a factory underneath a lemonade stand."

If that's the way I want to play it... Something happened to send Dale and Vicky down the dual victim-and-abuser path, destinies intertwined. And for some reason, Vicky stuck with the lemonade theme.

Dale just says he spent his Saturdays "in a factory underneath a lemonade stand." It's not out of the question he and Vicky made more lemon products than just lemonade, especially given Vicky's love for money (and those 600 lbs of lemons one tree can produce in a year). We can assume they changed locations a few times or someone would've found the trapdoor on Timmy's lawn. Plus when Dale started his abuse, Vicky hadn't started babysitting Timmy, whom she only met when he was 8.

So, I've set Dale up to be lured in by Vicky because they were friends. I like the idea of things gradually getting worse as Vicky slowly morphs from a friend into a very cruel person. If Vicky was bullying him, what stopped him from just... leaving?

Vicky's transformation was probably subtle if he stayed for so long..... I also pointed out in a recent post that Doug's underground milk empire where he uses hypnotized people for labor bears a striking amount of similarities with Vicky's lemonade stand, even down to the general vibes of "trapdoor entrance" (although it's implied there's another entrance in small building).

And if we want to be technical about things... We don't know if Doug and Dale pressed charges against Vicky. She clearly continues to babysit Timmy and other kids after "Nectar of the Odds" (Season 2).

In Season 4 ("Channel Chasers"), Doug remarks that Timmy's parents should've guessed Vicky was evil because of the Chip Skylark song "Icky Vicky," but he doesn't mention Vicky kidnapping his son. That's.... sus. He even offers to buy a car from her in Season 3's "Engine Blocked" (after Dale's escape).

Why would such a powerful guy let all of that slide? Did they just not have enough proof? Did Vicky wipe the place clean? Did Dale "not want to make a big deal about it" because he was so exhausted and grateful, he just didn't want to think about it or struggle with the legal system? Was he covering for her?? Was he scared to speak up?

... Did Dale not tell his dad the whole truth about where he was?

What if Dale was - in some vague and early concept way - in on the lemonade scheme from the beginning, back when he and Vicky were friends and she wasn't so cruel? Maybe she turned on him and sentenced him to the pit before long?

Why the underground-ness of it? Why the lemonade, which probably doesn't turn much profit... as lemonade. Unless you have unrestrained access to tons of lemons that you can turn into multiple products - Dale DID call it a factory - and no one is stopping you from accessing them...

... but how do you set up a situation where kids have access to a whole lemon orchard - presumably carefully maintained - and the adults don't take it away from them (Because... surely they would've found Dale and multiple other kids if they strayed close).

And Dale didn't leave. He does in "Nectar of the Odds" - apparently of his own volition - but not before. Was he kept there mentally as well as physically?

We KNOW Vicky can't be monitoring him 24/7 because "Nectar of the Odds" is the only episode depicting her paying attention to him, while others show her doing many other things in many other places (though it's worth noting Dale says in that episode that "Vicky's kept him locked up for so long").

Did he stay so long because it was the perceived better fate up until he miraculously crossed paths with his dad (via fairy magic) and took the risk? Would he have gone back in?

Maybe it wasn't supposed to get this out of hand. Dale and Vicky were young when this started... Somewhere between 7 and 9 (given that Dale was kept there for 7 years and Vicky is 16 when he escaped and he tells 9-year-old Dev this happened when he was Dev's age).

Maybe there was an accident. Something not just Vicky, but even Dale felt the need to cover up, especially in regards to the orchard and the fact that it needs to be Vicky's consistent source of lemons (and not something she lost out on before Dale's escape... an illusion of ownership maintained. Kids can't own the orchard, but what if they fooled people into believing it wasn't owned by kids?)

Hmm... some kind of accident that got two mostly innocent kids into huge trouble, thus setting up a horribly intertwined fate where if one of these toxic co-dependent friends backs out and squeals, even the squealer might suffer worse compared to trucking along on the cruel existing path.

tl;dr - if Vicky and Dale accidentally killed the orchard owner but they were kids and terrified to tell an adult lest they go to jail for life so they hid the body in the basement (or like ?? threw it to the coyotes or hyenas that inexplicably lurk on the fringes of Dimmsdale??) and are trying desperately to wipe their hands of this by pretending the lemon orchard is still operational so no one investigates until they can figure out a plan, and then Vicky hardens herself as a trauma response and manipulates Dale into believing it was solely his fault and she'll pin him with murder charges if he gets cold feet and turns her in, and he's miserable and gets a fairy (then loses his fairy via Pixie contract through Wish Fixers, presumably in an attempt to negotiate a way to protect himself from Vicky and somehow not gaining the ire of his father) and then H.P. (lawyer and unlicensed yet de facto therapist pulled two ways) is suddenly Dale's godfather and trying to comprehend what the flip is going on between misery and manslaughter while he's also juggling Gary, Betty, and Flappy Bob at the same time in preparation for the Musical because we know he spent 37 years on that plan...

... Would that be one messed-up yet hyperspecifically canon-compliant 'fic or what?

These thoughts have been haunting me all weekend and I HAD to get my "I'm not that kind of lawyer or therapist" joke out of my system, so there's your context. #Sorry. Is this the direction the actual 'fic will go? ... It's not the direction I really had in mind, but ?? It's off the wall and therefore I must shake it in my teeth. I can't not write Dale backstory this horrific. what. hey.

[batsplat]

if you were to direct a motogp movie (or make a one season of television) what season or rivalry would you make it about? and more interesting what artistic liberties would you take? it doesn’t have to be a straight up biopic bc imo those are often boring, instead it could be something like velvet goldmine (1998) aka fictional characters whose real life counterparts are pretty obvious, veering in like rpf territory. anyways👀

did you know. one time this guy put a curse on this other guy. and he never won a race again

anyway, look, I do feel like by this point that's the BORING answer from me, but obviously it's where my mind first went. I'm not sure I'd actually want it out there in film form because by now it's badly enough remembered that it's like, my cute little niche story, and I think there's something fun about the Wider World even within the motogp fandom not exactly getting how bonkers the whole thing was. (I know other humans have canonically watched motogp 2004 but I swear even journalists have forgotten some key key details and it's kinda annoying but also fun.) bold words from someone who's been blogging about it!! weird gatekeep-y instinct. but basically my job here is done as far as outreach is concerned - I wrote a very long post, now I get asks about it twice a week that allow me to think about it some more with the four other people who care, perfect balance. that rivalry doesn't need to go mainstream!! the whole point of it is that it's kinda cruel but narratively pleasing that it's gone under the radar, because it's another sign valentino won. but obviously, I cannot literally make a film about this, so the hypothetical repercussions I think maybe we can put aside for a moment here

okay I came back to this bit of the post after I increasingly got into of the spirit of coming up with dumb ideas, but it did make me flesh out what I'd even WANT from something like that. I'm with you anon, a lot of biopics are boring!! if you want to just know what happened, please just literally go and 'watch the races' and 'read books' like what are we actually getting here. you kinda want to give it a purpose for existing, right, a way of portraying real/mildly fictionalised events in a manner that is also taking some kind of stance on the material AND is doing stuff you can't do 'in real life'. thing is, look, you could make 2006 into a film, and I'm sure it'd be perfectly nice because it's fundamentally a solid underdog story (well, inherently winning a title with repsol honda is NOT being an underdog but you can write it that way), but also what are you doing beyond just telling people what happened? I feel like that generally about single seasons, they're not really doing anything for me. I was also turning around the biaggi/valentino rivalry in my head in part because that's the one valentino gave as his answer for 'rivalry he would turn into a film' (marc big wet eyes sitting right next to him), but like. a film about that rivalry from valentino's pov is fundamentally not something I'm interested in. you have all these isolated very memorable moments that make it work as a rivalry, like you can absolutely spin them into a dramatic yarn that goes through the genesis of their conflict to middle finger gate to punching gate to assen + donington + sachsenring + phillip island 2001 and it's basically *insert rousing music* successful coming of age. at most you can lean into the fact valentino became successful at being a dick. like idk it's fine but also what's the point? valentino is challenged in a sports context by biaggi, he's challenged because he realises his words have consequence and the press actually reports the words he says to journalists (the horror), but he is fundamentally not challenged on a personal level. that's the entire point, right? it's the ultimate comfort zone rivalry - biaggi is a dick who it is quite easy to hate and also reacts poorly to valentino's initial provocation. the animosity escalates and it is inherently fun to beat him. valentino is mean to him, but it's not like he even really crosses any lines to beat him. like you can make it into a film, and if you twisted the material a little bit you could make it satisfying, but I don't want to!

now the way the writing process of this post worked was that I was going to breeze through a bunch of non-sete/valentino rivalries and explain why I think some of them don't work for our purposes here, but then I ended up writing myself into changing my mind. so my take on the biaggi rivalry is that actually, you CAN make it work but it has to be from biaggi's perspective. basically, I think you've got to amadeus it (a web weave I have been thinking of making at some point btw). so,,, it's a meditation on talent and how unfair it all is, maybe minus the bit where salieri poisons amadeus (I know that doesn't happen in the film) or dresses up as amadeus' father to, y'know, make him write a requiem on his death bed. and it's not amadeus in that HERE, the clown prince gets a happy ending! but it's more like, in thematic terms, I think you have to zero in on this bit. biaggi didn't have parents who shoved him on a bike when he was three years old, he didn't have parents who were invested in his motorcycling career (or even necessarily particularly invested in him), he started the sport late and discovered that, yes, he did have a prodigious amount of skill in it - but one that he started honing far later than valentino did. he approached his career with a sort of grim resolve, surly and irascible and not interested in making friends with any of his competitors but very, very good. he goes away from the race track and dates all these models, he irritates fellow riders, he's not part of the gang and he's happy about it. he's very successful! four 250cc titles, wins his first ever race in 500cc at a time when doohan was very much winning everything. he's also just like,,,, an interesting and spiky enough character it's not hard to make him come alive

but then of course you have this gradual emergence of the amadeus character, the one who challenges his established position in the court of,, well... motorcycle racing, and also as the guy italians rooted for! and valentino's obviously, y'know, in so many ways the exact opposite from biaggi, and he's super young and cheerful and lively and is doing all his silly celebrations and is being a bit camp and goofy and treats motorcycle racing as a party (you really want to lean into the culture clash here, like in amadeus it's because you have stuffy austrian court vibes but here it's because everyone is having their bones broken every two minutes and just how... kinda grim a lot of motorcycle racing was). and he's also this innocent! yes, he insults biaggi, and yes, in retrospect we know valentino is kinda evil, but at the time he was a kid with a big mouth who was a little taken aback by how that biaggi feud sort of escalated beyond what he'd actually intended it to do! and biaggi just, hates him. and I think, sorry to the real man max biaggi here, but you've got to play with how once they're actually competing with each other, it's miserable how there's just this unbreachable gulf in talent. like, whatever biaggi does he cannot win! he isn't going to defeat valentino over the course of a full season! which is depressing and horrible and CRUEL, because there's this inevitability to the whole thing... and also! because valentino doesn't DESERVE it. and you don't have to go full salieri pleading with god to explain how god could give this CLOWN all this talent, but it's kinda the same vibe! how is it valentino, who is constantly just having a laff and canonically maybe wasn't the biggest gym-goer in the paddock and is just generally seen as, y'know, a bit of a dandy, this foppish clown who everyone loves and who doesn't have to work hard to be good - how is he the one who is winning so much!! it's miserable and unjust... and I think how you portray this is that you really emphasise the kinda, repetitive nature of the defeat. like, I think you probably want to make this into a non-linear narrative where all this biaggi backstory is communicated somehow but you don't just start it when he was born or whatever - you start it in 2001 when they're competing for a title and already hate each other. and then you heavy on the time loop vibes. the whole cinematic language and all that other shit should emphasise how all these weekends are structured in exactly the same way and if you're losing to this one guy, all these different weekends can start feeling the same. it bleeds into each other, it feels inescapable, you're trapped in this narrative you can't change... worst of all, you even return to the same places again and again - like play with that! biaggi keeps coming back to where they had the fist fight, to where valentino first insulted him all those years back. you play up the disorientation and the misery of it all, plus biaggi canonically gives us all this kinda messy freudian shit to play with like how he was dating 'valentina' and his relationship with her was falling apart because of how miserable valentino was making him. it's all there!!

