#colossal 2017

[babyspiderling]

Mine, Oscar x reader

AN: First smut, but god is it filth. Fem!Reader

Warnings: Breeding kink, degredation, slut, whore, lust, smut, public sex, you name it, it's probably here.

The jukebox blares with some old school country song that sounded vaguely familiar. Maybe one I had heard while flipping through stations or riding in someones old beat up truck in my youth. I spy Oscar pouring beers for the men at the bar. I shoot him a smile as I make an attempt to greet him. I sit at the empty end of the bar, more than happy to wait for now instead of pushing through the men and their smoke scented flannels.

It isn't long before I start to get impatient, drumming my fingers on the lacquered bartop in time with the music filtering through the moderate crowd. Oscars cutting it up with his customers and I start to get antsy. I turn away from the bar, leaning back against it to people watch, take a fleeting interest with the game on the televisions. I feel someone approach before I feel them. Incorrectly, I assume it’s Oscar and a wicked grin blossoms on my face before I turn to face him, only to be met with another face. James. I had seen him around, as you do in a small town. The grocery store, the bank, Oscars bar. I give a polite smile before looking back for Oscar who had conveniently gone to the back of the bar, out of sight. 

James scoots closer, and I can smell the whiskey on his tongue. An evil little bug takes hold, one that I know I’ll regret when I can’t walk in the morning but I’ve been missing Oscar like crazy and was willing to do whatever it took to get his attention solely on me. “Hey James.” I greet, turning my attention to him, ignoring the strong scent of alcohol wafting over my face. He invites me to dance just as Oscar re-enters the bar area. I let James pull me onto the dance floor to hold me in his arms and sway to the old country song crooning from the old jukebox that was older than Oscar himself. I pretend to have a good time, like he wasn’t trampling my toes under his every step. 

“What do you think you’re doing?” I don’t separate from James, despite hearing the possessive edge in Oscars voice. “Oscar!” I gasp, eyes wide as I’m caught. James grins around alcohol scented breath. “You know you’re not supposed to be here, baby. No more playing hard to get, I’m tired of chasing.” Oscar responds, a small frown blooming between his eyebrows and his jaw set under the stubble that drove me wild, whether I felt it under my fingers, against my lips or overstimulating the sensitive spot between my thighs that made my hips buck uncontrollably. I bite at my lower lip, reflecting on that stubble. 

“I just came for the music. Maybe a couple drinks.” I can’t decide if I want to dig myself out of the hole I’ve landed myself in or push more of my boyfriend's buttons and make him jealous. I lick my lips and decide on the second option. He laughs, but is quick to change his expression when he sees my lips, and takes a few steps forward. “It's not just the music you came for, is it? I know what you really want.” I pretend to deny it. “I came to dance. And James here is gonna help me out with that.” I turn to the poor man “Isn’t that right, James?” Oscar grabs my hand and pulls me away from the poor, shocked looking James. Oscar leans in and whispers in my ear, a sweet, little nothing “It’s ok, baby. Those lips are meant for me and me alone. You don’t have to play anymore games. You know you want me.” His voice is smooth and seductive.

“You finally gonna dance with me Oscar?” He laughs softly to himself, a dangerous glint in his dark brown eyes. “I want something much more than just a dance. And it doesn’t take an advanced degree in body language to recognize what it is you really desire.” James has long since been forgotten as I lay one hand on Oscar’s shoulder, the other taking his hand. “Oh? And what do you think that is?” His face inches closer to mine, his lips just barely grazing my ear. “Your body craves excitement. You want a man who will take control, who will dominate you, and push you to your limits. You want me.” I pretend that his little monologue didn’t send a delicious shudder down my spine, dampening the fabric between my legs. Despite how turned on I am, I decide to push my luck, continuing to brat. “Is that what I want, Oscar?” He leans in closer still, his large body pressed against mine, the woodsy scent of his cologne filling my nose. His voice grows quiet and turns into a low, seductive, almost hypnotizing whisper. “You do, You want me to show you how a real man takes care of a woman like you. How you should be loved. I”m going to give you just what you want. All you have to do is give yourself to me.” As we dance chest to chest for a minute, I can’t help but glance at the clock on the wall to see how long I’d have to wait before Oscar could take me home and fulfill his promises. “Is that all I have to do?” I continue to push my luck. “I don’t know. I mean, you’ve got a bar to run, and I don’t enjoy audiences.” My response is met with a growl of impatience and a tightening of his grip on my hip. His free hand runs down my neck to my back as he walks me backwards towards the bar. He pins me against the wood, the edge digging into my spine.

“I guess we’ll just have to wait until you close for the night.” I whisper, a wicked grin on my red painted lips. He grows in his throat again. I can almost feel his heart pounding in his chest from how hard he’s pressed against me, his desire on full display. “You don’t have to wait… I can close the bar now and take you upstairs in my office. Or we could do it here.” I make a small tutting noise in my throat. “As much as I do like the idea of christening the bar, I don’t do shows.” He smiles, his teeth a gleaming white as his eyes roam the bar, taking in the shocked expressions of the other patrons. He chuckles softly. “They might learn a thing or two.” He leans in towards me again, his breath tickling my ear as he speaks sweetly. “So, is that a yes?” His hand slides up my arms just to rest at my neck. “After you close up shop, Baby.” His lips graze my cheek as he whispers in my ear in a sexy purr. “You can call me any name you want, sweetheart. Just as long as you call on me when your little heart is aching for lovin’.” His hand slides down my face until it rests on my waist, and his voice is low and growling. “Your body wants to be taken by someone big and strong. You want it. And I want to give it to you.” I smirk, pressed chest to chest with him. “Oh, you do?” He slides his rough, calloused hands down my body, cupping my hips in a possessive grip as he looks into my eyes and licks his lips. “Oh, yes. Yes, I do.” His growl is deep and hungry as his gaze drifts down to my mouth. I can almost see the fantasies flashing through his head. I glance at the clock above the bar. “You’ve got an hour and a half till close. Maybe the time’ll go by fast.” I giggle, sauntering off to the back. He watches me go, a smirk playing at his lips and his heartbeat pulsing fast within his chest. 

The last hour and a half seemed like an eternity, and yet, it flew by as it approached last call. Eventually, it was just him and I in the darkened, empty bar. Oscar locked the door and turned off the open sign before meeting my eyes. “I believe we had an arrangement to christen the bar.” I hum, as if I had forgotten all about it. “We did, didn’t we?” He raises a brow at me, a knowing glimmer in his eyes. He lets his hand trail behind him over the shining wood until he reaches where I stand at the end. His body presses close to mine once again, leaving my breath feeling hot and heavy. When he speaks, it’s a quiet purr in my ear. “I don’t think you forgot. I think you like playing dumb. Let’s fix that, shall we?” My breath hitches, despite myself. I gasp as he turns me around, his chest pressed into my back, his hot breath tickling my neck and ear as his hands grip bruises onto my hips, dragging me back and forth over his clothed arousal, making him groan quietly. “Since you want to act like such a dumb fucking slut, I’m going to treat you like one.”

A hand threads its way into my hair, pulling tight to shove me against the wood of the bar. “There we go. Look at you, practically presenting yourself to me.” I whimper, my own arousal pooling in the small scrap of panty barely covering my core. “Let’s see what you’re good for.” He growls, flipping up my short skirt to expose the barely there lace. “Whore. Parading around in such a little skirt, barely wearing panties.” He tsks his tongue, his large, warm hand slamming against my ass with an audible crack that rings through the empty bar. I cry out, jerking against the bartop. “Hush. This is what bad girls get when they want to act like sluts. Maybe it’s my fault. Maybe I haven’t done a good job at showing you just who you belong to. Well, don’t worry, baby. I’ll make sure you remember.” Another crack sounds against my ass, making me gasp and arch. His rough fingers tuck themselves under the waistband, pulling at them to let them snap against my skin. “Such pretty panties. Too bad they’re gonna be ruined.” Without another word my ears pick up a ripping noise and my jaw drops as I try to look over my shoulder at him. He sees this and turns my face back to the bar. “Eyes forward baby.” He brings my bare hips back towards his clothed ones. I drip against the denim restraining his cock, moaning at the sensation. “Yeah, I know baby. I know.” I hear the sound of his belt being undone and the opening of a zipper as he sighs at the relief of no longer being so constrained. 

