#but that’s not ‘really good choice of reference’ and just a good ass extended metaphor

[genreawareness]

compilation of every time austin pulls a reference that makes my mouth drop open

[girl4music]

"WHAT THIS MEANS FOR THE SHOWS

If we operate with the premise of "the demon takes over and sets up shop", the actual philosophical and psychological discussions of the show become moot. There's no need for 'Angel The Series' because Angel isn't responsible for 150 years of carnage. Some random demon is. Spike should regain his soul in Season 7 and go "wait, who are YOU people?" because he's just returned to his own body. But that's never how the show treats it when it matters. Both shows are, in many ways, extended metaphors and extended allegories. The only times it's referred to as some external source are from the mouths of people who've had no experience being vampires, using a, frankly, really understandable excuse to explain something that's otherwise pretty heartbreaking. If it's just some random vampire going 'hey, these guys had mad mommy/daddy issues, let me replicate that," the entire show becomes profoundly less compelling."

Five By Five Takes slaying it once again with their Buffyverse analyses. This is exactly what I mean by how it's pointless Angel has a whole ass redemption story if his choice and agency and consciousness is taken away from him when he loses his soul and it gets restored again. First of all - what does that entail? And second of all - what is to learn from it? What's the moral behind the condition of nonconsenually giving over your identity to a demon? Five By Five Takes brilliantly explains why Buffy and Angel becomes so much more worth watching and re-watching when that black and white demon/vampire/monster lore just disappears from the then-narrative and the lines between good and evil start blurring. Because if all I got from it was demonic possession, I'd have dropped 'BtVS' in the trash ages ago with all the rest of the black and white rubbish. Instead - it's become one of my all-time favourite TV shows. And despite its inconsistencies in its lore and world-building writing, it still manages to thoroughly capture my heart, mind and soul. And it's precisely because they discarded the initial premise of "a vampire isn't a person at all" bullshit Giles regurgitates in eariy Season 1. it's precisely because they blur the lines on all of that why I give a shit to watch it and to continue watching it. To engage in and interact with it. If all I could get out of it is "there's no half-way", I wouldn't be here now. I really don't care if the lore is wonky. I just want a compelling story with excellent character representation and development.

[fancyfade]

I really like the way Hardware (1993) addresses the topic of superhero ethics.

Quick synopsis of the set-up: Curtis Metcalf, genius inventor, comes from a working class family and winds up from his perspective being set up to be the heir apparent to the inventor/businessman, Edwin Alva, who takes him under his wing and funds his schooling and, once he graduates, his projects. However Alva was actually just funding his schooling and appearing to encourage him in his endeavors so he could lock Curtis in a contract that gives him no rights to the royalties his inventions makes Alva (unclear if he has any like legal right as in copyright to his inventions as well I would assume not but it was not addressed yet). Curtis can’t work for a competitor either in the same field so he’s essentially stuck working for Alva if he wants to do what he’s dedicated his entire life to (inventing technology stuff).

Curtis initially tries to get some blackmail material on Alva so he can get out of his contract, but finds out Alva is involved in the criminal underworld via weapons and drugs dealing and smuggling.

also the character’s races are important to the story: i’m going to not comment a lot on this because I don’t want to be talking out my ass, so I’m going to just be like... relating things without commentary or sourcing what the original intent was from the creators: Curtis is a black man and likens what Alva did to him as slavery. Denys Cowan, one of the co-founders of Milestone comics and artist on hardware 1993 and the new series, who worked with the main author of hardware (1993) dwayne mcduffie, mentions that Hardware’s experiencse and the way he is treated (especially the glass ceiling) are part of how it felt to be a black creator in comics (link). (Back to the comic, not the interview) Curtis points out how many people perceive him as angry and bitter with a chip on his shoulder (Curtis describes himself as angry for good reasons). Alva is a white man who is too big and has his hands in too many pockets for the evidence curtis initially got on him to stick.

This is why Curtis created hardware: initially, his plan was to blackmail alva, when he finds out what Alva is up to he tries to send the evidence to the authorities because it goes beyond his personal problems with Alva. Then when that fails, he creates his armored suit (which he calls Hardware) to interfere with Alva’s operations and prevent him from doing more damage while getting revenge.

When he initially starts out as Hardware, Curtis has very little social life, he divides himself entirely between working his day job as cover for Alva, then working his night job as Hardware. he barely sleeps due to this. When he’s hardware, has a variety of lethal weaponry, the biggest of which is his omnicannon (which seems to like.. explode everything? he KOs a helicopter with it). He uses his weapons only on people working for Alva who are usually trying to kill him as far as I can tell. He’s also pretty unconcerned with killing them. He blows up a helicopter with someone still in it, shoots people, drops a guy he had pulled out from a helicopter from an unsurvivable fall, and cuts off a the arm of a construction worker who was holding a gun on him.

Curtis is more thinking on his end goal (getting revenge on Alva and stopping Alva’s criminal enterprises) than he is the means he takes to get there.

Pretty early in the run, Curtis is injured and found by his long term female friend Barraki. Since she finds him in his Hardware armor, he has no choice but to tell her what’s going on and she is disgusted. She views Curtis as extremely selfish -- she refers to it as him killing people “because his boss wouldn’t give him a raise” with no visible remorse. Curtis says he has no remorse period, not just no visible remorse. Barraki leaves and says doesn’t feel like she actually knows him.

Curtis obviously cares a lot about her opinion, because once she makes her stance on it clear he is kind of at a loss of what to do. When she asks him what he wants, he says he just wants her approval (also that she’s his only friend and he doesn’t want to lose her).

He winds up solving things as Hardware non-lethally for a while (replaces his omnicannon supershot with a neural net to paralyze people rather than blowing them up, tho he still has access to the omnicannon’s main shell for when he needs it), gives alva’s employees in the stuff he’s blowing up time to evacuate, etc

Then he has like I guess this... dream sequence? Guilt induced dream? Where he is seeing the people he harmed (the guy who’s arm he chopped off talking to him about his injury and losing his job, the dead bodies of the people he killed) and then Curtis talking to him as he is Hardware (like a his non-armored civilian version is berating his armored version for his life choices) and giving him a running commentary on his own life up to this point. People who are either personally important to him (Barraki) or socially important (a priest, Oprah) attack him for his decisions. Then when it comes to who speaks in his defense in his dream, it’s his employer, Alva, who created this situation from when Curtis was a kid to exploit him and benefit off Curtis’s talents and treats Curtis as no more than a cog in his machine (When Curtis initially approaches Alva for his profits, he does so with the assumption he’ll get them, because he had believed Alva to be like a father to him, Alva laughs at him and says he’s not respected, merely useful, and dehumanizes him by likening him to a dog).

Dream Alva’s defense of Hardware’s previous actions is that as Hardware, Curtis is doing what he was supposed to do -- treating other people as expendable resources in pursuit of his goals. So in Curtis’s guilt, he likens himself to Alva, the man who has been treating him like a tool.

I think this is kind of interesting because it’s something I’ve seen a lot in recent discussions of whether it’s okay for superheroes to kill people and one of them is that when you kill a person you’re not just killing that person. You’re killing whoever they were to the people who cared about them, if they’re looking out for anyone you’re affecting whoever they were providing for as well -- I think that’s why the initial person who appeared in Curtis’ guilt-dream was not someone he killed but the man who’s arm he cut off. There’s sort of this commentary on humanizing people I suppose with how the villain so clearly dehumanizes Curtis and treats him as a tool to his own ends, and then how we see Curtis imagining how the people he injured or killed while being Hardware might be affected not just in terms of “they got injured or killed” but also he imagines whatever their lives beyond working for Alva were. Curtis’s guilt is humanizing them in his head where earlier he said he had no remorse whatsoever.

Throughout the comic, there’s this metaphor for being trapped in a cage and then getting out but not actually being free (initially told through Curtis’s pet parakeet he had as a kid -- the parakeet flew out of his cage and tried to get out via the window, but only kept busting his head against the window, unable to understand he couldn’t go outside)

[image: 3 comic panels from hardware 1993 #1 showing young curtis metcalf standing in front of a window where a parakeet is laying down on his side with his  feathers ruffled. curtis grabs the parakeet gingerly in his hands and puts the bird back in the cage with a clang. his internal monologue reads “my bird made a common error. he mistook being out of his cage... for being free.” end image]

Curtis straight up says that his earlier actions as hardware were not letting him be free: he turned hardware into another cage.

[image: 3 comic panels from Hardware (1993) #4 showing barraki young and Curtis Metcalf standing and talking. Curtis is initially looking down regretfully at his hardware helmet. He says “I built the hardware armor to help me escape from the cage that alva put me in. Then I proceeded to turn hardware into yet another cage.” he looks at a parakeet that is flying around his house (his new pet) and says “see, Alva will make a mistake... eventually. And then I’ll put him away for good. That’s still very important to me. But it’s not going to be my whole life.” end image]

I don’t know whether the cage was supposed to only be in terms of how he conducted himself as Hardware or whether it also extended to work life balance (right after this he says that he was not going to make putting Alva away his whole life, he is letting Barraki in rather than pushing her away and he got the parakeet) and also his general view of the world (I already analyzed how he changes the way that he views the people working for alva). Either way I feel like the way that it was addressed was in a very satisfying manner that never wound up being preachy but did ask a lot of questions.

EDIT:

more commentary on the parakeet analogy from the writer of hardware: season one (the new relaunch)

The original Hardware #1 opened with a flashback of a young Curtis Metcalf remembering his pet parakeet escaping its cage only to be stopped by a barrier of glass, mistaking “being out of the cage for being free.” A brilliant meta-commentary, Thomas believes that it is “one of the greatest monologues in the history of comics,” and perfectly captures the entire story of being black in America.

[figonas]

Twilight Re-watch Notes Pt. 1 - A Contest for the Worst Movie Quote in History

I'd like to think I'm funny so please enjoy my scene-by-scene notes from a recent Twilight Saga re-watch.

Hey Catherine Hardwicke, opening with the death of an animal was probably not the best choice but go off I guess??

There is a lot of general Bella awkwardness that I'm skipping over here but the scene in gym class is so horrifically, painfully uncomfortable that I almost passed out from the second-hand embarrassment.

Jessica trying her best to be fake nice to the human embodiment of a crumpled soda can: "Aren't people from Arizona like....really tan"

Bella with all the cadence of a child who just found out Santa isn't real: "yeah..I guess that's why they kicked me out"

Mike clearly just trying to get his dick wet: "HAHAH you are funny"

no mike she is not.

