#fun fact it was originally suppose to have more stuff in the background

[smolcatpilot]

Was thinking up a new sona and came up with this! :3

[pins-snip]

Heyo! I wanted to post our build book somewhere so here we gooo

We stole the table of context ontop of finished photo idea from @sarahspaceman who I'm sure saw it from somewhere else. Our cosplays are a little out there so I wanted to give a debrief on just how we came up with this concept along with a way for the judges to find more materials.

Since this wasn't a thing that existed in any sort of media it was very important to me that the judges would know that we picked from historical imagery, so I wanted to have pictures as examples of what things were supposed to look like. In addition to giving examples from the games of imagery that we used in case they were unfamiliar.

You'll begin to notice a trend of pictures that have their background removed, I just wanted to be able to fit more stuff on the page without compromising space. I also tried to block like sections together to draw the eye easier when reading about certain pieces.

Another thing that I tried to do was keep in mind what the book would look like in physical form, so we tried to mirror where we could.

Fun fact, because I had this pattern notated I was able to go back and use it to make more trim when I decided my butt was too bare. Luigi's Hosen page too a log of finagling to get it too look right with the amount of text I wanted to be on there.

Because we ended up condensing some stuff together, we ended up with an extra page, page 12 became a "here's everything we haven't talked about yet that we want to talk about" By the time we sent off the book for Metro, we hadn't updated the shoes page with their new stained leather- they look much nicer now.

Snip went into a work frenzy and didn't take any photos of him covering the base in worble, but you can take my word for it that it did happen! (I was busy weaving when he was knocking Chain2.0 out) I love love love how the Poltergust turned out. It's a functional backpack and is super sturdy!

Hope you enjoyed our build book! It took us probably about 12 hours to put it together originally and then another 5 to redo the parts of it that didn't make sense in our late night frenzy the first time.

[tero-ga]

Aaaaanother TGAA SwapAU stuff and it is my wonderful boy Albert as the prosecutor!!

I've changed some of the designs in this one like the jacket color to white to make a resemblance of a lab coat and reflecting of Kazuma white school uniform, as well trying to bring more Frankenstein's Monster vibe too hehe (aaand make him look more miserable too). He is also have a locket that have a painting of him and his two brothers, it was given by Andrew during his wedding!

I also made bunch of character that related to Swap!Albert's life from 10 years ago, like Andrew(Klint's roleswap) and his other brother Michael, university Barok and Albert, etc. more info about the are there down below 👇👇

First of I wanted to say I'm sorry I can't do full render of everyone here, do that with all of them would be death sentence for me so I couldn't do it 😭😭 Anyway without further ado, I'm going right into it! Start from left to right!

This first one Ryunosuke father replacing as Genshin Asogi. At first while brainstorming I was thinking of maybe do three switch around with Genshin, Jigoku, and Yujin but the it somehow felt weird for me. Then the thought of maybe involving Auchi in this too (like, imagine him being swap with Jigoku wouldn't that be funny and terrifying thought), but discarded that idea out because of Menimemo would have no one to swap with (i have to i'm sorry). Sooo I ended just design him from scratch, he is quite easy to figure out since Genshin doesn't really have much going on with him, but since we don't have any idea of original Ryunosuke's parents at all I have to take idea from something else, and that is his daruma doll for his eyes (he is half blind!! :D) and Phoenix DD/SOJ design (droopy hair and light vest) and everything else is from Genshin. His name is Ryuuki Naruhodo since Ryunosuke is another name for Ryuichi so I want to keep the train going!!

Andrew the screwdriver, oh I missed him- Anyway, I redesign his outfit because tbh his previous outfit is ridiculous 😭 it's funny and fun but I do want to take him seriously now. I'm tried to keep the A shape still but it's less subtle now, I think it turned out okay!! (Oh yeah, his cane is supposed to be a hidden sword but i forgot to put that in the drawing 😭). I was supposed to make his bowtie red like the hair tie but then I realized it will getting rid of the purpose of the hair tie (it referencing the blood on the tip of the screwdriver) so I ended up making it color silver.

The Lady Baskerville, I gave her similar design to Sunny(Herlock!Swap) with the bowtie, color palette to his mascot, and hair on her. I'm not really quite fond with her design, maybe I'll do redesign her again if I got a idea pop up like crazy but in the meantime this is her design.

Guess who is this?? Another one of Albert's tool is here finally!! Michael the crosshead screwdriver! Since we never see Michael anywhere and only mentioned once in the game he is, I'm just draw simple design for him (I wished I could put M shape in the design but I have no idea WHERE to put it 😭 so I tried used the bowtie for it). I also thought it would be nice to make him a defense attorney so I made the design for the badge too. Since he is sadly not going to be mentioned a lot in this AU since I'm trying to make the storyline same as the original, so I made a backstory of what happened in the fun fact tags. There was supposed to be more tool to be added but my god that would be taxing to design, so I have to make only Andrew and Michael as his only siblings.

The doggie Balmung replacement, Bolt, He is a Irish Setter! Beforehand he was supposed to be Borzoi but then research the background of the breed I don't how difficult it is to actually get one in that era so I have to changed breed :((

Albert and Barok in university days!! I just keep same as before like previous design!! There's a tiny change like the hair and the neckties.

There is going to be more content of them soon because I have a lot of ideas for them sooo stay tuned ;)

Here's the concept designs!!

[daboyau]

Asking some writers/artists I follow:

Is there anything in your fic/comic that you as the author know about, but won't end up in the actual story?

@friendlyneighborhoodterrapin oohhhh I love this question!! It is so fun. You always have the best asks. 💚💚💚

so I am going to take this time to ramble about both The Rise Hunger Games AU and the Leave AU. I tried to avoid any big spoilers but no guarantees!

RHG au: 

Okay so for a while there I was totally delusional and convinced myself I’d write a full length fic focusing on each individual brother. I had names and a very very brief plot for each. This is 100% not happening, so I’m going to share those names. They were actually supposed to reflect the previous brother who had gone before them. (Which is partially why Donnie, who is after Raph, has the fic title ‘Turning a New Shade of Red’)

Turning a new shade of red(donnie)

Shadows of us are still dancing(leo)

Coming like a storm into your town (mikey)

We don’t burn the way you’d expect (raph)

So this isn’t totally canon so much as just a fun little thing I have in mind when writing, but you might occasionally see brief mentions of a failed uprising/attempted rebellion. This is a reference to the Hunger Games canon books, but like an au where they failed really early on and the rebellion never got off the ground. This won’t have any bearing on the story but it’s just a fun little background thing I think about sometimes and call it the secret timeline. Canon THG characters will continue to never be mentioned or important to the story lol. 

Talk of SA here but.