I arch my hips slightly, the teasing and anticipation leaving me needy. “Look at you, such a pretty little slut.” I feel his fingers trace my lips, parting them to see my leaking opening. “Oh, sweetheart, practically dripping for me. Bet you don’t even need my fingers to stretch you out.” He growls, pride mingling in his tone. I gasp as a thick finger breaches my walls, the small stretch already sending my eyes rolling. “Oscar~” I whine, nudging my hips back against the digits as my hands grip the ledge of the bar. Oscar shuffles closer, his burning length bumping against my hip as he leans over me. “Thats a good girl. Tell me who you belong to. Let everyone in this fucking town hear who makes you feel this good.” A finger teases at my clit. Not too hard that it builds pleasure, but hard enough to send my knees buckling and my hips jerking to chase the sensation. That earns me another pop to the backside. “Stay still.” His fingers leave and I can hardly breathe, tense with anticipation as I feel him square himself between my legs. A needy whine breaks from my throat as I feel him drag my soaking core over his length, the tip teasing my clit with every thrust. “Maybe there’s hope for you being my good girl yet.” I can practically hear the smirk in his voice as he drags back and guides himself into my cunt, the muscles fluttering around him as it tries to adjust to the sheer size of him. “Oh, god.” I warble, my thighs shaking from the effort to adjust to him. Oscar barely waits before he starts pistoning back and forth, in and out as a snails pace. 

All too soon I’m whining and moaning, begging for more as I try to fuck myself back on his cock. “Such a needy little girl. You need more? You need me to fuck you nice and deep? Yeah, I bet you do. You need me to fuck you dumb. It’s okay baby, you don’t have to say anything. You just keep letting everyone know who you belong to, who makes you feel so good.” I feel him pick up speed and his grip grow tighter. My eyes roll back as my cheek presses to the wood, drool pooling on the reflective surface. The familiar coil begins to tighten further, on the verge of snapping. I moan a warning. “Yeah? Yeah, is someone about to cum? Does someone feel too good? Hm? Is my pretty slut going to soak my cock?” He bends over me, feeling his stubble rake against the soft skin of the shoulder, his breath hot in my ear. “It’s okay honey, you can let go. Doesn’t mean I’ll stop, but you’ve been taking me so well. You don’t have to hold it.” I moan, pushed closer to the edge from his words alone. “You want to be good, don’t you? You want to be so good for me. Good girls cum when they’re told.” I tumble over the edge with a shout of his name, my toes curling in my shoes as I get a white knuckle grip on the edge of the bar. Oscar doesn’t even slow down, fucking me through my orgasm as he chases his. “That’s it. Tighten that pretty little cunt around my cock. Gonna make me cum, princess. Bet you’d like that, huh, want me to fill you up. Maybe I’ll even knock you up. Oh you like that idea, feel you tightening around me at that. Yeah? You want me to knock you up? Get you all nice and round with my baby? Gonna make you carry a piece of me in you for nine months. Gonna show everyone just who you belong to. Gonna be hard for them to claim plausible deniability when you’re the size of a watermelon and waddling all over creation. Yeah. Yeah I’m gonna knock you up.” His thrusts grow sloppy, pistoning in and out fervently, spurred on by his own words. He slams forward, twitching and spilling into me, painting my insides with thick ropes. He growls and bites an angry red mark into my shoulder, licking and sucking at it. The wave crashes over me one last time, triggered by his words and the way he twitches inside me. 

I slump against the lacquer, exhausted and fucked dumb just as Oscar intended. I whine at the empty feeling as he pulls out, feeling him start to drip out of me. He hums behind me, scooping up the evidence of our escapade before pushing it back in with a thick finger. “Gotta make sure it takes, sweetheart. You thought I was kidding about giving you a kid?”

[katyvern]

Day Two of Monster March with Colossi or the Monster from the 2017 Movie, Colossal. It's a good movie

[suntails]

stream of creation

[joeythephatone]

[riaarivic]

HIS - KNJ x F!reader: 1 Into you

💗Pairings idol!NamjoonxReader

💗 Genres idol!AU, Smut, Angst, Romance, Enemies to lovers

💗 Rating 18+ minors DNI

💗 Summary  Four years have passed since the last time you saw Kim Namjoon. But now he was right in front of you, with the same stupid warm smile that made your good judgment (and underwear) disappear without a trace. You haven't seen him for four years. But now here you were working for BTS again. Having to see his insufferably attractive face every day of your life again.

But there's something Namjoon doesn't know. The little girl with almond eyes and dimples in her smile clinging to his ex-girlfriend's hip, not only looked too much like him. But she was… His.

💗  Warnings for the series: Unplanned pregnancy (I KNOW BUT HEAR ME OUT) Unprotected sex, foul language, angst, miscommunications, pinning, SO MUCH PINNING, Hurt/comfort. Will update as the series progress. 💗  Warnings for the chapter: reader has very conflictive emotions about the news of her pregnancy at the begining. This chapter will have some back and forth time skips

💗 A/N: ⚠️ dialogue in BOLD is intended to be in English if not, they are speaking in Korean. ⚠️

Love, Ria

💗 Chapter wordcount 3,4k

💗 Series Index 1 2

His 01: Into you

"And baby even on our worst nights. I'm into you" Into you - Paramore.

💗💗💗MARCH 2022💗💗💗

You have to admit, you've been glued to your computer screen for a solid twenty minutes, utterly motionless.

Hyung-Joon, once your boss and now your business partner, just forwarded an email confirming your company's involvement in BTS's upcoming Permission to Dance on Stage tour. The whole team was buzzing with excitement about the colossal job ahead.

It would be the biggest job in your company.

It really was the opportunity of a lifetime, the pay was enough to take Hana on a Disney cruise vacation.

For a whole year.

Three years in a row.

Heck, you could buy the damn boat.

That's how good it would be.

You should be basking in the joy of this achievement.

Yet, the smallest detail casts a shadow over the happiness—precisely, the leader of the band. The young, talented, millionaire, successful, infuriating asshole Kim Namjoon is your daughter's father.

For the tiniest detail, it must be emphasized that he had no intention of being a part of her life.

Fuck him.

He couldn't even summon the decency to meet your gaze when he sent his mother and manager to deliver an envelope full of money, effectively kicking you and your daughter out of Korea.

The memory of it turned your stomach.

💗💗💗JANUARY 2017💗💗💗

An alien.

That's how all the people saw you when you entered Big Hit as if you came from another planet entirely. An alien who spoke their language perfectly, who had not come as part of a tourist excursion, but to work.

They all regarded you as if you had a second head protruding from your back. The security, while registering your information for your access card; the staff, makeup artists, hair stylists—all whispered things as you walked by.

What the hell were you getting yourself into?

The chance of a lifetime, you reminded yourself. The pay might not be extravagant, but the perks of being part of a K-pop group's staff more than compensated for it.

You were going to travel all over the world, meet new people, eat delicious things and most of all… be as far away geographically as possible from where you came from.

This is the opportunity of a lifetime

After navigating several security checkpoints and maneuvering through what felt like a maze of boxes filled with the group's merchandise, materials, and clothing, you reached the office where they awaited you.

The global press department.

Though the term "department" sounded too grand for the small space—more like a converted broom closet with your boss's desk and yours side by side.

"Oh! Miss… um," you smiled as you saw him struggling with the pronunciation of your full name.

"Call me y/n. You must be Manager Hyung-Joon," the man let out a sigh of relief. Despite his imposing stature, dominating the tiny office, a friendly smile adorned his face.

"Miss y/n, you're just in time. They are about to finish a rehearsal, and we are going to start the first practice interviews for the US tour. Did you bring everything you need?" You nodded, and he motioned for you to follow him.

Probably, nothing you had read about this group could prepare you for what lay ahead. As Manager Hyung-Joon swung open the door, the first thing that struck you was the noise.

That room was pure Chaos.

What you'd expect if you left seven practically teenage men to their own devices. They chatted and laughed, appearing at first glance like a bunch of ordinary kids.

Not like the young men who would become the biggest musical act in history.

"Bangtan, can you please be quiet?" the manager shouted, capturing everyone's attention. "This is y/n; she will be your translator from now on." All seven pairs of eyes turned to you simultaneously, and once again, there it was.

That look that made you feel utterly out of place.

According to what you'd been told, it wasn't common for the company to hire young, let alone single, women to work with BTS. Yet, you excelled at your job, armed with a glowing recommendation letter from one of your college professors.

Fast and precise with translations, you also brought experience as a journalist before accepting this position.

And that you accepted the joke of a salary they offered.

The company deemed you useful enough to overlook the fact that you would be the only woman among these men most of the time.

But your integration into the staff didn't happen before their main manager warned them that any attempt at inappropriate behavior towards you would result in drastic consequences.

Not to mention the uncomfortably awkward conversation you had in the president's office, where terms like contraceptives, confidentiality agreements, and the ominous "If you have any kind of relationship with one of the members, we will sue you for everything you have" echoed.

Though you were sure the suitcase you brought to Korea wouldn't be much help to a music company at the time.

The message was clear:

Mess with one of them.

You're out.

It's not like you were interested in a workplace romance; true, they were all attractive, but you needed this job more than anything else in the world.

At that time, Bangtan was gearing up for their promotions in the United States, and they required someone to assist them in English communication.

So they wouldn't be overly dependent on him.

