#any Ahab fans here??

[rurinkk]

Aegri Somnia

[bazpango]

A lawlight fan fiction where the NPA’s benefits package includes—mandatory—counselling sessions (their job is emotionally taxing) but they can’t use them because it’s too much of a risk to the task force’s objective in catching Kira:

Matsuda waltzes in with a stack of notebooks under his arm. “I read in Good Housekeeping that journaling lowers stress!” L groans. Soichiro—desperate for any crumb of autonomy in this investigation—fully endorsed the idea.

Light freaks. If anyone finds the Death Note and they hire a graphologist, the first samples they’ll want to compare will be his—if L has anything to say about it. He has to be careful. This will be a burdensome paper trail. With a second (well, third) notebook to keep track of, the mental load is at risk of becoming dangerously heavy—for even the best of liars.

Every morning and evening the team journals for thirty minutes; they are locked away in a safe at all other times. It becomes a sort of ritual for clocking in and out of work.

Light is meticulous. Holding his pen off-kilter to throw off the curves and edges of his penmanship. He takes to journaling like he’s penning the world’s most mundane, most detailed, most virtuous autobiography.

L’s notes on the other hand are borderline illegible. Each entry is merely one or two sentences at most. Sometimes just a word, or a string of numbers.

Strawberries too tart today, taste terrible

He is Kira

1600. 50? …

Misa Light-kun’s girlfriend

Watari. HQ. microwave mud cake?

Light-kun did not kiss Misa back

L feels it, something quiet and scheming in the man sitting beside him. He tugs on his tie. It’s something new, since they’ve started journaling.

Weeks go by. One night, he tiptoes down to HQ hoping to break into the safe and confirm his suspicions; to his surprise he opens the door to find Light seated on one of the couches, flipping through his journal and scrunching his nose at it. “Light?” Caught you. “You aren’t to be here after curfew. Especially not with that.”

“You’re one to talk.” Light’s eyes scan L and then flicker to the coffee table, where his own journal sits invitingly. L’s been got, and what’s worse, Light knows it. He always knows. L wonders if he’ll ever get used to it.

“Yes, but.” L perches on the opposite sofa. “There’s no reason for you to be reading my journal. I’m not a suspect in this investigation.”

There’s plenty reason, and they both know it. If Kira can anticipate L’s hunches, he can misdirect. It’s a poor bluff, but still it’s one that Light can’t cop to.

“I suppose your right,” Light says, lips tightening into a line. He locks eyes with L and closes the journal softly, tossing it on the coffee table. L scratches at his wrist, where the handcuff used to be. Questioning if this opportunity would be wasted by fighting fire with fire.

“Perhaps my journal offered some insight. I was thinking the same about yours,” L mutters, “…Kira is my white whale, I suppose.”

“But I’m not Kira.”

“Yes, you keep saying that.”

Light crosses one leg over the other. “And Captain Ahab isn’t someone to aspire to. I’d be careful Ryuuzaki,” he warns; sounding perfectly concerned as a friend ought to be, “or the task force might begin to question your aptitude. You’re beginning to sound obsessed.”

Snide bastard.

“And what of you, Light?”

Light stiffens. So begins the spar.

“Do you shed the work day off in the shower with ease? Is your sleep dreamless, or do you comb through evidence you might have missed? You are tasked to help us hunt down the most prolific serial killer to ever walk this Earth, and…” he raises a thumb to his teeth, “surely that can’t be accomplished between the hours of 9 to 5, even for someone as brilliant as yourself.”

He’s monologuing now. Leaning forward. Dangling the fish hook and begging that Light takes the bait.

“That would be a most incredible feat for any man,” L says. He’s got Light right where he wants him, wide eyed and stubbornly still. Careful not to reveal any tells, which is one in and of itself. “But you don’t see yourself as one, do you?”

Light scoffs. “What are you asking, Ryuuzaki?”

It’s a ruse. Light always knows exactly what he’s saying, and does this stupid little dance with him anyway because he knows he can. L normally quite enjoys it, but tonight he’s had it and he isn’t sure why. He stands, only to step across the coffee table and plant his foot on one side of Light, the other soon to follow on the other side. Light instinctively recoils until his back is flush with the back cushion. It isn’t quite straddling, because L is still quite hunched overtop of him. But it is an intimidating closeness. Obsessive, even.

“I’m asking,” L mutters, eyes darting back and forth between Light’s, “if you think yourself God, or man.”

He’s still an immovable force, a statue underneath him. But there’s a flush of pink to his cheeks. So, you are human after all.

“This is ridiculous!” Light huffs, wiggling, and for the first time there’s a tinge of urgency to it. “You’re not getting a false confession out of me, pulling a stunt like this.”

“That is not my intention.”

“Then what is?”

“Have I not made that clear?” L asks, and the patronizing tone gives Light significant pause. L looks at the wetness of Light’s lower lip and bites that thumb between his teeth. “…Or have you just tricked me into thinking you’re smarter than you actually are?”

Light, ego bruised and bested, smashes their lips together. He plays dirty, and spars with him until their lips are swollen and there is a tinny, metallic flavour on both their tongues.

God, man, monster. Whichever he is, L likes the taste.

[georges-chambers]

for the character asks...ishmael, ofc :3

Idk when you sent this but I wish I had seen it earlier because !!! VERY glad to do this!!

'How I feel about this character': So Much. In general. What can't I say about him? On one hand, as many point out, he's an almost definitely some kind of undiagnosable neurodivergent and due to this is incredibly relatable. ACCIDENTALLY CLICKED POST WHEN I MEANT TO SAVE THIS TO DRAFTS. ANYWAYS. I HAD MUCH MORE: He Also Suvks!!! He knows a lot but that doesn't mean he actually believes in objectively true things! Hes aware of his own faults but we get the feeling he's not too concerned with changing them very much! I also feel like some fans of Moby Dick kind of choose to gloss over the ways in which, beautifully as he puts it, his love for Queequeg is also almost definitely through a very warped lens due to the way he just thinks of Queequeg, and at times it also seems almost obsessive. And another important part of him, I think, is that he becomes just as obsessed with things that are important to him as someone like Ahab, just in a way that doesn't lead to relentlessly chasing them down and trying to kill them. Well, breaking down a door to 'save them' is. I'm sure you can see the similarities. But of course there's the way he writes obsessively about minor details about the whole voyage and people on it and Moby Dick himself in a way that implies he has a fascination with it all borne from the trauma it gave him. Which reminds me of how much he seems to actively want to hide any part of himself and his past from the reader but where it starts slipping out are often memories that seem kind of. Worrying(?) Definitely not Pleasant anyways. Which again, he seems to zero in on a bit. Also to me he is Not Cis. Of course.

'All of the people I ship romantically with this character': Ishmael's one of the very few instances where I think the only romantic ship I have of him are with the canon love interest (Queequeg of course). Aside from probably 2 ships or so, but those are either rather RPF (about someone who is dead but nonetheless real. I mean. He's kinda implied to exist in Moby Dick too, but he's very much real, its based on the real version) focused or Angst Heavy, so I would only share those in DMs at request.

Now as for potential sexual relationships? Another entire area I will leave to DMs.

'My non-romantic OTP for this character': Okay nevermind, I lied. I could Never explain it fully because its Not in the book and not based on anything in the book, but the 2011 movie. Showed me a whole layer to the potential of whatever was going on between Ahab and Ishmael and god. The toxic workplace relationship he had with that old man. That whole movie became Their Movie to me. Queequeg can of course become involved. I also like the idea of him and Bulkington of course.

'My unpopular opinion about this character': Its hard to say what'd be considered unpopular for this kind of a fandom, but I feel like the fact that the racism from his POV was progressive for its time only makes it even more immersive to him as a character. Its the sort of thing that's like . 'This is a fascinating indication about the time and the author writing in this time' and 'This could be considered a part of the character narrating all of this and how they view the world' Can very much coexist here. To me they feed into each other and I love it. Less like that, though, since that'd probably be the more popular of the two: I feel like a lot of adaptations are a bit less than accurate to what I personally think of with Ishmael because they often make him (even including the 2011 to some degree) a lot more overtly 'benevolent' than really fits. In the book, he does shit like contemplate just boarding up the room he's in and basically steal it from its original owner, and just the near frantic, almost aggressive tone he often takes with fucking Cetaceans, In General, towards his audience, I love, and really wish there had been like. Any of, in most adaptations, which seem to want him to be a much more 'relatable nice hero' which he just Fundamentally Isn't. There are so many times reading this book and rereading it where I've just gone, 'Ishmael, whoever you're having this argument Isn't here right now. I love you, but Please.'

'One thing I wish would happen/had happened with this character in-canon': I feel like actually learning more about what he did in his Past would kind of spoil some enjoyable and very fitting mystery and ambiguity so really what I wish we knew more about were his travels and life in general between the wreck of the Pequod and when he's writing that. Actually, no, if I absolutely Had to choose to actually be told 1 more thing about him? When and where was he a stone-mason. I love how hes very intentionally like, 'At Some Point in Time, For Some Point In Time, Neither of Which You Need To Know, I was a stone-mason.' And its just like. Actually no. Normally there'd be nothing odd about that but no, now I really do need to know what he could be hiding with that.

Once again Thank you so much for asking this and once again encouraging me to ramble incoherently about Moby Dick

[astroprompts]

✧ —𝐁𝐎𝐉𝐀𝐂𝐊 𝐇𝐎𝐑𝐒𝐄𝐌𝐀𝐍 𝐃𝐈𝐀𝐋𝐎𝐆𝐔𝐄 𝐏𝐑𝐎𝐌𝐏𝐓𝐒 [𝐒𝐄𝐀𝐒𝐎𝐍 𝟏]

“Why so gloomy, roomie?”

“I've had tapeworms that were less parasitic.”

“If you're looking for the toaster strudels, I got really high last night and ate them all.”

“I don't know how you can expect anyone else to love you when you so clearly hate yourself.”

“I pride myself on my ability to separate my professional life from my personal life.”

“I really gotta start putting my phone on airplane mode when I drink.”

“Sorry I haven't really been mingling. I get kind of awkward at parties.”

“I'm responsible for my own happiness? I can't even be responsible for my own breakfast!”

“Don't put things in my butt if you want them back.”

“Well, that was another in a long series of regrettable life choices.”

“Well, that went slightly better than the worst it could have possibly gone, so... Hooray?”

“Just like always, you're right, and everyone else is wrong. But if you don't swallow your pride, this is never gonna let up.”

“I'm not stubborn. I'm proud.”

“Is this a necessary conversation to be having right now?”