Okay so you remember how Finnick was getting pimped out in the original Hunger Games? That is definitely happening. Nothing will ever be explicit but you’ll notice little things mentioned offhandedly, like how Yoshi refuses to let Raph come to the Capitol after he turns 18, or how Cassandra’s victor ceremony really put an emphasis on her transition to womanhood, so on and so forth…. And Yoshi’s whole…everything before he returned to District 4. It’s another way to show how the Capitol views their victors as commodities and playthings. A lot of interactions Donnie and his fellow tributes/past victors have with people from the Capitol are meant to make readers feel at least vaguely uncomfortable. (Iiiif I’m doing it right.)

Leave AU: 

Okay so in this AU, despite living with Draxum and getting training, they aren’t doing much with mystics. Why? Because right now Draxum is focusing more on teaching them ways to develop and deepen their mystic reserves as opposed to actually using them. (Think meditation and katas and stuff like that.) This is for a couple reasons. One, because he believes they’re too young to be able to safely handle that sort of power. Two, because it’s a power and control thing. Three, because he needs them to store up as much mystics as possible so they can recover when he extracts the mutagen/empyrean from their blood. This might get mentioned eventually in the fic, but basically they go through these monthly/bi-weekly blood draws because the compound they were created with is naturally occurring within them, so Draxum essentially has an unlimited (if slow to harvest) supply of it on hand to experiment with. (Hope that made sense!)

Fun fact, Draxum actually had a lot of potential to be a really good parent in this AU. It’s mentioned sometimes, how he was strict but kind and gentle with them when they were younger. This is because at first, he really did intend to raise them differently after he realized he’d made a miscalculation in mutating babies instead of ready-to-go older warriors. So he was reading them bedtime stories and tucking them in and allowing them to have toys, even though he did want to start training them as warriors once they reached teenage/adulthood. In this AU, though, the counsel of heads decided to take more of an interest in his work than they do in canon and start applying a lot of pressure on him to produce results. So his long term project had to shift gears and become more focused on results instead of childrearing much sooner than he would have wanted. He’s doing it for the good of all yokaikind, though, so even though he may not like it he is able to be cold and distant with his children experiments and view them mainly as weapons. 

Draxum absolutely has a favorite kid. I have many thoughts and reasons for this that I am resisting the urge to ramble about here. (Luckily @boots-with-the-fur-club lets me ramble to her when I need to get it out of my system!) So in order of most to least favorite, it is:

Four

Two

One

Three

[readerwithsalt]

Opinion on both lol, if its still good for you

Well personally I’ve always been a Solangelo shipper. But sadly the reason was never because I liked Will solace. The reason I was so diehard was because I wanted Nicos character to finally to be happy lol.

The reason I was not particularly fond of Will solace:

well… the biggest reason was before he became Nico’s boyfriend he was never really a character on his own, you know? Like all of the other (straight) couples each was a character by themselves with growth, their own povs, arcs and stuff and then Nico (one of the most famed characters since the first series) was shoved together quite forcibly with this random background character that no one really remembered existed lol.

Now I’m not saying that having a background character shoved with a main character is always bad, but…

Anyway, another reason was Will’s utter disrespect to Nico in BOO. I know people say that Will only gaslighted Nico because Nico deserved it but personally I don’t think so. Will gaslighted Nico into believing that he was stupid pretty much. Saying that ‘no one at camp ever pushed him away’ (a lie since we’ve seen and been told the exact opposite in all the previous books) and telling the most traumatized character in the series that he just needs to ‘get out of his brooding cloud’. And pretty much saying he’s dumb for wanting to leave a camp that ostracized him for years lol.

I couldn’t help comparing Will’s angry and disrespectful reaction to Nico’s pain and feeling like an outcast in BOO to Jason’s understanding and respectful reaction to it. I was wondering why Rick made Will so annoying and pushy and rude and Jason so understanding and respectful of Nicos boundaries.

Will is very pushy, and he is always acting like Nico doesn’t know how to take care of himself and how to use his own powers even though Nico has been taking care of himself since he was ten years old. It’s not quite fun to read.

In ToN I liked Will a bit more tbh. I thought he was more respectful of Nico and stuff. But the thing that was still lacking was: character info. I know the pov was in apollos but still there wasn’t much.

In tsats they cranked up everything I disliked about Will up to eleven. They made him EXTREMELY whiny on a quest he insisted on going on. They made him feel burdensome. They made him feel… lame. He was a drag to read about. And for some reason they insisted on shoving Solangelo into the Light/Dark trope and made Will out to be someone who had never done anything bad in his life and couldn’t understand what personal darkness was even though he is a battlefield medic and knows it firsthand.

And it irked me that they kept having Nico describe Will as perfect and stuff and almost act as if Nico doesn’t deserve Will when, in my opinion, it is completely the other way around. Will almost seems to tolerate Nico more than like him in tsats lol. I wasn’t really a fan of it tbh.

They didn’t do anything special with Will and every piece of backstory we got from him was like eating plain white bread. That’s what his character felt like.

Plain white bread. 🍞

I don’t consider tsats to be canon tho because of the fact that mark oshiro changed riordans original outline of the book, named the book himself, and wrote 80% of it 😂. So yeah it’s pretty much published fanfic with an ‘okay’ from the original writer sadly.

I suppose the reason I don’t like Solangelo is because of Will not being a real character more like a cardboard cutout so that Nico won’t be alone romantically (even though he’s 14 and don’t need a man lol)

And one more reason I’m not quite into Solangelo anymore is that it seemed like when they got together that all of Nicos other important relationships took a backseat. In particular his relationship with Hazel. We had chapters of Nico and Hazel bonding and as soon as he’s shoved with Will solace his relationship with his favorite person is thrown to the wind….

Yeah.

[i-am-still-bb]

Treat for 22/10:

One of them is a modern witch and an owner of a famous potions recipe blog. The other one is a bit of a fanboy / just trying not to get his eyebrows synged off…

A/N: Originally conceived as an AU of The World Next Door. That had me stuck though. So we have this. But it still has similar elements, age gap, instructor/student dynamic, etc.

—

Fili drummed his fingers on the walnut conference table. One. Finger. At. A. Time. Focusing on how there were pits in the wood and some scratches in the varnish beneath his fingertips.

“Do you have any ideas?”

The silence following the question stretched on a beat too long and Fili knew he was supposed to answer. “Can you rephrase the question?”

“Enrollment numbers are dropping.”

“I’d noticed.”

“We need better student engagement and retention. Do you have any ideas? You are the most junior member of staff.” That last part was a thinly veiled dig and threat.

Fili shrugged, brushing off the words, “We could try putting some stuff on social media, teasers, sneak peeks, behind the scenes stuff. Stories about how potions and other magic sometimes go awry.”

