#even blue/red follows this trend mostly

[quinn-fucks-shit-up]

cat/dog, autistic/ADHD, Vulcan/human, sunshine protector/sunshine, goth gf/gamer bf, skater boy/ballet girl, vampire/werewolf, moon/sun, the list goes on

they're all the same fucking thing and I'm tired of pretending that they're not.

[sunnysam-my]

Hazbin Hotel redesign ideas p. 1

Unfortunately I don't really have time to draw rn, but here are some ideas if anyone is looking for inspiration.

THE VEES:

They follow lates trends so they won't stick to the outfits and technologies from the times they died. We even see that Vox changed his screen (head) to more modern, flat TV screen.

Valentino:

He is a moth that realises poison that's basically a date-rape drug. His wings are hidden, looking like a coat, which makes no sense, a cloak, cape or sleeveless coat would look better. He is a pimp who died in 1970s. Val was Hispanic when living. Apparently, he has bad eyesight.

He is supposed to be a moth, but I don't really see it much, and the furr around his neck, that's a part of his body, just looks ridiculous. I would design him after some actual poisonous moth.

Cinnabar moth - The cinnabar is slate-black with two red spots and two pinky-red stripes on the rounded forewings. Its hindwings are pinky-red and bordered with black. The caterpillars feed on poisonous ragwort leaves. The poison from the leaves is stored in the caterpillar's body and remains even when they are an adult. As adult they leak the poison when they need to. Cinnabar moths can be seen flying during the day and night.

Six-spot burnet moth - day-flying moth that flies with a slow, fluttering pattern. It has glossy black, with six red spots on each narrow, but long forewing. They release hydrogen cyanide when attacked.

Personally I would go with Cinnabar moth, but make the spots heart shaped, and leave his inner outfit without the accessories (the suit with the white pants and golden heart belt). I would also leave his general body type but definitely change the neck furr ring, because wtf is that? I would play around with his glasses since he is supposed to have eyesight problems.

[Edit: Actually, I would make him a combo of both moths and make the furr ring his hair, because he is bald without the hat!?!?]

Velvette:

Velv is a fashion designer and critic, she is also an influencer. She keeps the Vees together and their image fresh on the internet. She's a British black woman in her early 30's. Originally her appearance was supposed to be doll-like, but that was changed to 'it-girl' and a 'bad bitch' with a darker aesthetic.

Velvette's outfit is reminiscent of Val's (heart belt, coat with hearts, black stripes on arms) but darker, especially her sleeveless coat that imitates his wings. Since Valentino is already going to be darker (in my idea) and she is a fashion influencer it would make more sense for her to be brighter.

Main thing I would change about her is her skin tone, hair, and Harley Quinn themes left from her old design.

When creating very human like characters it's important to actually get the racial characteristics right. Her ashy skin and "curly" hair just makes it look like they didn't know how to draw a black character. I would give her a different texture, something between 3A and 4B. A hairstyle like heart shaped space buns would be so cool, but even if not, her styl in a poster in the background is already better than the ponytails.

When it comes to her style I would get rid of pom-poms shoes and fingerless gloves. Her outfit for meeting the overlord was pretty okay, but I would change her other outfit. My inspiration would be PidginDoll's design, because he makes fabulous outfits and makeup looks for all bodies, genders and races, but I'll keep the 'goth' (it's not goth, it's just a little bit alt, mostly skulls) theme.

Blue accents like makeup would work great with her brown skin and would reference Vox.

Vox:

I genuinely think he has the best design in the entirety of the show, I would barely change anything. His outfit is similar to Alastor who he is trying to imitate, but he wears a tail suit, which is way more formal and elegant than any other suit, trying to showing he is a better, modern version of Alastor. I've seen some people got rid of his hat and gave him a tail made out a cord for fun, but other than that his design is good. Not too much details and not too little, tells us a lot about the character.

Maybe less stripes, because apparently Viv loves zebras or something. /hj

[tunabesimpin]

🦚 TWST OC MITCHELL INFO 🦚

New oc alert! ^v^ getting more used to painting first and then lining so this came out more detailed than Tunas LOL

BASIC INFO

TAG : #twst Mitchell

Name : Mitchell / Mitty Class : 2-E (Student no. 5) Birthday : July 31st Age: 17 Height : 171 cm Dominant Hand : right Best Subject : Music Hobby : Idol Dislikes : Clutter & tight spaces Favorite Food: Potato Kabob Least Favorite Food : Spaghetti Talents : Dance (Ballet Specific)

Quick Summary: Mitchell or Mitty, is a micro-celebrity idol. Covering popular songs and trending dances, Mitty is determined to follow his childhood idols footsteps! Even though he couldn't join auditions to be in a group, Mitty has created a good following on his magicam and magitube accounts. As Flamboyant as he is, he still gets shy when complimented or meeting people he looks up to. Overall this peacock beastman is slowly learning step by step how to brainwash everyone to be his fan! (/j... unless?) ^o^

APPEARANCE

A peacock beastman with bright purply-pink hair and eyes. He has an ahoge that is not normal hair, turning blue towards the end. Above his left brow and below his left eye he has beauty marks. His overall body type is thin, toned and with hip dips. Very often Mitty applies red eyeshadow and lipstick as well as applying mascara and contact lenses to make his eyes appear larger. He has lobe piercings, but rarely wears earrings due to his hair covering or getting tangled easily. As for fashion he prefers deep reds and dark cool colors usually in lolita styles. For more casual looks he prefers loungewear like cardigans and loose pants.

PERSONALITY + BACKGROUND

As a child Mitchell was extremely influenced by anime idols and cute idol groups alike. Going as far as performing his favorite songs and dances in school talent shows. However, his obsession with making the crowd feel "awe-inspired" he often used his UM to his advantage. This didn't do well with many of his teachers and other parents... so surprisingly enough Mitty had many detentions in their early years. This record left him in dim lights for group auditions. Mittys mindset got a bit skewed and began to think... I will just have to try harder to rule the crowd! Overtime their hope to inspire morphed into wanting the world to love him (through mostly any means).

Upon entering NRC Mitchell had begun seeking attention online and decided a "debut concert" was most necessary. After the entrance ceremony Mitty went back to the mirror chamber, set up his phone camera and began to perform one of his favorite routines! Thus started his online career! While he is not as popular as others, he does have a few hundred supporting him and in his mind that's the first step to his domination!

Personality wise, Mitty is pretty dense when it comes to anything besides his interests and doesn't take no for an answer. No literally it will go in one ear out the other. Despite this he does take everything surprisingly seriously, ok not rejection, but everything else! However compliments? He will grin from ear to ear, go red and just absoluetly adore you! He can be a bit clingy when he's like this, but he's just happy some one likes him. When it comes to friendship though... well he's not a terrible friend, but he does tend to only think of himself most of the time... at least he will buy you things to make it up to you;; Just don't ask him for emotional advice too much he really isn't good at it. Overall he's a bit of an annoying person, but his shy and bashful bursts at compliments may be something redeemable.

Academically he is average. He does amazing is music but that's about it, everything else is passing at least. He struggles with history most due to his disinterest in remembering about people who aren't his idols.

In his free time, Mitty practices dance and song covers from his favorite medias. Posting them as often as he records and of course running to Cater for help very often. If they're not doing that, he's grooming his feathers or sewing new outfits. Occasionally he will tour around campus and invade dorms to take photos in his newest creations as well as show them off.

ABILITIES

UM- Focus on me! "Let me show you who's the main star!" -This unique magic allows Mitchell to take on his peacock beast-form. When showing off his beautiful feathers they act as a hypnotizing charm; causing dizziness, crossed vision, and luring people into a trance like state. If used with full force, Mitchell can force the afflicted to follow his movements. -Movement can not be fast or the afflicted will snap out of the trance. -strength of effects depends on the amount of magic used in this UM. Less input and you can expect a simple charm and lull effect, but with heavy input the effects will increase. -Small to medium blot manifestation; long term use at low levels is usually fine, but after a few hours blot formation rate will increase.

RELATIONSHIPS

Relationship chart to be made !

Notable Relationships:

Vil & Mitty : Mitty looks up to Vil and respect him so much! While he isnt into acting, Vils prowess and social media standing are impressive! Mitty is too busy fangirling and stuttering to speak to Vil casually. Vil doesn't seem to mind so long as it doesn't effect his work.

Cater & Mitty : Mitty joined the pop music club and immediately wanted to quit. It was quite contrary to what they expected. Cater and Kalim were quick to talk him into staying. Ever since, Cater has been a big help to Mitty in social media learning and Mitty may have taken to mimicking Caters speech online. Mitty says they're close friends, but Cater only see it as a casual friendship.

Riddle : Currently Mitty is trying to convince Riddle to form an idol duo. Riddle had been one of the first to "compliment" one of his dances, saying "Your dancing nice, however you are trespassing on Heartslaybl property!". Ever since, whenever Mitty visits Cater he doesn't hesitate to try and recruit the house warden. While Riddle does not hate him, he is often dumbfounded by Mittys inability to "read the atmosphere". It is not currently known why Mitty is obsessed beyond the nice comment.

Thanks for reading about Mitchell!! I did not realize until after i made his nickname Mitty that Mitty can mean "a fictional character given to grand and elaborate fantasies" and I think that's very fitting for him LMAOOOO anyways!!! Thank you for the support and time <3 !

[toastofthetrashfire]

Color in DFF Part 6: Episode 11

Parts 1 2 3 4 5

Okay the penultimate week! More color!

Shout out to @slayerkitty and our color discussions! And my phone-a-friend (you know who you are) for letting me pick your brain!

We start with Non in his pink/beige shirt. Now it's no longer just a lightened red but it's covered in dirt and grime making his color even more faded. The men around Non are all in black, clearly indicating dangerous intent and the way Non is being forced further into despair. Unlike the blues and grays of the "friend" group, these guys are completely devoid of color, showing how dangerous they are and how devoid of hope.

Despite this, Tee's uncle has a mix of white which aligns with Tee's white uniform as he pleads with his uncle to let Non live. White then represents salvation for Tee. It's his slim hope that he won't have to live with the implications of his actions for the rest of his life, that he can stop the worst from happening and right things. However, at the same time, the white sheets in the background hang like funeral sheaths, representing the false hope Uncle Deng offers Tee and foreshadowing death and the impossibility of a happy resolution.

Interestingly as Tee enters the room he stands in front of something green. This starts a trend in this episode of lots and lots of green. Now I pondered over this a bit. Because up until this point we've only had green in the following situations:

-Non's sweater (which I previously read as his attempt to be blue but failing, just as he fails to fit in)

-Por's shirts largely in the present (I interpreted this as his color)

-Jin when he tries to convince Non to stay on the film project (I saw this as Jin being in between the blue of the group and the yellow he wears when he pushes back)

-New in the previous episode (especially has he sinks deeper into his despair and revenge plan)

But in this episode we seem to have something going on related to Tee we need to unpack.

