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radioactive-earthshine · 2 months

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Orla's Non-Bat Comic Recs.

Hello folks, in light of the 'all published comics are BAD' wave that has been swept everywhere recently I would like to share a collection of comics that are good actually and are generally isolated (you don't need a spreadsheet to read them).

1.) Impulse (1995)

Why: This is about a neurodiverse coded teenage refugee from the future who cannot live with his blood family in the 20th century due to circumstances that are beyond his control. It is about learning to adapt to a world that doesn't make sense, and learning to love it too. As time goes on Bart learns how to love and he discovers who he is and what is important to him really. All the while some of the most chaotic things happen that you may ever see in a comic (Bart tricks the whole school into getting into a brawl and drives a car off a cliff). Primary themes: Found family (for real), loss, immigration coding, neurodiversity, foster homes, friendship, self discovery, school. Trigger warnings: child abuse, ableism, ptsd, gangs and gun violence (a shocking amount) mental illness. Available in Trade Paperback: Partially. Reckless Youth - collects Bart's first appearances from The Flash plus issues #1-#6 in Impulse. Flash/Impulse: Runs in the Family - collects Impulse #1-#12 plus supplementary issues from The Flash. Mercury Falling - Collects the entire Mercury Falling arc.

2.) Jack Kirby's New Gods (1971)

Why: This is the epic that started it all with Darkseid as he scours the earth in search of the Anti-Life Equation. It is about many deep layers of history involving the New Gods, the divide between New Genesis and Apokolips. In desperation to stop an endless war Darkseid and Highfather of New Genesis agree to a pact - to trade sons and in return a long period of truce and a ceasefire would pass between worlds. Highfather agreed, trading his son for Darkseid's whom he raised with love on New Genesis. Orion, years later, is a god of war and he fights for New Genesis and he fights for Earth, undogged he persists in vanquishing Darkseid's evil wherever it dwells. But Orion has a secret, and deep shame, for he experiences anger and wrath like no other on New Genesis but there is deep compassion and love that tempers it. As Orion fights for Earth he uncovers many secrets about himself, and at his side is his 'friend' Lightray who knows the darkness in him but never turns away. Primary themes: war, anger, ptsd, secrets, space opera, family, anti-war, malice, self discovery Trigger warnings: ptsd, this was written in the 70s but was pretty liberal for its time, still has some awkward moments that are slightly sexist and racist (mostly with names of black characters Vykin the Black and Black Racer which some people are uncomfortable with). Available in Trade Paperback: Complete. 1 book. Jack Kirby's New Gods - Collects all issues of Jack's 1971 series plus Even Gods Must Die and The Hunger Dogs. NOTE: Jack Kirby's entire Fourth World epic with Mr. Miracle and The Forever People is also highly recommended and is part of the New Gods tale. All 3 series has been complied into one massive trade called Jack Kirby's Fourth World, and all are available individually as well. Either way you might be able to find these at your library, or on Hooplah.

3.) Orion by Walter Simonson

Why: Decades after Jack Kirby wrote his final chapter for New Gods Orion finally gets his solo where he faces his father on Apokolips and steps up as its ruler. Now the leader of Apokolips Orion begins the arduous task of cleansing it of its malice and cruelty, a feat that is not easy and even more so when he does it without aid. With sinister deception at every turn Orion struggles and finds himself being tempted to use the very force that he was sworn to protect everyone from; the very anti-life equation itself. Primary themes; deceit, temptation, rebirth, life and death, redemption, mercy, compassion, love, forgiveness. Trigger warnings: torture, sexual assault implications. Available in Trade Paperback - Complete. 2 books.

4.) Barda by Ngozi Ukazu (NEW!!)

Why: This is a graphic novel and is a retelling of Barda as she comes to understand love and what she really wants from her life all while navigating the cruelty of Apokolips. Primary themes: love, cruelty, malice, torture, imprisonment, hope Trigger Warnings: torture, execution. Single complete graphic novel.

5.) Superman: The Harvests of Youth by Sina Grace

Why: This is a heartbreaking coming of age story about Clark Kent as a teenager in Smallville as he finds his place among his friends, family and himself as an alien during a time of death and hatred. It is a young Superman story that is incredibly relevant today in an age of internet toxicity and leaves you feeling hopeful. This blends some elements from Smallville (the show) but tweaks them to make this its own unique bubble world that feels believable and fresh. Primary Themes: toxic masculinity, incels, bullying, suicide, capitalism, teenage coming of age, teenage romance, high school Single complete graphic novel

6.) Superman Smashes The Klan by Gene Luen Yang

Why: In the 1940s the Superman Radio Show released the story "Clan of the Fiery Cross" that told a terrifying story about the KKK targeting a Chinese-American family that moved from Chinatown into Metropolis white-dominated suburbs following WWII. This is a graphic novel that is based on the same story. Primary Themes: racism, identity issues, internalized racism, police brutality. Single complete graphic novel, and also has 3 separate novels.

7.) Bad Dream: A Dreamer Story by Nicole Maines (New!!)

Why: This is Nia Nal's solo and origin story that has been confirmed to take place in the main verse for the current comics. Nia was born and raised in a small heavily isolated Sanctuary where aliens live safely. Even among dozens of alien species Nia is still seen as different as she is the only person who is trans. To complicate everything even more, Nia inherits her people's precognitive powers when her sister Maeve was raised her entire life to accept the powers into her. Terrified of her new powers and destroying her family by revealing them she inherited them instead of her sister, she flees from her hometown to Metropolis where she for the first time in her life meets other queer people. But there is a threat to her family on the horizon, and in order to protect them she must go back and face her fears. Primary Themes: transphobia, self discovery, xenophobia, acceptance, fearfulness, family, secrets, deceit. Trigger Warnings: see above, also internalized queerphobia. Single Complete Graphic Novel

8.) Static: Season One

Why: This is a modern retelling of Milestone Comic's Static as bullied nerd Virgil Hawkins comes into his powers at a protest when police discharge an experimental tear gas. The gas leaves many of his classmates dead, but some like him gain amazing powers - unfortunately some other people, like his bullies, also gain powers. Caught between law enforcement, capitalism, and the complexities of being a new teenage superhero Virgil works to uplift his community and stay strong within his nerdy friend group. This series is heavily based on the Static Shock TV show so fans of that show will be delighted with familiar faces, and names. And yes, Richie Foley is gay. Primary Themes: racism, police brutality, bullying, anger, frustration, dehumanization. Trigger Warnings: See above Available in Trade Paperback - Complete in Static: Season One which collects all six issues. Note: We also have its sequel Static: Shadows of Dakota out as well.

9.) Superman: American Alien

Why: This is a collection of short stories about Clark at varying stages of his life that range from funny to incredibly heartfelt. Primary Themes: finding ones self, self discovery, compassion Trigger warnings: I cannot think of one Available in Trade Paperback - Complete as Superman: American Alien which collects all 7 stories.

10.) Legion of Super-Heroes: Post-Zero Hour Reboot

Why: In the 30th century R.J. Brande Industries creates the Star Gate System, finally connecting the galaxy closer than it ever had before. Travel that once took months or years to complete now could only take hours and with it came the United Planets with Earth as its home headquarters. In an effort to promote the United Planets and unify the galaxy, the Legion of Super-Heroes was formed by Brande as a peacekeeping unit and an inspiration to cooperation. Sadly, it was co-opted by political parties and turned into a draft for talented teenagers to serve, or risk their planet's enrollment in the U.P. Over the course of over 200 issues teenage super heroes are given unfathomable responsibility and power while unifying to protect their galaxy and friendships while combating xenophobia and political corruption. This series is everything people wanted TTv3 to be but never got. Primary Themes: Dehumanization, loss of autonomy, death, life, space, technology, capitalism, political corruption, manipulation, deceit, hope, romance, found family Trigger Warnings: See above plus ableism and teenage pregnancy. Available in Trade Paperback: Partially. We have 2 volumes called Legionnaires which collect approximately 20 issues, plus extra content, of this run. We also have various other trade collections such as Legion Lost in its entirety.