Frowns appeared on the tenured track professors’ faces as soon as the words “social media” had left his mouth. This is why he rarely spoke up during these things. He kept his head down, did his research, lectured, and quickly attended conferences and published. 

Alice, the other young faculty member, specializing in potions that assisted in the growing of plants, clapped her hands. “My students would love something like that,” she grinned. “And I think it would do them good to see us as human, to see that we also make mistakes and singe our eyebrows and armchairs off.”

The department head looked skeptical. “It is an ‘interesting’ idea,” Fili could hear the air quotes around the word. “I think one of you younger people should be in charge. And as Ms. Yu is already assisting the Archives in their project then it should be you, if you don’t mind.

Fili did mind. Very much in fact. 

“It shouldn’t take that much time, maybe an hour a week,” the Head continued. 

And that was how a decade later Fili found himself spending more time on social media (Instagram, TikTok, and the like) promoting the university more broadly and the potions department specifically. 

He had asked for an assistant and was denied. 

It was fun. 

Sometimes. 

But other times he was just answering basic questions, or telling people “NO! ABSOLUTELY DO NOT MIX THOSE THINGS TOGETHER!” and then hoping that they actually listened.

Most of the time he was typing up replies, proofreading, posting, recording response videos, without paying much attention to the usernames that came across his screen. Sometimes there was one that would strike him as particularly ridiculous or clever; he would screenshot it, crop it, and save it to a special folder on his computer. He did the same with responses that made him give up home for humanity. 

But then there was one user, K.O.A.K., who asked questions that often made Fili pause and wonder and sometimes his only response was “I don’t know” even after he did some research and some serious thinking. 

They had a video chain going back at least six months at this point. 

Fili’s videos were well-lit against a carefully chosen background from a tripod; all courtesy of a performing arts student who interned for him for a semester. Really, she had bullied him into letting her do an unpaid internship. She was a double major and she said that the content of his videos were fantastic, but everything else was tragic. 

So now part of Fili’s large office / workspace was permanently set up for filming videos.

K.O.A.K.’s videos were probably worse that Fili’s had started out as. He always held his phone which sometimes made Fili nauseous while the user tossed ingredients into a travel sized cauldron that sat on a stove that had a single burner and plugged into a wall outlet. The wooden table it sat on was scarred from mishaps and frequently littered with ingredients, snacks, dust, and the occasional iced coffee cup of varying fullness. 

K.O.A.K. never showed his face. 

His hands featured in nearly every video. Sometimes his bare feet (which Fili had scolded him for, “What if you spill [insert potion here]? Or it boils over?” K.O.A.K.’s only response had been laughter, and to show off a fairly impressive old scar on his shin from just that thing happening) appeared. 

Fili shared tricks for making a potion that temporarily improved hand dexterity. “Roast the willow root before cutting it into thin 1 inch strips.”

K.O.A.K.  responded with a video demonstrating the differences between his original potion, one following Fili’s tip, and then one where he had added some olive oil to the foil packet before roasting, and then had roughly minced the root. 

Fili amended his notes.

He toyed with the idea of sharing his phone number as they starting talking about more than just tips and tricks for potions. But decided against it. This account operated in an official capacity. And it was probably bad enough that he was carrying on personal conversations through it. 

But he did notice that the twinge of excitement he got when he saw a notification form K.O.A.K. was the same as the one he would get early on in a new relationship. He had more than a little bit of a crush. It was merely academic, or so he told himself. He did not often get to talk about potions with anyone else.

—

Direct Messages between You (Prof.Durin) and K.O.A.K.

You: Why don’t you have a degree in this? You’re better than some of my grad students.

IDK.

You: You should apply to Erebor’s program. 

I don’t think they’d take me. I never took those ridiculous tests.

You: I’ll get them waived.

… I may not have finished secondary school

You: I’ll see what I can do.

—

Fili dismissed the class early. The first day of a new semester was always short. Most of his students were out of their seats and out the door before Fili had finished wiping down the whiteboard. Except for one. He was standing by the lectern, backpack slung over one shoulder.

“Did you have a question?”

The student shook his head. “I just wanted to introduce myself.”

Fili consulted his attendance sheet for a moment, “It’s Killian Oaks, right? If you would prefer something else, I can certainly do that. I just don’t have a note from the college about anything like that for you.”

“It is. But that’s not how you’d know me.”

Fili frowned in thought, one hand splayed over his papers on the desk. There was the niggle in the back of his brain that told him he was missing something.”

“You’d know me as . . .”

--

Taglist: Everything: @silvermoon-scrolls Fili/Kili: @dubhlachen

[bungo-alley-cats]

more of a chill post, this doesn’t add anything to the current universe other than “fun fact” stuff. if you want to see more of the background stuff that goes into this then this is for you.

Twilightclan Name Background

i try to make most of the names reference the characters in some way. most of the times i try to include this detail, but other times i just simply choose a name i think would sound good with the character. below i will go into details about the names of Twilightclan.

Darkstar. Darkstar specifically doesn’t really have a deep meaning behind his name. i simply wanted to go for a prefix that would be a synonym for Black- which was Dark-. So, Darkstar was born!

Cherryblossom. She originally was supposed to have the suffix -bite(Cherrybite) but when i was choosing names for the other cats, i got reminded of cherry blossoms hence the name change. i like Cherryblossom more than Cherrybite. alongside, the Cherry- prefix is referring to her hair color and also her fur color, in which she is a tortoiseshell!

Spritecrow. Spritecrow is one of the names i like the most. Chuuya got this name due to the fact that the Sprite- prefix because red lightning is called sprites! the -crow suffix he shares with Palecrow and calls back to them both while also symbolizing death due to their curses.

Palecrow. Honestly not much to say about Palecrow. Pale- is in reference to his fur/hair color. -crow is for the same reason for Spritecrow. it refers to both Spritecrow and their similar curses.

Spiderlily. Akutagawa is also one of the names i like! the name was taken specifically by spider lily flowers. i also wanted akutagawa to have a red diamond shaped marking in reference to black widows!

Lilac. I regret to say that Higuchi has a one-worded name because i couldn’t fit a suffix for her. in universe, this is completely fine but in the creation background it was me being lazy haha. but her name Lilac refer to Primrose Lilacs which are yellow!

Grayecho. Hirotsu has a very basic prefix, Gray- which basically just means he has gray fur. but instead i used the -echo suffix due to his ability/blessing, Falling Camellia!

Blackspider. Gin, unlike Akutagawa, is fully black with no markings hence the Black- prefix. she also gained the -spider suffix to tie her and Spiderlily together as siblings.

Fallenslip. Originally Tachihara was supposed to have Metal- a prefix because of his ability! but ultimately i didn’t do that because i liked the name Fallenslip better than Metalslip. so really, Tachihara was named purely because i like the name.

