#how can you be so disconnected from How Meat Happens

[sergle]

THE CHOOK WILL LAY EGGS!! They will go in my cake or they will rot on the ground I rly do hate anti egg folks. THERE WILL BE EGGS REGARDLESS IF YOU WANT THEM OR NOT, THATS WHAT HAPPENS WHEN YOU HAVE CHICKENS.

LIKE PLEASE... they lay an egg damn near every day what are you supposed to do with them. throw them all in the creek

[chu-diaries]

100 days of mental healthcare: day 100/100

Well, it's over! I genuinely can't believe it's been 100 days since I started this challenge (even more than 100, since I skipped a day or two when I couldn't post).

For those who just arrived, I started this challenge in April, the day after my birthday, when I was really in bad health. I had severe panic attacks about 4 times a day, which made me unable to do anything. I dealt with constant suicidal thoughts, I barely slept anymore and I was spending everything I had on doctors, self-knowledge courses and therapies. I found myself with two options: the first was to invest in medications that would make me dependent and drugged, but that would fix my brain. However, there was a risk that I wouldn't get the dose or medication right in time and my situation would get worse. The second option was longer and more difficult: studying how my body, my brain and my limits worked, and then adjusting day after day what wasn't going well. You know that I chose this option and that I created the 100-day mental healthcare challenge to track my progress on this.

In these 100 days I learned a lot that I want to share here. As we are all unique and different human beings, you may not agree with what I applied in my life, but I ask for respect and empathy, because all of this saved me. Also, some points have a scientific basis in research I did and books I read.

1. mental health and nutrition

This was one of the first things I learned. I realized that when I was hungry, my body didn't give me clear signals. Probably due to my autism and ADHD, I was always disconnected from my body's needs and didn't know how to identify hunger (which I expected to be something like a growling in my stomach, but it never was that way). What actually happened was that, instead of hunger, I had a critical increase in my intrusive and suicidal thoughts, which made mealtimes much worse than they should have been. Our mind is more vulnerable when the body is not properly fed and hydrated, and many of us neurodivergent people will not feel hunger like neurotypicals do. Our body wants us to move to find food, so it sends us successive stimuli through our brains to fight for our lives and, well, eat. Some of these stimuli can be very negative and, instead of propelling us forward, they drain our energy and make us even more depressed, which also doesn't happen to the same extent with neurotypicals, who deal with this type of thing much better. To avoid this, I started eating every 3 hours, and not because a doctor told me to, but because I realized that my crises happened with this frequency. By eating regularly and preventively, my body stopped depending on this resource to nourish itself and I became more mentally stable.

2. mental healthcare and intestinal system

The gut is not our second brain for nothing. The health of our mind is completely connected to the health of our gut. You have certainly heard the phrase “you are what you eat” and it is true. What surprised me most in my studies was discovering that neurotypical and completely mentally healthy people develop mental disorders if their gut microbiota is altered. In other words, we must nourish our gut to maintain our mental health. The more diverse our microbiota is, the better our mental health will be. This means eating various foods per week, as colorful and natural as possible, because food industrialization is also partially responsible for the number of mental disorders that exist today.

3. mental healthcare and eating meat

This is a difficult topic, since I was a vegetarian for many years, but I want to share what I learned with you. The incidence of mental disorders is directly associated with the levels of omega 3, taurine and tryptophan. Omega 3 is a good fat and essential not only for maintaining memory, but for all of our cognitive functioning and, although it can be supplemented in a vegan way, it is not as accessible to everyone in the appropriate dosage as fish. Similarly, meat has high levels of taurine and tryptophan, which regulate anxiety and depression and improve sleep. For many years I did not eat meat, supplementing protein with vegetables and whey, and for all those years I suffered from anxiety and depression. I never imagined that my blood type would also suffer more from this lack of protein: blood type O struggles more to maintain mental health and ideal mood levels with vegetable proteins. It is a blood type that needs animal protein. Going back to eating meat was not an easy decision, but I decided to test it out: even though I ate a small amount of animal protein per day, my cognitive function improved a lot in these past 100 days. I became more mentally stable and stronger, my mood improved, my gut responded positively and suddenly the things that haunted me were no longer so big. I never thought that mental health and animal protein had any connection, but I was very surprised to discover that eating meat (or not) influences our mind.

4. mental healthcare and intrusive thoughts

Well, I studied psychology, but it was a theory that didn't deal with intrusive thoughts. In these 100 days I discovered this term and delved deep enough to understand that we all have intrusive thoughts. Neurotypicals deal with them better, while neurodivergents deal with them much worse. Unfortunately, I suffered a lot with these thoughts and suffered even more trying to understand why this was happening in my head. If you suffer from intrusive thoughts, start by understanding that they are not real and that they do not come from you consciously. An intrusive thought is something that crosses your mind and is similar to a scary radio station that you accidentally connected to. It does not belong to you. I learned to think (and I like this theory) that this is a way for the brain to prepare itself for various possibilities, even the most absurd and impossible ones. We are animals and our body wants to survive, so I understand that the brain explores various probabilities to always be prepared, no matter what happens. Of course, for anxious and depressed people this has the opposite effect and makes us want to die. Over time, you learn that you can’t control when these thoughts appear, but you can control how much power you give them. I deal with obsessive intrusive thoughts every day, but each day I’m becoming more and more able to not get emotionally involved with them. “It’s just a glitch in my brain,” I think, taking a deep breath.

5. mental healthcare and joy (which is worth more than solving problems)

I've always had a very fast-paced mind, cluttered with things and addicted to solving problems. In recent years I thought I should focus more on relaxing and opening up spaces in my mind, but I discovered that an empty mind can be treacherous for neurodivergent people. Our mind is, in fact, addicted to solving problems. That's how our species evolved and prospered. Our mind has an organizational structure that seeks, through connections and associations, to process past and future events, resolve pending issues and find solutions for what was left behind. We do this with everything, even with things that are not in our control. I spent a lot of my life trying to solve what was going on in my head and I was unsuccessful because I wasn't the one who created this situation. Although solving problems is a pattern of the mind, it is a sweet illusion. Many things are not actually solved, we only think they are. I discovered that the time I invested trying to solve mental problems that I did not create could be used to create happier foundations to strengthen myself. I learned that it is actually joy that heals, not obsessively thinking about the problem until it is solved. Every time I focused my energy on doing something good, laughing or contemplating nature, I became a little stronger and remembered who I am. I won't deny that I felt guilty - the cognitive rigidity of autism screamed at me that I was ignoring my problems and that I was creating a silly fantasy world. Even so, I fought to break out of this pattern. It is still difficult. But today I believe that I’m meant to be happy and that cultivating moments of joy makes life worthwhile.

6. mental healthcare and feeling useful

Feeling useful is essential for mental health. We all want to be part of something and be recognized as necessary. In these 100 days, I decided to resume some volunteer work within my community and I also opened a new company, with handmade products, so that I would also have the opportunity to produce something that was not only in the intellectual field (handicrafts are very good for those who suffer from anxiety). Having a dynamic routine in which you have an important role is great for mental health and your sense of self-authority. Also, getting in touch with other people's personal stories helps to decentralize our gaze from ourselves, which is very useful if you suffer from OCD. As tiring as it may be, the more diverse activities we do, the better our cognitive function becomes.

7. mental healthcare and moving the body

It's interesting that to take care of your mind, you need to get out of your head and move your body. Many of the tensions accumulated in our minds can be released by running, walking or playing some sport. It doesn't matter what it is, but move your body. We were not designed to stay still, but to do various strength, balance and endurance exercises. Our ancestors walked for days in search of shelter and food, and that's how our bodies evolved. Especially for those who suffer from anxiety, high-impact exercises not only help regulate your mood and release neurotransmitters, but also generate a stress spike that will do your body good for the rest of the day. When we trigger these spikes, our body answer quickly and creates new pathways to respond to stress, which helps us better deal with anxiety, depression, instructive thoughts, etc. Our sleep also improves, as we use our stored energy and tend to think less before going to sleep.

8. mental healthcare and sleep hygiene

I have always tried to force myself to be silent. I forced myself to meditate for many years, without much success, but after the panic attacks returned, meditating and being silent were torture. It was as if I made room for all my inner demons to dance in my mind and I always felt worse. I recently discovered that neurodivergent people struggle more with silence and that it does them a lot of good to distract their minds with sounds, images and other stimuli that allow them to emotionally engage with something real and outside of themselves. I see that it is a controversial topic, but I no longer believe in sleep hygiene without screens and complex content. My best nights of sleep were those in which I distracted myself with something until I fell asleep or listened to someone talking until I fell asleep. So if you want to test what works best for you, know your limits and do not blindly obey the orders that someone has set. Maybe you work better at dawn, maybe you only need 6 hours of sleep, maybe you are different from the average. Your life's work is to discover yourself and be true to it.

9. mental healthcare and developing self-authority

This was very important to me. I have always had low self-esteem and I have always believed in others more than in myself. I sought answers and cures for what I suffered from various doctors and therapists, but all of this only made my situation worse. I became dependent on diagnoses, consultations and sessions that never really helped me. At a certain point I decided that I would educate myself on the subjects that bothered me. I studied, and studied a lot, about psychology, neurology, neuroscience, nutrition and about the functioning of the body as a whole. Today I no longer accept any diagnosis about myself because I have developed my own authority. I am the authority when it comes to myself, you know? I don't need others to tell me what I am feeling because now I know what it is and where it comes from. I also know, fortunately, how to solve it. When I go to a doctor or have an exam, I know what I am investigating and what I need to achieve. It is very sad that today medicine is just a search for money and that you only get good care if you pay a lot for it, so it is important to get educated about yourself so you won’t fall into standardized speeches that will lead you to the ever-increasing consumption of pharmaceuticals and drugs without, in fact, looking at the cause of the problem.

10. mental healthcare and time

There are things that only time can heal. There is nothing like letting time pass. A few months ago, all I could think about was how I wanted to end my life and it was tormenting to think about living for even one more day. Waiting for time to pass was difficult, but I was rewarded. Time has a way of overcoming some things if you allow yourself to create new memories, new connections and new laughs. If you are suffering a lot, wait a few more hours. Live one more day. Let time pass and life bring you better things.

See you guys again on my next challenge (maybe a productivity one?). Thanks to everyone who liked and reblogged my previous posts! 💕

[dunmeshichilchuck]

For That One Guy on Tumblr part 6

Chilchuck x !fem !halffoot reader

The party trudged through the icy floor they'd found you on. 

At one point Laois pointed out where they'd dug you out of the ice. There were what looked like explosions, signs of battle, and a dead ice golem. Ahhh so they'd been fighting something else and your body had just happened to have been uncovered. That made sense. 

You spotted a chunk of fabric attached to...something, and shuddered. Looks like they hadn't collected everything. The experience of seeing your own flesh, disconnected and dead was surreal. Maybe you should take it along with you as a souvenir. Laois would probably be all too ready to help you pickle it. 

You felt a hand on your shoulder and jumped. Turning, you saw Chilchuck. 

"Hey, come on, you're starting to fall behind."

You hadn't even realized you'd stopped to stare at the remains of your death, but the party had indeed started to pull ahead. 

Chilchuck turned without another word and you fell in step beside him as you both caught back up to the party. 

The door to the next part of the dungeon opened into what looked like one long hallway, bending to the right off in the distance. You stepped through the threshold and immediately shucked off the blanket you'd had to borrow to use as a jacket. It felt wonderfully warm in here. 