11.) Ascender and Descender by Jeff Lemire and Dustin Nguyen

Why: Tired of superheroes? These are two separate series that follow the same story about a young companion robot named Tim who was assigned to be his human brother's best friend and companion. Unfortunately, during a mining accident his entire colony had to flee and leave him behind as they attempted to escape toxic gas. 10 years have gone by since then, and a lot has changed in the world since he was shut down. Mostly being 95% of all robots have been destroyed and are targeted for destruction after a mysterious robotic alien force attacked all sentient worlds and obliterated the populations down to catastrophic levels. All Tim wants to do is find his brother Andy, but what has become of Andy in 10 years, and what will happen to him in 10 more years after they reunite? This story takes place over 20 years as Tim and Andy both grow and change, as they face the challenges before them and unravel the mystery of the Artificial Intelligence that swore to destroy all organic life. Oh, and magic is also involved too. Primary themes: hatred, violence, abuse, xenophobia, forgiveness, found family, brothers, dehumanization, life, death, magic, balance, manipulation, deceit, mysteries, will probably remind you of Mass Effect. Trigger Warnings: see above Available in Trade Paperback: the entire series is available across multiple books.

That's all I have for now folks, I'm tired of writing.

#comic recs #i am so tired of writing #i have so many more but this is just what I thought of first

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deacons-wig · 5 months

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I'd prefer if we never got to see the origin of Vault Boy and Vault Tec's branding in the same way I'd rather not get a canon answer of who started the War or how. That's the point of War Never Changes.

Vault Boy is a sinister figure in his cheerful embrace of Armageddon. Giving the Vault Tec brand a face and a name and a backstory feels so unimportant to what is actually interesting about Fallout. What's important to me is the big picture pre war, and the details of what comes after.

What is interesting to me is exploring how propaganda is designed to convince people how close they are to annihilation--or homelessness, unemployment, obscurity, or being The Other and therefore destined to suffer--in hell, in oppressions, being ostracized. Honestly insert any sort of marginalization or suffering here. Crony capitalism uses propaganda to market products designed to manipulate people into buying distance between themselves and that annihilation. Putting themselves "behind the thumb" of Vault Boy, so to speak. Buying a lifestyle. Vault Boy does it with a wink and a smile, inviting those who can afford it to buy their way to safety while using capital and fear to perpetuate the cycle. I don't need the specifics to understand this.

Some ghoulnaysis below the cut:

I'll admit, my initial reaction to pre-war Ghoulgins being the inspiration for Vault Boy was funny! Mr. Cooper Howard, washed up actor experiencing an existential crisis being shoehorned into corporate propaganda that then haunts him for the next 200+ years? Selling manifest destiny, racism, the Rugged Individual, the revisionist history that cowboys were a) white and b) more than a brief footnote in the history of the colonization of North America's west. The commodification of entertainers/creatives/public figures. Selling identities to be packaged into a product that will outlive them? Only to have that person live alongside that role they regret (?) playing... kinda tasty, if we have to give Vault Boy a backstory, though I didn't get a clear sense of his actual feelings about being used as a propaganda guy which I think is a failure of the show to commit to the narrative they set up, which happens with a lot of the show's (lack of) engagement with Fallout's larger themes anyway.

But The Ghoul (stupid name!!! weird and boring choice!!!) is just such an uncompelling and repellent character to me. I love a good bad guy or even anti-hero, but honestly he lacks any interiority. He's an evil karma character (eats people, waterboards and mutilates people, sells people to organ harvesters...like? that literally makes you evil in the games...) but the narrative pushes him as an antihero or someone with gray morality because he what..."likes" dogs? And isn't as decayed or unsettling looking as other ghouls (implying handsome=good or interesting). People aren't afraid of him because he is a ghoul, they're afraid of him because he's evil and will hurt them! Sometimes for no reason! I see the callback to the director telling him to shoot his co-star and Cooper saying he's "the good guy," but is that why he becomes so fucking evil post war? Really?

I don't know why he does what he does other than...the world sucked before and sucks now so he might as well represent the basest of human behavior? That seems to be the thesis of the show--unless kindness and community is engendered (by the vaults, by Management, by a civic government, by corporations) people will descend into chaos.

So why have this poorly executed anti-hero be the origin of Vault Boy? What are the narrative choices being made here? Is it just Rule of Cool?

Personally I would like a pathetic, rotting wet cat of a ghoul, some sort of carved out husk of a washed up movie star either trying to relive his glory days, or avoid them--having given up hope of finding his family after 200 years--being dragged into Lucy's orbit and being constantly reminded of his Vault Boy fame, that she is a walking Vault Girl with her Okey Dokey's and Golden Rule. He'd be a joke, a footnote of the old world. He'd be mean and snarky, even unpredictable and uncooperative--have a public persona of friendly curiosity and a private, cynical one.

Pathetic Ghoulgins would remind audiences of the cost of capitalism and imperialism without resorting to the thesis that war never changes means that people are inherently cruel and will resort to violence, rather than existent corporate and political power structures intentionally create the conditions in which people accept perpetual cycles of exploitation and harm for the sake of their own safety and comfort, despite knowing the cost of maintaining the status quo, and not seeing or believing that distance between the status quo and total annihilation is measured by the smiling thumbs up of a cartoon mascot.

I'm sure there are other ways The Ghoul could have been a successful character as well but.... That's satire. That's interesting. That's Fallout.

#fallout #fallout tv #fallout prime #fallout tv show #the ghoul #cooper howard #vault tec #“let people enjoy things” well i enjoy critical analysis #i dislike the big picture of the show but i love fallout enough to dig through the mess #fotv critical #fallout critical

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useless-catalanfacts · 11 months

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La Pedrera. Photos from Ajuntament de Barcelona and La Pedrera.

Nowadays, la Pedrera is one of the most famous building in Barcelona, Catalonia. It's one of the most emblematic buildings in the Catalan Modernism style, and has been declared part of the UNESCO World Heritage Site "Works of Antoni Gaudí".

But it hasn't always been recognised as good architecture, all the opposite! In fact, take a look at its name: it's technically called Casa Milà (house of the Milà family), but locals always call it "la Pedrera", which means "the quarry" in the Catalan language. When it was built, in 1910, Barcelonians thought it looked like an ugly piece of stone-y quarry mountain in the middle of the city.

But that's not the only thing that they thought it looked like. Let's see some parodies that were published at the time:

In 1909, the popular magazine Cu-Cut! published this vignette of a mother and a son walking in front of the house, when the child asks his mom "was there also an earthquake here?". This is a reference to an earthquake that happened in Sicily the previous month, and to the house's bendy shapes that look like it was shaken.

In 1925, the children's magazine En Patufet also joined in, with a vignette where the owner realises he can't hang up curtains* on this windows.

*Note: I'm using the translation "curtains" as a simplification so that English speakers without a detailed knowledge of Catalan culture can understand the joke. The vignette actually uses the word "domàs", meaning a decorative textile that is hanged from balconies during holidays.

In 1910, Cu-cut! compared it to a mona, the cake that Catalans eat on Easter Monday, by drawing a vignette where a child says "Daddy, daddy, I want a mona as big as this one!".

Three times did the magazine El Diluvio mock this building.

First, in 1910, they called it a "Medieval architecture model, between burrow and burial, that I don't quite dislike". It described its future in the following way: "the round gaps in the façade have become dark holes where all kinds of vermin come in and out: crocodiles and rats, but also snakes, hedgehogs, owls, sea monsters... Two undulating lines wrap up the building, which stands in front of an absolutely black sky. Above it, in the rooftop, the chimneys, the air vents and the stairs' endings have stopped being whipped cream mountains to become sinister piles of skulls."

In 1911, El Diluvio striked again, comparing the building's cast iron handrails to a fish stand. Their illustration had Casa Milà with a sign saying "cod entrails sold here!".

And lastly, it made fun of the controversial statue of Our Lady of the Rosary that was supposed to go on top. The Milà family in the end decided not to place the statue (some say because they didn't like how the sculptor made it, some say it's because they were scared of having a religious symbol after the 1909 anti-clerical riots) but the architect Gaudí, who was a very religious man, insisted on having it. This caused the Milàs and Gaudí to argue, which the magazine represents with a caricature of Mr. Milà wearing a Tarzan-like loincloth and branding a whip fighting against Gaudí wearing a pith helmet, grabbing him by the hair and hitting him with a hammer. The text under the image translates to "Will the Virgin Mary stand on top of the peculiar monument? Who will win, Gaudí or Milà?".