ANYWAYS the way you conclude this story is!! welkom 2004!! so again we can artistic license this a little bit and, uh, ignore sete (though I do also think it's fun if you lean into biaggi being displaced as a rival and staring at them being friendly and happy with each other from the outside) - but the key bit is that valentino is finally making the big error. biaggi wasn't winning titles on a yamaha, since he left yamaha has gotten worse, now valentino is making this big mistake out of his own hubris. language of cinema that shit and make everything brighter and more hopeful.... the time loop is finally over, biaggi has escaped, this year will be different!!!! everyone in his circle agrees, valentino is fucked. step off the plane at welkom (pre season testing didn't happen in this universe) and it's literal dawn of a new day... staring out at the sun and finally, biaggi can move on, can live a new and different life. anyway. obviously we all know what's coming next - you have this big dramatic climactic race where biaggi throws himself at valentino again and again and again and he comes so close to winning it... but he doesn't. and you have valentino living his best life, being delighted, but the film is focusing on how like,,, we're bleaching the joy back out of biaggi's life, how actually he's returning to what he already knew. and it ends on the podium, with the camera focusing on biaggi on that fucking second step or zooming in or whatever (idk how cinema works) and it just finishes on this shot of biaggi dead-eyed in a bleak world, trapped again for eternity aka until the end of the 2005 season. done!! I'm not sure this is quite what valentino had in mind, but. well. that's how I'd do it

this is from the pushkin play from 1832 not the 1984 film but like. low key pushkin already kinda nailed the essence of sports rivalries in the 1830s and we just have to acknowledge that sometimes

right. so the casey rivalry is where I'm going to go completely off the wall. skip this bit to get to the slightly saner stuff. this is also one I fully admit to sometimes playing around with in my mind anyway, but. uh. I'm gonna be taking this one in just. well. places. I do have a vision here but I also don't quite know how to explain it in a way that doesn't make me sound like I've lost my mind, but well if you're still reading this then that's on you. so lemme get this out of the way: the classic sports biopic formula would work well with casey. if I had to point to a single rider I would sports biopic-ify, it's casey. so you have all this kinda,, obvious adversity that's easy to get across, and it's a narrative you can follow chronologically without too much trouble. you've got all the childhood stuff, the australian racing club not letting him join them, the move to britain, the rising through the ranks, it's also this very biopic-friendly 'nobody ever believed in him apart from like three people' stuff. and the premier class is also narratively satisfying, from the rocky rookie season to the kinda shock success to then all the lows of 2008 and 2009 and the physical ailments and the anxiety and then the switch to honda and the title and then him deciding to retire... that's all good stuff! you can absolutely biopic-ify it! gun to my head and sure, I can walk you through exactly what bits of his life I'd focus on and put in what order and so on, and I think ultimately you could make a very good sports biopic from that

[some mild gore to follow in this next section]

but also. thing is. that's fine. it's just not where I want to go here, because again I feel like at that point you can also pick up his autobiography and just read it - because what you're basically doing here is just filming that. and I get how this stuff works, you're bringing the story to a wider audience, you can show stuff in a different way in that medium etc etc, and that's all great but also I don't care about bringing stuff to a wider audience. I care about doing fun stuff in my brain. so what I'd actually do here is just, basically, go in the exact opposite direction and ditch all the realism. genuinely, ditch the live action stuff, we're going animated - what I'm interested in here is stuff where we need to be able to fully suspend our disbelief and lean into some surreal shit. I'm not going to bury the lede here: my idea is that you take that thing where casey said he hated how ducati was ruining the bike by letting valentino's yellow encroach on it and, basically,, just go all in on that bit. like come on, that is so singularly visually evocative, it truly captures a lot of what's going on thematically in that rivalry. (see also x and x for the most relevant casey posts.) casey sees valentino as the malevolent force, this infection! he associates him strongly with a specific colour, one that can be sickly or unnatural or just... evil. malignant, malicious, malevolent, all the m words. to casey, valentino is a personification of everything that is wrong with the sport. valentino is literally the walking manifestation for so many of his issues, from the dangerous riding to the lack of respect to the lying to the cult of personality to the obsession with image and the media to the backroom games to the politics to the injustice of how different riders are treated differently, like!! he's literally all of that! this is a topic for another post, but this plays out in a lot of kinda, weird and funky ways where it's a two way street and sometimes when casey talks about motogp you go 'actually I think that's just valentino?' (btw he also does this about 'europe' right I don't think those are europeans you hate casey that's literally just valentino) and sometimes when he talks about valentino it's kinda? this feels like it's about a little more than the bloke himself? and basically, right, I think you need to take this to its natural conclusion where casey used to admire him and look up to him and want to emulate him on track and then gets disillusioned when valentino's worshippers turn against casey and casey is the one to bring valentino down to earth and... listen, I think you need to play around with valentino being a literal god. and I think you need to have casey stab him to cover up the yellow on the ducati with blood

okay. look. the idea here, right, is that we're basically making the subtext text, and just digging into that process of 'bringing valentino back to earth', of taking on a god and having the audacity to succeed, and also treating valentino as this sort of. infection in his own mind. the bike is literally being infected!! casey may have left the ducati but he STILL has some fidelity and love for this project, those were his people he worked with, and now valentino is coming in and just twisting everything around himself!! but also I think how this functions is that, okay, so you have all this normal stuff that's the actual 'plot' in the 'real world', but the ISSUE with the real world is that there's a lot of stuff that just. isn't possible there. like the thing casey wants in that rivalry but is never going to have is... a captive audience. a big problem casey has in that rivalry is that he doesn't get the chance to actually say a lot of stuff to valentino. he starts using the media more and more and plays the game on valentino's level, but there's still this disconnect where mr straight talking is the valentino rival who valentino never really blanks or freezes out like... there's a disconnect! there's valentino the person, who casey never quite figures out how to just straight up hate, and then there's valentino the character, the racer, the rider, the god who casey DESPISES. but when they're doing small talk at pressers and podiums, casey doesn't get to talk to that version of valentino! he just talks to valentino the person, who obviously isn't literally a different person but is also not going to explain to casey where he's coming from, is he, and also isn't someone who casey can explain to where HE is coming from. and that gulf... it does bother casey. I don't think he can quite verbalise why either, but there's just... this creeping tension. I think it'd be easier for casey if valentino really were more of a caricature, just kinda a dick in all walks of life. and there's just these canonical hints of that... the way casey talks about how he's sure valentino as a guy is fine, but he never knew valentino like that, the whole 'I'd like to go with valentino for dinner to tell him where I was coming from in that rivalry' thing, like!! it's there

so basically EYE think what you should be doing is using the wonders of storytelling to actually. embrace that element. and just leave realism behind now and again. valentino is a god, he is literally worshipped, he's part of this pantheon that casey is trekking to reach. casey is brave enough to take him on in combat, he is the first one who is truly able to draw blood. he sees how valentino isn't just a god of joy or battles or speed or the SUN or any of that other stuff - he's a disease, an illness, a god who is also a false prophet... the worship never quite goes away, because who ever truly gets rid of their valentino rossi complex, but casey eventually is given the chance to face a chained valentino and kinda,,, ritualistically publicly humiliate him using the ducati as both this sick thing that has to be 'cured' and this symbol of valentino's failure. I'm sorry, visual language goes brr here, like chain him up, do weirdly eroticised torture idc!! (psst psst valentino's fucked up shoulder also extremely goes brr here, casey low key a teensy bit weird about valentino's injuries? his thing after the 2010 leg break where he goes 'why's everyone making such a big deal about this other people break their limbs too' and then after 2011 jerez immediately asking whether valentino's shoulder is okay in just a very obviously passive aggressive way. literally he opens with that, valentino isn't using it as an excuse or anything, for some reason it's already on casey's mind and I would politely contest it was out of genuine concern for valentino's wellbeing!! it's just kinda? I'm so compelled by it? I suppose it is kinda about how valentino's suffering gets taken more seriously than his own? how those absences are received differently by the motogp world? idk I find this fun because casey does know this is one thing valentino can't really be blamed for himself, so it just slips out a bit? but yeah, casey + valentino's injuries, nobody's talking about it but I sure will, let casey get weird and mean and a teensy bit sadistic about valentino's injuries in an artistic manner.) crucially I like animation as a medium here because I think it's easier to lean into surrealism when you don't have to hand hold the audience so much through the suspension of realism, also there's just some imagery you can do in cooler ways through animation where in live action it may just look. weird. (I think you can also do one of those things where you have a live action film with only those specific bits animated but also... why? it just feels like in live action you need more 'justifications' for things, like am I saying casey is having some weird hallucinations and is losing his mind? no I just want to have weird vision sequences ffs.) the colour stuff!! valentino/casey is big on the colour coding as a rivalry, to the extent casey is even, y'know, drawing attention to it in the literal text!! yellow and red are banger colours, valentino is big on imagery himself with all his sun + moon motifs, it's kind of all there to make the easy next step to kinda zany surreal imagery. ritualistic stabbing works better in animation, you can kinda get the blood to like. drip down and overwhelm the yellow illness that's slithered out across the bike

and. AND of course what this entire set up allows you to do is.... give them an opportunity to talk. they can't talk in real life! casey CAN'T give him his real thoughts on anything, and fundamentally valentino can't either. they're opponents. they're strangers who chat sometimes. it's not just that they aren't friends, it's that fundamentally they cannot be friends - because their ability to do their actual jobs depends on a certain level of professional distance. valentino of course does have a decent read on casey, and vice versa, because when you're figuring out how to defeat someone then (if you're valentino) you're looking to play the rider too. valentino's entire approach depends on focusing in on his rivals and attempting to throw them off, to make them unravel. he's watching casey closely!! the entire journey of casey's first three seasons in the premier class essentially becomes like, this god of their world focusing in on him. figuring him out. trying to gnaw away at him. obviously, animation also allows you to go big on the panopticon-y imagery which is kinda fundamental to their rivalry, because of their fundamentally oppositional stances to 'performing' for the ever present cameras where there IS a little bit of common ground in they have both struggled with it. but valentino isn't going to ever say that to casey! casey isn't going to open up to valentino! so if you give them,, you know, a different arena to express themselves, where casey actually has this external figure to talk to (as he's like, cutting him open I guess) whereas valentino actually is put in a position where he's allowed to respond, where he can taunt casey a little bit, where he can interrogate casey's approach and also the similarities between the two of them and how casey has been forced to become a little more like valentino to challenge him... because the thing is, right, valentino is so big on message discipline with his rivals and has completely stopped talking about that rivalry post mid 2013 that, first of all, you have this complete imbalance in who's been telling this story for the past decade, but second of all you kinda don't have a sense of what valentino would respond? idk!! I think this is mainly fun as a thought exercise for me specifically but also I do think it's kinda, digging into some of the bits that make this narratively work as a rivalry, how valentino in this rivalry is actually just kinda... removed. like he's not really emotional about it!! at most he's a bit bitchy, but even that just feels about The Game. it's the most extreme in this regard followed by jorge - but with valentino's other feuds you kinda... see a bit more an unguarded moment, see something a little more real there. the casey rivalry feels so uncomfortable precisely because valentino is a little... inhuman in this one. I mean, if you want to have valentino as some kind of cross between a deity and a monster in any of his feuds, this is the one. casey's just an obstacle to him. idk don't you think casey kinda wants to chain valentino down and stab him and make him see casey a little more... well, I think he should want it and I think it'd be fun to see and get them to talk to each other. ugh and also all the implications of making the faith vs non-believer elements more literal... casey the heretic!!!