My immediate thought here was that green might be associated in Tee's case with freedom, because it is so prominent in the gaming cafe, which becomes Tee's path out of his uncle's orbit. However, the casino has it's own share of green too.

So this is puzzling right? Because up until now almost everything around Tee has been blue, red, and yellow. And now, just like with New in the previous episode, we switch from primary art colors (red, blue yellow) to primary light colors (red, blue green). Red, blue, and green. On top of this switch, we have both Tee's new and old spaces employing green.

So I went ahead and phoned a friend (texted but you get the drift). One thing they pointed out was that green might also be one of Non's colors. Instead of reading his jacket as an attempt on his part to be blue, they pointed out that this could be his color too. If we read his red as connected to his romantic relationships, green then is the color of his friendship. It makes for a mismatch with the group's blue, but not in the sense of him putting on an ill fitting costume, but rather in the sense that they have a fundamental mismatch in their colors. At times Non will wear blues and grays to fit with the group, but the others mostly seem to wear reds, pinks, and greens when they're draining him. I discussed in episode 7 how Por is suddenly in pink while Non wears a low battery shirt, signaling that Por is draining him and his color. Por later also wears green so perhaps it can be read in that light as well.

Back to the casino!

As soon as Non starts working on the casino floor he is in all black/dark blue, with the exception of his red bracelet. He is literally holding on by a thread to his color and to his life. So perhaps we can view the green of the casino as another representation of him being drained of that color.

The casino itself seems to be pretty divided, between the green space of the casino tables and the rest of the space that is primarily red, blue, and yellow. Non is largely shown in the green space where he is forced to work.

The exception is the space where he sleeps and dies (assuming he's really dead). In this space his shirt is clean of dirt, his red is able to shine through again. Perhaps this represents the hope he had before he died of getting out, or if he is still alive it could be a sign of that as well.

Either way, Non leaves the room in the same clothes he came in. This time his shirt is clean but he is being wrapped in a black body bag.

For Tee's part, he initially moves around the casino almost exclusively sticking to the spaces that are in red, blue, and yellow. Despite helping Non by begging his uncle, he doesn't fully start making a change right away.

Until he steps in to help Non at the casino. In that moment Tee moves into the green area of the casino. It's after this scene and his conversation with Perth's character that he starts to work at the gaming cafe. He becomes willing to enter Non's color scheme perhaps for the first time. So while the casino is a draining space for Non, that green becomes Tee's first step towards changing as a person and empathizing with someone.

This addition of green to Tee's color is important visually because he already has been mixing red into his wardrobe. Rather I think the red Tee wears signals two things, poverty and mental illness (or rather the mental illness of his father), two things he shares with Non, showing their similarities, similarities he was ignorant of or refused to acknowledge earlier.

Tee even wears the same shirt with his father as when he gives Non money. The shirt slowly mixes in more of a green-gray hue to what was previously white.

What I find particularly interesting is the way Tee's father is framed. He is in red/pink, much like Non, cementing perhaps a connection between characters who have mental illness, but also have both clearly been wronged by society and the social systems around them. Tee's dad mentions land being stolen from him. And the woman who yells at him and Tee is deliberately wearing a contrasting blue. The same blue that is worn by the "friend" group, by Non's parents, and Keng--all of whom reject, harm, and fail to collectively care for Non. The woman argues that Tee's dad should be locked up in his house, separating him from the outside world. I think there's a real critique here about the failures of inclusion, care, and collectivity (as an aside notice too how Por's mom blames Non's dissappearance on his bad upbringing, using her wealth and power to displace what was a failure of the community to protect Non onto the family unit).

Tee knows intimately what it means to be failed by society, to be uncared for. The only one who steps in to help him care for his father or himself is his uncle who is preying on him. Social systems and care have failed and folks like Tee and Non don't just fall through the cracks but get shoved through them violently.

This is why I find it interesting that Tee is not only wearing red/pink but also flowers--something you must nurture, care for, and help grow. He is wearing this when he takes care of his father, and we see the inversion of familial and care taking roles, and the pain that brings in a society that isn't imagining other forms of care.

Tee wears these flowers as he gives Non money and you can see in the way the scene is framed that Non is also standing in front of pink flowers. Tee is trying to make things right, it's a desperate act of care despite what he's done. It's tinged by guilt, and bogged down within a system that makes money one of the few forms of help that can be offered. And of course it comes in the wake of Tee and others withholding care and friendship from Non.

The gaming center highlights this further with striking greens and flowery pink curtains. Here he is in an environment where he can perhaps change, the green offering that promise. The pink flowers signal the way he is working for someone other than himself.

He doesn't abandon the blue of the friend group, but his colors are expanding sharply, becoming more of a rainbow as his world and perspective opens up.

Meanwhile back at school we get the rest of the boys. Each of them has a drink: red, blue, and green. Both Top and Fluke have red, representing the way that what happened with Non haunts them--though not in the sense of feeling guilty or caring so much as the consequences. Por's drink is blue, because he doesn't even care enough to be worried about consequences (he does have a huge shield against any in his parents). Jin is the one with green, clearly showing that he, like Tee is empathizing with Non and has a conscience, before he storms out of the cafeteria.

Back at the casino, Perth's character is also framed by blue, red, and green. This could represent the way, despite his put yourself first talk, he cares and empathizes with others. Or perhaps the way he tells Tee point blank that it's his fault Non is in this shit hole, moving along Tee's journey to self-awareness. But it could also be a sign that he is up to something that could help Non (for those Non is alive truthers).

After Non's death, Tee's world goes gray, at least for a moment. All color is gone, drained. No green, no pink/red, no rainbow. @tbhimnoteasyonmyself wrote a bit here about some other ways that this coloring represents Tee's grief, gray morality, and lifelessness.

After this, Tee continues to work at the gaming center. He's still surrounded by green, he's grown a conscience and with that comes the way he is now bogged down by guilt. He now wears a red jacket. Before I think his red was more closely aligned with what he shared with Non, things like poverty and mental illness in his life. Now, however, I think we can read this jacket during the sequence with White as a representation of Tee's feelings of guilt that White will help him at least temporarily wash clean. Tee begins these scenes with red on his shoulders, literally carrying the weight of what happened to Non on his back. In another sense, as the only one who knows what fully happened to Non, Tee becomes the only one who can carry on his color(s).

*side note and spoiler for the film Shutter but I feel like this has interesting parallels with the way the wronged spirit in the film sits on Tun's shoulders, weighing him down to represent his culpability, forcing him to literally feel the guilt he is supposed to be carrying but doesn't seem to actually feel, despite telling his girlfriend he never forgave himself.

White enters re-emphasizing the pink flowers. white will offer Tee hope that he is someone better, someone who can care for someone else, and perhaps be cared for in turn. And we get both white and pink flowers again out the back door of the gaming center.

White (the color) contains all colors, and White (the character) opens Tee's world back to rainbow again.

Over time red become colors that White wants to exchange and share.

And Tee gives in, passing off the weight of his guilt to White. He surrounds himself with pinks (care) and green (his conscience and sense of being a good person).

By the end of their backstory, White sits above Tee as a savior of sorts. He has taken the red off Tee's shoulders, leaving him born anew in all white, a fresh start of sorts. Tee moves from grey shirts early on, to a mix of black and white, to this final white. It's a striking contrast to the image we started this post with, where black competes with white, and the white shrouds signal a false hope.

In the present day, Tee wears tie die that mixes blue with pink then orange. We can see this as his struggle between saving himself and protecting/caring for White. But we also might see it as the creeping return of the guilt and pain Tee left behind and buried deep down when he let White take the red from his shoulders. He has to face it once again no matter how much he tries to shield himself from it's weight.

In a flashback of Phi and New, we get Phi in his blue and New in orange. I'm not sure what to do with the orange. We've seen New in blues, red, whites, and of course green coloring, which I wrote about a couple weeks back when we got his backstory. I'm not sure what to do with the orange. Something to reflect on when we have the finale perhaps?

Back in the present, Phi is also in white, representing the crossroads he's on, and his choice to start anew by stopping his revenge plan.

Alright! I think that's everything for now. I'd honestly love to hear other folks readings cause this week was a complicated one. I'm sure there's other interpretations and perspectives on this that would work just as well if not better.

[ofmiceandwomen]

On the fashion of the Gondolindrim

I have realised that I did quite a research regarding sensible fashion design for the 1st age elves and that I could share what I had learned.

The Gondolindrim live in a secluded valley in abundance. The city’s beauty and glory is close to that of Tirion. They have been living in relative safety for about four hundred years which is more than average American city. They are scholars and artists with multiple cultural influences and a loooot of time on their hands.

Materials

The Gondolindrim would probably use a lot of silk and metal fibres. Oh wait - is someone objecting that the silk moths are proliferating mostly in warmer climates? Totally right. But there are plenty other moths that produce their own kinds of silk and are adapted for colder climates too, the properties of these silks are just not as convenient for weaving as the silk moth’s cocoons. Maybe an obstacle for a human but certainly not for an elf. They probably love layered gowns with subtle embroidery creating 3D impressions and ethereal elegance, or prefer exquisite brocades with ornaments (probably ocassionaly using the house emblems). As for winter fabrics, Silk velvet would be the choice. I can imagine them trying to avoid using too much fur and furs mostly serve as decorative trims.

Egalmoth wearing his complicated attire including layered cloak with goldwork stars and diamonds . His hair is braided, although most of it is loose - probably Glorfindel influenced.

Colouring and patterns

This is the difficult part as each elf has probably their own taste. The lords usually sport their own colours but it doesn’t have to be a rule - they have multiple outfits and since they have their personal lives as well, I highly doubt they strictly stick to their emblem colour. As for the patterns, they don’t need to worry about the fabric waste so their clothes are probably well fitted and flattering. Lower classes clothes are beautiful as well but have probably much looser fit.

Left: Penlod sporting a light grey silk shirt. Right: Ecthelion’s costume design.