“You know what the problem is with everybody? They all just want to hear what they already believe. No one ever wants to hear the truth.”

“I want to hear the truth. I don't know if you want to tell it, though.”

“Your family will never understand you. Your lovers will leave you or try to change you. But your fans, you be good to them, and they'll be good to you.”

“No matter what happens, no matter how much it hurts, you don't stop dancing, and you don't stop smiling, and you give those people what they want.”

“People don't usually want to hang out with me after rehab. I'm really more of a before-rehab friend.”

“Morning, sleepy-pooh, you want pancakes?”

“The guest room is yours as long as you want.”

“Ahab's got a white whale to catch, baby!”

“You're not this girl's father, and you're not doing her any favors by refusing to set boundaries.”

“I get letters every day from boys telling me that I was the first girl they masturbated to.”

“You're not my dad. You're just a rugged, older man who provided me with a strong, masculine presence during my formative years.”

“I'm at a place right now where I never need to grow as a person or rise to an occasion, because I can constantly just surround myself with sycophants and enablers until I die tragically young.”

“I'm pumping out heartfelt anecdotes and witty observations left and right.”

“I really want to be here for you in your time of need, but I'm not really good with funerals or death or families or feelings or people.”

“My family made my life miserable, and then they never forgave me for leaving.”

“Well, he was a mean, sadistic alcoholic, who never supported anything I did and actively delighted in seeing me fail.”

“I'm just saying, if you can't find a way to let off some steam you're going to explode.”

“I should've known it was a waste of time to come back here.”

“Look, take it from someone with his own shitty parents; family is a sinkhole, and you were right to get out when you had the chance.”

“The stupid thing is, even now I still just want them to be proud of me and think I did good.”

“Closure is a made up thing by Steven Spielberg to sell movie tickets.”

“This is the sweetest choking hazard anyone's ever given me.”

“This has been fun, and also an offensive display of extravagant wealth, but maybe we should call it a night.”

“Give me a bottle of something to help me forget my problems.”

“I like being around you, and I don't know if I ever told you that in so many words, so I'm telling you.”

“You are a goddamn American treasure, you know that?”

“Am I just hungover, or are you talking like a Muppet?”

“You're the one who's always been there for me, so I drank a lot more bourbon and drove over to tell you how I feel.”

“Every time something bad happens, you come running to me for comfort.”

“We're just two lonely people trying to hate ourselves a little less.”

“You know the worst part? I knew this was gonna happen and I let myself get excited anyway.”

“Uh-oh. People only say they're fine when they're not fine.”

“I spy with my little eye someone who needs to shut the hell up.”

“Here. I got you a beer. It's on the house.”

“Did you think that I spent the last 20 years on my couch just feeling sorry for myself?”

“I think I need to head off to bed, and I hope I actually wake up later.”

“You have to live with the shitty thing you did for the rest of your life. You have to know that it's never, ever going to be okay.”

“You know what your problem is? You want to think of yourself as the good guy. Well, I know you better than anyone, and I can tell you that you're not.”

“You'd probably sleep a lot better at night if you just admitted to yourself that you're a selfish goddamn coward who takes whatever he wants and doesn't give a shit about who he hurts.”

“So... Should we talk about how you just tried to kiss me?”

“I'm not going to waste another thought on you.”

“Bad news-- I lost my driver's license.”

“Can you... Drive me everywhere I need to go for the next three months?”

“You know, with my knack for coming up with plans and your ability to hear them without contributing more than three words at a time, we make a pretty good team, don't we?”

“I was just trying to be a good friend in my own shitty, ass-backwards way.”

“You know, sometimes I feel like I was born with a leak, and any goodness I started with just slowly spilled out of me, and now it's all gone.”

“Why is it that 90% of our conversations these days revolve around plotting sabotages?”

“Look, all publicity is good publicity.”

“I need to go take a shower so I can't tell if I'm crying or not.”

“Maybe I just need to stop expecting you to be a good person, so that way, I won't get hurt when you're not.”

“You abandoned me, and I will never forgive you for that.”

“Unbelievable. When your powers combine... You are somehow even more stupid than the sum of your stupids.”

“They see a greatness in me, and they mistake it for goodness, but I... I know there's nothing there.”

“Look, if you really want to help people, it doesn't hurt to have a little money in your pocket.”

“I kind of think all you are is just the things that you do.”

[sisterspooky1013]

Parallel, Chapter 2/6

Rated X | Read it here on AO3

When she wakes, unfiltered sunlight is beating down on her eyelids. She sits up abruptly, alarmed by the realization that she left the blinds open, which she has never once done. When she opens her eyes, she is immediately disoriented by her surroundings. The room is large and bright with high ceilings and one wall that is completely eclipsed by a window. The bed she’s lying in is gigantic, the bedding an unfamiliar paisley print. She’s wearing what can only be described as a nightie: a small black scrap of silky fabric that barely covers her chest and torso, and matching panties underneath. She blinks rapidly, taking in the art hung on the walls and an open door that appears to lead to a bathroom.

Her heart starts to pick up as she strains to recall where she is and how she got here. She remembers having dinner with Mulder. She remembers returning home. She remembers getting into bed and then—nothing. She’s not in any pain, doesn’t feel the groggy, thick-headed sensation of being drugged. She slips one hand under her panties and doesn’t find any tenderness or slickness. Physically, she feels fine.

Carefully, quietly, she slips out of the bed and pads over to the window, tugging on the hem of the nightie in an attempt to cover more of her thighs. A brief flash of vertigo sets her off balance and she touches the window pane to steady herself as she looks down to the street below, at least thirty stories. Beyond that is the endless expanse of the ocean, still veiled in early morning fog that is burning off as the sun pushes higher in the sky out of view. The road that runs along the shore is lined with palm trees, giving the distinct impression that she’s on the West Coast.

Again, she surveys the room, looking for anything that might help her fill in the gaping blank spot in her mind. On the bedside table there’s a cell phone charging and she rushes over to grab it, walking on the balls of her feet to minimize the sound of her footfalls. Quietly, she creeps into the bathroom and slowly pushes the door closed, turning the handle to soften the thunk of the latch. She’s not sure which switch is for the light and which is for the fan, so at the risk of making noise she leaves them both off. After powering the phone up, she dials Mulder’s number from memory and says half a dozen silent prayers as it rings and rings.

“Yeah?”

“Mulder?” she hisses, holding her mouth close to the receiver and cupping her hand around it.

“Huh?” asks the unfamiliar male voice on the other end of the line.

“Mulder, it’s me,” she repeats. “I don’t know where I am. I think I need help.”

“Is this Darla? I told you to knock that shit off,” the voice says angrily, and the line goes dead.

Her ears ring in the silence that follows. What is happening? Slowly, she sinks down onto the floor and leans against an enormous soaking tub. She takes another look at the phone, which is a similar model to hers. Navigating to the phone book, she begins to scroll through a list of names. Aaron, Ahab, Amanda, Bill, Christine, Charlie. An unsettling feeling roils in her belly. When she gets to “F” and sees “Fox,” she dials it immediately. Who else could it be?

“Hello?”

She knows immediately that it’s him. He sounds confused, but not alarmed.

“Mulder, it’s me,” she says in a harsh whisper.

“Mulder?” he repeats, a laugh in his voice. “Are you still in bed?”

A pause. Her mind is racing but getting nowhere.

“I don’t know where I am,” she tells him, tears welling in her eyes. “I don’t know how I got here.”

She hears the snatch of a door opening and she freezes. Her heart lodges itself in her throat, beating so hard it nearly chokes her. Beneath the door, she sees a shadow block out the sun as someone approaches on the other side, and she springs forward in an attempt to lock it. She’s not fast enough, and the knob turns before she can engage the lock. She scrambles backward, squinting as sunlight blasts into the darkened room.

“What are you doing?”

At the sound of his voice she looks up and finds him standing in the open doorway, a cell phone in one hand. He’s wearing nothing besides snug-fitting boxer shorts and his hair is shaggy, falling over the tops of his ears. He’s tan and chiseled, a beach bum version of himself, and she blinks at him, stupefied.

“Mulder?” she says uncertainly.

He quirks his head at her and flips on the light.

“Are you okay?” he asks, setting his phone on the counter by the sink and crouching down beside her. He slides his hand over her bare upper back and she flinches, which causes his face to fall. “Did something happen?”

She looks around at the opulent, subway-tiled bathroom, then at him, then at her own outfit. For a split second she feels embarrassed that she’s barely dressed, but he appears to be wholly unaffected by it. In fact, he hasn’t even seemed to notice. She keeps waiting for something to make sense, but it doesn’t.

“Where are we?” she asks, and his eyes go wide.

“At home,” he says fearfully. “Did you hit your head? Should I call Sam?”

She shakes her head slowly, then stares vacantly through the open bathroom door. Mulder reaches up to push her hair behind her ear, and the sun catches on a ring around his third finger. She grabs his hand mid-air, closely examining the weathered gold band.

“You’re married,” she says flatly.

He shifts so that he’s sitting more fully in front of her, then cups her face in his hands and looks intensely into her eyes. It’s comforting, in a way. His eyes are the only part of him that seems to be wholly unchanged since yesterday.

“You’re scaring me, Dana. I’m calling Sam.”

She sits on the bathroom floor, dazed, as he takes his cell phone into the bedroom and paces back and forth in front of the window. The way his body moves, the concerned glances he throws her way as he speaks in hushed tones with someone on the other line, it’s all very much Mulder. Slowly, she stands and looks at herself in the mirror. Her mouth falls open at the sight of her hair, which is significantly longer than it was yesterday, falling just past her shoulders. She’s freckled and sun-kissed like she was as a teenager, and her body beneath the nightie is muscled and lean. It’s not that she doesn’t like what she sees, but she certainly doesn’t recognize it.

“Do you have a headache?” Mulder asks, now standing in the doorway with his cell phone held against his bare chest.

She shakes her head, and he brings the phone back to his ear.

“She said no. Her pupils don’t look more dilated than normal. She was fine last night, but she seems really…” He glances at her and then moves away, but she hears him say, “She asked me where she is. It’s freaking me out.”

She closes the bathroom door and finds a robe hanging on the back of it, which she puts on. She uses the toilet, splashes water on her face, and brushes her teeth with what she has to assume at this point is her toothbrush. There are three gentle raps on the door and when she opens it, the look of abject fear on Mulder’s face makes her feel afraid too.

“Sam said we should go to the ER,” he says gravely. “She thinks you may be experiencing some kind of neurological event.”

“Who is Sam?” she asks, and the color drains from his face.