Ophio. Last one up is Q! I gave them a one-worded name because i didn’t think a suffix would really fit Ophio. They gained the name Ophio because of a fungi whose scientific name is Ophiocordyceps unilateralis, which is the fungi known to turn ants into zombies! i found it fitting so i shortened it to Ophio.

and that’s is for Twilightclan! Duskclan will be next, but if you want to talk about any of the names or ask questions, feel free to send an ask, i would love to read it :).

[phantasmicfish]

General thoughts on Daisy Jones & The Six based on episodes 1 - 6:

- love love love all the Daisy/Billy interactions. The immediate hating each other’s guts which transitions to slowing getting to know each other and yet still constantly fighting… yes

- Warren being a super chill guy in both past and present. I love the way he’s just seen hanging out on his boat and laughing in every interview

- Daisy’s comebacks and quips. I wasn’t really feeling her feistiness in earlier episodes, but now I think it’s coming in hot just like book!Daisy was. “It’s not my job to not turn you on, you know that?” yes yes tell them off

- Really liking the way they’re building up Eddie’s resentment of Billy. The fact that Eddie literally auditioned to fill Billy’s role during Billy temporary hiatus, Eddie being in love with an eventually fucking Camilla… these are all details we don’t get in the book, but I think having them in the show along with all of Eddie’s little side comments really sell it. When Billy dropped out of the band and wanted to play Honeycomb for everyone and Eddie was like, “fuck no you can’t play it,” was a great snippet to have

- Eddie blowing off some girl to sit with Camilla at the bar. The conviction in his voice when he says: “I’d chose you before everyone.” Just. GHR. Praying the show deviates from the book so that Eddie ends up with Camilla and Billy ends up with Daisy, but I’m pretty sure they won’t…

- Anytime Billy stares at Daisy and Daisy stares back. They have such chemistry with just their gazes alone I’m going insane

- Not really liking the way Camilla treated Billy when he came back from rehab — making them sleep in sep beds and acting sorta weird when he was around Julia. Her actions are totally justifiable but I think it deviates too much from book!Camila personality-wise

- the Billy/Daisy kiss.

- And then immediately followed by Billy staring at Daisy like he wants to fuck her right in that recording studio right there right now

- the songs! I know the lyrics are v diff from those in the back of the book, but I’m in love with More Fun to Miss Than be With and whatever song was playing in the background when the cast was getting their photos taken

- Camilla presenting Billy with the photo that will probably end up being the cover of Aurora. It’s like she hates the fact that Billy and Daisy have such chemistry together but recognizes that that’s what makes their songs so great

- Also not liking how show!Jonah Berg is shaping up to be more of an asshole than book!Jonah Berg was. Him causally slipping in “by the way what was the name of that rehab clinic” was a low blow. I think it’s more due to the timeline the show has with his character— book!Jonah was supposed to be the catalyst that got Daisy to join the band (The Six That Should be the Seven)

- Billy lying to Camilla about the origins of Please. Like, why is he being so cagey? I just don’t get it. It feels really out of place for Billy to outright lie to her like that… he could omit things sure but like why lie about who wrote the song? Unless Daisy was also lying to ferment chaos or something lol

- I love the band’s dynamic in the early episodes, how close they seem! Loved the blackout scene where they were all singling together, I thought it was nice to show that the band members were actually friends before all the drama love triangle stuff went down

[rosemaryreality]

Sonic Prime article analysis

Hey guys guess what! there's an article on gizmodo with a new synopsis for sonic prime AND new screenshots! these screenshot's are apparently from episode 6 and 7 (and as you may know we are only getting 8 this year), and while i don't think they show too much, if you don't want any kind of spoilers i'd suggest to just block the tag.

Anyway personally i am SUPER excited about this SO i'm gonna go over this whole article if you don't mind

Alright so FIRST i want to go over the synopsis

While reading the first thing that caught my attention was this

Attitudes and abilities huh? First of about the attitudes, It's not really surprising per se, since we have seen sonic's friends acting kind of ...agressive in previous trailers (plus i'm sure we have all seen the grumpy/feral tails posts), but i do wonder how it will vary between the shatterverses. I feel it could get kind of repetitive if all of them acted more or less the same way. And now about the abilities, do they mean about how in the Rebel!verse people use guns and in the pirate one swords? or is there more to that? aside from cyborg amy having some crazy stuff idk if and how they would give anyone else some impressive new ability.

Something else caught my attention about this article though...

So it seems the core of the show will really be about Sonic learning to appreciate his friends, honestly I am both surprised and not. On one hand, many people, including me, thought this might be the case since the first time we saw that one synopsis that described this show as a journey of "self-discovery and redemption". But on the other hand, one of the first things Sonic says on the trailer is a compliment to his "crew" not really something that i feel someone that needs to learn the power of friendship would say.

Personally, i do not mind this, i know that there are people who hated this idea, but i do think it's a fun idea for the show. I know that this is supposed to be game sonic, but personally i always treat each iteration of sonic as his own little guy. You guys are welcome to disagree and voice your opinions about it (in your own post pls this is a Sonic Prime hype blog now). But i for one am curious (and as they say "cautiously optimistic") about what MoA's take on my favorite hedgehog may look like.

BUT ANYWAY BACK TO THE SYNOPSIS

ijcfoijfiojijdiajdieajSIJFAIODJIAJDIJDIJDIJEI

So, it seems that shadow really IS going to be helping sonic on his journey, I wonder about how much screetime he is gonna get.

Also i almost forgot lmao

It reads to me as saying that Sonic shattering the crystal CREATED this new worlds from Sonic's original one, instead of those been already pre-existing worlds that Sonic is just visiting. Which explain the name Shatterverses.

So anyway that is most of what i have to say on the synopsis, now the screenshots AND their descriptions.

First,

So it seems that things are getting kind of tense with these two, and i do wonder what it is about, but what makes this image the more interesting for me though is the fact that the article claims that this images are from episode 6 and 7. I've had the theory for a while that Sonic would come back at least to this dimension in particular, (based on this:

I don't know about you, but between the gloves and the way he is falling (in the trailer he looks like he is going to faceplant, meanwhile normal gloves!sonic fell on his knees), i feel like this are two different scenes) And it seems i was right. It makes me wonder, how many shatterverses is Sonic going to visit? will it be common for him to go back to world he left? are there going to be mini arcs for each dimention? I am genually so excited for this.