I'm not gonna go into the biology class scene because god knows tumblr has beaten that particular horse to death. BUT the scene in the administration office immediately after that is a TRIP. Edward has one of his most dramatic lines here when they won't let him switch classes: “I’ll just have to endure it” ?!?!?!?!?!?! This is INSANITY, he sounds like he's going to burst into tears like Edward please chill you aren't even being a little subtle.

I will never get over Bella trying to put Ketchup on her burger and then just???? giving up???? when it doesn't come out after she limply shakes it approximately once.

“HOW YOU LIKIN DA RAIN GIRL” Is our first contender for the worst and most unnatural line in movie history, and trust me there are plenty more.

Bella accusatorily saying “you were gone” to Edward as if this dude who she met for approximately 30 minutes 2 weeks ago owes her even a PALTRTY SCRAP of an explanation about anything???????

Actually, this whole scene is a horrific nightmare of awkward intrusive conversation:

“You’re asking me about the weather” HOE WHAT ELSE ARE YOU GONNA TALK ABOUT YOU DON’T KNOW EACH OTHER

“hey did you get contacts” WHO JUST ASKS THAT?!?

and of course; “it’s the fluorescents” [RUNS AWAY]

Charlie and Bella have the only organic-sounding dialogue in the entire movie. Any awkwardness they have is BELIEVABLE father-daughter awkwardness and not like "I'm being forced to film this against my will" awkwardness like every other exchange in this film series.

Bella asks Edward ALL OF ONCE about him saving her from the truck and Edward gets so haughty and smug thinking that Bella won't figure it out

“you’re not gonna let this go are you?” “no” “then I hope you enjoy disappointment” [storms off] MY DUDE LITERALLY 2 SCENES LATER SHE FIGURES IT OUT IN 3 GOOGLE CLICKS

“I had an adrenaline rush, it’s very common you can google it” contender number two for the terrible dialogue award.

Edward saying “if you were smart you would stay away from me” AFTER HE APPROACHED HER LIKE FUCK OFF [skeleton throwing its own skull gif]

Kstew got a lot of flack for her performance in this movie but when she has a good partner to exchange lines with she SHINES. The scene with Angela and her at the beach where she tells her to ask Eric to prom is GOOD. EVERY scene with Charlie in THIS ENTIRE FRANCHISE is GOOD. It is nothing but pure misogyny that Rpatz didn’t catch any flack for his truly, horrifically awkward performance

I cannot believe Stephanie thought it would be a good idea to have Edward save Bella from potentially getting gang r*ped like I get it girl is about the drama but still this is just a TOOOUCH too far

“your hand is so cold,” WHO SAYS THIS TO SOMEONE THEY BARELY KNOW COMPLETELY UNPROMPTED???

SHE TRIES TO REFUSE CARRYING BEAR MACE WHEN SHE WAS ALMOST R*PED NOT 4 HOURS PREVIOUSLY LIKE SIS CARRY A KNIFE?!?!?!?!?

The “you’re impossibly fast & strong” monologue is so bad I want to barf

“I’ve killed people before” “doesn’t matter” BITCH YES IT DOES WHAT IS WRONG WITH YOU

“MY OWN PERSONAL BRAND OF HEROIN” IS SO BAD. Like we all recognize how bad this is right? Especially when one considered the target demographic for these films, i.e. teenage girls, have NO FUCKING FRAME OF REFERENCE FOR THIS WHAT.SO.EVER.

“And so the lion fell in love with the lamb” YOU’VE KNOWN EACH OTHER FOR ALL OF 3 SECONDS I CAN’T WITH Y'ALL. AT LEAST THE BOOK HAD SOME BUILD-UP JESUS GEEZUS

Who thought this meadow scene was a good idea, they need to be sent straight to hell. WHY ARE THEY LAYING DOWN LIKE, SIT MAYBE?????? IT’S SO WEIRD AND UNNATURAL THEY LOOK LIKE DOLLS I HATE IT

The scene where they get out of the car and Edward puts his arm around Bella while Spotlight by Mutemath plays in the background is TOP TIER teen drama bs and I love it. Far and away the best shot in the movie apart from The Baseball Scene(TM).

I will never get over the fact that Edward's bitch ass rats Bella out for already eating when she comes over to meet his family. BE FUCKING COOL EDWARD FOR ONCE IN YOUR LIFE, GOD!!!

Esme is too pure for this world I can’t deal with her, & Emmet waving the knife is my favorite thing in all 5 of these movies

Why tf are Alice and Jasper fucking off doing god knows what in a tree and not helping with dinner like everyone else? Y'all ain't special even Rosalie is helping

Esme talking to Rosalie “Clean this up..now” I LOVE YOU BE MY MOM

Earlier they talk about the fact that vampires don’t sleep BUT the first thing Bella says when she walks into Edward's room is “no bed” girl we know what you after you ain't slick.....

WHAT IS THIS DANCING SCENE IN HIS BEDROOM IT’S HORRIBLE TO WATCH and I want to find whoever thought “well I could always make you” was a good line for Edward to say and slap them directly in the mouth.

“hold on tight spider monkey” excuse me while I VOMIT

Mike offering his opinion on Bella dating Edward HOWEVER justified is automatically invalidated by A. his own romantic interest in Bella and B. the fact that he has also know Bella for all of 10 minutes & has no bearing on her personal life whatsoever

THE PAST COUPLE OF MONTHS THIS MAN HAS BEEN COMING INTO HER ROOM AND WATCHING HER SLEEP THIS IS RED FLAG CITY LIKE BELLA WATCH A TRUE CRIME DOCUMENTARY OR READ THE NEWS FOR FUCKS SAKE

THIS FRANCHISE HAS THE MOST HORRIBLE KISSING SCENES IN MOVIE HISTORY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! YOU CAN HEAR LITERALLY EVERY BREATH, EVERY AWKWARD PRESS OF LIPS. You're telling me THIS was the best take of this???? CAN YOU IMAGINE HOW AWKWARD THIS WAS TO FILM

The whole scene when Bella is telling her dad about her date with Edward is absolutely god tier. Charlie snapping the barrel of the shotgun closed, him motioning that he has a halo on, asking her if she still has her pepper spray. BILLY BURKE LIFTED THIS MOVIE UP AND TRIED SO HARD TO CARRY IT ON HIS BROAD, MUSTACHIOED DAD SHOULDERS, WE STAN

WHERE TO START WITH THE BASEBALL SCENE:

Supermassive Black Hole in the background, Alice going AWF with her pitching, Rosalie getting all pissed when Bella says she's out and Emmett yells "c'mon babe it's just a game" like the puppy dog of a person (vampire?) he is, CARLISLE WEARING A SCARF WHILE PLAYING BASEBALL, I WILL NEVER EMOTIONALLY RECOVER FROM JASPERS BAT TRICKS, EMMET AND EDWARDS LAUGH AFTER CRASHING INTO ONE ANOTHER.

A TRULY IMMACULATE MOVIE SCENE. This scene isn’t long enough

“My monkey man” might be the worst line in this movie, I’m so torn between which one is the worst. Also, I'm just now realizing that this is the second time someone has compared a loved one to some type of monkey and I really don't like it.

Bella's defeated “I can’t hurt him” breaks my heart every time. AND FUCKING BILLY BURKE pulling out his acting chops with Charlie’s poor little broken sounding “I know I’m not that much fun to be around we can do more stuff together” & “I just gotcha back” LIKE LITERALLY EVERYTHING ABOUT THIS SCENE HURTS ME ON A PHYSICAL LEVEL AND I AM ENTITLED TO FINANCIAL COMPENSATION

I know I've skipped over a lot but it's just a lot of like star wipe level montage of nonsense, so we are mOVING ON to what is possibly the biggest plot hole I've never recognized before now: How in the hell was James planning on luring Bella out if he didn’t find that videotape of Bella's mom looking for her????? Or was he just going to bust up in the holiday inn, metaphorical guns blazing & toss Bella out a window???

This fight scene between James & Edward is VERY poorly choreographed and you can practically see the stunt wires pulling on their clothes but no one is surprised..this is Twilight after all.

Who the fuck starts the fire in the ballet studio if Carlisle & Edward are with Bella, Jasper and Emmet are holding James's arms and Alice is ripping his head off???? Esme and Rosalie aren't there so the only explanation is that Emmett's power Stephanie never told us about is his ability to start small, controlled, indoor bonfires with his mind.

If Bella was losing blood from her femoral artery it is HIGHLY UNLIKELY that she would have been cognizant enough to tell them her hand was burning + THERE’S A BIG ASS BITE HOW DID THEY MISS IT???

Let Me Sign is such a good fucking song. Actually, while we're on music every song on every Twilight Saga soundtrack SLAPS. At least 1 department at Summit Entertainment was staffed with competent people. (side note, why the fuck do I know the studio by name that made this movie. I need to go lie down)

Bella acting a damn fool in the hospital bed like clingy much

CHARLIE IS SUCH A GOOD DAD FUCK!

The Edward/Jacob beef is so dramatic at prom can you both chill for 5 minutes we haven't even gotten to y'alls bullshit yet that's not until New Moon.

Bella really thought this mfer was gonna turn her at prom in the middle of the dancefloor??????????

Flightless Bird American Mouth. That's it, that's the bullet point

Victoria coming to prom, like we stan a dramatic bitch.

I will almost CERTAINLY post my New Moon (Extended Edition) notes in a few days. & yes I do have notes on the entire franchise.

[calpalsworld]

Not "autistic anon," but also autistic, (being called maybe ableist made me want to put this out there before go to bed) i thought Zane was depicted that way purposefully by the writers. He has stereotypical traits like taking things literally, and has an actual humor switch. The writers have done things with Zane before like have him lose bodily autonomy (during that one Wu's teas short) and did something with his voice be it making him unable to be understood or talking too loud and the forced pirate voice by Jay. (what you're doing isn't too different from that, right?) I thought it was just a little iffy to distort his body and memory bc that could be interpreted as something not that I'm sure what exactly, it's some kind of disability. I dunno. I'm not good with putting this to words. I hope this makes sense.