“My sister,” he says gently. “Samantha.”

She blinks at him, and he watches her raptly like she might spontaneously combust at any moment. She opens her mouth, on the verge of reminding him that Samantha is twenty-plus years missing and most likely dead, but two of the struggling synapses in her brain fire and make a connection.

There are thin spots between dimensions, access points through which they can interact with one another.

A dream is the answer to a question we haven’t yet figured out how to ask.

“I’m dreaming,” she says absently, and Mulder dips his head to try and catch her eye. “I mean, I had a weird dream. I think…I think I’m just a little confused,” she elaborates with a shake of her head.

Mulder sets his phone down and takes her face in his hands, tilting it up as he examines her closely.

“You sure you’re okay?” he asks tenderly.

“Yes, sorry to scare you,” she says, pushing her mouth into a thin smile.

He sighs and rests his forehead against hers, closing his eyes briefly. When he opens them he kisses her, and she tenses and sucks in a surprised breath through her nose. One beat, two, three, he finally pulls away and searches her face with his eyes. She feels starstruck, elated but confused, and she can’t think of a single thing to say.

“Come have some breakfast,” he says resolutely, grabbing her hand. “I might need a drink after that.”

She allows him to tow her through the bedroom and into a well-appointed apartment that cannot possibly be hers. Windowed walls, ocean views, furniture that looks like it was selected from a catalog. This is a dream, she tells herself. A very, very vivid dream. Mulder gestures for her to take a seat at the counter, then pours her a cup of coffee and digs around in the fridge for a few minutes.

She sips at the coffee as she looks around, nearly choking when she spots a large photograph printed on canvas across the room. Abandoning her cup, she approaches the canvas and stares in awe at the image of herself in a sleek white gown, Mulder beside her in a black tuxedo.

“Oh my god,” she says under her breath.

“Here,” he says from behind her, and she returns to the kitchen to find a bowl of yogurt topped with fresh fruit.

“Thank you,” she mutters, and while she has absolutely no appetite she forces herself to take a few hearty bites. Dream food tastes real enough, as it turns out.

“So,” Mulder says, taking the seat beside her with a fresh cup of coffee. “You had a weird dream?” She nods, peering at his mostly nude body from the corner of her eye. She can’t help but notice how snug his boxers are, leaving very little to the imagination. “Do you remember what it was about?”

She turns more fully to look at him. If her Mulder were here, the real one, he’d tell her to have fun with it—there’s no harm to be done in the world of dreams. She doesn’t allow herself to entertain the idea that the world she is currently visiting might actually exist.

“I dreamt that we worked together at the FBI,” she says, and he barks a laugh.

“In the VCU? I’m not sure you’d have liked it any more than I did,” he says jovially.

So this Mulder did work in the VCU, just like hers did.

“What’s the date today?” she asks.

“January 22nd.”

“January 22nd…?”

He gives her a worried look, and she regrets the question.

“2000,” he says reluctantly.

Okay. Same date, same year. No time travel involved.

“Right,” she says, as though confirming that he’s correct. Though she is fairly certain that none of this is really happening, some part of her feels the need to avoid disrupting this dream-world in an irreparable way. That, and she wouldn’t like to experience Mulder having her committed, even if only in a dream. “What was Samantha up to?” she asks casually.

“Oh, I should call her and tell her you’re okay,” he says. “She and Candice are hiking Mt. Whitney today. They were just getting to the trailhead.”

Scully nods and takes another bite of her yogurt.

“Do you remember when we first met?” she asks, offering him a nostalgic smile.

“Of course,” he answers, eyeing her suspiciously. “What about it?”

“I was just thinking,” she says, scrambling for something plausible, “we all have unique memories, even of the same events. So my memory of the day we first met may be slightly different from yours. I may have retained different details, for example.”

“That’s scientifically sound,” he says, brushing invisible crumbs off the countertop. “Cognitively, each memory is completely unique to the person and their state of mind at the time of the experience.”

“So why don’t you tell me about your memory of when we met, and then I’ll tell you which parts I remember differently,” she suggests.

Mulder pivots a little and leans back in his chair, slinging one arm over the back of it. She keeps her eyes carefully trained on his face, though she is extremely aware of his bare chest and belly in her periphery.

“A thought experiment?” he says skeptically. “Who are you and what have you done with my wife?”

His wife.

She feels a flush of adrenaline, but then he cracks a smile and she exhales in relief.

“I was helping Sam move into her apartment at Stanford,” he says, turning back to his coffee. “I was right in the middle of making fun of a seriously anal retentive chore list on the fridge when the mastermind behind said chore list informed me that I was an arrogant asshole.” He glances over at her and smiles, and she gathers that the mastermind was her. “Obviously, I was immediately smitten.”

“Obviously?” she asks, surprised to find a genuine smile on her own face.

“Smart, gorgeous, and won’t put up with my bullshit?” he lists off, holding up a finger to punctuate each item. “Dream girl.” She feels herself blushing and hopes that he doesn’t notice. “How does that match up with your version of events?”

She opens her mouth and freezes, not having any of her own memories to reference.

“That sounds pretty accurate, actually,” she stutters. “Except my chore list wasn’t anal retentive, it was effective. Have you ever tried sharing an apartment with five med students?”

By his reaction she knows that she didn’t say anything illogical, and she really did create a chore chart for her shared apartment in graduate housing. But in the waking world, Samantha never lived there, because Samantha was already dead.

Mulder glances at his watch and hums around a mouth full of coffee.

“We should probably get moving, we need to leave in about an hour,” he says, clearing both their plates and cups.

Scully feels vaguely alarmed by the idea of leaving the apartment. Will her dream world persist if she ventures out?

“Where are we going?” she asks, then quickly adds, “I know we have plans, I just—”

“L.A.” Mulder answers, his back to her as he loads their dishes into the dishwasher. “Missy’s flight home boards at 5:30. We’ll drop her off at the airport after lunch.”

Scully’s stomach drops into her knees and she grabs on to the edge of the counter for balance.

“My sister?” she squeaks out through her suddenly constricted throat.

“The one and only,” Mulder says, oblivious to her reaction. After a beat, he turns to look at her, and she tries to shake off her stunned expression. “Why don’t you go get in the shower?” he suggests.

Scully nods and slowly slinks off the barstool. She walks to the bathroom in a daze, torn between wanting to wake up from this strange dream and never wanting it to end.

Tagging @today-in-fic

[popculturebuffet]

Pirate Month III: The Pirates! In an Adventure With Whaling! (Comission by WeirdKev27)

Ahoy all you happy people and welcome back to Pirate Month! As we wind it down, it's time once again for our yearly look at Gideon Defoe's pirates series. We started with Aardman's fantastic adaptation of his work, went on to the first book and now where we are at The Pirates! An Adventure with Whaling... or Ahab if your in the US like me... or Moby Dick for the reprint for the 2012 uk reprint.

For those just joining in pirates is a series of comedy novels by british author Gideon Dafoe. The first book, and parts of this one and possibly others but we'll get to that, was adapted into a movie by Aardman Animation. I'd seen that film but now kev has me reading the books as he's a fan too.

Last year I read the pirates first adventure, adventure with scientests where our heroes casued a lot of black comedy deaths, halfheartedly helped Charles Darwin on his adventures, wore dinosaur masks, picked up a new crew member in Jennifer, met a humanpanzie and other nonsense i've likely forgot. I also found out the film was a great adaptation as while it didn't follow the book to the letter it captured the spirit of these books fantastically.

I did have one worrying question in the back of my mind going into the second one: Would the books keep up the momentum or lapse into the formula of "the crew meets and teams up with a historical figure, wackiness ensues" i'm delighted that while that's technically true, Adventures With Whaling ups the ante, tightens the plot and is still gut busting all the while. It's a nice evolution of the series that makes me excited to keep sailing with the other three books eventually. To see what I mean join me under the cut for whale puppetry, mobs of cowboys in las vegas, and severe crippling debt.

So to start us off Adventures with Whaling has a tighter plot. Like Scientists, the plot is largely a loose frame to work jokes in but unlike Scientests, where the pirates really barely cared about Charles Darwin's plight and only needed his money, here the stakes are a lot more personal and are the reason for all the wacky nonsense we know and love.

This time Pirate Captain makes a mistake i'm sure many has and overspends. With the pirate's unamed boat falling to bits their fearless leader Pirate Captain takes the crew to Nantucket, insert your own dirty limerick here, intending to get the boat fixed by Cutlass Liz

Yup to my plesant suprise Cutlass Liz was also in the books, having a bigger role that likely could've come up , and still could come up, in any sequels. I'm seriously hoping now Aardman is on steady ground with netflix we get a sequel. And reading through the jackets of the future books it seems like the pirate of the year compettion is directly taken from Adventures with Napoleon. The Aardman Film simply took a bunch of neat bits and pieces and the basic characters and reconfigured them into it's own mostly original plot about charles darwin badly wanting to get laid. Not something i'm against mind as it worked well and like i've said it gets the spirit of the books down perfectly.

Here instead of just another rival pirate and the object of Pirate Captain's affections for one fantasy sequence, Cutlass Liz is an infamous pirate who runs a boat yard and enters the book killing a pirate who couldn't pay her while terrifying the crew. So naturally.. the Pirate Captain gets into massive debt with her due to a combination of trying to impress her and his oldest foe, Black Belamy.

Yes to my delight Black Belamy is back, having set off the previous book by setting our heroes on Charles Darwin. He's also not voiced by jeremy piven, another well worn plus. He has a bigger role this time out, not only setting off the plot AGAIN, but also coming back twice to bedevil our heroes. He's also one of the few things the film didn't do better as rather than just a broish bully he's the kind of bully who pretneds to be your friend while mocking you and is far more cunning. While he generally just meant to insult pirate captain here, his later two schemes show a nicely petty and manipulative streak.

To start he just mocks the boat Pirate Captain was going to buy and Pirate Captain's own ego does the rest, instead buying the biggest boat possible. Thankfully Bellamy leaves before he gives a bs excuse about his treasure he bragged about to impress Liz but still for some reason agrees to still buy it.

Liz is at least.. sorta forgiving and agrees to give him a few weeks to pay it off .. or else. SO our heroes with low suplies, less money and a threat to cut off the captain's luxioruus beard set off.

This elevates the book as rather than the adventures mostly being disconnected, with the very loose goal of we need money , we have a firmer goal: We need money or we're all gonna die horribly.