Influences and fashion icons

Now we have celebrities and big name fashion brands to set the trends. However, in the past, the nobility was responsible for that. I assume there were three major trend setters influencing the other lords and citizens: Turgon (the king), Egalmoth (aka the rich one) and Glorfindel (the pretty one). Turgon’s gowns (or…Turgowns? I will see myself out) are usually white with red silk lining and subtle but intricate embroidery, combined with some jewellery. As for the length of the robes it probably varies by the occasion. His style is followed mostly by Penlod, who is very fond of white as well. Egalmoth has a thing for jewels and rainbow colours, which makes his clothing extravagant and lavish. He is probably very fond of embroidery and even his outfits for archery trainings are masterfully crafted. His trademark, however, is the goldwork combined with gemstones and beads (a type of embroidery using metallic threads). His ceremonial attires are very complicated, however many elves struggle to follow his example mostly because of the costs. There are several elves that probably managed to customise his style for their needs - for example, Ecthelion is said to be very fond of diamonds. Since he is the lord of the Fountain and probably very fond of water he usually wears subtle blues adorned with sparkly diamonds droplets imitating the rain droplets. Then we have Glorfindel. If you look at eg. Fingon, we know he wears his hair in braids adorned with gold. I can imagine the Noldor in Valinor were fond of difficult hairstyles which probably persists in Hithlum. Glorfindel decided to ditch this trend once for all and leaves his hair loose for everyone to admire. His garment choices are significantly simpler than Egalmoth’s, he is avoiding long robes and his priority is movement and comfort. His favourite fabrics include linen and subtle brocade, sometimes embroidered. His choices are probably the most popular in the city as they usually reflect the nature (which must make the Sindarin citizens very happy). As for the female trend setters, we have Aredhel (but she has taste very similar to Turgon, the only difference would be probably the pattern) and Idril, who probably prefers loosely fitted garments with subtle jewellery. She is known for her negative attitude toward shoes which might be related to her Vanyarin legacy (I imagine Vanyar wearing very simple clothes unlike the crafty Noldor- their priorities don’t concern material things as much).

Salgant’s last outfit is mostly inspired by the King’s style. The short tunic suggests that he is wearing an informal outfit. The cape is made of silver velvet.

Ouch. This was long.

Special thanks to my partner who helped a lot with all the research. It means a lot for me. All the art belongs to me. I apologise in case there are some grammar errors, I’m not a native speaker.

Feel free to ask me anything. I will try my best to answer your questions as fast as possible.

Are you interested in more costume designs or references? ❤️ I’m about to open commissions and I can include this cathegory as well.

[atotalpitch]

in line w your post about Insta caption; your headcanon about how each Bella uses emoji, what they post on social media and how they'd caption everything?

word count is 1,5k for this one who's surprised??? you genuinely cannot send me an ask and not get answer longer than the fics that i write sigh i kind of went off the rails a bit and forgot about the “how they’d caption everything” part of the question, but here’s a detailed rant of how each of them texts and uses social media:

Chloe: where do i even begin? i feel like she has auto-caps on and uses a shit ton of emojis, but for their actual purpose instead of ironically. she does not send a single text without At Least two hearts, and is definitely not a dry texter by any means. also, according to everyone she has ever been in contact with, she has a habit of sending ten texts in a row instead of just writing everything into one message, which is denied within four seconds of it being brought up. (“but it’s easier to read separate, short messages!” “it’s just how i would talk in real life, you know!”) she has two accounts on instagram, one which is public and one which is private. on the public one she posts aesthetically and has a theme which she strictly follows. the posts are mostly about cute animals she takes care of, or major events. private on the other hand? it basically contains her Entire life – all ups and downs included – and a shit ton of random pictures of Beca. it’s only followed by the Bellas and some of her closest family. twitter, facebook and tiktok (which she would never admit to having) are on a different level. what that implies is very much up for interpretation. she’s one of those pinterest users, and has a board for Everything. has regular meetups with Aubrey when they just gush over their pinterest feeds, dream weddings, etc. (whatever it is that those people do idk)

Aubrey: perfect grammar and punctuation, one emoji per message. a facebook mom, if you will. she gets teased for it endlessly but her response is always something like “why would i use texting for anything other than it’s purpose of informing others?”

if you bring up social media in her presence, she will scowl at you and let you believe that she absolutely despises every form of online contacting. however, she will go back home and sit on Her Armchair with a glass of fucking expensive red wine and go through every single one of your social media accounts from tumblr to linkedin (stalker much?). not that she posts anywhere, except for twitter where she just lets hell loose every once in a blue moon. she does have an instagram account as well though, but just for liking other peoples posts as she claims if someone happens to ask (despite her story always having at least twenty random pictures at any given time of the day)

Amy: … she’s, well, Amy. she texts with full caps or no caps, always with at least five typos even if it’s just two words. it’s Something, how she manages to do that every single time. she’s a tiktok emoji trend user (eg. skull for laughing) which confuses others (read: Aubrey, who isn’t on tiktok) a lot.

her social media is full of memes, random selfies, “inspirational” quotes that are more or less insane, and pictures of food. she, for some reason, went viral on tiktok and has like two million followers. (nobody knows why, which is probably for the better.) on twitter, she mostly just retweets crazy shit and thirsts over celebrities Very openly. then there’s reddit… yeah,, there’s reddit. she doesn’t really use other socials, but does have accounts literally everywhere.

Stacie: as i said in the post that inspired this ask, she texts like Alexis (her actress) writes her instagram captions. so basically just a lot of dragged out words, a bunch of emojis and abbreviations and that stuff. i don’t know to describe it, so. take that as you will. im not sure how many of you follow her anyway .

our girl is for sure, without a doubt, a tiktok thirst trapper. she does it unintentionally at first, but when she goes viral she starts doing it for fun (almost like a hobby). her comments used to be flooded by creepy men, but once she put the bi flag in her bio they seemingly disappeared and were replaced by the army of “#wlw? we won” people. Aubrey’s not too happy about her posting herself like that, but she thinks it’s whatever as long as Stacie runs every video through her (not in a controlling way. she’s just also one of those lesbians who drool over her.) Stacie’s instagram is also kinda similar, but with pictures instead of videos. they’re subtle and barely revealing for the most part, but she looks good in literally anything so she has a lot of followers anyway. that’s where her social media use ends, save for the private twitter account that she uses to bully the rest of the Bellas.

Beca: she texts in all lowercase, but decent grammar anyways. she’s not exactly big on emojis, but slips them in every few messages (she’s a chronic frowning emoji user, that’s for sure). i don’t know how else to describe her texting?? she usually doesn’t even reply with other than half a sentence or a barely coherent abbreviation

she’s famous, so her socials are mostly “official” and really, Really lack personality. naturally, she has private accounts which her closest circle of people follow. she doesn’t post though, mainly just replies to other people. (well, maybe she accidentally clicks post on random memes sometimes, but you really don’t need to know that.) Batshit Crazy Reddit User™ and will use it as a reliable source for anything. you can also find her at 3am doomscrolling on twitter.

Emily: oh god. she texts like she just got a phone and is generally as awkward as when talking. kinda like Chloe, she’ll send a thousand texts in a row in the same way she stumbles over her words irl. she spams people with only emojis, and doesn’t Make Sense most of the time. but she’s Emily, so they let it slide.

she’s not that big on social media (follower wise) but active? hell yes. she posts something every. single. day. whether its a mirror selfie or a cute flower she saw on her way to yoga (she does yoga. yeah. i know. crazy.) you can pretty much imagine Hailee’s insta up until like 2020 but double the amount of posts. there’s never too much filters or hashtags for her, and she unfortunately did not grow out of the 2013(-ish) filter phase. she unironically uses facebook and watches instagram reels, and nobody bats an eye anymore when she giggles and sends a link to a puppy video from the deep dark archives of facebook. any other form of social media she stays away from, especially twitter (she has an account but zero posts or replies). she does learn pinterest from Chloe at some point, so that becomes a big thing for her eventually though.

Cynthia Rose: she texts in the closest way to normal possible. she uses auto-caps, a decent amount of emojis that actually make sense, and abbreviations that everyone can understand. but she does have a middle-aged man edge to it sometimes. she’s an influencer. not that kind of “grwm to go shopping” one, but she fights for rights, talks about representation, and brings out the voices of minorities. she runs campaigns, interviews people, and activist type of stuff. it’s a good thing and she’s happy about what she does (even if she does spend all day everyday working for it despite doing it for free). but, sticking to the running theme, she has a private twitter account. her header is a lesbian quote with two pairs of scissors, and her posts are just plain Insane. she mostly uses it to bully Beca for literally no reason at all. 

Flo: texts like a wine aunt. that’s it. there’s no other way i can describe it.

she has an instagram for her juice truck, and it has a bunch of followers all around the world who are interested in watching her move from one place to another. she also posts tutorials how to make her juices at home (especially during the pandemic), and she’s basically sponsored by a million companies just because she gave them recipes lol. on her personal account, she’s also kind of an influencer too. she mostly posts about fashion and food, maybe sometimes stray cats that walk up to her on the streets when she’s going around with her truck. she’s not really famous famous, but has like 30k followers. i feel like i’m just gonna say the same for them all, but she also has a priv twitter account for the sole purpose of including herself in the crazy ass threads where all of the other Bellas are just, going mental. she’s also a pinterest / aesthetic moodboard tumblr girly methinks. 

Lilly: you can only imagine how she texts, if she even does. ominous as fuck. i’m leaving it at that because shes just so,,,,,, well you know.

she doesn’t use social media as far as anyone knows, and she barely has a working phone number. but if we are being real, does anyone really know anything about her anyway???

Ashley + Jessica: i have zero idea??? it’s hard to give personalities to characters whose names are barely confirmed. but i’m guessing they’re the most “normal” out of them all. you know, casual texting and barely posting anywhere. it’s odd. but they are still bellas and we love them. 

[olivia-anderson-fanfic]

Unfamiliar

Part 5

Demon!Grim gets summoned by a bunch of kids accidentally and immediately decides to adopt them in retaliation

<P4

When you cash in a soul for Soleils, the amount of money you get for it can vary. Humans were worth the most, as their souls were ‘pure’, completely untouched by magic. Werewolves, which were humans who had been corrupted before a demon had even gotten to them, were worth the least, mostly out of spite.

Faerie souls were rare, since no demon wanted to wait up to a thousand years for one to die, and were therefore worth quite a lot.

What does this all mean?

That Grim was rich.

Which is convenient! Because kids, he learned, are not cheap!

“Deuce, please don’t take apart your old phone. Just because you’ve got a new one does not mean that breaking that breaking the old one is okay,” Grim sighed, pinching the bridge of his nose. He may be rich, now, but that didn’t mean he was used to it yet. Every time he glanced over and saw Deuce trying to convince Ace to use his claws to pry it apart, he had a mini heart attack. And he didn’t even have a heart!

Deuce pouted at him.

“You’ve got everything you needed to buy, I can always send you back home,” Grim said, raising an eyebrow.

The boy’s eyes widened and he shook his head, immediately grabbing the nearest friend – Ace – for comfort.