As the party continued walking you noticed that they had been working together long enough to automatically sort themselves into an order that made sense for combat. Laois was up front with Senshi, the two most durable heavy hitters. Then Marcille, presumably for quick backup and/or healing. Then Chilchuck, who would need to be out of the way of any fighting, and would be best equipped to hear anything sneaking up from behind. Izutzumi drifted around wherever, up in front, back behind, racing ahead and then flopping down and digging a stone out of her shoe. You weren't sure what her role in the party was yet, but she seemed extremely agile and confident, so you'd guess she could hit a lot harder than her skinny frame and lack of obvious weaponry would suggest. They really were all very well coordinated and used to working with each other. 

You kept in line with Chilchuck. Both because of all the tactical stuff you'd just run through, and because it was nice to get to chat with another halffoot again. It'd been a year since you'd seen another halffoot when you went into the dungeon, and then another six months or so in the dungeon.

Up ahead Laois and Senshi appeared to be in excited conversation about cooking the remnants of the barometz. From the sounds of it Senshi was looking forward to taking advantage of the tender meat to make delicious stir fry, and Laois was theorizing about the best way to use the plant as bait for larger monsters.

You glanced at Chilchuck. "Laois and Senshi seem to be having fun."  

He chuckled. "Yeah they do that. They're both kinda freaks about monsters, Laois MUCH more so. That guy..." He shook his head ruefully. "I mean don't get me wrong, he's a good fighter, and the monster knowledge helps him fight and survive, and he's even picked up some healing magic so he's a good guy to have on your side, but he just does not understand social or cultural norms or how to deal with people. Plus he's just kinda a freak about it."

You nodded. Up ahead, Laois and Senshi dropped their voices a bit and started discussing meals that would be suitable for you to eat until you recovered from revival sickness. 

You grimaced. "Ah, have they not..."

"Realized we can hear them even if they think they're too far away? No they haven't, they still think of me as a tallman child after all, I doubt they clock that we can do stuff they can't." He snorted and said. "I bet they think of you as a toddler. After all they already think I'm a kid and you're so much shorter than me."

"Wha- hey!" You spluttered. "I'm not the one that's short, you're ridiculously tall! Being around the tall races has warped your idea of whats normal for sure."

Chilchuck grinned. "Regardless of what's normal for us they're still gonna ruffle your hair first chance they get. Mark my words." 

You'd interacted with enough of the other races to know he was probably right. You'd been able to work people underestimating you to your favor sometimes but that didn't mean it wasn't annoying. 

Up ahead there was a strangled yelp, like a cat being sat on. Marcille gasped. "Izutzumi!" And started sprinting ahead to where the corridor took a sharp right turn. 

Laois and Senshi followed suit. You and Chilchuck followed but quietly dropped back to keep some distance.

You came skidding around the corner to see a very mangled walking mushroom and Izutzumi standing over it looking cranky. 

"Izutzumi!" Marcille gasped out. "are you okay?? What happened??"

"I can't stand these things." Izutzumi growled. She turned to Senshi, who was already inspecting the mushroom. "You better not be thinking about putting that into my food! I will NOT be eating-"

You heard a faint series of "chunk" sounds, like a series of very large stones softly falling into place. You whipped your head around, looking for the source. Chilchuck also started glancing around, but no one else reacted. It must have been out of their hearing range. 

it didn't take long to find the source. A solid wall had risen up in the corridor you'd just come down, and doors and turns had opened up in the corridor you'd just entered. 

Chilchuck turned to Senshi and Izutzumi. "Stop squabbling about that! We've got bigger problems." 

Tag list, ask to tag:

@night-shadowblood-writes2

@thoughtfulbelieverstrawberry

@dunmeshimeshi

@leguink 

@gh0st-spider

@reh-llik

@sy1v30n

@qardasngan

@mshope16

@toshi-tori

[maleyanderecafe]

(Spoilers for Dead Plate) Would you consider Dead Plate to be a yandere vn with that one ending where Vince makes Rody eat his ex?

Dead Plate is actually pretty fun because I actually quite like the type of gameplay of the diner dash genre, and it is impressive they were able to code this into RPG Maker of all things. Unfortunately, the gameplay is still pretty glitchy and majorly difficult to do in later levels because you need to hit a certain amount of quota to get certain endings, and the gameplay is rather difficult, so I had to search up some of the endings instead of completing the game like I usually do. To answer your question... kind of? It's one of those "it depends on your interpretation" kind of things (and probably the creator's twitter).

The story starts out with Rody who is hired to be a waiter at Vince's fancy restaurant after a lot of begging. We see that Rody is kind of a himbo and Vince is very straight laced. The majority of the story comes through the dialogue they have together. We learn that Rody is taking this temporary job to get a really fancy gift for his ex, Manon so that they can get back together again. Vince on the other hand seems to be a famous chef with a specific type of interest in food and is very serious about his job as a chef, to the point of intensity. We see in one of the scenes were Rody comes to take out the trash that he is yelling at one of the cooks for making a mistake, even putting their face over the oven fire to punish them. Similarly, when Rody accidentally knocks over the trash while taking ti out, Vince slaps him. At some point, Rody asks Vince if he can take some of the leftovers after each day, seeing as he doesn't really have much to eat. Vince allows him and each day, he is given a new dish that he leaves in the fridge. In one of the days, Rody interacts with a mouse, only to be served that to him as his leftovers. Rody also periodically gets very strange dreams about being eaten or otherwise prepared for food, often with Vince in them. During one of the days, after work, Rody ends up going into Vince's office, only to find a picture of him and Manon together in a bloody locket. He doesn't seem very happy about this, but proceeds as normal. Near the end of the week, Vince invites him to his house to serve a bunch of guests, which he does begrudgingly. Here we get to know how the other members of the guest know Vince. We also get to know that Rody considers Vince's food to taste not that great and that it in fact tastes "self absorbed", and we also learned that Rody dropped out of school at some point as well. After this, Rody ends up going into Vince's room and getting the fridge key but is promptly caught by Vince. Vince thanks him (sort of) for coming over and tending to his guest.

There are a couple of endings depending on certain criteria but we will go over them best we can.

The first ending happens when you are able to get enough money after doing all the shifts and quits the job from Vince telling him he no longer needs it. Rody, finally having enough money attempts to call Manon so that they can get dinner together, but the line is disconnected. He tries a couple of times, getting more desperate as he calls, even stating that he just wants to hear her voice, but no matter what, the call never connects.

The second ending happens when going into the freezer during the last day. Rody is caught and then promptly tied up by Vince. He is unable to escape, but Vince allows him to attempt to escape. He fails, no matter what and Vince kills him.

The third ending is probably the one that has the most information on the rest of the story, and is likely the most "cannon" ending for this game. It's similar to the second ending where he is tied up in the freezer, but this time he has brought matches to help him escape. He is able to escape the freezer, but finds a plate of meat on the counter. He is then promptly caught by Vince and has to avoid his attack. Missing this will cause Vince to kill Rody and drag him into the freezer. However, not missing will cause Vince to instead tear off Rody's ear and eat it, much to Rody's fear. We learn that the dish is actually Manon served up that Vince prepared specifically for him. We learn through Vince catching Rody a couple of times that Vince actually didn't care too much about his relationship with Manon, but rather the fact that Rody cared about her so much was what intrigued him. In fact, the reason why Vince ended up serving Rody Manon like this was because his critiques always talked about how his food was lack in love but due to Vince's lack of being able to taste, was never able to understand (this is foreshadowed when Rody calls his food bland and "self absorbed"). Because Rody constantly went on and on about Manon, he though that if he served him the thing he loved (Manon), that he would be able to make something that actually had that taste in "love" again (this is why Vince ends up serving the mouse he interacts with in one of the days, as he showed it "love"). Vince also reveals that this isn't something he normally does, as even the chef that he harassed earlier, he only fired and that he would never serve something like that to his customers, only seemingly doing this so he can revive his sense of "taste". Eventually, Rody ends up going into Vince's office and taking a broken bottle, stabbing Vince in the neck. He then ends up spreading oil all over the kitchen and promptly burning the entire building down, as Vince is still alive in it.

Finally, we get a flashback to when Rody and Manon broke up. It seems that Manon was mostly doing it because Rody would end up self sacrificing to provide for Manon, seeing as not only does he live in a shoddy apartment, but barely has enough money or interest in anything else but Manon. Manon seemed to have really loved Rody, but didn't want him to suffer by constantly catering to her, so she left him.

So now for the question of if I consider it a yandere vn, which is... it's hard to say? I don't think that this game was primarily made for a yandere to be one of the main characters (which is what I would more associate with a "yandere vn") but the two characters do exhibit some sort of yandere trait in one way or another.

Vince for instance has a very interesting take on love in terms of love in his food. You can for sure see him as just a person who is very obsessed over how his food taste, but it is also obvious that he has some sort of favoritism towards Rody, whether romantic in nature or not (it seems probably considering that Vince is gay), as all of the dishes that Rody takes home were made by Vince, and that he seems geuinely a bit sad when Rody quits on the first ending, as well as specifically making a dish made of Manon to serve to Rody. This seems to mostly be interpreted as a way for Vince to not only gain his sense of taste back but also to serve someone food with "love", but I can for sure see it as a way for him to make him shut up about Manon since he seems pretty annoyed when she's brought up. Still, he does end up killing him in like two of the endings, one where he is stuck bound up by rope in the freezer and one where he fails to defend himself. The second one can probably be chalked up to anger that Rody didn't eat the meal that Vince prepared him, but I'm not so sure about the other one. I guess it could be a way for him to eat his love like a lot of cannibal yanderes are like.

Rody himself is has a lot of the traits of light yanderes towards Manon, seeing that he basically seems to dedicate everything to her. Manon describes him as not ready for a relationship considering he keeps on trying to give up everything for her and calls his love exhausting, probably referring to how much he talks about her to Vince or to anyone. Even in his apartment, it's obvious that he doesn't really take good care of himself, with everything being very messy, with him burning his food and him sleeping on the couch. He doesn't seem very happy when seeing Manon and Vince together and seems to believe that money is the way that he can get back together with Manon, ignoring the actual reason, which is that when they are together, Rody ends up neglecting himself and just caring for Manon. On the twitter page, it's also confirmed that he would hide a body for Manon if that ever did happen.

Overall, very fun game. Love the aesthetic of the time incorporated into the game and the general character's attitudes. Whether or not Vince or even Rody is a yandere seems to be a pretty hotly debated topic amongst the fandom it's in, so I think it's for sure up to interpretation or until word of god says that they are.

[bidokja]

I was joking a while back that the actor they have playing KDJ for the orv movie was too handsome for him and a friend who's read orv was like "KDJ is actually secretly attractive!!" And I just felt my soul leave my body right then

SIGHS...

Okay. Buckle in. I'm gonna finally actually address and explain and theorize about this whole...thing.

I'm not gonna cite any exact chapters cause it's like 11:30 and I've got an 8 hour drive in the morning but I'll at least make an approximate reference to where certain things are mentioned. Also, this post is just my personal interpretation for a good bit of it, but it's an interpretation I feel very solid about, so do with that what you will. Moving on to the meat of things:

There is one (1) instance in the web novel that I know of which describes specific features of Kim Dokja (especially ones other people notice). This takes place when members of KimCom are trying to make Kim Dokja presentable to give his speech at the Industrial Complex (after it's been plopped down on Earth). This is when they start really paying attention and focusing on Kim Dokja's appearance since they're putting makeup on him; I still don't think they can interpret his whole face, but they can accurately pick out and retain more features than usual. If I remember correctly they reference him having long eyelashes, smooth skin, and soft hair. These features can be viewed as (stereotypically) attractive.