"Do you even speak Korean?" that was the very first words he spoke to you. He wore an expression somewhere between puzzled and annoyed for a moment before turning to speak to Hyung-Joon as if you weren't there. "Are you sure she's not a stalker?"

"I'm a communications major from Busan National University. I also speak Japanese, French, Spanish, and Portuguese. But my first language is English. I suppose that answers your question," you retorted, meeting his gaze challengingly, and he rolled his eyes as if your response bored him.

At the far end of the room, you heard an amused snort; you recognized him from the dossier—his name was Suga.

"Did that lady just shut up Namjoon-hyung?" the youngest among them stared at you as if you were a unicorn, a mythical creature, the weirdest thing he has ever seen, and the older one nudged him to stop staring.

"Nice to meet you all; my name is y/n. I will be your translator, and I hope you can take care of me." You bowed, and when you straightened, you smiled at everyone. He kept his stare locked at you, irritated and unimpressed by your initial response.

That was the beginning of it all.

💗💗💗DECEMBER 2018💗💗💗

Fool.

A complete fool is how you felt, your heart pounding in your chest as you found yourself on your bathroom floor holding a positive pregnancy test. Four years ago, your heart held a different kind of weight, the weight of a secret growing within you.

Two weeks after he had returned to Seoul.

Exactly two weeks after you had told him to get the fuck out of your life.

No. That's not true.

You know better now. He was already gone before you found the strength to let him go. You just hadn't realized it.

So, here you were sitting on your bathroom floor. The weight of your shared history hanging heavily between you. Looking at the abstract pattern on the tiles feeling like a complete idiot.

Feeling guilty for a child who will grow up without a father.

Because...

You thought you were strong enough to handle it. You believed you could navigate motherhood alone, but...

Should you tell him?

Would it be too selfish to unveil this reality now?

How could you shatter his world, now that his career soared to unprecedented heights?

And the company…

You knew The company would go to great lengths to erase you and this secret from existence if necessary..

Kim Namjoon the leader of BTS.

Korea's pride.

Fathering an unplanned child out of wedlock with a foreigner?

It could dismantle everything he had worked for.

And his group. It will destroy them and he will never forgive you for it.

Besides, did you even have the right to reenter his life?

After what you have said to him? After the wounds you carved upon each other?

You wanted to cry, but the tears remained trapped within your eyes.

Kim Namjoon, the man known as RM, the leader of BTS, was your adversary, your lover, the man who once held your heart, and the one who shattered it into irreparable pieces—

All within a year.

💗💗💗NOVEMBER 2019💗💗💗

This is a terrible idea

It took you too long to work up the courage to tell him that you had had a daughter. But you couldn't tell him by phone call or mail.

You mustered all the courage you had and took a plane from Los Angeles to Korea. You definitely did not imagine how extremely difficult 16 hours on a flight with a one year old baby would be.

You had to bribe Jungkook with buying him 10 cartons of banana milk to get his new number.

Calling him was much harder.

"Hello?" His voice, after a year, stirred emotions you believed buried deep within.

You had no idea what to say.

Hi Namjoon, remember me? I'm y/n, your ex-girlfriend, ex-enemy, ex-translator? Oh, by the way, we have a daughter. I'm in Korea. Sorry for not telling you earlier; I panicked, thinking the company might erase us if they found out. Congratulations on the new album.

Definitely not that.

"Hey, Joonie," you blurted, and somehow felt like worse alternative, "I'm in Korea, and I'd like to talk…"

"Yes," he interrupted, his voice as desperate as yours, "I'm sending a driver for you. Where are you staying?"

Two hours later, a black company van awaited you in front of your hotel. It transported you to a far more luxurious apartment complex than their previous dormitory.

They are doing so well.

That made you proud, they deserved every drop of success they had.

But he wasn't in the apartment.

Waiting for you in the living room was a face you'd only seen once—Namjoon's mother, Mrs. Kim Seolmi. Accompanied by bodyguards and a staff member, her gaze held the same mix of disappointment and anger as the first meeting. Her eyes shifted sourly when they landed on Hana, in your arms.

Hana was the vivid image of her father, every feature, dimples, almond eyes, pouty lips, and even her expressions. Seeing Namjoon in her.

It took Mrs. Kim mere seconds to deduce the baby in your arms was her granddaughter.

"He doesn't want to see you, neither you nor the bastard child you're carrying. Did you think you could pass off just anyone's daughter as my son's?" She pulled an envelope from her bag. You knew it contained money. "Take it and leave. A gold-digger like you, using men for money. How disgusting."

"Madam, I don't need your money. If Namjoon doesn't want to see me, he should tell me himself." You clutched your crying daughter, scared by the woman's shouts.

From a corridor emerged Sejin, BangTan's main manager. He always knew everything about them. And his presence here meant The company was already aware that Namjoon had a daughter.

Shit.

"I'm sorry, Miss y/n, but it's true. He asked us to give this to you," Sejin handed you a sealed letter with your name on it, "and this you must sign. It's the only way to prevent the company from taking legal action against you for involving yourself with a member."

"Ha! As if the half-breed was really my Namjoon's daughter."

Oh you were going to kill that woman.

Before you could unleash your thoughts, Sejin spoke again. "y/n, you know what it means to be in a relationship with an idol, let alone having a daughter out of wedlock. This could destroy him and Bangtan. I'm sure you don't want that." His voice carried pity.

"You don't want to go trough this, and we know you don't want to put your daughter through it." He took a breath and sat in front of you. "The company is willing to compensate you for your silence. It's your only option—"

"I don't want your fucking money, Sejin"

"Miss, if you go against the company, we'll have to fight in court, and you could lose custody of your daughter. I'm sorry, but it's true. He didn't want to come when he found out you were coming with your child."

He didn't want to come

When he found out

That you were coming with a child.

Your child.

That phrase echoed in your mind for years. You could still close your eyes and see Sejin's pitiful face—the same one he wore when informing an employee they could no longer work for them.

Because they spoke a second too long with one of them.

Because they smiled at them a little too much.

Because feelings started to emerge.

All were fired and forced to sign mountains of legal documents preventing them from ever speaking about what transpired.

Some were even offered positions at other agencies.

"You're fortunate Bang PDnim decided to compensate you. But it's your decision," he concluded.

Three hours later, you were repacking to return to Los Angeles, vowing never to set foot in Seoul again.

This should never have happened.

As you wiped away tears, your phone buzzed with several notifications.

Message from unknown number: Doll, it's Yoongi. Jungkook told me you were here and you were staying at a hotel in Myeongdon. Message from unknown number: I'm coming to see you.

Message from Cookie 🍪: Y/n Noona, Yoongi Hyung asked me to give him your number. Thanks for the banana milk, you should stop by the dorm and let's drink soju like old times!!!!

Message from NJ: I am so sorry. I hope you can understand.

The last message made you want to throw up.

The phone started vibrating with an incoming call…..

💗💗💗MARCH 2022💗💗💗

"Are you sure you're okay with this?"

Hyun-Joon regarded you with the same concerned eyes he had five years ago when you first met. He had transitioned from being your boss to your business partner and, eventually, one of your dearest friends. A few months after your departure from Korea, he called to share the news of starting their own management agency with a friend.

The startup funds came from the envelope Sejin handed you as compensation for never disclosing the identity of your daughter's father.

At least something good came from shattering your heart into a thousand pieces.

Today, you were the CEO of a flourishing company offering diverse services to music companies in Korea—translators, managers, staff, security; you had it all, and your agency ranked as the best in the market.

It was only a matter of time before you appeared on HYBE's radar.

It was only a matter of time before you found yourself back in the same room as him.

"Of course, this is the best contract the agency has had since we started. We are professionals, and your CEO is no exception," you reassured yourself more than Hyun-Joon.

He scrutinized you, trying to believe your conviction. "Well, let's get ready; they are about to come in."

The sight before you differed vastly from the first time you saw them in the modest conference room at what was then Big Hit. Through the glass door leading to your meeting room, the bodyguards entered first, followed by the new individual managers.

You knew much had changed since your last encounter. Initially, it was just you and a handful of staff members.

Now, it felt as if the President of the United States or Beyoncé were about to make an entrance.

Scratch that, the president's secret service probably had fewer people.

The room was nearly full, yet they hadn't arrived.

Jungkook walked in first. The last time you saw him, he still wore his school uniform. Now, he appeared as if he had stepped out of a novel, exuding a bad-boy aura with tattoos and all-black attire.

Behind him, Taehyung, the shy boy with the innocent smile, wore a designer suit, exuding timeless elegance like the protagonist of an old Hollywood film. You couldn't help but smile at the sight of him.

Jimin seemed unchanged yet transformed simultaneously—beautiful, elegant, with a hint of mischief in his eyes. When he saw you, he smiled discreetly, as if holding back many unspoken words.