It's not the only connecting bit too as while Liz is the looming threat that sets the plot off, well that and Pirate Captains fragile ego but that's the kind of threat you can nevery truly beat, there's another figure we see throughout the first half. While the Pirate Captain is having some drinks he runs into Moby Dick's Captain Ahab. I haven't read moby dick but thankfully this book just really requires you to know he's a grim old man whose leg got bitten by a whale and he's been trying to murder it ever since. Ahab pops up once or twice before becoming the center of the last act. It's small stuff sure but it helps make the silly story feel all the more impactful by the end: tying together these loose bits into one uprorarus set piece

Before we get there we have some smaller set pieces: the pirate captain's old mentor mails him a treasure map... that turns out to be a child's smile.. which they try to grin and bear but throw into the ocean because what the fuck man. I mean.. it's not a bad lesson but come on.

Since that fails the next one and one that made the book jacket is VEGAS BABY. Which I was so excited for and it did not disapoint. It's filled with kitchy landmarks, gambling and naturally our heroes loosing what little money they had left gambling. For once it's not even pirate captain's fault as he warned the crew. He runs into Ahab again who was told the whale was in the casino. And now I just want a version of Ocean's eleven where Ahab is one of danny's crew. I mean.. we're getting Godzilla vs the Great Gatsby and the rest of western literature this year, it's no longer impossible.

The Pirate Captain's real plan and reason for going is simple: Showbusiness! Vegas is all about those big flashy shows and this series has no concept for time or accurate history so the Pirate captain puts ona bit peformance. Antecdotes! Knife Throwing! An Albino Pirate! all the usual stuff.

To my shock given the title isn't adventures in vegas though given my love for vegas set stories I badly wish it was, it works. THey get a decent if not nearly enough pile of money scare a child who dosen't know the albino isn't a ghost, and have the child fead the albino merunge to show he's not threatning. All sentences I just got paid for recapping, all so over the top as not to be offensive

Sadly this dosen't pan out as Black Belamy, the bastard swoops in with a better show and the pirate captain's attempts to have a lymicrk battle with him result in him insulting an audience of cowboys and having to run for their life. A once an adventure staple, but not exactly good.

Our heroes seem to be at a dead end, depressed about their possible death and lack of success on the stage. I love how pettily angry the pirate captain is about how little they appricated his work. Such a good character. He stays largely the same this time, a bit of an ass (the bit about him trying to go into the showers while jennifer there has aged like fine mlik on a sidewalk but thankfully he clearly never got away with anything), an egotistic and a layabout, but a guy who genuinely loves his crew.

Well.. MOST of them. There's one exception introduced this book and he is a delight, the only pirate beyond Captain's #2 pirate with a scarf, the albino pirate and jennifer to really get much of a personality: The Pirate in Red. The Pirate in Red is a sarcastic bastard who freqnuently makes jabs at the Pirate Captain's expense, only stopping when the captain gestures to his cutlass. He's the only one besides pirate with a scarf who seems to have an idea what he's doing and unlike Scarf Pirate, will actually point this out.

While Pirate Captain DEFINTELY wants to kill him he either defintly knows...

Or more likely it's a sign of a change between books: Scientests relied HEAVILY on black comedy, lots of casual murder and death. This is still present in Whaling, Liz's plans ot kill our heroes are repsented by a threatning greeting card reminder and several people still do die, but it's tone down a bit, more in line with the eventual movie. There's still racy jokes, some that work like PIrate Captain not wanting his beard to get hurt as it'll hurt their gay following as he's known as a bit of a bear, and some age like fine milk left inside a monster truck in a hurricane, like the mention of thiland's "Ladyboys". Bleh. But most of the humor has held up perfectly and it's leaning a bit more into the nonsense, while keeping some casual deaths and murder for funsies. IT's a better ballance. I also got a rather large chuckle out of both times the inventory included the acordian pirate who died last book still stuffed and and mounted after his death.

So while Pirate Captain is loathe to agree with Pirate in Red, he finds his suggestion to... do some fucking pirating for a change actually has merrit. We get them boarding a leper boat an da school trip, both jokes that would be used in the movie. Both are pretty funny with the lepers giving them used bits and with the kids after getting what little money they had they just.. hang out. They build frankestines out of the leper parts, which is fucked up but man if I didn't giggle and Pirate Captain dosen't take them with him as they have moms to think about. Awww

Eventually though they find a whaling vessle and Ahab. Once again the rest of the plot is kicked off by a bad bit of piracy.. but it works largely because rather than someone they barely know.. it's a casual aquantince and it's hilariously awkward, with PC having run through his first mate and Ahab being angry as hell. I just love how it comes off as if you ran into a friend while doing something embarassing and having to make that awkward small talk. And invite him to dinner which is also awkard.

It does provide our heroes an out though: Ahab blows up at the pirate captain making a whale with his mashed potatoes, but admits it's more because he's just fucking tired. So he offers bounty: the same 6000 dubloons our heroes need.

So the rest of the book, the bulk of it really is truly an adventure with whaling as our heroes have no clue HOW to actually do this. The schemes are fast, furious, and stupid with having a bunch of pirates pretend to be krill, dangling various pirates off the bow, and naturally loosing a bunch more to sharks, and the Pirate Captain reading his secret romance novel loudly, which the crew naturalyl enjoys but dosen't do anything.

Eventually in a turn I find neat that REALLY ups the stake the Captain gets obsseed: he works everyone harder, then does the unthinkable: his prized ham, which gets mentiond quite a bit gets nailed to the door for the winner.

I like how this emphasises how the crew works; Sure pirate captain's killed a few dozen of them, and is incompitent as hell.. but he makes the ship fun, gives them adventure and does love his crew. He's not a great leader but he's THEIR captain and him taking all that fun away makes them deseprate

So ... because rule of threes.. the turn to the devil himself: Yes Jennifer suggests the impossible: A few of them including her sneak out and ask Black Belamy. I'ts a genius turn I did'nt see coming: we've seen how clever he can be, and it's the exact worst thing.. but our heroes are short on time and actual ideas.

Belamy being his bastardly self is actually.. helpful, wooing jennifer with a dinner and to his credit not being a dick: he clearly IS trying to win her into bed with his fancy dinner, flirting and what not, btu when she just calls him friend and dosen't quite catch onto his intrest, he dosen't force it. It's a bare minimum but Bellamy is such a scoundrel it's neat to find out he has standards. And he agrees to help. Granted it's of course another scheme on his old school chum and arch enemy, but it's more of a solution than our heroes have

I love how Pirate Captain reacts too: he's mildly livid for a second.. but upon it being explained they were all worried about him, he's genuinely touched by their gesture and belamy giving them what seems to be THE whale in 20 minutes.

As I said though it' sonce again another classic Black Belamy prank. Honestly i'll be dispaointed if adventurees with communist doesn't have him pull some half assed con on our heroes at this point that only works because our heroes are a few barnacles short of a hive minded barnacle monster.

He painted a whale from the zoo white... and our heroes just run with it. Yeah for once his half assed scheme actually helps as they had no other plan so "Hope he buys it" is all they got. Pirate Captain naturally has to take it one step further and stupider: have someone puppet the whale from the inside and apologize. On his last fucking nerve with the guy, PC assigns pirate in red for the job.

So our gang plans to have the whale apologize and arrives to a sketpical ahab and cutlas liz for a GLORIOUS climax. I mean it this finale is just so damn good. It starts with Pirate in Red going off script to insult pirate captain who can't just point to his sword as he can't see him, one of my faviorite gags of the book. Lucky for them before Cutlass Liz can understandably kill them, Moby Dick himself shows up and starts destroying their boat thinking i'ts a lady whale. This is also a great callback as that was thier first scheme. So the book climaxes in pirate captain hanging on for dear life as the whale bats him around and destroys his nice new ship while everyone thinks he's a total badass, cumilating in him and his prized ham, which he ran back for while everyone else jumped ship, ending up in the whales blowhole.

With the newfound respect of their creditors and thier debts paid Liz gives the pirates thir old boat back and we get a pretty sweet ending as they all watch clouds as they did at the start of the book.. they didn't really gain MUCh from this adventure.. btu they learned something: don't get into debt to impress women. Also maybe whaling's not for them.

Adventures in Whaling is a perfect sequel: it ups the stakes, ties the plot together way better, ups the jokes nad in general is just a delight. I dont' knokw if I can wait a year for the next one, this one was pretty damn fantastic. Thanks for reading

[wordsandrobots]

Well, Sunrise/Bandai Namco work fast* but the fan subtitlers work faster.

*laughs in ‘game in development since 2018′

Some notes on Iron-Blooded Orphans: Urdr Hunt based on this youtuber’s work (I’m not actually sure of the etiquette with linking to things like this . . .) under a spoileriffic cut. But before we get to that, I should note that Gundam Info has confirmed the identity of the green Gundam seen in promotions for the wider Iron-Blooded Oprhans G app this game is the campaign for.

It’s Gundam Gamigin (spellings may vary as far as Samigina), which would make it ASW-G-04, the lowest numbered machine save Bael that we’ve seen so far. It’s property of the Falk Family and we even get the name of its original pilot, Kalf (Calf?) Falk. Going by the auto-translations I’ve been using, the Falks maintain it but keep it firmly in storage.

Anyway, on to the plot!

Hajiroboshi  (Part 1, Part 2)

Departure (Part 1, Part 2)

598 (Part 1, Part 2)

Corridor of Betrayal (Part 1, Part 2)

Holder of the Ring (Part 1, Part 2)

Oh gods I was right. It’s Quatre Mk II.

OK, not really. But Wistario Afam is a distinct shift from Mikazuki as a lead. We’re very much on a different class level here. He’s also a bit of a brat? As in ‘spoiled’. This gels with character profile stuff about his caretaker, Demner Kitaco Jr, who it’s noted cannot say no to him.

The Radonitsa Colony is an active prison at the time of the game’s story (a few months after the Season 1 finale, I think?) I was unsure of that from the preliminary material. This is Gjallarhorn’s priority when it comes to protecting the place. But they also really stiffed their local garrison on equipment. Hloekk Grazes turn out to not be great in a fight (not surprising, they’re lower power than standard Grazes as they’re primarily an export model to selling to other groups).

The plot doubles back on itself from an opening attack on the colony to an earlier prison break by some random mook who has the credentials to join the Urdr Hunt (a weird ring doodad). I’m wasn’t actually sure the in-game scenes follow logically from the animated section, since it seems that Wistario and Demner react to the attack beginning after chasing down the convict, but in the animated opening, they’re working on some old pipes before the attack? But thinking it through again, I think that’s just unclear editing. The pipe scene is probably meant to be way before the flashback, and our protagonists kicking a door open follows from the chase with the mook instead. Likely that would be a lot clearer in full animation.

