#btw he's the blue guy in the preview

[certifiedgeeker]

“My Collection”

preview

staring — gojo satoru x black! fem reader

contents: office au! , cursing, misogynistic language, n word usage (duh!) , usage of pet names ( ma ) , missionary

authors note: this is just a bit of a test drive for this account to see if anyone will really like what i write lol. i plan on finishing this soon but this is just a preview. this is unedited and isn’t proofread btw to forgive any typos. hope you enjoy, mwah

word count: 1984

the rain tapped against the window harshly of your inner city condo, dark grey clouds gathering in the sky. a deep rumble reverberated through the air though it was drowned out by music playing off your flatscreen in the living room. you stood in the kitchen—shirt off making yourself french toast as the smoke wafted through the place mixing with the already lit leather and embers scented candles. getting your last clean blouse dirty before walking out the house was not on the list when you already had so much on your plate as it is today.

as soon as you got into the office you immediately had multiple responsibilities to handle seeing as you guys are behind. you’d just gotten off vacation and although you had a stand in she was a bit of a lazy worker. It was going to be hectic to say the least and you’d rather look good while doing it.

turning the stove off and plating the french toast with the rest of your breakfast you’d already prepared you began scrolling through your socials while eating. eyes laser focused liking comments and replying to dms. you had a modest social media following. content creating seemed like a perfect side hustle, although it’s not easy it came naturally.

outfit styling, food reviews, vlogs was just some of the content you made. being a senior marketing leader didn’t give you the most free time, but because of it you could fund the expensive perfumes you review and the vacations that you go on like your latest peru trip you made sure to document and upload.

as you scrolled through your notifications you’d seen a name that raised an eyebrow.

“._toru6eyez”

at the looks of the name it seemed to be a coworker of yours, not that you were worried your main page being appropriate enough. in fact quite a few coworkers of yours followed and kept up with your page, just this wasn’t one you had in mind. satoru gojo. although you couldn’t see the strangers face—based off the physique from the thirst traps, the back pictures that showed off his snow white hair, along with the tagged post (that never quite captured his face) from people that were closely affiliated with him it was more than safe to assume it was him.

what was he doing liking your post? it’s not like you had an issue with the white haired man, on the contrary it seemed to be the opposite. gojo although was an energetic funny guy always seen laughing with his friends and jr’s, whenever you came around blue eyes iced you out. it almost seemed purposeful that when you came into the room he quickly found a way to exclude you and if you did manage to keep yourself in the conversation you quickly became the subject of harsh jabs disguised as jokes and dismissive glares.

you were no meek target by any means being able to play the dozen having grown up with two older siblings who had quite the mean streak as well. it’s just this is your work place and you didn’t have time for the childish games. at every turn he poking fun at the way you were always dolled up saying if you’d put half as much effort into your work you’d gotten a higher raise by now and other things in the realm of. you’d brought it up to few of your coworkers who were closer to him to no avail. they’d all said the same thing over and over again.

“he doesn’t dislike you, he just doesn’t know you is all. gojo had a bit of a tough upbringing so bear with him, strangers put him on edge.” seemed to be the general consensus. having a tough childhood doesn’t give you a free pass to be an asshole though. they talked about him as if he was a feral animal and not a grown man.

this earned you guys the reputation of office rivals to which you’d have to somewhat agree to. so why was he stalking through your instagram? was still the lingering question as you’d seen he’d taken back his like when clicking on the post. the sound of your alarm going off interrupted your menstruations though. the next 5 minutes were a whirlwind of you scarfing down the rest of your food, putting on your clothes and heading down the condo elevator before speeding off in your custom skyline nissan gtr.

the drive was a blur—always going blank when behind the wheel before you check back in at the arrival of you destination. upon entry into your office building you were swamped immediately, running here and there doing this, that and the 3rd. it’s like you were the only one on your team who did any fucking work. although you were an accomplished individual your credentials didn’t matter to your predominately male teammates seemingly due to the words of a certain someone.

though you’d complain time and time again much wasn’t done except for a long meeting about team culture that annoyed you more than them. so from then on you learned to cuss them out directly but today there wasn’t much time for that much of the paperwork having a tight deadline. and because you didn’t want to die at the age of 21 due to a heart attack from the stress of yelling at those bums you opted to just do it yourself. though dying hot and young was very appealing.

so here you were ripping and running through the halls in your black coach monogram loafers, a stack of heavy papers from your latest client in hand. when returning to your office you quickly cut a corner too fast to stop from running into someone who had done the same. letting out a small yelp from impact your body tensed bracing itself to fall on the hard polished concrete floors. instead though you were quickly yanked up like a ass bad kid from underneath your armpit stopping your fall albeit hurting from how hard you were yanked.

“woah slow down, fast doesn’t always mean efficient. you of all people should know that.” thrown off from the sudden attack your face instantly pulled the meanest glare it could muster. you pulled your arm out of his grasp ready to fire back before being cut off.

“the paperwork you filled out before vacation is incorrect, you need to redo it so my team can finish our campaign wrap up.” the man added the small packet to your large stack of papers putting it at the very top unspokenly saying his stuff is top priority.

scoffing at his audacity you roll your eyes “you could’ve done this yourself gojo, it isn’t even something I have to sign off on seeing it doesn’t correlate with my program.” exasperation lacing your words as you pushed the papers back into his chest making him sway back.

taking off without another word before he could bombard you with more of his bullshit you headed to your office to bury yourself in the heap of work you had. slumping into your seat time ticked past as you signed this, stamped that, and planned meetings for your team. not noticing how the office grew quiet as your coworkers filed out the building for the day opting to go on a team outing despite the rain. you however continue to work only stopping when your stomach let out a low rumble.

todays lunch was just a chicken wrap with some fruit and bottle of water. you were trying to be healthy, it was so easy to get caught up in eating out every day with this job which wasn’t good for your health or pockets. being the ipad kid you were twitter was opened on your screen keeping yourself entertained with the shenanigans you saw; though your eyes widened when a video of a girl with her legs pushed back to ears being pounded into by the built man above her came up on your feed.

your instant reaction was to shut your phone off incase anyone heard. after a beat of silence you realized you were alone, gazing up to the door of your office you saw it was locked. what was the harm? pressing the power button you cut the device back on to see him giving harsh spanks to her clit as she let out sharp yelps.

he had her pinned down by the back of her thighs keeping her in place as he abused her walls. “don’t run me, take that shit ma.” the tone of his voice making you shift in your seat.

his words began getting to you making arousal pool in the seat of those pretty savage x fenty panties you were wearing. it got you to wondering when was the last time you got fucked good. honestly it’d been months ago, almost every time you’ve had sex in the whirlwind of time you’d been working here was a quickie.

nobody having the time to give it to you the way you like it. the notion making your pussy pulse making you shift uncomfortably in your chair again. it was getting you worked up how you saw her juices splash from her cunt knowing she felt so good imagining you in her place. knowing she was getting that everyday left youfeeling a bit envious. some good dick was longer overdue for you but it’d just have to be pushed to the back burner.

as you took the last bite of your wrap you looked at the still unfinished work on your desk.

a weary sigh slipped past your two toned lips as you bookmarked the video in your twitter to come back to later tonight at home. unbeknownst to you, you’d liked the video allowing your followers to see publicly. now your twitter wasn’t as popular as your instagram or tiktok so it’s not like anyone would know any different especially seeing how many more posts you’d end up liking.

maybe not

^-^

glacier blue eyes scrolled through your twitter, he doesn’t know why either. hate watching he’d chalk it up to. he just wants to see what else cringe shit you’re feeding your followers. how could anyone like the shit you post, it’s all so obvious you’re faking you personality for views.

“i think i’m starting to like the person i’m becoming.” he read your caption aloud with a petulant head shake. you were wearing a pair of brown short shorts and even though you were sitting he could tell they cut across your ass exposing your cheeks along with a white tank. upon closer examination the silhouette of your brown areolas peeked through. this is the shit he meant, the fake positivity thirst trap bullshit.

you were a hoe, and it’s not the fact you’re a hoe that bothers him. gojo satoru lovesss the hoes, it’s just the fact you hadn’t fucked him yet. he’d heard from a team member you and todo were fuck buddies. you and him had quickies often, the man beating your poor pussy sore in the backseat of his challenger numerous times. it got him tight, what the hell did you see in him when gojo is right here with good pipe waiting for you.

as childish as it may be it made him lash out on you. when in group setting seeing the way you’d bat those pretty doe eyes at other men but narrowed them at him pushed a button. he was never really one to easily anger but something about you made him tick in the worst ways possible. damn you and that pretty smile, he’d like to imagine you’d smile up at him after toppin him off. thinking about it made his dick hard. you made his dick hard and that’s a crime he’ll punish you for soon.

[fiddlefordhadronmcgucket]

Mackenzie from The Wise Man’s Cat (Felix’s fantasy story), like does this weird thing...basically his song  that we relate to him is Favorite Things from the Sound of Music but instead of Wild Geese in the lyrics I kept hearing “waggies” so I’m like 99% sure that there’s some kind of flying animal in that story that he calls a Waggy that 100% isn’t actually called that

[dribs-and-drabbles]

Thoughts on the costuming of Bad Buddy (a thread*)

Episode 9:

Honestly, I'm glad we've had two weeks between episodes because I've been able to take my time with all my analysis posts this week. I've already done the details, Ink and Pa's colours and the moment of their feet, Pat's shirt, the framing of the play's bows (addressing Pran's first outfit) and the peppermint inhaler...so that leaves a few of Pat and Pran's outfits and the friends.

At lunch, Pran wears a brown and white striped t-shirt during a moment when both sacrifice or yield something about themselves to the other - Pat offers to say they've broken up, him being the heartbroken one, so that Wai would talk to Pran, and Pran sacrifices not only that possibility to reconcile with Wai but also sheds some of his fears of showing pda by holding Pat's hand out in the open. The yellowy/orange drinks are a nice touch - with the theory that yellow signifies their love and happiness - and it's feels significant that Pat uses them to indirectly compliment Pran.

I wrote about the engineers' lunch scene after seeing the preview - I stood my ground with my prediction that the engineering group would support Pat and Pran before the architecture group (that mint green hat was my thin thread!) and I was right💪🏼. Even though Pat was turned away by Korn, we soon discovered they felt pressured to ostracise Pat because of the faculty rivalry when he found Pat and apologised.

And then the wonderful bedroom scene (for many reasons) - which I've also touched on - but it has the two faculty jackets hanging side-by-side again, Pran's blue bedsheets (Pat's colour), Pran's pink top (his own colour), all the important colours on Pat's stripy boxer shorts, and the three lights on the wall - alluding to the gay man flag, the bisexual flag, and the pansexual flag. Chef's kiss! (Btw, I'm Nong Nao in this scene - overwhelmed by it all 🙃)

Later, the engineering group wear a mix of blue (for themselves) - Cheng's blue shirt and the blue on Pat's - and also teal - Mo and Korn's tops, which could possibly be a connection to the mint green (I still haven't settled on this yet)...BUT ALSO look at Korn's magnificent sleeveless top - perhaps a little nod to all the sleeveless tops Pat wears, especially since Korn *ahem* 'jokes' that he has a crush on a guy from architecture too. And I love the blue lights in the background.

Then in the hospital, Korn is in full-on bisexual flag colours, Mo is again in blue but interestingly Pran is also wearing blue - the only time this episode he does - representing and supporting Pat but also showing how close he's become to the engineering friends.

Ah, Pat's shirt. I've already written about it here but in summary (because it is GLORIOUS) it has the red of Pran, his own blue, the yellow in the bridge and the lights (signifying their love and happiness), and the bridge itself symbolising how Pat is the bridge between the two faculties...as well as simply being an iconic image of the power of collaboration between architecture and engineering.

Wait...I need a moment...

Okay, I'm back...and on to the architecture *ahem* 'friends'. Oh Safe, my darling Safe, I still have hopes for you being the Best Boy of architecture...but you weren't this episode. It took a while for Safe and Louis to reconcile with Pran (thank god for the power of ball sports!) but the slight minty green in Louis' top and Pran's yellow shirt maybe indicated that friendship would prevail in this scene. (ALSO...now that there's a theory about Louis and Safe perhaps being a secret couple, maybe this mint green alludes to that!!!). I've already written about the holiday reference of Pran's t-shirt (the episode was broadcast on Christmas eve) but note also the red and blue of the sign behind.

On to the café scene, Wai and Safe are in their own faculty colour but Pat's blue is represented in Pran's bag on the table. Pran is now in an angsty green shirt as he worries about Pat and the police, and Louis is in a minty-grey perhaps signifying that things would work out (look I know I'm pushing it but I don't care at this point...or is it because of him and Safe?!? I just don't know anymore 😂). Btw, I think Wai took waaaaaay too long to realise about the cctv but *shrugs* drama.

At first, I was confused about the timeline of Wai's realisation of the cctv and then looking at the video - I wondered if he changed out of the first light brown shirt and into the yellow at the end of his shift...or whether he waited a-whole-ass-other day to look at the video footage... But then I realised he probably took the footage home to watch because it looks like his dorm room (the same chair and desk/computer can be seen in ep 6 pt 1). I was a little bit hopeful with Wai first in light brown - signifying that he will yield and help Pat in the end - and then in yellow, feeling as though he wouldn't do anything bad whilst wearing something that potentially signified Pat and Pran's love and happiness...but he was also being a First Grade Prick™ so I was still a little bit on tenterhooks.

And then, look! Wai's in BLUE at the end. He's come round, he's apologised...wait...what?! The [redacted] still hasn't apologised? And PAT apologised to HIM! smh...

Anyway, I've already written about the black, white, and green of Pat and Pran's clothes...that they could be a nod back to Ink and Pa's sandals and Pa's colour. I also LOVED that the hospital signs are mint green. Oh the coincidence.

The black and white of Pran's top could also be interpreted as being neutral - which might show how Pran will manage to get away from the encounter with Pat's parents unscathed and with his relationship to Pat still concealed. I wrote about the red in a reply to an ask...but in short, it could be read as a warning or danger to Pran, or perhaps it’s indicating that Pat’s family will accept Pat and Pran’s relationship sooner than Pran’s family (as with the engineering vs architecture friends). I also like that both Pa and Pat's mum have both Pat and Pran's colours in their outfits…but Pat's mum also has the dreaded angst-foreshadowing forest green on her skirt. It’s not going to be smooth-sailing but I think they’ll come around sooner rather than later.