Certain parts of the fandom have taken this scene and run with it at a very surface level, without realizing (or without acknowledging at the very least) that this scene is not about how Kim Dokja looks. This is, in part, due to not realizing or acknowledging why Kim Dokja's face is "censored" in the first place, and what that censoring actually means. I think it's also possible that some people are assuming the censorship works like a physical phenomena rather than an altered perception.

I'll address that last point first. The censorship of Kim Dokja's features is not something as simple as a physical phenomena. It's not a bar or scribble or mosaic over his face. If that were true it'd be very obvious to anyone looking at him that his face is hidden. But his face is not hidden to people. They can look at him and see a face. If they concentrate on his eyes, they can see where he's looking. They know when he's frowning or grinning. They see a face loud and clear. But what face are they seeing? Because it's not really his, whatever they're seeing.

No one quite agrees on what he really looks like. And if they try and think about what he looks like, they can't recall. Or if they do, it's vague, or different each time. We notice these little details throughout the series. Basically, Kim Dokja's face is cognitively obscured. Something - likely the Fourth Wall, though I can't recall if this is ever stated outright - is interfering with everyone's ability to perceive him properly. This culminated in him feeling off to others; and since they don't even realize this is happening, they surmise that he is "ugly."

Moving on to the other point about what the censorship means: To be blunt, the censorship of his face is an allegory for his disconnect from the "story" (aka: real life, and the real people at his side). The lifting - however slight - of this censorship represents him becoming more and more a part of the "story" (aka: less disconnected from the life he is living and the people at his side). The censorship's existence and lifting can represent other things - like dissociation or depersonalization or, if you want to get really meta, the fact that he is all of our faces at once - but that's how I'd sum up the main premise of it. (The Fourth Wall is a larger part of the dissociation allegory, but that's for another post).

So you see, them noticing his individual features isn't about the features. It's not about the features! It doesn't matter at all which features got listed. Because they could describe any features whatsoever and it would not change the entire point of the scene. Because the point isn't what he looks like. The point is that they can truly and clearly see these features. For the first time. They are seeing parts of him for the first time. Re-read that sentence multiple times, literally and metaphorically. What does it mean to see someone as they are?

This is an extremely significant turning point dressed up as a dress-up scene.

---

P.S. / Additionally, I'm of the opinion that Kim Dokja is not handsome, and he is not ugly. He is not pretty, and he is not ghastly. Not attractive, nor unattractive. Kim Dokja isn't any of these things. More importantly, Kim Dokja can't be any of these things. The entire point of Kim Dokja is that you cannot pick him out of a crowd; he is the crowd. He's a reader. He's the reader. Why does he need to be handsome? Why must he be pretty? Why is him being attractive necessary or relevant? He doesn't, he doesn't, it's not. He is someone deeply deeply loved and irreplaceable to those around him, and someone who cannot even begin to recognize or accept that unless it's through a love letter masquerading as a story he can read. He is the crowd, a reader, the reader. He's you, he's me. He's every single one of us.

[eisforeidolon]

Forgive me for restating the obvious, but I was reading through an old post and it just kind of hit me in a way it hadn't before: One of hellers' most fundamental disconnects with the show (and media literacy in general) is how they try to insist parallels establish romance.

SPN used parallels to couples and romantic tropes a lot in regards to the brothers. But it was never meant as a signal that they were romantically in love or to tell you something you otherwise couldn't figure out. It was to underline what we already knew from the entire rest of the story about how they were the most important people in each other's lives. It used romantic relationships because that's a central status typically reserved only for romantic relationships - that was part of the point.

Let's take an example or two. Dean compares himself and Sam to Jesse and Cesar from The Chitters. After interacting with them for a while, Dean is like, 'Haha, you fight just like brothers, almost as bad as Sam and me' and they say that it's more like an old married couple. This is Dean comparing an exact thing that actually happens between him and Sam, silly petty bickering, to something that exactly happens between a married couple. Likewise, let's take Dean's expression and the script note he's thinking about Sam's close call in Red Meat. Michelle is talking about watching the man she loves die and how nothing can be the same, and Dean is thinking about how he believed he lost Sam earlier that same episode and reacting to what she's saying. No one is under the impression that these are signposts telling you for the very first time that Sam and Dean are weirdly, claustrophobically close in a way that compares to romantic couples. They're quick moments which draw an underline on what you already know from the way they've acted towards each other for the entire preceding (and following) length of the show. If you cut either of those moments? It would change nothing about what we understand of Sam and Dean's relationship, because that's how using parallels in storytelling actually works.

Hellers want to insist that romantic couples and tropes being parallels to D/C in and of itself proves that D/C is romantic. Why else would SPN use couples and romantic tropes?!? Well, because SPN does that all the fucking time, maybe? Which is even before you get into how superficial the basis for their supposed parallels typically are.

Let's take an example or two. Hellers want to insist that Dean and Castiel were paralleled to David and Violet from Bloodlines because and I shit you not, one of them wore a tan coat. As well as the absurdly generic dialogue line, "I was there, where were you?" being used both in the backdoor pilot and in 6x20 by Dean. Aha! David and Violet are clearly stand-ins for Dean and Cas, and they were planning to run away together, so D/C is clearly romantic, BOOM! Except literally nothing about Dean and Castiel's actual relationship lines up with that. In no sense were Dean and Castiel ever planning to run away from their families together - not at the point where Dean was calling Castiel out for pretending he didn't know where Dean was if he really wanted advice or otherwise. Unlike the actual parallels with Sam and Dean, there is no underlying narrative base. Likewise, hellers want to insist that Castiel is Dean's Colette. Aha! Cain said Dean is living his life in reverse, and he killed Collette last and his brother first, so since he said Dean would kill Castiel before Sam, Castiel=Colette, and Colette was a romantic partner, so Dean lurves the angel! BOOM! Just for the sake of being pedantic, let's break this nonsense down one more time. Cain lists Crowley as well as Castiel as people Dean will kill before Sam. Collette was special to Cain because she saw everything he was, never gave up on him, and was able to get him to drop the blade. Which is literally what Sam does during the time Dean has the Mark - meanwhile Castiel tries to get Dean to not go and slaughter the Stynes and fails and is ready to give up and kill Dean after he goes demonic. Which doesn't even get into the part where ... Cain is literally just wrong in telling his little fairy tale. Dean is not him. When given the choice of killing his brother, Cain does it. When given the choice of losing control, Cain does it. Dean tries to get Death to shoot him into outer space and then kills Death rather than actually kill Sam. Dean and Dean's love for his brother are both far stronger than Cain is capable of understanding. So the parallel life thing? Is fundamentally hooey anyway. Again, there's no narrative there for a parallel to be drawing an underline on because none of their cobbled together meta resembles anything going on in the actual text. That's not how storytelling uses parallels or any other kind of subtext, by creating something entirely separate and expecting the general audience to decipher it. Though it's no surprise they try to insist that a show would do that, because they have nothing else.

TLDR; Their entire argument is that a comparison to a romantic couple makes two other characters' relationship automagically romantic because reasons. Which even putting aside the lack of validity in their parallels ... continues to be a boldly idiotic statement given the number of actually textual comparisons the show makes between Sam & Dean and romantic couples. Again, it's no wonder they freaked the fuck out over that forehead touch, because they very fundamentally refused to understand what SPN was actually doing on literally any level.

[baby-alien11]

Being an horror icon child with Y/N Ulrich (Dead Meat Podcast Ep. 188)

taglist: @volturi-girl-imagines @dessxoxsworld @aonungsgirlfriend @ethanlandryluver

A/N: Dead Meat is one of my favorite channels on YouTube, I'm proud of everything that James, Chelsea and their crew has achieved during the last years, they even had a cameo in Scream 2022 and they are friends with Radio Silence (they attended their wedding), so I had to include them in this series, you can check their channel, they have kill counts, podcasts, the horror awards, etc, so go take a look

"Welcome back to another episode of the Dead Meat Podcast", Chelsea greeted in the direction of the camera, "I'm Chelsea Rebeca"

"And I'm James A. Janisse", James continued, "In this episode we have a very special guest, she is the youngest child of Skeet Ulrich, best known as Billy Loomis in the Scream franchise, and in recent years as F.P. Jones in Riverdale, please welcome Y/N Ulrich, also known in the horror community as the 'Ghostface Princess'"

"Hi, guys", you greeted with happines, "I'm so happy to be here, thanks for inviting me"

"Thanks to you for acepting the invitation", Chelsea responded, "How are you?"

"I'm good, very excited to talking to both of you", you answered, "Wait, is that a cat what you have there?"

"It is", James nodded lifting the cat, "This is Lucy"

"She is so cute! I also had animal company", disappearing from a moment of camera, you returned a few seconds later hugging Butters in a way that he was seen, "This is Butters, is actually Jacks cat, but I love him like my own"

"He seems as good as we've seen on the internet", James commented

"Totally", you said pressing a kiss in the cat's head

"So, starting with the interview, what was like growing with Skeet Ulrich as a dad?"

"First of all, he's the best dad I've could ever had, I am the youngest of three siblings, so I was and still am the baby of the family", you laughed along with them, "I was literally a doll to my siblings, they dressed me with every costume they could think"

"Including the ghostface mask", Chelsea joked refering to the photo that Jack posted, "I'm going to say that you looked adorable in the costume"

"Thank you, and yes that was when I was five years old, my siblings were looking for a costume we haven't tried, and then my brother left and came back with the ghostface mask, they put the robe and mask and send me to the living room where my dad was reading a script, he saw me and laughed, that was my first contact with Scream"

"Oh my God, I remember watching the first Scream when I was a child, I was so scared after the opening that I hide during the rest of the movie", James commented with fun, "But that was the movie that made me interest in the horror genre, what old were you when you watch it?"

"It was a year after the fourth was released, I was eight at the time, after finishing the first one my first thought was 'why my dad and uncle Matthew want to kill auntie Neve, auntie Courtney and uncle David?'"

After that sentence, there was laughing between the three of you, enough to Lucy to get down from their owners lap to go to the cat tower of the studio, but Butters kept sleeping in your arms

"Y/N you had more guts at that age than I had", Chelsea joked, "Did you tell him that thought?"

"No, but for the next few days I walked around the house with a helmet and disconnecting all the phones and hiding the cellphones so ghostface didn't threat to kill us", you remembered, "Dad found out after founding the cellphones in my toy box, and asked me what was happening, I told him everything, we had a fun talk about the movies"

"This might be a difficult cuestion, but, who is your favorite ghostface?", James asked surprising you

"You cannot ask me that!", you joked while laughing, "Wait including the sixth movie?"

"Yes", James nodded

"Okay", you sight while thinking, "First, they all are great ghostfaces, with different motives and that, and my dad will probably disinherit me, but Im going to say Roman and Jill, I mean, Roman was the mastermind behind everything, he gave Billy the motivation, and Jill had a perfect plan that almost worked but she kinda messed up"

"They definetely are in every top five of ghostfaces", Chelsea agreed, "Now, talking about more recent years, we've seen that you often spend time in the filming sets of your dad's projects, what was like seeing everything from the other side of the screen?"