It seems the ‘convict’ snuck into the prison to partake in the titular Hunt. It is clearly a big deal of some kind. So it would have been really nice if someone could have explained what the hell it is. I assume that’ll be obvious plot-exposition girl Korunaru Kousa‘s job at the start of the next episode. In either case, the convict is sniped by parties unknown and Wistario pockets the ring he was holding.

So far the stakes are: #1 - Wistario’s home town is a decaying hole that everyone he knows is leaving and he wants to reverse this by turning the place into a tourist destination (I think this guy and Mika might actually cancel each other out in a matter/anitmatter explosion if they ever meet); #2 - some dudes in Spinner Rodi mobile suits are trying to find the Urdr Hunt doodad but did not expect it to be in the hands of a literal child in a Gundam (they are, of course, now very dead); #3 - Urdr Hunt . . . profit?

We get explicit confirmation Gundam Hajiroboshi was named after Venus itself, with Demner saying it’s been there since Afam’s grandmother founded Afam Equipment, the family’s company.  It was stored near the colony’s reactor so its Ahab signature would be hidden (e.g. from Gjallarhorn). Wistario’s grandfather said Demner would understand what the deal was if he stuck around Wistario. Which is . . . interesting. IBO doesn’t have any mechanism for actual inherited connections to Gundams, only legends of such that mask more mundane situations.

Hajiroboshi’s displays show Japanese characters rather than English. I think we already knew that from trailers, but it’s worth noting because IBO makes a distinction in written languages, with Teiwaz using a Japanese script (I cannot recall which, sorry) vs Tekkadan and Gjallarhorn using English.

Demner refers to the old men of ‘Dexter and Sinister’, which I assume to be the fishermen-looking chaps in the opening. Delightful.

Venus has definitely been teraformed in the same way as Mars. Blue skies and yellow deserts. To give Wistario his due, it is quite pretty.

[grits-galraisedinthesouth]

William's ever guiding hand on Catherine's back. Always careful not to cause her to FALL down in those high heels.

Ladies: Do not hold hands while walking in high heels on the grass, carpet, or any uneven terrain because it will cause you to become unstable and potentially fall down.

Page 6 has a story praising Prince Harry's pda w/wife, while Prince William's manner towards Catherine was described as "cavalier."

Prince William even assisted Princess Catherine with the flowers while Harry refused to pry the flowers from the hands of his rebellious wife because he seems to be afraid of her.

Meghan grabs on to & hangs off of Harry to control him, we've even seen them play "tug of war." We've also seen that she doesn't know how to properly walk in heels, so there's that too.

Harry being the beta male and the Ahab to Jezebel, stood by and waited for staffers to intervene in the flower folly. If Harry refuses to instruct his wife about flowers, one can only imagine how he handles more important matters.

The Trump's received such vitriol for a viral social media moment in Israel when cameras showed Melania accidentally swat DJT's hand.

Melania is a real high fashion MODEL. She knows how to walk in very high heels and DJT's hand could not help her, it could have hurt her. DJT was on the red Carpet & Melania was initially made to walk slightly behind him & at times off the carpet. Watch the full video where he signals for her to catch up & stay on the red carpet with him & the Netanyahu's.

Here's a Dose of Common sense: Melania would never intentionally swat DJT's hand in front of cameras, but she would signal to DJT to just "KEEP IT MOVING."

DJT also kept slowing down while walking with QEii. QE was affording him the honor to walk AHEAD of her to inspect the guard. He didn't understand she was honoring him by slowing down, so he kept slowing down in an effort to match her slower stride. She even whispered & gestured, "keep going 🤣" [We also saw her tell MM "just get in!"] I actually don't think DJT was properly briefed on how to "inspect" the guard💂‍♂️

What do I know as an American, but Diana always briskly walked past the soldiers during inspection. DJT stopped to chat with the soldiers. What can I say he's the Crown's American-Scottish child.

She's such a tiny person & he's a big guy so there were a few times we could see him looking around like "where did she go? 🤭" Of course the media made a stink out of it and didn't explain the full context of the situation. They didn't care to research. And I suspect many of you will only see what you want to see as well. But always try to watch the full video to grasp the full context of any situation.

BTW for those who are determined to hate him no matter what, the Obama's have shared similar "just get in" stories from their own breaches of protocol & etiquette foibles committed with her majesty.

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-11203129/Royal-fans-spot-moment-Meghan-Markle-refused-let-floral-tributes-Queen.html

Interesting spin with this new PR Headline "MM thanks royal aides... 🧐

[gerrymike]

opinions on boy king/knight dichotomy

hello there this ask is a leetle bit aged but i am logged in on chromebook rn so i am available for comment. my thoughts on the matter: EXCELLENT!!!!! for its dynamics and shortcomings specifically bc inherently it's a messed up foundation for a relationship to be built on imo. wait first up let's do definitions cause conceptions may differ..my only requirements for boy king are: duty to any cause; sense of responsibility for a literal or metaphorical state (e.g. attolia; the ninth house; your own kleos/honour; vengeance of any kind). my requirements for knight are: duty to the boy king; sense of general honour optional

so. obsessed with the violence of it all..the i-will-follow-u-into-the-dark-ology...the idea of duty and devotion to your #bestie and maybe the rest of the #world can seem sweet and romantic but ultimately it's a bond that may find you impaled on a spike or something. big fan. #tows me with a cable i have no knife to cut....i think there's a tag for that on my main

sexiest shit is when the knight sees clarity turns on their boy tyrant and kills them. find me more of this dynamic and i'll pay you money. starbuck failed to come in clutch here by not killing ahab and i've never forgiven him for it

[autumn-foxfire]

Regarding the Best Jeanist hate: one thing I see popping up is how heroes get compared to cops a lot and I have seen things like 'of course the author is too scared to kill a cop'. This general anti-police stance that (American) Tumblr has seems to play a role here. The heroes are the establishment and therefore evil, and the lov are the underdogs fighting against abuse /s. This completely forgets that the lov are in a way abusers themselves and that they harm innocents. I don't know how Japan sees the police, but I know that at least people outside the US (and tumblr) have quite different worldviews from mainstream Tumblr (for example the police hate seems a bit over the top at times to me because I'm not American and therefore can't relate to their struggles so well, because of very different experiences with the police system). So a Japanese author not sharing the same mentality as people on Tumblr might just play into how his characters are created and intended and how they are then viewed by some.

We shouldn't press our ideals on an author from a different country or culture. So the reason heroes are still intended to be the good guys but are disregarded by a lot of fans in favor of the intended bad guys, might just be cultural bias towards one specific topic. Fans will look for any flaw they can find in heroes, even if they are blatantly untrue, just to enforce their own worldview instead of accepting that this is written by an author from a different culture and therefore there is a chance that things won't adhere to their own cultural ideals. Not to mention the language barrier, which makes unofficial translations a bad source for facts to begin with.

I hope you understood what I'm trying to say here. Have a good day :)

I know Japanese police suffer from corruption much like American police, though I think it’s more due to organized crime (the Yakuza) controlling them and a different type of corruption then what we see in America (and I’d argue that even in BNHA such corruption isn’t rampant anymore due to the fact that the manga has actually tackled the Yakuza and has portrayed them as lacking the influence they once had).

However, I find any comparison to the heroes and villains situation to what is going on with the American police system to be extremely disrespectful to the real life victims of corrupt cops. Not only is BNHA completely fictional and has no impact on society, people have been actively comparing the League of Villains, a group of murdering terrorist, to innocent black/lgbt/disabled people who have been targeted by the police in hate crimes. It is beyond insulting to do so and I can’t believe people still think it’s okay to do (the other day I saw someone actually say ahab, co-opting a phrase from protesters of actual police corruption for a fictional story).

I find it beyond infuriating how American tumblr tries to enforce it’s politics onto a Japanese series created by a Japanese author and actually claim he’s pro corrupt cop just because he’s not pandering to their views. People need to stop looking at the manga from such a biased political lense and actually read it properly for a change :/

[prairiedust]

More Last Holiday Musings...

I want to poke at that interdimensional geoscope a little more, because upon reading it over again, I think I splashed it up a little fast and there are a couple of points I’d like to be clearer about. I meant to queue this up to post last night but also want it to be up before Gimme Shelter so ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ 

This is more blue curtains lit crit with a dash of folklore and an honorable mention for post-structuralism. And we’re talking about Supernatural after all, so this is sort of... well, it’s about endings.

Last Holiday was not a typical “filler” or even a typical MOTW episode. It felt extremely insular, possibly more so than any other episode I can think at any other point in the series. As opposed to the usual crowd of “locals,” a spate of victims, and a couple of red herring suspects, the only other people in this ep besides the Winchesters (including Jack) and Mrs. Butters were the two vampires and Cuthbert Sinclair. There was no “case” as in a usual MOTW-- there was no Chuck Struggle, either, and the lack of mytharc was strange against the lack of “filler” schema. That lack of “MOTW investigation” marked this episode also as being about “curiosity”-- the Winchesters all-too-quickly took Mrs. Butters for granted-- Dean even dismissed her as a “Magic Roomba” and that seemed to settle the matter. Furthermore, the moment that Dean spotted Mrs. B in his room, the stage was set for Antics ™ when she held up his goofy Scooby boxers, and indeed a zaniness, an almost manic energy drove the action forward at a breakneck pace. [Spoiler alert, we do get “investigation” in the next episode, 15x15 Gimme Shelter, as stills and the preview show that Castiel and Jack will be teaming up together, in yet another shake-up of the usual “MOTW” template, almost like we can expect the other side of a coin when Sam and Dean switch places with Cas...] These features set Last Holiday apart as not so much “filler” as “between,” as in there was struggle before, and there will be struggle after, but for a while there was cake. (Contrast this to the usual “peril of the threshold” that usually shrouds liminality if you’d like.)

At the end of Last Holiday, however, we finally get to find out what that old blue telescope really is, and with that name we get confirmation that there are no more alternate universes-- Chuck has burned them all. Viewers are left to come to the conclusion that in retrospect the telescope-thing could have changed the course of season 13 completely. The reveal is played off as darkly funny, but it’s also kind of a gut-wrenching moment, too. All the heartbreak of the last two and a half years, reviewed now through the lens of “if only.” If only they’d known about Mrs. Butters from the time they found the bunker, “none of this would have happened”… they’d have had monster radar, they’d have had the geoscope, they would have had supernatural help of a completely different level.