In 1912, the popular magazine L'Esquella de la Torratxa imagined that this extravagant futuristic building could only be a garage for parking airship and air-planes. This satirical drawing is titled "Future Barcelona. The true destiny of the Milà and Pi house". (Milà and Pi were the owners of this building).

The text that accompanied this illustration wondered if this building is the Wagnerian Valhalla, an anti-aircraft defense for the Moroccan War, or a hangar for zeppelins.

What do you think? Was the banter justified?

#la pedrera #casa milà #barcelona #catalunya #història #arquitectura #arts #history #architecture #antoni gaudí #gaudí #unesco world heritage #world heritage #historical #history tag #art history #art #modernisme #travel

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maxwell-grant · 6 months

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I guess it's also time for the annual ask: Thoughts on The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen?

@mirrorfalls asked: Perhaps it's time to touch the elephant in the room: thoughts on League of Extraordinary Gentlemen?

anonymous asked: Any thoughts on Moore's LOEG? anonymous asked: any advice on how to do a fictional character mashup story ala chimera brigade, league, etc? anonymous asked: you wrote a bit on the wold newton universe and the chimera brigade, any thoughts on league of extraordinary gentleman?

(TW: sexual assault, also a whole lot of racism)

(clip from Anti-Spook Squad by Doctor Lalve)

Let it never be said I don't love or do anything for you people because Jesus Christ what an ordeal.

It was pretty inevitable that I'd eventually have to talk about LOEG given the, niche, I made for myself here, and given I'd read and touched on all these other works that either inspired it or were inspired by it, like the Wold Newton Universe, The Chimera Brigade, Tales of the Shadowmen and etc. I'd read through plenty of different LOEG takes and fics, it's an idea that has a lot of appeal on it's own and is easy to flirt with, if not so easy to pull off.

One thing to put upfront: Kevin O'Neil was a brilliant, one-of-a-kind creator and his work here is great, it's the one thing almost unimpeachably great about the whole thing except when he's asked to draw racist caricatures, which he does quite a bit, we'll get into those. I love the collaboration between Moore and O'Neil and I frequently enjoy the little tidbits where they show up as themselves within the supplemental material. O'Neil does a lot of heavy lifting in these even at their worst, in fact especially at their worst. This comic is a legitimately impressive achievement, and I don't regret reading it, if nothing else I think it was a hell of a wake-up call in regards to all of it's warts I may have been overlooking or replicating in my work or that of others.

I'm gonna break it down by going through the individual installments:

Volume 1: One of the nicest things there is to League is that it only keeps getting better, in the sense that it starts off on the worst foot and it gets better by virtue of not really being able to get worse (yes, even with the Golleywog and Harry Potter sections and whatever). From the moment you open the book it takes about six pages for Mina to be assaulted by Brute Arab Rapist Hordes that Quatermain and Nemo have to gun down, and that pretty much sets the stage on what to expect. Volume 1 is where the series has yet to jump off the deep end in tackling all of fiction, being a more grounded adventure story based on it's premise of being a comic book crossover/hero team comprised of Victorian era literary characters. It's LOEG at it's shallowest and most straightforward, and also at it's least impressive. I'm not remotely charmed by much of what's done here, I've seen a million variants of these before and many of those weren't that great either, but their lows weren't as catastrophic.

(text comes from an essay Alan Moore wrote regarding his usage of Fu Manchu in the book, which was scanned and sent to me by @mirrorfalls, thank you for that.)

The LOEG's first enemy is Fu Manchu and the book sure likes depicting leering hordes of yellow peril cartoons for our heroes, Mr Hyde in particular, to brutally mow down. Alan Moore thought the genius trick to making Fu Manchu not-racist was to make him as inscrutable and sinister as possible so as to not even appear human, which is a great understanding of how racial caricatures work guys, the "not potentially offensive" shirt has people asking a lot of questions answered by it.

I've heard a lot of claims over the years that LOEG was intended to be a parody, or satire, and that it's using Fu Manchu to make a point as a criticism of the British Empire and imperialism, and I'm gonna make this clear before we move on: LOEG is not a parody or satire, not as a whole. It parodies and satirizes a lot of things, but it is neither parody nor satire. It is very much in love with much of it's subject matter even when it wants to burn it down. LOEG is also a frankly terrible critique of imperialism, it is one of the most imperialist things I've ever read. Part of it is because you can't just recycle problematic garbage and claim it's commentary, especially when you're going out of your way to sensationalize said garbage to be provocative or in many cases add shit that wasn't even there in the first place. Moore asked if anyone else was gonna try and criticize colonialist bigotry in fiction by tripling down on reproducing it as hard as possible, and then didn't wait for an answer before doing it.

Volume 2: Objectively an improvement over the first if only because Fu Manchu isn't there. It's also where the book kinda improves in terms of making a critique. LOEG never really has much to say about it's characters, instead developing them in service of the story or social commentary, and Volume 2 is better at it than the first. Still has a lot of the same problems as 1, it's still a shallow team-up thing that wants to have it's cake and eat it too, it's still the worse version of a concept that's been done many many times before and after. Edward Hyde gets the bulk of the focus here and he was very clearly Moore and O'Neil's favorite character to work on, he gets the most memorable sequences for better or worse. I don't wanna talk about him much and I don't wanna talk about how the book wraps up the Invisible Man's subplot (and how it's not even gonna be the last time sexual violation of a villain is played for oh-so-horrific catharsis), I'd frankly like to stop thinking about it.

The Traveler's Almanac was definitely the most exhausting part to read in full and only not a total waste of time because of Jess Nevins' annotations, which turn this into fairly valuable research material. But so do Wold Newton articles and they're really not the most riveting thing to read, and at least those have a point or constrain themselves to a single topic or character, or are briefer and come with resources on hand or have a point or even can pitch some neat/cool ideas and concepts as a whole. Jess Nevins even did the better version of this in his own WNU chronologies.

Where as this is just complete ass and there's only so many times you can read a variant of "and then we went to this place with horrible cannibal savages and then we went to the other place with beautiful cannibal savages and then we found this utopia and then we found this dystopia and then we referenced this and that and this and that", and it brings me to another point I'd also seen brought up a lot in regards to LOEG: that it's too damn anglocentric to live up to it's premise, too contradictory within itself, and it was always too big of an undertaking to be done the way Moore and O'Neill did it.

I appreciate Moore trying to make this world feel like a world, in as gigantic all-encompassing a scale as he could possibly account for, with a full world tour and internal chronology. I sure would have liked a big fiction crossover almanac with entire chapters for Africa and China and South America, but we don't get that, because EVERYTHING in them is taken from colonial texts elevated to fact. Literally, entire paragraphs taken from political and colonial texts. All the time spent dicking around with all of those Euro political texts and ancient lore that just had to be paid it's due, and then Orlando goes to China and finds Sun Wukong stuffed as a public freakshow and dismisses his mythos as a bunch of loony (but intriguing and exotic!) hogwash, and Godzilla is later brought up in one line of dialogue to mention how Hugo Hercules killed him offscreen. (I think those might be the only two texts Moore brings up that aren't from European/American sources? There might be others but good luck finding them in the annotations).

Is it unfair to expect Moore to have read all of fiction? Of course it is, but that's what he wants this to be about, he wants this to be about All of Fiction and he wants to write about Africa and China and South America with nothing but colonial texts about those places as reference. He wants to write about how the things he likes are cool and happened and are real while the things he doesn't like don't count or are garbage or didn't happen the way we were told happened. He wants to make a story criticizing racism and misogyny in fiction while writing a text far more racist and misogynistic than most of the things he's bringing up. It's irreconcilable.

Black Dossier: It's constantly jumping between different formats and having to adjust it's prose and visual style accordingly, and it does that fairly well (the beatnik section is completely fucking unreadable though, the prose sections are already a handful to get through as is but that one was too much even for me), although Tempest I think is gonna do it much better. It's got some good parts, it's also got some bad ones. Definitely more readable than the prior two + Almanac.