"Well, as I already told, I knew dad was an actor since I was young, but the first time that I was in one, was during the first season of Riverdale when I was twelve, I had vacations so I stayed there for three weeks, and it was like that every summer until he left the series", you answered while scraching Butters between the ears, "It felt like a summer camp, like the guys threated me like a little sister and the adult cast were like uncles, they still are; it was very fun because if you look closely, you can see me in the back of some scenes, like in Pops and things like that, and since my birthday was during that dates I celebrated there"

"That sounds like a lot of fun"

"It was", you nodded agreeing with James's comment, "I think that I spend more time in the girls trailers than in my dad's"

"Talking about cameos and visits to sets, how did you ended making a cameo in Scream VI?", Chelsea asked

"It all started when during the pandemic, my siblings and I were having online classes and we were just having our onlinse classes, he got the call from Radio Silence, which he attended on speaker making the three of us listen to everything from our rooms, of course I openned my door, so when I heard the call ending, I practically run to the living room and asked him if I could go with him, he was confused at first but he realised that the call was heard on the entire house, but because of the COVID bursting out, he only was there for a day"

"The shortest time of you in a set", Chelsea joked

"Actually yes", you nodded with a smile, "And due to that small amount of time he had to learn his lines in the hair and make up trailer, so during that little time, I played Sam Carpenter, played by the awesome and magnificent Melissa Barrera"

"How was meeting her knowing that she was playing Billy Loomis's daughter?"

"I love her!", you exclaimed with happines, "When we arrived to the set I inmediatly sat on my father's chair and she aproached to me to say 'hi' and talk like we knew each other from years, she is my half fictional sister"

"She is one of the best additions to the franchise, the way she plays the part, like 'I don't wanna see you but still listen what you have to say because somehow I trust you' is perfect", James agreed making you nod, "Now, we are a year later to film Scream VI, you are more visible in the screen, how was filmimg?"

Noticing a little movement behind you, James and Chelsea didn't say anything about the curly haired boy that was aproaching you

"Well, we were lucky that we had our vaccines and more liberty to film, so after my mum and dad gave their permition to me to be in the movie we flew and have a little reunion with the cast to know each other"

"And then I enter the story", Jack exclaimed from behind scaring you and making Butters jump off your arms, before looking at the camera on your laptop, "Hi guys, nice to meet you"

"Hi Jack", they greeted before James speaked, "Good to see you"

"When did you got here?", you asked turning to look at him while James and Chelsea smiled

"Like five minutes ago", he answered while openning a brown paper bag, "I went to get breakfast for us after the gym, here's your iced caramel latte and a breakfast beagel"

"Thanks babe", you smiled closing your eyes as he left a kiss in your head

"I'm going to be in the kitchen if you need anything", Jack said taking the bag

"Okay", you nodded returning your attention to the screen where James and Chelsea were smiling, "Where were we?"

"How was filming your cameo for Scream VI", Chelsea reminded

"Right, so I didn't know at what moment my cameo will be until two or three days before filming when Matt, Tyler and Guy told me that there was a scene in a Halloween party at the beggining and my cameo will be at that moment, and my costume will be a female version of F.P. Jones, which is one of my dad's recent roles, I thought it was cool, but the problem is that I didn't took my serpents jacket that the Riverdale crew gave me in my sixteen birthday"

"They had to make a new one?", James asked

"No, I don't know how or at what moment, but my dad had it in his luggage, so they made me a mini version of him, I filmed my little part and never stepped on the set again for the rest of the filming"

"Wait what?", Chelsea exclaimed, "Why?"

"Because I'm a fan of the movies and didn't want to get spoiled on anything, so my reactions during the movie were totally real"

"Well, now that you mention the movie we want to play a little game of reactions, the dinamic is that we would say a moment in the new movie and you'll say what was your reaction during that, is that okay?", James said which you nodded, "Okay, first one: the openning kills"

"Crazy, I mean Samara Weaving was wonderful as always and then the reveal after the dead was insane and then the real ghostface kills Jason and Greg was something new"

"The return of Kirby Reed"

"That's final girl material, she made her comeback ready to kick ghostface ass"

"The apartment attack"

"I swear that I was so nervous during that scene that Jack's arm was red the next day of how hard I was holding it, the way it started with Quinn's "body" get thrown at the group, the chase and then the ladder was so hardcore"

"The shrine"

"It was sick and fascinating to see everything from previous movies and from Stab, and then the stage with all the masks and robes, I wish I was there when they filmed in there"

"Gale vs Ghostface"

"I was so emotional during the stabbing scene, that after the movie I hugged aunt Courtney for like ten minutes, but Gale Weathers is a final girl"

"The train scene"

"Again it was so tense, especially because the group was divided in two and all the ghostfaces costumes, I breathe when the first part of the group was safe, and then I stopped when Mindy was attacked"

"The ghostface reveal"

"Don't get my started on that, for the whole movie I was suspicious of everyone and at the same time no because they had good alibis, when Detective Bailey was revealed I was like "what the hell", when Ethan revealed himself I almost fell off my seat, and when Quinn revealed alive and one of them, I almost lost my mind"

"Hi again", Jack intervined apearing beside you, "Sorry for interrupting again, but I had a video of Y/N reacting to the reveals"

"Oh my God", you laughed taking a sip of your coffee

"Can you show the video for us and the audience?", James asked

"Only if Y/N is okay with it", Jack said while looking at you, in what you nodded in response, "Fine, here's the video, it might be a bit dark cause it was film during the movie"

Positioning the phone in a way that was in front of the camera and was seen good, Jack played it showing your exact reaction to that scene, which was how you explained it

"I think you represented the entire audience with your reaction", Chelsea commented after the video ended, "Especially because at first we were like 'why, why them, what's their motive' and then we know that their are Richie's family trying to avenge him, they had a good motive, and if you think about it, it has similarities with the motive of Nancy Loomis"

"Yeah, at the end, the whole franchise is based on family relations, like Roman was the one who started everything because he wanted a bond with Maureen but she didn't, so he gave Billy a motive to start the killings and the events after were like a chain", you said noticing how Jack sit in the chair next to you with Butters in his arms

"We should do a video with the whole franchise in chronological order", James joked, "Now, before we finish the interview, what do you see in your future? Do you see yourself in the industry or not?"

"I really like this question", you answered while thinking, "I definitely want to stay in the industry but not as an actress, I mean, I did theatre when I was in high school and it was awesome, but I would love to focus on be a make up artist of the horror genre, like the ones who focus on prosthetics and that"

"That sounds so interesting, what was the moment that made you realise that?", Chelse asked

"It was during big part of my life watching movies and series, so it was building along the years"

"Well we hope to see your name in credits and featured in our Kill Counts in future years", James said making you smiled, "Same to you Jack"

"Thanks guys", Jack said in response next to you, "You are awesome"

"Well, Y/N, thanks for be this week guest on the podcast, it was great talking to you", Chelsea smiled, "We can't wait to see what you do in the next few years"

"Thanks for inviting me, I'm so happy that you are my first formal interview because I love the entire channel and content", you smiled, "It has been a pleasure to talk to you and I hope we can do it soon"

[basedkikuenjoyer]

Aftermath

This chapter, 1124...it really didn't feel that different than the last two. It starts here with our opener. Morgans here takes on a very similar role as Buggy did in 1122, and we're still unpacking the immediate worldwide reaction to the transmission. Importantly, Luffy's gonna end this chapter with a good reminder none of it was very important to him, but Morgans starts it with a good lesson in why it should to a degree.

It's cool seeing Vivi roast him over lying, but this right here is the essence of why shaping your story matters. Buggy could take the moment and make it work for him, Vegapunk was so disconnected he realized his message might stir panic but didn't do anything to ameliorate that. Morgans is setting up Luffy the same way Sabo was. This story should rattle worldwide faith in the government. As is though, it could just end up being a tale about Luffy massacring a beloved figure worldwide. This time I don't really think the opener casts as long a shadow over the rest of the chapter, but it's now something becoming a pattern with these past few chapters. But let's get to the real meat of this one:

Talking with IRL blorbo from my blog Fallensnowfan really helped with this one but it's so stark when you see it in the actual chapter. There's this very interesting juxtaposition in the fallout of Vegapunk's death. Lilith picks up on the conversation we saw with the VegaBoys last time, a theme we've explored throughout with them. What does death mean when you've split yourself into seven parts and have a giant brain floating in a vat?

Well, here we have some interesting answers to this question. Lilith pops up and makes this big show of trying to cheer up Luffy. Get him past these feelings of failure. It was a very sudden shift but it does feel earnest, even if it reminds me a little of Carrot in WCI's End Roll. As earnest as Sentomaru and of course Kizaru. For one, we've talked about how these spotlight moments remind us of Wano's bigger ones. "Have you ever had to kill your best friend?" Well, the Akazaya Nine know that feeling. Especially Kin'emon & Kiku who had to take on the dirty work with Kanjuro.

But man...what a moment. Even Akainu cracked a little and realized he stepped over the line. Seeing Kizaru actually shaken for once too. The little flashback helped cement it as does this amazing shot of him watching all that work go up in flames. Simply put though, Kizaru/Sentomaru clearly don't feel the same way as Lilith here. Which is why part of me has to wonder if Lilith's just putting up a brave front. It's interesting Usopp raises the question of what exactly makes her the "evil" one, which is an idea we never really answered.

And of course, we do end off on what certainly seems to be a final note for Egghead Arc as a part of this story. I do have to say, I'm not entirely sure how I feel about that. Lilith feels well primed to pick up that New World thread we've talked about going forward, I could certainly see this shaking out in a way where we maybe have a chapter or two away from the Straw Hats to finish off this story and give some people like Drake a moment in the intermission. Then head right into a perfectly straightforward Elbaf arc. We could even do that interspersed with clearing up some of Egghead's lingering mysteries...

But there's still enough weirdness to make me wonder. One thing I've thought for a while is that if the Giants are already here, they can tag along for a bit of island hopping. On some level it's kinda weird to keep them and Bonney and Kuma and Lilith floating around but we of course don't know what Elbaf's story is so it could easily have a place for all that. What it really comes down to for me is that, as it stands, Elbaf really has no apparent conflict set up. Which could work if it's a Zou-type arc where we reset our course or something. But if say...something happens and this group gets blown off course I could see that too. Use an intermediate arc to set up something to do on Elbaf.

Of course, this final panel gives us something to think about too. Who is the mystery silhouette? Sadly we'll have to wait for a break week to really know the next steps. Which means I have a decision to make too. I get the feeling enough people like these writeups for their own sake, but the original intent was to maybe do a little bit about the next arc reflecting on where it ties up Wano themes. Hence "Post-Wano Musings" and I could never keep that hyphen consistent in the tags. Didn't expect Egghead to keep giving me a lot to talk about there. I also just kinda thought it was funny to call an entire arc as long as Alabasta "Post-Wano."

We still have a lot of oddities and through lines though, and those could easily be left hanging as we get to Elbaf. I think my plan is to switch it up and just make normal chapter reviews when we reach a new island, Elbaf or otherwise, with a new tag. I'm leaning towards "Massive Musings" for now, but maybe something better will come up before we get there.

[townofcadence]

The first time Artair taps into his potential too far is--- messy, to put it lightly. It's like one of those pop-up tents, where once it's out of the bag, getting it back inside the original dimensions is a struggle. Even folding it at the seams isn't enough, you need to twist the frame, contort the body, until it's forced to fit back inside.