“But he doesn’t need that phone anymore,” Trinity argued, her arms crossed over her chest. “It can’t even text us! It’s awful.”

“It can’t text you when you’re in different worlds,” Grim corrected, tiredly. “And it usually doesn’t have to. Demons are the only species that consistently travels between worlds.”

“Still dumb,” sulked Trinity.

He shrugged. “Enchantments are hard, and finding someone to do them is expensive, it would be a waste to get them when most people won’t use them. Now, stop distracting me, I can see them trying to open the phone. I have peripheral vision, y’know.”

The boys’ shoulders jumped up to their ears, faces red as they quickly tried to hide the evidence behind their backs.

Trinity didn’t look ashamed in the slightest, only pouting harder now that they’d been caught.

Grim plucked Deuce’s old phone out of their hands. Problem solved. “Alright, next up, we should get some stuff to decorate your room.” He thought of his house, relatively bare save for a couple of sentimental things he’d picked up over the years. And small. “I can probably swap out the bed for two smaller ones…”

Ace shook his head, rapidly. “We can share!”

Grim blinked. Hm. A dragon wanting to share? These kids were… perhaps a little more codependent than he’d originally guessed. Should he… do something about that? And, if so, what was he supposed to do?

“Er… sure,” he said, slowly, making a mental note to stop by the library for a lot of parenting books and, perhaps, a few books on childhood trauma. “You’ll have to decide on what color sheets you want.”

There was a beat of silence.

“Red,” said Ace.

“No. Pink.”

“Absolutely not,” said Ace. “Just go with red. It’s dark pink.”

“And pink is light red!” she argued.

“I like blue,” offered Deuce. “It’s a nice… sleepy color?”

“Red’s way cooler.”

Technically, red was a warm color and blue was a cool color, but go off.

“I like blue,” said Trinity. “A nice sky blue could be okay.”

Ace looked betrayed.

“Are you sure you don’t want separate beds?” Grim asked, feeling faint.

“No!” all three of them said, immediately. Even Deuce, who wasn’t even going to live with them, had chimed in. Grim was definitely going to look into codependence.

“... okay. How about we get clothes, and you three can think on it?” he said, a little desperately.

Once they no longer had to share the things that they were buying, shopping was far easier.

Grim couldn’t say he was super knowledgeable about fashion, seeing as Hell didn’t really have any fashion trends for him to follow. Put delicately, there was… no need to cover up, and so most demons didn’t bother. Some experimented, sure, but it was just that – experimenting. Most gave up after a few years, if only because it was a pain to doll yourself up every morning.

This did not mean that there wasn’t an abundance of clothes stores to pick from, though, all in kids’ sizes.

(Demons, as strange as it may sound, were prone to randomly picking up children of miscellaneous species. Gotta pass the millenia somehow, he supposed.)

Now, Grim watched as the kids ran around, picking out items, and realized that he was even less fashionable than he had originally thought he was. Trinity took a liking to a tutu and a set of wizard robes. Ace picked up what looked to be a Batman costume. Grim simply did not understand.

Deuce looked pained. He tugged on Grim’s arm.

“Tell them that it looks bad and they can’t buy it, please.”

Grim looked at the two kids, and then shrugged. “If it’s what they want to wear, I don’t see why they shouldn’t.”

The faerie fell to his knees, devastated.

Now that he thought about it, faerie put a lot of effort into their appearances. They, probably, had a myriad of fashion rules to follow.

… whatever. Ace and Trinity were happy, and it wasn’t like anyone in Hell was going to care if their clothes ‘clashed’.

Outside of Deuce, who picked out a few outfits for them to wear ‘when they came to visit’. Grim added a new note to the margins of his already full mental notepad: make sure Deuce doesn’t burn their clothes out of sheer spite.

Considering his notepad was full, he should probably try and alleviate the danger now, before he forgot. He even had a plan for dealing with it!

Distraction! Kids are easy to distract! Especially with shiny things!

So, he took them around the mall. He didn’t let them go wild – he had no intentions of going broke, after all – but he was happy to buy anything within reason.

Something that the dragon, unsurprisingly, was even more happy to take advantage of. Though Grim was happy to say that Ace focused, largely, on buying nesting materials. Which meant that Ace was actually able to prioritize when splurging! Grim had done nothing to teach him this virtue, but he was proud regardless.

Trinity bought… a goldfish. Grim hadn’t known what she would get, he could have guessed for a hundred years and he still wouldn’t have guessed that she’d go for that. Still, it was her money, and it wasn’t like the goldfish would harm her, so he bought a tank and some little decorations to go with it. The tank was way too big for such a small creature, and literally flashy thanks to a couple of LEDs. He was half tempted to get a couple more fish, to fill it out more, but decided to hold off on that for a while, until he was sure that Trinity was capable of keeping the single fish alive.

Unaware of what Grim had considered and then subsequently shot down, Trinity was as content as can be with the current situation.

“I thought you’d get a cat, if you were buying a pet,” he mused, absently, watching as the tank and fish disappeared in a small flash of light, privately grateful that he had thought far enough ahead to choose a mall that provided delivery services.

“No!” she huffed, drawing his attention back to her. “I want a cat as my familiar, not my pet.”

Grim nodded, slowly. That made sense, he guessed.

“Also the water is calming,” Deuce said.

Grim, who had watched the kids sit in the fish aisle for twenty minutes, eyes full of wonder, decided he would take his word for it.

“I still think chimeras are way cooler,” he said.

The kids shook their heads, vehemently.

“Who even cares what’s cool,” Trinity grumbled. “What matters is how cute a pet is. Black cats are cute. Fish are cute.”

“Chimeras are cute!” Grim said.

All of the kids erupted into disagreement.

One day they would get it, he was sure.

But… he, privately, wouldn’t mind if they didn’t understand. Grim fought back a smile. They all looked so adorable when their cheeks puffed up in anger. He ruffled Ace’s hair, which only made his face burn an even brighter red.

Fighting off a laugh by clearing his throat, he looked around. “Right, anything else…?”

His eyes landed on Deuce. The boy seemed happy to be included on their little trip, content to follow his friends around and give his opinions on things when asked, but…

He sighed. “You can buy something, too, if you want.”

Ace immediately whirled to look at him, his eyes gleaming. “Get us all gaming consoles!”

“Vetoed,” Grim said, immediately.

Ace whirled back around, his mouth dropping open in sheer offense.

“It’s his money, he should choose what to spend it on.”

Deuce pressed his lips into a thin line, clearly thinking hard.

And then he led them all back to a jewelry store they’d visited early on, thanks to Ace. Ace had taken a liking to the watches. Grim sighed, about to tell Deuce not to buy something just because Ace wanted it, that it was supposed to be for him…

But Deuce pointed at something on the wall. A pair of golden bracelets. Enchanted, judging by the price.

Upon closer inspection (of the plaque hanging on the wall, just below the price tag), they were enchanted so the wearers could get a vague read of each others’ emotions, so long as both of them were wearing their bands at the same time. Basically, it was the ultimate friendship bracelet.

Predictably, Trinity and Ace started bickering with each other over who would get it.

Deuce either didn’t notice this or was actively ignoring it. Either way, he was blushing bright red, looking at Grim imploringly. “If – if I get them, my mom won’t have to worry about us getting separated! She’ll always know if I’m safe or not!”

Out of the corner of his eyes, he saw Ace and Trinity’s fight come to an abrupt halt, both of them sulking a little now that they knew it wasn’t for either of them. The smile that made its way across Grim’s face was partially out of relief. Deuce could never blatantly show favorites among his two friends, because that would surely lead to a blowup of some sort.

But he was mostly just smiling because this kid was a sweetheart.

“I have no problem buying that for you. I’m sure Delilah will love it,” he said.

Deuce beamed.

Grim clapped him on the shoulder, and then turned to the nearest store clerk. Within a few minutes, Deuce had a present for his mom, and Grim was much less rich. After a quick glance around, he realized they had kind of covered everything. As far as he could tell, all of the necessities were taken care of.

Which meant…

Oh no. The day was over. There was no more stalling it. They must return to the sheet debate.

Eventually, under threat of being stuck with brown sheets, they all compromised on a dark purple set… so long as Trinity got a light purple comforter to go with it, and Ace got to choose the fish’s name, and Deuce got to put glow-in-the-dark stars all over their ceiling.

They got home, every problem solved… only for Grim to look at all of the new stuff in his apartment and realize that every problem was not, in fact, solved. Because they had only bought the stuff, they still had to set it all up.

Hey, God! He was tired! Give him a break!

God did not give him a break, so he had to give himself one. After the room had been made livable enough for the kids to sleep in, and Deuce had been sent back home for the night, and the kids had been forced to brush their teeth (he could not comprehend why they hated it so much)... he dropped onto the couch and flicked the TV on.

Yeah, he could sleep. Just like he could breathe, could eat. In fact, Grim loved sleeping. It was a great way to pass time!

However, there were far more pertinent things to do.

Ah, his show. He had missed so much. The main leads had been about to confess, he swears!

Grim relaxed into the plush cushions, letting the prerecorded episode start playing.

… okay, they hadn’t confessed in this episode, but they would soon, he was sure of it.

He sighed, flopping back on the couch. Closed his eyes, the dull murmur of the TV playing in his ears. The kids had his bed, now, so here he would sleep. If he even could – the couch was comfortable, but only in the one place that had been properly broken in. He shifted around, awkwardly, for twenty long minutes that stretched into an eternity, before giving up entirely. He fumbled for his remote, starting to flip through channels…

Only the channels didn’t change. Because he’d turned the TV off in frustration when he’d realized that his ship wasn’t canon yet.

But he’d heard people talking…

He sat up slowly, listening intently for any whispers coming from the kids’ room. He didn’t hear any talking now, but they’d definitely been up for at least an hour after he’d put them to bed. Maybe he should have confiscated their phones? He had just assumed that they, as species that needed sleep, would actually do it, but perhaps that was foolish of him.

Grim tiptoed over to the door, and opened it, peering in.

Ace had once again curled along the perimeter of the bed, though there was now an actual nest for him to wrap around, a myriad of soft cloths he had taken a liking to and the occasional golden watch, in a loose ring shape.

Trinity lay in the center, her blanket abandoned once again.

… hugging Deuce.

When had Deuce come back?

Grim’s eyes flicked to the wall. They’d made a quick and easy, two-way portal between Deuce’s room and Grim’s kids’ bedroom. Now, the portal was glowing, the faint red warring with the blue and purple LEDs in the fish’s (named Lubert, because Ace was bad at naming things, too, apparently) tank. It had been used recently, that much was obvious.