there's some obvious stuff here you'd have to figure out, like 'how do you make this work as a narrative even to people who aren't familiar with casey stoner at all' and 'who the fuck do you think the target audience is here' and 'you do know this is not the kind of thing that would ever be made, right, go back to the casey stoner sports biopic like a sane person' but!! I do think it's material you can make work if you're just,,, efficient and smart in how you're actually telling the 'real life' version of the rivalry. also in my head this is. idk. an animated limited series not a film, which then brings in other stuff like 'episodic structure' because I'm fundamentally opposed to tv shows that think they're films. and look, I'm not going to write an entire film script treatment here, I just think a good writer can figure this stuff out. blood on the ducati is the framing device for everything else, simple. lots of animated floating eyes I reckon, first casey is watching valentino and then valentino is watching casey and the whole world is watching them... and it does bleed into real life just a little, where you're wondering whether casey is actually imagining/dreaming this stuff or valentino is or if they both know it somehow... you can get away with more ambiguity in animation. anyway, if you do want more thoughts on this one specifically for whatever reason, let me know because this one I do actually have more on

also laguna 2008 is a bit tortoise and the hare coded if you really think about it

[end of gore]

so. on to jorge. hm. the thing about jorge is that he was kinda writing a coming of age film in his own head, so like - yes, that's what you do go for? you can play it straight and follow how jorge has cast his rivals, or you can pin the whole narrative on the fact that jorge has cast them - the kinda artificiality of the narrative, the way jorge is this storyteller who isn't being recognised as much as he thinks he should be, isnt adequately appreciated. the way there's this three way discourse between what jorge thinks the story is and what the public thinks the story is and actual. you know. reality. I think this is a bit more light-hearted, like you know how the best stories about teenagers take their emotions seriously but also let them be kinda silly? because young people are silly! jorge was silly! he's got a lot of CHARM because he's so cocky and naive and full on and intense and awkward and kinda off-putting and tactless and a bit all over the place and so painfully, painfully young, like he's a good protagonist because that's a KID. but also, obviously there's also a lot of extremely not light-hearted bits of his story - everything about his father, his manager... idk this one's another one where, I don't just want to make it a generic sports biopic, and I'm trying to figure out the clear narrative arc here? I mean, you can point to the end of 2010 and really lean into him choosing victory on-track over popularity off it. the problem with 2010 is that it does not work as a dramatic season, yeah sure with the magic of biopics you can hack at it to shit but also. idk. what are we getting out of it. I think for narrative purposes you want to maybe narrow in, and end it at the end of 2008, with the switching of the numbers this kind of moment of emancipation? but also! this feels like we're straying a bit too far away from the fun sports elements and I don't want to REALLY suggest all the ways in which you could mine jorge's personal trauma in a jokey tumblr post, so I'm gonna move on from this one

the problem is 2015 just straight up doesn't work as a jorge-centric narrative, except in a very kinda comic way that leans into how absurd his role in that season was. 2012 as a season is a bit... y'know, it's fine. okay it's mostly terrible, but that's fine too. but it doesn't have a great narrative hook. which kinda leads you to the problem that I do think the valentino rivalry is more... juicy from jorge's pov, because for valentino, jorge is just kinda? an obstacle? idk he's more normal about it, it's just his job to destroy the guy, you know how it is. but also 2009 does work better narratively from valentino's pov, like it's the build up to catalunya specifically you can dramaticise... idk though, I do love catalunya but my heart isn't really in this exercise because I think valentino isn't really being... challenged here? it's a title fight where he's fundamentally using a set of tools he's already perfected, to beat a guy he doesn't really give a shit about. when the italian press is down on him pre catalunya, it doesn't spark any genuine self-doubt - it's just a handy source of extra motivation. there's no epic highs or lows that season, not real ones. and yes I know I was talking about making valentino who gets stabbed repeatedly to cover up an infection a moment ago, but that reflected real EMOTIONAL truths!! I'm committed to thematic fidelity more than I am to literal fidelity

genuinely I think the best way to tackle jorge is with the jorge/dani parallel journeys... what, film? tv show? maybe show actually - you don't have one coherent narrative Statement per se but you're constantly charting those journeys in reference to each other, really rooting it in their respective points of views, no neutral detached cinematic language like I want everything to be very much written to be from their eyes!! going from one to the other and back again. and you're charting these different journeys, right, and how they both captured different flavours of like... emotional successes and failures. I think it's actually about failure, yeah, about having to accept there's something you can't have and might never be able to get - whether that's universal love or a premier class title or whatever - but Actually, that might not be the end of the world. and during this process, they go from being enemies to tentative friends!! guys who realise they can maybe actually understand each other better than they thought!! this real moment of interpersonal connection. you have all these media narratives and the managers and so on and the fact they're competitors as these built in reasons why they've just been pitted against each other from the start... but y'know, again, it is also just a bit about maturing, about being able to set that aside, about making your peace with defeat and failure as an element of growing up. you can't win everything, maybe there's something you really really really want and you're just not going to get it, but at the end of the day it's kinda... yeah. self-acceptance. idk this is the nice one

so with marc you can go several different ways here I guess, and again he's also perfectly decent sports biopic material, probably second to casey in that category like yeah sure do the comeback story. but also, we do already have a very good self-produced documentary about what he thinks the narratives of his career are? idk this is also just a personal taste thing, I'll leave him to doing all the injury stuff himself, I don't have much to add there. we'll get to the obvious one in a second, but I was trying to figure out if there were other places I massively felt like you need the cinematic touch. and, again, the 2013 season is obviously very exciting!! but also, you have it covered in.,,,, multiple documentaries, I don't feel I have a take their either? his rivalries with dani and jorge aren't really substantive enough to sustain a bit of cinema. dovi... I mean, what are you saying there? what's the arc? I feel like if I tackled dovi, I'd go somewhere else and really go all in with the ducati stuff, and make it a bit more... you know, stark, stripped back, basically just the emotional component of how much he gave to that project and how he managed to beat away one rival after the next and how it all ended up falling apart in a kind of anti-climactic way? he's also good sports biopic material, but in a way I think the marc rivalry is the bit of his story I have the least to say on. so eg, 2017 is a dramatic season, but he's also kinda fine after it? he always knew it was a long shot, he tried his best and he got really close and then he lost. you can't amadeus it because dovi isn't (fictional) salieri. basically, I think what I'm saying here is that dovi is too well-adjusted to feature in this post. though I'd totally watch a film about his 250cc seasons, like it's a bit annoying because HE is the underdog who loses both title fights to jorge, but it'd still be kinda fun idk. I wouldn't really know what to do with the material but if someone made the film I'd absolutely watch it

right then. the thing about sepang 2015 is... yeah, sure, of course you can do it, it already exists as a narrative but... yeah, what are you adding!! idk I always think when you're adapting something, you kinda need to have a reason for it? I mean, what are you doing that's not already there in the footage? idk maybe this is just a sign of having been a fan of this sport for one too many years but to me the idea of sepang 2015 can get a bit boring (or maybe just repetitive) where I need a new TAKE on it to really get into the idea of fictionalising it. like where's the auteur's touch y'know, what can I still add to this!! but it also needs to WORK for someone who is new to the story, which kinda just makes you want to tell the story straight.... y'know the story is strong enough and COMPLICATED enough to stand on its own and it IS good but I don't really have anything interesting to say beyond 'yeah sure that'e be neat'. I can't tell you why, but I also don't think the casey approach quite works here? the idea of providing a framing device with which valentino and marc can actually talk to each other... eh. don't like that. hm. okay wait actually I just turned it around in my head for... a while and I think I've got an idea to make the worst motorcycle racing film of all time. so, my central stupid film-making gimmick here is just. centring the fact we're completely reliant on a few guys and what they're telling us in making up our minds, and our removal from that story and the imperfection of their perceptions and so on. so I think you kinda make a point of... not actually showing the motorcycle racing? like, you always show it by showing other people watching it, you're showing the tv screen rather than the actual racing. even in the cinematic medium, you're centring the theatrical aspects, where you drill it down to just a few characters. valentino. marc. uccio. marc's fuck ass manager. maybe a crew chief or two. keep it limited though, all the others are kept at a distance - you're constantly focusing in on the same few characters. and very early on you basically just like... get them to fourth wall break by telling you, the viewer, with their actual words how racing works for them, what meaning they take out of it - and again it's this remove because we're never allowed to actually feel the racing for ourselves (no helmet cams), and it sets up that as the tragedy unfolds, again and again we're just hearing from them what happened. it's all zoomed in on how claustrophobic the entire situation is, like doing the race direction room after the sepang 2015 is perfect for that kind of thing, and crucially they're only ever addressing the audience because they can't address each other. but fourth wall breaks also obviously draw attention to artificiality! I realise they are very much like, lame gimmick central, but also are these men not inherently about lame gimmicks... idk it's basically the same story but at least it feels like a kinda interesting way of telling it. kinda trite, but cinema allows you to get to the point and let valentino actually play with the camera... so literally take it into his own hands and lead it around and tell the story from his point of view. and you can play with how they do both change in what stories they think they're telling, how they're constantly revising their own stories, how their stories completely clash with each other... like. make them literal narrators. that's my pitch

so. one interesting pattern that has come up with my approaches to these rivalries is that with the exception maybe of the 2015 stuff, I feel like I'm more naturally inclined to treat valentino as a narrative device and centre his rivals. a big part of this is that valentino is a fantastic narrative device. he's kinda. this looming presence in every narrative in this sport where you can just sort of use him as a sort of way to poke away at all these other riders. the monster everyone loves who you are trapped with. BOO!! he's gonna eat you! which is fun! but ALSO, crucially, several of these rivalries aren't that emotionally challenging for him!! again, with casey right, he wants to beat him, but he's not having a crisis of faith over losing to casey. he thinks casey is annoying, he wants to beat him because he wants to win. valentino is casey's foil, but casey is not valentino's. valentino makes for an excellent personal antagonist to casey, but the reverse just isn't true. casey isn't forcing valentino to reexamine his approach except 'ramping up the levels of being a dick on-track' - like, yes, that's a serious competitive challenge, but also valentino is very comfortable in his own skin in that rivalry. sure, you could have valentino have some kind of massive revelation about the casey rivalry, but like. he doesn't in canon. he changes his behaviour towards casey in pretty predictable ways depending on what the relationship demands from his perspective at any given time. there's nothing more there