Once Artair taps into that part of himself too much, it's a bell that can't be unrung. His body doesn't know how to configure itself, and he has no control, no understanding of how to be what he is. What happens instead is a body that seems to be fighting itself, shifting with a mercurial nature into so many configurations, manifesting one power more and then another in rapid kaleidoscopic shifts. He has too many limbs, arms that shouldn't be, hands disconnected from his torso that still move. Each one is tipped with long, inhuman claws and growing thorns from darkened palms and fingers, except where shallow lacerations bleed gold. He has feathered wings growing from his back but also from places they shouldn't be coming from, until he's a massive sprawl of them-- they unfurl in a shimmering array of colors, and some vanish just as quick as they came. The arms appear, disappear, split into even more hands.

His eyes blink in and out of existence, a dizzying perception that sees more than humans and leaves him churning in the vertigo. His body bleeds gold like rivers and his hair floats like it's underwater and there are mouths not on his face but tucked in the strands. Flowers twine their way around his bones, his form, and long antlers tipped with cherry blossoms bloom on his head, too large, too long, too heavy.

His ribs shimmer through his skin in lines he can see despite what should hide them, and parts of his skin lose color until they are just voids of nothing, numb and cold. His body fractures itself into pieces in a moment, his irises shattering to pieces and the same happening where from his skin to his marrow a shard of him breaks off, floating away. The wind whips around him, but he is untouched in the vortex, centered in the eye of the storm that reaches the sky and breaks it open.

He contorts as his bones move where they should be, as his body continues to break until he's no longer recognizable as anything but a fractured mess-- and then in a blink he is back to the same moment, the same beginning, where he is unfurling all over again, too much spillage to control.

This time it's different too, a different amalgam of limbs and eyes and formless shape, rain drowning him and lights arcing along his skin like electric circuits, as he struggles to have a body at all, one that makes sense. But in the pain and contorting and the terrorizing change, it's hard to remember what a body is, how one felt to have.

It's hard to even remember what he looked like, except broken, and that thought only twists him further until he's melting with kintsugi lines of lightning cracking through his form. His mouths are filled with black ichor now. The flowers in his antlers are dying and dropping off in petals. The flowers wither beneath him and the water ripples in a pool around him. Moss grows on him and he can feel all the world in his heartbeat, all the tangled emotions that make them. Wounds open, old and new along his form that cannot rest.

His body breaks and reforms faster. What is a person? How do you be one? Has he ever been? Monster monster monster. What's real? What's him and not just someone else? Where did he ever begin? There are whispers all around him and they are all him, different versions, different times.

But he is just him, and he is so small except he's not, he's as vast and limitess as the universe, but he's also constrained in this form, a vessel of meat and blood and physicality. What's inside him strains against it, like a beast against a snare. But he's just not ready. Not yet. Not enough.

His form falls apart again, breaking into stardust. It begins again, and his mind struggles to collect the pieces. It's too much. All he can do is beg his own body for respite.

It doesn't know how grant such a thing. He begins again, again again again, dying and cycling and changing and shifting over and over and knowing he's only just scratched the surface-- until oblivion takes him.

He wakes up human, except now he knows he never was.

[17meltedcandles]

Beauty Standards and Tax Brackets

The more money you have, the more access you have to fit the beauty standard (fitness plans, surgery, brands, dyes/colored contacts).

And we’ve seen this link between wealth and beauty as long as we can remember.

- Aztecs putting jewels in their teeth

- Plump bodies in Ancient Greece to signify health (and access to it)

- Small feet in 1949 China, (show of wealth and proper petty as you could afford to not work)

- Fatness in medieval times to show the prosperity of meat and food

And the list continues on until today. Now we see slim bodies, well built, shiny hair, glad skin, doll lashes, plump ass, perky boobs. Usually, most of the time, these features come from surgeries, diets, specific ointments, trainers, appointments. And money.

The funny part is the more money you have, the more influence you have. Setting the beauty standard all over again.

There’s also a huge disconnect when someone naturally has these traits without having the money. They get called lucky to not have to spend so much money, they get preyed upon for their looks or sometimes get payed for it.

The opposite happens as well. When someone insanely rich is unattractive, they often get criticisms and many many comments about their looks and wealth.

This is also seen in literature. The Rich Mafia boss, the hot CEO, the Billionaire’s son, the Handsome Prince. All of these books push the narrative of wealth and almost always have a conventionally attractive man as the wealthy man.

This is not to suggest that I think ALL ugly people are poor or that ALL rich people are attractive. But just to comment on the beauty standard and how it just so happens to keep molding with the standards of wealth we’re seeing. Is it more expensive to hit the gym and eat greens? Slim bodies are the body standard. Does an influential figure have Doll eyes and a million bucks? Big doll eyes are back.

Simply observations :)

[palmviolet]

for the ask game: 11, 13, 18, 22. lol sorry this is many but i want to know!

ooh don't apologise i love these (despite how long it took me to answer this... sorry about that)

11. Do you believe in the old advice to “kill your darlings?” Are you a ruthless darling assassin? What happens to the darlings you murder? Do you have a darling graveyard? Do you grieve?

interesting question. the thing is with fanfic that i actually don't really edit... quick proofread, maybe a sentence or two added but rarely deleted, and any corrections from my lovely beta @shdwsilk, but i don't tend to murder my darlings alas. original fiction is an entirely different matter. editing process is ruthless, but each time i begin a new draft it's a whole new document (even if just duplicated) so i always have my darlings safe in a prior version. and yes, i grieve. such good stuff relegated to the graveyard

13. What is a subject matter that is incredibly difficult for you write about? What is easy?

in terms of what's difficult, i've honestly always found it hard to write about things close to my own life, even the most mundane things like going to tesco, getting on the tube. i guess its authenticity reads as somehow uncanny to me, feels performative and too false. that goes for people in my life as well — i try not to consciously base characters on people i know, but if i do find myself doing it, i immediately feel like the writing is somehow cheap and pretentious and otherwise just not very good. which is very much the opposite of 'write what you know.'

and then the flipside, it comes very naturally to me to write about america and american culture, despite not being american in the slightest. i just seem to like my own writing more when it's further away from my own experience, even if the feelings in the work are my own. but i think this is probably a mental block more than anything else.

18. Choose a passage from your writing. Tell me about the backstory of this moment. How you came up with it, how it changed from start to end. Spicy addition: Questioner provides the passage.

this is the reason it took me so long to answer lol there's too many to choose from. i was tempted to go for one of my PB fics, since that's the interest we have in common, but my TD stuff is much fresher in my head, so here:

Rust doesn’t dignify that with a response. He lights another cigarette — number eleven out of twenty, all smoked in the vicinity of the last hour and a half — and taps out laboriously a reply to Laurie’s text. Cowboy hats. Number keys as letters: what he actually writes, in the physical sense, is 222666922666999 44287777. There’s no function for a question mark. Everything delivered assertive, strident, grammarless, a speech-act. A fact already in motion. And her immediate response: 733777333332228 627778999 222266 4338 844336. Or, perfect marty can get them.

this is from chapter four of out of time man. it's set in 2000, and i knew there'd have to be a text conversation at some point, which got me thinking about the mechanics of texting back in the day and how annoying it was, and how that disconnect between action of typing and sense that comes out (signifier and signified...) maps onto rust's larger deal about body vs. self ('sentient meat'), which is specifically relevant to his relationship with laurie, in which he's very much just going through the motions because he believes that's all he needs to do to maintain the semblance of a healthy life.

and this is mirrored in the text here: 'a fact already in motion.' his belief in the inevitability of his biology translates into the primacy of the physical act of typing, which supercedes its sense or personal, grammatical inflection.

there's also a level of irony here that i couldn't help but imbue, reflecting the series' own wry humour: rust here is being predictably existential and dramatic about the notion of wearing cowboy hats to a costume party. which in itself goes to the heart of what i'm doing with this fic, which is exploring the notion of masculinity as a performance through the arena it's made most explicit — gay rodeo. to dress up as a cowboy invokes america's frontier colonial past, invokes rural masculinity and the violence of the movie gunslinger (himself related to the detective archetype), the death drive as represented by the rodeo — and all of that a costume, a performance of something hollow at the heart of american culture. to transmit this through the code of a phone keyboard only heightens its camp ridiculousness.

anyway. all this to say i'm having a lot of fun with this one. this paragraph did require me a) double checking how many cigarettes are in a pack of camel blues and b) looking up the old phone keyboards to make the numbers accurate. but my favourite paragraphs are the ones that take half an hour of thought and research ahaha

22. How organized are you with your writing? Describe to me your organization method, if it exists. What tools do you use? Notebooks? Binders? Apps? The Cloud?

....not very lol. all the writing proper is on google docs, original fiction on one account and fic on another, and i tend to do all my planning just... in the bottom of the same document? which gets annoying and means i don't know what the actual word count is but. idk. i also jot ideas in my notes app if i'm on the move. as for actual research, i keep my notes in word. for some reason. why do i do this. idk.

i've also become extra disorganised with TD because i don't even keep each fic in separate documents anymore, mainly because each of them has begun with a scattered snippet and slowly grown legs over time, while i'm working on about five different ones at once. hence it's impossible to find anything. again, why. who knows.

thank you so much for the asks! i had a lot of fun answering these, sorry it took me so long lol

[sneakydraws]

i wanna see fifty five goldfinch pieces 💔💔

OKAY!! So I have this little series I like to call the great decompartmentalisation of Theo decker... Let me walk you through it. I promise there's art after the massive paragraph of meandering analysis alright

You know how Theo's life is segmented into these distinct episodes? And how he himself is split into multiple different identities, and how much shame and fear there is associated with the idea of those identities mixing? For example: the straight a student living a completely, delusionally idyllic life with his adoring mother and the vanilla teenage troublemaker breaking into people's summer homes with his shady homoerotic bestie. When the two identities come into contact via his suspension, it leads to the most traumatic event in Theo's life, and honestly I suspect that might be the origin of this tendency towards compartmentalisation... I could go through the whole book here but the most prominent examples are Theo panicking at the thought of Mrs Barbour or his therapist finding out about Hobie, his cutting himself off from New York when in Vegas with his other shady homoerotic bestie (the amount of times Vegas is compared to an alien planet...) and his dual post timeskip identifies of charming antiques salesman/fraudulent art stealing junkie. And this often manifests in Theo's reluctance to let people from his different periods interact - see him rushing to stop Boris from talking to Pippa, and him keeping Hobie in the dark about the blackmail, and isn't it kind of weird that the barbours - Theo's soon to be legal family - don't really interact with Hobie and Pippa? Anyway. Basically I thought it would be cool to make a series of little vignettes of theo allowing the people and places and things that represent various versions of Him to interact and thus symbolically healing the disconnected parts of himself... Or something. I have more ideas scribbled down but somehow the only ones I ended up with proper art for is the various holidays (which, holidays are also a weirdly prevalent theme in tgf? Idk whats up with that but it's a good tool for this purpose) so we have:

Christmas Eve at Boris's, featuring Pippa and Hobie - I feel kinda bad for only ever portraying Boris with polish customs but let's be real I'm just using him to show off my own heritage lol. In Poland the main Xmas celebrations happen on Xmas Eve, traditionally with the appearance of the first star in the sky. You eat the mostly inoffensive barszcz as well some truly vile shit, such as mushroom and cabbage dumplings, mushroom and cabbage salad, other items made of mushrooms and cabbage, and finally the most disgusting dish of my life: Jewish style carp. No, it's not quite the same thing as gefiltefish, although that's the Wikipedia page you might use to get to the actual dish. All washed down with compote which I hate. You also break and eat communion wafers while wishing each other stuff, which Pippa is doing with popchyk here hehe

Christmas breakfast as a little bonus despite it not having much of a tradition - I associate it with lots of hams/cured meats, gherkins and maybe Tatar sauce (yum). Much superior to the Xmas dinner imho. Really I just wanted Theo and Boris to have a moment to themselves haha

Christmas proper at the barbours, featuring Boris and Tom cable! I could talk about all the tension and who's diffusing it but honestly I think y'all can draw your own conclusions lol. I just think it would be really funny for the infamous dis-engaged couple to each bring their delinquent boytoys and for Boris the drug dealer to actually come out looking superior

Vegetarian friendly Thanksgiving at Hobie's, as tradition requires! I think he'd love to throw one of his big Thanksgiving parties purely for all of Theo's families to get to know each other... you know, kind of an elaboration on that Thanksgiving illustration I drew a while back! This would be before all the Christmases I think. Boris is winning Mrs Barbour over with his roguish charm lol I think old ladies would like him... Theo in the corner freaking the hell out as per this project's mission statement lmao

And on a slightly different note I wanted Theo Pippa and Hobie to all visit weltys grave. I'm borrowing slightly from the polish tradition of all saint's day, when you clean, decorate and light candles on the graves of loved ones.