Anything I've not included in this post, I probably have in the other posts linked at the top. And as always here are the past episodes:

[Ep 1] [Ep 2] [Ep 3] [Ep 4] [Ep 5] [Ep 6] [Ep 7] [Ep 8] [Ep 10] [Ep 11] [Ep 12]

[tyonfs]

home alone with you (preview)

❝ there are criminals in the house, jisung! there’s no time to feed the cat! ❞

PAIRING ▸ park jisung x fem!reader (ft. yumark robbing your house)

GENRES ▸ fluff, crack, friends to lovers, home alone au, rich kid au

WARNINGS ▸ low iq, mild violence but for comedic purposes, seemingly unrequited love but it’s actually requited they’re both just stupid

SUMMARY ▸ a vacation with your family and the parks goes haywire when you and jisung are accidentally left behind at your house. all you wanted to do was confess your feelings to park jisung on christmas, but in an unfortunate turn of events, you have to deal with your cowardly best friend and two crooks trying to rob your home.

PLAYLIST ▸ all i want for christmas is you by mariah carey • christmassy! by the boyz

RELEASE DATE ▸ TBA (hopefully around jisung day!)

WORD COUNT ▸ around 5k words

TAG LIST ▸ @infnteen @jaehy9ngs @ridinhyuck @chubbsdabunny @fightmegirl @kiri-ah @prettyjaems @honeyju @neo-stay @kariskwn @marknolee @tacojisung @choerriesmotion

AUTHOR’S NOTE ▸ hello! this is sort of a late christmas present because inspiration struck out of the blue last night when i was watching the movie. send me an ask if you wanna be added to the tag list !! the preview is a shortened version and may be changed up in the final version btw!

IT WASN’T LIKE YOU WERE EVER NEGLECTED BY YOUR PARENTS OR ANYTHING, SO THIS WAS ABSURD TO YOU.

Forgetting one kid was one matter, but forgetting two? You wondered if you had the rights to never let your parents or Jisung’s parents live this royal fuck-up down.

Rather than being angry, you found this whole situation hilarious and slightly offended that your parents didn’t think to check if you were there during the car ride to the airport. Maybe they were stressed and trying to micromanage all of your cousins and your younger siblings, but you didn’t think you were that easy to miss. Hopefully, they had realized by now and were reflecting on their actions, but now you had to deal with being alone in your house with your best friend.

“Jisung,” you whispered harshly. When he didn’t stir, you resorted to throwing a pillow at him. “Park Jisung!”

Jisung groaned, pulling his blanket over him and shifting on the air mattress. “Five more minutes.”

Frustrated, you threw another pillow at him. “Jisung, everyone’s gone.”

He shot up in place, rubbing the sleep from his eyes promptly. “Gone? You’re joking, right?” He hauled himself up and stretched out his back. “Don’t scare me like that, Y/N.”

“Jisung,” you said, eyes sharp as you turned your laptop for him to see. “They’re not in the house and the flight left thirty minutes ago. They left us behind.”

Jisung boggled at the screen, kneeling down to get a better look. “No.” His jaw hung open while he stared at the pixelated flight moving across the world map. “Shut the fuck up. Tell me this is some sick joke.”

“I’ve tried calling them but it keeps going to voicemail,” you said, shutting your laptop. “We’re screwed, Jisung.”

“What do we do?” Jisung asked solemnly and then flinched at the sound of the doorbell. “Is that them?” he asked, looking like a dog who had just been given a treat.

“If it was, they wouldn’t need to ring the doorbell.” You pushed yourself off of your bed and made your way to the front door. “Come on.”

Jisung followed behind you, looking a bit wary of whoever was ringing your door. You looked through the peephole to see a man in a police uniform and furrowed your brows. Did your parents call them to inform you that they would be back soon? You opened the door, looking up at the policeman who started looking around your home before he looked at you.

“Um, can I help you?” you asked.

The man flashed a seemingly trustworthy smile but it just made you suspicious. “Just making sure everyone’s staying safe this Christmas with all of those robberies happening around the neighborhood,” he said. “Say, kid, where are your parents?”

Jisung scoffed from behind you. “Left us—”

You elbowed him sharply in the gut, rousing a wince from him. “They’ll be back, officer,” you replied. “They’re out buying Christmas decorations.”

“On Christmas Eve? A bit late for that, huh?”

“Well, late’s better than never!” you chirped, hand firmly on the doorknob. “Happy holidays then, officer.”

After he returned the greeting, you closed the door and locked it. You stared down at the doorknob for a second and then put the chain lock on as well, a small frown crossing your lips. Jisung took notice immediately and placed his hand on your shoulder, squeezing it gently.

“What’s wrong?” he asked.

“I don’t know,” you admitted, “I just got a weird vibe from that guy.”

Jisung shrugged. “Well, we’re safe in your house and our parents are landing late afternoon so we just need to wait until then to hear from them.”

“You’re right, you’re right,” you breathed out, relaxing your nerves.

You couldn’t help but feel guilty for finding this situation to be perfect. If you and Jisung were stuck at your house alone, it made for the perfect opportunity for you to tell him how you felt about him tomorrow. There would be no distractions, no annoying siblings, and no overbearing parents.

“Y/N,” Jisung started, a grin tugging at his lips, “you know what this means, right?”

“We can do whatever we want?”

“Exactly.”

“Yuta, that plan of yours to dress up like a police officer was genius!” Mark praised, looking absolutely elated as he watched the crook take off the fake badge.

“Leave it to a few rich kids to blindly trust the police,” Yuta remarked with a cocky smirk. “And, Mark, get this: they’re alone in there.”

“Alone?”

“Yeah, their parents are gone,” Yuta explained. “The boy gave it away but the girl was trying to cover for him, so I’m thinking we should rob them tonight while their parents are out.”

Mark looked uneasy but nodded along. “Is it really okay for us to just break in with them inside?”

Yuta rolled his eyes, pulling his unmarked van out of their parking lot and onto the road. He tapped his fingers against the steering wheel as he drove out of the neighborhood. He knew better than most that the people in this neighborhood only cared about themselves. They wouldn’t waste their breath if they noticed something suspicious going on.

“Trust me, Mark,” Yuta said. “It’s a piece of cake to get past kids like them.”

[kimberlyannharts]

A whole new author, a whole new story, a whole new universe!  It’s Power Rangers Universe #1!

so this won’t be as funny as usual bc with how much information this book is dispensing at once, to keep all these characters and timelines and locations straight i’m gonna flat-out just describe what’s happening and label the characters.  so first of all:

- the preview with Morphinaut getting trapped by The Nowhere King in the Space Between The Rift happened 584 years ago in whatever this current timeline’s past.  584 seems a little random but at least it’s a break from the 10,000 year guideline the comic has been using for ages.

- Ori (or Orisonth) is the blue ranger.  they use they/them pronouns, which is nice since the other they/them pronoun user in the comics was Xi and they’re fucking DEAD

- Bara Blue is Kartor, Ori’s brother(?).  Redhead Cate Blanchett is Vivali, the red ranger’s mother.  they’re evacuating off of this 0117 planet through their Master Arch.  there are apparently lots of Master Arches and lots of Morphin Master colonies across the galaxies. and Ori DOES call their race “Morphin Masters” btw, it’s not just a title for a select few now, which feels a little presumptuous to me, but whatever.  Vivali has another daughter named Sastra who apparently died in one of these evacuations, so everything is already going fine

the guy in yellow is Phiro, and he apparently has a pet alien dinosaur named Whendi, as you do.  the girl in red is Rhian and she got hairstyle tips from Ranger Slayer, because she’s always the blueprint

...i am totally honest i’m not sure if Telosi is supposed to be a guy or girl but either way they’re the person in green, and they’re angry because they haven’t gotten a call from Xev, who i ASSUME will be a guy in black.  because we gotta have our green/black pairs, baby!!!!!!!  also i like Telosi’s mom’s design.  why does this book have more of the rangers’ family than the past year of the main series.

- Aleia is the girl in pink and she’s proving that blue/pink pairs are forever superior

- friends :)

- MMPR: the Heart of a Master has the power to completely rewrite reality 

- here: hand me your Heart of a Master, the toaster barely singed the bread

- well THOSE sure look familiar

- sailor’s at the harbor, he’s come with a SHIP!!!!!!!!!!!

 - the Nowhere King (yes, i know it’s most likely Dark Specter) turned all the people on that planet (Namize, the planet they lost contact with) into lava monster things?  or attacked them with lava monster things?  i’m not sure.  but i gotta admit: they’re kinda sexy

  - Rhian “it was pragmatic to leave the innocent people to die to lava monsters” is bugging me a little but that’s red rangers for you.  meanwhile they better confirm Telosi and Xev’s relationship soon before i start shipping them  

- do you ever just want to get to the damn airport but your sibling insists on helping the random astronaut dude stuck in the sky

- fr though this is a really nice scene but i’m already taking bets on Kartor dying 

- it sucks their planet is getting attacked by The Nowhere King but at least the sexy white boy is here now

- but anyway WHERE’S WHENDI?

[b612sunsets]

i'm curious about your expectations/ thoughts on the ep 9 preview. Can we expect a post on it like you did for the ep 8 preview?

Hii~

I wasn't going to make one for episode 9 bc I think it looked more clear than the other previews of what to expect and what will happen now that everything fell into place. So maybe there wouldn't have a need for people to read what I have to say BUT I'll do it rn for you in this ask since you asked for it :3

First, we have at least two scenes with Sunah interacting with Yohan and she says in the one in front of a car: "Not people like Heo Joong Se and Cha Kyung Hee, you should take over the country".

To which Yohan answered:

A shepherd dog is known to herd and guard sheep. We've seen Sunah mention before in episode 7 that "the wolf broke into the ranch and got too violent" and the sheep would get scared and violent too, which made things easier for Sunah to take over the Foundation, that's why she wasn't surprised nor worried when Yohan announced the war against the nation. So here we have her directly tell him that she wants him to keep doing the job of leading and scaring the sheep (the corrupt powerful politicians) out of the way bc it's benefiting her and it's their enemy in common.

It seems Sunah is planning some type of tactic to reach her goals through the public on a planned/directed live court show or independent video with Yohan following her instructions. If not him, someone else but I think it's him, maybe Jinju and Gaon too (?) because when she's fixing Yohan's tie she's using the same blue outfit (She dresses so well, is so cute and beautiful and I feel sorry for what she went through, I can understand some things she has done but I'm not capable of liking her or defend her in all the other things).

Yohan and Gaon, Yohan must have talked with him about it now that they're a team, knows she is using them and maybe they will cater to her every whim and cooperate for now and strike later on when it's time to get rid of her. Just like Sunah will probably want to do with Yohan.

We see Yohan is fulfilling his promise of finding the people responsible for Gaon's parents death and make them pay for it. The fraud guy (Gaon's sworn enemy in Yohan's words) and the ones that helped to get him out of jail: Cha Kyung Hee's husband and Cha Kyung included bc Yohan has to avenge Elijah and K as well.

The president said something about creating a much more loyal group and giving them "the job" while the preview showed the people fighting on the streets. I think it has a relation with Yohan and the rebels/radicals civilians. He will try to use them in his favor? Yohan has been worried and watching them closely for some episodes now, his extremist fan base. Remember I could be wrong in all this haha

AND THE PART WE'RE ALL EXCITED FOR (why are we like this):

Gaon arrived in the address the fraudster is living (with Yohan's help from what we see or Gaon went there without telling him and Yohan knew he would do that and followed him to stop him) and as expected Gaon gets angry that this scumbag is living peacefully out of jail after everything he has done and tries to barge in but Yohan doesn't let him. "Is your hunt the only one that counts?" Gaon says and Yohan explains in other words: "of course not babe, but what's the fun in just entering and punching him to death? lmao no, let's come back later, you can strangle him like you've seen me do two times before and when we're finished we put his house on fire and make it seem like he got killed by accident" or some Yohan sh*t like that. It could be the opposite, fire first, choking later. Or not, many possibilities.

BTW, Yohan in a leather jacket while being his devil little self will be so 🔥 same with Gaon being encouraged by said daddy devil on his first murder................ no seriously why do I find it hot and nice when it's the two of them doing things like that in this drama, wtf. I'm SO Gahan biased and whipped for them, it's not even funny.

Is it too much to ask for some angst and comfort even if not in this episode? We've discussed it here.

Gaon feeling guilty and shaken after killing a person for the first time or becoming too uncontrollable. Yohan getting concerned of Gaon hurting himself and completely losing the good/selfless side that he admires in him even if he wanted them to be partners in crime. Yohan comforting Gaon and afraid of putting Gaon's life in danger. Same with Gaon, always taking Yohan's side and defending him through thick and thin. If he already put his life on line before for Yohan, he would do it now because he can't see a world without Yohan and Elijah.

They would be two idiots telling each other "Go ahead and kill person x, I can even help you, but don't you dare get killed or I'll kill you myself and Elijah will be the one helping", "Things went wrong, someone has to take the fall, it has to be me" and "We're in this together. I'm not leaving you behind or alone ever again. We both know how that feels". Alright, I'm getting too carried away, emotional and 🤡. That's what ffics are for.

I'M WAITING FOR MY GAHAN HUG.

That's it, anon! Sorry and I hope you liked it :')

[stranger-who-writes-fiction]

Back at it again with my self-indulgent comic posts. This time! It’s Supergirl: Woman of Tomorrow #3, perhaps the most tonally-distinct entry yet, with shades of The Twilight Zone. 

Spoilers!

So, as mentioned, this issue is the most deliberate in terms of both its pacing and its tone, IMO.

What is that tone, you ask?

To quote Alex Danvers, from “Midvale”: Hello, darkness.

THE STORY:

Kara and Ruthye are still looking for Krem Clues in the alien town of Maypole.

(Which is actually just Small Town, USA, complete with vintage 50s aesthetics.)

But the locals are clearly hiding something! So Kara and Ruthye continue to investigate, and they eventually discover what it was that the residents of Maypole were so keen to keep hidden. 

Genocide, basically. 

As I said, this issue struck me as very Twilight Zone; a genre story involving the build-up to a dark twist, all set against the backdrop of an idyllic small town. (Think, like, “The Monsters are Due on Maple Street” but instead of focusing on the Red Scare, it’s classism and racism.)

The wealthier blue aliens kicked all of the purple aliens out of town, and when space pirates showed up to pillage and plunder, the blue aliens made a deal with them: the lives of the purple aliens in exchange for their safety.  