The temptation to read Last Holiday as a Chuck-free episode is strong, but fraught-- the threat of Chuck’s involvement has been established by a pattern this season (well the pattern is woven throughout the whole series really but Dabb has deliberately structured these last three seasons with an exponentially increasing frequency.) I feel like we’ve been conditioned this season in particular to hold ourselves in a perpetual flinch, to be afraid of what we’ll learn “in retrospect.” That geoscope was really_good_subtext, and it is entirely possible, even encouraged, at this point in the plot to take information we’ve learned from the naming of the object, examine our own conditioned response to this episode, and apply both things to the structure of the season so far and make a prediction as to what might happen in the main plot. That’s what I mean about subtext getting loud. We’ve been given the green-light to make a prediction about The Struggle and march forward with it, and see if we will be correct by extrapolating the pattern, or if that expectation will be subverted (the twist is set up to run either way, so either outcome is satisfying.) It is Melville-esque architecture of the highest degree;I could write another thousand words just about that. So I have a prediction that I’m hanging on to, because of what we’ve learned from the geoscope, and what kinds of clues were hung up in Last Holiday, and I’m super excited to either have my hunch confirmed or be frightfully and delightedly surprised. I mean, where the fuck did Jeremy Adams even come from? He’s like our own Mrs. Butters, showing up in the last quarter to run a couple game-changing balls into the end zone, it’s bonkers. I mean, I know writing mysteries is hard and requires still AND cunning, but damn, son.

But anyway, back to the geoscope… 

I’m perplexed, from a very “lit crit” perspective, but this is where I’m at and why I referenced blue curtains-- if you shine too bright a light on subtext, does it evaporate-- like looking through an interdimensional geoscope and not seeing anything-- or is “subtext” sometimes not some ephemeral fever-dream that we as viewers conjure up through our experiential interlocution with the text but something a writer has steeped into the narrative as part of their craft? Or when you’re talking about an evolving iteration of writers, is it possible that one picks up a thread that another wove in for something else, repurposing or amplifying it? And, when perhaps is something deliberately instilled in the text in order to become “text” at just the right time? In Moby Dick, [spoiler alert lol] Quequeg’s coffin-- formerly one of many symbolic vehicles used to foreshadow the doom of the Pequod-- is repurposed as a life buoy and becomes the actual object that saves Ishmael’s life, transforming it from a portent of disaster to a symbol of salvation and then to one of Ishmael’s guilt for surviving Ahab’s madness-- the guilt that had been made text by the very opening line of the book, “Call me Ishmael.” In retrospect, the connotations of wandering, exile and salvation behind the name that the narrator gives himself become crystal clear. The problem that the post-structuralist model of “reading” as simultaneously “creating the text” has manufactured is that the idea that “subtext” can often be discounted as something dreamed up wholecloth by the reader, and thus inferior, imaginary, even delusional (and I use that last word knowing what a loaded term that is in the spn fandom, but this is not about a ship, even) where once it was considered to be a valid and measurable part of the text itself, like that dang coffin. It was the basement, the underpinnings, the catacombs below the opera house sure, but it helped to hold up the structure. And for some reason, putting subtext into a piece of media has become passe, or cringe? Anyway, not to be bitter on main but it didn’t used to be this way, at least not in the heady early days of postmodernism. So that green light? Critical hit against blue curtains. And while yes, some readings are going to be better supported than others, and the wild variety of checklists in this fandom mean that some conclusions have been drawn which can’t pan out, if you’re paying attention to the structure, the subtexts, the alchemical/psychoanalytical/postmodern themata, the ending will be very satisfying. 

So. What was once speculated to be a symbol for emotional lows or turning points (among other things) in the bunker was textually hit with a bright green light, then Dean got curious about it in text, and we were told-- in text-- that oh it’s just a fancy spyglass, and now that the other worlds are gone, it has no purpose…. that’s what I mean about the geoscope now being “pure”-- it wasn’t clear whether the telescope ever had any function, subtetxtual or not, and now that it’s certain what it’s “function” was, it’s now freed up as a “symbol”-- unless like in Moby Dick it’s new “purpose” is revealed later, but right now it’s caught in this liminal place of not-quite-clue and not-quite-metaphor... 

However, and I didn’t put this in my first post because I was trying to be fast and not a wet blanket, but I felt like finally naming the geoscope was an ending. 

This is literally Singer, Dabb, and Co tidying up the house before locking it behind them.

I think when Dean said he didn’t see anything through the “telescope thing,” that we’re to understand that maybe this was the last hurrah of the cute, zany, campy “subtext” or even “metatext” if you’d rather that so many of us have been parsing and which has gotten so weird and bright since season 12/13. I think I said in one of the folklore posts that writing about some of the things I write about feels like making daisy chains in the endzone during the big game. Which is fun, that’s how I personally got through having to be in AYSO soccer for four years, by looking for four leafed clovers and eating orange quarters. And we got a wood nymph in this episode, textually even, so I could easily check the “folklore” box on this one. But the sheer euphoria of Last Holiday and all the sparkles it brought into the story aren’t meant to last. When you look back on fifteen years of text, a lot of it is bleak, miserable stuff. That’s not to say that episodes like Yellow Fever and Hunteri Heroici and Fan Fiction et al shouldn’t be celebrated. But I think from here on out, things are going to be less “golly gee, three birthdays!” and more “There she blows! --there she blows! A hump like a snowhill!”

This episode was a gift in many ways, not just for the sense of glee it transmitted-- it also did so much work and there are things I want to yell about in the way language was hit, the red versus green lighting, the way the backwards holidays worked, the projector as a metaphor for Mrs. B projecting her regrets and fears onto Jack, the amount of food that was created and consumed, how that smoothie was also an echo of “fairy food” or an underworld pact if you squint-- but the stakes are so high now. We haven’t been shown the next valley-- there was no final scene of Chuck rubbing his hands together like the villain from a melodrama, for example-- but the last image we got was Jack blowing out a candle. After the candle is blown out, the cake is dismantled and consumed. Once the story is over, all the themes that are so hard to grapple in a text like a television show can be gathered up and analyzed. (IS that all, though? After all, Dean made his own cake later, which, like, echoes of the “oh two cakes” comic lol...)

Since I really never want to leave anything I toss out on this blog on a last note of doom and gloom, however, I do want to say that I too understand what that last image meant. It meant, as Sam said, make a wish. Think of the future, think of free will, and hope for something wonderful to happen. (or do like me and wonder what the hell Jack wished for with dread and anticipation ha ha ha.)

[naralanis]

hey nara! first off, I absolutely adore your blog and your writing, Perhaps is on my comfort fics list that I pull out whenever I’m having a bad time. I also happen to be a fan of your pen instagram and I was wondering if you had any suggestions on some fountain pens for beginners? I recently bought a “Pilot MR Retro Pop” that I really enjoy but I think I’m ready to branch off a bit. Do you have any tips with practicing with fountain pens you’d be willing to share? As much as I try, my handwriting never looks as nice as I want it to with mine. No pressure to respond if not, just wanted to stop by and let you know how much I enjoy your content! Hope you have a pleasant rest of your day/night!

Oh goodness, you’re talking about fic AND fountain pens in the same ask? Stop, stop, I’m already married!

First off, thanks for reading; I’m so glad Perhaps is there for you when ya need it, it makes me really happy to hear. Seriously warms my heart!

As far as fountain pens go... ANON I HAVE SO MANY THINGS TO TALK ABOUT I AM SO SORRY THIS WILL BE SUCH A LONG RIDE so I’m going to put it under the cut sorry sorry sorry in this essay I will

Hooray for the Pilot MR (or Metro, here in the US), it’s an AMAZING little pen, and if you’re calling it the MR, chances are you got it with an international standard converter, you lucky, lucky duck. I’m happy you’re enjoying it, as far as beginner pens go, this one is an excellent choice.

When you say “branching out”, this can mean one of two things. It can mean you want to branch out to other brands but a similar price range, or that you’re ready for a ‘next level’ pen. I’ll try to cover both! (I’ll link some of these models to the Goulet Pens website, but feel free to look for them elsewhere--I just really like Goulet’s very thorough descriptions)

If you’re looking to explore other pen models in the MR’s price range, there’s a metric ton of  options! Sticking with Pilot, you can try the Explorer-- a completely different, more streamlined pen than the MR, but if you’re used to the nib on your pen, you have a better idea of what to expect with it. There’s also the Kakuno, which is cheaper, but very cute with its little smiley face nibs haha

Another Japanese pen you can try: the Platinum Plaisir. Aluminum body, but do remember that Platinum nibs generally give a little more feedback than Pilot’s, which are some of the smoothest Japanese-made nibs I’ve ever seen.

You can also try the Diplomat Magnum -- it’s a a great little pen, and I love mine. Keep in mind, it is very lightweight, especially compared to the MR’s metal body, but to me that makes it great for long writing sessions. The nib is completely different--it will write a little wider, a little wetter than the MR (and any other Japanese-made pen), but it’s slightly springy and awesome to write with. Plus, it has an ink window so you can keep track of your ink!

Other options in this price range: the Jinhao 8802 (Shell or Rosewood, and the most bang for your buck imo as far as cheap fountain pens go), the Jinhao x750 or x450 (these are heavier, but they look great!), the TWISBI GO (a teeny, amazing little pen with a spring-loaded piston filling mechanism), and a Kaweco Sport (another pocket-pen, German-made, so the nib will write a little wetter/wider generally) or the Perkeo.

Now, if you’d like to push your price range a little further (only a little! I promise not to break the bank!), you cannot go wrong with Lamy.I am a self-admitted Lamy fangirl, so I may be a little biased, buuuut... it is what it is, their pens are great, they’re easy to disassemble for cleaning (I go totally nuts over it and even disassemble the converters, which you absolutely don’t need to do), and their nibs are SO EASILY INTERCHANGEABLE!

You can pick up a Lamy Safari for fairly cheap nowadays (and ever cheaper look-alikes, which I will never endorse but also will not judge anyone for buying), and they come in so many colours (the O.G. 1980 colours were also just reissued!), they’re like my Pokemon because I want to catch ‘em all.

For a little more, you can get yourself a Lamy AL-Star--the same design of the Safari, but this time in aluminum, which makes it look super cool (but also prone to scratches if you’re the kind of person that puts your pen in your pocket with your keys... that’s... definitely not me...), so keep that in mind.

You can also pick yourself up a Lamy Logo, for a couple more bucks. A completely different design, but still great, particularly if you like slimmer pens.