This is the one with the Gollywog in it and I'm not gonna talk about that thing, I think what's wrong with it is self-explanatory as is. Look, I truly love a lot of Moore's work I've read, and I think a lot of the pushback against Alan Moore painting him as just a cranky old man who hates comics is overblown and shitty and symptomatic of bigger issues with how fans discuss comics and superheroes, but his defense of the Gollywog and his response to the criticisms of LOEG was embarassing and beneath him.

Century: This is the one with Harry Potter and The Lightning Penis in it. To those of you who heard at some point that Alan Moore had done a much-maligned pisstake on Harry Potter and got curious, don't get your hopes up. It's nothing, it's not even that mean, it's just a crude crayon doodle in service of a larger and very dumb critique of modern fiction that could have been anyone. Shame that he bullseyed ahead of the schedule the cultural about-face against Harry Potter without having anything actually criticizing Harry Potter to show for it.

Century does work for me a bit better because it dispenses with the pretense of the series and has it build up to the big awful tragedy it ends on, with all of it's remaining characters miserable immortals and all the fictions having curdled up and gone sour. It works for me only because I have no love whatsoever for this world and so it destroying our characters in the service of the larger narrative about stories and fictional immortality and whatnot is a decision I agree with and I think makes it stronger, even if the social commentary / the story's criticism of modern stories compared to the old ones is frankly absurd. Century I think was perceived as Moore/O'Neill having lost the plot, but to me it feels like the plot (more importantly, the point of it) finally showing up after so much pointless dicking around.

The Nemo trilogy: Easily the one I most enjoyed reading, the Nemo Trilogy is almost like a breather set in between books, just fairly straightforward pulp adventure stories done in far less rancid a fashion than Volume 1. It feels less like a LOEG book and more like one of those LOEG fanfics made by people who like the concept and characters but are dissappointed by the books, so they fill or add or rewrite in the blanks with their own ideas, which is basically every LOEG fanfic ever made. I quite like Janni Dakkar as a character and I'm already a huge mark for Captain Nemo, one of my favorite characters ever, and I was of course very glad to get away from the extremely tiresome Mina/Allan/Orlando trio for a change. Frankly I'd even recommend these as a standalone, they're so disconnected from everything else in LOEG.

If you guys want to read a comic take on Captain Nemo though, read Mobilis by Juni Ba. Infinitely better than anything Moore did with the concept of Nemo, takes far less pages to actually explore the character meaningfully and has far more interesting, more humane and personal things to say and do in general, one of the best things I ever read and a tremendous palette cleanser after LOEG.

Tempest: Tempest is what I'd call the best of the LOEG books, in terms of craft and in terms of achieving what it sets out to do. Namely, it's one of the most elaborate and most artistically impressive slowly unfurling middle fingers I'd ever read, Alan and Kevin in full burning down the house mode throwing everything they've got at the wall, playing around with as many different styles and gags and ideas as they can cram into the great apocalyptic ending of their collaboration. It's a very spiteful work that has a lot of joy and humor to it, fully divested from giving a shit about it's characters and instead recasting them as the bit players they always were in the grand fuckening of humanity at the hands of our fictions.

It gets to burn down everything and also preserve everything in a big dreamy Noah's Ark forever, it plays to every strength the series had, and frankly I barely minded the detours because this thing is all detours. The superhero parody that takes up so much of it isn't really anything funny or insightful or really anything, but there's good bits in it, and I like Alan Moore talking trash about superheroes (of course, it pales in comparison to What Can We Know About Thunderman, but that one is a league of it's own). It's Alan and Kevin's farewell to comics with all the mixed feelings towards it and the industry and the subject matter they both have decades of so much experience with it. It is The End of Everything and I think it ended on the best note it could have ended with.

In summary, I think LOEG has a lot of individually cool or neat or even great ideas that I think get lost, because there is so, so much of it, and so much of it is impressively painted sludge. Sometimes it is ingenious, sometimes it is fun, it is never not visually impressive, but it's more frequently dull and grotesquely self-indulgent and far too shallow. It suffers from an almost inescapable side effect of doing this dealing with the fiction he was dealing with without accounting for taste or bothering to reign in his worst impulses, too much to cover and not enough actually being said about it. In truth, much of it doesn't feel much different than reading the wiki summaries for it I had already read forever ago. It is a unique beast taking swings that I'd never seen before that most wouldn't, probably for very good reasons most of the time. It is also guilty of literally everything it's criticizing other works of being and doing, and sometimes it actually provides it's best commentary because of that! It's a complicated thing to tackle and wrap your head around. God knows what Jess Nevins must have gone through to make the annotations for this, as they put it on the Almanac annotations.

I don't consider it wasted time because, I did really enjoy the final two installments, there are good bits scattered across the other books and I learned some good things from it as a whole, but would I recommend it in it's entirety? Unless you're really a huge fan or completionist for it's creators (although reading LOEG really disillusioned me on Moore in a lot of ways, not that this is a bad thing, if anything that's a necessary thing to really try and grasp a creator's body of work) or you're the kind of sicko who'd be in the tank for the whole thing, no, not really.

It is one of the most impressive and accomplished works I've ever read, I will probably come back to it for research purposes, but holy shit am I glad to put it behind me.

#also thank you davidmann for sending me the epilogue #replies tag #loeg #league of extraordinary gentlemen #alan moore #kevin o'neill #abc comics #comics

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kirbart90 · 4 months

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Introducing the main character in my upcoming SMG4 AU project: Apollo! 🪄🌓

She’s known as the Cosmic Magician and seeks to bring happiness and smiles to the universe with her magic shows. However, she also hides a sinister intent of manipulating her audience into a playground of mystery for her entertainment. After agreeing on a deal with Mr. Puzzles, Apollo’s magic shows skyrocketed the views and audiences of Puzzlevision due to them being well known across universes. She doesn’t go with Mr. Puzzles’ plan of getting 5 stars but is rather an anti-hero and helped the Smg4 crew defeat Mr. Puzzles, even though they didn’t intend to. After the PV movie, Apollo stays around the Showgrounds and tricks the crew sometimes but they don’t mind her staying at all as long as she doesn’t try to hurt Smg4’s friends. One day, she was bored and ended up finding Mr. Puzzles’ broken TV head, revives him, and chaos ensues.

The AU is still in wip but I’m really excited to show you all what I have in store!

#smg4 #smg4 oc #Magicians & Puzzles AU #smg4 au #astro’s arts #original character #smg4 fanart #SMG4 OC: Apollo #smg4 puzzlevision

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anarchic-miscellany · 5 months

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I appreciate the writing of "Mass Effect 2". Human supremacists bring you into the fold and hold over you the fact that they brought you back from death, flatter you and tell you you're the special person they need. And also they're the only ones who believe you and are doing something about the mass kidnappings of humans across the Galaxy. But you, the player, and (hopefully) an anti-Nazi human being go: "Yeah dog, these guys are still evil as fuck." But, you know, gritted teeth "working together against a common evil" is a great writing tool, and incredibly fun. So you go along with it. All the while the quite likable, well acted crew on your ship seem like reasonable, ordinary guys (with a couple of exceptions), like those 2 crew members Rolston and Patel just chatting about the former's daughter; you've got Hawthorne and Goldstein complaining about the quality of the food in the canteen; you've got Hadley and Matthews chatting about one of them going to visit "The Consort" on land; you've got your delightful double act of Engineers Donnelly and Daniels who just want to serve with you, and saw this as an opportunity to fight back against evil aliens. It's all very human, very ordinary enough stuff, little snippets here and there to give faces and personality to what was once a faceless selection of evil goons in the last game. That's not even getting into the excellent character of Miranda Lawson and the very much "exists" Jacob. And their silky voiced Martin Sheen leader "The Illusive Man" (an INCREDIBLE performance, like you hire Mr Sheen, you GET Mr Sheen) tells you that it's not racism or supremacy, it's just that every single race is out for itself, it's a dog eat dog world, so why can't they have an organisation after their interests? It's insidious and interesting and sinister in how it's nuanced and gets you involved and invested in their ideals, their goals and their politics. And the hammer blow comes when you're given one of the "good guys" and it's a Salarian (alien) doctor who engineered and modified a genocidal bio weapon against another alien race because his species and the others they work with play god. You start to think that these "Cerberus" guys may have a point... Pity they never made a 3rd game.