Which is where the episodic story connects to the larger mission; it was Krem who suggested the trade, and then joined up with the Brigands (space pirates) when he was freed by the blue aliens.

The issue ends with no tidy resolution to the terrible things Kara and Ruthye discovered, but they do have a lead on where to find Krem, now, as well as Barbond’s Brigands.

KARA-CTERIZATION:

Ironically, it’s here, in the darkest chapter yet, that we get the closest to what might be considered ‘classic’ Kara. 

Which I think comes down to that aforementioned deliberate pace--this issue is a little slower, a little quieter. It gives the characters some room to breathe.

That’s not to say Crusty Kara is gone. Oh no. She is still very much Crusty. XD 

But anyways. A list! Of Kara moments I loved!

I mentioned a few of these in a prior post when the preview pages came out: I like the moment where Kara blows down the guy’s house of cards, and I like that the action is echoed later in the issue when she grabs the mayor’s desk and tosses it aside. A nice visual representation of the escalation of Kara being, like. Done with these creeps. (Creeps is an understatement but you get the idea.)

Another one from the preview pages: Kara explains to Ruthye that her super hearing won’t necessarily help her detect a lie, especially if she’s dealing with an alien species she’s not familiar with.

It not only reveals her level of competence and understanding of her super powers, it also shows that, you know. She’s a thinker. She’s smart. 

Amazing! Showing, rather than telling us, that Kara is smart! Without mentioning the science guild at all wow hey wow.

(Sorry, pointed criticism of the SG show fandom.)

Anyways.

I dig the PJs! 

And Kara catching the bullet! Not only are the poses and character acting great, it’s also a neat bit of panel composition:

We start with Ruthye’s POV, and then move to the wide shot of the room. The panel where Kara actually catches the bullet is down and to the side of the wide shot panel--we move our eyes the way her body/arm would have to move to intercept the bullet. Physicality in static, 2D images!

Also, like. It’s a very tense moment, life-or-death, but. Ruthye’s wide-eyed surprise at the bullet in Kara’s hand? Kind of adorable. 

I was pretty much prepared for the page of Kara shielding Ruthye from the gunfire to be the highlight--it was one of the first pages King shared and I was like, ‘yeah, YEAH.’ But, shockingly? The TRUE highlight of the issue?

Where do I BEGIN?!?!

EVERYTHING. About this moment. Is lovely.

From Kara holding Ruthye above the bench to explaining the concept of a piggyback ride, to telling her:

“I’m going to hold my hands here, and these hands can turn coal into diamonds, so they’re not going to let go. I’m going to keep you safe.”

HNNNNNNNNNNNG.

Ruthye’s narration--about how Kara had avoided flying as she was concerned it would freak Ruthye out--just adds a whole additional layer of YES, GOOD, YES, and her line on that splash page is great: “You see, all that time, she was worried about me.”

HNNNNNNNNNNNG. AGAIN.

To say nothing of the STELLAR ARTWORK.

And SPEAKING of that stellar artwork, Evely and Lopes continue to knock it out of the park. Each issue is distinct and beautifully crafted, a true joy to look at.

Before I jump into more of the art, a few final notes of character stuff in general.

Ruthye is the one most affected by the experience in Maypole, as she can’t comprehend how a society of people that look so nice and gentle and peaceful could have been party to such a horrible act.

One of the big criticisms of the book thus far is that Supergirl is not the main character, and I guess I can agree with that observation. Typically, in Western media, the main character is the one who goes through the most change in the story. 

And, yeah. That’s Ruthye.

As I was reading the end, where Ruthye sits on the curb and Kara hugs her, I was imagining how the scene would’ve played, had King stuck with the original idea for the series: Kara as the one learning to be tough/experiencing all of this for the first time, and while I think that could certainly work...

I continue to appreciate that King literally flipped the script; that Kara, especially in this issue, is like, ‘I’ve seen this, I know this,’ as opposed to being the one going through a loss of innocence.

*Marge Simpson voice* I just think it’s neat!

Because Kara’s been a teen in DC comics for so long--ever since she was reintroduced to the main DCU continuity, actually--so this is all brand new territory, here. Having an older Kara who’s SEEN SOME STUFF.

(Alsoooooo, since Bendis made the destruction of Krypton not just inaction and climate disaster, but rather, genocide, and the subtext of a Kryptonian diaspora text, the waitress’ derogatory comment regarding the the destruction of Kryton, as well as Kara picking up the bad vibes the entire time, suggests not just a broad commentary on discrimination in all its forms, but specifically allegorical anti-Semitism. The purple aliens being forced out of their homes and into substandard living conditions, then the blue aliens--their neighbors and once-fellow residents--essentially allowing the space pirates to kill them, making them literal scapegoats, Kara discovering the remains of the purple aliens, and Ruthye’s horror at the ‘banality of evil’...yes. A case could be made, I think.) 

(Which would probably require a post unto itself and a lot more in-depth discussion, nuance, and cited sources.)

(Should mention that King has brought up that both he and Orlando--the other Supergirl writer he talked to--are Jewish, and for him personally, that shaped his views on Kara’s origin story.)

I guess my point is that this issue is perhaps not as out-of-left-field as some might think, and just because there isn’t as obvious an arc for Kara, doesn’t mean there isn’t some sharp character work at play. 

(I could be WAY OFF, of course, and I’m not suggesting it’s a clear 1:1 comparison. I’d actually really love to hear King talk about this issue in particular.)

Anyways.

Here’s the final page, which I think works, because as I mentioned before, there is no easy answer/quick wrap-up to the story of Maypole:

THE ART:

I mean. How many times can I just shout ‘ART! AAAARRRRRRRRRRRTTTT!’ before it gets old?

I dunno, but I guess we’re gonna FIND OUT.

There are some panels in this issue that I just. Like ‘em! From a purely artistic standpoint! Because they’re so good!

Like, I just really love the way Kara is drawn in that top panel. Her troubled, confused expression, the colors of the fading light, the HAIR. 

Evely draws the best hair. I know I’ve said this before. I don’t care. I will continue to say it, because it continues to be true.

The issue I find myself running up against when I make these posts is that I really don’t want to post whole pages, as that’s generally frowned upon (re: pirating etc.) but with something like this, you just can’t appreciate it in panel-by-panel snippets.

(Guided View on digital reading platforms is a BANE and a POX I say!)

Anyways.

LOVE the implied movement of the cape settling as Kara speeds in and stops. 

And, obviously, Kara flicking the bullet away is just. A+. 

And the EYES, man. LOPES’ COLORS ON THE EYES???!?! BEAUTIFUL.

Also, should note the lettering! The more rounded letters for the ‘WOOSH’ of Kara’s speed (and, earlier, the super breath) work nicely, and contrast with the angular, violent BLAMS of the gunshots. 

And, I gotta say, the editor is doing a really great job of not cluttering up the artwork with all the caption boxes. Which is no small task.

(I assume the editor is placing them, as editors usually handle word balloon/caption box placement, but I suppose it could be Evely? Sometimes the artist handles it. Either way, whoever’s taking care of all the text, EXCELLENT WORK! BRAVO!)

Okay I think that’s everything.

Ah, nope, wait.

MISC.

Just a funny observation, more than anything else: Superman: Red and Blue dropped this week, and King had a story in there, “The Special” (which was very good, btw.) Both Lois and the waitress swear a lot so I’m beginning to think that this is just how King writes dialogue for any adult character who isn’t Clark. XD

This is absolutely a personal preference but when Kara was like, “And my name IS Supergirl,” I was like nooooo. I know King is trying to simplify all of the conflicting origin stories and lore but I LIKE KARA DANVERS, SIR. XD

It’s almost assuredly a cash-grab/an attempt for DC to get all the money it can out of a book they don’t have much confidence in, but I like the cardstock covers! Very classy, much Strange Adventures.

(OH my gosh, can you imagine that issue 1 cover with spot gloss???? Basically the only way you could possibly improve on it.) 

Okay NOW I’m done. For real. XD NEXT TIME: Kara and Ruthye go after Krem and the Brigands!

[band-of-bitches]

We’re back ya’ll! Part two of my best friend, Kirsten, reacting to the second episode of Band of Brothers, Day of Days!

Kirsten is Blue I am Pink

-

Before the intro

You are about to lose your shit, because Spiers finally shows up

*inhuman noise*

*laughing*

Btw tumblr, I have not shown Kirsten a single video of Spiers, just a couple photos

I saw him in the opening!

-

Lt. Meehan on his plane

This is the plane that crashes right?

*slightly shook*

What?

How the fuck do you know that?

Because I remember seeing a plane crash in the preview we watched

Yeah, but how do you know it’s this particular plane?

I remember the faces, like, I remember these are the exact faces

Okay so you remember that; faces you’re gonna see once, but you can’t remember all the ones I showed you in a fucking power point!

*laughing*

- 

*Freaks out over Roe because I’m #obsessed*

Sorry sorry lol

You’re saying sorry as If i have a problem with it

.....this is why I love you

*laughing*

-

Winters unzips his pants

Woah, is he pulling out his?!?-

*Pulls out compass*

oh.

*laughing*

you thought he was pulling out his dick?

Yeah, I thought he was about to be like “Now it’s time, boys ;)”

pphht

-

*About Cowboy (Hall) being stuck with them*

Winters just went “we’re gonna babysit you until we find your parents”

*laughing*

-

After much anticipation, Spiers finally shows up

*makes a :o face and can’t even speak. She went dead silent, I think she met god*

*fucking cackling*

*pauses it cause I just had to* I WISH I COULD SHOW THEM YOUR FACE

Bruh, I just.......bruhh i can’t I’m *Kirsten.exe has stopped working*

You haven’t even seen his face!

I’m....*deep sigh*

*Both dying*

-

Like 20 seconds later, about to un-pause

Okay, you ready?

Wait a second *takes sip of water*

*snorts*

I’m getting my fill of water cause’ I can’t be looking too thirsty

*Dying of laughter*

-

Winter’s: “Let’s pack it up, boys”

Lol, they’re packing ;)

*poking me* you get it, you get it???

Shut up

DO YOU GET IT

Yes! I get it, you’re nasty!

lol

-

During the attack on German guns

Hey, a synchronized attack?!?

yes

Like on Haikyuu!

oml don’t you dare compare this to a Japanese anime!

A Japanese volleyball anime!

Jesus Christ

-

Did he (popeye) just get shot in the ass??

Lol, yeah

That’s gonna happen a lot more

WHAT???

-

Toye punches the German

oml he diD BRING THE BRASS KNUCKLES

I freaking love Toye

-

When Malarkey goes to get the Lugar

He’s gonna get fucked up, all for a gun?!?

hell yeah

You know, if he lived now, he’d totally be the guy to kill for a Popeye's sandwich

Oh, for sure

If you live in Maryland, you definitely know what I’m talking about. Some guy in our state literally killed someone for a Popeye’s chicken sandwich

I mean, it just be like that sometimes *laughing* It’s reasonable, ya know?

eXcUsE mE???

*laughing*

-

(about Malarkey) I may think he’s hot, but he’s kinda dumb

*laughing*

-

I usually hate shaky cam, but-

It works here!

Yeah, it fits so well!

lol, teen girl reactions, plus directing critiques

*snorts*

Only here, at band-of-bitches!

Both laughing

-

When Hall get killed

*GASP* did he just die????

Don’t pause it, just keep watching!

DID HE DIE

JUST WATCH MA’AM

WAS THAT TOYE???

What? No, that was Hall.

Oh. okay.

*laughing* You’re terrible!

-

I love Spiers bruh, he’s a little dumb for getting out of the trench, but I love him

-

Okay we’re are done with episode 2!

Bye! well not really bye because it’s...what time is it?...It’s 1:30am-

-It’s 1:30?!?

And we’re gonna watch episode three like right now

This is gonna be a long night.

-

This is stupid but Kirsten and I did a top 3 boys + honorary boy and man after each episode so here’s our ranking for episode 1 and 2

1) Winters (for obvious reasons)

2) Toye (because Kirsten likes his brass knuckles and he was funny)

3) Spiers ( “It’s fucking hilarious he jumped out the trenches” -Kirsten)

Honorary man is Sink, because he kicked Sobel the fuck out of there

-

Part two finished! I’m actually having a lot of fun listening to these and writing them down, but dear lord do we talk a lot in the am. Only 8 more to go!

Part one, three

[makeste]

BnHA Smash!! 01 and 02: Smash!!Might is a Fucking Menace

okay, so. I have about a million other things I should be doing instead, including (1) responding to asks and/or finishing in-progress metas, (2) reading Vigilantes, and last but not least, (3) actually making a dent in the ever-increasing backlog of Actual Work That I Really Should Be Doing Instead.

so naturally I’m procrastinating by taking my first stab at reading BnHA’s cute 4-panel omake spinoff series, BnHA Smash!! IT JUST MAKES SENSE. look, I have exactly one thing I felt like actually doing and not procrastinating today, so I might as well do the thing. basically it’s my attention span’s world and I’m just living in it.

anyway! so apparently this series was scanlated by good ol’ Fallen Angels. that’s right; prepare yourselves for some very creative cursing, fellas. other background info for anyone who, like me, is unfamiliar with this spin-off: this series debuted on November 9, 2015, a little over a year after the original series. said original series was currently at chapter 66, meaning the Final Exam arc was just wrapping up.

so now that we’re all properly oriented, let me go over a few disclaimers real quick and then we’ll get started!

all comments are my unspoiled reactions from my initial readthrough of the chapter. I did a quick edit for grammar and clarity afterward, and added a few ETAs in the process, but aside from that there are no changes.