Sorry I went to bed but now I’m awake 😭

Also I ended up totally spilling all my thoughts here rather than only specifically replying to you please forgive me context: my scary zane concept design, & my ninjago rewrite i refer to a lot 

Im a little confused but I think I get what you're saying? You're saying the Ninjago writers absolutely DON'T write Zane well (you listed examples of this) and you don't want me to fall into the same trap?

I had the opposite logic earlier. I thought: If Ninjago writers made Zane have stereotypical autisitic traits while also being a dehumanized robot, I may as well embrace it, say he is autistic blatantly, while also making him do funny/cool non-human robot things, so its clear as possible the two aspects of his character are literal and separate and not a metaphor for each other. But you're right! I do have a choice and I dont have to embrace things! :)

Like there were a couple ways I was gonna reject the original, for example, I never wanted Zane to have a funny switch, and I hated how other characters could fuck with Zane and he didn't even care 😬. I want to change that stuff. So youre right, if I am changing shit like that, it would be counterproductive for ME to GIVE him MORE traits along that theme. 😬😬😬 I should try to feel less obligated to portray Zane like he originally is. I still like the concept of "scary zane" (for reasons i explain below the cut) but I might tone it down a bit like with the claws and weird proportions and shit. I’d def make him look more skeletal and undead. That was my original intention, but i didnt execute it as good as I could have.... idk if anyone could tell thats what he was supposed to be like...my bad! But rn I dont wanna redesign him I wanna draw other stuff like normal alive Zane. Sorry LMAO 😳. Like I said in some earlier asks I think, I think Im gonna focus rn on how I should portray season 1 normal not dead Zane so thank you and feel free to share any other Zane thoughts ^_^ SOME OTHER THOUGHTS:

Also I Wanna Argue Some Stuff But I Understand its a Weak Argument Since All of This Context was Just In My Brain (so don't take this as an argument, just as me rambling): I don't want messed up things to happen to Zane and for it to just be ignored. I think if Zane is going to have fucked up things happen to him, as all characters must, its best for it to happen during a season where he actually addresses his feelings about being a robot (learning to accept that he will always be himself, regardless if hes "human" or the "original" or whatever. (thats how I always interpreted his emotions)). But I wouldn't have the other Ninja be very phased by Zane's looks because the whole point is they already love who he is (seasons 1-3 were about getting to know Zane) and now Zane himself just has to learn the physical, robot part of him is okay. Its about person-hood rather than humanity. Because the season focuses around Zane's soul, and because he lost his original body, I feel like I could mess around with his current, temporary body and have fun and make it scary. Because that body should be irrelevant. I understand it possibly being upsetting for an autistic character to be designed like this, but other people I talked to see it the opposite way. They find it comforting for him to look so different but still be himself and be so loved. SO IM ABSOLUTELY NOT saying its wrong to be bothered or to hate it or to feel any way. Just that I personally think it would be cool for Zane to be portrayed with a little spice lol, so thats why I like scary Zane for season 4.

Another Thing I Wannna Say But Is REALLY Hypocritical: (this isnt directed at anyone I just REALLY want to say this) I know I say "this is Zane but scary, he looks like fnaf" so he's obviously dehumanized, but I always felt like "scary" is more of an objective fact. Its an instinct. But what's "not human" is subjective. I think there is a problem with saying anything different from "average" human is dehumanized because that could extend to real people. Lol I know its bad for me to compare FNAF-ass Zane to real people, but I mean he could be real. People can have exposed teeth, and people can be shaped weird. And when someone first sees a person who looks like that they'll probably think "woah those features are scary" by instinct. And that surprise doesn't make someone ableist obviously. But bring that person’s humanity into question is NOT an instinct, and is fucked to shit. This is kinda a bad point for me to make since its about the fictional FNAF Zane I drew, and I am NOT implying ANYONE was thinking like this. [especially not the original asker anon who I am totally forgetting about at this point OOPS]. But I just thought it was an opinion of mine I couldn't go without mentioning when talking about dehumanization and disabilities.

^^^ I think you (anon) understand what I mean and might’ve said the exact same thing as me if you were writing a long ass response? I think this because you started to bring physical disabilities up and you said it was "a little iffy." ^_^ So we agree, but I don't see Zane's relation to real life disabilities as "a little iffy" I see it more like "complicated"? IF THAT DIFFERENCE EVEN MAKES ANY SENSE?????? I feel like a lot of things about Zane are really just complicated and need the right context, rather than the concepts necessarily being wrong -- NOW THAT I THINK ABOUT IT! THATS THE WHOLE REASON I DO THIS STUPID REWRITE! XD thats why a lot of my rewrite SO FAR has been the same concepts and plot beats, but different dialogue n specifics and such. I like a lot of concepts in Ninjago but I dont think they were presented correctly.....! :( So I guess all we can do is wait and see if I make Zane offensive or not....???

Also something about the memory part - yeah i agree i was surprised no one thought that was weird to make jokes out of his memory issues..... BUT I am like 100% firm on making his memory take longer to come back because I think its stupid how quick Zane was able to recover from literally dying. Like its just dumb to me. Hate it. (also bc memory & soul mechanics is ummm kinda important in my rewrite.... for reasons). Another memory thing btw, I was going to make his original amnesia come from hitting his head in an attack against the Skulkin when they stole his dads corpse, rather than his dad fucking choosing to make him forget. (its a sweet & iconic scene, but Um, WHY?!!!?!?!?!?) He has to follow data recovery instructions he finds in his dads diary. I think in that context it makes moments of memory loss somewhat different for Zane's character? Instead of loss of autonomy associated with disability, its a literal violent loss of autonomy associated with being traumatized by physical force. Idk how to phrase it exactly but I think that makes some vibes different?

Sorry, I think I got really distracted, and I don't know if I responded well to your points. Because uhhhh I think I agree with your stance actually? If I understand correctly? Fuck Ninjago writers for making the robot lose autonomy (a stereotypical robot theme) while also making him seem clearly autistic (NOT A HAPPY THEME FOR AUTISTIC PEOPLE) and not addressing it. And also auuugh Zane with a weird body is a difficult topic - kinda sussy pretty iffy.

Lol anyway idk if this made any sense and I REALLY rambled on you. but this was nice 👉👈 more Zane criticism pls love you and i love zane. i hope u dont feel mad at me because then it would be weird that im saying that lol. if you do feel mad at me tho you can send another ask (ILL TRY TO JUST LISTEN NOT RAMBLE NEXT TIME) but assuming ur chill rn, love you thnx

Take this page, don’t mind cole’s ass.

[boobdolan]

a review of melodrama (2017) by lorde

hey what’s up it’s your boy b-dawg. the b is for boobs as in breasts. this post is a track-by-track review of melodrama, the grammy-nominated sophomore studio album by ella yelich-o’ connor (aka lorde), a new zealand singer-songwriter who likes to dance funny and eat onions. her first album was pure heroine which was pretty big bc i think people (angsty teens) related to her songs about being an angsty teen.

i’m gonna keep it real with you chief. when i first heard green light (the lead single from the album) i thought it was pretty ass. but you know what. i’m an ass man despite my username. so eventually by some karmic circumstance i was reintroduced to the album and i realised: “hey! this is pretty dope! 😎” and then i ended up writing a 4000-word extended essay on it for the IB. but that’s another story.

green light is also the first track on the album, and it’s a hella effective one. with its intro bringing listeners acapella ella™️ over sparse piano chords, it kicks open the door to the sound of melodrama and immediately subverts any expectations for a pure heroine 2.0. as the song progresses we get additional elements of new and old - the boom-bap drums recall the hip-hop influences that permeated pure heroine, while her high-pitched backing vocals in the chorus introduce listeners to new vocal stylings from a singer who was previously known for being a Cool Bean who was Too Cool for all that stuff.

as the maximalist bop green light ends, listeners are thrown even further away from the sound of pure heroine with sober. personal note: sober was the song i most liked on the album upon first listen. and I can see why. it’s because i’ve got good taste! from the spacey uber-processed backing vocals to the bongo beat to the horns in the chorus, the song’s really unlike much else in the pop scene today. i especially like the “night, midnight, lose my mind” intro because when i first heard it i was like “wtf???? cool 🤠” anyway, point is, ella and her bf did well on this track.

at this point one might think, “this girl has a thing for acapella intros to her songs”. and she does! homemade dynamite starts, like an action movie, in situ, with its musings about top gun and the house party that the album is conceptually based around. one thing i love about the song is its synths. the 80s inspiration is obvious, with the synth pad emulating the iconic Fairlight sound on kate bush’s running up that hill. however, the moodiness of the synth pad is contrasted with a sprightly riff that comes in every now and then, emphasising that Potent Teenage Mix of Emotions™️ that the album is focused around. lorde also uses contrast in her lyrics, pairing wordy, literary, stream-of-consciousness style verses with almost childish phrases like “know I think you’re awesome, right???” it’s things like this that really encapsulate the state of being teenaged to me - that uncertain transitional period between adolescence and adulthood.

the following song starts with a very indie-sounding guitar, which is an unconventional sound for a lorde song. but the louvre is so typically lordey in that it shows off one of her greatest skills - the ability to create memorable, quotable lines with unique phrasing. who else would think of stammering the line “i overthink your punctuation use”?? who else would think of using a spoken “broadcast the boom boom boom boom and make ‘em all dance to it” as a hook??? another thing of note in this song is its extended U2-esque instrumental outro, courtesy of jack antonoff. sometimes when i listen to it, i understand why ella is banging him.

jack then mumbles the intro to the next song and starts playing the piano. after a few bars, ella joins him and her voice basically has sex with his tinkling on the ivories. liability is objectively great. lyrically, she reaches mind-bending extremes that many of her contemporaries can only dream of achieving. there’s a verse where she goes “home, into the arms of the girl that [she] loves” which is very interestingly constructed - it hits listeners with the initial shock of “oh wait is ella coming out” and just Leaves It for a few lines. and theN BOOM!!!! she’s actually talking about herself. that’s pretty cool. one other thing is her rhyme scheme in the line “the truth is, i am a toy that people enjoy ‘til all of their tricks don’t work anymore” which has a devastating effect that always gets me, even though it greatly takes advantage of her bananies voice.