The second screenshot by itself isn't much, I'm pretty sure it's from a scene from a previous trailer (it shows big, rouge and knuckles from the Rebelverse, along with two background characters, staring with surprise at something we aren't shown, but am 100% sure it's Sonic. they also have weapons) But the description under DID caught my attention:

Hello?? Rebel Rouge? Also for some reason she's the only one with a nickname (unless Knucks is on purpose and not a typo, but if so why does rouge gets a whole additional word and then knuckles name is shortened)

And now in the third image, THIS:

Here we have another look at our pirate crew (minus Knuckles) and they...don't look very friendly, i mean they ARE pirates but damn i wouldn't wanna mess with this people (well at least not with Rouge, Amy and Tails kind of look like they are trying too hard to look tough). But anyway that's not important, THIS is:

LMAO SAILS TAILS SADASKJD PLEASE TELL ME THEY CALL HIM THAT IN THE EPISODE. I had to google what Batten meant, apparently there is a saying "batten down the hatches" that means either to "secure a ship's hatch-tarpaulins, especially when rough weather is expected." or to "prepare for a difficulty or crisis".Also now that i think about it, it's probably also a pun on "Bat". At least Amy got a cool, easy to understand name.

NOW FOR THE BEST IMAGE,

SONIC WITH A SWORD MY BELOVED!!!! He doesn't seem very happy about it tho, in fact he looks really unsure? It looks like he managed to convince the pirate crew to work with him (also this is the third time we see a scene with these 3 together without Knuckles), and they look like they are teaching him how to use a sword? maybe? they look either excited or encouraging, something like that. (Also amy you aren't fooling anyone with those heart eyes girl come on you just met the guy). Not sure how i feel about this shoes tbh, they don't look bad but it's definetly his weakest assemble so far.

BUT ANYWAY WHO CARES SONIC WITH A SWORD <3<3<3<3

So anyway now the last picture:

Here we have another shot of the pirate crew! Now with Big included! Still not Knuckles though, which is weird because we know from the trailers this ship is his. I'm starting to wonder if they stole it from him lmao. I wonder who that lank is for, it looks to me as if someone else was about to use it to go to Knuckles ship, Big and Sails (lmao) are waving and everything, and Sails (lol) looks kind of nervous, so I'm guessing that it's not someone friendly.

Anyway i think that is all, until i have more time to think about it, or we get that footage from the game awards

[boogleboot]

crikey. a year since I started writing Fateheart. Roughly. What a time that was.

and still is, actually. it's not like I've stopped. The third book, second sequel to The Starless Sea, is in the works. I took a break from it the past months because I have been quite unwell, but it is called The Lotus Flowers and it WILL get done it WILL it WILL it WILL.

I also have Fever Pitch to finish, which is an interrim story that was going to go along with the rest of the collection of stories in the extended canon, but is actually rapidly approaching another full-sized book. (I think Fateheart has warped my perspective slightly on what constitutes a full-length story hahah.)

@erinmorgenstern are you aware that Zachary Ezra Rawlins has moved permanently into my brain? He has truly set up his entire life and his gaming desk in here and refuses to get out.

I've spent more close and intentional creative time with these characters - with Zachary, Dorian, Kat, Madame Love Rawlins particularly - than any others ever in my life and by golly I'm having a great time.

Erin pls read Fateheart and then have an extremely detailed conversation with me about Zachary's backstory, I have so many questions and also I want to know what you think of Leander.

Kidding. Erin owes me nothing. Though I owe her so much creative fulfilment at this point I would hardly know where to begin.

I've always wanted to be a writer, and I've known forever that the way to be a writer is to write. Only in the last year have I fully and confidently begun to claim that I am, in fact, a writer. And that is thanks to The Starless Sea. Some of this fanfiction is the best stuff I have ever produced, and I am very, very proud of it.

(Shoutout Death in the Valley, my beloved.)

Currently editing the latest Zachary/Dorian story to go up on Ao3 later today. It's called 'The Man Named Sky' and it is, courtesy of Katrina Hawkins, another dumb contrived time-travel plot (she loves them). I like this one a lot. It was supposed to be short, and I still think it's short, but it also turned out to be around 27k words, which my friends assure me is not, in fact, a short fic.

Ever onward, ever upwards. Book 4 is already in the planning, and then who knows. My mother keeps telling me to apply my attention to original works but until I have thoroughly and entirely worked through all my many, MANY thoughts about Dorian, I simply shall not be able to, I think.

And I'm having too much fun.

Gonna try to work on Fever Pitch (Set 5 years after Fateheart, 6 - or 9, depending on how you count it - years after The Starless Sea) while I'm at home for two weeks. It's an Alice and Wonderland-themed Starless Sea story, so that's going to be fun.

I have several other little gems to bash out for the extended Fateheart canon collection, and Lotus Flowers rolls slowly ever onward in the background like a slow-cooker pot with a dull red light that fills the kitchen with a slowly growing scent of herbs.

I am a writer!!! I have so many things in progress and so many things I am excited to work on!! And literally all of them are from or about The Starless Sea!! Haha!! WHat!!!!

Anyway. Thank you, Zachary, for the matcha latte drink by my side right now. Thank you Erin Morgenstern for writing a very fun book I like very much. Thank you to my discord besties for being so madly supportive and lovely about everything I write. Thank you to the academy for this little golden statue. Thank you to Mhatma Ghandi for peace and love on planet earth. Thank you Jennifer Coolidge for empowering women everywhere what no what let me finish my speech le t me hELP--

[deafeninggardenerpanda]

have u finished extra mode and true arena i think that solves most of ur gripes with the ending of magolor epilogue

just be sure to always read the new 120 energy sphere dialogue for both main and extra mode i think it makes more sense that way

i did finish everything! ive read all of the lore in the game actually. actually the reason why i havent made another follow up post on everything is because im wildly overwhelmed with how much new stuff they gave us lol, but anyways since youre prompting me ill write up something right now

first of all i dont know what you mean at all with extra mode and true arena solving my gripes. i do think my general impressions were improved after taking more time to think about it, but none of that came from playing the other modes. from what i can tell neither of those "solved" any potential misconceptions i had previously, unless you mean like, him saying hes been to a lot of different worlds before in a few places, which i still dont know if that Solves anything. alas almost all gripes remain

continuing about the new stuff, magolors timeline (and this whole remake's actually) is way too fucking fuzzy to make any solid conclusions. this isnt a gripe i have im just stating this as fact. apparently some places might imply that he was from the clash universe originally instead of the other way around?? everything about and revolving around magoland is pretty dubiously canon. magoland being in the background of the first level of nutty noon (i think) despite it not being the same universe makes the entire main game dubiously canon too if you choose to think about it that hard. like im just really confused about this whole remake mostly. also if by end of true arena you meant that something was supposed to be solved by magolor soul going into a different portal than the og, i have no fucking clue what that was supposed to imply so sorry

really final thoughts on the whole thing are: great and fun as a game, had other good and interesting additions to lore regarding the ancients, but the overall mago lore im taking from this remake is:

was in clash universe At Some Point for some amount of time

magoland is in a different universe and a lot of aspects of it are dubiously canon/just hee hoo game mechanics (masks, him taking minigames from different worlds)

hes not from halcandra (doesnt entirely rule out that hes some descendent of the ancients)

had character development (nice)

anything more indepth they gave us, im keeping in the corners of my vision but mostly ignoring for now LOL i do not know what to do with any of it

[rikeijo]

Today's translation #193

Pash! Illustration file 2017, Hiramatsu Tadashi's comments & interview

Part 3.