I’m aware that not everyone may be familiar with Smash!! even if they’ve read/watched the original series, so I’ve tried to make this recap comprehensible even if you haven’t read the spin-off. that being said, it’s probably more enjoyable if you have, so you can either purchase the first volume from Viz here, or read the chapter online (I don’t want to link directly, but the spin-off is available on most of the usual sites. literally just google “read mha” and you’ll find some good options).

this readthrough contains a handful of sorta-kinda spoilers for the BnHA manga, although there are no direct spoilers. just an indirect reference to a joke in chapter 242, as well as a reference to a theory which as of now is in no way canon. but just to be on the safe side I’m posting a heads-up.

and I think that’s it! so here we go.

so we’re opening with a brief summary of the series. people have superpowers and shit’s nuts. you know the drill

there’s also a brief description of the way that the superhero economy works, complete with Mt. Lady’s employees unionizing and demanding better pay

...what

guys I keep staring at this and thinking that surely, SURELY it doesn’t say what I think it says. sidekick... what... manager??

you know what? Viz unfortunately doesn’t include this series as part of their subscription package (WHAT AM I PAYING YOU FOR, VIZ), but it does at least include a free preview of Smash, and I bet you that this, the first fucking page of the series, is a part of that preview. so... let’s see...

okay, see, this actually makes sense! so did the FA scanlating team collectively all have a fucking stroke?! just, what??

this is one of the reasons why I had difficulty reading Vigilantes too, tbh. those early chapter scans were, uh. but at least Vigilantes has a Viz scanlation too. I don’t want to spend 10 bucks just to read one volume of this, but we’ll see. anyways

so now there’s a strip about baby!Izuku watching his favorite clip of All Might saving one hundred people from a bus accident or whatever

lol Inko you should not have left your shrewdly calculating four-year-old son unattended omg

TWELVE MONTHS’ WORTH OF TEXTBOOKS HOW CAN THIS EAGER YOUNG MIND RESIST

and this is why you don’t leave your credit card info saved on the computer when you have kids. life lessons learned today

this is the first indicator we have ever had that baby!Izuku wasn’t perfect and was, in fact, capable of being a little shit and giving his mom plenty of gray hairs in his own special way. ngl, I fucking love it

also 12,800 yen is about $118 USD, which is honestly a really good deal for a year’s worth of textbooks. he got three boxes of books! I just googled the average cost of college textbooks, and the google article said the average student spends about $1200 a year. so this is a fucking steal tbh

OH MY GOD INKO HOW MANY TIMES MUST HISTORY REPEAT ITSELF BEFORE YOU LEARN

at least install a fucking adblocker ffs. you’re lucky quirk supplement ads are the worst of the ads he’s getting! PARENTAL CONTROLS

now we are cutting to a comic about baby!Izuku defending another boy from my problematic fave, as seen in page one of the original series!

lmaooo

I’m not clear on how much of this spin-off can actually be considered canon. my understanding is that it is Horikoshi-reviewed and approved, even though he doesn’t actually write it. but it’s obviously a humor series, so a lot of it is just going to be jokes. that being said, I think my approach is going to be “if it’s not completely ridiculous and doesn’t contradict the actual manga, go ahead and consider it canon”

(ETA: I might change this up after reading the first two chapters. most of these strips would have terrifying implications if they were actually canon sob.)

anyhoo, this actually does contradict the manga in that we saw this encounter play out very differently. but I kind of wish it was canon regardless because looool. these cocky preschoolers and their fucking Battle Tears

the next comic is Mt. Lady accidentally stepping on a guy’s face and the guy being way too fucking happy about it (read: having a fucking nosebleed and taking an upskirt shot). we’re just going to skip this entirely. this is another problem I was having with Vigilantes too. you know, for all my complaints about Mineta and such, BnHA as a whole is so much tamer than it could be, and I need to give Horikoshi credit for that. he mostly knows where to draw the line, and to his credit he’s also much, much better about this kind of thing than he was when he first started. maybe Mineta’s standings in the character poll results are helping to clue him in

anyway, I’ll mostly just skip past the iffy stuff because I don’t have patience for it and there’s still plenty of other stuff to cover. so on to the next strip

which features a bunch of reporters fawning over Mt. Lady’s flashy quirk while Kamui Woods laments in the shadows

and yet we know this kid will have a prominent rise within the next six months. it’s so strange to revisit the start of the series and see how much things have changed in such a short time

oh my god

no one who dresses up as a giant mushroom could possibly have good intentions. I. just

and look at the fucking disappointment in Deku’s eyes. KAMUI WOODS HE BELIEVED IN YOU!

now some strange man is coming up to Deku and is all HEY YOU, YOU’RE A HERO OTAKU, TELL ME WHAT TO BUY MY SEVEN-YEAR-OLD SON FOR HIS BIRTHDAY. better not ask him unless you’re prepared to shell out $120 bucks for some fucking textbooks

hey, what!!

WE DIDN’T EVEN GET TO SEE WHAT HE BOUGHT HIM? unless it’s the action figure the kid appears to be holding? but I’m just going to go ahead and assume Izuku recommended the number one best gift that any seven-year-old child would love, i.e. a giant sword

now it’s a sludge monster omake!

so Izuku is trudging home all depressed after CERTAIN INCIDENTS, and Sludgey is glooping his way out of a sewer towards him

oh no All Might

my biggest takeaway from this is the fact that the entire second half of chapter one takes place after All Might has emerged from a fucking sewer. I forgot all about that somehow. or maybe it never fully processed until just now. but omg. this entire chapter must have smelled so fucking bad. these poor kids

wow All Might

sure called that one wrong. ah well nobody’s perfect

looooool

lmao, Smash!!All Might appears to be quite a bit more vain than the original. wow dude

btw, friendly reminder (and I think this is something that was actually pointed out to me after one of the recaps; that’s one of my favorite things about doing these) that All Might, after saving Deku, actually read his notebook before signing it. super-fast, I guess, because he’s the best. but yeah, so he knew exactly how smart and observant Deku was, and how much he wanted to be a hero. his decision to pick him as his successor didn’t just come out of the blue; even before the “my body moved on its own” thing, there was a lot Deku had going in his favor. this is one of those little details of which BnHA has so many, and which I love

lmao what the fuck

ngl this version of the series would have been amazing in its own way. but yeah. so this is why we clearly can’t assume everything in Smash!! is canon lol. but I can already tell I am going to enjoy the shit out of this series

now we’re cutting to Deku running at Sludgey in order to save Kacchan, oh shit. the most dramatic part of chapter one. clearly no moment is sacred

sob what

I don’t understand this strip at all. is this supposed to be a serious moment inserted unexpectedly among this multitude of joke strips? or did I miss the punchline? heeeeelp

(ETA: okay so. my best guess is that All Might wrote all over Deku’s life-saving advice, and so the joke is that Deku no longer knows what to do when assaulting sludge men because HIS NOTES ARE RUINED. idk. what does 25 P mean??)

now All Might has Done The Thing and saved my boys, and now Mt. Lady is helping with the cleanup. scooping up all the bits of sludge and putting it in trash bags

oh my god

nope nevermind. nope. nope

-- shit. okay, you know what? this first chapter has been a real in-your-face reminder of the fact that the sludge monster was not made of cute sparkly 2018-trending-fad slime, but was in fact composed of RAW FUCKING SEWAGE. (ETA: to be clear, I’m pretty sure the joke in this strip is that she accidentally picked up dog-doo during her clean-up. but still, the fact that it was indistinguishable from the rest of the gunk speaks for itself.) I think I forced myself to gloss over this fact originally due to the nope factor. but just. Izuku and Katsuki were both choking to death on this shit?? and just, how the fuck did they make it out of this not traumatized

and also, like. All Might was straight up going to leave Izuku alone afterwards, just, “well enjoy your autograph, fine citizen” and blasting off out of there. and everyone fucking saw Katsuki almost suffocate to death later on, and after giving him a pat on the back they fucking let him go off on his own too? and you can’t even make the argument that this was Just Another Day In Quirk Society either, because more than a year later, Katsuki is still a bona fide fucking celebrity from the media coverage of his attack. it clearly was not something that happens every day. in conclusion, these kids are resilient as fuck, and thank god for that because people apparently just do not give a shit, holy christ

anyway. at least Mt. Lady had gloves

OH MY GOD

I FUCKING KNEW IT OH MY GOD. THE ROIDS. MUSCLES LIKE THAT DON’T JUST GROW ON TREES, I DON’T CARE HOW MANY LBS OF GARBAGE THIS KID HAULED OFF THE BEACH. THIS BOY BEEN HITTIN THE JUICE

Smash!!Might is so fucking shady omfg. probably sells cheap counterfeit electronics on Amazon

oh shit and that’s the end of the fucking chapter lol. that’s it?? that was only eight pages. fuck it, let’s read another. but first here’s Horikoshi’s note on the spin-off

so he really feels that Neda gets the spirit of the series and understands him. that’s very encouraging. the best spoofs and parodies are done out of love. I really think I’m going to enjoy this series

so! onward to chapter two

so here’s All Might dressed as Mr. 2 Bon Clay from One Piece, I guess??

“you know what’s funny? dressing a man in girl’s clothes LOL.” guys can we grow the fuck up. and also acknowledge that All Might can look good in anything, so this questionable gag wouldn’t have even landed anyway. you work that tutu All Might

lmao check out the past users of OFA here

All for One for All theory fucking confirmed lol. just look. that’s him in the back of the conga line. clearly

so Deku is all “hell yes why would I possibly say no??” but then

HIS LIMBS. lmao. sign here

in all seriousness, given the shit this kid has been through since the part of the series, All Might probably should have gotten him to sign a liability waiver of some sort. not that it would have stood, since Deku is underage! anyways Deku you totally have grounds to sue the shit out of the Symbol of Peace should you ever choose to do so. and the trend of Smash!!Might being shady af continues yes please give me more I love it

so now All Might is giving Deku his fitness plan which has a really elaborate name

given that this is Smash!!Might, I can’t help but wonder if this plan is in actuality some sort of MLM scheme. All Might are you trying to get Deku to do Herbalife

lol what in the fuck

the original series skipped right over a hell of a lot, it would seem. like the time Deku traveled to Arizona and fought coyotes in a poncho

I’m starting to suspect that Neda-sensei might be on some sort of substance. “let’s see what jokes can I make about chapter 2 of BnHA. I know, I’ll send the protagonist to a fictionalized version of the American Southwest in a sombrero, and then turn him into a 65-year-old oil tycoon.” naturally

lmao that’s really it, that’s the strip. moving right along. okay??

now Izuku is staring at the intimidating piles of Beach Trash and is all “I HAVE TO PICK ALL THIS SHIT UP?”

omg Deku no

somebody call Marie Kondo. Deku none of this is salvageable. not even to reuse in a color page photoshoot spread four years from now

OH SHIT

PROVED ME WRONG OH SNAP. SHOWED ME RIGHT WHERE I COULD PUT THOSE SASSY TAKES. MY BAD DEKU I’M SORRY

anyways I don’t know what Smash!!Might is so upset about. he probably wove some kind of clause into the contract Deku signed that allows him a percentage of the profits. unless Deku already spent it all on textbooks

what the fuck is this fucking series lmao

time for a round of “what is All Might casually crushing in this panel?” is it (a) a cardboard box, or (b) like, a mini-fridge or some fucking shit. IT COULD BE EITHER. IT MAKES EQUALLY AS MUCH SENSE EITHER WAY. “HEROES THESE DAYS ARE [FLEEEEEEX] OBSESSED WITH BEING FLASHY” 

holy shit no wonder he ran away to the Sierra Nevada. it’s only a matter of time before this freak fucking kills someone

NOW WE’RE CUTTING AWAY TO KAMUI WOODS DRESSED LIKE A DAFFODIL, IN THE SAME FUCKING COMIC STRIP, BECAUSE REASONS

my jokes about the mangaka being high as a fucking kite when he wrote this are gradually becoming less jokes and more serious inquiries??

lol so he coincidentally just stumbled across All Might and Deku at this exact moment

AND IT WAS A FUCKING REFRIGERATOR OH MY FUCKING GOD

do you guys remember during the final exam when All Might beat the everloving shit out of Deku and Kacchan, and everyone was all “JESUS CHRIST WOULD YOU LEARN TO FUCKING HOLD BACK A LITTLE THEY ARE CHILDREN YOU MANIAC.” but now we can see plain as day that he was, in fact, holding back. anyways Smash!!Might is terrifying as shit and if this had been the main series I would have already pegged him as the final villain by this point

here he is now wearing an old-timey bathing suit but looking more like an escaped convict than anything else

this panel is actually canon. I’ve decided. this 100% definitely happened at some point. especially the swimsuit

now two bikini babes are walking up and they’re all “IS THAT ALL MIGHT??” with excited sparkly eyes because they don’t know that he’s actually a deranged con artist who crushes refrigerators like empty soda cans. this spin-off has truly opened my eyes

LOOK AT THIS SKEEVY FUCK. JUST LOOK

AND NOW HE’S RUNNING OFF AND LEAVING DEKU TO DROWN IN EXHAUSTION, SON OF A

“SUDDEN BUSINESS” KSJLDKF SMASH!!MIGHT IS A FUCKING MENACE TO SOCIETY AND ALSO DOES NOT GIVE ONE SINGLE FUCK. NOT ONE!! HE’S OUT THERE FUCKLESS, AND NO ONE IS SAFE

now Deku is approaching his mom all serious and says he wants to change up his diet

and she’s looking at the menu he prepared all impressed and thinking that she might join him. as long as it’s for your health, Inko. if this manga starts making jokes about your weight, I will beat it over the head with Deku’s textbooks

OMFG

THIS WENT IN THE EXACT OPPOSITE DIRECTION I WAS EXPECTING, AND THIS IS THE MOST AMAZING THING I’VE EVER READ WHAT THE ACTUAL FUCK. the whole fucking family is on the juice. and the fucking mangaka is on some special juice of his own oh my stars

now we’re cutting to Mt. Lady stomping on a car

thank fuck no one was actually in there. also does she not wear shoes

and also, it only just occurred to me that she must be another person with a special quirk costume, because her suit shrinks and expands along with her. Hagakure and Momo are really getting shafted by the costume design team here. they need to fire some people

anyway so Mt. Lady slipped on this carelessly placed vehicle and fell down and crushed an entire building whoops

bruh, you think you’re “ow.” let’s hope that building was empty too

and now she’s toppling another building just fucking because, I guess. and saying she can’t do urban areas

lmao and now the sidekick [CENSORED] manager from chapter one is back to guilt-trip her omg

I need this man to show up in every freaking chapter. please. respect my wishes

and now Izuku is standing on top of his collected pile of garbage screaming in victory

I only just realized that there’s still a big old Pile O’ Trash on this beach, though. someone needs to haul all of this junk away. or else get All Might and Mt. Lady to crush it all with a combined effort

oh shit here it comes y’all, the famous “eat my hair” scene. potential comedy gold right here omg

lol what the fuck

this man is a fucking billionaire and he’s out here clipping coupons and deleting pictures of his son in order to make room for them smdh

okay now we’re doing the hair scene

oh. oh no. I know where this is going sob please keep this comic rated PG for the children Neda

motherfucker they really --

Smash!!Might is a straight-up felon. this man has no fucking scruples. that’s okay Midoriya-shounen, if you don’t want to eat my hair we could just try some REDACTED, jesus christ I am going to need some bleach for my eyes after this

OR LET’S JUST STRAIGHT UP GO THERE WHY NOT

lmao sob. well, two chapters in and we’ve established that no territory is off-limits here. it’s a brave new world. wow

 so that’s it! our introduction to BnHA Smash!! I enjoyed it a lot and I will definitely be reading more! I’m not sure what kind of schedule I’ll keep, but this is a really good procrastination manga thus far, so knowing me I might actually work my way through this relatively quickly. especially since the Manga At Large is on break this week. anyways my deepest apologies to the many people who have been requesting for me to start Vigilantes instead. I just need something lighter right now, and this is a good fit. one of these days I’ll get my shit together with the other two spinoffs as well.