He looked at the three kids, fast asleep, seemingly perfectly content…

And decided that it was fine, though he did send Deuce’s mom a quick text so she wouldn’t wake up and worry that her son had been stolen away. Again.

He sighed, quietly, letting the door click shut.

And then turned his attention to the kitchen. Well, they’d wake up in a few hours. He might as well spend the time learning to make breakfast.

He opened the fridge and immediately stopped cold – not only because of the cool air washing over him.

Other species need to eat! He’d forgotten to go buy groceries!

He grabbed a scrap of paper and wrote a quick note for the kids, in case they woke up before he got back, telling them he was at the store and to call him if they needed anything. He threw it, vaguely, towards the counter, not even bothering to make sure it landed right before he rushed out the door.

If anyone in the supermarket questioned why he was walking around the store, visibly panicking, they didn’t ask. Which was great, because he was pretty sure that it would not help with the whole panicking thing.

Okay. Okay okay okay. Let’s see. Calm down. Think. Faeries eat fruit. He’d seen Deuce eat watermelon. Perhaps for the high water content? Whatever, that should be easy to prepare. He should also grab a couple of water bottles, just in case.

Right! Next up! Dragons are carnivorous. Grim wondered if they could eat eggs. That was certainly a breakfast-y meal, but he didn’t want to risk it. No, he could ask that later, for now he would play it safe and prepare some kind of meat. Let’s see… oh! Bake-kujira was on sale… but did fish count as a meat? It should! Though, he supposed, the ghost whale’s meat was kinda see-through, and he wasn’t sure whether the un-undead could eat it. He grabbed a chicken breast instead. As an afterthought, he grabbed a spice bottle labelled ‘chicken seasoning’. Helpful!

Okay. Last but not least… witches could eat anything a human could. They preferred things that had once been alive, since that meant they could replenish their mana while also taking in nutrients – which meant, unfortunately, Trinity would likely never know the joy of eating a processed potato chip. Still, that gave him a lot to choose from… though he wasn’t sure what, exactly, would be considered nutritious. Maybe he could just give her the stuff he bought Ace and Deuce? Maybe a vegetable, too…

He grabbed a weird white plant labelled ‘cauliflower’. That was, probably, healthy!

He rushed to the checkout counter. The cashier, thankfully, didn’t comment on his somewhat haggard appearance. Though the kitsune did raise an eyebrow at his basket.

“Trying something new?”

“You have no idea.”

She gave him a mildly curious look. Her many tails swayed back and forth.“I’m guessing you’re not just talking about how you’re not buying tuna today.”

“I… adopted some kids,” he admitted.

It was the first time he’d actually said that aloud.

He… felt strangely giddy. It suddenly felt far more real. This wasn’t the plot of some dumb TV show he was watching, he was adopting kids. Two of them! And a third, kinda, in spirit! He was buying groceries, for his kids, who were sleeping peacefully back home. He was going to make them breakfast.

A wide smile threatened to steal across his face.

She hummed her understanding, smiling a little in return. “Congratulations! Have you figured out which school you’re going to send them to yet?”

He blinked.

[childofaura]

Ok... I swore to myself I wasn't gonna make another negative MAWS post, that I was just gonna leave it at the Twink Slade disappointment post.

But apparently there's this trend that's been happening on Twitter, where people are trying to bring up the 2004 "The Batman" designs to try and defend the designs of the MAWS rogue gallery. And that was the territory I CANNOT let go, as someone who is a fan of Jeff Matsuda and his character designs.

SO FIRST, LET ME CLARIFY: I'm simply making ONE post about ONE factor of MAWS that irritates me. I'm not here to just sit and constantly bash on the show. I wouldn't do that, I have a personal close friend of mine who enjoys the show and I'm happy for her and I want her to enjoy the show. I have SO many gripes and reservations but I recognize those are personal.

I'll be putting this under a Read More and tagging it as Anti-MAWS so MAWS fans don't have to read/deal with this post. Probably just don't read my tags as well.

So if there's one thing that has irked me the most about MAWS, it's the redesigns and rewrites of Supes' rogue galleries. Mostly the redesigns though. MAWS took a bunch of colorful, diverse, and fantastical designs and made them monotonous, bland, and simply not fun at all. And yes, while the in-universe explanation (Being that they're all mechanically enhanced rather than freak accidents or born that way) makes sense, it still makes the villains incredibly un-appealing. EVERYONE is in boring black, white, and gray armor (aside from Parasite and while I think his physical design is neat I have issues with his character rewrite too, I'm just not here to discuss that). Everyone who had incredibly fun or creative designs was horribly washed out. Silver Banshee went from being a literal ghostly wraith to a boring motorcycle-looking chick. Livewire went from a vibrant blue lightning motif (that SHE herself created) to boring merc armor. And yes, I have issues with Slade's armor, the head was promising but the overall design has color-balancing issues.

Now let's look at the redesigns of the rogue gallery for the 2004 "The Batman" show. These are mostly drastically different from their original design counterparts, just like MAWS. But the massive difference is that most of these designs are still colorful (where it applies, obviously not to Penguin), recognizable, and push the borders of imagination; They're so ludicrous and exaggerated in their design and their physical features. Even if I was disappointed in some of the character rewrites (Like Mr. Freeze having only a small cameo to Nora in the flashback, but mainly being another selfish thug), the designs are still great. You can look at The Batman villain designs and easily recognize them because they follow the basic structure of their original designs.

Joker:

Is still in his green, purple, and orange color palette, with his trademark freakish grin. The design takes creative liberties with the spiked hair, the more athletic physique, and the actual clothing style of his outfit, but this is clearly meant to be Joker.

Mr. Freeze:

Is now essentially a cryomancer thanks to his mutation, but this is still obviously Mr. Freeze. Some kind of helmet (in this case encased in his own ice) wearing a thermal freeze suit, and his red eyes invoking the red goggles he wore in his original iteration.

Catwoman:

The design exaggerates a lot of features of the OG outfit, like the ears and the goggles (though the OG design really just has eye spaces), and uses shades of crimson and purple, but you look at the black bodysuit and the whip around her waist and she can clearly be identified.

The main argument I'm making with the 2004 Batman designs is that they're A) recognizable to their original counterparts by invoking the same color scheme and basic design points, B) Colorful and pushing the lunacy of a world full of supervillains, and C) Completely stand out from each other, no two villains look as though they're of similar origins (besides obvious pairs like Joker/Harley Quinn and the two Clayfaces, the latter which was a guy who took concentrated serum made from Ethan Bennett's Clayface DNA). The Batman designs are good because while they ARE drastically different from their original counterparts, they honor the original designs.

Whereas in the MAWS redesigns, none of the redesigns are reminiscent of their original counterparts (besides the obvious Brain and Monsieur Mallah, kind of hard to fuck that up), and lack the fantastical element that The Batman redesigns (And the original Superman show, where it applies) had.

Livewire:

Looks nothing like her original counterpart. The armored clothes, the lack of lightning motif, lack of color to her outfit (I'm not here to talk about the race-swapping), none of it is supposed to tip you off to being Livewire, especially when her character is written so drastically different. You should be able to tell who Livewire is BEFORE you see her powers.

When OG Livewire looks like this:

Silver Banshee:

Is just a regular human in drab clothing. There's some kind of attempt to give her the hint of a ghost motif with the bone legs, but then that disappears in her later costume design. Same later costume that tries to half-ass a skull motif on the helmet but it doesn't work with the helmet's angles.

When this is Silver Banshee's original design (going with a still from Batman Unlimited)

And if they wanted to stray from the whole "supernatural" aspect, they could have compromised like they did in Suicide Squad: Hell to Pay:

Which I mean I still don't like that redesign as much as Silver Banshee's OG design, but it's still recognizable and it's still cool.

The bottom line is basically this: You don't have to justify liking this new Superman show and its take on new characters. But to try and say the character designs on MAWS are like the 2004 "The Batman" cartoon redesigns is such an unequal and imbalanced comparison. The thought process for the character designs in these shows are so drastically different from each other, and the execution of said character designs aren't comparable.

[clairegregoryau]

Ten First Lines

ten first lines tagged by @ghostalservice! You should absolutely go check out her wonderful work ❤️

Rules: share the first lines of ten of your most recent fanfics and tag ten people. If you have written fewer than ten, don’t be shy and share anyway. All of these are Our Flag Means Death fics, mostly modern or historical AU, two canon-era. 1. It’s a dark, rain-damp night in the jungle, but the hunter is not alone. (Life Finds a Way, an OFMD x Jurassic Park AU) 2. Stede Bonnet stands on the ten-metre diving platform of the aquatic centre in Barbados, staring down at the blue depths of the pool far below. (Ordinary Magic, a Valentine's Day follow-up for Synchronicity (see below!) 3. Stede Bonnet stands outside the military hospital on the outskirts of London with a manila folder clutched in his hands, feeling suddenly very small against the enormous stone building. (Lost and Found, a WWI AU in which Stede's a searcher for the Red Cross, looking for information on missing-in-action Lucius) 4. Ed’s officially made it to his fifth Olympic Games, this time in Paris. (Synchronicity, my Olympic diving AU- unhinged smut meets incredibly tense diving action and a deep, deep love-at-first sight) 5. The thing about Stede’s dorm room is that it’s objectively insane. (I Want to Believe, The X-Files as Ed's bisexual awakening, co-authored by @ghostalservice- this line is hers!) 6. Lucky One Hundred, the website banner says. Could it be you? (Lucky One Hundred, camboy Ed x accidental subscriber Stede) 7. It’s a lazy afternoon on the island, as they all are these days, and Stede has Ed pressed up against the windows of the library, staring out across the whole wide ocean with his hands splayed on the glass, fucking slowly into him as he moans. (Eternal Stars and Endless Seas, a Here Be Monsters postscript (see below)- starts spicy, keeps going!) 8. Some days, when Ed feels like the world has thrown everything it possibly can at him, he’s reminded right quick that there’s fuckery out there to a level he’s never even imagined. (Birds of a Feather, a 1932 Great Emu War historical AU) 9. Ed wakes to the warm glow of morning light, and for a second he’s disoriented. (Tell Me on a Sunday, a fic-of-a-fic filling in extra 1987 detail about Ed's life for @faeeebaeee's Piña Coladas) 10. There’s a monster stalking the seas around the Leeward Isles. (Here Be Monsters, a post-canon reunion fic/ S2 possibility- my biggest and proudest work!) I don't know enough Tumblr handles off the top of my head to tag people! But I love to read these, so if you have a few works you'd like to talk about, please take this as your invitation to jump in on this trend ❤️

[pandoramsbox]

Sci-Fi Saturday: Doctor X

Week 8:

Film(s): Doctor X (Dir. Michael Curtiz, 1932)

Viewing Format: DVD

Date Watched: July 2, 2021

Rationale for Inclusion:

As mentioned last week, the critical and box office success of Frankenstein (Dir. James Whale, 1931, USA) resulted in a rush to make additional horror and/or mad scientist films. This trend would slow after 1934, in part because the beginning of enforcement of the Motion Picture Production Code sought to limit gruesome and violent content in American movies. The following weeks will include a handful of noteworthy examples of Pre-Code horror sci-fi. The first is Doctor X (Dir. Michael Curtiz, 1932, USA).