now the listener is halfway through the album, and at this point they’re likely as hard as the feelings in the title of the next song. hard feelings/loveless brings us back into the world of electronic drums and synths after the minimalism of liability, and it does so excellently, providing an ambient atmosphere with its muffled beat and echoey distorted guitar. this song used to be one of my least favourites on the album because I thought the L O V E L E S S chant in the second part sounded kinda dumb and edgy. but then i watched lorde’s performance of the song for VEVO and ?????? WtF????? it really shines with a small choir and a boombox. fantastic. i also appreciate the little paul simon sample that bridges the two parts together - it’s a rare example of lorde wearing her influences on her sleeve for this album. also paul simon is one cool mf. i pop my pussy to graceland 24/7. 😎👌

taking a note from jack antonoff’s albums, the next song is a reprise, which have been used by many artists after the beatles to say “hey look my album is cohesive!” even though the only reason why it’s cohesive is because it’s cohesively shit. that’s not the case with sober II (melodrama), which functions as a response to the first sober. the parent song’s repeated calls of “can you feel it?” are immediately countered in sober II’s first line: “you asked if i was feeling it, i’m psycho high”. that’s cool because it reinforces the house party concept of the album. however, while i think the strings and trap drums combo sounds cool on paper, this production choice is the album’s first misstep because it sounds like jack put together 2 apple loops on garageband that didn’t quite fit.

luckily, before lorde turns into one of the migos, we’re treated with another piano song - writer in the dark. a word about lorde’s vocal performance in this song: WOW!!!!!!!!!! 😃😃😃 good stuff! in the verses, her raspy, imperfect voice highlights the intimacy and personal nature of the lyrics. in the chorus, she double tracks her voice and sings with a more round tone, which gives the eerie effect of sounding a bit like kate bush. it’s ok. i’m a bush man too. jack does a little production trick in the outro where ella sings the hook progressively louder as he fades out her vocal and lets the song be overtaken by strings. while it’s cool, i feel like he quite obviously snagged it from the outro of david bowie’s “heroes”, where a similar trick was achieved by the production god brian eno. jack then did it again on the song slow disco by st. vincent later in the year. side note: i’m still kinda pissed about what he did to st. vincent’s masseduction. more on that another time.

the next song, which should’ve been a single, features the metaphor of a supercut. i’m not sure how i feel about that because, on one hand, the term feels very millennial, like a better-written version of katy perry’s save as draft. you know what i mean? like those songs that aged fast - crazy in love with its pager reference, and payphone with its..... payphone reference. on the other hand, a supercut is pretty timeless, as montages have been used in cinema since the french first figured out how to make moving pictures. and the word sounds cool, so it’s ok i guess. but that’s beside the point. the song’s really nice, with some very interesting moments. one notable instance is lorde’s phrasing and the instrumentation in the prechorus - “in your car, the radio on”. the instrumentation just stops for a beat after ella sings the line, in a genius move that makes the song Even More Boppable!!. another moment is how the beat changes during the final choruses - from mellow, with her voice sounding like it’s coming out of a cassette player, to full, regaining all the instrumentation of the original choruses. then the song ends with a weird echoey vocal outro that’s a fantastic moment for me, especially after the intensity of the final choruses. boner time!!!!! 😃 one last cool thing about the song is that i feel the line “so I fall into continents and cars” is an Excessively paul simon thing to say. it’s one of those abstract things that just sounds GREAT, like “fat charlie the archangel sloped into the room” from his song crazy love, part II.

speaking of part twos, the end of supercut transitions into the bassy, atmospheric synths of liability (reprise). unfortunately, i still haven’t gotten round to fully appreciating this song. to me, it’s the biggest misstep on melodrama. don’t get me wrong - it’s a nice enough song, it’s really chill, but it feels slight because of its association to the majestic, melodic liability. apart from their lyrics, there’s not much that links the two. i feel that liability needed no reprise; it’s a work that stands on its own. i felt the same way about yandhi when kanye west announced it. yeezus doesn’t need another album associated to it! it’s perfection by itself. also, someone pointed out that the drums on liability (reprise) are the same as those on taylor swift’s call it what you want, and the last time taylor and jack screwed up a great indie artist’s work was fast slow disco, which we don’t talk about in this house.

finally, we come to the end of lorde’s house party with perfect places. and what a brilliant ending it is. there’s something so stirring about the drum beat, with its crunchy, decisive snare. there’s something equally moving about the synths and chord progression in the chorus, which give me chills like loud organs echoing in a church. when put together, they sound industrial, menacing, as if they move into your soul and alienate you from your own body. but at the same time, they’re an emotional release, a source of comfort like bruce springsteen’s cathartic 70s and 80s albums. another cathartic element - the use of the word “fuck” in the chorus. i could write a whole essay on it tbh. to me, it represents an intensely freeing release of the bad vibes and negativity in one’s life - for lorde, perhaps, her failed relationship and the state of the world in 2016. you know how studies have shown that when you shout “FUCK!!!!😡😡” after hitting your toe on furniture, it helps ease the pain? it’s like that. so while saying something taboo on the record is such an edgy angsty teenage thing to do, but also reflects lorde’s release from her pain. or maybe i’m reading too much into it.

the album ends as it begins, with ella’s bare vocals, reminding us that she is once again the Queen of Indie Pop. overall, melodrama gets a

9/10

for being really cool. peace out bitches. 🤠

[sirrobin126]

This is going to be long as hell. 

Okay, so ages ago @thiievesandbeggars​ gave me a massive ship hc ask meme thing and I’ve finally done it, after adding bits and pieces every so often while I was studying. Most of it is going to be under a cut because it is, honestly, hella long.

Also, yeah its for Mionel in case you somehow didn’t guess that already.

Affection:

Who likes to cuddle?

Martha’s a very affectionate person and quite a touchy person. She doesn’t hide that or hold herself back when she cares for someone. Lionel is…new…to the concept of selflessly giving physical affection that leaves him vulnerable. That being said, although he doesn’t initiate cuddles to begin with, he is very into them when they happen. Martha can often find herself glancing at the clock on the wall and like half-regretting starting a Lionel hug when she had things to do that day. But she never really regrets it because he hugs like he hasn’t touched another person in years, even if they were together that morning. Martha swears up and down she saw him wipe a tear away once after an extended cuddle period but Lionel insists he just had a bit of kryptonite in his eye.

Who is the little spoon?

Martha, she is little and likes being the little spoon. She was used to it with Jonathan, who of course was a big strong loving protector man, and she just feels safe and comforted that way. I wanted to be cheeky and say Lionel, but I feel like he’s just too into looking at Martha, too set on protecting her from the outside world, and too uncomfortable being that vulnerable to turn his back on her.  

Who struggles to keep their hands to themself?  

Look, from the very moment they decided that maybe they could become a thing, and Martha indicated that she was open to a real relationship with him Lionel had to physically restrain himself from immediately pulling her close to him and kissing her like the world was ending. Every so often when they’re together Lionel will just get this wave of, ‘this is her, she’s here, there she is!’ and if they’re somewhere where it’s not ideal to start making out he will be in a state of absolute suffering and hold her hand, or touch her waist or trace his finger over her shoulders, because, there she is, with him.

Who gets naughty in the most inappropriate of places?

I mean, Lionel is a very dirty old man, with a very varied sexual history, and a very skewed sense of “the appropriate” (see: naked at work and fucking Lex’s girlfriend). He wouldn’t do anything that made Martha uncomfortable, but he does linger at the boundaries of acceptable behaviour.

How long can they cuddle until one becomes uncomfortable?

Like I said, a Lionel cuddle is difficult to start, and even more difficult to end. He’s not like, good, at judging how regular humans interact with each other, and he is not great at being a reasonable person. It’s fine when they’re sitting on the couch both reading or whatever and cuddling, but it’s not quite as fine when Martha has to get to the farmer’s market in five minutes but she just heard Lionel calmly exhale and felt his shoulders drop in relaxation which he never does and damn that’s nice but also if I don’t leave right now Helen McGregor is going to get to those good Rutabagas and take them all like she always does.

Who gives the most kisses?

They both like to, but if we’re talking not necessarily sexual kisses, its Martha. She kisses when she sees him. She kisses when she leaves. She kisses when she has to get up and go to another room. She kisses when she just feels a swell of affection or emotion come over her. Lionel loves this, because its not like she’s trying to get anything from him, or trying to make him do anything, she was just doing something and thought she’d let him know that she cares about him and then move on. Its not a super familiar feeling for him so he is disproportionally charmed by it.

What is their favourite non-sexual activity?

Probably discussing life philosophies and morality, or at least, that’s what they seem to spend a lot of time doing. They also like going to the theatre (Martha likes musicals, Lionel likes the opera, and they’ll both watch plays quite happily). Also book club. (Their book club is only the two of them, they alternate who gets to choose the book, they have a lot of variety)

Where is their favourite place to cuddle?

I wanna be cheesy and say the garden where they had that first convo but like, if Lionel has the choice between being outside and not being outside, he will choose the latter. So, I imagine they’ve set up a joint study for them both so they can both work on their individual stuff and still be together, and there’s like a bookcase and a nice couch where they can sit when they’re not working.

Who is more likely to playfully grope the other?

Lionel. Although, I don’t know if playful is always the right word to describe it. Cause that implies that its just a joke, and while he may play it off like that, if Martha took him up on it he would be immediately dtf, like just, on a moment’s notice.

How often do they get time to themselves?

Not often, which is why they have to find spaces they can be in. They both have jobs that are really intense on their time, although Lionel has a bit more freedom in that regard because he can choose to take days off at a time if he wants (and go stalk a teenager to find out what they know about aliens). But even though they’re officially a thing now, Lionel still keeps a little bit of distance from her working life to avoid giving her detractors any more ammunition to throw at her about being in the pocket of big business, which, is so absolutely not true that it’s laughable. Martha may try to find compromises and may treat business v politely, but if they tried to manipulate her into going against the people’s best interest she would shut that shit down quick smart. If anything, big business (Lionel) is subject to her demands way more. But, she’s concerned about what they would say, so Lionel doesn’t turn up to her work anymore than anyone else’s spouses (despite his natural tendency to butt in and interfere everywhere he can).

Family:

Do your muses plan on having children/or have children?

No. No, no. Even though they’re a pairing of the man who can’t help but have children, and the woman who wants to adopt every sad looking child that walks past her, they’re both past the point where they can spend another eighteen years raising a child. Also they have very different ideas on what having children is for, you know: love and support vs power struggles and passing on a legacy.

If so, how many children do your muses want/have?

Martha has one, Lionel has had four that we know of.

Who is the favorite parent?

Martha is everyone’s favourite parent. I mean, come on.