The nibs on ALL the Lamy models (even the more expensive ones like the Studio or the Scala or even the Dialog) are interchangeable! Even the gold nib on the Dialog! The only exception is the Lamy 2000 (which is probably one of the best pens out there period, and certainly an amazing first-gold-nib pen).

The one thing that absolutely kills me about the cheaper Lamy pens is that, for the most part, none of them come with a converter--you have to buy it separately. Which is fine, it’s not super expensive, and it is widely available, but COME ON, LAMY, JUST GIMME.

If you’d like to try a cool-looking pen with a CRAZY ink capacity and a nifty piston-filling mechanism, look no further than the TWISBI ECO. I have one of these (green, obv), and I love it. Never tires me out, and I stg mine never. dries. out. I don’t know what witchcraft is involved, but it’s an amazing pen for long writing sessions.

Finally, if you’d like to try another Japanese-made pen that is a little more expensive than the Pilot MR or the Platinum Plaisir, there’s the Sailor Compass 1911. This is one of the cheapest Sailor pens I know of, and a good introduction to the brand. Keep in mind that, like Platinum, Sailor nibs will give more feedback than the Pilot you’re used to!

If you would like to push your budget even further, here are some options for fountain pens under $100 (I know, big jump, but it’s good to see what’s out there to you can compare!) from JetPens.

There are a million other brands out there that you can look at. Sheaffer makes great, very cheap and fun beginner pens (including a whole Star Wars Line! They’re adorable!). Hong Dian has a ton of pens that look sleek as hell (like the Forest Series) and they’re all like under 20 bucks. Kaco is another one that makes surprisingly good pens! Parker is also an option, with the Jotter, which is a classic-looking pen. There’s Conklin and Monteverde (which have a ton of fountain pens in a wide range of prices, but I’ve had bad luck with their nibs, so I would suggest you do some independent research on those!), as well as Noodler’s if you’d like to go crazy with some flex nibs! The fountain pen rabbit hole is bottomless. Welcome :D

As far as handwriting goes, I’m afraid I don’t have much more to say besides practice, practice, practice. I learned cursive as a child, but never got into calligraphy, really. Even today, I only just dabble, but whenever I see something I like, I usually just like to try and replicate it. Very often I’ll see a video on Instagram and go Oh my god, how the hell did they write that G, I’ve got to try that and then what follows is me going through page after page on a Rhodia pad trying to imitate them. I like janinescribbles and aidanbernal on Instagram, they’re like handwriting goals--check them out!

A lot of the time, we’re looking for more line variation to make our handwriting look prettier--that’s usually what you see in that fancy, old-timey Spencerian cursive, or even copperplate calligraphy. Unfortunately, you won’t get that with just a regular fountain pen, but there is good news!

There are a TON of different nibs out there. Stub nibs, fude nibs, flex nibs, obliques, cursive italic -- you can even get your pen ground by a professional nibmeister to fit your specifications. There are calligraphy pens (like the Lamy Joy) or pen sets (Kaweco has a Perkeo Calligraphy set, and I believe Sailor has one of their own as well). You can even check out the Pilot Parallel set -- the whole thing is like the price of a Lamy AL-Star, you just won’t do regular writing with it; it’s pretty specifically a calligraphy/lettering set. There are even flex pens in the market (though none of them are as flexy as those old, vintage gold nibs) like the Noodler’s Nib Creaper, Ahab, and Triple Tail or the Conklins with their Omniflex nib (which has been problematic in the past, but I’ve heard good things recently). It’s a whole other rabbit hole!

But honestly, don’t sweat the handwriting too much. Just write a few lines every day, try new things, and get lost for eternity on some Instagram tags!

I think this is a long enough post as it is, so I’ll stop there! SORRY. HOPE IT HELPS!

[ariverofsongs]

damn it i unfollowed you opening your inbox it's the second time something like that has happened this week okay so!

i remember you said it's the scene that introduced you to it! is it the scene that you saw first or was it the scene that made you want to watch it, or are they the same thing? and what in particular would you say struck you in it that made you go OKAY i'm definitely watching that entire show

hiii dw call it a rebirth <3 I'm posting this before I lose it <33

So I watched txf from the start but it was just a random show that I'd heard of and knew was a pop culture thing and also....Kate McKinnon is a vocal xf and Gillian fan so had been meaning to find out what the fuss was about for a while. I was literally hooked from the pilot,,,it was just my vibes, I obsess so easily - this was something else.

BUT I had no idea of the extent of the fandom and stuff until around this ep I think I started googling like if Mulder and Scully ever got together (to try and save some heartbreak like when I googled if Jim and Pam stayed together in the Office - RIP my xf optimism) and I remember an article talking about 'tcotr' and how it was like a huge moment in the show for OG fans. Like I always do, I watch things at a pretty speedy pace so can never pinpoint for certain when thoughts about the show occurred,,, but it was the start of me knowing that I was entering something much larger than I could ever have imagined before!

Maybe something about how electric and free the scene feels to me in a calm way like you could see the static in the air between them but they are relaxed? like you said about Scully talking about Ahab (and everything else you said) and not realising what she's projecting onto mulder there doesn't seem to be any awkwardness it's banter but It's sincere. maybe I sensed something different from what I'd been watching before. not even different just the change of setting and the focus on two lonely bodies in the dark just emphasises everything that's not being said between each thing that is? a couple of best friends in love causing me to internally scream in excitement as something started to shift maybe? the smiles, the gazes. I generally have no idea why I feel certain ways, I just do.

Then I still had no idea about people being around on Tumblr and stuff until I read someone's dissertation online about XF Lesbians and the Scully effect and I thought THAT is where I want to be. And now I'm here.

sorry I tend not to think too much in words it's hard and have never had a coherent thought connected to txf I don't think so enjoy my confusingly arranged letters of the alphabet.

[woozapooza]

(fifi here!) oh ok nice! as for the names, oh boy, some of their surnames are just Iconic: Fifi Clampwell - Ishmael, Trixie Shedbanger - Starbuck, Manda Snorter - Queequeg, Lolita Meadworthy - Esta (Ahab's wife), Fanny Goldenshowzer IV - Stubb, Cora Klein - Pip, Isadora Slapsaddle - Flask, and their own headmistress, Dorothy Hyman - Ahab. def smth wrong abt queequeg, pip, etc. being played by white ppl even if it is set in a british school but ah well :/ anyway the girls have funky names

p.s. not musical related but!! would love to read your ishmael thoughts. love him sm as well <3 and also not md related at all LOL but as an avid fan i have to say that that princess artwork you reblogged recently is from the movie barbie as the princess and the pauper!!! a big fave of mine -fifi

Okay so first of all I have to tell you something that happened recently. I don't know how it took me so long, but after years of listening to the soundtrack on youtube, I discovered that it's actually available to purchase from Hereward Kaye's bandcamp site! So of course I bought it, and it turns out that when you buy something from bandcamp you have the option to send a little note to the artist. I didn't think he was really going to look at whatever I wrote, so I just wrote something simple, along the lines of "I love this ridiculous show with all my heart." But the next day, I received a thank-you email from him! So I wrote back, and actually I'm just gonna copy and paste what I wrote:

Oh wow, for some reason I didn't really think you would actually see my message! But since you responded, I just want to take a second to tell you that I've been a fan of Moby Dick the Musical ever since I discovered it by chance on YouTube when I was fourteen years old. I recently rediscovered an entry in my eighth-grade diary gushing about this very weird, very silly, very obscure, VERY entertaining musical I had just discovered; twelve years later, it's still one of my perennial favorite musicals. What's more, this year, I finally did what I had been wanting to do for these twelve years: I actually read Moby Dick (keeping an eye out for connections to the musical, naturally!) which is now one of my favorite novels ever. So thank you! I'm SO glad I finally realized I could buy the soundtrack!

He didn't respond, which didn't come as a surprise, but I'm just psyched that I got to tell one of the CREATORS of this musical how much I adore it!

Anyway. WOW those are some wacky names...except for Cora Klein, which just sounds like a normal name that a normal person might have, unless there's a joke I'm missing. Huh. So I take it that in the UK version, aside from the headmistress, the cast of the show-within-the-show is made up entirely of St. Godley's students? In the US version, there are also the security guards (one of whom plays Pip), the janitor, and some boys that one of the girls snuck in.

I have so many things I want to say about Ishmael but it's hard to put them into words without it just turning into "I LOVE HIM I LOVE HIM I LOVE HIM I LOVE HIM I LOVE HIM" which is an accurate expression of my feelings but doesn't make for a very interesting tumblr post. But I'm definitely going to try to actually articulate at least some of my thoughts/feelings eventually, so stay tuned!

Thank you for providing the context for that beautiful fan art! I played with barbies as a kid but never saw any of the movies aside from part of the Nutcracker one. I doubt I would have enjoyed them. My barbie games were overflowing with ANGST and PERIL and I doubt the movies reached the same dramatic heights.

[squeezeofthehand]

A (late) Review of Moby-Dick: A Musical Reckoning

I saw Moby-Dick: A Musical Reckoning by Dave Malloy last month, and I can basically divide it into “The Good, The Bad, and the Racist/Queerphobic/Ableist etc”

Some background: As most people who’ve ever spoken to me will know, I have a special interest in Moby-Dick AND Dave Malloy/Rachel Chavkin musicals (I truly believe that Great Comet is one of the best works of all time) and I consider Malloy and Chavkin both to be my biggest heroes and inspirations, at least when it comes to their respective style of writing and directing. That being said, they’re not perfect. I waited for this musical for about two years, and music/set/etc wise it exceeded my expectations, but it also majorly let me down in a lot of ways.

The Good: The cast! The crew! The set! (It was literally The Pequod - like, they got rid of the stage.) The lighting design in particular was really good - thank you, Bradley King. Manik Choksi, Andrew Cristi, and Starr Busby are gods. I do not have a singular bad thing to say about the cast or the design team! Even the stuff that was tacky/campy (i.e. some of the puppets) was tacky/campy in an enjoyable way. And the “fun” parts of the show were REALLY fun - the fact that they invited the audience on stage, the fact that they TRIED to make Moby-Dick more accessible even if they didn’t do it perfectly at times….the music, when not problematic, was BEAUTIFUL. Listen, I’d be lying if I said Dave Malloy wasn’t one of the best composers when it comes to skill. Everyone in that show sure can act, and sing…the band too, was marvelous, I heard no errors from anyone. This is, what, a three hour long show? And the cast/band was just like, “oh, no big deal.” Which makes “the bad” and “the racist” even worse because these people deserve better. This show deserves better, it deserves to be better.