#Cerberus #Mass Effect 2 #Mass Effect #Illusive Man #Kenneth Donnelly #Gabriella Daniels #Video Games #Crewman Rolston #Crewman Hawthorne #Crewman Hadley #Crewman Goldstein #Crewman Patel #Martin Sheen

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katatonicimpression · 4 months

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Has Exodus been Redeemed?

So, I saw someone posting about this the other day, and they made two really good points. Summarised here:

Bennet being redeemed because of Krakoa is weird and bad.

Any redemption Bennet gets should involve children because of that thing when he kinda maybe sorta tried to kill Luna

And yes these are both good points but also... are we supposed to think of current bennet as redeemed at all?

Some thoughts on all the above:

Is Bennet actually doing anything different now than he was in Messiah Complex?

I mean, no. Right?

When it comes down to it, Bennet's moral failings are quite straight forward. He doesn't care who he hurts, who he kills, so long as he conceptualises it as a step towards securing the salvation of mutantkind. He is myopic, narrowly focused on whatever he's decided his goal is, and his thought process is (sorry babe) irrational. He is not stable. He's not able to recognise that instability. Neither is he able to recognise his own hypocrisy when it arises. His worldview warps to make sense with whatever he's decided he needs to do. And, when all is said and done, he'll say it was God's plan.

So, he's like any old cult leader or anti vax podcaster, really. He pedals dangerous nonsense and has the just the right combination of personality flaws and mental illness to still be a true believer and a moral crusader.

Or he's like, you know, a crusader.

In Messiah Complex - an almost incoherent sprawling mess of a crossover event from 2007 - Bennet is distraught and struggling after M Day and ends up taking his Acolytes to meet Mr Sinister because he has come to believe that the only solutions lie in mad scientism or something. Bennet gets on his knees for him (literally) and then he and his Acolytes team up with the Marauders to fight the xmen because something something Destiny's diaries something something baby something something ice-stique something something. Bennet straight up vanishes from the story before it concludes. Idk maybe he went out for lunch.

Anyway, I bring it up as an example of a time where Bennet is looking for direction is his Holy War, joins forces with other mutants/mutates, and tolerates an uneasy alliance because he is 100% devoted to the mission.

Psychologically speaking, is bennet really behaving any differently in the krakoa era? Is he making different kinds of decisions? I don't think so.

In fact, Krakoa challenges his character less than Messiah complex. Which is weird, because in the latter he's straightforwardly a villain. Krakoa era Exodus is not a villain, not even an antagonist.

(I guess he's Sinister's casual antagonist in Hellions, but a) that's a comedic role and b) Nathaniel is the villain of hellions so that wouldn't even count)

He's not a heroic character either. He's just kind of an entity. Protagonist of one issue of Immortal X-Men and primarily featured as an interesting member of the supporting cast.

Krakoa offers Bennet a course of action where he is able to do what he always does (throw himself wholeheartedly at a mutant supremacist project while thinking of himself as the good guy in all of this). He is a defender of Krakoa and an ally to their cause.

So, this is not an arc. Categorically, it is not a character arc of any kind because he does not change. So, in that sense it's not a redemption arc either. But of course he is a character who has gone from villain to "guy who's on the side you're rooting for"

I think it's not wrong, then, to argue that what we're seeing from Fall of X era Exodus is the presentation of an unearned redemption. He's good/better now, but no actual story arc is there to back it up. He's not grown or changed or learnt anything. He's not been challenged. There is nothing in the text to suggest that he would now see non mutant lives as valuable, worth sparing.

So... is this bad writing?

He has not changed or learnt anything, are we supposed to believe otherwise?

The Krakoa era contains many in-story critiques of the nation it depicts, and to mixed results. Interestingly, Bennet is not heavily featured in this regard. Throwaway comments about him being scary or insane are tossed around, but he is not meaningfully involved in a story that questions the ideology of Krakoa - or of his ideology specifically.

It's hard to tell, then, what we're looking at. Let's roughly divide it into two possibilities:

Bennet is being portrayed as nicer, somewhat redeemed, and the mission of Krakoa is understood to be a virtuous endeavour.

Krakoa is understood to be a morally flawed endeavour, and Bennet is just being his same old self and not redeemed at all.

2 seems closer to what Gillen is doing in my opinion, but I think there's room for debate.

It's not like immortal xmen is really about the moral implications in the flaws of Krakoa. It's much more focused on the psychology of the characters on the Quiet Council and their interpersonal conflict and intrigue.

But, of course, explosions go boom.

Despite the intimate themes of immortal xmen (and its adjacent minis and oneshots), its overarching plot threads primarily involve krakoa being threatened with annihilation (inferno, judgement day, dominion crap, miscellaneous orchis crap, etc). Because of this, bennet is primarily featured as a defender of the people of Krakoa when they are under attack. This absolutely does lend itself to interpretation 1, wherein Exodus' zealotry is position's as a (complicated) good in the necessary and just cause of Krakoa.

To me, it feels like gillen is telling a story featuring characters who are predominantly morally grey or outright villainous, and using a setting and plot backdrop that forces them into the same or similar boat, allowing the writing to explore their intricacies. If the setting and plot were too normal - if it were one where the heroes would refuse to work with the villains or one where the villains were constantly being antagonists - many of those more interesting character beats would be cut off.

However, I don't think he has fully succeeded in this regard. The overarching thread of the innocents of krakoa being in mortal danger and needing protection is one that has moral implications. It does end up framing Bennet heroically, even when the on-page material does keep reminding you that he's, you know, a deranged zealot.

There's more that can be said about how the fact that Krakoa is constantly under threat of total extinction undermines any attempt at nuance in its portrayal, and how it contributes to the greatest failings of this era. But I do plan to write that retrospective soon so I'll save it for later.

For now, I'll say that to me it feels like the intent was not to tell a story of redemption arcs at all. Instead, morality was not the focus and the storytelling deliberately steers away from the pedagogical. However, despite this intent, the shape of a redemption story remains, simply due to the nature of Bennets role in Krakoa.

Won't somebody please think of the children?

The one way in which we arguably do see change in Bennet is with The Children.

Bennet is shown telling stories to the children of Krakoa, teaching them and, also, protecting them. His interactions with Kafka in X-Men Forever are a good example of this.

The thing with Luna (he takes her from Fabian who was, unsurprisingly, responsible for all this mess) is a pretty bleak moment in Bennet's history. It also I believe leads to him being stabbed by Dane which I can't imagine him enjoying.

Bennets canon history is actually kind of weird. He's one of those characters with a lot of "idek how he got out of that but he turned up later on so he must have" in his wiki. The krakoa era is probably the most prolonged, stable period of his existence where the audience has had a strong sense of where he's at and what he's doing for the last five years.

Similarly, in universe the krakoa era could well be the first time Bennet's life has been anything close to normal for a long time. He has a home that isn't a supervillain lair, and actual down time for the first time since Mags woke him up. He is walking around in public and kinda sorta socialising for possibly the first time in his entire life.

He has that line about how he's old and wise, and that other line about how he's not naive (a repeat - he says it in the 90s and in krakoa) and both of those things are lies. Because he's, you know, a delusional cult leader. He is not literally old. He was a young man (which in medieval terms could literally mean still in his teens) when he went into that coma. And it's been 30 years real time since he woke up. But no characters who were adults then have aged in that time (and some (emma) have got younger) so whatever it is in universe it's not more than a few years. He's still in his 20s in my interpretation. Moreover, his life experience is extreme social isolation and a series of fanatical violent cults. He is naive. He's not wise.

He's also not really had a chance to just be and coexist with other people. So, in that sense it's not weird to see him be kind to children in Krakoa. Nothing we've seen technically contradicts the idea that he would be. Willingness to threaten a child in one situation and the ability to genuinely care for children aren't actually contradictory. But emotionally, there is resonance to showing this softness to him in this regard.

So, this is the one area where you could say there has been a meaningful change to Bennet, but again it has no narrative arc to it. Beyond simply the implication that if you let this guy chill for a minute, he eventually does mellow a bit.

But it is nice. And it is fitting.

Static characters and hypocrisy

Bennet is a character who fundamentally is incapable of seeing himself as being in the wrong. This is baked right into the type of villain that he is.