Following him, J-Hope entered. His off-stage personality always intimidated you, yet he remained the kindest and most focused among them. That hadn't changed.

Yoongi walked in behind him, smiling genuinely upon seeing you. Among all of them, he was the only one you still maintained contact with. Nonetheless, seeing him in person brought a sense of relief.

Jin came in almost last, and you couldn't help but be amused. Despite not having seen him in person for four years, he hadn't aged a day. Serene as ever, he entered with a respectful bow.

A chill ran down your spine.

They entered in the official order.

From youngest to oldest.

And last.

Him.

Kim Namjoon, always entering last, responsible for introducing them all. Front and center, as always. His now-blond hair caught your attention first. Even beneath his clothes, you could see that he had grown. His arms filled his shirt just like his chest and legs.

Your mind instinctively wandered into territory you almost slapped yourself for entertaining.

You looked up, and he was looking at you. Whether he was surprised or not, his face revealed nothing. With almost a decade in the business, Kim Namjoon knew how to conceal his emotions.

Assuming he had any.

He obviously doesn't care to see you. And who were you to him?—just some woman he was fucking four years ago.

Just

The mother of his daughter.

Your ears buzzed, and you were so deeply lost in your thoughts that you didn't notice when he began talking.

"...it's a pleasure for us to work again with you and your agency," that damn voice, it could still stir emotions in you. "Miss Y/LN, it's also nice to see you again."

Oh, is he going to call you by your last name?

"It's Lee now," your voice sounded cooler than you thought it would, perfect.

"Congratulations, in that case," he stiffened his jaw, and you smiled at him. Simultaneously, several people in the room tensed up.

Ah yes, that was another detail Kim Namjoon obviously didn't know about you.

Eric Lee was your other business partner and your best friend. You had married three years ago so that he could obtain a visa and stay in the US with you.

Eric gave his last name to Hana and had practically raised her with you.

And also.

Eric was completely, totally, and utterly gay.

Your marriage was only on paper.

But that was a detail you weren't going to explain to Kim Namjoon.

By the way… where the hell was he?

Namjoon cleared his throat, snapping you out of your thoughts. "In that case, I think we can start—"

"Mommy!" a little voice interrupted, entering the room. With so many people there, you could only see the top of her dark brown hair. "Uncle said to play hide and seek; can I hide with you?"

Almond eyes.

Dimples in the smile.

The same pouty lips.

Kim Namjoon who was almost 10 years in the industry and knew perfectly well how to hide his emotions, but he looked at the little girl in front of him as if he had just seen an alien.

His face showed a thousand questions.

How old was that little girl?

Why did she have the same eyes as him?

Why had she called you mom?

Did you have a daughter?

The whole room tensed up.

Oh shit, I knew this was a bad idea.

But things happened so fast.

For the first time in her life, Kim Namjoon looked at his daughter's face.

And you were looking at the consecuence of what once was a stolen kiss behind a closed door.

And then evolved to so much more.

A snarky remark.

An irritated snort after others spoke.

A heated argument in a press room.

A few stolen kisses behind the staff room door.

A night in a hotel room.

And despite your reluctance to admit it,

Despite everything.

You would always be

His.

💗💗💗💗💗💗

I KNOOOOOWWWW! Another fic and I haven't finished translating/editing/rewriting/posting Hate!. But Yes, I had to, I had a writers block and decided to pull this one out of the vault of prompts.

Pregnancy troupe? while I'm writing a dark mafia romance? I KNOW But hear me out with this one, it is A RIDE.

I REALLY wanted to write a short agnsty BUT filled with heart clenching romance and.. other things clenching smuttines.

Yes, I'll continue updating Hate! but i would love you a bit if you give this baby a chance... literal baby. AND KIM NAMJOON AS A GIRL DAD!!?? IM NOT GOING TO DEPRIVE MYSELF OF THAT

Ps. If you want to be on the tag list drop a comment below!! 👩🏼‍💻✨

As always love you guys,

Ria 💗

[jimintomystery]

MST3K's most wanted

I've been organizing my Mystery Science Theater 3000 collection, so I've become preoccupied with the handful of episodes that are not easily available, and the reasons why. In case in anyone else is interested, I thought I'd share what I've learned.

For our purposes we'll be focusing on the ten seasons that aired on cable, from 1989 to 1999. With the post-2017 episodes, it's trivial to purchase them on home video or streaming. And the pre-cable stuff, from KTMA, is widely available as bootleg footage, which is probably about as good as you're ever going to get. But the episodes from the cable era have been notoriously difficult to re-release, and require special attention.

Of the 176 MST3K episodes that aired on cable, 166 have been released on home video, and 145 are available for streaming/download on the Gizmoplex. As someone who's been trying to collect the whole series since the 1990s, I think that's pretty impressive. But there are 40 episodes that have been particularly tricky. Let's take a look, won't you?

Currently available on the Gizmoplex, but never on home video (1):

913 - Quest of the Delta Knights

As I understand it, nobody was sure who owned the rights to this movie, or how to contact them, for years. The situation has only recently been cleared up, perhaps too late for a DVD release.

Currently available on the Gizmoplex, but out of print on home video (8):

203 - Jungle Goddess

317 - Viking Women and the Sea Serpent

319 - War of the Colossal Beast

510 - The Painted Hills

619 - Red Zone Cuba

806 - The Undead

808 - The She-Creature

912 - The Screaming Skull

It looks like all of these went out of print due to being on a set where a different episode's rights expired. Theoretically Shout Factory could re-release any of them in a "Lost and Found" set, but that may not be cost-effective as people move away from collecting physical media.

Currently available on home video and MST3K's official YouTube, but not on the Gizmoplex (1):

615 - Kitten with a Whip (Vol. 25 DVD, 2012)

Kitten is one of the Universal movies that could only be licensed for physical media. And yet, it's the only one I can find on the official YouTube channel. Beats me why that is.

Currently available on home video, but not on the Gizmoplex (16):

401 - Space Travelers (Vol. 32 DVD, 2015)

522 - Teen-Age Crime Wave (Vol. 33 DVD, 2015)

524 - 12 to the Moon (Vol. 35 DVD, 2016)

601 - Girls Town (Vol. 39 DVD, 2017)

605 - Colossus and the Headhunters (Vol. 38 DVD, 2017)

614 - San Francisco International (Vol. 32 DVD, 2015)

704 - The Incredible Melting Man (Vol. 36 DVD, 2016)

801 - Revenge of the Creature (Vol. 25 DVD, 2012)

802 - The Leech Woman (25th Anniversary Edition DVD, 2013)

803 - The Mole People (Vol. 26 DVD, 2013)

804 - The Deadly Mantis (Vol. 27 DVD, 2013)

805 - The Thing That Couldn't Die (Vol. 29 DVD, 2013)

814 - Riding With Death (Vol. 36 DVD, 2016)

815 - Agent for H.A.R.M (Vol. 33 DVD, 2015)

901 - The Projected Man (Vol. 30 DVD, 2014)

1013 - Diabolik (Vol. 39 DVD, 2017)

I was able to find the DVD sets listed above on Shout Factory's website. As far as I know, they'll remain in print for the foreseeable future, but there's no way to know how long that will last.

The general pattern with these episodes is that the movies are owned by major studios that would only license them for physical media. Columbia owns Teen-Age Crime Wave and 12 to the Moon. MGM owns Girls Town and The Incredible Melting Man. Paramount owns Diabolik. But the big player here is Universal, which controls the rights to Space Travelers, San Francisco International, Revenge of the Creature, Leech Woman, Mole People, Deadly Mantis, Thing That Couldn't Die, Riding With Death, Agent for H.A.R.M., and Projected Man.

The odd man out here is Colossus and the Headhunters; I can't find any info on who owns the rights to this film, which may be part of the problem.

The real hard cases, the stickiest of wickets, are below...

Released on home video, but now out of print (5):

212 - Godzilla vs. Megalon (Vol. 10 DVD, 2006)

309 - The Amazing Colossal Man (VHS, 1996)

910 - The Final Sacrifice (Vol. 17 DVD, 2010)

1001 - Soultaker (Vol. 14 DVD, 2009)

1012 - Squirm (Turkey Day Collection DVD, 2014)

Megalon and Colossal Man were both recalled when rights issues came up after they were released. Oops. These were produced by Rhino, back before Shout Factory took over.

The Final Sacrifice is particularly tough to find, even unofficially, because director Tjardus Greidanus is very aggressive about tracking down download links. I always figured someone was similarly possessive of Soultaker, since it's clearly a passion project, but that's purely my speculation.

The Turkey Day DVD set is still available on Amazon at a reasonable price, so Squirm is still relatively accessible for now.