Who is the authoritative parent?

Authoritative or authoritarian?

Who is more likely to allow the children to have a day off school?

Martha is tough but fair int his department, she’ll always want Clark to go to school, but she will take into account how tough things can be for him sometimes and cut him some slack. Lionel is more of the Spartan method, if you can sneak out of school and not get caught, go for it, excellent. If you get caught though, he won’t swoop into to save you unless it going to negatively affect the Luthor reputation.

Who lets the children indulge in sweets and junk food when the other isn’t around?

Martha isn’t constantly baking for nothing you know.

Who turns up to extra curricular activities to support their children?

Support or brag? Lionel turns up to Lex’s chess matches the same way Lucius turns up to Draco’s quidditch. Because he thinks he has some skill at it and wants to reap the benefits of that in a place where he can be recognised for his son’s achievements. He’s a bad dad.

Who goes to parent teacher interviews?

I mean Lionel went to them but goddamn, someone trying to tell him how to raise his kids? That did not go down very well. He did listen though in case there was anything there he needed to throw back in Lex’s face when he was thirty during an unrelated argument. He is not a good father.

During middle school, Martha of course was like, deep in the pta, and she ooooowns the fucking bake sale/school fete. Alice from down the road tried to take the crown a few years into Martha’s rule. This would have been fine with Martha if Alice had been nice about it when she decided that she was going to take care of the bulk of the organising and give Martha “a little stall for your cookies and things”. But Alice wasn’t nice about it, and Alice hadn’t communicated with her and had ignored Martha’s further questions. So it just couldn’t be helped that Martha made her stall bigger than the allotted space, because her question about space was never answered. She couldn’t help if it was decorated to the nines, more than any other stall (Jonathan spent a sleepless night glueing, and hammering and painting the stall’s wooden beams). She couldn’t help if she baked her fucking ass off and made confectionary creations the population of Smallville had never even heard of. She also couldn’t help that when she arrived at the fete, Alice’s organisation skills were poorer than average and Martha happened to have on speed dial every bouncy castle, entertainer and activity provider, with whom she already had a good relationship. She couldn’t help that everyone referred it to as Martha’s event. She couldn’t help that Alice was so embarrassed that she didn’t even show her face at the next pta meeting and meekly accepted whatever job Martha deigned to give to her the next year, which Martha gave her with a polite smile and excellent line of communication of course.

Martha later told Lionel that story when they were working together, as a metaphor for a business thing she was trying to argue with him about. Martha was a little embarrassed of it when telling it, but Lionel had to be excused after hearing how Martha absolutely destroyed her competitor and could be found running cold water over his face in his private bathroom before he could even think about facing her again.

Disagreements:

Who is more likely to raise their voice?

Lionel is the more dramatic and emotional one so obvs him, when like, the mildest inconvenience happens to him, he stubs his toe and threatens the doorframe. But when Martha raises her voice, shit’s gotten real, and you best go over exactly what you’ve done to push her to the edge.

Who threatens to leave but never actually does?

Lionel’s not usually one for empty threats but goddamn he knows nothing better is ever going to happen in his life than Martha Kent. He’ll bluster and give his speeches and talk about how his philosophical point of view is right and correct and other opinions?? Never heard of them?? and he’ll say I might as well leave but he doesn’t even touch the door handle.  

Who actually keeps their word and leaves?

Martha. She’s not one to go over the top, she’s not one to overreact, so if she says she’s going to leave, things have probably reached a real breaking point. She’s probably thought it all out and considered it inside before you ever hear about it.

Who trashes the house?

Depends whose house they’re at, neither of them would trash the others stuff. I can see Lionel’s office just littered with paper and shit that he’s torn up in frustration. But Martha’s more likely to turn to the oven and angrily bake for about 24 hours until she calms down so the house is just covered in passive aggressive cupcakes that Lionel won’t eat out of spite.

How often do they argue/disagree?

Not actually that often. The points I made above are honestly rare cases with them. Like, when it comes to bickering then yeah, all the time, you can’t have two such different people, who are also very clever, together, and not expect half their conversations to be a debate of some kind. But those kinds of debates are playful, they’re not the end of the world and they’re also littered with Lionel making puppy dog eyes at Martha that she won’t concede his point and Martha loudly wondering how a man who is so smart can be so goddamn stubborn and single-minded. If it’s something important that Martha feels strongly about then Lionel will usually defer to her opinion and do his best to fight for whatever it is she wants, but Lionel’s an opinionated guy too so when their fundamental views of the world clash that’s when there are teething problems.  

Who is the first to apologise?

Martha is the first to apologise if she thinks he was really hurt by the things she said. Lionel is the first to apologise if he’s had a little time to let her viewpoint sit with him and he’s come around to it. Which is a privilege he bestows on Martha and Martha alone. He’s never apologised first to anyone else in his life unless he had a motive behind it. Lionel also apologises biggest and with flowers, whereas Martha’s is more of a frank face-to-face thing that acknowledges his feelings but doesn’t budge on her beliefs. Lionel would rather forget the whole argument and move along without getting into it.

Sex:

Who is on top? Who is on the bottom?

Bold of you to assume either of them would limit themselves to one position or the other. If you asked Lionel he’d say he was a top, if you asked Martha she would tell you that it was a very inappropriate question and she wasn’t going to answer. In her head she would say top as well. In reality they do much more sharing of both positions.

Who has the strangest desires?

Look, the strangest desire between either of them is that Martha looked at a smarmy, arrogant, casually ruthless, workaholic mess of a man who had done his level best to build his company at the explicit detriment of her town and neighbours and still went “Oh fuck, he’s hot.”

Any kinks?

Have you see Lionel? You take one look at that man and tell me he doesn’t deserve to be kinkshamed just for the general way he is. Lionel has both a praise kink and a love of being threatened. He likes a bit of ruffage, he likes to be tied up, he likes to tie people up. He’s not averse to hair pulling, he likes potentially dangerous settings, and anything with the threat of being caught thrown into it. He’s a dirty old man.  

Who’s dominant in bed?

In general, Lionel, because he’s got that whole ‘I am the deciding factor in the events of this world and master of the universe’ thing going on that he’s pretty committed to. With a lot of partners he’s very dominant, but if you know how to play Lionel he can switch to sub so fast you get whiplash. You just have to be able to follow through with your dominance or Lionel gets very smarmy and condescending and generally becomes an arrogant nightmare to deal with. Martha and Lionel don’t play into a lot of the dominance dynamics tho, it’s not usually been Martha’s speed.  

Is head ever in the equation?

If I ever publish my fanfiction you’ll know it is.

If so, who is better at performing it?

Lionel has had, a lot, of practice.

Ever had sex in public?

Lionel definitely has. But the closest the two of them came together was when they got drunk and made out in the coat room of a very important fancy party that Martha was super nervous about. Also on Lionel’s private plane, which Martha considers public but Lionel doesn’t.

Who moans the most?

Martha is very vocal, to Lionel’s absolute delight. Lionel moans too but he’s a bit more of a talker, to the surprise of no-one ever.

Who leaves the most marks?

Martha's got longer nails, so she occasionally leaves claw marks down his back which Lionel is very into. Lionel can give hickeys like a goddamn teenager, and he’s a territorial show off, but he doesn’t do it often because he’s above that thank you very much.

Who screams the loudest?

You better believe he’s doing his absolute best at all times to make her scream.

Who is the more experienced of the two?

Come on, he’s been a serial philanderer and an absolute horndog for decades. She had flings before, but honestly, Martha’s been with the same man since she was in her early twenties.  

Do they ‘fuck’ or ‘make love’?

They would both scoff if they ever heard that question asked, and each would assume the answer to be obvious. However, for Martha, this is a lot more adventurous and wild than she’s used to so she considers it the former. For Lionel, he doesn’t usually get this intense level of intimate romantic connection during sex so he definitely considers it the latter. They think they’re on the same wavelength.

Rough or soft?

Depends what they feel like. When rough, Martha gets to play into that dangerous aura Lionel’s got going for him, when soft, Lionel gets to consider what an angel she is at least once per second.

How long do they usually last?

Hey, I’m not going to say anything, but they are getting up in years.

Is protection used?

God, you know, for a man so cautious and meticulous in his planning, so paranoid and careful, he sure does have a lot of illegitimate children.

Does it ever get boring?

No, how could it when the whole relationship always feels new. They only have a certain amount of time together, and they’ve lived without each other for so many years that every word, every feeling, every touch is as exciting as ever. Also, Lionel voice: Martha Kent is a beautiful angel and I should be shot if I ever don’t think that in her presence.

Where is the strangest place they’d have sex?

The plane was pretty strange for Martha. Lionel’s giving it a while before mentioning any other strange places he would be into. His office for one, and also he has this thing about maybe churches, but he’s not going to push it.

Sleeping:

Who snores?

Lionel used to, but he got a very expensive operation to stop that because goddamit no ones gonna think he’s not perfect all the time. Martha snores but only after she’s been drinking, something Lionel found out about the first time he had to put her to bed drunk, because she’s so tiny but she was so difficult to move and he found it equal parts hilarious and adorable.

Do they share a bed or sleep separately?

Oh my god, if you think Lionel is going to ever not sleep in the same bed as Martha when he has the opportunity then you do not know Lionel Luthor.

If they sleep together, do they cozy up together or lay far apart?

Lionel likes to think of himself as a solid oak tree, lying there while Martha curls around him, which is true, sometimes. Lionel can also be classified as a bit of clinging vine, wrapping his arms around her as they falls asleep.

Who talks in their sleep?

Lionel is really bad for it. No-one has told him that he sleep talks, which he does, badly, but usually he falls asleep after everyone else so unless you wake up before him you don’t hear it. He will mutter anything from non-sensical sentences, to entire monologues and have fights with opponents about the stupidest thing. He doesn’t know he does it, he wakes up mad at people for dream reasons but he doesn’t know that he was actually fighting them. Martha mentions it off-handedly one day that he said something funny in his sleep and Lionel is just like ??? w hat. And Martha’s like, yeah you know, you were talking about this thing. And Lionel just, fucking, goes into this spiral of have I been giving away my plans for years? What is this betrayal of my own body?

What do they wear to bed?

Well, according to the comic, Lionel defs sleeps shirtless, if not entirely naked (This is the hill I will die on). I think he sleeps in nothing but expensive silky boxers, or silk pyjama pants. I think Martha wears cute patterned pyjamas.