now, obviously you know where I'm going here. there IS a rivalry where you can make the argument he changes as a result of it, there IS a rivalry that tips him over the line and makes him to do stuff he hadn't done before that, there IS a rivalry that happens to coincide with a period of his competitive life that challenges him both personally and professionally. now, look, I have already talked about the sete rivalry. you know what I think about this rivalry - and if you don't, I really already have told the story here and here and here and here and also here. I think this works perfectly well as a narrative in its own right, and it's one you can tell from either perspective... but you kinda need both. I think again you probably naturally lean towards starting it from sete's perspective and that first proper meeting (I mean, idk if it is their first actual meeting, but it's the logical obvious place you start this story) with sete giving valentino advice during his first 500cc test and valentino just, y'know, ignoring him and being a cocky shit and then crashing. so you get to see sete being kinda exasperated by the whole thing. also, obviously ibiza is like, a key framing device here, like it's the most obvious in-your-face way of tracking their relationship with each other. I don't actually know how often they partied there together, but it must have been at least twice and if the commentators are to be believed it must have included 2003. artistic license and you can add one or two more times, but mainly you want to focus in on 2003 onwards right. so you've got this 2002 one where it's, y'know, high point of their friendship and in the name of narrative efficiency, you establish here that sete is looking to make the honda switch. the emphasis is on how valentino has been winning everything but on the flip side you're getting the first insight into his discontent. and there's a bit of a vibe of, what could you possibly have to complain about? like you are winning so much? so it's late one night where they've had this slightly unguarded alcohol-fuelled moment of genuine vulnerability but in the end it's actually characterised by how... unsubstantial the link between them is, because they wouldn't talk about this kind of thing with each other and they might both be similar in some ways but also don't gettttttt each other. it means you can return there as a location in 2003, where you've just had sachsenring and valentino's dramatic loss but they're still partying together and it's like. obviously In The Air that not everything is quite right... their relationship is already gradually altered and twisted because you're introducing this element of actual stakes and competition (obviously in 2004 they do NOT spend that time together, as far as we know anyway, and you can show them being very much not together at ibiza as a very obvious Oooh Things Will Fall Apart and maybe already haveeee)

and I do think basically I've already said what I think the themes here are,,,, several times by this point, so I'm not going to belabour the point. I think all of this fundamentally works as a narrative with like, minimal massaging and rearranging of the elements for dramatic effect. it's all there already, everything from sete's arc with the [insert non-tasteless way of covering a real life tragedy that fundamentally alters the course of sete's career] and how that leads to sete becoming the challenger and how he does want to win and his eventual downfall. with valentino, you have the element of liberation and self-discovery and... well, growing into your own but also kinda having the narrative drawing attention to how 'growing into your own' can involve becoming a fully realised character who is essentially quite cruel? you have this kind of... build up, right, towards this moment of revelation, where you lay bare who these two people actually ARE at sepang 2004, and then again at jerez 2005. valentino has gone his own way, he has freed himself from the chains of honda, he has embraced individualism and the chance to define himself and his own legacy and stand on his own two feet and not rely on the strongest bike or all this stuff within honda where they chose him as their flag bearer, for better or for worse... like he comes to his own here! he takes the step from 'great rider' to 'legend' because he gets to this dramatic moment of stepping into the unknown, he takes this massive risk that could have cost him so much, and it ends up elevating him. but it also puts him under duress, and in that moment he reveals himself - whatever sete did or did not do at qatar 2004, EVEN IF sete did all that shit, what you are left with is valentino vowing to ruin this man. valentino uses sete to make himself 'better', to fuel himself as a competitor. valentino turns sete into a tool in his own story. and again, thematically you've got all this stuff about how sete was managing the image of the rivalry and how valentino took advantage of that - how sete needed it to remain respectful and valentino was completely willing to abandon that. like, you have two protagonists who really are similar in quite a few ways, who think they have this shared understanding with each other, but when it comes down to it? they end up being super painfully different

now I can go on about this and how to play it straight, basically, you can just do that rivalry and I think it'd be cool and fun and very easy to arrange in a good narrative way. BUT I've kind of already. done that. like I don't want to suggest a film that is basically a nicer version of my tumblr posts. so I want to take this in a slightly different direction, and I think what we need to consider with this rivalry is this: what if you made the curse literal? basically, what's always kinda charmed me about this rivalry is that the curse should not work and all the misfortune that befalls sete after that is so comical that it's kinda... what do you do with that? and the answer is you just lean all the way in. my pitch is this: what if valentino sells his soul to the devil?

so, you know faust, right, and you know the bit at the start of goethe's faust where god and mephistopheles are basically making a wager over how corruptible this one human is. and faust is like... he's kinda disillusioned, he feels that everything he's dedicated his life to in academia is fundamentally hollow, gets very close to committing suicide. and faust has gone a bit new age-y, gotten into all this mystical shit and he's got this pentagram that ends up preventing mephistopheles from leaving his presence in their first meeting... and basically what the devil can give him is like, the chance to attain some true pleasure, and for that faust is willing to bet everything - so if faust can just have that, then maybe eternal damnation is worth it. and look, I'm not going to summarise the entire plot of faust here and it does go off the wall a bit with all the gretchen stuff, but the point is you have this version of the devil who is fundamentally a cynic and is attempting to win an argument with god by making this human succumb to his own nihilism. and what faust basically does is like, abandon his normal life where he's trying to live by normal virtues and goes off on this journey with the devil. and there's this little moment where mephistopheles,,, pretends to be faust and takes on the role of an academic adviser (you know how it is) and seduces this random student away from the word of god and sends him down a wretched path, which ends with this bit:

like, a big part of faust's tragedy is supposed to be about... well, hubris, of the relationship of god to man, of no longer being afraid of the devil... and obviously, this is all framed very much in terms of religion, but at the end of the day it's also about, you know, having purpose - faust is living a life that no longer has any meaning to him, all of his knowledge and studies now no longer fill the void inside himself. his nihilism opens the door for mephistopheles, and is what makes him willing to accept the devil's terms. now, and I am so very sorry to goethe here, I think we have some material we can use here to explore the valentino/sete rivalry. obviously, you can't do a one-to-one, you need to get rid of some of like, the depression and all that - there were times when valentino was feeling 'a bit low' in 2003, but not 'faust thinking everything he'd done in his entire life was pointless' low, yeah? also, unless you want to do a real long view here and even then it can't really be justified, there obviously isn't really a 'tragedy' here from valentino's perspective. like, he wins! this isn't valentino's tragedy, it's sete's! I was being a bit facetious when I said he was 'selling his soul to the devil', and you can kinda parse mephistopheles' motivations in different ways depending on what flavour and what interpretation of him you're dealing with here. you don't 'damn' valentino, you essentially just turn him into a tool of the devil!

so, this is how this works out in my head: the devil works more broadly as the manifestation of competitive impulses, the kind of 'how far would you go to win' question as a bloke who shows up and literally talks to the characters about it (magic of cinema). he's also engaging with valentino feeling like his victories no longer having meaning, with being disconnected from honda and from the entire culture there and just feeling like he's going through the motions. there's this element of like... opening the door to what is essentially a journey of self-actualisation, bringing him closer to being a 'god' but also allowing him to fully come into his own and become himself. to win on his own terms. I reckon ibiza is my preferred narrative device where the devil talks both to sete and valentino there (separately), first literally as a mysterious stranger and then... maybe not? he's talking to them at times of their lives when they're not at ibiza and it's not happening there in the physical world and they both end up kinda having to confront they're dealing with some potentially malevolent supernatural entity. but the important elements of the devil is that a) he's not going to do anything the humans don't actually ask for themselves, and b) everyone knows he's following his own agenda and you should be careful of the requests you make of him. so it's kinda like... essentially, the backdrop of this rivalry unfolding is they're constantly being challenged to decide what lines they're willing to cross. which culminates at qatar... and maybe you do have sete making like. a teensy mistake. a teensy error in judgement, one that is both real and deliberate but he could not have known would get that reaction and instantly regrets. and valentino, who is I think inherently sceptical of the devil coming to offer to help him and maybe does crank out the pentagrams (remember, the whole point of faust is that he was too arrogant to be scared of the devil, or one of the points anyway), in a moment of fury does decide - no, actually. I will take that step. I will curse sete. now the thing is, dramatically this is a teensy bit tricky because when you're talking about being damned by the devil, usually the consequences are a bit more severe than 'not winning a motorcycle race again' (yes, you can get into how sete did also seem genuinely cursed after that, cf his ambulance/bus crash situation, but again we are flirting with being in poor taste in this tumblr post). but the thing is, right, you have to lean into the silliness here! qatar 2004 is inherently silly, a CURSE is inherently silly, like real life is already silly here! you have to engage with the people where they are, and for these athletes all this shit is so heightened that the emotions are full on. like, valentino would've sold that guy to the devil! and to him not winning another race is basically the worst thing that can happen

so, obviously, you get to do the actual curse stuff. curses are inherently campy fun, the devil doing curses is campy fun, getting valentino rossi to crank out the pentagrams is inherently campy fun. you get to play around with this, right, like you know that bit in the brno 2005 race commentary where the commentators are talking about how valentino might as well have a little radio to talk into sete's helmet to remind him of how sete had fucked up at the sachsenring. OBVIOUSLY obviously obviously it is just so... idk scrunchy and fun to have this idea of valentino becoming a malevolent enough force to literally do that.... like damn the commentators did kinda eat with that?? ughhhhhh do you ever think about sete leading the qatar 2005 race for most of the way???? like that's SO fucked up because you literally have articles from about the race going 'hey maybe sete can break his curse' and then the commentators are talking about curses having one year expiration dates but obviously they!! do not!!!!! there's one race where sete goes off track and the commentators are talking about how valentino will surely have smiled into his helmet like that's so fucked!! it's so fucked!! but idk I think basically you have all this creeping curse-y stuff and devil stuff and then you get this twist and then it just becomes misery zone for sete until you sort of. compress the timeline and have him retire without getting into what happened at the end of 2006. and valentino just relishing in all his very worst emotions. and you've got sete who was the better man after jerez 2005, who took the high ground again and again and again and it did NOTHING for him.... and then he's cursed and his career is finished and the devil has had his fun getting mixed in with mid noughties motogp. and now obviously this is inherently kinda dumb and corny and silly but it's the devil!! mephistopheles to me is allowed to get up to dumb shit sometimes, let him have some fun!! idk I like curses being literal idc

I think the obvious critique here is 'this doesn't really feel like it gets the message of faust'. which, yes, is true - and obviously the way narratives are structured, a satisfying resolution isn't 'well selling your soul kinda slaps, actually'. and my statement to respond to this argument is as follows:

this is essentially canonically what happened. valentino DID do something kinda evil and it DID work out 100% for him and it DID kinda slap. at least when you add in the devil, you're making explicit the bit where it is a little bit bad. also, is sports not inherently about selling your soul for success... the story of valentino and sete is essentially about how we are twisted by competition, how pretending that we don't wish ill to our opponents is inherently dishonest. it is about lifting a facade for something that is already inherently there in the souls of men. this is obviously inherently a deeply cynical stance, but this is also a deeply cynical story beyond all the fun battles and camp dramatics. the devil is a cynic and he is basically the point of view character of goethe's faust - he's the one who is positioned closest to the audience. sports is all about living out some of humanity's worst instincts in a relatively low stakes setting, which means we get a free pass to have fun with a deeply cynical story that goes 'maybe selling your soul to the devil is fine, actually'

do I stand by this stance? not really, but the whole fun of storytelling is that sometimes you can just be kinda mean. I think goethe would get it... you can tell which character he enjoyed writing the most

the OTHER way you can do this is centre everything around qatar 2004 as like,,, the mystery box element...... okay look I have now made two posts that go WAY too deep on the 'what really happened' element but I do loveeeeee the whole thing like I would just make a film about that very end of the season and we show it from all these different angles as different characters narrate what happened... like fuck all the riders I want to hear from whichever mechanic used the scooter... the gresini mechanic who gave evidence to race direction.... various honda higher ups the crew chiefs like this is jb vs juan martinez it's war!!! obviously you still have the same emotional/thematic hooks as the general rivalry does but idk I would have a LOT of fun figuring out how to structure that, I loveeee mysteries... maybe I'd write it as a mockumentary yeah..... this one's just fun

anyway. a lot of stuff going on in this post, huh! you can probably tell I didn't edit this much. my classic tell when I edit my tumblr posts is I remember how 'paragraphs' work. unfortunately all I have energy for are like. a bunch of rants about things in my brain. I think when tumblr tells you that you've reached the maximum number of characters per paragraph and you need to figure out where to put a break, it's probably a bad thing? on the whole, my stance is I don't have anything AGAINST mildly fictionalised versions, but for me I'm always more of a.... well I want to take advantage of the full specificity of the events as they happened or just come up with a completely original story. kind of person. I know this ask probably wasn't looking for my 'what if you bled out valentino as he's strung up above a red motorcycle' vision but yeah. with a lot of biopics I'm always a bit 'well you could just read about this couldn't you' like I need stuff to take some kind of a stance on the material it's using... all my stuff takes a stance. that's all I've got. obviously all these stances mean that basically none of these things could ever be made. and I know what I said above but if they called me up to write the casey stoner biopic script treatment, I would also do that. if you've actually read to this point, give me a shout - you're a real one and I love you

[hestzhyen]

Chapter 45 Uh, Seriously?! Posting

So! Full speed ahead it is, internet void! What a dense chapter.