Never released on home video or streaming (9):

201 - Rocketship X-M

213 - Godzilla vs. the Sea Monster

311 - It Conquered the World

416 - Fire Maidens of Outer Space

418 - Attack of the the Eye Creatures

807 - Terror from the Year 5000

809 - I was a Teenage Werewolf

905 - The Deadly Bees

906 - The Space Children

In 2017, Shout released its final (?) MST3K DVD collection, which included Satellite Dishes, a compilation of host segments from episodes that "may never get a legitimate release." This included the nine listed above, as well as The Amazing Colossal Man and Quest for the Delta Knights. Of course, Delta Knights eventually got a digital-only release, which is cause for a glimmer of hope. But the others are probably tougher nuts to crack.

Wade Williams owned the rights to Rocketship X-M and had a particular sentimental attachment to the film. His death in 2023 may make it easier to negotiate with his estate, but I wouldn't count on that being a swift process.

Godzilla vs. Megalon and Godzilla vs. The Sea Monster are part of a prestigious franchise, and it's remarkable MST3K got away with riffing on Godzilla movies in the first place. I get the impression that Japanese culture doesn't particularly appreciate the sort of mockery MST3K is known for, so the rights to these two movies may be a long, long shot. Then again I used to think there was no hope of for the Gamera episodes too.

Fire Maidens, Deadly Bees, and Space Children are owned by Olive Films, and currently licensed to Paramount. It's possible a deal can be made later on, but not until the current arrangement expires.

The major bugbear for MST3K fandom is Susan Hart, the widow of American International Pictures co-founder James Nicholson. One way or another the AIP catalog was split up and Hart laid claim to several of their films, including Amazing Colossal Man, It Conquered the World, Eye Creatures, Terror from the Year 5000, and Teenage Werewolf. Hart's price for licensing her movies is very high, and it seems Shout has given up negotiating with her. I suppose the situation could change when she passes away, but I'd feel rather silly hoping for an old woman to die just so I can pay 8 bucks to watch robots laugh at a werewolf movie.

In conclusion, I've already purchased all the movies available on the Gizmoplex (I got most of them in a Kickstarter reward package), and the 31 that aren't available there can be obtained by, ahem, other means. So it's a great time to be an MST3K fan, and I'm still amazed how easy it is to watch the show nowadays.

[mysticstronomy]

WHAT IS MORE POWERFUL THAN A QUASAR??

Blog#409

Wednesday, June 12th, 2024.

Welcome back,

On July 12th, 2018, researchers announced that they’d caught a single, tiny, high-energy particle called a neutrino that had rained down on Earth from a supermassive black hole some 4 billion light-years away.

Astrophysicists are excited because this is only the third identified cosmic object they’ve managed to collect the elusive particles from — first the Sun, then a supernova that went off in a neighboring galaxy in 1987, and now a blazar.

So, what is a blazar, anyway?

At the center of most galaxies — including our own Milky Way — there’s a gargantuan black hole that can have the mass of millions or even billions of Suns. In some galaxies, this supermassive black hole may collect a swirling disk of gas, dust and stellar debris around it to eat from.

As material in the disk falls toward the black hole, its gravitational energy can be converted to light, making the centers of these galaxies very bright and giving them the name active galactic nuclei (AGN).

Some of these active galactic nuclei also shoot out colossal jets of material that travel close to the speed of light. Scientists call this a quasar.

But when a galaxy happens to be oriented so the jets point toward Earth — and we’re staring right down the barrel of the gun, as it were — it’s called a blazar. It’s the same thing as a quasar, just pointed at a different angle.

Those jets shoot matter at close to the speed of light in our direction and, we now know, produce high-energy neutrinos like the one detected by the IceCube instrument in September 2017.

The first blazar found was originally misidentified as an oddball of a star. In 1929, the German astronomer Cuno Hoffmeister published a catalog of 354 objects he thought were variable stars, or stars that get brighter and fainter over fairly short periods of time. This catalog included an object that was called BL Lacertae, or BL Lac for short, after the constellation it was in — Lacerta, the lizard.

By the late 1960s and 1970s, astronomers began to notice something funny about BL Lac. It did get brighter and fainter, but not in a regular, predictable way, and it seemed to emit a lot of light in the radio wave regime, which was unusual for stars.

Further studies showed that BL Lac was too far away to be a star in the Milky Way galaxy. And in some ways, its behavior looked more like another mysterious object astronomers were finding — called quasars — than it did variable stars.

Eventually, astronomers found that BL Lac was in fact a bright object in the center of a distant galaxy. And they began to find other objects that shared BL Lac’s strange properties, calling them “BL Lac objects.” By 1980, they coined the name blazars, combining “BL Lac objects” with the somewhat similar “quasars.”

Studies in the 1980s and 1990s gave evidence that the bright radio light from blazars came from jets of material moving at relativistic speeds. By the mid-1990s, astronomers determined that blazars, quasars, and some other bright galaxy phenomena they observed were all in the same family of objects: active galactic nuclei.

Originally published on www.astronomy.com

COMING UP!!

(Saturday, June 15th, 2024)

"WHY DO PLANETS ROTATE??"

[azureflight]

HotD is not a prequel to GoT. It's a soft reboot for the tv franchise.

WARNING: The author is overdosing on copium and hopium, smoked directly from a colossal tin foil hat. Beware.

We have all groaned at the mention of the prophesy in the very first episode of the first season of HotD. "Why even bring that up?" was the common, understandable response. After all, that whole TPTWP/Azor Ahai thing went absolutely nowhere in GoT. There was no need for anything from any of them, they stupidly gave WW a dragon which allowed them to pass the Wall in the first place and then it turned out WW were not a big deal as Arya solo-killing one dude with a dagger they had since season 1 episode 2 was all it took.

The complete meaninglessness and worthlessness of the whole prophesy and the sheer weakness of an anti-climax that was the Others (White Walkers) threat is one of the main complaints people had with the entire S8 of GoT, especially the book fandom. And it always felt like a stupid twisting of the knife to keep talking about it in HotD, since we know it goes nowhere and means nothing.

Now, we know that's not how it's gonna go in the books. Not only is GRRM on the record talking about it, but 2D are also on record bragging about making it all up on their own. But this is the show and it's already not following the books, so talking about it in show canon is moot.

Unless...

Unless of course, HotD is the start of a second, separate show canon, distinct from GoT.

Now, when I first heard it in season 1, I assumed, like many others, it was a misguided attempt at making references to the OG show in order to hype up the audience and create connective tissue to get us into this new story. And indeed, as HotD repeatedly brought it up again and again, I too have rolled my eyes so far back I almost went blind.

But with the first episode of season 2, now HotD did something else. It didn't just allude to a prophesy that went nowhere, to a threat that was a big fat nothing. Instead, it straight up contradicted GoT.

The infamous "Beyond the Wall" episode was first broadcasted in 2017. Fire & Blood got published in 2018 and came with a specific passage, a letter from Alysanne to Jaehaerys, about how her dragon refused to cross the Wall. This info was not available before in any books, thought it was speculated by the fandom as a possibility. The book directly went against GoT, it felt like GRRM saying "no, wtf, no."

GRRM also gave HotD the info about Aegon I being a dreamer and the whole conquest being motivated by a prophesy about the Long Night, and TPTWP.

HotD did not have to include any of this. Targaryens and their dragons and Dany was good enough hooks for GoT/asoiaf audience. No one knew about Aegon I being a dreamer or having a prophesy, so no one would be upset by such an "omission" either. Indeed, including this bit of info earned them only derision and rebuke, continues to do so.

So why persist? They talked about it again and again in season 1, but by the time they sat down to write the scripts for season 2, the feedback was out there, not only from online fandom but also from professional critics in the industry. This prophesy is not crucial or fundamental to Dance's story neither, they could skip, tone down, ignore. But they don't. They changed so much from the books, a borderline fanfic at this point, yet they insist upon talking about this and hyping it up against the collective negativity of the fandom. Why?

HotD is the first spin off from Got/asoiaf IP that HBO purchased. S8 was such a massive let down, what had been an iconic cultural cornerstone for a decade, almost instantly dropped from discussions, unless it was to talk about "shows with shit endings." There was talk of "remaking" it, almost as soon as the last episode aired, which was of course nonsense, but it explains the mood.

HBO sat down and commissioned bunch of spin offs, not only to milk a popular franchise, but also to keep it alive after a massive blow. And GRRM was particularly backing HotD, talking about how Dance was a story he always wanted to tell.

Now, with HotD's success, we have Dunk&Egg coming, as soon as 2025 if all the news is to be believed. A script is being developed for the Conquest, there is talk of reviving Nymeria's show. HotD did its job of salvaging the IP after what could have been a franchise killer of a garbage ending to GoT.

Thinking on it in very general terms, everyone agrees that asoiaf books will eventually get another shot at adaptation. Of course they will, everything does. Reboots and remakes never die. But when, where, how, is the question, and I think we have the answer.