[iturbide]

I think everything you said RE: Grima and violence and age is why I'm one of those who prefers the reincarnation angle: it allows at least ONE Grima to wrestle some amount of agency over his own future away from everyone else.

Robin wholeheartedly rejects the future of being violent and evil and hurting people by existing. He chooses to live among people. It strikes me this can only happen in a timeline Grima sent himself back in, because what allows Robin to grab that agency is the memory from Grima: the memory of killing Chrom, which to me implies INTENSE REGRET for that to linger from Grima's going backwards in time.

I'm really glad you like that breakdown! I think a lot of the preference for possession vs incarnation can come down to what tropes each individual enjoys most, and for me personally, there's a lot of narrative appeal to the possession angle.

A big things for me is how it paints Validar, honestly. Sombron may be far, far more monstrous in the grand scheme of things, but there is something so intimately heinous to me about Validar looking at his newborn child and seeing not the endless possibilities that might await that new life, but a meat puppet, made to be drained of potential and filled with the will of an ancient god. He says himself that he's willing to bring Robin to the brink of death, specifically because it won't matter how he broke them after Grima claims their vessel. It says so much about his character.

One of my favorite things about it is the idea of a dragon suddenly finding themselves in a human body, and how they would adjust. I love the image of the striking change in body language: Grima's dragon form doesn't have lips, so their old body gaped its jaws when it wanted to smile, and this translates in expressions that are too wide and unnerving in a human body; little gestures also become more exaggerated, like head tilts when confused or examining something, because the dragon had a long neck with a much larger range of motion that's just not possible on a human body (though the instinct to try is still there).

(Also, I do have a soft spot for the horror aspect of Robin's friends and family seeing that figure and recognizing them...until they move, or speak, and realizing in an instant that something is Wrong, because that's not how Robin walks, that's not how Robin sounds, so who is that?? I love that so much, it's so fun to play with.)

But while it's certainly true that the reincarnation aspect is very poignant, personally I think that the possession angle has equal potential for emotional resonance -- just maybe in a different way.

So, fair warning, this is a lot of personal speculation and headcanon, but at this point it's baked into a lot of my writing so there's no getting away from it.

It starts with Grima being sealed by Naga and the First Exalt. I think it's fairly reasonable to say they were pretty pissed about this fact. But also...there really wasn't anything they could do anymore, at that point. They could rage and fume all they wanted, but they no longer had a connection to the world. Maybe they could watch, somehow, from a distance, or through a veil, but the world was out of reach. For a thousand years -- a substantial chunk of time even for a dragon -- they were disconnected from everything.

And then, very suddenly, and seemingly out of nowhere, they feel something.

Because Robin has been born bearing the Heart of Grima.

For the first time in a millennium, Grima has a connection to the world through this newborn babe. They can feel through Robin's senses, hear through Robin's ears, see through Robin's eyes. The world looks different from this perspective, rather than seeing it all from above, and though Grima has no direct influence over anything, they soak it in all the same, because it's different and it's new and no matter how they might deny it, they want this.

And so Grima gets to see Robin grow up. Secreted away from Plegia by their mother, Grima is first-hand witness to Robin's upbringing, able to see the shape that the world molds them into. And perhaps they find themselves growing attached to this child, who is told from a young age that they were born with a gift, a blessing, in the form of their Brand...and who chooses to safeguard it. Robin does not hate their connection to Grima and try to disavow it, nor do they flaunt it and use that blessing as an excuse to exert their will over others: they hide it from the world, yes, but only to prevent it from falling into hands that would use it for evil.

Grima knew what it was to be both revered and reviled in equal measure by mankind. But Robin's connection is different. There is no reward for protecting that secret, but they do so regardless. They love Grima, in a way that the Fell Dragon doesn't recognize.

Grima finds themselves returning that love in whatever way they can. They lend power when Robin is in need, fueling the Ignis skill that saves their life on more than one occasion. They listen sympathetically to Robin's thoughts, and perhaps offer advice in the bad times (though Robin never recognizes it as anything more than their own worst impulses). They come to care for the human that was made to be their vessel, and want for them all the things they could never have for themselves.

But they see, too, that the world has not changed that much in the thousand years they've been dead. Humans are still cruel and callous, still dishonest and dogmatic, still killing one another over less than nothing. Grima sees everything they loathed about the world remains just the way it was...and then sees Robin live through it, choosing to fight only when they have to, choosing to be kind even when they shouldn't. And Grima can't hate Robin, as much as they might want to. They've come to care too much for that.

Eventually Robin falls in with the Shepherds, and maybe things aren't easy, but they're better. Robin starts to open up They make friends. They're happy -- really happy, not just putting on a front. And Grima is happy for them, glad to see them finally getting the good things they deserve in life, and vicariously enjoying it all through that connection they share.

...but then everything goes wrong.

Then there comes a war with Plegia.

Then there comes the Dragon's Table.

Then there comes an insidious presence, forcing Robin to act in ways they never would.

And their dearest friend dies at their own hand.

Robin is bereft. Robin despairs.

And in that bleak, terrible moment, Grima reaches out to them, and promises them the power to make the man responsible pay. To make him suffer, as he has made Robin suffer.

Robin is grieving. Robin isn't thinking.

And just once, Robin gives in to their worst impulses. Because in that moment, more than anything in the world, they want revenge against the man who made them murder their closest friend.

And Grima takes control of their vessel, and smites Validar off the face of the earth on Robin's behalf. Plegia is already dead because of Validar, her entire population wiped out by his Grimleal Cult to raise the dragon's body; Grima turns the sea of corpses to Risen, and sets them on the monsters who saw this atrocity through.

That's all it takes. One moment of weakness. One mistake, made in a moment of despair. It's not until later that they both realize that this cannot be undone: that Grima's soul, now bound within Robin's body, can't be removed; that Robin's soul, nudged aside but held tight to keep it from being disembodied, can't resume control of their own body without both of them expending incredible effort. The Risen, now unleashed, cannot be controlled, and once the last of the Grimleal Cult are dead they spread inexorably across the land.

And so Lucina's timeline comes to ruin -- all because Robin loved Chrom, and Grima loved Robin.

But, of course, that's not the end of the story. Because Lucina, in an effort to change fate, petitions Naga and returns to the past with the other Shepherds' children, escaping their dying world to prevent catastrophe. And Grima follows her into the past...not to assure their resurrection, but to prevent it.

They know from the outset that they are choosing death. But this time, it is their choice. To preserve a world that Robin loved, and to give Robin a chance at a happy life, Grima goes back to help Lucina change the past, entering Validar's fold to unmake his designs where they can, minimize the potential damage where they can't.

And this time, love doesn't end in tragedy.

[styrmwb]

I beat World of Warcraft: The War Within (for now)

Every single word I am about to write I do so with the fear of god that none of it will age poorly

(also wow this is a long one sorry that my ramblings keep getting more rambly)

The summer of 2024 is the summer of "why do I have two separate MMOs that I want to play I hate myself", cause I already had FFXIV Dawntrail a bit ago, and now we got WoW, my first MMO love who I have had a horrible relationship with During BfA and Shadowlands and All That Blizzard Shit I was like Jaina in the scene of Warcraft III with the Culling of Stratholme "I'm sorry Arthas, I can't watch you do this." But then things (as far as I know) in real life are getting better, and then they did Dragonflight which in game was getting better and I'm over here tentatively having fun with a smile on my face ready for it to go bad at any time, and that's how I felt about War Within: This looks cool, are they going to be able to do it, or am I going to be disappointed once again?

And god. PLEASE DON'T LET THIS AGE POORLY BUT HOLY SHIT THEY LANDED IT SO HARD, I LOVED THIS EXPANSION!!!! I want to talk about why!!!! And like I said in Dawntrail MMOs obviously release more content (hell by the time I beat my set goals a raid came out (I did not do the raid), so I considered "beat" to be Loremaster (all the quests), all the dungeons, and all the delves so DON'T COME AT ME WITH "BUT YOU DIDN'T DO NERUB'AR" I WANTED TO WRITE A BEAT A GAME POST FOR AN MMO LEAVE ME ALONE

Story

This is what I was scared of. I love Warcraft, I love it so much I love the world, I love the lore, I love the everything, and obviously this game has had a... Not Great experience with respecting its own universe with... good writing. So I am understandably hesitant! Even Dragonflight which was a step in the right direction still didn't grab me in some ways and was a little cheesy I did really like the avengers assemble in the emerald dream though I'm not above that; so I didn't come into War Within expecting the best thing ever, but I really did appreciate how they did this.

Everything fits pretty well within the world, nothing feels like it contradicts previous info, it actually takes a lot from the existing world and expands on it; Xal'atath and the sword was Legion, Earthen have been a thing since Wrath, Nerubians have been around since WCIII, they got Kobolds, they got a healthy amount of previous guys you know from Dalaran/other people who happened to be on Dalaran (lmao) to really make the whole thing FEEL Warcrafty and not something kind of disconnected, despite the new concepts being introduced, which made me very happy.

The story itself was great. I felt invested fighting against Xal'atath because she fucked with my mans, and I really liked how much of a presence she was; involved in everything, but not to an annoying amount, and it didn't feel like the conflict with her was bullshit like the Jailor (they can still fuck this up we got several patches to go). I enjoyed learning about the Earthen, the Arathi, and the Nerubians, and like I said it all fit really well and I didn't have any moments of like "wait what the fuck why this"; even the Arathi felt pretty well explained "oh there's an empire somewhere else we haven't seen" cool and awesome, doesn't contradict anything already existing and opens up a new place in the future.