The main reason I included Doctor X in this survey, other than being a fan of the film, is that it was shot in two-color Technicolor. The color system, often incorrectly called "two-strip Technicolor", was the third iteration of the Technicolor motion picture color process. The color images produced originated on black and white film where each frame was captured first through a red filter, then a green one. Separate red and green color matrices would be created, dyed cyan-green and orange-red respectively, and in combination during the dye imbibition printing process created semi-realistic color images. 

It's only "semi-realistic" because blues and purples are not reproduced, thus not replicating all colors perceivable to the human eye. This lack would soon be corrected by adding a third color matrix in the fourth iteration of the process: three-strip Technicolor, the famous "glorious Technicolor" of mid-century Hollywood and British cinema.

Part of the joy of going through science fiction cinema chronologically is watching technology advance over time. So far we've gone from silent to sound, and with Doctor X we introduce the first film of the survey shot with a subtractive color process.

Reactions:

Despite the overly elaborate lie-detector and laboratory set pieces in play, Doctor X is more of a horror film than a science fiction one. The main group of characters is a group of scientists and their leader Doctor Xavier (Lionel Atwill) uses a scientific contraption to suss out which of his colleagues is the allegedly cannibalistic serial killer on the loose, but the plot is more concerned with the crimes of the allegedly cannibalistic serial killer on the loose. The film also includes a beautiful woman being menaced by the reporter investigating Doctor Xavier's connection to the crimes, Lee Taylor (Lee Tracy), and the actual killer, in the form of a dark haired Fay Wray, as Doctor Xavier's daughter Joanne. Even before her legacy defining performance in King Kong (Dir. Merian C. Cooper and Ernest B. Schoedsack, 1933, USA), Wray was an established scream queen.

As the film goes on it is revealed that the serial killer was not taking away parts of his victims to eat, as originally thought, but as research samples for creating synthetic flesh. This synthetic flesh can also apparently create muscles, tendons, bones, capillaries and all the other complex structures of the human body because, in addition to using his invention to disguise his face, the killer fashions a fully functional synthetic arm from the magical puddy. It's a shame that this technology is limited to a plot point instead of a core part of the narrative because it is conceptually fascinating. I suppose that's what Clayface plotlines in Batman media are for though.

Interestingly from a production and trivia standpoint is the fact that the horror effects make-up for the synthetic flesh was created by Max Factor. The company was known for its innovations in cosmetics with the specific demands of cinematic production in mind, but its focus was on creating beauty, not monsters. Granted, even Universal Studios' maestro of monsters Jack Pierce had a workload of applying mostly conventional beauty make-up. Specialists in special effects make-up, like Rick Baker, would not exist until after the disillusionment of the studio system.

The Technicolor shows off its ability to display color, but does not descend into what I call "Technicolor abuse," which I define as the use of color for spectacle more than contributing to the overall diegesis of the film. (For examples of Technicolor Abuse see The Adventures of Robin Hood (Dir. Michael Curtiz, 1938, USA) and Babes in Toyland (Dir. Jack Donohue, 1961, USA)) Given the overall emphasis on green in the film's color palette, the red heart beating in the jar in Dr. Wells' (Preston Foster) lab adds to the intended shock value of the moment. Cinematographer Ray Rennahan makes the most of two-color Technicolor's limited range to create beautifully composed, vivid scenes.Doctor X may be more horror than sci-fi, but it's still an entertaining genre flick. It was successful enough at the box office to result in Warner Brothers Studios making a follow up film again starring Atwill and Wray, with direction by Curtiz and Technicolor cinematography by Rennahan, The Mystery of the Wax Museum (1933). Like Doctor X it shows off two-color Technicolor at its best, but unlike its predecessor it's pure horror.

[rk-ocs]

As its Desmonds Birthday, I'm going to upload an old fic with him in it, and also a varient if my OC, Red Jordan-Ryan

This one was an AU set in a universe where Desmond was Mechanic, Red is not a time traveler and never left home or changed her name, her cousin is a twin, and oh yah its set in the xman verse, and Desmond has Charles power, Red is Reven, and Aiden is Magneto, at least powerwise if not personality.

---

Burn like the sun

--

Sometimes Desmond likes to play hero. Mostly he uses his talent to avoid, to hide. He knows when someone sees him, and exactly what they think about him. He works at an auto body shop in Chicago. Mostly they internally bitch at him over prices.

He's on vacation. Exploring Quebec , and struggling with the pronunciation even if he can find the words he needs in their minds.

He steps into the connivance store to prevent a robbery, to talk a situation down.

He didn't expect anything to come of it.

Carnelian is like him. Her talent is changing.  She is the shift.

She shifts forms as easily as breathing.

Unshifted, she is pale blue, with eyes like silver and hair like gold.

He finds himself helping her. She's a child, and for all her cousin loves her, she doesn't know how to help her fit in.

Desmond does. They sit at the window and people watch , and he tells her about them. Tells her about trends and fashion and how other people blend in.

Before he goes, she decides her main shift. It consists of vibrantly blonde hair, dark blue eyes, tan skin, and it has a scar on her lip.

He's a bit confused that out of any detail that she would use from him, she chose that, but she is notoriously stubborn.

He gives her his email, and they exchange letters regularly.

Until he disappears.

----

Carnelians main male alter ego, contains traits from her cousins and from Desmond.

If anyone were to ask, she's not sure whether she would claim to be their cousin or their kid.

She has his coloring, with her features.

She's never told them about this male alter.

She never tells them about a lot of things she gets up to.

For all that she  will practice Javelin with Monique, and critique Derek's buildings, and religiously email Desmond, but she has her own hobbies too.

Probably not ones they would approve of, particularly hacking.

She's learning. She has a talent for computers, and its fascinating stuff.

Her contacts build up, lawful and lawless.  She calls this Alias "Ghost", because none of her contacts ever see the same face or persona.

Maybe it will get her killed someday.

She likes to think she is more careful then that.

She has IDs set up if they need to disappear.  She's worried about Desmond, he's being followed. They've never talked about it, but sometimes Monique will insist on being with him, and Derek will "insist" Desmond stay another night, because tonight would be "terrible for driving" .

She's not stupid.

She doesn't know what "They" want with Desmond,  but she does know she is in the best position to do something when "They" come.

She can be anyone, after all.

She will be anyone, to help Desmond get away. She owes him, after he helped teach her to blend enough to be around people.

He's sort of family at this point, and there isn't a lot she wouldn't do for family.

---

It's one of Carnelian's contacts in Chicago that tells them Desmond has disappeared.

Derek and Monique are going to have to have a chat with Carnelian, about just what she gets up to in her spare time, because contacts..? When did she get contacts.  What Does she need with all these connections, and fake IDs.

Just because she can shift, doesn't mean she needs to use it for this. What is she planning? 

But first, Desmond. Where did he disappear to?

Carnelian already had people on that.

Aiden Pearce was a fixer, who Carnelian had never met, but heard was talented and willing to work, but also extremely antisocial. He also occasionally fancied himself a hero, and Carnelian was hoping this trait would work in their favor when she agreed to meet him in person to exchange information.  Or maybe Brenks would be useful at least.  He was good when paid

Derek was going to meet these fixers with her. It was going to be expensive, but there was no way they were going to let their friend be kidnaped.  Particularly not a mutant. Not in this kind of environment. Would anyone else even look if they knew?

"I can be intimidating enough, Derek," Carnelian complained again. She shifted into a tall muscled man. "I can be anyone and everyone.  I could probably be Aiden, and get the information myself, provided I do a job. I hear he gets a lot of leeway to be rude, because they are aware he's talented, and hope for him to owe them one."

"You're not doing that, Carnelian."

"But-"

"For the last time, I'm coming with you. You can be a scary looking man if you want, but I'm still coming."

She went and sat in the driver's seat, and shifted into a man.

"You're not driving. You're too young to drive. "

" I have a license."

"What lunatic gave you a license?!"

"Hey! This one is legit. I went to school for it."

"This one is legit?" How many forged licenses does she have!

"Just get in the car."

Derek got in the car, for lack of any better options. He could spend the ride asking her what other highly illegal activities she has been up to.

-----

Damien had to admit, It was strange to be involved in a missing persons case.  Normally, they went through proper channels for these, but Ghost was known for paying well for quality work. And Aiden had insisted on meeting him.  Which was unusual.

There were several mismatched descriptions of his appearance, and while ghost was known as a decent hacker, his disguise abilities were why he was hired, when he took Jobs anyways.

So what did he want with Desmond Miles?

Desmond's Id was fake. Oh, he had no doubt that the guy's name was real, but a bit of digging revealed a lot of holes in it. For Ghost to reach out to so many people about his disappearance, had to mean something important.

He had asked for a face to face meeting to talk.  Face to face encounters could be very informative. People were easier to read these days, and he wanted to see Ghosts disguise skills in action. He might be someone worth working with in the future if this went well. 

He frowned at his coffee.  It was running low, and Aiden still wasn't here. What the hell was he even doing?

He got up to get more coffee. Aiden could pay for his own damn coffee when he was this late.

When he got back to his table, Aiden was there with two unknown men.

One was a tall skinny blond ,  where the other was short, muscular , and darker than his companion. They both wore jeans and cool gray hoodies.

Aiden was frowning at the taller one. Aiden is fingering a metal memory stick,  and the last thing Damien wants is for a fight to break out between them in a public cafe. So many witnesses.

The shorter male turns around, and fingers an envelope, before tucking it back into his sweater.

"You must be Damien."

"And you are."

"I am Ghost. And this is Interceptor."

'Interceptor' shot him a dark look. Apparently they had failed to talk this over before arriving.

"Now ,what happened to Desmond Miles."

Ghost was unexpectedly blunt. This was not how he was used to information drops going.

Aiden, however, laughed. He waved a memory stick at Ghost. Ghost in turn waved $500 at him.  Interceptor offered a laptop, and Aiden inserted the memory stick, and snagged the bills.

Ghost and Interceptor watched the footage they had gotten of Desmond's kidnapping.

"What do you know of Abstergo?"

Ghost asked.