HotD is where it starts. This show is not a mere prequel to "Game of Thrones". It is the starting point of a new show universe for asoiaf franchise. And the first thing they did to set it all up and signal that commitment, is to talk about the prophesy, the Long Night, and how that's not gonna go like it did in the GoT.

HotD brought up Aegon I's prophesy upon hearing it from GRRM, keeps talking about TPTWP, keeps alluding to the super important threat of WW and now went out of its way to inject that "dragons cannot cross the wall" lore bit, not because they have a bizarre compulsion to make references to a failed plot line that pisses everyone off, but because they are specifically developing towards another shot at that plot line, one that promises to be better.

HotD is not a GoT prequel. It is the first installment of the new asoiaf-show universe. D&E, the Conquest, and maybe even Nymeria when it arrives, will follow this new canon, and all of them will eventually lead to another adaptation of asoiaf novels.

When? No idea. Harry Potter and the deathly Hallows Part 2 was released in 2011. A remake of the novels, now in tv series format, is currently being developed and projected to release at 2026. Apparently 15 years is seen as enough. Will it be longer for asoiaf? Maybe. Shorter? I do not think so.

But it is coming. We always knew it would eventually, some how, come, but I think we now know how and where it's coming from.

[incorrect-koh-posts]

Other than leper king and his heirs which book would you recommend for research on Baldwin iv of Jerusalem?

All right then, buckle up for some nerdery! 😁

I will preface this by saying that I am not a total expert on Baldwin and haven't done a colossal amount of research specifically on him. I could chew your ear off prattling on about the general world of the crusader kingdoms, their politics, and about Raymond III of Tripoli and Sibylla of Jerusalem in particular, but Baldwin isn't my main interest here. Also, as far as I know, Hamilton's study is the only longer academic work centred solely around Baldwin. Hence, in order to learn more about your fav and the world he lived in, I'd recommend reading a little more broadly. Being a king, he is featured (at least in some capacity) in most publications that deal with the Latin kingdoms in the latter half of the 12th century.

That said, have a list:

Piers D. Mitchell: "Leprosy and the Case of King Baldwin IV of Jerusalem: Microbacterial Disease in the Crusader States of the 12th and 13th Centuries", International Journal of Leprosy, vol. 61, no. 2, 1993, pp. 283-91. Pretty self-explanatory. You can find this article on the internet; Mitchell also has a few other publications that deal with medicine in the crusader states, so you might find some additional Baldwin stuff there as well.

Elma Brenner: "Recent Perspectives on Leprosy in Medieval Western Europe", History Compass, vol. 8, no. 5, 2010, pp. 388-406. Has a little bit on Baldwin, might be useful if you want to find out more about how the disease was regarded by his contemporaries.

Helen J. Nicholson: Sybil, Queen of Jerusalem, 1186-1190. Routledge, 2022. This is a really good and really recent one that I was lucky enough to find in my uni library. Of course Sibylla-centred, but gives a good overview of the politics in Outremer and of course has passages about Baldwin in it. Also look into some of Nicholson's other publications if you're interested in the role of women in the context of crusading.

Kevin James Lewis: The Counts of Tripoli and Lebanon in the Twelfth Century: Sons of Saint Gilles. Routledge, 2017. Obviously mostly a Raymond-centric source, but it is also relatively recent and has a good chunk on Baldwin in the chapter where Lewis talks about Raymond's time as Baldwin's regent.

Joshua Prawer: Crusader Institutions. Oxford University Press, 1980. More politics to be found here, but very well put together. Prawer was an extremely prolific scholar where the history of the Latin East and the crusades was concerned, so - once again: if you're interested, look up his other works.

Jonathan Riley-Smith: The Oxford Illustrated History of the Crusades, Oxford University Press, 1997. Good overview that goes into detail about the mentality among crusaders and aspects of daily life. Again, Riley-Smith is one of the authorities in the field, so looking into his bibliography might be worth a shot.

If you're into military history, the works of Benjamin Z. Kedar, John France - or, if you want something more dated, R.C. Smail - might be of interest to you. They mostly cover general points of Frankish and Muslim warfare or the Battle of Hattin in particular (other than in Hamilton or in some of the primary sources from the crusader period, I've never come across an article on the Battle of Montgisard), but might be helpful if you want to get a feel for what life was like at the time.

Hans-Eberhard Mayer is also definitely worth a look as a scholar, even though his works are a bit older now. However, I'm not sure how much of his stuff you can find in translation - I've only read him in German.

For the physical setting of crusader-period Jerusalem and the material culture, I very heartily recommend two works written or edited by Adrian J. Boas: Jerusalem in the Time of the Crusades: Society, Landscape and Art in the Holy City under Frankish Rule (Routledge, 2001) and The Crusader World (Routledge, 2016). I consult both of these frequently for world-building in my fic writing.

If you want something on the general concept of the knight / chivalry, Maurice Keen's Chivalry (Yale University Press, 2005) might be a good start. For a detailed analysis of medieval courtly culture, I recommend Joachim Bumke's Courtly Culture: Literature and Society in the High Middle Ages (2000, English translation by Thomas Dunlap). That thing was invaluable when I was writing my BA thesis. And if you'd like to know more about the literary life of the crusaders, there is a recent publication called Literature of the Crusades (Cambridge University Press, 2019) edited by Simon Parsons and Linda M. Paterson that I also found rather good.

For fashion: The various Osprey Military History books are a good choice if you want visual representations of knightly dress. There's also a collection of essays called Encountering Medieval Textiles and Dress: Objects, Texts, Images (Palgrave Macmillan, 2002) edited by Désirée Koslin and Janet Snyder, which is one of the better ones I've found, as most books about medieval fashion focus mostly on later centuries. This one might be a bit hard to get through, though, if you don't have some kind of background knowledge about medieval texts or architecture.

If you want something less strictly academic and more in the vein of popular history, you might want to try James Reston's Warriors of God (2002) or the much more dated but rather fanboy-ish The Crusades: A History (also sometimes titled The Dream and The Tomb) by Robert Payne, which is very pro-Baldwin.

Other than that, I'll link you an older post about fictional depictions of Baldwin and other assorted good bois and girls from KoH. I hope this will scratch the Baldwin itch for you!

And: If anyone has more suggestions, of course do feel free to add them!

[mrchalamet-mrstyles]

Timothée Chalamet’s massive new deal with Warner Bros. has solidified his status as a bonafide movie star. The 28-year-old actor has been a familiar face in many of the best films of the last decade and has already earned a Best Actor Oscar nomination for 2017's Call Me By Your Name. Chalamet's new multi-year deal with Warner Bros. will allow him to both star in and produce a series of WB films after the major box office success of Dune: Part Two andWonka.

Chalamet became the first actor in four decades to star in the top two films at the domestic box office over a span of eight months. With all of Chalamet's box office success comes increases in pay after the actor reportedly made between $8-9 million from Wonka and is set to make even more for Dune: Part Two. While Chalamet has always been a critical favorite in films such as Greta Gerwig's Lady Bird (2017) and 2018's Beautiful Boy, his recent standout performances in major blockbusters have cemented his abilities in major studio movies as well.

Chalamet's first role in a massive blockbuster was as Cooper's son Tom in Christopher Nolan's Interstellar. The actor had a relatively small role considering that Cooper's relationship with his daughter Murph, played by Mackenzie Foy and Jessica Chastain, is much more chronicled than his relationship with Tom, who is also portrayed by Casey Affleck. Interstellar was not Chalamet's feature film debut, which was Jason Reitman's 2014 dramedy Men, Women & Children, but it was his first role in a significant movie. Now, ten years later, he's back in the driver's seat with Warner Bros. making a colossal collaborative deal.

Since Chalamet's rise to stardom really started with Interstellar, it'd be quite fitting for Chalamet to star in an upcoming Christopher Nolan movie. Nolan, who notably did not go with Warnes Bros. for his 2024 Best Picture-winning Oppenheimer over differences about the film's distribution, has announced that he is more than willing to work with Warner Bros. once again. All of Nolan's movies besides Oppenheimer and his first critical hit Memento (2000) have been distributed by Warner Bros.

A Chalamet-Nolan reunion under the Warner Bros. umbrella would mark a full-circle moment ten years in the making. It remains a mystery what Nolan will do next after the massive critical and box office success of Oppenheimer, but a Chalamet team-up could be the next best step that is by no means out of his reach. As for Timothée Chalamet, his only confirmed upcoming projects are the Bob Dylan biopic A Complete Unknown directed by James Mangold, and the eventual Dune: Messiah.

[elvisomar]

Mark Mothersbaugh | Ruby Kusturd (2009-2014)

"Carved from the world’s largest ruby and weighing in at 30,090 carats, the piece exudes the subversive and whimsical attitude characteristic of Mark Mothersbaugh’s art...