I think the one thing that was strange was how short the main campaign was. I hard focused it on my main and it wasn't enough to get me to max. But once I did all the Sojourner achievements I could see where the rest of the writing meat went, because so many of those side stories were amazing; some I'm genuinely surprised WEREN'T in the main campaign (the Haranir got like 2 steps in the main deal and then never showed up?? do the side quests to figure out anything about this person we put in the teaser cinematic; this is like my one beef with the main campaign, anyways). So many heavy emotional hits, stories that actually made me feel. The old Earthen losing his memories I think was a highlight for me.

What I really appreciated about every quest I did was the focus on emotions, on internal processing; like yeah, this is World of Warcraft. We fight a lot. There's a lot of fighting. But this expansion takes its own title to mean more than just being in the world, and focuses a lot on trauma, fighting with yourself, accepting yourself, connecting with others after trauma, and I really really appreciated that a game like this actually managed to slow down and question these little large things that it never really did in the past. Also, even with the deeper, more serious tones being so strong, the humor this time around is really great. There are a lot of moments in the main story and in the side quests that actually got me laughing out loud. Overall, I was really satisfied with all the story they gave me and I cannot wait to see if they are able to continue this upward trend to finish the expansion off.

I also want to say "stay a while and listen"s have been the greatest thing this game has ever introduced to give nerds like me more good writing while letting other players not have to suffer through it if they don't want to.

Characters

This is also an important section which was really hard to separate from the above; like I said, Warcraft does not have a great track record of how it treats its beloved characters who can be amazing at the highest of times (COUGH SYLVANAS SHADOWLANDS AS A WHOLE COUGH), so I was worried here. But the way our returning characters were treated, on top of the new characters, was really surprising.

Our Returning Friends:

Anduin - My fucking boy. I love Anduin, he is one of my favorite characters, if not my favorite character, in all of Warcraft. Seeing his struggle with himself hit really hard, and I really appreciate how they did it, it didn't feel disrespectful, he got moments to bring him up, he got moments that validated his current state; it hurt me to see the optimistic prince in such a state, and I love where his journey is taking him. He also calls me friend and that makes me happy Anduin if you were real I would be your friend

Alleria - I think her story is going to be cooked a little longer in the future, cause for this expansion she was often in the background hunting, but I love that despite the internal AND external things trying to keep her alone, she's not so far gone as to be separated from the people she cares about; I am actually excited to see how she'll play out. The fact that her and Turalyon still clearly love and care for each other despite the circumstances makes me happy.

Moira - I very much enjoyed that the Bronzebeard-Thaurissan family got such a spotlight this time around. It was great seeing Moira continue to prove herself as a leader with the action taken + the diplomatic role she placed herself in with the Earthen. The sidequest where she gets Fearbreaker was really a place for her to shine on her own. While I was a big fan of the trio of her, Magni, and Dagran, I can't help but feel like her portion didn't stick with me as much as the other two, but that could be a me flaw rather than a game flaw. I do hope she continues to get more screentime to show off.

Magni - Did not at all expect where this man was going. Depressed and angry speaker was an interesting way to start the expansion, and I enjoyed seeing him be able to reconnect with his family, to be freed from his prison (they hatched him!), and to really start his grandpa arc/hopefully make a relationship with his daughter arc.

Dagran - If you told me that the 3 polygon baby in Ironforge was going to be one of the best characters in a future expansion I would have been very surprised. He's such a nerd but in a really enjoyable way, and the connection he has with his family + Brinthe is really heartwarming to see. I want more of this 🤓 motherfucker

Brann - Not really a character in the main story, but he's here and I love it, except when he tells me that those webs will summon Nerubians, and not to stand in them. I hope he gets more uncle moments.

Khadgar - Fuck. This old shitty wizard is also top contender for favorite Warcraft character, so the way this expansion started gutted me. I was actually real life mad I wanted to destroy that stupid purple elf and all her spiders; I am so happy that he's fine I am going to put him in the best retirement situation possible and he can get his girlfriend and live the rest of his life happy DON'T YOU FUCKING DO THAT TO ME AGAIN BLIZZARD.

Jaina and Thrall - Did not get to be there lmao. Thrall really got the short end of the stick being on the loading screen. The Horde as a whole could have gotten more love this expansion, and this is coming from a man loyal to the Alliance. But also you guys got a lot in the past so uuhhhhhh fuck you lmao

Side note, where the fuck is Muradin; your brothers, your niece, and your great nephew are here, your brother hatched, Where Are You.

Our New Friends (and Enemies)

The Earthen - Initially, incredibly off putting. Why are they not scottish. But I really grew to love these robot dwarves. The council was all surprisingly great, Merrix has his whole sidequest where "oh he's a bad guy" no not at all he cares about his people, Baelgrim warms up to you and is the Obligatory Sacrifice Character, Adelgonn really showed the humanity these people can have, Brinthe was surprisingly funny and charming, and I loved to see her grow closer to Dagran (new aunt unlocked let's go). Overall, it was really cool to see this race of people show both their construct nature mixed with the free will they've unlocked. So much more interesting than I expected.

Faerin and the Arathi - Definitely the strangest part of this expansion, but incredibly cool to see. I was unsure going in, did they really feel like the fit in, their vibe seems a little separate from Warcraft and more Diablo-y or a different franchise, but I was really interested in their culture, the genuine nature their society had despite the traitors (like I was totally expecting Steelstrike to be evil not to have a cooking quest with her and her family); Faerin was likewise a surprise. I see the name "Lothar" and I'm like oh geez how are they gonna mess this up and I was instead greeted with a kind yet tough warrior who Has feelings and struggles with loss and is a wonderful friend to Anduin (the quest where you sit down with Faerin and Anduin might be one of my favorite sidequests ever).

The Nerubians - Ok so yeah we're all used to these guys being Bad Spiders Go Kill which they were def introduced as, but then you get to their zone and they're presented as their own society in such a cool way?? These are people! They're spiders, but they're people! The Severed Threads are a fun trio of characters that I enjoyed talking to. Honestly, surprisingly enough the Nerubians as a whole are like, really funny? There's a bunch of really good comedic moments, some played straight which hit the hardest. (Mr. Sunflower my beloved) I loved the split in society shown, the dislike, the Reason for dislike shown between the Ascended and the normal Nerubians, I could really feel the reason for dissent against the Queen (I haven't done Nerub'ar like I said but I do wish she was more present.)

Xal'atath - I said my main opinion earlier, she was a great presence in the story and I very much enjoy her as a villain. I really like the bonus dialogue you get if you've interacted with her before. I really think she has the potential to be one of the best major villains we've ever had if Blizzard plays their cards right (I am scared).

World (of Warcraft)

Dragonflight's zones were cool; but. Nothing really WOWed me (funny joke). Going into TWW, I thought underground was cool, but I wasn't sure at first. Looked at the little pictures for each zone, still unimpressed. Once I actually got Into the game and played it though, these are some of the best zones in the game.

I have these four screenshots, my favorite parts of each zone, and I still feel like I am not doing them justice. They're huge, they're so incredibly varied, and you feel like you can still breathe despite being underground (and they're confining when needed). I've always said that despite the lows, Blizzard's art department hard fucking carries the game, and they continue to flex. The cities are getting so much better at feeling sprawling and lived in, an evolution from the tiny Stormwinds of classic WoW. I love Khaz Algar so much. One of my favorite parts of my playthrough was when I entered Hallowfall for the first time, during the Beledar shifting event (not the story one! the random one), and I was amazed and confused. I don't think I've felt this mesmerized by the game since I was like 10 walking through Teldrassil. Something really special I also loved about Hallowfall (might be contender for top 10 zone of all time) is yes, this feels outside. There is grass. There is water. There is sun. But then you look at the land, you look at the rocks, the stalagmites, you look up and it reminds you that you're underground. There's so much spectacle here and I feel like I could go on and on and on about each zone and how amazing they are. (I'm ending this section now but I have to say I love Bug Suramar)

Music

Piggybacking off the last section, the music this expansion has been absolutely incredible, I haven't really hooked onto as much of the soundtrack as I have since BfA; Shadowlands really just had Maldraxxus and Revendreth and I honestly don't remember much of Dragonflight's, but here it's so strong. Isle of Dorn's windy outdoor flutes, The Ringing Deeps' sound of echoing mining, Hallowfall's beautiful choir, and Azj-Kahet's plucking spider sounds, it's all so strong, so memorable and unique.

Cutscenes

Really small section here but I love the cutscene work they've been doing. The fact that we get what used to just be in the prerendered ones in game??? The models look so nice there! Yeah sure my character looks a little awkward doing default standing they haven't mastered it like FFXIV yet but I LOVE the cutscene work. Even the lower quality ones have shown a lot of character. I think of the scene with Elrich and Brinthe, he still shows off and feels like an asshole, and you can clearly see the humorous frustration Brinthe feels at being interrupted. It's great.

Gameplay

I am the least excited to talk about the gameplay here, but I really do enjoy what they're doing this expansion. I love Delves and the solo content they're doing, I think their quest design continues to be engaging and fun (even though I was a little tired of the shout instruction randomly to get item/do task and all of the pulling slowly mechanics), and even though I'm not really a dungeon guy each one was incredible, they all excelled in presentation and vibe. The mechanics didn't really get me like I think Dawntrail's dungeons did, but I imagine they go harder in Mythic which I will not be doing.

The classes I played during my session of goals were Warrior, Evoker, and Warlock, which I had fury mountain thane (later slayer), arms slayer, augmentation chronowarden, and demonology diabolist. I really enjoyed the flavor they all brought, and in the case of diabolist it's SO fucking fun holy shit. I know not every class got something cool, and I will be playing those eventually (haha two of every class split between factions I have a problem haha).

Speaking of alts, I love Warbands. The fact that I got to work on loremaster, level Brann, and work on renown across 4 separate characters is an absolute godsend.

Last thought here; Skyriding is amazing. Yeah it was introduced in Dragonflight but I really just needed to be able to fly Invincible everywhere. The fact that Blizzard finally embraced flying and made it engaging by just making the zones huge is the best path ever.

I Have Talked So Much I Am Sorry

yeah i hate this expansion isn't it clear

I really truly desperately hope that WoW continues this upward trend, continues this energy forward. I want to be able to hit each patch, to look back, and still feel the same happiness and excitement as I do now for the game. WoW is a game I have loved for most of my life. I want it to succeed. I want to say that I love it and not be embarrassed. If we continue to have more times like what War Within is at launch, I have no doubt that those things will be the case. They just need to not prove my fears right. With all of this very very very long post said;

9.5/10. The most love I've had for Warcraft in a long while. Honest competition with Legion for favorite expansion. Please Don't Fuck This Up.

please help me i still feel like i could have talked more

[queenofthursday6599-blog]

You know sometimes something will happen in fandom that feels not quite racist but still iffy and I never know if I should say something or ignore it because it never seems intended to be racist.

The not quite racist thing that inspired me to make this post is actually a crossover au.

Specifically the Paulina Sanchez (from Danny Phantom) and Damian Wayne (from DC Batman) are twins au.

Which feels vaguely racist because I feel like the root of the au is that Paulina and Damian have skin tones close to the same color, green(ish in Paulina's case) eyes, and black hair.

Even though Paulina is latina and Damian is a mix of middle eastern, chinese, and white.

And it's mainly the twin version of the Damian and Paulina are siblings au that gives me this discomfort, because it seems like most of the people who write for this AU don't mention race swapping as part of the AU.

So my brain automatically goes "Ah yes, these twin children, one who is all latina, and the other who is middle eastern/chinese/white, who came from the coupling of a white guy and a middle eastern/chinese woman."