"Officially they are electronics and entertainment. Gary  once told me that he once was writing a book on the CIA, and mentioned that Abstergo has interests in every large company across the  planet."

"Can I talk to Gary?"

"Gary died in 2004, and all his notes disappeared ."

"That seems suspicious."

"It does, doesn't it."

"So, officially Desmond was kidnaped by the TV company."

"Perhaps they needed a cheap mechanic."

"Haha. Very Funny." Ghost told him Deadpan.

"Why is Desmond so important to you anyways? He's a mechanic, and beyond his fake Id, he doesn't seem to be particularly interesting"

"He's... Talented alright."

"Ah"

"And almost family.  So, where do you think he has been taken?"

Aiden stared hard at Ghost.

"Pay up the rest. "

"Yah, yah."

He handed over the envelope , and Aiden checked it, before handing over half to Daimon.

"Kent, Ohio. I have a map of the route they took on this stick."

Ghost took the memory stick.

"Thank you."

Interceptor packed up the laptop.

Aiden caught Ghost before he left the booth." I assume you are going for a plan with infiltration, first, but would you say no to backup?"

Ghost smiled. "At what price."

"Warren Vidics . I'll get you a password, if you can get his card, and a good disguise."

Ghost gave him a thumbs up. "Hell yeah. You've had us covered, right?"

"Just who do you think you are talking to?" Aiden asked, mock offended.

"Where shall we meet up later?"

"Remember that Coffee shop in Fort Wayne."

"Sounds like a good place to switch cars."

"See you there then."

Ghost and Interceptor left, and Damien stole Aidens hat to get his attention.  While Aiden glared at him, Damien asked his question.

"What the Hell is going on?"

------

Aiden Pearce had a way with metal.

It wasn't something he went out of his way to show off.  Mutants were not looked on favorably , to say the least.

It had interesting uses in his line of work. His shots were more accurate, he wasn't in the habit of getting hit by bullets, it did some interesting things to cars, and it made locks impossible or open without his say-so.

He didn't use his "Talent" more creatively, unless he was off camera.

That's when he met Carnelian.

He had  frozen his pursuers in place  by dropping their pants by the Zipper, stolen their  guns and shot them with them, when he heard a voice comment on it.

"Hey that was pretty cool? Are you some kind of telekinetic?"

He had turned his gun on the man, and he had been pretty sure he was alone, and was not about to have the secret blown now.

"Woah buddy!  I'm not bulletproof! watch where you point that thing. "

He hadn't been amused."

"I am the last person in the world who would talk about something like that."

The man had insisted.

The man was now a woman.

"I think we can work something out", she insisted, before she became his doppelgänger.

"This ought to be suitably confusing, right." She had insisted, in his voice.

Well, he had no intention of shooting him after that.

Once he was back in the safe house , he turned to the unknown, whose zipper was not real, or so his metal "sense" told him.

"So, let's work something out." He told the man.``

--------

Desmond was working on the Abstergo scenario. He knew Lucy had orders to eventually get him out after he gave them what they wanted, though he was not sure where her loyalties lay. He was also aware Viddic wasn't kidding with his coma threats. He was working with them, hoping to get out of this situation with everyone intact, and disappear again.

He was dubious of his ability to last that long. It was bad enough hearing everyone's thoughts in the present. All the time in the Animus has given him access to the thoughts of people in the past.  What's more , his ancestors " talent" was showing up in the present. Sometimes his eyes would glow gold, and show him secrets. Sometimes he thought he heard the Animus talking to him.

Sometimes in his waking moments, he was Altaïr.

Some days, he thought he heard Carnelian asking him to get Viddic's Wallet for her. She told him she had a plan to get him out of there. She kept asking him to log into a Runescape account she had set up, and go onto a chat with her.

But Carnelian was supposed to be in Quebec.

And her voice in his head kept telling him how to Log into Vidic's computer.

Something had to give.

So, after a particularly long session, when he was supposed to be asleep, he went to the computer, and Logged in

"Des, what the Hell Kept you?" RockinRed4012778 demanded.

No really Dude, I've been calling out to you for days, and you weren't doing anything about it. I've been in the chat for days, you should be able to hear me.

Did whatever they've had you doing ,scramble your brains completely?

"Your in" he types

-"Yes" she thinks. "Send me a face so  I know you comprehend me."

:  (

"Good"

-"She thinks.

-"Not tomorrow, but the day after,  Viddic and Lucy have a meeting, at seven PM. I'm going to get someone to delay Lucy long enough that I can come in as her, get you, and Go. "

:  )

"Do you think you can get me Viddic's bank cards?

"Why" he typed

"I promised someone a favor for this."

It probably won't be hard to get that with his pick pocketing skills, if Viddic has it on him.

"If he has it." He types

"He will," she assures him.

------

She keeps expecting something to go wrong. For someone to demand to know what she's doing.

Nothing happens.

She gets Desmond, he holds up the cards, and off they go.

It's bizarre.

Not even her bank Robbery, where she takes the bank card Desmond got her, goes to the bank as Viddic, and withdraws everything with the password Aiden got her, goes off without a hitch.

She gives Aiden most of the money, and they Drive off to meet Monique at Hell, Michigan.

She supposes This is Monique's expressing displeasure at staying behind for this adventure.

-----

"Remember How you wanted to live in New Brunswick, once"

Derek looks over at his little cousin in confusion.

"What does this have to do with anything?"

"I think you guys should go there. You have the money, after all."

"What are you getting at?"

"I'm thinking you should marry Desmond, have him take our last name, and more importantly Canadian citizenship, and have him add our new fortunes to your accounts, under his temporary false name. Because the two of you are afraid aunt Eleanor and Uncle David won't be understanding of your Sexuality, the two of you eloped and went to New Brunswick."

"I'm not Gay, Kiddo."

"I know. You don't have a type.  

"Why did you even suggest this then," Derek asks, looking back at the sleeping Desmond drooling on the window.

"He's family. I want the world to know it. I want him to be a cousin. "

"He already is family."

" I know. It just seemed to be a pretty good idea. No one could question it that way."

"They always will kiddo. Why didn't you suggest Monique. She actually likes Men."

"And have her give up Javelin, to go into hiding?"

"Do you think even that would get in the way of her  Javelin training? Or throwing sports in general."

"Might make it hard for her to be the world champion."

"We will figure something out kiddo."

We spent the rest of the drive talking about plans."

-----

When Monique saw Derek and Desmond walk into screams Ice cream, she gave them each a bear hug .

"I still don't understand Why you didn't take me?"

"It was a stealth mission, Monique"

"I can be stealthy. "

"Sure you can."

"I brought the stuff. "

"We've switched cars a few times. Let's drive this one somewhere else to drop it , and then stick to your car.  How does living in Ontario sound Desmond  Ryan?"

"Ryan"

"You're going to be a cousin. We will work out the legalities."

"How does Sudbury sound?"

"I can be a mechanic in Sudbury. Just so long as it doesn't require me to fake an accent. "

"Keep your nose clean."

"Carnelian, we have a lot to talk about, in that department, regarding your hobbies."

"Yes I have some useful hobbies, don't I."

"Kid. Quit while you're ahead."

Desmond Advised.

"You have some explaining to do."

Monique insisted.

"First off , I'd like to ask why you never outright let me be involved in the plans about "the people who follow Desmond."

"Nope, we asked first. Start talking Kiddo."

"Zut"

-----

[inkantation]

anonymous asked

whats the ratio of inkling to octo in tsunaomi and why did you as the artist decide that

Tsunaomi is meant to be half Octoling, half Inkling, but in actuality, her design leans harder into Octoling traits than she does Inkling. That's mostly personal preference, though some were recent changes for ease of drawing. Because I literally have this unshaded piece open rn, you get diagrams.

Hair

Octoling:

Naomi has 8 limbs in swim form, and this is reflected in her standing form as her hair.

She has 4 true tentacles that all use the Octoling shape.

All of her tentacles have upward facing suckers

Inkling:

Her bangs are basically the Inkling Hippie cut bangs

Naomi has these two little 'vestigial' tentacles - essentially just little framing fringe that lacks the muscles and do not correlate to anything in her swim form.

NOTE: Originally, I used to draw her with a mixture of 2 Inkling 'egg' shaped tentacles and 2 Octoling tentacles. I changed this fairly recently because I was never quite satisfied with how the 'egg' shaped ones looked, and would usually just hide them behind her body. This opens me up to more poses to draw for her, since I'm not dreading her hair.

Mostly, her hair shape is meant to mimic very iconic bangs throughout music history, like Stevie Nicks and Selena ( I'm specifically thinking of the Si Una Vez live video. ) Long hair with waves, thick, straight across bangs. She also accidentally read as cheerleader for so long that I just made it canon, lol.

Face / Body

Octoling

Not even marked on here, b/c I think it's fairly obviously, her freckles are blue rings, like the Blue Ring Octopus. ( yes, this does mean she's full of neurotoxins. )

She has the 'sharp' * or clawed hands that Octolings have, as well as the ink transition color on her fingertips. **

The lil lopsided fangs are so cute, literally how could I not give that to her.

Oh, I also forgot to mark her pupils! I just think the 8 shape is neat.

* Canonically, the Octoling fingers are just a sharper shape than Inkling fingers, but like — Claws. Heart.

** Originally, I thought this was an Octoling-only trait, though ever since Deep Cut's designs dropped, I've decided it's actually a fashion / body mod trend, like a tattoo of some kind. Very popular in Takotsubo / The Octarian Domes, and it followed any Octarians who fled Inkadia for the Splatlands. Not very popular in Haikara / Inkopolis, though!

Inkling

Pointy ears - ironically, because we didn't know what Octoling ears looked like until Octo Expansion. I had assumed they were the same shape for years, lol.

Though, honestly, I would've picked the pointy ears over the rounded ones for Naomi anyways, I think they sell her design so well, and translate to my favorite part of her swim form.

Addendum: Swim form

I drew this in literally ten minutes haha.

Her swim form is basically an Octoling swim form, however, she has transparent fins on her head that make the triangle shape of the Inkling Squid form. I literally think its so cute you can't change my mind. Not related to her species make up, but I like to imagine she's like, Serval Cat sized - large, but not so large that you can't just scoop her up like a baby.

Other random facts that aren't really asked by the prompt:

If we're assigning real world ethnicities, Tsunaomi is Mexican and Japanese.

Her orange and blue color palette is literally just the default colors of Splatoon 1, but also, it's a darker version of the real world Blue Ring Octopus

I rarely draw her without red lipstick - another reference to musicians I really like; Again, Selena, but plenty of others too.

Her body type - thinner up top with thick thighs - is modeled after real world gymnasts and aerial performers.