In this issue, we collected all original Yuri!!! arts drawn for PASH!, but was there any art that was especially memorable to you that you have drawn or supervised?

The onsen illustration from November issue of PASH! is an early one, so I remember it particularly well. Even when working on the anime I have discussed the nipples a lot with other staff members (laugh). If nipples are drawn too clearly, it looks unnatural, but it also looks unnatural if you don't draw nipples at all - so in the end we decided to drawn them like this. It's very interesting, how the fact that Yurio observes intently the other two from a slight distance shows how the relationship between the three of them is like. This magazine cover (PASH! Illustration File 2017) is also well-designed. The order was for an art of the three of them going on a drive together, so first we had to decide on the location. In the end, the Director came up with the setting that they went on holiday together and the location looks like a road along a beach in Israel, so the background is this pleasantly blue sky. Yurio has plenty of cats in his lap, but I'm not sure if they are supposed to be real cats or plush toys (laugh). Also, this is something that was true in case of the anime, but cars are quite difficult to draw. In case of this illustration, I looked up Cadillac and tried to draw it as realistically as was possible.

[Notes: The Israel beach can be identified as Tel Aviv specifically based on the shape of street lights! Tel Aviv is famous for being an extremely gay-friendly city *wink wink*.

(This is of course widely known in the fandom, but as I translate stuff thinking mainly about new fans, who maybe want to know more about Yuri!!!, in addition to just watching the anime, I think it's worth mentioning fun facts like that ✨)

The onsen illustration Hiramatsu-san talks about is this one:

[armchairaleck]

Sadly for me I have come to the end of my writing ideas for one shot stories which means I am now faced with the unpalatable dilemma of trying to actually write and finish one of my long fic ideas, and this level of commitment fills with me with existential dread.. well actually I think other shit does that and I write to try and forget the yawning chasm that opens up beneath me, but oh well, never mind eh…

I currently have four multi-chapter WIP ideas all of which exist in various degrees of very unfinished states on my hard drive, none of which I’m certain I can complete, but even so, I will outline them below, I will ponder them, I will be totally open to any suggestions that probably no one has..

Viren Origin Fic

Okay so my TDP original idea was always to write Viren’s background and relationship with Harrow from around age 13/14 right up to the start of the show... the main problem with this is - all the known cannon stuff seems to squeeze everything into about 8-10 years in the middle, while leaving the decades on either side of his marriage up until the magma titan debacle like a blank void of stuff I would have to make up and get totally wrong - due to my blinkers with Viren, my desire to make the world a lot darker than it’s probably supposed to be, and my unshakable belief that Harrow and Viren’s friendship becomes a twisted and suffocating vine that sucks them both into the pit of their own poor moral morasses.. but is also all they have.. and it’s sad..

So the plus side of this - I just really kinda love to explore the Viren/Harrow, Viren & Kpp’Ar, Viren/Lissa relationships, along with Sarai… I also love the slow descent of Viren from carefree boy, to loving dad to errr… not loving dad?

Down side – I could start writing this and find it is totally blown out of the water by the new cannon that will appear this summer and that often derails me, because while I am absolutely able to misread a character and their motivations and level of evil intent, like a fucking pony prancing around a field on a spring day.. I can get oddly OCD about additions to story cannon that mean this could very easily get destroyed and then I would have utterly wasted my time… also there are A LOT of missing pieces to fill in..

Viravos dead souls fic

Urgh, following on from this.. I also thought I could round it off with some vaguely cannon Viren/Aaravos.. um.. two years dead lost souls fic.. that could also be a stand alone. So for some reason my brain did not go down the horny Aaravos emerging from the cocoon s3/s4 gap fic, that people might actually want to read, and instead went to the hey.. what if Aaravos had to give the traumatised soul of Viren two years of therapy, in space, while his body lies on earth stitched in stasis.. anyway, it’s basically a lot of moping and angst between a middle aged man regretting all his life choices and a near eternal elf who has been irreversibly psychologically damaged by 300 years of solitary confinement.. fun times? This is not.. I also want to give them an unrealistic level of softness here because I'm pretty sure Viren will get no happy ending and I want him to have something.. I’m a sap and I have to just deal with this sad fact..

The plus side of this - I guess.. oh.. I don’t even know if there is a plus side.. people might want to read it? Until they discover that for an E rated fic it will really offer them nothing at all.. just slightly traumatised bad sex.. well, haha, that’s all my E rated fic to be fair…

Downside - I cannot really write Viravos to save my life.. meh..

Viren/Kpp’Ar Gothic AU

Alright, I switched this to gothic for more historical leeway and more opportunities for brooding, crazy mansions, resurrection and ghosts in the attic.. anyway.. this is a time when humans have fucked the world up even more fully, when they have destroyed nearly all magical components and dark mages are a dying breed of unhinged self-destructive maniacs that make Jack Parsons look sane.. I have a vague outline for this stitched out that I will probably expound upon in a different post, it’s pretty dumb and deranged and exists mostly so I can write some Viren and Kpp’Ar together..

Plus side of this – I mean despite the fact I’m patchy on the historical details I do love me a bit of gothic - brusque anti-social Kpp’Ar energy, mixed with Viren channelling his inner hysterical lady vibes… (just kidding olden days hysterical girls with smelling salts, you could never be as overwrought as Viren gets in front of a mirror..)

Minus side – this is literally as ridiculous as it sounds, there would be A LOT of plot I would have to write to fill inbetween the main beats, and I would probably have to do a lot of research.. watching old black and white horror films and reading the first 100 pages of gothic novels that I’ll simply forget to finish.. sigh.. okay maybe I’ll do the research and forget the writing..

Cyberpunk AU

Welp.. despite the last one, this is probably the most insane of all my ideas and exists solely because I wanted to ship Viren with Ibis… What? Why did I want to do this? I have literally no idea, except that often for some reason my brain will think.. oh.. I wonder what would happen if those two completely incompatible characters that have no way to actually get together in cannon met up and had a fuckin ridiculous and unlikely relationship that literally no one else in the whole world would care about?

So despite the fact that I know I don’t have a quarter of the world building chops necessary to actually write this, I have thought about it quite a lot..

Dumb things this AU contains:

A physical border between human kingdoms and Xadia where armies are constantly lined up in a don’t blink first cold war scenario…

An online version of the breach that separates the shitty human commodore 64 8-bit level of technology from the apple mac in 100 years sleek levels of advancement the Xadians have achieved..