The Bad: Well, as a book fan, I disagreed with a lot of characterization…most of which can fall into The Racist etc, so I’ll just focus on the “bad but not inherently problematic” here. I really didn’t agree with a lot of things about Ahab’s characterization, i.e. I did not read him as just a bad white guy who’s the epitome of privilege. Stubb, on the other hand is, a canon white supremacist in the book and that barely gets acknowledged in the ways that it should. I do get what Dave was trying to go for, especially in re: Ahab & climate change, but this wasn’t the show for it - or at least, Ahab wasn’t the character for it. Which brings me to my next point: Most of the time, I’m a fan of the quirky Malloyian anachronisms and parallels to modern day issues, but I feel like he was trying too hard here and stepping out of line. Loose adaptations can be fun, anachronistic adaptations can be fun, even INACCURATE adaptations can be fun…but this just wasn’t. It didn’t feel like Moby-Dick, but more like a story vaguely inspired by it. If that had been what he was going for, it would’ve been fine, but he really acted like this would be an accurate adaptation of the book, so I felt let down. The only anachronism/breaking of the fourth wall that I somewhat liked were the talks of Melville and Hawthorne, honestly, and even those I’d sacrifice in favor for accuracy to the source.

And now…The racist/etc.

So. 

Where to begin? I suppose chronologically. Queequeg. Who, according to Dave Malloy, is a stereotypical flamboyant queer person of color! and also a quirky cannibal! He’s trans in the musical, apparently, but there’s not much indication of that in the show beyond from him wearing a binder and a skirt. Now, I am all for trans Queequeg of course, but he was a caricature in this particular adaptation. I do not blame Andrew Cristi. I blame Dave (and mayyyybe the costume designers to some extent). I felt baited. Also, early production rumors and quotes said that there would be a song in which Queequeg saved someone from drowning. That never happened. It pains me to say it, but he didn’t feel that much like an important character (due to the bad writing -- again, it has nothing to do with the actor). 

Additionally, Dave Malloy said that Queequeg and Ishmael would be a clear gay relationship…but the musical left so much room for them to just be interpreted as friends. It somehow became less gay than it is in the original Melville novel. The marriage was excluded, as were the quotes about them being a cozy and loving pair and about Queequeg holding Ishmael like a wife. They were replaced with the “I don’t wanna sleep with a cannibal” song, which was fun to watch at first but way too grossly stereotypical for me to genuinely enjoy it. Queequeg deserves a fun and light-hearted song, but he does not deserve a racist/homophobic one. My advice? Replace it with the actual chapters from the book, please. I do like the fact that The Pacific was a romantic duet and that they sing directly at each other during Squeeze Of The Hand, but those two songs are mere scraps especially compared to, for example, the Bosom Friend chapter of the book. It looked like they were going to kiss during The Pacific and I was very disappointed that they did not. Perhaps the team should keep the songs the way that they are for future productions, but add more romantic staging.

Pip-not-Pip/Elijah/??? (Ashkon Davaran’s character) and Fedallah were also major, major, issues. Not the actors, I love them. Not the book characters, I love them. But the musical characters.

Basically, Fedallah gets this 20 minute long monologue that can be summed up as “religion is bad” and a lot of other things including but not limited to egotistical fake-woke praise on color conscious casting and how badly America is fucked. And that’s not even mentioning the fact that Fedallah is Parsi and Zoroastranian in the book (and it is NOT good rep in the book by any means, trust me, I’ve been calling Malloy out on his racism but I can’t act as if book!Fedallah was anything less than an ~exotic caricature~ either). However, that’s beside the point, at least in this review. Musical!Fedallah is not Parsi nor Zoroastranian. Don’t read this the wrong way, I’m all for Black Muslim rep! But with a character who is already canonically something else? Take a white character and make them a Black Muslim, I encourage that, but when a character is already something else, no.

If the monologue was influenced/written by the actor, that’s one thing and I’d have less issue with it, but I think Dave wrote the vast majority of it, which…yikes…

My constructive criticism: Cut the Fedallah monologue. If the creative team still wants the actor/character to have the same amount of stage-time as he does now, replace it with a different monologue, maybe something from the book? Something about whaling history?

Another thing that needs to be cut or at least completely rewritten: Tambourine. The song starts off with an ableist verse that can be summed up as “you think you’re crazy because you get nervous on the subway? No! I’m more crazy than you!” Don’t take this as me saying that Pip’s trauma/PTSD shouldn’t be addressed at all, but this is the absolute worst way to address it. The song also has a lot of performative lines such as “is god cisgender?” Which, considering this is the same musical that also has trans bait, I truly hate it. Not that I think God should ever be viewed as a cis white man, but much like the “America is awful” stuff in the Fedallah Monologue, this is an offensive and fake-woke way to address such a topic. 

Part IV was really heart-wrenchingly beautiful. No criticism there.

To summarize by part-

Part I: Cut/replace the campy Queeqeug song, but otherwise keep it as it is.

Part II: Cut/replace the racist and xenophobic Fedallah monologue.

Part III: Cut/replace Tambourine. The rest of the Ballad Of Pip (starting with Kim Blanck’s beautiful song) is alright. Good, even.

Part IV: Great! No editing needed besides from the typical tweaking that writers may choose to do after their first draft.

In general: Make Ishmael/Queequeg more obvious, make Queequeg less of a caricature, do some major editing to Fedallah and Pip-Not-Pip/Elijah/???. Tambourine and Fedallah’s Monologue need to be completely rewritten, but I get that the creative team may not want to take scenes away from the actors, which is why I encourage them to remove all of the racist bs and create something completely new/different for the actors to perform. 

I understand that Moby-Dick is clearly a work-in-progress on all levels. I do not dislike for the show for being a scrappy rough draft. I judge it for its racist, homophobic, ableist, etc messages. Dave has acknowledged that this first copy is far from perfect, and I sincerely hope that the racism/etc. is the first and main thing that he fixes. 

[almasexya]

Moby Dickheads (Whale God, 1962)

“What, you’ve gone out of order?” I hear none of you saying, because something tells me the chronological order of these reviews isn’t something getting a lot of attention.

That said, the reason I’ve jumped back a year to focus on another kaiju movie with a spurious claim to the title is twofold. One, this movie is damn hard to find. Unlike every other title on this list, Whale God has never seen a US release in any capacity, meaning that the only way to watch it is either to be fluent in Japanese, or hope somebody has undertaken the task of translating it.

Two, now that my Gamera set is here, it’s time to do something I hadn’t initially planned, which is to add the non-Toho kaiju movies into my rotation, which will only serve to make an already massive project take even longer. But what the hell, I’ve got the time to spare.

So if you haven’t caught on by now, Whale God is not a Toho production, but was produced by Daiei, the studio best known for the Gamera and Zatoichi series. While it’s not a typical kaiju film by any stretch of the imagination, Whale God definitely represents Daiei dipping its toes into that pool, and ironically is a far better film than their first true entry into the genre, which we’ll get to soon enough by god.

It honestly took me some time to find a copy of this film that was worth a shit. There’s an upload on youtube that’s okay, but if you want to check it out for yourself, I’d recommend the version on Internet Archive, which is how I found it. It doesn’t seem like Daiei paid much attention to this film either - as far as I can see it’s gotten one DVD release in its home country over a decade ago, so I wouldn’t expect this one to come stateside anytime soon, if ever.

That said, Whale God is not for everyone. It’s more of a period picture than a kaiju movie, and it’s the only film on this list I anticipate including trigger warnings for. Even the bloodiest of the Gamera pictures don’t hold a candle to the violence depicted here, not to mention the fact that one character rapes another. Whale God is very much for adults, at the far end of the pendulum away from the kiddie fare most kaiju movies are known as.

You could call the film a Japanese Moby Dick, and you wouldn’t really need to say much more. A small whaling village in Tokugawa Japan is terrorized by a monstrously large whale that, no matter how hard they try, they cannot kill. Generations have tried, and all have failed, leaving protagonist Shaki (Kojiro Hongo) to avenge his family and kill the beast. The village elder and permanently grouchy old Samurai played by Takashi Shimura fills in for the Ahab role by offering his land, titles, and even his daughter to the man who can slay the beast, which leads the drifter Kishu (Shintaro Katsu of Zatoichi fame) to come to town and try to kill the whale himself.

Katsu is nearly unrecognizable as Kishu, a psychotic rapist who is about as far from the noble Zatoichi as you can get. It’s almost disturbing to see him at his most depraved, but he clearly relishes the chance to cut loose. The conflict between Kishu and Shaki drives the film to its conclusion, as the two characters serve as foils to each other: Shaki cares for nothing aside from killing the whale, his obsession driving him to mania, while Kishu couldn’t seem to give less of a shit as long as he gets to kill something big and get rewarded for it.

Watching these two actors square up, both psychologically and at one point literally, is damn exciting to watch, with both men giving it their all. Kishu is an absolute bastard, but he’s a compelling bastard you just love to hate, while all-around nice guy Shaki is almost depressing to watch as he slips into whale mania, abandoning everything in his personal life in a single-minded pursuit to take down the Whale God to avenge his family. Obsession and the damage it causes is a powerful theme here, and it’s made quite clear that going after the whale god isn’t going to end well.

Scaring up info on the production of Whale God is difficult. According to IMDB, the special effects director was Takesaburo Watanabe, who worked on a few of the 70s Godzilla films but otherwise wasn’t involved in any other kaiju films. From what I could glean there were two whale props, one smaller one designed to swim around, and another one large enough to climb on. Both get their fair share of screen time, with the latter one appearing at the end as the Kishu and Shaki stab at it with their harpoons in showers of blood and gore.

The whale itself is based on a real living thing that I confess I had to look up, called a North Atlantic Right Whale, which is apparently threatened with extinction today. For a baleen whale, the Whale God sure smashes up a lot of boats and appears to either be eating people or just swimming into them, but it serves to make him a frightening antagonist, and we can chalk up any odd behavior to how damn big he is anyhow. The Whale God doesn’t have the personality of most kaiju, but he doesn’t really need it: he’s wild nature personified, and he does let loose a few roars near the end of the film that should satisfy kaiju fans.

Between this film and the Daimajin series, it’s a shame the Gamera movies weren’t initially shot as period pieces, because Daiei’s team definitely seemed more suited to this kind of work. Whale God is a well-paced and compelling character study that also has a giant baleen whale that inexplicably eats people. It’s also a film you definitely need to be in the right mood for, because the dour atmosphere, punctuated by Akira Ifukube’s score, never lets up. Whale God is a bleak and often downright miserable film, but it has a way of sticking with you after the end card. If you’re in the mood for a mature period piece, give this one a look.