[shirasade]

So. Yeah. Ep 6 of WRU? killed me ded. Not sure how many of my brain cells are still functioning after that couch scene. *fans self*

But we’ll come back to this. Later. ;) This was definitely my favourite episode of the show so far. Not only because of all the Tutor x Fighter (which y’all know by now owns my fucking heart) but also everything else.

Saifah and Zon were the cutest, sweetest couple! No panicking, just long stares and smitten smiles - from both of them. Seriously, they’re so in love, it’s a miracle I didn’t get cavities. Saifah going “YESSS!!” on the phone with Zon, Zon not being afraid to demand things (like sleepovers *g*) because he just knows Saifah can’t say no to him. <3 That whole scene on the roof - of course it’d have been nice if they kissed, but I just love the way they are now, in that liminal space before the unavoidable happens.

It was interesting to get a glimpse of Fighter’s home life. We knew that he’s rich, but now we also know that his father is obviously not the loving sort. Ordering your son to date your girlfriend’s daughter for a business deal? Yuck. But massive props to Fighter for not allowing himself to be railroaded and breaking things off with Hwa.

Hwa - for a while I was worried she’d turn into “obstacle girlfriend” when she seemed to obstinately refuse to accept the truth. I wish they’d given her relationship with Day a bit more space to develop. His feelings were clear, and we did get an inkling that she likes him, too, but to go from “Oh, I’m heartbroken, I need to get Fighter back!” to “Yes, I’ll be your girlfriend!”... I got whiplash, to put it mildly and will have to be sold on them as a couple. But at least this means she won’t stand between Fighter and Tutor (although her reaction will be interesting).

The whole thing with the cat was cute. I’m still not sure I understand Japan’s mixed reactions to Tanthai’s blatant flirtations, but this was the first time it felt as if he was mostly pleased and not mainly puzzled.

Baby Blue! I’m not sure if I’m setting myself up for disappointment, but I very much support his crush on Champ. I am not a fan of the way Dew treats him, and Champ is just a genuinely good guy. If they don’t end up together I’ll be sad. In short: Team Champ all the way! :)

Which brings us back to Tutor and Fighter who went through an entire rollercoaster. Oh boy. How many kisses and almost-kisses have they shared by now? And still Fighter refuses to admit out loud that he likes Tutor. It’s always one step forward, two steps back with our disaster!gay (bi?) Fighter. They didn’t sub the preview for next week, but it does seem as if Tutor will close the deal, so to speak. (Have I mentioned how much I love Tutor? Because I do, so much - he’s confident without being cocky, and vulnerable without being a pushover. And he looks like Saint Suppapong, so there’s that. *g*)

The scene where Tutor, in the great tradition of every Asian drama ever, uses food as a love language was just wonderful. Fighter was completely disarmed, all his defenses down. When he kissed Tutor’s hand... My heart!

We all knew that Saint and Zee have incredibly chemistry, but I must say, that scene on the couch? Blew me away. Finally a couple where both give and take, for that alone they deserve an award. Obviously their bodies already know how to talk to one another - now, if only they could do the same with words, they’ll be unstoppable as a couple.

So Tutor met Fighter’s dad (who I assume will be a major obstacle for them) and next week Fighter will meet Tutor’s mom - and hopefully we’ll get a nice coming-out scene for Tutor. I’d really love another supportive parent in a Thai BL! Also, more info on Tutor’s family background.

And now excuse me, I need to rewatch the couch scene some more. ;)

(Btw, if you were as annoyed by the mistimed subs for part 1 as I was, I downloaded the video with copyvid and the subs with downsub and then set the subs to ca. -9 seconds after the opening credits in VLC. But I assume they’ll fix them eventually, as they did last week.)

[darkzorua100]

So I’ve gone through the new opening a few times now and I’m ready to dissect it. Hopefully they will continue to update this one, unlike the last one, because it looks like some of this stuff might be happening in a few episodes based on what we know from the summaries while other bits look like they can be continuous elements/themes throughout this season.

Also just a quick note. I’m not going in complete order of what was shown since some shots later down the line overlap with previous ones that look like they could be happening in the same scene.

So two of the beginning and ending shots are of Yusaku’s empty duel disk. Since it looks like Ai (who isn’t even shown in his Ignis form at all in this opening) is going to be the main villain of the season, it really does bring home the point that Yusaku really is finally alone during this season. Because lets be real here, once we get to the season 3 finale, everyone is going to get killed off again while Playmaker is going to be the last one standing to beat the bad guy. Only difference this time around is that the big bad is Ai, Playmaker’s partner, meaning that Playmaker isn’t going to have anyone to stand next to him and to help him beat his old partner.

We have these two shots of our main cast of characters in the real world and in Link Vrains. The thing I like to note is that when we get the transition Spectre, Emma, Akira, Go, and Kengo disappear, leaving just Playmaker, Blue Maiden, Soulburner, Revolver, and Kusanagi. Our main fighters from last season aren’t much of a surprise since I figured they would continue to be the main focus but this makes me wonder now if Kusanagi will start to go into Link Vrains more if they included him in the shot of the Link Vrains characters and will start playing more of a role there instead of the real world side of things.

On a unrelated note, I love Takeru’s pose in the real life shot XD

Yusaku and Ai (I’m just going to continue to call this guy Ai until they show tells me it isn’t him) standing in the rain, both of them looking miserable. Yusaku missing his partner probably while Ai is probably missing his kin and probably Yusaku as well for having to leave him when he did.

However you can tell there’s a difference in their tone once they shift. Once Yusaku looks up, he still looks sad but when Ai turns and is now facing forward, he now looks determined, like he’s putting his doubts, his human friendships to the side in order to complete his goal of getting the other Ignis back. The moment he has his resolve to do whatever he has to to bring them back even if it means he has to go against Yusaku. 

These two shots look to be taking place in the same area so I’m grouping them together. It looks like Blue Maiden is trying to talk someone out of something (maybe her brother or another character that’s not in the shot) which looks like it is going to lead into a Akira and Blue Maiden tag duel. First off FINALLY we get a tag duel in Vrains and FINALLY we get to see Akira duel again since freaking the beginning of season 1. I’m interested to see how this is going to play out and I’m curious to see if Aoi is still going to be playing Marincess or will she go back to using Trickstars now that Aqua is gone?

We see that Go has gone back to playing Goukis so Aoi could go back to her original archetype as well. Speaking of Go, I’m curious to know what kind of role he’s going to be playing this season if he’s important enough to be in the opening with the other characters. Hopefully he’s in better health this time around and will finally just get over himself.

More proof this new guy is Ai? Evil Decode Talker (btw his monsters look awesome). And apparently these two are going to be dueling in freaking space. I’m so looking forward to this duel because one Ai looks like he’s going to go crazy in it and two I very much want to know if Yusaku will know this is Ai when this duel happens. It is hard to tell with Playmaker if he recognizes this as Ai in the preview. If he does find out, then this is going to hit hard for him and if he doesn’t know this is Ai at this point, he’s might just fight this like any other fight. I’m also curious to know how he’s going to find out if this is Ai. If Yusaku will put the pieces together himself or if Ai will just tell him that this is him.

I’m very much hoping this means we are finally going to be getting more real life scenes and not just the writers trying to throw in Angelmakershipping out of nowhere. Seriously don’t do this to Aoi’s character. She does NOT need to fall for him. This is what ALWAYS leads to the females going to sh*t. I mean I have my own personal problems with Aoi’s writing but don’t make it worse.

I’m very curious to know what Roboppy’s role in all of this is going to be. Ai is probably going to be trying to get the other Ignises back but why is Roboppy along for the ride? Honestly it is probably just to be with her “big brother” which is honestly just adorable in its own right. It looks like she’s going to be dueling as well which judging by her monsters looks like her duels are just going to be fun in a Yuya sense. I wouldn’t say an entertainment style of dueling but something like that is how I see her duels playing out.

It looks like we are getting all of the brother sister team ups this season because it looks like Blood Shepherd and Ghost Girl are also getting a tag duel together. Judging by the fact they we see Roboppy in a Speed Duel and these two are also in a Speed Duel, maybe we might get a Speed Tag Duel between Ai and Roboppy against Blood Shepherd and Ghost Girl. And if that’s the case, well these two are dead. Also Blood Shepherd can also say “I told you so!” to everyone along with Revolver. 

Speaking of Revolver, it looks like him and Soulburner are actually getting a rematch! HELL YES! Finally have these two flat out murder each other!

No seriously, after this death glare Takeru gave Ryoken in today’s episode, I want Takeru to punch Ryoken so badly. I will be so disappointed if we go this whole show without Takeru punching Ryoken in the face. Takeru lost his impulse control in Flame, he might actually punch him and honestly I’m expecting Takeru to get into so much crap now because of the fact that Flame is gone to keep his temper in check. Yusaku, you might want to keep Takeru under constant supervision, especially considering Ai might actually go after him in order to bring back Flame. Takeru really is not in a good position right now, is he? 

But back to the Revolver vs Soulburner rematch, I’m still willing to bet that Revolver is going to win this only because of three reasons (damn you Yusaku)

Revolver wasn’t even trying the first time around and with the opening hand he drew, he could have easily destroyed Soulburner on his first turn. If the writers go the route with how everything at the beginning of the duel will be the exactly same as their last one, Revolver is easily going to be able to overpower him in seconds.

I’m pretty sure this duel will air around the time the Revolver Structure Deck will be out and you all know how it works when it comes to new products. The anime has to advertise the hell out of them to get them to sell. And considering the fact that Salamangreats are meta and the OCG is probably sick of them by now, they are going to make this duel seem like “hey Salamangreats are so last format! Here try Rokkets!”

Takeru no longer has Flame who again was 100% his impulse control but was also a big reason why Soulburner won 99% of his duels. Flame gave him advice and the encourage for Soulburner to keep on fighting to win. Without Flame, I’m 100% sure Soulburner’s dueling is going to take a big hit from it. If Soulburner does lose this duel from this reason alone, I think it will be a good driving force for him to legitimately try and get his partner back. 

And speaking of Flame and the other Ignis, the opening and today’s episode really was hitting it home that the rest of the Ignis are gone. Now I don’t think Flame, Aqua, Windy, Earth, and Lightning are going to stay permanently dead. That just doesn’t seem like something a Yu-Gi-Oh series will do (since it is extremely rare for anyone to stay permanently dead in this franchise) but I do think these five are going to be staying dead for quite a while from the looks of things and won’t actually return until the middle, middle end, or the end of the season/show if season 3 is the final season of Vrains. 

We get this quick screenshot of what looks to be a new female-like android character and it appears to me that she is in the Knights of Hanoi’s base. Since we know that SOL created these androids, is this the spy Ryoken has been hinting at from within? On one hand, that’s pretty freaking smart but on the other, Ryoken, if this is your spy, you are a giant freaking hypocrite. You don’t trust Ai (which I mean at this point might be justified) but you have a freaking android working for you as a spy in SOL? I seriously can’t even with this boy.

It looks like these androids might be playing a significant role this season if they are showing them in the opening. Since I think some of these shots might be actual future shots, this could be the moment before Ai and Roboppy appear and upload their data into two of these androids and that’s how they both have human forms. 

And one final thing I like to note is...when the summaries talked about SOL having a ship, I was thinking along the lines of a pirate ship, not a freaking space ship! Are you kidding me right now?! Playmaker and Ai might actually be dueling in space, like actual space. We are going full on Zexal now. Season 3 isn’t messing around apparently. 

There were a few other shots but these were the ones that interested me the most. Over all, I’m very much looking forward to season 3 and I just hope it doesn’t play out like season 2 in certain scenarios and seriously hoping it doesn’t end like a certain series if this is the final season. 

[cruddyborderlandstheories]

Athenas Masterpost

This is going to cover everything Athenas, like the official page and trailer, both new trailers, the art book preview, and some stuff shown in the ign trailers. It’s a lot.

There will NOT be endgame spoilers in this post. If there’s anything that comes up that I want to discuss, you can find it in a spoiler post I’ll be making soon :) I DO discuss a thing that occurs during the first 3 hours of BL3, though I think that’s pretty okay with y’all lol

tl;dr: there’s too much to summarize. 13 days until bl3. lmao im screaming on the inside.

“A misty, tranquil planet that has recently attracted the wrong kind of attention. Athenas is mostly uninhabited, save for a sect of monks known as the Order of the Impending Storm who have made their home in the high peaks of the mountains. What secrets do they guard here, inside ancient walls that were built long before humans set foot on Athenas?”

We definitely got a lot less info for Athenas than the other planets, and I can see why. They want to keep it mysterious.

Also, I’m not saying I totally called it that the pyramid was Eridian, but I totally called it. I am surprised it’s implying that the entire area was built by them, but what can ya do 🤷‍♂️

Anyway, since this post is long overdue, let’s just jump right in!