First up, John Hishaku and the Samurai Murderer Guy that was at Chihiro's house in chapter 2.

Guess we'll see more of him soon, how fun! It's not quite clear how many people are talking here, but Hishaku scheming is afoot and the game is on. The only question is how fucked the Kamunabi is going to be by the end of the arc IMO.

And don't think I missed that vase reappearing. My nemesis. The spiky boi on the mid-left drove me insane as soon as the raws dropped but I would like to tentatively propose that it is a kiku (chrysanthemum). Different colors have very different meanings so I still admit defeat on that front. But kiku are usually associated with mourning or Imperial imagery, so that's cool. I demand a treat if this flower arrangement turns out to be the world's subtlest hint that the Hishaku are related to an old regime or breakaway faction of the government.

But yeah... so much cuteness this week. Very welcome after the rich drama from the past few chapters.

Boys who commit patricide together fall asleep mid-conversation wake up together, apparently. And for all the fan artists/fanfic writers out there, it's now canon that both of them are wearing long-sleeved shirts under the other layers. I was kind of hoping for Chihiro to be wearing one of his dad's shirts but this is more in character...

Fine, okay, it's probably for convenience's sake since apparently these guys can only rest for one night before jumping into the lion's den. But I'm flabbergasted by their soulmate coding. I kind of expected Hakuri to pass out, but Chihiro conking out at the same time in the same pose is too damn cute! Barely over a week together and they've already perfectly synced their sleep schedules and postures lol.

I find it deeply amusing that the entire flashback sequence at the end of chapter 44 was purely for the reader's benefit though. Seriously! Hakuri asked Chihiro "So... what comes next?" and then they both immediately passed out sitting up. So the last four pages were there just to spare us from even more infodumping in this chapter, which is much appreciated.

That's something that Hokazono-sensei also did at the end of the vs. Sojo arc in chapter 18. 10 pages to him exploding, 7 to the situation at the Kamunabi (which will now come into play! EXCELLENT LAYERING OF DETAILS!). I don't know if I'm smart or educated enough to do a full analysis on the techniques he's using, but I love the style. He doesn't let the emotional points linger too long or waste a single goddamn panel in this manga. Yeah, I want more time with the characters outside of serious plot moments, but there's not much else for me to complain about. The need isn't particularly dire anyway since every scene is efficient in giving us characterization and info at the same time (example later this rant).

So yeah. Thanks to that excellent pacing decision, we get to witness this crowning moment of heartwarming:

LOOK AT THESE DORKS. LOOK AT THEM. I LOVE EVERY SINGLE ONE. Thank you for this moment of Team Goldfish x Hiyuki and Tafuku bliss.

And look at the food on the table! Hiyuki and Tafuku have earned a measure of trust with Team Goldfish! Just a bit, but Shiba definitely wouldn't have let them stay the night and eat with them if he felt they were dangerous.

It's also so sweet that Char's comfortable sitting in big bro Tafuku's lap... she's come a long way since her debut as a scared, scruffy orphan. Wonder where the gang is hanging though. Someone's apartment, I guess? A nearby hotel? More insignificant details this annoying reader wants to know...

TW for SF5-era tournament enthusiasts: That Stage appears in the first panel.

Did anyone have bets on Shiba wrecking Hiyuki in Street Fighter while waiting for Hakuri and Chihiro to wake up? I didn't, but I love it. And this scene highlights something I've really come to appreciate about Kagurabachi's writing: it's incredibly efficient. Almost every scene has more than one thing being conveyed at a time. For instance, here we learn that Hiyuki sucks at Street Fighter compared to Shiba but is too stubborn to quit (comedy & character consistency) and still doesn't know he's ex-Kamunabi (serious). This in turn tells us that Shiba's probably got something to hide from active Kamunabi personnel. After all, it's not like the org itself is a secret, and we wouldn't see Hiyuki questioning him twice if his circumstances weren't suspicious. So Shiba's subplot thickens while we laugh at the gag- peak efficiency.

The cuteness, though... the sweetness of this chapter, man!

Chihiro respecting Yuu's nickname and correcting Hakuri with such a gentle expression is incredibly adorable. He's so relaxed here... but oh wait, there's... chibi Hakuri and Chihiro apologizing for worrying Uncle Shiba?!

Chihiro and his new #1 enabler owe more than an apology but it's good enough for now.

This break wasn't quite long enough to reset the tension in my opinion, but it absolutely delivered on character moments. We definitely needed this after all the big feels from the previous few chapters. I wish there was more time devoted to letting us calm down before ramping up again but what we got here is pretty good.

And so we jump feet-first into laying the groundwork for the Kamunabi arc. A nice, efficient recap of the situation leads us into some additional context and a surprising bit of Shiba characterization. Whatever beef he's got with the Kamunabi feels quite personal for a guy who plays it cool and loose most of the time. We know he's glad he quit because they're too uptight, but there's gotta be more to it than that- he's subtly trying to steer Chihiro away from them while Hiyuki is having none of it here. I want to gently snap this man in half to make him spill his secrets...

At the end of the day, though, Shiba's not going to stop Chihiro from joining the Kamunabi. That's been his thing since Chapter 1: if Chihiro makes up his mind to do something, Shiba will offer advice and make suggestions but ultimately leave the decisions up to him. I wonder how much of his guilt over Kunishige's death plays into that...

Then!

PFFT. "I know what I'm doing here seems risky and unwise but It's fine, trust me. I've got Hakuri." OKAY BUDDY. You've been able to do a hell of a lot since you met this kid haven't you? It's like meeting him changed the trajectory of your life as much as you changed his.

Shiba's expression is very interesting to me. He's like "ah, I get it..." and he's not thrilled in the slightest. Adding Hakuri to the team means Chihiro can be even more reckless than ever before; what little influence he had over Chihiro's safety is all but gone now. And Hakuri himself won't try to stop Chihiro from putting his life on the line- he'll risk his own to help him do it! All this while they're poised to go somewhere he probably can't follow... poor Mr. Shiba.

And then!! AND THEN!!!

Chapter 32: Smile Unlocked (once has no meaning...)

Chapter 36: Smile Lost (twice is a coincidence...)

Chapter 38: Locked In (three times is a pattern...)

Chapter 45: Smile Restored (four times is fate)

The one pulling the other forward is always on the right, leading the reader as well.

When one calls, the other answers. What one starts, the other finishes. A and Un. And this time Hakuri echoes Chihiro's "you got it" catchphrase back to him! I hope this is their thing now, like the "How's my timing?/Perfect" bit that Shiba and Chihiro had.

I'm going absolutely insane over this interaction though. It's the first time Chihiro's gotten to hear someone affirm that they'll see things through with him at his own request (on-screen at least). The first time he's outright said he needs someone, even. And of course Hakuri responds so enthusiastically- he's finally wanted. Just a few days ago he thought he'd never amount to anything. But he's got so much hope thanks to Chihiro's faith in him now.

"What I need in my life is a samurai! THAT'S YOU!" is finally answered with "I'm going to need your help again." hnnnngh what in the hell is this chapter.

Platonic, familial, romantic- however you want to see their relationship, these guys are meant to be together. If I ever start to doubt Hakuri's importance again just smack me right upside the head- he's truly Chihiro's other half now. Let's cheer them on and hope nothing horrible happens to Hakuri ever again! Protect the smile of the boy who would die for you on command, Chihiro. You've been warned.

Protected Bearers

Cool stuff ahead, and tough times to go with them. I doubt things will be as simple as Chihiro successfully making his case and being allowed to start trying to Talk no Jutsu the former wielders. This arc seems like it could easily be longer and more complicated than the previous two combined. I kind of hope it is, just to get more time with everyone. I've never loved a cast of characters this much.

That said... In another series I'd be sure Chihiro would visit each area one by one in their own mini arc, but Kagurabachi is probably going to subvert the expectation somehow. We got previews of the areas so we'll be seeing all of them. Probably (we goddamn better after that gorgeous spread showing them off.), but not in the way we'd expect. This story is so fast I kind of expect us to blitz through all of them in a handful of chapters each... guess it depends on how in-depth we get with the bearers themselves.

As we originally saw them in chapter 18. The slightly updated designs from this chapter are pretty nifty.

I'm 100% sure the order they're presented here corresponds with the areas shown on the spread immediately afterwards. So eye scars is stuck in a temple, the girl is stuck in an onsen, kabuki monk guy is stuck in what looks like a floating shrine, and sushi chef is in... a sushi restaurant. Wow shocker.

I'm going to make the assumption that they got to choose where they were imprisoned for the rest of their lives. Maybe it was the government's way of expressing gratitude for helping the war effort? Which makes Magatsumi's wielder (the Sword Master) being sealed up like a nasty curse all the more intriguing... he's clearly fucked up but was he always that way or did the sword corrode his mind? Is there more to the lifelong contract with these swords than just being the only person who can use them? I better get some answers!

Anyway.

So Kunishige personally knew and chose these people... I wonder how meeting them will deepen Chihiro's understanding of his father's legacy. I sincerely doubt that all of them will make it easy for him to recover the blade they're tied to, but we'll hopefully learn a lot while Chihiro makes his attempts. Really seems like we are set up for Kunishige and Seitei War backstory so I am hype. Dead DILF lore! DEAD DILF LORE!

Hiyuki and Kamunabi Thoughts

Hiyuki also had some interesting moments this chapter. She understands that the current stalemate with the Hishaku has tied the Kamunabi's hands for the most part, forcing them to do less than savory things (like bidding on the Shinuchi) to keep the peace. And despite her hotblooded outburst before the auction, she still has rock solid faith in her org's mission. So I don't think she'll defect easily so as long as she believes the mission is doable under better circumstances.

And it seems like she thinks Chihiro might be the right catalyst for change... hmm. She's essentially using him as a chaos agent to shake up the status quo because he proved himself to her. She finds him worthy of deciding how to handle the blades, so now she's giving him and Hakuri the opportunity prove themselves to her leaders. Very cool. There's some rather deep stuff going on with her.

Hiyuki's much more establishment-oriented than her personality and actions suggest. I get the sense that she's there as an idealist who is willing to upset the status quo to see the mission through. A true believer in a bureaucratic institution- love that type of conflict. Can't wait to see more of her in this arc!

So now we're set to see Chihiro's philosophy and methods on trial. Super intriguing stuff and I'll definitely be looking at the questions each Kamunabi leader is asking to try and suss out their allegiance. Playing Guess the Traitor this arc is gonna be a lot of fun (I hope)!

Speaking of which... Azami as the traitor allegations don't move me, but I do think he'll be restricted this arc due to the ongoing investigation into his clandestine activities. Chihiro could well be on his own without an adult to watch out for him. At least he and Hakuri will be there for each other. ...With no one to try and stop them from doing reckless stunts. Uh oh.