They don't even bring up Mr. Sanchez, Paulina's doting single father. No he's essentially reduced to just some guy or completely absent in these aus by the nature of the twin AU.

Especially versions where Paulina is raised along side Damian in the League.

Even though they could do the race swapping and make it interesting. Having Paulina being ethically arabian/chinese/white but raised in latino culture due to her latino adoptive father is interesting.

Heck making Bruce a Latino who's completely disconnected from his culture due to his parents dying when he was a kid and then being raised completely outside of Latino culture, with one of his kids being far more connected to their latino roots is interesting.

But no one ever seems to go those routes.

It's why I vastly prefer the half-siblings version of this au.

Where even if Paulina's mom is Talia Al Ghul, her dad is still doting papa Sanchez, and not Bruce Wayne.

Damian was grown in an artificial womb to be perfected as the League's future leader (and Ra's future meat suit), while Paulina was grown in Talia's womb as part as a long term undercover mission that involved her developing a civilian identity and living as a civilian for a few years while gathering information.

She married Mr. Sanchez and had Paulina under a false identity, and then when it was time to go back to the League faked her death.

Ra's didn't really care about Paulina's existence due to her birth outside of the League, and her being the daughter of just some random guy as far as Ra's was concerned.

Like Nyssa's kids and grandkids. Decedents of his who aren't part of the League are irrelevant until proven otherwise useful in Ra's mind. He full on let all of Nyssa's decedents get murdered in the holocaust because he cared so little about them.

If they aren't part of the League he does not care they exist unless he can use them in some way.

So in conclusion while I don't actually think the Paulina Sanchez and Damian Wayne are twins crossover AU is actually racist, it does make me cringe a little because if feels a bit like someone went "these two light brown skinned characters look similar enough. Why not have them be twins" and then thought nothing more about it.

And I feel like I don't get this weird feeling with the AUs where Danny and Damian are twins or full blood siblings because it feels like most of them mention Danny being race swapped to the same ethnicity as Damian, even if he's also said to be white passing (though not all of the stories make him white passing).

Though I tend to feel this way about most AUs where two characters who are different races are made full biological siblings and race swapping is no where to be seen.

Half siblings I can deal with, especially if it's not a stretch or impossible for the character to be multiracial already, because we never see one of their bio-parents.

Exactly how it is with Paulina (you thought my ADHD ass lost the plot didn't you). We never see hide nor hair of Paulina's mother in canon, she's never even mentioned actually, and while Paulina is the spitting image of her father, I'd 100% buy Talia Al Ghul getting married and having a baby as part of some kind of long term information gathering mission, and that baby being Paulina Sanchez.

So yeah, that's why I prefer the Paulina and Damian are half-siblings through Talia AUs over Paulina and Damian are twins AUs.

Also, protective older half sister Paulina who though raised fully civilian can make grown men cry using just her words, teaches her adorable grumpy little brother the correct way to do eyeliner and that the humble nail file is the ideal secret weapon is all I need in life.

Like I need Talia's head bitch in charge energy to be genetic. None of this, Paulina spent her early life in the League of course she's so cutthroat, nonsense, no she's just born like that.

[ae-neon]

The House of Mirrors.

This was supposed to be a NxR "meet cute" submission but it's not cute and it's not even romance or NxR💀you'll see. Modern AU obv

Chapter 1.

Nesta Archeron sat in her car, scrolling through the online catalogue of clothes she'd ordered - eager to be free of her black mourning garments. The year she'd spent pretending to be a grieving widow was finally coming to a close. It was more than her late husband had deserved.

It was the start of Autumn and the leaves of the trees that dotted the streets of Velaris' Northside suburbs had just begun to turn. She would need new jackets and a scarf or two.

She was parked in a Maserati outside of her mother's house, her family home, waiting for her sister. Not Feyre, who was already inside helping prepare the three course meal their mother had set her mind on. But for Elain, who always knew how to ease the tension between Nesta and their mother. Nesta wasn't willing to step foot inside without her, not today.

It hadn't always been this way between them. She wasn't sure they'd been better, but they'd been different once. Before.

Her phone buzzed as a notification popped up, one of her favourite accounts having uploaded a fresh set of custom clothing. The designs weren't overly unique but there was something about their simplicity that drew Nesta in. The page only offered that they were organic material made with traditional Illyrian methods.

Emerie had been the one to introduce her to the online boutique, years ago, when Nesta had very suddenly announced her mother had introduced her to someone and that they'd be married soon. The clothes and books and wine had been a mix of condolences and congratulations.

Gwyn had been horrified, she thought arranged marriage was the same thing as forced marriage. In most cases, it wasn't.

Nesta liked a fur lined coat, commented a tree emoji, and knew the creator would know to put in an order for her.

A knock at her window almost made her jump. Her sister's husband, Graysen, smiled and jerked his chin to the driveway to where Elain stood in a soft pink sweater and jeans. She would've waved if she hadn't been weighed down with bags full of groceries.

Nesta hadn't noticed the couple pull up and into the driveway of the large two story house. She wondered if her tendency to disconnect might ease up once she got back to living her life, to being herself - if that was even possible.

Inside, the house already smelt of traditional Scythian food. Undoubtedly, three meat pies already sat baking in their mother's giant oven despite it being hours before dinner.

Nesta followed Graysen to the living room while Elain delivered the bags of groceries into the kitchen.

Her father was sitting in his recliner, reading the biography of an ancient prince. It was something they'd always shared, less a love of and more a hunger for knowledge and escapism. Her father temporarily escaping from the pain of his injuries and Nesta temporarily escaping from being Nesta Archeron.

She greeted him with a kiss to his grey hair, the familiar scent of pine soap easing her nerves a little, "Baba."

His brown eyes, Elain's brown eyes, greeted her from over the rim of his glasses, "My girl, you know your mother has been up since dawn? I told her you girls can take care of these things by now." He sighed, "But you know how she is."

The ease evaporated.

Nesta wondered if her father expected her to agree, to share in his exasperation, like it would bring them together after everything that had happened. Yes I know, but better than me, you know. You always knew. So why have children with someone so uniquely unfit to do so?

She left her father to recount his thoughts on the book to Graysen. He'd been shocked, the poor boy, the first time he'd come over to find himself sat among men and boys while the women fluttered about taking care of everything.

Graysen did not come from a Scythian or Illyrian or Raskian or Bharati family - was not constrained by his parents' need to preserve and enforce culture in an alien world. He'd been born and bred in the Southlands, and it sometimes showed itself in unexpected ways. Ways Elain seemed to like.

For that reason Nesta had not interfered in her mother's plot to ensnare him and his father's private security empire through Elain. It had been the best she could hope for, far better than Nesta had gotten.

But now it was Feyre's turn. And Nesta knew that if she didn't do her absolute best to oversee her sister's engagement, if she so much as breathed wrong, it would destroy whatever was left between her and her mother.

The kitchen was a separate but huge space, made of stone and wood and metal. Four pots already sat on the stove and, as predicted, the oven glowed with heat. A homey, steel-legged table stood in the centre in place of a kitchen isle.

It healed something in Nesta to see the table and its plastic, floral tablecloth. Tugged on memories of food and laughter, of homework and housework, of growing up in Scythia.

She moved to place a hand on her mother's back in greeting.

The older woman, the physical blueprint for Nesta and Feyre, only turned her grey head to say, "It's good you're here, Sisi, your sister is so slow. I've spoiled her and now she can barely cook."

Estanna Archeron turned and pointed with her knife to where Feyre leaned against the opposite counter, "What will you do when you're married, hm? You will have them think I raised a donkey instead of a daughter." She clicked her tongue and turned back to Nesta, "See to this, Sisi."

Nesta moved towards Feyre, reaching for and squeezing her hand, "See to the food or my sister?" Then added in Scythian, an old proverb, "Choose wisely as I only have one miracle."

She rolled up the sleeves of her modest black dress and motioned to Feyre to share from the bag of chilled baby carrots she was munching on.

It was almost sickeningly familiar. Almost.

And yet none of it was the same.

Her mother would not hug her and the only reason Nesta had been let in the house was because of the role she would have to play in the process they were about to embark on.

~

The setting sun cast golden glow over the city, reflecting off windows and soaking the little heat it gave into every stone.

The Northside was a pleasant enough neighborhood; made up of Southland business owners, landlords and little caches of immigrants rich enough to see that their children lead good lives.

Rhys had never been there. Well maybe once, years ago and drunk, when a Raskian girl snuck him into her bedroom. He'd almost broken a rib falling out of her window the next morning but he was certain it had been a scratch compared to what her father had intended.

And now he was back, to ask a shipping tycoon for his daughter's hand in marriage.

Business with a side of pleasure, Helion had said.

Rhys pulled into the driveway behind an Audi with flower stickers on the bumper. Behind him his cousin parallel parked his pickup in front of the black Maserati.

Rhys' uncle stepped out with his son not far behind. Cassian whistled, eyeing the car in front of him, "5 bucks this guy tries to swing his dick around and 10 bucks you punch him in the throat before your honeymoon."

Rhys checked his reflection in his own window, "You could add a couple zeros to that and it wouldn't matter, the man who owns that car is dead."

Cassian's father, Devlon, slapped a hand on his son's shoulder and guided him towards the house, "Say anything stupid like that to these people and I'll put you on a plane back to Illyria before noon tomorrow."

Rhys grinned at Cassian's frown, at the memory of that threat being met before.

They took a few steps to the door and rang the bell once, then again after a minute. Cassian reached forward undoubtedly about to push the button until it broke when the door suddenly swung open.

A tall woman in a long black dress answered. Her steely gaze hit Rhys head on before it slid past him to the men beside him. For almost a second it looked like she might frown but it passed so quickly he wasn't sure he hadn't made it up.

She stepped aside and opened the door wider, "Please, come in."

Rhys motioned for his relatives to go first, watched her press back as their massive frames filled the small hallway.

All three were almost caricatures of Illyrians, built like warriors. Though, considering Nesta was only a head or so shorter - she too held to the stereotype of tall, well-built Scythians.

She seemed a little startled when she turned to find them still standing there after she finished locking the door. It showed again – that little flash of what might have been displeasure or irritation, but she just as quickly recovered.

"Hi." Rhys said, catching her off guard before she could speak.

She blinked, stared at him, "Hello...?"

"It's customary to greet, at least for us, before inviting guests into your home."

Her mouth parted, "Oh I'm so sorry, of course, it's the same for us, I just-" she caught herself and straightened. She cast her gaze past his shoulder, to Cassian and Devlon, "Hello, welcome. I’m Nesta… the eldest.”

“Rhysand. That is my Uncle Devlon and his son Cassian,” Rhys said. It was also their custom, to have the intended groom lead the proceedings – a chance to show both enthusiasm and a sense of responsibility.

“My father and brother-in-law are in the living room, it is just to the right. Please make yourselves at home, dinner will be served soon."

She seemed to wait until they had begun to move then slid that steel gaze to meet his once again. Her face and voice were a little less sweet when she said to him, "You'll forgive me? I'm sure you've heard what happened, it's been a difficult year."

It was his turn to be made uncomfortable, "Of course. My condolences."

He’d heard rumours about Tomas Mandray; his bloody fortune, his pretty little trophy wife and his violent demise. Most of them had seemed ridiculous if not down right malicious…until now.

Something in those haunted grey eyes told Rhys he had no idea what he’d just walked into.