[doubleddenden]

I had a thought about Pokemon- "oh when don't you?" I hear some of you say. I'll have you know I have been hyper fixating on Sonic Adventure 2 and Sonic 06 this past week, so the answer is surprisingly "not always!"

But back on track, I had a thought regarding 2026, aka the 30th anniversary and MOST LIKELY when gen 10 drops, since they've consistently dropped a new gen every 10 years so far.

You know what's another consistent thing they've done on the 10th and 20th anniversary gens? Nostalgia. Well, Pokemon marketing has really crunk up nostalgia since gen 6, but it was especially thick during 4th and 7th gens.

4th gen brought a bunch of cross Gen evolutions and pre evolutions to the table, even dropped a new Regi on us. 7th gen didn't really bring those- instead it went for a more direct approach with regional variants being introduced exclusively for gen 1 Pokemon, on top of Kanto constantly being brought up in conversation and Alolan lore and even the return of Red and Blue themselves. 2016 was also the year they dropped PoGo to lather on an extra helping of gen 1 nostalgia (which was already kinda high given XY and ORAS introduced new Kanto Megas- especially the starters- and gave Eevee a new Eeveelution in Sylveon).

Anyway, if we follow this trend, and use common sense, i think it'll be safe to say they'll be milking nostalgia a bit more than usual. So what can we expect?

It's theorized gen 10 will be in Australia due to the painting of Uluru being seen in Hassel's classroom. It would make sense, Australia is basically a living Pokemon region already but rated M, basically it'd be easy to turn lots of the animals there into Pokemon as long as they don't stop to try and give each one a job like they usually do. Australia is a longtime fan requested region, and it has a layout that would easily transition into a region map.

However, there's something else interesting regarding the wildlife: lots of Marsupials and other unique animals that fit into similar environments seen in other regions.

You could say these are Convergent Species- animals that adopt traits similar to a different species to survive in the same environment. The Thylacine, aka the Tasmanian Wolf/Tiger, is an extinct 4 legged marsupial with traits similar to a canine that farmers basically hunted to extinction because they kept killing their sheep. You could even directly call it a convergent species to the Dingo, an actual native wild canine species that fills a similar niche. I might be missing some bits or maybe I got some terminology or definitions mixed up, but I think you get the picture here.

Pokemon Convergents are a little different- with exceptions to Sinistcha and Poltchageist, it would seem that it's basically using the same body plan to survive in a different environment, such is the case with Tentacool and Toedscool, but the ideas are still there to be worked with.

Australia, if chosen as the 10th gen region, would actually be the first region in the SOUTHERN hemisphere. Basically, it's off on its own, separated by incredible distance from other mainline regions (apparently just narrowly beat out by America when it comes to average flight time to and from Japan, but consider we/Unova are closer to the European regions than Japan).

So all this preamble to say: I think a hefty chunk of the gen 10 Pokestralia dex will be comprised of Convergent Species and Regional Variants, maybe a marriage of the two and something akin to whatever happened with the Paradoxes and BM Ursaluna. Tbh, I'd rather have a fresh dex of mostly new Pokemon, but if we contribute nostalgia as a factor, it's not entirely off the table to consider that, for the 30th anniversary, they decide to do maybe 20 to 50 or more lines as part of a "best of" bit where they essentially revamp old favs again. We've already seen that they're willing to stretch what it means to get a regional variant with exclusive evolutions and even allowing MULTIPLE variants in one region, and as far as we can tell, they've already stretched the term by basically making a regional variant of Sinistea/Poltchageist and Polteageist/Sinistcha and swapping the names around. Basically, nothing is off the table going forward.

So for instance, convergent Kanto starters (like water Charmander, a fire Bulbasaur, a grass Squirtle, etc), a convergent Pikachu and Meowth line where they basically swap species, maybe a regional Cubone line that converges with a convergent Kangaskhan or a regional Sharpedo that evolves into a convergent Garchomp, maybe convergent Lucario and Zoroark- you get the idea here. Essentially a "who's who" of popular Pokemon from past gens in THEIR eyes.

I think they'd probably toss these in with new Pokemon, of course, but I wouldn't be surprised to see a BUNCH like this when it comes up.

[abramstalks]

My Abstract Image

The abstract image I chose to use for this assignment is named Tink Tonk, which is painted by the well-known artist, Nabil Nahas. Nabil Nahas has produced a variety of different pieces throughout his long career which mostly all share the same structural scheme; usually having a mixture of enthusiastic colors and different shapes throughout the different pieces. In this specific painting there are both long and short lines varying in width, some being very thick while others being sickly thin. This piece is also filled with an abundance of different colors including red, different variations of blue, yellow, gray, and black. With there being more blue throughout this piece of art it sparks a sense of patience and understanding, easily making one feel comfortable and satisfied. Therefore, after viewing this piece it became apparent to me that it was attempting to tell me something, this being that even though there may be some disappointing or angering factors (The color red) throughout life there will always be a much richer abundance of happiness (The color Blue) somewhere to be found. I would tag this piece as a 3-dimensional project due to their seeming to be layer upon layer of different triangles and shapes. After reading into Nahas he follows a trend of mixing different substances with paint like: Pumice, volcanic rock, and different powders, to deepen the textures in his paintings. Sadly, the one disadvantage about this painting is that towards the center of the work it seems to be heavily worked upon, creating a sense of claustrophobic energy throughout the entire piece. Despite that, what really drew me to this painting would have to be the pure beauty created by the variety of different colors and shapes that were used throughout the entirety of the piece.

[binenbaumaj]

Marcasite (Pyrite), Pearl, Topaz, Silver Ring 14201-1536

This lovely cluster Victorian design ring features oval-shaped ±2.40ct Topaz surrounded by a halo of Pearls and Marcasite (Pyrite) crafted in Silver.

Details: ±2.40ct Topaz, Pearls, Marcasite (Pyrite), Silver Ring. Dispatches from a small business in Amsterdam, The Netherlands. Size: 17.93 NL / 56.3 FR / 7¾ US / P UK Weight in grams: 4. Condition: New.

Design Area : Victorian. Area Information : The Victorian Era spanned Queen Victoria's rule of England from 1837 until 1901. During this time, a middle class began to emerge, sparking a demand for jewelry in the mass market, jewelry trends often reflected the tone of current events. The era is usually divided into several subsections: the Romantic Period from 1837 to 1861, the Grand Period from 1861 to 1880, and the Aesthetic Period from 1880 to 1901. During the Romantic Period jewelry also featured nature-inspired designs, similar to jewelry of the Georgian era. Frequently, these designs were delicately and intricately etched into gold. Lockets and brooches were popular in daytime jewelry during the early Victorian era, whereas colored gemstones and diamonds were worn during the evening. During the Grand Period jewelry , because the Grand or Mid-Victorian era corresponded with the death of Queen Victoria's husband, many jewelry pieces have solemn, somber designs. Known as mourning jewelry, the pieces feature heavy, dark stones. Jet, onyx, amethyst, and garnet are frequently found in jewelry from this period. Compared to previous periods, Mid-Victorian-era jewelry features highly creative, colorful designs using shells, mosaics and gemstones. During the Aesthetic period, jewelers used diamonds and feminine, bright gemstones such as sapphire, peridot, and spinel. Star and crescent designs as well as elaborate hat pins were also popular. Some scholars believe the aesthetic era began sooner, in 1875, and ended as early as 1890.. Materials : Marcasite (Pyrite), Pearl, Topaz. Material Information : Topaz Topaz is a gemstone which, throughout history, has shared its name with all other yellow gemstones. It was not until the mid 18th century that the name was assigned to the aluminum fluor-silicate that is uniquely topaz. During the 16th century Cellini described a (most probably) yellow sapphire as "topaz". Due to its close resemblance in color to citrine, yellow to orange "actual topaz" were termed "precious topaz" to distinguish between them. Topaz comes in many hues, from colorless to yellow, blue, brown, red and everything in between. The colorless and pale blue stones are most abundant in nature, followed by yellow and brown stones, while the golden-orange, pinks and reds are most rare. The latter are mostly mined in Brazil. Pearl All pearls originate in mollusks (mollusca), whether natural or cultured. Mollusks are a phylum of invertebrate animals that includes oysters, clams, mussels, snails and octopus among their approximately one hundred and twenty-eight thousand species, all with the ability to produce pearls. Only a few of these varieties can create gem quality pearls. Marcasite (Pyrite) Marcasite is an iron sulfide mineral with an orthorhombic crystal structure. It is very brittle and unsuitable for jewelry. What we call "marcasite" in jewelry is actually Pyrite - "fools gold" - that has been faceted to imitate diamonds. Popular from around 1700 onward, marcasite is usually found mounted in silver. Because of its golden yellow color and metallic luster, Marcasite has remained popular in higher quality fashion jewelry. In antique jewelry, marcasite can be distinguished from cut steel faux gems because marcasites are usually bead or prong-set as a gemstone would be and cut steel is riveted. Silver Silver is a white metallic element, harder than gold, softer than copper and second only to gold in malleability and ductility. Represented on the Periodic Table of the Elements by the symbol Ag, silver is an excellent conductor of heat and electricity. Silver is considered one of the noble metals because of it is excellent resistance to oxidation. Historically, silver has played a prominent role in the production of jewelry an objets d'art and is usually alloyed with another metal to harden it enough to maintain the desired shape and details imparted to it.. Size : 17.93 NL / 56.3 FR / 7¾ US / P UK. Gender : female. Weight (in grams) : 4. Condition : New. https://www.binenbaum.com/product/marcasite-pyrite-pearl-topaz-silver-ring-14201-1536/

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Mascots

The Laughing Cow

One of my favourites, something I think to do with when I was little. Me and my mum used to eat it together with crackers, or just as the triangles. She's also red which follows a trend in mascots and boxes because of the colour supposedly making you hungry.

Cookie Jarvis

Cookie Jarvis, the mascot for Cookie Crisp also was one from when I was little and also has a red colour on his character. He is in a red shirt, but I think what appealed to me mostly because it was tiny cookies in cereal.

Chocolate Coco Pops:

I'm going to be honest a lot of cereal brands have friendly and silly animals like the monkey they put on the kellogg's coco pops. They are always smiling and the milk is always spilling everywhere. Is it to show action is it to show excitement? Maybe it's to get kids to try make their cereal look like the boss and spill it so they have to get another bowl, consuming the box contents quicker meaning they would have to buy it more often?

Frosties:

This one stands out a lot. A blue box in the sea of red and white boxes. But Tony the Tiger still follows the trend of wearing red to make people hungry and is also smiling in front of the cereal like veery other mascot and is also a animal like every other mascot. I say that even though there is a few mascots of people and mythical little characters.