So that's a wrap on this fuckhuge ramble. Hope the breakneck pace slows down just a smidge but I'm still very onboard with whatever is coming next. Thanks for allowing me to ramble as always, void.

[marshallpupfan]

Marshall Merchandise Update - Rescue Wheels Edition™

Slowly but surely, the Rescue Wheels merchandise has been popping up in stores here in the USA. Naturally, I've been keeping an eye out for them, so it's time to show off what I've found so far!

First off, I decided to put a background on my monitor again, just to spruce things up. I also attempted some better lighting by using a lamp instead of my camera's flash. Some pics still came out a bit iffy, so I apologize.

In any case, here's the first piece of Rescue Wheels merchandise I got! Nearly a whole month ago, in fact. I seen it listed on Amazon and figured why not go for it, since stores here in the USA were taking a long time to get them.

The vehicle, itself... it's not my favorite, I'll say that. It's just shaped a little too box-like, but the flame graphics are cool, even if they are just stickers. Strangely, the ladder water cannon on the back doesn't move at all. If anything, I do like the figurine. Not the best, but I still like it.

Next, the usual plush doll, which we always seem to get upon each new subseries or movie. They decided to go back to the old style, which is kind of a shame, since I liked what we got for The Mighty Movie and Jungle Pups better. It just looked cuter, imo. Ah well.

Now that's one cool-looking pup. Super cute! 😎

Next, a new "Pup Squad Racer" vehicle! With not-so-good lighting that I didn't notice until I upload these pics. I probably should've put it on something to get more of that background in the shot. Also, ignore the dust under the monitor... I forgot to get rid of that. 😅

As you can see, this is yet another one of those smaller vehicles. I'm fully convinced these are indeed meant to be replacements for those True Metal vehicles... which is perhaps for the best, since the last few we got were kind of cheap. These are a nice alternative.

Unlike the True Metal vehicles, the pup's head is a lot bigger, so it's a bit more detailed and nicer. I dare say it's pretty cute! And...

...Hey, wait a minute. Who's big tires are those? That doesn't look like Marshall's vehicle...

Wait...

Is it...?

BOOMER??

That's right! Boomer, the villain pup of Rescue Wheels, got his own figurine and vehicle! I'll admit, that's quite rare, since PAW Patrol villains rarely ever get merchandise of any kind. It's only happened a few times in the past.

If you remember that character spotlight post I made of Boomer, then you might also recall that I became quite a big fan of this pup after watching Rescue Wheels! Thus, when I heard he was getting his own toy, I knew I had to have it. Admittedly, I think his vehicle turned out a bit nicer than Marshall's. Don't tell anyone I said that.

His figurine's also nice, if you ask me. Even as a toy, this pup looks quite cool... and cute! I'll certainly have to add this somewhere to my Marshall collection. He'll go nicely next to Claw. Two of my favorite villains, hanging out. We just need this in the cartoon now! lol

Oh, by the way, if anyone's interested in one of these, know that they're exclusive to Walmart (at least, here in the USA). They also made one for Roxi, which I believe is exclusive to Target. Just an FYI.

But wait... that's not all! Even more surprising than the vehicle...

Boomer also got a plush doll! Wow, you really lucked out, Boomer! At this point, I'm hoping the kids asks their parents for these and his figurine & vehicle... that way, Spin Master will see him as popular and we'll see him again someday soon. Hey, let me dream. lol

That is also one cool-looking pup! Boomer! Boomer! Boomer!!! 😁

Alright, that's all for now. And a good thing, too... after all these purchases, my poor wallet is probably screaming at me again. Too bad I'll likely make one or two more soon, since Rescue Wheels got its own batch of mini-figurines in mystery boxes, of course. Sadly, Boomer didn't get included in that, else Marshall wouldn't be the only one I'd be tracking down. It's still crazy to see him get what he did though! Man, if only Claw got his own plush doll instead of Sweetie...

So... what's next? I wonder how much longer until we start to see merchandise of Air Rescue? Then again, the USA hasn't even aired Rescue Wheels yet, so no doubt it won't be until next year. Good... that gives my wallet plenty of time to recover. lol

[notafraidofredyellowandblue]

Recent posts about masculinity got me thinking. I am not surprised that people see Till as the epitome of masculinity ofc if you go by looks. But from what I've seen I find Paul to be a lot of the things that I personally find very manly. He's confident without being an ass about it. He can be stern (like with people trying to enter the boat) without being rude. He can have a committed relationship with an equal and takes responsibility (we don't know ofc but I think not having children with everybody is a part of that for me). He works in a field he loves and is serious about but without sacrificing everything for it. And he can still be funny and silly and goofy and is certainly no killjoy but I bet if needed he can switch to serious in an instant. He enjoys what he's reached in life without boasting. He can show affection (like hugging his daughter) without that embarrased air around him. I can see a growth over the years without loosing himself. A man can be built like a tank but if he lacks qualities like these the manliness level for me drops considerably. I think about this when people talk about Till as the greatest and overall best because I honestly don't see it. And I was quite impressed back in the late nineties by his sensibility and the way he talked and so on but over the years he lost a lot of what appealed to me. For me (all of this is ofc my very personal impression on the available data) it feels like Paul can seem very much like an overgrown child but has really grown into a man and Till seems very much like the man around but is still a teenager on the inside. Which maybe explains the also many people who consider him a poor little meow meow whose bad life choices are never his fault.

i pondered if i wanted to share this ask, because of the negative undertone the word 'masculinity' has these days, but then i figured that's mainly because of 'toxic masculinity' and let's face it, anything combined with 'toxic' would make it negative, same goes for 'toxic cuteness', 'toxic softness' and 'toxic freches früchtchen' (to go with Paul's phrase 😊)

And i agree that Paul seems to be a very manly man: confident (even at 18) but with an easiness to it, firm without being rude (both with fans wanting to enter a boat, but also with Till wanting to bash his head against Paul's mic), in control without being micromanaging. I think there isn't much in Rammstein going on without Paul knowing it (and having an opinion on it 😊) (btw: that's why it imo was so funny that Richard managed to sneak up to him on stage and surprise him 😊

And indeed Paul can be very playful, both in a 'goofy with the guys' and a 'cute and playful' way, sometimes even childlike, but never childish 🌺. And also very affectionate, as he shows regularly with several bandmates ❤️

The phrase "growth over the years without loosing himself" i like a lot, and i agree with it. He's definitely older (can you believe he'll turn 60 end of next year?) and more mature than he was when Rammstein started (or Feeling B), but he's always very much Paul ❤️

Till i see as a masculine man too (maybe they are the among most masculine in the band, with Olli), but maybe in different ways. No i'm not talking about physique (although i can imagine that is why people who don't really know him, also see him as masculine), but Till has imo always had a 'cool' and a 'don't give a damn about what others think' vibe that imo makes him very appealing to be with. I think it's one of the reasons why he always attracts attention in a group of people, a certain magnetic quality (even though he may not always like it), and yes, imo very masculine.

Aside from that Till is one for 'going back to nature', living off the land, roughing it; all very masculine traits imo. (And ofcourse there are his views on people who go in therapy, which in itself are also pretty masculine, but in a different way).

I think more than with Paul, Till has different persona in different situations: on stage, being both a showman and a prankster, jetsetting, and tucked away in small village life. The playful part on stage is imo often being a bit of a prankster (lately i'm often reminded of Nelson of The Simpsons when i see him on stage), and he has retained a bit of juvenile humor (watch him laughing when Flake got that 'dick hat' on on stage).

Where Paul is 'in control', and according to stories, Till likes to be in control too (at least on stage, we know what happens when some of the crew make a mistake) but he handles it differently. I also think that Till is easily persuaded to do something if he's indulged in what he likes (rather, it has been stated almost literally in at least one making of) That's why personally i'm not a big fan of the entourage he formed around him the last couple of years, because imo they indulge him too much and don't tell him 'no'. Ofcourse he's old and intelligent (Till is from a very intellectual background, he should be able to look at himself and evaluate) enough to say 'no' himself, but he often doesn't imo... But like i said, he's smart enough to be able to figure that out 🌺 maybe just every now and then, he needs someone to give him a kick up the youknowwhat 😊

Does that make him less masculine though? 🤔 Not in my book...but what do i know 😊

[crehador]

brother crab's spring 2024 parting thoughts (part 1)

doing this quickly and messily this season because it has been a very messy season for me (how... how did i get 50+ episodes behind at one point)

anyway LOADS OF PHENOMENAL STUFF THIS SEASON although i would not call it flawless sentai daishikkaku is still far and away the anime of the season for me (but more on this in parting thoughts part 2, since its season hasn't finished airing just yet)

THE GREATS

kaijuu 8-gou was so much fun. imo it's a very typical battle shounen (but with an adult lead! fantastic) in that it hits all the beats you would expect a battle shounen to hit, but it hits them well. characters are fun, fights are dynamic, worldbuilding is solid and compelling (not terribly revolutionary, but it doesn't need to be)

it's overall just such a good time. hoshina im lov u. s2 please come soon

boukyaku battery was also phenomenal. easily one of the sports anime of all time. hilarious and riveting. the characters are so good, both as individuals and a team, and their backstories all unfolded so wonderfully. the visuals just get better and better. mappa let your staff rest but also. damn. undeniably good work

and todochi!! todochi forever!!! terrible fucking boyfriends (affectionate)

wind breaker was super solid all around as well, i haven't seen toman myself but i keep hearing that it's like toman if toman were good (lmao i'm so sorry to hear this toman enjoyers, stay strong)

oddly enough i'm not possessed with like... and overabundance of super strong feelings towards the characters, though. they're all really fun to watch, and i definitely plan on continuing the series, but i'm not quite rotating them in my head all the time. still good stuff though

THE GOODS (THE VERY GOODS)

astro note should be in the greats honestly but i'm trying to do three per section in this post, but it was just a delight through and through. there was nothing i didn't enjoy about this. takumi you are such a shit (affectionate)

tadaima okaeri... honestly i'm really happy with this adaptation! not only for voice actor reasons (but yes mostly for voice actor reasons) but like put next to all bl adaptations, this one imo does a lot very, very right

i adore the series itself too, did a quick reread before the series started airing and it really is just so wholesome and sweet. but personally i find it a stronger family (and found family) story than a romance, like where it really shines is its exploration of community and generational trauma despite best intentions. which is i imagine not what many people expect from an omegaverse bl but there it is

yozakura-san chi no daisakusen is continuing on into next season (i forgor) but i think it's pretty solidly made its home in this tier for me. it's a lot of wacky, zany fun, and really a delight to watch every week, but it doesn't really stay on my mind afterwards. so just, good stuff!