Are either of your muses insomniacs?

Lionel has the most trouble sleeping, but he kind of ignored that it was a problem and started to think of it as a feature of his superhuman personality. He just started kind of working instead of sleeping and called it a day. He convinced himself that he had moved beyond regular sleep patterns and went to sleep late and woke up early every day, not quite connecting it with the giant crashes he would have every so often that he would put down to substance or alcohol related reasons, not considering that the crashes happened to coincide when work was particularly stressful and big deals were getting done. This was because his stress got worse than normal during those periods and his body had to finally give up and crash. Lionel just figured it was a product of business and that it would make him stronger, because he is an idiot with no capacity for self-reflection. As he got well into his 50s, he started sleeping in more because he still had trouble falling asleep but because his business was so stable and set up he just decided that as CEO he got to have later mornings than everyone else. That allowed him to finally get the amount of sleep regular people do, and also it feeds into his superiority complex and vanity that he is allowed to do something his employees can’t.

Can sleeping pills be found by the bedside?

Martha was kind of horrified by Lionel’s terrible sleep patterns and the fact that he didn’t seem to see a problem with it, so she originally gave him some herbal remedies and tried to get him to like meditate and stuff, but when she realised that wasn’t going to work, she had him go to the doctor. So now he has a pill he can take if he’s having a particularly bad night, but they often sit untouched in Lionel’s bedside drawer because what, he’s going to sleep when he has work to do? I think not.

Who wakes up with bed hair?

Martha. It’s not like ridiculously bad, but its certainly a lot more wavy and unruly than when she combs and straightens it for the day. She doesn’t mind spending a little bit of her morning doing her hair, she doesn’t wear a lot of makeup or jewellery so doing her hair is kind of a nice morning ritual that she can spend time on now that she doesn’t have to be out in the field at a godforsaken hour anymore.

Lionel’s haircare routine happens at night, because he wants to wake up and essentially be ready to go. That wild look his hair has is actually carefully cultivated to look like that, and is helped by a humidifier he keeps in the bedroom, and the silk sheets and pillowcase he has is as much for his hair as his body. He also has a leave in conditioner and oil for his beard. Unfortunately when he has short hair it’s significantly harder to tame and so he will wake up with a few stubborn cowlicks that stick straight out from his head that he either has to leave like that or wrestle with (depending whether he is good or evil at that point)

Who wakes up first?

Martha, she’s been living on a farm for nearly forty years, and she’s got her morning “get ready and make breakfast” rituals set in. She just feels more ready to face the day when she’s had an early morning, like there are so many more hours of sunlight in which to get things done and be productive. When she sleeps in she always feels like she’s missed out on something.

Who prepares breakfast in bed for the other?

Martha was always used to making breakfast while Jonathan was setting up for the day, and she likes cooking so she continues to do it. The first time she made breakfast in bed she made two plates of food and brought them back up and they sat in bed and ate them and although Lionel winced he didn’t say anything about food that might get on the silk sheets. So she does it sometimes and every time Lionel is very thankful and charmed but also like, these are very expensive silk.

Lionel has before made a big production out of breakfast in bed tho, like on Martha’s birthday he had a very fancy breakfast made at an upscale restaurant at Metropolis and transported to Smallville and brought it up to her on an eating tray that sat on a mini-table and there was a rose on it and a very nice looking, suspiciously present, cloth napkin that went over her legs (and the silk bedsheets). The most surprising thing of all was that he managed to wake up before her and set it up. Of course, he just didn’t sleep the night before but he’s not going to tell Martha that, and anyone else who helped is sworn to secrecy. He thinks it was a perfect surprise but Martha did wake up whilst people were still downstairs and Lionel was furiously whispering trying to get everything together, but she was kind enough to pretend to be asleep and wake up astounded at Lionel’s entrance.

What is their favourite sleeping position?

Lionel is him on his back with Martha curled up next his chest. Martha’s is on her side as the little spoon, with Lionel’s arm over her.

Who hogs the sheets?

Asleep and half-asleep Martha is nowhere near as patient and considerate as awake Martha, so if she gets cold during the night she will just pull as many blankets, or a Lionel, towards her as she needs. Similarly, if she is too warm, she will have no hesitation to throw the blankets off her and either pile them on Lionel or throw them on the floor.

Do they set an alarm each night?

Martha doesn’t anymore but Lionel does, his alarm clock is a radio that plays a Metropolis news channel for him to wake up to and immediately get the latest news and information about whats going on that he will need for the business day, even on the weekends.

Can a television be found in their bedroom?

Lionel hates watching television in the living room so there’s no way he has it in his bedroom. He’s a big fucking snob and he definitely thinks he’s better than tv. He hates that there are some things he kind of likes to watch (discovered in the long hours fixing clocks and setting up charities in his guest house at the mansion). He considers these quiz shows and murder mysteries beneath him, but if Martha’s watching he’ll act like he has no choice but to sit down next to her and watch as well. The only thing he watches voluntarily are the news and maybe nature documentaries, if he’s had a few drinks. He can’t watch history or science documentaries because he just becomes the embodiment of the “i know more than you” meme. Drunk Lionel is definitely the type to talk to his tv.

He’s also the biggest hypocrite about plebeian interests because he is an internet hound. He’ll turn his nose up at people that get all their info or entertainment from the news, but you try and pry that phone out of his hand, and see what happens. He’s always checking for updates and alerts on his phone and computer.

Who has nightmares?

Martha has always had a pretty standard mix of good and bad dreams. After Jonathan died they got worse, and often it was dreams that didn’t seem like nightmares at the time. But, just at the point in the dream where she was talking with Jonathan, or they were working the farm together, or they were having their anniversary dinner and he apologised for being late, she would wake up and for a moment she would still be in the world of the dream before remembering. Every time it was like losing him over again. It was the hardest immediately after his death. Then, as time went on and she started seeing Lionel, she found that although she kept having these dreams, it wasn’t as crushing to wake up from. She started seeing it more as Jonathan still watching over her, coming to visit her while asleep, joking about whatever was going on in her life and bitching about whatever thing Lionel had just done. Martha is still torn between thinking that it’s just her subconscious finding a way to work through problems she’s having, and really believing that Jonathan has found a way to still be with her.

Who has ridiculous dreams?

Lionel’s dreams are hectic as hell. He’s always late, he’s always chasing something, and he always has shit to collect. He’s had a lot of fucked up shit happen in his life, the feelings from which he’s repressed the fuck out of, so his subconscious feeds him a cocktail of high octane emotional anxiety. However, because his brain is a dick, it associates these emotions with the most whack scenarios that Lionel will never take seriously. How exactly is he supposed to connect the guilt and fear born of real serious actions and behaviours, to the fact that in his dream he and Richard Nixon have to collect every VHS copy of Jane Fonda’s original workout series and goddamit they’re already behind schedule! He has tried to induce lucid dreaming before, so he can make use of sleep time instead of wasting it like everybody else, but part of the process included keeping a dream journal, and after the fifth time he had to write down that he tried to get Darth Vader’s autograph (despite never having seen a Star Wars film) he just got too paranoid that someone was going to read about his stupid dream cycle and somehow use it against him. He burnt the book. Lionel also doesn’t have nightmares often, his regular dreams are stressful enough, but when does they are pretty goddamn harrowing, so, on par, he’s mostly okay with the ridiculous stuff most of the time.

Who sprawls out and takes up most of the bed?

Martha is the most active sleeper. Lionel’s a bad sleep talker in the first hour of sleep and closer to when he wakes up, but for the rest of it he’s dead to the world. He has such a tough time getting to sleep that when he’s in that rem cycle he is fucking out of it. Martha is a lighter sleeper and so she’s more likely to spread out or roll over or push Lionel closer to the edge and leaving him with a little sliver of space and she’ll have most of the bed for her own even tho she’s usually right up next to Lionel and the rest of the bed is untouched territory.

Who makes the bed?

Martha, or Lionel’s cleaner. It depends whose house they’re at and whether Martha managed to get to it before the cleaner could. Martha hates making any more work for the cleaners, and anything she can do herself she does. She begrudgingly acknowledges that in a place the size of the Luthor Mansion a cleaner is probably a good idea, but she feels very bad if she’s not doing her best to do all the stuff she can to reduce the cleaner’s work. Lionel does not understand, because he’s paying for someone to perform that service and that’s their job that they’re getting paid to do. Also, he probably wouldn’t care if the bed was made or not, unless it was for like the express purpose of taking someone to bed and having the room all done up nice and impressive. Otherwise it’s like, I could be working.

What time is bed time?

For Martha, bedtime used to be 9:30pm, only now she’s has a very bad influence on her time, and her work starts later, so there’s no set bed time anymore. She and Lionel will stay up much later than they should, but can you blame them.

Who’s the grumpiest when they wake up?

Lionel, defs, he’s the grumpiest in general so the very idea of having to sleep makes him mad.

Work:

Who is the busiest?

Lionel is a workaholic with a huge number of interests and schemes that he needs to keep an eye on. He’s always got at least three things he’s actively working on in his head whenever he’s doing a single task. He also makes a habit of physically going out to places and doing things that a CEO doesn’t need to do. He could just delegate it to people while he sits in his office, but Lionel spends as much time out of the Luthorcorp building as he does in it. Martha finds her work very rewarding, and she works hard to help the people of her state and community, but she’s been around a bit now and knows the importance of a home life balance in addition to work. Lionel’s still unfamiliar with the concept.  

Who rakes in the highest income?

Look, I’m gonna give you three guesses.

Are any of your muses unemployed?

Nah, are you kidding me. Lionel goes weird if he’s not employed, boy starts fixing clocks and bringing out his multitude of very random but inexplicably mastered hobbies. Catch him in the studio painting full size realistic portraits and recording his one man jazz album as he asks you to pick a card to show off his excellent sleight of hand. Martha is also now reluctant to retire or leave her job, because she really feels like she can make a difference where she is. Also, she’s good at it.

Who takes the most sick days?

Ironically, Lionel. Like he’s the biggest workaholic and works works works forever. But he’s also an obsessive fuck who needs to take off days at a time to figure out why this teenager that his son is tangentially friends with is in a specific place and what they know about aliens. He also needs to very dramatically show up in places where people don’t expect him (when he could have easily sent an email) to complete his enigmatic image.  

Who is more likely to turn up late to work?