That humans, god bless their ingenuity, have discovered a way to hook into, in order to try and steal the technology of the five nexus powers and boost themselves out of the depressing state of their own existence..

Defection from Xadia to the human kingdoms by various elves who have grown tired of the 1984 levels of state surveillance imposed on them by the dragons.. and who now work with the humans as primal jumpers, i.e. those who can get into the breach naturally..

Dark jumpers, who are social pariahs with both humans and elves and destroy everything they touch.. as per cannon..

Zero magic in the human kingdoms because they’re so awful of course they’ve destroyed it all, they rely on the dirt and smog of fossil fuels, while Xadia is renewable and magical all the way, but also under the grip of dictatorial state control.. seems like you just can’t have it all eh..

Just the whisper of Aarovos existing out there somewhere in the online breach like Jeff Bridges in Tron Legacy…

Weird pseudo sex pollen stuff that I would really have to remove to stop a decent into pure insanity..

Um.. drugs.. this is cyberpunk and the ONLY cyberpunk type stuff I have read is either by Philip K Dick or is Neuromancer… which means I figure cyber punk just has to involve a heinous amount of drug taking, which is probably inappropriate for a kids cartoon fic..

Alright, this makes total sense in my head but I am aware that trying to write it down makes it sound pretty nuts..

Plus sides – none?

Minus sides – I think those have all be listed above… so I should probably leave this here…

Alright, that's all I have thought about, which is probably for the best..

Honestly I do not know what to do here, maybe work on everything concurrently and finish nothing.. maybe do nothing.. maybe try and learn to draw better so I don’t have to worry so much about writing and plot and pacing and world building.. maybe wait for the sweet inspiration for a one shot of below 15k words to hit me..

..and yet I feel compelled to write SOMETHING.. which sorta sucks..

[drjdorr]

I thought of a crazy 40k theory, you ready? I'm not, but let's go!

So the Emperor made 20 space marine legions, each with its own primarch*, right? But because vague and ambiguous reasons 2 legions and their corresponding primarchs are seemingly gone by the time of the Horus Heresy, these two often being referred to as the Forgotten and the Purged and to some degree even had the memory of them forcibly forgotten. Got that? Great now let's keep moving.

So many of you may have noticed that what I said implies there are 18 known primarchs, but actually there are 19. You see the 20th legion(the Alpha legion) openly was primarched by Alpharius, but in the background was his twin** Omegon. Fun fact that will come back later, Alpharius and Omegon actually share a single soul(neat, huh?).

Now the primarchs while still in their gestation pods were stolen from the Emperor and thrown all over the galaxy through the Warp(aka the Sea of Souls) where physics/metaphysics can get a little wonky and part of the great crusade was just the Emperor going out and collecting his lost kids/weapons/it's complicated to know. And from stuff we hear in later points in the timeline, characters indicate that despite the two missing primarchs being basically expunged from all records and forbidden to be spoken of, all 20 had at one point or another been found***

Now what I'm proposing is that their truly were Only 20 primarchs. Let me explain my thoughts, so the Emperor makes 20 primarchs, each with a soul of their own that are then snatched into the Warp. While in the Warp one primarch accidentally loses their soul to another and ends up sharing a soul with a different one. Time passes and because Warp soul nonsense the primarchs sharing a soul grow up looking similar, infact practically identical. More time passes and the Emperor reunites with his sons who he reunites with their legions. As time passes the primarchs who have soul nonsense going on cause their legions to alter to fit this fact with the twin primarchs' legions eventually being indistinguishable from each other as well as so intertwined it's virtually impossible to tell where one ends and the other begins. Meanwhile while we don't have many examples of beings with multiple souls(especially psyker souls), the few we have/are rumored to have tend to be exceptionally powerful, Big E himself being a prime example****, all it would take is a moment of hubris and there would be reason to purge him, and given how powerful the Emperor's genetics are, probably wouldn't be a bad idea to purge his whole legion, just to be safe. Of course, given such an embarrassing failure of a primarch and to prevent future rebellions(oops), the Emperor wipes all traces of the double souled primarch from record or memory but due to the alpha twins psykic powers, Omegon and his legion accidentally got forgotten from memory and record too.

Now do i think this theory is true? Of course not, I called it a crazy theory for a reason, plus even GW should know to never have anything about the Forgotten and Purged ever Actually be true. But still a fun idea to think about isn't it?

*yes I know, I'll get to it

**wait, wouldn't all the primarchs arguably be twins? Well Alpharius' identical twin

*** I didn't miss type, 1. Omegon is secret and basically unknown to basically every one, and 2. The Theory

****supposing the shaman origin is true

[spaceorphan18]

Glee Musical Retrospective: Lean On Me (Ballad)

Sung by: Artie Abrams and Mercedes Jones feat. New Directions Original Artist(s): Bill Withers

You know how the song Ironic doesn't actually contain any irony? Or how the episode Mash Up didn't have any actual Mash Ups in it? Well - I suppose now's a good time to explain that the episode Ballad doesn't actually contain any ballads.

Ballad definition: a poem or song narrating a story in short stanzas. Traditional ballads are typically of unknown authorship, having been passed on orally from one generation to the next as part of the folk culture.

Though, you can also claim it's a slow, often romantic pop song. Which... I'd argue a majority of the songs in this episode aren't that, either. But I digress... I really just didn't have a better way to open this one up.

Story Analysis

I'm going to start by throwing out there that this was Mercedes' idea. She finds out that Puck is the father, but does she gossip that around? She does not. Instead - she probably hears that Quinn (who up to this point has been a terrible person to her) has been thrown out. And what does Mercedes to? She gets everyone together to sing a song of friendship and encouragement. I just don't think Mercedes gets enough credit sometimes - and it's a nice gesture from her to support people whom she may not even consider friends in their time of need.

The whole sentiment of the song is about friendship and about being there when someone else in need. The lyrics are pretty straightforward (Glee a lot of the times pushes in hard when it wants to make a point) but the thing I like the most about it is the fact that there isn't a romantic element to the song. It's truly about being there for someone in their time of need.

And I feel like this is another one of those songs that hits at the heart of what the show was trying to go for. Yes - this song is meant for Finn and Quinn -- a way for the Glee club to say they're there for their friends. But it's also the show saying that a club like this is a way to have a social group that you can depend on, even if you feel like an outsider in life.

Finn and Quinn seem to appreciate the gesture, too. And it's nice to see Quinn have a moment of acceptance of these people whom she's spent so long hating against.

There really isn't a whole lot else going on, but I have a few smaller things to mention.

Of course there's the smaller, and uncomfortable, moment between Kurt and Finn during the 'call me' stuff. It's supposed to be a little comedic beat, but ooff, no. Kurt's kind of caught up in a fantasy that he and Finn bonded over this.