THE NOT BADS (OR AT LEAST NOT TERRIBLES)

jii-san baa-san wakagaeru was actually overall really enjoyable to me! lots of really deep, poignant moments, an ending that... i shan't say, and loads of quality humor and sweet family moments

but it came out the gate real strong with a first episode that was rife with grandpafucker jokes so i feel like a lot of people might not have made it to the poignant stuff which, fair enough lol. wouldn't say this is something that can't be missed, but really wasn't bad all told

sasakoi... tragically... had i think a pretty strong start but alas. production issues have reared their head and the animation quality in particular got worse and worse throughout

personally i'm not that much a fan of the drama either. the main relationship is pretty cute, but the drama surrounding them... honestly i just couldn't get invested. but that's solely a personal taste thing

as for re:monster... the less said the better. never in my life have i seen a show that more obviously wanted to be a hentai but wasn't

THE SEQUELS/CONTINUATIONS

obviously dungeon meshi was excellent no one needs me to say anything about that

yuru camp s3... i can understand the criticisms, i can understand not vibing with the new art style. but tbh i personally still enjoyed it immensely, it's still cozy, it's still cute, i couldn't really ask for more

hashira training arc my beloved. i can't really give an unbiased review of this one because i love u genyaaaaaaaaa. and gentaaaaaan. god this was such a good arc for them. anyway

shockingly enough i think that is... all i watched this season? (besides yatagarasu and sentai daishikkaku, but more on those later)

i thought there were more than just these but i don't see anything else in my activity log

so basically EXTREMELY STRONG SEASON aots will be decided in like... 20 hours

[helladventurers]

WOL outfits throughout my run of the game

I've been working on this character based on Zooey from granblue fantasy, and all of her outfits so far have been based on her ^o^ or well, at least the main ones anyway (also big shout outs to @dewpriism for the help in making most of them)

Tags:

Gui plays ffxiv (every post regarding the game, including opinions and reactions and anything in between)

Daughter of Dravania (WoL specific tag, including glamor, gpose pics and lore posts)

WoLtfits (glamor posts, once again with most glamour being inspired by zooey gbf)

Original outfit (slight recreation because I can't remember which gloves or skirt I was using at the time, the skirt used to fit a lot better with the top but I've since been unable to find it on my glamour dresser)

This one was the very first one I made, when I was still playing paladin in ARR, and for how limited my knowledge of the game was (and for how ugly a lot of the pieces in ARR are), I'm still proud and found of this one, even tho it's been since retired and it's not quite as good as the later ones

Dark knight outfit

This one was after I started getting more used to the game (and realized that gatherer/crafter items could be used by any class in the game), it's a bit darker than I wanted it to be, but it still looks cute imo (and fits a dark knight :V), the only part I didn't really like were the leg guard things, but I liked the shoes too much to put on greaves or boots, and sadly this game is extremely limited when it comes to skirts 😭

this also has the distinction of being the set I used the most of since I played through HW with it and used through the vast majority of my stay in free trial, only switching to the next one when I decided to play bard

Bard/gunbreaker outfit

Now THIS is the one that I feel like has been the most quintessential outfit so far ✨ it's the closest one I've had to Zooey's actual outfit (with the only downside being the fact it has sleeves), my friend did an amazing with the boots especially, since despite the fact they're made out of leather, the colors still makes it look like they're greaves without looking super clunky and heavy like in my first outfit

It's both by far the best one I've had thus far and extremely faithful to what Zooey outfits I had in mind when I started playing, while still having its own personality

Red mage outfit

This one is by far the most out of the rails one so far lol red mage doesn't really fit Zooey's aesthetic, but it's an aesthetic I, as the player, really liked, so I asked my friend to see if they could at least make a color scheme that would fit Zooey, and they knocked it out of the park once again, and once again doing a banger job of making leather boots look metalic~

While this originally was just the pvp version of the level 70 red mage set, I ended up adding the skirt once I realized how well it went with the rest of the set.

And that's it for now ^o^ overall I'm proud of these, and really happy with the results, despite none of them being 1-1 to Zooey's outfit, I still really like them, and the small differences that detract from the likeness to gbf Zooey ends up giving the outfits a bit more personality while still being reasonably close to what I perceive as her aesthetic. This is far from finished as each new expansion opens up more possibilities and chances to try out other outfits based on the new pieces I come across

[franzis-frantic-thoughts]

I just saw the new TMA2 designs and I fully agree ... they look very low quality. No offense to who designed them, but apart from (maybe) the last design, it doesn't look like anything I'd spend money on 🙈

The "I brought Magnus Back" Design isn't half bad tbh, except that the flower doesn't really make sense to anyone on my discord server. The best explanation we have is that it's a (bad) rendering of a Spider Lily.

Red ones seem to be associated with death and white ones with rebirth. There's an argument for flowers to be made re. the Bone Garden and the spider-meaning is obvious. But the Spider-Lily-meaning is far from it. They could easily have gone for a spiders' web or an eye or a coffin or anything else to do with Magnus. My only hope is that the flower will become relevant in TMA2, and therefore will make sense retrospectively.

but the other design... I just can't get over how awful it looks. I'm not criticising the use of Stockimages. That's what they're for. But the whole composition just looks so cheaply and quickly made. So many different colours in the writing, "cloth rustles" instead of "fabric rustles"... I think they tried going for a vintage horror film poster and just did it super badly. It's not good enough in a bad way to be ironic. It's just bad in my opinion.

Also I'm just incredibly salty about the fact that other shows get far less merch and the merch is also less well advertised.

Even if these designs are bad, at least they exist. Even if these designs are bad, at least the public is being made aware of them.

It all circles back around to RQ putting all their efforts into pushing TMA (which definitely deserves pushing, it's a great show), but neglecting all their other shows!!

So many people have commented on my posts / tagged them with something like "never even heard of RQG or STL" or "What is Trice Forgotten?" or "let's be honest, who even listened to those?" (I did. And so did dozens of other people. But can these commenters not see, that that is precisely the problem?)

Anyway, back to Merch:

Trice Forgotten only has four designs so far, all of them are on Teepublic, the Alestes' Crew design isn't on Redbubble, but the rest is.

Chapter and multiverse has five designs and they're all on both websites.

Both of these incredible shows have only gotten quite simplistic designs so far. Given the awful quality of the "TMA returns" shirt, I'm glad now?! I still wouldn't wear a UTBC or TARGE logo on my chest for personal/conviction reasons, but the TTCS logo is kinda cute, imo. The moustache is very hipster which I like for this.

Also I'm still eying the "Visit Galactonium" design as a poster. It would look fab next to my Tardis poster!

I was hoping for character-specific stuff for C&M, the way they did for RQG (let's not talk about the fact that the Cel design only came out after the show had ended and Cel had already been part of the party for years, or the fact that the other character designs are all out of date, or the fact that Brutor got the most designs what the fuck).

[birb-tangleblog]

TTS Brotherhood Ask Game!!! :)))))

9. Who do you think is the most skilled in fighting?

14. Do you think the Brotherhood should continue with new members?

18 What is a cool headcanon that you liked from someone else?

9. Who do you think is the most skilled in fighting?

Ohhh man, this is a tough one- I see them as pretty evenly matched? I can imagine them all countering each other in different ways, and perhaps having favorable/unfavorable matchups- though I think they're all be close enough in skill that any fight would be a tossup.

Honestly, I kinda want to compare them to a starter trio from pkmn? (or rock paper scissors lmao)

Hector -> Quirin -> Adira maybe?

I feel like Hector's win condition against Quirin would be to outmaneuver and take him down before he runs out of stamina. Quirin is a tank, but also slower and the easiest to outspeed- Hector's aggression and decisiveness benefits him here.

Quirin, in turn, would win a war of attrition against Adira- if Adira didn't engage, he wouldn't burn himself out like Hector would. He can play just as defensively and patiently as she can, and out-endure.

And like we saw in the series, Adira has an excellent balance between strength, defense, and dexterity, and leverages each to her advantage. I'm not sure one member of the brotherhood is objectively the most skilled fighter, but of the three, imo she's probably the most reliable.

If we're talking canon/post-series and not hypothetical matchups, I debate on if Hector or Adira would be stronger. Quirin is obviously rusty, so he's out. Hector is isolated, and not necessarily fighting skilled opponents most of the time- but he probably practices and drills himself religiously. Adira's out in the world, so more likely to encounter trouble and test her skills- but she also might avoid fights because it's safe/practical.

We do see Adira beat Hector in a fight in RatGT, buuut I think that could've gone either way.

14. Do you think the Brotherhood should continue with new members?

Honestly, no! I think the Brotherhood, as it was, needed to come to an end. The secrecy, the demand of loyalty to the point of self-destruction and sacrifice, the legacy of the moonstone and the mindtrap talisman… it's better left in the past. (I also tend to HC that the Brotherhood favored recruiting orphans or children who otherwise had nothing, which is another reason the system would need to change in my mind.)

I think the Brotherhood could definitely reform, possibly under a new name, and become more inclusive/healthy- I really like the HC that in a canon-compliant ending, Hector goes on to be a teacher/mentor for the next gen- but part of rebuilding the DK would be starting that part of it anew.

18. What is a cool headcanon that you liked from someone else?

Xannerz has really cool thoughts on the DK and the Brotherhood!! Hard to pick just one w/ all our chatter, but I really like her headcanon that not everyone left the DK in the evacuation and a small handful of the citizens stayed behind. Ones who were older or sick, and just couldn't make the long journey, or maybe who refused to leave out of love/loyalty to their home- Edmund wouldn't have been completely alone, but it's still bleak and tragic in its own way.

Meechatuck's idea that Quirin is actually quite skilled at picking locks and Mo (rainyday-deer)'s old HC that Hector whittles are also both very cute to me!

[lumeha]

Oh also 31-34

31 - What is your favorite pre-timeskip character design or outfit?

Rhea

Okay technically she counts but - anyway - while I love Rhea's design, I will count characters who do not change designs as "pre-timeskip", and the answer coming from the bottom of my heart is...

Catherine.

Her design is just absolutely top-notch. She's everything. She looks gorgeous. She looks fierce. I love her armor, I love her hair, she's (chef kiss) SHE'S SO BEAUTIFUL OKAY

(shout out to Gilbert's braid that made me fall in love with his design too)

(and shout out to Rhea She Pretty)

32 - What is your favorite post-timeskip character design or outfit?

I think it's a tie between Ingrid and Felix ngl. Okay and shout-out to Dimitri, he has an eyepatch, that means I have to stan, I'm the one asshole who loves characters who wear an eyepatch.

But.

Okay, Ingrid. She's not one of my faves, but I adore her post-skip design. I think it works both as a Faerghan design, with the fur, the colour palette, the details, and as a really pretty inheritor of previous Pegasus Knights designs ! Which makes it so fantastic to me ! I adore that part !

Felix.. has a bit of a weirder one but. idk. The spats are so good as a detail. I love that he is still clearly with the Faerghan palette and the fur and I own a hoodie inspired by his top half so I really genuinely love the design. But I also love that he has a more saturated colour palette compared to the others. Makes him both fit in and stand out and it's an excellent design, love that !!

33 - What is your least favorite (or hated) pre-timeskip character design or outfit?

Uuuhhh I'll have to go with F!Byleth. It just feels like more of a mess next to M!Byleth's design ? I think she could be cute, it's just that her design looks a bit like a mish-mash of things that don't quite gel together the way I want it to in the end :c

34 - What is your least favorite (or hated) post-timeskip character design or outfit?

... I don't think it's that controversial, but Bernadetta. I just ?? Don't ?? understand the direction they went with with her post-skip design. It doesn't look like something someone like her would wear ? the haircut looks strange ?? Overall I think it's a pretty bad one, and it's not like it looks like it's on purpose like Lorenz' pre-skip haircut.