Lionel. He owns the company. He’s always been able to decide when turning up to the office is less important than intimidating or seducing someone somewhere else.  

Who sucks up to their boss?

;) ;) ;)

What are their jobs?

Lionel is the CEO of LuthorCorp, Martha is a Kansas State Senator

Who stresses the most?

God, they’re both stressers, Martha when she’s worrying about Clark and whether people are in danger or emotional turmoil, she’s very empathetic and cognoscente of the different things people are going through. On the other hand tho, Lionel’s body has known no moment of relaxation in his life, he gets massages not as a luxury but as a necessity or he’d snap like a brittle toffee next time someone brought him news he didn’t like.

Do your muses enjoy or despise their careers/occupations?

They enjoy them for the most part, there’s always stress and frustrations that come with it, and Lionel’s job does have an inexplicably high risk of the CEO being hurled across various rooms, but ultimately, Martha’s in a position to affect change and put her education to good and effective use, and Lionel is his own boss and has power, money and influence on his side.  

Are your muses financially stable?

They’d better hope so because Lionel is not going back to a lower Momme count on his sheets, he’s earned it dammit.

Home:

Who does the washing, takes out the trash, does the ironing?

Lionel hires a lot of people to do the jobs he doesn’t want to. Pretty much all housekeeping in the Luthor Mansion is handled by staff, to Martha’s embarrassment. Like, she understands that this is a contract and people get paid to clean and do housekeeping but she can’t stand the idea of making more work for them so she always keeps anything she’s doing at the mansion pretty tidy so as not be like Lionel and just leave things around, knowing they’ll be put straight for him. She won’t hear of him hiring anyone for the Kent farm or the place in Metropolis tho. And she has gotten him to do housework before, just by being matter of fact about it. She was baking once and noticed that the bin was full so she asked him to take out the trash like it was an everyday occurrence (you know, like regular people) and Lionel was halfway to the garbage bins outside, holding a trash bag before he stopped and was like ‘wait - I have people for this’.

Who does the cooking?

Martha is a happy baker, a stress baker, an angry baker, a bored baker, the woman likes to bake and she is damn good at it. She’s also just an excellent cook in general so she does a lot of cooking for the two of them. Of course, she doesn’t do it all the time because she has a demanding job that often causes her to stay late at the office, so Lionel’s chef also does a good part of the cooking.

Who is more likely to burn the house down just trying?

Lionel is lucky not to be banned from her kitchen without supervision. He treats cooking like a battle and the kitchen like a chemistry set. He got very pissed that cooking wasn’t something he was immediately good at, even though the first time he tried he was attempting stuff way too advanced for someone who probably hadn’t set foot in his own kitchen since 1983. After he failed the first few times he read a hell of a lot of books and did a lot of thorough research (you know, like a normal person) and made it his obsessive priority to get good. Yet, he still doesn’t have the magic touch Martha does and he won’t believe her that she just does what feels right. He could be a cordon blue chef by now and Martha ‘the recipe is more of a guideline’ Kent’s food would still come out better.

Who is messier?

Lionel, because he has the luxury of being messy and knowing that it will all be put straight by the time he comes back to it, but all his important and classified stuff is sorted and locked up of course. He’s not necessarily a naturally messy person tho, and if he didn’t have someone picking up after him he would get a lot neater quick smart because he doesn’t like living in a chaotic environment even tho he himself embodies chaos. Martha knows there is more important things in life than spending a lot of time cleaning up, and she has the patience to put things back as she uses them instead of rushing off to do something else immediately. She tries to tell Lionel its more efficient that way but he just can nOt expend those extra few seconds to clean up after a task, he has a new thing on his mind and he needs to get to it.

Who leaves their dirty clothes on the floor?

Lionel may be messy, but hell if his suits are going to pay the price for that. They’re going to be handled well and treated like the precious materials they are.

Who is the prankster around the house?

Martha, just because she can get away with it. Lionel never suspects her, she’s the one person he has a complete blind spot to when it comes to expecting tricks or betrayal, so she’s the one person who can get one over on him just by pretending to be in earnest. Of course he reacts in the most betrayed and offended fashion. One time Martha made him that fake food, like eggs and chips that actually turn out to be peach yoghurt and apples and Lionel eats it and just, gives her the most puppy dog hurt, lost expression. But Martha won’t acknowledge that it was a trick. She’ll just be like, no I just think you need to eat more fruit, even though it was obviously meant to look like eggs and chips.  She catches him playing a very sad song on the piano later when she’s in earshot.

Who loses the car keys when it comes time to go somewhere?

Martha will and then she’ll get flustered and have to retrace her steps from when she came home and then find them beside the spice rack, or under a couch cushion. She eventually finds a bowl to put her keys in and puts it on an accent table near the door so that she won’t have this problem anymore. She has to train herself to put it there everyday but soon enough it becomes routine. Lionel, who has very different connotations for sets of keys in a bowl, does a small double take every time he sees it for the first little while, he doesn’t tell Martha why. Lionel never loses his keys because he has a driver to take care of that for him.

Who mows the lawn?

Lionel has mowed the lawn exactly once. Martha made a passing comment about the classic housewife looking at the hot young gardener or pool boy trope, and Lionel kept teasing her about it. Eventually, when the latest housekeepers were on vacation, he took the opportunity to make the joke a reality and Martha sat, sipping a cocktail and laughing as Lionel, in jeans, with a flannel tied around his waist and no shirt on mowed the lawn. She enjoyed herself and he was very happy about that but mowing the lawn was the most boring experience of his life. He didn’t think to bring headphones for music or radio, and the noise was too loud to hear himself think. He just kept looking over at Martha the whole time to stop himself going haywire with the repetitive work. Martha tipped him $20.

Who answers the telephone?

Lionel is constantly getting called, and constantly answering the phone. If its not Martha’s cell, its usually safe to assume that its for Lionel, as different people are trying to reach him at different places. Martha doesn’t really like talking on the phone, she likes talking to people in person and always gets nervous something is going to get miscommunicated over phone conversations.

Who takes the longest to shower?

Are you kidding me, that man needs a hell of a lot of time to apply every cream, shampoo, conditioner, and then aftershave that he has, in the correct order, for maximum aesthetic and image. He has a waterproof radio in there and Martha bought him a set of shower pens so he would stop running out every few seconds to write something down and then getting back in. His shower set up now looks like another office, if its a waterproof shower gadget, Lionel probably has it.

Miscellaneous:

Is money a problem?

Nope. 

How many cars do they own?

Martha doesn’t know, and she doesn’t really want to know. She only needs one and if he even thinks about buying her another one she’s donating however much he’s going to spend to every charity within a fifty mile radius. Lionel has twelve. 

Do they own their home or do they rent?

They own their various places. Martha after having paid off the mortgage with Jonathan over about thirty years, Lionel just buys things when it strikes him. 

Do they live in the city or in the country? 

They move between places, because Smallville is Martha’s home base, and Lionel has a lot of history and investments in the town so they do still stay at the manor, and the farm, even though both of their jobs are based more in Metropolis, so they also spend quite a bit of time at Lionel’s apartment in the city. 

Do they enjoy their surroundings?

They’re both city kids at heart but Martha loves her home, and she feels protective and defensive about her town. 

What’s their song?

Not in-universe but: ‘Two less lonely people in the world’ (all Air Supply songs are Mionel songs, I don’t make the rules, don’t @ me)

Of course, if you actually asked them then, ’Salut d’amour’ Lionel would tell you, ‘La Fleur Que Tu M’avais Jetée’, he’d think to himself. Martha’s would be a lot less symbolic, it would be something that reminded her of a time with Lionel, something playing on the radio early on in their relationship, or song in a musical they went to see that Martha saw him enjoying and thought about how handsome he looked when smiling. 

What do they do when they’re away from each other?

Lionel pines something awful. He is insufferable to be around when Martha is out of town on business. Martha texts him all the time tho, because she likes to comment on things she sees and the people that she meets. When Lionel’s away on business he emails practically every hour, you’ve seen that man’s emails, always about five when one would do. Martha is better about the separation than Lionel, except at night. She really hates sleeping alone, whereas Lionel is really used to it so it doesn’t bother him as much. 

Where did they first meet?

So many years ago in the front of Jonathan Kent’s pick up truck. Nobody would have known it at the time, but they would both have one of the most profound impacts on the other’s life. 

How did they first meet?

In a high octane situation where both of them were worried about whether the boys in their arms would be okay.

Who spends the most money when out shopping?

Lionel has expensive taste. And he likes to buy expensive things. If there’s two versions of the same thing he wants to buy, but one is $1000 dollars more expensive, well, say hello to your new fancy toaster Mr Luthor, it has 8 toast slots and 100 settings and you’ll never use it but, by god, you own it.

Who’s more likely to flash their assets?

Is this a trick question? The man’s a compulsive show off. 

Who finds it amusing when the other trips over?

Martha. Not because she’s mean, or because she finds people hurting themselves funny. If he actually hurt himself she wouldn’t laugh. But like, it’s Lionel Luthor. He’s not supposed to trip, and if he does, he looks at the floor like its been plotting this very moment for months and he’s going to revenge himself upon it. Lets face it, that’s funny. 

Who pays the bills?

Much to Martha’s chagrin, she does have to concede that its kind of nice not to be worrying about how she’s gonna stretch the account month to month, but she doesn’t let him pay for everything, and gets very uncomfortable when he buys too expensive things. Lionel just gets frustrated that she won’t let him pay for more, he has all this money damn it, how else is supposed to show his love? Open and honest communication? Bah, unnacceptable. 

Do they have any fears for their future?

Yes, like, absolutely. They both know how quickly shit could go downhill if there isn’t someone (Clark) combatting the threats trying to take the city and town down all the time. 

Who’s more likely to surprise the other with a fancy dinner?

Lionel, by a mile. He likes doing fancy rich people things, and he’s good at showing affection via buying shit, so this is kind of like a romantic and thoughtful version of saying I love you, with money. He just likes to see her happy and treated like a queen. He would buy her a goddamn throne to sit on if he ever thought she’d accept that. 

Who uses up all of the hot water? 

One of these people is rich and has been inconsiderate for a very long time, one has not. I’ll let you work it out. (For real tho, Lionel has a back up water heater for sure)

Who’s the tallest?

Okay well this isn’t a hc, more of just a fact that Lionel is taller and Martha is tiny and its adorable. 