"According to Mothersbaugh, he stumbled upon the colossal ruby when he was hanging out with a gemologist friend who 'had this story about a gem mine where somebody was just in a hurry to get rid of a bunch of stuff, and he happened to be at the right place at the right time and he bought it for a ridiculously low price.' The two discussed how the types of people who usually buy these absurdly large gems have often acquired their money by rather sinister means—they are members of drug cartels, Russian oil executives, mobsters. Mothersbaugh decided that he’d like to carve the ruby. Specifically, he’d like to carve the ruby into the shape of a turd… 'So whoever owns the world’s largest ruby, [has] to buy a turd to get it.' To disguise the turd as a scoop of ice cream, Mothersbaugh placed the ruby into a beautiful, highly polished bronze cone."

—excepted from an article by Linda Tauscher for Grey Art Museum at New York University, published July 6, 2017.

[spacetimewithstuartgary]

NASA Telescopes Discover Record-Breaking Black Hole

Astronomers have discovered the most distant black hole yet seen in X-rays, using NASA telescopes. The black hole is at an early stage of growth that had never been witnessed before, where its mass is similar to that of its host galaxy.

This result may explain how some of the first supermassive black holes in the universe formed. 

By combining data from NASA’s Chandra X-ray Observatory and NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope a team of researchers was able to find the telltale signature of a growing black hole just 470 million years after the Big Bang.

“We needed Webb to find this remarkably distant galaxy and Chandra to find its supermassive black hole,” said Akos Bogdan of the Center for Astrophysics | Harvard & Smithsonian (CfA) who leads a new paper in the journal Nature Astronomy describing these results. “We also took advantage of a cosmic magnifying glass that boosted the amount of light we detected.”

Bogdan and his team found the black hole in a galaxy named UHZ1 in the direction of the galaxy cluster Abell 2744, located 3.5 billion light-years from Earth. Webb data, however, has revealed the galaxy is much more distant than the cluster, at 13.2 billion light-years from Earth, when the universe was only 3% of its current age. 

Then over two weeks of observations by Chandra showed the presence of intense superheated, X-ray emitting gas in this galaxy – a trademark for a growing supermassive black hole. The light from the galaxy and the X-rays from gas around its supermassive black hole are magnified by about a factor of four by intervening matter in Abell 2744 (due to a phenomenon called ‘gravitational lensing’), enhancing the infrared signal detected by Webb and allowing Chandra to detect the faint X-ray source. 

This discovery is important for understanding how some supermassive black holes can reach colossal masses soon after the big bang. Do they form directly from the collapse of massive clouds of gas, creating black holes weighing between about ten thousand and a hundred thousand suns? Or do they come from explosions of the first stars that create black holes weighing only between about ten and a hundred suns?

“There are physical limits on how quickly black holes can grow once they’ve formed, but ones that are born more massive have a head start. It’s like planting a sapling, which takes less time to grow into a full-size tree than if you started with only a seed”, said Andy Goulding of Princeton University. Goulding is a co-author of the Nature Astronomy paper and lead author of a new paper in The Astrophysical Journal Letters that reports the galaxy’s distance and mass using a spectrum from Webb.

Bogdan’s team has found strong evidence that the newly discovered black hole was born massive. Its mass is estimated to fall between 10 and 100 million suns, based on the brightness and energy of the X-rays. This mass range is similar to that of all the stars in the galaxy where it lives, which is in stark contrast to black holes in the centers of galaxies in the nearby universe that usually contain only about a tenth of a percent of the mass of their host galaxy’s stars. 

The large mass of the black hole at a young age, plus the amount of X-rays it produces and the brightness of the galaxy detected by Webb, all agree with theoretical predictions in 2017 by co-author Priyamvada Natarajan of Yale University for an “Outsize Black Hole” that directly formed from the collapse of a huge cloud of gas. 

“We think that this is the first detection of an ‘Outsize Black Hole’ and the best evidence yet obtained that some black holes form from massive clouds of gas,” said Natarajan. “For the first time we are seeing a brief stage where a supermassive black hole weighs about as much as the stars in its galaxy, before it falls behind.”

The researchers plan to use this and other results pouring in from Webb and those combining data from other telescopes to fill out a larger picture of the early universe.

“Results like this show why NASA has a portfolio of elite telescopes,” said Mark Clampin, Director of Astrophysics at NASA. “Each has their own superpowers, so to speak, and they can accomplish amazing things when they join forces.”

NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope previously showed that light from distant galaxies is highly magnified by matter in the intervening galaxy cluster, providing part of the motivation for the Webb and Chandra observations described here.

IMAGE....Astronomers found the most distant black hole ever detected in X-rays (in a galaxy dubbed UHZ1) using the Chandra and Webb telescopes. X-ray emission is a telltale signature of a growing supermassive black hole. This result may explain how some of the first supermassive black holes in the universe formed. This composite image shows the galaxy cluster Abell 2744 that UHZ1 is located behind, in X-rays from Chandra (purple) and infrared data from Webb (red, green, blue).  Credits: X-ray: NASA/CXC/SAO/Ákos Bogdán; Infrared: NASA/ESA/CSA/STScI; Image Processing: NASA/CXC/SAO/L. Frattare & K. Arcand

[satoshi-mochida]

Tokyo Xanadu eX+ for Switch delayed to July 25 in the west

From Gematsu

The Switch version of Tokyo Xanadu eX+ will launch on July 25, a delay from its previously planned June release window, publisher Aksys Games announced.

A four-CD set featuring all 88 songs from the Tokyo Xanadu eX+ soundtrack will be available exclusively via Aksys Games Online Store.

Tokyo Xanadu eX+ first launched for PlayStation 4 on September 8, 2016 in Japan, followed by PlayStation 4 and PC via Steam on December 8, 2017 worldwide, and Switch on June 29, 2023 in Japan and July 13, 2023 in Asia.

Here is an overview of the game, via Aksys Games:

About

In addition to the new scenarios and gameplay not included in the original PlayStation Vita version, this updated edition of Tokyo Xanadu includes all additional content for the game and a revamped localization of the story. A four-CD set featuring all 88 songs from the Tokyo Xanadu eX+ soundtrack is available exclusively on the Aksys Online Store. 10 years ago, a colossal earthquake devastated Tokyo and changed the lives of its inhabitants forever. The city has since been rebuilt and life has slowly returned to a semblance of normalcy. However, behind the veil of this newly rebuilt metropolis lies another world, one with a sinister secret. The earthquake that originally destroyed Tokyo was actually caused by the emergence of a mysterious and lethal shadow world known as Eclipse. Now, action must be taken to thwart the legions of Eclipse and ensure the protection of peace!

Key Features

New Scenarios – Enjoy unique tales of the wielders that weren’t depicted in the main story. Once you’ve completed the game, get access to an all-new quest and carry on the adventure!

New Playable Characters, New Monsters, Dungeons, and Bosses – Play as the mysterious knight, White Shroud. Brandish unrivaled strength and the powers of light to take down vile monsters and vicious bosses! Plus, new dungeons filled with fierce new monster types and giant bosses to battle!

New Boss Battle Mode – Revisit battles with various bosses that appear in the main story. The time you spend on each battle is recorded; how fast can you defeat each boss? This mode also features Boss Rush, where you can battle bosses one after the other.

Watch a new trailer below.

Release Date Trailer

[pirateprincessjess]

Are you interested in other giant monster media or are your interests Godzilla specific? I was just thinking about the 2017 movie Colossal which is a very DIFFERENT giant monster movie and was wondering if it was something you’d resonate with.

I adore giant monsters in general! I will admit that most of the Kaiju content i interact with is Godzilla, Gamera, and Ultraman, but if it has a giant monster than I usually try to watch it.

Colossal was a great movie, but it was not what I had expected going into it. The trailers made it look like a quirky comedy, but the actual movie was so much better than that.

Tbh I highly recommend Colossal to anyone who hasn’t seen it (movie has a trigger warning for Addiction, and abuse). It’s a shockingly mature story that has a lot to say

[mitigatedchaos]

2008 - 2020+

(~1,700 words, 8 minutes)

A summary of events and my ideological development from 2008-2020; most of this will be familiar to long-time readers; this post is mostly for later review in 5-10 years.

[ @lokifreign ]

did it seem sudden in 08?

[ mitigatedchaos ]

10 years ago was 2013. By 2013, the direction of the eventual [identitarian] shift was visible, but it wasn't established that "real" "serious" liberals were going to go along with and indulge it.

[ @lokifreign ]

I had a different view (I'm 51; Clinton cleared up any lingering misunderstandings I entertained about dem/lib); it's interesting - I'd love to read something clear about that time period from that perspective. 08 for me was more about the death of the free internet, but I'd be really interested at seeing that realization from the inside somewhat namean. thanks fr sharin'! 🫀👍 [...] never mind! ^_^ all set

So to clear this up for anyone else...