I just think it ends up looking really off. A bit inspired by older games archers and snipers, but, idk, it really doesn't work with Bernadetta's personality imo, and it just doesn't look that great to me T-T

50 FE3H questions

[batsplat]

Thank you so much for ur work for this community 😭

thank you!! so, listen, I need to get some casey, jorge and valentino images out into the world

this is from the 2007 qatar post-qualifying press conference. obviously it's not just the three of them given colin edwards is like. right in the middle. (and *checks notes* gábor talmácsi is also there.) but still a photo of historical significance... casey's first ever race with the ducati (which he very much wins), plus valentino with his then-current teammate edwards and then-future teammate jorge... it's a bit unclear when jorge was actually signed - lin jarvis implies it was in 2006 but if that's the case, edwards seemed to be under the impression for a little too long that he wasn't going to lose that seat. anyways! look at wee nineteen year old jorge lorenzo, look at his utter absence of anything approaching a smile... look at him

misano 2007 post-qualifying press conference and a very powerful photo imo... some nicely contrasting vibes here, good composition... jorge had already been announced as valentino's teammate, and the title is already more or less in casey's pocket (even more so after casey won here and valentino had a mechanical dnf lol - they'd basically brought the race back to the calendar for valentino so this was. not ideal! incidentally still the last race with an entirely non-european podium.)

not much from 2008 tbh. casey and vale took turns to flop in the first bit of the season and then jorge started crashing his brains out. anyway these are from indianapolis, at a time when jorge was just about in the process of getting his act together while casey had crashed in his last three races (including laguna where he picks up the bike to finish p2). quite fond of this race actually, bit of a mess due to the weather and ends up getting red-flagged

first race of 2009.... casey's scheduled annual qatar win. decent shout for his most boring one of the lot, sorry king

pre-event presser before mugello, where valentino had won seven consecutive times headed into the 2009 race. if I'm valentino I low-key never show my face again after the le mans catastrophe but whatever it's fine

the le mans fiasco in question

anyway mugello is another wet-ish race that valentino ended up playing too conservatively because of the le mans horror show. so casey wins! also jorge beats valentino! old man's washed! just about scams his way onto the podium

italian press weren't particularly kind to valentino for having the audacity to lose mugello. they said it was over... he was finished... imagine only winning a race seven times in a row. was he even trying any more? loser

valentino bounced back at catalunya 2009 in highly dramatic fashion (y'know, it's the one with the last corner overtake). moment of deep historical significance in which jorge pulls valentino down from the podium to give him a hug

first race where casey was really struggling with his mystery illness... idk if I were valentino or jorge I'd maybe check if the third guy on the podium isn't about to drop dead but. well. professional athletes, never really been known for their empathy. they did clap along with the journalists in the post-race press conference when the moderator thanked casey for actually making it to the presser, so that's something?

we all have our struggles

the very next race. immaculate vibes imo. the 2009 title fight going into assen had all three of them tied on 106 points... #heritage

anyway the race itself is pretty boring (as unfortunately are many of the races that year), but it's valentino's 100th win so good on him ig. he got out a special banner with photos of all his wins, which would've been an absolute pain to lug around if he'd not immediately won the next race after his 99th

cute. unfortunately, this is now very much mystery illness period for casey... heroic effort to get himself to the podium but not much more was possible at the time

laguna 2009 post-quali presser. jorge is sitting for the photo, because even though he'd bagged pole, he had a massive highside right at the end of qualifying... hurt both his ankles and his shoulder. he'd also had a horrendous highside right at the start of laguna '08, did a good job to banish his gremlins in order to win at the circuit in 2010

qatar 2010... can't have been after the race because casey crashed :/ valentino grabbed the win, before immediately injuring his shoulder in a motocross accident. all went downhill from there, really. damn the eruption of eyjafjallajökull we were robbed

laguna 2010 podium, most memorable as 'that time when they accidentally played the italian anthem rather than the spanish one and valentino thinks it's extremely funny' (clip here). extremely poor quality photo shows casey found it funny too. very #them thing to happen to them. valentino buddy the cap's supposed to remain off for the duration of the anthem

this is very much post-leg break btw, still pretty cordial with each other given some of the stuff they'd been saying about each other to the press during that period lol (not casey/jorge, they were basically fine by this point)

presser right after jorge and valentino's little motegi misadventure... gifs from the presser. valentino's smirk vs casey's grin while jorge is being interrogated, I think about you often...

this was casey's fourth consecutive phillip island win (of six total)... isn't that just like. an incredibly cool circuit to be goated at. does mean the fight for the victory was generally quite boring - though the battles behind casey weren't always exactly thrilling either, so you can blame that on the era too. 2008 and 2010 has decent action behind casey, 2009 is the closest casey was pushed for the win and 2011 at least has a bit of weather-related jeopardy

valencia 2010, photos taken before unfortunate events

last shared podium!! le mans 2012, a fun wet race that featured the final proper casey/vale duel at the race after casey's retirement announcement so has real sentimental value... congrats to valentino for not collecting casey this time. presser clip where he shows he's also pretty glad about how he (just about) managed this

[blossomwritesthings]

what is “bubble?” i’ve seen you and some other STAY accounts post stuff from it but i can’t quite figure out what it is. from what i can tell it’s a subscription of some kind, but like is it worth it?

ok, so basically...

bubble is kind of like facebook for stays. it's a place where fans can ask questions and potentially get replies from skz. stays can also post pictures and create group chats. plus, there are 8 individual chat rooms for each skz member, and each member has their own profile where they post different things and stuff.

it's an exclusive, subscription-based app, and the only way you can access its features is by buying a skz fan club ticket. they usually go on sale for a few months at the end of each year, so the subscription/buying window is open for quite a while for new members to join. they recently just had their annual fan club sign up period, which was between oct-nov of 2022. i'm not certain on this next detail, so don't quote me on it, but I'm pretty sure that you can only access their private bubble community with a fan club ticket, so without one, you can't be a part of the activities. and since the tickets only go on sale once (???) a year, the only time you can gain access is at the end of each year.

everyone has a different opinion about bubble, and there are similar apps to it for other groups from diff companies, so i won't speak for every stay when i say that i personally think it's a waste of money. sure, you get some cute goodies from the fan club ticket purchase, and you gain access to their bubble community, but you can literally find the stuff they post on bubble anywhere online. jyp market's it as something exclusive and private between you and skz, when in reality, your sharing the texts/photos between the rest of the fandom. i don't see any need in spending the money to gain access to their bubble, when i follow certain ig/tumblr accs that specifically translate their posts, upload their bubble photos, and even record the videos they share on the platform. however, i DO understand the appeal of it. I mean, there's a chance that one of your questions/letters could be answered by skz, but that's getting pretty lucky imo. and for some fans, it feels like a intimate place for just them and their fav star.

however, if you think it's worth it, then i'd def say spend the money. if it's smth that will bring you joy and happiness, then go for it!! 🥰 hope this helps haha and that it wasn't too confusing... 🤡

[adotrevsleft]

Album ranking post #1:

Initial thoughts (May 1st 2023): this album and all of its songs have something to offer to any different type of audiences. However, these were clearly made for the fearnots and the fearnots only.

Final thoughts (June 23rd 2023): I still stand with the opinion that there is a variety in the album tracks and each song is different which leads to appeal to different types of people, so maybe it's not just for the fans. It mainly is, but not completely. However, there is a huge inconsistency within the album tha could have been better executed, also there was no reason to add the other songs wich were literally the same just adding a (2023 version). There was no reason. I know it was done so there wouldn't be a recording of garam but, girl was proven innocent like nearly a year ago, so what was the reason? But, it surely does make me excited for their next comeback, because this was the end of their trilogy, I believe, so I'm excited to see what they will be able to offer us next time.

Now onto the ranking - with a few words:

1) FEARNOT (between you, me and the lampost) - a beautiful song that is so highly underappreciated in the lsfm fandom, it's insane. I have been playing this song on repeat since release. Because who doesn't love depressing songs yk? Atm, I have to say that this is my favourite track from lsfm's discography so far. The emotion is felt through their vocals and that's probably why I instantly fell in love with this song. 10/10

2) Eve, Psyche and the Bluebeard's wife - so fucking catchy. Also on repeat. Tbh, when I first listened to it I was slightly unsure but it's amazing. But, I just know that "I'm a mess in distress, but we're still the best dressed, fearless say yes, we don't dress to impress" is going to stay iconic. 9.5/10

3) Unforgiven (feat. Nile Rodgers) - tbf, I was surprised no one was making a big fuss that Nile Rodgers was a feat in this song because when I told my dad he genuinely freaked out. People are comparing this to unforgiven constantly to the point in which the song seems to be unenjoyable, but really this song is something to be enjoyed by itself. 8.5/10

4) No-return (into the unknown) - just a fun little song. After listening it from their concert, I was super excited for this song. It was quite catchy for the first week but afterwards I got bored of listening to it. But, it is a really sweet song and I did genuinely enjoy it at one point. 8/10

5) Burn The Bridge - genuinely makes me want to fight my inner demons (I don't have inner demons dw, it's just a metaphor). This is an intro I can vibe to instantly. The other ones that were previously released were not as interesting, this intro sounds like the intro to a long story (in this case the album), it sounds like a proper intro and I have played it a few times because it does feel quite empowering listening to it. 8/10

6) Flash Forward - it is such a cute song. I haven't gone back to it a lot, but certainly is a great song. It really depends on the mood of that day for me to listen to this. Clearly, this was trying to be similar to good parts, but good parts was way catchier imo. Also, this is a song I would recommend to anyone who likes a chill pop song. 7/10

7) Fire In The Belly - just because this track is at the bottom of this ranking doesn't necessarily mean it is a bad track. I can see the reason people enjoy it, but for some reason I don't see it. People say it's like antifragile or that this should've been the title track, but imo this doesn't have the same power and statement that Unforgiven does, and is definitely not as powerful in execution as Antifragile either, that's why I heavily disagree with that opinion. But, it's not a bad song either. 5.5/10

Overall score for this album: 8.1/10

[ramblings-of-a-mad-cat]

Sometimes whenever MC talks to Barnaby it feels like they’re talking to a 5 year old imo. Idk why they make him so dumb and childish almost all the time. I mean I guess it was alright when he was a 3rd year (still a bit odd though) but now in 7th year he’s still pretty much the same if not only a bit more mature/smarter and that’s really not good. It’s not cute or funny anymore, it’s actually quite concerning at this point. Next year he won’t be at school anymore and it’s not unlikely that some people are gonna take advantage of his naivety and I don’t think anyone wants that.

This is how I feel as well. The game insists on featuring him quite a lot (not on the same level as Penny or Merula, but he's only about one tier or so lower than them.) He's in all of the advertisements and he's been a love interest consistently since the Celestial Ball. So he's easily one of the favorites of the developers - or, alternatively, they believe he's popular among players and highlight him for that reason. Whatever the case, they choose to feature Barnaby a lot...and yet unlike other characters, he hasn't really evolved as a person, nor have we learned much of anything about him since Year 3 when he was a lead. The last moment, the very last that I can recall him getting development was during Year 5. Him exploding during the big Library fight because it reminded him of being at home, and then MC getting to see firsthand what that was like when Barnaby let them practice Legilimency on him? Complete with Barnaby's cheerful explanation that he just represses this stuff? Oh my stars. That is...heartbreaking. (And also chilling for me because I can relate on so many levels.) But that was Year 5.

Since then, he's gotten so little. Every time he turns up, it's just playing on the joke that he's stupid. Now, I will say that Barnaby isn't badly written for a "stupid" character. He has some genuinely funny moments and scenes that make you face-palm but also smile. He has hidden depth, and a wisdom that comes from his experiences and traumas. He rarely shows it but he can be quite mature, to general amazement. To draw a few comparisons, Barnaby is written rather like early-seasons Patrick Star, from Spongebob. I think I even once made an "Incorrect Quotes" post using Barnaby for the iconic "Is this the Krusty Krab?" Bit. To those who know what I'm talking about, I'm sure you can see what I mean. It suits him. Dopey, but well meaning. Still, that bit can get old. This is what I mean. Barnaby isn't badly written, but too often he's just very one-note. Another comparison I've made to Barnaby before is Olaf from Frozen. That's a character who he reminds me of and I think he could do with taking another page from Olaf's book. Because although Olaf is quite childish...he grows up a fair bit in the second film. He begins to mature, and it's beautiful. Jam City, Barnaby could be just as beautiful if you'd only let him be.

Thought you should see this, @dat-silvers-girl