The Athenas video is nearly half the time of the Eden-6 one, so there’s not a lot to cover unfortunately:

We’ve seen this shot multiple times before

also the emphasis that Athenas is ‘tranquil’ and ‘peaceful’ ahahahaha no it’s not.

i love these dudes! Order of the Impending Storm!!! I wonder if their funky goggle things have anything to do with Sirens, like how they have Siren-trackers. I also really love their outfits. lowkey want one of these robes.

a great overview look of the area leading up to the pyramid. I got more to say about this... but it’s probably best if i leave it for later on in the post after we get more info

also, note the water and the rocks and stuff on the left there. This will come into play later... not even in this post. a later post.

also i totally called this being an ancient aliens reference lol

Vault logo on the flag there. definitely shows how much these guys worship the Vaults

This!!! I have so much to talk about here!

alright so now that we know what the vault keys look like.... this doesn’t appear to be part of any of the Vault Keys we’ve seen. especially not the Promethean one. not even the pyramid shaped one.

im mostly interested in this because this is obviously a monk, her robes match the ones we saw above with the hood. she doesn’t appear to be Eridian because we’ve seen the Watcher and the other Guardians, who are built in the image of the Eridians, and she looks wayyy too human. We’ve also seen statues of the Eridians in that one shot of the Pandora temple.

so it seems like the monks have gone inside the pyramid before and... built this statue? for some reason??? It’s interesting that she has an extra pair of arms as well. I wonder if she is like the Siren ancestor of Amara. which could prove my theory that the next successor of Amara would have another set of arms... it might also explain why Amara’s tattoos are everywhere on the buildings (outside of her being the Tiger)

it would also explain this shot, the skeleton with the book, which we now know we’ve seen before with Maya:

so even though they’re protecting the pyramid/temple, i don’t think they’ve been avoiding it entirely- at least not for the first time after discovering it. maybe they stopped going in after they discovered something bad, somethin like iunno... the Rampagers?

it would be Really Weird if the Eridians built that statue, especially when they probably didn’t know what humans looked like at the time. unless of course they helped shape humanity or smth. meaning they probably personally created Sirens. oh that’d be wild... i wonder if we’re going to learn about how early Sirens shaped humanity in that case. discovering fire could be entirely different lol

“hallowed land” 

i wonder if this is where we’ll have anointed gear explained to us... i imagine the order is still worshipping Eridian/Siren stuff, so them having all sorta knowledge of this stuff would make sense

more Maliwan. you guys notice we see cultists purely on Eden-6 (outside of the crashed ship), but Maliwan purely on Athenas? a mix on Promethea, tho that’s bc we’ve actually gotten gameplay. 

So my guess is Maliwan has joined up with the cult (be it through whatever means: Maliwan is in) and they’re looking for the Promethea key. which makes sense. they’re attacking Rhys on Promethea, so when he helps us out, word probably gets back to Maliwan (somehow) and they swap from wanting to take over Atlas (either by defeating them w/ Zer0/that giant space laser/whatever or just changing priorities) to wanting to open that fuckin Vault. Teaming up with the CoV is the best way to ensure that happens. I’m sure there will oodles of betrayal going on between the two parties.

I LOVE THESE THINGS

THEY’RE AMAZING

GOOD BOYS

in all seriousness, actually, im curious why we don’t see these good boys on Promethea. maybe they’re only for the top-tier squads? (mechanically, probably higher-level enemies) they look super high tech, so i would not be surprised if Maliwan thought Atlas would be an easy takeover so they didn’t send everything they could have

Nog! not much to say here tbqh

“Protect Athenas Before It’s Too Late”

I imagine before Maliwan gets the Vault Key or some other wild power, like power over the Rampagers. seriously, in the We Are Mayhem trailer, there’s a rampager are fighting on the side of Maliwan (altho if this is The One Rampager, or just One of Many is hard to tell. it could morph depending on which element it is. we just don’t know. personally i think there’s 1 per planet... i’ll explain later)

From the Art Book Preview:

Alright yes. “Maliwan forces have already seized control of the monastery, where part of the Promethean Vault Key has been located, turning a simply recovery mission into a vicious firefight...... A large and foreboding crypt built into the side of the mountain was also designed, and might perhaps have housed the Vault Key fragment deep within its gloomy interiors”

i don’t think this means the crypt is like an actual area. it would be interesting to discover that the pyramid is a giant crypt because... jesus. it would fit with the whole pyramid theme, at least. altho im wondering if this is more like a labyrinth situation where they’re trying to keep a Rampager inside as well as the treasure... which MAY be a Vault Key Fragment

Actually, this brings up a great point: did Atlas spread the Vault Key out throughout the planets? Is this where Typhon originally found that Key fragment? wtf was in the Vault that Atlas needed to disassemble the Key and return its fragments? oh boy i hope it’s something scary

From the Moze Eden-6 E3 Gameplay:

oh ye this. okay so this is definitely 100% Eridian. I’m guessing we get this from Athenas because this seems like a fairly important object and, well, Athenas is all about Eridian stuff. When we go through the next few videos, keep an eye out for the temples. You’ll see the glowing red diamond shape constantly reappearing there.

one of the devs admitted that there are hunks of Eridian Writing left around the world that will ‘open up’ things for the players, so I imagine this is exactly what we’ll use to get to it. If this IS only for endgame stuff I’ll be slightly disappointed. I know we have access to this before Eden-6, since there are gameplay videos that show the player breaking the Eridium chunks with this thing. the above one is from the Moze Eden-6 gameplay, tho I’ve also seen newer footage from the Balex gameplay with this same tool

The following clips can be found in this video:

im mostly interested in the wall art here

what looks like a sun or a planet

this symbol which makes an appearance elsewhere

these two are the same area, im imagining this is the fight up to the pyramid, with Maliwan forces and barricades everywhere

the sun again in the background (middle top)

this cool piece (bottom left of the above pic) which looks like a hand covered in glowing blue. i imagine this is some sorta representation of Phaselock? mainly because of the blue orb in the palm of her hand

not much to say about this area tbh. looks like a residential area to me, so possibly not in the residential district

writing on the top mid-right. 

idk why i just noticed these trees are green and not red but yeah, that’s interesting. so probably a different area from Amara’s trailer aka: not Partali

and yet we see amara’s tattoos on the building in the back right. sorry for such terrible quality btw, tumblr ate these images and spit them back out

These clips can be found in the Borderlands are Yours trailer:

looks like the small building we see directly next to Maya and Ava

altho very clearly not the same exact area so im curious what these are supposed to represent. tbh im kinda reminded of graveyards. i really hope there aren’t corpses in those omg

another better look at the two pieces of art. i imagine the one on the right has something to do with the eridians given its in a diamond shape, which we know has something to do with the eridians now

also im not playing amara first (possibly last. depending on how i feel fl4k may go last) but HOLY SHIT her action skills are beautiful

THIS FUCKER

i know he’s probably a vault monster but like... 

idk i feel its kinda sad gearbox is showing off a VAULT MONSTER of all things in so much promo material. like why is he fighting with Maliwan/the cult in the We are Mayhem trailer??

sup with that?

does he have multiple stages?? is that’s why he changes elements? goes from two heads to wings to extended necks. like wtf is up with this guy?? he definitely looks like he can be elementally charged given his eye sockets aren’t glowing when he emerges like they do

here but then

this dude looks like he has an entirely different skull like...

this dude is a corrosive one who also seems to be working with Maya (who i guess IS probably the corrosive aligned siren)

and we’re guessing the nuclear charged one is the one from Athenas... for reasons i’ll explain below

AND honestly i've been thinking and maybe the fire one is actually from Promethea? and maybe there’s another that’s on Eden-6 and another on Pandora?

alright so i have 2 reasons for this. one involves spoiler talk with the cloth map, so that won’t be discussed here (but if you see the map and the planets, you’ll understand what i’m alluding to here, most likely). the other is that in this screenshot of all the quests from the Eden-6 demo:

we see immediately after “hostile takeover” is the quest “the impending storm”. which is, indeedy, a reference to the Order of the Impending Storm. We know they’re on Athenas, so I imagine we run over to Athenas to get part of the Vault Key. We’ve established from the art book that’s where it is.

but then after The Impending Storm, Space-Laser Tag (which we all know is that giant-ass laser thing in the asteroid belt), and Atlas, at Last, there’s a quest called Beneath the Meridian.

And we know this area... is definitely underground. we’ve seen with the fire-y boy that the ceiling is just rocks

then we see this shot with the nuclear (?) one where the window outside is clearly showing off mountains/sky, which we know is kinda Athenas’s deal

and we know these two areas are the same v ^

since there’s the same ‘Vault’ in the background

so my only problem with this entire theory that there’s multiple rampagers is that

we see the twins killing/absorbing the red/fire one’s power which is also on athenas since the background is the same as the vault area from the above two pictures. unless there’s a similar vault-thing on promethea and eden-6. we know there’s one on Pandora, but that one is outside so.

so i guess they are the same beasty boy but... why why why show us one of the vault monsters

it’s so cool going in blind and not knowing what you’re going to get out of it.

so im going to say this is a minor vault monster (especially given it’s not exactly the same rock-like design as the other vault monsters) and the ‘vaults’ are actually something smaller. maybe they hold keys, or the pieces of the keys, or they’re part of that teleportation network i keep talking about (and i guess i should just make a seperate post about it) but i don’t know if these are actual Big Boy Vaults. especially when the Rampager doesn’t match actual Eridian-created Vault Monsters

that said given we see a bunch of dead guardians on the floor, its possible the rampager killed them? but i get the feeling we might actually be the ones to pull the trigger cause... combat is fun

so. yeah. if the rampager is guarding something that’s fine. i wanna believe teleportation network. i’d love to see the twins come in, walk out of that vault, absorb the rampager’s powers, and then walk out after locking us in like ‘peace’ and we have to use the teleportation system to make it back to promethea with the vault key fragment or whatever

[im here after the cloth map reveal like... uh huh. i see. u dumb bitchard.]

idk i just thought this was a fun screenshot lol

BoRdErLaNdS

ah yes

that’s eridium

this also appears to be in the temple, but, like, again if there’s more than one temple this could also be on Pandora or even Eden-6. Kinda leaning towards Pandora. HOWEVER since we only know for certain this sort of temple area is on Athenas (from that one statue shot), we’re gonna analyze this bad boy right now (also lowkey think this is Pandora because of the varkid nests but shhh)

what do i actually have to say about it? uhhh not much tbh. i think i’ve said all that needs to be said concerning the twins mutating cultists with slag/eridium. 

i will say im pretty shocked at, like, the eridium HORNS and shit. so maybe this is just some cool little miniboss. (okay not mini because look how big he’s gotten!! just like Bloodwing :D)

you know what, it looks like he’s standing on one of these

floor tile things, and now im super curious. is the fire part of a trap? is it powering this lad up? i definitely know he’s a cultist because he’s got the neon light tubes on his shoulder pad

see here

you can see these on other cultists like goliaths and such and such

also this is pretty similar to what we’ve seen in the LLE (especially the powersuits) given their bodies also form eridium crystals when they’ve ascended

i feel like its powering him up

you know during the fight with bloodwing when Jack powers up bloodwing using the elemental flamethrower things? would be interesting if this is similar to that.

like dis

yeahhh

the radiation boy is back and he’s actually elementally charged this time

huzzah

also i love the chest mouth lmao

has anyone here seen stretch armstrong? like that one episode where Gabe (crostini man) gets turned into a bunch of flexarium monster chunks

but yeah, awesome mouth my guy.

im curious if it’s being elementally charged to cryo or if it’s stopped being charged. if this is like a cutscene between different stages in the fight, etc etc. 

this also looks fairly similar to this area here

but red this time. which... may tie into the elemental stages. which maaaaay tie into those floor platforms elementally charging that demon baby up above. bloodwing 2.0!

You can find the following clips in the Official Guide to the Borderlands:

god i keep telling myself to be on the lookout for athenas clips but i get so distracted by the gorgeousness of this fucking game i forget and have to keep going back

if that dude in the back floating was t-posing i would have lost my shit

new Siren tattoos!!! we haven’t seen these before. they’re very flowy, i love them. i hope we get to meet the siren with them!

i also loooooove this area in the back. i hope we get to climb it and explore. i would love to just be able to climb to high up areas in bl3 and look down and see the area i just came from. it’s possible! we have the technology! thousand cuts / bnk3r ascension 2.0!!!

more of amara’s awesome looking powers

zane has 2 trans pride skins im so happy 😄

also look at how teeny tiny that ‘Vault’ is in the back!!! it’s only like 2x the size of Iron Bear!!! gimme BIG vaults!! GIANT VAULTS

also also

the VOID vault

i get a feeling these are connected somehow.

sniper spoooot

not much to say about this tbh. zane’s claw things look fucking dope tho. i want one irl.

we’ve seen this shot a few times before already

alright before you get mad, let me explain why i think this is athenas

you see this picture

this maliwan jackass. the building to his left is 100% athenas architecture.

the rocks in the top picture look identical to the ones next to him. plus we’ve seen water in the distance of some of the areas of Athenas

it could also be Eden-6 (which honestly i would not be surprised if it is instead) but given the ivy and the rocks i felt it was worthwhile to put in. plus the moving eridian structures are so cool looking. i feel like that’s going to be a puzzle.

oh oh also

maybe that area leads into/exits from here? because they’re both underground in cavern-like areas

but like... it could also be eden-6... because of that one shot of the temple area in the side of the cliff ASDFHDGJFJGFHSD

still radiation charged. 

also seriously this ‘Vault’ is wayyyy smaller than a regular Vault. like... the one in BL2 that you can walk right up to... huge. and nothing even comes out of it. the Warrior climbs up from over the edge

the bl1 is much bigger than this one, too. also the vault of the traveller, i would argue is the biggest out of all of them but eh

for the Vault of the Sentinel, the actual arch we see... i’ve already gone over why i don’t think that’s a ‘real’ vault and that its all more of a simulation, but you can read that whole thing here bc i am trying my damndest to not get off topic for this post because holy fucking shit. this got long.

Alright so. Onto the website pictures

another cool shot of the academic district, really showing off the pyramid in the background. god i wanna know what that is. could be the temple (underground things notwithstanding). it’s probably holding that statue with the vault keys in either arm

you know the one, it’s at the beginning of this post. but damn that thing is huge!! i am hoping it holds more than just the promethean vault key. 

did i already talk about how there are siren tattoos written along the edges of this area??? because... damn.

also the symbol for what is probably Vault Key sitting right smack dab in the middle??

also sorry i just noticed those blue shapes are moving. like a fountain or something?? weird light.

i mean... the trees are also warping in the background. wonder wtf is going on here... 

anyway whatever she’s holding actually doesn’t match up with any of the vault keys we’ve seen so... wtf are you???

a very nice shot overlooking the water. also a wind turbine in the background. i think the area on the left is where we’ve seen ava and maya? but dont hold me to that lol

definitely looks the same. even has the tree

another shot of that area i think we’ve seen Amara fighting in

big shot of the pyramid with the vault symbol everywhere. and the planet with the beams coming out of it. which in retrospect...

anyway that’s spoiler talk so let’s talk in another post.

another shot of athenas from a slightly different angle, we’ve seen this one before, too, and i remember because i complemented the road signs

annnnd im tired. good night everybody.