2000-2008

From the perspective of someone who grew up in the 00's, the Republican Party put a tremendous amount of political investment into the Iraq War, which turned out to be a disaster. The only WMDs were leftover chemical shells, not exactly a "clear and present danger;" I'm not aware of any of them being used in terrorist attacks.

2008-2012

So going into 2008, Republicans looked epistemically bankrupt. The War probably cost them an entire generation. It was such a colossal fuck-up that one of the early MitigatedChaos essays, back in 2017, was "A Price Paid in National Will," arguing that patriotism is an exhaustible resource. It is basically screaming at the 00's US establishment right for squandering a valuable and precious resource with their dumb war. [1] As it happens, military recruitment is way down.

By contrast, the first-term Obama-era Democratic coalition offered us people like Roland Fryer, a pragmatic-minded black academic who was willing to reach counterintuitive conclusions or try things like just paying students to see if that worked. Combined with things like the lead-crime hypothesis or support for early childhood education, the epistemic grounding was a lot better than what they offered after 2016.

The public position of the Democratic Party 2008-2012 was largely meritocratic colorblind liberal individualism, combined with moderate immigration restrictionism, with only a modest exception for Affirmative Action in universities. They were still pro free speech, valued professionalism, and valued things like consumer rights, and mostly weren't against patriotism.

This was an extremely well-hedged set of positions, adequately handling risks from multiple directions at once - and the follower libs (the "Stage 3s" as post-rationalists would call them) echoed all of it, causing the overall Democratic coalition to seem much, much smarter than they actually are.

Even electing a black President seemed a decent bet, and if there is one thing Obama is really good at, it's projecting a Presidential image.

If you combine this with Transhumanism and an expectation that significant new technologies will overcome long-standing issues in the case that social solutions don't work, kicking in around 2040-2050, as most Rationalists probably would have expected at that time, it covers most of the bases. Get some potential gains from social policy, stalling for time for a few decades, and then if any problems are leftover, mop them up with biotech.

I was also engaged in a phase of gender exploration from around 2009-2012 (in cyberspace). I encountered some of the current gender ideas early. At the time, because they weren't as popular, there was a stronger selection effect.

2013-2017

From around 2012-2013 onwards, we started getting the articles about "manspreading," and "mansplaining," combined with a frame that it was prohibited for men to question this because of "male privilege" including subconscious bias which, by definition, they could not be aware of.

I actually checked in on a Mens Rights forum around this time, and a GamerGate forum later, and contrasted what I actually saw with both media coverage and left/lib representations which were... basically almost all completely different from my direct observations.

I was very doubtful because the epistemic norms of the movement were just awful, and very obviously designed in a way that was prone to abuse.

From around 2014 onwards, those same norms were shifting to the much more dangerous field of race. Obama didn't campaign on it, and more "serious" Democrats instead of like, Gawker, were more focused on things like "Republican obstruction in Congress."

By late 2014 or early 2015, I had given up on defending the Obama Administration in arguments, which I'd been doing since around 2008.

From 2013-2015, I was feeling depressed and anxious. Without realizing what I was doing at first, I began an exercise to rework the basis of my politics by working on a fictional country, rewriting it again and again and again.

The development of some kinds of political writers may require something like this, either working from a distant time, like Moldbug, or trying to work out a simulation of a country repeatedly and gaming things out with others, as Scott Alexander and I both did. This allows something that I call Ideological Stereoscopic Vision - viewing the same issue from two ideological perspectives simultaneously. With this, it's possible to see the functional mechanics of your original ideology, which otherwise just appear to be truths.

I was going leave the Presidential box blank in the 2016 election, but voted for Clinton as a personal favor for a dear friend.

Overall my basic model from 2012 wasn't that bad. I hadn't called to deplatform all the Republicans, for instance, and once Trump won the primary, based on the uncertainty I concluded that it was possible he would win the general election.

However, I had to build a much more sophisticated model to explain the benefits of things like colorblind liberal individualism, and explain why it was being attacked, and how. Until 2014, I hadn't considered it something that even could come under serious attack, since influential people should know better than to let that happen.

2017-2020

Around 2017, I opened the blog MitigatedChaos.

In 2018, Roland Fryer was #metoo'd. An investigation mostly cleared him except to require workplace sensitivity training (proportional, IMO). However, the investigation was apparently overruled by a secret committee, and in 2019 he was suspended for 2 years without pay.

In 2018, Robin DiAngelo's "White Fragility" was published. This was followed in 2019 by Ibram Kendi's best-selling, pro-"corrective" discrimination, "How to Be an Anti-Racist." (At some point in 2020 or maybe 2021, the Microsoft Windows 10 login screen featured a link to "anti-racist books" with Kendi's book at the top.)

Unlike Fryer, both writers seemed uninterested in whether their proposals would actually work, as did their readers.

As someone who had voted for Obama in 2012, I was willing to elect politicians or spend money, even if that money might not necessarily work, but that was assuming those involved were actual academics making a serious attempt with some chance of success, not spiteful unqualified quacks.

Because people throughout society demanded that I take race seriously, in 2019, I conducted an investigation into school funding and whether charter schools would be capable of closing racial outcome gaps. (It's difficult to assess their effectiveness on grades due to selection effects on parents, but they're about as cost-effective as public schools, may produce a modest benefit, and allow parents to at least provide a safe environment for their children. The few online charter schools in my sample had dismal results.)

That was when I learned that the social interventions camp were 90% bluffing, hadn't checked the research, and the amount of good faith I had been giving them since 2014 was unjustified. Each of them assumed that someone else had been doing the actual work (not "doing the work" of reading about bad things that happened to racial groups, but the work of figuring out how to solve things).

That was mostly true in 2010. It certainly wasn't by 2018 - or at least the links between the people doing the work and the actual movement were well broken by that time. The implicit claims of what Social Justice can deliver, and the urgency with which they make their demands, have been wildly disproportionate the entire time.

Going into 2020, I still had hope that serious liberals might be in charge somewhere. But instead of actual reforms which might be useful, we got "Defund the Police," which as the CHAZ and subsequent national stats have demonstrated, is delusional.

After 2020

When it turned out that Biden is just lame, and the great racial awakening wasn't as promised, some of the air went out of it. Biden had the opportunity to end the thing in one swoop by just leaving Trump's executive order in place, but instead confirmed that the Democratic Party is committed to this program of crank race dogma, and in the institutions the supporters are digging trenches.

Mainstream Republicans are aware of the problem and acting now, so what was a rout has stabilized into a war front. The primary mission of the right-wing ideological vanguard from 2017-2022, waking the Republicans up to the scale of the problem, and punching through the window of social acceptability hard enough to get them moving, is now complete. As a vital or artistic movement, they no longer have the same margin of information advantage, and energy is leaving the scene.

Sometime after 2020, I developed the coalitional interest deadlock theory to explain some of what had happened - why did the Democrats double down on such a hateful strategy that's obviously bad for the country? Why not just stick with their epistemically-advantaged position from 2012? One possible answer: because each of their coalition members inhibits any other coalition member's attempts to fix anything, so the only thing to do is find an outgroup to blame and hope no one notices, as no one is willing to negotiate a settlement to free up resources for improvement.

They have little to offer but decline and hatred, for now. Maybe in 10 years, they'll be as different as the 2020 Republicans are from 2000's.

---

[1] A left-anarchist view here would be that such sentiments will always be exploited for wasteful wars of imperialism that enrich a small and well-connected group at the top; there is something to such a view, but the actual 21st-century US wars, and their duration, also seem to have been caused by ideological derangement.

[fotos-art]

All images courtesy of TASCHEN

Mount Fuji World Heritage Center (2017), Fujinomiya, Shizuoka, Japan. Photo by Hiroyuki Hirai.

Haesley Hamlet (2020), Gyeonggi, South Korea. Photo by texture on texture

Japan Pavilion (2000), Expo 2000, Hanover, Germany. Photo by Hiroyuki Hirai

Nomadic Museum, Pier 54, New York, United States (2005); Santa Monica, California, United States (2006); Tokyo, Japan (2007). Photo by Michael Moran

Simose (2023), Otake, Hiroshima, Japan. Photo © TASCHEN

Centre Pompidou-Metz (2010), Metz, France. Photo by Didier Boy de la Tour

Cardboard Cathedral (2013), Christchurch, New Zealand. Photo by Steven Goodenough

Kur Park Nagayu (2019), Oita, Japan. Photo by Hiroyuki Hirai

Swatch/Omega Campus (2019), Biel/Bienne, Switzerland. Photo courtesy of Swatch

La Seine Musicale (2017), Île Seguin, Boulogne-Billancourt, France. Photo by Didier Boy de la Tour

# COLOSSAL # TASCHEN # Hiroyuki Hirai # Haesley Hamlet # Michael Moran # Didier Boy # Steven Goodenough # Swatch # artist photographie # fotos art # xpuigc