Who’s more likely to just randomly hop into the shower with the other?

Martha. Lionel, of course, has entered other people’s showers, but usually as he’s in the process of seducing (and probably having another illegitimate child with) them, so the first time she popped in the shower and actually started, you know, showering, he was caught off guard. Like, um, you- you know I’m in here right. He quickly understood the value of such intimacy, but he still does tend to get handsy. 

Who wanders around in their underwear?

Lbr, everyone at the Luthor mansion has seen more of Lionel than they ever should have. If he’s fixating on a thing sometimes he doesn’t get dressed before working on it, meaning that at particularly stressful times you could often walk into a room and see Lionel in just a robe and boxers (if you’re lucky), speaking orders into a phone. Of course, he wouldn’t be caught dead like that for an outsider to see, only family and staff (who all have some, probably illegal, non-disclosure agreements binding them), and he would demand to be notified immediately if the mansion was getting a visitor so he could put on a suit that costs more than their house. 

Who sings the loudest when singing along to the radio?

Martha, she’ll chuck on music as she’s working on stuff and have fun with it. Lionel doesn’t sing to the radio, but he does conduct an invisible orchestra when he’s listening to his records. 

What do they tease each other about?

Lionel teases her about her farm habits and vocab she’s picked up over the years, she teases him about how he doesn’t understand how regular people live. He teases her for how she never sees the plot twist coming in a tv show, and she teases him about how paranoid he got the time the waitress gave him his coffee and he seriously considered it might be poisoned because, and she quotes “Her smile was off, she smiled at me funny.” “Lionel stop looking at her. I can see you using your peripheral vision. Oh my god, put the cup down before they ask us to leave.”

Who is more likely to cringe at the other’s fashion sense at times?

Oh my god, Lionel has the widest fashion sense possible, any time Lionel is not dressed in a three piece suit and overcoat he is wearing something disastrous. Like, credit to the man that he found a look that both works for him and is socially appropriate in the workforce, but his non-thousand-dollar-suit fashion sense can be daggy as fuck. Like, have you seen that man not in suits? His comfortable clothes are terrible sweaters and bad pants (Pls don’t get me started on John Glover’s own terrible pants). If Lionel wasn’t oppressed by the world’s sense of what is appropriate fashion, he would be unstoppable. Flare trousers? Collars as high as they will go? Does it make me look like a dramatic fuck, check, then yes. 

Lionel is 0-100, he is either dressed to fucking destroy in suits that cost more than your house, or he looks like the middle class dopey dad from a bad 90s sitcom. And if Lionel wasn’t so concerned about how people perceive him and how his look affects other’s attitudes he would channel that instinct for thousand dollar clothes into something truly hideous and I would be living. 

Do they have mutual friends?

No, they come from a very different circle of friends. They also have very different experiences of “friends”. For one thing Martha’s friends aren’t usually considering a plot to kill her in the back of their minds when they see each other. 

Who crushed first? 

Lionel has been gone since the day he first set eyes on her, he just didn’t know it at the time.

Any alcohol or substance related problems?

Lionel drinks more than he should, and he’s done a lot of stuff during his life. He was a high flying businessman in the eighties so you do the math. He also smoked well into the nineties until he quit, not because of all the health PSAs, but because he didn’t like that his craving for a cigarette kept taking him away from work (also someone jokey said the tobacco controlled him once and that spun around in his head until he couldn’t take it). Lionel liked to do addictive things to prove to himself how strong he was when he kicked it, which was honestly playing with fire because he has a very obsessive personality but, fuck, you try and explain that logically to him. Good luck. 

LuthorCorp buildings also now have very draconian smoking rules, not because of health and safety or government requirements but because Lionel is petty and full of spite and he better not see you light up, and better not smell so much as a whiff of tobacco on you. He was presented with a conscientious business owner award from the Metropolis anti-smoking lobby which of course he accepted graciously with lots of platitudes about civic duty and moral compasses, and inwardly mocking every person applauding him. His picture hangs at their office which he enjoys immensely. 

Who is more likely to stumble home, drunk, at 3am?

That’s neither of their style really, they prefer to drink in the house rather than go anywhere. If anyone’s drunk at 3am its probably Lionel in the study with a half finished bottle of whiskey dictating his ideas for his novel into a tape recorder, or shouting the correct answers at the contestants on wheel of fortune. His novel ideas are incomprehensible, but his WoF answers are usually correct. Once he even rang into the station when the host gave a false answer and forced them to issue a correction. He had no recollection of this event the next morning. 

Who swears the most?

Lionel. I think Lionel went through a phase of being like, swearing is beneath me, it is only for those of a low and uncouth vocabulary, and I shan’t be one to use it. But then like, he just has too much anger and too much spite to be able to contain in polite words, and so I think he absolutely swears a lot to himself in private because shit goes wrong and he is not about that, but he still contained it when talking to people so they wouldn’t think he’d lost control. 

Martha had to curb any swearing in the house because she had a very fast, smart child with sensitive (if not super at that point) hearing who could pick up and parrot anything she said back at her. They never heard the end of it the day Jonathan broke his wrist fixing the barn roof and quite understandably swore black and blue. Clark ran around the house for days after, cussing up a storm and it took a concerted effort to get him to stop. 

[jdsbloghoughtonhouserehab-blog]

Kung Foolery and the Art of Addiction Recovery

The mantis spreads its forearms. The snake coils itself up to strike. The tiger tightens its muscles, preparing to launch. The crane kicked ass in The Karate Kid. And the monkey broke into the Shaolin Temple’s winery, and is now doing fancy missteps like a true drunken master.

That last one was me.

A buffoon back in active addiction.

But I had a black belt in it, and so was proud. I could drink you under the table, then kumite kick it to the curb. That’s because somewhere along the path I had fallen to the teachings of a dark kung fu master. The teacher was called Master Poo Luh Choices. Those teachings, however, led to pain.

I had good teachers too.

My parents, for one, are masters of justice. They fight every day to bring balance back to the downtrodden lives of this country. They take on, through the courts, those who would criminally neglect the poor, just as the Shaolin Monks of old fought raiders and bandits with spectacular high kicks and spinning bladed staffs.

And you won’t believe the difference they’ve made to so many people.

They’re my heroes. In their sixties, like Mr Miyagi, and they’re master splinter schooling me in kindness. Something I forgot this week in my previous blog post. (Now removed, through the suggestion of a forth-coming zen instructor.)

If we extend this metaphor to warrior monk tropes in a galaxy far, far away, then Recovery is the Force that connects us and binds us to the world around us. If I just keep myself open and serene, I can avoid the tumultuousness, terrible emotions.

They bring trouble.

As Master, whatshisname, Yogurt said: I sense fear in you. Fear leads to anger. Anger leads to hate. H8ers bring sh!tst0rms, possibly on social media.

The blog I wrote this week was about my experience with the dark side regarding an attempt to hustle me.

But, no, not the other person’s dark side. That is irrelevant.

My own dark side.

See, I have another teacher, one I visit on top of a mountain in the metaphorical local of Sherpas and sheep shindigs. It’s a steady climb, and it’s an inconvenient journey. But s/he meditates there. And it’s from this vantage point they get to see the whole picture.

Anger caused by fear, and poor impulse control, kept me from seeing it.

This wise old master spoke to me… (actually over FB, since screw mountains. S/he can Instagram that sh!@ – they have wi-fi everywhere.)

…and pointed out a few things.

The blog post this week was a little too free with the details – and, to be honesty, it was more judgey than Judge Dread and Judge Judy’s love child. I made interpretations that may or may not be true.

The wise old master (literally, long white hair and I swear I can see threads of long, wispy beard) showed a vision of a world where people are desperate, and not necessarily desperate because of drugs, but because the world can be a cruel and harsh place.

Desperate, and who need help, and who don’t need judgement. Even when they try and infringe on my boundaries in some way. It would have been better to be vaguer, kept it to my experience of it, but I didn’t. I wanted to prove how clever I was in spotting the flaws in the story, how I poked holes in it, how I would never be fooled again. So there were way too many details, and way too much emphasis on the other person.

But, I had already “won” before that post went up.

Because I managed to put up some boundaries like a – Star Wars reference / Sci-Fi play-on-words, look how clever I am, whoop whoop, sigh –  Force Field. I beat a desperate person’s desperate attempts to shake me down.

Then I went back to an old martial art form called I Do Your Fourth Step For You Fu.

[Explanatory note: the Fourth Step in Recovery is about

taking your own inventory

for things you’ve done wrong. You’re meant to be focused on yourselfand your actions, not with the actions of other people, even if they have brought you harm. That’s because it is your journey and it’s an accounting in order to become a more enlightened being, one who will grow as a kind and caring person who contributes to society instead of taking from it, as many addicts do in active addiction.]

Inventory taking is easy when it’s someone else. It surprised me how easily I slipped into it. Wise Old Master gently reminded me that what makes my own personal-style of writing work is: I normally talk about me. My experiences. My actions. Not someone else’s.

Not unless they’re fictional, blonde, and play the cello. And may or may not be going mad.

Which is how I feel sometimes.

The forces of emotion are overwhelming.

What this person did, and tried to do, though, doesn’t really matter. There was no harm done. I was just left shaken like a power-surged Mr Ever Ready.

The climax was an outpouring of processing on my blog.

It’s gone now. The stain of shame has been washed out white.

White like the belt I wear around my crisp new karate suit. See, I’m still young in recovery, in many ways. That’s part of what this blog is. A journey. I never considered myself a spiritual person, not in any other sense than previously convening with Johnny, Jameson, and J & B.

I guess what I’ve learnt from this is: spirituality is feeling for the other person, looking past the demon ninja masks they’re currently wearing to see their true face.

I messed up earlier this week, because I was unspiritual. And I broke a code of honour.

I hope this post helps bring balance to what I did. And how I got here is because the Wise Old Master taught me to sweep.

Like how many tourists, seeking enlightenment, sweep in the temples throughout east Asia, where a broom is a school for stilling the mind, becoming calm, centring yourself, and cleansing soul-stuff.

So I swept, and I swept, and finally, hopefully, I swept enough that now my side of the street is clean.

Maybe, just maybe, I’ll master recovery too, one day.

Because when it comes down to it, life’s like an old martial arts movie on video tape.

When you make a mistake and possibly hurt someone through mean-spiritedness…

Be Kind.

And Rewind.

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