[1wngdngl]

Pokemon Shield playthrough - Part 5

Back again with another post! This one covers Route 5 and the Water Gym.

Just as I start down the route, I encounter the Cameraman/Reporter duo, who are a classic trainer pair from past games. Given that all the Gym Challenge stuff is a big spectacle in the Galar region, it makes perfect sense that Gym Challengers would get interviewed along the way.

This horde of Minccino chased after me. It was adorable.

I discovered the Pokemon breeding-grounds - or at least, the artificial version of it. This is not the same as the old “Day-Care” that could also level up Pokemon. The Nursery is solely for eggs, while Levelling up can be done with PokeJobs and the experience candies.

The people here are really nice - they gave me a free rare Pokemon!

It’s like a baby dinosaur! I believe this is also the first Poison-Electric combo we’ve had.

Since I don’t want to have duplicate types, I remove Yamper from the team. I prefer dual-types, plus this purple dinosaur looks cooler. Okay, so he starts at Level 1, and he’s pretty frail, but I can be patient.

Leaving the Nursery behind, I encounter another traditional trainer class - the Chef. He sends out food to attack me.

I also find a wild Wobbuffet - and promptly realize just how horrible its catch rate is.

I wasted every last Poke Ball on this fiend. At least he gave decent experience when I knocked his lights out.

I consoled myself by catching the weird apple creature for myself. Here’s another unique type combo - Grass and Dragon (wait, does Mega Sceptile have that typing?) It only knows a defense-raising move and the incredibly-weak Astonish, and has horrible stats all around. I’m sure it will evolve into something great, if I can figure it out. (btw, is it weird that Galar has both apples /and/ “Leppa” berries?)

I decided that my psychic-bug-cocoon wasn’t doing enough for me, so it got booted off the team.

I also got a second try at Wobbuffet ;)

This guy has a nice camping spot for himself. He never leaves. Maybe he ran away from home?

Seeing a pink puffball and an apple fight over a toy is too cute for words.

My coworker also has this game, and was kind enough to trade over this incredibly-high level Wingull. Not that I really plan to use it, but it /does/ have Pokerus. You’d think by now the nurses and professors of the Pokemon world would have learned to harness the power of Pokerus and turn it into a mandatory booster shot.

Back on track, these silly Team Yell people are blocking the bridge forward.

I get to see what my Dark-type fox /could/ have evolved into, if it were still on my team :( It looks like a proper gentleman-thief.

I love Pokemon - you save someone from getting their precious possession stolen, and as thanks, they give you their precious possession.

Too bad the outfit for it is so garish.

The blue color is a little better though.

Now that I have a bike, I can go into the Wild Area and try the Rotom Rally mini-game. It’s basically a time trial as you travel between different regions of the Wild Area. It looks like you can’t get attacked by wild Pokemon while in this Rally mode, so it’s probably the quickest way to get around (minus the flying taxi, of course).

These guys can also upgrade your bike a bit, but it’s expensive. And they don’t have the ride-on-water option either.

You know, Serebii.net says that Bunnelby doesn’t evolve until Level 20. This is an illegal Diggersby here!

Okay. Back on the bridge. Riding is so much faster than walking, but I keep stopping anyway to grab hidden items and look at the scenery. You can see the Dragon city in the background.

Another fight with my rival on the bridge. His Scorbunny has evolved, but it’s still not too tough.

In this place, Eldegoss literally float by on the wind. 

Here’s the tunnel that ducks under the train tracks. What could be on the other side?

That can wait! First, I gotta get my Pokemon sent out on more jobs. I love this logo that’s a blatant KFC rip-off.

Oh, I also discovered that you can, in fact, change the wallpaper of PC boxes. All of the choices are pretty boring, though.

Also, my coworker invited me on a raid battle with a 5-star Ditto. I have a bad feeling about this...

Scorbunny’s final form is so majestic.

None of the previous raid battles I fought had “barriers”! Is that something that only shows up in multiplayer raids?

This is it. We’ve weakened it, and now I have the chance to obtain this rare, useful, iconic Pokemon for myself...

Yeah, I failed the capture. I didn’t know they could fail. At least I got some good loot.

FINALLY, I make it to the seaside town of Hulbury. I wonder which British coastal town this is based on? For being the main port of the region, it’s not really all that big.

We encounter Chairman Rose and some of his “admirers”.

We also learn a little more about the relationship between Rose and Bede. Apparently Bede really wants to impress the Chairman, so maybe he’s not so much “working for him” as trying to gain his favor.

You know, I really don’t think he pulls off that outfit. What is it even - a mix of baseball uniform and swim trunks?

Oleana thinks she can boss me around.

I don’t owe you anything, silly person! This is /my/ Pokemon journey. And I’ll take as long as I want. ^.^

Sigh...Why can’t I just throw my coal monster at these goons to get past? My character is way too nice.

Oh, here’s another look at that elephant Pokemon that the Chairman had. It looks like it’s wearing a little hat.

Also, please be more creative when naming locations.

Here’s the “bustling market” I was told about? Must be a slow day.

We’ve got the stock “bitter medicine” booth (I never use these)...

Ah! Here’s something useful. You can bet I will use this item to maximize my earnings from every battle. I haven't seen an option to re-battle trainers yet, and those cool outfits won’t buy themselves.

I trade away for a Cottonee. You know, why don’t people in real life just trade pets with each other whenever they feel like it?

Pokemon, Pokemon...People already say your recent games are too easy, and now you’re giving me a free held item that’s super-effective against the current Gym? (Yet another sign that you should ignore Oleana and /not/ go straight to the Gym upon arrival.)

If nothing else, Hulbury is scenic. I bet the dock is covered with Wingull droppings though.

These people obviously don’t get the point of Pokemon.

With the hills overlooking the sea, I’m reminded of Los Angeles - or was it San Francisco? It’s probably a lot colder in Hulbury though.

Here’s the train station at the top of the town. Of course it can’t take me anywhere new. What if my dying grandmother lived in the next town over - would you let me get on /then/?

I never got into Pokemon’s post-game battle facilities much. I wonder what Galar will have in that department.

I go fishing in the pier, and find a few new Pokemon. That seems to confirm that what you catch is based on where you are, so there’s no rod upgrades.

Good to see that Basculin still comes in two forms. I’m guessing Sword version has the red form?

Another sneaky way to help players - hide a Chinchou in the pier. Its electric attacks would also be useful against the Water Gym.

Aha! Here’s that Pokemon we saw in the trailer, when everyone wasn’t sure if it /was/ a Pokemon or just a generic fish. Well, it is real, though it doesn’t look that useful. It actually looks like a skinnier version of red-striped Basculin.

Nope, not keeping you. I only have six slots!

Some more postcard pictures.

Here’s that weird-looking Pokemon that was also glimpsed in the trailer. Will I be able to find this in the wild?

A hidden Electric-type TM. This is why you explore and do side stuff /before/ continuing the main story.

About ready to face the Gym now. First, now that I’ve entered a new town, I have some new options for my league card.

Here’s a brief look at where I am so far.

And a preview of Nessa. That pose cannot be comfortable.

My team. I’m hoping Avery’s Electric attacks will help, even though he is a bit under-leveled...

First, the Gym puzzle. It’s not really that hard. You could probably do it completely by accident.

In the old days, we had puzzles involving sliding around on icy floors, and using the Strength HM to push boulders into the correct holes. Now /that/ was a puzzle!

I wonder if Nessa ever gets cold, wearing that?

Her Dreadnaw wasn’t a super-high level, but it was incredibly powerful.

It knocked out my Dynamaxed Pokemon, even when the Dreadnaw itself was small!

I had no choice but to pull out my starter, and fight water with water.

Turns out Nessa’s calm demeanor breaks when she faces failure.

And now it’s dusk. I still don’t get how time of day works in this game - is it just an aesthetic thing related to the story?

A change in lighting can make for totally different pictures.

I have access to a new job company. They must be a sponsor for Nessa, since she wore a pin with their logo. Does this mean we can actually encounter Wailord in the game?

I also get the Chairman’s league card. I like the way he writes his signature.

You know the drill - can’t advance with my life until I follow the plotted line into this restaurant. At least it looks fancy inside. I like the Wishi-Washi designs on the floor.

Some story stuff happens. I am completely extraneous to this conversation.

I don’t really know how I feel about the Chairman. I still think he’s probably up to no good, but he’s not the cackling-evil sort that Lusamine was. Maybe it’s actually Oleana who’s evil, and Rose is being manipulated.

This restaurant: Nice location, horrible service. The whole time I sat here - empty glasses, and no food. If I’m gonna be forced to sit and listen to some exposition, I should at least get a meal out of it. 

Okay, that’s all for now! In the next entry, I will enter this tunnel into yet another mine.

[ifeveristoday]

Amazon releases the Boom! Buffy a day earlier than its published date - I thought it was just a fluke with the first digital copy, but I preordered the second issue and it happened again.

Buckle down internets, here are some mildly quick reactions to issue 2 of the Boom! reboot

okay, so the preview panels are fun to guess about and theorize but wow, dialogue really puts everything in context and all of the supposed drama that I was thinking/okay reading other people’s thoughts re: what was going to happen -- I was wrong about pretty much everything except for Buffy disliking Joyce’s boyfriend. Of a year. 

who is probably most likely not evil or going to die in a horrible fashion ...right?

Nice meeting you Eric.

The pacing of this issue is just as quick as the first one - I feel because there are so many characters and such a rich mythology to draw from, that there’s going to be a long run of introducing all of them into the Boom!verse before there is a long sustained arc - that we meet 2-3 new characters each issue and then get a corner piece of the overall puzzle.

This is both good and bad - because it can be overwhelming to a new reader who may not have seen the show and is experiencing Buffy for the very first time in comic form, but for a long time fan like myself - these little introductory drips make me really impatient for what comes next. I just want to collect all the Scoobies and get to the story!

The new additions - Eric and Rose don’t strike me as anything more than love interests currently and are appropriately supportive of Joyce and Willow. 

They’re more like cameos but I hope they will get fleshed out in future issues.

Onto canon characters-

Cordelia, Cordelia, Cordelia. In full Queen C/Tracey Flick mode. The twist is that there is no animosity between her and Willow, and Cordelia is that rare popular person who’s actually nice to everyone which is so not how popular media portrays high school to be. I know! Willow envies Cordelia but it’s not due to any messy romance issues, it’s because she thinks Cordelia is so much nicer, smarter and more beautiful. Rose sweetly reminds her that she is all that too.

So for everyone who was worried that just because Willow wears crop tops now she isn’t the awkward insecure muppet skinning sweetheart from the show --- she still is.

Cordelia’s confidence and charisma have been amped to 11 in the Boom!verse - she’s running for class president and already has been Ms. Sunnydale 2017 and 2018. In a conversation with Spike, she also reveals that she doesn’t care what other people think about her.

It’s interesting in this introduction of Cordelia- she’s the most overtly confident, with it character so far - Buffy has that whole secret identity she’s poorly keeping and burgeoning slayer powers, which leads to prickly independence and sassing of authority figures and also a remarkable lack of knowing how to read a room, Willow has self-doubt about her own worth, and Xander -- well those blue boxes were his blogs and feelings of alienation the entire time. They’re three separate characters that are drifting alone in the same direction, whereas Cordelia has the appearance of popularity, beauty, and connecting to others. So ...pretty parallel to the show actually.

Robin - similar to Cordelia in the confidence department - he’s also super smooth - the closing distance between him and Buffy in each descending panel was a nice touch. Buffy, who is already on edge for inadvertently showing off her slayer speed to the track coach, mistakenly thinks Robin is flirting with her - which he neatly turns around into a compliment and a flirt. It was cute, but I want to know why he fell off a roof.

But back to that other meet cute - Cordelia spots a few of her campaign balloons floating around Sunnydale woods and because she’s environmentally minded, runs to catch them.

Spike is lurking in the woods. As you do.

This dialogue:

What’s a nice British guy like you lurking around high school campuses for?

Luring girls like you into the woods.

What big eyes you have, Grandmother.

Cordelia does not interrogate Spike further about why he’s hanging out in the woods and even offers him a ride -- but this is brushed off due to Cordelia’s belief that paranoia is pointless - “..what’s the point in assuming everyone is out to getcha?”

Oh you sweet summer child.

They’re all so young, Gandalf. *sniff

And Spike knows her name, so that’s going to end up real well.

I thought it was both believable and telling that Xander’s blog box wrote “Girls don’t even have to try to be likable. A friendly smile, and they have anyone wrapped around their finger.”

Spoken like a boy who doesn’t know anything about girls. But he’s in pain and we’ve seen what happens when people are in pain and don’t reach out - as quickly as the Scooby Gang assembled in the first issue, they are distant from each other in this issue as other characters are introduced. Xander is constantly shown as an outsider looking wistfully at Willow/Rose and Cordelia. And the chat group with Buffy/Willow, he really feels left out. I honestly hope they don’t go down the path Jonathan did in Earshot with Xander’s characterization, but that last ominous blog box - When am I gonna finally get what I want? <shades of school shooter I’m just saying there’s media precedence>

And finally, to Anya and Drusilla - they’re the keepers of the Spooky and hint at an arc - what brought them to Sunnydale in the first place. Drusilla knows Anya is a demon and can’t be tortured or killed, and Anya tricks Drusilla with a psychology trick, which -- I’m not sure I like, but I will admit I laughed at Anya’s smug expression in the last panel. Bet you feel real dumb right now -- indeed. I’m going to calm down on the theorizing of future previews because they are misleading without dialogue. 

So future issue: JENNY CALENDAR (Year Book Club will now be meeting in Ms. Calendar’s classroom in Room 106), the school play is Phantom of the Opera (could be worse. could be Cats.) and there’s a sinkhole in the Science Wing.

And there’s a gossip girl style bulletin at the beginning of the issue:

Ok, guys, NEW SCHOOL YEAR UPDATE! There’s a new student named Buffy and she seems SUPER cool, but also, like, super introverted? Btw I am GREAT at talking to introverts, but she spends all her time in the library with the hot dad librarian. Weird. Also, I hear she walks around a lot at night STABBING PEOPLE. Who does that? Maybe she just needs a new friend to show her that stabbing is bad!