Redemption arcs can come in a lot of different forms. Sometimes the fictional universe has concrete concepts of good and evil, and a redemption is about aligning yourself spiritually with the good side (e.g. star wars) or by fulfilling some abstract metaphysical requirement (e.g. Buffy). Sometimes the emphasis is on doing the work to improve yourself (e.g. zuko), and sometimes it's a grand gesture at the right moment. Sometimes it's because a bigger bad came along, sometimes the redeemed one suffers a lot, sometimes they don't.

There's also the fun cartooney type of redemption arc where the bad guy is forced to just kinda hang out with the heroes and becomes part of the team by osmosis. Tgis is a personal fave but I don't think it suits Bennet - he should have an actual arc if it happens at all.

So, if there's an actual arc, it could vary a lot but one thing it requires is introspection and for the character's flaws to actually be confronted in the text.

Now, is it possible to write something like that for Bennet? Yes.

There are limitations, as with any character. He wouldn't suit an arc than evokes a grandiose good/evil darkside/lightside dichotomy because part of his problem is that he already thinks like that. Similarly, you would have to be careful when introducing a character foil (someone to be azula to his zuko for example) because he is not self aware enough to recognise his own flaws in the other. In general, he's someone who can very easily externalise any moral lesson he learns. It's doable, but difficult.

The example I want to evoke is Isaac from Netflix Castlevania. Isaac's storyline in s3 is basically him just travelling from A to B, and on the way he encounters these little vignettes. Some affirm his world view in s2 (aka "humanity sucks might as well help Dracula kill everyone") and some gently challenge it (e.g. "you should consider having friends") and he talks about it. He does philosophy. He reasons through his positions. And, eventually he starts to change. By the time he confronts Hector in s4, he's no longer here for revenge. He's moved on. He's now acting according to what he thinks will make things better.

I love this. I love that it's completely internal as an arc and I love how much agency isaac has. And I love that the dialogue is genuinely clever. Most philosophy dialogue in pop culture is written to just sound deep, but in castlevania they really managed to maintain meaning and coherence throughout.

And obviously the shape of Bennets arc would be different to this, but the idea of a well crafted "man does philosophy, sees the abstract concepts illustrated in narrative vignettes as he does so, and then eventually changes for the better". And a good writer could do this for him.

But should they?

So, this is that lingering thing. You redeem a villain in a comic book and now you've lost that villain. You let Exodus meaningfully improve and then he's no longer available to churn out as a big or medium bad. Maybe you might want to keep Bennet's delightful combination of flaws because it allows you to explore them. Maybe a redeemed Bennet isn't really Bennet anymore, or doesn't have what you want from him as a character. You make the unselfaware villain introspect then what are you left with?

A happier character, sure. But maybe not a good ingredient for a story.

And with bennet, the kind of introspection and self confrontation needed for a redemption arc would change him a lot. It would change him at his very foundation.

Does that mean he's doomed to be a static character? Not necessarily. I think it would be possible to bring shape to his storylines without shaking those foundations, but it is limiting. And also, they don't focus on him enough to do it.

Conclusion

The title of this section is a such a joke because I have nothing conclusive to say. I feel like if you read this far, you've been tricked.

I think Exodus makes for an interesting villain, and (imho) is actually best suited to be posed as not the only/main villain in a story. A supporting antagonist, if you will.

But that doesn't mean seeing him in a protagonist role isn't welcome. I loved it the one time it happened. And as for uncomplicated heroics? No, he's not there yet. And if he got there, it would involve a pretty hefty change to his character.

But it's not like I would be mad if it happens. We don't need a crusader villain (especially as I personally don't think Bennet's zealotry is well suited to paralleling modern religious extremism - at least not the mainstream stuff) and hell, I want to see what a fully sympathetic write of him would look like. Maybe he'd get to talk to Dane again. That could be fun.

But it doesn't look like that's going to happen. He'll probably continue to hover in this "villainous ally" space for the foreseeable future. He's in heir of apocalypse. I doubt he'll get a lot to do.

Anyway. Thanks guys if you made it this far. Hope you have a nice day. I'm currently spending billable hours sitting in a stairwell writing essays about comics. What a time we live in.

#exodus #bennet du paris #rants #idk the word count because on phone but it's long #sorry

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thealmightyemprex · 6 months

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Sci FI Month:Why X Men the Animated series is awesome

So I binged the entierty of X Men the Animated Series and I intended to make an epic review with episode reccomendations,annnnnd it ended up too long ,so instead I am going to go over reasons why this show is Great and has an enduring legacy

1.X Men in general as a franchise has tons of characters to choose from and I think it is so wise of the show that they limit it to 9 core characters,while some fan favorites get really good guest appearences like Nightcrawler

2.The Characterization and relationships are top notch ,every character gets a spot light and each character has layers ,with each character having their own demons.Even Professor X who couldve just been the mentor figure gets fleshed out to where you understand why he does what he does .Oh if you wanna know who my fave characters are:Storm,Wolverine ,Gambit, and Beast

3.The villains are varied ,from the anti villainous Magneto ,to the brutish Juggernaut ,to the bigoted Graydon Creed ,to the sadistic Sabretooth,to the complicated Mystique ,to the cold Mr Sinister to (My favorite ) the bombastic Apoclaypse

4.As a comic adaptation I think its fun that the show doesnt limit itself to one period of X Men but pays tribute to 30 years of comics:The designs are Jim Lee inspired,they pay tribute to Lee and Kirby,the stories pull a lot from Chris Clairmount ,and several episodes were written by comic legend Len Wein

5.The show doesnt have the biggest budget but with its shading ,strong character designs and editing it still holds up rather decently

6.Voice acting is all around solid,Cal Dodd,Lenore Zahn,George Buza and John Colicos are the go to voices for Wolverine,Rogue,Beast and Apocalypse to me

7.The series is serialized with a conitinuity,which while common with modern cartoons,was kind of a new thing back then.We can thank this show for changing how action cartoons were done.Also each season has a distinct feel with the first three having story arcs(The Sentinels in season one,Magneto and Xavier trapped in the Savage Land in season 2 , andDealing with the aliens known as the Shiar Empire in season 3 )

8.The writing does not talk down to kids,in fact the writing for the show is very good not shying away from the fact this is a show about prejudice

9.I think the show has good momentum getting better and better up to Season 4 ,which is the best season of the show .Now Season 5 does feel like it is running on fumes,but it still has great episodes and contiains one of the greatest animated series finales ever "Graduation Day "

10.And of course.....The theme song is kickass

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If you want me to explain my feelings more just ask me,I am more then willing to ramble about this amazing cartoon.I plan to do my top 10 favorite episodes,villains,and multi parters

@ariel-seagull-wings @the-blue-fairie @piterelizabethdevries

@amalthea9 @themousefromfantasyland @princesssarisa

@angelixgutz @theancientvaleofsoulmaking @filmcityworld1 @countesspetofi

#x men the animated series #Sci fi month #Youtube

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superfreaksdev · 15 days

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Super Freaks at SAGE 2024

Well, I haven't been here in a hot minute! Let's see what Mr. Freaksdev and friends have been cooking up:

Super Freaks 1 Ultimate Edition 3.0

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Super Freaks 1 Ultimate Edition is back with its big 3.0 update. In the new Uncle Swordsman Story, you and up to three other friends can zip around the screen with reckless abandon thanks to the new Warrior Aura that increases in size the more yorbs you grab. You can move double speed, but beware! You lose it all if you get hit.

There are also new bosses, like Kranion and Sticky's all powerful bumbling sitcom dad Marrow Prime!

Look at this epic artwork by @engineerkappa @kappaengineer @kappa-artz that I totally didn't threaten with credit card fraud to do for me! It's so cool!

Super Freaks Presents: Strato Freaks 2

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The surprise sequel to 2009's/2023's (long story) Strato-Scruffy has a public demo at SAGE. In this wild Fantasy Zone/NiGHTS like shmup, you and a friend can fly around endlessly looping levels trying to collect the Powerful Monkey Council and rack up huge combos by shooting enemies. Also, check those sick cartoon graphics!

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Things aren't that simple, however. As your Hot Clock runs down, the level gradually gets harder, and more enemies will appear. Let it run down all the way, and that sinister skeleton Sticky will appear to harass you until he claims your last pink cartoon heart. and we wouldn't want that, would we?