There's the shared look between Puck and Quinn - and the subtle acknowledgement that Quinn has feelings for him.

Rachel is oddly chill about all the Finn and Quinn love. Honestly, everyone seems rather happy to be there - and I have to wonder if there is some slight actor bleed going on - as everyone seems a little too happy to be hanging around on each other.

Towards the end, a bunch of the cast literally start leaning on each other. Nice touch, lol.

Technical Thoughts

It's the second episode in a row where Mercedes and Artie, both of whom really didn't have a story line, get a duet together. For story reasons - it can't go to most of the other people in the episode. But, I want to also argue that Amber and Kevin have remarkably strong voices together. It's a combination we're going to see a lot of because of it.

This is one of the first times I can really hear the actors' voices on the recorded background (Naya's voice can really be heard.) But, as usual, the show has, like, tripled the tracks making it seem like there are a lot more than eight other people singing backup.

I feel like we should have a counter as to how many times Mercedes hits that high note at the end. I'm sure she's already done it...

Fun Fact: Jenna Ushkowitz and Kevin McHale explained that Tina's adlibs were placed in the song because Kevin had trouble performing them the way the music producers wanted. (as per their podcast Showmance. I'm hoping their new podcast will allow me to sprinkle in more facts like this.)

Glee Live

Since I didn't have a whole lot to say about this one, I'm throwing in a few extra things. First of all -- I need to clear up a myth. This is NOT Darren's audition for Glee. During the first season, I believe Glee did a thing where they wanted people to send in tapes (or something - it's all fuzzy now), which is what inspired this video. But it's not what led to Darren getting Blaine.

So - this is a fresh faced (shaggy haired) young Darren. And I'm so fascinated by this. First of all - the recording is terrible. Was he using his phone?? Anyway, the thing about Darren is that he is a gifted performer, but maybe not flawless with his vocal technique. You notice how he's doing a lot of trills on his notes? That's not just a stylistic choice. It's because he's having a hard time staying on the pitch - so if he moves it around a bunch, he can hide some of his weakness. It's clever. And Darren's charming enough in his physical performance to distract you from vocal imperfections.

Also - two key changes Darren? Lol...

(You guys know I love Darren, right? Okay just making sure...)

So - we were somewhat robbed from Blaine and Mercedes's duets during the show's run, so here's Amber and Darren singing the same song years and years later. And omg, this is just gorgeous. Both of their voices have matured and grown. The harmonies on this are beautiful. Everything about this is beautiful.

vs. The Studio Version: The studio version has a longer introduction and the inclusion of the second verse. And as usual - it's a cleaner track. That's about it. It's a great song, but not a whole lot to say about it.

vs. The Original Version: Wow - the original version is way slower. And is much more relaxed in nature. Glee did have a tendency to speed up its versions of songs -- which I gathered was often due to the time constraints of television. But it makes me wonder - was Glee's frantic pace due the necessity of fitting a lot of things into one place? Or was just that the nature of the song?

Also - we finally get a departure from the original arrangement. The backup vocals in Glee are used in place of the piano.

[joshhhhhhhhhhhhhhh]

I did literally just say I love Sonic now more than ever so gonna offset my last post about Prime being negative by mentioning a few things I really like about Prime.

One of the biggest ones is just how dope it looks! Really fun stylised 3D animation that looks smooth and has a good focus on like, keyframing and strong poses - combined with the really expressive mdoels it’s a style that really works for Sonic and I can’t wait for more even just to see how it looks.

And on visuals, I really like the character designs! Part of the reason I grind Sonic Dash so hard or why I bought the Tokyo 2020 Olympics is because getting any official opportunity to see the characters in alternate outfits is usually just super fun, especially because of how strict SEGA usually is with that stuff. Prime meanwhile comes around and has given us like 3 extra outfits for several of the core cast with still more to come! That’s just blanket really fun!

I also like that Sonic’s new looks tend to give him neat little abilities. Narratively it doesn’t amount to much but I don’t even feel like it has to - it’s a neat surprise factor/rule of cool thing that adds character to whichever universe we’re in and enhances Sonic’s reactions to those places as well. If anything it’d honestly be cool to have something like that in the games lol.

I like the voice acting a lot! I actually can’t meaningfully expand on that one lol, it just sounds really good, everyone feels well cast to me, it doesn’t feel like many awkward line reads made it through to the final thing. They are just nice. The only person I don’t adore is Eggman but even then, A) I so can’t imagine non-Mike Pollock Eggmen and B) actual Eggman is mostly absent in favour of Mister Doctor Eggman so I’m pretty much solid with it anyway.

I really enjoy New Yoke as a setting a lot. “What if the villain won?” is a classic setting for a reason, even being one that multiple pieces of Sonic media have explored, but I think New Yoke manages to feel particularly fresh even just on execution and aesthetic alone. It helps that it still feels very lived in - there’s a living, breathing population and a band of rebels that operate in secret and there’s Nine’s hideout and just like, cool shit going on lol.

For that matter I like Nine a lot. I literally put Tails as my 5th favourite Sonic character in that list I did a while back and he’s been in virtually every single Sonic game even during some of its most intense Solo Sonica eras - but he can feel very relegated to the background because of the nature of his character sometimes? So it’s really awesome to see Prime use Nine as an excuse to really let Tails play a major role with lots of actual development and stuff. This is helped doubly by the fact that, awkward pixel art aside, the flashback of his actual backstory (as canonised by Origins wow) alone helps him just feel like the real Tails we’re dealing with, just in a different setting. And yeah, the mechanical Tails are just really cool lol. Particularly a fan of the fact that it allows Tails to be up close and personal in combat again - he’s supposed to use his Tails to attack as well but lots of Sonic media has him holding back for support roles in combat, it’s nice that Prime is willing to acknowledge that, yo, Tails can throw hands. And also tails lmaoooooo

I’m not sure how best to word this part specifically also, but I personally was worried that Prime would sorta like, I guess just follow a rigid structure of x episodes in x shatterverse, grab the crystals, and then move onto the next one? The formula not really changing? But it does not do that and we kinda go back and forth between them and there’s things happening between the shatterverses and like, just in general there’s an actually good attempt to keep the structure fresh and interesting.

And the biggest thing of all is that. Prime is actually just really fun lol. There’s a lot of other good things I haven’t mentioned, but it all comes together with what I have to make a show that’s actually just plain old entertaining to watch. I didn’t feel like I was watching the new Sonic show out of obligation, I was just watching it because I genuinely liked watching it. Even my problems with it don’t feel like a huge deal because it’s so good at the moment-to-moment that I wasn’t really thinking about them while watching. Like it’s literally just a good show, and that slaps.

So fuck yeah, Prime is dope.