Immediate headcanon: this is Harmony writing these updates. Also Xander’s blog has only three followers. 

Final verdict - they’re still hammering out characterizations and the tone of the story, but I dislike that the Scooby Gang has basically evaporated in the second issue and that the cameos of the love interests don’t really add anything to the story except to announce their existence. Eric is totally not going to bite it at any time.

Buffy basically only hangs out in the library and hasn’t attempted to make any other friends besides Xander and Willow, there is no Dawn (and no Mr. Gordo, this is outrageous), Cordelia’s charm offensive makes me think she’s going to reveal herself as a Mayor Wilkins type later on but until then, shine on you crazy diamond. Giles is there to be annoyed at Buffy and I find myself in that odd position of being both on their sides but mostly like Giles, get your feet off the table, Buffy. I was hoping to find out more about when Buffy started training with Giles - they’re definitely not close yet, still very much in the I’m just doing this because I have to and why don’t you take your sacred calling more seriously, you frivolous American teenage girl phase. But yeah, she’s bratty to both Joyce and Giles.

Willow and Rose were there to be cute, and that’s appreciated but again - Rose didn’t really bring anything meaningful to the storyline.

Also yeah there’s a giant bat monster that kills vampires loose in Sunnydale.

Must be Tuesday.

[havingonlydreams]

i am never going to use this tumblr for posts again

alright so since i finally got out of testing today and i learned how to scroll frame by frame through youtube videos, i am going to reward myself by doing an unnecessarily thorough breakdown of the quanzhigaoshou live action trailer imagery(watch cn fanbase beat me by a country mile)

nighttime cityscape/highway scene fades out

team happy walks into one side of an arena, wearing competition uniform (i will explain this later)

we switch to team excellent era, coming in through the opposite side of the same arena, also in competition uniform. their side of the arena is lit in red, not blue. are they playing at the same time? is this happy vs ee? :shrug:

also, why tf is a backpack part of all these uniforms? how much stuff do esport players need to carry anyway? did a backpack company sponsor the production??

panning shot of signs, looks like they’re for huang shaotian or blue rain

that’s cruel, br-fen. why does captain get no love :cry:

shot continues moving, now the signs are for han wenqing

based on lighting, i don’t think they’re the same shot

fade out to scene of arena packed with fans and players

if I’m getting these signs right, looks like it’s (right to left, moving with the camera):

team void, tiny herb, tyranny, blue rain, excellent era

so, all stars

honestly, the scale’s kinda small. thumbs down to location scouting – the weird lighting polyhedrons confirm that it’s the same arena as the one from the happy/ee shots in the beginning, so expect ~location weirdness/ambiguity~

unnecessarily synchronized card insertion

based on the card logo, i wanna say tiny herb?

ee responds in kind!

tyranny puts headphones on in unison. the headphones are white. also, i think this is their casual uniform. based on the giant maple leaf in the background, i would say that this is an away game with ee, but the worn metal and circle room in the background look more like tyranny’s supervillain clubhouse

now ee is playing. this shot looks like ee turf – they’ve got white-backed seats, and that weird angular lighting motif. also they’re wearing black and blue headphones because ~product placement~

i say turf, not arena, because there don’t appear to be any actual player booths in these two shots, the set design looks like what we’ve seen for the clubhouse pics (this is because the production couldn’t afford to film all of the games in actual arenas, isn’t it)

also, ee is wearing competition uniforms.

now tiny herb is playing on what looks like the same set, but with the background lit in red, not blue. maybe they’re playing against ee? also from this angle I can clearly see that they are *headsets*, not headphones, which means that vc is not banned by this version’s alliance. some dude in blue is hanging out in the background, probably an official of some sort. I am not sure whether this is their casual/competitive uniform

a guy in ee uniform sweeps his hands across a keyboard with unnecessarily colorful backlighting

~product placement~

ye xiu (yang yang) stands in front of ‘glory pro league’ hologram thing with his back turned, wearing the happy casual uniform

mouse shots! keyboard shots!

face shot! (of ye xiu, wearing casual uniform (puma!) and headset (white))

group shot of happy walking down arena hallway, wearing competition uniform. this is where I explain this bit. so as far as I can tell, every team has (2) uniforms: a casual uniform, which looks like a tracksuit and those enormous thick sweatpants had an ugly, ugly, baby, and a competition uniform, which looks dorky as hell. all of the female characters manage to elevate the terrible costuming by being beautiful, but are dragged down by the fact that apparently the alliance uniform for women mandates a miniskirt, because apparently no one has gotten cold legs in an arena, ever. (to be fair to the costume department, its not that they did a terrible job, its that their job was to replicate esport uniforms, which are a hot mess)

the main difference between happy’s casual and competitive uniform, btw, is that the casual one has a high collar and the puma branding, and the competitive has this funky sweater? not-collar thing

idk fashion words

also, ye xiu is wearing a mask because Reasons

(the reason is that judging by chen guo, this is from the challenger league arc, and the producer/director/writer/whoever decided to move around certain things)

boom! ee vs happy in the big arena, baby~~~

one dude from each team is standing under the spotlights, probably sx and yx by process of elimination

presumably!yx is NOT wearing a mask. maybe it gave him acne

pan across team happy getting ready to play in their booth? idk where this is

i see at least three types of headsets in this shot, and wei chen, who is not wearing his. maybe he got knocked out early?

now it’s the weird circle room that was in that early shot with tyranny! advertising on the ceiling lights, nice

I … have no idea what’s going on here. giant ee leaf on the sides, bunch of logos I can’t make out in the back, there are just *way* more people in here than any match would call for

like I think the dudes in the middle are wearing ee casual uniforms, but everyone else seems to be wearing black tracksuits? i don’t even know

ye xiu, geared up in full hobo gear (long coat&hoodie), storms out of the ee club set that was previewed in earlier set pics.

keyboard and mouse action!

ye xiu playing in the ‘storage room’ on a gaming laptop. also, he’s changed into a *different* hoodie

I have no clue what brand the laptop is; it’s the same as some of the monitors in a couple of earlier shots, might be Chinese?

yu wenzhou cameo

ye xiu hobowalking sadly in the snow (ngl, the hoodie make me laugh a little)

excellent era (w/su mucheng) walking into some stadium wearing casual uniforms. they are piss ugly

(the uniforms, that is. also ee minus mucheng, but who’s counting?)

happy coming from the opposite direction, also in casuals

and they pass each other! dramatically!

probably!yx taking a glory badge out of a box. can’t make out the details, but it says ‘1’ at the bottom, so these are probably the drama replacement for championship rings

tang rou focus shot! also, if that’s her line in the vo, I am *very* pleased

“turn all of the ‘can’t be done’s into ‘can do’”

yu wenzhou shot in casual uniform

ye xiu on The Motorcyle (pfft)

chen guo prepping for a celebration at Happy! she is Very Excited about that champagne tower. not sure who the two messing around with balloons in the bg are

tang rou in a cab looking upwards –

-to su mucheng, walking inside a stadium while wearing ee competition uniform

huang shaotian smiling at yu wenzhou while the rest of br preps. also, the blue rain competition uniform is an Abomination, which you will not appreciate until seen face on

ye xiu, whispering ominously ‘this is the last match’ as happy leans in around him

wei chen and… steamed bun? who is making a weird face, thumbs up

‘good luck’ whispers wang jiexi

and steamed bun *grabs* the challenger’s league cup, lifting it to wild cheers

chen guo and the crowd are ecstatic

partayyyyyyy

‘I will NOT give up’ says han wenqing, man who nobody, ever, has thought would give up

han wenqing and huang shaotian fistbump as tyranny and blue rain walk down a hallway, both dressed in their competition uniforms. zhang xinjie is confused. yu wenzhou is smilingly tolerant of the fact that hst is fistbumping right across his chest (huang shao is going to DIE, later)

okay so,

uniforms

tyranny’s looks fine! maybe the best competition uniform in the alliance (the bar is not high)

they’ve got a pretty normal chevron pattern across the front, some stripes. about the only problems are that the pants are a *little* too tight, and that some tyranny members are absolute maniacs who zip their jackets up all the way so it looks like they’re wearing the worlds weirdest collared shirt

blue rain …

so the closure is not that bad! pretty unconventional, an asymmetric zip with two fasteners across the top and some kinda … shawl collar? idk. I actually like it

but the pattern … i feel like someone said to the costume department, ‘you know, all of these uniforms have too many straight lines in their designs. we should add some curved lines. give the curves to blue rain! they’ve got no girls, so it’s the only way they’ll get any!’ and then they doubled down by adding raised piping for emphasis

that, and the way that uniform material looks like some kinda spandex-velour mix … it reminds me of the star trek:the next generation uniform! also, the casual uniform does the same curved line thing except in the opposite direction, and as a cutout, so its even worse

chen guo cheering in crowd

maybe a projection screen? tyranny and ee logos up on the wall

and happy logo SLAMS shut

ye xiu with his hoodie looking sad and pathetic in the snow up at happy

happy in competition uniforms coming downstairs (chen guo, so challenger’s league)

also damn, happy internet café is *swanky*

I mean, my eyes would hurt from the glare after a while, but it’d be pretty

EXCELLENT ERA

trophies. looks like seasons 1,2,3 going down to the left

sun xiang at the whiteboard lecturing ee. he is the only one not wearing the casual uniform. where is your piss ugly uniform, xiang xiang? this is a team endeavor, you’re not allowed to not wear it. it builds morale

BLUE RAIN

yu wenzou smiles

huang shaotian … fake guitars? with … something that’s been bundled up

TINY HERB

i guess this is why they redesigned the logo, so it would match the aesthetic and could be slammed shut like this, but i still don’t like it

honestly, tiny herb training room aesthetic is incredibly beautiful and soothing

but still way too much white, what the hell ppl, don’t you know about eyestrain?

‘today we’re training how to put our headsets on, synchonizedly’ sponsored by hp

also apparently that *was* the tiny herb competition uniform earlier, since this is the casual one. hmm. a bit too olive drab. tyranny’s still winning

signature wang jiexi EYES shot

TYRANNY

tyranny training room looks a lot less like a supervillain lair when brightly lit! go figure

now it looks like an overexposed supervillain lair *set*. progress!

captain han is ANGRY

hands clasp in front of happy members in the bg. tang rou is def not paying attention

is ye xiu wearing a mask AND a hat??? dude, chill

happy walking into crowd of fans&paps … somewhere. why is steamed bun kneeling next to the door? :it is a mystery:

group cheer! no ladies

group … orange juice! with su mucheng! damn, qiao yifan’s tall.

confetti in the stadium, and reporters charge forward

judging by teams and signs, this is all stars, so reaction to ye xiu’s dragon raising its head?

‘beautiful!’ ejaculated ye xiu

key and mouse action ~~

and the crowdteam happy goes wild!

team fist pump! someone has put their phone on their chair. I hope they don’t sit on it

ye xiu putting on headset in happy internet café. cant tell if this is hobo!hoodie or hoodie no.3

ye xiu :eyes:

key press. wtf program starts up with ‘s’

cgi is cgi

everything looks super gloomy and overcast ~ i hope they do more varied environments

and we see lord grim! they’ve gone for a really…tarnished metal? look for the MMU

like, I would not mistake it for an umbrella.

yang yang face

THE KINGS AVATAR

  Okay, so if you were looking for anything of actual substance in this, looks like they’re doing ch.1 - 1052 at least, probably 1-1060, so the end of the challenger league arc.

[thebigreylotheory]

Star Wars Episode 9 Dream/Nightmare?

Well, it’s that time of year, again.

Here, it can’t decide if it wants to be Rainy Days and Mondays or the dog days of summer.

Last night, I dreamt I went to Manderley, again…oh wait, wrong blog.

But my brain has definitely decided that it wants to dream about Star Wars, again.

In this dream, Atlanta’s Dragon*Con was Star Wars Celebration and Star Wars Celebration was Dragon*Con. Hm, probably because both are on my mind. I really don’t know if Atlanta actually has anywhere large enough to host Celebration. 

(This is an uncrowded day at one of the host hotels…looks lovely.) Dragon*Con is a mess of walking between hotels in the heat and getting accosted by panhandlers and Beastie Boy flash mobs (true story). So, this should have been a red flag to my subconscious right there. But I digress.

And, of course, because this is a dream, and I took extra strength Vitafusion Melatonin, there was a special panel showing the end of Episode 9.

So, we were down to the final battle of the movie…

And, Luke, in some form or fashion, wasn’t dead.

Maybe he was a Force Ghost, but he wasn’t blue, because he’s just that good, or maybe they found Darth Plagueis’ Resurrection/Philosopher’s Stone (and Kylo was going to wish Vader back but lost the coin toss to Rey), or maybe they got the Dragon Balls and Luke was just hanging at King Kai’s Planet for a while, or achieved some 1up level in the Force where he doesn’t have to be a transparent blue meanie,

You know like Obi-wan and his notorious vagueness on family matters,

Or Yoda, the fire setting troll.

Luke and Kylo were powerless as they watched Rey being held captive, sorta like this,

By a guy in a white uniform. Definitely not Snoke or Thrawn. In my mind, he was a little closer to a Prince Xizor type, but human. Long white hair.

The villain in white was making his torture into a game…And, it’s going to sound crazy, this is already crazy, but it was a little like:

Wheel of Fortune, in the sense that Rey, Kylo, and Luke had a guess at something to make it all stop.

(BTW, has there ever been a SW Wheel of Fortune night??)

Then the worst imaginable happened…

Nature called, and I had to go to the little girl’s room (I have the worst luck even in dreams). For some reason, I thought this would be an excellent time to go…that the game/scene was just going to go on and on and I’d make it back in no time.

I was wrong.

By the time I got back, the Episode 9 ending preview was over.

So I asked my seat neighbor what happened.

And she’s all: “Luke’s gone, Rey died.”

All around me, people are upset. True, in reality, the fanbase is already divided…In this dream, a lot of people were shocked that Kylo, apparently, was the only character to survive the sequel trilogy…

Maybe it was more of a nightmare?

I mean, I’m a biased Reylo, but dark without light? Where’s the balance in that?

Now that I’m awake, I’d like to edit this dream and imagine it could be a setup for an Episode 9 Part I and Part II.

Wouldn’t it just gall us (in an entertaining way) if Episode 9 Part 1 was extremely vague as to whether Rey was dead or alive?? (Suddenly the Bon Jovi song is in my head…).

But, probably not.