Super Freaks Arcade

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This Super Freaks game was first made for Freakjam 1 back in January and gradually expanded on ever since. It reinterprets the gameplay and levels of Super Freaks 1 Ultimate Edition into a 1980's arcade game, loosely based on both Mario Bros. and Pac-Man Championship Edition. You and a friend can collect yorbs to fil your quota and make the Skull Jar (your goal) appear! But enemies will continue to climb out of Kranion's portal. Rack up some crazy combos by running into a bunch of enemies in a row! Also, there's a four player battle mode that's pretty hectic!

Super Freaks Side Story: Scruffy Minus: Rise of the Anti Freaks

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This one's actually not entirely a solo joint. I've had wonderful collaborators for the above games, but Scruffy Minus I've been largely hands off with; this game is more the mastermind of Riegel25, Jorjoe05, and NULL3D, and we've crafted a crazy, lore heavy adventure that explains what went down between the classic and modern eras of Super Freaks.

Mr. Shootem Breaks Out!

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If I were to list every freaks cameo we'd be here all day, but this one's different enough to be my honorable mention. I'm part of the Shooteam working on Mr. Shootem Breaks Out, a wild breakout experience where you need to shoot the ball with your gun instead of using a paddle.

King Quincy is playable here, armed with a number of funny palette swaps (Gordan Freakman, anyone?), and the Go-Go Yo-Yo from Strato-Scruffy and Strato Freaks 2. Thanks to the power of epic licensing, my good friend defnotreal got Plok (yes really) and the Kid from I Wanna Be The Guy (also yes really, and there's a funny as hell story behind that one) as guest characters! Plok also has a Gambi skin, so I don't just get to cross over with Plok--I get to assimilate him! Thanks Pickfords!!!!!

Now, don't forget to find that Shootem Kickstarter and wishlist it! We got some amazing goals in mind you are not prepared for.

#super freaks #scruffy #sagexpo #sonic #platformer #indie #Youtube

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loverofcats14 · 2 years

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My Embarrassment is Yours to Share Mc x Lucifer

The Anti Lucifer League thought of a prank that went south real fast.

"Argh Lucifer needs to shut it with all the RAD meetings it's getting to the point it's inferring with my naps!" Belphegor groaned as he was sleeping on the lunch table. "I swear Lucifer is just a lap dog for Diavolo. It makes me sick one of the most powerful beings is doting to Diavolo-" Satan stated as he ate an apple while reading.

"Mhm we should get back at him!" Belphegor shot up,having one of the most sinister ideas as he smiled. "I think it's time to bring one of the big guns Satan."

"Again why did you bring me into this-?" You sighed as you walked home with Belphegor and Satan. "As a member of the Anti Lucifer League you HAVE to!" Satan laughed holding your books. These two always brought you into their petty pranks. You just hope Lucifer wont be too pissed so you wont hang from a wall."Okay Mc here's the plan!" Belphie and Satan said smiling at you.

As you saw Lucifer leaving for his meeting with Diavolo you ran up to him. Lucifer looked over confused in why you're talking to him so hastly. "I need to go into your study room to get a book for my history test." you lied through your teeth as Lucifer raised an eyebrow. "You can wait Mc I need to assist Diavolo with a predicament." "Please Oh Great Lucifer I'll get straight "A"s if i pass~" you said in a high pitched voice. "Fine Mc just don't go around snooping or you will be punished." Lucifer sighed as he walked out.

You texted in the group chat updating the scheme at hand

Satan- Really that was easy Mr Oh Great Lucifer psh

Belphegor- Mc go and do it now he'll probably put the spell back on the room in a hour ish.

You- Fine fine

As you raced into Lucifer's study you steadied yourself knowing Lucifer uplifted the spell of no trespassing would go off in a hour or so. You found his coat and placed a small sized condom in the pocket. As you took a picture in your DDD sending the picture to the group chat as insurance. To be fair the prank was sorta funny. You laughed to yourself as you grabbed your DDD and walked out Lucifer's study and hoped for the best.

"And Lucifer we should also attend to-"

Ding,ding,ding...

Diavolo realized he got a notification from you as he picked his DDD up. "Lucifer Mc is texting give me a second." Oh? Why would you text Diavolo-? Lucifer thought as all of a sudden he saw Diavolo snicker. "Diavolo what's the matter-? Lucifer asked trying to get a better view by moving his head. "Oh um- it's nothing! Haha-" Diavolo covered his mouth in amusement.

You sended Diavlo a picture of the condom looking as if you took it out from his coat. With a caption saying "This is probably why Lucifer has a big fat ego to make it up in size." You snickered As Diavolo was trying to hold his laughter as you dialed him.

"Ah Lucifer Mc is calling let me have a moment haha-" Diavlo pressed his DDD to his ear as you called. Lucifer thought this was strange but payed no attention just thinking you sent him a funny post from Devilgram. "Diavolo do you have the picture-?" " Ah yes Mc, haha it's rather amusing I never knew." Diavolo laughed into the phone.

"Diavolo can you put Mc on speaker they asked me for a book I just want to know if they found it considering their tallness." Lucifer chimed getting passive aggressive as he saw Diavolo laugh.

"Ah yes sure Lucifer-" Diavolo put the DDD on speaker without you knowing-

"Thats probably why Lucifer has such a big fat ego Diavolo! To make up for his small skinny dick! Haha!" Diavolo and Barbatos were in shock realizing what you just said out aloud. But Lucifer realized what just had happened and even if he didn't see the picture, his pride was shattered. Considering Diavolo was laughing at this comment beforehand.

"What was that Mc? I have a what now?" You immediately realized Diavolo must've put you on speaker. "WELL DIAVOLO GOTTA GO HAHA-" you hanged up and immediately ran to find Satan and Belphegor.

"Mc you'll be alright! It's just a harmless prank!" Satan tried to comfort you as he locked his room. "Mc I'll give you 300 grimm if you survive his punishment." Belphegor said as he hugged you thinking you wont be able to walk in a long time. The DDD dinged as all three of you looked at the notification.

Mc in my room now. Don't make me search for you.

"Rip our member Mc may they die peacefully." Satan and Belphegor chanted as you shot them a dirty look.

As you walked to your demise you knocked the door to the study room. "Come in." His voice very deep and melancholy. You opened the door to find him working on his stack of papers. He didn't even look up at you as his tight gripped his pen. "Sit on the chair." You immediately sat in hoping he didn't realized you were shaking so hard.

"Now Mc, it's obvious you weren't the one to put this ahem prank into action, so who directed this idea. Was it Satan or Belphegor?" He asked standing up with a smile looking at you shaking in your chair. "Belphegor! He was tired of the RAD meetings so he wanted to embarrass you in front of Diavolo! I'm sorry Lucifer! Please forgive me!"

You sighed as Lucifer walked up to you his form overbearing your head. "Ah, poor Mc you were influenced by my brothers, so much so they made you decieve my trust hm? This poor sheep influenced by demons disobeying her shepherd. I forgive you Mc. You were made to disobey me sadly but I forgive you." He smiled as he saw you in confusion gripping the arm chair for life.

You were thankful he wasn't punishing you however, you were still skeptical on his intentions. As his hooded eyes showed just half his eyes. His smile widdened as he rambled on his speech.

Using his gloved pointer finger under your chin propping you head to meet Lucifer's. "However sheep must learn from their mistakes so you will learn my sheep."

Its been 3 hours since Lucifer called you to his study. Satan and Belphegor were figuring out what to do to make it up.

"If Lucifer wasn't a kill joy Mc could've been here right now with us hanging out." Belphegor sighed with his pillow. "No Belphegor, it's just Lucifer's stupid ass nature I swear one day he will pay for what he's doing to Mc." Satan vowed as he paced his room.

Until they heard a knock on Satan's door both members opened it in anticipation. Seeing you there they felt relief. "Oh Mc we thought you were gone! Thankfully you're in once piece!" Satan said looking at you up and down. Belphegor knew something was wrong though and his intuition was right as you took out your DDD.

"Mc, show your neck to those two." Lucifer sadisticly hummed as you pulled down your RAD shirts collar. The two members were confused on what was happening until they saw it. The hickeys all over your neck. "Mc what did he-" Satan was interrupted.

"Now open your mouth Mc." You opened your mouth as Lucifer's cum was still in there spewed all over your mouth. "Oh grosss-!" Belphegor and Satan almost gagged. "Now the message."

"Lucifers dick is so big and wide I sucked it so hard I'll want more." You shamefully told them as you closed your mouth with their shocked faces. "Now my dear brothers remember that next time you pull something." Lucifer cackled as he hanged up leaving the Anti Lucifer League in the embarrassment Lucifer felt.

#obey me brain rot #obey me smut #obey me brothers #fanfic #lucifer fanfiction #lucifer x you #smut #lucifer smut #anti lucifer league #obey me requests

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kierrasreads · 10 months

Text

A Study in Scarlet (Sherlock Holmes #1) by Arthur Conan Doyle Review

Plot

Our first meeting with Sherlock Holmes. And John Watson's too! The young doctor is astonished by Holmes' many idiosyncrasies, including his talents on the violin.

But it's not long before Sherlock Holmes, with Watson in tow, is working with Scotland Yard investigating the murder of two Americans whose deaths have some mysterious connection to sinister groups gathering power in both Britain and America.

Here's where it all began, 'A Study in Scarlet.' Meet Sherlock Holmes, one of the world's leading consulting detectives - fictional of course!

Discussion

We meet again, Mr. Holmes! Like many fans of this iconic detective, my first introduction to him was through the BBC adaptation of the series, starring Benedict Cumberbatch. I was obsessed with this show! Then, my interests shifted and I left this British character in the past. My interest in the series got ignited again fairly recently. One day after work, I was browsing the Roku channel and saw that the platform had many Sherlock Holmes films from 1939, with Basil Rathbone portraying Sherlock Holmes and Nigel Bruce portraying Dr. John Watson (I believe all 14 films from this series are available on Roku). Anyway, the point is that I decided to read the Sherlock Holmes novels again and stick to them this time. This first Sherlock Holmes story totally captured my interest. The first part of this novel (Dr. Watson's reminiscences) proved to be fairly interesting and I was surprised at how fast Sherlock Holmes was able to solve the case.

The second part of the book focused on Jefferson Hope's past and took place in Utah (I'm sure some of you can see where this is going). I was utterly shocked at the portrayal of the Mormons, especially Brigham Young. I'll admit, I know next to nothing about Mormonism, its history, etc., but the whole second part of the novel read as..well..anti-Mormon. I couldn't help but wonder if Doyle had a grudge against the religion/group in general, or used this as an opportunity to let his grievances be known, but let's just say that I was relieved when Jefferson Hope finished his story and the focus shifted to the trail/conclusion. I'll have to research to see why he chose this particular lighting to portray the Mormons (of course, I realize that every story with revenge and murder must have a villain, otherwise it would be a completely different type of novel).

That's all I have to say about that! It was a good, brief read that got me back into the Sherlock Holmes fandom.

Rating

5/5

#kierra's reads #bookblr #sherlock holmes #john watson #a study in scarlet #dr john watson #arthur conan doyle

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rinseveryday · 1 year

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Hello! I have so many thoughts and theories in my mind, especially I want to ask you the one. What do you think about the Demon King Rin? In the last chapter we saw how all pieces of the puzzle is coming together....

Hello! Thanks for the ask! I also have so many thoughts, please ask away anytime.

Massive spoilers for chapters 139 (138? I don't remember) and above!! Putting my response under the cut because it is long :> Like, I had to sit down for over an hour, long.

Demon King Rin my beloved boy

You know what's funny about life is that I fell in love with him way back in 2013, and he ended up becoming exactly my type of character 10 years later. I kept up with the series, but I discovered my tastes through other media so it was a huge shock to me when Demon King vigilante Rin shows up in canon. I was/am OBSESSED with the anti-hero or jaded hero types, like Daredevil and Deadpool just to name a few (I had a Marvel phase) as well as serieses like Devilman and Chainsaw man on the anime side. A monster with a human heart, bonus points if they live in a world that doesn't accept them. Now why am I talking about other shows? (Bc I wanna, that's why)

Well, Blue Exorcist didn't start as an adult rating, morally gray, anti-hero series did it? It was a fun, cliché Shonen show for teens set in an academic setting with all the typical school festivities and classmate crushes you can expect. Kinda different than Daredevil. But it's slowly been creeping towards darker, more serious topics over the years because Katoh's specialty lies in her ability to twist clichés into her own thing. AoEx's plot runs a lot deeper, and more sinister than your typical devil shonen manga. I still see a lot of theories about AoEx that still think it'll follow a Shonen plot, though, where the end will be a big fight against Somebody and then they'll all go home, become exorcists, and move on.

But really, Katoh's already said that Rin is a character that, if she's not careful, becomes real dark, real fast. I bet she had been wanting to add an anti-hero plot to the story for a while. He's no Naruto. He is the fox.

And so, newsflash! Rin's biggest antagonist isn't a demon. It's himself. Not demon!Rin, but Rin, as a whole. The plot isn't anywhere near being finished. Right now he's not the Blue Exorcist quite yet. He's a guy (level of humanity questionable) wreathed in the flames of a demon god. The day where he must choose between Assiah or Gehenna, is coming closer.

We see in the timeskip chapters a world where the current day has become Rin's tragic anti-hero backstory. Where he made choices that led him away from his human allies. Where he chose to embrace his demonic nature and fight against the corrupt human organizations.

I used to think that someone else was leading Rin, using him as a puppet leader of a resistance with his friends kept away as blackmail. Because how could Rin be so organized as to lead any sort of resistance right? Did his friends die which made him go rogue? What did Paku see? Was it related to Rin's reasons for becoming the Demon King?

However, now with the things Rin brought up in the most chapters, I don't know. I still find it hard to believe Rin would lead anything, but maybe he was just doing his own thing and the demons followed on their own *shrug.* If Rin's friends were still in the picture, he'd go to the ends of the Earth to get them back. So that leaves us with either a) they're dead or b) he chose to leave them.

People wear masks to hide. He doesn't need to hide his identity because his flames give it away so... Maybe he's hiding from shame.

His face went from sad to blank when he realized Paku was around. Rin Okumura? With a blank face? Our Mr. Wears his heart on his sleeve? Dude who cries from manga and slaps his knee when he laughs?

The blank face is a coping mechanism, just like the mask. He's probably disassociating so he doesn't have to deal with the painful memories she brings. Memories of his friends... Memories of being human.

Which brings us to the question, What did Rin remember when he woke up? I have a feeling he never reconciled with his demonic nature in that future, which led him to be at odds with exorcists. (RIP Malchidael Miku, you were too annoying to live). He probably didn't see the same future Mephisto did, but considering he does have all the same powers Satan does, he definitely saw Something.

Rin is right in that he was wrong to cage his so-called "demonic side." Or, if you read the raws too, he called it the "demon me." Everyone has anger and violence and desire and scorn in them as part of their survival instincts. That's not even a purely "demonic" thing. Rin forces the embodiment of those feelings, demon!Rin to yield and stay put. He doesn't understand why demon!Rin lashes out so strongly nor why he wants to take over.

Uhmmm sounds real healthy right? *Checks watch* demon!Rin should be back any chapter now~ It really begs the question, is demon!Rin the evil one for wanting to break out? Or is human!Rin the evil one for forcing demon!Rin to keep seething in jail?

Going back to the topic, it seems that Rin doesn't want to become the Demon King this time but he also isn't sure what to do. He knows he needs to do something about his burning questions and he knows the key to truly taming himself lies in knowledge and understanding. He has only caged himself, and has yet to reach Yuri's level of taming. Demon!Rin will come back. He'll always be there to protect Rin when he needs him the most.

While I sure love me some villain and anti-hero AUs, I do hope my beloved Rin Gone Wrong to stay in those chapters. He deserves a happier True Ending than becoming a Demon King 🤧

Well, there's some of my thoughts on Rin as Demon King and the plot. This got super long and was actually longer before I cut out all the unnecessary rambling.

Tl;dr he scares me

#ask #theory #it was hard to write with my brain exoloding #rin okumura #aoex #idk if i wanna put this in the big tags bc i dont even know if im coherent #been busy freaking out over my new job so it was nice to just think about Rin for a few hours

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